Why We Feel So Overwhelmed & How to Get Help in a Hurry - With Dr. Caroline Leaf

25:03100 % of people experience regret. It's part of being human. It's very normal. It's okay. It's okay to not be okay. And that's a big message of what I'm trying to convey to people. And when I wrote this book, Help in a Hurry, as you know, I've written a lot of books and they deal with the healing journey and habit formation and the science, and we can talk a little bit about that, and we still need to do that. That's really important in order for us to rewire our mind-brain-body network. It takes time. It's going to take cycles of 63 days, and I know we spoke about that last time, and we can touch on that a little bit later.

25:37But in the moment when I have something that I regret, I need to know what to do right now so that I can actually direct the next 63 seconds because the 63 seconds leads to two minutes and three minutes and an hour and a day and a week. So if I can learn to self-regulate now in this moment when I'm triggered, whether it is someone making me angry, whether it is something I'm regretting, whether it is someone who I want to punch in the face, whether it is people pleasing I catch myself, all the kind of hot buttons which I've tried to touch on in this book. if I know how to catch myself and regulate myself in that moment and calm down my neurophysiology tap into my wisdom then I can identify patterns and I can then do the work which takes a little longer which goes through the healing journey of habit formation and change which takes cycles of 63 days so I say all that to say this when we talk about regret regret is something that everyone battles with, it's totally normal, it's okay.

26:36I'm stressing, it's okay to regret. Regret, if you know what to do with it in the 63 seconds, you can make it work for you and not against you. Every single one of these things, you can make people-pleasing work for you and not against you, you can make anger work for you and not against you, if you know how to manage the moment. And if you know how to manage the moment, you can recognize the pattern. If you can recognize the pattern, you can rewire the network. So it's like a starting point, and that's what these techniques so forth. So regret creates a cycle and it's a cycle of if only could have, should have, would have.

27:10And it's if I had done there and been there at that time, then there would have been this happening and there would have been that happening. So there's certain facts that we create that are partially true because they didn't happen, but they're based on sufficient evidence and data that seem kind of that they could actually be real. And that's why regret is so almost insidious because it feels so right to do that regret, if that makes sense. So something's happened, maybe it's a business decision that seems so right at the time. Maybe it's someone, a loved one that you're helping. Maybe it is, whatever it is, maybe it's something that you ate or said or did.

27:51TV you watch, something you listen to which you wish you didn't because now you can't get it out your head. and you start imagining if I didn't go down that road, if I was there at that time, if I did this, if I said that, if I could have done it this way, I could have recognized that in July last year that business decision was not the correct one and I could have gone this way and we wouldn't have wasted it. So we're very good at saying what it is and then we're very good at creating a movie of counterfactuals. And a counterfactual is taking that fact that happened and building stories around it that are counter to the facts because they didn't happen and they're not going to happen because the past is finished.

28:33And there's upward and downward counterfactuals. An upward counterfactual is actually worse than a downward one. An upward one is there's a more positive result. So in other words, it feels like it would have been better. So you say, if I had got there in time, that wouldn't have happened. And then that leads to guilt. If I had not done that, then I would have saved this amount of money. I wouldn't have gotten that, this, and this. wouldn't have and so it seemed an upward counterfactual means things would have been better if only could have should have would have had actually happened and the downward counterfactual is well if I'd done that a worse thing would have happened so an upward counterfactual is so close to the situation but it seems like a positive thing would have resulted if you'd done that so it catches you makes you feel sick to the core and can really keep you in a loop between the conscious mind, which is very powerful because it creates, but it's very limited because it's like a toddler and it's chaotic and it's all over the place and it has to be controlled by the non-conscious, which is our wisdom.

29:36But an upward counterfactual, a regret upward counterfactual, which is something that this would have been better if I did that, keeps us stuck in the conscious mind brain body loop. Now the brain and body are hosts. They don't do any thinking. They can't think they only respond and they're only designed to respond to healthy stuff like healthy regret healthy anger so when we come in with toxic regret where i now i'm in a loop where i i just i just can't get beyond this point i wish i had done that and you know depression comes in and it affects you and it's viral in the way it spreads and it carries over into your work and in your relationship and and the day and you get more and more depressed and anxious and you land up with doctor and you think you've got you get told you have a disorder meanwhile you've got stuck in that loop and it's just every moment it's just another upward counterfactual that another reason why you so and then self-doubt shame etc and it just goes and that is energy that's your mind is not some nothing it is electromagnetic energy the exact thing that makes your cell phone work is a very, very, what's the word, basic form of our mind.

30:44Our mind's electromagnetic energy. Electromagnetic energy is a spectrum. It's based on quantum physics principles. It's linked to gravitational fields. We have a field around us and through us. This is not woo-woo stuff. This is hardcore science. It's been proven over and over again. and so that's the energy that we pick up on a QEEG in your brain, on an EKG when you have your heart tested, if you have an MRI. Whatever, when we use any kind of technology to look inside the human body, what we're seeing is the energy of the mind. We're seeing the impact of our thoughts inside of our body. That's what we're literally seeing and we're seeing the result of the impact of our thoughts and what it's done physically to our body.

31:30So we pick up the damage. So we pick up the wrong energy and we pick up the result of the wrong energy. You throw the computer on the floor, we're going to have a computer that's not working. So when we mess up our mind, when we get stuck in that regret cycle, we are putting that kind of energy in the brain, creating that structural damage in the brain and the body because our memory is everywhere. It's even in your toes and your fingers. It's everywhere. So the constant pounding of that wrong energy creates a structural damage. So then we're dealing physically with some kind of damage to our genes, to our immune system, to our hormones, to whatever, heart, cardiovascular.

32:05For example, anger, if we stay in a state of anger for long, which regret can lead to levels of anger because we get angry at ourself, we get self-critical. So even though these are chapters in the book, one can lead into the other and that kind of thing. And for example, anger will release a lot of catecholamines, I can never say that word, which then affect our heart and can lead to cardiovascular disease, heart problems, problems with your heart, high blood pressure, that kind of thing. And that's a result of the mind using the brain and the body, specifically the heart in this case, where it's being damaged.

32:37Shawn Stevenson:I want to talk more about anger. Okay, we're going to jump to that. In just a moment. Let's finish the regret. So, and this is what I was going to say, actually. Did you read my mind? Yeah. Our fields are interacting. I can read your mind, totally, totally interacting. But it's the fact that, you know, again, we tend to think that our brain is our mind, but every cell in our body basically has antenna or receptors that are picking up our mind. Exactly. So our mind isn't just local, right? Just in one spot. No. Our whole body is in this field of our mind. Your toes have got memories. Yeah. I told that to Mel Robbins the other day and she could not get it.

33:14You know, there's that song, I fell it in my fingers, I can't sing. I feel it in my toes. I don't know if you know which song that I'm talking about. Anyway, there's a song. I think it's one of Elton John's songs. I don't know. I'm not sure. But literally.

33:26Shawn Stevenson:I thought it was The Weeknd. I Can't Feel My Face. No, it's I feel it in my fingers. I can't sing. So the tune's going to come out. We're putting that on wax. We're going to remix it. We're going to find it. Exactly. There we go. We have musicians in this room right now. I definitely don't want to sing it. But essentially, yes. that when you experience a regret, you are building that into this zone of your mind first. So the mind is the first, number one. If you get a sequence going and you create it, it's like if you imagine this zone around me, this energy field that's around and through me, so imagine it's sort of circling all around me, this energy pulsing electromagnetic field.

34:08The thought that you're building builds into all the details gather together like little particles and literally form a cloud. So it's literally like raindrops form a cloud. The particles of information form a thought, literally. So around me, all over me, all around you, all around whoever's listening and watching, every human, we have our field and every experience of these clouds going around us. In any one moment, we're building these clouds. There's information coming from the outside that are adding to the clouds and building their own clouds. And then there's information from us inside out building these clouds.

34:41So we have a mixture of those. And as soon as those clouds build, and this is happening at 400 billion actions and faster, we estimate as scientists, it's fast. We make a copy. Our mind copies that and puts it into the brain as a tree-like structure. That's why I've got these trees. And that's made of proteins and chemicals. And that's the networks that we all hear about. It's in the neurons and whatever. So it's basically as a cloud is copied and put into the brain, a neuron grows dendrites to hold that information. So dendrites, which are the tops of neurons, are where the copies of the clouds that the mind has made grow onto.

35:20So that's where they come from. They are stimulated. Does that make sense? They are activated. The catalyst is the copy of the cloud makes a copy. The mind makes a copy of the little cloud, puts it in the brain. There's an electrochemical, a neurochemical reaction, and proteins form. And the proteins grow into tree-like structures on the top of neurons. And that's housing the thought. And the more we think, the more drops in the cloud, the more branches. More drops in the cloud, more branches. So it looks like a tree in the brain made of proteins. And the mind also makes copies of that in a little hedge kind of shape, which then go in through the cell, inside the actual cell, into the little protein.

35:59I don't want to get too technical, but like little hedges right inside the cell. And that's also memory. So it's another version of memory. So we've got these, and it's all linked. So we have a worldwide web because we have 37 to 100 trillion cells. We have a neuron can have however many thoughts, details we put into our thought. That's how many branches we're going to grow. I mean, this thing is massive. It's a web, and that's one thought. One thought is a massive web. And we're building these all the time. We're brilliant. and we're building these networks. But if we're building networks that are regret-driven or anger-driven or whatever, so if I'm now stuck in that, if only I had done this and gone there at that time and done this, I would have just fixed this person or helped that person or saved that person or saved that portion of the business, that is creating a right down to your toes of this web.

36:48Shawn Stevenson:You feel it everywhere. You feel it everywhere. And if you don't deal with it, it's pounding and hammering. So upward and downward counterfactuals will tend to build a negative thing. So even the downward one, if I think the negative, I can get really depressed and think, well, I should have done that. And that bad thing would have happened. But we can get so stuck in the bad thing, even though it doesn't have as much impact as the positive, because the positive makes us feel worse about not doing it. You've got to have a balance of both. So what we need to do after that long explanation, and this explanation kind of works for all the different things we're going to talk about, like how it builds into the networks.

37:23What we need to do with things like regret is realize that the regret is something we can learn from. This is good basic stuff that we've heard before, but I can look my regret in the face. So the first of all, I must see my regret as something that is positive, which is interesting because if it's positive, why is it positive? Because it's giving me data. It's data. I'm data driven. So it's what data is it giving me? Well, it's giving me something that's obviously something that worries me. It's something that's either guilt-driven or it's something I can learn from. So it's data. So what can I learn from that?

37:55So the first thing you do with a regret is identify, is it an upward or a downward one? It's most likely an upward because things will feel better, make us, you know, if I did it this way, I would have had a better outcome. So it makes me feel worse. So the first thing is to face it, face on and say, hey, you know what? It's okay to feel regret. I'm feeling this regret. I'm going to honor this regret because it gives me data. I'm not going to honor the regret because of what it does to my network. I'm going to honor the regret because of its data. If I face that data, I can then take that data and I can make a decision.

38:28I'm going to stay here and get more depressed and more anxious and my life's just going to go down a rabbit hole of terrible stuff. Or I can say, what did I learn? In a good old fashion, what did I learn? Or what did I learn what not to do? Like Thomas Edison said after inventing the light bulb after a thousand plus trials and a reporter asked him, well, how do you feel about your failures? And he said, well, they're not failures. I know a thousand things that don't work. And it stuck with me so much. So you can say to yourself, okay, I honor this regret. This is the name of the regret. You spend five seconds, not more, five seconds, six seconds, 10 seconds max, honoring that regret by just looking at it as information and say, okay, now, what did I learn what not to do what can I take into my future what is something and you could you know you could journal this you can write this down you can do this quickly in your head you can do it in the moment you can do a quick one in the moment to get you to the next moment and then come back to it that evening or the next day if you see it's a pattern so in the book what I have are tables and charts and lots of like this exercise I'm talking about now I laid out so that you can actually track it if you find it's a pattern and that you're constantly go into that kind of zone of regret with only work-related stuff, then you can do a 63-day cycle to work on regret for that kind of thing.

39:50If it's a pattern maybe with a family member, then you can work. If it's a pattern in your life that it's touching all areas, then you really do need to spend the time and do the work of going through the healing journey of 63 days of rewiring and building a new habit. But at least you can in the moment catch it and still carry on for the day. So that's just, I mean, there's more things you can do with regret, but I think you've got the idea.

40:16Shawn Stevenson:What you're offering, of course, is help in a hurry. So there's quick hitters, basically. Quick hitters for now. How do I get myself under control now? I'll deal with the big stuff when I've got. And sometimes it's just a very subtle change in thinking, like a little perspective shift. Like, for example, when you talked about in the book, and this really stood out for me, the downward counterfactual and how, you know, and there's a lot of research indicating that that's more beneficial. It's not saying that it's good necessarily, but it's better than upward, which is like that regret. If I would have done this, things would have been so much better.

40:50Shawn Stevenson:But downward counterfactual and a good example would be something like this situation happened and I'm dealing with something that I regret. I feel bad about this. but because of this thing happening, I'm going to choose to look at it like this. I have regret, but this saved me from a future bad thing happening because this situation, even though I wouldn't want this to happen, it gave me something that I can work on right now that's going to help me to not deal with this in the future. That's exactly it. You want to take that data and you want to add that to your resilience and that's wisdom.

41:29That's gaining knowledge. That's what have you learned. We're here to love. we're here to learn. We're here to grow as humans. So any regret when you make it work for you, you are taking that fork in the road of not going down the wrong way, but actually taking that information as the data and saying, I've now learned something that I can use in the future, something that I don't want to do. I've grown as a person. I've learned a lesson. I'm better for it, even though you may not feel it. Look for the silver lining. There's always a silver lining.

41:55Shawn Stevenson:I've got a couple of great examples. All right. So recently, I know someone who lost a loved one they lost a family member and they were feeling a sense of regret which was I should have picked up the phone more often right which many people experience that yeah very common and just being really hard on themselves for a time being and over time you know number one you share this it's okay to not be okay and to feel that feeling because that regret can offer you an opportunity. To grow. And what I was able to do, fortunately, was to help to reframe a little bit. Of course, so this happened. We can't change it.

42:35Shawn Stevenson:That's the thing. It's like you stay in the regret so long and play that movie as if it's going to change. Exactly. Change the past. But, okay, so this happened. You wish you would have picked up the phone more often. Who can you pick up the phone for now? There we go. That's exactly, that's a brilliant example. Who can you spend more time with right now so that you don't have this feeling again. And for many of us, again, we usually have many other people in our lives who love us. And to be more proactive and to really invest in those relationships and do those small things that maybe you feel like you have regret that you didn't do previously.

43:11That's beautiful. And I love that. And I would add to that, I love the fact that you brought in, you know, reach out to someone else. You can also take that information and you can apply that in so many different ways. You can pick up the phone and you can help someone else. You can also tell you the big thing that happens with regret is guilt and shame and self-blame. And that in itself can become a whole terrible cycle. And so it's really important in dealing with help and hurry in a moment is to start by, and I'm going to emphasize what I've said already and what you've already emphasized me saying, it's okay to be okay.

43:47It's okay to honor that regret. It's okay to feel that. And even if you do feel a bit of guilt, honor that too, because that little bit of guilt was what you maybe needed in that moment just to deal with that particular situation. But you're not going to stay there. The big key thing with all of this Help in the Hurry stuff, all of the work that I'm trying to help people with in their mind, is don't push away what you're going through. Face it full on. Like our body sweats, like we vomit when we're sick, like we have high fevers, you're getting it out. When we're in a society where it's kind of, people do talk about things.

44:22There's a big emphasis on awareness compared to previous years where things were suppressed, but they're getting it out and then they don't do anything else with it. So what I'm saying is get it out, honor it, but now do something with it. You've got to have the learning. You've got to take the data and you have to use it, as you said, with a family member. Pick up a phone and phone another family member or look at how you have grown as a person. Look at what does that guilt mean? Why do you feel the guilt? What do you need? What's missing in your life that you feel that you... So, you know, be curious.

44:51Grow. Don't get stuck there. Don't get stuck in that loop. Go deep. Develop insight. Tap into your... As soon as you go deep, as soon as you get curious and ask those questions about the why, how can I use this data? What is the silver lining? And at first, you may not see the silver lining, but there is always a silver lining because you learn something in that moment that someone else will benefit from. And it's all about connection and helping other people. You know, that really is we are wired for love. That's what we are as humans. So we can take those experiences and turn them around. And that's why what I meant by saying we can make regret work for us if we catch it, analyze it, and move forward.

45:27Shawn Stevenson:I love this. Got a quick break coming up. We'll be right back. As you know, mental health challenges have skyrocketed in recent decades without addressing the root causes shown in mountains of studies, including social isolation, sleep abnormalities, nutrient deficiencies, sedentary behavior, and many other factors, we'll continue to see rates rise and our communities struggling for solutions. It's so important for people to understand that no two cases of depression are alike. There are unique lifestyle and mental health work that each of us need in different situations. And right now in the United States, depression is the leading cause of disability.

46:09Shawn Stevenson:is the number one reason for people missing work and school. And so we've got to do something about this. Of course, medications can be helpful in some contexts, but most people are not educated about the science-backed natural supplement that's shown to be just as effective as many medications. An analysis published in the Journal of Effective Disorders found that the renowned spice saffron was just as effective as conventional antidepressant drugs like Prozac, Tofrenil, and Celexa. Additionally, the researchers noted that fewer people experienced side effects from saffron than from those other treatments.

46:56Shawn Stevenson:This should go without saying. People should know about this. something that's been utilized for centuries far safer and just as effective as conventional antidepressant drugs now are we talking about curing this condition absolutely not we're talking about having another option to turn to something that can be supportive in an overall plan to support our mental health there is no supplement there is no drug that's going to fix everything but again people need to know about this and there are great companies that are providing easy-to-use saffron supplements like the Happy Drops from Organifi.

47:33Shawn Stevenson:This includes a therapeutic amount of saffron, gachucola, passionflower, and ginger. They are amazing. You really do notice a difference. And I highly encourage you to look at the reviews for this product. I'm just going to share a couple with you because they really do stand out. Nicholas said, happily surprised. He said, I was extremely skeptical of this product despite all the good reviews. However, after using it daily for the past two weeks, I can definitely say they work. I definitely have an easier time staying positive and rolling with the punches of daily life with the help of happy drops.

48:08Shawn Stevenson:Hillary said, happy drops will make you happy you ordered. I found out about these little drops of bliss on Instagram. I was skeptical as every product makes claims that aren't always backed. Upon trying these happy drops, I've noticed a mood improvement, energy that lasts throughout the day, and improved sleep at night. I'm thrilled. Definitely check out Organifi's science-backed gummies. Again, they're called Happy Drops. Head over to Organifi.com forward slash model, and you're going to get hooked up with 20 % off. Go to Organifi.com forward slash model. Again, you're going to get 20 % off store wide.

48:51Shawn Stevenson:Pop over there and check them out. And now, back to the show. Another downward counterfactual that I just thought about, like a specific example, is if somebody, which, you know, we've got people who are tuning in and, you know, just living a fitness and active lifestyle, some stuff's going to happen. You might experience an injury, whatever the case might be. And when an individual is injured or even when we're sick, we tend to have some depression come on. Right? And this is just the chemistry. It's a chemistry thing that's associated with both of it. It's also a normal response, yeah. But getting stuck in it is the issue.

49:25Shawn Stevenson:And so maybe somebody has a flare-up of a back issue, for example, and a downward counterfactual would be, I regret this. I regret that the situation happened. But this is giving me an opportunity. It's telling me I'm grateful because it's preventing me from something potentially worse that could have happened if I wasn't taking care of myself like I know I need to be taking care of myself. So good. You see, you learned something. You took the data and you turned it around instead of regretting, why did I do that? Why did I do that? You actually took that around, turned that around, reframed that, reconceptualized that, and maybe you find another form of exercise that actually is what you needed because you weren't working a certain other group of muscles or whatever.

50:06Shawn Stevenson:Yeah, yeah. So these tools are always available. They're built in. We have them. We have them. We've got to be careful of just staying stuck in the conscious loop. So we've got three levels of mind. We've got the conscious mind, the subconscious, and the non-conscious. not unconscious. Unconscious is when you're asleep or knocked out or anesthesia. We've got to remember conscious, subconscious, non-conscious. The non-conscious is the biggest part. It's huge. It's infinite beyond present, past and future. Absorbs everything around us. It can have multiple thoughts being managed at the same time.

50:39It's huge, massive. It's on our side. It's our best friend. It is our wisdom. It's phenomenal. And all of us, that's who we are. That's at the core. It's our true self. And that's what we need to tap into. We've got to work to find the wisdom because everything we need is inside of us. The conscious mind is brilliant. It's fantastic, but it's limited. It's a chaotic, messy toddler learning, decision-making choice. And it's very – obviously there's choice in all levels of mind, but it's a choice that's very based on how my brain and body feel. It's very physically driven in its choices. So therefore it's not reliable.

51:18It can never work alone. Like you cannot let a toddler just run all over the place and they'll get hurt. So like a parent guides a toddler and a teenager and, you know, you're always helping your children or you're helping people, whatever. But especially a toddler is a good example. Our conscious mind needs the wisdom of the non-conscious. So it has another level, the subconscious. And the subconscious is like a waiting room. It's in between the two. To give people a feeling for the size of these and the ability. The conscious mind is awake when you're awake. It operates at about 2 ,000 actions per second, which is about the amount of one conversation, about 100 bits of information in any one moment.

51:59The non-conscious can handle an infinite number of conversations. A conversation, yes, we're having a conversation, but you can also see a conversation as an experience, a thought. So conscious mind can handle one, an unconscious infinite. it. So in this moment, you and I are having one conversation based on one general thought that we bring in a lot of detail and it's stimulating other thoughts, but it's around a cluster of it's around a concept. The non-conscious is not limited to this one conversation. It's drawing on a million different things and it's putting ideas into the subconscious. And the subconscious can have around about four to seven conversations.

52:37So it can hold about four to seven thoughts at once. So as you and I are talking, we're stimulating each other's non-conscious The non-conscious is then putting into the subconscious what we are going to say next. And that pops up. Now, that's in this conversation. In life, that happens all the time too. The non-conscious is searching around for that regret cycle, that toxic-looking tree.

52:59Shawn Stevenson:Because we're having conversations with ourselves. We're having conversations with ourselves. And those conversations are based on our experiences. And our experiences become thoughts made of memories. and so the non-conscious mind scans and it looks for these, the toxic ones and it puts those, the ones that are the most disruptive to Caroline in this moment to Sean in this moment, to every listener and viewer in this moment puts those in order of priority into the subconscious, into the waiting room triages them literally from the most important, most disruptive to the least disruptive that you need to deal with in this moment it also puts the good stuff in so it puts stuff like a great conversation, a great memory, a great whatever because we need to also focus on those to build our resilience.

53:41So a lot of the techniques in Help in a Hurry, this book, are ones that I recommend people get familiar with and practice when things are going well. So the network is already built in. So when you're in that emergency situation, when someone angers you, when you find yourself people-pleasing, when the regret jumps up, you don't have to get sucked in and fall down that whole pathway. It's going to happen. The regret's going to happen. But instead of it wiring in in a toxic way, you immediately catch it and direct how it's going to wire in that moment. And so it's good to be proactive and practice and understand and know about these in advance.

54:17So the subconscious mind then holds these four to seven in any one moment and it sends it up as signals. And when we self-regulate, when we live a mind-managed life, we are self-regulating. And that means I'm listening to the signals. And those signals, there's four categories. It's my emotions, which really hit us in the face. It's where am I feeling that emotion in my body. So it's our bodily sensation. It's our behaviors, what we're doing and saying in the moment and how we're doing and saying it and our perspectives, how we're looking at life, our attitude. And that's the four categories of signals.

54:49They're not diseases because emotions would include things like depression and anxiety. We're told depression and anxiety are diseases. They're not diseases, as they're signals. ADHD is attention deficit hyperactivity. It's basically, it's a behavior. You're back in to pay attention, you're kind of hyperactive. It's not a disorder, it's a set of behaviors that maybe have become extreme. So any of these can become extreme, but they work together as a team. And what we need to do is always look at the grouping and the category and pay attention to those signals. So basically, we have these four signals that come up, and those signals are coming from what the non-conscious is placed into the conscious mind.

55:29So, for example, as we're talking now, we're going to both have non-conscious putting things in our subconscious to guide our interaction. And we're listening, both of us, you're listening and I'm listening as we listen to each other. And as I'm talking, I'm being guided by that information. And it's coming up as signals. So the emotion is I'm excited, I'm positive, I can feel my body's like, you know, hyper, it's tense in a good sense. the way I'm speaking, it's passionate and my attitude, my perception is this is, I love the stuff. So that's the signal that's then bringing up the data and then I'm paying attention to the data, which is the content.

56:08So that's just to give you kind of an example and I translate that into regret, for example, that we were speaking about. Those signals could be coming up as anxiety, could be the emotion, gut ache for the bodily sensation. I'm feeling like my gut sore or or maybe one starts sweating or whatever. The behaviors are withdrawing maybe or irritability. The perception is, you know, I'm just such a mess. I can't do this. I've messed up so badly. I'm useless. That's the perception. Now, those are just signals. They don't give you enough information. You need to find the data that they're attached to.

56:45So my signals I described just now, if I just said those signals, I wouldn't give any information. I'm giving words. I'm explaining things. So in other words, what I'm trying to say is signals are attached to data. And that data, those are thoughts with memories. And when we learn to self-regulate in the 63 seconds, when we face that regret, honor me. It's an upward kind of factual. You don't even have to label it, but honor it by saying it. I am regretting this. Specify it. Lay it out. You're actually allowing it to come into your conscious mind. And as soon as you are conscious of it, the most amazing neurophysiology happens.

57:19you weaken that thought. So thoughts have power, but they don't have to control us. If it's a good thought, control away with full permission to control away when it's a healthy thought. But a negative thought, we do not want that to control us. And that's why we have signals. So when a signal comes up and tells us this is something I'm feeling all these things that are not great, it's disruptive. I must pay attention. Now, in the moment, those four signals, especially when it's negative stuff like regret it's very overwhelming and that's how we need it we need to go to to disrupt the potential toxic cycle in that moment in that 63 seconds so when you get that call when you get that text when you whatever you want to be able to catch it in that moment and that's why i say for example like the you know the regret thing you can just face it straight on say it name it um and say i'm going to this is it's okay to it's okay to not feel it's okay to feel this way i'm going to but then there's there's another way of doing i can look at something i can look at this differently?

58:18What have I learned from it? You can train yourself in advance to ask yourself those four questions and say, I'll deal with this later. It's okay. So you're telling yourself, your mind, your wise mind is telling that toddler mind, it's okay. I know you feel like this. I'm honoring that, but it's not going to help you. Let's move forward. See what I'm saying? So we can give some other examples when you touch on the other topics I know you wanted to touch on.

58:41Shawn Stevenson:Of course. As you just mentioned, a well-managed mind, training yourself in advance. I love that quote that you don't rise to the level of the situation or you don't rise to the level of your expectations. You fall to the level of your training. It's very good. And so when things are going to happen and how quickly can you be able to lean in and access that mind management, have that habitually kind of built in. Exactly. Because, you know, stuff is going to happen. And actually, there was something specifically in this chapter, and it was a great summation of how to approach this with regret. Don't worry about making the right decision.

59:20Shawn Stevenson:Make the decision right. Right? So whatever decision that you made. Good job. You remembered that perfectly. Yeah. Wow. Impressive. We have that power. It's just how, again, how quickly, and can you train yourself to get to that place of power to whatever the decision that you made, how can you make this decision the right decision? Exactly. So that statement is something that you're going to train yourself to do. So the first time you apply some of these techniques, you're going to forget what to do and you're going to find yourself, you know, whatever, fumbling around. But everyone will remember something.

59:54They'll remember it's okay to honor that regret because that's not something that you would normally do. You know, so it's to get to make the decision to do something in that moment instead of just rolling with it. we've made people aware now that you don't have to live in that regret cycle you can do something about it and that's yeah yeah

1:00:14Shawn Stevenson:And with you, we talked a little bit about this. We opened the door to it earlier. It's an A word. Anger. Anger. It was anger. So this is something that, and somebody just said this yesterday. I was just in a conversation with a very smart, successful, very experienced physician. And she was just like, I feel like people are just angrier now. Right. And I was like, I see that. I see that. Yeah. And so what do we do? How do we get some help in a hurry when we feel like I'm just so angry? I'm angry all the time and just so angry. What can we do? Anger is an emotion. It's one of the four signals.

1:00:56And when it comes out in the way that we sing so much of it, I mean, we were just in Paris recently. And there were a couple of people on the street and they're just yelling and getting it out. And now on the one hand, they get it out and then it's over. But it leaves an impact.

1:01:11Shawn Stevenson:Are they getting it out in French? Yeah, they're just yelling and they have these little words and whatever. They're just in the middle of the street. If someone irritates them, they'll just shout at you. And it's just, you know, that's kind of what they do. It's in their culture. But then it's over. So they get it out and they move on. So I'm not saying go and yell at someone in the middle of the street. But essentially anger isn't a negative emotion unless you make it a negative emotion. The big thing is that every signal is positive because every signal carries data. And emotions are a signal and anger is one of those emotions.

1:01:41The problem with anger is, that doctor is quite right, there is definitely an increase of anger, which is not surprising considering how we are not allowed to really deal with our stuff. So we've moved from suppressing the sort of boomer generation and the Gen X to a certain extent. We've moved from that to the other side of the ditch where it's pour it all out and label it and then what? So it's kind of you've crashed the plane. So you've done your meditation. You've done your I feel this, this, this. Now what? And that is creating a, it's this release and then you're shoving back down. So what you're doing is you're putting that, you're bringing that thought up.

1:02:23You're opening it up and you're talking about it, but you're not actually moving forward. So it closes up, moves back into your non-conscious, more disruptive than it was before. Now, if you keep doing that or you suppress, you maybe don't do the meditation or the neurophysiology or the breathing or the exercise or something to prepare to control the neurophysiology. You may not be doing that. Or you may be doing that without talking about how I feel, et cetera, et cetera. You may be doing one or two or none. So you're suppressing. But if you do one, if you just meditate, if you meditate plus talk about your feelings, if you do neither, if you suppress.

1:03:01all of those are not healthy on their own they're incomplete and any in anything incomplete becomes a living force that is generating the wrong kind of energy and it's swirling and eventually it's like a whole closet that you constantly shove stuff in and you know when guests come and you just quickly shove it all in there and one day it's so full just everything falls out and it crashes or the volcano eventually explodes and that's what this anger that we've seeing this sort of anger that's now become distorted and disruptive because generally anger is an emotion that makes you act. It makes you take action.

1:03:37It makes you move forward. Something is not right. I'm going to fix this. This is that abuse or that thing that that person said. These are not good things. But it's when it becomes where it turns and it becomes that someone else is hurt. When another person is hurt, when you're hurting another person and you're hurting yourself and it's chaotic, that's when it's slipped off to the other side. and that creates, that I mentioned earlier on in terms of blood pressure and heart, distorted anger is one of the quickest ways of creating cardiovascular disease, even quicker than eating the wrong kinds of food because of the fact that it has such a chemical reaction with the kinds of, it throws, all chemicals are good in our body, but when they're in the wrong quantities, which incorrect anger or distorted anger will do, it then puts our heart at risk because now we've got this massive of chemicals flowing around we've got this very disruptive energy pattern coming from our mind into our brain making copies and adding to it so it's just there's a lot of stuff coming in and then it explodes so it's the understanding the way people move forward is hearing what we're saying and understanding that a lot of our current days way of dealing with stuff is creating this boiling anger in people where we partially deal with stuff and then we shove it down and it's worse than before so we're seeing pure meditation alone for example backfiring we're seeing just talking about our feelings backfiring and leading to lots of angry outbursts we're seeing the overwhelm from social media constant stimulation not which doesn't allow enough deep thinking we are designed for deep thinking and deep thinking means i tap into my unconscious multiple times a day and we're on our cell phones every four to six seconds, which doesn't allow us to deep think.

1:05:24That will create this chemical chaos that will lead to anger. So it's kind of a combination of those three things that lead to distorted anger. Good anger is always controlled. It always has an ending and it always generates something positive. So if your anger isn't controlled and it's not progressive and it's not creating something positive, it's distorted anger. And so if you find that that's a pattern in your life or you find that maybe, yeah, I am talking about my feelings but not doing anything about them, or I am just meditating, and I'm not telling you to stop. I'm just saying complete the cycle.

1:05:56You can't just meditate. You can't just talk about your feelings. You also have to reconceptualize them. You have to embrace and reconceptualize, which is the whole neurocycle system I've developed, which is basically mind management. You can't suppress either. You can't just keep on social media and expect not to get angry. You can't suppress your grief. If you're crying, for example, in grief and you cry, hormones come out in those tears. And those hormones have built up in your body because of the grief, which is overwhelming. So your body generates more chemicals for your body and those chemicals have to get out.

1:06:33If they stay in, they actually can make you feel sick and can make your grief worse. So when we cry, we release those chemicals and then you raise things like endorphins, as you know a lot about, in order to help create an anandamide. And you get a burst of chemicals and oxytocin that kind of rebalance.

1:06:51Shawn Stevenson:I know many people have experienced that. Like they cry and they feel better. They feel better. Yeah, we need to be free to cry. You don't mean, we all cry different ways and whatever. But it's those kinds of... And the chemistry changes in those tears based on why we're crying. Exactly. It's different chemistry each time. So powerful. And we're supposed to get that out. It doesn't mean you have to walk around crying all the time, but a couple of tears, as I said, It's different. We all have our own way of crying in different patterns and different situations. But essentially that the anger is when it's distorted, we've got to get it out and it's got to be progressive in a way.

1:07:24So a way of dealing with anger in the moment is, once again, I'm giving knowledge, we're giving knowledge. That's why in every chapter of the book, there's a little bit of this explanation that we're doing and then a technique with charts and whatever to help people to practice dealing with it. So if that is an issue, if you have an anger that's progressive and it doesn't lead to, I mean, it's just disruptive, it's chaotic, then one of the things that works really well is to create a gap. And a little gap is the neurophysiology of that emotion of anger is very strong. In your body, it's going to have a very, when it's disruptive, as I mentioned, the catecholamines and the different hormones, it disrupts a lot of hormones, not just one.

1:08:02But I specifically said, I cannot say that word, catecholamines, because those go straight to the heart. And that's why we see people dropping down dead. People that are constantly angry seem at the prime of their life, but they're always reacting in anger in the office or something, just drop down dead from a heart attack. Angry people drop down dead from a heart attack. So this is very real. Also, a lot of GI problems, people that have a lot of anger that they don't release, it accumulates a tremendous GI problem. So those are two, a lot of other areas, but those are two major areas that get affected.

1:08:32Shawn Stevenson:So let's say that I'm I'm f***ing angry I'm angry And I just can't let it go I can't get out of this anger What would you tell me to do? What I tell you to do is to create a gap I tell you to count 2 to 6 Which is 10 seconds So you're going to breathe in for 2 You're going to hold for 2 And you're going to breathe out for 6 counts And you're going to do that 6 times So it's in for 2 Hold for 2 Out for 2 and I'll explain the science behind it in a moment and you're going to do it six times. So you've done two, so let's do another four. In for two, hold for two, out for six. For the balance of three, I want you to actually, when you breathe in, I want you to say let in your mind and then when you breathe out, go in your mind.

1:09:21So in one, two, hold one, two and you're saying let and now with the six counts, go. Now the last two, in two, hold two, saying let, out six, saying go. Last one, in one two, hold one two, saying let, and then go. Six counts, saying go. That is 60 seconds and it's completely changed your neurophysiology. Can I see this?

1:09:58Shawn Stevenson:Yes, go for it. I feel better after the first one. And sometimes you can just do one and it's enough. But so that 60 seconds, that 63 seconds is key in rewiring. But if you get it right in 10 seconds, fantastic. I had to try to drum up something to be angry about. I'm sure we can all think of something. There you go. You're not an angry, you control your anger. Then the other thing you can do is use I statements. Because our natural reaction when we're angry is to say, you have done that again you didn't listen you did this you they that so we immediately and you can look at my body movements the minute I take that anger and I do that it comes out in this very vigorous heart and that's really bad for your heart I mean just doing that in demonstration I don't feel I didn't feel very good and if you look at someone who's in that state of anger they're doing that you know all the blood vessels everything I mean everything is just not good so using a you statement in a state of anger is bad use an I statement so breathe and then say okay, I am feeling angry because that person did this or they did that.

1:11:02And you say it out loud or write it down or say it in your head, it's phenomenal how it will calm you down. And even if you have to say it over a couple of times, even if you do that for a full 60 seconds and just add detail on, so you create that space for yourself. So you could do three little of the breath things and the other 30 seconds you could say a statement. There's a lot you can do in 60 seconds. That's why I say practice. Work out a little formula with that combination. It completely breaks down and gets you into that space where you can tap into your wisdom. Every time we get stuck in regret or anger or any of these top 18 things that I've identified from surveys and research and clinical practice that are kind of the things that really, there's a lot more, but these are the top ones that catch people.

1:11:48Any time that you're in any of one of those, we can learn to catch those in that 63 seconds and redirect what's going to happen in the next hour and then you start training yourself and you start retraining those circuits and that kind of thing. You can catch it in 63 seconds.

1:12:04Shawn Stevenson:This is, again, it's mind management. We've got the instant help with the breathing, but we've got to do the work. We've got to do the work. Because we're going to have an emotional place that we kind of live and hang out because of the branches, because of what we've grown accustomed to. Exactly, exactly. Right? And so it's being able to fortify, support the trees that we want to grow and to allow the other trees to kind of be pruned away and to dissolve. Exactly. They deconstruct and reconstruct. So they never completely go away because our stories never change. But we can change what they look like inside of us.

1:12:41So quite rightly what you say, they deconstruct, they get small, and then we rebuild. We can't just pull one out. We can't just replace a negative thought with a positive thought. We can't just take an angry thought out and pop in a positive, which is very much sort of the CBT affirmation. You've got to do the work first, and then you can do that. You've got to first work through the process, and then you can use that as a practice tool, as a technique. Very quickly, also, what happens if we try and get, if we don't manage it, any of these things. We get stuck in the conscious mind, toddler mind, without the parent, and the brain, mind, body.

1:13:15So we get stuck in the conscious mind, brain, body loop, but we don't tap into the non-conscious. And the non-conscious is where wisdom is, and that's not good. That means you've let your toddler run out in the road. That's literally what's happening. And we know what will happen if that happens. Or you've let your toddler go turn on the stove. Or you've let your toddler throw their toys all over the place or something like that. That's what we do. So that's why it's so vital that we learn to recognize, I'm in regret, let me catch. And as soon as I catch, I get insight because we lose tremendous insight when we're in anger or regret or any of these situations, people pleasing.

1:13:48We don't have insight. We don't think deeply. We don't have good cognitive fluency. So these little techniques that you can do in 63 seconds take you into the depths. And it may be very deep the first moment, but as you practice, you learn to get very deep very quickly. So that's what's happening.

1:14:07Shawn Stevenson:I want to ask you about this because, again, you address pretty much all the common feelings, problems, what people are immersed in today, whether it's anger or regret or, you know, not feeling like I'm not happy enough. Right. You know, we have a culture that's always promoting, you know, you should be happy. Right. And so you talk about this as well. And one of them is my inner critic won't let up. Right. Just constantly criticizing themselves. and got this inner critic, this voice in our heads. What is that voice, Dr. Ray? That is us being so harsh on ourselves, and it's coming from exactly what you just said, our productivity culture, where we have such a, you've got to be happy, you've got to be productive, you've got to have your goals, you've got to have your vision board.

1:14:52If you're sad, there's something wrong with you, why aren't you happy all the time? Seek after that goal of happiness, positive psychology, toxic positivity, all these things you've had. What are you doing? Is every moment filled? it's like I'm doing guilt when you're not working the French, excuse the example but they got it right, they take two hours lunch break every day and you'll see them between 12 and 2, they're in the park they're drinking their wine, they're having their lunch and then they go back to work and after work they connect and they talk, I think honestly Paris has got the culture they've got this thing really down in terms of that sort of thing we are so when it comes to the inner critic once again a bit like the regret and the anger all these things when when i don't manage it it gets out of hand so when i look when i when when we live in a zeitgeist that is so externally focused which you also spoke about in the beginning that has an external locus of of goal control where that's what we've got to be like that productive that happy that that it's so unrealistic that's why goal setting is also a bit dangerous because we set one goal and that kind of thing.

1:16:01When we live in that kind of society, we're constantly comparing. Social media, FOMO, you mentioned it earlier on, you know, we scroll through and even though we know it's curated, why don't I look like that? Why aren't I getting, why don't I have as many followers? You know, we've all fallen into that trap. So we've got so much data coming at us that at such a fast speed and we're not taking time to actually stand back and say, hey, look how well Sean's doing. That's amazing. I'm so excited for him. I can't do what Sean's doing, but I can do what I'm doing. So what can I learn? Enhancement. We don't do that.

1:16:32We're so caught up in this. Oh, wow. Look what Sean's doing. Oh, wow. I'm so stupid. Why can't I do that? And you be hostile with ourselves and we start criticizing and it's coming from a lot of letting the outside control us instead of getting to know who we truly are. When we spend time in mind management, when we spend time stopping that flow in the 63 seconds and learning how to dive deep over the 63 days, we start realizing I can celebrate Sean, not be jealous of Sean. And if I am a little jealous of Sean, I'm not going to hit myself over the head and be hostile and self-critical. I'm going to say, yes, I am jealous of Sean or whatever.

1:17:11I'm just giving you some dumb example. But why? There's a reason. So what data can I get from there? That's okay to be. It's okay, Caroline. It's okay, Sean, to be jealous, whatever. It's okay to not be okay. It's okay, but what can I learn from it? What is it telling me? And that then shifts the self-criticism. Oh, I'm jealous again. I feel so guilty. I'm so bad. I'm useless. I can't do what they're doing. And now I'm jealous on top of it. And that leaves me busy. And then self-social media. And then we run. And then I've got to be happy and I'm not happy. It's hitting us in every direction. We've got to stop the flow.

1:17:44We've got to stop that flow. And we've got to stop ourselves. So how do we stop ourselves in the moment? A couple of simple things that you can do, and the one is kind of silly, but imagine an ant, a tiny little ant. But first of all, imagine a big red ant next to it. So you know those red ants that hurt. And imagine they're on a stage, and the curtain opens, and there's this red ant. And there's not one, there's a lot. And you're standing in the stage, and there's a lot of red ants, and they're biting you. And this is you attacking yourself, attacking yourself. Now move off the stage. you've got the power to get rid of those red ants but you've got to get off the stage so you get off the stage you sit in the audience and you watch and you sit back and you say okay so you bit me and then that's what is that self what was that self-criticism i'm not as good as sean what's that one saying you bit me i bit you because you're saying and whatever whatever the cell and as you say them they turn from a red ant into a little black and eventually there's just one little black ant there and eventually there's no ants and you so you're watching i mean It's such a simple exercise.

1:18:45You can do it really fast, but it takes that power out of that self-criticism, and it makes you stop for a moment and think, okay, let me be curious. What's the data? Always. What's the data? What's the silver lining? What is this telling me? How can I grow? My whole purpose as a human is to grow and to learn and to operate in love. So it's okay to not be okay because most of us are not okay anyway, and that's normal. That's part of being human. so I can now learn from that to grow and to be more at peace. What we should be seeking is peace, not happiness. But that's a great exercise for self-criticism.

1:19:20There's others. I've got lots of little fun things like that to do, but they work.

1:19:24Shawn Stevenson:That's so powerful because you're taking something that is just floating around, these feelings that we have, and you're concentrating it into kind of personifying it as an ant. Yeah. Like you're giving it some substance. I can stamp on it. Right? and you know again so many of these thoughts are just overwhelming or in but they're fleeting they're floating around and we don't really let them create chaos identify them exactly we don't identify them we just leave them the swirling chaotic mass and we don't have to we can order them we can put them on the stage we can put them in that box we can order our mind brain body connection is very ordered you know as it as a understanding about food and exercise we've got to have order.

1:20:06We've got to have routine. That is our mind-brain-body connection. It's what we, everything's organized and clustered. What we do with our toddler mind, our conscious mind, which is so powerful, but we don't use it properly. It works well when it connects with an unconscious, when it listens to the signal from the subconscious, but we let it get chaotic. You know, another thing you can do with the ant and the self-criticism is you can say, okay, you know what? Thanks for sharing that with me. I appreciate it, but you know what? And I'm curious about why, and I'm going to find the why, and I recognize I'm not going to find the why now.

1:20:34It's probably going to take me 63 days but thanks I don't want that now and close the curtain end of the show leave the theater and move on with your day I mean it's those things that you visualize it's very very powerful little exercises that that you can just get you through into the next moment and you can do all of that in 63 seconds we started this off with me saying that

1:20:54Shawn Stevenson:we need some help and we do and this isn't something that is just going to be you know snap your fingers and everything is fixed. It's about doing the work. But also, it is so comforting to know that we have solutions in the moment, we can feel better now, we can rise to the occasion now we can get through the day. And that was really the premise of this book from what I took from it. Yeah, exactly. Because so many of us just feel like I can't even make it through the day, I'm struggling. And so giving us these mental prescriptions for us to use is so valuable. and if you could, can you share what people can expect when they pick up a copy of Help in a Hurry?

1:21:35I love how you said that. You literally quoted my chapter 18 at the beginning there. Thank you for reading the book so intensely. Beautifully said. So, yeah, basically it's short chapters covering those main areas like the jealousy and the anger and the self-criticism and the intrusive thoughts, all the sort of top 18 that has come from surveys and clinical research and application and so on. And it's a short explanation of what it is, a little bit of the science, very simple. And then there's techniques. There's five or six techniques for each one. On pressure, there's seven different types of pressure cooker points.

1:22:10Like, for example, I didn't get X done. And can I quickly explain this? Absolutely, please. I didn't get X done.

1:22:17Shawn Stevenson:So this feeling, so help, I'm under pressure. I'm under pressure. Yeah, help, I'm under pressure. Each chapter starts, it's help, I'm under pressure, or help, I'm angry, or help, I'm tired all the time, or help, I'm people-pleasing. And then it explains what it is with a bit of science. And then there's techniques. There's charts. You can download them. There's a QR code. They can download the charts and they can fill those charts in. The idea of the charts is to take the techniques you are charted, is for you to then apply that and proactively learn those techniques and also to track patterns to see if you've got patterns.

1:22:47And then if you've got patterns, then I recommend they do the neurocycle, which is we've got it in an app. I've got it in the book and the QR codes are in there and there's discounts and whatever. There's a whole lot of pre-order bonuses to help people to understand this as well. So basically, like one of the most common pressure cooker points, and think of a pressure cooker. It's a great way of cooking because the steam makes things cook quicker, but it's got to be set in a certain way. And if there's too much steam, it explodes and makes songs and the thing pops. That's what pressure does to us.

1:23:14Pressure is good for us. Pressure makes us move forward. Pressure creates positive stress in us, like anger creates positive. All these things, they're actually all positive if we know how to use them. when a pressure is when as we know a pressure is a lot of things coming at us which is that's why sort of that the first chapter was pressure because all of these things create a sense of pressure if i understand that how to use that pressure i can keep the pressure cooker from exploding and so one of the it's directly seven main ones there's there's about 13 but i found that there were seven top ones that came out and one of the top ones of those seven is i didn't get X done.

1:23:50So this is in our productive, highly productive, sort of pressurized society is very often, and I know I fell prey to this. That's what really was something, and I still have to catch myself, but I would get into bed. I'd be married to Mac for 37 years. We just celebrated our 37th wedding anniversary, and I think for the first 10 years of our life, I would get into bed, and even now, I don't do it often anymore, and I'd get into bed at night and I'd say, oh, I didn't get this done. And I'd get so, I couldn't sleep. I became so toxic then regret followed and then I felt this my chest felt like it was going to burst I got angry and frustrated so you know it kind of and I just couldn't sleep and eventually Mac turned around he's so good at reconceptualizing and like sometimes I think most of the words a lot of the wisdom is coming from his brilliance but he turned around he said to me instead of saying what I didn't get done why didn't you say what you did get done I think he was just so tired of me keeping him awake and he said like Like, you know, why didn't you say what you did do?

1:24:51And I said, I didn't do anything. He said, oh, come on. And he started listening. Let's look at what you've done. So that's the idea there is, you know, that I didn't get X done. Sure, that's okay. But there's a chart. You can fill in a chart and you can actually go through. So the first thing, there's like a chart with four little steps that you go through. The first thing is to acknowledge what you didn't get done. Always honor that. You've heard me say it throughout this interview. Honor whatever it is that you're going through. And the honor is not for the thing. It's for the data that it provides.

1:25:18So write it down. Then look at, okay, how is that making you feel in this moment? Remember, this is quick. We're not doing it. So how do you feel in this moment? How is this making you feel? So it's making me feel, as I described, awful, frustrated, whatever. And then you're going to say, okay, well, how am I going to do a mind shift? The concept of a mind shift. How can I shift my mind around this? So the mind shift there was, well, what have I done? And as soon as you start looking at what you have done and you list that down, oh, I actually did all of those things. okay so what you didn't get done can you make a plan so it's it's to get it out acknowledge how you feel and then do the mind shift which is look at it from a different angle and then come up with some sort of little exercise or technique okay well i can do that tomorrow that i didn't do today and that was really cool what i did today and immediately it will calm you down so that's an

1:26:05Shawn Stevenson:example shout out to mac who's here in the studio by the way um being able to handle that situation because as soon as you said what you said, which I'm going to repeat it here, I thought about my wife, all right? So when you're saying, of course, and acknowledging and honoring that, like, I didn't get such and such done. Well, what did you get done? And you saying, I didn't get anything done, right? And just going to the extreme. And that's one of the things I would talk about. Let's talk about how it is, but don't make it worse than it is. Exactly. And a lot of times when you're in that space, you don't want to hear it, right?

1:26:39Shawn Stevenson:And so sometimes it might have to come from a patient voice or something even, you know, outside of that. Exactly. What I've learned is really helpful for my wife is listening to you or listening to somebody who's a guest or a friend or something like that. Who's usually telling them something, telling her something, of course, that, you know, and I just sit there. And over time, of course, I've just been more like, yeah, you know, like instead of me being like, you know, I told you that. But just allowing her to have those revelations. And again, just to be clear, my wife is perfect. Exactly.

1:27:17Shawn Stevenson:Capital P. Exactly. Exactly. And the same thing, but it's so funny because I tend to, of course, I do have a positive disposition. But that like 1 % of the time or maybe 2 % of the time I'm not, she is right there on me and being that person for me. You see, that's the thing, Sean. That's one of the other things is we can get into those places of regret as well and all these things. and it's like a tunnel and a tunnel filled with sinking sand that I talk about in the book as well as an analogy and so that pressure cooker you can all of these things can so the tunnel thing is a good example so whatever it is whether it's the regret or the anger or the pressure I didn't get x done and you'll see where I'm going with this in that tunnel there's sinking sand and you can either get stuck in the sinking sand of I didn't get x done or the regret or whatever it is or you can actually accept the branch from Mac, from your wife, and you can actually then, because you can't, if you just do this and this thing, you'll sink, because every bit of movement, every bit of chaos creates more chaos in your sink.

1:28:15But if you stay still, stay calm, create the gap, reach out for the help, and that's where giving perspective, it's so much easier to give someone else advice than give yourself advice. So we've got that wisdom that's inside of us, because I was being interviewed about this. Someone asked me, but what if I feel like I don't have any wisdom? Then I said, well, when did someone last ask you something, ask you for advice? And then, oh, this and this. I said, did you give good advice? Where did it come from? You have wisdom. We're just better at giving it to other people than ourselves. So we've got to learn to reach out because we do get perspective, and we definitely need to encourage more of that.

1:28:51We don't just have to wait for a therapist to tell us. We are loved ones. That's why we need community. That's why we need to build deep, meaningful relationships because different people in our lives are going to throw us a branch and pull us out of the sinking sand.

1:29:03Shawn Stevenson:We've got to have the willingness. The willingness. That's another thing for us to do in the work. I've got to do it alone. I've got to do it alone. Because you might not be like, I don't like the length of that branch or whatever. Exactly. Instead of just like somebody's extending the branch, take the branch. Take the branch. This has been so awesome. I love hanging out with you. I'm so glad I get to hang out with you more as well. I love it too. Thank you. This book is, please, everybody listening, don't just get this book for yourself. get this for somebody that you care about. The chapters, as you mentioned, are very short, and they're very punchy, very insightful.

1:29:37Shawn Stevenson:I learned a lot. Oh, good. Thank you. You know so much. I'm very honored. Yeah, I appreciate that. And also what you did was you gave language to certain things that I've thought about or considered before, but I just didn't know I was doing that thing. And so it's fascinating, but also very helpful. And right now, and everybody's got to take action on this right now because when you pre-order help in a hurry you're going to get access to almost a thousand dollars in bonuses and this includes the help in a hurry summit yeah helping to hurry master class a mini book with quotes and affirmations and all kinds of really cool stuff and you're going to get all that for free when you go to help in a hurry book.com all right help in a hurry book.com you can get the book from your favorite retailer right there on the website and pre-order the book and you're gonna get all of these bonuses which you were even a part of the summit that i did for the eat smarter family cookbook these summits are phenomenal the wisdom the insights and you get free access to this and it's hundreds of dollars of value easily easily and you get that for free so i highly encourage everybody right now go to help in a hurry book.com pre-order the book get all those great bonuses almost a thousand dollars of value and those bonuses, you're the best.

1:31:01Shawn Stevenson:Oh, thank you. You said that so nicely. Thank you. I want to get the book. You made me excited. That's what it's all about. Thank you so much. And again, I'm just so grateful for you. And I happened upon one of your books thanks to my daughter when she was in high school. I love that. You remember? And to have you here. And it's something that I get to talk with her about. And I've learned so much. And I'm so grateful because, you know, you've given voice to and are advocate for the thing that is most important. And unfortunately, in our cultures today, we've been deflected from our mind and from our real power.

1:31:34Shawn Stevenson:And so you said that beautifully. Thank you so much. I'm very. Thank you. The feelings mutual. I love what you do as well. And I always love talking to you. It's always I always come away feeling so, so wonderful. So it's a great green tree to go and build resilience when I think of our conversations. So thank you. That's right. Got amazing trees over here, baby. I tell you. Dr. Caroline Leaf, everybody. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode today. I hope that you really enjoyed this and make sure to grab a copy of Dr. Leaf's new book. It is incredibly valuable. It's called Help in a Hurry.

1:32:08Shawn Stevenson:And right now, as of this release, you can pre-order the book and get almost a thousand dollars in free bonuses. All right. So take action on this. Go to helpinahurrybook.com. And that's where you can get access to pre-ordering the book and all of these incredible bonuses. We got some amazing masterclasses and world-class guests coming your way very, very soon. So be ready. Make sure to stay tuned. Take care. Have an amazing day. And I'll talk with you soon. And for more after the show, make sure to head over to themodelhealthshow.com. That's where you can find all of the show notes. You can find transcriptions, videos for each episode.

1:32:48Shawn Stevenson:And if you got a comment, you can leave me a comment there as well. And please make sure to head over to iTunes and leave us a rating to let everybody know that the show is awesome. And I appreciate that so much. And take care. I promise to keep giving you more powerful, empowering, great content to help you transform your life. Thanks for tuning in.