#1 Neuroscientist Explains How to Manifest Love & Happiness In Your Life

34:12I have to say I'm not an expert on this, but it's obviously opening up the dimensions of your mind and your consciousness to one of the things that she mentions, and I'm not saying that there's science to this right now, but I think it's very interesting, is opening up channels of communication to the angelic realms. Interesting. actually I didn't really give you the context for this which is that since the pandemic people have lost loved ones to actual death a lot of relationships broke down and I'm talking marriages friendships working relationships and a lot of you know mental health problems are massively on the rise and that involves this loss of sense of self this loss of purpose I don't know who I am anymore I can't trust my gut anymore and so I'm trying to find the answers to help people who've been through that and if you take grief as an example if you think that somebody in your family or a very close friend died and you're never going to see them again and you're never going to hear from them again and you have to carry on in this life that must be so painful and i don't know how people can ever necessarily get over that if you believe that our conscious consciousness doesn't disappear with physical death and that if we learn how to expand our minds to access different planes that potentially you could remain connected and bonded in some kind of way to a person that you loved very much in this life wouldn't you want that so how do we start to train our brain to unlike unlock new dimensions outside of this three-dimensional world i am going to take it back to this raised awareness that we talked about because i guess you'd have to be open to thinking that it's possible yeah so if you're close-minded to it then you're not going to be able to create that no um and you'll just think that it's a it's going to be a waste of your time because it's not going to work yes um so i would like to pose hypotheses to people like the one that i just said to you like if you thought that there could be some way that you can remain connected to someone that you've lost wouldn't you want that well if because your answer was yes and your answer wasn't well of course i would but it's not possible you know like there's going to be all sorts of answers that people would give then i would ask you to operate on the basis that that might be true and so that could look like different things for different people that could be have a conversation with that person in your head or have a conversation with that person out loud I mean I think that Richard E Grant very famously says I was married to my wife for so long that I kind of know the answer that she would give so I have conversations with her in my head as if they're between me and her but obviously it's my brain that's kind of creating the answer but it is based on what i think she would say so that's that's acceptable to most people yes that would be acceptable um you could take it further and people often report that they experience you know words or thoughts in their head that they don't believe are theirs however you're now veering into how i would diagnose someone with schizophrenia I'm hearing voices.

37:44Or thought insertion is also a diagnostic symptom of schizophrenia. Thought insertion. Yeah. So there are thoughts in my head that aren't my own. Interesting. Yeah. Are all of our thoughts our own thoughts? I mean, I just think this is becoming questionable. I can't give you the definitive answer to that. And where do our thoughts come from? Exactly. I mean, that's called the hard problem of neuroscience because there isn't a full understanding of whether our thoughts only arise from neurons and chemicals or whether we're a higher you know being than that and we have the ability to feel these emotions and have thoughts and then the neurochemical response is a consequence of that um something that people have been arguing about literally forever um so you know without all the answers i would just ask people to explore um another thing that you can do that is just like a very joy joyous one is so i'm i've got this hashtag that i often use called i find hearts and i literally like see hearts everywhere everywhere um and and it's just you know it's just so sweet and people love it and they send me their pictures of the same so up until recently that's always been random like i'll be walking and then i'll like a defect in the pavement, but it's heart-shaped kind of thing.

39:11But one thing that I've started experimenting with is asking for specific signs that are really unusual things that you wouldn't expect to see in certain places, and then just seeing what happens and writing it into my journal. Like almost asking for a sign to confirm something or to say, show me something unusual or show me this if I should take this direction, or what do you mean? Yeah. So I wouldn't say show me something unusual. I would specify what it is. Show me a pink elephant in the middle of the night or whatever. Maybe not that specific. Maybe just a pink elephant. That's too unique.

39:48Show me a pink elephant if I'm supposed to take this action. Yeah, that kind of thing. Okay. And you could easily say that really it's just your intuition and we understand how intuition works now. but you could also extrapolate it to being about something else. And that's kind of where I want to push our thinking. What does neuroscience tell us about signs, signals, and synchronicities? Are they something we should be paying attention to based on neuroscience and brain chemistry, or is it more spiritual woo-woo? Well, neuroscience doesn't tell us anything about that or much let's say about that at the moment but that's why I'm probably going to write another book which I said I would never do but I'm just so fascinated by this um so when I get back um to London I'm going to start like properly doing the research on this so far it's being kind of something I'm interested in and I have to say I wasn't sure if my book publisher would be okay with it.

40:55About these things, science, signals, synchronicities? Yeah. That's fascinating. I love that stuff. And I think that it coming from a neuroscientist is a new angle. It's not that there aren't books out there on this kind of thing. But I really want to open up that conversation as well because there's a lot of people suffering. And like I said, you can sound like you're crazy if you start talking about stuff like this. So I want to open up the conversation, being open, but trying to keep it as rigorous as possible to give people permission to come forward and share these stories. Because I think that's only going to be good for everyone.

41:36Wow. That's cool. So when someone sees the signs, signals, and synchronicities happening in their life, what do you think that's telling them? That they're on the right path, that they should be paying attention more, that they should be trusting their intuition more when they're seeing these three things um so i feel like what it says and somebody said this to me actually the last time i was in la but it had to land really emotionally for me to to believe it and that's what i want for everyone is it tells you that you are being guided and it tells you that you're safe and protected all right and one of the things i picked up from you a couple of years ago was that you said sometimes you know if i'm feeling like in an emotional crisis i just say to myself i'm safe i'm safe i'm safe and i can't tell you how many times i've used that in the last two years that's beautiful but that's kind of like self-soothing the inner child right yes with this kind of interest and more esoteric things that I've had like since I met you that time I'd like to think that it's not I'm not just safe because I tell myself I'm safe but I'm safe because I believe in something greater yes and I'm tapping into it and I'm allowing it to make me feel safe um because however good you become psychologically at soothing yourself you can still feel very alone um so feeling like unless you have a deeper spiritual connection to something yeah exactly yeah that's what i meant to say wow that's fascinating do you believe that we can be in beautiful healthy loving relationships and we can manifest everything we have on our vision or action boards if we have yet to heal the wounds of our childhood as a neuroscientist?

43:34No. Really? Wow. So if we have these visions and dreams and goals that we want to go after, if we want to have a beautiful relationship, but we are wounded still, the inner child is wounded inside of us as adults, what will happen to us? So this is really about inner child and shadow, right? So I think people understand that you've got an inner child that maybe didn't get over things that you experienced in your childhood. Shadow is about the parts of yourself that you've rejected because as a young child, you rely on your primary caregivers for survival. And if there is something that they don't love about you, you want to hide that for all the world so that they will still love you and not let you die.

44:21You don't want anyone to notice about you. No. That's shame. So you hide it away in childhood and often find yourself in adulthood no longer even aware of what those things are because you've rejected them so deeply. Wow. Yeah. But that's driving a lot of your unconscious behavior. Right. So if you put together the inner child and the shadow, then what happens is you meet people on the same level of psychological wound as you. Oh, yeah. You also leave people if you evolve out of that and they haven't been able to. Wow. Which I think goes back to one of the pieces of content I heard you talk about, which is the sense of smell connected to someone's stress levels or anxiety levels.

45:07You'll attract a similar nervous system or I guess a certain similar stress level. Is that right? So it's not smell. It's sensing, not through smell, the level of the stress hormone. Interesting. But that's short term, right? But the inner child and shadow stuff is longer term. Gosh, that's fascinating. Yeah. So you think we attract people based on our psychological wounds? 100%. Wow. And as we start to heal and grow, if the other person's not healing and growing, we kind of pull away. Wow. That's interesting.

45:48oh i can see the cogs moving in your brain i just think it's fascinating speaking i guess about relationships and men and women with all of your expertise on the brain is the process of manifesting love and falling in love different from men versus women i think if it's love you're really looking for then it's not different not lust yeah the issue is what you're actually looking So you think men and women manifest love the same way, similar ways? yeah i think if you know if you want that sense of partnership and friendship and intimacy and you want to be loyal and you want it to be for the long term then it doesn't matter what gender you are um but if the disconnect is often and you know this is a bit of a stereotype but usually it's more that men are sorry that women want a loving stable relationship and men perhaps you know don't want that as one sex or whatever yeah or don't you know just don't want it right now, but go through periods where that's what they want and go through periods where that's not what they want, which I guess could be true of any gender as well.

46:51But overall, more likely women will want to be in a monogamous relationship. Why is that based on kind of the brain size? So it comes from evolution. So when we lived in the cave, women did need men to protect them from predators and to hunt for food. So women tend - I guess especially if they're pregnant too and they weren't able to go out and hunt or gather or whatever it might be. I mean, they generally didn't hunt as much, so they gathered more. But then it's hard to get protein from what you gather rather than what you hunt. So for survival, and they use the fat and the skins and everything.

47:31So it wasn't just food, it was shelter and fire and all of that kind of stuff. so although we don't necessarily need a man for those physical things now it's a very strong survival wiring in the brain and so what we have you know in in the cave we lived nomadically so often the men would go and hunt and be away for a very long time or if they went far enough and they found a cave of the of the same tribe they would just stay there and not go back? Why risk your life to travel back for six weeks? But over time, a lot of societies in the modern world have asked people to live in unit families. And so we have seen men's brains be rewired.

48:20Really? Yeah. Relatively recently, like maybe in the last 10 years, research has showed that when you become a dad for the first time, oxytocin rewires your brain so that you're more into bonding and less into the testosterone competitive stuff. Because if you think about it, lions and tigers, they'll eat their own children. You have to tame that in some ways, right? But how do you tame it, but also harness it in other ways? You know what I mean? It's like a dance of like having drive and testosterone. Yeah. Like I never want to lose that drive, right? I get this question all the time. But I also want to be like a great loving parent and partner and all these things.

48:59Yeah. and not let testosterone drive me in doing damaging things. You know, so. Well, so from about the age of 35, your testosterone will have started dropping significantly already. Not mine. No, it's gone. One's testosterone tends to drop from that age. So when you do become a dad. It drops after you become a dad. For the first time. oxytocin goes up testosterone drops you become much more about like cuddling and bonding and wanting to stay in the home and look after the interesting mom and the baby less about less about like lifting and like hunting right yeah interesting if you keep lifting then you would actually like keep your testosterone levels higher also if the baby sleeps in the same room as you then your testosterone levels drop even more come on so you might want to move out for three months to a different bedroom yeah I've already told her I'm getting my sleep, you know, the first few months.

49:59So your testosterone drops? If you sleep in the same room as the baby. Why is that? Because the oxytocin's becoming like, you know, higher and higher because you've got this cute little warm thing that smells so nice and is so like vulnerable and dependent on you. And it's like in the room with you the whole eight hours, you know, just oxytocin boost. But are women attracted to men with less testosterone? wrong um they are when they're not fertile but they are not when they are at peak fertility really so mid-cycle when you're ovulating you're going to want a bad boy and the rest of the time you're going to want a nice man that will stay at home and help you look after the baby so if you're not a bad boy when you're at peak fertility as a woman is that going to hurt the relationship if you don't give women what they want hang on say that again so if a man is not a not a bad Not a bad boy.

50:52Yeah. When a woman is at peak fertility and the man just wants to cuddle and chill and not be driven by testosterone and give the woman that testosterone feel. Yeah. Will that ultimately hurt the relationship long term if the woman doesn't get what she wants sexually? I mean, I think if she's chosen him by then. So this is more about when you're like in the choosing phase. Once you've settled down with someone, then you have like a logical conversation about are we trying for a baby or not, right? but logic and emotion are two different things in relationships you know you might logically say okay I'm safe but emotionally you want something else this is a reason that people cheat right because they're not getting what they want sexually yeah and so it's like how do you suppress the thing you want sexually to be like oh but he's such a good guy or he's this but if he's not giving me what I want then I'm going to go find it from this other younger testosterone German man right you're getting really jealous here I'm not getting jealous this this this fantasy younger high testosterone man well i'm just thinking this what women deal with i know is this what women deal with yeah to some extent you know more consciously or less consciously depending on the woman yeah um it's interesting right so let me kind of explain the physiology behind it from the research that we know the best which is in um prairie voles so there are two types of voles in america marsh or mountain voles voles what's a bowl it's a little rat-like creature prairie prairie dogs no not prairie dogs it's more like a mouse or a rat okay cool yeah the ones that live in the marsh or the mountain they have plenty of food and plenty of shelter and they're super promiscuous the ones that moved to the prairie where there's like scarce food and shelter they snuggle in and settle down and become monogamous for life the same rat the same mouse but just living in different areas come on so so wait you tell me rats are monogamous these these voles these voles are a mass the voles are monogamous um if they live in the prairie if they live in the prairie but not if they live in the the food and abundance they're just and lots of female voles that they can go and visit just little polyamorous voles yeah because they know that if they get they get um you know one vole pregnant and she's left on her own to look after her young they're going to survive because they're well sheltered there's plenty of food for her to nip out and bring it back to the babies yeah but in the prairie if he was promiscuous then the chances of his offspring dying are quite high because she can't defend the nest herself.

53:42She can't find enough food for herself and them without help. And so let's extrapolate this. How does this help humans, right? Okay. Well, first off, which mice are happier? The ones that are more promiscuous or the ones that are coupled? I think it depends on the vole. So you think the female mice are happy if they just, you know, are pregnant, but then their partner just leaves? No, no. They're not happy. No. How do we know? Can we test that? Okay, so how do we apply this to our lives? No, hang on, there is an answer to that. We test it through levels of oxytocin and vasopressin. Come on, have we done this?

54:22Have people done this? Yes. No way. These mice? Yeah. Wow, that's crazy. And actually, just to be serious, the research has done more to help with loneliness, grief, and heartbreak. But obviously, it's got implications for dating. Wow. um so because one of the things that we saw with the receptors in the brain is that like if if i'm in no it's got to be the other way around if you're in love with me you've got more vasopressin receptors in your nucleus accumbens which is on the reward circuitry and then every time you see me you get a reward and the longer that we've been dating and stay together and become closer that reward becomes more intense every time you see me however if we then had a prolonged separation time can down regulate the effect of those receptors so obviously there are implications for that in a breakup or grief right right um and but one of the things i think is like so so important for dating is that if a woman if a couple are getting to know each other and this is all on like heterosexual couples research then as a woman is sexually interested and liking the guy and enjoying the dating her oxytocin levels is like slowly slowly starting to go up when they start actually having sex she's going to be releasing higher levels of oxytocin every time she orgasms and that's going to make her bond to the guy much more if you have sex on the first date the guy's vasopressin levels will plummet straight away and all he'll be interested in is testosterone if you make him wait his vasopressin and oxytocin levels go up and then when you do actually have sex he's already bonded so it's more likely to become part of a loving relationship wow so if a woman sleeps with a man on the first date or two Is a man driven to want to bond long-term with that person?

56:30No. Why not? Because the vasopressin levels drop as soon as he has sex. What does that mean? So vasopressin is the one that makes the prairie voles monogamous. The higher the levels of that, and that the receptors appear in the reward circuitry of your brain. and so basically if you see your partner in distress it um affects your brain that those neurons and you want to comfort her through physical touch um so that's oxytocin but if you haven't had time for those receptors to appear in the correct place to make you bond then it's just it's just you know it goes back to lust so what i say about love and relationships is that the genetics and the receptors will load the gun, but sexual activity will pull the trigger.

57:25So based on neuroscience, if you sleep with someone quickly, you're less likely to bond long-term together. They're more likely to be promiscuous or just not be as interested in that person long-term. Is that right? That's fascinating. No. But you hear a lot of people just be like, you know, just sleep with them on the first day. It's fun. Just have fun. You know, it's all good. But I just feel like you're setting yourself up for let down. But if that's what you want, that's fine. But I think... Don't expect the guy to keep liking you after that. No, no. And don't say it's fine and it's fun if you actually want a long-term relationship and then be disappointed that they didn't want that too.

58:06Yeah. So the brain chemistry within a man changes if they have sex earlier with a woman. And it changes in a different way if they wait and they actually create a bond. First, and then have sex. Yeah. What changes within a woman when they have sex with a man? Do they become more bonded to the person? Yeah. So for the woman, it's not so much to do with whether they are already in love with the person or not. If they're having sex and they're releasing oxytocin, because we don't have as much testosterone as you. you've got at least seven to eight times as much testosterone as me. And that buffers the effect of oxytocin, whereas I would get the full effect of oxytocin.

58:52That's fascinating. So a woman, when they have sex with a man, they're bonding quicker. Yeah. When a man has sex with a woman, he's not necessarily bonding right away. He has to have more time connecting with her until he bonds. Yeah. That is interesting. And then sex will, then the oxytocin isn't as buffered by the testosterone. So when you've got the vasopressin and the oxytocin high, then the testosterone has less negating effect on it. This is fascinating. Okay. What else about neuroscience and relationships should we address since we're on this topic that you think is really interesting? um so i think you know the whole like visual and smell thing at start is quite interesting and then the receptors and hormones to do with bonding and sex is really interesting i would say that because we live so much longer now you know we we're using these cave analogies but to be honest in cave times you and i would both be dead died 30 yeah um so relationships potentially have to last for longer and I think there's two things to say here one is that you can use neuroplasticity to keep growing and changing in a way that keeps a relationship fresh if you are holding on to this fantasy that a relationship has to last forever even if we're now living till we're 100 right so I think another way to look at it is about being in the present not necessarily putting this intense pressure on yourself your partner in the relationship that it It has to last forever.

1:00:25Yeah. Understanding that even if a relationship breaks down and that's obviously difficult to handle at the time, that there are potential possibilities for something that's more right for you at a different age than maybe a choice you made in your 20s. So, you know, nothing, you don't have to be a neuroscientist to say those two things. It's kind of like just using your brain to understand that there's a certain amount of time there are you know benefits to being in long lasting relationships but there are possible alternatives as well yeah that's interesting um i want to go back to what we're talking about a little bit before in terms of 3d 5d brain states um Thank you.

1:01:20I guess my question is, what is the, you know, we're in the three-dimensional world right now, 3D. But from my understanding, 5D allows us to manifest faster. It's like skipping time. It's not saying you have to push things forward in the physical material world. You're jumping time in a sense. I don't know if that makes sense. And when we use our brain to think about something, we're sending a signal into space, into time, space, our environment, consciousness. we're putting a signal out into the world. And maybe sometimes when we think about someone, we're sending that signal to the other person, right?

1:02:03Potentially. And if we send a signal out consistently, we're signaling to the world. And if we fill our hearts with love and gratitude and harmony and peace in a beautiful state, a flourishing state of abundance, we're signaling something out and we're drawing it back in through the heart. is that a bunch of baloney or is that something that you can back by science to support our energy our thoughts our way of being and connected to the actions we take on a daily basis that's a really beautiful way that you've put it and a great question as well and so i just want to start that story with a few things like if you think about what you and i watched as sci-fi when we were kids, so much of that is true now.

1:02:51It's happening. Yeah. And things that we used to think about the brain, like one way that we used to treat mental illnesses was by doing a frontal lobotomy or cutting the corpus callosum that bridges the left and right hemispheres. And we thought we were doing a good thing. I have actually given patients electroconvulsive therapy in my career, so not that long ago. and not because I wanted to but I had a patient that came to me um and said you know I've got a long history of depression and when it gets to the point that I don't want to eat and drink the only thing that helps me quick enough that I don't have to suffer for weeks is is ECT and I said are you sure you don't want to try you know there are some modern antidepressants now that you know have an effect in a couple of weeks and she was like no I'm not eating I'm not drinking I'm totally depressed I just want ECT so I was like okay um but we don't generally do that so much anymore um so our understanding of psychiatry psychology and then with the advent of brain scanning how you know how healthy brains function has come a long way even at this conference at the weekend that all the speakers were amazing but a few of them mentioned right brain left brain and I said I'm sorry, but I've got to stand up here and say we really can't talk about the brain like that anymore.

1:04:11It's so much more complex and sophisticated with these amazing networks and subsystems. And it's just doing a big disservice to the brain to talk about. It's all connecting. Yeah.

1:04:26So in that sense, the research that most backs up what you're talking to, speaking to, is we can't prove all of that yet. but how we're getting there is through two main ways one is looking at what happens in the brain with psychedelics and um how they can induce neuroplasticity so i keep my eye on the research at johns hopkins because i you know it's like to me the best um lab that's looking into that stuff and so there are really great benefits from one or two doses spaced one to six months apart of certain psychedelics in mental illnesses like depression and schizophrenia potentially in grief as well but what's really interesting to me is that everything that you see that a psychedelic can achieve relatively quickly, you can achieve yourself by sleeping right, eating right, breathing right, and meditating.

1:05:33Let's go. I'm so happy you're saying this because, you know, I have a lot of friends that swear by psychedelics. They say like, oh, this changed my life and it's opened me up and it's allowed me to see things differently. But I've been to many meditation intensive retreats that I feel like I'm seeing visions and I'm seeing like geometric shapes and pulsating and, uh, you know, all these different things that we are creating ourselves within ourselves. You know, it's the chemicals, the pharmacy that we have in our brain and body that can manifest and create these things are so powerful that I think if trained continually, it's hard work, when you're trained properly and continually with the right teaching, can have just as powerful effects, if not more powerful healing benefits than an outside pharmacy.

1:06:27That's just my belief. I may be wrong, but it sounds like from your research, that's true. I'm so glad you said that because I know it's particularly popular in LA as well. Oh yeah. Everyone's talking about microdosing and ayahuasca and everything. And my concern is that - And they're swearing by it and it's helping them immensely. And I'm like, cool if it's helping you cool uh but can you try other things too that aren't changing your brain chemistry from the outside in but rather from the inside out i think there's a couple of other things around that one is that if it's not if it's not a you know in a hospital or a lab under like proper supervision with qualified people then a how do you know how pure the source of whatever you're taking is um you know in the 60s there were so many bad like lsd trips that happened to people so what happens if something goes wrong and there's no one trained there that can help you neuroplasticity as i remember we discussed before is not always good it can be bad you know you obsess over a breakup you're just wiring into your brain stay in it for years there's grief and so can these psychedelics do that as well they can keep you trapped in a depressive state they can even like yeah like they can make things more negative because how do you know where that mushroom or whatever it is that you're taking is going to induce neuroplasticity in your brain.

1:07:44How are you directing that if you've got no experience of that? So that is a bit of a concern. When they did the ayahuasca research at Johns Hopkins, they used the pure ayahuasca. When you do it in ceremony, it's mixed with something that makes you purge. Makes you throw up and feel sick. Yeah, and have diarrhea potentially as well. Yeah. So the purging... I don't want that. I know. Who wants to go through that? It completely puts me off. Some people don't mind it so much, but it's done because it symbolizes a massive release. Yes. And that's part of... And a rebirth. Yes, exactly. But you're taking something that you don't need to take.

1:08:27You could just take the ayahuasca and have the actual mental process without purging. And the two-string. So, yeah, I mean, I'd volunteer for Johns Hopkins, but not for the ceremony. So what do you think is the best way to rewire our subconscious mind to benefit us to feel healthier, happier, and whole as human beings versus taking drugs or some type of psychedelics? So I wanted to put that together with the research on both the Buddhist monks and the U.S. Marines that Amishi Jha did, the mindfulness-based training with. so all of that research shows the impact of different types of meditation on the brain and however so before we get to the meditation even this temple needs to be in the best you know it needs to be clean it needs to be polished and so that means that you're sleeping sufficiently you're eating a really good nutrient dense diet with the good fats and enough protein fiber all of that um the dark skinned foods you know that i think i've mentioned before um that you are not sedentary um not necessarily that you do lots of high intensity exercise but that you you move you breathe you know you breathe deeply um that you're well hydrated then we come on to the meditation part and meditation is you know i remember even the first time i spoke about it at a bank thinking am i going to get away with this you know but people found it really interesting and then it really was about sitting cross-legged with your eyes closed and you know doing a certain kind of form of meditation whether it's guided or breath so the nature piece is that because we've existed in the palette of nature since we were in the cave it we do find it most people find it beautiful unless you've got like terrible allergies or something when you walk past trees particularly certain trees that you have a lot of in LA, I've noticed.

1:10:30So pines, firs, cedars, cypresses, palms, they release something called phytoncides that actually interact with your immune system and boost the release of natural killer cells that help you to fight off cancers. Trees. Wow. So being in nature helps you fight off cancers. Yeah. Wow. Wow. But the beauty of it as well. So that's a chemical thing that's going on. Not just the actual chemicals that are being released from those trees, but you actually being in the environment and viewing it. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. So that's beholding beauty. Making beauty is also important. So things like singing, playing an instrument, dancing, drumming, chanting.

1:11:19Because if you think about it, in the cave, we danced and drummed and chanted, but we didn't have resources to do anything that wasn't essential to our survival. So I still haven't quite worked out why, but those things are obviously essential to our survival. Interesting. Yeah. Okay. So back to, I guess, reprogramming your subconscious mind. Eating, sleeping, what was the other thing you said? Meditating, breathing. Well, I want to come to that one last. So the physical foundations are eating, sleeping, drinking, and breathing. Then when we come into the realm of mindfulness, we're taking it now to the next level and saying it's not just necessarily sitting down and doing a meditation, but it's spending time in nature.

1:12:08It's beholding beauty. It's gratitude. Art. It's art. It's music. It's dance. Yeah. And so when we're not incorporating a healthy lifestyle, eating, sleeping, drinking enough water, breathing, meditating, if we're not incorporating that, it's just going to be harder to accomplish what we want. It's going to be harder to manifest. It's going to be harder to attract healthy relationships. We're going to feel in a more stressed out state is what I'm hearing you say. Oh, it's like buying a Ferrari and then putting the wrong gas into it and never changing the oil or the water and expecting to win Formula One.

1:12:45Right. It's not going to happen. How can someone tell if they are in a lower energy state and it just might seem so daunting to take on something new to improve their life? they might be in scarcity and they might be struggling in relationships they might be feeling emotionally depressed physically depressed financially depressed and they're just getting by minute by minute and day by day how can someone get out of themselves when they're in a scarcity state or lower energy state suffering state and into a more beautiful state of being um i really feel like i'm the wrong person to answer that question because you've been there and you've written the book about it, which I've read, The Greatness Mindset.

1:13:32There's so many amazing science-backed tips in there about this exact question. But I just want to give one really easy thing for people that they can start doing today, which is the micro habits that I mentioned. So just if you're in that place and you and I have both been in that place, just start drinking some more water. If that's the only thing you can do today, you will actually feel better if you're hydrated. try to go to bed half an hour earlier or an hour earlier try to you know just go and do 100 steps after your meal um really really small things but these kinds of things and you know i always say change 10 things by 1 percent not one thing by 10 percent they accumulate and they make you feel better yes and it's you know it's not about sort of having the dream home manifestation straight away.

1:14:23It's about building yourself up to that. Why do you think some people manifest quicker than others? If some people feel like, man, he or she, everything they do, it just turns to gold. And it just seems to be happening so quickly. And there's so much farther ahead than me. Why does it seem like some people do it faster and other people are just working so hard to create some momentum in their life. I mean, again, I'll bring this back to, because with you, I always like to use sports analogies. It's practice. Yes. There's no other, there's no secret answer to that. Takes time. And I also find, even though it's something I practice all the time, that I can have like months in the desert where nothing's happening.

1:15:07And then I have like periods of time where everything is like falling into place. And I started saying to my friends, when that's happening, ask for everything that you want, because it's like a magnetic time. So when you see that it's happening anyway, then think, okay, what else was I wanting the last few months that I didn't manifest? And really like put that out there. You mentioned magnetic. How do we become more magnetic to the things we want? So I want to answer that in a relationship way because I feel like when people are looking for their partner, they've usually got a very good idea or maybe even a list of what they want in that partner.

1:15:43Yes. I'm going to make a list of all the things I want in this person and then I'm going to go find it. And I'm going to wait for it, you know, this to come along. But do you ever make a list of what you have to offer in a relationship? Do you ever check if you can match up to everything that you're asking for on that list? All right. All right. Preach it. I like it. I mean, I think if you do make a list, you need to look at it and ask yourself if you're bringing that to the table as well. Because if you're not, you're not going to get that. That needs to be the standard you are. Yeah. The things you want, you have to be that standard.

1:16:13If you're not, then there's going to be a disconnect at some time. there's gonna be something that's off that's good or you're just gonna get continually disappointed because if this super kind generous you know person that always has your back finds that you don't always have their back why are they gonna go out with you exactly they're not yeah what do you feel like has been the most magnetic time in your life where everything was just you were a vortex of possibilities and opportunities just people coming to you everything was saying yes, opportunities were flooding in your way. When has been that time?

1:16:47I mean, I would say that I've had several experiences of that, but they're not lasting all year. But because I do an action board every year, I've got several times when it's felt like a lot of those things came true. And then equally, probably more times where it doesn't feel like any of that's happening. Yeah. When you create an action board or a vision board every year, how much of it usually comes true that year or some year down the line? Is it 20 %? Is it 50 %? 80 %? Oh, because I'm very realistic and specific, I would say that 80 % will come true within the year. Wow. And some things might have to leap over into the next year.

1:17:29Wow. And I'm just going to be really honest with you, because you're my friend, that some of those things just have never come true. Right. And maybe they weren't meant for you. Yeah, that's how I've had to like... So 80 % of the things you put down on the vision board yearly, on average, come true within that year. Yeah. Wow. Do you put a specific date next to the thing that you want by? No, but I know I'm doing it for that year. And I know that some of them are quick wins that I can do a lot to push forward. And that some of them are bigger things that I'm going to have to wait a bit for the magic of the universe.

1:18:03Interesting. And I also leave quite a lot of space because what I've begun to realize is, you know, when I'm in that mode of like everything's manifesting, I sometimes say, be careful what you wish for. So what I also learned was that my brain is limited by what it thinks I can get or I deserve. And so I do want to be open to the fact that something could come up that I haven't thought of yet. And for that reason, I leave space. On your vision board. You'll have like an empty white space. It's just like... Well, I'll just have things, you know, they're not crammed together. Oh, it's not all full.

1:18:40So there's space between them. No. Interesting. I'm going to have to come to your bathroom and check out your vision board one day. See what it looks like. So how many things do you put on there? Is it like 20 things or is it more like five or six kind of big things? You mentioned kind of smaller wins. That really changes from year to year. So I have had one year. I only had one image on my vision board. What was that? It was a beautiful horse kicking up water. And it was the year that I was incorporating my business. So it was all about like stability and loyalty and trust and like a team, but then also causing a bit of disruption in the industry.

1:19:17I like that. All right. So wasn't it actually like a bunch of people in an office space of like, this is the team, how it's going to look and feel. It was more of a emotional image. Mine are very metaphorical. So actually, if you did come to my bathroom and look at my vision board, you probably wouldn't know what everything meant. But I know. Interesting. Yeah. So it's not like, okay, I want the dream home. I'm going to put up an image of a home. But it might be something else that feels like home. So with that one, I did have... You did have the home. I had like an interior. so I had like a bathroom with you know particular bath and candles and rugs and kind of I don't know if you call them poofs you know this little Moroccan leather like a chair or something it's like a little low stool thing so it was a vibe which was kind of like a bit of a hippie vibe yeah so that represented home one year I did have when I wanted outside space I had a particular picture of sort of the house was in the distance but you know the picture was more of the garden what was the most incredible thing that you manifested that wasn't on your vision board oh that wasn't on it that was empty space that ended up coming into your life that you didn't even dream of but you're like wow this is even bigger than what i could have imagined i'm not i'm not making this up but being on your podcast and then being on steven's podcast were things i never thought were going to happen to me.

1:20:48I wouldn't have put them on because I wouldn't have thought that that could come true. Really? Yeah. Well, if you think we were first in contact in 2019 when my book came out and you did want me to come on the podcast, but then the pandemic happened, so I couldn't. So it happened like much later. And then like my career had changed quite a lot by then. And, And, you know, it had a very big impact on me and my platform and my work. So, but I hadn't, before the book came out, said, I want to go on School of Greatness because I just thought I would do a few small podcasts in London and, you know.

1:21:24Go along with your day. Yeah. Interesting. What is saying, you know, what is saying yes to something that you didn't even think was possible and do for you? You can reference the School of Greatness or something else, but just like what is saying yes is something that you didn't even think about putting on your vision board, but being open to the universe's possibilities of an opportunity and saying yes to it, what does that do for you? What does it unlock? So I think it comes back to the reason why I started leaving space on my board, because it made me realize things can happen to me that are better than what I thought could happen.

1:22:02So it unlocks your sense of self-worth, your self-esteem, your self-confidence. and makes you think, okay, well, and it's very practical because obviously now I can say I've been on this podcast twice. So if I approach like another really big podcast - It's easier to get on with stuff. Yeah, exactly. Of course. Yeah. What about the negative side of vision boards? What if someone puts something so big on there that just seems like so unrealistic that this will never happen and they put it on there, yes, I want this thing, I want this money or this relationship or this opportunity, but they don't believe they're worthy or deserving of it.

1:22:44So they say they want it, but really they don't believe they're worthy of it. Does that have a negative effect or does it draw them closer to the worthiness of having the actual thing? I've got an example of this that I'll share with you first and then maybe we can decide together if it's like the answer to that question, which is that I was on an Instagram live with my friend who's very successful in the fashion industry and who's very humble and she said at one stage when her career was really you know getting traction that it was her dream to have a house in the Hamptons now you can imagine the comments that then started coming up well I'd like a house in the Hamptons yeah but she was working incredibly hard in an industry that was lucrative enough that that was realistic for her.

1:23:33It was a possibility. And I've been to that house. And when I walked into the house, I thought, I know what it took you to get this and that this was a dream that you worked so hard for. It's not overnight. No. So I think that kind of thing, really for people, will just lead to disappointment. I would say you should start with, I'd like to own my own home. It may just be an apartment. It may not be, you know, Beverly Hills mansion, but sort of take it step by step. I mean, if I think back to the amount of money that I put on my first vision board when I had just stopped being a doctor and started up, you know, my coaching practice, it was realistic.

1:24:12And so when it then became true, I could like increase it over time. But if I'd put like a million dollars on it, then I would have failed. Right, right, right. Yeah. for some reason i think you're going to get along very well with martha and i gotta you gotta go on her show sometimes she's got one of the biggest shows in lat america but she does english as well okay but she would talk everything about like the spirit realm and like near-death experiences that's like her that's all night she's reading books and watching youtube videos about near-death experiences and what happens to the brain and things like that so she would love to diving with you on this i was actually very impressed that you knew as much as you did i wasn't sure when you're you're sleeping next to someone who's watching these all day long i've got you know i'm on the i'm i'm able to like listen a little bit like okay i don't know about this but i'll i'll take it in yeah yeah i'm open to it i mean i'm super grateful to you and therefore through her that that you wanted to have this conversation yeah yeah yeah of course she would love to have you on i think if she knew this about you so i want to connect you guys later Thanks.

1:25:19Has she watched Surviving Death on Netflix? She must have. She watches all these YouTube channels on this stuff but I'll, you know, she's reading all the books. Yeah, she's like deep in this work. I'm starting, I'm going to start a course. And she's almost like Media Mask, you know, she's connecting with... I would love to see her. yeah. Yeah, it sounds like she could maybe really help me to understand that better because I'm just on that journey. But I'm going to start this sacred geometry course so maybe I could discuss that with her. Come on. That's cool. Yeah. When are you starting that? Well, it's on an app that I've already got, but because I'm so busy in LA, I thought I would just wait till I get home.

1:25:54That's cool. But I might do one on the plane. No, I'm going to connect you guys for sure. Gosh, what else do we need to know? What else do you feel like people need to know right now, this time in the world? For someone listening or watching this right now, what do they need to know about their brain, their mind, and how the universe works to support them. Is there anything else? It's probably going to be a bit of a recap, but I think it's important to do. Like I said, at the beginning of the pandemic, I realized very, very quickly, like within two weeks, there is going to be a horrific mental health consequence of this.

1:26:36And then a couple of months in, I started trying to sort of say, you know, does it have to be a mental health crisis or could it be a spiritual revolution? And I don't even really know where that was coming from. It was just a phrase I was using. I didn't really have much to back it up. Obviously, I've subsequently spent three years kind of delving into that personally for my own spiritual evolution. And I want to share that with people because what I'd really like to say is if you are feeling lost and broken, if you've lost relationships, if you have actual you know actually lost people are and are in grief the answer actually is in your brain and that there is so much that you can do to reconnect with yourself to bring an amazing tribe of like angels and supporters around you and to navigate grief in the most graceful way beyond what you could think possible and all the things that you speak about you know that i speak about to believe that and and hypothesis test it because because you you will feel better and there's no harm in trying wow do you ever feel worried being a neuroscientist and being in the science world talking about spirituality and things that you i guess essentially cannot measure?

1:28:05Do you ever feel worried about, are people going to take me seriously or my credibility or, you know, are they going to laugh at me if I'm talking about spirituality? Yeah. One of the things I said before, because a question that I get is like, how do you survive in a man's world? You know, how did you do a PhD in neuroscience 30 years ago? I didn't really realize that as a girl, I wasn't... 30 years ago? Come on. Stop it. You're not asking me about my age again. Come on. Stop it. That was like 70 years ago. Come on. Um, so I, I didn't, I just never thought like, oh, a girl shouldn't do that. I was like, I'm interested in everything neuro, so I'm going to do that.

1:28:40And was it a risk when I gave up being a doctor and started a business from nothing? I guess so. But the big, the bigger risk for me would have been staying stuck in something, you know, that wasn't stimulating me and, you know, intellectually and wasn't going to open up a whole new world for me. And some people made comments when I wrote The Source about, do you think, you know, are you worried about how this is going to affect your career? I'm just such a no regrets person. And like now more than ever, I am now talking about things that are properly woo-woo, you know, The Source, I could back up.

1:29:16And I genuinely believe it's going to help people and I'm going to find something. And I feel very guided and I'm like living in trust at the moment. Wow. That's beautiful. I want people to get your book. It's called The Source. And it's really about the secrets of the universe and the science of the brain, which I think is just such a powerful thing. And I think a confusing thing, the brain, the mind, the universe, spirituality, I think it's confusing for a lot of people to understand. But you bring modern science, ancient wisdom together in simple terms for us to understand. So I want to acknowledge you, Tara, for your consistency and listening to the call within you.

1:29:59It's what I'm hearing you say. It's like you were called to leave modern medicine, I guess, and tap into these new approaches. You've been called to put your voice out there, called to write a book, called to keep tapping into sacred geometry and all these different things. So I want to acknowledge you, Tara, for your listening to the call, no matter what people think or say. And I don't think people are criticizing you, but that might be a fear or concern that you might have. So I acknowledge you and I want people to get the source. I want them to follow you on Instagram and social media, Dr.

1:30:36Tara Swart, anywhere on social media. You've got a lot of things that you're working on so they can follow you there and stay in touch with you there. I want people, if they're watching or listening, to leave a comment of their biggest takeaway, but also on YouTube, leave a comment, but also leave a comment on your Instagram to see what resonated the most with them, what spoke to them the most, what they want to hear more about from you. So make sure to do that on our YouTube and on Tara's Instagram as well. Is there anything else we can do to be of service to you today? Oh, Louis, you're such a kind person.

1:31:13You've done so much for me already. So no, but I think I am going to need a lot of help with anecdotes for this research that I'm doing. So yeah, that would be the best thing. you've got so many followers. If people have stories to share of experiences like that, I would love to hear them. Wow. Okay. Where should they message you or stay in touch? Should they send you a DM or email or your website? I think DM is probably the best. I'm most active on Instagram. Okay, cool. So they should DM you stories about or anecdotes about what? Or put comments under my posts as well. Okay, cool. Awesome. Yeah.

1:31:49I think I asked you this last time, so I'm going to ask you this about the three truths because you're in a different energetic state this time than you were then. So I'm curious to see what your three truths are now. But I asked you this last time, if it was your last day, many years away, and you got to create anything you wanted to create, but for whatever reason on this last day, you have to take all of your content with you. So no one has access to this conversation or your books or anything you ever create, but you get to leave behind three lessons to the world from all the things you learned, whether it be from science or just personal experiences.

1:32:21What would be those lessons or three truths for you? So I actually, as well as doing vision boards, I choose like one to four words each year that are like words that are going to guide me for that year. So I think I might as well share those with you because they'll be the most authentic. So the first one is peace.

1:32:45and I don't give too much meaning to the word I allow it to show up in my life but I think it's definitely like inner peace but also peace with the people around you and then beauty is a big one for me since I'm researching the neuro aesthetic stuff so just you know seeing beautiful things smelling the flowers just like you know appreciating the beauty in everyone and then freedom and i think this is really related to the last question you asked me which is that is not having that fear of criticism or skepticism and just really trusting myself and going with what i want to wow yeah you know it's interesting uh and i wish that for everyone that's you know that's those are my words but that's what i would wish for people you know it's interesting for the last four years I have had set intentions as well for each year and I've had different words and four years ago they were peace clarity and freedom peace clarity and freedom I actually had four but you asked for three so I didn't say my other one which is truth but that's like clarity isn't it so they're really close that was my intentions I guess three and a half years ago but um yeah peace clarity and freedom because i didn't feel like i had them wow so i was like and i was searching on the outside to to have them as opposed to becoming that becoming clear becoming free being free being peace and um you know i was always searching for things on the outside as opposed to developing them from the inside totally the same i so not to quite the same extent as you, but it was where I was feeling I was getting close to those things, but I couldn't quite, you know, and I was just thinking, I was struggling with something and thinking I just so need peace in that area.

1:34:39And then I had this light bulb moment, which was like, I give myself peace. Peace does not come from the outside. Let's go, Tarn. Yes, I am peace. Yeah. That's beautiful. Final question, what's your definition of greatness? So something else that's come up in the research recently that's become really important to me is about having a purpose that's greater than yourself so doing something that doesn't benefit you directly um so you know something altruistic something that's for the benefit of others and you obviously get a benefit from doing that because it makes you feel good but it's about kind of you know your life is your life but if you want a life of greatness I think you've got to do something bigger than that's that something that's just about your life absolutely yeah That's beautiful.

1:35:28It's about a life of service. Tara, thank you so much for being here. You're amazing. Appreciate you. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad-free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review.

1:36:04I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you if no one has told you lately that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.