Revel In It: Just Breathe with Emma Seppälä

The best-selling author joins Oliver for a mindful conversation about combatting anxiety.

From a technique called Sky Breath Meditation, to cultivating an attitude of gratitude, and the benefits of exploring nature...Emma offers easy ways to heal and thrive in a chaotic world.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hi.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
I am Kate Hudson and my name is Oliver Hudson.
We wanted to do something that highlighted our relationship and
what it's like to be siblings. We are a sibling railvalry.

Speaker 1 (00:21):
No, no, sibling, don't do that with your mouth, revelry.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
That's good introduction with Oliver Hudson. This is the intro
of the podcast Sibling Revelry. I am doing the intro
in case anyone is wondering. I'm doing the intro before
we introduced our guest, Emma Seppola. I just want to

(00:56):
talk about the end of school, because the end of
school is upon us for those of you who have children,
and it is the most exciting time ever because I
guess it depends what age your kids are, you know
what I mean, Because some people maybe don't look forward

(01:17):
to summer because now you have to occupy your children
because they are of a certain age to where they're
not away in school and you have like six seven
to eight hours to you know, work, to do your thing,
and then summer comes and boom. Now you're inundated with
your children having to find activities. But that's not me.

(01:38):
It's goddamn summertime and it's time to sleep, it's time
to celebrate. We have two more days. When they were kids,
I'm one to embarrass my children. I just love doing it,
and hopefully it makes some stronger people because of it.
Or they could be an extinsive therapy. I don't know.

(02:02):
It will go one of two ways. There's no right
down the middle. But you know, I would love to
pull up blasting schools out for summer. And they hated it.
And then now you know, I got a sixteen year old,
a fourteen year old. It's horrifying for them. I mean,
it's just horrifying. They care so much about what people think,

(02:23):
as we all did when we were that age, like,
oh my god. But summers upon us very excited. It's
time to party. I got a haircut, a fresh cut, chop,
my salad. I'm ready to roll. But first, let's get
into some happiness. Let's get into some science of happiness,

(02:44):
because connecting those two things, summer makes you happy. Let's
figure out why interesting we're living in this sort of
new age, not new age, but this you know, we
are all trying to sort of find the secret sauce.
How do we stay happy of course, the ups and

(03:07):
the downs of life will happen. But how do we
consistently stay in somewhat of a frame of mind to
where we're not spewing these negative feelings and creating these
negative emotions that are only a detriment, honestly to our
physical well being. I'm always on a bit of a search.

(03:32):
I write in my journal, I do little manifestations that
I may or may not believe in, But why not
fucking give it a shot. But let's talk to Ami Sepola,
because she actually has studied this shit instead of me,
you know, spouting my certain beliefs. And she has a

(03:54):
new book out called Sovereign, And then there's a bunch
of other things like Sovereign, like how to become the
greatest human being in the world or whatever it is,
but Sovereign. Just google Sovereign and buy Sovereign. That is
the book that might change your life. Anyway, Let's bring
her on so she can educate me and everyone else
around us, maybe make this this date a little bit better. Hello, Hello, Hello,

(04:20):
how are you good? Well, I'm so glad to talk
to you. Thank you for coming on. Our friend James Dodie,
he was so awesome. We actually exchanged phone numbers. We
kind of text. Now I think we're becoming best friends.
I'm not sure.

Speaker 3 (04:38):
That's awesome. He's a really good friend to have. I
love him.

Speaker 1 (04:42):
He is.

Speaker 3 (04:42):
Yeah, we work together for many years, and yeah, he's special.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
He is. I mean, his story was really inspiring, you know,
just about sort of you know, the world of manifestation,
the neuroscience behind it, which is why I'm sort of
I'm excited to talk to you about for so many
different reasons. Number one, it holds a special place for
me as far as sort of the science of happiness

(05:09):
because this is what my mother has been sort of
researching for years and years and years now, I mean
twenty plus years. Yes, happiness has been sort of her
focus joy sort of not just the sort of existential

(05:30):
idea of it, but the actual science behind it, you know.
And to talk to someone who has actually dedicated a
lot of their lives to that is exciting because you
can actually put some data to it.

Speaker 3 (05:44):
Yeah, Yeah, I love it.

Speaker 2 (05:45):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:46):
I've been aware of her research with the meditation and
with children and yeah for a while because I've been
in that field for wellness. It's really awesome work.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
So how did you get into this? You know, I mean,
how did this all happen for you? And did it
start like this?

Speaker 3 (06:02):
Well, it started with so I grew up in Paris,
which sounds, you know, really romantic, but it's actually there's
a lot of negativity in the culture, and so growing
up there, you always think everything's always going a hell
and a hand basket. You're never good enough, nothing will
ever work out. That's kind of the thoughts that are
going on. Even as a kid. You just learned that.
And then I moved to the US for college and

(06:23):
I saw, oh, wow, like, people don't have time for
complaints here, people are more positive. I thought, I really
like this. But then I looked around and I saw, wow,
people believe I am what I do and my achievements
are essential to my identity. And I saw people burning
themselves into the ground that there's something that's still causing

(06:44):
a lot of suffering, you know, And I think we
can see that around us all the time. And then
after college, I went to China for a couple of years,
and I saw people who had absolutely nothing, and they
were freaking grateful for everything, and they were so strong,
they were so resilient, and even though having nothing, and
I was like, WHOA, like, these people have something that

(07:05):
in the West we have outer wealth, these people inner wealth.
And I saw the same in India and then I thought, okay,
I needed research this further. So then I did a
master's in East Asian Studies slash Buddhist studies at Columbia
with Bob Thurman, who you probably know about. Yeah, yeah,
and so, and that was awesome and I loved it,

(07:27):
and I thought, okay. Oh. At one point I thought
I'm gonna do a pag with him, and I thought, no,
I don't want to make this just an intellectual exercise.
And I started really getting serious about my meditation practice.
And then I thought, okay, let me do a peach
in psychology because I can do research on meditation and
whether it benefits people and show it with data and
if it does, that can help people. And so then

(07:49):
I went into I did a pH in psychology and
looked at the science of well being and compassion, and
also did studies on meditation for mental health, for well being,
and I work with veterans with trauma using breathing practices
and a lot of the things that had also helped
me because I was in New York City during nine
to eleven and I had definitely had some some trauma

(08:09):
stuff going on.

Speaker 2 (08:10):
Yeah, I was about to ask that, like, you know,
did you suffer with your own sort of anxiety depression
or sort of who am I in this big world?
This overwhelming feeling, you know, of how am I going
to make a difference? Who am I?

Speaker 3 (08:25):
You know?

Speaker 2 (08:25):
And then had to sort of utilize some of your
practices meditation to get yourself out of funks?

Speaker 3 (08:32):
Absolutely, absolutely, And I think it was it just became
really apparent after nine and eleven. Every morning at eight thirty,
I'd be sitting in my little, you know, studio apartment
on West hundred Street shaking before going out. And I
was like, all right, like something's got to change. You know.
I tried so many things. I didn't want to go
with the medication route. I did want to go with
the meditation route, but I tried a lot of things

(08:54):
that I tried, you know, you know, I was going
to the Tibet House all the time, following Bob them
around and all the Tibetan monks, hoping to gain inner
piece by osmosis, and that wasn't working. I did. I
did beagrim yoga like five times a week, and I
was strong, but I was still anxious. And then I
also was trying mindfulness, which was sort of new at

(09:15):
the time, new in the sense of Kebatsin's work had
just sort of his first books were out and not
a lot of people knew about it yet. But I
still felt like, if I just sit here and observe,
I'm just so freaking aware that I'm anxious and it's
making me crazy, you know. And I was like, this
isn't working for me. And then I stumbled into a

(09:36):
breathing practice that I learned at Columbia. Some of the
fellow students had organized this program. It's called skybreath meditation,
and I thought, I hate this. And then at the
end of the class, the teacher said, do this for
forty days and then see if it works for you.
And I said, yeah, I'm going to do this because
I don't believe you, you know, And also as a scientist,

(09:58):
I just that's how I think I'm twenty years later,
I'm still practicing every day and that's what I've done
some of my research on the breathing. So I just realized,
like poor anxiety. That was a really good practice for me,
and that's when I then connected research with veterans later on,
because I think a form of meditation.

Speaker 2 (10:18):
I mean, I think we have this idea that it's
just sitting quietly with your legs sort of cross with meditation.
And this is just my own opinion, but it can
mean so many things. I mean, I can have a
meditative experience while I'm walking, or the other day I
was running and my eyes were so focused only about
ten feet in front of me, and I almost lost

(10:40):
consciousness in the sense of I know, I'm heading in
a direction, but my mind is no longer on sort
of that direction, and I was my brain started to
move into this sort of sort of peaceful meditative place,
you know. So it's finding your meditation, your personal meditation, right, yes.

Speaker 3 (11:00):
And I think we go into meditative states throughout the day,
whether we realize it or not. And children are in
it a lot. They're so present, they're so immersed in
the moment, you know. And it's interesting though, in our
time and age, when things are moving so fast and
we're getting pinged from all sides constantly. It's like our
current modern way of life is stopping us from going

(11:23):
into those natural places of meditation that we would otherwise
go into. So which is why we kind of have
to make it a practice.

Speaker 2 (11:28):
You know. Yeah, no, I know it's so true. I mean, look,
we can't deny the future. We can't deny the evolution
of technology. It's just what it is, you know. But
I do think nature is extremely important in that balance
because the minute you get into a place where you

(11:49):
have trees, you have the ocean, you have a river,
you have a lake, and you are, you know, in
somewhat solitary place. You almost you can't help, but your
mind sort of open up and sort of wander a
little bit, and you know, find awe. It's so awe.
The word all awe used to be something I felt

(12:10):
like we had a lot of, and now it's sort
of moved away a little bit, that sort of wondrous
Oh my god, look at what we're looking at.

Speaker 3 (12:18):
You know, yeah, I mean, awe is something we could experience.
All the kids experience all the time, right all the time,
and it's like everything is amazing, Like, oh we're still
alive for another day. That's searching amazing. I mean, there's
so many things to be so in awe of and
and I love what you said about nature because you know,
the science shows that exposure to nature decreases anxiety, depression,

(12:42):
increases well being, increases creativity. So if you take like
a team, you know, people always trying to get their
team to be more innovative, and it's like, well, you're
having them sweating and sympathetic activation, stressed out at their computer.
I'm not going to get more innovative there. But if
you if you have people go into nature for three days, unplugged,
without their fall nothing, guess how much more creativity they
come back with.

Speaker 2 (13:03):
Mm hmm. Well you have no choice. Yeah, yeah, oh
oh my god. I mean you watch I have three
kids sixteen, fourteen, and eleven, you know, and we're not
crazy about technology, meaning like I'm not limiting it. I'm
sort of of the world. We're in it, do it.
But there's going to be a balance here. You're going

(13:23):
to have to get outside. You're going to have to
find something other than sitting in a room and scrolling
through TikTok. I will say though, that when they don't
have their phones, or when maybe one is lost or
something happens, your creativity just opens way up and remember
when we were kids, it's like, okay, what do we

(13:44):
do now, Oh well, let's build this and create this
and jump off of this, even though it might be dangerous,
you know. I mean, we just did so many more
things that were innovative.

Speaker 3 (13:59):
Absolutely. I mean, that's one of the reasons I wrote
my most recent books called Sovereign is just about bringing
awareness to the fact that we have there are ways
in which we're limiting our own our own well being,
but also our own potential. For example, creativity. Again not
meaning just exclude technology forever from your life, but making
sure to have boundaries with it. Like we grew up

(14:19):
in a we just grew up with phones and technology
taking over our lives without even thinking about Wait a sec,
what are healthy boundaries? And should I take some time off?
I mean, I know, for me, when i want to
write a book or like run a study where I'm
figuring out the solutions to a problem, It's going to
come to me when I'm not thinking about it, when
I'm in nature, when I'm you know, doing something other

(14:41):
than highly stressed or focused on something. In fact, research
is that it's not just if you don't have access
to nature, which a lot of people don't. Unfortunately, then
even having a plant on your desk, and if you
don't have a window, even having a screensaver or poster
has an impact on your well being. That's just how
people wired.

Speaker 2 (15:01):
We are for it. Okay, love, oh my god, totally.
I mean, if we're going back to sort of primal man,
I mean, it's just in our dna. I mean, I
think that's why. I mean, I can only speak for myself,
but when I actually get into nature, something happens physically
to me that I can feel, you know, and it's

(15:23):
probably I think you can say a lot of people
feel that way, and I think it's just sort of
this unconscious reconnection with something primal. I want to go
back real quick to the breathing because I'm interested in that.
I've been. I've sort of suffered. I guess you can

(15:45):
say the word with anxiety since my twenties, and I'm
sure even before that without the recognition of it. I
am on medication, I'm on lexapro. I have been meditating,
but not consistently enough of the practice of mindfulness because
I firsthand know how it can sort of affect me

(16:06):
in the most positive way. But it's not. It's it's
it's much more difficult than people sort of say. It's
it's not easy to follow and to actually practice. So
this breathing I'm interested in. What was it called against sky?

Speaker 3 (16:20):
It's called sky breath Menita.

Speaker 2 (16:21):
How does how does it work?

Speaker 3 (16:23):
Yeah? So it's so it's a practice that originally stems
from India. I don't know if you've heard of Grudev
Rabbie Shankar. He's like an Indian Yes, yes, yoga master,
and so he started teaching this I think like forty
years ago and now you can just learn it online
a couple of sessions. It's a series of breathing practices
and that when they come together. What our research I

(16:46):
can tell you, I mean, I know I feel better
when I do. It helped me with my anxiety and trauma.
And then from a scientific perspective, I can tell you
what we what we see.

Speaker 2 (16:54):
I loved that because I want to get into the
science of all of this as well.

Speaker 3 (16:57):
Yes, definitely, so what we found. So we worked with
veterans who for whom traditional treatments hadn't worked, and we
know that for people with post traumatic stress or veterans
with post traumatic stress. The therapeutic approach wasn't always something
that they could complete or that was successful for them,
including the pharmaceutical approach as well, or they didn't want
to do the therapy, they didn't want to do the meds.

(17:18):
So what we ended up seeing was so many veterans
are dropping out of these studies and then, sadly you've
probably heard about the suicide rate is really high. Gosh,
it's so sad because you know, yeah, they basically just
sort of handed their life over to you know, and
then they come back and they can't really make it through.
So it's really sad. And so I thought, you know,

(17:39):
the breathing worked for me and traum and I know
it had worked for other people and survivals of the
tsunami and so forth. There was a couple of research studies,
so I thought, you know, let's do this, and we
ran this study over a week. So we had one
group of veterans who did the learned the breathing, and
one group veterans who did not. And what we found
is that over the course of one week, their anxiety
normalized and it was just you know, with the questionnaire

(18:02):
like you feel less like it was also physiologically, so
we put them in a situation where they're sitting in
a room with the lights turning on and off and
like blasts of white noise coming, which is mildly annoying
if you don't have trauma, but if you do, it
can be very lead to kind of a large startle
response in the body. And we saw that the more

(18:22):
their anxiety improved, the less they respond they had an
anxiety response. We're seeing at the physiological level a shift.
And then most recently we ran a second study with
a larger group of veterans with the Palo Alta via
and they found that it's at least as good as
the gold standard therapy or post traumatic stress, but even

(18:43):
more powerful at the level of the brain with regard
to ability to regulate your emotions. So again from a
scientific perspective, you know. And again we ran the study
at Yale as well, not with veterans but with Yale students,
and we want to see which well being intervention is
most powerful. Is it the breathing or We did a
mindfulness based stress reduction class, and then we did an

(19:03):
emotional intelligence class and a control group, so the students
would do one of those and we found that the
breathing had the best results. And what we think is
happening is it's almost like you're reprogramming your nervous system.
And if you think about it, like in our day
and age, we're programmed to be in sympathetic so we're
programmed to be in fight or flight, m Like, that's
what our modern life is conditioning us for, starting with

(19:28):
coffee in the morning, you know, it just starting with that,
but then go go go stimulation, you know. And also
this sort of addiction to a dread. I it's one
of the things I write about my new book. It's
we're almost addicted to adrenaline. We're almost it's a high,
it's definitely a high. And it's we think I can't
get anything done unless I'm in the state, although we're
really only supposed to be there like one percent of

(19:49):
five percent of our life, you know, if we want it,
like anyway, we can go into that. But in any case,
what this breathing seems to do from a scientific perspective,
what we're seeing is it to condition your you for
to be in a balanced state, so you're you're coming
back to a more parasympathetic state. But also with regards
to trauma, what the veterans report is I remember what happened,

(20:12):
but I can move on. So in the case of
post traumatic stress, it's as if that trauma is right
in front of you, so you're afraid to go into
them all because it's a crowded place, and in crowded
places you experienced an attack or whatever. Right, So, or
if you could think about, oh, I'm in a new relationship,
but I have trauma from the last relationship, so I'm
scared in this relationship, you know. And so what it

(20:33):
seems to be doing is something we call memory reconsolidation.
So when you have trauma, you're you're remembering. Let's see,
you have a car accident, right, and you remember that
car accident, and you could think, oh, you know, I'm
over the car accident. But then whenever you're in a car,
you get at your heart starts beating and you're in

(20:53):
this fight or flight activation. So it's the memory is
attached to your body being stressed. Does that make sense?
And that's in a sense a way you could think
of post traumatic stress. But what happened with the breathing
is that they could have the memory but without their
whole body hijacking the moment. It's like when you've seen

(21:14):
a movie that's scary, You're like, yeah, that was scary,
but you're not scared now anymore. That's how a memory
should be, right, But in trauma, it's like, no, the
trauma's still here. Twenty five years later, I'm still here.
I'm still in the trauma. And that's what it seems
to be, sort of rep normalizing your nervous system and
thereby so we call it memory reconsolidation, or this idea

(21:34):
of being able to shift the relationship.

Speaker 2 (21:37):
Do you have to use thought a thought process when
you are doing this breathing or is it just taking
care of itself.

Speaker 3 (21:46):
It's taking care of itself, which is really good because
the veterans they just first of all, they had a
real show me attitude. They were just doing the study
for the money. They're like, I'm just here for the money.
This isn't going to work. And second of all, I
think they were shying away from all cognitive like you know,
rethink this rethink, it's just a lot, you know, and
we also know that you know, there's this idea in

(22:09):
psychology sort of change your thoughts, change your life, you know,
and that's okay, But if you're dealing with big trauma
or big emotion, it's not going to work because when
you have a big trauma, you're at migdala is activated
that the emotion centers are activated. You don't have access
to your ability to think clearly. We know that that's
what neuroscience shows. So change your thoughts, change your life

(22:30):
maybe works. If you're upset about a parking ticket. It's
not going to work if you're upset because you just
found yourselfs.

Speaker 2 (22:34):
Cheating on you, right right, Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I
know because I went through you know, stilling CBT, you know,
cognitivile therapy, and I really loved it. It made the
most sense to me. It was very active therapy. Yeah,
but it has to be paired with sort of more
of a mindful practice as well. Yes, And then of

(22:54):
course I subscribed to the ball of fire theory, which
is my own, which is this earth. We're all going
to be a flaming ball of fire at some point,
So what does it all really matter? I know that
sounds nihilistic, but at the same time, it's like we
have all, we create, all of these problems you know,
that are catastrophized and actually based in no reality yet

(23:19):
because we're projecting, and that projection actually physically makes us
feel pain, whether it be short of breath, whatever sort
of you know, stress pains that you have and you're
hurting your body physically by creating total bullshit. Yeah, and
then when you think, well, why do I care so much?

(23:41):
You know, in a million years or whatever, but civilization
will no longer exist where you know, sometimes that makes
me feel better. But what is the breathing? What is
the actual practice like of this specific style of breathing?

Speaker 3 (23:57):
Yeah, so I recommend learning it from an instructor.

Speaker 2 (24:00):
Don't give you yeah, just a basic Yeah.

Speaker 3 (24:03):
It starts with a series of different panama similar to
what you might learn in yoga class, but a little
bit more extensive. And then it has a rhythmic breathing
that goes in a certain pattern and it's guided, so
you're guided through it when you do the class.

Speaker 2 (24:18):
M M. You could probably find it on YouTube right now, right,
I mean, so.

Speaker 3 (24:22):
I wouldn't recommend YouTube because I don't know what they're
putting out there, but I would learn it from a
trained instructor. Just because you want to do it, learn
it the right way. That's at least what our research.
We've only done research on that. Like the actual you
can learn it through the nonprofit car Art of Living.
You could just it's like a zoom two or three
sessions in a row something like that.

Speaker 2 (24:43):
Yeah, great, amazing.

Speaker 3 (24:45):
Yeah, but I can teach you a really short breathing
practice that's like a mini mini practice that you could
just you know it.

Speaker 2 (24:53):
I think this is important too, even for me. I
mean I would say selfishly want it, but you know,
I think a lot of people, obviously, as we know,
especially today, a lot of people are struggling with some
sort of a mental health situation, even if it's even
if it's minor, even if it is you know, anxiety
or a bit of depression or where am I? Who
am I? Why? Where all these things? And if you

(25:13):
can even just sort of have a mini practice or
something that can bring you back to center, even if
for that moment, so then the it's almost like you're
building confidence in yourself to regulate. It's not necessarily about
this idea that you are going to be regulated forever,
but when you sort of move off kilter a little bit,

(25:36):
you're like, Okay, I'm not going to spiral into this
whole of anxiety because I know I have a tool
to bring me back to center.

Speaker 3 (25:44):
Yes, you know completely, absolutely, So you know I think
sometimes it helps to know the science behind it. So
when you when you inhale, your heart rate is increasing,
when you exhale its slowing down. So if you breathe,
do you want me to guide to your practice or just.

Speaker 2 (26:00):
Discussed I'm going to do it right now.

Speaker 3 (26:03):
Okay, So all right, so just close your eyes for
a moment, and I just want you to just tap
in and notice how you feel at this moment so
that you can see how you'll feel after. So you
can notice sort of how your body feels any areas
of looseness or tension. Can also notice, you know, your
thought traffic, so just notice if there's a lot of

(26:24):
thoughts coming in, are not so many, And then you
can also notice how you feel your emotional state. And
then we're gonna shift or breathing. So we're going to
breathe in and try to breathe through your nose and
have your hands on your lap palm spacing up because
it's just an easy You're going to be able to
breathe deeper that way. So we're going to breathe through

(26:45):
the nose. Breathe in two three four, hold and breathe
out two three four, five, six seven eight. Breathe in
two three four, fill your lungs, hold and breathe out

(27:07):
two three four, five, six seven eight. A couple more
times deep, breath in, fold at the top, and breathe
out for twice as long as you breathe in five
six seven eight deep, breath in two three four, holds

(27:31):
and breathe out two three four, five, six seven eight,
and do two more on your own, knowing that as
you're breathing out, because you're lengthening that exhale, you're starting
to slow down the heart rate. And as you do that,
you're tapping into your parasympathetic nervous system, which is the
calming response, the opposite of the fight or flight. And

(27:56):
after this next exhale, it can just relax, keep your
eyes closed, just notice any shifts and how you feel
and the traffic in your mind, and when you're ready
you can open your eyes.

Speaker 2 (28:15):
Mm hmm, yeah, totally feel it. Yeah, yeah, one hundred percent,
I mean one million percent. This is sort of what
I do sometimes to go to sleep, you know, without
even really knowing it. Yeah, you just I don't. I mean,

(28:37):
if anything just feels like you've got more oxygen going
into your brain, it clearly feels a little clearer, a
little lighter, you know exactly.

Speaker 3 (28:45):
Yeah, And that's you know, I just feel like that's
in our sovereignty, Like that's inner wealth. You know. We
talk about outer wealth. We talk about mental health. It's
like this is you know, we have the ability. It's free,
it's at our fingertips. It's ancient, you know, it's the
one thing we've been doing since we were born, and
we'll do till we die. Like if you're alive, you're breathing,
you know. Doesn't work with the veterans too. It was like,

(29:07):
it doesn't matter if you're a wounded wet veteran, if
you you know, are injured, but if you're alive, you're breathing.

Speaker 2 (29:13):
Yeah. So explain the title because I love it, you know,
because it's freedom essentially, right, I mean, is that kind
of the idea behind it, or you know, explain that
title a little bit why, you.

Speaker 3 (29:26):
Know, Yeah, And I think we often think about outer freedom,
like let me let me have, you know, what I
need to be sovereign on the outside, like let me
have my own house, in my own bank, accountant, this
and that. It's like, well, that's all fine and good
and it's great. But if on the inside you're feeling bound,
you you're not feeling free, then that's only part of

(29:49):
the you know, part of the equation. And on the
other hand, when you have that inner sovereignty, then you
have almost everything that you need, you know. And I
think for myself, I just saw how easy it is
for us to fall for thought patterns, behaviors, compulsions in
our life that are actually standing in the way of
our own freedom. I'll give you an example. So I

(30:11):
teach leaders at the Yale School of Management, teach executives
and Vijillie's talented people that come in and also some
of the students, and I see that the biggest thing
standing in their way is their relationship with themselves. For example,
if I ask an audience how many of you are
self critical, ninety five percent of them raise their hand.
If you look at it from a psychological perspective, self

(30:32):
criticism is self loathing. It's so powerful. It's self loathing
you know, and some people are like, whoa, this is
self critical, you know, essential for self improvement. It's like
self awareness is being like, oh I suck at statistics?
Is that self awareness? Right? But self criticism is beating
yourself up, is feeling shame, not feeling good enough. Eighty

(30:53):
percent of millennials endorse the idea I'm not good enough
with regards to almost every area of their life. If
you think about that, it's so heartbreaking.

Speaker 2 (31:02):
What do you attribute that to?

Speaker 3 (31:04):
I think I call it like viral, toxic viral programming,
Like it's it's runs in families, it runs in communities,
it runs in societies, it's running rampant, and it's something that,
when you look at the research, leads to anxiety, depression, burnout,
fear of failure, less willingness to try again, basically the
opposite of resilience. And yet if you have the so

(31:27):
if you are able to have a life affirming relationship
with yourself, like sky's the limit. So whenever I ask
that question to the audiences I speak to, there's one
or two people who are not self critical. And when
I when you look at those people, they're so freaking powerful.
They are so powerful it's like, Wow, you have a
life affirming relationship with yourself. It doesn't mean that they're
like ego driven or all self centered. It just means

(31:50):
that they have the kind of relationship with themselves that
they would have with their best friends. That's support it.
You know. I often think about that, like, how are
you going to show up on the battlefield of your life?
Are you going to show up, you know, are you
going to show up wounded because you kicked your way there?
Or are you going to show up brand spanking your
armor because you loved your way there? You know?

Speaker 2 (32:19):
How would you sort of explain or tell the difference
between delusion and sort of just a strong sense of
self worth, Like you're talking about meaning, oh, I can
do nothing wrong because I have so much self love
that no I can do this. I can do that.
I have the ultimate compassion and forgiveness for myself. So

(32:40):
now I'm going to take advantage of that and just
sort of you know what I mean, Yeah, because I
feel like that probably could happen.

Speaker 3 (32:50):
You know, it could happen. I mean I think that
oftentimes the people who've met who have that inner sovereignty
also very humble, you know, because when you're aware, when
you're deeply aware of yourself. So by that self compassionate
relationship with yourself is one in which you are you
care for yourself. Like I think the best analogy is

(33:11):
if you have kids. You have kids, right, and yeah,
you're aware of Oh, when was the last time the
kid ate? Or I mean now they're older, but when
there's when.

Speaker 2 (33:19):
Less they still no matter what you're like, dude, what
did you eat? Did you eat? Why are you eating
total dog shit? You've just consumed eight billion calories of
ultra processed food. Do you realize how bad that is
for you?

Speaker 3 (33:30):
Dad?

Speaker 2 (33:30):
I'm fine, I'm young. Look at my muscles. I'm like,
I don't care about your muscle. So, yes, I still
have these conversations, right, you're.

Speaker 3 (33:39):
Aware like when is that time they ate? When is
that time they slept? They get enough reast like you know,
And it's really just about when we have that nurturing
relationship with ourselves. And it also means being deeply honest
with yourself, you know. But the three tenets of self compassion,
the research shows one is to be able to treat
yourself like you would a friend. So I often asked

(33:59):
this question, like, what did you say to yourself the
last time you made a cringe worthy mistake? And people
will often say things like you're such an idiot or worse,
like really awful things. When you look at it, you're like,
this is so heartbreaking. This is how people talk to themselves.
But when I ask, okay, so what would you say
to your best friend who made the same mistake? They say,
You're okay, You've got this. Everyone makes mistakes, no big deal,

(34:21):
Like it's just so so kind, you know. And when
you think about it from a research perspective, those people
will have a more self compassionate relationship. They end up
with much better mental health, they have better relationships. If
you're hard on yourself, you're also hardest on the people
you love the most to unhurt the least. Yeah, they
have better sleep, they have better cognitive abilities. I mean,

(34:41):
the list goes on.

Speaker 2 (34:43):
Sticking with that real quickly though, the science behind that,
because I love that, and I you know, you were
I think, and I don't. I'm not a scientist and
anyway whatsoever. But I assume that when you were having
these positive affirmations, when you have self compassion and self
forgiveness and you do speak to yourself like you are
your best friend. I'm assuming that even chemicals, dopamine, all

(35:08):
of these things are probably serotonin released because you are
having a healthy, positive relationship, right. I guess my question
is the science behind that when you all have self love?
Is there actual physical evidence behind your brain and the
chemistry that that goes on.

Speaker 3 (35:27):
I love that you think like a scientist. I love
that you asked that, because what self compassion researchers have
positive is that when you have a more self compassionate
relationship with yourself, it's like you're in this. You create
a more nurturing relationship that puts you back in the parasympathetic.
Our conversation keeps going back to that, like it's all
about how do we come back to there? Because when
we're in parasympathetic, that's when we show up as our

(35:48):
most creative. We're the best decision makers, we're more emotionally intelligence,
we're healthier, we sleep better, you know, we have better
immune system, and the list goes on and again. So
you know, reclaiming your inner sovereignty. Yes, life has its stressors.
You're going to base financial stressors, relationship stressors, help stressors.

Speaker 2 (36:05):
Whatever out of doubt. Yeah, I mean, yeah, of course.

Speaker 3 (36:08):
Yeah, But let's not add to it. Let's not add
all the other layers that are preventing you from them
being as resilient as you possibly could be when those
situations arise.

Speaker 2 (36:20):
So let's go through an example. Okay, let's just take
finances for a second. Okay, I'm I, I don't know
if I want to make my rent and I'm having
the stress. You know, kids are healthy, everything's good, but
holy fuck, how do you sort of reframe that in
order to you know, have better self talk when the
reality is like I don't know if I'm going to

(36:41):
make rent a real life problem, you know.

Speaker 3 (36:45):
Yeah, So in those situations, which are difficult situations, if
you can bring your own mind back to a place
of greater peace in your nervous system, back to that place,
you're able to think more clearly. So back to the
sort of idea we were talking about before. You know,
when do we get our best ideas or able to
ability to think clearly, It's when our nervous system is

(37:08):
more relaxed. And if you think about like when for yourself,
if you're working on a problem or trying to think
of a solution to something. When do you come up
with your best.

Speaker 2 (37:17):
Ideas mm hmm, Yeah, when you least expect it, Honestly,
when you're at your most sort of even state.

Speaker 3 (37:24):
Yeah, like what kind of activities.

Speaker 2 (37:27):
Again, running? I mean my brain rolls when I'm sort
of in an exercise mode, when I am sort of daydreaming.
You know, I have a very creative brain. I probably
have some sort of ADHD, but in the best possible way,
you know, because it allows me to sort of relax

(37:47):
into myself and my brain will just wander and not
think about all of these sort of things I need
to accomplish in that day.

Speaker 3 (37:55):
Yes, you know exactly. So when you go in those spaces,
your brain is an alpha wave mode, which means, which
research has shown, is when we're most likely to get
our aha moments of insight or innovation, like is happening
for you? And those moments come not when you're in
this highly stressed or focused mode, but when you are
allowing your mind to be in this You can think

(38:15):
of it as a meditative state of mind.

Speaker 2 (38:16):
Mm hmm, exactly.

Speaker 3 (38:18):
Yeah, And in that moment you so the outer stresses
are there, but and yet when you're able to do things,
whether it's breathing, meditation, going in nature and calm yourself down.
You're able to think more clearly, You're able to make
better decisions. You're able to come up with innovative solutions
you wouldn't have come up with before. And I always think, gosh,

(38:38):
if we keep always stay hooked in this high adrenaline
mode no matter what, we are preventing ourselves from coming
up with the most innovative solutions that we have and
reclaiming your sovereignty with regards. So that is engaging in
some of these practices that are allowing you or to
do that. You know, and people will roll over in
the morning and the first thing they look at is

(38:59):
their phone. It's like every moment that you're highly focused,
you're taking away from your ability to come up with
those innovative solutions that would otherwise arise in the early
morning hours when maybe things are slower.

Speaker 2 (39:10):
Yeah, everyone does that. I fucking do it too. It's
like I get up, grab the phone. I mean, it's horrible.

Speaker 3 (39:19):
It's interesting. See how like in the positive sense, we
can think of it as let me carve out some time,
which you do when you're running. It sounds like when
you're running, you're not also looking at your phone or
listening to something necessarily. Yeah, so let me make sure
that in my day I have these moments in which
I am allowing for the alpha wave mode in my brain,
you know, at whatever time. And if you think about it,

(39:41):
that's why kids are so innovative, they're so genius. And
the reason is because they are in that space a lot,
you know, unless you give an iPad at ah two
you know what I mean, And they're constantly in there.
But otherwise, like my kids are constantly pulling all this
stuff out of the recycling bent to build stuff, you know. Yeah,
and right my last night, my kid is like, I
want to write I'm running a book.

Speaker 2 (39:59):
Mom.

Speaker 3 (39:59):
I get back to my I got to write this book.
And you know, sky's the limit and that's all of
our potential.

Speaker 2 (40:07):
No, I know what it almost feels like too, because
you're a parent, right, So it's like we have this
next generation that is honestly probably first or second generation
that is truly growing up on the technology that is today,
you know, and how to sort of maintain that that

(40:30):
creativity or to keep that that creativity going now, not
to say that it's all bad, meaning technology is definitely
you know, my kids are more entrepreneurial. They're like, Okay,
how do I sell things? I want to make money?
What if I create this online sort of store and
put some of my old stuff on there. I mean,
you know, there is the positive elements to that, but

(40:51):
as far as sort of you know, maintaining or you know,
keeping that primal creativity that has to do with building
you know that, you know, what if I do this
and put this together, you know, how do we how
do we keep that? Is it just by taking this
away from them and saying go outside? You know?

Speaker 3 (41:14):
I mean in a way, That's why I've been writing
about this, because it's like a cry for like our
planet in many ways of sinking ship. It's like, we
need innovation, we need creativity, We need brilliant solutions, and
we can have them and we can get them, and
our next generation is definitely gonna be doing some of that.
And it's that's having that awareness because what the research
shows that is in the last twenty years, creativity kids,

(41:38):
creativity has been plummeting. It's not just because of technology,
because prior to like ten years ago, you know, there's
certain amount of generations that didn't have technology right at
their fingertips all the time. But it was also because
in school we're prioritizing logic and reason and so forth,
which is great, like you need to be able to
think and write clearly, but we have not and allowed

(42:01):
there to be emphasis also on the other modalities of thinking.
In fact, I have a whole chapter on intuition in
my book because we could think of intuition.

Speaker 2 (42:09):
Yes, intuition, you reminded me, that's another thing I wanted
to hit upon before we finish this intuition.

Speaker 3 (42:16):
Yeah, so keep going, Well, there's this thought, oh, intuition's
magical things like well, actually, you know, if you look
at the data, it's these aha moments are also you
could think of as moments of intuition or insight. And
you know, like Albert Einstein, he knew how to tap
into this. He would go and listen to or play

(42:36):
Mozart and he knew that was and he would see
he would say intuition is a maybe misquoting, but it's
like intuition is a divine gift and reason is a
faithful servant. We've created a society where we honor the
servant and have thrown away the gift. So for him,
he would get these insights like downloads insights and then

(42:57):
he would go and work on it and write the
paper or you know, do the study or whatever. But
in our society we've just we've completely not made room
even in education for those moments of insight. So the
little little kids still have oftentimes they'll come up with
something creative, but as of you know, eleven, twelve thirteen,
if you're not prioritizing that or giving kids the ability

(43:20):
to be in that day dreaming mode. I mean, I
remember as a kid just sitting in the bus going
home and just daydreaming, what else is I going to do?

Speaker 2 (43:27):
Right?

Speaker 3 (43:27):
But that's when you're also coming up with your brain
is an active problem solving mode when you think you're idle.
And I think in the US particular, our culture here
values doing doing doing, but in that process we devalue
those moments. You know, most Americans have very little vacation
and they don't even take it, and of those who

(43:48):
do take it, they're checking their email, so it's just
like checking their work email, you know. But in so doing,
we have stopped ourselves from being as innovative as we
could be.

Speaker 2 (44:00):
Yeah, So I want to get back to intuition, but
first I wanted to hit upon sort of India China
what you talked about in the very beginning, because I
went to India when I was nineteen years old. I
was there for three weeks, and you know, it was
definitely life altering in the sense of sort of being,

(44:20):
you know, a young man and seeing you know, a
different culture that I had never experienced before, and coming
back with this sense of wow. Like you said, these
people a lot of them have absolutely nothing, but the
joy and sort of the happiness, you know, was just

(44:41):
you know, penetrating. I was like, whoa, what do you
attribute that to from a cultural standpoint, from a scientific standpoint,
and when you're talking about China, when you're talking about India,
and then you're sort of relating that to the US,
where everything is like consume, consume, consume. How do we
breach the top?

Speaker 3 (45:00):
They may not, especially if you see that the poorer communities,
they may not have any much materially, but they have
each other community. We see that also from a cultural
research perspective in lower socioeconomic status groups in the US,
is that the lower socioeconomic status, the more connected to

(45:20):
one another. But there's the community as that. There's also
the gratitude and I think see that a lot in India,
Like they get a new car and they'll like do
a pooja in it and a prayer of gratitude in
the car. Like there's I could be one day a
year where they like celebrate their cars and their vehicles
and there's just this gratitude for everything that research shows

(45:40):
gratitude is one of the best kept secrets to happiness
because especially you know, in our society, research shows that
three times more positive things than negative things happen to
us every day. But what are we focusing on? Oh
that nasty email I got or oh I didn't sleep
well last night? Well, do you have a roof over
your head? Do you have a meal? Like are you

(46:01):
able to engage with the world and you know whatever,
and some way you're doing really really well, but we can't.
And that was how it was in France. You know,
it was like someone was telling me this the other day.
It's like in France, everybody lives in heaven but thinks
they live in hell. Well, if you think you live
in hell, doesn't matter where you live, you know what
I mean. Yeah, And I was there's a woman that
I talk about in my book called Nazarene and Sheik,

(46:23):
who's incredible. She she grew up in the sweatshop sweatshops
of Katmandus, who's the child slave, so really intense story. Anyway,
she lives in the US now and I have the
privilege of meeting her the other day and I was
talking to her and she's like, yeah, I'm she's just
like a Nepal they have nothing, but there's so much joy.
And she's like, come here and people have everything, but
they're empty inside. And it's profound to hear that from her.

(46:47):
So yeah, So there's I think there's the community aspect,
and there's this a gratitude aspect. And I think India
and also in China I saw this. They have this
long tradition millennia of about this inner sovereignty aspect. And
here we're like, like you said, just buy this, look
like this, do this, whatever, and then you'll be happy.

(47:08):
And it's like I was just actually touring some houses
last week because I'm thinking of moving somewhere, and I
walked through the houses, these really nice houses, and I
was like, wow, everything is perfect, like everything is decorated perfectly.
And I got me wondering, like, here, we decorate our
houses perfectly, what about the inner what about the inner mansion?

(47:28):
What's that look like? You know, we don't think about that.
We don't talk about wisdom in our society. That's not
something that's sexy. It's like, oh what, But you know
in other cultures that's always been part of the it's
always been part of the conversation.

Speaker 2 (47:42):
Yeah, I love that. That's then internew book like your
inner mansion. That's it. No, it's so true. I mean
it is so true. I mean it's funny because you
hear about it all the time. I mean it's nothing new, Like,
you know, money can't buy you happiness all these things.
But when you're attaching sort of you know, actual science

(48:02):
to it is what my mom was as achieved and
has been trying to achieve for twenty years with children especially,
you know, it just it validates it a little more
over because you know, people are less apt to sort
of it's like, oh, what is this woo woo crap basically,
But when you're like, no, look, look, here's a picture
of your brain. And here's what happens when you have gratitude.

(48:24):
Here's what happens when you have self compassion and you
can forgive yourself and you are creating that inner mansion.
You know, here's an actual study. And then on the
flip side of it, here's what happens to your brain
when you self loath and self hate and you're just
living in this state of negativity and selfishness and selfishness.

(48:45):
And when you can see that scientifically, how can it
not sort of bring on a change? And it feels
like mindfulness, meditation, you know, it feels like there is
a shift. But there's three hundred plus million people in
this country, so it's going to be hard to shift
the whole country. But yeah, one at a time.

Speaker 3 (49:03):
We're getting spent these messages though. This like every marketing
agent in the world who's directed at your segment of
the population is hitting you home with like, look like this,
buy this, achieve this, do this, become wealthy, become powerful,
become famous, become whatever the things, and it's like and
so that goes into the mindset. But I was talking
to this seventeen year old the other day who's been
meditating since he's eight. I said, hey, do you feel

(49:26):
different from your from your friends? And he's like it's like, yeah,
you know, I kind of see through stuff. My friends
they want big car, big house. And I'm like, he's like,
I'm just really interested in like science, and like he's
just interested in like he's curious. But he's like he's
like I kind of see through things. And he wasn't.
He was humble, quiet, he wasn't like showing off. But
it was like, Wow, if we can help people like

(49:47):
your mom, like we can help kids see through all that,
you know. Actually, in my in my book, I interviewed
a colonel in the Air Force whose job it was
to brainwash the enemy. Okay, so he was brainwashing the
tet that I'm through messaging and so forth, and so
I said, WHOA, Like, how do you sort of walk

(50:10):
around your world, you know, because you're someone who crafts
messaging and manipulate people's minds. He's like, oh, I always
look for intent. And I was like, well, how do
you teach your kids that? And he's like, well, when
we go through the grocery aisle and we get to that,
like if the kid wants something like say unhealthy cereal.
I'll be like, oh, why do you want that? And
then the kid'll be like, because look at the box
is like so cute and stand all these little characters

(50:31):
on it, and he's like, oh yeah, why do you
think that's like that?

Speaker 2 (50:34):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (50:34):
Because it's fun makes me fun. I want to play
with the box, I want to look at it. And
it's like, okay, so what.

Speaker 2 (50:40):
Do you think.

Speaker 3 (50:40):
Why do you think they made a box like that
so kids would like it? You know, it's like training
the kid to see through stuff. I thought that was
pretty cool.

Speaker 2 (50:48):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean I'm in the middle
of it.

Speaker 1 (50:51):
You know.

Speaker 2 (50:51):
Again, we live in this TikTok culture where it is
literally creating clones. I see my child on the street
eighty times a day with the same hair and the
pants and the whole thing. I'm like, holy shit. I
mean it's nutty. And then all the trends, All of
a sudden, everyone wants cologne. All of a sudden, everyone
wants this. I mean, it's unbelievable to see how it

(51:13):
happens in a large group setting. It's not an individual choice.
It's just following these trends that are being fed to you.
Through social media, and it's a little bit scary. You know,
it's like, well, individuates yourself, you know, maybe get a
different haircut. But it's like Dad, like you don't get it.

(51:34):
And then again it's about sort of oh, I want
to wear these clothes or you know, it's a definite material,
materialistic sort of world that we're living in right now.
And it's I always give give them shit about it,
but they're like, you don't get it, old man. I
mean they call me you know what I mean, And
I'm like, okay, it's the need.

Speaker 3 (51:55):
To go along. Also, we have a fundamental after food
and shelter, it's our greatest need. And of course as
teenagers it's going to be very very at the forefront.
They need to belong. Yeah, but it's interesting because so
you know, going back to what you're saying earlier about
the research, so when you when you look the brain,
when you get something for yourself, it increases dopamine for

(52:18):
a little bit, not for very long, but for a
little bit. But when you're giving to others, it increases.
It makes you happier than when you receive, and it
sustains the level of happiness. So you know, when we
live a lifestyle, it's just all about me, myself and
I and like getting the big check, getting the whatever material,
whatever things that leads to these little dope bursts of dopamine.

(52:41):
But they don't last. So we're on this treadmill craving
more world or more and it never satisfying. And yet
when you are engaged in compassionate activity or service activity
or doing something for others, we all know what it
feels like. I feel the helpers high, you know, at
on point, there's nothing better. And what the research shows
is at the level of the brain that sustained well
being and those people live longer have lower inflammation. Like

(53:04):
it's really amazing.

Speaker 2 (53:06):
Yes, I totally yeah. I mean I volunteered the children's
hospital for a few years and I was heavily involved
and it was an incredible feeling, you know, and it's
something I need to get back to because we become
so inundated in ourselves. How are we going to advance?
We but you know, in a reasonable way too. I
think it's self preservation. I need to provide for my family.

(53:28):
I need to make sure that they have shelter and
they have food and all the basics you know, and
you know you've created a certain lifestyle for yourself, you
have to maintain that lifestyle. You know. I do think
that at times you forget to sort of put yourself
in the give back mode.

Speaker 1 (53:43):
You know.

Speaker 3 (53:44):
That balance is key.

Speaker 2 (53:45):
Yeah, it really is. It really is something that I
need to work on, to be honest.

Speaker 3 (53:51):
Well, and if I can summarize the signs of happiness
in one sentence, that's how I would summarize it. The
happiest people who live the most fulfilled lives, but also
the most healthiest, longest lives are the ones who balance
compassion for others with self compassion. That balance is profound,
you know. And one of my favorite research studies looked

(54:12):
that people who had been really stressed, so who had
gone through a very stressful life experience like war or
something like that, and those people usually live shorter lives
because stress shortens your life, especially a high intensity trauma
like that. And yet my colleagues found this subgroup of
people within this group that were like living forever. It
was like, why are these people living so long? It

(54:33):
doesn't make any sense. Yeah. I turned out all those people,
in some way were engaged in compassionate service. Oriented activity.

Speaker 2 (54:39):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (54:40):
Didn't mean they were doing anything crazy like drawling to
Africa and feeding orphans, but and that preserved their life
and erased the effect of the trauma. It's amazing.

Speaker 2 (54:49):
Yeah, that's the lesson here. Everyone go do something for
somebody else. I mean, even if it's small, you know,
it doesn't have to be this huge thing that's going
to take all of your time. I mean, just even
the small little things. I were coming to the end.
This has been so much fun. But I definitely want
to hit on intuition for a second, because you know,
I said, it's it's it feels magic, meaning I think

(55:12):
people have stronger intuitions than others. I feel like I
have a strong intuition maybe reading somebody in the first
few minutes of getting to know them and being correct,
you know. I think that might and this is my
own self analysis, but it might have It has to
do with my own work and sort of my own

(55:32):
psychology and wanting to learn about who I am, why
I am, who I am, the human condition in general
as related to me. I feel like I have some
insight just because of that. But when you talk about intuition,
it's that feeling of I have a feeling, and I

(55:53):
think you right that that's usually the right feeling or
that first instinct is correct one, Am I right in
saying that?

Speaker 3 (56:02):
So to answer you know all the things you said,
First of all, some people are Research shows some people
do tend to be more intuitive if they have this,
if they tend to have more what we call it
openness to experience. So, given that you've shared about you
being naturally a very creative person and having that, research
shows you do have a propensity to being more intuitive.

(56:24):
But everyone does have a certain level of intuition, and
it can be fostered and nurtured through things like meditation.
But you also do. But what neuroscience shows is that
when you're making a decision that's complicated, going with your
gut feeling is going to lead to a better decision
than if you were to try and analyze all the pieces.
Let's say you know your phone is broken, should you

(56:46):
buy a new one? That's not a complicated decision, right,
I mean, finances could be an issue, but like, it's
not a complicated decision. There's a problem, you got to
fix it. But let's say, hey, you got this job
in another city. You'll have to move schools, you have
to buggleld a new house, don't get into a new community.
It's going to impact your spouse's job, like all this
other stuff, and you're weighing a lot of things. Then
research shows that going with your gut feeling is going

(57:09):
to tend to make them You're going to make a
better decision. That's what. Yeah, that's what the data shows.
And the military has actually been studying intuition for decades now,
and it was made fun of it in a movie
called Men Who Stare at Goats. I don't know if
you're heard that movie.

Speaker 2 (57:21):
Yeah, yeah, But since then, yeah.

Speaker 3 (57:24):
Yeah, they've created they've launched a new research study because
so many veterans were coming back from Afghanistan and Iraqs saying, yeah,
I just had a feeling I shouldn't go down that road,
and like save their lives, so the lives of others,
and you know, it's it's something we've all experienced. My
friend Krishnel was in the Twin Towers during nine to
eleven and the guards were saying stay inside, and he

(57:47):
had this instinct to run, and he ran and he
saved his life by a hair. You know what, we're
trained out of it. How many people also had that
feeling but thought to stay because they wanted to obey orders.
You know, we're taught just listen, talk, you know, pay
attention to the voices outside of you. But we actually
are wired physiologically with a cognitive ability that we're still

(58:10):
you know, in the we're still researching this idea of intuition.
But what it shows is that it's designed to save
our lives.

Speaker 2 (58:17):
Yeah, no, it's it's so interesting. I definitely want to
go down that path a little bit more once the
research just becomes more available and more in tuned and
fine tuned, you know, because intuition seems like can be
clouded and muddied with fear as well. And I only
you know, which is not a true intuition. So I

(58:37):
can only say that because I had a fear of flying.
I don't much anymore, but I had a real fear
of flying, and it would be like, my intuition is
telling me don't get on the plane because it's going
to fucking crash, and that's of course not true. But
I am almost creating an intuition rather than having an intuition.

Speaker 3 (58:54):
You know, well, I love that again, you have like
a real sign. Do you think really scientifically? Because that's it.
We want to know what's real what's not. And when
we have fear, Yeah, I could be like, oh no,
my intuition says, don't go up on stage and talk
in front of a million people. It's like, wow, you're
just afraid. But I'll give you one more example about
how physiologically wired we are for it. So have you

(59:16):
ever been around someone where you just have a bad
feeling but you can't explain it and you just want
to that to wait. We have that all the time.
So let me give you an example of what could
be going on this situation in our society. We don't
know what to do with our emotions, so most of
us suppress them, right. That's kind of what we're told.
If you're feeling angry, just mask it. Right. So let's
say I were feeling angry right now and I was like, no,

(59:36):
I'm not angry, I'm just fine. Your heart rate would increase,
Your intellect will have not caught on. You'll be like, oh,
she's smiling, she seems fine, but your physiology has registered
my physiology. We do that very quickly. It's a subconscious
physiological resonance very very fast. And what that registers is

(01:00:00):
there's this threat for you in your nervous system. And
I'll give you an example. Why So, have you heard
of equine facilitated therapy?

Speaker 2 (01:00:05):
Yes, yes I have.

Speaker 3 (01:00:07):
So there's a therapist and who uses a horse with
the patient.

Speaker 2 (01:00:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:00:11):
So let's say they're working with the kid with trauma
and the kid comes up and they're like, I'm not
scared of that horse. I'm just fine, I'm not scared.
But they're actually scared. The horse is moving all over
the place, super anxious, and as soon as the child
says a cam scared, the horse calms down. Why the
horse doesn't understand English, but the horse, being an animal
of prey, is hyper aware of this physiological resonance. And

(01:00:34):
we registers inauthenticity as threat, of course, because you don't
know what could be coming at you, and we do
the same thing we do. So it's literally physiological that
we can sometimes register what's going on and we register
it as threat. But our intellefe is so far behind
and much slower at processing this kind of thing. So
it's just another way that we that our intuition kicks in.

(01:00:56):
It's almost an instinct, so there's different forms of intuition
can think about.

Speaker 2 (01:01:01):
Mm hm, amazing. Well this has been amazingly insightful and
so fun. And why don't you tell his name of
the new book again? The whole title? I didn't. Yeah,
there's a there's it's a lot. It's Sovereignty and then bang,
so go ahead with the title.

Speaker 3 (01:01:17):
It's called Sovereign Reclaim your freedom, energy and power in
a time of distraction, uncertainty, and chaos.

Speaker 2 (01:01:25):
And it's a must read. Honestly, it's retaining that power.
It's so important. That's done self love too, you know,
it all leads to good things. Well, thank you, and
I appreciate the time. Yeah, it was a blast, This
was awesome. I'm glad the saw this all went down.
I can't wait to read the book. I mean candidly,

(01:01:46):
I haven't read the book yet, so I'm I'm this
is definitely what I'm gonna read right now. So I
hadn't read James as either, and he is in my
ears now all the time because I want I'm listening
to it and then your next stup for sure, I
cannot wait.

Speaker 3 (01:01:59):
Yeah, yeah, let me know what you think.

Speaker 2 (01:02:01):
I will I will thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (01:02:04):
Yes, it's my pleasure. Thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:02:06):
All right. Wow, It's like I'm just educating myself. I
feel like this podcast is more for me than it
is for anyone who's listening. Maybe I'll just dedicate my
guests to self realization, so it has nothing to do

(01:02:30):
with what you the listeners want, It has to do
with me and what I need. That's going to be
the new theme of this podcast, sibling revelry, but it's
more of just Oliver Hudson's Psychosis. Maybe we'll change the
name to ohp Oliver Hudson's Psychosis. Anyway, that was awesome.

(01:02:52):
You should get that book. You should. I'm going to
get it. I think it's I think it's going to
be pretty rad. There's so many things that we can
do to just to be happier, you know what I mean.
There's no doubt that we're fucked up, and we've got
all kinds of shit going on in our lives, and
you wake up and it's like, oh my god, bills
and kids and this and stresses and it's just normal
across the board. But I think there's definitely a real way,

(01:03:18):
a spiritual and scientific way to regulate and to actually
just live each day a little happier. I mean, even
if it's one percent, it's still just still one percent more.
And I'm gonna do that today. I'm gonna try and
do my best. All right. I love y'all and I'll

(01:03:40):
talk to you soon. Hey, you know what, give me
a call, shoot me at d M. I'm out.