May 2, 2024 • 46 mins
This week Scott is joined by happiness researcher and best selling author, Dr. Emma Seppala. Scott and Dr,. Seppala discuss the concept of “sovereign", an emancipation from all the ways you subjugate yourself in your own existence. Emma teaches us all how to reconnect with yourself in a healthy way.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I think in our society we're given a lot of
things to do instead of feel. You know, a lot
of things to consume instead of feel, and yet that's
how we stay bound and addicted and unhappy.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
On this episode of the Psychology Podcast, I chat with
Emma Sepola about reclaiming yourself and setting yourself free. Sounds good, right.
I've known Emma since grad school and she consistently puts
out good vibes and teaches us how to have healthy
bodies and minds. In this episode, we discussed what Emma
refers to as sovereign, which is designed to emancipate you
(00:43):
from the many ways in which you knowingly or unknowingly
subjugate yourself at every level of your existence, from yourself,
to your emotions, to your mind, to your relationships, to
your intuition, and to your body. Emma shows us how
we bind ourselves and how we can reap claim our sovereignty.
Emma is a very wise and compassionate human and I
(01:05):
think you'll learn stuff in this episode you can apply
in your life right away to reconnect with yourself in
a very healthy way. So, without further ado, I bring
you Emma Cepola Emma, Emma, Emma, Hi Scott, how you doing.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
Good to see you, Good to hear you.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Good to see you too. Congrats to your new book,
Sovereign Reclaim your Freedom, Energy and Power in a time
of distraction, uncertainty, and chaos. Wow. Well, I think a
lot of people are really yearning from that right now.
So you know, this major theme of this new book
is setting yourself free, and it's opposite state, which you
(01:46):
refer to as the bound state, where through life experiences,
fear and trauma, we start to disconnect from ourselves. So
you're really contrasting these these things, and hopefully we can
help our listeners and viewers, if they're watching the YouTube
channel right now, help them, help them set themselves free.
(02:07):
No one could do it but themselves, right, We can't
do it for them.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Yeah, so true, and that's that's the whole goal of
this book.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
I know I read your book.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
You are awesome, Scotty.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Well, thank you. Go on stop. So what's where do
we even start with this this? Can you can you
describe to me that how you conceive of the concept
of energy. I mean, there's so many places to start
in this discussion, but I see that word interwoven quite
(02:44):
a bit throughout the book, and can you just kind
of tell me what you think of that word.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
I love that as a first question, Scott, because in
many ways, as I'm contrasting the balance state and the
sovereign state, the bounce state is really everything that trains
us of our energy. It's the beliefs well, the behavior
patterns we have, the addictive behaviors that we have, the
ways we conceive of ourselves and the ways we interpret
the world that drain our energy, the way that we
(03:10):
interact with people that drain our energy. And when we're
in a sovereign state, that's the opposite. We're filling our
own tank or maintaining it, but we're also filling others tanks.
So's it's a pattern, and that goes through all of
the different chapters. You know, as one example, just as
one belief that drains us is you know, whenever I've
asked audiences how many people are self critical, almost every
(03:34):
single person raises their hand. And as you as you know,
self criticism the psychological definition is that it's a form
of self loathing. And when you think about that, just
you know that the majority of people are walking around
with this, you could think of it as social conditioning
or programming, like viral programming that runs in families and
runs in societies and does us no vapors and drains
(03:55):
us of our energy. That's one example.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
How do we get that bounded, you know, and disconnected
from ourselves? And you know, throughout the course of our lives,
can our relationship with ourselves change depending on life circumstances.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Absolutely, And I think that's the journey, right, that's the
journey of and it starts with awareness, like being aware
of the many ways that we engage with behaviors or
thought patterns that drain our energy. Another example is our emotions.
And I don't know you think about this a lot too,
and that most people when you ask, well, what have
you learned about what to do with your emotions, your big, bad,
(04:36):
negative ones, people will say, let's just suppress them, right,
just suck it up, butter cups. That's pretty much what
everyone is up to. I mean there's some exceptions, you know,
in some Latin cultures in southern Italy, But even then
there are certain emotions that are just not acceptable and
that are suppressed. And when we look at the research
suppression basically increases the negative emotion, and it's more likely
(04:59):
to come out somatically, you know, through health stuff, or
it's going to explode or come out as passive aggression
and destroying both ourselves and others in the process. So
that's just sort of one example of that. And how
the journey towards becoming more sovereign with regards to our
emotions is to learn to actually feel them, just like
(05:19):
a child will feel their emotions one hundred percent and
then it moves through them. Just like so going back
to that theme of energy, the child lets the energy
of the emotion move through them and then they're done
a few minutes later, as opposed to adults who can
hold on to an emotion forever. Not to say that
I'm encouraging exploding our emotions all over the place, but
the ability to feel, and I think, I think in
(05:40):
our society we're given a lot of things to do
instead of feel, you know, a lot of things to
consume instead of feel, and yet that's how we stay
bound and addicted and unhappy.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
What does a healthy self esteem look like?
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Well, you know, I always just ask, like, you know,
what are some of the things that people say to
themselves when they make a big mistake. Right when you
ask people that, they usually say words like you're such
an idiot, you don't belong here, not good enough, those
kinds of words. And you know, whenever I hear that,
it's just so heartbreaking to hear how people talk to themselves.
(06:22):
When during the pandemic, I would teach on Zoom and
I would ask this question, what do you say to
yourself when you make a big mistake? And people would
write it in the chat and you'd see one thing
after another of these heartbreaking words that people tear themselves,
tear themselves up with, And when you think about it,
it doesn't make any sense because what would you say
(06:43):
to your best friend? You would say, what would you
say your best friend? You would say, Oh, you're okay,
everything's everybody makes mistakes, You're totally fine. We'd be so
encouraging and loving to them. Why do we have a
self destructive relationship with ourselves? You know, we talk about
toxic being in a toxic relationship or toxic workplace. Most
people are walking around with a toxic relationship with their
(07:06):
own self. What about that makes sense? It doesn't, but
it keeps people bound this. One study found that eighty
percent of millennials endorse the belief I am not good
enough with regards to most areas of their life. Can
you believe that? It's so heartbreaking? And so I always
(07:26):
think what would happen to this world if every single
person had a sovereign relationship with themselves? I mean, how
would they show up? They would be able to show
up within their full potential, be their freaking best selves
and rock stars like Scott Barry.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Kaufman, Well, thank you, I appreciate that. Yeah, you got
me thinking that. I think I might start using the
phrase instead of self esteem. What we really need is
a healthy self relationship. I like, yeah, I just thought
of that phrase self relationship.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Yeah, and so totally why wouldn't you? I mean, the
only relationship you're guaranteed for the rest of your life
is with yourself. Might as well make it a good one, right,
or a friendship, a romance and what happens then? You know?
I just you know, I always think, like, how are
you going to show up on the battlefield of your life?
(08:20):
Are you going to show up you know, limping because
you kicked yourself there? Or in brands spanking new shining
armor because you loved your way there. You know, where
are you? How are you going to be strongest? And
and yeah, so that's just something I think about. And
Maya Angelo has this beautiful quote where she says, I've
(08:44):
learned a long time ago that the only thing that
forgetting now the exact quotes, I've learned a long time
ago that the only thing that makes sense to be
on my own side, something like that. And then Audrey
Lorde has another really great quote and she says, or
self care is not self indulgence, it's an act of
political warfare. So powerful. And she was a self described uh,
(09:13):
a gay black woman in a white, straight man's world,
you know, so she just was she was battling a
lot of battles as an activist and writer and so forth.
But it's so powerful what she said. It's it's that's
how you're going to show up. You're going to show
up powerfully if you show up with that self care.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Wow, that's really powerful. Emma. You know you've done some terrific,
groundbreaking research in our field on the neuroscience of emotion regulation.
I'd be remiss not to have you review some of
your most recent findings or your most the highlights of
some of your findings, you know what, what are some
(09:51):
of the highlights of your findings? And why as adults well,
and also why don't children learn learn this stuff? We're
never taught this, I know, Scott.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
It's so weird. I always just think, like, no matter
how many mds, PhDs, black belts, you know, dishes, you
know how to cook, languages, you know how to speak,
most people are running around with as much education about
how to handle their big, bad, negative emotions as a
five year old, which is basically no formal education. I mean,
you're supposed to you know, like the two hardest things
we're supposed to manage in our life, which are emotions
and relationships, we never get any training on and they
(10:23):
cause so much pain, you know. And so yeah, I
mean we were looking specifically, I was looking at a
trauma so after nine I was living in New York
during nine to eleven, and I had a lot of
anxiety after that day, and I tried a lot of
things to help me at the time, you know, I
(10:44):
tried mindfulness, I'd go to like hot yoga and I
do all this stuff, and I was still shaking. You know,
I was still shaking at eight thirty in the morning,
and then I walked into a breathing class called it's
called sky Breath Meditation, which was a breathing class that
was offered at Columbia by some fellow students through an
organization called Art of Living. And I was like, okay,
what is this And I learned the breathing practices and
(11:07):
then I felt wow, like I feel like I can
move on. I regained my sovereignty over my anxiety. So
fast forward then, you know, I did my doctoral program
in psychology and I was doing a postdoc and working
with veterans with trauma or coming back from Afghanistan and Iraq,
and many of them had gone through traditional therapeutic or
pharmaceutical treatments and they hadn't helped them. They were self medicating,
(11:28):
like in their basement smoking weed or drinking et cetera.
And so I thought, you know, this helped me so
many years ago. Let's see if we can help them
with breathing. And that was one of the first studies
that we ran with a breathing protocol, with doing on
the sky Breath meditation for a week and then we
looked at their anxiety pre post, one month post, and
one year post. And we also looked at physiological measures
(11:51):
of startle response and so forth. And what we found
was that after one week their anxiety had normalized, I
mean compared to the country role group, they they had
really uh, some of them no longer qualified as having
post traumatic stress. And then when we looked at the
physiology of it, we saw really strong correlation between their
(12:11):
reduction in in start a response and their reduction in anxiety.
So correlation was zero point nine. Now this is something crazy.
And then one month later and yeah, one month later
and one year later, they they had maintained they they
were they had maintained what they had experienced after that
first week. So their anxiety was normalized. And it was
(12:33):
interesting because many of them hadn't continued their breathing practice,
and so that was really cool. It was like as if,
you know, there's a way to sort of stabilize the
nervous system even if you have gone through trauma through breathing.
And I think, to me, that makes sense in the
because a lot of psychological approaches are through the mind,
like change your thoughts, change your mind, change your life,
(12:54):
you know, And I think that can work to a
certain extent, and I think I think it does work,
you know, being grateful and so forth. We know, oh
that that works. But when there is a really intense trauma,
really intense anxiety, it's lodged in the body, the memory
is I'm just think about one veteran he would he said,
you know, I'll stand in front of the mall, and
I'm here in Madison, Wisconsin, and I know there's no
(13:16):
danger in the mall, but I still have to brace
myself for twenty minutes before I can go in. Because
his mind is doing fine. It's just that the trauma
in the body, the memory in the body, is bringing
up so much anxiety. And so what we think is
happening is that through breathing there's this combination. You're not
(13:37):
just addressing the mind, you're also addressing the nervous system.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
Tell me a little tell me a little more about that,
because I've been critical of the trauma obsessed culturally living
now and also the obsession with the body keeps the score.
So I actually would like to hear more about this. API.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
Absolutely no, I'm fascinated by myself because we've run a
number of other studies subsequent to this and found some
really interesting stuff. So yeah, I mean, one thing we
think is happening is this is that as the veterans
are doing their breathing practice, they go into this deep
(14:17):
parasympathetic state of just calm, and in that moment, it's
sometimes these memories come up. They can come up in
the form of the flashback, they come up in the
form of simply a smell of feeling, of physiological sensation,
but they're in a deep parasympathetic state. So when usually
when they're having a flashback or a memory, they're back
(14:39):
in sympathetic activation as if they were in the trauma
that they experienced. And that's why post traumatic stress doesn't
allow you to move on, because it's as if that
trauma is still right there in front of you right
now or every time it's triggered, right and so, and
they're not able to sleep for that reason. They're constantly
in high activation. And what happens with the breathing we
believe is that as they're going into this parasympathetic state
(15:03):
and the memory maybe coming up, there's like a decoupling
that happens between the physiological activation and the memory. And
so what they have said to us, is I remember
everything that happened, but I can move on. And they
get got off their met their sleep meds, anxiety meds,
you know, and you know, sometimes I get in touch
(15:24):
with them because like a reporter wants to talk to
them or something, and some of them are like, I'm
not I honestly don't remember what that was. Like. I'm like,
I can't believe you don't remember what that was like
you were living in your basement, going through a divorce
and you couldn't even know about work, you know, so
talk about sovereignty, you know, how can we regain sovereignty?
So many people have gone through trauma, and you know,
many psychological approaches do work and do help, and exposure
(15:47):
therapy does help, you know, in some cases and in
other cases, there are people that fall through the cracks,
and many veterans have fallen through the cracks. And there's
been a very very high suicide rate, as you probably
know daily. It's a horrible amount. And and I wanted
to see is there another is there another way that
we can bridge that gap, that we can catch those
that are falling. And we subsequently ran another study with
(16:08):
the Palo alto Va the larger, a larger group of veterans,
including both men and women, and and it was a
it was a design where you uh, that where it
was side by side with the gold standard therapeutic treatment,
cognitive processing therapy, and the design was such that we
(16:32):
wanted to see if the breathing intervention was either it
was at least as good as that one. I'm forgetting
the name of it now off the top of my head,
but it's that's what the statistical uh, what the stats
are that you're you're conducting on it. And that's what
was found that was at least as good as the
gold standard therapy. And then but then looking at just
(16:56):
the physiology too of emotion regulation, those that had gone
through the THING program as opposed to the therapy showed
better emotion regulation at the physiological level. So again because
I think what's happening with breathing is that you're actually
something is going on at the nerve with the nervous system.
It's not just cognitive and so so that's just really fascinating.
(17:17):
And then another study we ran here at Yale looking
at so Yale undergraduates tend to have worse and worse
mental health as the semester goes on in their height,
you know, type A, and just getting more and more
anxious and depressed with the with time, and so we
want what do.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
You say, my personal experience?
Speaker 1 (17:39):
Yeah, you remember that Scott we met at Yale all
those years ago. Oh it was so fun. Yeah, and
uh exactly. So what we wanted to see is can
we provide a buffer to prevent this from happening. So
we randomly assigned students to It was about two hundred students,
I think. We randomly assigned them to one of three
(18:01):
well being interventions or control group. So it was either
this sky breath meditation visit, the breathing or it was
mindfulness based stress reduction, or it was emotional intelligence which
is mostly cognitive skills, or the control group. And we
wanted to see which one of these was going to
do to help the students most. And what we saw
was that the breathing group had the most impact of
(18:22):
all and I think it's because it probably brings together
a lot of the elements from the others. Has both
the physiological breathing component, but also brings together the mindfulness.
Because what we saw is that mindfulness scores increased thanks
to the breathing, and then it has some cognitive you know,
you're you're better able to take in any kind of
cognitive information when you're you've addressed the anxiety that's at
(18:46):
the level of the body. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Can you give our listeners a concrete practice? Can you
teach us something?
Speaker 1 (18:54):
H yeah? Absolutely? So you know what you know, what
we researched is a program that takes a couple is
to learn, is like a whole protocol, like a twenty
minute protocol. But what I can teach you now is
something real simple that you can.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Keep a back stuck in the past. You've taught me
stuff in the past to help me get through my
flying anxiety you have.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
Oh my gosh, fantastic.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
I don't remember that while ago ago.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Yeah, yeah, oh good? Did it help?
Speaker 2 (19:19):
Oh yeah, okay.
Speaker 1 (19:20):
I'm glad to hear that. Okay, So real simple thing
that people can take away from from just listening today.
So when you breathe in, your heart rate increases, and
when you breathe out it slows down. And if you're
you know, if you're in a nurse's office, you can
really scare them by exhaling for a really long time
and see what happens to your heart rate. But what
we're going to do today is I can lead us
(19:41):
through a real You want me to lead us through
an exercise, Yeah, I'll lead us through a short extras Okay,
what we're just going to do is lengthen our exhales
for a while with our eyes closed. So before we start,
before we start changing our breath, you can just close
your eyes and have your palms open on your lap,
and then you want to breathe in for a count
(20:01):
of one, but hold on before you start breathing. Sorry,
before you start breathing, I just want to assess where
you are right now, So just assessing your level of energy, noticing,
you know, how many thoughts are going on in your
own mind, so you could have a lot of traffic,
a lot of thought traffic, or not a lot. Just
(20:22):
sort of noticing your own state of mind first, so
you can see if there's a shift from before to after.
And then for the breathing, you want to breathe in
for account of one, two, three, four, hold and then
you can breathe out for two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight,
So you're breathing out for either twice as long or
(20:43):
a time and a half as long as you breathe in.
You want to do that for about five minutes and
then reassess sort of where you're at and then and
that's a practice that you can take with you. Do
you want me to guide us through it or.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
Yeah, I'm doing it right now, okay.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
So I'll keep guiding us then for a few minutes. Okay,
So breathe.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Then two three four, hold and breathe out two three four, five,
six seven eight. Breathe in two three four, hold and
breathe out two three four, five six seven eight. Breathe
(21:29):
in two three four, hold and breathe out two three four, five,
six seven eight. Breathe in two three four, hold and
breathe out two three four, five, six, seven eight. One
(21:56):
more time deep breath in two three for hold, breathe
out two three four, five six seven eight, and then
come back to normal breath and just assess any shifts
or changes in the state of your mind. And then
(22:18):
when you're ready, you can open your eyes and notice
how you feel with the eyes open.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
I opened my eyes already. I'm gotta admit amazing. Yeah, no,
it's it really does help do something to my parasympathetic
nervous system.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
Yeah, something, Yeah, it's it's a way to gain sovereignty, right.
I mean, look all the time throughout the day, we
have so much media coming at us. We have so
many things, so many people, so many demands, and sometimes
you can just rush through the day and there's all
this stuff in our head from everything we've been accumulating.
And then you you're right somewhere, either at your office
(23:01):
and you want to just be focusing, or at home
and you want to be focusing on your loved ones,
but your mind is completely cluttered with everything that's been happening,
and you're not able to be present with what you
want to do. And you know, having sovereignty of our
mind is being able to bring it back into a
place where it can be aware and present with what's
going on and calmer and able to you know, we
know from research, when you're calmer, you're a better decision maker,
(23:22):
you have better emotional intelligence, you're more focused, better attention,
better memory, and you're more creative. Right, so, all the things.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
That's true, that's true. The emotion regulation and trauma narrative
link is really interesting to me because I feel like
trauma has exploded in our society, where it was once
confined to like veterans and others would diagnosed post traumatic
(23:51):
stress disorder. Now it's every student I teach, it's everyone
on TikTok, everyone and everything is blamed on their trauma
as well. So to a certain degree, you know, trauma
is a higher level, conscious construction of an event. It's
it's a label that we're putting on an event. And
(24:14):
of course you are quite right to point out that
there are bodily uh uh top you know, bottom up effects.
You know, there's top down, but there's also you know,
bottom up effects that that can linger, especially under triggering
situations that are related. But now everyone's being triggered by everything.
You're a very very compassionate I mean, I've known you
(24:36):
a long time, Emma. You are very very that you
have like a very like motherly way of being to
the work, to the world at large. Just my observation
just now, I am not you. I think some people
(24:56):
need to toughen the fuck up, is what I'm saying.
That's what I'm saying. Now, work with me, here, work
with me, let's meet, let's meet in the middle.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
Let's rest, let's meet in the middle, because you know,
one thing I talk about also is you know, yes,
things may have happened to you. To to most people,
something's happened. You know, you've had a car accident, you
had a tough youth, you had a tough breakup, you've
had your morning. You know, yes, those things happen. And
(25:27):
in that sense, we are victims of those situations. And
yet I do, really, from the bottom of my heart,
believe that when we hold onto that victimhood, we are
keeping ourselves in a bound state because we are not
we are. It kind of keeps us in that place like, okay,
I'll share. You know, for myself, I was in an
abusive marriage. Okay, so I know what. I know what
(25:48):
it's like to be in a situation like that. And
yet if I stay in that, I'm a victim of
you know, a domestic violence. I am, I am identifying
with a disempowered position as opposed to I am you know,
I lived through that, I learned through that, I grew
(26:10):
through that. I'm you know, I'm stronger for it, and
I'm more sovereign now. But sovereignty, I think is really
reclaiming that post traumatic growth, not so much focusing on
the victimhood, which can painfully keep us in a place
of feeling abused. And you know, this is it's a
(26:32):
this is a tricky line to walk because I'm not
saying no, you didn't have trauma. Yes you had trauma,
and yet it is in your favor to identify with
the fact that you have survived it, you're growing from it,
and you're stronger for it, and you're not having that
happen to you ever again.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Well yeah, well love what you're saying. The idea though,
that trauma is something objective as opposed to a subjective thing.
Speaker 1 (27:03):
Though.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
You know, it's interesting because there's so many different definitions
of trauma in this psychological literature. It's not like we
all agree in the literature. You know that on this term.
And you know, if a student is traumatized that they
have homework, is that a fair use of the word trauma?
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Do you know?
Speaker 2 (27:21):
You know there's I just the word trauma is being
used now like everyone's being traumatized as opposed to I'm
upset or I'm anxious. It's now I'm traumatized.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Now.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Now I think there are things we can all I
mean there's a list of things we can all agree.
I think the ACE checklist is still valid, you know,
but there are so many things now that fall are
falling under that purview for young people. Yeah, what are
your thoughts of that?
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Well, they're not by by going deep into that as
a victim, they're disempowering themselves. And that's a problem, you know,
because then they're not accessing, you know, their inner core
strength and belief in themselves that Yeah, like, this is
hard for me, and I can get through this, and
(28:13):
I'm a freaking warrior. You know. We've all been through
hard times, and even just looking back on it, you
can be like, wow, I'm I went through that, and
I can do this. You know, I can do this again.
And I could do it with more wisdom, I could
do it with more compassion. I can do it. I've
gone through suffering and I'll continue to go through suffering
because that's human life, and I can do this.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Well, that's lovely. That's a lovely actually, I mean you are.
You are very forward looking, which is which is why
I mean I'm very much in line with that. For sure.
Your research has spanned multiple areas. You've also studied intuition
and got feelings. You know, you are. We have an
instinct for self preservation that we often ignore, but you
(29:01):
do argue that we can make better decisions in our
lives if we can gain some sovereignty over that. Could
you elaborate a little more on your research relating to that.
You know that I'm so furious about that instinct for
self preservation because my hero, Carl Rogers called it the
we have an organismic valuing system in our body, is
(29:22):
what he argued. I have renamed that in my coaching
program too. We have a self actualizing compass.
Speaker 1 (29:30):
In our body.
Speaker 2 (29:31):
So it's even more than self preservation. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Absolutely, Well that's sovereignty, right, self actualization is sovereignty.
Speaker 3 (29:44):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
I think you know when ilse a grad student, I
was a grad student James Gross's lab at Stanford, which
was the Emotion regulation Lab.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
He's amazing.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
I love him. He was an amazing mentor. He is
an amazing I mean to this day, he's my hero.
And you know, one of the studies that was really
interesting was that in the lab we looked at suppression.
What happens when you suppress emotion? Now, when someone is
suppressing anger. Let's say I were suppressing anger and I'm
(30:16):
talking to you and I'm pretending I'm not anger. I'm like, nope,
I'm fine, everything's fine. Right. Let's say that your heart
rate would increase, so cognitively you wouldn't understand. Okay, you
wouldn't understand why you're feeling not so you want to
back away or you want to get out of there.
You know how sometimes you have that feeling like I
don't I can't explain it, but I just don't have
a good vibe. I need to move, I need to
(30:37):
get out of here. Well, what happens is that physiologically
you've already registered that I'm suppressing emotion. You've registered inauthenticity,
and inauthenticity from an instinctual point of view, registers this threat,
so even animals. So I'll give you an example with
equine facilitated therapy. So when a therapist uses a horse
to work with a Let's say a child with anxiety, right,
(30:59):
and the child protect not to be scared of the horse,
the child will come up and be like, I'm not
scared of that horse. I'm just fine. But if that
child is scared the horse is moving all over the
place and is anxious, and the horse doesn't understand English, right,
but the horse is registering inauthenticity and that registers this threat.
And so and we have the same thing, and we
(31:20):
register in authenticity as threat, whether we realize it cognitively
or not. Our heart rate is going up. So I
thought that was really fascinating. And then that and we
have so we have an instinct which we can think
of intuition as instinct. We can think of it as
you know, putting the pieces of putting the pieces of
information together in the back of our mind. I mean,
(31:40):
there are many ways that we can conceive of it.
Joseph Michaels, who is my colleague at Stanford, he looked
at decision making and he thinks about intuition as your feeling.
You know, you say, I have a feeling this is
a good idea or not. And what he found was
that when decision making is complex, when you're weighing a
lot of things, you're going to make a better decision
if you go with your feelings rather than just thinking
(32:02):
through it reasonably. If the matter is simple, no big deal.
But if it's complicated, you're going to make a better
decision if you go with your gut feeling. I think
that's just really fascinating. That also ties into you know
what you and I, Yeah, what you and I are
really interested in with the whole idea of the creativity.
Where do you get your creative insights? Again, it's from
a place of relaxation, right, So you could think of
(32:25):
it as, oh, my brain's putting together a puzzle in
the back, in the background and I'm not realizing it.
Or you could think of it as receptivity like Einstein,
you know, he he would go and play Mozart and
then it would come, the ideas would come to him.
How does that happen? However we think about it, it's
it's a way of being receptive in a non cognitive
(32:46):
way that can really that can save our lives. Like
my friend Kushel was on nine to eleven. He walked
into the second Twin tower to get into his office
and then the building was hit or I don't know
remember which tower was, but anyway's building was hit and
the guards were giving orders to stay in the building,
and Krushill hesitated for a moment and he ran out
(33:07):
of there, and he saved his life by hair and
what would have happened if he hadn't listened to his gut.
How many people in that building had the same gut
feeling and didn't go with it. Right, So this is
an area of research that I think is going to
be going to grow a lot. It's already growing. There's
just a lot of interest, and the military has been
researching it for decades under different names. But and there
(33:31):
was a movie that made fun of it called Men
Who Stare At Goats? Did you see that movie? Well,
it was kind of making fun of that. But they're
always starting new programs again because so many service members
came back from Iraq and Afghanistan having reported using gut
feelings to like save their lives or save other people's lives. Oh,
we didn't go that on that road because I had
a feeling, you know. So now they're studying it again.
(33:52):
It's sort of top secret and nobody would nobody wants
to talk about it, but it's happening, and I know it.
I have I have some some intelligence from that.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
Yeah, so interesting. I don't know if you know, but
my my dissertation was on impulsit learning.
Speaker 1 (34:11):
No, I didn't know that.
Speaker 2 (34:13):
Yes, yes, and it's relationship to creativity, so I think
I'm all about uh harnessing that power.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, tell me about that.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
Well. The regularities and statistical probabilities that we learn automatically
and unconsciously throughout the course of our day. There are
individual differences in it. I found some people are better
at impulsit learning than others, and that was unrelated to
their IQ score, So they could have do well on
(34:48):
IQ tests and see those patterns explicitly and consciously, but
not be as good as at seeing the tacit areas
of life. So yeah, I found implicit learning was correlated
with openness to experience the personality trait makes sense, and yeah,
(35:10):
it was which that in turn was correlated with creative achievement.
But I so, yeah, no, I think that's really good.
And you would argue that it's important to distinguish between
just like a blind faith in one's emotions, right, and
a more honed expert intuition.
Speaker 1 (35:31):
Absolutely, because our feelings are always changing and it's not
like you can just I'm just going to always go
with my feelings. That could also make you really wish
you washedy like you. We definitely have logic and reason there.
And I like how Joe Michael says. He says, you know,
when I have to make a big decision, of course
I use my reason, but I also consult my feeling.
And I think just that even just that invitation to
(35:51):
consult one's feeling has been absent from our discourse, absence
from our education. Pooh poot is not like magical thinking.
But actually, you know, even when you're like mother's intuition,
there's a word for that, like we know what's going
on with our kid better than you know anyone else.
And I also think that you know, making time for
those moments. And I know, Scott, you and I have
(36:12):
talked about this a lot, about those moments of you know,
the awful wave of moments in our lives where we
are in a more relaxed state, you know, whether it's
through meditation or contemplation, or being out in nature or
playing music, listening to music, whatever it is that allows
us to go into a more serene space. That's when
you're more likely to sort of access those insights. And
(36:35):
you also want to make sure that you're not not
being colored by your trauma or fear. Right, It's like, oh,
I have a good feeling I shouldn't go on stage.
Well maybe you're just really afraid to go on stage.
But if you went up there, you'd be a rock
star and you'd be helping people, So you should do
it right. So we have to make sure that we're
not you know, we're not. We have to make sure
that that our feeling really is is is an intuition? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (37:01):
Yeah, I love that. You know, you've you've tied a
lot of this stuff to leadership too, right, m hm.
And what do you think? What do you think are like?
Do you can you give an example of any sovereign
leaders people you would say, Oh, they're sovereign, they're sovereign,
they're not bound. Trump is bound. Do you think Trump
is bound?
Speaker 1 (37:23):
Oh that's hilarious. I can't speak to I have no idea.
He is definitely doing his own thing. But whether he
is a sovereign I don't know. Because you know, a
sovereign state is one in which you're not caught up
in addictions, whether that's addiction to fame or addiction to
(37:46):
money or pleasure, all those things are bound. Those are bondage.
And it sounds like from his history you may have
some of that. But yes, I I once met this. Uh.
I was actually supposed to escort this woman, her name
is Linda to a stage and I hadn't met her before,
and within minutes of her sitting next to me, seconds
(38:07):
maybe tears start rolling down my face. Scott, this is
embarrassing here. I'm her host. I'm supposed to bring her
to the station. She's going to speak at Stanford Business School.
And she looks at me and she's like, I'm making
you cry, and I'm like, what is happening to me?
And I had this flash of insight at that moment
that I had never met a woman who owned her
(38:27):
sovereignty so completely in my life, and it almost shot
a pang of pain in me, not just for myself,
but for all women in particular. This was what this
was about fifteen years ago, and it was sort of
a maybe a flash of insight, you know, one of
those wow you know. And she is an incredible woman.
(38:48):
Talk about working with her intuition. She definitely moves with
her intuition, but she's also brilliant. But she and she
in fact, this is an intuition story herself. So she
went she lost her father when she was in her
teens and experienced firsthand what it was like to have
a main provider pass away in the family, and so
(39:11):
she got herself to Yale on a tennis scholarship and
then at Yale once she got married at Yale and
then was pregnant shortly thereafter and a single mom, so
she had to somehow support her child. And she went
to Wall Street in the eighties as a woman. So
she became financially successful, but was sexually harassed by both
her colleagues and her clients constantly. So she finally decided
(39:34):
to retire in her thirties, thinking that's it. I'm out
of here, and she moved to Florida. And then she
had an intuition that came to her as a dream,
and her father came to her and said, this is
not what I had in mind for you, and she
realized there was something else she was meant to do,
and she decided to make sure that no other families
(39:56):
that she could help whatever have to deal with losing
a main and so she bought these companies that other
people had given up on as you know, a lost cause,
and turn them around. So I think companies like Style
a makeup, you know, like, these are companies that even
the consulting companies had given up on. She bought them
just to make sure that people would lose their jobs.
(40:18):
And she turned around all these companies. She's called the
Turnaround Queen. She at one point had seven hundred thousand employees.
And this woman is incredible, and she dances to her
own drum and has thereby shown up with at her
full potential and made such a difference. So it's just
one example. And I do believe, you know, yes, there
(40:41):
are extraordinary people, but we all have extraordinary gifts, every
one of us if we allow them through. And that
comes through when we are sovereign as opposed to caught
up in ways of thinking and behaving that keep us bound.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
Yeah yeah, well well wow.
Speaker 1 (41:02):
Yeah, I mean and you know, I was teaching a
group of undergrad a yell undergrads the other day and
asking them what's your definition of success, you know, and
they're all like, well, you know, make a lot of
money or do this or that the other And I said, okay,
so I want you to think about the most wonderful
people in your life, you know, think about the people
that were there for you and mentored you and just
(41:22):
saw you for who you were and just helped you along.
And then it says, how would you describe those people?
And they would say, oh, they were loving and warm
and caring. You know, they use those kind of words.
And I said, would you say that those people have
had a successful impact on your life? And they were like, yeah,
so what is success? Isn't it that ability to show
up for people and you know, support them and just
(41:44):
be there completely present in that kind of a loving way.
I mean, you know, we really have to think about
what that is. And Lynn, she has a lot of
love in her heart. I can tell you that. And
she's showing up as a badass, like she's she's a badass,
you know. You know I'm mess with her, but she's
making such a difference you should have on your podcast.
Speaker 2 (42:05):
I would welcome an intro. I would welcome in absolutely. Well,
I've really I've really asked the main questions that I
want to ask you today.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
Is there anything else?
Speaker 2 (42:14):
Is there anything you would like to add?
Speaker 1 (42:16):
Yeah? Yes, I'd love to talk about relationships, Scott. What
do you think?
Speaker 2 (42:20):
Yeah, let's do it.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
You know, relationships is another area of our life where
we just don't have we don't get a manual for
and we want we want to have good relationships, and
we suffer in relationships, you know. And it's it's really
interesting to me because oftentimes relationships are also obviously places
where we can kind of project all of our own
fears onto other people who we haven't done anything, and
(42:43):
here we are, you know, creating all the suffering. But anyway,
I think a lot of people have talked about that.
I'm not going to go into that in so much detail,
but there is a new field of research that is
really amazing called positive. It's on positive organizational scholarship. You
familiar with it a little bit, I'm sure you are, right.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
I yeah, yeah, I love that that Amy Wear, Nesta
Ernski and Jane Dunnan, Jane Dunnan and all that.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
Yes, I love this, So I guess I share. I'll
start with the story. So my friend, it tells she's
a environmental activist and she's often in the African jungle
or in the South American jungle doing undercover investigations on
deforestation and child labor. And then she'll like write to
these companies and tell them that what they're doing is
illegal and then anyway, she does amazing stuff.
Speaker 3 (43:29):
Right.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
So she was once in an African country in the
jungle doing this investigation when her car disappears, right, her
driver is gone, and she's told to get in the
car with these two muscles strapped guys in military apparel
and weapons. And she knows that the government is in
cahoots with the rubber company that she's investigating because they're
getting kickbacks that they don't want to tell. There she
(43:51):
has she has three hours. She's three hours away from
the airport, so she had no choice but to get
in the car with these guys who are her hitmen. Right,
And in the spad of the three hours, not only
did she did they say did they not kill her?
But she made friends with them. They even at one
point held up a little sheet so she could relieve
herself by the side of the road so she wouldn't
go into the jungle and get bitten by snakes.
Speaker 2 (44:12):
Ok.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
And they and she had got confirmation that they were
meant to kill her when they when she got to
the airport and they said to her, do not ever
come back here. You are not safe here at all.
But if you do come back, come over a land
border under our protection and stay with us.
Speaker 2 (44:30):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (44:31):
So what happened here? It Tel has something called positive
relational energy. She knows how to connect with people in
such a way that is life giving. And I think
we all know, you know, this concept of energy vampires
has been around for you know, two decades, and there's
so much talk about it. But what we don't realize
(44:52):
is that there's another type of relating which is not
one that sucks you dry. It's energy enhancing and that's
the key to positive relational energy. And so Kim Cameron
and some of his colleagues did research on larger organizations
and saw that there were these pockets within the organizations
that were hyper productive, like what was going on here.
(45:13):
At the center of each of these was one person.
He said, there was one person, and that person was
giving life to everyone around them. It was like and
so he called them like positive, positively energizing leaders. And
that is really incredible and it's something that can be taught,
and Kim does. He trains people in us. He trains
leaders and turns them around. You can become a positive
(45:34):
you can have what it Tel had. Now a story
was extraordinary, by the way, and I'm not saying that
you know, other people who are in hostage situations didn't
have this, because that's not true. I mean, she was
very much a particular case, and she was in the
process of connecting with them able to explain what she
was doing, and they realized also how she was trying
to help their villages and so forth. I just want
to give that caveat. But positive relational energy is something
(45:56):
that can be trained and that anyone can learn, and
that it can really catapaul both some relationships and work relationships.
And it has a lot to do with the values
that you have and how you live, but it also
has to do with your ability to have fill your
own tank and have a have a positively energizing relationship
with your own self. So I just want to add that.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
That's really cool. I love the phrase positively energizing leaders.
I just wrote that in my notes. Good stuff. Well, Emma,
thank you so much. Is there anything else you want
to add?
Speaker 1 (46:29):
Oh, I'm super grateful to chat with you, Scott. You know,
so we go, we go way back and.
Speaker 2 (46:35):
Me too, me too. Thank you, Emma, Thank you, Scott,
good luck with the book.
Speaker 1 (46:40):
Thank you,
I think in our society we're given a lot of
things to do instead of feel. You know, a lot
of things to consume instead of feel, and yet that's
how we stay bound and addicted and unhappy.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
On this episode of the Psychology Podcast, I chat with
Emma Sepola about reclaiming yourself and setting yourself free. Sounds good, right.
I've known Emma since grad school and she consistently puts
out good vibes and teaches us how to have healthy
bodies and minds. In this episode, we discussed what Emma
refers to as sovereign, which is designed to emancipate you
(00:43):
from the many ways in which you knowingly or unknowingly
subjugate yourself at every level of your existence, from yourself,
to your emotions, to your mind, to your relationships, to
your intuition, and to your body. Emma shows us how
we bind ourselves and how we can reap claim our sovereignty.
Emma is a very wise and compassionate human and I
(01:05):
think you'll learn stuff in this episode you can apply
in your life right away to reconnect with yourself in
a very healthy way. So, without further ado, I bring
you Emma Cepola Emma, Emma, Emma, Hi Scott, how you doing.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
Good to see you, Good to hear you.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Good to see you too. Congrats to your new book,
Sovereign Reclaim your Freedom, Energy and Power in a time
of distraction, uncertainty, and chaos. Wow. Well, I think a
lot of people are really yearning from that right now.
So you know, this major theme of this new book
is setting yourself free, and it's opposite state, which you
(01:46):
refer to as the bound state, where through life experiences,
fear and trauma, we start to disconnect from ourselves. So
you're really contrasting these these things, and hopefully we can
help our listeners and viewers, if they're watching the YouTube
channel right now, help them, help them set themselves free.
(02:07):
No one could do it but themselves, right, We can't
do it for them.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Yeah, so true, and that's that's the whole goal of
this book.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
I know I read your book.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
You are awesome, Scotty.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Well, thank you. Go on stop. So what's where do
we even start with this this? Can you can you
describe to me that how you conceive of the concept
of energy. I mean, there's so many places to start
in this discussion, but I see that word interwoven quite
(02:44):
a bit throughout the book, and can you just kind
of tell me what you think of that word.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
I love that as a first question, Scott, because in
many ways, as I'm contrasting the balance state and the
sovereign state, the bounce state is really everything that trains
us of our energy. It's the beliefs well, the behavior
patterns we have, the addictive behaviors that we have, the
ways we conceive of ourselves and the ways we interpret
the world that drain our energy, the way that we
(03:10):
interact with people that drain our energy. And when we're
in a sovereign state, that's the opposite. We're filling our
own tank or maintaining it, but we're also filling others tanks.
So's it's a pattern, and that goes through all of
the different chapters. You know, as one example, just as
one belief that drains us is you know, whenever I've
asked audiences how many people are self critical, almost every
(03:34):
single person raises their hand. And as you as you know,
self criticism the psychological definition is that it's a form
of self loathing. And when you think about that, just
you know that the majority of people are walking around
with this, you could think of it as social conditioning
or programming, like viral programming that runs in families and
runs in societies and does us no vapors and drains
(03:55):
us of our energy. That's one example.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
How do we get that bounded, you know, and disconnected
from ourselves? And you know, throughout the course of our lives,
can our relationship with ourselves change depending on life circumstances.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Absolutely, And I think that's the journey, right, that's the
journey of and it starts with awareness, like being aware
of the many ways that we engage with behaviors or
thought patterns that drain our energy. Another example is our emotions.
And I don't know you think about this a lot too,
and that most people when you ask, well, what have
you learned about what to do with your emotions, your big, bad,
(04:36):
negative ones, people will say, let's just suppress them, right,
just suck it up, butter cups. That's pretty much what
everyone is up to. I mean there's some exceptions, you know,
in some Latin cultures in southern Italy, But even then
there are certain emotions that are just not acceptable and
that are suppressed. And when we look at the research
suppression basically increases the negative emotion, and it's more likely
(04:59):
to come out somatically, you know, through health stuff, or
it's going to explode or come out as passive aggression
and destroying both ourselves and others in the process. So
that's just sort of one example of that. And how
the journey towards becoming more sovereign with regards to our
emotions is to learn to actually feel them, just like
(05:19):
a child will feel their emotions one hundred percent and
then it moves through them. Just like so going back
to that theme of energy, the child lets the energy
of the emotion move through them and then they're done
a few minutes later, as opposed to adults who can
hold on to an emotion forever. Not to say that
I'm encouraging exploding our emotions all over the place, but
the ability to feel, and I think, I think in
(05:40):
our society we're given a lot of things to do
instead of feel, you know, a lot of things to
consume instead of feel, and yet that's how we stay
bound and addicted and unhappy.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
What does a healthy self esteem look like?
Speaker 1 (06:00):
Well, you know, I always just ask, like, you know,
what are some of the things that people say to
themselves when they make a big mistake. Right when you
ask people that, they usually say words like you're such
an idiot, you don't belong here, not good enough, those
kinds of words. And you know, whenever I hear that,
it's just so heartbreaking to hear how people talk to themselves.
(06:22):
When during the pandemic, I would teach on Zoom and
I would ask this question, what do you say to
yourself when you make a big mistake? And people would
write it in the chat and you'd see one thing
after another of these heartbreaking words that people tear themselves,
tear themselves up with, And when you think about it,
it doesn't make any sense because what would you say
(06:43):
to your best friend? You would say, what would you
say your best friend? You would say, Oh, you're okay,
everything's everybody makes mistakes, You're totally fine. We'd be so
encouraging and loving to them. Why do we have a
self destructive relationship with ourselves? You know, we talk about
toxic being in a toxic relationship or toxic workplace. Most
people are walking around with a toxic relationship with their
(07:06):
own self. What about that makes sense? It doesn't, but
it keeps people bound this. One study found that eighty
percent of millennials endorse the belief I am not good
enough with regards to most areas of their life. Can
you believe that? It's so heartbreaking? And so I always
(07:26):
think what would happen to this world if every single
person had a sovereign relationship with themselves? I mean, how
would they show up? They would be able to show
up within their full potential, be their freaking best selves
and rock stars like Scott Barry.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Kaufman, Well, thank you, I appreciate that. Yeah, you got
me thinking that. I think I might start using the
phrase instead of self esteem. What we really need is
a healthy self relationship. I like, yeah, I just thought
of that phrase self relationship.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Yeah, and so totally why wouldn't you? I mean, the
only relationship you're guaranteed for the rest of your life
is with yourself. Might as well make it a good one, right,
or a friendship, a romance and what happens then? You know?
I just you know, I always think, like, how are
you going to show up on the battlefield of your life?
(08:20):
Are you going to show up you know, limping because
you kicked yourself there? Or in brands spanking new shining
armor because you loved your way there. You know, where
are you? How are you going to be strongest? And
and yeah, so that's just something I think about. And
Maya Angelo has this beautiful quote where she says, I've
(08:44):
learned a long time ago that the only thing that
forgetting now the exact quotes, I've learned a long time
ago that the only thing that makes sense to be
on my own side, something like that. And then Audrey
Lorde has another really great quote and she says, or
self care is not self indulgence, it's an act of
political warfare. So powerful. And she was a self described uh,
(09:13):
a gay black woman in a white, straight man's world,
you know, so she just was she was battling a
lot of battles as an activist and writer and so forth.
But it's so powerful what she said. It's it's that's
how you're going to show up. You're going to show
up powerfully if you show up with that self care.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Wow, that's really powerful. Emma. You know you've done some terrific,
groundbreaking research in our field on the neuroscience of emotion regulation.
I'd be remiss not to have you review some of
your most recent findings or your most the highlights of
some of your findings, you know what, what are some
(09:51):
of the highlights of your findings? And why as adults well,
and also why don't children learn learn this stuff? We're
never taught this, I know, Scott.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
It's so weird. I always just think, like, no matter
how many mds, PhDs, black belts, you know, dishes, you
know how to cook, languages, you know how to speak,
most people are running around with as much education about
how to handle their big, bad, negative emotions as a
five year old, which is basically no formal education. I mean,
you're supposed to you know, like the two hardest things
we're supposed to manage in our life, which are emotions
and relationships, we never get any training on and they
(10:23):
cause so much pain, you know. And so yeah, I
mean we were looking specifically, I was looking at a
trauma so after nine I was living in New York
during nine to eleven, and I had a lot of
anxiety after that day, and I tried a lot of
things to help me at the time, you know, I
(10:44):
tried mindfulness, I'd go to like hot yoga and I
do all this stuff, and I was still shaking. You know,
I was still shaking at eight thirty in the morning,
and then I walked into a breathing class called it's
called sky Breath Meditation, which was a breathing class that
was offered at Columbia by some fellow students through an
organization called Art of Living. And I was like, okay,
what is this And I learned the breathing practices and
(11:07):
then I felt wow, like I feel like I can
move on. I regained my sovereignty over my anxiety. So
fast forward then, you know, I did my doctoral program
in psychology and I was doing a postdoc and working
with veterans with trauma or coming back from Afghanistan and Iraq,
and many of them had gone through traditional therapeutic or
pharmaceutical treatments and they hadn't helped them. They were self medicating,
(11:28):
like in their basement smoking weed or drinking et cetera.
And so I thought, you know, this helped me so
many years ago. Let's see if we can help them
with breathing. And that was one of the first studies
that we ran with a breathing protocol, with doing on
the sky Breath meditation for a week and then we
looked at their anxiety pre post, one month post, and
one year post. And we also looked at physiological measures
(11:51):
of startle response and so forth. And what we found
was that after one week their anxiety had normalized, I
mean compared to the country role group, they they had
really uh, some of them no longer qualified as having
post traumatic stress. And then when we looked at the
physiology of it, we saw really strong correlation between their
(12:11):
reduction in in start a response and their reduction in anxiety.
So correlation was zero point nine. Now this is something crazy.
And then one month later and yeah, one month later
and one year later, they they had maintained they they
were they had maintained what they had experienced after that
first week. So their anxiety was normalized. And it was
(12:33):
interesting because many of them hadn't continued their breathing practice,
and so that was really cool. It was like as if,
you know, there's a way to sort of stabilize the
nervous system even if you have gone through trauma through breathing.
And I think, to me, that makes sense in the
because a lot of psychological approaches are through the mind,
like change your thoughts, change your mind, change your life,
(12:54):
you know, And I think that can work to a
certain extent, and I think I think it does work,
you know, being grateful and so forth. We know, oh
that that works. But when there is a really intense trauma,
really intense anxiety, it's lodged in the body, the memory
is I'm just think about one veteran he would he said,
you know, I'll stand in front of the mall, and
I'm here in Madison, Wisconsin, and I know there's no
(13:16):
danger in the mall, but I still have to brace
myself for twenty minutes before I can go in. Because
his mind is doing fine. It's just that the trauma
in the body, the memory in the body, is bringing
up so much anxiety. And so what we think is
happening is that through breathing there's this combination. You're not
(13:37):
just addressing the mind, you're also addressing the nervous system.
Speaker 2 (13:43):
Tell me a little tell me a little more about that,
because I've been critical of the trauma obsessed culturally living
now and also the obsession with the body keeps the score.
So I actually would like to hear more about this. API.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
Absolutely no, I'm fascinated by myself because we've run a
number of other studies subsequent to this and found some
really interesting stuff. So yeah, I mean, one thing we
think is happening is this is that as the veterans
are doing their breathing practice, they go into this deep
(14:17):
parasympathetic state of just calm, and in that moment, it's
sometimes these memories come up. They can come up in
the form of the flashback, they come up in the
form of simply a smell of feeling, of physiological sensation,
but they're in a deep parasympathetic state. So when usually
when they're having a flashback or a memory, they're back
(14:39):
in sympathetic activation as if they were in the trauma
that they experienced. And that's why post traumatic stress doesn't
allow you to move on, because it's as if that
trauma is still right there in front of you right
now or every time it's triggered, right and so, and
they're not able to sleep for that reason. They're constantly
in high activation. And what happens with the breathing we
believe is that as they're going into this parasympathetic state
(15:03):
and the memory maybe coming up, there's like a decoupling
that happens between the physiological activation and the memory. And
so what they have said to us, is I remember
everything that happened, but I can move on. And they
get got off their met their sleep meds, anxiety meds,
you know, and you know, sometimes I get in touch
(15:24):
with them because like a reporter wants to talk to
them or something, and some of them are like, I'm
not I honestly don't remember what that was. Like. I'm like,
I can't believe you don't remember what that was like
you were living in your basement, going through a divorce
and you couldn't even know about work, you know, so
talk about sovereignty, you know, how can we regain sovereignty?
So many people have gone through trauma, and you know,
many psychological approaches do work and do help, and exposure
(15:47):
therapy does help, you know, in some cases and in
other cases, there are people that fall through the cracks,
and many veterans have fallen through the cracks. And there's
been a very very high suicide rate, as you probably
know daily. It's a horrible amount. And and I wanted
to see is there another is there another way that
we can bridge that gap, that we can catch those
that are falling. And we subsequently ran another study with
(16:08):
the Palo alto Va the larger, a larger group of veterans,
including both men and women, and and it was a
it was a design where you uh, that where it
was side by side with the gold standard therapeutic treatment,
cognitive processing therapy, and the design was such that we
(16:32):
wanted to see if the breathing intervention was either it
was at least as good as that one. I'm forgetting
the name of it now off the top of my head,
but it's that's what the statistical uh, what the stats
are that you're you're conducting on it. And that's what
was found that was at least as good as the
gold standard therapy. And then but then looking at just
(16:56):
the physiology too of emotion regulation, those that had gone
through the THING program as opposed to the therapy showed
better emotion regulation at the physiological level. So again because
I think what's happening with breathing is that you're actually
something is going on at the nerve with the nervous system.
It's not just cognitive and so so that's just really fascinating.
(17:17):
And then another study we ran here at Yale looking
at so Yale undergraduates tend to have worse and worse
mental health as the semester goes on in their height,
you know, type A, and just getting more and more
anxious and depressed with the with time, and so we
want what do.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
You say, my personal experience?
Speaker 1 (17:39):
Yeah, you remember that Scott we met at Yale all
those years ago. Oh it was so fun. Yeah, and
uh exactly. So what we wanted to see is can
we provide a buffer to prevent this from happening. So
we randomly assigned students to It was about two hundred students,
I think. We randomly assigned them to one of three
(18:01):
well being interventions or control group. So it was either
this sky breath meditation visit, the breathing or it was
mindfulness based stress reduction, or it was emotional intelligence which
is mostly cognitive skills, or the control group. And we
wanted to see which one of these was going to
do to help the students most. And what we saw
was that the breathing group had the most impact of
(18:22):
all and I think it's because it probably brings together
a lot of the elements from the others. Has both
the physiological breathing component, but also brings together the mindfulness.
Because what we saw is that mindfulness scores increased thanks
to the breathing, and then it has some cognitive you know,
you're you're better able to take in any kind of
cognitive information when you're you've addressed the anxiety that's at
(18:46):
the level of the body. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Can you give our listeners a concrete practice? Can you
teach us something?
Speaker 1 (18:54):
H yeah? Absolutely? So you know what you know, what
we researched is a program that takes a couple is
to learn, is like a whole protocol, like a twenty
minute protocol. But what I can teach you now is
something real simple that you can.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Keep a back stuck in the past. You've taught me
stuff in the past to help me get through my
flying anxiety you have.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
Oh my gosh, fantastic.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
I don't remember that while ago ago.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Yeah, yeah, oh good? Did it help?
Speaker 2 (19:19):
Oh yeah, okay.
Speaker 1 (19:20):
I'm glad to hear that. Okay, So real simple thing
that people can take away from from just listening today.
So when you breathe in, your heart rate increases, and
when you breathe out it slows down. And if you're
you know, if you're in a nurse's office, you can
really scare them by exhaling for a really long time
and see what happens to your heart rate. But what
we're going to do today is I can lead us
(19:41):
through a real You want me to lead us through
an exercise, Yeah, I'll lead us through a short extras Okay,
what we're just going to do is lengthen our exhales
for a while with our eyes closed. So before we start,
before we start changing our breath, you can just close
your eyes and have your palms open on your lap,
and then you want to breathe in for a count
(20:01):
of one, but hold on before you start breathing. Sorry,
before you start breathing, I just want to assess where
you are right now, So just assessing your level of energy, noticing,
you know, how many thoughts are going on in your
own mind, so you could have a lot of traffic,
a lot of thought traffic, or not a lot. Just
(20:22):
sort of noticing your own state of mind first, so
you can see if there's a shift from before to after.
And then for the breathing, you want to breathe in
for account of one, two, three, four, hold and then
you can breathe out for two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight,
So you're breathing out for either twice as long or
(20:43):
a time and a half as long as you breathe in.
You want to do that for about five minutes and
then reassess sort of where you're at and then and
that's a practice that you can take with you. Do
you want me to guide us through it or.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
Yeah, I'm doing it right now, okay.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
So I'll keep guiding us then for a few minutes. Okay,
So breathe.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Then two three four, hold and breathe out two three four, five,
six seven eight. Breathe in two three four, hold and
breathe out two three four, five six seven eight. Breathe
(21:29):
in two three four, hold and breathe out two three four, five,
six seven eight. Breathe in two three four, hold and
breathe out two three four, five, six, seven eight. One
(21:56):
more time deep breath in two three for hold, breathe
out two three four, five six seven eight, and then
come back to normal breath and just assess any shifts
or changes in the state of your mind. And then
(22:18):
when you're ready, you can open your eyes and notice
how you feel with the eyes open.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
I opened my eyes already. I'm gotta admit amazing. Yeah, no,
it's it really does help do something to my parasympathetic
nervous system.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
Yeah, something, Yeah, it's it's a way to gain sovereignty, right.
I mean, look all the time throughout the day, we
have so much media coming at us. We have so
many things, so many people, so many demands, and sometimes
you can just rush through the day and there's all
this stuff in our head from everything we've been accumulating.
And then you you're right somewhere, either at your office
(23:01):
and you want to just be focusing, or at home
and you want to be focusing on your loved ones,
but your mind is completely cluttered with everything that's been happening,
and you're not able to be present with what you
want to do. And you know, having sovereignty of our
mind is being able to bring it back into a
place where it can be aware and present with what's
going on and calmer and able to you know, we
know from research, when you're calmer, you're a better decision maker,
(23:22):
you have better emotional intelligence, you're more focused, better attention,
better memory, and you're more creative. Right, so, all the things.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
That's true, that's true. The emotion regulation and trauma narrative
link is really interesting to me because I feel like
trauma has exploded in our society, where it was once
confined to like veterans and others would diagnosed post traumatic
(23:51):
stress disorder. Now it's every student I teach, it's everyone
on TikTok, everyone and everything is blamed on their trauma
as well. So to a certain degree, you know, trauma
is a higher level, conscious construction of an event. It's
it's a label that we're putting on an event. And
(24:14):
of course you are quite right to point out that
there are bodily uh uh top you know, bottom up effects.
You know, there's top down, but there's also you know,
bottom up effects that that can linger, especially under triggering
situations that are related. But now everyone's being triggered by everything.
You're a very very compassionate I mean, I've known you
(24:36):
a long time, Emma. You are very very that you
have like a very like motherly way of being to
the work, to the world at large. Just my observation
just now, I am not you. I think some people
(24:56):
need to toughen the fuck up, is what I'm saying.
That's what I'm saying. Now, work with me, here, work
with me, let's meet, let's meet in the middle.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
Let's rest, let's meet in the middle, because you know,
one thing I talk about also is you know, yes,
things may have happened to you. To to most people,
something's happened. You know, you've had a car accident, you
had a tough youth, you had a tough breakup, you've
had your morning. You know, yes, those things happen. And
(25:27):
in that sense, we are victims of those situations. And
yet I do, really, from the bottom of my heart,
believe that when we hold onto that victimhood, we are
keeping ourselves in a bound state because we are not
we are. It kind of keeps us in that place like, okay,
I'll share. You know, for myself, I was in an
abusive marriage. Okay, so I know what. I know what
(25:48):
it's like to be in a situation like that. And
yet if I stay in that, I'm a victim of
you know, a domestic violence. I am, I am identifying
with a disempowered position as opposed to I am you know,
I lived through that, I learned through that, I grew
(26:10):
through that. I'm you know, I'm stronger for it, and
I'm more sovereign now. But sovereignty, I think is really
reclaiming that post traumatic growth, not so much focusing on
the victimhood, which can painfully keep us in a place
of feeling abused. And you know, this is it's a
(26:32):
this is a tricky line to walk because I'm not
saying no, you didn't have trauma. Yes you had trauma,
and yet it is in your favor to identify with
the fact that you have survived it, you're growing from it,
and you're stronger for it, and you're not having that
happen to you ever again.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Well yeah, well love what you're saying. The idea though,
that trauma is something objective as opposed to a subjective thing.
Speaker 1 (27:03):
Though.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
You know, it's interesting because there's so many different definitions
of trauma in this psychological literature. It's not like we
all agree in the literature. You know that on this term.
And you know, if a student is traumatized that they
have homework, is that a fair use of the word trauma?
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Do you know?
Speaker 2 (27:21):
You know there's I just the word trauma is being
used now like everyone's being traumatized as opposed to I'm
upset or I'm anxious. It's now I'm traumatized.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Now.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Now I think there are things we can all I
mean there's a list of things we can all agree.
I think the ACE checklist is still valid, you know,
but there are so many things now that fall are
falling under that purview for young people. Yeah, what are
your thoughts of that?
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Well, they're not by by going deep into that as
a victim, they're disempowering themselves. And that's a problem, you know,
because then they're not accessing, you know, their inner core
strength and belief in themselves that Yeah, like, this is
hard for me, and I can get through this, and
(28:13):
I'm a freaking warrior. You know. We've all been through
hard times, and even just looking back on it, you
can be like, wow, I'm I went through that, and
I can do this. You know, I can do this again.
And I could do it with more wisdom, I could
do it with more compassion. I can do it. I've
gone through suffering and I'll continue to go through suffering
because that's human life, and I can do this.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Well, that's lovely. That's a lovely actually, I mean you are.
You are very forward looking, which is which is why
I mean I'm very much in line with that. For sure.
Your research has spanned multiple areas. You've also studied intuition
and got feelings. You know, you are. We have an
instinct for self preservation that we often ignore, but you
(29:01):
do argue that we can make better decisions in our
lives if we can gain some sovereignty over that. Could
you elaborate a little more on your research relating to that.
You know that I'm so furious about that instinct for
self preservation because my hero, Carl Rogers called it the
we have an organismic valuing system in our body, is
(29:22):
what he argued. I have renamed that in my coaching
program too. We have a self actualizing compass.
Speaker 1 (29:30):
In our body.
Speaker 2 (29:31):
So it's even more than self preservation. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Absolutely, Well that's sovereignty, right, self actualization is sovereignty.
Speaker 3 (29:44):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
I think you know when ilse a grad student, I
was a grad student James Gross's lab at Stanford, which
was the Emotion regulation Lab.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
He's amazing.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
I love him. He was an amazing mentor. He is
an amazing I mean to this day, he's my hero.
And you know, one of the studies that was really
interesting was that in the lab we looked at suppression.
What happens when you suppress emotion? Now, when someone is
suppressing anger. Let's say I were suppressing anger and I'm
(30:16):
talking to you and I'm pretending I'm not anger. I'm like, nope,
I'm fine, everything's fine. Right. Let's say that your heart
rate would increase, so cognitively you wouldn't understand. Okay, you
wouldn't understand why you're feeling not so you want to
back away or you want to get out of there.
You know how sometimes you have that feeling like I
don't I can't explain it, but I just don't have
a good vibe. I need to move, I need to
(30:37):
get out of here. Well, what happens is that physiologically
you've already registered that I'm suppressing emotion. You've registered inauthenticity,
and inauthenticity from an instinctual point of view, registers this threat,
so even animals. So I'll give you an example with
equine facilitated therapy. So when a therapist uses a horse
to work with a Let's say a child with anxiety, right,
(30:59):
and the child protect not to be scared of the horse,
the child will come up and be like, I'm not
scared of that horse. I'm just fine. But if that
child is scared the horse is moving all over the
place and is anxious, and the horse doesn't understand English, right,
but the horse is registering inauthenticity and that registers this threat.
And so and we have the same thing, and we
(31:20):
register in authenticity as threat, whether we realize it cognitively
or not. Our heart rate is going up. So I
thought that was really fascinating. And then that and we
have so we have an instinct which we can think
of intuition as instinct. We can think of it as
you know, putting the pieces of putting the pieces of
information together in the back of our mind. I mean,
(31:40):
there are many ways that we can conceive of it.
Joseph Michaels, who is my colleague at Stanford, he looked
at decision making and he thinks about intuition as your feeling.
You know, you say, I have a feeling this is
a good idea or not. And what he found was
that when decision making is complex, when you're weighing a
lot of things, you're going to make a better decision
if you go with your feelings rather than just thinking
(32:02):
through it reasonably. If the matter is simple, no big deal.
But if it's complicated, you're going to make a better
decision if you go with your gut feeling. I think
that's just really fascinating. That also ties into you know
what you and I, Yeah, what you and I are
really interested in with the whole idea of the creativity.
Where do you get your creative insights? Again, it's from
a place of relaxation, right, So you could think of
(32:25):
it as, oh, my brain's putting together a puzzle in
the back, in the background and I'm not realizing it.
Or you could think of it as receptivity like Einstein,
you know, he he would go and play Mozart and
then it would come, the ideas would come to him.
How does that happen? However we think about it, it's
it's a way of being receptive in a non cognitive
(32:46):
way that can really that can save our lives. Like
my friend Kushel was on nine to eleven. He walked
into the second Twin tower to get into his office
and then the building was hit or I don't know
remember which tower was, but anyway's building was hit and
the guards were giving orders to stay in the building,
and Krushill hesitated for a moment and he ran out
(33:07):
of there, and he saved his life by hair and
what would have happened if he hadn't listened to his gut.
How many people in that building had the same gut
feeling and didn't go with it. Right, So this is
an area of research that I think is going to
be going to grow a lot. It's already growing. There's
just a lot of interest, and the military has been
researching it for decades under different names. But and there
(33:31):
was a movie that made fun of it called Men
Who Stare At Goats? Did you see that movie? Well,
it was kind of making fun of that. But they're
always starting new programs again because so many service members
came back from Iraq and Afghanistan having reported using gut
feelings to like save their lives or save other people's lives. Oh,
we didn't go that on that road because I had
a feeling, you know. So now they're studying it again.
(33:52):
It's sort of top secret and nobody would nobody wants
to talk about it, but it's happening, and I know it.
I have I have some some intelligence from that.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
Yeah, so interesting. I don't know if you know, but
my my dissertation was on impulsit learning.
Speaker 1 (34:11):
No, I didn't know that.
Speaker 2 (34:13):
Yes, yes, and it's relationship to creativity, so I think
I'm all about uh harnessing that power.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, tell me about that.
Speaker 2 (34:27):
Well. The regularities and statistical probabilities that we learn automatically
and unconsciously throughout the course of our day. There are
individual differences in it. I found some people are better
at impulsit learning than others, and that was unrelated to
their IQ score, So they could have do well on
(34:48):
IQ tests and see those patterns explicitly and consciously, but
not be as good as at seeing the tacit areas
of life. So yeah, I found implicit learning was correlated
with openness to experience the personality trait makes sense, and yeah,
(35:10):
it was which that in turn was correlated with creative achievement.
But I so, yeah, no, I think that's really good.
And you would argue that it's important to distinguish between
just like a blind faith in one's emotions, right, and
a more honed expert intuition.
Speaker 1 (35:31):
Absolutely, because our feelings are always changing and it's not
like you can just I'm just going to always go
with my feelings. That could also make you really wish
you washedy like you. We definitely have logic and reason there.
And I like how Joe Michael says. He says, you know,
when I have to make a big decision, of course
I use my reason, but I also consult my feeling.
And I think just that even just that invitation to
(35:51):
consult one's feeling has been absent from our discourse, absence
from our education. Pooh poot is not like magical thinking.
But actually, you know, even when you're like mother's intuition,
there's a word for that, like we know what's going
on with our kid better than you know anyone else.
And I also think that you know, making time for
those moments. And I know, Scott, you and I have
(36:12):
talked about this a lot, about those moments of you know,
the awful wave of moments in our lives where we
are in a more relaxed state, you know, whether it's
through meditation or contemplation, or being out in nature or
playing music, listening to music, whatever it is that allows
us to go into a more serene space. That's when
you're more likely to sort of access those insights. And
(36:35):
you also want to make sure that you're not not
being colored by your trauma or fear. Right, It's like, oh,
I have a good feeling I shouldn't go on stage.
Well maybe you're just really afraid to go on stage.
But if you went up there, you'd be a rock
star and you'd be helping people, So you should do
it right. So we have to make sure that we're
not you know, we're not. We have to make sure
that that our feeling really is is is an intuition? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (37:01):
Yeah, I love that. You know, you've you've tied a
lot of this stuff to leadership too, right, m hm.
And what do you think? What do you think are like?
Do you can you give an example of any sovereign
leaders people you would say, Oh, they're sovereign, they're sovereign,
they're not bound. Trump is bound. Do you think Trump
is bound?
Speaker 1 (37:23):
Oh that's hilarious. I can't speak to I have no idea.
He is definitely doing his own thing. But whether he
is a sovereign I don't know. Because you know, a
sovereign state is one in which you're not caught up
in addictions, whether that's addiction to fame or addiction to
(37:46):
money or pleasure, all those things are bound. Those are bondage.
And it sounds like from his history you may have
some of that. But yes, I I once met this. Uh.
I was actually supposed to escort this woman, her name
is Linda to a stage and I hadn't met her before,
and within minutes of her sitting next to me, seconds
(38:07):
maybe tears start rolling down my face. Scott, this is
embarrassing here. I'm her host. I'm supposed to bring her
to the station. She's going to speak at Stanford Business School.
And she looks at me and she's like, I'm making
you cry, and I'm like, what is happening to me?
And I had this flash of insight at that moment
that I had never met a woman who owned her
(38:27):
sovereignty so completely in my life, and it almost shot
a pang of pain in me, not just for myself,
but for all women in particular. This was what this
was about fifteen years ago, and it was sort of
a maybe a flash of insight, you know, one of
those wow you know. And she is an incredible woman.
(38:48):
Talk about working with her intuition. She definitely moves with
her intuition, but she's also brilliant. But she and she
in fact, this is an intuition story herself. So she
went she lost her father when she was in her
teens and experienced firsthand what it was like to have
a main provider pass away in the family, and so
(39:11):
she got herself to Yale on a tennis scholarship and
then at Yale once she got married at Yale and
then was pregnant shortly thereafter and a single mom, so
she had to somehow support her child. And she went
to Wall Street in the eighties as a woman. So
she became financially successful, but was sexually harassed by both
her colleagues and her clients constantly. So she finally decided
(39:34):
to retire in her thirties, thinking that's it. I'm out
of here, and she moved to Florida. And then she
had an intuition that came to her as a dream,
and her father came to her and said, this is
not what I had in mind for you, and she
realized there was something else she was meant to do,
and she decided to make sure that no other families
(39:56):
that she could help whatever have to deal with losing
a main and so she bought these companies that other
people had given up on as you know, a lost cause,
and turn them around. So I think companies like Style
a makeup, you know, like, these are companies that even
the consulting companies had given up on. She bought them
just to make sure that people would lose their jobs.
(40:18):
And she turned around all these companies. She's called the
Turnaround Queen. She at one point had seven hundred thousand employees.
And this woman is incredible, and she dances to her
own drum and has thereby shown up with at her
full potential and made such a difference. So it's just
one example. And I do believe, you know, yes, there
(40:41):
are extraordinary people, but we all have extraordinary gifts, every
one of us if we allow them through. And that
comes through when we are sovereign as opposed to caught
up in ways of thinking and behaving that keep us bound.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
Yeah yeah, well well wow.
Speaker 1 (41:02):
Yeah, I mean and you know, I was teaching a
group of undergrad a yell undergrads the other day and
asking them what's your definition of success, you know, and
they're all like, well, you know, make a lot of
money or do this or that the other And I said, okay,
so I want you to think about the most wonderful
people in your life, you know, think about the people
that were there for you and mentored you and just
(41:22):
saw you for who you were and just helped you along.
And then it says, how would you describe those people?
And they would say, oh, they were loving and warm
and caring. You know, they use those kind of words.
And I said, would you say that those people have
had a successful impact on your life? And they were like, yeah,
so what is success? Isn't it that ability to show
up for people and you know, support them and just
(41:44):
be there completely present in that kind of a loving way.
I mean, you know, we really have to think about
what that is. And Lynn, she has a lot of
love in her heart. I can tell you that. And
she's showing up as a badass, like she's she's a badass,
you know. You know I'm mess with her, but she's
making such a difference you should have on your podcast.
Speaker 2 (42:05):
I would welcome an intro. I would welcome in absolutely. Well,
I've really I've really asked the main questions that I
want to ask you today.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
Is there anything else?
Speaker 2 (42:14):
Is there anything you would like to add?
Speaker 1 (42:16):
Yeah? Yes, I'd love to talk about relationships, Scott. What
do you think?
Speaker 2 (42:20):
Yeah, let's do it.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
You know, relationships is another area of our life where
we just don't have we don't get a manual for
and we want we want to have good relationships, and
we suffer in relationships, you know. And it's it's really
interesting to me because oftentimes relationships are also obviously places
where we can kind of project all of our own
fears onto other people who we haven't done anything, and
(42:43):
here we are, you know, creating all the suffering. But anyway,
I think a lot of people have talked about that.
I'm not going to go into that in so much detail,
but there is a new field of research that is
really amazing called positive. It's on positive organizational scholarship. You
familiar with it a little bit, I'm sure you are, right.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
I yeah, yeah, I love that that Amy Wear, Nesta
Ernski and Jane Dunnan, Jane Dunnan and all that.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
Yes, I love this, So I guess I share. I'll
start with the story. So my friend, it tells she's
a environmental activist and she's often in the African jungle
or in the South American jungle doing undercover investigations on
deforestation and child labor. And then she'll like write to
these companies and tell them that what they're doing is
illegal and then anyway, she does amazing stuff.
Speaker 3 (43:29):
Right.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
So she was once in an African country in the
jungle doing this investigation when her car disappears, right, her
driver is gone, and she's told to get in the
car with these two muscles strapped guys in military apparel
and weapons. And she knows that the government is in
cahoots with the rubber company that she's investigating because they're
getting kickbacks that they don't want to tell. There she
(43:51):
has she has three hours. She's three hours away from
the airport, so she had no choice but to get
in the car with these guys who are her hitmen. Right,
And in the spad of the three hours, not only
did she did they say did they not kill her?
But she made friends with them. They even at one
point held up a little sheet so she could relieve
herself by the side of the road so she wouldn't
go into the jungle and get bitten by snakes.
Speaker 2 (44:12):
Ok.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
And they and she had got confirmation that they were
meant to kill her when they when she got to
the airport and they said to her, do not ever
come back here. You are not safe here at all.
But if you do come back, come over a land
border under our protection and stay with us.
Speaker 2 (44:30):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (44:31):
So what happened here? It Tel has something called positive
relational energy. She knows how to connect with people in
such a way that is life giving. And I think
we all know, you know, this concept of energy vampires
has been around for you know, two decades, and there's
so much talk about it. But what we don't realize
(44:52):
is that there's another type of relating which is not
one that sucks you dry. It's energy enhancing and that's
the key to positive relational energy. And so Kim Cameron
and some of his colleagues did research on larger organizations
and saw that there were these pockets within the organizations
that were hyper productive, like what was going on here.
(45:13):
At the center of each of these was one person.
He said, there was one person, and that person was
giving life to everyone around them. It was like and
so he called them like positive, positively energizing leaders. And
that is really incredible and it's something that can be taught,
and Kim does. He trains people in us. He trains
leaders and turns them around. You can become a positive
(45:34):
you can have what it Tel had. Now a story
was extraordinary, by the way, and I'm not saying that
you know, other people who are in hostage situations didn't
have this, because that's not true. I mean, she was
very much a particular case, and she was in the
process of connecting with them able to explain what she
was doing, and they realized also how she was trying
to help their villages and so forth. I just want
to give that caveat. But positive relational energy is something
(45:56):
that can be trained and that anyone can learn, and
that it can really catapaul both some relationships and work relationships.
And it has a lot to do with the values
that you have and how you live, but it also
has to do with your ability to have fill your
own tank and have a have a positively energizing relationship
with your own self. So I just want to add that.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
That's really cool. I love the phrase positively energizing leaders.
I just wrote that in my notes. Good stuff. Well, Emma,
thank you so much. Is there anything else you want
to add?
Speaker 1 (46:29):
Oh, I'm super grateful to chat with you, Scott. You know,
so we go, we go way back and.
Speaker 2 (46:35):
Me too, me too. Thank you, Emma, Thank you, Scott,
good luck with the book.
Speaker 1 (46:40):
Thank you,
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