October 19, 2024 • 59 mins
Dr. Kyra Bobinet, a pioneering MD and public health expert, joins us to unravel the mysteries of behavior change and why we often struggle to do what's best for ourselves. Her groundbreaking book, "The Unstoppable Brain," provides fresh perspectives on how to achieve lasting change by overcoming failure. Discover how her experiences with incarcerated youth and population health studies led to a transformative system for behavior modification. As we journey through her insights, you'll gain a deeper understanding of how identity, beliefs, and strategies can align to foster resilience and success.
In our quest to redefine traditional mindsets, we venture into the world of the iterative mindset—a skill that champions practice and experimentation over rigid goal-setting. Uncover why this mindset excels beyond grit and resilience in promoting habit formation and improving mental health and work performance. With tools like the Iterative Mindset Inventory, we provide practical strategies to cultivate this empowering approach in your own life. Join us as we explore how the iterative mindset can be a game-changer for personal growth and achievement.
Our exploration takes a fascinating turn as we delve into the neurological aspects of failure, focusing on the habenula's role in shaping our perceptions and motivations. Through Dr. Bobinet's expert lens, we learn how therapeutic practices—ranging from ketamine therapy to journaling—can rewire the brain and neutralize the fear of failure. By embracing these insights, listeners can harness the power of the unstoppable brain, transforming past traumas into stepping stones for future success. Tune in to discover how to break free from the constraints of failure and embrace a mindset of growth and resilience.
keywords
neuroscience, behavior change, iterative mindset, personal growth, failure, motivation, health, psychology, Dr. Kyra Bobinet, The Unstoppable Brain
takeaways
- The iterative mindset allows for experimentation rather than fixed goals.
- Neutralizing failure is crucial for personal growth.
- The habanula plays a significant role in our motivation and behavior.
- 20% of the population naturally possesses an iterative mindset.
- Iterative mindset can be trained and developed over time.
- Failure should be viewed as a learning opportunity, not a setback.
- Mindset is the main determinant of behavior change outcomes.
- Compassion-focused approaches can help mitigate feelings of failure.
- Tools like breathwork and journaling can aid in overcoming psychological barriers.
- Understanding the neuroscience behind behavior can empower individuals to change.
Chapters
00:00- Introduction to The Unstoppable Brain
02:45- The Journey to Understanding Behavior Change
06:14- Discovering the Iterative Mindset
12:20- The Importance of Iteration in Personal Growth
19:40- Building an Iterative Mindset
26:26- The Neuroscience Behind Failure and Motivation
32:18- The Role of the Habanula in
Looking for a Next Level Human Coach? Get on the waitlist and get access to the brand-new science of quantum metabolism and identity restructuring with Dr Jade and the team.
http://nextlevelhuman.com/human-coaching
Want to become a Next Level Human Coach? Get on the waitlist. Go to: http://www.nextlevelhuman.com/human-coach
Connect with Next Level Human
Website: www.nextlevelhuman.com
support@nextlevelhuman.com
Connect with Dr. Jade Teta
Website: www.jadeteta.co
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the show everybody.
This is the Next Level Humanpodcast.
I am your host, dr Jade Tita,and today I have a very
interesting guest.
This is Dr Kyra Bobinette, whohas a brand new book out, and
that book is the reason why Iwanted her on the show.
It's called the UnstoppableBrain, and the subtitle is the
(00:22):
New Neuroscience that Frees UsFrom Failure, eases Our Stress
and Creates Lasting Change.
And so before I introduce you,kyra, I just want to give
everyone a little bit of abackground.
You know, as a podcast host,one of the things that happens
is you get people pitched to youall of the time, and so people
come across and you kind of lookat them and say, yeah, that's
(00:42):
not for me, that's not for me.
Well, most of you listenersknow that I have been very much
over the last 10 years,specifically the last five,
really engaged in this questionof why is it that we oftentimes
know what to do, but we can'tactually do it?
What is going on there?
Is it habits and behaviors,which we know?
(01:05):
This is part of it.
Is it identity and beliefs?
I think this is part of it, butwhat is all the sort of story
that's going on here, and sothat's why I wanted you on Dr
Kyra, because I want to unpackthe different ways that people
see this.
You have been doing reallyamazing work.
Just so everyone knows, kyra isan MD and also has her master's
(01:30):
in public health and has beeninvolved with some of the
research in behavior change andstumbled across sort of a new
system that is very effective,that she is seeing for behavior
change.
So we're going to learn allabout that.
So what I would love for you todo, kyra, is tell us a little
bit about how you got here beingan MD.
(01:51):
It's not typical for an MD tobe focused on these kinds of
things, but you are, and youhave written a book on this, and
it is very important from myperspective.
We might know what to do, butif we can't do it, we're not
going to make any change.
So if you could just give us anupdate on sort of your
(02:12):
background and the story thatgot you here, and then let's get
into this amazing work thatyou're doing.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
Absolutely so.
By the way, you're a clinicianafter my own heart, so I'm
really excited about thisconversation.
I guess how it started was justobservations in patient care
where you know somebody wouldsay oh yeah, doc, like I'm going
to, I promise I'm going to stopsmoking, I'm going to, I'm
going to do this, I'm going todo that, I'm going to eat better
, I'm going to exercise, andthen the next time they either
(02:39):
ditch you and avoid you or theycome in with their tail tucked
and are like you know, like Ifeel so bad about myself.
And one patient that wasparticularly poignant for this
was a guy who came in.
You know, I had 10 minutes withhim.
He had a gouty toe, very generickind of situation.
I'm writing the prescriptionfor the toe and I say, you know
(03:02):
so how'd this happen?
And he said well, doc, you know, I did.
Three days ago I did meth,haven't been to sleep since.
And so, you know, meth, no sleep, dehydration, gout, and I
remember thinking I'm on thewrong end of this animal and I
didn't really know what I wasattracted to in that moment.
I thought, you know, should Igo into addiction medicine?
(03:24):
No, that doesn't really draw me.
But, and there was no behaviorchange.
You know specific degree that Iknew of at that time, you know,
and, and so I think I did,that's what kind of sparked my
interest in hey, wait a minute.
You know there's there's a lotof things upstream of what I'm
doing that I'm super curiousabout.
(03:44):
So I started crawling up thatstream.
I started a program forincarcerated youth which was all
about behavior change, comingback into the community,
lowering recidivism with thatgroup.
So they kind of taught me, youknow, what does and doesn't work
.
I also went into public healthand, as you mentioned, you know,
did population health studieson 33 million people where, you
(04:06):
know, I'm testing everythingfrom wearables to programs to,
you know, texting programs, toany kind of education program,
incentives, punishment andreward structures, all that kind
of stuff, and so I just wentdeep on trying to change
people's behavior for about twodecades and then, as you
(04:29):
mentioned, then had kind of adiscovery that really changed my
mind about the whole thing.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Okay, so we have the right person, because 20 years
looking at behavior change fromall these different things and
this is why I really love youknow, just for the listeners to
understand, this is one of thethings that I really love about
being an MD and then being anMPH.
Having a master's of publichealth it gives, I think, a
really interesting perspective,because not only are you working
(04:56):
clinically one-on-one withindividuals and seeing those
individual case studies, butyou're also able to zoom out and
see some of the issues that areaffecting the population as a
whole.
And so I can imagine you'resort of looking at these
individuals one on one in frontof you and then kind of zooming
out and being like what iseveryone suffering from and what
works for everyone?
(05:17):
And you're running intoconstant roadblocks and
understanding all these things,all these stuff that we have
available to us.
So I am interested in, ofcourse, what was the thing?
Because over 20 years doing allthis research, looking at all
the things that are available tous, you obviously found things
(05:40):
that did not do much, thingsthat did some things but weren't
able to last, and now you seemto believe right, when this is
the thing that I think is reallybeautiful.
You now believe you found asolution that I assume can work
for the vast majority of people,and this is why you've done a
(06:00):
book on it.
So what is this solution?
Is that where you want to start?
Or do you want to start interms of helping us understand
how you came to the solution,Some of the things that were
surprising findings.
Maybe that led you here?
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Well, you know, it's kind of a handshake and since
it's organically coming up.
Let's go with the solution, andthen we can back our way into
the brain science that fuelsthis solution or enhances it.
So one thing that happened wasin my pursuits of, you know,
trying to change behavior.
I had gone to work in thebehavior design laboratory at
(06:37):
Stanford and the school ofmedicine as well at Stanford,
and I had also started abehavior design consultancy for
large companies looking at thepopulation health view, still
trying to figure out, like youknow, because at heart I'm an
interventionist, you know I wantto change people and so I was
looking for research that wouldgive me clues on what would work
(07:01):
, that kind of thing, and I dida behavioral study with Walmart,
who hired us to really rethinkwhat is it that causes people to
be healthy versus not under thesame circumstances?
So these were people who were,you know, lower socioeconomic
status all over the UnitedStates and they had every what's
(07:24):
called social determinants ofhealth.
You know every barrier to beinghealthy that you could imagine.
You know single parents,multiple jobs, you know taking
care of senior parents, you knownot having enough money or time
and also living in food deserts, those kinds of things, and so
what I found was superinteresting is that you had
these kind of unicorns scatteredabout you know, in different
(07:48):
locations, who didn't know eachother and, independently, what
they did was they were differentthan their peers in one
particular way, which is thatthey had a different mindset
than everybody else, thaneverybody else, and this mindset
was made of.
(08:08):
Well, let me practice this, letme experiment with this, let me
just see if this will work.
That kind of curiosity andexperimentation kind of view,
then kind of smart goals, andI'm going to re-regiment it and
I'm going to do this and that,and instead of setting a goal,
they would set up an experimentor an effort, you know, to see
what they could do.
The second thing that was partof this was that they would
(08:32):
iterate instead of fail wheneverthey hit an impasse.
And so inevitably, as I'm sureyou've seen in every single
patient you've ever had,somebody hits up against some
unexpected disruptor, someunexpected trigger internally,
some, you know, barrierexternally.
And what these people diddifferently and uniquely was
(08:56):
that they iterated their waythrough that problem to
something better, so that theywould do either small tweaks to
what they were trying or theywould do a wholesale change.
It just depended on what theirinspiration or what their
learning guided them and, as aresult of them iterating and not
(09:17):
failing, these people keptgoing and they were able to keep
themselves in effort.
I call it versus everybody elsewho tried something, failed it
and then quit trying.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Yeah, this is going to be very familiar to my
listeners and so you listenersknow this, but this is the first
time Dr Kyra and I have talked,so I'll clue her in a little
bit and see what she thinks Like.
One of the one of the keythings that this group of
individuals you're talking tounderstands is that to me, I
(09:51):
oftentimes say there's only onerule in all this, and that is do
what works for you.
Right, it's like the one ruleto rule them all.
It's like you had to become ametabolic detective versus being
a dieter, and it seems likeyou're saying something similar
to this.
If I'm right and I oftentimesuse this Bruce Lee quote that
(10:11):
you know with my individuals isthat you know, if you think
Bruce Lee, this is the martialartist, actor, philosopher Bruce
Lee.
If you think about Bruce Lee, hesays you know, discard what is
useless, absorb what is usefuland add what is uniquely your
own.
So this is this very iterativeprocess, when you try certain
things on, and in that processyou gain some understanding that
(10:32):
works for you.
You gain some understandingabout things that don't work for
you and, of course, you cameinto the process knowing some
things already that werepowerful for you.
And there's a final quote thatI oftentimes like to use, which
is you've arrived when arrivalis no longer the goal.
This idea seems to becompatible with what you're
(10:53):
saying.
Am I thinking about this right,or are there pieces I'm missing
?
How does that hit you when youhear that?
Is this very similar?
Is it exactly the same, or arethere key differences here?
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Yeah.
So what I can say is you'respot on with the research that I
did in terms of find what worksfor you, and I would just maybe
point out a little specificityaround in this moment, because
where people can trip up onfailure or perceived failure, is
that they can say well, thisalways works for me, zumba
always works for me, but whathappens is that they don't see
that there's a decay of theirlove of yoga or Zumba or
(11:39):
weightlifting or whatever thecase may be, and that is just a
sign that there is anotheriteration that is coming up that
they need because they'refalling out of love with that
particular food or thatparticular exercise or that kind
of thing, and so I find thatit's one thing to make sure that
it matches you.
(12:00):
It's another thing to understandthat it may not always be your
one and only.
It may not be the one thingthat you do for the rest of your
life.
We don't know which things thatwe're trying, that were our
lifetime, that are seasonal,that are momentary, and just
having the right mindset of bothfinding out what works for you
(12:22):
and honoring in this moment whatcan I get myself to do, instead
of some fantasy of what I wishI would do.
That seems to be the thing thatcloses the gap most often for
people.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
Yeah, I love that distinction.
I love that distinction andyeah, so I lost you there for a
bit, but I love that distinctionbecause I think some of the
things that I see with this isthat certainly we can talk about
the metabolism sort of changing, and you're speaking to the
psychology changing, and I oftentell people you have to account
for that A menopausal woman isnot the same as a younger woman
(12:59):
who has her hormones working forher, not to mention an 18 year
old who's passionate about danceand nightclubs is not going to
be the same as a 40-year-oldwho's dealing with teenage
children and trying to get themto school and the passions
around that.
So I love this idea.
So, I guess, walk us through.
(13:19):
How does someone begin thisiterative process?
Because what are the?
Because you alluded to this,it's almost like it's a
personality trait, or is it alearned trait?
You know, cause that's going tobe the first thing that people
ask Is this something that I canlearn?
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Yeah, and so in our research, about 20% of any
population are iterators.
They have really high scores oniterative mindset and we've
done a research validationseries of studies to develop a
tool to measure iterativemindset.
So iterative mindset is youpractice or experiment instead
(13:55):
of setting a hard, fixed goal,and you iterate whenever you
reach an impasse.
An impasse could be you'rebored, you need variety.
An impasse could be you'rebored, you need variety.
An impasse could be it's toochallenging.
An impasse could be you killedit and now you want to level up
right.
So that's where people start toiterate and this tool, the
(14:15):
iterative mindset inventory, hasbeen validated and we're about
to publish on this and in thepopulation that is 20% already
there.
They don't need any moreiterative mindset for that
domain.
But we also find that people arelike patchwork quilts In some
areas of their life they'll bevery iterative and in other
(14:39):
areas of their life they'll bevery performative, which is the
opposite of iterative.
So in people's careers, forexample, there's
performance-based goals at work,those kinds of things.
In school, there'sperformance-based grades and
grading and ranking and thosekinds of things, and in those
areas they forget their naturalfaculties to be iterative and
(15:02):
they start to suffer and there'sa lot of mental health problems
that occur when you stopiterating and you start
performing for other people,because that means that the
other person is now controllingyou and your experience.
So we can get to that in asecond.
But to your question aboutwhether it's trainable, it's
absolutely trainable.
We've done preliminary studieson this and you know, to me, the
(15:24):
mindset that you're running,the software that you're running
on your hardware of your brainand your nervous system, is the
main determinant of youroutcomes.
And so checking for the levelof this mindset, which is more
powerful than any mindset thatwe tested, so we tested it
against growth mindset, learningmindsets, performance mindsets,
(15:47):
self-efficacy, grit, resilience, learned helplessness, all of
these sort of and optimism andover and above any of those
qualities and strategies that wemight use in our life,
iterative mindset was, wasstronger at habit formation,
(16:09):
mental health, well-beingoutcomes, performance outcomes
at work, productivity at work,healthcare, risks and costs, and
I think one else, yeah, healthoutcomes.
So it is to me the mostsignificant factor and it
(16:29):
probably has a lot of allegoriesor synonyms for itself kind of
your work and how aligned thatis with this, but it's the most
powerful thing that I've everseen in terms of our ability to
change our behavior and sustainit.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
More importantly, yeah, you know what, kyra, I
love this so much, but partlyselfishly, because I'm seeing a
tool that I did not have thatI'm realizing is a huge piece of
the work that I've been doing.
You know, it's reallyinteresting, right?
Because you talk about allthese things that we know have a
great evidence base AngelaDuckworth's work and others on
(17:09):
grit and stuff and thisiterative mindset.
It makes sense that it's takinginto account a lot of these
things resilience and all theseother things learning a growth
mindset, a resilience mindset,all of this.
Actually, for you, the listener, just before you and I jumped
on, kyra, I didn't tell you this, but I went on your website and
I actually took the quiz.
(17:30):
There's actually a quiz there.
So if you guys you all who arelistening go to
drkyrabobinettecom slashiterative-mindset-quiz, you
actually can take a quiz, andI'm assuming this is a part of
the.
Is this the actual assessmentor is this a shortened version
of it?
I'm curious.
(17:50):
I ended up getting the seeker.
I just got a report sent to methat tells me a little bit about
being the seeker.
So it sounds like this actuallyis a place where we can go and
get a sense of where we are onthis iterative scale.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
That's right.
And also you can track overtime.
You know, as you evolve andpractice iteration and practice
iterative mindset you can.
Your profile might change andso that's something just to know
about yourself and give someevidence-based you know from
this research someevidence-based direction,
guidance on what might behelpful for you at this time
based on yeah, I love it so much.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
I love tools like that are so important.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Yeah.
So let me, let me ask I'm justplugging in my computer because
I'm getting ready to run out ofgas, but all right, so.
So we're all good now.
So let me, let me ask you then.
So you said this can absolutelybe changed.
I'm build this iterativemindset skill and you are
(19:06):
educating us on that.
This absolutely is a skill.
It is absolutely determinativeof success, more so than other
things that are very wellestablished, at least based on
the preliminary research thatyou have done and that you're
going to be publishing.
How do we begin this process?
Is there a set of things thatyou have found work for the vast
(19:29):
majority of people?
That here's step one to beingmore iterative in your mindset.
Here's step two.
Here's step three.
I'm curious on if there is anysimple, stepwise process to get
people started.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yeah, in the book I have a acronym, because I was a
doctor and we deal with allkinds of acronyms, as you know,
in our education called Iterates, and that's really just a
brainstorm framework where youknow if you're stuck on
something or you're not surewhat to do.
You know being able tobrainstorm by each of these
(20:06):
categories each of those lettersrepresents something, might
help to jar loose your ownintelligence and your own
creativity around what you could, what your options are, you
know.
And then the most importantthing about iterative mindset is
that it prevents and protectsagainst the idea of failure or
(20:28):
discouragement, and it turns outthat the new neuroscience that
I cover in the book is so keyfor that, because this mindset
is the most protective factorI've ever seen, and again, I
articulated it, but it exists innature.
There are people 20% of peopleare naturally going to do this
(20:49):
in any particular domain oftheir life, and the rest of us
have to learn how to do it.
So what I would say is numberone to assess things so that you
neutralize failure.
The first step is to neutralizeany past failure or pre-failure
, because some people are reallycreative and they have all
kinds of stories about how theywill already fail.
(21:11):
Right, and you've probably seenthat in many people.
The second thing is to pick apractice, to your point, your
wisdom of what's going to workfor you right now.
Right, and just try.
It's just a try, it's like letme just see if this works, you
know.
And then the third thing is toiterate.
When you reach any sort ofimpasse, you're bored, you're
(21:36):
stuck, it's too difficult, youwant to level up, you want to
challenge yourself, and that'swhere that iterates model can
help with brainstorming, becauseiteration is new to all of us,
you know it's.
It's something that we're notused to thinking in iterations,
but those areas of our livesthat we naturally do, that we
(21:57):
actually tinker or tweak withthings, that's where we're
iterating, and so we just haveto expand that goodness to the
areas of our lives that are notgetting that kind of treatment.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Yeah, you know what it reminds me of?
It reminds me of MarcusAurelius.
I'm like, I'm into stoicphilosophy and he has a saying
that the obstacle is the way.
And I've oftentimes seen thisidea.
It's like, if you can getbeyond and I talk to my clients
and patients about this all thetime the idea that it's a
failure to me.
There's always a lesson there,right?
(22:29):
So this is this sort ofgrowth-based mindset, but you're
adding something uniquely ontothat, because you're not just
saying, hey, there's a lesson inhere.
It sounds like you're almostsaying, not only is there a
lesson in here, but actuallythis is the path to get beyond
the obstacle, right here, butactually this is the path to get
beyond the obstacle, right?
So it's just.
It's basically like thisiterative mindset is essentially
saying, yes, there's lessonsand yes, you need to be
(22:51):
resilient, but it almost hastaken it one step further and
saying, and this is a process,rather than a protocol, rather
than a recipe, it's sort of aprocess by which you will escape
any obstacle, right?
So it's a really interesting.
I see some parallels here withthis and just so you, the
(23:15):
listener, and I'll let Dr Kyrahear this as well but to me,
I've always thought part of ourproblem is protocol-based
practices, right, where it'ssort of like oh, jade gets one
thing, kyra gets another thingand you get another thing.
That's kind of the way itshould be, but in practice
that's not the way it is.
It's basically like Jade, kyraand you all bake the cake
exactly this way, turn the ovento 465, put in this amount of
(23:36):
sugar, drop in this amount ofchocolate.
It's a very recipe-based thing.
I am convinced that in medicineand pretty much everything we
do, this is a big piece whythings fail.
It seems like what you're doinghere is you're actually teaching
people a process rather thangiving them a protocol or a
recipe.
That's essentially saying heylook, here's the general way
(23:59):
that you can approach baking acake, but your cake is going to
come out in an infinite numberof different ways based on what
you like.
Maybe it's coconut cake, maybeit's chocolate cake, maybe it's
you know something else withsprinkles, but you'll end up in
a place where you get yourunique thing, like maybe I'm
going to end up doing donuts andKyra's going to end up doing
(24:20):
you know, now I'm getting hungry, by the way, but everyone's,
everyone's going to be a littlebit different, but is this, is
this partly what it comes downto?
So do you?
Is there this idea in thisprocess where we have to release
the idea that if I look at mynext door neighbor and see what
they're doing, if I look atsomeone on social media and see
what they're doing, that I haveto essentially maybe use that as
(24:42):
a starting point, perhaps, butquickly iterate away from it,
based on what is working for me?
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Yeah, I think working for me should be your top level
filter for everything.
So when you look at Instagramor you look at your neighbor or
whatever, those are ideas ofsuggestions.
If you will, and if you feelreally attracted or drawn to one
, yeah, give it a go.
But where people get intotrouble is that they become
(25:10):
sharp, pointy objects.
You know that they that cutthem.
You know when they think of itas, oh, if I'm not doing it the
way he's doing it, or I'm notgetting the results that he's
getting, then I'm bad that weturn on ourselves and we cut
ourselves on these, these ideas,because it's so rigid it's.
And again, if I had the mindsetthat I'm just trying this as a
(25:33):
practice to see, like I wouldtry on a shirt at a store, you
know, just to see if it looksgood.
If it doesn't, I'm not going toblame myself for a particular
color not looking good on me.
I'm just going to go find thecolors that work for my skin, my
style, whatever the case may be.
And so that is a better attitudethat people could have around
(25:56):
health and fitness and behaviorchange type of things.
So that again, the number onestarting place is to neutralize
all ideas of failure.
You cannot fail at beingyourself, you cannot fail at
learning, you cannot fail atthis life that you're trying to
live.
You're just figuring it out.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Yeah, you've alluded to this several times now, so I
want to unpack the science here,if we can a little bit, just so
the listener can get a sense ofthis here.
If we can a little bit, just sothe listener can get a sense of
this.
You've alluded to this idea ofbeating yourself up or making
yourself feel bad, or shaming orguilting yourself.
It's like, well, I'm going totry this and if it doesn't work
the way it works for Jade, thenI'm somehow a failure and a bad
(26:38):
person.
Can you just briefly tell uswhy this idea?
Because you see this all thetime.
There's this, I think, prominentthing in our culture where it's
like I need to berate myselfinto success.
Right, it's this idea that I'mgoing to whip myself, you know,
into shape, and it is sopervasive and you're alluding to
(27:00):
the fact that this does notwork.
Can you help us understand whyit does not work?
What is going wrong there?
Because it seems, unless I'mmissing something, that what you
stumbled across is that this isa pervasive, underlying problem
in being able to achieve aniterative mindset if you have
(27:23):
this constant beating yourselfup mentality.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
Right, and so I have come to realize and believe,
based on the neuroscience, thatthe most important thing for us
as humans to deal with and tomanage is any notion or story of
how we failed and how we're theworst person on the planet.
And the reason why that is jobone is because there is a newly
(27:50):
discovered area called thehabenula, which is like half a
centimeter in the center of yourbrain, and it basically acts as
the brakes for your behavior,and it is turned on.
The brakes are put on when wethink we failed, and so that
(28:12):
leads to all kinds ofobservations that we see all the
time as clinicians and also aspeople living in bodies is you
know, I know what I want to do,but I can't get myself to do it.
I procrastinate, I feel stuck,and then, when I feel that way,
then I turn on myself inside myown head.
You know, dorsolateralprefrontal cortex is a main area
(28:34):
of, like rumination, negativeemotions.
You know, all these thingsstart to churn, and this brake
pedal is the cause of all thatbad feeling, and so that to me
was like a huge breakthroughthat, you know, the more people
know about this fact, they'regoing to stop wasting their
(28:54):
energy on just forcing successand deal with the side effect of
failure, failure thinking,failure, thoughts, failure, self
indictments, all that kind ofstuff so that they can actually
succeed.
And it's paradoxical because wethink that success is doing
(29:15):
something that we intend to do,but it's actually unblocking our
failure to try to do somethingwhich is more important and
twice as powerful as thedopamine, as the success, as the
gas, as the gas pedal, as I say.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Yeah, and if we're listening closely, it's so
interesting, right?
Because in a sense, what you'redoing and correct me if I'm
wrong here, because I may havethis slightly off but what it
sounds like is you're creating agame where failure doesn't
exist in the game, the game isbeing played for the sake of the
game, which takes this idea ofbeating ourselves up kind of off
(29:53):
the table right.
It's just kind of like you'rejust playing a game, just trying
things on, and that's part ofthe process.
And it's trying, it's notfailing, it's iterating, it's
not failing, it's discovering,it's not failing.
So all of a sudden we're takingthis idea away that we can fail
, which is kind of thispsychological sleight of hand
(30:14):
that makes us get into sort ofthis cross between a therapist
and a coach.
And one of the things that welean very heavily on is
compassion-focused therapy,which reminds me a bit of what
you're doing here, because itessentially removes this idea
(30:37):
that you are bad in any way andgets you focusing on
compassionate thought.
There's sort of two rules here.
One is the human rule and theother is the empathy rule that
we teach clients to use onthemselves.
The human rule is toessentially say you know what
Jade, you know what Kyra, youknow what.
You're only human, you knowhumans, you know, are learning
creatures and we're just here tolearn.
(30:58):
And that's the first part.
You're only human.
We all suffer and we're alljust here to learn, and that
releases something in people'sminds.
And the next part is you knowwhat?
Yeah, I know it's hard, andthat's the point.
There's lessons in the hardright.
So there's this idea in myprogram, which is easy, is
earned kind of thing, right whenit's just like.
This is the way it's supposedto be You're just here
(31:20):
discovering, you're just herelearning, and it seems to fall
in alignment with sort of thisiterative thing.
And so you're doing this reallybeautiful psychological sleight
of hand that sort of takes theidea of failure off the table.
Is this kind of how you'reseeing it as well?
Speaker 2 (31:36):
Yeah, I've come to see that anything that works is
neutralizing failure in some wayor the other.
You know, I used to call itlike the Dumbo feather.
You know, dumbo was an elephantand he had a feather from crows
and he believed that he couldfly because of his big ears.
And it's kind of like whateveryou can do to somebody or they
(31:57):
can do to themselves, to havethat feather of being able to
believe that they're not goingto fail or that they haven't
failed, it renders them, itturns off their habenula and it
renders them motivated andpersistent.
They have the ability, becauseyou might have the idea of grit
(32:20):
before that, like I'm going tobe gritty or I'm going to be,
but you're just being, like youknow, quixotic.
You're just going up again,you're doing the same thing over
and over again, expectingdifferent results, and you're
just banging your head against awall with brute force, right.
And so this is the key to notgetting in that kind of Sisyphus
, rolling the thing up the hilland having it roll back down
(32:44):
hellscape, where you actuallyare free.
You free your mind, you freeyour self, your habenula,
because when the habenula is on,it is incredibly painful.
It is what drives addiction.
It is what drives when peoplehave withdrawal from addictive
substances.
This area of the brain iswhat's causing it to be so
(33:07):
uncomfortable and so likemaddening, you know, and so
people will do anything in thatstate to numb out or distract
themselves.
And that and that's what wehave to understand is like there
is this mechanism in the brainthat is working against us
Whenever we try to changeourselves, whenever we try to
(33:27):
change our behavior.
So whenever we try, to changeourselves.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
Whenever we try to change our behavior, this is our
greatest obstacle.
Yeah, ok, so let me.
I want to.
This is going to get into somehypothetical stuff and I'm just
curious your, your sort ofunderstanding of this and if you
have anything to say about this.
This is so.
I think.
All the rest was for thelistener and this one's for me.
So let's see if we can, ifmaybe you can help me with this.
So here's my hypothesis, and Iwant to see what you think about
(33:54):
this.
My hypothesis is that thismechanism that is going on with
the Hebenula is sort of amechanism of narratives and
stories, right?
So it's this idea that I failedthis many times and I'm just
convinced that I'm a failure orI'll fail.
This even can bleed over intoother things.
So I failed so much in withfinance, and now I'm failing in
(34:15):
health and fitness.
And it's like this, this youknow, as children and as
adolescents and even as adults,when we encounter difficult,
challenging things that make usfeel perhaps less than and I
(34:39):
call these misguided,unconscious decisions mud, right
?
So they're misguided becausethey happen during times where
we don't have the skills, thewisdom, the knowledge, the
know-how, the maturity to dealwith them.
They're unconscious becausethey follow us around like a
shadow.
And they're decisions, because,whether we're aware of them or
not, we did make a decision orchoice to see the world in a
particular way.
And so this mud in my mind.
(35:00):
It's kind of like thinking ofthe Habanula sitting in mud and
not able to escape, and so thenI go.
Well, the work that needs to bedone is one rewriting these
stories, trying to get peopleinto this more unconscious state
where they can see change theirperception around the idea of
(35:20):
failure in the first place, andthen sort of rewire the nervous
system around this or theemotional response to this, and
then, of course, the nervoussystem around this or the
emotional response to this, andthen, of course, at the end,
retrain the brain, which iswhere habits and behaviors come
in.
So to me, I'm wondering whatyou think about this idea of
let's call it a habitual, ahabitual, habitual response Mud.
(35:43):
It's stuck because you've seenthings as failure so long and
then needing to go down in thereand restructuring these stories
through some of thisunconscious work.
Is there anything in yourresearch or in your ways of
seeing this that this idea wouldmake sense when we look at
(36:03):
things like PTSD or adversechildhood events, or just
traumas and difficulties orrepeated failures in any domain,
finance relationships and or,you know, health and fitness.
Speaker 2 (36:15):
Yeah, as you may suspect, what they've shown in
the literature is that whensomebody has and this was shown
in animals, because you can'ttraumatize humans and then show
pre and post effect, but youknow when they would mess with
the instability and the traumafor baby mice that their
(36:37):
habanula was incredibly triggerhappy and so it hypersensitizes
the habanula, going off to anynotion of failure, and that
lines up with PTSD symptoms.
Right when you've got thishypervigilance and you've got
this pessimism, you know thatnothing's going to work for me
or this is everything'sdangerous, everything's scary.
(36:58):
You know that that gets reallyprogrammed in the brain so PTSD
can happen through, you know,massive adrenaline rush.
That kind of super glues all ofthese neural networks together,
rewires your brain like in aninstant.
Or you can have the childhoodexperiences that you're talking
about where, for example, myfather even though I love him, I
(37:19):
love him dearly, he's nowpassed he would tell me that I
was going to be an effingfailure and that I was a loser.
And I think in his mind he wasdoing that to counter, motivate
me, like paradoxically, motivateme to strive and to achieve.
And hey, you know, it kind ofworks.
But, as you said, a lot of mudwas instilled in that moment.
(37:43):
And so my habanula, because Ihave so much trauma and
different things from my pastthat I've had to heal from, and
that kind of thing can be quite,you know, tenuous or
pessimistic and about things,and then that becomes drawing
from my narrative self, myfrontal cortex, my prefrontal
(38:04):
cortex, those two things matchup and I can become depressed or
I could become anxious or Icould become pessimistic as a
result.
And so what's different about meis that I know I have a
habenula.
And because I know I have ahabenula, whenever I see any
hint of a gap between what Ishould be doing or what I want
(38:25):
to be doing and what I'mactually doing, I'm like, oh, my
habenula is on, it's diagnostic, and if my habenula is on, then
I feel like shit, I feelterrible about myself and about
the world or wherever.
And so I know whereas otherpeople, if they don't know about
this part of our brain, I knowbetter than to wallow in those
(38:45):
stories that you're talkingabout in the mud and I can
immediately have the rightaction to neutralize the failure
to either talk myself out of itor get myself out of it
Journaling, talking to somebodyyou know whatever somatic you
know, running whatever, whateverthe case would be, to kind of
get yourself out of that gear iswhat people like me who know
(39:10):
about this will do, whereaseverybody else might just take
too long lingering in the.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
I love this so much.
It's not always the case that Imean it often is the case when
you're interested in someone'swork.
You're partly interestedbecause it dovetails into some
of your work.
But it doesn't surprise me that.
Surprise me that there's a lotof now crossover that I'm seeing
.
I have one more line of I wantto be respectful of your time,
(39:36):
but I have one more line ofquestioning that I want to go
down that I think will be useful, just for the listener to sort
of understand.
To me there are many differenttools that we can use to.
You know, to use my vernacular,you know, get us out of the mud
, to use your vernacular toreally free the hubbenula from
this gap you know of.
You know the thing that we wantto do, that we see that we're
(39:59):
not doing and we know we're kindof in this, you know, hubbenula
sort of cemented in aparticular degree.
Some of those, from myperspective, would be things
like we use breath work combinedwith journaling, a form of
written exposure therapy, a formof holotropic breath work, very
shortened, and a form ofcompassion therapy and cognitive
(40:20):
behavioral therapy, or what wemight call exposure therapies.
I'm wondering what you havefound to be the most potent, if
any.
Obviously, you've done andthank you so much for this work
and sort of what you're bringingforth with this idea of this
iterative mindset.
What I'm wondering is how muchhave you got into which
(40:43):
practices work the best, if any?
Obviously, the definition ofbeing right it's you know, we
can think, feel, choose, actHabits and behaviors.
Think, you know, focus on thechoosing and the acting.
Some of the, you know,therapies, talk therapies, you
know, go to thinking.
Not very many things get intothe feeling state and of course,
before you can think, feel,choose and act, you have to see
(41:05):
the world differently.
So I've always thought thatperception altering treatments
are one of the first ones I liketo do.
But then I like to kind of goup the chain of like.
First I need to get you seeingyourself in the world
differently, then we can getthinking and feeling in line,
then we can get choosing andacting in line.
But of course it goes in theother direction as well.
(41:26):
But I'm more interested in thefull length of sort of you just
looking and saying, hey, jake,here are the things perhaps that
we have seen in the world oftherapy, in the world of somatic
work in the world of meditation, in the world perhaps
psychedelics, you know, and allthese that can make a difference
here.
What would you say are the top,top ones?
Speaker 2 (41:47):
So you're asking me what are the top iterations that
work for most people?
Speaker 1 (41:53):
Yeah, and tools.
You know tools that seem to get, you know, fix this habanula
let's call it the habanulahijack, maybe like just fix this
, you know issue.
Are there tools that seem todeal with this?
Of course, you know, once youget into the behavior change,
it's an iterative, choosing andacting process and maybe that's
(42:16):
all there is to it.
I'm wondering if there are anytools that get to the thinking
and feeling and seeingdifferently to help this
iterative process along, becausethe way I'm conceptualizing
this is that what you're doingis you're taking the system of
habit change, you know, which ischoosing and acting, seeing
that it's not, it's eitherincomplete or that this is a
(42:38):
better model, a better way ofdoing it, this iterative process
, and we're using this iterative, you know sort of style, maybe
in coaching or in thinking, andyou know acting and choosing.
I'm wondering is there anythingelse that you've seen that can
come before that helps thisprocess along, to get people to
be more iterative in theirmindset, or is it just simply
(42:58):
practice?
Speaker 2 (43:00):
The main thing for progress, or the main thing that
works, that unifies everythingthat works, is their ability to
turn off the hebenula.
That's my hypothesis, becauseeverything I've seen that turns
off the habenula frees up themotivation and the forward
motion in an animal, no matterwhat if it's a human, if it's a
(43:21):
mouse, whatever the case may beand you talk about psychedelics.
It's been shown that ketamineis specifically acting on the
lateral habenula, an outsidepart of the habenula, and that
it stays embedded in thoseneurons for up to three months,
which, by the way, mapscompletely exactly to the
(43:44):
symptoms, relief that patientssay that a ketamine therapy
treatment helps them.
But once you disrupt thathabenula, being time you turn it
off, kind of overwhelm it.
Then you've got three months tobuild new habits, new ways of
being, all these things you kindof.
(44:05):
You can't put a cast onsomething and then have no
healing of the bone underneath,you know.
So habits and habit practices,whatever those are those
iterations you know, does thiswork for me or that work for me?
It gives you a bit of abreather.
And so do SSRIs to some extent,because they're working on
(44:25):
serotonin, which is alsoreleased by and affecting the
habanula.
Hebenula controls dopamine, itcontrols serotonin, it controls
everything.
It is the main reason why weare able to do or not do
anything that we do or don't do.
And so now that we know aboutthis hub, you know, and we know
(44:46):
what turns it on and what turnsit off, then we can see
everything as an iteration onand what turns it off.
Then we can see everything asan iteration Breath work.
You know, there's an ibogainederivative that has been shown
to affect the nicotinicreceptors in the habanero, which
are higher and different thanall the other receptors in the
(45:06):
brain for nicotine.
And so that particular ibogainederivative particularly works
on the nicotinic receptors,blocks them, and then that is
what causes the disruption ofvery intense drugs, of abuse.
That's the mechanism of actionfor ibogaine.
And so what I find is thateverything kind of converges on
(45:29):
this science.
If something is alleviatingdepression, if it's alleviating
anxiety, it's absolutely doingit in part or whole through
habanula.
Speaker 1 (45:40):
Yeah, I love that idea and you know what I'm
looking at, this idea of.
Well, I don't know if you'veseen some of the stuff on GLP-1s
and its addiction, itsaddictive capacity.
Yeah, of the stuff on glp-1sand its addiction.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
You know it's addictive capacity, yep and um,
and I think, I think and I'mactually looking it up as we
talk, uh, that glp-1 is actingon the benula as well it has
like that, that there's just ifit's like first principles right
, if, if depression, anxiety arecontrolled by hebenula that's
the latest thinking and if GLP-1lowers depression and anxiety,
(46:16):
it has to be going throughHebenula, at least in part.
But my guess is that it's majorbecause it's a daughter
molecule to oxytocin.
Speaker 1 (46:25):
Yeah, it's really interesting, right.
Yeah, it's really interestingright when you think most people
are going to be taking GLP-1sbecause they want to reduce
their hunger, but it's having animpact on these sort of core
(46:45):
places that are driving soothingbehavior in the first place,
partly because of this action,and so you know, I work a lot
with the GLP-1s as well becauseof the weight loss world.
So, yeah, it's reallyinteresting that you bring this
up and it's important.
You and I have like minds rightOnce you find these.
You don't always find this, bythe way, but sometimes in
medicine you find a newmechanism where you go, oh, this
unlocks a lot not everything,but it unlocks a lot.
(47:07):
And this habenula mechanismthat you're describing really
opens up an area that I thinkhas blinded us to effective
treatments.
What I love about what you'redoing is that you know you're
essentially educating people onthis mechanism and then the
behavioral responses, thisiterative sort of way of
(47:27):
behaving.
That is core.
But I love this idea thatyou're talking about, about
using some of these compounds,perhaps, and certain techniques
that can open up this window oftime where this iterative
process can be downloaded better, let's say, than previously.
And certainly this is what Isee when I run certain of my
(47:48):
events.
You'll see that people willcome to the event.
They'll be sort of in thisheightened state World has
changed.
But unless they get into thisdifferent style, a lot of them
won't opt for sort of thefollow-up, integration and
coaching, and those individualsmiss out on this window.
I've just never put it that way.
I absolutely love that.
So I want to just say thank youso much, dr Kyra, for your time.
(48:13):
First of all, thank you foryour work.
It's my belief that it'sindividuals like you,
practitioners like you, that areable to translate the science
for the public, and I think thisis you, being an MD and a
master's in public health, thatputs you in a unique position to
take this complex science andteach it to all of us.
So I just want to say thank youso much for your work and
(48:36):
taking the time.
I know doing a book, you know,is not an easy thing.
I've done eight of them now andit's never easy and they don't
make you rich.
People think that that's what'sgoing to happen, but it's
usually just to help people withthese sort of new insights.
But it's usually just to helppeople with these sort of new
insights.
So deep respect and deepgratitude for you, my friend,
(48:56):
for this work.
Is there anything that you want?
Final thoughts that you want togive us before we go?
And then I want to make surepeople know where to get the
book and know where to find outmore about you.
Speaker 2 (49:08):
Yeah, I think that you know.
To me, this is the mostsignificant finding in my career
, in all of behavior change.
Pursuing this for so long, it'sthe Holy Grail to me, and what
it means is that failure andmitigating and neutralizing
failure becomes our top priorityfor being able to restore our
(49:29):
faculties, and I believe thatpeople can change themselves if
they know about this and stoptripping over it 100%.
Speaker 1 (49:39):
I agree.
The book for everybody is theUnstoppable Brain.
It's subtitled the NewNeuroscience that frees us from
failure, eases our stress andcreates lasting change.
You all just got a little bitof a snippet right here.
You can learn more about DrKyra at drkyrababanettecom and
(50:00):
you can also get that quiz thereas well.
And I know you said you are onsocial media as well.
What's your handle on socialmedia if people want to go there
and check you out?
Speaker 2 (50:10):
I think it's at Dr Kyra Bobinette on.
Speaker 1 (50:12):
Instagram?
Yeah, I believe it is too.
I just followed you.
Dr Kyra and I were talkingbefore we all came on with you
and we both kind of love anddon't necessarily always love
social media.
That's a whole other thingabout what that's doing to our
habanula, but that's a wholeother discussion.
Speaker 2 (50:33):
There's studies on that.
Speaker 1 (50:35):
Yeah, there's studies on that, so maybe we have to
have you back on, but I justagain my gratitude.
Thank you for your work.
I'm looking forward to readingthe study or studies when they
come out.
I've gotten your book onAudible, which I'm going to be
listening to, and I soappreciate you.
Just do me a favor, kyra, stayon the line.
I just want to make sure thisuploads.
But for all of you, thank youso much for being here and I
(50:56):
hope you learned something.
We'll see you at the next show.
Welcome to the show everybody.
This is the Next Level Humanpodcast.
I am your host, dr Jade Tita,and today I have a very
interesting guest.
This is Dr Kyra Bobinette, whohas a brand new book out, and
that book is the reason why Iwanted her on the show.
It's called the UnstoppableBrain, and the subtitle is the
(00:22):
New Neuroscience that Frees UsFrom Failure, eases Our Stress
and Creates Lasting Change.
And so before I introduce you,kyra, I just want to give
everyone a little bit of abackground.
You know, as a podcast host,one of the things that happens
is you get people pitched to youall of the time, and so people
come across and you kind of lookat them and say, yeah, that's
(00:42):
not for me, that's not for me.
Well, most of you listenersknow that I have been very much
over the last 10 years,specifically the last five,
really engaged in this questionof why is it that we oftentimes
know what to do, but we can'tactually do it?
What is going on there?
Is it habits and behaviors,which we know?
(01:05):
This is part of it.
Is it identity and beliefs?
I think this is part of it, butwhat is all the sort of story
that's going on here, and sothat's why I wanted you on Dr
Kyra, because I want to unpackthe different ways that people
see this.
You have been doing reallyamazing work.
Just so everyone knows, kyra isan MD and also has her master's
(01:30):
in public health and has beeninvolved with some of the
research in behavior change andstumbled across sort of a new
system that is very effective,that she is seeing for behavior
change.
So we're going to learn allabout that.
So what I would love for you todo, kyra, is tell us a little
bit about how you got here beingan MD.
(01:51):
It's not typical for an MD tobe focused on these kinds of
things, but you are, and youhave written a book on this, and
it is very important from myperspective.
We might know what to do, butif we can't do it, we're not
going to make any change.
So if you could just give us anupdate on sort of your
(02:12):
background and the story thatgot you here, and then let's get
into this amazing work thatyou're doing.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
Absolutely so.
By the way, you're a clinicianafter my own heart, so I'm
really excited about thisconversation.
I guess how it started was justobservations in patient care
where you know somebody wouldsay oh yeah, doc, like I'm going
to, I promise I'm going to stopsmoking, I'm going to, I'm
going to do this, I'm going todo that, I'm going to eat better
, I'm going to exercise, andthen the next time they either
(02:39):
ditch you and avoid you or theycome in with their tail tucked
and are like you know, like Ifeel so bad about myself.
And one patient that wasparticularly poignant for this
was a guy who came in.
You know, I had 10 minutes withhim.
He had a gouty toe, very generickind of situation.
I'm writing the prescriptionfor the toe and I say, you know
(03:02):
so how'd this happen?
And he said well, doc, you know, I did.
Three days ago I did meth,haven't been to sleep since.
And so, you know, meth, no sleep, dehydration, gout, and I
remember thinking I'm on thewrong end of this animal and I
didn't really know what I wasattracted to in that moment.
I thought, you know, should Igo into addiction medicine?
(03:24):
No, that doesn't really draw me.
But, and there was no behaviorchange.
You know specific degree that Iknew of at that time, you know,
and, and so I think I did,that's what kind of sparked my
interest in hey, wait a minute.
You know there's there's a lotof things upstream of what I'm
doing that I'm super curiousabout.
(03:44):
So I started crawling up thatstream.
I started a program forincarcerated youth which was all
about behavior change, comingback into the community,
lowering recidivism with thatgroup.
So they kind of taught me, youknow, what does and doesn't work
.
I also went into public healthand, as you mentioned, you know,
did population health studieson 33 million people where, you
(04:06):
know, I'm testing everythingfrom wearables to programs to,
you know, texting programs, toany kind of education program,
incentives, punishment andreward structures, all that kind
of stuff, and so I just wentdeep on trying to change
people's behavior for about twodecades and then, as you
(04:29):
mentioned, then had kind of adiscovery that really changed my
mind about the whole thing.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Okay, so we have the right person, because 20 years
looking at behavior change fromall these different things and
this is why I really love youknow, just for the listeners to
understand, this is one of thethings that I really love about
being an MD and then being anMPH.
Having a master's of publichealth it gives, I think, a
really interesting perspective,because not only are you working
(04:56):
clinically one-on-one withindividuals and seeing those
individual case studies, butyou're also able to zoom out and
see some of the issues that areaffecting the population as a
whole.
And so I can imagine you'resort of looking at these
individuals one on one in frontof you and then kind of zooming
out and being like what iseveryone suffering from and what
works for everyone?
(05:17):
And you're running intoconstant roadblocks and
understanding all these things,all these stuff that we have
available to us.
So I am interested in, ofcourse, what was the thing?
Because over 20 years doing allthis research, looking at all
the things that are available tous, you obviously found things
(05:40):
that did not do much, thingsthat did some things but weren't
able to last, and now you seemto believe right, when this is
the thing that I think is reallybeautiful.
You now believe you found asolution that I assume can work
for the vast majority of people,and this is why you've done a
(06:00):
book on it.
So what is this solution?
Is that where you want to start?
Or do you want to start interms of helping us understand
how you came to the solution,Some of the things that were
surprising findings.
Maybe that led you here?
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Well, you know, it's kind of a handshake and since
it's organically coming up.
Let's go with the solution, andthen we can back our way into
the brain science that fuelsthis solution or enhances it.
So one thing that happened wasin my pursuits of, you know,
trying to change behavior.
I had gone to work in thebehavior design laboratory at
(06:37):
Stanford and the school ofmedicine as well at Stanford,
and I had also started abehavior design consultancy for
large companies looking at thepopulation health view, still
trying to figure out, like youknow, because at heart I'm an
interventionist, you know I wantto change people and so I was
looking for research that wouldgive me clues on what would work
(07:01):
, that kind of thing, and I dida behavioral study with Walmart,
who hired us to really rethinkwhat is it that causes people to
be healthy versus not under thesame circumstances?
So these were people who were,you know, lower socioeconomic
status all over the UnitedStates and they had every what's
(07:24):
called social determinants ofhealth.
You know every barrier to beinghealthy that you could imagine.
You know single parents,multiple jobs, you know taking
care of senior parents, you knownot having enough money or time
and also living in food deserts, those kinds of things, and so
what I found was superinteresting is that you had
these kind of unicorns scatteredabout you know, in different
(07:48):
locations, who didn't know eachother and, independently, what
they did was they were differentthan their peers in one
particular way, which is thatthey had a different mindset
than everybody else, thaneverybody else, and this mindset
was made of.
(08:08):
Well, let me practice this, letme experiment with this, let me
just see if this will work.
That kind of curiosity andexperimentation kind of view,
then kind of smart goals, andI'm going to re-regiment it and
I'm going to do this and that,and instead of setting a goal,
they would set up an experimentor an effort, you know, to see
what they could do.
The second thing that was partof this was that they would
(08:32):
iterate instead of fail wheneverthey hit an impasse.
And so inevitably, as I'm sureyou've seen in every single
patient you've ever had,somebody hits up against some
unexpected disruptor, someunexpected trigger internally,
some, you know, barrierexternally.
And what these people diddifferently and uniquely was
(08:56):
that they iterated their waythrough that problem to
something better, so that theywould do either small tweaks to
what they were trying or theywould do a wholesale change.
It just depended on what theirinspiration or what their
learning guided them and, as aresult of them iterating and not
(09:17):
failing, these people keptgoing and they were able to keep
themselves in effort.
I call it versus everybody elsewho tried something, failed it
and then quit trying.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Yeah, this is going to be very familiar to my
listeners and so you listenersknow this, but this is the first
time Dr Kyra and I have talked,so I'll clue her in a little
bit and see what she thinks Like.
One of the one of the keythings that this group of
individuals you're talking tounderstands is that to me, I
(09:51):
oftentimes say there's only onerule in all this, and that is do
what works for you.
Right, it's like the one ruleto rule them all.
It's like you had to become ametabolic detective versus being
a dieter, and it seems likeyou're saying something similar
to this.
If I'm right and I oftentimesuse this Bruce Lee quote that
(10:11):
you know with my individuals isthat you know, if you think
Bruce Lee, this is the martialartist, actor, philosopher Bruce
Lee.
If you think about Bruce Lee, hesays you know, discard what is
useless, absorb what is usefuland add what is uniquely your
own.
So this is this very iterativeprocess, when you try certain
things on, and in that processyou gain some understanding that
(10:32):
works for you.
You gain some understandingabout things that don't work for
you and, of course, you cameinto the process knowing some
things already that werepowerful for you.
And there's a final quote thatI oftentimes like to use, which
is you've arrived when arrivalis no longer the goal.
This idea seems to becompatible with what you're
(10:53):
saying.
Am I thinking about this right,or are there pieces I'm missing
?
How does that hit you when youhear that?
Is this very similar?
Is it exactly the same, or arethere key differences here?
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Yeah.
So what I can say is you'respot on with the research that I
did in terms of find what worksfor you, and I would just maybe
point out a little specificityaround in this moment, because
where people can trip up onfailure or perceived failure, is
that they can say well, thisalways works for me, zumba
always works for me, but whathappens is that they don't see
that there's a decay of theirlove of yoga or Zumba or
(11:39):
weightlifting or whatever thecase may be, and that is just a
sign that there is anotheriteration that is coming up that
they need because they'refalling out of love with that
particular food or thatparticular exercise or that kind
of thing, and so I find thatit's one thing to make sure that
it matches you.
(12:00):
It's another thing to understandthat it may not always be your
one and only.
It may not be the one thingthat you do for the rest of your
life.
We don't know which things thatwe're trying, that were our
lifetime, that are seasonal,that are momentary, and just
having the right mindset of bothfinding out what works for you
(12:22):
and honoring in this moment whatcan I get myself to do, instead
of some fantasy of what I wishI would do.
That seems to be the thing thatcloses the gap most often for
people.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
Yeah, I love that distinction.
I love that distinction andyeah, so I lost you there for a
bit, but I love that distinctionbecause I think some of the
things that I see with this isthat certainly we can talk about
the metabolism sort of changing, and you're speaking to the
psychology changing, and I oftentell people you have to account
for that A menopausal woman isnot the same as a younger woman
(12:59):
who has her hormones working forher, not to mention an 18 year
old who's passionate about danceand nightclubs is not going to
be the same as a 40-year-oldwho's dealing with teenage
children and trying to get themto school and the passions
around that.
So I love this idea.
So, I guess, walk us through.
(13:19):
How does someone begin thisiterative process?
Because what are the?
Because you alluded to this,it's almost like it's a
personality trait, or is it alearned trait?
You know, cause that's going tobe the first thing that people
ask Is this something that I canlearn?
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Yeah, and so in our research, about 20% of any
population are iterators.
They have really high scores oniterative mindset and we've
done a research validationseries of studies to develop a
tool to measure iterativemindset.
So iterative mindset is youpractice or experiment instead
(13:55):
of setting a hard, fixed goal,and you iterate whenever you
reach an impasse.
An impasse could be you'rebored, you need variety.
An impasse could be you'rebored, you need variety.
An impasse could be it's toochallenging.
An impasse could be you killedit and now you want to level up
right.
So that's where people start toiterate and this tool, the
(14:15):
iterative mindset inventory, hasbeen validated and we're about
to publish on this and in thepopulation that is 20% already
there.
They don't need any moreiterative mindset for that
domain.
But we also find that people arelike patchwork quilts In some
areas of their life they'll bevery iterative and in other
(14:39):
areas of their life they'll bevery performative, which is the
opposite of iterative.
So in people's careers, forexample, there's
performance-based goals at work,those kinds of things.
In school, there'sperformance-based grades and
grading and ranking and thosekinds of things, and in those
areas they forget their naturalfaculties to be iterative and
(15:02):
they start to suffer and there'sa lot of mental health problems
that occur when you stopiterating and you start
performing for other people,because that means that the
other person is now controllingyou and your experience.
So we can get to that in asecond.
But to your question aboutwhether it's trainable, it's
absolutely trainable.
We've done preliminary studieson this and you know, to me, the
(15:24):
mindset that you're running,the software that you're running
on your hardware of your brainand your nervous system, is the
main determinant of youroutcomes.
And so checking for the levelof this mindset, which is more
powerful than any mindset thatwe tested, so we tested it
against growth mindset, learningmindsets, performance mindsets,
(15:47):
self-efficacy, grit, resilience, learned helplessness, all of
these sort of and optimism andover and above any of those
qualities and strategies that wemight use in our life,
iterative mindset was, wasstronger at habit formation,
(16:09):
mental health, well-beingoutcomes, performance outcomes
at work, productivity at work,healthcare, risks and costs, and
I think one else, yeah, healthoutcomes.
So it is to me the mostsignificant factor and it
(16:29):
probably has a lot of allegoriesor synonyms for itself kind of
your work and how aligned thatis with this, but it's the most
powerful thing that I've everseen in terms of our ability to
change our behavior and sustainit.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
More importantly, yeah, you know what, kyra, I
love this so much, but partlyselfishly, because I'm seeing a
tool that I did not have thatI'm realizing is a huge piece of
the work that I've been doing.
You know, it's reallyinteresting, right?
Because you talk about allthese things that we know have a
great evidence base AngelaDuckworth's work and others on
(17:09):
grit and stuff and thisiterative mindset.
It makes sense that it's takinginto account a lot of these
things resilience and all theseother things learning a growth
mindset, a resilience mindset,all of this.
Actually, for you, the listener, just before you and I jumped
on, kyra, I didn't tell you this, but I went on your website and
I actually took the quiz.
(17:30):
There's actually a quiz there.
So if you guys you all who arelistening go to
drkyrabobinettecom slashiterative-mindset-quiz, you
actually can take a quiz, andI'm assuming this is a part of
the.
Is this the actual assessmentor is this a shortened version
of it?
I'm curious.
(17:50):
I ended up getting the seeker.
I just got a report sent to methat tells me a little bit about
being the seeker.
So it sounds like this actuallyis a place where we can go and
get a sense of where we are onthis iterative scale.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
That's right.
And also you can track overtime.
You know, as you evolve andpractice iteration and practice
iterative mindset you can.
Your profile might change andso that's something just to know
about yourself and give someevidence-based you know from
this research someevidence-based direction,
guidance on what might behelpful for you at this time
based on yeah, I love it so much.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
I love tools like that are so important.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Yeah.
So let me, let me ask I'm justplugging in my computer because
I'm getting ready to run out ofgas, but all right, so.
So we're all good now.
So let me, let me ask you then.
So you said this can absolutelybe changed.
I'm build this iterativemindset skill and you are
(19:06):
educating us on that.
This absolutely is a skill.
It is absolutely determinativeof success, more so than other
things that are very wellestablished, at least based on
the preliminary research thatyou have done and that you're
going to be publishing.
How do we begin this process?
Is there a set of things thatyou have found work for the vast
(19:29):
majority of people?
That here's step one to beingmore iterative in your mindset.
Here's step two.
Here's step three.
I'm curious on if there is anysimple, stepwise process to get
people started.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yeah, in the book I have a acronym, because I was a
doctor and we deal with allkinds of acronyms, as you know,
in our education called Iterates, and that's really just a
brainstorm framework where youknow if you're stuck on
something or you're not surewhat to do.
You know being able tobrainstorm by each of these
(20:06):
categories each of those lettersrepresents something, might
help to jar loose your ownintelligence and your own
creativity around what you could, what your options are, you
know.
And then the most importantthing about iterative mindset is
that it prevents and protectsagainst the idea of failure or
(20:28):
discouragement, and it turns outthat the new neuroscience that
I cover in the book is so keyfor that, because this mindset
is the most protective factorI've ever seen, and again, I
articulated it, but it exists innature.
There are people 20% of peopleare naturally going to do this
(20:49):
in any particular domain oftheir life, and the rest of us
have to learn how to do it.
So what I would say is numberone to assess things so that you
neutralize failure.
The first step is to neutralizeany past failure or pre-failure
, because some people are reallycreative and they have all
kinds of stories about how theywill already fail.
(21:11):
Right, and you've probably seenthat in many people.
The second thing is to pick apractice, to your point, your
wisdom of what's going to workfor you right now.
Right, and just try.
It's just a try, it's like letme just see if this works, you
know.
And then the third thing is toiterate.
When you reach any sort ofimpasse, you're bored, you're
(21:36):
stuck, it's too difficult, youwant to level up, you want to
challenge yourself, and that'swhere that iterates model can
help with brainstorming, becauseiteration is new to all of us,
you know it's.
It's something that we're notused to thinking in iterations,
but those areas of our livesthat we naturally do, that we
(21:57):
actually tinker or tweak withthings, that's where we're
iterating, and so we just haveto expand that goodness to the
areas of our lives that are notgetting that kind of treatment.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Yeah, you know what it reminds me of?
It reminds me of MarcusAurelius.
I'm like, I'm into stoicphilosophy and he has a saying
that the obstacle is the way.
And I've oftentimes seen thisidea.
It's like, if you can getbeyond and I talk to my clients
and patients about this all thetime the idea that it's a
failure to me.
There's always a lesson there,right?
(22:29):
So this is this sort ofgrowth-based mindset, but you're
adding something uniquely ontothat, because you're not just
saying, hey, there's a lesson inhere.
It sounds like you're almostsaying, not only is there a
lesson in here, but actuallythis is the path to get beyond
the obstacle, right here, butactually this is the path to get
beyond the obstacle, right?
So it's just.
It's basically like thisiterative mindset is essentially
saying, yes, there's lessonsand yes, you need to be
(22:51):
resilient, but it almost hastaken it one step further and
saying, and this is a process,rather than a protocol, rather
than a recipe, it's sort of aprocess by which you will escape
any obstacle, right?
So it's a really interesting.
I see some parallels here withthis and just so you, the
(23:15):
listener, and I'll let Dr Kyrahear this as well but to me,
I've always thought part of ourproblem is protocol-based
practices, right, where it'ssort of like oh, jade gets one
thing, kyra gets another thingand you get another thing.
That's kind of the way itshould be, but in practice
that's not the way it is.
It's basically like Jade, kyraand you all bake the cake
exactly this way, turn the ovento 465, put in this amount of
(23:36):
sugar, drop in this amount ofchocolate.
It's a very recipe-based thing.
I am convinced that in medicineand pretty much everything we
do, this is a big piece whythings fail.
It seems like what you're doinghere is you're actually teaching
people a process rather thangiving them a protocol or a
recipe.
That's essentially saying heylook, here's the general way
(23:59):
that you can approach baking acake, but your cake is going to
come out in an infinite numberof different ways based on what
you like.
Maybe it's coconut cake, maybeit's chocolate cake, maybe it's
you know something else withsprinkles, but you'll end up in
a place where you get yourunique thing, like maybe I'm
going to end up doing donuts andKyra's going to end up doing
(24:20):
you know, now I'm getting hungry, by the way, but everyone's,
everyone's going to be a littlebit different, but is this, is
this partly what it comes downto?
So do you?
Is there this idea in thisprocess where we have to release
the idea that if I look at mynext door neighbor and see what
they're doing, if I look atsomeone on social media and see
what they're doing, that I haveto essentially maybe use that as
(24:42):
a starting point, perhaps, butquickly iterate away from it,
based on what is working for me?
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Yeah, I think working for me should be your top level
filter for everything.
So when you look at Instagramor you look at your neighbor or
whatever, those are ideas ofsuggestions.
If you will, and if you feelreally attracted or drawn to one
, yeah, give it a go.
But where people get intotrouble is that they become
(25:10):
sharp, pointy objects.
You know that they that cutthem.
You know when they think of itas, oh, if I'm not doing it the
way he's doing it, or I'm notgetting the results that he's
getting, then I'm bad that weturn on ourselves and we cut
ourselves on these, these ideas,because it's so rigid it's.
And again, if I had the mindsetthat I'm just trying this as a
(25:33):
practice to see, like I wouldtry on a shirt at a store, you
know, just to see if it looksgood.
If it doesn't, I'm not going toblame myself for a particular
color not looking good on me.
I'm just going to go find thecolors that work for my skin, my
style, whatever the case may be.
And so that is a better attitudethat people could have around
(25:56):
health and fitness and behaviorchange type of things.
So that again, the number onestarting place is to neutralize
all ideas of failure.
You cannot fail at beingyourself, you cannot fail at
learning, you cannot fail atthis life that you're trying to
live.
You're just figuring it out.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Yeah, you've alluded to this several times now, so I
want to unpack the science here,if we can a little bit, just so
the listener can get a sense ofthis here.
If we can a little bit, just sothe listener can get a sense of
this.
You've alluded to this idea ofbeating yourself up or making
yourself feel bad, or shaming orguilting yourself.
It's like, well, I'm going totry this and if it doesn't work
the way it works for Jade, thenI'm somehow a failure and a bad
(26:38):
person.
Can you just briefly tell uswhy this idea?
Because you see this all thetime.
There's this, I think, prominentthing in our culture where it's
like I need to berate myselfinto success.
Right, it's this idea that I'mgoing to whip myself, you know,
into shape, and it is sopervasive and you're alluding to
(27:00):
the fact that this does notwork.
Can you help us understand whyit does not work?
What is going wrong there?
Because it seems, unless I'mmissing something, that what you
stumbled across is that this isa pervasive, underlying problem
in being able to achieve aniterative mindset if you have
(27:23):
this constant beating yourselfup mentality.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
Right, and so I have come to realize and believe,
based on the neuroscience, thatthe most important thing for us
as humans to deal with and tomanage is any notion or story of
how we failed and how we're theworst person on the planet.
And the reason why that is jobone is because there is a newly
(27:50):
discovered area called thehabenula, which is like half a
centimeter in the center of yourbrain, and it basically acts as
the brakes for your behavior,and it is turned on.
The brakes are put on when wethink we failed, and so that
(28:12):
leads to all kinds ofobservations that we see all the
time as clinicians and also aspeople living in bodies is you
know, I know what I want to do,but I can't get myself to do it.
I procrastinate, I feel stuck,and then, when I feel that way,
then I turn on myself inside myown head.
You know, dorsolateralprefrontal cortex is a main area
(28:34):
of, like rumination, negativeemotions.
You know, all these thingsstart to churn, and this brake
pedal is the cause of all thatbad feeling, and so that to me
was like a huge breakthroughthat, you know, the more people
know about this fact, they'regoing to stop wasting their
(28:54):
energy on just forcing successand deal with the side effect of
failure, failure thinking,failure, thoughts, failure, self
indictments, all that kind ofstuff so that they can actually
succeed.
And it's paradoxical because wethink that success is doing
(29:15):
something that we intend to do,but it's actually unblocking our
failure to try to do somethingwhich is more important and
twice as powerful as thedopamine, as the success, as the
gas, as the gas pedal, as I say.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Yeah, and if we're listening closely, it's so
interesting, right?
Because in a sense, what you'redoing and correct me if I'm
wrong here, because I may havethis slightly off but what it
sounds like is you're creating agame where failure doesn't
exist in the game, the game isbeing played for the sake of the
game, which takes this idea ofbeating ourselves up kind of off
(29:53):
the table right.
It's just kind of like you'rejust playing a game, just trying
things on, and that's part ofthe process.
And it's trying, it's notfailing, it's iterating, it's
not failing, it's discovering,it's not failing.
So all of a sudden we're takingthis idea away that we can fail
, which is kind of thispsychological sleight of hand
(30:14):
that makes us get into sort ofthis cross between a therapist
and a coach.
And one of the things that welean very heavily on is
compassion-focused therapy,which reminds me a bit of what
you're doing here, because itessentially removes this idea
(30:37):
that you are bad in any way andgets you focusing on
compassionate thought.
There's sort of two rules here.
One is the human rule and theother is the empathy rule that
we teach clients to use onthemselves.
The human rule is toessentially say you know what
Jade, you know what Kyra, youknow what.
You're only human, you knowhumans, you know, are learning
creatures and we're just here tolearn.
(30:58):
And that's the first part.
You're only human.
We all suffer and we're alljust here to learn, and that
releases something in people'sminds.
And the next part is you knowwhat?
Yeah, I know it's hard, andthat's the point.
There's lessons in the hardright.
So there's this idea in myprogram, which is easy, is
earned kind of thing, right whenit's just like.
This is the way it's supposedto be You're just here
(31:20):
discovering, you're just herelearning, and it seems to fall
in alignment with sort of thisiterative thing.
And so you're doing this reallybeautiful psychological sleight
of hand that sort of takes theidea of failure off the table.
Is this kind of how you'reseeing it as well?
Speaker 2 (31:36):
Yeah, I've come to see that anything that works is
neutralizing failure in some wayor the other.
You know, I used to call itlike the Dumbo feather.
You know, dumbo was an elephantand he had a feather from crows
and he believed that he couldfly because of his big ears.
And it's kind of like whateveryou can do to somebody or they
(31:57):
can do to themselves, to havethat feather of being able to
believe that they're not goingto fail or that they haven't
failed, it renders them, itturns off their habenula and it
renders them motivated andpersistent.
They have the ability, becauseyou might have the idea of grit
(32:20):
before that, like I'm going tobe gritty or I'm going to be,
but you're just being, like youknow, quixotic.
You're just going up again,you're doing the same thing over
and over again, expectingdifferent results, and you're
just banging your head against awall with brute force, right.
And so this is the key to notgetting in that kind of Sisyphus
, rolling the thing up the hilland having it roll back down
(32:44):
hellscape, where you actuallyare free.
You free your mind, you freeyour self, your habenula,
because when the habenula is on,it is incredibly painful.
It is what drives addiction.
It is what drives when peoplehave withdrawal from addictive
substances.
This area of the brain iswhat's causing it to be so
(33:07):
uncomfortable and so likemaddening, you know, and so
people will do anything in thatstate to numb out or distract
themselves.
And that and that's what wehave to understand is like there
is this mechanism in the brainthat is working against us
Whenever we try to changeourselves, whenever we try to
(33:27):
change our behavior.
So whenever we try, to changeourselves.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
Whenever we try to change our behavior, this is our
greatest obstacle.
Yeah, ok, so let me.
I want to.
This is going to get into somehypothetical stuff and I'm just
curious your, your sort ofunderstanding of this and if you
have anything to say about this.
This is so.
I think.
All the rest was for thelistener and this one's for me.
So let's see if we can, ifmaybe you can help me with this.
So here's my hypothesis, and Iwant to see what you think about
(33:54):
this.
My hypothesis is that thismechanism that is going on with
the Hebenula is sort of amechanism of narratives and
stories, right?
So it's this idea that I failedthis many times and I'm just
convinced that I'm a failure orI'll fail.
This even can bleed over intoother things.
So I failed so much in withfinance, and now I'm failing in
(34:15):
health and fitness.
And it's like this, this youknow, as children and as
adolescents and even as adults,when we encounter difficult,
challenging things that make usfeel perhaps less than and I
(34:39):
call these misguided,unconscious decisions mud, right
?
So they're misguided becausethey happen during times where
we don't have the skills, thewisdom, the knowledge, the
know-how, the maturity to dealwith them.
They're unconscious becausethey follow us around like a
shadow.
And they're decisions, because,whether we're aware of them or
not, we did make a decision orchoice to see the world in a
particular way.
And so this mud in my mind.
(35:00):
It's kind of like thinking ofthe Habanula sitting in mud and
not able to escape, and so thenI go.
Well, the work that needs to bedone is one rewriting these
stories, trying to get peopleinto this more unconscious state
where they can see change theirperception around the idea of
(35:20):
failure in the first place, andthen sort of rewire the nervous
system around this or theemotional response to this, and
then, of course, the nervoussystem around this or the
emotional response to this, andthen, of course, at the end,
retrain the brain, which iswhere habits and behaviors come
in.
So to me, I'm wondering whatyou think about this idea of
let's call it a habitual, ahabitual, habitual response Mud.
(35:43):
It's stuck because you've seenthings as failure so long and
then needing to go down in thereand restructuring these stories
through some of thisunconscious work.
Is there anything in yourresearch or in your ways of
seeing this that this idea wouldmake sense when we look at
(36:03):
things like PTSD or adversechildhood events, or just
traumas and difficulties orrepeated failures in any domain,
finance relationships and or,you know, health and fitness.
Speaker 2 (36:15):
Yeah, as you may suspect, what they've shown in
the literature is that whensomebody has and this was shown
in animals, because you can'ttraumatize humans and then show
pre and post effect, but youknow when they would mess with
the instability and the traumafor baby mice that their
(36:37):
habanula was incredibly triggerhappy and so it hypersensitizes
the habanula, going off to anynotion of failure, and that
lines up with PTSD symptoms.
Right when you've got thishypervigilance and you've got
this pessimism, you know thatnothing's going to work for me
or this is everything'sdangerous, everything's scary.
(36:58):
You know that that gets reallyprogrammed in the brain so PTSD
can happen through, you know,massive adrenaline rush.
That kind of super glues all ofthese neural networks together,
rewires your brain like in aninstant.
Or you can have the childhoodexperiences that you're talking
about where, for example, myfather even though I love him, I
(37:19):
love him dearly, he's nowpassed he would tell me that I
was going to be an effingfailure and that I was a loser.
And I think in his mind he wasdoing that to counter, motivate
me, like paradoxically, motivateme to strive and to achieve.
And hey, you know, it kind ofworks.
But, as you said, a lot of mudwas instilled in that moment.
(37:43):
And so my habanula, because Ihave so much trauma and
different things from my pastthat I've had to heal from, and
that kind of thing can be quite,you know, tenuous or
pessimistic and about things,and then that becomes drawing
from my narrative self, myfrontal cortex, my prefrontal
(38:04):
cortex, those two things matchup and I can become depressed or
I could become anxious or Icould become pessimistic as a
result.
And so what's different about meis that I know I have a
habenula.
And because I know I have ahabenula, whenever I see any
hint of a gap between what Ishould be doing or what I want
(38:25):
to be doing and what I'mactually doing, I'm like, oh, my
habenula is on, it's diagnostic, and if my habenula is on, then
I feel like shit, I feelterrible about myself and about
the world or wherever.
And so I know whereas otherpeople, if they don't know about
this part of our brain, I knowbetter than to wallow in those
(38:45):
stories that you're talkingabout in the mud and I can
immediately have the rightaction to neutralize the failure
to either talk myself out of itor get myself out of it
Journaling, talking to somebodyyou know whatever somatic you
know, running whatever, whateverthe case would be, to kind of
get yourself out of that gear iswhat people like me who know
(39:10):
about this will do, whereaseverybody else might just take
too long lingering in the.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
I love this so much.
It's not always the case that Imean it often is the case when
you're interested in someone'swork.
You're partly interestedbecause it dovetails into some
of your work.
But it doesn't surprise me that.
Surprise me that there's a lotof now crossover that I'm seeing
.
I have one more line of I wantto be respectful of your time,
(39:36):
but I have one more line ofquestioning that I want to go
down that I think will be useful, just for the listener to sort
of understand.
To me there are many differenttools that we can use to.
You know, to use my vernacular,you know, get us out of the mud
, to use your vernacular toreally free the hubbenula from
this gap you know of.
You know the thing that we wantto do, that we see that we're
(39:59):
not doing and we know we're kindof in this, you know, hubbenula
sort of cemented in aparticular degree.
Some of those, from myperspective, would be things
like we use breath work combinedwith journaling, a form of
written exposure therapy, a formof holotropic breath work, very
shortened, and a form ofcompassion therapy and cognitive
(40:20):
behavioral therapy, or what wemight call exposure therapies.
I'm wondering what you havefound to be the most potent, if
any.
Obviously, you've done andthank you so much for this work
and sort of what you're bringingforth with this idea of this
iterative mindset.
What I'm wondering is how muchhave you got into which
(40:43):
practices work the best, if any?
Obviously, the definition ofbeing right it's you know, we
can think, feel, choose, actHabits and behaviors.
Think, you know, focus on thechoosing and the acting.
Some of the, you know,therapies, talk therapies, you
know, go to thinking.
Not very many things get intothe feeling state and of course,
before you can think, feel,choose and act, you have to see
(41:05):
the world differently.
So I've always thought thatperception altering treatments
are one of the first ones I liketo do.
But then I like to kind of goup the chain of like.
First I need to get you seeingyourself in the world
differently, then we can getthinking and feeling in line,
then we can get choosing andacting in line.
But of course it goes in theother direction as well.
(41:26):
But I'm more interested in thefull length of sort of you just
looking and saying, hey, jake,here are the things perhaps that
we have seen in the world oftherapy, in the world of somatic
work in the world of meditation, in the world perhaps
psychedelics, you know, and allthese that can make a difference
here.
What would you say are the top,top ones?
Speaker 2 (41:47):
So you're asking me what are the top iterations that
work for most people?
Speaker 1 (41:53):
Yeah, and tools.
You know tools that seem to get, you know, fix this habanula
let's call it the habanulahijack, maybe like just fix this
, you know issue.
Are there tools that seem todeal with this?
Of course, you know, once youget into the behavior change,
it's an iterative, choosing andacting process and maybe that's
(42:16):
all there is to it.
I'm wondering if there are anytools that get to the thinking
and feeling and seeingdifferently to help this
iterative process along, becausethe way I'm conceptualizing
this is that what you're doingis you're taking the system of
habit change, you know, which ischoosing and acting, seeing
that it's not, it's eitherincomplete or that this is a
(42:38):
better model, a better way ofdoing it, this iterative process
, and we're using this iterative, you know sort of style, maybe
in coaching or in thinking, andyou know acting and choosing.
I'm wondering is there anythingelse that you've seen that can
come before that helps thisprocess along, to get people to
be more iterative in theirmindset, or is it just simply
(42:58):
practice?
Speaker 2 (43:00):
The main thing for progress, or the main thing that
works, that unifies everythingthat works, is their ability to
turn off the hebenula.
That's my hypothesis, becauseeverything I've seen that turns
off the habenula frees up themotivation and the forward
motion in an animal, no matterwhat if it's a human, if it's a
(43:21):
mouse, whatever the case may beand you talk about psychedelics.
It's been shown that ketamineis specifically acting on the
lateral habenula, an outsidepart of the habenula, and that
it stays embedded in thoseneurons for up to three months,
which, by the way, mapscompletely exactly to the
(43:44):
symptoms, relief that patientssay that a ketamine therapy
treatment helps them.
But once you disrupt thathabenula, being time you turn it
off, kind of overwhelm it.
Then you've got three months tobuild new habits, new ways of
being, all these things you kindof.
(44:05):
You can't put a cast onsomething and then have no
healing of the bone underneath,you know.
So habits and habit practices,whatever those are those
iterations you know, does thiswork for me or that work for me?
It gives you a bit of abreather.
And so do SSRIs to some extent,because they're working on
(44:25):
serotonin, which is alsoreleased by and affecting the
habanula.
Hebenula controls dopamine, itcontrols serotonin, it controls
everything.
It is the main reason why weare able to do or not do
anything that we do or don't do.
And so now that we know aboutthis hub, you know, and we know
(44:46):
what turns it on and what turnsit off, then we can see
everything as an iteration onand what turns it off.
Then we can see everything asan iteration Breath work.
You know, there's an ibogainederivative that has been shown
to affect the nicotinicreceptors in the habanero, which
are higher and different thanall the other receptors in the
(45:06):
brain for nicotine.
And so that particular ibogainederivative particularly works
on the nicotinic receptors,blocks them, and then that is
what causes the disruption ofvery intense drugs, of abuse.
That's the mechanism of actionfor ibogaine.
And so what I find is thateverything kind of converges on
(45:29):
this science.
If something is alleviatingdepression, if it's alleviating
anxiety, it's absolutely doingit in part or whole through
habanula.
Speaker 1 (45:40):
Yeah, I love that idea and you know what I'm
looking at, this idea of.
Well, I don't know if you'veseen some of the stuff on GLP-1s
and its addiction, itsaddictive capacity.
Yeah, of the stuff on glp-1sand its addiction.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
You know it's addictive capacity, yep and um,
and I think, I think and I'mactually looking it up as we
talk, uh, that glp-1 is actingon the benula as well it has
like that, that there's just ifit's like first principles right
, if, if depression, anxiety arecontrolled by hebenula that's
the latest thinking and if GLP-1lowers depression and anxiety,
(46:16):
it has to be going throughHebenula, at least in part.
But my guess is that it's majorbecause it's a daughter
molecule to oxytocin.
Speaker 1 (46:25):
Yeah, it's really interesting, right.
Yeah, it's really interestingright when you think most people
are going to be taking GLP-1sbecause they want to reduce
their hunger, but it's having animpact on these sort of core
(46:45):
places that are driving soothingbehavior in the first place,
partly because of this action,and so you know, I work a lot
with the GLP-1s as well becauseof the weight loss world.
So, yeah, it's reallyinteresting that you bring this
up and it's important.
You and I have like minds rightOnce you find these.
You don't always find this, bythe way, but sometimes in
medicine you find a newmechanism where you go, oh, this
unlocks a lot not everything,but it unlocks a lot.
(47:07):
And this habenula mechanismthat you're describing really
opens up an area that I thinkhas blinded us to effective
treatments.
What I love about what you'redoing is that you know you're
essentially educating people onthis mechanism and then the
behavioral responses, thisiterative sort of way of
(47:27):
behaving.
That is core.
But I love this idea thatyou're talking about, about
using some of these compounds,perhaps, and certain techniques
that can open up this window oftime where this iterative
process can be downloaded better, let's say, than previously.
And certainly this is what Isee when I run certain of my
(47:48):
events.
You'll see that people willcome to the event.
They'll be sort of in thisheightened state World has
changed.
But unless they get into thisdifferent style, a lot of them
won't opt for sort of thefollow-up, integration and
coaching, and those individualsmiss out on this window.
I've just never put it that way.
I absolutely love that.
So I want to just say thank youso much, dr Kyra, for your time.
(48:13):
First of all, thank you foryour work.
It's my belief that it'sindividuals like you,
practitioners like you, that areable to translate the science
for the public, and I think thisis you, being an MD and a
master's in public health, thatputs you in a unique position to
take this complex science andteach it to all of us.
So I just want to say thank youso much for your work and
(48:36):
taking the time.
I know doing a book, you know,is not an easy thing.
I've done eight of them now andit's never easy and they don't
make you rich.
People think that that's what'sgoing to happen, but it's
usually just to help people withthese sort of new insights.
But it's usually just to helppeople with these sort of new
insights.
So deep respect and deepgratitude for you, my friend,
(48:56):
for this work.
Is there anything that you want?
Final thoughts that you want togive us before we go?
And then I want to make surepeople know where to get the
book and know where to find outmore about you.
Speaker 2 (49:08):
Yeah, I think that you know.
To me, this is the mostsignificant finding in my career
, in all of behavior change.
Pursuing this for so long, it'sthe Holy Grail to me, and what
it means is that failure andmitigating and neutralizing
failure becomes our top priorityfor being able to restore our
(49:29):
faculties, and I believe thatpeople can change themselves if
they know about this and stoptripping over it 100%.
Speaker 1 (49:39):
I agree.
The book for everybody is theUnstoppable Brain.
It's subtitled the NewNeuroscience that frees us from
failure, eases our stress andcreates lasting change.
You all just got a little bitof a snippet right here.
You can learn more about DrKyra at drkyrababanettecom and
(50:00):
you can also get that quiz thereas well.
And I know you said you are onsocial media as well.
What's your handle on socialmedia if people want to go there
and check you out?
Speaker 2 (50:10):
I think it's at Dr Kyra Bobinette on.
Speaker 1 (50:12):
Instagram?
Yeah, I believe it is too.
I just followed you.
Dr Kyra and I were talkingbefore we all came on with you
and we both kind of love anddon't necessarily always love
social media.
That's a whole other thingabout what that's doing to our
habanula, but that's a wholeother discussion.
Speaker 2 (50:33):
There's studies on that.
Speaker 1 (50:35):
Yeah, there's studies on that, so maybe we have to
have you back on, but I justagain my gratitude.
Thank you for your work.
I'm looking forward to readingthe study or studies when they
come out.
I've gotten your book onAudible, which I'm going to be
listening to, and I soappreciate you.
Just do me a favor, kyra, stayon the line.
I just want to make sure thisuploads.
But for all of you, thank youso much for being here and I
(50:56):
hope you learned something.
We'll see you at the next show.
Popular Podcasts
Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club
Welcome to Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club — the podcast where great stories, bold women, and irresistible conversations collide! Hosted by award-winning journalist Danielle Robay, each week new episodes balance thoughtful literary insight with the fervor of buzzy book trends, pop culture and more. Bookmarked brings together celebrities, tastemakers, influencers and authors from Reese's Book Club and beyond to share stories that transcend the page. Pull up a chair. You’re not just listening — you’re part of the conversation.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!