What if you didn't have to manage your anxiety, your trauma, your patterns for the rest of your life? What if you could actually repair the root problem—and move on?
In this final episode of our series, Dr. Lee Warren and I talk about the solution. The shift from "holding pressure on the wound forever" to actually stitching it up and letting it heal. The shift from symptom management to root repair. The shift from spending years in therapy just managing to actually becoming the surgeon of your own mind.
Dr. Warren explains the consent-to-automate sequence—the missing piece that most mental health approaches don't teach. It's the moment your brain asks for permission to automate a thought, feeling, or reaction. And once you learn to spot that moment, you can withhold consent and install a better automation instead. The brain rewires in seconds to minutes—not years.
But here's the key: it's not just about changing your thoughts. It's about rewiring your self-image—the subconscious beliefs that are running the show. Because if your self-image undermines what Scripture says about you, you'll keep defaulting to the old patterns no matter how hard you try.
We tie it all back to Ephesians 4, where Paul talks about being "renewed in the spirit of your mind." He wasn't saying "manage your old self forever." He was saying "put on the new self"—an actual identity-level transformation. And that's exactly what Self-Brain Surgery makes possible.
This episode is the hopeful one. The practical one. The one that shows you how to stop managing and start repairing. If you're ready to move on with your life, this is the conversation you've been waiting for.
GUEST: Dr. Lee Warren // wleewarrenmd.com // @drleewarren
Listen to Dr. Warren's Podcast here.
Order Dr. Warren's New Book, The Life-Changing Art of Self-Brain Surgery.
HOST: Leanne Ellington // StresslessEating.com // @LeanneEllington // @theteenagerbrain
To learn more about Leanne, head over to www.LeanneEllington.com, and to share your thoughts, questions, feedback, or guest suggestions instantly, head on over to www.WhatsGodGotToDoWithIt.com.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
If you want to go on a journey, if you're skeptical,
don't worry.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Now here to preach. I'm gonna keep it clean and
talk to me and recall where.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Faith needs fars nature and get in touch with your
creator with a bacon, love and je. She even speaks Hebrew.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
What's that Gonza?
Speaker 1 (00:31):
What's that? This well sabosation, hil talking transformation?
Speaker 3 (00:41):
What's that?
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Don sat.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
Hey, everyone, welcome back. It's Leanne here. We are here
with what's God got to do with it? We've got
the spiritual brain surgery here, live it over here on
the Godpod if you're just joining us. We are wrapping
up this series with doctor Lee Warren called why mental
health is geting worse even though we're trying harder, And
in the first episode we talked about the paradox how
(01:05):
it's being talked about.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
There's more resources, there's more.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Attention going to the mental health crisis, but there's worse outcomes,
and it's because there's a foundation problem. The mental health
culture nowadays is built on theory and it all sounds
great in theory, but it's not based on how the
brain actually works. There's the missing link. So definitely check
out episode one. Last week we talked about the observer
effect and how where you put your attention literally shapes
(01:31):
your reality.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
We got into the brain science.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Of it, and if you're constantly focusing on trauma or
your pain or the parts of you that are broken,
you're actually training your brain to keep running those patterns.
And it's not personal, it really is just the way
the brain works. And so today we're talking about the solution.
Hopefully you've been getting hope the whole way through, but
we want to give you hope and show you some
practical elements of what this process looks like. So here's
(01:57):
the question. What if you didn't have to just manage
and anxiety or manage or put a lid on your
trauma or your patterns for the rest.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Of your life.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
What if you could actually repair the root problem and
move on. So that's really what self brain surgery is about.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
That's what Lee lives for.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
So and we've talked about the paradox, you know, we've
talked about how what you observe gets stronger in your brain,
you create.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
More of it. Let's talk about.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
What actually works. So what would you see if you
were to nutshell it? What is the shift that we
need to make.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
I think the biggest thing Leanne is you need to
be a surgeon operating on your brain all the time
instead of a victim of what your brain is doing.
And the way you look at that is, despite what
you may have been taught or what you may have heard,
your brain is basically running one play all the time
as it relates to your mind brain interface the things
you think and feel, and that play is your brain
(02:50):
is attempting to get your permission to automate things and
turn them into habits so that you don't have to
pay as much attention to them, so that things like
if you're driving to work right and you change jobs,
that first drive to work. For the first two or
three days, you have to think about the drive, all
the changes of your lanes and speed zones and school
zones and all that stuff. You have to think about
(03:11):
it both hands on the wheel, paying attention. But after
a few days you can get there and you've been
listening to the radio. They've been listening to Leanne on
the radio the whole time. You haven't thought about the
drive one time because your brain has automated everything that
you need to do for that drive safely so you
don't have to pay attention to it, so that you
can use your mind for something else. That's the play
that your brain is running, and that play is running
(03:33):
even as it relates to your mental health. And so
that means that over the course of your lifetime, before
somebody told you that you had a choice in this,
you made a lot of those automatic connections in your
brain that produce the way you think and feel. I
feel anxious, I feel nervous, I feel depressed, I feel scared,
I feel body image issues, whatever it is. Your brain
has automated that, and you don't have to think about
(03:54):
it to feel that. And so the solution then is
this sometimes long and definitely requiring effort and repetition process
of telling your brain a set of new things that
you wanted to automate. And the pivot for me is
stop thinking about what you feel and start thinking about
what you want to feel. And so I want to
(04:16):
be more calm and stressful situations. I want to have
a more positive image of my own self in my life.
I want to have a higher sense of performance or
whatever it is. Then you start repeating that to your
brain and I do it in the mornings, I have
a morning quiet time, so that what I want to
do with my day is I don't want to be
under pressure and stressed and then have automatic reactions pop
(04:40):
up that I give into. I want to be in
charge of those things. And so that means that looking
ahead to my day, Since your brain doesn't actually know
the difference between something you're just imagining and something that's
actually happening, you can leverage that to say, I'm going
to build a brain by sort of thinking about future
situations in this day. So let's say you have a
day coming up and you have a meeting at nine
(05:00):
o'clock with somebody that always pushes your buttons, and you
get triggered and you get mad, and you say something
you shouldn't say, you get called to HR. You know,
all the things happen, or you get stressed out and
you go to the kitchen and you eat twelve bags
of cheetohs or whatever it is when you're under stress.
Then you can say, Okay, I'm going to imagine that
meeting and I'm going to tell my brain that that
meeting is going to go a different way. And when
they say this thing, I'm going to say this thing instead,
(05:22):
I'm going to make a better response than I have
made the last time to get to a different outcome
than I normally get to. And if you imagine that
scenario playing out a few times, your brain will begin
to use Hebb's law to automate some of those connections,
and then when it actually comes to pass, you're more
likely to have the new response that you're trying to
(05:42):
automate rather than the default old one. And so you
can prove this to yourself by just doing it a
few times a day in simple situations, right like, Okay,
next time I go into the kitchen instead of doing this,
I want to do that, and think about it as
if you're doing it. Your brain will wire that, and
then when you get into the kitchen you'll have a
little flag that'll pop up and say, oh, I'm going
to do this this time instead of that, and you'll
(06:04):
have that nudge and you may not give into it,
because you may have that old automation that feels stronger,
or your motivation for whatever it is that you may
have chosen otherwise might feel more important at the time.
But if you keep practicing that, you're going to build
a brain that automates the new response that you want.
Your brain will listen to you, your brain will obey you,
because neuroplasticity doesn't care about whether it's been a long
(06:27):
standing thing or something new. It just wants to do
what your mind tells it to automate. And so knowing
that can strip the value piece out of it, the
judgment piece. You don't have to feel ashamed of how
it's been or anxious that it might not work for you.
It will work for you. You just have to persist.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
Yeah, absolutely, and yeah, we talked last week about the
difference between like focusing on the problems versus focusing on
the solution, and looking backwards versus looking forwards. You know
a lot of people are saying like, oh my gosh,
I wish I wasn't stressed, or I wish I wasn't
freaking out right now, or I wish I wasn't so anxious,
and that's so problem focused versus even just asking what
would give me peace of mind right now, that's right,
what would actually make me proud of myself right now?
(07:03):
And giving yourself a better question rather than continually telling
yourself what you think you already know. Because the brain
is literally asking do you want me to keep running
this pattern? And most people don't realize they're already saying
yes because they're just on autopilot.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
So we've got to give it something new.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
And this is that consent to automate sequence that you
talk about in your book, and how the brain is
asking for permission to automate something right, But can you
install a better automation essentially right? And here's what I
love about the brain. Yes, there's repetition, there's consistency. I
teach air, attention, intention, and repetition. But the brain can
(07:39):
rewire pretty quickly, or at least the rewiring process can start.
And I think a lot of people think, oh, I've
been this way forever. It's going to take me years
to override this. So can you talk to us a
little bit about the brain automation process, Like when you
interrupt the old pattern and you install a new one,
how quickly the structural changes can start. Now, there's a
(08:00):
difference between the beginning of the structural changes and then
having those become the new default. There's gonna take some time,
but I think people underestimate how quickly this process can start.
So can you just talk a little bit about that.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, so these structural elements in your brain called microtubules
that are kind of like the girders that you put
in axons through to connect one neuron to another neuron.
And then the place they actually connect is called a synapse, right,
that the place where the neurons make contact with one another.
And so when you want your brain to do something
that it hasn't been doing, then you need to create
(08:35):
some new synapses. And we know that the primary driver
of those new synaptic changes is thinking, that's what you're
thinking about. And now there's good evidence that microtubular rearrangement
starts within seconds to minutes of you thinking about one
thing and not another thing. So that means that literally,
in almost real time, your brain begins to organize to
(08:56):
prepare to lay down these new neuronal pathways within seconds
of thinking, Okay, I'm going to stop being so anxious
and start being more hopeful, right within seconds. The problem is,
is we talked about in the last episode, the longer
you have automated a particular behavior, the more robust those
old connections are. So you might make you know, ten
thousand new synapses over here, but you've got one hundred
(09:16):
million supporting the old automation, the old habit. That's this
been the way things have been, and so it's going
to take attention. Like you said, intention, you got to
keep it up and repetition. You have to do it
for a long time. And there's there's people that say
habits take twenty one to ninety days to form, right.
I don't know if there's real good evidence about either
side of that, but the best way to think about
(09:38):
it is we used to live in Wyoming, and in Wyoming,
there there's a place where the Oregon Trail used to
go through, and to this day you can go and
see the ruts in the ground where those wagons came through,
even though it's been one hundred years since there were
wagons there, but they were so frequently traveling across the
same ground that the ruts in the ground are so
(09:58):
compressed and compacted that they have it won't ever go away.
They're just like fossilized in the ground. And that's kind
of what synapses are in your brain, that no matter
how many new synapses you make, there may be some
persistent old synaptic pathways in there. And it's going to
take a long time to degrade the old automation until
the new one sort of takes precedence. And so that
(10:20):
means don't give up. Recognize the progress that you're making.
But when you slip in and have a day or
have a moment when the old thing kicks in, it's
not because everything went to pot and you just failed.
It's because those ruts in the ground are still there
in your brain. And so don't think that a temporary
slip back into the old pattern means that failure is
occurring or this process isn't going to work for me.
(10:42):
It's just that you have to spend a lot of
time to make the new process the default.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
It takes a while, sure, sure, And I mean what
we do know the research shows too, is that who
you're being when you're doing the doing makes a big difference.
Because if you are trying to instill a new habit
under force persian coercion, you hate it. You're looking at
your body like it's a burden. You're looking at this
like it's a chore. You're telling yourself that it's not
going to work again, those negative neuro associations, it is
(11:09):
literally keeping you from that long term storage part of
the brain, the basil ganglia, it never gets what it
needs to download it. And I'm totally oversimplifying this, right,
But when you are surrounding it with positive neuro associations,
when it's a place of choice not a place of force,
when you are actually enjoying the process of it. So
maybe it's in minimums not in maximums. You're playing the
consistency game, not the intensity game. You are doing things
(11:32):
that you actually enjoy alongside the thing that feels like
a chore. It is a completely a different experience in
your brain. And that is a big factor in how
long something takes to become your default, because when you
are in the opposite realm, when you're in the force persuasion, coercion,
you hate it.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
You don't believe it's going to work.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
Honestly, repetition might not even ever make it your default
because there's certain nuances, right, So we do want to
make sure that it's about like who we're being, not
just what we're doing. And then we're talking about behavior change.
One of the big questions I asked my clients before
they go to do the work that they do with me,
like it's like, are you ready to not just focus
on the doing and the behaviors and the actions and
(12:12):
ready be ready to become the version of yourself who
has those actions those behaviors. And that's where the belief
and self image comes into play too. So I think
we underestimate how much influence we have over are not
that we can just like play god with how our
brain and the timeline of how it's wired, but there's
elements that we can really influence based on how we
(12:32):
show up in the face of it.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
That's right. And you can leverage your reward system too, Like,
so if you have this sense that you're giving up
something that is a reward for you, then your dopamine
system is going to fly back. Like I said, no,
I want the reward, like I want the cupcake or
I want the cocaine or whatever. Like you have to
tell your brain that the reward you're seeking on the
(12:55):
back end of this change is the one that you
really want, like like, this new life is the thing
I want my neuroendocrine system aiming at. And I'm going
to convince myself that the work that I'm doing now
is the beginning of this new deliverable that my brain
is actually gonna want, that's going to produce a life
that I really want.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
Absolutely, And then if we take away our source of
dopamine and don't replace it with something, there's going to
be this gap as well, So we have to keep that.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
In mind as well.
Speaker 3 (13:22):
There's a lot of nuance to this, and that's why
you know, when when somebody is giving just hard and
fast advice of like, oh, just stop doing what you're
doing and start doing this, just stop eating cheeseburgers and
eating a salad, it's like, well, if you're taking away
all of my source of you know, positive connection or
I have this positive association or almost this drug like fix,
and I'm not replacing it with anything, it actually feels
more like punishment. Something in the brain is not going
(13:44):
to connect to that and you might be able to
do it for a short amount of time, but it's
not going to work forever. And that's where again we
have to keep coming back to the short term change
conversation is easy, Like anybody can do that, Like I
could tell you a thirty day you know, transformation and
you would it would work like gangbusters, right, But to
actually transform who you're being, not just right now, but
ten years from now, twenty years from now, a lifetime
(14:06):
from now, that is a completely different game. And this
is where we have to adhere to the laws of
how the breed works.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
I'm script.
Speaker 3 (14:23):
So we're not going to get on our soapbox for
a second. But I do want to talk about this, Okay,
this idea of renewing the mind and neuroplasticity and how
people are just like throwing around scripture with bright and science. Right,
talk to us about what Paul was really talking about
in Ephesians four when he said be renewed by the
spirit of your mind. Can you talk about what this
(14:44):
looks like in practicality, not just in kind of theory
and poetry.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Yeah, so you're talking about Ephesians four twenty three where
he says, I want you to be made new in
the attitude of your minds. Oh, but you need to
back up to seventeen in that same chapter to really
get the context. Paul's talking basically about the idea that
thoughts become things like thoughts become what's real in your life,
and he lists all these things. He calls the people gentiles,
and what he's talking about is not are you a
(15:10):
Jew or not a Jew? He's at that time, he
was really referring to are you do you know Jesus
or do you not know him? And if you don't
know him, he would call you a gentile. If you
do know him, he would call you saved, you're a
Christian or whatever. And what he says is the gentiles
are doing all these bad things in their life. He
lists off all these things, the adultery and drunkenness and
all this stuff, and gladdening and all these things. But
(15:30):
then he says in four to seventeen, he says, I
don't want you to be like that. They're lost in
the futility of their thinking. And so it's the behaviors
back up to the thought processes. Right. So what he's
saying is when by the time he gets down to
four twenty three and he says, not you, you'd be made
new in the attitude of your minds. He's contrasting the
things that you think about and the things that you
(15:52):
ponder and what you dwell on, because that's what builds
the brain that's going to support the life that you
want or continue the life that you don't one. And
so the real answer to the question is hey being
made new in the attitude of your mind being renewed,
as Romans twelve two calls it is. Is not about neuroplasticity.
That's a brain process. That's a brain process. It's about
submitting your will to the will of the Creator, the
(16:16):
Holy Spirit, the great physician who's there with you. In one,
Corinthians two sixteen says you have an advantage over everybody else.
You have the mind of Christ. Like you literally have
God in your head giving you advice and guiding you.
He won't do the work for you, so it's it's
self help, but it's not a self reliance. He's there
with you to help you. But you've got to pick
up the knife and it's going to operate this system
(16:37):
and run the place the way he's designing you to
be able to do it. But all of it starts
with submitting your thoughts and getting them right first. And
so when we talked about reward well ago for example,
like it's just as important to celebrate a well played
day than it is to celebrate a night of not
having alcohol or twinkies or whatever. Like, like you need
(16:59):
to get to the next and say, you know what,
I don't have brain fog today, I'm not hungover. I
don't have, you know, crumbs in my bed because I
ate a large Domino's pizza in my bed before I
fell asleep, and I feel better, and so celebrate that,
because then your reward system will recalibrate and say, wait,
I feel this reward today and my body feels good,
and I'm proud of myself, rather than the little bit
(17:20):
of reward I might have gotten last night by saying, gosh,
I knuckled through the night. I didn't have alcohol tonight,
or I made it through, you know. And so now
you're rewarding yourself on the back end for the result
and not the willpower of sort of dredging yourself through
some scenario. Right. But all of that happens because you
change how you think about it, Like it's not it's
(17:42):
not I want to stop doing this thing tonight, it's
I want to start being alive tomorrow. I want to
start being proud of myself. I want to I want
my kids to see me modeling this so that they
don't have to grow up in this house like I did,
thinking that this was inevitable because my dad did it too.
Like it changed the reward pathway and you're come alive.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Yeah, Paul wasn't saying manage your old self forever. He
was saying, put on the new self, which is an
actual identity level transformation. And this is what the consent
to automate sequence that we were talking about even makes possible,
because it's not just about behavior modification or positive thinking.
It's an actual identity shift where you are becoming a
new creation, not just intellectually but at the subconscious level
(18:23):
where your brain is actually automating new patterns. And you
mentioned this idea of being proud of yourself or celebrating
yourself the next day, and one of the things that
I hear all the time from women is but does
that mean that I'm self righteous? Or does that mean
that I'm being you know, cocky or braggadocius. And it's like, no,
it's about receiving the amazingness of the brain that God created, right,
(18:45):
But you also can celebrate that you use your free
will to go override something that you used to do
all the time and then give the glory to God.
But that's where the receivership piece of your transformation comes in,
where it becomes a co creation with God. Rather than
just waiting for God to do it for you or
feeling like you are just you know, weak to your
sins and you can't ever overcome it. Right, there's there's
(19:07):
somewhere in between, and that's where, again, I believe, is
a piece of the puzzle of reshaping our relationship with reality,
because that's not reality to me either of just like
thinking that God is just going to do it for me,
but then also thinking I'm a jerk if I'm celebrating
that I just did something amazing using the brain that
God gave me. This is where we need a paradigm shift,
you know, so super super powerful. Let's get practical for
(19:29):
a second. So if somebody's listening and they're like, Okay,
I get it. I want to stop managing, I want
to start repairing. Where would you say that they.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Start I start. I'm going to just say they should
read your book. That's what they they should start. But
where would you say they'd start.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Well, not to be self referential, but I mean, all
these ideas are in there, and like I give you
these tools. Yeah, for me, it always starts in the mornings.
I think I said earlier, maybe in our previous episode,
like like I have to set my intention for the day,
because you're going to get into a scenario during the
day that can to you by surprise, like something's going
to trigger you or make you want to pull the trigger.
(20:05):
Something's going to just sort of surprise you, and you're
going to be in a reactive posture if you're not
aware that that thing, if you do not have thought
ahead of time that that thing might happen. So what
I mean by that is if you spend time in
the morning leveraging that idea that your brain doesn't know
the difference between reality and what you're just pondering, then
you can run what the business people call a pre
mortem analysis. Right. The business people say, Okay, if I
(20:27):
get to the end of this day and this meeting
failed or this company went bankrupt or whatever happened, what
would the steps have been that made that failure happen?
And then how can I engineer around those so that
I have a better outcome. In medicine, we would call
that an autopsy, but they're doing it at the start
of the transaction instead of after the patient already died. Right.
They're looking at the system from the start. And that's
(20:48):
what I try to do in the morning. So if
you want something really practical, like wake up a little
bit earlier than you have to get yourself in a
calm vegas nerve activated state. So do some breathing, do
some meditating. I spend time in the Word of God
every morning. It's with some worship music, just to try
to get my nervous system in that right hemisphere activated
state where everything's sort of a big picture and not
(21:09):
such a fact oriented thing like we spend our whole
day being in. And I try to get myself in
a mode of thinking ahead to the day I'm about
to encounter, and what are the places where I tend
to default to old patterns that I want to change
or I'm trying to change. And then when I see
myself in that place, in that scenario where I tend
to default, then I imagine myself taking a different action
(21:32):
than I have in the past when it failed for
me or when I didn't do the thing I really
wanted to do. And so then I tell my brain, Okay,
here's what you're going to do. I try to wire
in the new default behavior as opposed to the old one,
knowing that it takes repetition and attention and attention and
a lot of time to get that to be your
actual default. I try to leverage it by just running
(21:54):
the play enough times that at least three hours from now,
it might be a little bit more likely that my
brain will remind me that I had set an intention
to follow through with a new behavior. And so I
think if you practice that, it will build confidence that
the system really does work for you, and it'll start
producing some yield that you can measure and see. And
then when you start doing those post mortem analysis at
(22:15):
the end of the day, which is also important, like
look back and say, how did this day go? Did
I actually carry out the things I intended to do?
You'll start having some wins that you can put on
the board. And that celebration piece that you said, while
I go like, it's not bragging, when Paul said I rejoice,
I will boast in the Lord, right, So you can boast,
you can be proud, You can brag almost on how
(22:35):
well God designed your nervous system and how reliable it
is when you put it in the right state, and
how awesome it is that your brain will actually wire
in response to your mental commands in ways that help
you and don't hurt you, and that gives you incredible
hope because now you have some power. All this time
you thought you're a victim, and now you know you
(22:55):
have some agency and some opportunity and some power and
some choice and how things actually turn out. I think
that's that's pretty helpful.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
Absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:04):
And I think it also adds the question of doing
a little internal audit and saying, like, where are my
first fruits going in the day, Like am I just
immediately getting on and scrolling on social media? Or like
all of this stuff that we've been talking about on
this series. It's great in theory, but if we're treating
this like the crumbs that we give ourselves at night,
rather than like really making a radical commitment to rewiring
(23:26):
your brain and transforming your life, because it really is
a radical commitment, like it is about drawing that line
in the sand and saying, no, I'm done recycling the
same pain. This ends now, and it doesn't have to
be a deep, dark rock bottom, but you do have
to get to that place where you're like, no, I'm
no longer willing to live like this, and I am
ready to do the work because it is work. And
there is a massive difference between deciding to change a behavior.
(23:48):
There's a massive difference between making a decision to lose weight,
making a decision to stop drinking, making a decision to
stop doing X, Y and Z and start doing X,
Y or Z, versus deciding to heal the real problem
in your brain deciding to create the transformation in your head,
your heart, your mind, your brain, your spirit, very different conversations.
But if you don't have the mental bandwidth because you
(24:10):
are first thing, scrolling whatever, right, and you haven't truly
committed to this being totally transparent everything that we say
that we're saying in this series, honestly, it's not that
it won't matter, but it won't make a difference. And
that's where I'm imploring all of you to take your
desires for transformation seriously because God can't override your free will.
(24:31):
You know, he loves us too much. Not too is
what I say about it. You know so beautiful. No,
this is such a powerful conversation I and again it's
a hope giving one right. So that is where we
get solution focus, where we stop managing, we start repairing
and learn to spot those moments in your brain that
are asking.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
For your permission.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
You might not know it right, and for you to
give the ability to say, hey, no, we're not doing
that anymore. This is the direction that we're going. And
that takes commitment, it takes repetition, it takes it takes work, right,
But this is I believe our responsibility and the opportunity
and as you say, becoming the surgeon of your own
mind and that way where that's we're truly healing the
(25:13):
problem and moving on with our lives because nobody wants
to stay stuck in the problem. That's why we're all here,
that's right. So yeah, Lee, this has been incredible. Thank
you so much for being here, for bringing spiritual brain
surgery to what's God got to do with it?
Speaker 2 (25:26):
Again, tell people where they can find.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
You, Len, It's an honor to do this work with you.
It's hard and holy work, but it's worth it, man,
it is worth it. I'm easy to find online doctor
Lee Warren dot com as my website, my books, podcast, newsletters,
all that stuff is there all the time. And I
would just encourage people to do this work like it
is really worth it to change your mind and change
your life, your brain will support you. It's just waiting
for better instructions.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
Absolutely, it's waiting for that decision. And honestly, it's I
believe it's harder not to do this work, you know,
it's harder to sit in the pain of not knowing
who we really are and living with the version of
ourselves that's out of alignment with who God designed us
to be, and witnessing that's where that's where the shame lives,
you know, knowing I'm designed for so much more, I'm
witnessing myself show up as this version of myself, but
I know this is who I am. That gap is
(26:10):
where the shame lives, and that's not a place to live.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
So thank you so much for being here.
Speaker 3 (26:15):
If you love this series, stay tuned because Doctor Warren
is going to be back with more spiritual brain surgery
content right here on What's God Got to Do with It?
But thank you for listening to this series, and we
will see you next time.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
Bye.
Speaker 3 (26:29):
We'll be back with more What's God Got to Do
with It? But in the meantime, I would definitely love
to hear from you, So just tell me where you
are in your story or maybe what questions you have like,
where do you feel you need clarity or support or
wisdom in your own journey? I definitely want to hear
from you, So head on over to What's God Got
(26:50):
to Do with It? Dot com and scroll down to
the form to share your thoughts, your questions, your feedback, and.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
You can do that instantly. So What's God Got to
Do with It? Dot com You'll find all the ways
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Speaker 3 (27:02):
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Speaker 2 (27:17):
Be sure to rate and review to show your support.
It really means so much. What's God Got to Do
With It?
Speaker 3 (27:24):
Is an iHeartRadio podcast on the Amy Brown Podcast Network.
It's written and hosted by me Leanne Ellington, executive produced
by Elizabeth Fozzio, post production and editing by Houston Tilley,
and original music written by Cheryl Stark and produced by
Adam Stark
If you want to go on a journey, if you're skeptical,
don't worry.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Now here to preach. I'm gonna keep it clean and
talk to me and recall where.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Faith needs fars nature and get in touch with your
creator with a bacon, love and je. She even speaks Hebrew.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
What's that Gonza?
Speaker 1 (00:31):
What's that? This well sabosation, hil talking transformation?
Speaker 3 (00:41):
What's that?
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Don sat.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
Hey, everyone, welcome back. It's Leanne here. We are here
with what's God got to do with it? We've got
the spiritual brain surgery here, live it over here on
the Godpod if you're just joining us. We are wrapping
up this series with doctor Lee Warren called why mental
health is geting worse even though we're trying harder, And
in the first episode we talked about the paradox how
(01:05):
it's being talked about.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
There's more resources, there's more.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Attention going to the mental health crisis, but there's worse outcomes,
and it's because there's a foundation problem. The mental health
culture nowadays is built on theory and it all sounds
great in theory, but it's not based on how the
brain actually works. There's the missing link. So definitely check
out episode one. Last week we talked about the observer
effect and how where you put your attention literally shapes
(01:31):
your reality.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
We got into the brain science.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Of it, and if you're constantly focusing on trauma or
your pain or the parts of you that are broken,
you're actually training your brain to keep running those patterns.
And it's not personal, it really is just the way
the brain works. And so today we're talking about the solution.
Hopefully you've been getting hope the whole way through, but
we want to give you hope and show you some
practical elements of what this process looks like. So here's
(01:57):
the question. What if you didn't have to just manage
and anxiety or manage or put a lid on your
trauma or your patterns for the rest.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
Of your life.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
What if you could actually repair the root problem and
move on. So that's really what self brain surgery is about.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
That's what Lee lives for.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
So and we've talked about the paradox, you know, we've
talked about how what you observe gets stronger in your brain,
you create.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
More of it. Let's talk about.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
What actually works. So what would you see if you
were to nutshell it? What is the shift that we
need to make.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
I think the biggest thing Leanne is you need to
be a surgeon operating on your brain all the time
instead of a victim of what your brain is doing.
And the way you look at that is, despite what
you may have been taught or what you may have heard,
your brain is basically running one play all the time
as it relates to your mind brain interface the things
you think and feel, and that play is your brain
(02:50):
is attempting to get your permission to automate things and
turn them into habits so that you don't have to
pay as much attention to them, so that things like
if you're driving to work right and you change jobs,
that first drive to work. For the first two or
three days, you have to think about the drive, all
the changes of your lanes and speed zones and school
zones and all that stuff. You have to think about
(03:11):
it both hands on the wheel, paying attention. But after
a few days you can get there and you've been
listening to the radio. They've been listening to Leanne on
the radio the whole time. You haven't thought about the
drive one time because your brain has automated everything that
you need to do for that drive safely so you
don't have to pay attention to it, so that you
can use your mind for something else. That's the play
that your brain is running, and that play is running
(03:33):
even as it relates to your mental health. And so
that means that over the course of your lifetime, before
somebody told you that you had a choice in this,
you made a lot of those automatic connections in your
brain that produce the way you think and feel. I
feel anxious, I feel nervous, I feel depressed, I feel scared,
I feel body image issues, whatever it is. Your brain
has automated that, and you don't have to think about
(03:54):
it to feel that. And so the solution then is
this sometimes long and definitely requiring effort and repetition process
of telling your brain a set of new things that
you wanted to automate. And the pivot for me is
stop thinking about what you feel and start thinking about
what you want to feel. And so I want to
(04:16):
be more calm and stressful situations. I want to have
a more positive image of my own self in my life.
I want to have a higher sense of performance or
whatever it is. Then you start repeating that to your
brain and I do it in the mornings, I have
a morning quiet time, so that what I want to
do with my day is I don't want to be
under pressure and stressed and then have automatic reactions pop
(04:40):
up that I give into. I want to be in
charge of those things. And so that means that looking
ahead to my day, Since your brain doesn't actually know
the difference between something you're just imagining and something that's
actually happening, you can leverage that to say, I'm going
to build a brain by sort of thinking about future
situations in this day. So let's say you have a
day coming up and you have a meeting at nine
(05:00):
o'clock with somebody that always pushes your buttons, and you
get triggered and you get mad, and you say something
you shouldn't say, you get called to HR. You know,
all the things happen, or you get stressed out and
you go to the kitchen and you eat twelve bags
of cheetohs or whatever it is when you're under stress.
Then you can say, Okay, I'm going to imagine that
meeting and I'm going to tell my brain that that
meeting is going to go a different way. And when
they say this thing, I'm going to say this thing instead,
(05:22):
I'm going to make a better response than I have
made the last time to get to a different outcome
than I normally get to. And if you imagine that
scenario playing out a few times, your brain will begin
to use Hebb's law to automate some of those connections,
and then when it actually comes to pass, you're more
likely to have the new response that you're trying to
(05:42):
automate rather than the default old one. And so you
can prove this to yourself by just doing it a
few times a day in simple situations, right like, Okay,
next time I go into the kitchen instead of doing this,
I want to do that, and think about it as
if you're doing it. Your brain will wire that, and
then when you get into the kitchen you'll have a
little flag that'll pop up and say, oh, I'm going
to do this this time instead of that, and you'll
(06:04):
have that nudge and you may not give into it,
because you may have that old automation that feels stronger,
or your motivation for whatever it is that you may
have chosen otherwise might feel more important at the time.
But if you keep practicing that, you're going to build
a brain that automates the new response that you want.
Your brain will listen to you, your brain will obey you,
because neuroplasticity doesn't care about whether it's been a long
(06:27):
standing thing or something new. It just wants to do
what your mind tells it to automate. And so knowing
that can strip the value piece out of it, the
judgment piece. You don't have to feel ashamed of how
it's been or anxious that it might not work for you.
It will work for you. You just have to persist.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
Yeah, absolutely, and yeah, we talked last week about the
difference between like focusing on the problems versus focusing on
the solution, and looking backwards versus looking forwards. You know
a lot of people are saying like, oh my gosh,
I wish I wasn't stressed, or I wish I wasn't
freaking out right now, or I wish I wasn't so anxious,
and that's so problem focused versus even just asking what
would give me peace of mind right now, that's right,
what would actually make me proud of myself right now?
(07:03):
And giving yourself a better question rather than continually telling
yourself what you think you already know. Because the brain
is literally asking do you want me to keep running
this pattern? And most people don't realize they're already saying
yes because they're just on autopilot.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
So we've got to give it something new.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
And this is that consent to automate sequence that you
talk about in your book, and how the brain is
asking for permission to automate something right, But can you
install a better automation essentially right? And here's what I
love about the brain. Yes, there's repetition, there's consistency. I
teach air, attention, intention, and repetition. But the brain can
(07:39):
rewire pretty quickly, or at least the rewiring process can start.
And I think a lot of people think, oh, I've
been this way forever. It's going to take me years
to override this. So can you talk to us a
little bit about the brain automation process, Like when you
interrupt the old pattern and you install a new one,
how quickly the structural changes can start. Now, there's a
(08:00):
difference between the beginning of the structural changes and then
having those become the new default. There's gonna take some time,
but I think people underestimate how quickly this process can start.
So can you just talk a little bit about that.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, so these structural elements in your brain called microtubules
that are kind of like the girders that you put
in axons through to connect one neuron to another neuron.
And then the place they actually connect is called a synapse, right,
that the place where the neurons make contact with one another.
And so when you want your brain to do something
that it hasn't been doing, then you need to create
(08:35):
some new synapses. And we know that the primary driver
of those new synaptic changes is thinking, that's what you're
thinking about. And now there's good evidence that microtubular rearrangement
starts within seconds to minutes of you thinking about one
thing and not another thing. So that means that literally,
in almost real time, your brain begins to organize to
(08:56):
prepare to lay down these new neuronal pathways within seconds
of thinking, Okay, I'm going to stop being so anxious
and start being more hopeful, right within seconds. The problem is,
is we talked about in the last episode, the longer
you have automated a particular behavior, the more robust those
old connections are. So you might make you know, ten
thousand new synapses over here, but you've got one hundred
(09:16):
million supporting the old automation, the old habit. That's this
been the way things have been, and so it's going
to take attention. Like you said, intention, you got to
keep it up and repetition. You have to do it
for a long time. And there's there's people that say
habits take twenty one to ninety days to form, right.
I don't know if there's real good evidence about either
side of that, but the best way to think about
(09:38):
it is we used to live in Wyoming, and in Wyoming,
there there's a place where the Oregon Trail used to
go through, and to this day you can go and
see the ruts in the ground where those wagons came through,
even though it's been one hundred years since there were
wagons there, but they were so frequently traveling across the
same ground that the ruts in the ground are so
(09:58):
compressed and compacted that they have it won't ever go away.
They're just like fossilized in the ground. And that's kind
of what synapses are in your brain, that no matter
how many new synapses you make, there may be some
persistent old synaptic pathways in there. And it's going to
take a long time to degrade the old automation until
the new one sort of takes precedence. And so that
(10:20):
means don't give up. Recognize the progress that you're making.
But when you slip in and have a day or
have a moment when the old thing kicks in, it's
not because everything went to pot and you just failed.
It's because those ruts in the ground are still there
in your brain. And so don't think that a temporary
slip back into the old pattern means that failure is
occurring or this process isn't going to work for me.
(10:42):
It's just that you have to spend a lot of
time to make the new process the default.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
It takes a while, sure, sure, And I mean what
we do know the research shows too, is that who
you're being when you're doing the doing makes a big difference.
Because if you are trying to instill a new habit
under force persian coercion, you hate it. You're looking at
your body like it's a burden. You're looking at this
like it's a chore. You're telling yourself that it's not
going to work again, those negative neuro associations, it is
(11:09):
literally keeping you from that long term storage part of
the brain, the basil ganglia, it never gets what it
needs to download it. And I'm totally oversimplifying this, right,
But when you are surrounding it with positive neuro associations,
when it's a place of choice not a place of force,
when you are actually enjoying the process of it. So
maybe it's in minimums not in maximums. You're playing the
consistency game, not the intensity game. You are doing things
(11:32):
that you actually enjoy alongside the thing that feels like
a chore. It is a completely a different experience in
your brain. And that is a big factor in how
long something takes to become your default, because when you
are in the opposite realm, when you're in the force persuasion, coercion,
you hate it.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
You don't believe it's going to work.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
Honestly, repetition might not even ever make it your default
because there's certain nuances, right, So we do want to
make sure that it's about like who we're being, not
just what we're doing. And then we're talking about behavior change.
One of the big questions I asked my clients before
they go to do the work that they do with me,
like it's like, are you ready to not just focus
on the doing and the behaviors and the actions and
(12:12):
ready be ready to become the version of yourself who
has those actions those behaviors. And that's where the belief
and self image comes into play too. So I think
we underestimate how much influence we have over are not
that we can just like play god with how our
brain and the timeline of how it's wired, but there's
elements that we can really influence based on how we
(12:32):
show up in the face of it.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
That's right. And you can leverage your reward system too, Like,
so if you have this sense that you're giving up
something that is a reward for you, then your dopamine
system is going to fly back. Like I said, no,
I want the reward, like I want the cupcake or
I want the cocaine or whatever. Like you have to
tell your brain that the reward you're seeking on the
(12:55):
back end of this change is the one that you
really want, like like, this new life is the thing
I want my neuroendocrine system aiming at. And I'm going
to convince myself that the work that I'm doing now
is the beginning of this new deliverable that my brain
is actually gonna want, that's going to produce a life
that I really want.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
Absolutely, And then if we take away our source of
dopamine and don't replace it with something, there's going to
be this gap as well, So we have to keep that.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
In mind as well.
Speaker 3 (13:22):
There's a lot of nuance to this, and that's why
you know, when when somebody is giving just hard and
fast advice of like, oh, just stop doing what you're
doing and start doing this, just stop eating cheeseburgers and
eating a salad, it's like, well, if you're taking away
all of my source of you know, positive connection or
I have this positive association or almost this drug like fix,
and I'm not replacing it with anything, it actually feels
more like punishment. Something in the brain is not going
(13:44):
to connect to that and you might be able to
do it for a short amount of time, but it's
not going to work forever. And that's where again we
have to keep coming back to the short term change
conversation is easy, Like anybody can do that, Like I
could tell you a thirty day you know, transformation and
you would it would work like gangbusters, right, But to
actually transform who you're being, not just right now, but
ten years from now, twenty years from now, a lifetime
(14:06):
from now, that is a completely different game. And this
is where we have to adhere to the laws of
how the breed works.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
I'm script.
Speaker 3 (14:23):
So we're not going to get on our soapbox for
a second. But I do want to talk about this, Okay,
this idea of renewing the mind and neuroplasticity and how
people are just like throwing around scripture with bright and science. Right,
talk to us about what Paul was really talking about
in Ephesians four when he said be renewed by the
spirit of your mind. Can you talk about what this
(14:44):
looks like in practicality, not just in kind of theory
and poetry.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Yeah, so you're talking about Ephesians four twenty three where
he says, I want you to be made new in
the attitude of your minds. Oh, but you need to
back up to seventeen in that same chapter to really
get the context. Paul's talking basically about the idea that
thoughts become things like thoughts become what's real in your life,
and he lists all these things. He calls the people gentiles,
and what he's talking about is not are you a
(15:10):
Jew or not a Jew? He's at that time, he
was really referring to are you do you know Jesus
or do you not know him? And if you don't
know him, he would call you a gentile. If you
do know him, he would call you saved, you're a
Christian or whatever. And what he says is the gentiles
are doing all these bad things in their life. He
lists off all these things, the adultery and drunkenness and
all this stuff, and gladdening and all these things. But
(15:30):
then he says in four to seventeen, he says, I
don't want you to be like that. They're lost in
the futility of their thinking. And so it's the behaviors
back up to the thought processes. Right. So what he's
saying is when by the time he gets down to
four twenty three and he says, not you, you'd be made
new in the attitude of your minds. He's contrasting the
things that you think about and the things that you
(15:52):
ponder and what you dwell on, because that's what builds
the brain that's going to support the life that you
want or continue the life that you don't one. And
so the real answer to the question is hey being
made new in the attitude of your mind being renewed,
as Romans twelve two calls it is. Is not about neuroplasticity.
That's a brain process. That's a brain process. It's about
submitting your will to the will of the Creator, the
(16:16):
Holy Spirit, the great physician who's there with you. In one,
Corinthians two sixteen says you have an advantage over everybody else.
You have the mind of Christ. Like you literally have
God in your head giving you advice and guiding you.
He won't do the work for you, so it's it's
self help, but it's not a self reliance. He's there
with you to help you. But you've got to pick
up the knife and it's going to operate this system
(16:37):
and run the place the way he's designing you to
be able to do it. But all of it starts
with submitting your thoughts and getting them right first. And
so when we talked about reward well ago for example,
like it's just as important to celebrate a well played
day than it is to celebrate a night of not
having alcohol or twinkies or whatever. Like, like you need
(16:59):
to get to the next and say, you know what,
I don't have brain fog today, I'm not hungover. I
don't have, you know, crumbs in my bed because I
ate a large Domino's pizza in my bed before I
fell asleep, and I feel better, and so celebrate that,
because then your reward system will recalibrate and say, wait,
I feel this reward today and my body feels good,
and I'm proud of myself, rather than the little bit
(17:20):
of reward I might have gotten last night by saying, gosh,
I knuckled through the night. I didn't have alcohol tonight,
or I made it through, you know. And so now
you're rewarding yourself on the back end for the result
and not the willpower of sort of dredging yourself through
some scenario. Right. But all of that happens because you
change how you think about it, Like it's not it's
(17:42):
not I want to stop doing this thing tonight, it's
I want to start being alive tomorrow. I want to
start being proud of myself. I want to I want
my kids to see me modeling this so that they
don't have to grow up in this house like I did,
thinking that this was inevitable because my dad did it too.
Like it changed the reward pathway and you're come alive.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Yeah, Paul wasn't saying manage your old self forever. He
was saying, put on the new self, which is an
actual identity level transformation. And this is what the consent
to automate sequence that we were talking about even makes possible,
because it's not just about behavior modification or positive thinking.
It's an actual identity shift where you are becoming a
new creation, not just intellectually but at the subconscious level
(18:23):
where your brain is actually automating new patterns. And you
mentioned this idea of being proud of yourself or celebrating
yourself the next day, and one of the things that
I hear all the time from women is but does
that mean that I'm self righteous? Or does that mean
that I'm being you know, cocky or braggadocius. And it's like, no,
it's about receiving the amazingness of the brain that God created, right,
(18:45):
But you also can celebrate that you use your free
will to go override something that you used to do
all the time and then give the glory to God.
But that's where the receivership piece of your transformation comes in,
where it becomes a co creation with God. Rather than
just waiting for God to do it for you or
feeling like you are just you know, weak to your
sins and you can't ever overcome it. Right, there's there's
(19:07):
somewhere in between, and that's where, again, I believe, is
a piece of the puzzle of reshaping our relationship with reality,
because that's not reality to me either of just like
thinking that God is just going to do it for me,
but then also thinking I'm a jerk if I'm celebrating
that I just did something amazing using the brain that
God gave me. This is where we need a paradigm shift,
you know, so super super powerful. Let's get practical for
(19:29):
a second. So if somebody's listening and they're like, Okay,
I get it. I want to stop managing, I want
to start repairing. Where would you say that they.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Start I start. I'm going to just say they should
read your book. That's what they they should start. But
where would you say they'd start.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
Well, not to be self referential, but I mean, all
these ideas are in there, and like I give you
these tools. Yeah, for me, it always starts in the mornings.
I think I said earlier, maybe in our previous episode,
like like I have to set my intention for the day,
because you're going to get into a scenario during the
day that can to you by surprise, like something's going
to trigger you or make you want to pull the trigger.
(20:05):
Something's going to just sort of surprise you, and you're
going to be in a reactive posture if you're not
aware that that thing, if you do not have thought
ahead of time that that thing might happen. So what
I mean by that is if you spend time in
the morning leveraging that idea that your brain doesn't know
the difference between reality and what you're just pondering, then
you can run what the business people call a pre
mortem analysis. Right. The business people say, Okay, if I
(20:27):
get to the end of this day and this meeting
failed or this company went bankrupt or whatever happened, what
would the steps have been that made that failure happen?
And then how can I engineer around those so that
I have a better outcome. In medicine, we would call
that an autopsy, but they're doing it at the start
of the transaction instead of after the patient already died. Right.
They're looking at the system from the start. And that's
(20:48):
what I try to do in the morning. So if
you want something really practical, like wake up a little
bit earlier than you have to get yourself in a
calm vegas nerve activated state. So do some breathing, do
some meditating. I spend time in the Word of God
every morning. It's with some worship music, just to try
to get my nervous system in that right hemisphere activated
state where everything's sort of a big picture and not
(21:09):
such a fact oriented thing like we spend our whole
day being in. And I try to get myself in
a mode of thinking ahead to the day I'm about
to encounter, and what are the places where I tend
to default to old patterns that I want to change
or I'm trying to change. And then when I see
myself in that place, in that scenario where I tend
to default, then I imagine myself taking a different action
(21:32):
than I have in the past when it failed for
me or when I didn't do the thing I really
wanted to do. And so then I tell my brain, Okay,
here's what you're going to do. I try to wire
in the new default behavior as opposed to the old one,
knowing that it takes repetition and attention and attention and
a lot of time to get that to be your
actual default. I try to leverage it by just running
(21:54):
the play enough times that at least three hours from now,
it might be a little bit more likely that my
brain will remind me that I had set an intention
to follow through with a new behavior. And so I
think if you practice that, it will build confidence that
the system really does work for you, and it'll start
producing some yield that you can measure and see. And
then when you start doing those post mortem analysis at
(22:15):
the end of the day, which is also important, like
look back and say, how did this day go? Did
I actually carry out the things I intended to do?
You'll start having some wins that you can put on
the board. And that celebration piece that you said, while
I go like, it's not bragging, when Paul said I rejoice,
I will boast in the Lord, right, So you can boast,
you can be proud, You can brag almost on how
(22:35):
well God designed your nervous system and how reliable it
is when you put it in the right state, and
how awesome it is that your brain will actually wire
in response to your mental commands in ways that help
you and don't hurt you, and that gives you incredible
hope because now you have some power. All this time
you thought you're a victim, and now you know you
(22:55):
have some agency and some opportunity and some power and
some choice and how things actually turn out. I think
that's that's pretty helpful.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
Absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:04):
And I think it also adds the question of doing
a little internal audit and saying, like, where are my
first fruits going in the day, Like am I just
immediately getting on and scrolling on social media? Or like
all of this stuff that we've been talking about on
this series. It's great in theory, but if we're treating
this like the crumbs that we give ourselves at night,
rather than like really making a radical commitment to rewiring
(23:26):
your brain and transforming your life, because it really is
a radical commitment, like it is about drawing that line
in the sand and saying, no, I'm done recycling the
same pain. This ends now, and it doesn't have to
be a deep, dark rock bottom, but you do have
to get to that place where you're like, no, I'm
no longer willing to live like this, and I am
ready to do the work because it is work. And
there is a massive difference between deciding to change a behavior.
(23:48):
There's a massive difference between making a decision to lose weight,
making a decision to stop drinking, making a decision to
stop doing X, Y and Z and start doing X,
Y or Z, versus deciding to heal the real problem
in your brain deciding to create the transformation in your head,
your heart, your mind, your brain, your spirit, very different conversations.
But if you don't have the mental bandwidth because you
(24:10):
are first thing, scrolling whatever, right, and you haven't truly
committed to this being totally transparent everything that we say
that we're saying in this series, honestly, it's not that
it won't matter, but it won't make a difference. And
that's where I'm imploring all of you to take your
desires for transformation seriously because God can't override your free will.
(24:31):
You know, he loves us too much. Not too is
what I say about it. You know so beautiful. No,
this is such a powerful conversation I and again it's
a hope giving one right. So that is where we
get solution focus, where we stop managing, we start repairing
and learn to spot those moments in your brain that
are asking.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
For your permission.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
You might not know it right, and for you to
give the ability to say, hey, no, we're not doing
that anymore. This is the direction that we're going. And
that takes commitment, it takes repetition, it takes it takes work, right,
But this is I believe our responsibility and the opportunity
and as you say, becoming the surgeon of your own
mind and that way where that's we're truly healing the
(25:13):
problem and moving on with our lives because nobody wants
to stay stuck in the problem. That's why we're all here,
that's right. So yeah, Lee, this has been incredible. Thank
you so much for being here, for bringing spiritual brain
surgery to what's God got to do with it?
Speaker 2 (25:26):
Again, tell people where they can find.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
You, Len, It's an honor to do this work with you.
It's hard and holy work, but it's worth it, man,
it is worth it. I'm easy to find online doctor
Lee Warren dot com as my website, my books, podcast, newsletters,
all that stuff is there all the time. And I
would just encourage people to do this work like it
is really worth it to change your mind and change
your life, your brain will support you. It's just waiting
for better instructions.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
Absolutely, it's waiting for that decision. And honestly, it's I
believe it's harder not to do this work, you know,
it's harder to sit in the pain of not knowing
who we really are and living with the version of
ourselves that's out of alignment with who God designed us
to be, and witnessing that's where that's where the shame lives,
you know, knowing I'm designed for so much more, I'm
witnessing myself show up as this version of myself, but
I know this is who I am. That gap is
(26:10):
where the shame lives, and that's not a place to live.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
So thank you so much for being here.
Speaker 3 (26:15):
If you love this series, stay tuned because Doctor Warren
is going to be back with more spiritual brain surgery
content right here on What's God Got to Do with It?
But thank you for listening to this series, and we
will see you next time.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
Bye.
Speaker 3 (26:29):
We'll be back with more What's God Got to Do
with It? But in the meantime, I would definitely love
to hear from you, So just tell me where you
are in your story or maybe what questions you have like,
where do you feel you need clarity or support or
wisdom in your own journey? I definitely want to hear
from you, So head on over to What's God Got
(26:50):
to Do with It? Dot com and scroll down to
the form to share your thoughts, your questions, your feedback, and.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
You can do that instantly. So What's God Got to
Do with It? Dot com You'll find all the ways
to do that.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
And if you like this podcast and want to hear more,
go ahead and follow, like, and subscribe wherever you listen
to podcasts to get your weekly dose of.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
What's God Got to Do with It?
Speaker 3 (27:12):
New episodes drop every single Tuesday, and while you're there.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Be sure to rate and review to show your support.
It really means so much. What's God Got to Do
With It?
Speaker 3 (27:24):
Is an iHeartRadio podcast on the Amy Brown Podcast Network.
It's written and hosted by me Leanne Ellington, executive produced
by Elizabeth Fozzio, post production and editing by Houston Tilley,
and original music written by Cheryl Stark and produced by
Adam Stark
Feeling Things with Amy & Kat News
Host
Amy Brown
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