Change Your Brain Every Day - Change Your Brain, Change Your Grades with Chloe Amen

Episode Date: August 1, 2019

The surprising #1 fear for most Americans isn’t heights, spiders, or clowns, but speaking in public. Many tense up in fear just thinking about getting up in front of the class or workplace to give a presentation. So how can you stay cool, calm, and collected when your name gets called? In this episode of The Brain Warrior’s Way Podcast, Dr. Daniel Amen, Tana Amen, and their daughter Chloe give you practical tips to keep your head and face those fears.

Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. In our podcast, we provide you with the tools you need to become a warrior for the health of your brain and body. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we have been transforming lives for 30 years using tools like brain spec imaging to personalize treatment to your brain. For more information, visit amenclinics.com. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is also brought to you by BrainMD, where we produce the highest quality nutraceuticals to support the health of your brain and body. To learn more, go to brainmd.com. Welcome back. We're on day four talking about change your brain, change your grades. And so happy we've got Chloe here. We're having a great time.

And as one of the contributors, she's here talking about it with us and we're having a wonderful time. Please leave us questions or comments. You can tag Tana Amon, like at Tana Amon for Instagram, at Daniel Amon. You can go to thebrainwarriorswaypodcast.com. We're also going to be doing a book giveaway. So stick with us. We'll tell you how to get that book at the end. So what are we talking about today with change your brain, change your grades? I'm going to talk about giving presentations in class or at work. And it's the number one fear in America is speaking in public because people think they're being judged. And I guess in a way they are being judged. You're being graded.

And so they're anxious and worried about it. What other people think of them? Has this ever been an issue for you, Chloe? Okay. You know what? I have to be honest with this one. I definitely had my things in school that were big challenges for me,

but I really like to talk. Really? And I like to talk in front of big groups of people and I like to be the center of attention. So I mean, honesty is key, right? You're in the right family. So this one, I would get nervous before certain presentations, but I, that this was never my, um, never a big weakness for me, but I definitely have great tips. Um tips because I've had to learn how to give different types of presentations. Well, you've sang at church and-

And I'm in acting now, so I audition in front of casting directors all the time. You were in my last public television special in front of millions of people who watch that. And I still remember your very first presentation and you knocked it out of the park. I mean, talk about being judged, walking into an audition room with a bunch of casting directors just looking at you. And they're literally judging you. They're literally, yeah, judging you.

So what are the tips? Okay, so let me think of a few really good ones. The one for me that's really key, and this might sound like kind of a broad statement, but I mean, every person has a different way that they do it. It was honestly just minimizing in your head, minimizing the entire thing in your head because we make it into this big thing.

We brew on it before we go to present or to talk to someone, to get up in front of someone and talk. We go over it and over it and over it in our head. We think about every possible thing that could go wrong, and it ends up becoming this really big thing. For me, because I do have anxiety and I do overthink things, it was honestly just the time that I would take before to brew on it and to make it bigger, take that same amount of time to do the opposite.

Take that same amount of time to do the opposite. Take that same amount of time to intentionally shrink it down, make it smaller, not less important, but make it just the entire ordeal smaller in my head. So it's, it's almost like it's, it's so simple, but it's like, it's just a presentation. They're just people. They're, you know, like they're my friends. I'm like, it's like, and it's just that, that language that you tell yourself. So the thoughts you tell yourself matter. Right. Yeah.

So what you're saying is exactly what I did for my black belt test. Like you said, this isn't just for, this is not just for grades, right? Or just for school. So when I was taking my black belt test and I was really, really nervous about it because I was testing with, at a school where it's really high level people. And I had built in my head, I didn't realize it, but I built in my head this, this idea of these big monster guys and a couple of more world champion, you know, karate tournament fighters. And I'm like, so I was really scared of it. And I went to my middle-aged mom, middle-aged mom. Right, middle-aged mom. So I was telling myself, a middle-aged mom, these guys are big. You were not just telling yourself, you were telling me.

Everybody, right. So, but I have an NLP coach I go to and what you're talking about is a perfect NLP tip, right? So neurolinguistic programming. And that was the first thing he said, he goes, I'd be scared too. So that's exactly what we did. We shrunk, what I did is I shrunk all the big monsters, these guys, these dudes that were world champions is I shrunk all the big monsters, these guys, these dudes that were world champions. I shrunk them down to be normal size, to be the same size I was. I made myself a little bit bigger. I turned them black and white, made myself color. I made their voices sound like Mickey mouse and then I put them in boxers. So envisioning, envisioning it in your head, planning it through in your head is another,

another thing that I do for sure. Um, but it's just so much for me is just about like the language that I tell myself. It's just presentation. And I also, it's just like, if something was to go wrong, because a lot of times when people do, and maybe this works for some people, but it just did not work for me is, is ignoring the fact that something could go wrong. So it's always like, no, it's going to be okay. Everything's going to go right. And you tell yourself this to make yourself less nervous. But that's not realistic. And when something does go slightly wrong, then you're like,

this isn't according to plan. And my head just shuts down. But I told myself nothing was going to go wrong. And now something's going wrong. What do I do? And I'm having this panic attack. Instead of what if something goes wrong, what do I do? And if I went, okay, so if that did happen, my worst fear, that thing that I'm thinking about,

if that did happen, rather than putting it in the back of my head, if I bring it forward and acknowledge it, so if that were to happen, what would those people that I'm so afraid of, what would they do? They're probably not going to sit there afterwards and go, that was really terrible. Like I've never seen anything that bad. They're going to go to Starbucks, they're going to get their latte, and they're going to go on with their life. And I know that because that's what I would do.

Brain warriors don't go to Starbucks and get their latte. I'm sorry. Just saying. She gets an almond milk. I get an unsweetened almond milk latte. But the brain warrior is listening. So the thing I'm hearing, though, is that you prepare. So to deal with presentation anxiety, you are prepared.

And you work hard. Preparation decreases anxiety. The other thing is don't leave because I've seen this happen that people get anxious and they don't show up. Because when you don't show up or you leave a situation, the situation now has you by the throat and will choke the life out of you, will control you. That's how this psychiatric disorder called agoraphobia, which literally it's Greek, means fear of the marketplace. I've treated people, I've not left

their home for 20 years because they were afraid they would go out and have a panic attack. And it's because initially they were worried about something. It caused them not to go to the store, not to go to the mall, not to go to their friend's house. And it started controlling them. The other thing that's so important is controlling your breath. And because that's something you can control, but when you get anxious almost immediately, your breathing starts to become faster, less efficient, which means you get less oxygen to your brain. And when your brain gets less oxygen, it panics. Because if the brain is deprived of oxygen, for just a few minutes, it'll actually start killing cells. And so it freaks out. And so the magic number is take three seconds to breathe in, hold it just for a second, and then take six to breathe out.

And if you do that 10 times, your anxiety will be less. It drops your adrenaline. Along with getting your mindset right. Yeah. So important. That's the part that I heard that I really want to touch on because what you said is so important. What you were talking about is you really make a point not to take what other people say personally and realize that they're probably not saying all that much.

And I love Byron Katie's saying, what people say about me is none of my business. But the truth is you're saying, what do you say the 80-40-60 rule is really important too? Well, this is the 80-40-60 rule, which just saved my life. It says when you're 18, you worry about what everybody's thinking of you. And when you're 40, you don't give a damn what anybody thinks about you. And when you're 60, you realize nobody's been thinking about you at all.

But fortunately, you figured it out at 15, right? Well, gosh, especially 15-year-olds. No one's thinking about you. They're all thinking about themselves. They're thinking about the selfie they just posted. Like, it's not. No, yeah. I couldn't agree with that more.

That's hilarious. Yeah. So, A student, hard worker. You know, obviously your mom and dad are super proud of you. Some other tips as we close this last podcast, change your brain, change your grades. When you were reading the book, anything you went, oh, well, that's cool, I'm going to do that.

Or the things you added. There are all these tips by Chloe and Alizé that really added great great fun but also practical tips of living in a world that has instagram and facebook and constant interruption right um so i could add something about that about time management for sure because that is one thing that i've had to learn because i'm involved in so much that sometimes I can get scattered and when I need to get something done it's important to learn time management um and some little things that I do for myself I guess now that I'm like talking about it I'm realizing that a lot of how I I regulate myself is just by asking myself questions and

changing like little things my mind like just the language I use with myself. But for time management, it's just write yourself what I did. I actually did this the other day. Write yourself a little note card, like, you know, like one of the little study cards. And three, give yourself three little tactics, just three, because if you overload yourself, you'll never remember them. Three things that you are going to either ask yourself that you're going to do or, yeah, so ask yourself that you're going to do or you're going to think in your head to keep yourself on track. And every time you start to feel yourself going off track, stop and go through those three things that are on that note card. And by the end of it, by the end of those three things, usually you realize

you might not want to get back on track, you might not want to focus, but you have a harder time getting sidetracked. Because I think what really gets us sidetracked now is it's instant gratification, right? So we're studying, we get bored, we pick up our phones, but we do it so instinctively. It's not even that it's like, oh, I don't want to do this anymore. I should probably pick up my phone. We don't even have that much time in between. We just instinctively go on Instagram. But if you stop for that one second and some of the ones that are okay. so like my little note card for time management. I wrote one of my questions to myself and it's kind of random, but it's, am I confident about this? Am I confident about the fact that I'm picking up my phone and going on Instagram when I know I should be studying for a test? Usually the answer is no, actually

answer them. One of the other ones, I think the second one is what is going to matter most later? The fact that I studied for this test or the fact that I went on Instagram. Am I going to regret it later that I did this? So what actually, and actually answer it, which one is going to matter most later? And then the third one is, oh, it's just, and then a blank. That's a big one for me with almost everything. It's just Instagram or it's just an hour. If I plan to study for an hour, it's just an hour. And then I can go on Instagram. So fill

in that blank. And usually it, it really changes it around. And when I'm trying to eat healthy, that's a big one too. Um, this is like kind of getting off track, but it's very important when I'm trying to eat healthy and I come downstairs and, or I'm out and it's like, I walk by ice cream or something and it's like, I really want it. I really want it. Usually instinctively we do the same thing. If we don't stop and think about it, we'll just do it. And then we will get it later. If you stop and take that one second and you have a note card and you go through your three things, um, usually it works works but what i do is like it's just ice cream it's just pizza and then it's like what's gonna matter most later you know that's a great use of language

and another three words that i use all the time i use i use it with patients this morning does it fit if i do this does it fit with the goals i have the goals i have to be healthy the goals i have to be smart the goals i have to keep my brain intact does it fit you know what it works the other way with motivation too nike said it best just do it so if i'm like if i'm you know playing or if i'm at dance or i'm in an audition it's's like, it's just an audition or it's just like five minutes. And it's like my performance actually increases because like, just do it.

What do you have to lose, right? Go for it. And if we look at your ability to perform two years ago versus now, it's like- And it's so much. And people actually don't know that Chloe is the face for unicorn slime. You just had to do it.

Her videos have like 26 million views. Poopsie. The ambassador of poopsies. It's way more than that now. You're looking at the face. It's fun. Well, you have been such a joy. Thank you for having me. Actually, for your whole life, you've been a joy. We're grateful that you helped with Change Your

Brain, Change Your Grades. Coming up, you're going to meet our niece, Alize. She is awesome as well. If you want Change Your Brain, Change Your Gr, signed by all three of us, go to brainwarriorswaypodcast.com. Leave us a comment, a question, a review. And in the subject line, put Change Your Brain, Change Your Grade, raffle, and we'll enter you into a drawing. Take care. If you're enjoying the Brain Warriors Way podcast, please don't forget to subscribe so you'll always know when there's a new episode. And while you're at it,

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