Change Your Brain Every Day - How Your Relationships Deeply Affect Happiness

Episode Date: May 20, 2021

Dr Daniel Amen and Tana Amen reveal tips on how they have maintained their loving relationship and offer knowledge on how to grow closer in a crisis, instead of drift apart.

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 are on our happiness challenge. So this is our fourth episode this week on the happiness challenge. And we've talked about ADD and all sorts of things that can interfere childhood trauma and how that interferes with your happiness. so all of these great tips on what to do well this week's really about noticing what you like about other people and those are things that can interfere with that childhood trauma about me so many things i like that you actually um ground me so i because of a lot of the way that my life was, I can tend to notice what's wrong. I'm the intense one in our relationship. You are so soothing. So grounding. Um, you're

the end to my Yang for sure. But when you're with me, I feel like everything's going to be okay. I just know it's going to be fine. And that makes me happy. And when we're together, I just, I feel calm and I just, I love the time we spend together. And you notice what's good about me. And you notice what's what's right around us. I mean, I, I joke that it's like you're like annoyingly Pollyanna. But, but actually, I really appreciate it. Someone with your brand, I would be annoyingly Pollyanna. But no, I really do appreciate it. Oh, God, no, I would never be married to someone like me. No, that would be annoyed. Annoyingly, Pollyanna. But no, I really do appreciate it. What would happen if you were married to someone like you? Oh, God. No, I would never be married to someone like me.

No, that would be a disaster. We would probably kill each other. Because I'm very intense. I'm very aware of the things wrong around me. Very much in survival mode. I mean, I was ready for the pandemic. I have a survival room. So no, that wouldn't work out well.

No, because you're very calming you're very balancing i thought you were going to say well i really like you make my cappuccino oh no i love all that it is shake for me that's true and you're gonna make my hot chocolate tonight like all of that is really good too that's all a bonus no we're really we're a very good fit. So what do I like about you? So many things. I love your beautiful brown eyes. I love how we always sort of connect by touch. And, you know, even after 15 years, we hold hands and we look in each other's eyes. And we have a lot of tender moments.

And we don't attach to things that might irritate us. It doesn't go over and over and over again. Thank you. Yeah, we can let things go. Java calming. Or happy saffron. And during the pandemic, initially you were more freaked out than I was, but rather than argue with you about you shouldn't feel this way. I went and found how to get a big freezer. You supported me.

When you bought a freezer, I just felt so supported. I was like, oh, wow, he's with me in this. I got this big freezer and I just suddenly felt like you understood me. Whether you did or not is not the point. Well, people during the pandemic have had mismatched anxiety we've talked about that a couple of times and and there have been times in the pandemic i was more anxious than she was yeah you're more anxious about the actual virus i wasn't as anxious about the virus and you were more anxious about you know the vaccine and things like that but i supported you through that

with the you know even though i don't feel the same way about all of that it's like okay i love you and i'm going to support you about that because your dad died so and so if you have mismatched anxiety if you can calm the person with high anxiety by doing the right things by doing things to soothe them um just help your relationships and you can grow closer during the time of crisis the chinese symbol for crisis is actually a combination of two symbols it's danger and opportunity so what is the opportunity that you found and so so many families, I think like ours got closer. Yeah. And one thing that I, that I, especially during the pandemic, but one thing that I noticed and I, and I do this, I've had to train myself to do this and I'm intentionally done this. Um, sort of like we did with, through the pandemic with our mismatched anxiety about different,

we were anxious about different things. Um, but I do it with my daughter at different times. But I do it with my daughter when I start to find myself either getting irritated or thinking that's silly or whatever it is, you know, that I don't agree with. I step back and I just say to myself, what's more important. And for us, it's like between us, it's very clear to me. There's very little in life that is more important than our relationship. So whether it is, you know, whatever it is, I don't care what it is. There's very little in life that is more important than our relationship. So whether it is, you know, whatever it is, I don't care what it is. There's nothing politically or a vaccine or whatever that is more important to me than keeping our relationship solid and making us feel secure. So that's, for me, that's when I know I need to drop it. It's like, this isn't worth it.

Or with my daughter, she might be irritating me with something, but it's like, what's more important, the relationship or winning this argument? It's not worth it, the battle or the war. Yeah. I also love that about you. You don't have to be right. I mean, you'll frequently tell me when I'm right. I told you so. It's one of the things I don't like. But staying with what we like. And I want you to do this exercise with someone in your life. Stay away from those things you don't like. Focus on what you do like. And that's, you'll get more of what you pay attention to you'll get more of what you pay attention to with your children with your spouse with your co-workers if you're a boss at

work with your employees um and i have a really good executive team at Amen Clinics and BrainMD. They're actually really good about noticing what they like, but can also speak the truth about things that may be problematic. That's what we want for you. It's a big secret to happiness, which is why we spent a whole week on it. But that's your exercise. Write it down. Notice what you like more than what you don't like. Take a picture of it. Post it on any of your social media sites, hashtag Brain Warriors Way podcast. Also, leave us a comment, question, or review. And if we read it on the air, then we'll enter you into a drawing to win either one of Tana's new books, The Relentless Courage of a Scared Child, or your brain is always listening. Stay with us.

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