Change Your Brain Every Day - Tiny Habits To Do Everyday To Influence Your Mood

Episode Date: November 1, 2018

Studies have shown that where we bring our attention has a huge impact on how we feel, so it should come as no surprise that people who focus on the positive aspects of their lives tend to be happier people. But of course, it isn’t easy. In this episode of The Brain Warrior’s Way Podcast, Dr. Daniel Amen and Tana Amen teach you some simple tiny habits you can use to train your brain to gravitate towards positive thoughts to feel happier.

Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. Here we teach you how to win the fight for your brain to defeat anxiety, depression, memory loss, ADHD, and addictions. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we've transformed lives for three decades using brain spec imaging to better target treatment and natural ways to heal the 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 nutraceutical products to support the health of your brain and body. For more information, visit brainmdhealth.com. Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Welcome back. We are still in our Feel Better Fast series, and this is the last podcast on Rational Mind. And as we get started, I want to just read one more review because that's one of my favorite things to do. So please keep them coming. So this one's from El Coco One.

This podcast is informative, inspiring, motivating, and essential to everything that has to do with your physical, mental, and spiritual life. A well-rounded podcast from the experts themselves. You can't go wrong. Just received my healing ADD book and excited to read it. My family has a history of cancer, diabetes, substance abuse, heart disease, obesity, including a brother diagnosed with schizophrenia. Sounds a lot like my family. It's been a relief to be able to have a place where I can make sense of it all and try my best to help my family. Being born and raised in Hawaii and being Hawaiian myself

and having to deal with these challenges has been very difficult for me. I actually find a lot of solace in this podcast knowing that I am in control of my own destiny. Mahalo nu. Thank you so much. I lived in Hawaii for two years. I love Hawaii. Yeah, it's one of the few places I think I could move. So we're going to finish up rational mind and we're going to do it with tiny habits. One of the unique things about Feel Better Fast is there are over 50 tiny habits. What are the smallest things you can do today that will make the biggest difference? And once you do them, you have to actually celebrate because the celebration produces a little bit of dopamine that makes you feel happy. And we talked about whenever you feel sad, mad, nervous, or out of control, write down what you're

thinking. Yeah. And then take them through the questions. Is it true? Can I absolutely know it's true? How do I feel? When I believe the thought? Who would I be without the thought? And then turn the original thought that tortures you around to the opposite. That's my favorite part. Because the opposite of the thought that's torturing me, Tana never listens to me. The opposite, Tana does listen to me, is true. So I'm actually torturing myself with a lie. And if I believe the lie, she never listens to me. I now give myself permission to be rude to her, which means

she's not going to listen to me. She's going to be furious with me. So it's often our negative thoughts that drive our negative behavior that changes the behavior of our partner in a negative way so I want you thinking accurately honestly I don't want you lying to yourself either in a good way or a bad way and I want to add something about the celebration we do this so as a family even the smallest things it's really fun so when something good happens for one of us it could be something that most people might not even really pay attention to, which is a mistake, I think. I mean, it's not for me to judge you on that, but it's a really good thing as a family because it helps you bond as a family. So when something good happens to one of

us, we celebrate, but we don't go celebrate by getting drunk. We don't go celebrate by smoking pot or going and eating a massive chocolate cake. We don't celebrate that way. We go out, we have a healthy dinner together, but for us it's more about the community. We go for a walk, we laugh and talk about it together. We just try to connect. For us, celebrating is about connecting

and just really thinking about the good thing that happened and paying attention to it and acknowledging it. And it's just our way of bonding and paying attention. So some other tiny habits that I talk about in the book is start every day with today is going to be a great day. Now, why would you want to do that? Because your unconscious mind will then find why it's going to be a great day. Do you know that most people actually wake up with negativity?

Because when you first wake up, your brain is sleepy. It actually has less blood flow when you first wake up in the morning and so people will often wake up sometimes in the middle of the night like you said before and they'll just start worrying about all the bad things i wake up with you petting me like a dog because i love you i feel like aslan our dog and so if you go today is going to be a great day then you'll cuddle me back makes me super happy but on the top so I have a to-do list and it's 11 pages long of stuff I'm doing but right at the top of my to-do list is today is going to be a great day. Because if I do that, then my mind will find why it is going to be a great day. You have to come up with a line or something that you say

or some line of gratitude that you wake up to that becomes a habit. No, I want them to do this one. Okay. I want them to do this one because it's purposeful. Today is going to be a great day. And my patients who do this, they notice it makes a significant positive difference for them. And the bookend to today is going to be a great day is at the end of the day. And often it's great to do this at dinner with your family, is what went well today. Notice it. And if you talk about today is going to be a great day at breakfast

and what went well today at dinner, you're beginning to actually flood your family with positive psychology techniques. And that's part of our celebration is like, oh, something cool happens. Okay, so my daughter gets accepted into the mayor's youth council or whatever it is, something that happened. And we'll sit and we celebrate and it's like,

well, what do you think made the difference? Like we'll notice the good things. Does that make sense? And so it's just a good thing to do. Right. And you want to hear about the hard things that happened that day, but you want to also balance them with what went well today. Along that line, try to get into the habit of writing down three things you're grateful

for every day. Research has shown that that increases happiness, self-esteem, self-control, longevity, and improves your relationships. When Tana and I focus on the gratitude we have for each other, our relationship is so much better than if we nitpick each other on the things that we don't like. Where you bring your attention determines how you feel. And the truth is, is there's so many more things to be grateful for if you just actually are present and think about it. There are so many more things to be grateful for. You know, even if they're small small just focus on those small things and i torture my family with the movie okay i'm not sure that's one of the things to be grateful for but i mean it started

out being one of the things but now i think i'm past it. No. This is worth thousands of dollars in therapy. So whenever one of my grandchildren becomes horrified. But we have a lot of grandchildren and a lot of nieces and a lot of nephews. You don't understand. It's just. No, I'm not kidding. I want you to watch the Disney movie Pollyanna. And it horrifies me.

It just shows how old I am. Because I first watched it when I was six years old. It came out in 1960. And I just loved it. And yes, I loved Hayley Mills. She's so cute. But there's a very important psychological principle that she teaches people in the movie. So Pollyanna was a missionary's kid.

Right. And her parents died, and she had to go live with her Aunt Polly, who's played by Jane Wyman. And you understand why Ronald Reagan actually divorced Jane Wyman. Stop it. Because she so clearly played the witch. You know, she's not a happy person. But Pollyanna just has this great attitude.

And what she teaches people to play is a game that her dad taught her. So when Pollyanna was a missionary's kid, she wanted a doll. And so her parents wrote to the missionary council andanna was a missionary's kid she wanted a doll and so her parents wrote to the missionary council and there was a mix-up and they actually sent her a pair of crutches and pollyanna was crushed and she was really sad and her dad taught her to play the glad game whatever situation you're in what is there to be glad about in this situation?

And initially, Pollyanna said nothing. And her dad said, come on, you're a smart kid. What is there to be glad about these crutches? And she said, well, at least I don't have to wear them. And the movie really centers around the glad game. And she transforms a community. An entire town, yeah. And recently I was on a flight

and the flight was delayed and it messed up the trip. And I'm like, so what is there to be GLAAD about in having a delayed flight? And I'm like, well, they didn't take off with a damaged plane.

That would have caused my death. I can be GLAAD about that. I can be GLAAD about that my death. I can be glad about that. I can be glad about that. You can be glad about that. Two, whatever situation you're in, what is there to be glad about in this situation? I want you to start keeping a journal. Journaling is so important.

When I did the research on Feel Better Fast, which is, you know, what are the short-term, what are the effective short-term kinds of psychotherapies that work, journaling was all over that. Yeah, this is one of the things that helps our daughter, Chloe. Write down. And I think every day it's good to just sort of rate your mood, your focus, your anxiety, your energy. And like on a scale of one to 10, one is bad, 10 is good. And that way, as you do these small, tiny habits, you'll notice that those numbers are being improved. So stay with us. We're going to talk about attachments next. Use the code podcast10 to get a 10% discount on a full evaluation at amenclinics.com

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