Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - #41 Stress - The Health Epidemic of the 21st Century with Dr Rangan Chatterjee

Episode Date: December 19, 2018

“We need to give our mental health the same care we give our physical health.” This week, I’m in the hot seat being interviewed by friend, fellow GP and lifestyle medicine advocate, Dr Ayan Panja. We talk about the whirlwind of the last year and how those experiences have shaped me. After the huge success of my first book, The 4 Pillar Plan, it became clear to me that the area that people struggle with the most, myself included, is relaxing. In fact, The World Health Organisation have named stress as the health epidemic of the 21st Century. Indeed, one study found that 80-90% of what GPs see is in some way related to stress. Ayan and I discuss why stress has become such an issue and why it can be so damaging to our health. But what can we do about it? I talk about the areas covered in my new book, The Stress Solution, which is full of simple, practical tools that you can apply in your lives. I also share my top tips for reducing stress, from having a golden hour every morning without your phone to prioritising your relationships. I hope you find this conversation useful! You can pre-order the book on Amazon now. Show notes available at drchatterjee.com/stress Follow me on instagram.com/drchatterjee/ Follow me on facebook.com/DrChatterjee/ Follow me on twitter.com/drchatterjeeuk Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

So everything I do, whether it's a podcast, whether it's the book, whether it's work on TV, whether it's the blogs I write on my website, or the live events that I do, medical doctor, author of The Four Pillar Plan, and television presenter. I believe that all of us have the ability to feel better than we currently do, but getting healthy has become far too complicated. With this podcast, I aim to simplify it. I'm going to be having conversations with some of the most interesting and exciting people both within as well as outside the health space to hopefully inspire you as well as empower you with simple tips that you can put into practice immediately to transform the way that you feel. I believe that when we are healthier, we are happier because when we feel better, we live more. Hello and welcome to episode 41 of my Feel Better Live More podcast. To celebrate the release of my brand new book, The Stress Solution,

today's episode is actually a little bit different from normal. For the very first time on my podcast, I myself am going to be in the hot seat and interviewed by Dr. Ayan Pancha, a good friend of mine who you may have already heard on episode 10 of this podcast. Ayan will be asking the questions today and talking to me about stress and my new book. And on that note, I have a very special announcement to make. As Christmas is still almost one week away, and because so many of us find it such a stressful time with everything that still needs to get done, the food, the presents, the social events, I have decided to release the audiobook for The Stress Solution

one week early to help you get through this very busy time. Why not go to your preferred audiobook provider today, such as Audible or iBooks, and download your copy now. Before we get started with today's conversation, I do need to give a very quick shout out to our sponsors who are essential in order for me to be able to put out weekly podcast episodes like this one. Athletic Greens continue their support of my podcast. I prefer that people get all of their nutrition from food, but for some of us, this is not always possible. Athletic Greens is one of the most nutrient-dense whole food supplements that I've come across and contains vitamins, minerals, prebiotics,

and digestive enzymes. If you are looking to take something each morning as an insurance policy to make sure that you are meeting your nutritional needs, I can highly recommend it. For listeners of this podcast, if you go to athleticgreens.com forward slash live more, you will be able to access a special offer where you get a free travel pack box containing 20 servings of Athletic Greens, which is worth around £70 with your first order. You can check it out at athleticgreens.com forward slash live more. Now, on to today's conversation. So you're probably used to hearing Dr. Chatterjee's dulcet tones at this point, Now, on to today's conversation. it's all a bit strange this isn't it and uh and i'd like to probably start with just talking about

this year so we're at the end of 2018 and at the beginning of this year you wrote a book which was published the four pillar plan which is an international bestseller and you're about to launch your second book the stress solution what are your reflections on this year? Yeah, I think this year has been a little bit of a whirlwind, really. Like you, I went to medical school and I had no ambition to be on television. I had no ambition to be an author. Yet those are things that have happened in the last years. And I've got to say, the experience of both of those things have really changed me as a person. And as a doctor, I've, you know, I've had, I've experienced so many things that I would not have experienced just by seeing patients in the

consultation room. And I really feel that the, the work I've done on television, but also with this, with my first book is really helping people to change their lives. You know, I remember finishing off that book and I thought, you know, if 100 people read this, that'll be great. And, you know, I recently found out from my publishers that, you know, across the globe, I've sold over 150,000 copies of The Four Pill Plan so far. Yeah, which it was just incredible, really, because it's amazing to see how many people have found that book useful um but but in many ways it's been reflecting on what i found this

year so i yes i live in the northwest of england but i travel quite a lot i'm often in london and i get stopped pretty much at least every week, if not on most days, by someone who I don't know who has read my book and, you know, it has changed their lives. And, you know, it's incredibly gratifying. You feel very lucky. You realize what a privileged position you're in to be able to actually help transform the lives of so many people. And it's having reach in a way that I never expected. It's, you know, I wrote that book for the public, you know, but it's incredible how many healthcare professionals, literally hundreds around the country, if not over a thousand now, have contacted me saying that they are signposting their patients to the book, whether it's GPs, whether it's physios, pharmacists,

you know, I've got some psychiatrists and spinal surgeons, there's even a pediatric clinic in Birmingham, who have, you know, contacted me to say that they're using the principles in my first book, with some of their kids who've got intractable headaches, and three of them have got better recently in a way that drugs could not do previously. And to be honest with you, it's a little bit overwhelming how far that book has reached, but it really solidifies what I'm trying to do, which is to try and empower every single person that I come across to become the architects of their own health. And I think this year has given me a lot of confidence because until you write a book and put it out there, you know, you just don't know if people are going to buy it, if it's going to resonate with them. But the book success has gone far beyond my reach. And that makes,

you know, that makes me incredibly happy to know that actually people are talking about it. They may not know me me they may not have seen any of my tv shows but they really resonate with content and they're sharing it with their friends with their family with their work colleagues with the people closest and dearest to them they're um you know they're sharing it so how's it been yeah it's been a whirlwind. It's been pretty exhausting. But I'm getting ready for doing it all again with a new one. Absolutely. And I just would say on the four pillar plan, I mean, I see that love and respect for that book. It's almost got a life of its own, hasn't it? And exactly as you say, you know, whether it's from, you know, patients, or whether it's from other

healthcare professionals, I think it is just a stunning book in that it's, its reach is so broad, it's so accessible, yet it seems to have very broad appeal. And I, you know, I would, I would echo that. And I can, I can see, I see it every day on social media and in the consulting room. So, you know, congratulations on that. And, you know, the success that it's, you know, got, think, is very, very well deserved. But let's talk a little bit about your next book. So what made you write a book on stress? Yeah, there's quite a few things that made me write the next one on stress. If we look at the first book, for example, which was the four key areas of health

that I feel have the most impact on our health and well-being, but at the same time, we've got a fair degree of control over relaxation, food, movement, and sleep. The one that people keep coming back to me on when I'm talking around the country, whether it's talking to people on this podcast or just talking to people on the streets, the one that people struggle with the most is the relaxation pillar. That's the one I have struggled with the most. And I think that is really reflective of what's going on in society, that stress is endemic, stress is everywhere. In fact, the World Health Organization said that stress is the health epidemic of the 21st century. That's a remarkable statement. And there was a study from a few years ago, you'll be addressing this, say as GPs up to 80 or even 90% of what we see every single day in our practice is in some way related to stress.

really see stress a lot of the time, but it's almost like a silent epidemic that's going on in the backgrounds. And that people, I've seen it with my patients that people don't want to address. It's easy to address your diets because you can see it. You eat three times a day, maybe two, maybe four, but you know, it's something that, oh, I know I need to change my diet, but what does it mean, you know, changing your stress levels? And I really wanted to really do what I did with the first book, but really focus in on stress and go, okay, where does stress exist in the modern world? So help people identify it and then give them really simple, practical tools that they can apply in their everyday lives. And these aren't tools that, you know, I've just got from scientific journals. Yes, there's a lot of science in there.

you know, I've just got from scientific journals. Yes, there's a lot of science in there. But more importantly, it's tools that I have seen with real life patients that really change their health, change the way that they feel. Busy people, maybe working two jobs, maybe busy family lives, having elderly parents to look after, you know, all kinds of competes and commitments. These are tools that even the busiest people can apply in their everyday lives. We're both GPs, so if I think about a typical day for us in practice or even myself last week, I'm seeing tired, fatigue, low memory, anxiety, mental health problems, low libido, which I'm seeing more and more of, gut problems like irritable bowel syndrome, and even things like high blood pressure and type 2 diabetes. These aren't as separate as we think they are. All of those conditions and symptoms that I've just described, if you try and look at

that, you know, what's causing them, they all have stress as a key, key driver. Yet we talk about, let's say, type 2 diabetes, everyone's talking about diets, and they might be talking a little bit about movement. They're not talking about stress. Stress will raise your blood sugar. Stress will cause high blood pressure. Stress will cause anxiety. Stress will cause your memory to decline. Stress is one of the biggest causes of low libido. And so what I really wanted to do is go upstream and just go, well, stress is a big driver of many of the symptoms we see today. How can I help the public?

How can I help my patients to change that? Yeah, as you say, it's sort of invisible, isn't it? And much harder to quantify than all the other variables in someone's life. And let's talk a little bit about the types of stress. You touched on some examples there. You know, the person who's too busy or got too much going on in their life. I mean, is all stress bad for us? No, not at all. I think it's a really, really key distinction to make is that a little bit of stress is very good. It turns us into the best version of ourselves. You know, it becomes superhuman in many ways when we are a little bit stressed. It's when that stress becomes chronic and it doesn't

get switched off and there's just that low grade stress every single day. That's when something that is a helpful response suddenly becomes harmful. I think a useful way for people to think about this is to rewind back millions of years ago when our stress response evolved. And it's a little bit simplistic, but probably not quite as simplistic as people might think. So our stress response evolved to keep us safe. So two million years ago, we might be getting attacked by a wild animal. And therefore, you know, if we saw that that was likely to happen, or we felt that that was imminent, our stress response would kick into gear. So a series of biological and physiological processes would kick in into our body,

which would help keep us safe. So for example, sugar would pour into our bloodstream so that we could run faster. Brilliant. Our emotional brain would go on to high alert so we'd be vigilant for all threats that might also be present at the same time. So they're appropriate physiological responses. Exactly.

They were there to help us. We release a bit of cortisol. Cortisol is one of the body's stress response hormones. A little bit of cortisol makes us think clearly, makes us think more sharply. You know, we all know that feeling of when we've got a test or an exam or a presentation to give at work, a little bit of stress actually helps you perform better. So, you know, that's a good thing. But those things I just mentioned, if those things aren't switched off those things I just mentioned, if those things aren't switched off after an hour or two, if those things become longstanding and they're there

every day, suddenly a helpful response becomes harmful. So sugar pouring into your bloodstream, great to help you run away from a lion. Not so good if it's happening every single day, because that will lead to weight gain, high blood pressure and ultimately type 2 diabetes. Your emotional brain being on high alert so you're vigilant for any threat that's around you, brilliant in the short term to keep you safe. But if that's going on day in day out, that's what we call anxiety. And it just goes on and on. A little bit of cortisol helps your brain think clearly. Too much cortisol starts to kill nerve cells in your hippocampus, the memory center of your brain. If you're running away from a lion,

the last thing you need to do is to be able to chill out and procreate, right? That's a non-essential process. So your body switches off. It diverts attention to what's essential and it switches off what is deemed non-essential. Why is stress such a big driver of low libido? Because if you're stressed, you know, having a libido is not a priority for the body. And it's the same thing with gut problems.

When you're running away from a lion, you don't need your gut functioning well. You need to switch off your gut because it's non-essential. And then you think about all the gut problems that you're seeing every day, that I'm seeing every day, including Irritable Bowel Syndrome. And we now know that stress is a key, key player there. And so stress impacts every single organ of the body. It can be for better and it can be for worse. you know really what the book is about is helping to shine a light on this but as i say importantly giving people practical tools that they can apply so it sounds brilliant and it sounds much needed and it's made me think of

what you were just saying this made me think of a couple of things i mean the first is that the argument that a lot of people would make and say look you know stress is just part of the modern life you know we need to just get on with it and it wasn't a problem 50 years ago the way it is nowadays and I'd like to hear your thoughts on that in terms of what's happening on a societal level and why stress is such an issue now and the second is is there one right way to de-stress so a lot of people will say you know, I go for a run and that really helps me. But other people find things like meditation or listening to music more helpful. What are your thoughts on those?

Yeah, I think two great questions. If I take the first one, first of all, which is, you know, what's going on in society that is leading to the fact that, you know, that is leading to the fact that, you know, stress is causing so many problems today in the 21st century in a way that it probably wasn't 30, 40, even 50 years ago. I don't think it was anywhere near the problem it is today. I haven't said that I wasn't alive 50 years ago, so I'm speculating. Well, you know, but I think society is changing rapidly. I would even say that I'm seeing more stress-related problems now than I was even five years ago. But we're getting busier. There's more and more things for us to do. You know, the boundaries between our personal life and our work life are blurred.

Many of us are living longer. You know, so we've got elderly parents we may have to be caring for and looking after. Many families now have two working parents when before there might be one working parents and maybe the mother or a, you know, maybe the father in odd situations, but would be staying at home to sort of deal with the house and looking after children. Now, look, I'm not saying the way society has progressed is not a good thing. Clearly it is in so many ways,

but I think it's come at a cost. Many of us have moved away from places where we grew up. So our network, our family are not around us. So we're trying to work. Maybe two partners are trying to work. We're trying to bring up children with no friends around, no family support around. Human beings have never lived like this. We've always evolved in communities and tribes. We've

had parents or aunties or uncles around to help bring up the children. They say it takes a village, whereas now for many of us, we don't have that village. We've literally got ourselves. And therefore, it's now common parlance, isn't it, for parents to talk about wine o'clock. You know, I'm not convinced that that was there even 30 years ago. I think it's just a reflection of how stressful people find their lives. Oh my God, yeah, the kids are in bed. Okay, I'm going to chill out now with a glass of wine. And I think these are symptoms of how stressful we are. We even talk about, you know, let's say something as simple as sugar. Okay, so many people are trying to quit sugar. Because we know that the excess intake of sugar can be

problematic for our health and the way that we feel. But I genuinely feel that just trying to give up sugar because you know it's bad for you, I think will be limited. If you are chronically stressed, you are going to seek comfort in something. And often that goes to sugar. You must know that feeling. I know that feeling. You come home late. You've not slept well the night before. You've had a busy day with patients.

You just, you know, you feel like something sweet that's going to just make you feel a little bit better. And I think stress is the underlying driver behind why many of us make the lifestyle choices we do. So, I mean, those are some of my thoughts, but it goes beyond that. And I explore so many of these concepts in the book. And I think we are living, in many ways, we're told we're living ultra connected lives, you know, that we're more connected than ever before. And look, I absolutely agree. In a digital sense, of course we are. You know, I've got friends all over the globe who I communicate with via social media, via Facebook, via Instagram, in a way that I could never have done before. I wouldn't even have known these people. I can now, like we all can, you know, FaceTime someone

5,000 miles away and have a crystal clear, high definition image of them, what they're doing, like I could do in my family in India, see what they're doing in that moment. I mean, that is incredible. So digitally, we're more connected than ever before. But I would argue on a real human level, deep, meaningful connection, I don't think we've ever been this isolated. We are a lonely society. Loneliness is an epidemic. It's not just the elderly. It's not just elderly people who are living by themselves. No, men between the age of 30 and 40 are one of the loneliest groups in society, you know, which is one of the reasons why there's such a rapid rise in the male suicide rates. Research has shown the average number of close friendships we have has been declining for 25

years. So it's a big question that you ask, you know, what has changed in society? In many ways, everything has changed. I mean, I don't think society now is recognizable from how it was 20, 30 years ago. And I've got to say, technology is one of those big things that I think we're all recognizing now, particularly now that we've had things like social media for maybe, what, 10, 12 years, something like that. That is not a long period of time. You know, 12, 13 years ago, that did not exist. I don't know, when did Facebook come around? Was it?

2007, I think. 2007 or 2005, 7, something like that. Not that long ago. And therefore, you know, we haven't quite realized how we best use this technology. This, my approach and the book does not demonize technology. It recognizes how phenomenal technology is,

but it's about how we reset our relationship with it so that it doesn't overwhelm us because I see huge problems from the overuse of technology. You touched on two very interesting things there, how the cup of tea has turned into a glass of wine, you know, socially, and also how it's possible to have, don't know a million Instagram followers but not have anyone to you know eat a meal with on a on a Sunday night that type of thing and so and these are key things

I mean and moving a little bit more into the actual book itself which is stunning I think you know it really is and I think I think all the things that you're telling us are really brought to life in it, you know, and I've been very lucky to have a glimpse of it already, you know, and I can, you know, sat there in front of us. You talk a lot about downtime in the book. Can you just expand a little bit about that? Yeah, I think in many ways, this is a continuation from what I've just been talking about with technology. So let's take a typical day in the life of someone today. Of course, not everyone's the same, but for many of us, it involves this. It involves the alarm goes off.

Okay, so we're in a deep sleep and we turn over and our phone is usually the alarm. So the alarm is blaring. That's jolted us out of our deep sleep. We look at the phone. We've got a big jolt of blue lights into our eyes. Then we might see a notification from the gas company saying, your gas bill's due.

You've been stalking me. This is my life, by the way. Well, that's why I start off like a day in the life in the introduction is literally to show people, hey, this is probably you. And, you know, bit by bit, you just get these hits of what I call micro stress doses. There's a big theme for this book is the difference between micro and macro stress doses. I love that.

And I think it's great. Yeah, I think it's a useful way for us to look at stress. I think it's great. Yeah. I think it's a useful way for us to look at stress. There are clearly some very traumatic things that happen in people's lives, whether it's abuse and neglect, you know, bereavement, all kinds of things that I would call a macro stress dose. These things often need processing.

They often need going to see a therapist or a healthcare professional to help go through and deal with that trauma and that emotion. Having said that, people who have experienced macro stress doses are going to find this book really, really helpful because they will be walking around every single day, very, very close to their own personal stress threshold, very, very close to their own personal stress threshold, which means it won't take many micro stress doses to tip them over. So I think each and every single one of us has our own unique personal stress thresholds, and it will vary from day to day, depending on what else we've got in our lives. And why I think that's so important is we've got this threshold and we can deal with multiple stress hits up to a point or we can cope we're quite resilient but once we get near that threshold

and particularly when we go over that's it it's as if all the balls we've been juggling suddenly all fall down onto the floor you know we overact to things. We get overly emotional. Little things become big things. We can't think clearly. I think we all recognize that feeling. It's how do you feel, let's say, on the Thursday of a busy week in your NHS practice, as opposed to on a Sunday evening when you've probably had a nice weekend with your family and finally managed to switch off from work. It's because your personal stress threshold has changed. And I think the more mini stress doses, sorry, micro stress doses, this is basically the opposite to a macro stress dose. A micro stress dose are those little hits, the notification from the gas company that you need to pay the bill,

the three WhatsApp messages you've not replied to, the people who keep emailing you to say, hey, you're not replied to my last two emails, you know, what do you need? The fact that you've not been around to check on your parents because they're not so well and you haven't been around and something's happened, or the fact that actually your kids go to different schools, so you've got two drop-offs in the morning and how do you juggle that with work? You might have burnt the toast and you'd be ready to have that. And then suddenly the toast is burnt. You're like, I'm going to be late for work. So I'm just going to go. It's all these little hits that come day in, day out that if you leave the house and actually you've had six or seven or 10 or 15

MSDs, these micro stresses before you've left, you're going out facing the world much nearer your threshold, your stress threshold than you would have been otherwise. And that will mean you're more prone to getting frustrated with your work colleagues, more prone to getting short tempered, more prone to having road rage on the way to work, rather than actually living in a much calmer state. And as you say, you can resonate with a day like that. I think pretty much all of us can resonate with a day like that. And it's not a case of saying, well, I can miraculously make those things disappear. No, I can't. Stress is endemic in the modern world. I can't necessarily remove the stresses that are in people's lives. But what I

can do is give them some tools that they can apply they're going to help reduce the impact of those and i know they work i apply them on myself i apply them on my patients i'm so keen to get this message out there that there are little things that often don't take more than 10 minutes a day that they can do um so did that answer your question yeah absolutely i think it's great it's um it's really interesting i i'm recently i've been um on a journey myself sort of looking at how other practices work in terms of general practice to sort of reduce their own stress levels and one of the places that we visited um actually have this idea before a meeting starts they have a

minute silence and they check in with each other so if you've had a very bad weekend um and you know you've got a lot of stress going on in your life you're not going to be completely present at that meeting and so and i thought that was such a great idea and it's one of those things that you know we are going to implement at our workplace but i want to hear what your tips are you know what are your sort of top tips if you had had to sort of listen to this and if you were listening to this podcast right now and you wanted some take home stuff in terms of what can I do immediately in my busy day to make my stress levels not affect me quite so much, what would you say? Yeah, well, just to finish off the answer to the last question, which was on this downtime, this idea of downtime, I think this really feeds into what some of those top tips would be. We need downtime. So if you wake up and the first thing you do is look at your phone, right? You are allowing incoming noise into your brain. And the barrage of that noise, for many of us,

doesn't stop all day. And for many of us, we're still lying in bed at night, still looking at our phones, still getting all this incoming noise into our heads. That has consequences. We need a bit of downtime where actually there's no incoming noise coming in, where we can just be. We need a bit of downtime where actually there's no incoming noise coming in, where we can just be. So what's really interesting about that is that when the brain switches off or disengages, when we're not focused on a task or we're not focused on doing something, you would think that our brain sort of goes to sleep a little bit and starts to unwind. But that's not strictly the case. There's a part of the brain called the default mode network, the DMN,

that goes into overdrive when you're not focused on a task so the dmn is a powerful source of idea generation it's why a lot of people myself included come up with our best ideas in the shower when we're out for a run or a walk in the park because you're not actually trying to do something and focus on something or read a tweet or read a blog on social media or see what trump's been saying you know you're not actually trying to do something and focus on something or read a tweet or read a blog on social media or see what Trump's been saying. You know, you're not doing that. So you're allowing a different part of your brain to flourish and to thrive. And all of us have got time in our day to have a bit of switch off time and have a bit of downtime.

And I think that's one of the most important things that we can do is build in some of that switch off time. So how can we do that? Well, one strategy is to have what I call a golden hour every morning. Now, this is basically an hour in the morning where you're not looking at your phone. Okay. Now, an hour might be too much for some people. Fine. Maybe start with five minutes, start with 10 minutes, just have a little bit of calm to allow yourself to just be and see how you're feeling. Allow your inner feelings to come to the surface, which often, if you are constantly listening to other things, reading other things, you won't allow those inner feelings to come up. So you'll be suppressing a lot of your emotions. So I'm a big fan of this sort of golden hour or golden 10 minutes every morning. I think that's a great tip for people. Some people will say, yes, but I like to meditate in the morning. Brilliant. Fantastic. Many of them

do that on their apps. Fine. So you can do what Michael Acton Smith does and I do, and he's the founder of the app Calm. He puts his phone on airplane mode first thing in the morning. So he can still use the Calm app. He can still get the benefits of meditation, but he's not getting all the text messages, all the emails, those sorts of things. So I think that's something that could be quite powerful for people. And it's a small thing, you know,

just 10 minutes really does make a difference. You'll find your own stress levels are lower. If you live with anyone, you'll be much more present with your partner, much more present with your children. So many of the times that I've checked my email first thing in the morning, I realized that, yes, I feel I'm getting ahead of the day. Oh, I've got back to a few emails. Then my kids wake up and I'm not present with them. I'm thinking about that email. Oh, I've got to do that. And I've lost a real golden connection time in the day with my family, with the people who mean the most to me. So that

would be one tip. I think another simple tip for people would be have a non-tech lunch hour. You know, we all work in different ways these days, some in offices, some of us work at home, but for most of us, we're looking at technology at some point during our working hours. I think your lunch break is a fantastic time to switch off, put the phone in the drawer, you know, or in the briefcase or in the rucksack, put it away and use that time to go for a walk. It could be a five, 10 minute walk without your phone, you know, allow your brain to just be, allow your default mode network to kick in. You get all kinds of ideas. And one thing a lot of us forget is that our brain is always trying to solve problems, but we need to give it time to solve those problems. If there's something, if you've got a dilemma at work, for example,

or certainly when I was writing this book, if I was stumbling across a problem or hitting writer's block, I would go for a walk or a little jog and almost invariably the solution would come. And I always used to wonder why do I get those great ideas when I'm out or in the shower? But now we've got the science to tell us why that is. It's the DMN that kicks into gear, which is one of the reasons why we get these ideas. So that would be another tip. I guess another quick one I would say to people is in the relationships that mean most to us. So for most of us, I'm guessing it's our partners or our close friends or our children. You know, I think it's really important to prioritize those relationships and a simple way you can do that.

Again, this is not an anti-technology book, just to be really clear, but put the phone away when you're with your friends, when you're out for dinner with your friends, when you see your partner, put the phone away. Have a bit of 10 minutes or 15 minutes of real meaningful connection because those phones are very clever. They distract us. You know, a recent study came out, I don't know if you saw this or not, that even if you are sitting with someone, and we're sitting here now, even if our phone is on the table face down or on silence, it will distract us. Okay? Our working memory will be reduced. Our ability to solve problems will be reduced. We will complete any task that we're trying to do with an IQ that is lower than if our phone wasn't there. That's incredible. That's how distracting these things are. So these are just a few simple things that people can try and apply. Golden hour in the

morning, if you can, tech-free lunch hour, and any meaningful connection, you know, put the phone away. I do love that. And it really, really resonates with me so much, you know, this. And I like the thing about, you know, putting your putting your phone away, it's sort of like hold hands rather than hold your phone type thing, isn't it? And also, you know, I think it's so common nowadays, when you when you look at people in lunch breaks, for example, they're sat there just staring at their phones and often conversation is completely absent, isn't it? Because people are just literally have their face stuck in their phone. Yeah, but let's say roughly 15 years ago, before smartphones were there, if you were in a shop waiting to pay for something, if you were in a coffee shop waiting to buy your coffee, right, what you would do, you'd stand in line and, you know, you'd people watch, you'd be aware of what's going on around you. You might bump into a friend of yours or a work

colleague you've not seen in a while because your attention is on what's going on around you. Now, what happens? We're all stuck in our phones. We're using it as a, oh, we can get ahead. We can get our emails done or we can scroll on social media. Every bit of downtime that we have is sucked up now by doing something else. And I think we are literally craving downtime as human beings. And I don't think it's nature. Nature is expansive. It forces you to look outwards, whereas technology encourages you to gaze inwards. And tech's not going anywhere, nor should it. Nor should it. I think that's a really key point. It is absolutely fabulous in terms of what it's allowed us to do,

but we just need some rules around it. We need to be able to guard our digital borders and make sure that we've got some downtime from that i think nature's brilliant what i also love is it ties so much in with with your first book you know i remember that thing about embracing morning light is a big thing for you and and this no tech 90 which is you know avoiding you know blue light 90 minutes before bed and that that all seems to make much more sense in this context. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think, you know, those are the themes in the first book. This one is definitely a huge progression from that. There's a lot of new content, a lot of new

material. And I think I've explored a lot of issues in a much deeper way than I had the opportunity to do in the first book. Even things like nature. So we talk about nature. So why is nature so good well there's many reasons and we all know that we feel good when we're in nature but when i was researching the book i came across um something called fractals now fractals are geometrical shapes that only exist in nature so in lakes trees coastlines things like that raindrops okay yeah that's where you find fractals. Now, just looking at fractals lowers your cortisol levels. And cortisol is one of the main stress hormones.

It appears that we are hardwired deep into our code that's there to exist as a human. It's hardwired to respond well to nature. We intuitively know we feel better in nature. to respond well to nature. We intuitively know we feel better in nature, right? We know that, but now we've got science to back it up as well. And what's incredible is if you can't get a daily dose of nature, and I get for some people it's a bit tricky, even looking at a picture of nature lowers your cortisol levels. I think that's the study I talk about in the book from the University of Brighton. Absolutely incredible. Just looking at nature makes me wonder, is that why Apple or Microsoft have all their screensavers as a picture of nature? Because it is relaxing. And, you know, another thing about these fractals, you look at those fractals,

there's a part of your brain called the parahippocampus that gets activated, which helps us to regulate and process emotions. So, you know, as is probably a common theme with a lot of my work, a lot of the things we talk about are common sense. They mean common sense. They have been ingrained in human behavior for thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of years. The rules of good health haven't changed. What's changed is the modern environment. So we need a reminder of how we just get back to that yeah and i love it when the common sense ties in with science that's so satisfying isn't it yeah exactly and that's what i've really tried to put in this book very i hope it's very readable like the first one um i've written it so that people find it i

hope an enjoyable reads um something that they're going to pick up because they want to read it, but they're going to get educated, but also hopefully be inspired to go, hey, that's not that hard actually, is it? You know, I reckon I can do that. So, you know, only time will tell if it does do that in the same way. Yeah, absolutely. I was just going to say also one of my favourite parts of your book,

which is something that I see more and more through my work as well, is you talk about purpose, you've got a whole section on it. Tell us a bit more about that and how you came across that in terms of your research for this book and how it links to stress. Yeah, it's a really great question, actually. I mean, when we think about stress, we don't usually think of meaning and purpose. We're often thinking about, you know, emotional stress. We're often thinking about, you know, overload, things like that. But I would argue that actually not having a sense of purpose in your life is probably the quickest way of stressing you out. I think if you follow

everything else I'm asking someone to do, but you don't have a feeling, a meaning and a sense of purpose, I think your life is inherently stressful on one level. Now, that can be very scary for people to hear that because a lot of people will think, well, hold on a minute, I've, you know, I've got work, I've not got a I've, you know, I've got work. I've got, not got a choice here. You know, I've got to pay the bills, got to pay the mortgage, got to feed my family. You know, I don't have time for meaning and purpose. And I understand that, you know, I've worked in a whole variety of different practices. I've worked in middle class suburbia. I've worked in inner city practices where a lot of people are living very tough lives on benefits.

So I've seen a huge spectrum of different people and how stress applies to them. But I do think that not having a sense of meaning and purpose is one of the fastest ways to stress you out. So what can you do about that? Well, there is a framework out there called Ikigai, which some people have heard of, this Japanese concept of what you can do to live a happy and calm and productive life. The Ikigai, there are several interpretations of it, but one of them is this beautiful four circles, which intersects in the middle, which is when you fulfilled Ikigai,

when you do something with your life that meets the following criteria, something you love, something you're good at, something the world needs, and something you can make money from. Now, I love that whole concept of Ikigai, but I've got to say, for many people, for many of my patients, it's a little bit unachievable. It sounds great, but how many of us are able to live our lives in that way? Whereas everything we do, our work and our home life meets those four criteria, not that many of us. And so I've designed a new framework to help people find something, find their meaning, find their purpose in a much more achievable manner. It's called the live framework. I probably don't have time to go through it all

in detail here. Yeah. I'm really proud of this actually. It's, um, it's something I've used on a lot of my patients now and they all find it as a very, just a very practical way and a non intimidating way to find meaning and purpose. And you don't have to do it all from one thing. You can tick the boxes from various aspects in your life. You know, I had a patient who was in his fifties and he came to see me with a whole variety of different problems and there was nothing specific going on you know what it's like in general practice you have people who they're not well something's not right with their lives but there's nothing there's no sort of diagnosis that you can make there's no blood test that's coming up saying

hey this is the problem and the feeling i was getting with him um you know he didn't really enjoy his job was a bit lackluster. Mood was down a bit sometimes. And it turned out, we're looking to his life, you know, there was nothing in his life that brought him joy at all. Nothing. You know, he just thought he was going from day to day doing what he has to do. Like so many people that don't even think about the luxury of doing something that gives them joy. And it turned out in our conversation that he used to love train sets. I think he used to do as a kid and as a teenager, he loved it playing with old train sets. And we had a conversation about maybe he could re-engage with that same look. And I know you don't enjoy your job particularly, but you need it to feed your

family and pay your mortgage. So why don't you just engage in this hobby that you love and he thought okay I've not done that for years anyway to cut a long story short he basically started doing that and it was truly transformative for him within a few months he was like a different person and ironically he actually started to get more enjoyment out of his job and his family when he engaged in that passion it's as if that one thing had lots of knock-on benefits. And I see that not only in my patients, I've seen that with close friends of mine, I've seen that with myself, that when we're just go, go, go the whole time, when we're just doing what needs to be done and we stop doing the things that nourish us, it's a vicious cycle. And it's not unique. You're nodding your head so i'm i would imagine i

know i'm not interviewing you but i imagine you it's probably something about that you can resonate with it's there's so many things we have to do now um and one thing i would say to people is that you know these days our to-do list isn't never done i mean when was the last time you had done everything that you were meant to have done? Pass. I have no idea. Yeah. I mean, I don't think for many of us we're ever done. There's always another email to reply to. There's always something else that we should have done. There's always another class we could have taken the kids to.

You know, it's just, it's nonstop. So I think we actually have to recognize that that stuff's not going away. We need to schedule in time for ourselves, self-care. You know, we have to prioritize that. If we don't schedule it in, it will not happen. You schedule in work, you know you've got to be at work. You schedule in when you've got to pick up your children because you know that needs to get done. But what, do something for yourself? It doesn't go in the schedule. So what happens? We're too tired, we're too stressed. It never happens. So I think there's some really, really nice little tools that I've created for people that are going to help them figure out how to do that. Also, I think, Rangan,

one of the great things about this particular podcast, because you're in the hot seat, as it were, I think people would love to find out a little bit about, a bit more about you, because often with your guests, you know, you get sort of under the surface. And I'm going to put you on the spot here a little bit. Okay, I'm getting nervous now. Ask about your own life and your own stress levels

and perhaps just, you know, let people know what's the one thing that's really helped you in terms of your stress levels. You're a busy guy. You know, you've got a very busy life. I imagine you get, you know, compared to someone like myself who seems overwhelmed with people trying to get in contact with me for various things. You must, I mean, I can't imagine what your email inbox must be like. But what's the one thing that's helped you manage your stress levels? You've clearly been on this journey this year doing lots of research for this book, which sounds amazing.

And having looked at it, it's one of these things I think is going to help so many people. But what's the one thing for you in your life that's changed your stress levels during the course of this year? Yeah, I mean, if I reflect on think i've been i have been on a journey and i've tried various things at various times which have all you know some have been more successful than others but if you ask me for that one thing i'd probably have to say it's something that i've managed to engage in now for probably over two months maybe three months now um you know after having tried for donkey's years to make this a regular practice and it's a morning routine um it's you know i have tried but sometimes i'd get up and go yeah i mean that's great i don't really

have 15 minutes now to spend i could just get through my emails quickly before the kids wake up and I have to give them breakfast. You know, I've really started to prioritize the first, certainly the first 15 minutes of my day. Sometimes it's 35, 40 minutes, depending on my schedule, but I will wake up early. And what I do, I've got, and I go through some tips on how you can create this and personalize it for yourself in the book. But what I do in the morning is I'll come downstairs now. I will, my phone will be on airplane mode and I will basically do a meditation on the app Calm. And sometimes I'll be 10 minutes, sometimes I'll be 15 minutes. So I'll sit and do that. and sometimes I'll be 10 minutes, sometimes I'll be 15 minutes. So I'll sit and do that.

Once that's done, I then do some movement practice. So very light things. It could be some yoga stretches. It could be some ankle mobility. It could be some light stretches. It could be some hip rolls. It could be anything, anything that I'm feeling. If I'm feeling something a bit tight, I'll just work on it. So I do a bit of movement. Again, it could be two minutes. It could be 10 minutes. It could be 10 minutes. Just depends how long I've got. And then I try and finish off with something positive, whether that's reading something positive or whether it's doing something called affirmations. And what's really interesting is that

I try and get up before my kids, but my daughter and sometimes my son seems to have a sixth sense of when daddy's up and when he's downstairs doing all this. So often they'll come in. I don't mind if they're coming during the movements because they often join me. It can be challenging when they come into the meditation, but I've learned,

I've learned that that's my issue and not theirs. I mean, why wouldn't they come down and see what daddy's doing? So I've learned that actually my angst and stress about that is something I've got to work on. I really have let it go. And I thought, okay,

great to come down to come down. And I've tried to explain to my daughter, Hey, daddy's just doing another five minutes of meditation, you just sit there and draw whilst I do that. But they're often down for the affirmations. And we say something positive together. So often, I'll sit there with my daughter, we'll hold hands together. And we'll say, okay, I'm happy, I'm calm, I'm stress free. I'm happy, I'm calm, I'm stress free. And I'm happy, I'm calm, I'm stress-free. And we'll do that for about a minute or two. And, you know, at the end of that minute or the end of the two minutes, she's got a big smile on her face. I've got a big smile on my face and I feel like a million dollars. And, you know, that may sound quite dramatic or quite, you know, quite a

lot of different things to do. It doesn't have to be as complicated as that. It doesn't have to be as long as that. It can simply be five minutes of sitting in silence. The key thing I think really is not to get the phone on, not to put the laptop on, because I really do feel that once you start down that path, your downtime becomes very limited.

You just start the day with noise and without calm. So I would say a morning routine, what we call in the book zoning in, is very important each morning. I would have to say if you pushed me that that is probably the most impactful thing I do. Those 10 or 15 minutes in the morning have benefits for the rest of the day. I know when I haven't done it, because I am a lot less reactive. Sorry, when I haven't done it, I'm a lot more reactive. Little things start to bother me. I get stressed. I'm just not as present as I could be otherwise. So that's something, even this morning. So I had to get up at five o'clock this morning to get the train down here to London for a day of recording podcast,

right? Now, the old me, even six months ago, I would have thought before the train, I haven't got time, you know, I haven't got time for any of this faff, you know, I just need to get in the shower and go. But because it's now been going on for a period of time, it just feels like, you know, you wouldn't go outside without putting your clothes on, right? It's sort of, it's almost starting to ingrain itself as a habit. So I thought, no, I'm going to get up. And I did, I didn't do the whole thing.

I did 10 minutes meditation. I did about five minutes of movements. That was it. And then I thought, okay, I really must get in the shower now and get ready. But I'm noticing it. I'm, you know, the train was late because of the weather, but it didn't stress me out. I knew I'll be running late for all the podcasts today,

but I thought, hey, what can I do? That's just the way it goes. I can't change the weather. And I've just found that that little moment of calm, that dose of calm I give myself each morning has benefits for the rest of the day. And I would highly recommend it. That's brilliant. And I think just to tie it all together you know the key tenet of this is that stress in the long term is very

bad for us and of course if you're not doing that on a daily basis the the cumulative effect over years on things like blood pressure and blood sugar you know that stacks up doesn't it and i think that's that's the thing that people often forget they think well i've got to get through today and then start again tomorrow. But of course, it catches up with you. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we know that stress, some studies reckon stress might be behind up to 90 or 95% of all chronic disease.

And again, most things are multifactories. There are many, many drivers of all these things. But we forget that stress is a big driver for type 2 diabetes. It's a big driver for hypertension or high blood pressure. stress is a big driver for type 2 diabetes. It's a big driver for hypertension or high blood pressure. It's a big driver for getting strokes. It's a big driver for Alzheimer's now. We're seeing that actually stress kills nerve cells in the hippocampus. The hippocampus is your memory center. You need that. And we've both spent time with Professor Dale Bredesen, one of the world's leading Alzheimer's researchers in California. And he passionately says that chronic stress,

day in, day out stress is a risk factor for Alzheimer's. And so that can be quite hard for people to, you know, you know, just as well as I do, when you've got younger patients in your practice and you're trying to engage them in behavior change, it's really tricky because you try and tell them that, oh yeah, if you smoke, you're going to get lung cancer when you're 70. It just doesn't resonate with them. Whereas if you tell them that actually that's going to have an issue with your impotence and your ability to get an erection, suddenly they switch on, they're listening. Hold on a minute. What did you say? And I think when we talk about stress, we've got to be quite careful because yes, it increases the risk of these

chronic conditions, but it also impacts you day to day. Your memory goes down, your ability to concentrate goes down. You won't sleep very well if you're stressed. That's probably one of the biggest causes of insomnia is that we're stressed. You know, your interactions with your partner, your children, with your friends, what are they like when you're stressed? Who do you take it out on? It's often not your work colleagues, it's often the people that are closest to you.

So I really feel that I can tell you for me, since I really, this year in particular, it's amazing what writing a book on this sort of stuff does. It really helps you motivate yourself for your own behavior. I'm much more present with my kids. I'm much calmer at home. I asked the kids the other day, have you noticed a difference? They said, yeah, daddy.

And it's just so gratifying when the people who are closest to you can see a difference. I feel I'm closer to my wife by simply addressing these stress practices. And I know we won't have time today, but there are four pillars of stress, as you will, in this book. It's sort of like the first book, but these are all to do with stress. And what I call the four big stress superhighways that exist in the modern world. And they work both ways, you see. So for example, if we talk about one of those pillars is our relationships. So not having good quality nourishing relationships increases your stress levels. But having increased stress has a negative impact on those relationships. So all these pillars work both ways. And I think it's

incredibly insightful for people to read this and understand lots of things that are going on that they might not have put down to stress i think it'll be very interesting for people to go oh now i get it now i get why i do that or now i get why this always happens when you know when this has been going on in my life. And I do think relationships, that's probably one of the pillars I'm most proud of because I talk about how important it is to nurture our friendships and how seeing your friends in real life is not a luxury for your health. It's an absolute biological necessity. And I make the scientific case for that, but there are also some practical things that you can do. I talk about how society now has insidiously eroded intimacy from our lives intimacy with our friends intimacy with our partners you know most of us are having

slightly controversial but many of us are having these eye affairs with our phone you know we spend more time touching the curvy contours of our iPhone or our Android phone than we do our wives or our partners. You mentioned touch in the book, don't you? Yeah, that's the other chapter in the relationship pillar is on human touch. Human touch is something that we become scared of in society. You know, I've got to say myself as included, you know, I think 10 years ago, if I was giving someone bad news in my practice, a cancer diagnosis or something, you know, I'd move my chair a bit closer. I might put my hand on their shoulder to deliver the news. I'm very cautious these days about doing something like that because how society has changed. And I'm not saying there aren't good reasons for that.

But again, human touch is a biological necessity. I really delve into these beautiful touch fibers that exist on our skin and how they feed our emotional brain and how human touch alone can lower your stress levels. So I think there's a lot of fresh material in here, a lot of exciting and hopefully fascinating information for people, which is always concluded with what can you do about it? Because, you know, we love reading interesting things. Yeah, absolutely. But my whole approach is about this is interesting.

Here's the science. Here are some case studies of patients who might have symptoms just like you, but then here is what you can do in your life. Yeah, I think it's going to have a massive impact. And I hope it is as successful and more successful than your first book. Final question. What are you going to be doing this time next year? Um, yeah, let's say that the, this book has had the tv whether it's the blogs i write on my website or the live events that i do around the country it's got one goal in mind which is to inspire every single person to become the architect of their own health and i don't know exactly what

i'll be doing in 12 months but i can pretty much say with almost 100% certainty, it will be something with that theme in mind. Whether it's a book, whether it's, you know, doing two podcast episodes a week, whether it's doing a bigger speaking tour than the one I'm doing this January. I just love getting this information to people. I love hearing the stories from people that when they apply these tools. the stories from people that when they apply these tools, I was in London just a few weeks ago, someone stopped me in the streets and said, Hey, Dr. Chachi, can I just say something to you? And I said, sure, sure, fire away. And I said, I want to tell you, I've been on painkillers for 20 years. And since reading your book, and I've been applying to print source for the last three or four months now, I've managed to come off all those painkillers. I just want to say thank you. And, you know, I get emotional even thinking about this because I didn't write this book to help people come off painkillers. As you well know, I think that the drivers of the way we feel, the drivers of our ill health are all very similar. And it's universal. There are some good principles of good health. There is robust science to support it. But when you get the basics

right, the knock-on effects are profound. Whether it's your weight, whether it's your energy, whether it's your libido, whether it's the fact that you come off painkillers, whether you put your type 2 diabetes into remission, whether you've improved your mental health. That excites me. That's what keeps me going. So in 12 months, I will know that I'll be doing more of the same. I don't know quite how, but something like that. Well, I think that's amazing. And the world is a better place for you doing that work, I think. And it's been an absolute pleasure interviewing you on your own podcast. Rangan, thank you so much

that concludes today's episode of the feel better live more podcast i hope you enjoyed the slightly different format of today's show and that it has left you feeling inspired to make some changes in your own life as always please do please do let Ayan and myself know what you thought of today's episode by tagging us both on social media. You can find Ayan on Twitter with the handle dr underscore Ayan and on Instagram with the handle at DrAyanPancher. As mentioned at the start of this podcast,

the audio book for The Stress Solution, which I have narrated in full, is now available to download. The paperback version will be available to buy in the UK in all the usual places from December the 27th and will be available all over the world in places like Australia, India, New Zealand and the United States in the coming weeks. You can see all the international book links on my website at drchastji.com forward slash book. If you regularly enjoy my weekly podcasts, one of the best ways to support it is to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or whichever platform you listen to podcasts on. These reviews help to raise visibility of the podcast, which in turn helps me to attract better guests. Another great way is to take a screenshot on your phone right now and share

with your friends, or you can do it the good old- fashioned way and simply tell your friends and family about this show. That's it for today. I hope you have a fabulous week. Make sure you have pressed subscribe and I will be back next week with my latest conversation. Remember, you are the architect of your own health. Making lifestyle changes is always worth it. Because when you feel better, you live more. I'll see you next time. Thank you.