Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - 8 Powerful Ideas to Make 2021 Your Best Year Yet #142

Episode Date: December 23, 2020

This is a very special end of year episode that I hope serves as a celebration of the conversations I have had on the podcast this year. My team and I have put together some of the very best ideas shared on my show which I believe, if you start implementing, will immediately start to transform your health and happiness. The central theme is looking after our minds, which has never been more important. Whether it be controlling our reaction to stressors, managing anxiety, spending time alone with our thoughts OR cultivating resilience and learning to be more present: this special episode will help you on your journey to become your true, authentic self. We’ll hear: Rich Roll on the importance of having time alone with our thoughts and why we need discomfort in order to grow. Jay Shetty explaining why so many of us these days are not living lives that are truly ours. Tom Bilyeu discusses identity, how to become resilient and how to view criticism as a gift. England Football Team Psychologist Pippa Grange shares her belief that most of us are performing at life not living it. She explains why we should stop holding back, put fear aside and allow ourselves to live the life we want to live. Brian MacKenzie reveals how we can use the power of our breath to become more present and help counteract the constant stimulus of modern-day life. James Nestor explains why the way we breathe is so important for the health of our body and for the health of our mind. Psychotherapist Julia Samuel talks about the many ‘living losses’ we are experiencing through the pandemic and that how we respond to change, in many ways, determines how our lives will unfold. And finally Peter Crone - AKA The Mind Architect - explains why we all need to slow down in order to find true happiness in our lives. This is a powerful episode that I really enjoyed listening back to - I think you will too! Show notes and the full podcasts are available at drchatterjee.com/142 Follow me on instagram.com/drchatterjee/ Follow me on facebook.com/DrChatterjee/ Follow me on twitter.com/drchatterjeeuk DISCLAIMER: The content in the podcast and on this webpage is not intended to constitute or be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your doctor or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have heard on the podcast or on my website. 

Hi, my name is Rangan Chatterjee. Welcome to Feel Better Live More. Hey guys, so how are you doing? We're getting to the end of 2020. What a year we have had. Just trying to think about how to, you know to close the year with a podcast. And I started with my team to put together a bit of a compilation episode. One that I think is full of hope, full of celebration, but also one that really gets you into the right frame of mind for the year ahead. I know 2020 has been challenging, but I think if we can think about our mindset and how we view challenges and how we view everything that comes up in life and potentially reframe it a little differently, I think it can help us have a more fulfilled 2021. Now, the theme of today's compilation episode is looking after

our minds. I don't think it's ever been more important than it is today. And that can mean controlling our reaction to stresses, managing anxiety better, spending time alone with our thoughts, cultivating resilience, or simply learning how to become our true authentic selves. This episode contains some of the very best clips from this year to help you harness the power of your mind. We've got former guests on the show, Jay Shetty, Rich Roll, Peter Crone, Tom Bilyeu, James Nestor, Brian McKenzie, Pippa Grange, and Julius Samuel. I think you're really going to enjoy it. If you're a first-time listener to the podcast, I think this is going to give you a really good insight as to what this podcast is about

and potentially inspire you to listen to some of the original episodes. And if you're a long-time listener, I think you can have a smile on your face as you listen to this and remind yourself of some of the highlights. And now onto this very special compilation episode. We begin with the inspirational podcast host, Rich Roll. And this clip comes from episode 93, where Rich talks about the importance of having time alone with our thoughts and why we need discomfort in order to grow. When I think about life, when I think about health, when I think about what people are struggling with these days, and if someone was to ask me what I think the number one problem in society is, I think it's solitude. I think it's the fact that we have no downtime, we have no space. I think one of the negatives that technology

has done, for all that's positive, one of the negatives is, I don't think the negative that's been spoken about enough, which is the fact that any bit of downtime we previously had has been stolen from us. I want you to think about this for a moment. I'm older than you, but I think one thing that we share in our general age bracket is that to the extent that we are the same general generation, we are the last crop of people who know what it's like to live in a pre-internet world and now live in a fully connected world. Our childhood was marked by periods of boredom where we had to go out of our way

to figure out creative ways to entertain ourselves. Like the amount of energy that you would have to exude with your imagination to figure out how to spend time was extraordinary. Fast forward to the 12-year-old now or the 10-year-old or the 8-year-old. They have to exert even more energy to not be distracted, to find boredom, to find stillness. And I think it cannot be overstated how profound a change that is. And I'm not sure that we really appreciate the extent to which that's going to change the course of humanity, because what is that person going to look like in 20 or 30 years

when they're an adult? It's going to be a very different type of being. And I think now, more than ever, we're in a crisis of presence in that we never have to be by ourselves ever again, ever, ever. You have to go out of your way to find a moment of stillness. And who was it who said, you know, all of man's suffering can be boiled down to his inability to spend, you know, time alone with himself? I mean, we don't ever have to be alone with ourselves. And I know that I've found myself struggling with this

because of how different my life is now from when i wrote my first book now there's so many more things vying for my attention and a lot of those are driven by technology that you have to you have to move heaven and earth to create boundaries around that to carve out a few moments of quiet because you're expected to be um you know accountable and in communication at every given moment of your waking day i agree that i don't think we recognize the gravity of this i i think when we you know we're missing a lot of the big picture when we talk about even things like food and sugar, for example, as important as they are, when you understand where a lot of our behaviors come from, this whole idea of these underlying

stressors in our life and how we then use our certain behaviors to compensate for them, I think a lack of downtime is one of the biggest stressors because if you can't sit alone with your thoughts and you always need distraction, well, you're going to use distraction, whether it's social media, whether it's Netflix, whether it's food, right? So how much of unhealthy food intake is driven by an inability to sit and be alone i think a lot yeah i mean i think i think emotional eating is is a condition that's under underappreciated it's easy to dismiss that like oh i'm addicted to whatever kind of food but you know i think most people's compulsive eating eating behaviors and patterns are a function of of of this unconscious drive

to change their emotional state, like this reflexive need to not feel whatever they're feeling. And I think if somebody was to do a food journal or to posit the question, like, how come I always end up face-planting in theazs, you know, three times a week at midnight or whatever? Like, if you were to journal, like, what happened to you emotionally that day? Like, there's triggers for these things. that maybe you're not even consciously aware of or completely in touch with that is compelling you in an unconscious way

to behave in a certain way to change that emotional state so that you can feel different. So whether it's drugs and alcohol or food or the phone or whatever else is, it's all the same thing. It's all the same thing. It is a addictive predisposition to alter your emotional state

and avoid having to confront, you know, a feeling or an emotion and an inability because of the way we're hardwired to understand that feelings are just that, they're feelings. Like when we have an uncomfortable feeling or a fear impulse or something like that, we're hardwired through our amygdala, which we talked about earlier, to think that we're in peril. We're going to die, right? And we're going to act accordingly to redress that. But the truth is, it's just an emotion. You're not going to die. And if you can develop the wherewithal to sit with it, to be in that discomfort that you can become connected to that. And I think we're in a culture right now where nobody wants to be uncomfortable for a minute.

And everything about society is oriented around luxury and comfort and convenience and the idea of having to tolerate even a moment of discomfort is considered you know something that we're trying to transcend and yet deep within us we have a deep need to be in discomfort in order to grow and i think that's why you're seeing like spartan races and ultra endurance, like there's, you know, like if it's all about luxury and comfort and, you know, a padded bank account, then why are all these people showing up to climb in the mud, you know, on a, you know,

cold Sunday morning? It's because as human beings, we're disconnected from that natural state. And I think the more that we're disconnected from that natural state. And I think the more that we're willing to be in discomfort, the more resilient we become, the more alive we feel and the more connected to the planet, to ourselves, and to each other we learn to be. Next up is the award-winning storyteller and former monk, Jay Shetty. In episode 122, we explored identity, the monk mindset, and living an authentic life. In this next clip,

Jay explains why so many of us these days are not living lives that are truly ours. Jay, I think one of the first times I came across you was a few years back. I heard you on an interview. I remember being really impacted by what you said. I think, who is this guy? I mean, this is pretty incredible what I heard. You were talking a lot about, I think, identity. It really got me thinking about what is my identity? I guess I was on a journey then anyway, since I lost my father about seven years ago now. I think that was one of the significant moments in my life that got me to start questioning everything, thinking about, well, who am I? Am I living my life or am I living somebody else's life? I think you expressed it so beautifully. But then when I read your book, I think you start off very early on with identity.

So I wonder if you could expand on identity. What is it? And why do you think many of us need to spend a bit of time thinking about it? The monks start with identity and at the root of the issue. Because a lot of what we experience in the world today, as you know, and I know how holistic you are in the way you advise your patients. When you were speaking on my podcast, I was so impressed by you and how you're able to tie in so many psychological and natural practices and relational exercises that can improve people's health and

wellbeing overall. I remember you talking about encouraging your clients to see more friends as a way of changing the way they feel. And I was thinking, wow, this person's got so many great ideas. And the reason is because Rangan, you also have that monk mindset of you go to the root of the issue. It's really easy to just say, oh, well, just take two of these a day or try this, or, you know, maybe you need to do this. But when you think about it from the root perspective, where do our challenges arise? And our challenges arise by how we see ourself. And what I believe Rangan's referring to is, there's this quote that I begin my book with and that I've shared in interviews for the last few

years. And it's from a writer named Charles Horton Cooley. And he said, and bear with me, you've got to really listen closely to this. So what he said that the challenge today is, I'm not what I think I am. I'm not what you think I am. I am what I think you think I am. Now, just let that blow your mind for a moment. I will explain it, I promise.

I'm not what I think I am. I'm not what you think I am. I am what I think you think I am, which means we live in a perception of a perception of ourselves. So I'll break it down. If I think Rangan thinks I'm smart, I'll say I feel smart. But if I think Rangan thinks I'm not smart, then I'll say I'm not smart. And so the challenge is that we're basing how we feel about ourselves on what we think someone thinks of us. And the greatest challenge with that is how do you have any idea if what you think someone thinks about you is even true and whether that's even the best place to start. So that's where our identity struggles. We start pursuing things in life because we think other people value them. It's almost like, let's think of the most playground version of this.

If I remember wearing high-tech shoes from BHS to the playground, right? I remember my mom, because my parents didn't buy me Nike trainers or Adidas trainers, which I always wanted. We didn't come from that background. I couldn't afford them. And my parents didn't want me to have them. So I'd walk in with my high-tech trainers from BHS. They were about 10 quid or whatever they were. And to me, it didn't make a difference. I didn't really know at that time whether high-tech was good or bad. They were just trainers that my parents bought me. Now, everyone, the cool kid at school had the latest Nike trainers. All of a sudden, I start thinking that he's now surrounded by everyone. Everyone's talking about his trainers. Everyone's giving him adoration. Everyone's giving him

respect. Everyone's talking about his trainers. So now I think that if I want to have that same experience and love from people, that I need to get that. Not realizing that I may be able to get deeper love from people by being kind and compassionate. That I may actually be able to build a real relationship with people if I'm loving and considerate and empathetic. And it's so crazy how your life can become about

pursuing something. And that's why Jim Carrey puts it best. And I'm paraphrasing. He says, you know, everyone in the world should achieve everything they've ever wanted and accomplish everything they've ever pursued just to realize that it's not the point. Now that doesn't mean the monk mindset is not about not pursuing your goals. It's actually about pursuing your truest goals, your truest self, and your most authentic aligned goals. So it's not about not having goals. It's about making sure that your goals are actually yours. Just taking a quick break to give a shout out to AG1, one of the sponsors of today's show. Now, if you're looking for something at this time of year to kickstart your health, I'd highly recommend that you consider AG1. AG1 has been in my own life for over five years now. AG1 has been in my own life for over five years now. It's a science-driven daily health drink with over 70 essential nutrients to support your overall health.

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If you want to take advantage of this limited time offer, all you have to do is go to drinkag1.com forward slash live more. That's drinkag1.com forward slash live more. forward slash live more. The next clip comes from episode 110, and it's with the US entrepreneur, Tom Bilyeu. Now in this episode, we discussed identity, how to become resilient,

and how to view criticism as a gift. People have, they have created an identity without realizing that they've created an identity. So when you, if you're going to recognize that your identity in and of itself is a construction and then ask yourself, okay, well, what would be the ideal identity to construct? The answer is to be that of the learner. If you have a fixed mindset and your identity is something that is anything other than being a learner, it is very fragile. So to use Nassim Taleb's language, you need to build an identity that is anti-fragile. Because if you don't, when someone attacks you, what happens?

You feel badly about yourself, right? It's very easy to get under somebody's skin because you've triggered their insecurities. When you trigger their insecurities, the psychological immune system kicks in and it says, no, no, no, Ron again, you're not bad. They're bad. They're dumb. They don't know what they're talking about. They're an idiot. Only a fool would not be keto

or not be a vegan or whatever their identity is wrapped around. And so they go on the offensive and they never stop to think, hey, I'll give everyone listening, lean in. I want you to hear this part. When somebody tries to hurt you, they will almost always start with something real so they're going to come at you with the thing that they know you're most insecure about and so why do people when somebody um people always like oh if they come after you for your looks it's because they've lost no they're coming after you for something they know will hurt you so people are coming after you at a place where they are most likely to trigger you. The triggering is the psychological immune system, which is beneficial because people with the

highest levels of self-delusion also report the highest levels of happiness. So that's incredible, right? That's super powerful. I'm so grateful for the psychological immune system. I can only imagine the number of times it saved me from spiraling into despair because I see myself a little too accurately. So I get its use. But if you flip your mentality and say, my identity is not as a entrepreneur, it's not as a vegan, it's not as a doctor or a podcaster, my identity is that of the learner. That's it. The only thing that I value myself for is my willingness to admit when I'm wrong and to learn. Now, the secret power there is one, it's anti-fragile. So the more you attack somebody for being stupid, if they're a learner, I am literally asking one

question when somebody says I'm doing something wrong or I'm dumb. What am I doing wrong? In what way am I dumb? Because if you give me that piece of information, I grow more powerful. What am I doing wrong? In what way am I dumb? Because if you give me that piece of information, I grow more powerful. So I'm always looking at the hilarious secret about wanting people to criticize you is like the more you try to hurt me

with something real, I have the chills. The more you try to hurt me with something real, the more powerful I'm gonna grow because I'm actually going to open myself up. Even though you're saying it to hurt me, you are actively trying to tear me down. You're probably gonna hit me with something that I can learn from.

And so what I always tell people is when people are chucking rocks at your head, think of them as actually being gold nuggets or bricks or whatever. And you can take that gold to the bank. You can take that brick and build a house. Like however you wanna think of it, but you have to let it hit you.

You can't deflect it and send it flying off in another direction. You've gotta to take it. It's going to sting a little, but then you're going to have that material with which you can do something. And so if you build your identity around being the learner and you're constantly growing over time, you grow more powerful, but you have to lower the psychological immune system, or you can tweak it much like you can go in and edit a virus to deploy something in the human body you can edit the psychological immune system to say the only thing you can protect me with is that i'm the learner love it i mean i love that i love this idea of being

anti-fragile what that's gonna seem to live for you yeah what a beautiful concept what a powerful idea particularly these days, right? We're all getting offended at every little thing. We can't put anything out without getting offended by someone. But what does that tell you? You know, as we discussed, Tom, I mean, I love, these days I'm in a really good place where I feel I can, any friction in my life, anything that starts to bother me, for me, that's an opportunity to learn. That's an opportunity. Why is that bothering me? Why is that triggering me? Is there an element of truth behind this? Or do I disagree? I don't think I'm as anti-fragile as I would like to be.

In fact, I know I'm not because I'm, you know, I'm constantly trying to grow this stuff. But it is even just that flipping mindset whereby instead of looking at who's posted the comments and looking them up and thinking, what do they know, right? That sort of thing. It's like, hold on a minute. Is there an element of truth to this? Next up is England football team psychologist Pippa Grange. Now, Pippa believes that many of us are performing at life rather than living our lives. And in this clip from episode 126, which is probably one of my favorite conversations of the entire year, she explains why we should stop holding back, put fear aside, and allow ourselves to live the life that we want to live.

side and allow ourselves to live the life that we want to live. There's a poverty in uniformity. So when we try and make everybody cookie cutter the same, when we have this sort of central idea of what good looks like or what enough looks like, and everybody's moving to that middle ground, I think it's just, it strips us of the richness of our humanness, of everything that we are, of the spirit in a way, you know. And for me, when we just try and conform to one archetype, one way of being, what a loss because we have to trim off all these slightly untidy edges that are where all the gorgeousness is in people. And I think that's such a shame. Why do people wear suits and ties? Why do we still do that? What is it about moving to that sort of central model of how you're supposed to be,

whether you're a child or an adult, working in a bank kind of thing, you're still doing that same thing, that there is this way of being that shuts down so much of ourselves. I think it's a shame. You know, it's one of the trappings of how we show ourselves as good enough or the same or proper or professional or, you know, all these ways of showing ourselves as enough and fitting in and conforming. But I think maybe more importantly is how free we feel to share opinions, to put our views out there, to express what we care about and not have to trim it, tidy it up, hold back so much. That's really where the pain is and the loneliness, I think, for a lot of people. Because the more you hold back so much. That's really where the pain is and the loneliness, I think, for a lot of people. Because the more you hold back from what you really feel,

the more you're performing your life, not living it. And that's a problem. That I could feel shivers, as you said, that you're performing in your life, not living it. That is so powerful, Pippa, because I see that with society. I see it with people around me. I see it with my friends. I've seen it with myself. I personally think that we're performing a lot of the time and we're performing because we need to feel that we're seen in a particular way so that we're good enough. So if we could unpack some more of that, I think that mental freedom is on the other side of it, or more mental freedom is on the other side of it. It's the performative nature

of us showing up and with all our, what's that beautiful quote? And I don't remember who said it, but personally, I'm just a bunch of flaws stitched together with good intentions. And it's perfect because it's not about accept, it's not about sort of a resignation or presuming you won't try and find your very best potential or express your talent as best you can. But it's the idea that if you don't do it a particular way, you're not worthy and good enough as a human being and and therefore everything else is is sort of anchored into that yeah i i'll be honest with i can't shake this this this idea that you mentioned are you performing at life or are you living life i think i think it's so powerful i i think i again i can't imagine that won't have an impact on every single person listening or watching this right now. I'd ask everyone to just ask themselves, are you performing at life or are you living your

life? It's so simple yet so profound. And I would want to just add to that, that it's not another area to lay blame on yourself, you know we all do it the whole conversation the whole compassionate conversation i'm hoping to have is like okay where's the dial down button how do i turn this down we all do it it springs up how do i turn it down again you know and how do i let go sometimes we feel like we've got to add something most of the time this stuff is just letting go it's like uncurling your hands and letting go of some stuff trusting yourself a bit more being brave in that way rather than another level of perfectionism that you have to achieve our breath lies at the intersection of our physical health, our mental health, and our emotional health.

And breathing and breath work has been a really popular topic on this podcast. Next up is the human performance specialist, Brian McKenzie. And back on episode 113, he explained how we can use the power of our breath to become more present and help us counteract the constant stimulus of modern day life. Breathing could well be one of the simplest and one of the most accessible things to all of us. Yet it's something that very few of us are actively looking at and actively practicing. Yeah. Why do you think that is? I think we've moved ourselves far enough away from inside out understanding that outside in has become our go-to default. I look at my phone for an answer to something, right? I'm on social media for things, for answers to things. I look at heart rate monitors for things. I look, you know, it

continues to add up on the outside in trying. So we're missing the, there's a big variant in that, like there's a big variation in that because to understand how you feel, you have to go in, you have to go to the base layer of what's going on. And at the fundamental layer of all of this is breathing. And so actually taking the time to actually reorganize and feel things, you know, people are so stressed out and it's like, that's all just a conceptualization. That's just story.'s all just a conceptualization. That's just story. That's just a narrative. We are designed to handle stress at very high output. It, and, and maybe,

and then I'm, I'm stealing this from a friend of ours, David Bidler, but maybe it's not that we have a disorder. Maybe it's not that, you know, anxiety and all this stress is, is actually disorder. Maybe this is just a natural reaction to the amount of stimulus to the stimulus that we're taking in from the outside and not paying attention to things from the inside. Because when I, I've met and worked with a lot of high level people, whether athletes, executives, um, whoever, right? The people that are functioning the highest are shutting out everything else. They're in their environment and what they're in, like the conversation you and I are having right now. I'm not thinking about the drive that I've

got to go do, except right now when I say that, right now I'm distracting myself. And so this is where the context of things starts to happen. And then I start to overload more because I'm distracting myself. And so this is where the context of things starts to happen. And then I start to overload more because I'm in an environment I should be paying attention to. And I'm not feeling what's going on with that and present in that situation. And so breathing is that thing that I can go and bring myself right back and stop a lot of the physiological ramifications of that stuff. If we were still out there, meaning still out in nature, still trying to survive, right? Like,

like cave people, right? Like we wouldn't even need to be worrying about breathing because we'd be existing in a natural environment, responding to that natural environment in the way that it, that we should have, right. Versus putting ourselves into places where comfort and convenience and the illusion of safety becomes this very, um, it, it, it encompasses our entire life. A lot of people will listen to this. We'll probably be thinking, well, you know, it's all very well moving out to nature, but I don't have access to that. And so why the breath really fascinates me, because I've worked in many different areas. I've looked after affluent patients. I've also looked after very deprived patients. And I guess breathing is free. Breathing is accessible to everybody. And then what that naturally lends itself to is if you

have control over your breath, even if you are living in an inner city where there is a lot of noise around you and there's a lot of inputs that you are constantly having to fight off, well, at least you have a tool like a shield where you can use for your body to help you survive in that environment. This is where that hack world has to come in if we're existing in these places, right? Is we have to actually start to hack things and breathing is one of those hacks. We're staying with the phenomenal power of our breaths with my next guest, science journalist

and author James Nestor. Now breathing is one of the only ways that we can exert control over our autonomic nervous system. And in this clip from episode 124 of the podcast, he explains why the way we breathe is so important for the health of our body and for the health of our body and for the health of our minds.

By changing the way in which you breathe, you can actually change how your mind is processing thoughts and feelings and emotions. We can almost induce a feeling of anxiety and panic by changing the way that we breathe. Of course we can. And if anyone wants to do that, you can start breathing in this very unhealthy way right now. You will stimulate a sympathetic response and that's easily measured. So I thought this was interesting as well at UCSF, which is very close to my house, University of California, San Francisco, Dr. Margaret Chesney had worked for decades on National Institutes of Health Research looking into something called continuous partial awareness, also known as email apnea.

And what she had found was that when we sit down at our desks in the morning, one estimate says that 80% of office workers do this. We open up our email, got Zoom on, got Twitter on. Oh my God, I have 60 emails. We stop breathing. We just stop breathing and then we go. So she called it email apnea because we're so distracted and stressed out by what's going on. If you think about when you're extremely, let's say there's a tiger coming around the corner here of my house, what am I going to do? I'm going to be silent because that is a reflex reaction to be very scared, to be silent so you don't become prey. And once it's on, once the fight is on, I'm going to breathe a ton to get more energy to my body, to feed more energy to my brain and heart and other essential muscles to get me out of that

situation or to fight off that thing. But we do the same thing unconsciously at work. Even though there's no tiger around, even though there's nothing threatening us, our sense of threat has become so sensitized that so many of us will stop breathing or start breathing completely dysfunctional. And she's found that if you do this for long enough, it can have some of the same effects on us as sleep apnea.

By that, I mean neurological disorders, physical problems, again, spiking blood glucose, adrenaline, and it's just something so few of us are aware of, and I was wearing a pulse ox and all these different measuring what happened. Every morning, I put this stuff on and sit down. was wearing a pulse ox and all these different measuring what happened every morning i put the stuff on and sit down my breathing would go to hell every single morning um and i realized that you know that's probably a reason why around 11 30 i'd get i used to get the slight headache used to feel kind of fatigued it was still morning time and i wasn't full of energy and so by just switching your breathing,

again, you can allow your body to work so much more efficiently. As a society, we're probably over-breathing, okay? Can we individually practice a little bit every day where we sort of slow that down? So we know that this slower breathing, we know how it affects us and we know that most of us are breathing too much

and too often. Dr. Patricia Gerbarg and Dr. Richard Brown, who's at Columbia, have used this for people with anxiety and depression, even bulimia and anorexia. All of these different maladies that you would think wouldn't have anything to do with breathing, but these populations traditionally breathe way more than they should. They're constantly stressed out. And it's completely touching to see these people be reacquainted with their breath because they've completely lost control of it over decades. And just to take a slow and steady breath in, a lot of them instantly freak out because it's way too slow to them. They associate that with an attack. But once they acclimate to it, this might take a session or two to really get this down.

You watch this transformation occurring. You just watch the stress just lift from their faces. You can adopt healthy breathing practices anywhere. And we know that there's a solid foundation of science between all of these things. We have seen people absolutely transform by adopting simple breathing habits. This is not a placebo effect. It's absolutely real. And I'm convinced I've experienced this myself. I've talked to dozens and dozens of people who have also experienced it. I've talked to the leaders in the field who have introduced me to all of their data. And I find that this is an underappreciated and under-acknowledged aspect of our health, but that's starting to change and it couldn't happen

sooner, especially right now in the midst of a pandemic. focusing on your breathing can really have some transformative effects. 2020 has highlighted that one of the only things we know for sure in life is that things will never stay the same. Change is a constant, yet many of us resist it. My guest for episode 123 of the podcast was the wonderful psychotherapist, Julia Samuel. And in this episode, she spoke about the many living losses we are experiencing and that how we respond to change in many ways determines how our lives will unfold. Busyness is an anesthetic. So it stops us feeling. When you're busy, you go to your kind of thinking part of the brain and your capacity to really feel and emote kind of lowers. So that when you're busy, you're kind of on all the time. And for change, to process change,

we need space so that you can feel. Because oxytocin is the kind of feeling safe hormone in our bodies that tells us that we're safe. And through that oxytocin, that allows us to feel safe, to think, to reflect, adapt, change and thrive. When we're very busy, we can go at different gears. So, I mean, if you're really in trauma and terrified, you're in sort of fourth gear and you don't change at all. You're just on alert, as you know very well, fight or flight or freeze, and you're not able to think. But you can have lots of, there's a spectrum of it. able to think but you can have lots of there's a spectrum of it but as a sort of say second gear you feel enough to kind of be able to function but you don't um adapt or process or make sense

and you don't feel very much because you're distracted the whole time distraction i think is i think it's something that we all do i think it it's, you know, in some ways, I sort of feel, Julia, that it's never been easier than now to distract ourselves. We've got this real conflict, haven't we, where we've all been put under, you know, pressure in a way that we've possibly never felt before. Certainly, I know in my lifetime, I've never experienced anything like this. or certainly I know in my lifetime, I've never experienced anything like this. And actually what we want to do on one level is kind of sit with those feelings,

see what's coming up and processing them. Yet the flip side to that is we've got endless ways now to distract ourselves, whether it's Instagram, YouTube, Netflix, books, podcasts, whatever it is, is this something that you think is problematic for society as a whole at the moment? Before we get back to this week's episode, I just wanted to let you know that I am doing my very first national UK theatre tour. I am planning a really special evening where I share how you can break free from the habits that are holding you back and make meaningful changes in your life

that truly last. It is called the Thrive Tour. Be the architect of your health and happiness. It is called the Thrive Tour, be the architect of your health and happiness. So many people tell me that health feels really complicated, but it really doesn't need to be. In my live event, I'm going to simplify health and together we're going to learn the skill of happiness, the secrets to optimal health, how to break free from the habits that are holding you back in your life. And I'm going to teach you how to make changes that actually last. Sound good? All you have to do is go to drchatterjee.com forward slash tour, and I can't wait to see you there. This episode is also brought to you by the Three Question Journal, the journal that I designed and created in partnership with Intelligent Change.

Now, journaling is something that I've been recommending to my patients for years. It can help improve sleep, lead to better decision-making, and reduce symptoms of anxiety and depression. It's also been shown to decrease emotional stress, make it easier to turn new behaviours into long-term habits, and improve our relationships. There are, of course, many different ways to journal, and as with most things, it's important that you find the method that works best for you.

One method that you may want to consider is the one that I outline in the three-question journal. In it, you will find a really simple and structured way of answering the three most impactful questions I believe that we can all ask ourselves every morning and every evening. Answering these questions will take you less than five minutes, but the practice of answering them regularly will be transformative. Since the journal was published in January, I have received hundreds of messages from people telling me how much it has helped them and how much more in control of their lives

they now feel. Now, if you already have a journal or you don't actually want to buy a journal, that is completely fine. I go through in detail all of the questions within the three question journal completely free on episode 413 of this podcast. But if you are keen to check it out, all you have to do is go to drchatterjee.com forward slash journal or click on the link in your podcast app. I think it's whether you do it in awareness or out of awareness. So I think scrolling, listening to podcasts, scrolling through Instagram, when you're choosing to do that is a perfectly fine pastime.

I think what I'm talking about is that, yes, you're right. We all do want agency. We do. Some people have more sense of their own agency than others, but I think we all want to feel that we can affect change in our own life and affect the life that we want to kind of have a goal that we're heading for and that we can make the choices from informed information to get there. But also, from informed information to get there. But also we don't like discomfort. So my kind of big message is that pain is the agent of change. And that's through grief when you're grieving someone that has died or a living loss, which a lot of the pandemic has been. So there's been obviously

45,000 deaths from the pandemic. So that is grief from death. But there's been multiple living losses, loss of structure, loss of jobs, loss of trust in tomorrow is going to be the same as today, loss in health. Many, many aspects of our kind of trust in the world have been turned upside down. And my kind of message is that we can't fight those feelings, you know, because if you squash them, they come out sideways, they come out in a different way. And they tend to come out in our relationships or in our bodies, you know, our mind and our body are completely connected. So that if we give ourselves time and opportunities to find out what we feel and find ways to reflect and feel it, sort of loss orientation, if you like, then we can have restoration orientation where we watch Netflix, we have fun, we drink, we do the

other stuff that's engaging and not such emotional intensity, or it might be emotional intensity if that's what we want, but you allow space for both. And one doesn't knock the other out, that you hold both side by side and oscillate between them. My final guest is the one and only Peter Krohn, also known as the Mind Architect. Now, in this clip from episode 121, which was Peter's second appearance on the podcast,

he explains why one of the most important things we can do to improve our health and well-being is to take a moment to reflect. is to take a moment to reflect. Slow down. Everyone's in a hurry to get to a future where one day they don't have to be in a hurry. You know, if you just look at that, right? It's like people are working in jobs they don't enjoy, you know, to hopefully have sufficient money one day

so that they can relax and have fun. But, you know, to what degree could we incorporate some of that now and actually take a breath, like quite literally, just stop and breathe for a minute, because it is so conditioned within us to survive. So your point about the hurry, the urgency, this competitive nature of society, it's a survival paradigm. And to me, real success is where I can be at peace in the midst of chaos. And that's got nothing to do with my bank account. It's got nothing to do with whoever's on my arm as a beautiful man or a beautiful woman or the title on my business card. It's can I be comfortable in my own, regardless of what's going on around me? And that to me is a human being who's found the true definition of success.

Because I'm blessed to work with people who have more money than time. And they would traditionally be seen as the most successful because of their net worth. Yet, if you were to understand the inner mechanics of their feelings and their thoughts and their relationships, you would see somebody who's quite broken and who's very upset and is on all sorts of medication and doesn't know how to feel compassion for their partner and certainly doesn't feel loved by anybody so is that really success or is that just somebody who's got a lot of cash so i think it's the opportunity to redefine what does it mean to be a successful human being. And this is why I talk about this work, because it's not this linear track of one day future scenarios of when I have, right, fill in the blank, enough money, the best body, the right

partner, the bigger home, the best job, the blah, blah, blah. That is this perpetual waiting game, which is saying that my happiness, my freedom, and my peace are perennially ahead of me. But if you just understand that, then you have to be. You have to be at some state in a mild state of dis-ease or frustration or lack of contentment. Because the way your brain is conditioning your relationship to life is that what I want is in the future. So that speaks to my lack of contentment today. And what I'm inviting people to consider is that you're always where you are, you're never in your future. I'm not saying don't have goals and aspirations, I have many, but I have an intimate relationship with life and the way it is right now. And I'm fully content with the way things are while

still being committed to things that I'm excited to create. True happiness is the absence of the search for happiness. And that gives an entirely different relationship to time that I'm here right now with you in this conversation and there's nothing quote unquote wrong in my life. I'm not worried about where do I have to be next or what am I going to or what are people going to think about what I'm saying? then I wouldn't be in the moment with you. I would be in my own mind. And I feel that is something that people lack. If they could just slow down enough to go, wait a minute,

is my life truly in danger or is that just my perception? Is it really a life-threatening situation or is it just the way it feels? And could I just for a minute sit quietly take a few deep breaths listen to the person I'm with who invariably is going to be a loved one of some form and actually not feel the need to react or control or manipulate or get somewhere that's real relief for people what did you think did you enjoy that compilation episode? I really, really enjoyed listening through it. I hope you did too. There was so much gold there. And as always, I really would

encourage you, try and take one thing that you can start to apply into your everyday life. I really hope those clips inspire you to go back through the back catalogue and listen to some of those original conversations in full. All the links to the original episodes can be found on the show notes page at drchatagy.com forward slash podcast. I also just want to take a moment to say a big thank you to all of you who listen to my podcast each week. You share with your friends, your communities. You take a moment to

review the show on your podcast platform, which really makes a difference. And you also take the time to comment about the show on my social media channels. I do not take this for granted. It is so much appreciated. I do have big plans for the show in 2021. I want to continue pushing myself out of my comfort zone and hopefully do the same for you too. Please don't forget my brand new book, Feel Great, Lose Weight, is coming out in just a few days now. It is not just for people who want to lose excess weight.

It's going to help all of us understand our own behaviors better, help us feel less stressed, talk to ourselves in a much kinder way, and understand, as always, just how impactful the small things that we do each day can be for our overall health. I really would appreciate it if you check the book out. I spent a huge amount of time this year writing it, thinking about new ideas and thoughts. And as always, really working hard to try and simplify ideas so that you can easily apply those tools and techniques in your own life.

Next week, we will be back with not just one, but two very special conversations. So please make sure you have pressed subscribe so you don't miss them when they come out. I want to say a big thank you to my wonderful wife, Vedanta Chatterjee, for producing the show each week, Sarah Swanson for putting this compilation together, and to Richard Hughes for audio engineering. I hope you have a wonderful week. I hope you have some time to switch off, do some reflecting, have some relaxation, do some reflecting, have some relaxation, and I'll be back very, very shortly with my latest conversation. Remember, you are the architects of your own health. Making lifestyle changes always worth it, because when you feel better, you live more.