Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - BITESIZE | Life Lessons from a Brain Surgeon | Dr Rahul Jandial #297

Starting point is 00:00:00 Today's Bite Size episode is brought to you by AG1, a science-driven daily health drink with over 70 essential nutrients to support your overall health. It includes vitamin C and zinc, which helps support a healthy immune system, something that is really important at this time of year. It also contains prebiotics and digestive enzymes that help support your gut health. It's really tasty and has been in my own life for over five years. Until the end of January, AG1 are giving a limited time offer. Usually they offer my listeners a one-year supply of vitamin D and K2 and five free travel packs with their first order. But until the end of January, they are doubling the five free travel packs to

Starting point is 00:00:51 10. And these packs are perfect for keeping in your backpack, office, or car. 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. Welcome to Feel Better Live More Bite Size, your weekly dose of positivity and optimism to get you ready for the weekend. Today's clip is from episode 185 of the podcast with the leading neurosurgeon, Dr. Rahul Jandil. Now, Rahul is often the last hope for patients with extreme forms of cancer. He's observed humanity at its most raw, but also its most robust. And in this clip, he shares some of the powerful lessons he's learned that are applicable to all of us. lessons he's learned that are applicable to all of us.

Starting point is 00:01:52 I've met over 10,000 people operating on more than several thousand, and I've met them all in their crises. I've met them all in their most difficult times in their lives, and they've let me come aboard and partner with them and journey with them for a little bit. And so I started to see the ways in which they coped. I started to see some that were triumphant in moments where I think I would just flail. And so what I've learned as a brain surgeon and neuroscientist is the human story of these people who see growth in their own lives based on their description when we would perceive it as calamity, a cancer diagnosis, a scan where the cancer has spread. And they have shown me that not always, but that difficult times, you know, they hold a reservoir for growth and just sort of the transcendence of the things that usually encumber us, the little thought, the little steps, the little frustrations. When that finish line comes into view, because I take care of advanced cancer

Starting point is 00:02:58 patients, they live differently and they often wonder why did not we have these focuses, you know, focus on these kind of things, quality of life before the cancer diagnosis. I think that can shed light on how to live fully and how to live your life, realizing that it does end one day. And I think those insights are positive and optimistic and triumphant. They're not negative. They're not pessimistic. And so they inspire me. They enlighten me with their descriptions of what they wish they would have done differently now that the end is within sight. What are some of the insights that you've learned that have changed you and changed the way that you live your life? Because it's that frustrating thing about the human experience that we often need to confront our own mortality before we start truly living? What it means for me is not just to live well or live fully, because that's sort of a personal dimension. But what are the lessons we can take from the approach cancer patients implement when they're facing those crises. The approaches that I see cancer patients employ,

Starting point is 00:04:29 utilize, to me, that's fascinating. After the cancer diagnosis, you have to get scans all the time. I mean, it's every three months for life. And I always think, how scary must that be to be in that scanner? What are they going to find? So there's a structure in which they say, okay, it's going to be a rough week because I have a scan and I've had something called scansiety and that's a difficult time. So we compartmentalize because you can't just say, don't stress out. That's not fair, especially with their situation. So they have little release valves and time points when they allow themselves to

Starting point is 00:05:05 stress out that, hey, I've got a brain scan this week. It's going to be a rough week for me. And that's okay. But after and before, let's protect that time to live fully. So that's like one technique I learned from cancer patients that I try to apply to my life as well. I try to apply to my life as well. There's a certain intentionality, isn't there, living like that? And as you describe that, I'm struck by how many of us just live on autopilot. We don't really think about what we're doing day to day. We're just existing.

Starting point is 00:05:40 Before we know it, it's the end of the month. Before we know it, the season has changed. But what I'm hearing from these patients is that because of the three monthly scan, they have a certain rhythm to life because of these fixed points. Brother, you captured it well, the word season. So seasons and gardens and ecosystems is the right way to think of your brain. And that's something cancer patients do. There will be a season of growth, but there will also be a winter. That doesn't mean the winter puts you back. It's not two steps forward and one step back. You're pulsing through your life. There are moments of triumph, but that's not forever. Maybe that's springtime.

Starting point is 00:06:24 And there are moments of tragedy or difficulty, and that's not forever either. So if we really start to see our brains, and I just wish I could show people, it's like 100 billion electric jellyfish crammed into a skull that's floating in clear liquid, spraying chemicals and electricity like it's Aurora Borealis. If we knew we are like that in our skulls, I think we would see our mind and reactions and behavior differently. And I think your word season is spot on. There are seasons of growth and there are seasons of sort of winter and loss. And there are also sort of seasons within the brain where things are dormant. There are brain cells that are dormant until you have a certain stress. And that's the cue for them to activate. If the stress is too high, they stay dormant. If there isn't any stress, they stay dormant. So if we start to think of our brains as gardens, it fits more with the patterns of life that cancer patients have. A very difficult

Starting point is 00:07:35 diagnosis. What do you do next? Just suffer for the three years ahead or the 13 years ahead? So they bring in this concept of the seasons of their year, difficult moments, surgery, chemotherapy, radiation. That was a difficult season. After that, they have some vitality and a good window to see family and travel that springtime in their life. I think if we do it that way, our stumbles and our difficulties don't feel like setbacks they just feel like something that we we push through we brace through we manage through that crisis for this next spring time in our life that will arrive that that approach in their minds serves them well what about the patients who are not going to be coming back for the three-month scan for those who

Starting point is 00:08:26 it literally is the end of the roads what have you learned from their outlook and therefore you know what can we learn um from hearing their stories well that's harder you know um in their eyes that those those discussions I have in clinic or in those conversations, it's interesting that most often I see them sort of running through a film tape of their life and how quickly it has gone by, where they were born, the key places they lived,

Starting point is 00:09:02 their family, friends, achievements, failures. And that's an intense interaction to see that. That time with them has been very illuminating for me personally, that that time will come for me as well. And I don't live in fear or darkness. Actually, it creates an optimism. Like this morning I got up and I was like, man, I'm thankful to be here today. And what am I going to do with this today? I take my days less for granted after seeing patients look up as my father did. And you can sort of like, almost like a windshield, you can see like the journey of their life. And when I see that impatience, I think there's no time to waste.

Starting point is 00:09:50 And that's very important for me that there's no time to waste. Yeah. What I really get from our conversation today is, yeah, the things we do day to day, yes, they are important, of course. conversation today is yeah the things we do day to day yes they are important of course but the way we think about our life the way we prioritize our life the way we can learn from people who feel that they may be at the end of their life i feel there's some real powerful wisdom there so i wonder if you could just share some of your closing thoughts on that for my audience life at its depths also reveals its heights meaning that people who are struggling can also demonstrate tremendous powers and strength and growth that they didn't know they had in them and to witness that has been powerful.

Starting point is 00:10:53 And the second thing I would say is that no triumph or tragedy is forever. And so if we see our lives and the moments in our lives as seasons, enjoy where you're at. And if you find yourself in a difficult place, that too shall pass and there will be a new season after that. Those are the lessons I've learned. Hope you enjoyed that bite-sized clip. Hope you have a wonderful weekend. And I'll be back next week with my long-form conversation on Wednesday

Starting point is 00:11:21 and the latest episode of Bite Science next Friday.

Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - BITESIZE | Life Lessons from a Brain Surgeon | Dr Rahul Jandial #297

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