HealthyGamerGG - Dr. K Is Back! Mental Health Guide Launch

Episode Date: August 27, 2021

Check Out Dr. K’s Guide to Mental Health Here! https://coaching.healthygamer.gg/guide Taken from stream dated August 19, 2021. Stream Schedule: https://www.twitch.tv/healthygamer_gg on Twitch. Youtube: https://youtu.be/s5cjlHMkOUM for VoD Archive. Support us at https://ko-fi.com/healthygamer if you enjoy our content and would continue helping making it accessible to everyone! Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/healthygamergg/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All righty, chat. Let us begin. How's everybody doing today? It's nice to be back. So welcome to another healthy gamer Gigi stream. My name is Olo Koenogh. I'm a psychiatrist practicing in Boston. Just a reminder that everything we discussed on stream today is intended to be for educational purposes only and nothing is intended to be taken through as medical advice. So stream's going to be a little bit different today. I think it's, I'm just going to chill with y'all if that's cool. Like, I don't have much energy. I was hoping to fill you all in a little bit about, you know, how I've been doing and, you know, just share some kind of random thoughts, just kind of what's at

the top of my head right now. And then hopefully, you know, I think Dr. Dr. K's guide is actually launching today, so we're going to talk a little bit about that. And then we're just going to hang out for a little bit. You need to do a Toto 2 patch review. Oh, man. Pudge hook kills creeps. No. So let's kind of start from the top.

So we went on vacation, and we were, I mean, we took a couple risks, to be honest, like we ate in a few restaurants and things like that. But, you know, when we left on vacation, I think the Delta surge was not that bad in the United States. And so we, you know, took a calculated risk and our kids had been quarantined for like over a year. And so we decided to try to go, for the most part, hiking in the wilderness, you know, with a flight here, there and things like that. But generally speaking, we like, you know, we tried to play it safe. my wife and I are both vaccinated. And the vacation was great. I think the kids really enjoyed it and stuff like that.

It was a lot of fun. We spent a lot of time out in the wilderness, hiking and climbing and seeing water and splashing around in streams and stuff like that. So it was really fantastic. It was nice to kind of unplug from technology for a while. It was interesting. I took a Nintendo Switch

and had every intent to catch up on gaming because it was vacation and ended up playing on the flight there and playing on the flight back. But then like outside of that, you know, I took a couple books. I didn't even read. I just really appreciated sitting and thinking and spending time with, you know, spending time with my family, which was fun. Which I haven't had a vacation in a while now, probably close to two years. So it was nice to really do that. and, you know, I think, yeah, so on the way back, I'm guessing I contracted COVID on the flight, you know, so people are supposed to wear masks on flights.

And, you know, some people around me were not. And so I got COVID. I got the Rona. And then got tested positive on Sunday when I started to feel symptomatic. Thankfully, it was a, it was a breakthrough case of COVID. I got vaccinated early. So I got vaccinated. I got my second dose, I think, at the beginning of February or something like that, if I remember correctly. So overall, the COVID course hasn't been too bad. I strongly urge everyone to get vaccinated. And I think luckily, you know, so I got it, my wife got it, Kutti got it, our kids got COVID. And the funny thing is they're doing well.

So they bounce back pretty quick, quick for which I'm very grateful because Delta variant especially can be bad in kids. So I was really worried about them for, you know, a little while and there was one night where I was, you know, checking their oxygen like every two hours and didn't really sleep and had COVID myself and stuff like that. And thankfully their oxygen levels were fine and stuff like that. Hospitals down here in Texas are full. So was it confirmed Delta? No, but I highly, highly suspect it's Delta. But, you know, the funny thing is they actually recovered faster than Grutti and I did, which then means we've got like, we're in quarantine.

So I'm in day 10 of quarantine now. And we're in quarantine. And, you know, for the last week we've had two relatively healthy kids for which I'm grateful. You know, I'm not really complaining. But it's been hard because Grutti and I are both exhausted and symptomatic and stuff. and our kids are like running around and they're bored and stuff, which has been, you know, wonderful. And it just kind of reminds me how much I have to be grateful for. And it's been like a dark couple of weeks, to be honest. I don't know if this is the COVID or just like, you know,

what's been going on recently. But like my headspace has been bad. I've been, you know, having really, really like dark and negative thoughts thought about kind of like quitting and stuff like that thought about, you know, like just it's a lot and just sort of I'll go back to just being a regular doctor and I'll see patients and I'll have an impact in, you know, a handful of people's lives and it'll be real and I'll do good work and really no one can complain, right? Like, it's not like I'm going to be sitting on my ass and playing video games. And so, you know, I think it's just an important reminder that, you know, irrespective of how resilient you are or whatever, you've been through that losing your health and your brain being in an inflamed state

and not taking care of your body and like even if your body is under assault that like that's going to affect your mind right like that's going to happen and I encourage all you all to think a little bit about you know what you for those of you who are struggling in terms of your mental state really think about what you're doing for your body like what are you eating you know how are you sleeping what substances are you using and and recognize that all of those things will be affecting your mind in some way. Like we do know that the brain exists. So if you're kind of a pure biologist and you kind of say that the mind is simply a function of the brain

and there's no those kind of consciousness or anything outside, that's fine. You can even accept that. If you accept all that, then it becomes even more important to take care of your brain and your body because your brain exists within the body. And so anything going on in the body is going to affect the brain, right? So we have inflammatory cytokines, which are little molecules that are immune cells release that will travel through our bloodstream and affect how our brain works. And so for a while, I was feeling really, I was kind of balanced between, I shouldn't say

balanced, I should say swinging like a pendulum, between feeling like, you know, some degree of despair and stuff like that. Like, you know, I was following some of the stuff that's been going on in Afghanistan and and with the IPCC, like, climate report, and, like, I think Greece was, like, literally on fire for a couple of days. I think they got, you know, very, very, like, 48 degrees Celsius weather or 116 degrees Fahrenheit. And, like, you know, it just seems like, like, the world is going to crap. Like, you know, people are getting sick. Like, Texas ordered five mortuary trucks because we do everything bigger in Texas, and we love trucks.

And so for those of you who don't know, you know, mortuary truck is like, like it's like a trailer, like an 18 wheeler, like a semi-truck that's used to store dead bodies. And so there are times where, you know, I really felt like the world was going to hell, like, real fast. And it can be, you know, it can be hard to stay positive. And so, you know, I didn't stay positive, to be honest. There's another part of me that felt like when I did sort of find, you know, moments of kind of feeling good and I had like bad dreams and like had trouble sleeping and crap like that. I think the overwhelming thing that I actually feel right now is actually gratitude. Because despite how bad things are, I'm like, I'm actually one of the lucky ones, right?

So I remember watching this terrifying video of like, you know, people clinging on to planes as they we're leaving Afghanistan. And it's like, I have a lot to be grateful for. I picked up medicine for my whole family and we have, you know, good health insurance, which we're like lucky for. And, um, you know, I had to pay like $45 or something for, for co-pays or whatnot for like medicine. And like, we can afford that. Right. Like, I'm lucky. My kids at the end of the day, like, are not waiting in an emergency room, um, for a ventilator that doesn't, you know, that's occupied. Like, there are a lot of out there who have it way, way worse. I have a community that generally speaking, like, supports me and cares about me and stuff like that. And like don't underestimate the

value of like caring from random strangers over the internet. It really does matter, right? Like to be loved is like a rare thing. And I think a lot about, you know, like I've had my fair share of struggles to be sure. Like, don't get me wrong. But, you know, I've, you know, I've all. always had people who, like, loved me and cared about me, which is not something that everyone who's watching today has. You know, I had family members that would bring us food and stuff like that. And, like, you know, I had, you know, people taken care of us, right? Like, I got taken care of.

Like, Grutti got symptomatic a few days after I did. So for the first couple of days, she was, like, taking care of us. And I'm lucky to have people who are there to take care of me. And not everyone has that, right? Like, so I think it's an important point about kind of comparison and, and thinking about what you're capable of and Harma and all this kind of stuff. I know I'm kind of rambling now, but I think, like, what people need to understand is, you know, the standard that you compare yourself against really needs to be,

I mean, what you compare yourself against really needs to be like, you need to take into account, like, what your spawn location is, right? Like, what's your RNG? Because at the end of the day, like, COVID, thankfully, was not that bad for us, right? So, like, we're both vaccinated, right? We come from families and communities that are, like, pro-vaccination. I understand the Taliban has banned COVID vaccines. You know, we live in a part of the world where, like, we have access to medical care and we have, you know, I quarantined in this room.

I don't know if you guys can see it, but I had, like, a mattress here. like quarantined here for, you know, a couple of days. And I'm lucky. And if y'all are struggling, I think it's important to remember that, you know, when you look around and you see other people who are doing well, you really have to be very careful about paying attention to what are all the supports that these people have, that allows them to do well. You know, getting, you know, freshly cooked food that was like health. and stuff like that, like that counts for a lot in terms of recovery, right? Like maintaining your energy levels, being able to afford medicine,

having people care about you, having, like, the healthy gamer team has been absolutely amazing because, like, Ruthie and I have both been out, right? So, like, we're the ones who, you know, for the most part, I was about to say run things, but I think that what we really learned is that we don't, right? So, like, the healthy gamer team here, we've got an awesome team of devs, and our coaching program has been running, and like people have continued to help people. Our coaches have really stepped up, you know,

and they've done a good job at like continuing to do the work that we're here to do, which is to try to make the world a slightly better place because sometimes it really does feel like the world's going to hell. And so I'm grateful. And if you all are struggling, be a little bit compassionate towards yourself, right? Think a little bit about, you know, what kind of advantages do you have and what kind of advantages don't you have?

I think one of the saddest things about people in this community is that, like, they're not, a lot of them aren't loved and cared for by their parents. And like, that's one of the most basic things, right? When we think about what it is, like, you know, basic spawn, good spawn versus bad spawn. Like, having family members who, you know, care. I don't know if you guys got that. And so if you do have a crap, you do have a, right? So speaking of luck, right, that was one of my kids. I don't even know what she's doing. And yeah, so it's nice to have, you know, someone, that child love you every day. And so it's, I'm lucky.

And I think for those of y'all who feel like you're kind of struggling and don't have things going your way and stuff like that, you know, be a little bit compassionate towards yourself, cut yourself a break. Like, really think about, you know, what it is that, you know, we take full responsibility for all of our failing sometimes. Like, it's a good thing in, you know, to take responsibility for your actions and stuff. But I find that a lot of times people will ignore all of the, like, you know, they'll look at the final result and they won't look at like all of the factors that contribute to that result. So, you know, why am I successful? It's because when I fucked up for a few years, and I definitely did

fucked up, and I worked hard, and I deserve some amount of my success, I'm sure. But at the end of the day, like, when I was 24 years old and, like, couldn't make rent for three months in a row, this was 14 years ago, I had a brother who was kind enough to, like, pay my rent for three months, right? And he, like, really didn't ask questions and hasn't asked to be paid back and stuff like that. And those kinds of financial supports are critical. Um, And so if y'all are struggling, I'd say, you know, a couple things to keep in mind. The first is cut yourself some slack. If you grew up in a situation where you don't have loving and supportive parents

and you're not financially independent and stuff like that, like you can't expect to function the way that people who have all of those advantages often do, right? And so work on, you know, whatever little thing you can try to move forward because, unfortunately, I think the world needs you. and the world needs you to be better because we can't help everyone and so it's not so much about needing you to be better so that you can help other people

a lot of people I think really get caught up in that but I think that there are people out there that really really need help and you may be one of them and I think by all means you should accept help there's no shame in accepting help that's the other thing if you guys want to talk about you know how I got to where I am I accept help I do not turn it away

Like when people offer to help, I take it, you know. Because I think the world really is going to need you because, like, what I see is, like, not good. Like, it's kind of interesting because for a long time, you know, I was kind of thinking about the central sleeping last night and a nightmare. So I was pondering at, like, five in the morning. And I was kind of thinking a little bit about, like, the future and what the future holds. And for a long time, people, you know, think about the future and they think about you know, like how the future will be different.

And it occurred to me that for the majority of humanity, when people kind of look at the future, you know, they haven't seen a whole lot of change. And I'm beginning to appreciate how much of a luxury that that may be. You know, and I don't know what the world is going to look like a year from now, two years from now, four years from now, ten years from now, 20, 30, 40. It really seems like some of the stuff in the IPCC report, I'm not an expert on climate science and politics and stuff.

I don't know how it was funded or things like that. But, you know, it's scary stuff, man. And so take care of yourselves. Because I don't think that the world is going to be fixed by other people. That's the really, really scary thing. I think the one thing that we're really seeing, and I don't know people are following, you know, a lot of people are not even from the U.S.,

but the Texas governor recently banned mask mandates. So it's like schools cannot require people to wear masks. Our ICUs are full. You know, our medical workforce is like down to 80% capacity. We're ordering refrigerated trucks to store the number of dead bodies that we're going to be dealing with. And there's someone who's actively trying to prevent the use of masks who's in our leadership. And so I'm not, I'm really not making a political comment. I'm really not trying to.

I know I'm sure it sounds that way, but it's not, I'm just kind of, I'm just kind of thinking that like, it's scary because I think we're living in a world where like you taking care of yourself is like not enough. Right. Like when we think about some of these things like climate change and this may just be like the despairing mindset I've been in. But, you know, there are some people who can screw things up for you. Like, I'm pretty sure that, you know, if people had behaved responsibly worn their masks and everyone had gotten vaccinated that me or my kids wouldn't have gotten COVID. But we live in a world where you get affected by other people. And so that's really the thought that makes me think about, you know, why do we, ultimately why I decided not to quit, at least yet. I mean, who knows, I may change my mind at some point.

But, you know, it's because I think, like, the world needs us to do better, right? each and every one of you. Like, we need to do more. And sometimes doing more is not saving the world. You guys don't have to start a mental health startup to try to save the world. Not everyone has to do that. I think at the first and foremost, it's taking care of yourself. And what does that mean? I think it means if you have toxic people in your life, starting the process of setting boundaries with them. If you feel like you can't do anything or that you've fallen so far behind, try to do something. you know don't let something don't let everything get in the way of doing something don't let everything be the enemy of doing something because that's the only way that this is going to work right

like people have to start somewhere and you got to do what you can and i know it's hard to do stuff i mean you know it's it's interesting right despite all of my advantages and all of my resilience and all of my yogic training like i felt despair another thing to remember is that you know despair and positive sentiment are fluctuations of the mind, right? So try to remember that the mind, by definition, does not stay happy. And that's what's so sad when you kind of see Bridezilla's right. There are these people who want this perfect wedding and they piss off a bunch of people and they're incredibly inconsiderate to have this perfect day. And how long does the happiness from that perfect day last? They spend, you know, $80,000, have all of their friends,

friends lose weight and wear dresses and have perfect pictures and don't let friends who've been there their entire lives in the picture because they've got a tattoo or prettier than they are. And how long does that happiness from your perfect wedding last? And so, you know, I know it's tough, but like try to remember that it's the nature of the mind to equilibrate. Now, some people may be saying, but I've been depressed for years and I've been anxious for years and stuff like that. And I can understand that. I too was probably depressed for years when I really stop and think about it. And remember that depression can manifest in different ways and different people, right? It's not always like getting out of, you know, a ton of trouble getting out of bed.

For some people, depression is getting out of bed, you know, cleaning yourself up, putting on some makeup, going to work, pretending to smile for eight hours, coming home and laying on the sofa in some kind of mind-numbing crush of like inability to feel, pleasure and just not wanting tomorrow to come because you don't know how many more days you can continue to live a fake life. And from the outside, things will be fine. Right. That's how it looks. So it manifestss in different people in different ways. But I think the only way that this works is for you to try to do something. And I know that a lot of y'all are and that's what we're here for. Right? Because I think that telling y'all to try harder if you are struggling, if you do have

crippling anxiety if you, you know, you're trying to put your life together. Like, that's literally why we exist, like is an organization. That's the mission that we've got. And I think that, you know, you can look at the world and you can feel despair and I certainly have. And there's also like signs of hope, right? There, the Taliban took over Afghanistan and now, like, evacuation, they're like letting people leave, right? So there was this desperate moment where people thought they were going to get trapped and stuff like that. And as I understand, I don't know how real this right? Because I get my information from the internet, which I don't know if you guys know this, but the internet is like, you know, sometimes the information isn't perfect.

But they're letting other people evacuate it appears. And so there are bright spots, right? Like there are, you know, big planes that carried 800 people out, you know, the day of. So those, like, there are breaks here and there. At the end of the day, I have a lot to be grateful for because it seems like my kids are pretty healthy. And there are bright spots, right? There's y'all, too. I mean, we're a community of people who are here to help each other out. And I think that, you know, I saw a post on the subreddit from someone who is doing well and benefited from coaching. And I've been lurking. I've been doing what I usually do on Reddit, which is lurk. And that's, you know, we will, I think there's, there's reason to hope. And it's tough.

but try to stay, you know, as motivated as you can, lean on other people for help. For fuck's sake, if you guys, you know, do have mental health issues, like go see a mental health provider, right? So when we say that this is for educational purposes only, it's not like just a legal disclaimer. It's like genuinely there's a huge difference between listening to someone talk about mental health on the internet and having a human being dedicated, you know, generally speaking in therapy, it's one hour a week to like, spending time trying to being thoughtful and spending time with you to try to help you improve your life um and so if if you guys are suffering from i saw someone in chat was you know laying on the sofa trying to overcome their anxiety and like if you're not in mental health treatment like you really should be because this is the really sad thing is that sometimes we don't accept help right so

if i had to say there's one thing that you know really is I think if this change and I don't know how successful I'd be is I accept help from people, right? And I was about to say there's no shame in that, but let's be honest, there's a lot of shame in accepting help, right? There's a lot of shame in accepting help. How do you get affordable therapy? Okay, so, you know, I think Rad tries to offer grants and stuff. I think there are free clinics. A lot of people don't realize this, but there are free clinics.

You know, so you can do like search for free mental health clinic in your area or community mental health center, and they can oftentimes help you get therapy for free. You know, a lot of people don't know this, but a lot of times providers, like 70% of the people that I've seen over my career as a psychiatrist have been below the poverty line, probably. you know a large chunk of my practice continues to be free care and sometimes it's people who lose jobs and stuff like that like and that's just how it you know it's okay so i know it sounds kind of weird but sometimes you can even ask people it can feel really shaming to beg but you can even ask someone hey i can't really pay your rate but i'd really like to work with you and i really need help could you help me. And sometimes, you know, I like to believe that my colleagues are in it for the right

reasons. Sometimes they, you know, can't say yes. But I think pretty much most of my colleagues will have a small slice at least. I mean, oftentimes not as high as mine is, but we'll have a, you know, 5%, 10% of their people who they'll see for free. And so I think ask around and investigate is the short answer. And I wish I had a better answer for you guys. And frankly, that's why we're doing what we're doing, right? So when we stream and stuff like we're trying to help people out, we can at least educate y'all. And I think part of, you know, so a lot of people have reached out to me

and have wanted to work with me and whatnot, and I'd love to. Don't get me wrong. I really would. But I think that that's actually part of the reason, I guess, is a good segue. To talk a little bit about, you know, why we made Dr. K's guide to mental health. Because at the end of the day, I think that people, you know, what I realized is that my, I can't work with everyone individually. And I know this sounds kind of weird, but because this is the very opposite of working with someone individually. Right.

It's a, it's a, it's a, it's a series of videos. But I think one of the big things that I try to do with people is to, you know, use like branching logic. So if you think about individual work, what is the nature of individual work? It's not a linear track, right? So the whole purpose of individual work is at the beginning when someone comes into my office, I try to figure out, okay, like, is this person depressed? Are they anxious? Are they here to learn how to meditate?

You know, what is going on here? Like, what is appropriate for them? And then what really Dr. Kay's guide is, is it's the way that I work with people individually. So I sat down and thought about, you know, what is like 75% of what I try to share with people when they come into my office. And it's kind of like a choose your own adventure. So, you know, what will then do is I'll try to explain to everyone. Okay, when someone comes in and they say they're depressed, you know, what does that mean?

Like, does that mean that they're mentally ill or are they sad or they, you know, And so, you know, I think this is where I'll have this conversation with them, right? Which is like, what is the difference between being, like, clinically depressed and, like, feeling depressed but not having a mental illness? And that's a really important conversation to have. It's a really important concept to understand. And then, you know, so that's the purpose of the guide is to walk you guys through as best as we can, the journey of, like, how I work with people without actually, like, being able to, like, work with people. And so once you sort of see that, you know, we've got depression, there's clinical depression and non-clinical depression. For some people, you know, non-clinical depression goes down the route of like spirituality.

So then I'll explain to them concepts like dukkha, which is the Sanskrit word for suffering. I'll explain to them what is Dharma. You know, how do you find your Dharma? And then I'll explain to them. And a lot of times when people are curious about Dharma, I'll explain like karma. So, you know, understanding your Dharma. means understanding your karma. I'll talk about sort of what happens in the mind during someone who experiences depression.

Not the clinical illness, but like what are the cognitive features of depression? So how can you understand why your mind despairs and chooses to focus on the negative? And then I'll explain to them the nature of their negative emotions. Like why do we even have negative emotions, right? It's kind of weird that we have all these, that we have like our mind like produces negative emotion for us all the time it's kind of it's kind of bizarre right like why is our mind why is our mind capable of having us feel sad and lonely and hopeless and things like that and then as we understand the nature of of negative emotions and

why we have them so like to teach people how to understand their mind you know i'll explain principles this is something i use a lot principles of edic psychology um it's something our coaches are trained with. And then I'll kind of go into five different patterns that I oftentimes see in people who feel depressed and feel stuck in life, but don't necessarily meet criteria for a clinical illness. And so some people are depressed because they've fallen behind. It's not like they have necessarily a neurochemistry imbalance or an episodic depression or things like that, but they feel they've fallen behind. Shit, I can't like that. And then, you know, the other thing that I'll try to do is, you know, for people, I don't know if you guys can kind of see this.

I can't really point to it. But, you know, this video includes two meditations that are specific to people who have fallen behind. Or maybe there's, these are two meditations for all of these. But, you know, there's, so what I'll try to do is teach people specific meditation videos based on, you know, if they're unable to forgive people, if they feel hopeless all the time. And, but part of that hopelessness is actually protective, which is kind of interesting, right? Because if you're hopeless, then there's no point in trying. And if there's no point in trying, you're never going to fail. And if you're never going to fail, it'll never be a failure.

So instead, you choose hopelessness because it's actually very protective. It protects you. It's a 100% protection against trying and failing. The problem of conditional love, this is unfortunately a really sad one where people are taught from a young age that their worth and values human being is not intrinsic. That whether, you know, whether they're a good person or a bad person depends on their performance. We'll also talk about things like the fantasy trap, which is sort of when your mind, people whose heads get stuck in fantasy. And so, you know, we'll also explain a couple of other things like, you know, a lot of people have questions about what's

coaching, what's therapy, when should I do what, how to deal with these. So that's kind of the the non-clinical track, right? So there's some stuff that overlaps with the meditation module. And, you know, there are different meditations for these. So I guess depression in a holistic lens has three meditations with it. And then down the clinical track. So some people, you know, I do kind of conclude have like a clinical depression. And so based on that, then I'll try to explain to them like the science of like how, you know, depression works. in the brain, I'll explain, you know, the concept of differential diagnosis and like clinical features of depression and I'll even explain general treatment principles. And this is where, you know,

this really is not a substitute for medical care or therapy or things like that. But I think it is, these are the educational, even when I'm treating someone, right? So I'll make a specific medication recommendation or things like that. There's some like treatment principles or treatment philosophy that I approach people with that I think it's completely fine to share, right? So like a lot of people will wonder. So in general treatment principles, we talk about medication and psychotherapy and complementing alternative medicine. So a lot of people will come into my office and they'll ask me,

you know, I don't want medication. Is that okay? And so my answer to them is not specific to them, right? It's not actually like medical care. It's just like what's the relationship? between medication, psychotherapy, and complementing alternative medicine. Do I need to see a psychiatrist? Can I go see an Ayurvedic doctor?

Like, what are the advantages and what are the disadvantages? Right. And so I'll explain all those, and I'll remind you guys that I use all three, right? So I'll do psychotherapy. I'll prescribe medication and I'll use some Ayurvetic interventions. And then, you know, people are curious about this is sort of included for completeness because I think people don't really understand bipolar disorder very well nowadays. Everyone's like, oh my God, my son is bipolar.

No, he's not bipolar. He just gets pissed easily. That doesn't mean you're bipolar. And then we do talk a little bit because a lot of people are curious about Ayurveda. You know, we've had a couple posts a few weeks ago, which I thought were awesome, sort of talking about shortcomings of Ayurveda, my bias towards Ayurveda. I think those are all really fantastic posts, really excellent criticisms. And so I really appreciate when people, you know, this is not, I know we joke about it

being a cult, but it's really not a cult. Like if you guys don't believe in this stuff or you think I'm biased or you don't think I'm being objective, then by all means don't accept what I have to say. And so, and there are a lot of people who are very interested in Ayurveda. So this is kind of like, this is why the guide is designed where it is, right? So we've got a little piece about Ayurveda down here, but the majority, the guide has nothing to do with Ayurveda. We'll talk about, you know, different things relating to Ayurveda and how we approach herbs. The funny thing is a lot of the criticisms we actually talk about. right here, I will talk about criticisms of Ayurveda and stuff like this here.

And this is kind of the downside of trying to stream this stuff is that, like, this is information that I think is going to be very useful and very interesting to a tiny slice of people. So one of the downsides of stream, because people are going in and out, and people don't watch things sequentially, is we can't really go into a lot of detail about, you know, some of these things like brain gut access or shortcomings of Ayurveda, or things that you should be careful about in terms of trying to use herbs and stuff like that. You know, we don't recommend any actual Ayurvedic medicines. So we will talk about herbs that have science behind them just from an educational standpoint.

But when we talk about Ayurveda for depression, we don't really talk so much about Rasa Shastra and some of these other things. Because I think the people who are critical of them were right, right? So I don't do Rasa Shastra. I think Rasa Shastra can be dangerous. For people who don't know what Rasa Shastra is, it's using, if I remember correctly, it's using like heavy metals, treatment, which sort of makes sense scientifically because some of those things may have like immunosuppressant effects, like they can damage your immune system, which if you've got an autoimmune disease can sometimes be therapeutic. So for example, we'll use heavy metals and

some kinds of chemotherapy and stuff like that. So there may be even in Western medicine some indications for this stuff, but we don't recommend any of that stuff here at Healthy Gamer because I think it's risky and it's not well regulated and stuff like that. But for people who are interested in Ayurveda, you know, I'll have people who come into my office. and they are interested in Ayurveda and a lot of people in our community are so I've chosen to include some information about it. You know, if you don't like it, you don't have to do it by all means. And that's really the point of the guide, right, is that like not everything is going to work for every person. And that's what I try to think about as a clinician.

And, you know, things are not getting better, it seems, in the world. And so this is my or our humble attempt because it really is our. I want to say that there are people in the organization who have put in just as many hours in designing this and stuff as I did in writing the material. You know, it took me about six to eight weeks to write 160,000 words, and then a few months to edit them. And then at the end of March, filming was done. And over the last five months, we've had a team of developers and UX designers, UI designers, who have been working week after week after week to make this product. And so this is our attempt to,

someone was kind of saying it's a crash course for mental psychology. Like that's sort of what the first step of it is, right? And then kind of for those of you who struggle more with anxiety, so like understanding, okay. Let me see if I can, let's go to anxiety 101. So I'll sort of show you guys. So like, you know, this is just an example. So of anxiety 101, so we're going to explore like what anxiety means.

Right? So like when people use the word anxiety can mean a physical experience, a mental experience, or a clinical illness. You guys understand? Like that's an important distinction. And when someone comes into my office and they say, I have anxiety, my first question is like, okay, what do you mean by that? Is this a mental disorder that requires treatment? Or is it like your physiology?

Like, is it like your heart beating way too fast? Or are you worried about something? Do you guys get how these are all like different? And so we'll ask and hopefully answer some of these basic questions. Like, why do we even have anxiety? Like, why is the human brain capable of making anxiety? What is anxiety? Where does anxiety come from?

And what is the process of anxiety in our minds? Like, if I were to open up your mind and look at anxiety and how it functions in your mind, what would I see? And so, you know, I think hopefully these will be updated some. So a reminder that this is just the minimum viable product. Okay, guys. So like this needs to be updated and stuff. So we wanted to get it out to you.

We're hoping to add more references and things like that. But we've included scientific references where we can. There's appropriate meditation videos for anxiety. We even included a glossary for, you know, the terms and stuff that we use. So a lot of people have worked really hard on this. So then that's kind of like, you know, when someone comes in and says, I've got anxiety, this is what's going on in my mind is anxiety 101. Okay, what are we dealing with here?

And then if I decide, okay, oh, it sounds like this person has an anxiety disorder. Then we get into a lot of cool stuff, right? So like, what is an anxiety disorder? What does it mean to have a disorder? Because that's like basic stuff that I don't think people explain. And then we review the sort of, you know, psychiatric differentiations of anxiety. So there's generalized things. Oh, crap.

See, like I have to click through. Okay, so just looking at the references, making sure you're good. So, and then this can kind of show you like where you can go next. So you can pick from down here, you know, which is sort of what I do as a clinician, right? Like in my mind, I'll think, okay, like this person has an anxiety disorder. I think what they've got is generalized anxiety disorder. So let me explain to them what generalized anxiety disorder is. And so we'll talk about generalized anxiety disorder.

There's some stuff around sleep here. And then other people may have social anxiety. So how do we understand social anxiety? How do we understand some people may be using marijuana to treat their anxiety? What happens if you use marijuana to treat your anxiety? So I run into this a lot where people will use substances and then rebounding experience a lot of rebound anxiety. So rebound anxiety is actually caused by things that we use to self-medicate. And then what happens when we self-medicate and the medicate,

medication wears off is due to principles of, you know, neurologic tolerance. We'll get changes to our neurons, which will actually make our baseline anxiety worse over time. So, you know, we'll talk about melatonin and pineal gland, I guess, adrenaline, sympathetic nervous system. So this is going to be like a little bit more scientifically valid. So we'll talk about, you know, a little bit about substance use and things like that. And then some people, you know, this is sort of the DSM approach, which I don't think is a complete, you know, is by no means complete. And then we'll also talk about things like anxious personality. So we made a video about attachment theory some time ago. And so a lot of people, you know, when they feel anxious all the time, it's not just that they have a mental disorder, like a discrete generalized anxiety disorder.

Some people are very anxious because of the way that they were raised essentially. You know, when we're growing up, some people, the world that you grow up in can be a safe place or it can be a dangerous place. And early on when you grow up in certain kinds of environments, your brain wires for like hard mode. And you think that the world is a dangerous place. So even as a child, if you're like abused or neglected, what essentially happens is that like you can't move about the world with confidence. And if we think about anxiety and confidence, they're basically at opposite. it ends up the spectrum, right? So the more anxious you are, the less confident you are. And a lot of that stuff actually goes down to personality psychology and attachment theory and stuff like that.

I'm not an expert in this stuff, but, you know, it's an introduction, right? It's an educational introduction. And what I'd recommend is if anything on this particular branch resonates with you, then go see a licensed mental health professional dig into it. You can say, hey, I watched a video on attachment theory, and it really resonates. with me? Is that something you can help me with? And then find a therapist who can actually work with you in more detail. We'll talk a little bit about neuroscience of anxiety, physiologic anxiety, and I think this is where, honestly, I think that part of the reason that anxiety is getting so bad is because most of our mental health professionals are not trained in physiology. Right? So if you think about

like a clinical social worker or a psychologist, they have a lot of wonderful training and a lot of it is way better than what medical doctors are trained in. So, for example, psychotherapy training for psychologists is far superior to medical doctors. But they're not trained in physiology. And I don't think that anxiety is purely a mental thing, right? There are physiologic components to it. So understanding that. And then this is where we kind of deviate from science a little bit and then talk a little bit about breath in the mind.

So I'll talk about Brown-I-M and Chi-Gong and some of these things. and you know so some of this stuff is because people you know we try to do a good job of including stuff that's a little bit more scientific stuff that's a little bit more spiritual just like I do with my actual patients and the people that I work with and so that's kind of the clinical track you know there's more to it treatment approaches to anxiety so how do I think about treating someone with anxiety the Ayurveda stuff and then then we have the non-clinical track so understanding things like thought loops and cognitive anxiety responses. So this I think is a really good video. Let me see if I can get to it. So we try to, you know, have you guys go in order, but you can

kind of click through stuff if you really feel like it. We wouldn't recommend it. So this is, I think, a key thing. So this isn't really mental illness. Okay. So anytime our mind has anxiety, generally speaking, if you look at the way we respond to being anxious, we'll try to distract ourselves. We'll try to control the uncertainty via avoidance. Oh my God, if I go to the party, no one will talk to me. The best thing to do is just don't go to the party. Easy, problem solved. Then I don't have to feel anxious.

We'll sometimes try to remove uncertainty via reassurance. Hey, do you think it's okay if I go to the party? You think someone will be there to talk to me? You think it's okay. Are you going to be there? Are you bringing someone? Are you bringing your significant other? And then sometimes we'll fight it, right?

We'll be like, uh, anxiety. Like, oh, anxiety. Like, I'm going to win. I'm not going to lose anxiety. I'm going to be strong. I'm going to be like military. I'm going to be like a success guru military. Like fight the anxiety.

And sometimes when you fight the anxiety, sometimes you win, right? Sometimes you do win. And then what happens the next day? It does come back. So we'll talk about just on a very fundamental level, like what does the mind do in response to anxiety? Right? So it's important to understand. Like this has nothing to do with mental illness.

It's just like everyone experiences anxiety and everyone can do things to distract themselves. And then what we'll do, so once we understand what we try to do, you know, then so if you kind of go the cognitive route and you're like, oh, this is really interesting. Like I really like this cognitive approach to anxiety. Then you can go down the Vedic psychology route and then some scars and stuff. And then the responses to anxiety, then we kind of go to, okay, like anxiety's a learned behavior. What happens when we fight against anxiety? What does that do to our mind? What happens when we give into our anxiety? And then, okay, so this is all great, Dr. Kay, what do we do about anxiety? And so these will also have, like, so some of these have, so it looks like this has two meditation videos,

this has one meditation video, and so that's the anxiety track. And then we get to my personal favorite. So sometimes people come in and they're interested in meditation. So, you know, this is definitely the least scientifically valid portion of the module, because a lot of the stuff is drawn from, you know, not science. But we'll talk about this, I like a lot. So, you know, we'll talk about what is meditation. And then a lot of people will ask me questions like, how do I, you know, what kind of meditation should I do? So we'll talk specifically like, what is meditation? Like when we use this word meditation, what does that mean?

So, you know, you'll hear people say, oh, I had a blissful meditation and you can't get your mind to sit still. And then you'll think, wow, that person is an awesome meditator and I suck. Is that true? What's going on there? What is meditation? And so I'll sort of describe how I think part of the problem is like linguistic because the English language we have one word meditation whereas Sanskrit has these different words that all get translated as meditation. And then we'll kind of get into some stuff that I don't really talk about too much on stream, although I'd love to. I think it's once again one of these things that's a little bit.

Let me see if this worksheet. Does this work? So then what we'll do is like all. talk about the history of meditation. So where did like how did meditation like come to evolve? Like what is mindfulness? Let me see if I can find this. Right. So like over here we've got, you know, we'll talk about like the origin of dantra and then like how dantra developed yoga. And then yoga has these four branches. So like this is what we would call religion is Pacti yoga. Garmu yoga is people who like focus on actions. Niana yoga is the path of knowledge. Rajya yoga is

path of willpower. And then we'll talk a little bit about, you know, some of the things that I teach. And like, so I teach breathi-hara techniques, like, you know, closing of the nine gates. And so where does that fit into the broad structure of meditation? And then we'll even talk a little bit about Buddhism, right? So where does Buddhism come in? So Buddo was probably had Raji yogi teachers. So then he kind of developed his own thing. And then, like, there are different traditions. And then we go down to Zen. and then we end up with mindfulness. And if you look at the whole tradition of meditation, what you discover is that mindfulness

is actually a pretty small slice of it, right? There's Vajrayana Buddhism, which is very different from mindfulness. There's Theraveda Buddhism, which is very different from mindfulness. And then we'll kind of talk about kundalini yoga and like chakras and all that kind of crap. Right?

And once again, the purpose, some people may be like skeptical of chakras and stuff, which is totally fine. I'm not saying that you should do that kind of thing. Remember, the goal of this is to teach people and explain to them my perspective on meditation. And so if you think that Kundalini yoga is a bunch of BS, by all means, don't do it. Do any of these others, right?

If you're into mantra and you're like, wow, I want a magical spell that I can chant to accumulate spiritual energy because that's your cup of tea, then go for it. If you're like, I don't want that. I actually want something that's a little bit, you know, more, I want to do meditation that is more scientifically valid than do mindfulness. And if someone's like, well, I want to do something that scientifically valid is kind of Buddhist, but is also a little bit than dothynic in nature, then do Vajadayana practices. Right. And then for some of y'all are like, okay, I want to open up my chakras. Then do kundalini yoga.

So the purpose of the guide is not to say that any one thing is the right thing to do. I've spent about 15 or 16 years studying all of this stuff. I've gone to medical school. I've done neuroscience research. I've studied with lots of different teachers and different parts of the world. I've stayed at monasteries in South Korea and India. And the goal of this module is to share all of that, right? So when someone comes into my office and says,

what kind of meditation should I do, I won't give them this lecture, but I'll kind of think about this, right? I'll ask them, are you more scientifically oriented? Are you more spiritually oriented? And they're like, yeah, I'm like, I believe in chakras. And I'm like, okay, fine. So then like, let's explore like Badger Yanabu. or this or that. Are you trying, are you trying to be in recovery? And they're like, yeah,

I'm trying to be in recovery. Okay, so then fantastic. So if you're into tantra and you want a mantra, but you're also into recovery and you want like, you know, you want to combine those two things, then I would recommend Vajyayana Buddhism and Refuge Recovery. Because Refuge Recovery is sort of like this AA program that's rooted in Buddhist principles. So you'll be able to learn a little bit, you'll be able to level up your Buddhism knowledge there. And I'll teach you some Vajiriana practices. level up there so you're kind of going in one tradition that's synergistic. So that kind of customization is something that we really aim to shoot for. It's what I do with my patients. I can't do that with each and every one of you, but what I can do is explain the full thought process that I

have in my head so that you guys can pick what's appropriate for you. And then, so then there's also like not just the traditions of meditation, but if you look at meditation, you know, different practices have different kinds of, let's see if this, you know, so like here's an example of like a, you know, a proof of concept study that loving kindness meditation to target affect and mood disorders, right? So like people are starting to differentiate between different kinds of meditation. This is a little bit more of like not historical, but like how can you classify like where meditations go. So Zen meditation goes over here, Thratica, which is fixed point gaze and goes over here. You know, we'll explain all these terms. I mean, or, you know, explain some of this stuff at least. And then we'll get, sorry. So then we'll talk a little bit about the science of meditation.

Okay. So we'll talk about the physiology of meditation, how it works, things like that. Once again, it's like a 25-minute video. So it's not, you know, people, they're researchers who will devote their entire lives. You can make entire courses, teach every week for the rest of their life and you won't cover all the science of meditation. But we try to give you guys a little bit of everything. And then a lot of people are curious about the metaphysics of meditation. So like, okay, that's fine. There's science to it. But like, what about enlightenment? Like what is

what is enlightenment? What is the nature of the universe? What is the basis of reality? Once again, not saying that this is correct. But if you guys are for people who are curious about, you know, what's the meditative, what are, what is the metaphysics of the meditative worldview? You know, include that as well. So like if you're interested in science, you can watch that video. If you're interested in the metaphysics of it and the nature of reality, you can take a spiritual perspective. The goal of the guide is to give you all both. And then you all decide, okay, this makes sense to me, this doesn't make sense to me. This resonates with me. This doesn't resonate with me. And then what we get to, um, an important kind of branch point. And depending on why you want to

meditate, I'll take people down five paths. Some people will say, I want to discover my true self or I have low self-esteem. So, okay, fine. So let's talk about the Atmanpata. So what can we learn about meditation about the path of self? So what is the self? What is the nature of self? What's confidence?

What's ego? How do I develop confidence? Some people will say, I want to learn how to meditate because I'm depressed. And this is where we overlap. So you can get access to these videos from the meditation guide or the depression guide. So we'll talk a little bit about the nature of suffering in Dharma and Garmah. Some people will say, oh, I want to learn how to study better.

and I want to learn meditation for performance. Okay, so if you're interested in that, then we're going to talk a little bit about knowledge in the mind and things like that. Some people will say, I just want to understand myself better. I want to understand how I work. Okay, so that's fine.

So then we'll go down to the Manasbada, which is the path of the mind. So what is the nature of mind? What is the system of mind? How does mind work? We'll teach you guys a little bit more about mantra and more detail. And then this is probably something that a lot of our community needs,

the path of accomplishment. Dr. K, I want to be more successful. I want to be more motivated. I want to accomplish more. I want to put my life together. So Sinti means accomplishment. So what can meditation teach us about becoming more accomplished? So we'll teach you guys, you know, some of these spiritual concepts as well as things

that are a little bit more like concrete. Like how do I turn my goals into actions? I have all these goals, all these things that I want to do. How do I actually start moving towards them? What is the nature of motivation? Where does motivation come from? What are different things that I can do to, like, improve my mental fortitude and motivation? And so that's the guide. You guys want to watch some?

Okay. You watch like a minute or two. I'm going to go ahead and stick off of your coat. Okay, so essentially move this over here. That's definitely going to have enough of it. You've got to know this, okay? Can you take this? This is ridiculous.

This is absolute. Alej, I'm going to go, bro. This is nuts, man. Moses, dude, this is absolutely insane. Like, do you know what you signed me up for? This is... Dr. K? Like, it's not my room.

It's not my space. I'm in some, like, there's an echo. I think you're muted. I just want, like, I want Twitter chat. I want our chatars back. Okay, I'm gonna go. I can't hear you. All right, bye.

I don't know if this is gonna work, dude. I don't know how I got into this. Maybe we can make this work. It's actually pretty good. Welcome to Dr. Kay's Guide to Mental Health. Alrighty. Yeah, so I discovered suddenly chat. So I am terrible at acting.

So I can't watch it, dude. I can't watch myself. So I'm all, like, I am so bad. You know, I thought to myself when I was, like, when I was younger, I was like, people don't know this, but I had a chance to become a Bollywood film star at one point. And

and I was like, oh sure, I could act. It's easy. People make it look easy, right? And, but I am such a bad actor. It's terrible. And, but we had, you know,

it's fun. We did it for the, we did it for the lulls. Someone's asking is there a module about addiction? Not yet. So here's the other thing, okay, chat, is, uh, so when it comes to Dr. Kay's guide, like, so here's the crazy thing. We've spent a lot of time and energy in building this. Now I'm going to ask you all a question, chat. Is it good? Is it worth it? Do you guys know? No, so, nope. Nope. Nope, nope, nope. Everyone who's saying yes is you don't know, right?

I appreciate the faith. I really do. But let's be honest. The answer is, we don't know. Right? Like, let's be objective. Like, we don't know. So whether we continue doing this stuff, right?

So, like, y'all tell us what to do. If you guys like this, and if it's helpful, then we'll try to do more. And if you guys are like, this is the, this shit, is worse than cyberpunk at launch on PS5. And it is a complete waste of time and energy, and it's terrible. Then we'll say, sorry, and we're going to try to do better next time. And if you guys say, hey, this is fantastic.

I mean, we think it's really good, to be honest. Otherwise, you know, we could have pulled the plug at many points, but I feel really good about it. I think it's a lot of what I've used to help people, so we feel confident. We've invested the better part of a year. of our lives and time and energy and money and all that kind of good stuff. A lot of people have spent a lot of time. You know, we're confident in it. That's why we're offering it to you.

But you all have to tell us. You guys have to tell us, hey, actually, this really does help. I learned a ton about myself. I don't think it's going to transform anyone's life because it's educational, right? But what I do want people to do, what I do, what I do, what I do, do want people to do is try it. And I want y'all to learn, like, this is the stuff that I wish every person who walked into my office knew. I think it's the goal is to equip you guys with some basics of like, okay, what are these different diagnoses? Like, if I feel like I have anxiety, like, what does that mean? Do I need to see someone? Do I not need to see someone? You know, I want to learn meditation for anxiety. Like, then you should get this. That's the purpose.

It's to educate you guys. Because the, and for those of you don't know, it's included with coaching for free. So as long as you're a client in the coaching program, you will have access to the guides. And that's because our coaches don't have, you know, not all of our coaches have done neuroscience research and not all of our coaches have spent time, you know, studying in ashrums in India.

And as a result, they can do coaching, which they're good at and the outcomes there are, we're happy with. But there's a knowledge piece that's missing. So the goal is for you guys to kind of like learn the knowledge piece here, and then, you know, get the individual attention that you need, work on your specific applications of these problems with a coach. And if you guys, you know, really go down the clinical track and you're like, wow, this really sounds like me,

then you shouldn't see a coach. You should see a licensed mental health professional. Right. And that's the goal is to empower you guys. Because once again, at the beginning of the stream, I was talking about how, you know, the world is ending and all that stuff. I don't know that it's enough for me to spend the rest of my life. going to an office and working for seven hours a day, eight hours a day, seeing patients.

You know, I can help a lot of people in that time. I see patients for about a year or two on average. But over time, you know, you accumulate rocks is what we call it in medicine. Because over time, what happens is the better people leave and the people who are struggling a little bit more stay longer, right? So over time, probably what will happen is I'll have a very stable panel of like the same people and I won't have any new slots anymore. But what, you know, I just don't think it's going to be enough if I did that. I don't think being a doctor is enough. I'm not saying that it's not enough for other people.

I'm just saying for myself, I think that the world, like, I have something to share and I've been given amazing opportunities. I kid you guys not. Like, you know, how lucky am I to be able to spend seven years studying to become a monk? And then, you know, do neuroscience research. and then become a medical doctor and then, you know, become a psychiatrist. Like I don't know many people who have the luxury of being able to do that to try to learn every dimension, not every, but, you know, huge different traditions.

There are two gigantic traditions that we have about understanding the self. One is sort of the spiritual, philosophical, or religious tradition. The second is like the scientific tradition. And I know that people will go and do like a meditation training here and get a certificate there and stuff like that. But there's a big difference between, you know, getting certified in a mindfulness-based therapy and going in like living at a monastery for months at a time.

And so I have all these privileges. So what am I supposed to do with that, Chad? I don't think it's enough to just help individual people. We also have Twitch, right? We have YouTube. We have these abilities to disseminate things. and so that's what I think it's going to take because mental health is not getting better

like people are getting worse COVID has profound mental health impacts people may actually like you know be permanently disabled from having COVID like what is that going to do to people what's that going to do to their mental health I'm not sure but I I'm getting this profound sense that what we're doing in the field of mental health in psychiatry is like not enough. There's so much online toxicity. There's so much online bullying. People are feeling worse about themselves.

They're getting rejected thousands and thousands of time on Tinder. People are editing their photos on Instagram to an unbelievable degree, which is making everyone else feel like inadequate. What is that going to do to us? I don't know. I mean, I don't know how many therapists it takes to fix all that. So our approach here at Healthy Gamer is to go the AOE route, right, to try to educate y'all as best.

as we can to empower you as best as we can, and that's what we're here to do. I've also come to realize that, you know, my time and my life is, like, very limited. Like, I've always kind of known that, but it's interesting to get sick and sort of kind of realize that this, you know, when I tested positive, like, you know, the thought crossed my mind that, like, this could be a terminal illness, right? It is for a lot of people. Like, it's terrible. And that maybe I've got a week or two left on this earth.

And so what am I going to do about that? And so I took care of myself. I took a break and stuff like that. Like I didn't have like fever. Like I felt like it. I was like, oh my God, I have like so much to write and so much to share. Like I'm streaming my way to the grave. I've got one week left.

I thought about marathon streaming. It's being like, I'm going to show up on Discord. And one at a time you all show up and we're going to get through as many people as we can because we've got 10 days left before I'm dead. And I decided to rest, which was the right move. Right. So there's take take care of your stuff. if you get sick. But I sort of felt that desperation. And that's where like, I don't know how to say

this chat, but I mean, we got to, you know, we got to get our shit together. Like, as individuals, as the generation of, of Twitch chat and millennials and Gen Z is humanity. Because Greece was on fire a few weeks ago. People were clinging to an airplane and like falling off as it took off. And like, there are five mortuary trucks on their way to Texas in anticipation of too many dead bodies. This is the world that we live in. Can you guys hear that? I think someone's just taking a poo-poo

and needs help wiping, is my guess. And so we got to do better. And that's what we're here for. Healthy gamers. And I need y'all's help. I'm going to try to educate y'all as best as I can, but I do not have the time to spend, you know, 12 weeks with each and every one of you. So I need y'all to, if you have a mental health problem, go see a licensed professional.

If you can't afford it, call around, try to do whatever you can. You know, be careful about the way that your mind tells you, oh, this isn't possible because dot, dot, dot. Right? So one of the things that we find a lot, I was just teaching our coaches about this the other day, is kind of a lot of times people who are stuck will sort of have this mental construction in their mind that prevents them from trying

and so as long as you have that mental construction that says don't bother because dot dot dot dot dot dot that's what gets you stuck right it's the idea that there's no point in trying because it's inevitable to fail that's what keeps you stuck I'm not saying that the deck isn't stacked against you deck is absolutely stacked against you

If you can't afford therapy, like that sucks and the deck is sacked against you. But there are free mental health clinics. There are providers out there who are actually doing it to try to make the world a better place. I think that's most of my colleagues. And it can feel incredibly shameful to ask them, hey, do you have any room for free patients? You know, and there's a, like, because, like, I'm a sucker for a sob story. And so there'll be people who, you know, will come in and they'll say, like, can I just see you once? And I'll be like, okay, fine.

And then they'll be like, and then I feel bad for him. So I'm like, okay, I'll figure some way to make it. You know, we'll figure out some way to do it. I had one of my patients recently lost their job about six months ago, and so they're like, I can't afford you anymore, and I'm like, okay, so what are we going to do about that? It's like, I don't know, I'm going to find someone else. You know, like you can if you want to, but you don't have to pay me.

We're here to do the work, and I have faith in my colleagues that there are enough that I'm out there who, you know, will, you just have to get lucky, too. And once you start doing the work, that's what you have to do. and you know so take care of yourselves chat we hope we genuinely hope the guides will help that's what it's there for it's a basic education on things like depression and anxiety and and meditation you know hopefully you'll hear something in there that will help guide you to the right kind of therapist a lot of people will ask how do i find the right therapist well if you kind of know something about anxiety ahead of time it can help you so then when you look at online profiles one

is like I specialize in attachment issues and like that is what my problem is so maybe I should go to see that person where someone else is like I specialize like I'm a deeply spiritual therapist you're like okay that's for me and someone else is like I'm CBT trained I'm a researcher at a XYZ and you're like I'm interested in the science that's the person for me but it has to start with educating yourself right so that's what we're here to do we're here to help you educate yourself questions I'm kind of wiped chat Yeah, make sure you say thank you to everyone, especially people on our team and in the community.

Yeah, I think I said thank you, but I'm happy to say it again. So thank you very much for everyone's thoughts and prayers. You know, all the well wishes. Like I mentioned earlier, it's nice to be loved. Like, it's a real luxury and a real privilege. Huge shout out to the theme that's the team that's kept things running. You guys like understand that I've been out for three weeks and this product is launching today. Not saying it's bug free.

Not saying it's perfect. You know, it'll get patched. It'll get improved. We'll work on it over time. But people have been working tirelessly and in the absence of myself and group Dita like make this happen for you all. So I know that you guys love me,

which is great because I get to be, you know, I get to be the face that receives all the adulation and stuff like that. But, you know, I just found out just recently that someone else on our team had COVID a couple months ago and, you know, that wasn't fun for them. And so as best as you can, send some TLC to everyone.

else on the Healthy Gamer team because it's a big team now. I mean, we've got, you know, tons of people and they're working really hard to try to make the world a better place too. They believe in our mission. And as much as I appreciate all the praise, like, I'm not the one who deserves it all, to be honest. I deserve maybe five to 10 percent of it. But the rest of it goes to everyone behind the scenes, like the people who made these overlays and the people who, you know, help me, I couldn't figure out how to lock in to show you guys some of the stuff. And so there were like two people who helped me do that. Um, there's someone who, what are we, what are we congratulating me for? I'm confused. Because it's your birthday. Oh, is it my birthday? It's not my birthday.

Okay. Thank you, Wobbs. Could you have the showered since Sunday. Okay. All right. Anyone got a quick question or two for, I guess we're just having a birthday? As you all can see, they have tons of energy, and I think the real challenge is that Lutti and I don't. But I'd much rather have it this way than the other way around. So Owen DeGal is asking what meds are good for depression and suicidal thoughts?

So this is something I'm going to give you sort of an answer. So the first thing is that, you know, this is definitely what meds are good depends on an individual, right? So like this is why we go through years of medical training before we prescribe medication. Because the whole point of having lots of different medicine is that there are different meds that are good for different people in different circumstances. And it's sort of a cop out of an answer. And we talk about that in the guides and general treatment principles. And here's what I will say in a more detailed answer. So if you look at like evidence-based protocols, usually first-line treatment for things like depression are SSRIs or the selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors.

But there's also a black box warning on SSRIs, which shows that people who start SSRIs and are suicidal, in adolescent populations, there's actually an increased risk of suicidality after you start an SSRI for about, I think, two or three weeks, maybe two to four weeks. So when someone asks a question, what meds are good, this is why I strongly encourage you all to actually go see a licensed professional because it's not like a video game where there's just like, you know, what's good and there's like a answer. It's complicated. You're putting something into your body. Sometimes it can have bad effects. You know, figuring out what medication is right for you is like it's a process. It's going to be asking you questions like, you know, what kind of depression do you have? You know, what, you know, do you know, what, you know, you know, do you. You know, you know, you know, Do you feel like you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning? Do you feel like you're restless and you can't sit down? Because those are different kinds of depression. Respond to different, generally speaking, medications. But SSRIs is the evidence-based first-line treatment in most treatment protocols for depression.

How do you work one-on-one with me? So I think this is the challenge, right? So the whole reason that I stream is because I don't think that working with people one-on-one is enough. So we've got a bunch of people who are in line, and the short answer is you get really, really lucky, I guess, R&G. But as the days go by, I see fewer and fewer people individually just because making this, like I said, I mean, I wrote basically two nonfiction books in six weeks. And it takes a lot of time and energy to do this stuff. And I'm not trying to be arrogant or anything.

It's just I wish I could work with everyone. I wish we were smaller than I could work with everyone. It would be easy to answer. early on when we started streaming on Twitch, we had a couple people from chat who ended up, you know, I did some individual work with, but now there's just too many y'all. That's why we trained coaches.

And y'all don't have to work with me. The whole point of the guide is that you can get a lot of the way that I approach things and then actually work with a licensed mental health professional who can, like, help you the rest of the way. I'm not, my outcomes as a psychiatrist are not astronomically better than the average. psychiatrist. I imagine they're a little bit better, but, you know, that's because the average psychiatrist just does 15-minute psychopharm visits on average. But, you know, compared to other

therapists, I don't think I'm necessarily better than any of them. So you guys don't need me. And I'm trying to share my thought process so that you guys can, because there's a lot of people out there who, you know, do have space in their practice. And I think y'all should go see them, and then I'll share my thoughts with you in the guide, which is why I made it. What are you most excited for once the guide is officially released. Honestly, the thing that I'm most excited for, I hope it's helpful. Like, that's why we made it to help people. So I'm not really even excited.

I don't, you know, it's, I imagine they were congratulating me for the guide being released. I don't even know. But I don't feel excited today. I feel a little bit pensive. Like, I want to know whether I'm hopeful more than excited. It's not like, oh, this is going to be so great. It's going to be awesome. It's going to transform lives.

I actually don't know that. Like, I'm concerned. I put a lot of time and energy, and guys, I don't know if you'll get this, but I failed a lot, and maybe this is going to be a flaw. It's just my attempt to make the world a better place. And what I hope more than anything else is that it helps people. That's why we made it. Okay.

Someone's asking, what is your opinion on advanced resolution therapy? I don't really have one. I don't really know too much about it. I mean, there are a lot of different, you know, acronym therapies, CBT, EMD. E-D-M-R, I'm not familiar with all of them. What meditation is good for COVID recovery? I'm not really sure. So that's something where, you know, COVID is a real, I would say, like, you know,

I imagine some kind of meditation will be helpful, but I would do some kind of braunayam, like, not you should be your own chanting or something like that, but there's really no data to suggest that a particular meditation is, like, good for, like, you know, recovering, or at least I'm not familiar with that. I'd think about doing something like Brown I am, but remember that COVID recovery is also highly individual, right? So some people may have lingering symptoms that are different from other people, and there may be different meditations, depending on what your symptoms are. Is there stuff for people with ADHD at all in the guides? Not so much, to be honest. So I think, you know, the real challenge that we had was choosing what to include and what not to include.

And so I think ADHD is something that really deserves its own guide. And so if people, you know, depression and anxiety were the two things that seemed the most important. Depression and anxiety and meditation were the three things that people were the most curious about. And so we started with those. And if it works well, like talking about addictions, trauma, ADHD, motivation, relationships and communication, maybe sex and sexuality. So if someone's asking, what if I don't want, what if I absolutely don't want medication? I think that's a completely valid perspective, right? So it's your body and you get to decide what happens to it.

And at the same time, I would talk to your doctor about that. So I get people who come into my office. So I explain this in the general treatment principles video. I get people all the time. So before I was famous on the internet, or the tiny corner of Twitch, I'm not really famous on the internet. But, you know, I get like I was sort of known. for being like a psychiatrist who is into

complementing alternative medicine. So I'd get a lot of people who are like, sometimes I get like anti-vax kind of folks, right? They were like, nothing artificial, nothing pharmaceutical, and I'd be like, help me understand that. What if you're absolutely don't want medication? Like, why don't you want medication? What's your understanding about medication?

I'd be like, well, I don't want to become dependent on it. And then I get kind of confused. So you think medication is going to make you dependent? Like, what does that mean to be dependent on medication? It's going to make you artificially happy. It's like, oh, well, I don't think SSRs don't really do that. If they did, I think they'd be

substances of abuse, and everyone would be popping them. And so I think it's about if you absolutely don't want medication, I think you're completely entitled that opinion. And if you have a medical provider, I'd talk to them about that opinion and let them talk to you and see what they have to say. What do you think of ECT for major depression? I think it's a good evidence-based treatment for the right people. Right. So if we look at ECT electroconvulsive therapy, it's the, so remember that, let's just talk a little, this is getting the medical.

So this, once again, it's just general treatment principles, okay? So if we think about why do we use ECT as psychiatrists, that I can explain. So remember that medication needs to be metabolized, right? So like, let's think about, so I think about using ECT in severe cases of depression. And I also think about it in cases where people are poor at metabolizing stuff or where you want to be careful about metabolism. So people who are elderly. and don't have good metabolisms and suffer from side effects. And they get woozy from Paxil, for example,

and they fall and break their hip. That could be fatal. Right? So you have to be really careful about medications. You have to be really careful about polypharmacy and the elderly as well because they're taking blood pressure medications and this medication and that medication. You toss something else in there. You don't know what's going to happen.

Second thing, it's kind of interesting. But pregnant women are some of the most protected women in medicine in terms of like patients that we try to protect. We're very, very careful about what we do with pregnant women because they're pregnant. There is, you know, some evidence that, you know, taking SSRIs and stuff may be linked a little bit to increased risk of autism and stuff like that in pregnancy. So we want to be careful because, you know, some of the medications that we prescribe, like lithium, for example, for bipolar disorder, can lead to cardiac anomalies in the fetus. So sometimes in pregnant women, if, you know, if you're going to take a medication that could be iatrogen, I mean, not iatrogenic, the brain fog.

Teratogenic. Could be teratogenic is unsafe, then you can use something like electroconvulsive therapy instead. Would looking up all the cited sources help me prepare to be a coach? I mean, I think it would help you. But, you know, I think our coach training is pretty robust. And really, the sources cited are not to make coaches. sources that we cite are to help the people, right?

They're not coaching is, to become a coach, we're preparing you to help someone else. This is not designed to help people necessarily help other people. This is designed to help you yourself. So I'd still encourage you to look at them if you're interested. But our coach training is quite different. So someone's saying gene testing to prevent improper metabolite of antidepressants, excretion sounds interesting.

Yeah, so that's cool. I've done that with someone. my patients, but the American Psychiatric Association doesn't recommend it yet. Seems like the science is there. It's not clear whether there's a clinical benefit to it. Does medication actually work for panic disorder? In my experience, yeah. Treated a lot of people with panic disorder with medication.

So do you think studying the guide can help in becoming a better coach? I definitely think so. So I think that we've asked our coaches to watch it. They definitely get access to it. and so I think it'll help. So what are the differences between psychiatrists, psychologists, and therapists? So sometimes these terms are somewhat interchangeable. So a therapist is like a profession that can have multiple degrees.

A psychologist and a psychiatrist have different degrees. So a psychiatrist is a medical doctor. So like I went to medical school and I like did, you know, three months of surgery. and treated people in the ICU on ventilators and like, you know, delivered babies and things like that. That's a medical doctor. And so a medical doctors can then specialize, right? So I can specialize in delivering babies or being a cancer doctor or specializing in mental health. So that's what a psychiatrist is. A psychologist is usually one of two things. A PhD or a PhD or a doctor of philosophy in psychology, I think is what the degrees are. And so PhDs tend to have a little bit more

research training, and both the PhDs and SIDEs tend to have more psychotherapy training than medical doctors. Medical doctors in most places are the only ones that can prescribe medication. Nurse practitioners can prescribe it too. But generally speaking, you know, medical doctors out of the more traditional therapists, we're the only ones that can prescribe medication. There are some states and stuff in the United States and maybe some countries in the world where psychologists can prescribe medication. But generally speaking, we get trained in therapy and medication and physical stuff, which I think is wise, by the way, because with physical side effects and stuff, I think it's useful to have medical training to deal with things like serotonin syndrome and cardiac arrhythmias

and all the fun stuff, kidney damage from lithium and things like that, which I think are, you know, medical complications. And then so, and then usually you can also have clinical social workers or counselors who can also, and all three of them can do therapy. And for what it's worth, there isn't really good evidence that, you know, being a medical doctor makes you a better therapist than being a social worker. So what it appears to come down to is really years of training and stuff like that. So a medical doctor may be somewhat better at therapy right after training than a

psychologist than a licensed clinical social worker even then the evidence is not very good for that but even if that effect is there I think that probably has more to do with the fact that training to become a psychiatrist is eight years whereas becoming a licensed clinical social worker is like somewhere between two and four so once you normalize for numbers of years of practice versus training I think there's really no data that suggests that you know having a fancier degree makes you a better therapist Do you think you're a bodhisattva? No. Not a bodhisattva.

I rage too much at Dota Patch notes to be a bodhisattva. What do you guys think about? Yeah. How long should a person in an abusive household expect to stay in therapy? I mean, it depends on the abusive household, right? So, like, let's just think about that question for a second. So how long should you expect to do something? Well, that depends.

Are all abusive households the same? Right? So when you say, how long should someone in an abusive household expect to stay in therapy, the duration of therapy is likely to be related to the extent of the psychological damage. And this is where it's been my experience that, you know, growing up in an abusive household can have drastically different effects. What was the kind of abuse? How long did the abuse happen? When did it start? You know, how old were you when it started?

But this is what I will say. I mean, that being said, the short answers, I don't know. It depends on the person. But I know it's an unsatisfying answer. This is what I will say. When people come into my office, I would say that 95 to 99% of them within six months to one year are doing better, like significantly better. necessarily all the way there, but I've seen good results in a year. I would say that in the most, I'd say for probably like the most severe traumas that I've worked with, it takes closer to like two to three years to really get those people solid. Like I've had a couple of cases of like really bad trauma. And it took, it took like over two years. But they're making progress the whole time. So I think it's like

You know I think you can You can get a lot done in like a year is a long time You can get a lot done in a year If you put your mind to it You find a good therapist And they put their mind to it You all can get a lot done I've also had people who have been in therapy for decades

And will wind up in my office And will be in therapy with me for three years And they don't seem to make much progress But those are the minority I think most people get better And I'd say give it a year give it a year. So,

Oam chanting without voice, can it be done? I think so. So remember, mantras can be done silently, which once again is explained in the guide.

So do your modules address sleep in any way? Yes, but not as much as they could. So there isn't a module on sleep, but there are a couple of meditations on sleep. You know, I think that if you look at sleep,

once again, there's a, there's, so, you know, when someone says, I have trouble sleeping, my mind does this all over again. So when someone says I have trouble sleeping, so let's just do this real quick, okay? And I hope I'm making this clear. So when people ask,

you know, how long does someone need to stay in therapy? My mind doesn't go to one answer. My mind does this. So let's talk about like sleep for a second. So like, you know, if we were to make a sleep module, my first question, you know, when you look at sleep, so there are sleep disorders, right? So things like narcolepsy and, you know, insomnia of idiopathic origin. There's also familial fatal insomnia, which I know sounds scary and is scary. Terrifying. Which is what it sounds like. It's a rare genetic disorder that results in trouble sleeping is its hallmark symptom. And it's it's autosomal dominant and it's usually fatal. So like when someone asks me, you know, I have trouble sleeping, there's a clinical track and there's like a lifestyle track, right? So then,

then, or there's like a clinical track. There's like, I'd probably say like there's like a lifestyle kind of track. And then there's also like a meditative sort of track, like a spiritual Eastern perspective track. So if you go down the clinical track, you know, there's sleep disorders. There are other disorders that can interfere with sleep. Like do you have depression? So depression, for example, impairs sleep. Right? It can make people hypersomnic or insomonic. anxiety impairs sleep. So we don't have something directly about sleep, but we'll talk about depression and anxiety

and teach you guys a couple of meditations that will affect sleep, but then you kind of go down the clinical track, which has the more common stuff, right? And then like the super rare stuff, like familial fatal and sound like. I've seen a case of that by the way. It's wild, dude. It's scary, terrible. And so there's like the clinical track, and then there's also

like the lifestyle track. So if you have trouble sleeping, you know, there are different questions like do you, so down the clinical track, things like circadian rhythm disorder. are much more common. Right? So do you have circadium rhythm disorder, which is like where your circadian rhythm is all messed up? Do you have shift work disorder?

So some people who work night shifts and stuff have difficulty sleeping. So there are like different kinds of disorders that you can have. So are any of those at play? That's one question. Another question that I'll tend to ask is like lifestyle factors. So like what's your caffeine intake? What's your alcohol intake? What's your marijuana intake?

You know, are you using substances of different kinds? What's your sleep routine like? So routine is very, very important for sleep. There are issues like vitamin D, no, sorry, not vitamin D, melatonin production and UV wavelength of light. So are you, you know, in a situation where you're being exposed to the wavelength of light from computer screens because that will inhibit melatonin production, phones and stuff like that? And so, you know, what we'll recommend as doctors is we'll say, no screens two hours before bed. And everyone else is like, well, what the hell am I supposed to do for two hours before?

bed. And this is where like, you know, I know it's kind of fascinating, but what I really, when I really help people, what we do is come up with their two-hour bedtime routine. Like, that's what helps people. It's like, we're going to do yoga for a little while. You're going to brush your teeth and you're going to floss and you're going to do your dishes and you're going to toss a little laundry and you're going to make a to-do list for the next day. All that crap that you should do that you don't do during the day needs to become your bedtime routine. And then it'll be like two birds with one stone. And once people like take care of all that crap, you know, and they start doing yoga and they exercise a little bit and they start flossing.

And then like before you know it, two hours is up because that stuff sometimes adds up in terms of time. And then you've been off of the screen and then it's easier to fall asleep. You know, so there's kind of lifestyle factors. Substances are involved, things like that. You have to think about all that kind of stuff. And then, you know, from an Eastern perspective, there's understanding what is the nature of mind and what is the nature of sleep. Why is it that it's difficult to sleep? What are some meditation techniques that you can do to help you sleep?

you know someone else is talking about flux so that's like a great example so flux is like you know a program that alters the um the wavelength of light that your computer emits right there's all kinds of stuff for sleep it's like it's a whole conversation okay yeah so when someone's saying man COVID can hit hard even on backs people yeah but like thank God I was vaccinated because it's I got COVID 10 days ago and I'm still streaming. I was planning on streaming for like 45 minutes, but I'm going an hour and a half now. And like, I'm going to be tired after this, but at least I can do it. Like, I had a couple days of fever and then mostly now it's fatigue and messed up taste. Thoughts on TMS and how the medical community won't accept it. I think, what do you mean by the

medical community won't accept it? TMS, I believe, is an FDA approved treatment for, you know, certain kinds of depression and stuff. I think a big problem, so TMS is transmagnetic stimulation. I think the big challenge that I've seen in TMS is that insurance doesn't cover it and it's expensive and that there are a lot of people who are personality disordered who want to get some special kind of treatment and there are enough providers out there who are willing to give TMS to anyone who will pay for it. That's, I think, the biggest problem.

Thanks for the gifted subs. Zeroune. hog. I hope, I don't know if we did this, but I thought that you can gift the guide, too, if you guys like it. We tried to add that functionality. Do I have an opinion on COVID vaccines? I think everyone should get vaccinated. How do you respond to the people who are hesitant? Generally speaking, I don't, but like in terms of my patients and stuff, I'll recommend them, I'll talk to them about what their hesitations are, what their concerns are. But I think, generally speaking, I strongly recommend vaccines for COVID.

I need to find out if I need to see a therapist or a psychologist. The two can be synonymous, so I would go see them. Is there a difference between psychotherapy and psychoanalysis? Absolutely. So psychoanalysis is like something that Sigmund Freud did. It has a different approach to it. So like generally speaking, the way that they're delivered nowadays is different too. So psychoanalysis was traditionally done daily.

for about an hour at a time, whereas psychotherapy is, like, different. Like, it tends to be done once a week. I'm sure that there are more qualified psychologists out there. Like, this is a good example of where my training is not that great. So I haven't gone through analytic training or anything like that. So, you know, they're different. So I think psychoanalysis, I want to say that psychotherapy is more, like, illness-focused. But that may even be an unfair statement.

I'd say ask someone else. There's definitely a difference. It's hard for me to come up with the words to describe how I understand it to be different. And furthermore, I'm concerned that I wouldn't be able to accurately represent how they're different. Can the guide help with CPTSD if I've already got a therapist? So that's a good question. And I want to kind of highlight a couple of things. So the guide is not intended to be a substitute for mental health treatment.

Like when we say that, we mean that. It's not just like, hey, it's like, it's not a substitute, but it's educational, right? So I'm going to explain in like 15, 20 minutes, these are the different disorders. This is how I think about treatment. These are what your options are. It's basically like the scripts that I go through with my patients. Like it's the stuff that I share with all of them, which are making available to all of you. So will it help?

I hope so. And that's because I would expect your therapist to handle the clinical side of things. and what I hope you would be able to get out of the guide is like a little bit more about, you know, when you have complex PTSD, it affects your sense of self in a deep and profound way. So when I work with people with C PTSD and I teach them this stuff in the Atmanpada and things like that, they find it useful. Now, do they clinically improve from learning about the Atmanpada? It's hard to say because when I work with people, I do both, right? So I offer clinical interventions and non-clinical intervention. So I can't say that the Atman Bhada is like what helped them and has a clinical benefit because I really don't know.

But my hope is that this guide will teach people about the basics of meditation and some stuff about depression and anxiety and how your mind works. And I would hope that that helps anyone, whether you've got C PTSD or not. But I would not expect a clinical benefit for your CPTSD from the guide because there's really no evidence that it would do that. and it's not what it's designed to do. It's designed to be educational, not treatment. Are you worried about the guide launch? I mean, I guess so. But what's the difference between PTSD and C-P-T-SD? Okay. So I guess we're doing like, yeah. So by the way, guys, so these questions, right? These questions are exactly what is the kind of stuff that's in the guide? It's like, what is depression? What's the difference between social anxiety and generalized anxiety? What's the difference between panic attacks and being socially anxious? So PTSD is post-traumatic stress disorder, which is when you have a traumatic event and it lingers and continues to affect you in particular ways. So post-traumatic stress disorder can be an isolated one-time event. So let's say I fell off of a plane while trying to escape Afghanistan.

And after that, I have post-traumatic stress disorder. Okay, maybe a little bit of a poor joke and poor taste, so I apologize for that. But just the image that came to my mind, literally. those guys must have PTSD. So it's an isolated event, okay? Then C-P-T-SD is complex post-traumatic stress disorder. And what I really think of in terms of complex post-traumatic stress disorder is repeated things that are traumatic. So when someone grows up in a household where they are, you know, like they grew up in Afghanistan, for example.

And like every week, there was. was like, you know, people shooting and like the Taliban was fighting against, you know, the U.S. forces and like it's like a chronic persistent traumatic event. So we see this a lot in cases of, of, you know, like parental trauma where it's like chronic. Like you go home every day after school and your parents will yell at you or they'll hit you or heaven forbid something worse. And so that affects someone's mind and creates. an illness that's different from a single event. So that's the way that I think about complex PTSD versus regular PTSD. So is there one for addictive personality? So that's where like I'd love

to do one about addictions. So I think the challenge is it's hard. But once again, if I did one about addictions, I'd talk about the addictive personality and what that means. But per se, there isn't too much about addictions. Right. So the focus is on depression, anxiety, and meditation. So as parents shouting every night during childhood PTSD. So let's explain. So this is why general treatment principles and differential diagnosis. So an event does not make something PTSD. Right. So I want you all to understand this. When something traumatic happens to you. So let's say like it's really interesting because you can look at studies on resilience and you'll have things like, you know, genocide in the Congo. You'll have this population of people. So like thousands of people that

we're all exposed to the same event. And some of them will get PTSD and some of them won't. So the event is not what makes, the event is traumatic. The event is a traumatic event. But PTSD happens within the person, right? So when there's an outside event, how that event interacts with your genetics, your mind, your brain will result in a clinical illness or not a clinical illness. And so some people may have, you know, repeated events that

result in regular PTSD. Some people may have repeated events that result in complex PTSD. Some people may have repeated events that end up in no PTSD and no clinical diagnosis, no impairment to function. So you all have to remember that this is tricky about trauma, but like, you know, anything can be a traumatic event. But if you look at manifestation of illness within the body or mind, it's usually a combination of an outward event with some kind of internal vulnerability or genetic vulnerability. right so like you can anyone can be traumatized and whether i develop PTSD from it or not is like a complex equation that we don't quite understand that involves genetics epigenetic phenomenon support structures resilience all these other kinds of things does that make sense these are good questions

really really important questions which is why we built things like the guy because i think this is the basic stuff that it's really important for people to understand but i just don't I don't see anyone like teaching it simply. So are personality disorder some kind of spice PTSD? These are all excellent questions. These are so good. Probably the last one I can answer just because of fatigue. So it's interesting because if you look at people who experience childhood trauma,

sometimes what they end up with is a personality disorder, right? And so what does that mean? So this, by the way, is in the guide. So when we talk about the anxious personality and stuff like that. So when we think about a personality disorder, a personality disorder is like the way that you're wiring is kind of laid down. So when I think about a clinical illness, I think about you and something happening to you, which isn't entirely correct.

But so, you know, when I think about major depressive disorder, here you are, you're going about living your life, everything's great. And then major depressive disorder strikes. And then you are afflicted by an illness. illness like COVID comes from the outside and afflicts you. So what happens in a personality disorder is that something about the way that your brain is wired as you grow up wires in a way that is like generally speaking maladaptive. So if you have heavily narcissistic parents, you are going to like monkey see, monkey do. So you will develop your own narcissistic defense mechanisms with your

parents are very narcissistic. So usually what I find in people who have narcissistic personality disorder is they have at least one parent who is hell a hell a hell a narcissistic. And so we know, for example, that, you know, you internalize and you condition things from your, from your, like your upbringing. And so what I kind of think of as a personality disorder is when that person is being coded, when the code is being laid down, it's not something that afflicts them temporarily. It's the way that they're wired. Now the good news is that our brain can rewire. So a lot of people feel like if I have a personality disorder, you know, I'm screwed for life, no. There's good evidence that your brain, the overwhelming evidence that your brain can rewire. Right. So we know that personality

disorders can improve with treatment. We know that your brain can rewire itself over time. And I've like seen it happen like literally. Like where people, as they start to gain awareness, you know, they start to see that their mind is like, producing these thoughts, oh, this person is going to abandon me. They don't like me anymore. And then there's like, there's another part of their mind that will be like, actually, hold on a second. That's just, that's the way you've been conditioned, but it doesn't necessarily make it true. And then they sort of have this fork in the road where they're going to be like, am I going to give into that or am I going to like not give in that? And as they like start to

learn how to resist that conditioning, literally what they're doing is laying down new neuronal wiring and new neuronal connections. And over time, those thoughts, will decrease and they'll start to have like healthier relationship oriented thoughts. So it, you know, personality. And so it's a good question because if we think about early lifehood trauma, right, so you can manifest in different ways. If you get traumatized, you can either not have any problems, lucky or resilient or who knows, really genetically blessed.

You can end up with PTSD. You can end up with complex PTSD or you can end up with a personality disorder. and it's all it's not all like mutually exclusive as well because all of these are like human constructions right they're like descriptors that we use to describe stuff they're descriptors they're not real so like i can't biopsy someone and say this is PTSD versus a personality disorder it's all like a shade of gray it's kind of like in a game you know you can have there in games we have supports what what does it mean to be a support like a character is not necessarily a support support. It's a role that we've created that we sort of slot people into our framework. And so most mental health diagnoses are that way, where it's sort of like a framework where we try to like agree on how something is defined, but that's like our human attempt. It's like a political party. Like a political party is like not a real thing. It's like an abstraction. It's a

human creation. You can't biops anyone and find a political party. You know, it, it, and so psychiatric diagnoses are the same way. All right, chat. Who should we raid? Have you heard about the potential psychedelic treatments for depression, dealing with traumas, and even cancer? And what's your view so far? My view is that they are good potential treatments and that we need more science to really figure out how good they are.

But I think they're very promising. I'm excited. I think it could be a breakthrough in the field of, you know, pharmacology. We can start to use these things therapeutically consistently. But at the same time, you know, I think the research really needs to be there. It's promising, but it's still early. And a lot of things, you know, we'll see what happens because I've also had people in my office who have had like PTSD from using psychedelics.

Okay, who we rating? TriHex. Did I train as a shaman? No. I did not train as a shaman. Oh, here we go. Hello? Oh, the guide is live.

Great. Okay, so you all can check it out now. Thank you. Okay. Guys, I need someone... Okay, we're going to raid trihex because I'm not getting a consensus. Okay, we're going to raid trihex.

Check out the guide, guys, it's live. Honestly, from the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for all of the well-wishes and that spiritual energy transmitted across the interwebs. You know that toxicity that gets transmitted to you when you feed in the game and someone else is like, ugh, I hate you, and then it makes you feel bad in your soul. I've been getting the opposite of that,

and I'm grateful for, you know, all of it. of that positive energy. I really hope that guides have helped. I'm telling you guys, I've spent the better part of, you know, one year of my life in terms of trying to put these together for you all. It's what I think is missing. Um, so check them out. And, uh, yeah, and be patient with us, because this is a minimum viable product. And we're not, you know, we're not like Microsoft. So, you know, or even CD Project Red. Um, and, and give us your feedback because we, you know, we, we, we want to do well and we're interested in doing better and take care of yourself. Stay safe. Get vaccinated if you haven't. And yeah, take care. Thanks for coming.