HealthyGamerGG - "I watch your videos but nothing changes"

Episode Date: February 5, 2024

In today's episode, we address a community post that asks how to implement change based on the content we produce. Check out HG Coaching: https://bit.ly/46mKzHj Or, take the quiz to see which Coaching types is right for you: https://bit.ly/3FjiHcd Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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We never question our own beliefs. And this is how we create echo chambers. And this is how we stay stuck. My ex consumed a ton of Dr. K content and got a false sense of wellness. Just a heads up, my ex-boyfriend had a huge mental health slide and became less and less well. I was really worried about him, but he felt he was past needing therapy and above getting an intake or any help. of any kind. Yet he consumed a lot of Dr. K content. He even recommended that I watched Dr. K because my anxiety was getting worse. Actually, I got therapy and it turns out that my anxiety was almost entirely to do with my ex, our relationship, and my growing codependency on trying to fix him. Well done. Unfortunately, I think it gave him a false sense of being on top of his

mental health. However, it continued to get worse. Eventually, I uncovered a very serious drug addiction issue, not to mention other addictions over time, such as gaming, work, shopping, consuming content, etc. One of the biggest things he is he obsessively watched the content but never took any of the advice or put it into practice. For example, binge watching the content on sleep hygiene late at night and continuing terrible sleep habits after that. While I did watch some Dr. Kane found it useful, taking notes, etc., please be mindful that this is not a substitute for real professional help, journaling, meds, therapy, etc. I assume that this is probably obvious. Yeah, we say that at the beginning of every stream and every piece of content that we put out.

And don't think anyone has been misled. Thank God. However, I saw the subreddit today and thought I'll leave a message before parting. Thank you so much for doing that. Let's talk about the problems of watching Dr. Kay's content and the false sense of well-being that it provides. So this is something that we've got to understand. Okay. So this is a case of someone whose partner was addicted to what sounds like substances of some kind,

had some pretty bad addictions. and then consumed mental health content on the internet as an excuse to not do work. As much as I love to bash Dr. Kay's content, I don't think we can really take the blame for this. And here's the reason why. Hey, y'all, I want to take a second to talk about HG coaching. And y'all may be wondering, oh my God, bro.

Like, I don't want to talk about coaching. I just want to watch YouTube videos because there's a part of your brain that recognizes that you need to do better in life. But you don't actually want to invest the time and energy. You just want to sit there and watch another YouTube video, which is exactly why I developed a coaching program. Because I realize the problem that we have today is not that we don't know what to do. It's that we don't really understand how we work and how to get ourselves to actually do things.

And the reason I developed a coaching program is so that 12 weeks from now, you can actually have made progress. We've shown that people improve in their sense of life purpose by about 58% and a 25% to 45% reduction in depression and anxiety. The reason we made a coaching program isn't because you can't DIY it. It's because if you want to have made significant progress three months from now, you're going to need help doing it. So if you're interested, check out the link in the description below. And if you're still not ready yet, totally fine. That's why we literally have 800 YouTube videos.

So there's something we've got to understand about the consumption of mental health content, which is actually spiraling out of control right now on the internet, which we're a part of. Okay? And I'll tell you all what we're doing to do with it. first thing to understand is as someone struggles with their mental health, they recognize that their mental health is struggling. And then what happens is our mind does something really, really slippery, which is it recognizes, okay, I need to do something to fix this problem. But then the problem is that there's a part of our mind that looks at what it takes to fix a problem and decides that it doesn't

want to do that. Because fixing problems is difficult. Fixing problems requires sacrifice. Fixing problems is sometimes painful and requires things like accountability. And the mind does not like that. So sometimes what the mind will do is it'll look for something that is almost like virtue signaling for improving our mental health. It'll look for something that says, okay, if I do this thing, then I'm checking the box of improving my life. And if I'm checking the box, then here's the key thing. I can continue with the degenerate behavior I do not want to give up. Degenerate is maybe a little bit unfair, like if people are struggling with an addiction, that's the slipperiness of the addiction mind.

This is what I learned as an addiction psychiatrist. Some people will show up and will talk the talk. And now what's happened is we have a plague of mental health content on the internet, of which we're guilty. And here we are trying to help people with their mental health, but there's something really slippery that goes on, which is that watching our content is not going to be sufficient to change your life, right? And I hate to say it, but that's how it is.

So this is what we actually try to do with our content. So I'm going to explain this. I don't know that we've ever explained this. So here's the thing. If someone is not reluctant to engage in mental health support or improvement, what you basically have to do is meet them where they're at, which is precisely why we do what we do. Right.

So we try to create content that is engaging for people where they're at. So even if someone doesn't actually want to do anything about their mental health, we're actually okay with that. and we're going to try to engage you in a way that sort of brings you in, right? Makes things a little bit entertaining, a little bit fun, a little bit humorous. And hopefully by the end of it, over time, you will start to make some changes. And this is what we've seen in our community time and time and time again. It's not like people show up on day one and then they watch one video and they're like,

oh, crap, I'm going to transform my life because I watched one YouTube video by this guy. And then I'm going to transform my life. It's actually the people who do do that end up not sticking with it. right? And sometimes, like, this is even consistent with things like mania, where I've seen a lot of people, you know, clinically who are manic and they like watch one video and they're like, oh my God, this transforms my life. So if you're someone who is watching one video and you're like, this shit is transforming my life, unless it's the gifted kids video, that one is fair game or maybe why we've got a couple that I think is fair to transform your life, to be honest. We've heard that feedback like time and time and time again. So maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe like one or two of a percent of you all, you can be transformed by one video. We'll concede that. point. But 99 to 98% of people, let's be honest, one video is not going to change your life. And so then the question is, if you're chain watching Dr. Kay's content, we see this a lot where people will binge watch it, right? The key thing to understand is that information does not necessarily create behavioral change. There is a second component to this, which is the application of the

stuff in your life. And that's also why when we make content, we don't just say, hey, here's what's going on, we try to say like, okay, here are one or two things that you can do to apply this principle to your life. And that's where the rubber meets the road, right? And this is true of other parts of like watching content as well. Like you can look at exercising content or if you're like me, you can watch cooking videos on YouTube. But watching cooking videos is not the same as learning out of cook. And our content is no different. So what I would strongly encourage you all to do is pay attention to your mind. Right. And here's one really simple. test that you can do. And be honest with yourself. What am I watching this content for? And there are a

couple of reasons that you can watch it. Number one is I'm watching this content in order to get ideas so that I can try to make some kind of substantial change to my life. I'm watching this in order to apply it. Okay? That's number one. And if that's what you really want to do, what you should do is try the thing in the video before you watch the next video, right? Try it. The second thing that you can do to make our content more worthwhile is manipulate the information. So now we're going to teach you all some stuff about how information changes someone's behavior. And this is the crazy thing. It doesn't even require you to attempt to do something. The key thing that has been shown scientifically to result in like understanding and behavioral change is the ability to manipulate the information.

So for example, if we have when we're working in the hospital, right, so I'm a psychiatrist. So sometimes we'll have someone in the hospital who wants to leave the hospital against medical advice. So this may be someone who came in with a heart attack and they are addicted to alcohol or opiates. And so what happens is on day two of the hospitalization, they had a small heart attack. They're sitting in the ICU. They're starting to like want their substances. They're starting to withdraw and they're like, I want to leave. And people are like, you can't leave.

You just had a heart attack. And then the patient is like, no, I want to leave. And so then is it. And then what happens is the cardiologist calls the psychiatrist, right? And so then I get a page and I show up at like two in the morning because there's a patient who's two days post-M-I who wants to leave the hospital. And now this is where we get into a really tricky thing as doctors because on the one hand, we're here to help patients, but we also want to respect their autonomy.

And so what we do is something called a capacity evaluation. And a capacity evaluation involves checking a couple things to make sure that this person is well within their mental frame to make decisions to leave the hospital. And one of the key aspects that we rely on that sort of demonstrates that this person really knows what they're doing is their ability to manipulate information. And so if y'all are watching our videos, and even if you don't say, you say, Dr. Kay says, okay, like you should meditate every day for one week. And you're like, I can't do that.

That's totally fine. What you should do, though, is manipulate the information. Play around with it in your head. What this means is challenge the information, right? So Dr. Kay says this, and I think he's wrong because of this. That's actually good. Tell me why I'm wrong, right? Do it in your head or I guess post. Second thing that you can do is try to think about, okay, even if you think that this is wrong, and this is really huge, if you think a piece of information is wrong and you're listening to someone else and your mind is reflexively challenging it. If you really want to learn and change, what you should do is try to understand how that information could be right. So try to take the other person's point of view and question your own beliefs,

right? So this is something that the internet doesn't do. The internet is like, hey, I think this is wrong. Therefore, screw them, downvote, cancel them. We never question our own beliefs. And this is how we create echo chambers. And this is how we stay stuck. So if you are someone who consumes some kind of content. This is really common, by the way, right? So we see this a lot with, like, people who are consuming content that they disagree with. And this is like, this is going to be political, where I'm going to watch videos of people who I politically disagree with, and I'm going to just poop on them in my head, and I'm going to feel better about myself. Or we see it with things like gender dynamics, where I'm going to consume stuff that has a view on gender and

relationships that I completely disagree with. And I'm going to consume that content. And then people are really confused. They're like, I don't understand. why the algorithm is serving me this toxic content. It's because the algorithm understands that you actually really enjoy engaging with it, right? And then you watch this crap and you're like, these people are wrong. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, all these people are idiots. They're all dumbasses. So this is what our mind reflexively does. So if you want to really learn something, I know it sounds insane, but try to understand the other person's perspective. Okay, this is the second way you manipulate information. One is to challenge it, and the second is to try to support it, try to figure out

what is this person thinking and in what circumstances could this be true? Because here's the crazy thing is if you understand that side of things, you will understand so much more and you may grow yourself as a human being. So what you really need to do is manipulate the information. The third thing that you can do is engage with the information either through conversation, like you can post, like we see this a lot where, you know, we'll have like video-based discussions on our subreddit or talk to people on Discord or talk to people about, you know, what they think about this particular thing.

These are always to manipulate information. And for those of y'all that are kind of lazy, right? You're like, eh, I don't want to do anything. I don't want to do anything. I don't want to meditate. I don't want to wake up. I don't want to do yoga. I don't want to journal.

At least think about it. And that's one step forward in terms of, like, applying the content to your life. And this is something that I think we undervalue in our society today. So right now we get bombarded with so much information and so many opinions that we're, we stop thinking for ourselves. And people are kind of like wondering. They're like, why on earth do people listen to celebrities and their opinions on like geopolitics or the economy?

Like, what does a celebrity know about this particular thing? And why do we do that? We do that because we as human beings and in this society today, we have surrendered our capacity for critical thinking. And this is where there's so much information, but why isn't the whole world becoming happy and successful, right? There's all the side hustle people out there, The finance bros, and maybe finance ladies, who knows, who are like, you should side hustle and you should do this and crypto.

And like, why isn't everyone a millionaire? Like, what happened? Like, how is this? There's so much good information. It's because we don't think about it. We've stopped doing the thinking for ourselves. And so this is the key thing to understand about consuming our content. First of all, you've got to be careful that there is not a part of your mind that is using our content as a substitute for progress. Do you all understand that? that. What this means is that you think, okay, if I watch 10 Dr. K videos, my life will get better, right? And so then you're like passively watching Dr. K videos because like if you watch enough Dr. K videos, your life will get better, right? There's some data, so we're doing an internal study and we hope to kind of formalize it and stuff like that. So we have some initial data that watching our content can improve mental health by about like 8 to 11 percent, literally. Like, it may actually help. Just as a frame of reference, you know, some studies show that medication

improves things by maybe about 30 to 50%, right? So some studies say 50 or 60%. Chances are that further data really shows that that number is way smaller than we thought, and it's probably closer to 30%. So, hey, like, I'll take watching YouTube or Twitch or whatever for a 10, like, you know, being a third of the value of an SSRI, like, I'll take that. Right? So this data hasn't been third party checked or we haven't done a formal study or anything

like that yet. We've seen a signal that is now like, okay, we should really study this, do something that's a little bit more controlled, really. analyze the data and see how much it helps people. But this is also what we see kind of like on, on, you know, when people in our community say, hey, you've helped me a lot. Right. So I went to the international last week and that was fun. And like literally hundreds of people were like, hey, your content has changed my life. So when people walk up to me and they say that, I'm like, okay, like maybe we're doing something right. But the key thing here is that you've got to be

careful because sometimes your mind will delude you into thinking that you're making progress by doing something that is very, very hands off. That's not hard. So be careful about that. Binge watching our content, like if you want to, go for it, right? I'm not going to say no. But also recognize that there's a majority of people in our community who will say, hey, it helped a lot more when I slowed it down. So watch out for that. Second thing is, if you want to make it worthwhile, just do the stuff that we tell you to do.

Easy. That's why we tell you to do it, right? Give it a shot. I'm not saying you have to do it 100%. Give it a shot. The whole point is for you to learn about yourself because I know it sounds crazy. As brilliant as I am, a stranger on the internet is not going to be able to give you the perfect advice. The whole point of this channel is to teach people how to understand

themselves. It's to teach you how to understand yourself. So what we're going to do is we're going to give you like a heads up. I mean, sorry, a head start, right? We're going to give you, we're going to lay things out so that you don't have to figure everything out, but you should test it and apply the concept yourself. And the last thing is even if you're not willing to do anything, that's okay. Try to manipulate the information. Challenge the information. Try to understand for the parts that you disagree with, why is your perspective different from this person's perspective? That's really healthy. And the fourth thing, which we're totally for, is if you look at addiction psychiatry, change doesn't happen overnight. And so this is the four thing that we really focus on,

and I do this quite intentionally, is I recognize that not everyone is willing to make a change today when they watch a piece of our content. They're not willing, right? So y'all in the audience, you may not be willing to change. That's actually okay. But as long as you stay around, over time, what we tend to see is that people are more and more willing to change. So I wouldn't say binge watch everything and then disappear for a month. What I'd say is like watch a couple videos a week and then like over time, like your desire to change will increase. And that's actually what we see too, which is that I don't think that, you know, I don't

think that people find drastic change in a short amount of time. I think what happens is people who are members of our community, their mental health will improve over the course of months to years. And so that can work. And it's okay if you're not ready to change today. We're going to try to send you something entertaining. But I think the unfortunate truth is that a lot of people will use our content as a substitute for making progress in their life. They'll start to think like, okay, if I watch enough YouTube videos, I will be better.

And that's just like saying, look, you can watch enough YouTube videos about working out. Ain't going to make you swall. And I hate to say mental stuff is a little bit different, right? Because hopefully you can shape your thoughts and that's a part of being mentally swole. But at some point, you've got to do something. And so be careful about that for yourselves and other people. This episode is brought to you by CarMax. Want to buy a car the easy way?

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