The Aspiring Psychologist Podcast - Compassion: The Antidote to Shame, Criticism & Trauma | Prof Paul Gilbert OBE

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hi, my name is Beth and I'm a psychological well-being practitioner from Newcastle. I just wanted to say the biggest thank you to the contributors of the clinical psychologist collective book. I've enjoyed reading this so much and loved having an insight into the range of backgrounds and experiences. People have prior to applying for the doctorate and it's been really interesting seeing the potential barriers to the application as well and how I can try and work around this. I really started to doubt myself and whether I was good and to apply for the clinical psychology doctorate, but this has really given me the confidence boost that I needed to give it a shot. So the biggest thank you ever.

Starting point is 00:00:40 Professor Paul Gilbert, OBE, founder of Compassion Focus Therapy, joins me today to answer a very powerful and important question. Why are so many of us our own harshest critics and how might compassion be the antidote? Together we explore how compassion transforms our brains, heals trauma and reshapes relationships. I'm Dr. Marianne, a qualified clinical psychologist. Subscribe, like, comment and watch now to learn how you could transform your life. Just want to welcome to the podcast, Professor Paul Gilbert.

Starting point is 00:01:16 Thank you for joining us, Paul. Thank you very much, Marianne, for inviting me. And this is your 200th podcast, and I think it's amazing what you've done. Incredible. Thank you so much for your kind words. I want to think about what compassion is, actually. If someone is tuning into this, thinking maybe this could be something that would help me or my family or my work teams, what is it, Paul?

Starting point is 00:01:43 Yeah, it's a wonderful question actually because there's so many things on the internet now about compassion and it's about kindness and love and all the rest of it. And you do not need to worry about that. You really don't need to worry about it. don't need love to be compassionate, I can assure you. So what is it? Now, as a psychologist, we study compassion as a motive. Now, all motives have two parts to them. We call them an algorithm. What that means is there's a stimulus and there's a response, okay? So your body works on an algorithm. So if the temperature goes very high, you'll start sweating. It goes very low. You'll start shivering. All your body needs to assess is the temperature, and then your body will do the rest, right?

Starting point is 00:02:26 Now it's the same with threat. For example, if your brain detects a threat, your body will stimulate your heart rate and you'll want to run away or whatever. If on the other hand, you see food, then you don't want to start running, you want to start salivating, preparing to eat. So that's what it means, stimulus and response. What is the stimulus response for compassion? Sensitivity to distress and suffering and need. That's the first thing. You see this is suffering, you can, you are tuning into distress. And then you work out what is likely to be helpful. And they have to match up because you can see somebody in distress, right? And you do the totally wrong thing. So you need wisdom and courage. And this is very important. Now, so in our approach, we always highlight the fact you need the two things.

Starting point is 00:03:16 Because if you only have the one, you can get into difficulty. So, for example, if you only have sensitivity but you don't know what to do, when that happens, people tend to turn off from compassion. because they find it overwhelming. If you know what to do, but you're not sensitive, you're not going to do. I can't care. Well, I could help you, but I don't really care whether to help you or not.

Starting point is 00:03:36 So that's the other side of the problem. So these two issues are very, very important. Now, again, compassion is not one thing. For example, when we're working with the guys, the men who are always a bit sniffy about compassion. Oh, it's a bit weak. It's a bit soft, a bit, you know. So, well, think about this.

Starting point is 00:03:54 If you accept that compassion is about being sensitive, to suffering and wanting to do something about it do you accept they say yes okay i can accept think of a firefighter now a firefighter will risk their lives for you okay but they need to do it wisely and with courage you don't want to just rush in there and not knowing what they're doing and that's classic compassion right so what's what's weak or fluffy about that okay for psychologists and for therapists we have to it's not a fire that we're working with it's somebody's mind that's in great distress. And so we have to be able to tolerate that. We have to be sensitive to that. But we also need to know how to work with it. We can't just say,

Starting point is 00:04:33 well, I'm going to be nice to you and kind to you. Isn't that great? That's not enough. We need to study. We need to understand. So what would help this person? We need to work with them. What is it that would help you? How can we help you find a thing that would help you? And we also need to know, to start with, of course, the focus of their distress. So compassion for us is that, is the sensitivity to suffering. in self and others with a commitment to do something about it and with wisdom and courage. So it's a little bit of a long definition, but it's important this, because this is not really about love. I mean, obviously, for people you love, you're going to do it a lot, but we can also

Starting point is 00:05:12 do it for people we don't even like. We can actually also recognize we don't really want them to suffer, and if we can help them not suffer, we will. Now, kind, we've done a lot of research this kindness is different kindness is really wanting people to feel good so for example what we found in our studies was that you know kindness is about remembering your birthday and being nice to you and supportive and that sort of thing whereas compassion is when there's suffering and so what we find is that if you look at people ask them about kindness they will become less kind to people they don't like so at the moment you don't like somebody you're not going to remember their birth day or whatever but if it's a suffering like they've got kidney disease and you

Starting point is 00:05:59 could help them there's a much less chance of compassion reducing when with somebody you don't like you you still don't want them to suffer so the concept of suffering is very important in in compassion in a way that it's not so important for kindness and love is a totally different thing all together so courage and wisdom to address suffering, that's compassion. Yeah, like, amazing. I think you might have done this before breaking it down, but it's really, really helpful to think it's not just one thing. And actually it's the, it's the perfect, perfect storm of all of those things that you need to be able to

Starting point is 00:06:40 have to be able to engage with it and have it make a difference. Can we imagine for a minute that perhaps, perhaps in this example, a man has gone to the doctors and is struggling with, with mood, maybe with anxiety. And the GP perhaps picks up on the negative, self-critical way that this man talks about himself and his experiences. And of course, the GP's going to refer to mental health team, but he's aware that the waiting lists are long. And maybe he says, actually, I think you should download Professor Paul Gilbert's Compassionate Mind book and listen to it whilst you go for walks. So we're getting the compassion stuff going in and we're getting some exercise. Now I think that would be an excellent bit of social prescribing because of course I've read the book and I know

Starting point is 00:07:32 the benefits of moving your body and being, you know, more compassionate to yourself and less self-critical. But to this man who was perhaps not expecting that outcome, how can we help him realise that maybe is going to be a really helpful thing to do, poor? Well, the first thing is helping them recognize that, you know, stuff's going off in your mind, which is causing your pain and suffering. You know, would you agree that being critical in the way that you are, that's hurtful to you? And you don't come away with that, getting in joy, excitement and enthusiastic to get on with love. The chances are you feel quite the opposite.

Starting point is 00:08:14 Now, usually people kind of agree on that. Okay, so we can understand that this is whatever's happening to you, it's not making you feel good. You're not able to really function with it. And it's also like physical diseases, isn't it? You know, if you don't sort out this, like if you blood sugars have got a problem, you've got diabetes,

Starting point is 00:08:33 but then you need to start looking at not eating so much sugar, maybe, all that stuff. So finding, helping people recognize that actually self-criticism is not so good. Incidentally, self-criticism itself is okay because that's just saying you could have done that better. It's when there's an attention. attacking element to it. There's a sense of you're no good. You should have done better. It's when you get that anger towards the self. That's really what causes the harm. Okay. So we've

Starting point is 00:09:00 got him to accept and that actually the way that he's, the way that he's criticizing himself is probably quite hurtful. So the next thing is helping them think about, do you want to understand that? So where do you think that's come from? Is that your voice or is that the voice of somebody else where you criticize as a child or bullied or whatever? and try to see if there's an origin to it, or if you've been struggling and you're just disappointed because you can't achieve what you want to achieve, and so you have what we call the disappointment experience, and then you attack yourself, I should have done better, I should have done this. I'll give you a personal story in a moment.

Starting point is 00:09:37 And what you have to see underneath criticism is always grief. Sometimes anger, always grief. Why? because you feel when we criticize this up underneath that there's always the feeling we could have been better and if we were better then we'd be loved more we'd be wanted more we'd be admired more we'd be valued more we'd be happy whatever it is and there's a real sadness that because this isn't going to happen there's a sense of isolation so if you look into your self-criticism you always find a feeling of loneliness in it there's always a sense of loneliness when you're focusing and feeling very critical and depressed, you feel lonely. And that's the problem with

Starting point is 00:10:18 self-criticism, because that's what's underneath criticism, and that's partly what can drive it. Give you an example, my personal example, why grief? I was cricketer. I was quite competitive as a cricketer. I used to love playing cricket. I met my wife through cricket. But anyway, as I got older, I became not so good at cricket. And I was playing in this team that I really wanted to play with, but I was a weaker member. I remember on one game, it was a really important game. It was a relatively easy catch that I dropped. And I became very angry of myself.

Starting point is 00:10:51 You know, why did you drop that catch? I mean, it was such an easy catch. Why did you have to do it in this game? You know, very important game. So then I thought, oh, that's interesting. So when I came home, I sat and did a little exercise and myself. So, okay, so what is it then? What is driving this anger towards yourself?

Starting point is 00:11:08 Why have you got so upset about dropping a catch? Yes, it's upsetting. And then I realized that part of what that was about was recognizing, I'm getting old. I can't keep doing this. You know, I'm losing my ability to play. I'm not going to be able to play for this team very much longer. Sooner or later, they're not going to want me because I'm too old. And realizing that actually underneath that was this real sadness of what I was losing and what was happening and the way I couldn't be the way I wanted to be.

Starting point is 00:11:39 That's quite important, particularly for men, of recognizing that hitting yourself and bashing yourself and so underneath that is a sadness. And working with the sadness that sits underneath your criticism is really one of the ways in which we can heal because then we've become compassionate to that sadness, become compassionate to that, in my case, difficulty in struggling with losing my abilities to see a ball and to be able to run like I used to. to be able to run and knees started to get arthritic and everything. It was really tricky, a little bit of a tricky period for me that I wouldn't be part of this life anymore. So that's an example, I think, that might be useful to your guys. It is, and it's also an example of the fact that kind of being compassionate to ourselves

Starting point is 00:12:32 is we've got to think about it as a bit of a muscle, haven't we, that we've got to be able to practice it regularly so that it can, maybe even if it's not there immediately at the point where we're feeling that difficult emotion that it can come to us at a point when we are home and we have got a cup of tea and we can be I've got that image of you being really curious well why why did I have that reaction what could that be about and that sounds you know like a wonderful practice that we could I think all benefit from you know and you know what my experience of being a mother, sometimes in the moment I do not give my ideal response, but for me, once I've

Starting point is 00:13:16 taken a breath and a moment, I'm always conscious to try to repair that rupture and to allow myself to not be a perfect parent. That's not a thing. But I guess to be curious and help them understand about why mummy did shout then, actually, is because she was a bit stressed, she was driving and you turn the music up very loud and I was a bit worried and a bit scared that we might crash and I couldn't think clearly and just helping myself understand about my responses but I think also helping especially young developing minds about about my responses but to be mindful of their own responses and compassionate to them as well so powerful Paul it's very powerful and the point is your compassion is to your disappointment right because your compassion

Starting point is 00:14:05 Because yes, the critical part is not coming to terms of the actually, so in my case, for example, the compassion is saying, yes, it is very sad for you, Paul, you know, because this cricket's been very important to you, you met your wife through it, both of you love the game, and this is very sad. And getting old is a sad process. And, you know, it's not just coming to terms of the cricket, it's also coming to terms of the reality of aging. So I was able to have an empathic connection to the sadness, like the same way that you're telling, an empathic, connection to the sadness. The critical process will stop you see that gets in the way because you're just hammering yourself and bashing yourself. You're not able to do the healing process which is coming to terms with whatever pain is sitting underneath. So in the case for you, Marianne, that's disappointing because you didn't really want to be like that with the children. So yes, that is upsetting. That is disappointing because you didn't want to be like that. So you have the compassion to that disappointment that you're feeling because your emotion's got the better of you in that moment, which they often do, don't they? Same for me too. But you were able to bring

Starting point is 00:15:08 compassion to that moment, so yes, that is upsetting. I am disappointed about that. And that allows you then to begin to work with it. Because people get very shamed, you see, then they shame themselves and I shouldn't have done that. So then they become critical of being critical and gets out of control. It really does. And you so nicely kind of give us that example, actually, that with your cricket, it's okay to be sad about making the right decision. If you'd continued, you might have physically injured yourself, which then would have impacted your whole life, actually, not just the cricket. And you're allowed to mourn for that.

Starting point is 00:15:44 You're allowed to grieve for that. You're allowed to feel really proud of the vibrant young cricket playing man that you were, but also, you know, make that decision to step back from that. Yes. I mean, I think the point you make is a very important one is to realise that grieving, is the pain we pay for valuing. If it didn't value it, then it wouldn't bother me, really. It's like if you lose somebody you love,

Starting point is 00:16:09 the more you love that person, the more you're going to grieve that person. So if you don't want to have to feel sadness when you make a mistake or disappointment or whatever, don't value anything. Because if we don't value anything, it doesn't matter, it doesn't it really? It's because it matters to you.

Starting point is 00:16:24 Because it matters to you. That's why you get so upset with yourself. And it's recognizing. So why does this matter? So what sits underneath that? What is my sadness, my grief, my hurt, that's sitting underneath my criticism. Otherwise, people get locked into the criticism and they can't drop down to that. There's something that matters to you that's hurt you, that you've lost or damaged or whatever that you didn't intend to.

Starting point is 00:16:51 And I mean, the point that you make is a good one, like arguments if you lose, if you get angry, and then you're disappointed because you've been angry and you're worried about that. again, recognizing that the anger, it usually comes from a position of fear or hurt or something or sense that people aren't listening to you or some kind of conflict, right? So always be in touch with the pain that sits underneath the critical process. And sometimes you can track that back to things that happened into Charter where you've been criticised and so on and so on. Yeah, absolutely.

Starting point is 00:17:24 And we've touched upon shame and criticism. them. And I wonder if we can think a little bit about shame and how we could use something else differently. I'm guessing compassion is going to be the answer. But someone at my gym, to give a practical example, we have to name our heart rate monitors to take part in this particular class. Mine is named Marianne. I might not surprise you. But you could name it, you could name it whatever you wanted to. And at my gym, someone is called there's wide load. And when I say, spoke to them about that. I was like, what, why, why have you named yours that? And he said, well, because, you know, and kind of wibbled the belly and was like, you know, I've got to motivate

Starting point is 00:18:06 myself. And but every time the instructor has to refer to this person, it's, it's, you know, called out, shouted on a microphone, wide load. And I just wonder whether there's a, a kinder way that might be less shaming, less critical, that might help any of us towards whatever our goals are, whether they might be fitness, diet, exercise, just general well-being. What's your take on that, Paul? Yes, I think you're absolutely right. I mean, the thing with shame, there are two types of shame. One would be called external shame, internal shame.

Starting point is 00:18:38 So external shame is where you're worried about what other people would think about you. So you may or may not have a negative view of yourself, but you're worried that other people will if you don't change or you don't get the right body shape or whatever it is that they will. And sometimes by using things like wide load, you're kind of saying to the audience, you don't need to shame me because I'm doing it myself, right? I understand.

Starting point is 00:19:01 I understand I've got a white issue. So you don't need to kind of shame you for it. So that's a self-defensive physician. So the concern about how we exist in the mind of the other is a very major concern for humans. But then we also have what we call internal shame, where even if people are being supportive to you, you still criticize and shame yourself

Starting point is 00:19:19 because you're feeling not good enough. And that's often sometimes linked to perfectionism and all that sort of thing. So the key thing then is recognizing, are you primarily worried about what other people think or are you really just attacking yourself? And again, the key with shame and shaming is to recognize that it is not going to help you. You do not come out of a shaming experience, feeling enjoyed, encouraged, okay, I'm going to do whatever. It's always a head-down experience. I mean, you might try to improve because you're worried. about shame. So we call that fear-based motivation. And the psychologist, we know,

Starting point is 00:19:59 fear-based motivation is not such a good thing. It's important sometimes, but generally speaking, the way we treat ourselves, it's not so good. So it's finding the ways in which you make a decision about what your values are. I actually do want to lose weight because it would be good for me. And yes, I'd like to look nice. That's good. And then following it for a personal valuing point of view. I want to do this because I'm to do it, not because I'm ashamed. The shame is a fear base, whereas making a decision, I'd like to do this because of the benefits to me. Now, they're not going to be totally separate. They will obviously fuse together. You can have both of them. But the key thing with shame is

Starting point is 00:20:40 deciding what it is you feel ashamed about it and then making decisions about how you can improve. But do it compassionately, encourage yourself. Okay, let's try this. This has been very difficult. I feel distressed because I got issues with my weight. be compassionate to that distress. Okay, I'm going to try a little bit. And if I make mistakes, I'm going to have another go. So, you know, we work with people who are overweight, and they'll try a little bit, and then maybe they slip back.

Starting point is 00:21:07 So you need compassion to the slip back. Okay, you need compassion. When things have got tricky and you let it go a bit and you've had too many pizzas, stand back and say, okay, so rather than beating myself up about that, I need to be compassionate, support me. myself and get back to what I want to achieve because my critic will push me away because if I criticise myself, I'll just eat more pizzas. So what I need to do is, okay, that wasn't so good

Starting point is 00:21:34 eating all those pieces. So I'm going to get myself back into a position where I can now follow my values and that means being compassionate. And we do, it's interestingly enough, it's quite important for that if you've got a lot of guys listening in the case of sport, actually. There's some really interesting stuff in football. For example, if you're playing football and somebody makes a mistake and misses the goal, it's really important that all the team members around that person support him, say, it's okay, it's going to be okay. And get him back so that he can relax, or she can relax quickly to get into the game. Because if they feel isolated, if they feel the whole team is looking at them negatively and judging them, they stay anxious. They

Starting point is 00:22:14 stay, they're not able to perform in the way that you need them to perform on the field. So everybody has a collective responsibility if one of the players has made a mistake to get their confidence back as quickly as you can and that means not criticizing them or isolating them on the field but really going up to them and say look that's very disappointing for you yes that was upsetting that you missed the goal and so on and so on but okay you're a good player we just get yourself back into you into the zone and you're going to be great so very very important to understand that when we're disappointed we yeah it's upsetting and so forth but how do we get ourselves back into the zone of taking action to move towards our goals because if you keep beating up yourself

Starting point is 00:22:57 you'll just move further away from them um was if you say okay this is what I need to do I need to be compassionate to myself right now because I want to get back to doing what I want to do which is maybe to lose weight or whatever so the ability to deal with setbacks the ability to fail and get back, fail and come back. That's really what a compassionate position is. Yeah. Thank you. And it's helpful as a mother of two young footballing children. I've got a nine-year-old and a 12-year-old. To think about that, actually, because you do see on the pitch when people are disappointed with themselves and when they feel like they might have let themselves or the team down. Yeah. Yeah. I really like that. And I remember, I think

Starting point is 00:23:40 it was in the 2021 euros, which I think essentially were called the 2020 euros, but we took face in 2021 because of the whole COVID synonyms shenanigans. And there was such disappointment when penalty takers for England didn't get them. And it actually turned into racism. I don't know if you remember the incident that I'm talking about. And I remember I was asked to talk on the radio, actually, and in the media about how we can be compassionate. whilst also being disappointed. And I think that is such a powerful idea because, yes, we can be disappointed in ourselves and others,

Starting point is 00:24:20 but we don't need to be mean with it. We don't need to other people in that experience. That, you know, we can just say, I am really disappointed with how that turned out. That's right. Because it's unintentional, right? You always remember that disappointment is always unintentional. I mean, nobody wakes up in the morning,

Starting point is 00:24:40 then they think, you know, I'm going to play football today, but you know what? I'm going to miss the goal and screw it all up. Yeah, that'd be fun. I fancy a loss this week. Nobody does that. Nobody does that. So these things are always unintentional. You know, they're just errors that are unintentional.

Starting point is 00:24:58 And we also say to people, you know, with mental health problems, always remember that things like anxiety and depression and paranoia, you never, never choose them. You don't want them. They're unintentional. okay they're not your fault at all okay nobody wakes up in the morning and thinks themselves you know what my life's going very well and I feel so confident I need to go on one of those courses to learn how to have panic attacks and scare the shit out of myself you know what I mean I've got to go and find out how to be suicidally depressed because I'm so happy I 'm suddenly missing in my life I've got to practice suicidal no one does that no one does that

Starting point is 00:25:35 what we do do however is we need to practice how to be supportive and kind to ourselves and compassionate to ourselves and encouraging and empathic to ourselves. Now, that is a practice because that is less common. The threat system is very easy. The hostile aspects of the mind are very easy to stimulate. You don't need to practice those. The ones you do need to practice are the ones of what happens when things get difficult for you. How do you deal with the struggles of life in a way that is encouraging, supportive, and moves you forward?

Starting point is 00:26:07 So very important because otherwise we blame ourselves. access or blame ourselves. You know, blaming the self for all kinds of things, it's not your thought. That's one of the big problems with people in mental health difficulties. Yeah, and I'm a woman who stands before you and before the audience as someone who has been able to curate a more compassionate view of myself and to be less critical and less shaming. And it's your book for compassionate mind that really helped me to start that process. Could you tell us a bit about a few of your books, please, Paul? Yes, so the compassion in mind is a book that I wrote, I think it took about four or five years to write.

Starting point is 00:26:51 There's an interesting story about that, actually, which I can tell you, again, about the importance of compassion. So I think it was about 19, 2007 or something like that. So just more or less finishing the book, and I knew it was too big, as you said, it was too big, very big. And so I wanted to cut it down, but the publisher was saying, no, you know, We've got a print run. The copy editors is all set up. The book's okay. It's a bit big, but, you know, and they said,

Starting point is 00:27:17 we know you, if we ask you to cut it down, you'll take another. So, okay, but unfortunately, my father was dying of lung cancer. So I had to put the book to one side and go down and be with him at the end. And that was tricky because seeing somebody die of lung cancer is horrible because they basically choked to death. So I was there for all that. We couldn't get him into hospice, so we cared for him.

Starting point is 00:27:39 So there we are. That was quite absurd. So then I came back to Dobby. Like all these emails say, where's the book? Where's the book? Okay, I sent the book. Went to send a book.

Starting point is 00:27:50 And of course, got all these signs saying, bounce, bounce, bounce. I thought, okay, maybe it's too big. I'll break it up into chapters. So I broke it up into chapters. And again, bounce, bounce back. And at that point, I had a rage attack, an absolute rage attack. And I, you know, used every word you can imagine.

Starting point is 00:28:06 And it was a bit like John Cleese, you know, where they come and threatened to. smashed my computer with a baseball bat and bloody hell and so on and so on and i was screaming and then i had to get a work gun in my car and i suddenly remembered my wife was there in the house and i thought oh no she would have heard all of that and then the critic turns up because the critic loves it the critic loves it when you've screwed it and there it is oh so you've just written a book on the compassionate mind about mind regulation you're a total fake you're a you're a fucking useless piece of shit aren't you all that stuff right

Starting point is 00:28:40 I was in a real state and, you know, and it was almost, because I've done a lot of compassion in my train, almost in the car, it was like another person who said, Paul, it's not your fault. It's not your fault. You've had a terrible time with your father. You're in a state of grief. It was awful to see him die the way that he did. And you've worked so hard on this book and everything. It's not your fault. It's not your fault. But just slow down. And that's what I did. So I slowed down. So I slowed down and then I just allowed myself to have a cry and I took my phone out and phone my wife and apologized so the key point about when you practice compassion it won't always stop you from losing it you might but if you can learn to always turn towards it it will always help you look this is a point of suffering it's it's very painful it's very difficult but just let's just slow the whole thing down and see what we can do to repair and so on and so on So it was a very powerful experience for me because I was really raging.

Starting point is 00:29:42 I mean, like a mad thing. And also it helped me understand that these rage attacks can be so painful and so out of control that if you don't have some way of actually down regulating, it's very difficult for people. So we do quite a lot of work actually, as you know, in safety, about helping people with rages and so on and so on. But that was a personal experience. The compassion is there for the dark side. It's there for the suffering. It's there for the difficulties.

Starting point is 00:30:07 It's not there to, oh, let's be nice and kind to each other. I mean, that's great. That's okay. Do all that. But compassion is there when it's really bad and really helps you to find the courage and the wisdom just to settle and not blame yourself and realize this is a great, terrible point of suffering for you. That's why you're raging. So that's another person example. Yeah, thank you.

Starting point is 00:30:33 And it's a really powerful example that I think gives us all permission to be. be human. You know, we've got these feeling states and sometimes we're going to use them, right? They may not show up in a way that looks pretty or makes us feel like good about ourselves at the time. But it's how we make sense of that and how we recognise that actually these feeling states are communications, aren't they? They crop up for a reason. Like like you said, not just for a jolly. They crop up because they're trying to tell us something about about ourselves. Yes. Yes, absolutely right. And it's the, you need compassion for the suffering, right? That's the thing. And the greater the suffering, the greater the

Starting point is 00:31:12 pain, the greater the anger, whatever it is, the more you need it. Yeah, absolutely. Where would be a good place for people to learn more about you, about your books, about your work? Is your website the best place for that, Paul? Yes, I think so. If you're new to compassion, come to the website, it's www.compassionate mind, one word.com.uk. So you can certainly come and see, and there's practice, there for you. And the other thing to remember is when you practice compassion, they are stimulating brain systems. You are actually practicing developing brain systems, and we now know that if you practice, you literally will change circuits in your brain. Now, people often ask me, well, how do you know? Well, we know partly from research, but look, I can give you a very

Starting point is 00:31:56 quick demonstration. If you're laying in bed, for example, and you certainly bring to mind to worry to mind, and you start worrying about that, what you'll find is your, you'll heart rate would have gone up slightly. So your worry will be affecting your cardiovascular system. And if it's anxiety, your muscles tend to get floppy and loose, whereas if it's anger, muscles tighten up, right? So anger can be linked to headaches, particularly the back of the neck and that sort of thing. So what you're focusing your mind on has a big impact on your body. And we always sometimes use a sexual example because it's so easy that if you're fantasizing something sexual, you only use that fantasy, you only use that fancy because you want to stimulate

Starting point is 00:32:40 things in your body. Now, if it doesn't stimulate things in your body, the fantasy is no good to you. And so you can literally move blood flow and hormones around your body with your mind. You can do that. It's amazing when you think about it. Your mind will change the flow of hormones and blood flow according to what you're fantasizing. But it's the same for compassion. If you practice compassion, you will be stimulating circuits in your body and your brain that will strengthen over time. And over time, those circuits will be available to you so that it will allow you to start switching into compassion and calming down. Just like I said in the car, I'd been practicing for a while. So they automatically came on for me when I was in a state of distress. But compassion

Starting point is 00:33:25 is not just about, you know, being kind and nice to ourselves. That's all to the good. But it actually changes your brain and your body. Okay, you can change your brain in your body. And over time, that will really help you. Yeah, I don't, I don't need to see a scan on my brain, Paul. I know that since learning about your book and your work and really practicing that daily since 2018, that my brain is different. Yes, I'm just wired differently. And I'm, I'm a better a human for my experiences. You know, I think grief and trauma is awful, isn't it? Because it makes you ultimately often a better person. But sometimes you'd be like, I'd settle for being that slightly shittier person I was and not have gone through all of this. But

Starting point is 00:34:12 thank you for holding my hand. The book is big. I listen to it as an audiobook and I love it. And I might well listen to it again having met you again in person today. But thank you for doing what you do. And please to anyone who's listening or watching this, please do either pick up a copy or download an audio book of the compassionate mind because I honestly believe it might just change your life and the life of those around you. Paul, thank you so much for your time. That's a pleasure. Thank you very much for inviting me, Marianne, and all the, what you're doing, getting all this information out there because that's so important for people that they have available, the information is available to them. Otherwise,

Starting point is 00:34:55 it's all locked up in academic, you know, bookshelves or something. So you're doing a fabulous job. Thank you. And thank you for being so accessible and so generous with your time. It's really appreciated. Great. Thank you so much to the incredible Professor Paul Gilbert OBE for sharing his time so kindly with us for not one but two episodes.

Starting point is 00:35:15 If you haven't watched the previous episode, there's a bit more of a kind of psychology vibe. It's our 200th episode celebration of the Aspire psychologist podcast, but even if you're not working in the psychology or mental health field, there's still so much to learn there. So I will make sure that I link that in the description and in the up next on YouTube. If you found this content helpful, please do, you know, set the comments ablaze. Let me know. Let me know what your take-home message is from it. Let me know if you could spot the bits where I almost cried because I was just so moved

Starting point is 00:35:54 from connecting with Paul and what we were talking about. Following the show, subscribing, liking, commenting, sharing it with your friends, you know, getting busy in the comments really is the way to help this channel and this podcast grow, which helps me to attract brilliant, brilliant guests like Professor Paul Gilbert OBE. Hope you found it as inspiring as I have. What a privilege, you know, that I get to, that I get to,

Starting point is 00:36:24 to do this. Like, that is not lost on me. And these conversations, well, they will stay with me forever. I genuinely think this is going to be two episodes that I'm going to be watching back so regularly as my, I guess, just regular dose of compassion for myself to act as a top-up. I would love to know if you do the same. Please do check out Paul's website. And please do check out his books. I really love the compassionate mind. I think that's a great place to start. whether you read it or listen to it. My name's Yana and I'm a trainee psychological well-being practitioner. I read the Clinical Psychologist Collective book.

Starting point is 00:37:35 I found it really interesting about all the different stories and how people got to become a clinical psychologist. It just amazed me how many different routes there are to get there and there's no perfect way to become one. And this kind of filled me of confidence that, no, I'm not doing it wrong and put less pressure on myself. So if you're feeling a bit uneasy about becoming a clinical psychologist, I'd definitely recommend this just to put yourself at ease

Starting point is 00:38:10 and everything will be okay. But trust me, you will not put the book down once you start. Thank you.

The Aspiring Psychologist Podcast - Compassion: The Antidote to Shame, Criticism & Trauma | Prof Paul Gilbert OBE

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