THE ED MYLETT SHOW - Manage Your Mental Mess w/ Dr. Caroline Leaf

Episode Date: March 30, 2021

Manage your mind… Control your mess! We all have a mess in our brains. How we are able to manage that mess is the difference between a healthy mind and body and a mind and body riddled with anxiety and depression. And there is no one better on the planet to explain brain science than Dr. Caroline Leaf. Dr. Caroline Leaf is a communication pathologist and cognitive neuroscientist with a Masters and Ph.D. in Communication Pathology, specializing in cognitive and metacognitive neuropsychology. She’s a bestselling author, international speaker, and worldwide educator. She was one of the first in her field to study how the brain can change with directed mind input and has transformed the lives of hundreds of thousands of individuals with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), learning disabilities (ADD, ADHD), autism, dementia and mental ill-health issues like anxiety and depression. In this interview, Dr. Leaf is breaking down the inner-workings of your mind in a way you’ve NEVER heard before. She is revealing the science behind how to recognize negative patterns and turn destructive thoughts into healthy thoughts that SERVE YOU! Whether you are a person of science, a person of faith, or somewhere in between, this interview will open your eyes to the TRUE POWER you have inside to control your mental AND give you practical steps on how to do it. 👉 SUBSCRIBE TO ED'S YOUTUBE CHANNEL NOW 👈  → → → CONNECT WITH ED MYLETT ON SOCIAL MEDIA: ← ← ← ▶︎ INSTAGRAM ▶︎ FACEBOOK  ▶︎ LINKEDIN ▶︎ TWITTER ▶︎ WEBSITE  

This is the Ed Milach show. All right, welcome back to max out everybody. I'm so excited to have this guest here today. By the way, she's made a huge sacrifice. She's what at the time of recording this, there's a storm where she lives in Texas, snow's rolled in, there's no power. She went and got a hotel room so that we could do this today. So if you see the background, that's where she is. And you wouldn't know it from the background,

but this is one of the most remarkable people I've ever talked to in my life. I had the great honor of being on her show. She's a cognitive neuroscientist, which just even saying those things is a miracle that I can get that out of my mouth, never mind understand what it is. She's one of the most brilliant people you're ever going to meet in your life. She's a bestselling author. She's got a PhD in communication pathology. She's brilliant. And you're going to write a bunch of notes today. I mean,

like a bunch of notes. So Dr. Caroline Leif, thank you for being here and making the sacrifice to be here today. I wouldn't have missed this. Thank you so much for that lovely introduction and I just absolutely love talking to you. We hit the most amazing talk on when you're when I interviewed you and I think you're incredible as well. So thank you. Thank you. I don't know the channel to you what we're going to talk about today. That's for sure and we're talking a lot about your brain today.

She's an expert on memory. She's an expert on thinking. She's also a woman of faith. She's very expert on memory. She's an expert on thinking. She's also a woman of faith. She's very complex, interesting person. And a pleasure to listen to as you can already hear with that South African accent. So let's start out a little bit because we're gonna talk about thinking.

So I was thinking about thinking when I was preparing to talk with you. And I think it'd be a good place to start because I don't think most people understand it. What is a thought? How does a thought work? There is such a great question and I'm really glad that you asked that because it's a good place to start. Okay, a thought is something that you actually build. So it's the consequence of three actions and those actions are seeing and when you think you always you feel and when you think and feel you choose those three like my fingers are

stuck together, those three always go together. You're always thinking when you're thinking you're always feeling when you're thinking and feeling you're always choosing and that is mind and when mind happens which always happens, you never, your mind is never not with you, you wake up with your mind, you go to bed with your mind, you get dressed with your mind, wake up with your mind, you go to bed, with your mind, you get dressed, with your mind, you eat with your mind. You have discussions with your mind, they're using your mind now.

Your mind never stops. So you're always thinking, feeling and choosing. And thinking and feeling and choosing has a consequence, and the consequences of thought. So the thought is the result of thinking, feeling and choosing. So during the course of the day, you think, feel and choose in response to the experiences of life. It begins as you open your eyes in the morning, and at night time when you close your eyes and go to sleep, then the building part of thinking,

feeling and choosing, building, you think, feel choosing, both thoughts all day long, and then at night time your mind is still going, but now you're sorting out the thoughts that you've built, kind of a housekeeping, regenerative function, wavy dream, get prepared for the next day and all that kind of stuff. So, thought is a real thing that is holding the data of the experience, and it holds the data in terms of information and emotions, because you think and feel and choose, so it's data and emotions. So it's simple way to understand this is all the listeners and viewers now. As you introduce me, you would have literally sown a seed in the ground to use that analogy of this is some kind of thing about thinking and mind and brain and whatever. And then

as we're speaking, we're growing little roots. So as as as I'm speaking, they're growing roots. Those roots are protein structures and they are holding my words as vibrations. And as I'm giving more information so you are growing more of these little protein branches in your brain and it's all connected and coordinated and you're doing it in your own unique ways. Every listener would be building their own roots and it's filled with data and emotions because you're thinking and feeling and choosing as you listen to me. And then you go like a little treat trunk, which is your angle, how you view this information. And then that produces little branches with leaves. I've got some analogies here, here's a here's a thought that's what I thought

looks like. The roots you can't see, but there's the treat trunk and there's the branches with the leaves. And the branches with the leaves are the memories of how you are seeing this information. So it's the leaves are the memories of how you are seeing this information. So it's the behaviors and the motions of how you see this information. So my words are down here in the roots and your interpretation are in the branches and the leaves. And so that whole thing is a thought

and like a tree is made of branches and roots. So a thought is made of root memories and branch memories. And collectively this then produces what you say and what you do, it produces your actions. So everything that you do, all your communication, your writing, speaking, talking, running, dancing, jumping, relationship, work, all of that stuff is coming from thoughts that we've built. And we're doing this all day long, we're building thoughts and then it might be sort of thoughts out. And that's a healthy thought for the viewers

and those that can't see, it is some just on audio, this is a toxic tree, a toxic thought. So I'm using a wierry thought also a tree but you can see it's very much the living dead game with throwing stuff. So it's very much alive, but there's the roots, the trunk and the trees.

And your brain, your thoughts look like trees. That's why we say that thoughts have an arbor like structure tree like structure. And in and this is healthy. Our brain is wired for this. It's not wired for this. This is a good and nice folded protein, nice balance chemicals, all the right stuff.

And this is incorrectly folded proteins and chemicals and creates a massive response in our immune system in the brain which thinks that this is something like COVID. It doesn't that's at all. So the immune system will send out the same kind of immune army that be be be be antelimpsi and macrophages and all that kind of thing to fight this toxic thought in the same way to fight COVID or any virus in your body. So that's how real they are. Wow, okay, so let's unpack that a little bit. So first, think field shoes is something everybody can take from this right now and understand that you're

processing information that way. This idea of the root with the tree is brilliant. I understand that, so I'm still with you. But you know, when you and I have talked in the past, I want to ask you about this. So it sounds to me as if past experience past thought informs future thought. Absolutely. If we're not conscious of it. So let's assume I have a pattern of responding to stimulus in a particular way because of this roots got bigger and bigger and the trees got bigger and bigger. And so these past experiences, these past thoughts are informing how I think feeling shoes currently. How does one overcome the negative implications potentially, if there are toxic thoughts of not doing detrimental damage to us now? Excellent question as well. So, that you're totally correct. Every experience we have is basically built into our brain and into our mind. So already the implication of what I'm saying is that mind and brain are not the same thing.

So we can go there in a moment, but to answer your question, we have to be, we, and when I say we, we with our thinking feeling choosing, so we, you, me, that's mind. So we've got this part of our mind that's what I like to call the wise mind. It's this instinct that we just know, for example, it's like when someone comes to you for advice and you just give them this great advice and there's just this, wow, I didn't even know I knew that or you have a great conversation or something like that. There's this instinct inside of us of what's right, okay? And that's what I call the wise mind. And that's thinking, feeling choosing. So we've got this at our core. And so we're drawing on that, that wise mind psychologically is a gravitational field scientifically. And that we use to then

self-regulate the stuff that's driving us crazy, all the bad habits we've got, all the whatever. So we have to get into a system of mind management. We need to manage our minds through self-regulation and we see from neuroscience and for mind brain integration research which has been my field for nearly 40 years now that we can do that every 10 seconds. I'm not asking you to check on your watch like on your Apple watch for every 10 seconds or your timer. I'm just saying basically we supposed to be when you're conscious you should always be self-regulating. To the extent where, like for example, now we're talking, so it was listening, it was watching, just look at your hands, look at your facial expression,

be aware of your body movements, be aware of the impact of what you're saying, and how you're saying it, or how you're listening, I'm watching all of that at the moment when I'm speaking, I'm extremely aware of it because I'm saying it. I'm looking at your face. I'm seeing your responses. So that self-regulation is what we should be doing all the time. When you self-regulate yourself like that, you're self-regulate how you're thinking, feeling and choosing in response to every experience, the conversation, the things that irritate you, the things that frustrate you, the compactness in your life. You'll start seeing, I always respond in this way, with this kind of thing happens, or my husband or wife or business partner or child or whatever, we always seem to have the

same kind of argument as a patent, so you can start identifying the toxic patterns when you self-regulate. So then you can start identifying the repetition and then you can start thinking, observing, for example, that maybe you highly anxious five times a day or almost every day or all. So you start seeing these patterns in your life and all those patterns, that's self-regulation. Caroline's so brilliant that I want to unpack. She can say incredibly powerful things and I don't want to go over all of them and go to the next thing because I want to go deeper on them. So you talk about the difference between the mind and the brain. I'd like to just mention that and then you teach like I think you call like five steps to mind management.

Yes, the nearest. So give us a quick, what's difference between brain and mind and what are these five steps to managing our mind? Maybe you just listed a few of them there, but I like lists. So I'm just wondering what those are. Absolutely. Well, first of all, the five steps we call the neuro cycle, I call it the neuro cycle. So with your mind you're cycling through your brain, you're directing the neuropastocity, which is really nice to know. You can actually direct changes in your brain. So my whole premise is that if you are always, your mind is always working and it's always changing the brain. And it's always happening, can we direct that process? So for three, three, almost four decades now,

I've been researching that and the answer is yes, and that's what's in the book, in the mental mental mess. So if you add the nearest cycle to your lifestyle and it's a lifestyle, you actually will literally improve your ability to manage your mind by 81% and more, which is phenomenal because it means

that you influence cellular health through the telomeres, which we can unpack as well. You can reduce inflammation, you can improve your immune function, your cardiovascular function, your logical kidney line, everything about your body will respond to mind management because your mind basically is driving all those functions anyway. Your gut health, your gut brain interaction, all of it isn't

if you did your brain and body are dead. So what's keeping, what's the difference between a dead person and a live person? Mind. So if mind is messy, brain and body are messy. If mind is cleaned up and it's a process because we're all going to be messy because we have free will and part of getting in our mind sorted out, part of my management is dealing with the mental mess. It's accepting I'm going to make decisions, I'm going to get into arguments, I'm going to make, you know, misunderstand people, I am going to have acute traumas and toxic traumas and imposter syndrome and people pleasing and all the stuff all of us go through in different ways.

So I'm going to have that and it's okay, but how am I going to manage it? So for me personally, what's happened over the years is that I still go through these things, but the differences I'm 81% more efficient in identifying and managing. So instead of something that could throw me years ago for days and affect my work and everything I can deal with it within seconds and minutes and get back on track. So that's one part of the answer. So before I go to mind brain do you want to ask anything or unpack anything with what I say? No, are there are there specifically five things like it are going to sequence? Yes,

it's a sequence. So before I tell the sequence, let me tell you mind brain because it'll make so much more sense. Because I've alluded to it a lot. So your mind is separate from your brain, but inseparable. So the brain and mind are not the same thing. And the brain and body collectively are made of

37 to 100 trillion cells. And your mind is and then that those 37 to 100 trillion cells and your mind is and then that those 37 to 100 trillion cells arrange themselves into this incredible the brain and the heart and the lungs etc. And your mind is what actually is the external force that keeps them going, the blood flowing, the chemicals, electricity, the electromagnetic, all of that, which is phenomenal. So that's why our mind's not managed, the body and the brain will be a mess. And so, and that goes down to even like if you are eating, if you're eating maybe eating a farm to table, wonderful diet, etc. But you're not dealing with your anxiety or you're not you're trying

to stuff it down or you're not dealing with that bad habit or that toxic tumor, you will lose up to 80% of the nutrition because your mind has affected the ability of the digestive system to actually digest and get to simulate the nutrients. And sometimes it's kind of messy and sometimes it's great and we all, if we're human, we are going to experience messes and there's no shame in that. The sooner we get rid of the shame and guilt and condemnation around being messy and the sooner we as leaders talk about the mind more authentically, the more we give people that follow us a permission to talk about mind. Only three percent of leaders are talking about mind, which is terrible.

So that's creating the stigma that they're pretending that be perfect. And that's how we see people that seem to be perfect in their lives and they're committing suicide. Meanwhile, it's because we've got this philosophy in the stage of being open and seeing issues of the mind as helpful messengers of an underlying issue. The neuropsycho then is these five steps. It is how you manage your mind moment by moment. So it's a lifestyle. So the neuropsycho is what you do when you're awake and conscious and then automatically prepares you for sleep because sleep is fixing up your brain. So your mind is always with you, so your mind always needs to be managed. And so in analogy and then I'll dive into the five steps, you can go three weeks without food, you can go three days without water, you can go three

minutes without oxygen, but you don't even go three seconds without using your mind. So you're always thinking, feeling and choosing, yeah. So it's gather awareness. Second step is to reflect. Third step is to write. Fourth step is to reach it. And the first step is an act of reach. So each of those, they so profound, they do the most phenomenal stuff in your brain. And the first half of the book where I talk about the mental health system and I talk about mechanical trials, I do explain what each of those steps are doing. So the first thing is to gather awareness.

Gather awareness and I've chosen words very carefully. If you think of a big fat apple tree and you apple picking and this apple tree is so full that you actually can't like you just go up to and you just nudge it and this apples are just falling on your head. That's how we often feel when you're on minds and mace. They're just everything's just falling on our head. That's how we often feel when you're on minds and mess. There's just everything's just falling on our head and it's just too much. So what you can do with the neuropsycho is

when you feel that situation coming on, remove yourself from the tree and stand back and watch the tree. And gather awareness of all of that. Don't be scared of it. Don't run away from the apple tree. Just stand back and observe the apple tree. Observe what's going on there.

Let me jump in about that. This is brilliant. One of the things I've taught for a long time, I didn't understand the neuroscience behind it was that for me, and there's four other steps, this is why everybody needs to get the book, but awareness of your thoughts, I've always said when I'm aware of these patterns,

when I'm aware of my thoughts, they begin to lose their power over me. They're influenced over me. And one of the reasons that you're explaining it scientifically, which I've always wanted to understand better, because I do become separate from the thought when I observe it, almost like I'm above it and distant from it. Like you said, and I realize I'm not just that thought and that is a pattern that I'm running. And so I just want to acknowledge what Caroline saying, because from a practical standpoint, when I coach people, this is

something that is the first thing I teach is just becoming aware. Now to know that there's four other steps is obviously very empowering as well, but I want to just unpack this a little bit into another area. So I want to use your brilliance towards something else. One thing I want to acknowledge is that what Caroline is saying is that neuroplasticity is real that mind can change matter, that literally that these thoughts, the few change them, change the protein structures in your brain, change the matter of your brain.

So this is powerful to know that we can physically change our brain by using our mind. And this distinction between the mind and the brain is also a breakthrough way of listening to it or seeing it for me, as I'm sure it is for everybody else, just those things alone, just those two things alone have made our time already incredibly invaluable for me and anybody listening to it. But as terms of patterns and awareness and the power that these patterns can have over us, I'm a big believer that identity drives so much of our lives. And you being, I've heard you talk about this briefly,

but I think we all are trying to become consistent with whatever this identity is that we think we hold for ourselves. And sometimes the lack of an identity is unbelievably detrimental to someone's life. And I've heard you talk about this, being from South Africa and watching what they tried to do with Mandela. And so could you speak for a minute about the power

that identity has over us and a little bit of how we can at least be more aware of the identity we hold and how we can change it to serve us if we need to. Love your question, it's brilliant and it's so important. Yes, I grew up, I was born in Zimbabwe and that had enough, that country, that learned had enough problems and still has and then grew up in South Africa and all my kids were born there and we'd been in the States now for 13 years. So I was in South Africa in the apartheid here, era and the transition and the post and so by the time I was had my first child, my second child that Mandela came into power, we actually I was carrying my baby and in the to go, that Mandela came into power. We actually, I was carrying my baby, a newborn baby, and in the, to go vote for Mandela,

literally, and with our, with our housekeeper, and you know, that's hard significant that is in my, in my lifetime. But I was working in the pre-apartate, if the pre-transition, in the, let me see, the, the, the apartheid era, and it was horrific. I chose to, I worked across all socioeconomic strata and different political areas. So from the riches of the rich to the poorest of the poor, education corporate, and I spent three days a week working in the, what they call the townships, which were areas that they had to apart, separated, absolutely evil. And the reason I chose to work in all the

different environments was to understand mind and humanity. So wherever you are, whatever you in, how does this work and how can we use our mind to help us cope with all these different circumstances? So in terms of identity, absolutely. What you experience in your nurturing and in the environment that you grow up in is definitely going to affect how you see yourself because every experience is converted through think field choose into brain. So you can imagine a massive forest which is your non-conscious mind in or in and that massive forest is filled with all different shapes and sizes of trees and in between the green trees you've got these little black trees and maybe there's a big clump and maybe there's a little one and some trees are little and some green little

black trees from a recent experience and some trees are little and some green little black trees from a recent experience and some very big ones from long established experience. So something like racism would be a very, very dominant cluster of dark black trees using the warning signal of all the anxiety and the stress and the terrible things that come from something as evil as racism, which is pervasive and affecting ability to actually how you see yourself.

And so every bit of nurturing is built into your brain. Every experience built into your brain to this forest is influencing. In the middle of the forest, just to give a visual, we have this wide-fledged optimism by. So I always explain it like a strip of trees that are perfect. In the middle of the forest, there's this untouched area that's just perfect. And that's where you want to really access that. So if you're flying your helicopter, which is you in life,

you're flying your helicopter, and you kind of, if you, as you develop soft regulation, you don't just fly your helicopter and bash into a tree and crash, which is what we do a lot of. That's messy. If you want to know how to not do that.

So soft regulation teaches us how to fly with the pilots and co-pilot. So we're flying over this forest and we're looking at whatever smoke signals are coming up for it. We're the signals and if you see there that there's so much of that particular type of black cluster of trees, dark and that's influencing how you see yourself, your identity's been affected. But if you look at all, if you're really dig deep and you see the middle part of the forest, which is you, it's ed, who can do something else that no one else can do, but there's these dramatic experiences that are affecting identity. So they can

block and they can become so big that they can actually build a like a black wall against the green forest. So it's almost hard to see who you really are because you're so busy and being involved in that you stuck in that cluster. So that's why you've got a self-regulation is not sitting and walking amongst those trees and getting lost, which is what we do. But it is actually getting in the helicopter flying above and saying, okay, self-regulate, what am I doing? What's what and the only way you can get to the trees and the forest and all that stuff is by looking at the warning signals. So these we track and then so then you pay attention together, awareness of four basic signals. The first is the emotional. So let's say that you

feeling a high state of anxiety that could be all depression. Now depression and anxiety are not it's they're not illnesses. To say you have clinical depression or clinical anxiety is one of the most unscientific statements of our age and has created a huge problem with people on our We're backing way more with mental health not because mental health is on the rise But because the most management of mental health is on the rise We're not allowing people to talk about the story in the forest. We're just saying oh signal of depression Five symptoms you can't sleep you can't get out of bed, you're feeling whatever, suicidal, diagnosis, label, treatment is mainly medication at the current stage as the gold standard. Some therapy if you're lucky. And that very often the therapy is putting a bandaid on the wound

because they don't deal with the whole origin story. That's terrible. What we have to do is we have to say, okay, so there is this signal, there is this emotion of depression, it's consistent in your life, or anxiety, or both, very often it's comorbid together. And terror and despair and anger and a whole bunch of others, it's never just one. So all of this is giving you power and giving you control, shifting the power balance. When you do this gather in this way and I'll finish the other three in a moment, you are making 1400 neurophysiological responses work for you and not against you. Your blood vessels around your heart are dilating,

which are seeing blood for an oxygen tube rain. It's increasing your ability to think more creatively. It's decreasing in possibility I can go on and on and on. I know my body is in a state of healing. But when I suppress it, if I don't get the awareness, if I just suppress it, my 1400 neurophysiological responses will work against me. So now that blood vessels around my heart, for example, one of the 1400 will constrict. That means less blood flow, less oxygen to the brain, increased impulsivity,

decreased cognitive flexibility. That's just a few. There's a lot more that I'm just giving a few not over one. So I stay in a state of increased vulnerability to disease by 75 to 98 percent if I don't get the awareness. But if I get the awareness, I shift that the moment I get the awareness in milliseconds, I've gone from brain damage to brain healing. In seconds, in milliseconds, that's phenomenal. This is so important my management is. So then I gather and this is not hard, it is hard but it's not hard. It's hard because we have got very, we just want to, we want quick fixes. There's no quick fix when it comes to mind. This is a lifestyle. So you gather awareness of your emotional stuff, the depression, anxiety, label it, be specific. Then you're going to gather awareness of your physical state, heart flushing, GI symptoms, tension in your shoulders, what is physically going on alongside

this emotional stuff? Could be a series of things. There's no cookie cutter, anything, unique, you have a unique signal guide. Then you're going to look at your behavioral signals. In other words, what are you doing? How are you speaking? How are you, how are you connecting with others? How you doing your work? How you just with yourself with all the behaviors? How you speaking? How you, whatever, what's your creativity like? So what are your behaviors when you're in the state? And then you're going to go to your perspective. As I start getting specific about looking at these emotional, physical and behavioral warning signals, I'm actually looking at the branches. I'm looking at these because they're memories that

tall tree is made of memories. So I'm the signals have drawn me in and those have been these what I've just described. But now as I land my tree, I'm starting to look a little closer at these signals. And so now I also want to look at what my perspective is, what is the treat trunk, what's the perspective of what's this giving me life sucks or I hate life for, it's not with living or there's just no purpose or what's the then you start that's so by the time you've done that you've objectively gathered all these apples in your basket, you control them. Now you go to looking at the detail, what is this, what's the? That's when you reflect. So reflect is ask, answer, discuss, ask, answer, discuss. Put the thoughts on trial. Do that autopsy, that mental

brain surgery without the blood. Why? And then you answer, why? And you discuss, why? And you dig, dig, dig. Anyway, so when you write, you can write in lines, but I would recommend you learn how to make a medical, it is unbelievable. In therapy when I used to still practice, we would have people backing with schizophrenia, which is not a disease, it is a broken mind. It is someone who's gone through so much trauma that they're disassociating their minds, disassociated with the symptom of an underlying trauma. And very often they can get multiple personalities because they're coping. It's pure survival. So the system, the neuropsychal, in the extreme form, we would use that, and by the time we got to writing,

I could show, I could have subject to the headspot, the personality, the mind, because of trauma, as they're writing onto the medic, in the medicop, which is a pattern in the middle on branches, like a tree, like a branch grows, each branch goes out the previous branch, and leaves are growing on the branches,

that's what you do, you grow branches, and you put your words on the branches. And you just like literally pull your brain on paper. As we did this, we would, the sub-tations would actually see, oh, same, they're talking about the same thing, but suddenly there's three different perspectives. The fourth step is then to recheck. It's to look at what you've written. The third step is messy. It's like words all over the place.

The fourth step is where you start connecting. What are the patterns? What is the antidote? What is the, what do I need to reconceptionize? See it differently. It's if you use an algebraic example, we all probably remember x plus y equals z, even if we didn't understand it.

I'm sure all of us can recall x plus y equals z. And the concept there is that x plus y creates something kind of new that's over in sort of replaces. I'm not saying that I'm saying express wire equals xy. Reconceptualization is xy because it's your story that you don't want to just, is that I'm putting a bandaid on? I'm not fixing the issue.

And that's what if you just do like 10 CBT, you know, cognitive behavior therapy, not that I'm saying it's bad, you can use CBT, but CBT fits in step five if you wanted to work for you. You've got your first funnel what's going on and then you, but if you just all positive affirmations, people use, they're feeling terrible, they want to achieve a goal, 10 of those in the morning, 10 at night, they're abandoned, it's not going to be sustainable because you have to find out what, what are you trying to drown with the affirmation? So you want the affirmation to work, you have to go through the neuropsychal, then the affirmation will work as a first step. You know, that's how you go to change perspective. There's so much in there to unpack that I don't I want everybody to do is go back and

replay that because there's so much in there and also you have to have the book too so that some of these things that you know that are on the surface what we're doing this now go much when you're in the book. But I want to ask you we're going so deep into the science of it. One of the things that I'm going to go completely different direction with you. So one of the things that fast things about views as I've learned more is you're also a person of faith. Not religion so to speak. I don't think, but faith. Frankly, most of my scientists friends, even my science friends, not all of them, this is an

affair statement, but I think you would agree with me that by and large, there's usually two camps of people in life. There's sort of faith-based and science-based. And that's not that's that's too big of a general statement. It is true. I have it's by and large. I have all kinds of friends who are very scientifically-based, including myself, who have incredibly faith. But you are a little bit that you understand so much about the brain. And I'm wondering for you, I've always felt like my thoughts are prayers. I've felt that way. That's beautiful. Thoughts are prayers. Is there any validity to that being true? Because prayer is such a deep state of consciousness.

And then is there anything particularly about maybe organized religion in general? You think maybe gets it wrong. So it's kind of two questions and one. And I'm just curious of your thoughts about both of them. Because I just personally, I'm fascinated by that. Both you live in both worlds as do I. So I'm just curious. I love it. I love how you I love that you asked that question. And for me, it's the most obvious answer because spirituality and science are one in the same thing. So if you think

of like all the beautiful, all the they're just two sides of the same coin. But if you think of it like the spiritualities, like a story, the philosophy and you look at all like the, all the, they're just two sides of the same coin. But if you think of it like the spirituality is like a story, the philosophy, and you look at all like the Bible and the Torah and the Quran, you all the holy books of all the different religions, which ever religion, and just the diversity of all the religions is an indication of how magnificently huge humanity is and that there's something that's beyond, that's how I see it. So the diversity is so beautiful and how all across the whole world, every culture has some belief system that goes beyond just me here.

And that's that for me is spirituality. And that's where it goes to even the second answer first is that I think organising religion is just man trying to get control. But when and if they want to do it and it keeps them being a loving person great and if they are an accepting person of other religions, fantastic. The problem of organised religion comes in when they say this is the only way because there's no way that there is only one way because there's so many different people. There's something you can do that no one else on this planet can do. So if it doesn't do it, we all suffer. So there's a viewpoint and every the beauty of the diversity is different

ways of seeing the different facets of what I would call godness. So I talk about godness as opposed to god and limiting god so many religions will say, he I'll never understand. He even in the Bible it says male god made in God's image male and female. So obviously God's not male or female God's a combination of what we don't understand. So the beauty of spirituality is we just don't understand it. And to try and understand it is to lose to miss it. And to see that it's this incredibly beautiful beyond the sunset, the falling in love,

the having a child, the rising from the ashes, the agreeing in love, the having a child, the rising from the ashes, the, you know, the, the, the agreeing to disagree, seeing different ways of doing different things, seeing that, that is not just one type of that is spirituality, and that's the story. It's the beautiful story of humanity. Science is how it all works. How does the world work? How does the brain work? How does the mind work? How do we as humans work? And how does the world work? How does the brain work? How does the mind work? How do we as humans work? And how does the world work? So you can't separate them because you are a human and if you believe in in whatever you believe in, you still are a human with a brain. So science still applies to you

because you're a human. You use yourself and you're using science. You eat food. That science, you are parenting a child or you are running a business that science science comes from the words scleror which means knowledge. So everything that we gain, everything you're a scientist, I'm a scientist, we just science and we just both have knowledge of different fields. You know, so if you look at it like that it's about knowledge, the how to and then the story of and you put the two together you have a beautiful complex humanity. The reason I wanted to ask Caroline, this guy's a little jump in,

is because she said this on stage with one of the most powerful and well-known pastors in the world, and in the conversation that I watch, and I know you know the conversation I'm talking about. And he responded like I did, because I'm a Christian, and that's an organized religion. When I say organized religion,

I don't mean it in the way that most people do. I mean more like the doctrine, chicular church, as opposed to an organized doctrine of a religion. I believe't mean it in the way that most people do. I mean more like the doctrine, tickular church is supposed to an organized doctrine of a religion. I believe in Jesus Christ. People know that that follow me. I'm open and love people of all faith. But I believe in an organized religion. But oftentimes, you know, certain specific churches will, you know, certain scriptures to an extreme. One of the things that she was talking about

with one of the, with this particular pastor was, and he even said that sometimes, you know, the bad things that happen in our life, it's very easy if you just blame it on the devil or blame it on this, but what if it wasn't just the devil happened to be that you're thinking in a toxic way? And so there is this, and I want to bridge that gap between people that are strong believers and science.

Like I believe there's a quantum field. I just happen to believe the creator of the universe created this larger field that we can plug into that has vibrational frequency. Exactly. Exactly. Things and and so I want to make sure my audience knows I'm a strong believer in my faith at the same time. And I'm a strong believer in the organized structure of Christianity for me. But what I think sometimes, I think you do too, sometimes though, particular church is every church anybody's ever gone to no matter what their faith is. There's a slant. There's a reliance on maybe one a version of scripture or a belief than other. And I make sure that sometimes that doesn't blunt people understanding that they have thoughts. They still troll it specifically.

They can still gain to your point. Science more now. I do the program. Hopefully for me, the more I learn about the nuances and the sophistication, the intricacies of the brain and neuroscience makes me more reliant that there must be a creator of this magnificent structure. Exactly. Exactly. We have a very basic understanding of.

And so when you're hearing scientific things like this, for me, it's strength is my business. What an amazing God I must have to create. These amazing beings that we all are, that function the way we are. And I want us to function at a higher level for his good, for the service of you. And the more we understand ourselves,

the more we understand our mind and the difference in our mind, our thought, the trees, and all of the stuff that we're talking about here, field, the more you become great at these things, you can serve your God better, your version of God. So I just want to make sure I said that today because it's, you're so fascinating to me in this regard. Okay, a couple more things because we're going to run

out of time and like, I love this stuff. Is there one or two? Can I interrupt you for one second? Sorry, I wanted to try to add to that there. If you think of the, I mean, I was just teaching in the church this last Sunday, I teach all over the place, Neuroscience, Conferences, Churches, Medical Communities.

I teach humanity, I teach humanity. And one of the things, what do we think we're doing here? We're capturing, we're bringing all sorts into captivity we were renewing the mind so that if you want to know the science of how to do that you know that's that's a that's a statement that people will make oh bring all thoughts but they not do it so here I'm telling you how to do it so that's where the Bible tells the story science is how to do it and then you and we don't really talk about why it for love and survival and that first through the middle that's on made in love image, which is perfection. But we

have a label for you life and based on cursing, choosing life. So we can choose. So that's what we make amazing the art of forest. And that's what we have to go into our wisdom for us to go fix up the art of forest. So there's kind of a, you want a more spiritual angle to what I do. No, I love that. And I want people to know that you do as well. And this really strong belief, I don't like this battle between the two, which to me is just ridiculous. Like man, this little brain that Caroline has tapped into that is her to serve us, to serve one another

so that we can live longer and so that we can live more productively. And we can be kinder to one another and we can understand those and the more and more I've understood how my mind works and I've changed myself through lots of techniques like she teaches. I frankly feel like I've been, you know, I sit all the time still, but I feel like I'm a better man of God. I understand human beings better. I have more empathy, have more faith, because I understand these things. And so they're not one or the other.

They're both, as you've said. 2,000 sand coin. Can you give us one or two brain rituals for brain health? Just rituals for brain health. One or two things do on a regular basis. OK, well, the neuropsycho goes without saying. That's your number one. We need to get into that.

That's the main thing that you want to be doing all the time because that's constantly driving your mind and driving your plasticity. So you're linking into the spiritual, you're driving that healthy spiritual through the brain to get the brain healing like it should. So that brings brain healing and so that in addition to that you can do your brain preparation and brain preparation would include things like the breathing and these different types of breathing. So one of the techniques that I've kind of combined in research, which is so powerful is Is this combination where you would breathe in for three counts? But as you bend in your breath out for seven. So it's a ten sick. I call it a ten sick and pause

So you breathing in for three a deep inhalation, but youaling for seven. And the reason you exhale for longer and you really rush it out, you really push it out like that yogi breath. You really push it out that ocean breath at the back of your throat. Is that that pushes the oxygen to the front of your brain. And the minute you upload oxygen to the front of your brain, you almost like have to shake your head because you feel laated. You have increased your, you've dropped impulsiveness and you've increased your introspective ability. So you wiser, you have increased your, you've dropped impulsiveness and you've increased your introspective ability. So you wiser, you've increased your wisdom and you've also calmed

down your chemicals that will then calmed down your entire brain and body, which then makes you much more able to think clearly. So if you do that at least six to nine times, so for 60 to 90 seconds, you are going to put your brain health in a very ideal state to do the neuropsychil. But at any stage of you need to calm down in the moment, that's a great 60 to 90 seconds thing. So input three after seven, and then you can add to make it even more powerful. You can add a cognitive component. You can take the words of the mind. Remember mind is how you think, how you feel and how you choose the three work together. So you can add, you can, when you breathe in, when you inhale for three, you say think feel, and then as you exhale, you say choose.

So it's think feel, choose. And as you do that, you can do it quietly in your mind or out loud. You are bringing in a cognitive component factor. So you're forcing mind brain integration, you're forcing into into hemispheric coherence, which means left, right, will work together. You are balancing all the waves of your brain, which is alpha delta theta alpha beta gamma. You're increasing theta as well, which is a healing wave, increasing gamma, which increases creativity. So there, does that give, does that answer your question? Would you want more? No, thank you. I mean, you're just such a treasure like the I don't like.

I don't want to end the interview because I want to just keep asking you things because there's there's maybe the only person on the spinning earth who can answer these things the way that you do, but I want to finish with something and I find when I coach people holds them. And I think that maybe you can help me help other people and just help anybody listening to it. And this is this idea of cognitive dissonance. And I think we'll hold people back and you can explain it differently than I can. But it's holding, you know, you talk about coherence a minute ago, getting both side brain working together. It's not a type of coherence, though,

we're in coherence or in congruency, where we hold two conflicting thoughts, for everybody. I want to be a multi-millionaire, but there's this other part of you that thinks rich people get there by doing bad things. And so these are two thoughts in conflict. And so it's great to have a positive thought. This cognitive dissidence issue, which she's holding up both trees, if you're listening to the audio, the healthy one and the toxic one, is there a she's doing this? This is the root of the basically we go to the root of your work, so to speak, root pun intended, right? Because of the trees. Is there people where be holding these two 15 thoughts, not just a positive and negative, but they are in conflict with one another,

which is different. You can have a positive and a negative thought, but when two thoughts contradict one another, I think you're wired for pain potentially, and you're wired to sort of chase your tails, so to speak. So if someone's sitting here going, well heck, that's me, like no question at all, like I wanna be in a lot of other relationship,

but I don't think I deserve to be loved. Those are two thoughts in conflict with one another. What would you say lastly to somebody who, not, and even as I've said it, are starting to become aware of other conflicting thoughts they have? What would you say to somebody like that? First of all, that it's very normal. We all have it because we're all dealing with so much stuff. So it's very much because we can make choices and because there's so many options and

there's that that's why. So it's very much because we can make choices and because there's so many options. And that's why. So it's very normal. So just so important that we don't get frightened and get into guilt-chairment condemnation because we do every time we do something wrong, because of or unfortunately because of our neuro-adductionistic world that we live in and quick fix world. And like, you know, what's wrong with you? You haven't said an attitude statement, so if you haven't in the religious world, you know, we're so faith.? You haven't said enough gratitude statements of you. Haven't in the religious world, you know, where's your faith? And so there's a lot of toxic positivity in both the religious world and the psychological and the scientific world where you're supposed to be in the stay and age.

So that needs to a lot of cognitive dissonance. So first of all, I want to normalize it, which immediately people should be going, I'm not the only one. Soon as you do that, you've already sort of shifting brain processes and brain health. The other thing is that this is what we're wide for. So if I'm in cognitive dissonance and the one is saying, this is this and the other one is saying the opposite,

then you have to use this to fix this. You have to go through the neuropsychology. It's going to take you 63 days, but you don't ignore this. You land your helicopter and you start doing the work. And you start working out why is there this dissonance? Why is there this cognitive dissonance? We are thinking one thing but I'm doing another one. I know I should be doing that but I can't do that. Or I believe, whatever, anything that's in opposition, this is the wise mind. Your cognitive dissonance is the wise mind and some kind of experience that has lead to the growth of

the thought that is impacting your behavior. So what you're going to do is find out where does this come from and how can I reconceptualise it so that I can operate in this accurate truth. So yeah, so that's it. So you just you've got to do the work of the it's not going to go away in five minutes. I would recommend landing the helicopter, do the neuropsychal over the 63 days. I have to tell you the two things that I took from today because I have read the book and so I'm aware of the five steps and there's two things I took from today. I just want to share with everybody. Well, three.

One is a dreamer, more brilliant than I know. It's more incredible than I do. But two things. One, I'm driving the helicopter. So in so are you all. You're driving that helicopter. So you can get above these things and look down at them and you can park the helicopter and do the work. And that's important to know because I think sometimes we think the

helicopter drives us. And that's not the case. And then, and then I think probably, you know, there's a lot of different things you shared today. But I think the second one for me is that I can get above these thoughts and that they can lose their power over them. I've always sort of known that to some extent, but I don't think I understand the extent that you've said this today. And I just really want to thank you. I think today was one of the most remarkable conversations. I know it's one of those people have to go back and listen to again because of because of the depth of it, but I just think you're unbelievable. I want people following you. So just start it Instagram. I mean, they should get your books,

but they go to Instagram to follow you there. Is that the best place for them? Yeah, go to Instagram, Dr. Caroline Leaf, because from there you can get to everything. And the book is a tiny up, it's the name of the book, tiny up your mental means.com. I've got a podcast,

as you know, you've been on a tiny up your mental means. But that's a great place. Instagram the book, book, tiny up your mental means.com. Guys, she's unbelievable. She's one of a kind. I'm just telling you, which is why I'm so grateful to have had a chance to share this experience with all of you guys here today. So thank you Caroline and I can't wait to have you back again because this is this is easily one part of like a 10-part conversation for sure. Thank you so much. Thank you. I love your

questions. You always are such insightful questions. And we do. We have a great conversation. We could just keep going and going. So I'd love to come back. Thank you so much. We're going to have dinner. It's going to be like a five hour dinner.

I think so. Yeah. I wonder maybe we should just like make it an all day thing. They start in the morning. We just like end at night, you know? I would love that. If they record it, we can put it out. And it'll get a good help.

A lot of people. But even if they don't, it would serve me. So thank you so much, everybody. Everybody, please share the show with anybody you care about that you think this would benefit. And if you're listening to the audio version, go over to YouTube and subscribe. If you're watching this on YouTube, click on an audio platform

and listen to the audio versions of this so you can get it as you travel as well. God bless you all and max out. [♪ Music playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background, playing in background,