The Liz Moody Podcast - This Revolutionary Approach To Weight Loss Is Sustainable, Fun, & Proven To Last—So Why Is No One Talking About It?

Episode Date: October 2, 2024

Dr. Laurel Mellin discusses her groundbreaking technique known as Emotional Brain Training (EBT). Dr. Mellin, a professor at UCSF and New York Times bestselling author, explains how EBT, a method shown in peer-reviewed studies to help with weight loss and maintenance, targets the root cause of stress-induced overeating by reprogramming the brain’s emotional circuits. The discussion covers the scientific basis of EBT, the importance of addressing stress to manage weight, and practical techniques to rewire negative circuits in the brain for lasting change. Dr. Mellin also provides insight into how brain states influence our behavior and emotions and shares actionable strategies for listeners to start their own journey toward healthier habits and a more joyful life. 00:00 Introduction 01:33 What is Emotional Brain Training (EBT)? 02:47 The Science Behind EBT and Weight Loss 05:25 Understanding Stress and Overeating 06:28 The Eight Chemicals of Overeating 07:58 Rewiring the Brain with EBT 09:18 The Role of Stress in Obesity 21:26 The Five Emotional States 27:49 Rewiring Circuits for Lasting Change 32:43 Rewarding Yourself Naturally 33:55 The Role of EBT in Managing Cravings 35:47 Techniques for Brain State Management 40:10 Identifying and Rewiring Circuits 51:29 Practical Steps for Emotional Brain Training 53:57 Conclusion For more on Dr. Laurel Mellin's Emotional Brain Training (EBT), you can visit www.ebtconnect.net. Her latest book, 1-2-3 JOY!: Easy, Natural Weight Loss that is Scientific, Proven, Drug-Free & Fun can be found where books are sold. Ready to uplevel every part of your life? Order Liz’s new book 100 Ways to Change Your Life: The Science of Leveling Up Health, Happiness, Relationships & Success now!  To join The Liz Moody Podcast Club Facebook group, go to www.facebook.com/groups/thelizmoodypodcast. Connect with Liz on Instagram @lizmoody, or subscribe to her newsletter by visiting www.lizmoody.com. This episode is sponsored by: LMNT: go to DrinkLMNT.com/LizMoody to get a free LMNT sample pack with any order. Puori: head to puori.com/LIZMOODY and use promo code LIZMOODY for 20% sitewide. Cymbiotika: use code LIZMOODY on cymbiotika.com to get 15% off plus free shipping on subscription orders. Great Lakes Wellness: use code LIZMOODY for 25% off your first purchase at greatlakeswellness.com. Olive and June: visit oliveandjune.com/LIZMOODY for 20% off your first Mani System. Naväge: go to Navage.com/LIZMOODY and use the promo code LIZMOODY for a free cleaning kit with your starter pack. The Liz Moody Podcast cover art by Zack. The Liz Moody Podcast music by Alex Ruimy. Formerly the Healthier Together Podcast.  This podcast and website represents the opinions of Liz Moody and her guests to the show. The content here should not be taken as medical advice. The content here is for information purposes only, and because each person is so unique, please consult your healthcare professional for any medical questions. The Liz Moody Podcast Episode 270. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All right, Dr. Malin, welcome to the podcast. I'm happy to be here. Thanks, Liz. EBT is the only intervention other than weight loss surgery that is shown in studies published in peer-reviewed journals to keep the weight off, going to the root cause, and getting the skills in my own brain, empowering myself and essentially higher purpose and joy the way we all want to live. And in those states, we don't need the extra food. I never deprived myself. I honor how I feel and what I need, and I needed those cookies. And right now, I don't know what's going on, but I just don't need it. What do you think about general stress relieving practices?

Are those helpful but not getting to the deeper level? How does that fit into thinking about EBT? Hello, friends, and welcome to the Liz Moody podcast, where every week we are sharing real science, real stories, and realistic tools that actually level up every part of your life. I am your host, Liz Moody, and I'm a best-selling author and longtime journalist. Today, I am so excited to welcome Dr. Laurel Mellon to the podcast. Dr. Mellon is a professor at UCSF, and she is the New York Times best-selling author of multiple books,

including most recently One, Two, Three, Joy, easy, natural weight loss that is scientific, proven, drug-free, and fun. She's one of the founders of a revolutionary technique called Emotional Brain Training, which is actually the only intervention other than weight loss surgery that is shown in peer-reviewed studies to help people lose weight and keep it off. It is huge and I'm not sure why more people are not talking about it, but I knew I had to create this episode for you. We are going to get into exactly what EBT is and the specific techniques that you can use to rewire your brain to break any bad habits and experience a lot more effortless bliss in daily life in this episode. All right, Dr. Malen, welcome to the podcast. I'm so excited to have you here. I'm happy to be here. Thanks, Liz. Your research is so relevant to so many people

and yet I had not heard about it until recently. Not enough people are talking about it. So I'm so excited to dive in today. Let's start out with, can you explain what EBT is and how it works for weight loss to me like I'm five years old? EBT is a method of processing emotions that can be applied to rewiring the circuits in the brain, the major circuits in the brain that control everything we do, mental health, physical health, obesity,

and turn those circuits that are spewing all sorts of chemicals that make us overeat and feel athargic and be down on ourselves into circuits that actually create joy and purpose and a whole chemical construct that soothes our soul and makes us satisfied so we don't need the extra food and we don't tend to pack on pounds. And I want to just be super clear on this because it feels huge. And again, I have not heard anybody talk about it before. You said, research has shown that the eight major chemicals that drive overeating and weight regain, GLP is but one of them are all stress activated. So basically every chemical

associated with overeating is associated with stress. It's activated by stress. Is that true? That is absolutely true because we know that just because we have hunter-gather ancestors that actually were involved in the evolution of our brain, that way back then, everyone when they were stressed were typically hungry. And they were going to die from. under nutrition. So our genes are set up that whenever we're in stress, we're going to activate a chemical cascade that will make us hungry, will make us overeat, and we'll take whatever we do eat and store it as fat. So essentially, even though it used to be that everyone thought, well, some people have a genetic propensity, yes, that's true. But all of us as humans have a genetic

propensity when we're stressed to overeat and gain weight. What that means is the circuits in our brain that controls stress are the focus of treatment for weight. It is absolutely clear that even though we think that we should shoot up with a particular chemical or that we should try to force ourselves to eat healthy, that is actually not the solution. The solution is to go to the root cause of the stress chemicals, because it's a stressed chemical cascade that gets us in trouble, and go to something called the amygdala. The amygdala is in the emotional brain. It stores all the circuits that tell us what to do.

If I'm upset in this way, this is the chemicals that are going to come out. These are the emotion, thoughts, behaviors, and this is how I'm going to cope. And some of these circuits in our amygdala are fantastic. They're called homeostatic circuits. They're all the chemicals that make us healthy and happy. But all of us have a few of these chemicals that are not so good, and they come from the other kind of circuit. They spiral us down. And the chemical effects is to take us into health and unhappiness and cravings and overweight.

Everybody's got an amygdala with some of those health-promoting circuits and some of those that are harmful. What we do in EBT is we say, let's switch off and rewire the circuits that are faulty, because the faulty circuits are what cause these eight chemicals to go haywire and make it virtually impossible for us not to have cravings, to be depressed, to seek food for comfort. and to pack on those pounds. The way we can control all those chemicals is by switching off the stress response. You want to think about how victimized all of us are. And 75 to 80 percent of people, our stress eaters, have struggled with eating and wait for a lifetime. I got my food circuit

when I was 11. I was teased at school. And I came home and my mother was at home. That was the day when mom stayed home more. And my mother was there. I didn't know how to tell her. I was ashamed I was. And I just saw these cinnamon rolls on the counter, and I saw them, and I was really running a lot of stress in my brain. I was feeling very deprived and very embarrassed and very confused and overwhelmed. And so I got the fight or flight drive going. I reached for those cinnamon rolls, this little food circuit. The two of them combined into what's called a survival circuit because whenever you do something in stress, the brain strongly remembers it. My brain would remember it, and it stored it in the least plastic areas of my brain. And what happened is I wake up

the next morning and all of a sudden I have a special relationship with food. I want that food because these eight chemicals are being activated. And these are the eight chemicals. It starts with the amygdala. Into my brain came to all this stress because I was made fun of. I come home, and what happens is the amygdala activates cortisol. Cortisol makes you hungry. It makes you eat more. It also drains reward. So it drains your dopamine, that's the reward center, the nucleus accumbens, drains the reward center, and drains serotonin. So at that point, we are stressed, we are depressed, and we are underrewarded. And we live in an environment where there's constant access to foods that immediately reward us with no effort at all.

They're high sugar, high fat, and they're everywhere. So we reach for those foods. And what happens is these foods, the sugary fatty foods, increases insulin. The fourth chemical is insulin. We start having high insulin levels, which blocks the fifth chemical, which is leptin. So now we're starving to death. We can't lose weight, and our brain is telling us we need to store fat. Okay, so now we're feeling really terrible, and we have a full-blown stress response.

And then the gut hormones, which are PYY, Grelin, and also a GLP1. and agonaginous is used in these weight loss drugs, they all go. So we've got all eight of these happening. Now, any natural solution that's going to be lasting and not create dependency is going to be based on changing all of those eight chemicals. Well, you're not going to take eight shots. So what we do with EBT is we switch off and actually erase, rewire the circuits that are causing it.

If you use a weight loss drug, because I really believe in people doing whatever they want, But they should also know why there are dangers involved. Because the body and the brain are very interrelated. And it means that one chemical is not a lone island. All the chemicals affect other chemicals. Instead of switching up the stress response with emotional brain training and activating essentially the regulation of all eight chemicals. Because if you're not stressed, you're going to go back to other ways that are more health-promoting.

You just inject one chemical. That's an imbalance. That's not a complete solution. Plus, you're dependent upon the drug because you haven't solved the problem. The problem is wires in the amygdala to rewire, not an injection. So you'll have more consequences, and then you feel like you can't get off the drug because, in fact, when you do, you regain the weight. EBT is the only intervention other than weight loss surgery that is shown in studies published

in peer-reviewed journals to keep the weight off after the treatment ends. which means we've gone to the root cause, the emotional brain. The emotional brain, the amygdala in particular, is the ruler of our eating in weight. So that's why we target it? In your mind, why has obesity risen so much in recent history? Because the environment has become so toxic, unless we reset our skills to process emotions that go down to the toxic stress-induced experience and change it, we will be either overweight or depressed or using another external solution. another addiction. That's just the way the brain works. The problem is stress. It's not that the old methods didn't work in 1980, but the research shows that starting in 1980, they didn't work anymore.

The stress levels for all of us, the shared stress of the speed of change, the information overload, the amazing temptations was so high that all of the stress-related conditions started rising. And you can tell it best with obesity because you can actually measure it. It's harder to measure incrementally, anxiety, depression, and other addictions. The idea is it started going up and nobody did anything. And then by 2000, 2001, it started going up more. And now with the pandemic, 2008, and then the pandemic, it's off the charts. So this is what's happening with emotional brain training. People are flocking to it because what they're saying is, okay, I get it. I can't take one more medication. I can't go to three therapy sessions a week. Or if I want to do any of that, I want to

bolt on going to the root cause and getting the skills in my own brain, empowering myself to be able to process whatever comes my way back to a state of deep connection and essentially higher purpose and joy, the way we all want to live. And in those states, we don't need the extra food. We just had a doctor on this podcast talk about our metabolic health. And she would say that there's so many reasons that we are in this epidemic of obesity right now. But one of them is that ultra-processed foods exist in far greater amounts in the world than they have at any time in history. And these mess with all of our neural chemicals. How does that sit with EBT? It's very simple. The science is that there is a stress triangle in the brain. And what that means is if you turn off those wires

that make you overeat, those chemicals that are driving you to overeat. I could be sitting here with you in a room filled with cakes and cookies and chips. And I could care less. Even if those cakes and cookies and chips are literally engineered to mess with those neurochemicals. Exactly. Would you like to know why? Yes. Tell me why.

There's something called survival circuits in the brain. They're the ones that we attack first with emotional brain training. because they're the ones that essentially combine a fight or flight drive and the chips. So when I woke up that next morning after eating those cinnamon rolls, I began to have a fight or flight drive biochemically to eat those foods. So I was instantly rewarded by the dopamine from the foods. So in order to change a behavior, you have to rewire that circuit and encode a better circuit, a circuit that will reward you anymore. Nobody stops eating, drinking, spending, whatever it is, unless they have a better choice.

And that choice is in your unconscious mind. We use this skill in EBT called the cycle tool. It is the powerhouse of changing people's brains, and it's very simple but very deep. I would do what your mother probably told you not to do. I would complain about the fact that I was overeating. And then I would express emotions, angry, satifrey guilt in a certain way.

And what happens? Here, I'm complaining with my thinking brain, but the problems in my emotional brain, in my amygdala. So it would essentially unlock by expressing emotions in that way, really for one minute or two minutes, it essentially opens the circuit and the circuit includes a drive, like a message that says, like I get my safety or my power or my protection or whatever it is, something of basic need, existence from stuffing myself with sugar.

And that is telling me that and those chemicals are driving me. And so of course I'm going to have the chips right there, okay? because I'm being immediately rewarded externally by the chips, and biochemically I'm driven. So I find the exact words, and it has to be the exact words. Now, all of us think about what is causing me to overeat. And we have ideas and insights. Those insights plus five cents give you a nickel. They're worth nothing, because the real message is in the unconscious mind.

And what EBT does is allow you to very quickly find out what your unconscious mind is telling you. And once you have that exact words, like this one woman recently was saying, I get my mothering from stuffing myself with food until I feel complete. Whatever those words are, they're different than what you really think your issue is. Once you have those words, they're magical because all you do is confront them with the opposite, the healthy opposite. I cannot get my mothering or whatever it is from stuffing myself with food. You change it into a circuit of higher purpose. I can get my mothering or safety or power or whatever from connecting to the deepest part of me. This is an emotional and spiritual experience, the deepest part of me.

And in that state, you are in perfect biochemistry. All of those eight chemicals are not being activated. And so the drive goes away. And I'm going to do it for higher purpose. Once you do it for higher purpose and the seven purposes within EBT are sanctuary, which is peace and power from within, authenticity, vibrancy, integrity, intimacy, spiritual, and freedom, the thought of those higher purposes activates reward chemicals that are better than chips because chips only last a few minutes, maybe an hour. But that higher purpose that's now embedded

in your amygdala is with you all the time. And so you look at the chips and you say, I don't think so. I don't want that. Not that you're depriving yourself, but you're being chemically affected, turning off those eight chemicals and giving yourself that dopamine and that endorphins from higher purpose, and you don't want it. In fact, you think it's rather revolting. This is something that we record over and over again, thousands and thousands of people. I was just talking to someone the other day. It's a woman who just came into EBT. She just got into an EBT support group. She had just been using the app and listening to her certified EBT provider for a couple of weeks. and she said, I have had a sugar-eating circuit since I was 20 years of age.

She was in college. She was really stressed, and she reached for sugar, and she got that circuit. And she says in two weeks of EBT, what I did is I found the exact message, I confronted it, I broke the circuit, and at some point when the circuit's broken, you will notice a change in your behavior. So with EBT, you never try to not eat the chips. If you want chips, have them. You're going to have them anyway. At least I would.

What you do is you focus on using the chips. using these emotional tools to demolish that circuit and you have proof that you've demolished it when all of a sudden you go to the refrigerator and you're sure you're going to get the ice cream. Maybe you go to the freezer or maybe you go and have some leftover pizza and you open the refrigerator door. That's what she did. I opened the door and I looked in and I thought, that's weird. I don't even want it. And that gives you evidence that you have security.

You've gone to the root cause of the problem because the circuit is gone. Which is so different than dieting because you are eating to the point of nourishment, but you're not eating beyond nourishment or things that aren't nourishing you in the first place. Exactly. And remember, every time you put that food in your mouth, never blame yourself because you have been taught by the system that is here now, the medical system and the commercial weight loss program system that the problem is the food. The problem is not the food. As long as you're not addressing the circuits, you're going to be eating the food. And if you deny yourself that food, that's sad. because you absolutely need those chemicals. And you haven't moved to demolishing that circuit, so you get your chemicals met the other way. So essentially, when people come into EBT,

we just say, get into your support group, start warming it up with other people, people helping people help themselves. It's a combination of warm connection, someone just listening to us while we take those five minutes to process our emotions, and science-based tools that conform to the exact resiliency pathways in the brain. That combination is what works, and then just watch the magic unfold.

And what people do, and this is to answer your other question about health problems, people do is they come in, they usually want to rewire their food circuit first. They want to get rid of it. So once they rewire their food circuit, and they can see that food is lost, is power over them, and they're not taking an injection. It's all natural, and it's in their own brain. Then they say, hey, you know what, I have some other circuits too. And so they rewire their mood circuit, maybe their relationship

circuit, their work circuit, their procrastination circuit, they typically rewire four major circuits in their brain because they usually are four. What that does is it lifts up something very important, which is a set point of the brain. Most of us have a set point, and here's the number system. We call it the EBT five point system of emotional and behavioral regulation. Your set point is at one that the top of the brain is in charge, and in that state because of state-specific memory, all your happy memories are activated. All the times when you didn't need the extra food, all the times when maybe you had a difficult day at work,

but somehow you just move through it into joy, all of them. So you are a different person in that brain state. Okay. And then when you go to brain state two, which is not feeling great but feeling good, you're still in what's called homeostasis, which is those circuits that are health promoting. And so you can handle pretty much of everything.

You don't feel rewarded, but you can handle anything. Right here about your cheekbone, that's where the level three is. And that's where you feel a little stressed, kind of scattered, maybe anxious, maybe overthinking. Four, definitely stress, maybe depressed and stuck. And five is the very bottom of your brain where the reptilian brain is in charge.

And at that point, you are flat out, overwhelmed and lost and confused. So everyone has five different levels of stress in their brain. There's five different emotional techniques, one for each tool, because the emotions are different. in each state, do you say to yourself, I am going to notice when I'm not in joy, not at Brains State 1, and whenever I'm not, I'm going to use the app and I'm going to switch up to

one, where you're optimal chemicals. But overall, the program lasts six months to a year, and you raise not just the state of your brain, you repeatedly change your state so you feel great and rewire whatever circuits you're there until your brain naturally stays at a set point or a habit of Brain State 1. The number one rule of habits is to make the things that you want easier and the things that you don't want harder. Yet so many of us want to eat healthier, but so few of us actually take the steps to make eating healthier easier. That's where Marley Spoon comes in. What I love about this company and what's different than all of the other companies out there that are doing like

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That is branch basics.com and use code Liz Moody. Let's just circle back for a second because you said something sort of offhand, but you're like, if you don't eat the chips, you'll feel stressed and you'll feel sad because you are reliant on those neurochemicals. You have to get them from somewhere. I just want to sit on that for a second because I don't think I wasn't at least making the connection between, oh, I'm using these things to alter my neurochemical state. So of course it's hard for me to deprive myself of them because

then I do feel worse without them, like truly physically worse because these neurochemicals are not available to me. Exactly. That was like a little bit of an aha moment to me, which is why it's so hard to not reach for them because it feels silly to say I would feel depressed or I'd feel stressed when I'm not eating this donut. But you're saying that's actually true on a physiological level. Absolutely true. And that's why when people start, they are told, do not diet, eat whatever you want to eat, but before you eat, use the tools, we call it spiraling up from stress or joy. It just takes a minute and turn off those chemicals. And then go ahead and eat whatever you want to eat. Never deprive yourself. Because the whole point is to see when you've

used EBT long enough, maybe it takes two weeks, maybe it takes whatever it takes so that you have no interest in the food because then you have verification that you've changed the wire. Love that. I think it's so fascinating. And then you said you have the these five emotional states and they correlate with physically different states in your brain. Is that correct? Exactly. Can you go through those again? What are the five and what actual part of your brain are they activating? So from top to bottom, there's the neocortex, the limbic brain and the reptilian brain. All of our circuits, even though they are stored in the amygdala, the amygdala, when it activates the circuit, puts a certain brain area. It's called a physiological brain state in charge.

Imagine you have a file cabinet in your brain, and you've got your five circuits, which are the reptilian brain, the four which are in between, the three, which is the limbic brain, and the two which is in between, and the one that is purely neocortical. Healthy adaptive memories at the top, and it goes down all the way to the five where the addiction circuits are. So all day are we moving in and out of these five states? Absolutely. You know about heart rate and heart rate monitoring that the heart rate is always changing. more so, the physiological brain state is always changing. It's perfectly normal to be in all five states in any given day. And it's not even bad to be at four or five. This is really important.

And this makes me tear up because I went through 20 years where I had my food circuit before I rewired it. I know the pain and agony I went through. But the issue is people in a traditional program will tell you, eat healthy, be happy, try to stay in that happy state. Actually, that makes it worse. Because if, in fact, you want to rewire your food addiction or your strong drive to overeat, you have to go down into the stress momentarily, just for a moment. Using EBT takes one, two or three minutes. Stress activate the circuit. Otherwise, it stays closed. The synaptic

connections between the neurons are closed. It will not change. You've got to stress activated, so the neurons begin to be open to change. The synaptic connections are fluid. And then in that state, where they're fluid, you give it a different message. People don't do that because if you don't have the emotional skills to get quickly out of that state, you're going to get stuck in it and you're going to be in a bad mood all day. The current programs that are not treating the stress, the emotional circuits in the brain force you to be better and better and better on your diet. Meanwhile, the circuits in the fourth and fifth drawer of the brain are getting stronger and stronger and then boom, all of a sudden something happens to your brain and you're back to

binging or back to needing that food like your life dependent upon it and then we blame ourselves. So you said that we need to get into that four or five state and then be able to get back out of it. And you said that it only takes one to three minutes. Yes. Can you explain what that might look like? The reason that we can't get out of that state is because when we're at three, four, or five, the emotions are very difficult to process. If you're at one or two, you're in homeostasis, and so you say, how do I feel? I feel sad. I need to cry. I feel happy. I need to share that. We know how we feel and what we need. The emotions are actually biologically based on helping us

understand what we need to survive. They're accurate. Once you go into the stress zone, which is called alistasis. What happens is the emotions are scattered, stuck, or toxic. Two things happen. Number one, the emotion themselves does not tell us what we need. They just tell us that we feel bad. Secondly, the stress chemicals activated by that circuit take the thinking brain offline. So we can't self-regulate very well anyway. So we have these gargantuan emotions. We have this thinking brain that's not working. And so what do we do? But go get some food or any of its substitutes. The purpose with EBT is we have cracked the code on how to dissemble those scattered stuck and toxic emotions very quickly. Take six months to a year to get your set point up to that joy state, and so you

have lasting results. They see results right from the beginning. It is a new paradigm that is really based on one thing, neuroplasticity and neurophysiology. And when you are true to those, the process is extremely different than cognitive or mindfulness programs. You start by being a kid and you start by sitting up in your chair and you're not just talking about your thoughts or your insights, you're connected to your body and you're frustrated. And in five sentences, you complain. You say the situation is, last night I over ate and I'm completely out of control of my food. You don't express feelings here.

You're trying to get more stressed. And when you do that, you activate the circuits at the bottom of your brain. You have to be stressed to activate them. So you say in just five sentences, not anything long. You pause, you say, what am I really stressed about? You say, I overeat. See how simple it is? Because the bottom of the brain is very simple.

The reptilian brain doesn't even use language, right? So it's very simple. So I complain, I overeat. Right then, if I didn't have a way to process my emotions, I would just go to the refrigerator because I'd be stressed. Instead, we use the natural flow of feelings, a big burst of anger. I hate it. I feel angry that I do that.

I can't stand it. I hate it. You can do it a louder to yourself. And what happens is, to you. things. That anger procedure that takes, you know, what, 20 seconds, essentially activates the very bottom of the brain, so the most damaging circuits are now unlocked and ready for rewiring, and then it dissipates the stress. So you're back to about a brain state two or three, and you feel pretty good, and your thinking brain is online, so you can follow the rest of the procedure.

You say one sadness, one fear, and one, hey, I do have some power here, why don't I just, and you imagine what you could do. This is the magic of it. At that moment, the unconscious mind opens up and tells you the precise message that the unconscious mind is giving you that you need that information in order to rewire it and it floats up to your thinking brain

and now you have what you need to rewire it. And then you check it out with your neocortex, you're thinking of brain. You say, that's the message coming from my unconscious mind. Does that ring true? And if, in fact, in your body, you know it rings true. That means the message in your unconscious mind matches the words in your conscious mind and now you can rewire it because it's that perfect match that cleanly rewires

that circuit enough so that you don't just sort of kind of want to eat differently, but you simply don't even care about the extra food because it really rewires or crushes that circuit and transforms it into a circuit that promotes health. Do you have to consciously rewire it? like, do you have to replace it with a statement that rings also true but is more helpful? Exactly. So the little circuits, maybe the three and four circuits, you can rewire on the spot. But most of us who have struggled with eating and weight, these are deep in the brain. They have been encoded through trauma.

And sometimes we don't even know when the trauma was. But it makes us just go numb or on a false high. Or it could really, we know because we're depressed or anxious. Essentially, the strong circuits that are the four major circuits, we want everyone to rewire four circuits. Typically, the food circuit or another habit, a mood circuit. Everyone has a mood they get stuck in. Everyone has a relationship pattern they suck in. And we also have a program for stress overload for people that don't have eating and weight problems. And those people do a work circuit because a lot of circuits come out about work. This is very important. People who have

struggled with eating and weight. The fourth circuit, the big four that they rewire when they come into EBT is called a body circuit. Our relationship with our body is extremely important to our relationship with ourselves. And what we're doing in EBT is rewiring our relationship to the love inside of us, to the connection to our source or our spiritual connection or the deeper meanings of our lives. What happens with the body circuit is when we've been out in society and people have criticized us for our weight or judged us for our saves, we internalize that and we start judging ourselves. Or when we start to gain weight, at first, it's just because we're overeating, but it turns out that that weight has some benefits. It makes us feel safe. It makes us feel like

who we are. So the body. The body circuit is either self-judgment about our weight, which is very, very pernicious. If we have essentially our self-judgment about our weight is a self-judgment about ourselves. And the essence of feeling healthy is that self-love that's inside. So if we don't have that self-love, but we're judging ourselves, that creates a lot of stress. Another one that's been studied by the Kaiser Family Foundation that we believe is one of the key reasons people don't lose weight and keep it off is that there are some secondary gains of keeping the weight on. It feels safe. It feels even just familiar. So you find out what that

drive is and rewire it. And what happens is when the judgment stops, something beautiful happens. And we call it the joy of releasing extra weight. The basic program is come in, rewire your food circuit, until you have freedom from it, you don't stop. It might take a week. It might take longer. And then the same with emotion. May people get into anxiety or depression or numbness, a relationship pattern, either essentially unplugging from ourselves and plugging into someone else and merging with people so we have to please them or rescue them or fix them, or essentially disconnecting from others and only caring about ourselves in distancing. So either distancing or merging, everyone does it in stress. It blocks that sweet spot of connection of intimacy,

and it also blocks another chemical, which is oxytocin. And oxytocin is an appetite suppressant. So you rewire the love circuit and then you rewire the body circuit. By the time you rewire the body circuit, this is what people say, I'm just releasing extra weight. And you know what? It's really fun because I don't need this anymore. I don't judge myself. I obviously needed this extra food because I wasn't getting my dopamine and endorphins in another way. And now I am, this just feels natural and I love every minute of it.

Just to be clear, because I think we've been really trained to think, oh, I get oxygen. I get serotonin from this. I get serotonin from this. I get dopamine from this. And all these things are sort of outside sources. Are you replacing the outside sources with better outside source choices? Or are you just naturally feeling all of these things? You're naturally feeling all these things because, in fact, the circuits in your brain do it automatically. Okay. When you replace a maladaptive circuit, like I get my my safety from eating, I get my safety from connecting inside, you go automatically to a state called neural integration. that's best for mental health, physical health, and addiction. And in that state, you are naturally rewarding yourself in ways of higher purpose.

Authenticity, you know, feeling genuine and being really an authentic person, feeling whole, vibrancy, intimacy is big. Because when we have that intimacy connection, when we're giving and receiving love, that's how we live our lives. Most of us, if we are in stress, we either overgive or we wall ourselves off. and that doesn't happen anymore. So what happens is we're getting those chemicals naturally, and we're not even trying to change our behavior because these are in our unconscious mind and they become naturally how we live our life and who we are.

Specifically, what are ways people are rewarding themselves after they've achieved this level one brain, or are they not needing any rewards? Like, would I still be wanting and experiencing pleasure in my life? Would I still be wanting to go on a vacation, wanting to eat a really delicious meal or not anymore? You're going to eat a delicious meal, but you don't need quite as much of it. You want to go on vacations. You want to do everything that's pleasurable.

But, you know, you can be out looking for pleasure, and underneath it is this bad feeling in your body. You're never quite connected. These are trauma circuits, and when you have that connection inside, you get all the chemicals that are healthy, and then you add some pleasurable things to it, and you take yourself into the stratosphere. There's nothing wrong with eating some chips. there's nothing wrong with eating cookie.

It's just how often and how much. And if you're eating it to the point where you don't feel good about it anymore. Like I think we've all had that experience of like, I'm eating this one cookie. It's so delicious. I'm really enjoying the melty chocolate and the buttery, caramely notes and all of that. And then you reach for a second cookie and a third cookie. And by the third cookie, you're like, I don't even know what I'm getting out of this, but I'm still wanting more and more. So you're saying by doing all of this, we're still going to enjoy that first cooking.

Absolutely. But after our brain has gotten the pleasure out of it, we're not doing it more and more where we're like, why am I even doing this? Yeah, right. EBT gives you the ability to shut off those circuits and the amygdala on the spot because that circuit that's making you with the eight chemicals is not in your brain anymore. So you don't have that drive. So for example, you eat the cookie and at some point it's just, you're done.

This is why I'm so against dieting. You're going to say to yourself, I have to stop. right now. Do you know how much stress that causes? Which makes you want more. Like it literally telling yourself that you cannot have these things is impacting your neurochemistry in a way that makes you want them even more. It's even worse with food than other addictions because the food circuit is related to the spirituality circuit and to the love circuit. So when you feel like you have to deny yourself, it's an assault to the deepest part of yourself. And that's why don't do it. eat whatever you want to eat. And again, the whole idea is you start using these skills. And at first,

they help a little bit. And you just say, don't worry about it. Just keep eating whatever you want. Just before you eat, just go ahead and spiral up. And when you get into rewiring, go ahead and find that food circuit and demolish it. And somewhere along the line, a couple weeks, maybe a month, whatever that is into it, you just notice that I never deprived myself. I honor how I feel and what I need. And I needed those cookies. And right now, I don't know what's going on, but I just don't need it. And that's a scientific solution to obesity and eating. And it's also one that, again, nourishes our spirit because it honors how we feel and

what we need. And there are absolutely no judgments. They're just circuits. Is there one spiral up technique we could be doing and then one breaking down the food circuit technique we could be doing at home for like a month and see the results in real time? I'd be happy to share two techniques with you, but I would feel guilty if I told you that it would really work to solve the problem. And the reason is we have plenty of data that if you're not with another person doing it where you have fun and you get that loving connection, you probably

won't use it as deep as you need to or as frequently to have lasting results. But that could be an action step too. Like my podcast was originally called healthier together and my last cookbook was called healthier together too because there's so much research around the fact that when we do things in community, we have so much more success. So maybe you could give us these two techniques and then we say do it with the partner. And then if you're seeing that success, like we have all these other resources so you can go further on this journey. Exactly. Number one is tell your partner or your friend, you can do it with your friend that you're no longer to talk about feelings. You're going to talk about brain states, numbers. And so when you get together, you say, what's your number? Am I at one feeling

great, two good, three, a little stress. This is the danger zone. Four definitely stressed and five stressed out. You don't have to talk about your feelings at that point, but you let someone know what's going on in your inner life. There's five different people in every person. There's a person at one, two, three, four, or five different circuits, different ways of being. As a perfectionist, I'm like, what if I get my number wrong? Do you have any advice for identity? identifying the number that we're at? I will tell you a little bit about that, but I would say it's more important to have a system in place, a structure in place with the other person to say your number. Because implicit in that is acceptance and that no one's good or no one's bad and everyone's in the

five states. So if I say to Walt, my husband, I'm at five, I'm toxic, I would love to listen to you, but I don't have the bandwidth. But when I'm in a higher state, I will. And I love you. What happens then is he knows, okay, I get what's going on and I don't really want to talk to her if she's at five anyway, right? That's part of it. So just speak in terms of physiology instead of all these feelings. Really, emotions, a psychology is based in physiology. EBT is the new neuroscientific psychotherapy. So that's number one.

Start speaking about the reality of life because when you're at five, it's not that just your emotions are off, but your relationships, your thoughts, your spirituality, your health, everything. equally dysfunctional. And at one, everything's functional. So a person really understands what's going on with you. So share your number, not your feelings. Secondly, I want you to try this one little technique. It's called the flow tool. You say, one thing you're angry about, I feel angry that, just complete the sentence. And then I feel sad that. I feel afraid that. And I feel guilty that. What I'm contributing to it is. You do that when you're just at three, it's just a light stress response.

You essentially stop the sympathetic nervous system from being activated that causes these stress chemicals. And then, remember, getting to a place of peacefulness or calm is not enough for the brain. The brain needs positive emotions because that's what really shuts off that sympathetic nervousism and activates the parasympathetic nervousism. so you can relax and be connected. So this chemical stop raging. And then say, I feel grateful that.

I feel happy that. I feel secure that. And I feel proud that. And by that time, you're going to turn your attention to your body. And you're going to notice sensations in your body that are associated with brain state one, optimal physiology. And you're going to say, wow, that really works. How does that interact with the fact that you said, talk about your number? or not your feelings.

That's the feelings process. In other words, a self-regulatory process for brain state three. If you are in brain state three, you can try this technique. Exactly. And the result of the technique in the simplest terms will be. Brain state one, joy. Okay. So if you're in three, you can get to one.

But if you're in like four or five, this technique is not going to be the thing that's going to get you to one. No, you need something much more focused and intensive. And you are rewiring your unconscious mind. Okay. People say, oh, it's just a psychological stress. No, what happens biochemically is if we've been shunned or hurt or disappointed or whatever that is, the brain activates this fight or flight chemicals that feel like you are going to be annihilated, even though the assault feels moderate. And as a result, you're going to have to do something like overeat or you're going to need to have the skills to switch off that response, one way or the other.

So going back to my fear about misidentifying my number, I want to use that tool. Can you give us just like a very brief example of when we're at one, we're going to feel like this. When we're at two, we're going to feel like this. Or three, five, we're like crying under the covers. Yeah, right. That's a good point. Okay, take a nice deep breath. At one, you feel connected to your body and you have, you can see me a glow in my eyes,

maybe even a little bit of sparkle of tears. You can feel a glow all over. You feel connected to the deepest part of yourself. You feel secure inside. You feel of purpose. and there's a certain amount of joy. All the elevated emotions you feel, you can feel love, compassion, gratitude, hope, forgiveness, awe, and joy. And these are the elevated emotions.

Kind of the things that we're trying to get when we're like eating all the cake and looking for that alcohol or scrolling on social media. We're trying to feel these things, but they're not actually making us feel them. And it's one, two, or three minutes away. So that's state one. State two. Both of these are homeostatic, which means good chemicals, which means the chemical. They eat chemicals that cause overeating are not being activated.

You feel present to both your positive and negative emotions. You can actually feel very sad, but the difference is your brain, your thinking brain and your emotional brain are connected and the feelings fade. They flicker. They don't get stuck. So I might say, I feel sad about my dog because he's sick. It'll go away. I just say it and it goes away.

That's two. You feel present. You don't have that glow of brain state one, but you feel solid and you feel connected. and you're healthy. So two is almost recognizing that we're not floating through a magical world. Bad things happen. And we're not in the state of toxic positivity where we're ignoring that, but we have the resiliency to deal with those things. Exactly.

Okay. You want to stay at one or two, but of course you want to go to three, four, and five sometime during the day. Because if you use EBT at that time, it helps rewire the circuits. And you can use EBT at three, four, and five either by artificially creating that three, four, or five state by being like, I feel angry. agree building up that state? Or can you recognize I am really stressed right now? I'm a three or four. I want to do these techniques. If you honor the fact you have that number, you're going to decrease what's called secondary stress. Secondary stress is a big deal. All of a sudden we get stressed. And now the problem is not that we're stressed. It's that we're stressed about being stressed. So it stops the secondary

stress. Oh, I'm at three. Of course I'm going to feel kind of anxious. So it stops the secondary stress and that helps. So your point is almost when you feel a three or a four or five even, you shouldn't be like, ugh, why have I so stress? Why is life so hard? You're like, this is an opportunity to rewire my brain. Exactly. Love that. And when you're at three, it's different. You're not connected. And once you're not connected, once the thinking brain is not connected to the emotional brain so it can control it, you're in danger. So how do you feel at three? You feel scattered. Okay. When you're at two, all you have to say to yourself is, how do I feel? and about three feelings will come up, and you pause, this is the tool for brain state two,

you pause until one of them is dominant. When one of them is dominant, that's the genetic purpose of emotions. If you pause and ask yourself how you feel one particular emotion will be dominant and it will point automatically to your most important need. So you don't have to figure out what you need. It just points you there. Not so at three, because you're in what's called allistasis. These are circuits that have no shutoff valve.

the emotions are toxic, and essentially those biochemicals are raging. At three, I feel scattered. I feel anxious. I feel upset. I don't know how I feel. I'm kind of this and that. I could do. You're all over the map. And sometimes people start overthinking. And then the thoughts become their own problem. I think I spend a lot of time at three. It's very common. At four, it's different. So you might be a little anxious at three. At four, it's not good. You feel bad in your body. You know that you. you are definitely stuck. You cannot shake this mood. You are maybe depressed. You are down on yourself. You feel like the world is not working, and you're just stuck in a really bad state. Now, Brace 8 is where we're toxic. And this is called a stress overload experience.

And the chemicals are just raging. And the job of Brinsate 5 is to convince you that whatever expectations you have, you have to act on and you have to do it now. And that's why they affect food so much. because you have to get that food right now or you will die. And you know you have to get it as if your life dependent upon it. Now, really hear that because it means that when you're in that brain state five, never blame yourself.

This is called biochemistry. And what happens is you're going to do whatever you do. That's why never judge yourself for the food. Never judge yourself for the food. You're in brain state five. And you may even not know you're in brain state five because you don't feel horrible. you just feel numb or another thing you can feel like an addict would or a real low. But either way, at five, what is happening for you is you're biochemically affected and you feel

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Get 15% off with code Liz at oneskin.c.co slash Liz. Again, that's 15% off at oneskin.co with code Liz. Do we need to know the root of our circuit to rewire it? Like you told the story about the cinnamon rolls, mean teas. Do we need to ultimately be able to find that? story for ourselves or can it work without that? What a great question. It goes back to the kind of circuit it is. If it's a circuit at three, you can pretty much change that circuit really easily. If it's at four, there may be a story you need to tell. And at five, you definitely do. So this is

how EBT works for the big four circuits, food, mood, love, and body circuit. You take three steps. And the first step is you do a really good cycle and you get right down to the bottom of your brain and you find the exact words. Once you find the exact words, and this may sound counterintuitive, the first thing you do is you love the circuit because you say to yourself, when that was encoded, my brain did that for me because there was no better option. And all healing starts with self-love. And then once you've established that this is something that's just a wire, it's not your fault, your brain just encoded it, then you begin to do something called the travel back tool. Now, this is magical. It's one of the most powerful EBT tools. Your brain is

set up for healing. And all we're doing here is giving you the structure of the techniques to make that happen. Because let's say I found my food circuit. I get my love from eating sugar and not just a little bit, but to the point I make myself really sick. In that moment, the circuit is activated. And that circuit is like a magic carpet. And what it does is you say to yourself, am I drawn to traveling back? And it's a yes or no. If in fact there's not a lot of memories back there that need to be cleared, you won't be drawn to traveling back to the past. You will instead just sit with your feelings and feel the awareness that that is a circuit. It's been in my brain for a long time. I'm really getting to know myself in a deeper way. But if in fact you say to yourself, wow, am I drawn to

traveling back. You don't have to answer that question with any checklist. Your body will tell you because it wants you to heal. And if it's better for you just to sit with it and be aware of your feelings, that's what you'll want to do. If in fact it's better to travel back, some magical things happen. What happens is you ask yourself several questions. Hmm, can I find one memory? And you say, what your mind travels back through a lot of different images until it comes up with one particular one that's really powerful? And you answer the question, yes. And then you say, can you see yourself in that image? If you say, yes, I can. Can you find love and compassion for yourself? You say, yes, I can. And then finally, do you feel drawn to stepping in, you, the older,

wiser person, stepping in to that previous you that's in that image, and giving that person the safety and love and wisdom that you needed at the time? If you answer all four of those questions with yes, you have what's called a reattachment experience, and you can rewire the circuit right in that spot. If no, you don't feel that way, you're going to need to use the EBT tools of processing the emotions to clear away what we call that emotional clutter, because your brain will not let you release that circuit for good until you've gone back a little bit to that time and learned some lessons so that you will never not take care of yourself again.

You'll never let someone harm you again. You will speak up for yourself in a new way. So it's very self-protective. And what it does is it leads to, I don't believe in clearing out all the emotional clutter from my childhood. I mean, I have other things to do. But what EBT does is it takes you just to that piece of clutter that is most productive to process so that you have freedom from it and you're at peace inside.

What would you say to somebody who doesn't really remember their childhood? No problem. If you don't remember it, then it's not there to be. rewire and don't worry about it. And you'll just sit with those feelings and have compassion for yourself. And also, many people have circuits that are not encoded in one event, but over time, there's learned, and they won't have those travel back experiences. So essentially, your brain will tell you what's best. You don't have to figure it out. And the tools of EBT give you all the options. So you'll be able to listen to your body and know exactly what to do. One of the things that I think is so fascinating is how much we are

continuing to wire in these faulty circuits. Like if every time we need safety and security, we're eating a donut to get that, then we are wiring in that circuit that the donut gives safety and security. Exactly. Yeah. That's why if you don't go to the root cause to the amygdala and say, hey, I'm going to have fun here. I'm going to learn how to rewire my unconscious mind and clear this out so I have freedom. Essentially, you're pushing it down the road. And those other circuits are getting stronger. And at some point, people just give up. And they just say, all right, I'll just be on as many medications and I'm just going to be miserable with my food. This method is so powerful and so exciting to use and so liberating that it's not about you, that you can do this wiring work.

And you can start changing pretty quickly. What do you think about general stress relieving practices? Are those helpful but not getting to the deeper level? Or how does that fit into thinking about EBT? There's nothing wrong with it except for one thing. I don't encourage it in the first three months of EBT when you're really getting at that circuit because you want to be stressed. Can you end us with just one homework assignment, something that anybody can do the second they turn off this podcast to begin to tap into some of the benefits of EBT? The first thing is an energetic change. I want you to forgive yourself for all the things that you've done that you say, why didn't I eat better? Why didn't I do that?

When did I do this? and appreciate that the science shows that it's about circuits in the emotional brain, and nobody has given you the skills to know that and to do something about it. So start with forgiveness and appreciate on the day you were born, you had all the inherent strength, goodness, and wisdom you would ever need to stop having a weight problem. You just would. And now you have the skills to move forward. And then start tomorrow morning.

And when you wake up, say to yourself, hey, what am I doing with my day? And what I want you to say is, I am creating joy in my life. And whenever I'm not at that brain state one, I'm not going to blame myself. I'm going to say, hey, that's just a wire. And I can rewire it when I get around to it. I don't have to do it now. And secondly, during that day, notice some time when you're a little stressed. You're at brain state three.

And then follow this formula and see what happens. I feel angry that. I feel sad that. I feel afraid that and I feel guilty that and notice the shift and then go to the positive emotions. But I do feel grateful that. I feel happy, even a little bit happy that. I feel secure that. And last, I feel proud that I.

Those eight feelings you're beginning to break up those circuits in the bottom of your brain and spiral up to a state of connection. And you will feel that sense of joy and pride right in the moment. Can I ask one tiny clarifying question? Yeah. Do they need to be related at all? Can I feel guilty that I'm a bad friend but proud that I'm successful at work? This has to do with the five levels of stress. If you're at three, the brain's going in all directions and the topics will be different.

Okay. And that's okay. And it's fine. If you're at four, the brain is saying, okay, there's a threat here. I need to do something about it. and they will all be on the same topic. Ooh, so it's a signifier of what level you're at. And if you're at a four, this is probably not the tool for you at this moment.

Okay, that's actually really helpful and wonderful. If people want to find out more about your work, about EBT, where should they go? The website is eBT.org. And right there, you can sign up to get into a support group with all of the program. We have daily support where you can drop in with the certified EBT provider every single day and be listened to and taught how to use these skills in addition to your weekly group. Also, there's a new book on EBT called One, Two, Three, Joy, which gives you all the science and the practice of EBT.

I wrote this book earlier in this year when I said, I think I want to get in one book the major awareness and science that I've spent 40 years on to how to stop having issues with food and weight. And so it's a long book, but it's got the science and the practice in it. And for anybody listening who's like, wait, daily support, is this going to be something that's going to take up a ton of time? I just want to be clear again. This is not something that you have to devote hours to every day or every week. Absolutely not. The basic requirement is 30 minutes a week where you have your support group. And then during the week, you just integrate it into your life. In other words, whenever you're at three or four or five.

But in addition to that, people have times when they're really stressed. And when you're really stressed, that circuit at four or five is, unlocked, and it's a moment of opportunity to change the circuit. I love that. Thank you so much, Dr. Mellon. This was fascinating. It's a pleasure. Thank you. That is all for this episode of the Liz Moody podcast.

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to miss what we have coming up soon. I will be delivering some incredible science, interviews, and advice every single Monday and every single Wednesday for you. Okay, I love you and I will see you for the next episode of the Liz Moody podcast. If you love this episode, you would also love our episode on Ozempic with the New York Times bestselling author of Good Energy, Dr. Casey Means. This is a super balanced deep dive into not only GLP1 Agnes, but also how our metabolic health impacts our fertility, our longevity, our energy, how we feel every single day, and so much more. And these simple steps that we can all take to optimize our metabolism. I will link it for you in the show notes so you can listen to it next. Oh, just one more thing.

It's the legal language. This podcast is presented. solely for educational and entertainment purposes. It is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, a psychotherapist, or any other qualified professional.