The One You Feed - Emiliya Zhivotovskaya

Episode Date: September 30, 2014

I was lucky enough to catch Emiliya Zhivotovskaya near the end of Camp GLP and we were able to sit down in her small room on the floor, holding microphones and have this conversation. I think we were both very tired after a great weekend at camp. She had delivered numerous workshops, emceed the Talent Show and was feeling under the weather to boot. Nonetheless it was a wonderful and warm conversation. Enjoy!!At the age of 5, Emiliya and her family fled from Kiev, escaping the fall of Communism and the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl. She found herself in a new land, faced with challenges completely foreign to the average kid growing up in a New York suburb. Then, 9 years later, she faced yet another tragedy, the sudden loss of her brother as he ran to save his fiancé from drowning and lost his life in the process of saving hers. And years later, the loss of her mother.From this place of deep challenge, she could have turned to the dark side. She could have given up, blamed the world and walked away from joy. From happiness. From possibility. Instead, she found awakening, strength and a renewed sense of gratitude. She discovered within herself a wellspring of resilience and a relentless desire to understand where this came from and how to bring a similar lens to others. She was determined to help others flourish.Her exploration quickly developed into a lifelong quest, leading her to study psychology at Long Island University, then get her masters degree in applied positive psychology from the University of Pennsylvania under the guidance of the legendary founder of the science, professor Martin Seligman. Graduating summa cum laude, she has gone on to found the Certification in Positive Psychology program at the Open Center and head up her own endeavor, The Flourishing Center. Emiliya is also currently pursuing her Ph.D. in Mind-Body Medicine at Saybrook University, where she is also on the graduate faculty. (Curriculum Vitae)Emiliya Zhivotovskaya is widely acclaimed for her striking ability to share the transformative power of positive psychology, deliver actionable and specific strategies that yield tangible, measurable results. And share these ideas in a wonderfully engaging and entertaining way. In This Interview Emiliya and I Discuss...The One You Feed parable.How both wolves are part of the human condition.How to feed both wolves and integrate them.Courage is not a lack of fear but having the ability to move through it.The bad wolf is trying to protect us, it is part of our evolutionary programming.What is positive psychology?How both positive and negative emotions are useful.The role of positive psychology in handling depression and anxiety.Depression masquerading as loneliness.Why there are not more depression support groups.Depression as learned helplessness.The criticality of exercise in handling depression (Want to be depressed? Don't exercise!)The BDNF and Serotonin loop.Taking micro-steps to build new habits.The biological wiring of social comparison.The role of gratitude in feeling better.How gratitude shifts the brain into a more expansive state.The small tweak that makes gratitude much more powerful.How negative emotion and problem solving are not connected, they can be pulled apart.That negative emotions make problem solving worse and narrows our ability to see options.How positive emotions help us move into broaden and build mode.That pain as a motivator falls prey to the law of diminishing returns.Eustress-the role of useful stress.The difference between useful and destructive stress.Thinking about being happier but not taking any action is worse than not thinking about it all.The fixed vs growth mindset.How you can't enjoy the journey when stuck in the fixed mindset and the growth mindset creates the conditions to enjoy the journey. Emiliya Zhivotovskaya LinksEmiliya Zhivotovskaya HomepageEmiliya Zhivotovskaya FacebookEmiliya Zhivotovskaya TwitterCertificate in Positive Psychology created by Emiliya Zhivotovskaya Some of our most popular interviews that you might also enjoy:Kino MacGregorStrand of OaksMike Scott of the WaterboysTodd Henry- author of Die EmptyRandy Scott HydeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

People don't realize that the negative emotion and the problem-solving are not the same thing. Welcome to The One You Feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes like, garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you think ring true. And yet, for many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self-pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other

people keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together, our mission on the Really Know Really podcast is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like why the bathroom door doesn't go all the way to the floor, what's in the museum of failure, and does your dog truly love you? We have the answer. Go to reallyknowreally.com

and register to win $500, a guest spot on our podcast, or a limited edition signed Jason bobblehead. The Really No Really podcast. Follow us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. At the age of five, Amelia Zivotovskaya and her family fled from Kiev, escaping the fall of communism and the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl. She found herself in a new land, faced with challenges completely foreign to the average

kid growing up in a New York suburb. Then, nine years later, she faced another tragedy, the sudden loss of her brother as he ran to save his fiancée from drowning and lost his life in the process of saving hers. And again, years later, the loss of her mother. From this place of deep challenge, she could have given up, blamed the world, and walked away from joy, from happiness, and possibility. Instead, she discovered within herself a wellspring of resilience and a relentless desire to understand where this came from and how to bring a similar lens to others.

She was determined to help others flourish. Her exploration quickly developed into a lifelong quest, leading her to study psychology at Long Island University, followed by a master's degree in applied positive psychology from the University of Pennsylvania. She's gone on to create her own company, The Flourishing Center. Amelia is currently pursuing her PhD in mind-body medicine at Saybrook University. Here's the interview. Thanks for taking a couple minutes and sitting down with me. So our podcast is called The One You Feed, and it's based on the old parable of two wolves where there's a

grandfather who's talking with his grandson, and he says in life there are two wolves inside of us. One is a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love. And the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandson stops and he thinks about it for a second. And he asked his grandfather, well, which one wins? And the grandfather says, the one you feed. So I'd like to start off by asking you what that podcast means to you in your life and in the work that you do. Honestly, I have to say that my first instinct is it like choked me up a little, like it made me want to cry. And I guess it'll come out as to why I'm not really quite sure why. And, and honestly, I see them both as essential parts of the human condition. So when we say, which one do you feed?

I, of course, my, my, my rational brain goes, no, of course we should feed the good wolf because, you know, that's what we've been raised to do is feed the good wolf. But then my empathy goes out to the other wolf, the, the hatred, the greed, the fear, that's a part of the human condition. And, um, we can't leave that part of a starving because it's gonna, it doesn't go away. It doesn't die. It'll just be starving. And the work that I do is about helping people integrate the different parts of themselves. And I'm wondering if there's, if there's a way to feed the good wolf and feed the other wolf. Um, and, and it's not that either needs to win. It's that they have to learn how to work together. A lot of the work I do in coaching is helping people take their fears and rather than thinking that they have to check their fears at the door, work with them. Some really interesting signs coming out in research around courage and courageous people. And so often people think that courage means that you just, you're fearless, you move without fear. And what we know time and time

again is that people who embody courageousness don't not, it's not that they don't feel fear. It's that they, their willingness to act is stronger than their fear. So what they've done is that they've taken that wolf and some people could say they decided that they weren't going to feed it. I would say that they gave it the protein and good food that it needs and put it on a leash and said, let's walk alongside me. And I want you to be on the lookout for what might go wrong. And I want you to whisper in my ear because I'm going to listen to you, but not always take your advice. You don't need to shout at me. And that the real transformation I've seen that people make is not when they completely ignore the other wolf or starve it. But when we find a way to say there's abundance and there's enough

to go around. And so often when you are able to honor that emotional, that the darker side, to honor that emotional, that the darker side, the scared side, the guilty side, the shame side, with just compassion and with just love and saying, I hear you and it's okay. We're okay. Because that other wolf, it's just trying to protect and it's doing something that has been planted within us evolutionarily thousands and thousands of years ago. And if we ignore that part of ourselves, in some ways it just ends up being starving and like that grumble in your stomach that you get on empty. And we try to put that part of ourselves in the dungeon. And after a while, it actually, it gets angrier, it gets hungrier, and it acts out even more simply because it's hungry, but it doesn't need, you don't need to give it all of your attention because at the end of the day,

hungry, but it doesn't need, you don't need to give it all of your attention because at the end of the day, we're really integrated. We're just one wolf and, and we can really show up as the highest expression of ourselves and then really create a stronger platform for that good wolf, for that loving wolf, for the one that is, is, is dedicated to service and acts with gratitude and with humility and doesn't just shun a part of themselves out, but really brings it all forward. You know, I actually had somebody say, well, I don't really believe there's two wolves inside of us. I was like, well, I know there's not two wolves inside of me, right?

It's a story that, but, but what I really liked there, and I'd like to maybe spend another couple of minutes on it is you do hear that you have to integrate your dark side, right? You have to do those things. And then we could start trying to twist the parable. Does the bad wolf start to become nicer? But it's a story. So how do we bring those parts of ourselves that are there, that probably have some information

to tell us about who we are and what's important to us. How do we work with those in a constructive way? Great question. It might even be helpful for me to talk a little bit about what positive psychology is and what it's not in the context of what we're talking about. When positive psychology first came about, people said, Oh, this must be a scientific study of happiness. So you must be trying to make everybody happy and, or focus just on positive emotions. And you were trying to get rid of negative emotions. And we would say, of course not, of course we can't get rid of negative emotions. Why would you want to? In fact, they actually did

a study where they asked people, if we hypothetically could give you a pill that you could take, and if you took this pill, you would never have to feel any negative emotion. You wouldn't feel sadness or grief or anger or despair. And you would just be able to feel the positive emotions, content, happy, joyful, grateful, connected. Would you take the pill? And almost everybody always says, of course not. And I think the reason that they do is because inherently they understand that it's not human to not feel all those negative emotions because some people would say it's the contrast. It's knowing the dark or knowing the downsides helps you feel that actually really appreciate the positive. helps you feel that actually really appreciate the positive. Some people would say, I want my fear with me when I'm walking down a dark alley. I need to have my spidey senses up to be able

to see what might go wrong. And from a positive psychology perspective, we want to understand what good or what value do these emotions serve and use them for what they're here to give us and check that which we don't need at the door. Because any one emotion, it's not that positive emotions are good and negative emotions are bad. It's that they serve different functions. We call this thought action tendencies. So negative emotions have a very specific thought action tendency. When you're scared, you want to run. When you're angry, you want to fight back. When you're disgusted, you want to repel. When you're embarrassed, you want to hide. And those are really important evolutionarily programmed emotions. And any one

emotion is not bad. It's when we get stuck in them. And most people just don't have the tools as to how to work with those emotions. And so we get stuck in them. Like expressing anger and experiencing anger are two very different things. And most people hide from it because they think that expressing their anger is the way to experience it. But actually learning how to experience your emotions, breathe with them, feel with them, it, but actually learning how to experience your emotions, breathe with them, feel with them, move them, I have found is a lot more helpful than what most people try to do, which is they try to shun it. So just because you stuff an emotion doesn't mean it goes away. And more

personal mastery comes from actually working with those emotions, moving through them so that there's also more space for the positive emotions. And then we actually actively have to put in things like love and contentment and gratitude. For the record, if you find that pill, I'm on the fence. So just let me know if it exists. As a former addict, I spend a lot of my time chasing that exact thing. thing. So this, I like that. And I like the evolutionary talk. I've done a couple mini episodes recently where it's just sort of me talking and most, that's probably when most listeners turn it off. But I've been talking about, I was talking about negativity. Like, why is it that we're prone to see the negative? You know, it's sort of evolutionarily,

we have to be alert for threats, right? But we're not, so our world is different today. And knowing that that's what we're going to default to in a lot of cases, if we know that, we can sort of say, all right, let me try and reframe the situation. Instead of seeing a bunk house that's cold and with a thin mattress, you can see one that's surrounded with people.

I mean, it's all a framing exercise at that point. So now let's talk a little bit about, I want to explore the idea of positive psychology and depression. Because that's a theme that comes up on the show. I know a bunch of our listeners wrestle with that. I've shared my stories of wrestling with it. So where does because the the the layman's take on it is traditional psychology is focused on the things that are wrong with us. Positive psychology is focused on taking you from a baseline to a higher point. But I don't, that doesn't make sense to me. I think that's a false, it seems to me to be a false division. So how does this work in with people who might have something that might be considered more of

a traditional mental illness, a depression or an anxiety type thing? Firstly, in today's world, it's so hard to even 100% reliably define mental illness. With the new DSM, I don't know what constitutes normal anymore. And something I've been really connecting with lately is research by John Cassioppo. He has a great book out called Loneliness. And he points out that very often, not very often, but enough,

doctors will diagnose something as depression where it actually is loneliness and they look very connected. And so while they're getting treatment for their depression, the heart of it is actually, the root of it is that they're lonely. So I'm going to interrupt you on that because that's fascinating. But why do you not think

there's depression support groups? I have been pondering that question because I agree 100%. I think loneliness is a big piece of it. There is enormous number of support groups that prove to be enormously helpful to people. And I'm wondering, is it just that nobody has done it and pushed it? Or is it that you cannot engage depressed people in that kind of way? Great question. Well, firstly, one of the leading researchers, the founder of positive psychology, Dr. Martin Seligman actually started off as a depression specialist and studying depression. And he became a famous psychologist based on his learned helplessness theories, basically showing that one of the ways in which depression shows up is that people learn that they're helpless. They learn to be helpless and they take on internalize this belief that

nothing I do matters. And the way that that shows up in our mind chatter is why bother? So why bother going to talk to someone or why bother going to a support group? Nothing I do matters. So that could be one is that by the, that, that people aren't being reached at that time. Another version is just that it's just, it's such a low level background music. And we as human beings are so resilient and we're so adaptable that oftentimes we just, we keep going. And so people are functionally depressed, not realizing that there could be another way. And so it could be also maybe depression groups are around and they're just not marketing

themselves well enough to even make it known to the public. I also think that mental illness or anything related to the mind scares the bejesus out of us because when a person has a physical illness that you can see, or even a behavior that is concrete, like within alcoholism, okay, well, that's the concrete behavior. There's drinking with sexaholics there's a concrete behavior foodaholic there's you know there there should be a support group that says hi i'm addicted to my thinking i'm addicted to my thoughts i'm addicted to my emotions where's the ea the emotional addiction groups i actually think there is something called emotions anonymous but it has never really gotten you know any traction I've never really even known what it does.

And it's just because there's blurred lines. It's all so blurry because even something like depression, it's like, am I depressed? Or is this just, you know, I'm muddling through. This is just my life and this is just a tough time I'm going through. And we are just now being able to understand what is actually happening in people's minds when they are depressed. And now we're relating it also to the body, how much of it is physiological.

Some people will have a massive shift in their depression as they shift their diet. But in terms of what can people do for depression, because I realize that even in our conversation, we're feeding one wolf. We're feeding the what's wrong wolf. We're feeding even the conversation of focusing on what isn't working. Because some people would even say that even depression actually serves an evolutionary function. I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together on the Really No Really podcast, our mission is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like

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It's for the voters to decide. Follow The Big Take podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen. In terms of what people can actually do when they are stuck in sadness and depression, there's so much. And if you define depression as believing that nothing you do matters, or you learn that you're helpless, the minute a person starts to take small action steps and see positive changes, then they start to believe that maybe I can make a change. And so there's two interventions. I mean, there's many, but there are two that come to mind is firstly, this is one of

the reasons why exercise is so beneficial for people with depression. Firstly, you get your, you get yourself moving and you start to see physiological changes, whether it be my heart rate is up, I've broken a sweat, I feel a little better. I have a little bit more energy. You can't keep saying nothing I do matters because here it is. I just made a change within my body. We also know that there's a BDNF and serotonin loop. So BDNF is a neurotransmitter that gets released in our brain. And basically what it does is it helps the two neurons fire a little bit better together. It's like miracle grow for your brain. It helps the connections come together. It gets released when we're active. And when we're not active, it decreases its production. Even as much as 20 minutes of sitting will start to decrease

your production of BDNF. And there's a relationship between BDNF and serotonin. So as BDNF is present, we release more serotonin, which makes us feel better, which actually releases more BDNF and serotonin. So as BDNF is present, we release more serotonin, which makes us feel better, which actually releases more BDNF. In fact, some researchers would say that not moving, not being physically active is actually like taking a pill for depression. Speaking of finding magic pills, you know, I often say to people, if I had this pill that I would say, here, you take this pill. And when you take this pill, you get depressed. Would you take it? And say, of course not. But that's what many of us do when we don't physically move our bodies. So great, huge amount of exercise. And it, and it perpetuates itself as the, I mean, depressions,

once it's sort of set into a certain degree, it's defining characteristic to a large extent as lethargy, the feeling that it's, and so that's why we talk about exercise being so important, but that like a minute, just if that's all you've got, but if you did a minute, a few days in a row, you did something, right. And you succeeded at something and it sounds silly, right? I mean, it's one of those things I've had, I've had people write and go, well, but look at these people. They didn't get there by doing a minute of exercise a day. And I said, eh, maybe not, but they started somewhere. They started where they were. Yeah. Yeah. And that's the key point though, is that firstly, we want to give compassion to that wolf that compares and says, well, what do you mean a minute? Like, you know, this person's doing an hour, even, even social comparison that's biologically wired within us. Thousands of years ago, it was really useful.

And it's important that the person chooses that time frame, whatever that small step is based on what's appropriate to them. For some people, it might actually just be, I got out of bed. And for others, it'll be, I went for a minute-long walk. One of the first studies in positive psychology had actually been done on looking at an intervention that was just for two weeks. People were told to write down three good things that happened to them that day. And for each of those good things, write down how they contributed to that good thing happening.

And what they found was that after two weeks, the group that did this compared to the control group had a significant increase in their happiness level and a significant decrease in their depression level. And what they found is that at six month follow up, those, those, those, um, that effect was still present statistically significantly.

And some people would say really just for two weeks, doing something for two weeks would have created that kind of change. And what often happened is that people experienced the benefit of it and they kept going. But the critical piece to that is not just the three good things that I'm grateful for, because many people will do that and they'll make their gratitude list. They'll say, I'm grateful for my health. I'm grateful for my family. I'm grateful I have a roof over my head.

Day two, I'm grateful for my husband. I'm grateful that I can put food on the table and I'm grateful for my health. And they just kind of get into this monotonous way of being around even something like their gratitude exercise. The brilliance of this intervention is actually also in the second piece, which is how did you contribute to that good thing happening? And what that starts to do is it gets a person recognizing that they're able to impact their life and it shifts that lens. Something I do matters. Something I do matters. So even if it's like, I'm grateful that it was a beautiful day outside today, the person says, well, you know, how did I do? I didn't create the weather, but they stopped and they noticed it. So it's that self-acknowledgement that starts to

little by little build, not a person's self-esteem, but a person's self-efficacy, a belief in themselves that they can make something happen in their life. And this intervention is just as powerful for people who would, we would say are north of neutral or at that neutral point in terms of their happiness and their life satisfaction. You don't have to be in the negative zone. The idea in positive psychology is that it's not just about making people happy. It's about wherever you are moving you north of neutral in your own life satisfaction. You said something yesterday that blew me away about this. And it's something I've thought about with gratitude is you said that people who don't feel grateful for something,

but do that exercise feel worse? Did I understand you right? No, actually what it is is that people who know that they have a lot that they should be grateful for, but can't feel it, it actually does more harm than good. So the guilt trip that I give my kids on, well, there's starving children in Africa, you should be grateful for what you have, which I really try never to do. But it's inevitable that it slips out occasionally.

Yeah. And it happens to all of us. And again, this is where I have so much compassion for that wolf, the wolf that says, well, no, I want things to be different. Sometimes we don't let ourselves feel grateful for the things that we have because we think we'll just, we'll get too content and we'll get too complacent. If I just start finding things to be grateful for here, like I'm not happy in my body, I need to lose a hundred pounds. Well, if I, if I start to be too grateful, well then I'll stop working on this goal as opposed to recognizing that there's a lot of benefit to going into the positive saying, I accept certain things are really good in my life. I see that they're good and things will change. But when people, you know,

when people have a lot that they think that they should be grateful for, I have a beautiful house, I have a steady paycheck, I've got a partner who loves me, yet why can't I feel grateful? That does even more harm. And the feeling part is what Brene Brown calls foreboding joy. It's that we don't let ourselves feel. It's like there's this little flower starts to open up of, oh, this feels good. And then one of the other wolves comes in and goes, uh-uh, don't, hey, be careful. If you feel, if you get too happy about this, someone's going to come steal your thunder. Or what if you lose this? Don't enjoy get too happy about this, someone's going to come steal your thunder, or what if you lose this? Don't enjoy this too much because this can go away.

However, when we actually allow ourselves to feel grateful, and some of the ways that I will have people do that is first, I ask them, where do you feel that in your body? Start with something that they can feel grateful for, like your mother, unless you've got some triggering mother issues, which not everybody can go to a positive place with their mother. Wherever it might be, start with where you're at. And actually, I would say not your mother. Most people can get there quicker with their pet. I was going to say, yeah, the dog is a classic. Dog or cat. And just start there. And I ask them just to connect with their body. Where are you feeling that in your body? We'll focus on letting that grow. Other times I asked them to think of something that they have in their life that they think they should be grateful for,

but they can't generate that emotion. And then we do thought experiments. What would it be like if you didn't have this thing in your life? Imagining and actually walking that through. And some people would go, well, Amelia, why would you make that person think about how bad that would feel? But sometimes we go into the negative emotion to then really experience that positive emotion. But it is key that what makes those positive emotions effective is that you can feel them. It's not enough just to think them. And the negativity bias is that we have no problem feeling fear or anger or hurt or mistrust or any of those other things. And you can almost think of those emotions on a scale. And the reason why depression is the hardest is because it's one of the lowest vibrations, apathy and depression. It's like

trying, and they say an object once in motion stays in motion. And when someone is in that place where they're just like the worst that can happen is I don't care. That's what happens sometimes with suicide. It's like, I don't care anymore. I give up. I'd rather see a person be angry about where they're at than be depressed than where they're at. And obviously we honor where people are at at every, every chapter, every stage of the game, but it requires a very different toolkit because there's almost like no energy there

and you have to generate energy. Thank you. I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together on the Really No Really podcast, our mission is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like why they refuse to make the bathroom door go all the way to the floor. We got the answer. Will space junk block your cell signal? The astronaut who almost drowned during a spacewalk gives us the answer.

We talk with the scientist who figured out if your dog truly loves you. And the one bringing back the woolly mammoth. Plus, does Tom Cruise really do his own stunts? His stuntman reveals the answer. And you never know who's going to drop by. Mr. Bryan Cranston is with us today. How are you, too? Hello, my friend. Wayne Knight about Jurassic Park. Wayne who's going to drop by. Mr. Brian Cranston is with us today. How are you, too? Hello, my friend.

Wayne Knight about Jurassic Park. Wayne Knight, welcome to Really, No Really, sir. Bless you all. Hello, Newman. And you never know when Howie Mandel might just stop by to talk about judging. Really? That's the opening? Really, No Really.

Yeah, Really. No Really. Go to reallynoreally.com and register to win $500, a guest spot on our podcast, or a limited edition signed Jason bobblehead. It's called Really No Really, and you can find it on the iHeartRadio app, on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I want to keep sticking with our wolf analogy because, or metaphor, because that's what we're, we're here for. And, and I would say that many of us feed, feed the wolf of judgment and, and, and shooting on ourselves and not letting us,

letting ourselves feel really happy and grateful for what we have. I know I'm like that. You know, I, I put all this work into one of my programs and then my program happens and I'm like, oh, that was nice. And I'm onto the next thing. And I'm on to the next thing. And I'm always on to the next thing. And I'm always on to the next thing. And I think the reason why we push ourselves in that way is a useful thing to do. It's the same reason why we whip ourselves on the back saying, you should go to the gym. You should make a change. And oftentimes people think that they have to push themselves as the only way that they're going to make a change. And oftentimes people think that they have to push themselves as the only way that

they're going to make a change. And it's being able to hold both of those things at the same time. I want things to change and I'm going to look for ways to feel positive right now because in my choosing positivity, I actually gain resources in my mind and in my body that can help me move towards that goal. So what I mean by that is that let's take worry, for example. So I want to scale my business and in order to do that, I need to raise say half a million dollars in order to scale my business. And I want, and I'm worrying, how am I going to do this? What if I don't do this? And the brain gives all of these, I won't be happy until I do these things. And so there's not that much positive emotion because how can I be grateful and happy for

what I have right now? Because I need this and I have all these what ifs going on in my brain. Well, people don't realize that the negative emotion and the problem solving are not the same thing. They can be stuck together for people, but you can problem solve and take action towards your steps, action towards the things that you want in your life and use a little bit of pain as a motivator, but not the amount of pain that we give to ourselves. And then on the positive side, the positive emotion of maybe pausing and being mindful and recognizing, I'm grateful for what I've done thus far, or looking at the resources

that you have around you. Anytime we start to shift into a neutral or more positive state, what happens in our brain is that we tend to think more creatively. I always say that you're not thinking about how you can cure world hunger when you just stubbed your toe, because when we're in a negative emotional space, we narrow and we focus. We are, our field of vision narrows and our, our, um, the access to the areas of our brain and our creativity just narrows. But if we can get ourselves into an upward spiral, even if it's just, Hey, you know, there are beautiful things around me right now. Then we can think more creatively, a more concrete example. So when somebody comes to me for, uh, for, for career coaching, they've been, they've been unemployed

for a while. They've been searching and everybody tells them things like, just follow your passion. And the P word has now become a curse word, you know? And, and because they're digging and they're searching and there's no worse feeling in the world than searching for something that you've lost, right? It's like trying to find your keys and you just can't find it. And then you feel worse and it just becomes a narrowing and focusing downward spiral. And what people end up doing is they keep going down that downward spiral. Cause like I have to come up with something. I need to do something. And then they're feeding that negative wolf, not realizing that, hey, my keys are right here.

And that what I do with people is the first step to help them begin to uncover their life purpose or even think about what can they do? Because literally ask them, so what are your options? And it's like looking at a deer in headlights. They go, I have no options. I don't know. And it's not that they don't have any options, but in that moment, their brain can't give them access to them.

So we'll start with, tell me something good that's happened in the past 24 hours. Tell me about a time in your life when you felt like you were at your best. And we start exploring the more positive side of their experience. And doing that, oftentimes, all of a sudden, a creative idea will come up. You know what? I just realized I'm really good at doing that. Or that really lights me up. Or sometimes these

miraculous things will happen. They wind up talking to someone and the job shows up. And I have examples of this in my practice come up all the time. But really what just happened is within that person, they shifted gears in their car out of narrowing and focusing into a more broadened and built space, a more positive emotional space. Negative emotions we associate with fight or flight. Positive emotions we associate with tend and befriend. And we were more likely to like, who wants to network when you're down in the dumps and you feel like you've got nothing to offer. Your resume has been turned down so many times and people tell you, you have to go to a networking

event, you know, but when you can get yourself into a more positive, grateful, optimistic space, you're, you're just naturally tending and befriending because that's just the gear that you're in in your car. So many different thoughts there, but it occurred to me that we hear a lot about that, well, I don't want to be happy or content because then I would become complacent. And it just occurred to me as you were saying that, that I don't think that's what causes complacency. I think that's a complete myth. Now, there is something to be said for being young and hungry. But as I think about my own life, because I always wrestle with this idea of how much discontent do you need in your current situation to push you? And so real life example, right? If I am working on a consulting job and I like it,

right? It's, you know, I do some e-commerce consulting. I like it. I'm engaged. I'm, but is it ultimately what I want to be doing? But what I realized is that that being in that groove is the energy for everything else that comes. And it's that sort of tortured artist myth that's out there. Yeah. You said so many great things there. Which one do I jump on first? Well, firstly, about how much pain do you use as a motivator? It's the law of diminishing returns. Many people think stress is a bad thing. And there's a type of stress that's a good stress. It's called eustress in research,

E-U-S-T-R-E-S-S. Eustress is actually, I think of it as useful stress. And that eustress is the stress that motivates you. It's that time pressure. It's that sense of urgency. It's that, you know, I have to make this business succeed because I've got a kid to feed. It's that thing that motivates you. And then if you stay in that stress too long, it's the law of diminishing returns that then you get into a place of distress or chronic low-level stress. And so being able to tell the difference is really important.

Yeah, I did one of the many episodes I did recently was on rumination and how that there's this, we have a fallacy that if we keep thinking about something, somehow we're doing something with it. And the reality is we're making it worse because we, as we become more anxious, we become less able to problem solve the very problem that we, that we have, which is so counterintuitive

to people. Yeah. In fact, a recent study just came out looking at comparing people who think about the fact that they want to become happier and how that affects their well-being compared to people who take action. And of course, this makes perfect sense that people who take action would have higher, that would be happier. But we actually have data now to show that people who sit around and who think I should be happier, not only does it not contribute to their well-being, takes away from their wellbeing compared to people who even take the smallest action. May I share my theory on complacency with you? I think one of the most brilliant psychologists of our time that has done, that has addressed this, but in some ways indirectly, Dr. Carol Dweck has done research on mindset and her book is called theset, the Psychology of Success.

And she identified that there's two different types of mindsets that a person can hold. One is a belief that things are fixed. And another is a belief that things can change. One is a belief that either you have it or you don't. And another is a belief that no matter how much of it you have, you can change. Now you can plug in for that intelligence potential as a business person, a talent for art or singing or dancing, or whether or not a person, when people come together and it's just, if you're a good fit, then you're a perfect fit as a couple. And then things should just always work compared to no relationships require effort. And that no matter where you're at, it's always going to be changing and growing.

And so what she finds is that when people are in a, inherit a fixed mindset, even if it's, hey, I'm smart or, or I'm a, I'm a leader. Um, but their belief is that either you're born a leader or you're not, either you're born to be a success or you're not. What happens is that either you're born a leader or you're not, either you're born to be a success or you're not, what happens is that they're the ones who are likely to plateau. They're likely the ones to actually become complacent and not take that next step. Because if you look at it as either you have it or you don't, you inherit this belief that A, people are constantly judging you as either you have it or you don't. And what often happens is this fear role. It's like, okay, well, I've reached a certain level of success, but if I try something harder and I fail, well, then people will find that I really wasn't as smart as they thought I

was. And what often happens is that people's mindset influences how they treat challenges, how they treat opportunities and what they put their energy to. So when a person really becomes complacent, it's not that they became too grateful for what they had, because what we actually, you know, the motto is what we appreciate appreciates. It's that, that complacency is usually held back by a place of fear and a place of judgment and all those what ifs. And it's often linked because they believe that they would become exposed or it's like, okay, you know, what if, what if I try something and I fail?

Whereas those who take on the growth mindset, who are just curious and they recognize it's all about learning and it's all about growing, they don't become complacent because some doing something that's a little bit more challenging, sure, it's challenging, but that's where the growth happens. So we hear time and time again, and I think some people just want to puke when they hear this statement where it's like, you should enjoy the process and not the destination. Well, you can't do that in a fixed mindset. Because the fixed mindset, when you're just trying to prove either you have it or you don't. It's binary. It's binary. It's all about the outcome. And there's so much anxiety built into the process that you never really want to stop and enjoy the process. Whereas in a growth mindset where you literally,

you get happy, you get off on the journey, you get off on the destination because that's what enables growth to happen. And when you believe, well, it's all about growing, it's all about learning, then you really can enjoy the process. And then you get to the destination and sure, you might enjoy the destination too, but it's not any less satisfying than the work that got you there. And so complacency is almost like when you really talk to someone who embodies growth mindset, it's like, I wouldn't even come up into my mind to just become complacent. Or to think that I would just be grateful for what I have and therefore not able to do it. So I really think it all keeps coming back to what's a person's mindset. Do you ever have the urge to just drop the mic when you're done? Like, you know, like an MC does after they just nail it, just

drop the mic and walk off. This would be a moment that if you did, you could, I would, I'd be like, all right, that's fair. I have too much respect for your technology. I would be all worried about what would happen to the equipment. Well, I think that might be a good stopping point, even though I could probably do this for hours. So I think maybe we'll have to do a part two. Thank you. Because I want to explore savoring and lots of other things that I know you talk about. But thanks so much for taking the time to be on. This has really been, I think it is tied together, so many of the themes that come up in the show in a really coherent way,

which has got to be positive for folks because the coherency is not coming from this end. Thank you so much for having me on. It's such an honor. Thank you. Thank you. you so much for having me on it's such a such an honor thank you thank you you can learn more about this podcast and amelia jovatovskaya at oneufeed.net slash Jovatovskaya. I'm just kidding. Good luck.