We Can Do Hard Things with Glennon Doyle - How to Live a Little Happier with Dr. Laurie Santos

Episode Date: January 20, 2022

1. The simple exercises Laurie conducts with her students at Yale to help them reset their brains and restructure their days in order to access happiness.   2. Why being “time famished” is one of the most common obstacles to happiness, the signals our bodies give us that we are starved of unstructured time, and what we can do to build more of it.   3. How understanding that our brains are wired as “comparison machines” incompatible with happiness can lead to improved wellbeing.   About Laurie:  Dr. Laurie Santos is Professor of Psychology and Head of Silliman College at Yale University. Dr. Santos is an expert on human cognition and the cognitive biases that impede better choices. Her course, “Psychology and the Good Life,” teaches students what the science of psychology says about how to make wiser choices and live a life that’s happier and more fulfilling. The class is Yale’s most popular course in over 300 years and has been adapted into a free Coursera program that has been taken by over 3.3 million people to date. Dr. Santos has been featured in numerous news outlets including the New York Times, NBC Nightly News, The Today Show, CBS This Morning, NPR, GQ Magazine, Slate, CNN and O, The Oprah Magazine. Dr. Santos is a winner of numerous awards both for her science and teaching from institutions such as Yale and the American Psychological Association. She has been featured as one of Popular Science’s “Brilliant 10” young minds and was named TIME's “Leading Campus Celebrity.” Her podcast, The Happiness Lab, launched in 2019 has over 48 million downloads. Instagram: @lauriesantosofficial Twitter: @lauriesantos To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Whether you're doing a dance to your favorite artist in the office parking lot, or being guided into Warrior I in the break room before your shift, whether you're running on your Peloton tread at your mom's house while she watches the baby, or counting your breaths on the subway. Peloton is for all of us, wherever we are whenever we need it, download the free Peloton app today. Peloton app available through free tier, or pay subscription starting at 12.99 per month. Well, hello, Pod Squad. Thanks for coming back to We Can Do Hard Things. How come you always get to do the beginning part?

Okay, actually everybody, Pod Squad stay where you are. Yeah, don't move. Go ahead, babe. It feels a little bit like one-sided here. Hello, Pod Squad. Hello. I'm your space, Abby. Claim that space.

Take it up, girl. Two sister, I just want to welcome you back. Here we are. We can do hard things, podcast. podcast. We've been talking to Dr. Laurie Santos. We love her so much. And I feel like I am killing this intro. Do you know why I bet you're killing it? The podcast squad is going to be very excited about this. We're talking to Dr. Laurie Sanders about happiness. And so we have some happy news for you. What's the happy news?

Abby is out of the closet. Look at it. She's out of the closet. She is recording now in a room. We are in a room pod squad. And you are out of the bathroom, honey. I know, but here's the deal. The pod squad has been so overtly concerned

with you being in the closet, but nobody is worried about me being in a basement bathroom. Well, they didn't know that. What they don't know is that my microphone, this entire time, and computer, has been sitting on the toilet. And I have been in a room that is like eight inches by ten inches. Oh my gosh. eight inches by 10 inches. But I think there's some kind of cognitive dissonance that people have to see Abby Wombach speaking her bold truths

in the closet. It makes people upset. This is symbolism for sure. Yeah. Ironic. Yeah. As a lannus morse that would probably say. It's ironic.

But the pause question also knows is that we have a very emotional relationship with closets. Like I have always done my best creative work in closets. I wrote all of Love Warrior from a closet. Okay, then I, Abby and I got a house and I got an actual office. And so I sat down in the office to write untamed and I could not do it because the office was too big, and there were too many distractions.

And we know I'm like, Dory from Nemo, whenever there's any, I just, and writing is so terrible and horrible that I would find myself like organizing books, or like I'm never organized anything, but when I have a deadline, I become like home edit. I'm just like all over the place. Our house is never cleaner than when there is a deadline, and become like home edit. I'm just like all over the place. Our house is never cleaner than when there is a deadline

and there's been the works. My friend Rachel held Evans. She died and that is one of the worst things to happen to the spiritual world, but she used to put a post it on her computer that said Rachel, the next sentence is not in the pantry. So I did that too. But the point is that I actually, even though I had that lovely big office, what did I do?

Where did I take my computer every day to write untamed? You wrote the whole book untamed book in the closet of the office. In the closet of the office, which was tiny, by the way, nothing was tiny. It was way tiny. It was like it was not a walking storage space underneath the stairs. No, I hit my head every time I stood up or went in and screamed in the afloat. The angled ceiling.

Yes, she would know I was done writing by it, scream, fuck, over and over again. Okay, but now we're excited. You also, we are in an office and we're together in this room. We are in an actual room, speaking to each other, and that is a happy thing. And now I wanna tell you one other happy thing that happened to me this week, okay. I don't even know this.

I, you know it, okay. Just, it's like told you all about it. Okay, my friend Kate, you know, we met two new house, Kate Lester, as a friend from our area. She came over and she brought me a plant, Okay, and now I take plants very seriously now because my son is obsessed with plants. And so he has taught me to value plants, although not to name them because that is personal. I don't know, he told me that's wrong.

That's not respecting the plantness of plants. That's trying to turn them into people. Okay, we don't listen to that. We have grand plants. He's gone away from college. We are desperately trying to take care into people. Okay, we don't listen to that. We have grand plants. We've gone away from college. We are desperately trying to take care of this plant. So when Kate brought me this plant, I was like, oh my god, my own chance. This is my chance. So I watered it every other day with a special little cup that I had next to the sink. And I watched it. It was getting greener. I felt like it just, I just could tell that it was

growing and it was so happy. Okay, so Kate comes over a couple of days ago, she's sitting at my table and she's about to leave and I say, Kate, real quick, how often should I water that plant? I put it to the plant, it's on the island. How long should I, how often should I water? Because I'm doing it a lot and she goes,

well, probably never because it's a fake plant. Okay, so what I want you to understand doing it a lot and she goes, well, probably never because it's a fake plan. Okay, so what I want you to understand is that I've been watering this plant. I've been seeing it turn greener. But I've been seeing it grow. Okay. And I just feel like there's a metaphor here like so many, so many, watering dead plants like it's good to have real plants and real friends. And I don't know something. I'm working with a metaphor. But I think that was kind of happy.

Like, oh my god, this is amazing, right? And also a metaphor for happiness, right? Because in your judgment, your experience of that situation was that that plant was thriving, yes, and growing. And you had an experience of that that was just based on your perception of and I would say it's correct to say misperception. Yes. What was happening, but nonetheless it made you happy. It made me so happy until Kate ruined it. She ruined it.

She ruined it. Baby, but I have a question. What do you think's happened or happened to all that water? I blew dry it. I blew dry it yesterday. You are kidding. No, I took a blow dryer and I blew dry the fake plants. I don't want to kill a fake plant.

That feels like something even I shouldn't be capable of. Wait, wait, wait, back up. You're saying you were just not going to tell us that part of the story. You're saying, I was there. You found out it was a fake plant. Yeah. Well, I have a problem to solve. I'll go get my hair dryer and I'll shoot it on the plant. What else was I supposed to do? When he problems that Glenin has is solved with the hair dryer, actually. Well, Abby, when we were 10 and she was trying to make cookies, the first thing on the recipe said, pre-heat the oven.

Okay, so we're not a big cooking baking family. So her little analytical mind was like, pre-heat. How would I pre-heat? How would I get the habit of an hot before the oven was on? So what did she go get, Abby? The hair dryer. She got the hair dryer. So it's just, this is, and I got caught.

So who was it? I think, I think it was my friend Carrie's mom. I think I was a friend's house and she walked in, she said, what are you doing? And I said, I'm preheating the oven. I'm sitting it. But listen, in my own defense, I don't understand cooking, but I know words. And I looked at that word heat before, heat the thing up before. Okay, it's not pre if it's you turning it on. Right. They should turn it on exactly. Right. And wait until it's 350 degrees. That's right. Turn it on and wait till it's 350 degrees. That is just heating. And now I'm creating.

I think that we have actually figured out the exact moment that you and cooking split. That's right. Humiliation of that moment that my family has never effing stops telling that story. Well, also because it didn't make sense. You're like, no, that my family has never effing stops telling that story. Well, also, because it didn't make sense. You're like, no, that's not the way you define it. Like, I'm not going into that territory. And I'm bitter about cooking. I very much resent every time someone says to me, it's just following directions.

Cooking is just following directions. No, no. It's a recipe. It's a recipe. OK, so I pick up a recipe. And I'm like, OK, it's just going to tell me what to do. OK, I'm just going to do. It's number recipe. Okay, so I pick up a recipe and I'm like, okay, it's just gonna tell me what to do. Okay, I'm just gonna do, it's number one, number two, number three.

And then the first sentence is something like, julienne the carrots. And I'm like, what the fuck does that mean? Like, that's not a direction. That's mocking me. I don't want to get a dictionary to make a salad. So no, I'm not, I'm not, I know you know hair dryers. I'll tell you what, I know how my know my way around

a hair dryer. Do you think when you're only tools of hair dryer, every problem looks like something that needs some hot air blown on it? All right, you guys think I didn't really know that this was gonna go this way way. But, here we are. Just trying to bring some happiness to your week. You did.

My face hurts right now, I've been laughing so hard. Okay, let's welcome Dr. Laurie Santos, so she can help us bring this conversation into any sort of reality. So we are so lucky that Dr. Laurie Santos is back to answer our pod squads happiness questions. Thank you so much. Should we just jump in and hear from them? Yeah, let's do it.

Hi, Glennon, Sister and Abby. My heart thing is this, like Abby, I am a huge people pleaser. I love making people feel happy, cared for and supported. However, I've crossed the line where it has become unhealthy for me. I drain myself for the sake of others, no matter how much it cost me. While I'm working on boundaries and putting myself first, there's an overwhelming amount of guilt I feel when I can no longer meet people's expectations,

have to say no to something or know that I've disappointed someone. Do you have any advice on how to cope with or free myself from this inevitable guilt that I feel? Thank you so much from your fan, Shannon. Yeah, well, Shannon, you're not alone in the I feel like a lot of people are probably nodding their heads along right now There is lots of evidence that doing for other people can make us happy But that's only if we have the bandwidth to do for other people and the problem is that we sometimes don't Right, like we really have to be putting our own oxygen mask on first before helping other people Like it's such a cheesy metaphor that comes out of the airlines But whenever they say it, I'm always like, yeah, yeah, like

tenet, like you know, the only one in my world who'll say that to me, thank you. Thank you for giving me permission. But like we all need permission, right? And I think this is so essential. I mean, I see this in my college students all the time. Like these are incredibly driven students. So many of them are really, you know,

interpromoting social justice and action. And I watch them like burning out, right? Because they're not kind of giving themselves the bandwidth to like take a break and take a breath. You need to find ways to kind of say no to give yourself the bandwidth, like boundaries are healthy. And then kind of make sure when you're saying yes, that it really is a real yes. You know, you kind of need to kind of give yourself space to be able to say no and sometimes.

And if you can't do that, that's a spot for some self-compassion, to interrogate, okay, why do I, myself, just one human feel like I can't say no to a million things, right? What's going on? Do I think of myself as superhuman? Do I need to give myself a little bit more self kindness? Do I need to reset some of these boundaries? Like, those can often be hard conversations, especially depending on who's doing the asking,

but they're really essential ones for you able to not feel burnt out all the time. These days, I'm trying to get my students to talk a lot about their specific emotions. And we all know certain emotions, like sadness, anger, those can be hard to kind of figure out, but we kind of get them. But the one they feel so much that they need better ways to articulate is overwhelm. Like overwhelm where you're just like,

I freaking can't, like, this is just so much. It's not anger, it's not sadness, it's not frustration. It's just like, I don't have the bandwidth. And emotions are signals, right? Like an overwhelm is a good signal of like this, this means you got to step back. Like you got to start saying no to some of these obligations, right? This is an honest signal of what you're capable of. And we don't listen to those honest signals, you know, you get into really nasty territory.

So yeah, setting a nasty territory look like like when we look at looks like addiction, right? It looks like addiction. It looks like, you know, really having a full nervous breakdown. It looks like burnout when you become cynical about even the things you love and the people you love, right? Like you don't want to get there. You want to act on it ahead of time. I'm Jonathan M. Hevar. I'm a podcast producer and someone who likes fancy things. But I grew up working class. My parents were immigrants with factory jobs. And because of that, I think about class a lot.

And I want to talk about it. That's what we're doing on my new podcast, Classy. And what did you all eat? You know, trailer food. I was like, girl, we're not doing that anymore. You'll hear from people who told me awkward, embarrassing, and strangely intimate things about what class means to them. She said, you know, for the house cleaner, I hide the tag on the $6 bread.

And I just thought, don't you think she knows that you're wealthy? You're hiding the tags from yourself. Classy. A new podcast from Pineapple Street Studios. Available now. Wherever you get your podcasts. Can I sneak in a question between voice and eels? I think that's it.

How do we talk about cultivate, deal with happiness with our children? I don't think we do a very good job of that in our culture because we just keep telling them they should be happy in a million different ways. So can you give us like what does the research say about that? What parents can do. Yeah, I think one thing you can do to make your kids ultimately happier and definitely to make them psychologically healthier is to let them be unhappy. It is to let them fail. It is to let them screw up. It is to let them cry. It's to let them see you do the same things because that is the way by which they do stuff.

Yeah, I'm interviewing for my podcast, this wonderful woman, Julia Lithcott-Hames, who wrote a book about how to raise an adult and she talks a lot about helicopter parenting. And she goes through this idea that in all of our anxiety to protect our children, we're like ruining our own mental health, but we're kind of messing them up too. We've all had the satisfaction of what it means to get through like a difficult task or to like, you know, struggle a little bit and then get to the other side,

or even struggle a little bit and not get to the other side, but you like learn something from it. And we, generationally, are taking that away from our kids and not letting them feel any negative emotion. We teach them the negative emotion. There's a cure for that. There's a cure for everything. We'll just blanket it. And that doesn't help them when actually in reality, there's death and taxes and all these things you don't have good cures for. We're kind of not preparing them for the right world. Yeah. Okay, let's hear from our next pod squadder. Hi, Glynon. I recently asked my husband for a separation and also stumbled on your podcast around the same time. And it, you know, has been my saving grace. And I guess my hard question is, you know, am I doing the right thing?

Will I get past these feelings of, I'm an awful person? And does my happiness really matters. Falling out of love with my husband, husband, awful, and I wake up every day hoping that maybe today's the day that I can convince myself to be in love with him. Will I just pass this? I know nobody can give me the answer Maybe today's the day that I convinced myself to be in love with him. Will I just pass this?

I know nobody can give me the answers that I really want. Do I ask him for a divorce or do I not? But that's only I can answer that question. But anyway, I appreciate you guys so much and I adore Abby and your relationships went in. Know that even though you don't have all the answers, you are helping in ways that you don't even realize. I love you guys. Thank you.

Well, I mean, lots of threats here. I mean, first just acknowledging the pain, like that sucks. Like it sucks to be in a position where the person you thought you're going to be with Reverend, you're not having those feelings for it sucks to have the uncertainty about what to do. Like that's a tough, tough, this is situation to be in. And I think this is a spot where, you know, these practices of self compassion can be so good. Like, even if it feels like this is a spot where, you know, these practices of self-compassion can be so good. Like, even if it feels like this is a horrible thing and you're a horrible person,

you are not the only person to fall out of love with someone. Like, this happens all the time, in fact, probably in like 50% of marriages. So, like, let's do a little common humanity and recognize that, like, these things come up. Then, kind of engage in some self-kindness, right? Like this hurts, this sucks. This is a bad thing to go through. You know, what can you do to kind of do something kind to yourself? And research your Christian, Neff has this wonderful suggestion that like when all thing, when everything else fails, just give yourself some kind touch. She literally recommends like just taking your arm and like stroking your arm, stroking your forearm.

You might for a child who is going through something. The beauty is, your brain doesn't know the difference. If it's like you're self-stroking or someone else, you just feel this touch and feel a little comforted. Do things that feel kind. Then try to notice a little bit when those thoughts come up. I'm a horrible person. No, you're literally 50 50% of marriages out there

that people go through this, right? Kind of common humanity and mindfulness. In terms of the question about what you should do, I think she said it right. You probably need to make the decision for yourself. But the thing to know is that either way it goes, you're much more resilient than you think. I mean, it sounds like Sherry has the answer

that she's out of love and she might just need to make the hard decision. But I think the reason that decision is hard is you're doing some forecasting about how bad it's gonna be. Like there's this idea that I'm never gonna get over it, you know, that my partner's never gonna get over it. Like it's just gonna suck forever.

And this is the good side of hedonic adaptation. It will suck, you know, when you first make that decision, it's going to feel like it's going to suck for a while. But all the evidence points to the fact that it's not going to suck as badly or for as long as you think. And so you can kind of trust in your own resilience there. And most people who are in that situation, once they finally make the decision, often have the thought, why didn't I decide to like pull the bandaid off sooner? And so, yeah. Yeah.

And I just always remember myself, it's hard either way. Like I think in this position, we're always like, well, which one's going to, which one's the right one, the wrong one, which one's the easy one, the hard, like, but actually there's hard both ways, like staying in a relationship that you know is not right for you is hard. Leaving a relationship that you know is not right for you is hard. So you really do have to just decide what's the right kind of hard. But she also has this thread where she says, but does my happiness even matter? Like that can you speak to the idea of happiness as kind of this zero sum game and how our happiness works

in ecosystems that she's saying, if I choose my happiness, it means they are unhappiness. My kids are happiness, my partners are happiness. Like how does that actually, is there studies on that? Yeah, I think this is another spot that we get wrong all the time. I think this is like a common perception. I think moms do this all the time where it's like, I need to sacrifice my happiness for like,

my kids happiness. Like, yeah, I'm super anxious about everything in their whole life, but like, how else do I make them happy? What we forget is like a very core mechanism of our emotions is that they are contagious. Like if you're a super anxious, super unhappy mom, like your kids are going to pick that up. They're going to like, so good. Are you sure, are you sure, Dr. San

does? I think it is. It's really horrible. But for our caller, we'll get off the mug. But for our caller, you know, if you're deeply unhappy in a relationship, you're not making the other person as happy as they could be. You know, in some ways, you might be giving them a gift to just like, again, rip off the band-aid so that that person, again, that person at the time might feel like it's never going to get better. But all the studies suggest is not going to be as bad as you are forecasting. Even if it takes some time, because grief takes time, right? Like grief is about any loss that we didn't really want, right?

Even if you're in the position of kind of falling out of love of your partner, you have to grieve what you thought it was going to be at first or what it was in the beginning or something. And so you need to kind of give yourself some time to grieve, but you will get stronger even if it doesn't feel like it. I remember when I was deciding about my marriage and feeling this way. Like, does my happiness even matter? Can I free myself from this without ruining everyone's lives? Liz said to me, there's no such thing as one way liberation. When you free yourself from something that

wasn't meant for you, you are automatically freeing the other person because if it's not meant for you, it's get to our next voice mailer. My name is Ellie, hi, Lynn and Amanda and Abby. I am in my 20s and I just look up to all of the so much for different reasons. I would love to know what advice would y'all have told yourself in your 20s and I just look up to you all so much for different reasons. I would love to know what advice would y'all have told yourself in your 20s and just starting out with career relationships all the things. Would love to hear it. Bye. Love it.

Love it. I think that was 20 years old. I think that wasn't a dentist. I was going to say I think that wasn't for me. I think that was for you all. So I want to hear you all go with that question. This is good, especially because I have lived a life that, I mean, I would say that I basically wake up thinking what fun things can I do today? And I usually actually put them off

to later on in the day, but something that I've been trying to do more recently is to actually put it on the to-do list of my life so that I don't miss out. Like, for a long time, I gave myself the reward of doing the fun thing after doing all of the other things that I needed to do, whether it be pay bills or workout or whatever. And so now I give myself the gift of maybe going surfing first in my day. I mean, it also helps it surfing in the morning is better. But I just am happier all day long. And then I go for my run like right after I surf so that I get that thing done. That's cool. Yeah. So it's like instead of holding your breath all day and then breathing.

Breathe first. And then the rest of your day has more joy infused into it. Yeah. So it's like instead of holding your breath all day and then breathing. Breathe first. And then the rest of your day has more joy infused into it. Yeah. Cool. And you are literally putting in your to-do list stuff that is fun. Right. Like you might need the remedial step first of not like when does the fun stuff happen in my to-do list, but like make sure it gets in there anyway. Yeah. And I think the problem is that for some of us when we're feeling really time-famished, it's the fun stuff that goes out the window. Right? Like sometimes when I'm looking at my calendar and like,

oh my gosh, I have to squeeze extra stuff in. It's not that work meeting that I hate that goes. It's like, you know, my yoga class with my friend. I'm like, well, I guess I'm going to have to skip yoga this week. I guess I'm not going to have to sleep as much this week. Sleep also so important for mental health and happiness. So just that it is in the priority list at the same level as the bills and all the other stuff is really powerful.

Not to dodge this question, but I have a question about research on this because what she's saying is go back and look at your 20s. And it's like we all know that at the end of our lives, there's only going to be a few things that matter. I mean, like we intellectually know that. No one would argue, but then, even though we know that, right now,

we're not acting as if that were true. What that's wrong with us. No, honestly, what is wrong with our brains and our lives that we know that, but we're not doing anything. Like everyone has advice for the persons in their 20s, but no one has ever done the thing they should have done in their 20s. Right, this is like sometimes when I talk

about my happiness tips, like, and there's people say this about my Yale class too, they're like, all of this is common wisdom. Like we already know this stuff. And I'll say, well, it's not common practice. Like, did you just do all this stuff today? Like, no, right? Like we need some kind of help with it.

And like, you know, why don't we do it? Our brains are built wrong. They're that there's that wanting liking disconnect, you know, capitalism. There's lots of messaging coming in. That's not telling us to just like be present and enjoy the joy and like look out your window. That doesn't sell iPhones.

So there's a lot of outside pressure to kind of keep us stuck in this rat race. But then if you do look at people at end of life, none of that stuff is gonna matter. And again, not to go back to the Greeks and the Romans here, but this is the concept of carpe diem. It's like seize the day. They don't mean like get through your hold to do list. It's like, sees the day. They don't mean like, get through your whole to-do list.

It's like, sees the day because tomorrow you may die. And when you do the reflection on, what if tomorrow is the last day? What if someone came down and was like, you know, just going to give you a window when you walk outside and you get by a car, nothing you can do about it. Like, today's the last day, just want to like give you a FYI. Probably the to-do list would go away. And probably you'd be present with the people you care about in a different way.

You'd want to be present with the food that you eat or whatever. You just do things differently. I hate that there's carpe diem on planners and things. I'm like, no, they meant something different. You'll be shocked to know that my entire career started with an essay called Don't Carp A Diem. Love it. Love it. Yes. Yes. Yeah, yeah.

But I do think that there is such a wisdom to that. It's like, how do we avoid the big deathbed regret? It's like avoiding bedtime regret. It's like how the Annie Dillard idea of how we spend our days is how we spend our lives. So it's like how do we divide that up and make it smaller and make sure if like what we really love at the end of the day is our family and our peace and our joy and our friends like did we spend any time on that today? Yeah. And I think the sad thing is how little how little we do. We do this values exercise with my students where I have them come in and you know they write a big

list of you know what are the things you value and they circle, you know, all these virtues of like a spirit of adventure and learning and all the stuff. And then we do this exercise, like, okay, new exercise, new exercise, we're going to have you just write down how you spent your day, just like a typical day, like 7 a.m. and then I go back and I say, okay, let's, let's match those up. Like, you know, how did those things go together? And they have this moment where they're like crap. Like, you know, the things that really matter to me, I'm not kind of putting my time into.

And then there's like the further exercise of like, okay, well, you know, what would you do differently? And I think it's an exercise we can all do. And, you know, I'm no better here, right? Like if I looked at my day today, I mean, this part's fun, but like I had a bunch of stuff that was like staff meeting and boring and emails

and blah, blah, it's like, wait, you know, if tomorrow was the last day, I really wouldn't have wanted to spend it this way. And so, you know, what can we do to restructure our lives? That might mean setting up boundaries, that might mean saying no, that might mean recognizing, hey, I'm not gonna get to this next accolade in the way that,

you know, careerist me would want, but that's okay because death fit, he's going to be a lot happier about it. Yeah, and wise me knows, I mean, I think what I would tell my 20-year-old self that my 20-year-old self would never believe and would still go ahead and live her life the same way she did. You know, I was talking to my almost 20-year-old when he's a freshman in college now. Just trying to promise him that he's working his ass off in high school so that he can we get into this college, so that then he can work his ass off in this college, so that he can get to this job, so that then he can work his ass off into this job, so that then he can...

It's just this constant destination promise of happiness, and there's no there there. I mean, as a writer who you know decided that that eventually if I just reached this thing, if these many people read my, if this, if this, then I'll be happy. And then you get there and there's no there there. And no matter what happens, you all, you learn that the good news and the bad news is it's just the little freaking things every day. And this is, this is another bias that the good news and the bad news is it's just the little freaking things every day. And this is another bias that researchers call the arrival fallacy. I'll be happy when, you know, filling your went. I'll be happy when I get married. I'll be happy when I get that promotion. I'll be happy when I buy a house, right? Then it happens and it's not that it's awful, but it's, you know, I mentioned before the my Yale students who filmed their admission acceptance

video and like they find out you got into Yale, they yell they actually play this little song, it goes bulldog, bulldog, blah, blah, blah. And they know like, oh my god, they're getting in, they cry. My students will say that was like one of the happiest moments, but the instant after it was one of their darkest moments because they're like crap. Now I gotta, like it was all for that.

And I have to chase the next carrot to get into med school or chase the next carrot to get, you know, my banking job or whatever. It's great. And we're constantly chasing these carrots. We really believe, I think Disney sold us a line. Like, we really believe happily ever after. But as my colleague Dan Gilbert, who I mentioned before,

is fond of saying, happily ever after only works a few of six minutes to live. Like, it's does last that long. Like, what do you think it's gonna be? It's gonna, you're just back to baseline quickly. Oh my gosh, I mean, I relate so much to what you just said, having literally gotten a gold medal put on my neck, seeing the flag and watching, you know,

listening to the anthem and then literally stepping off of that podium and being like, okay, I guess I wanna do that again. And the whole thing starts all over. And I always just thought, that's the only amount of time I'm letting myself celebrate because I've got more work to do here. And that's how I rationalize it. And that's how you just stay on that rat wheel,

running and running and running for the happiness that is always actually there. You have access to it, right? Like, however you wanted to find happiness, I just feel like we as humans have more control like you're saying, Dr. Santos. I mean, oh, yeah. We often do the same thing you just mentioned,

which is like, you get the gold medal, you're on the stand, you find out, you get into you, whatever, you have this moment, and then you have this deep, dark despair. And instead of saying, well, hang on, maybe it wasn't that rival. Maybe it was the path in the journey. And I should do it. We say, oh, maybe it wasn't one gold medal.

I need to be triple gold medal. Right. And this happens with salary all the time, right? You get to some, you know, you get a promotion and you think, oh, if I get more money, I'll be happier. And then you get more money and you're like, I'm not happier. And you don't think maybe the connection with money and happiness isn't what I think. You think like, must be more money. One of my most harrowing interviews that I did for my podcast with this with this guy, Clay Cockro, who's a wealth psychologist to

the point zero, zero, zero, one percent. And first of all, all, there is a job, wealth psychologist to the .0001%, we'll say, I have $500 million, but I'm not a billionaire. I just get to get to the billion. And he watches them go through these financial hurdles. So we never think, it's not the arrival, we always think, I just need a different arrival, a bigger one, that'll make me happy. It's how capitalism always wins. It's the capitalism always wins, right? It's like the house always wins because you can go in and win a little bit, but you don't leave. You don't say, oh, now I have enough.

You stay and then the house wins at the end. And I think that's a cool part of it because it doesn't mean we're naturally greedy and we're naturally, I mean, to actually think about it in terms of, like I've heard you say Dr. Santos that like the brain is just a comparison machine. It's not that there's something wrong with you. It's just that's the function of your machine is that it can't process absolute. It can't look and say, look, I have food and shelter and health.

Therefore, I'm happy. It can only process the comparison to what you just were or what somebody else is across the street. That's literally the only processing it can do, right? So that's, that we have to understand about that about ourselves to say like, you are incapable of actually assessing your situation. You are only capable of comparing it to something else. And totally, and that's, and that's where, and then maybe like that's where this issue situation, you are only capable of comparing it to something else. Totally.

And that's where, and that maybe, that's where this issue of recognizing a thought is just a thought is powerful. And emotion is just emotion is powerful. Just because I want to do that doesn't mean it's real. Just because my brain is delivering me this information doesn't mean it's real. And that's the one extra thought process we have, right? We can have a meta level say, do I really want to follow that? You know, do I want to sterk capitalism?

Do I want to do hard things, but the hard things that don't destroy me and don't destroy my happiness? And we can think at a meta level if we have the bandwidth to do so. And sometimes it can be really powerful for our well-being to do that. Let's end with that.

We're gonna hear from our pod squatter of the week. We're gonna let you go, and we're gonna leave you with that. We're going to hear from our pod squatter of the week. We're going to let you go and we're going to leave you with that thought that we don't have to believe everything we think. Right? We can be smarter than our brains. You're just a freaking delight. It's so damn smart. I'm so grateful for all of your work.

I will be listening to all of your podcasts on the Happiness Lab. We actually have our children listen to them too when they're stuck with us in the car and the way to soccer. And thanks for taking care of those college kids. We have one now and they're under so much pressure. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you're there. My name is Caitlin and I'm touch share of a little moment with you. I was just listening to your latest episode and sharing it with my friend Rebecca. They have a back. Hello. And I was introducing her to the podcast and we are actually driving right now. back at the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end of the end I had to share that little bit of joy with you because this has been a very hard process getting here. I've changed my careers, I've changed my cities. Everything just feels very overwhelming right now and this podcast and everything that

you guys say just helps me feel a lot less alone. I just had to thank you for everything that you all do. It really helps. I'm really excited for this next chapter and that's it! Thank you for the great day! We sent it for Caitlin, right? We did, of course! Yeah, we know when you're making big changes and you're doing hard things and we send just

little signs so that you'll know you're on the right track, which you are. I kept thinking about Caitlin and Rebecca just traveling across. I kept thinking of what open spaces. Just congratulations. I think you have some on the ways actually. Oh, that's better. I kind of hope that that's what they're doing over there.

We love you, Rebecca and Caitlin. Good job taking care of each other and doing the hard, exciting, life giving things. All right, the rest of you. We are already are excited to see you the next time we all get together. I feel that. I feel that.

I just, I love this. I love them. I love Dr. Santos. I love my sister and Abby. I love the pod squad. Okay, we'll see you soon. I love Dr. Santos. I love my sister and Abby. I love the pod squad. Okay, we'll see you soon. Bye. Bye.

We can do hard things is produced in partnership with cadence 13 studios. Be sure to rate, review, and follow the show on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Odyssey, or wherever you get your podcasts, especially be sure to rate and review the podcast if you really liked it. If you didn't, don't worry about it.

It's fine. you