{"id":20559,"date":"2024-02-07T11:28:49","date_gmt":"2024-02-07T18:28:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/?post_type=transcript&p=20559"},"modified":"2024-02-07T11:28:49","modified_gmt":"2024-02-07T18:28:49","slug":"ending-worry-addiction-and-unwinding-anxiety","status":"publish","type":"transcript","link":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/ending-worry-addiction-and-unwinding-anxiety\/","title":{"rendered":"Ending Worry Addiction and Unwinding Anxiety"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"image_print\"Print Transcript<\/span><\/a><\/div>

Tami Simon:<\/b> Hello, friends. My name\u2019s Tami Simon, and I\u2019m the founder of Sounds True. And I want to welcome you to the Sounds True podcast, <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I also want to take a moment to introduce you to Sounds True\u2019s new membership community and digital platform. It\u2019s called Sounds True One. Sounds True One features original premium transformational docuseries, community events, classes to start your day and relax in the evening, special weekly live shows including a video version of <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i> with an aftershow community question-and-answer session with featured guests. I hope you\u2019ll come join us, explore, come have fun with us, and connect with others. You can learn more at join.soundstrue.com.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I also want to take a moment and introduce you to the Sounds True Foundation, our nonprofit that creates equitable access to transformational tools and teachings. You can learn more at SoundsTrueFoundation.org. And in advance, thank you for your support.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this episode of <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i>, my guest is Dr. Judson Brewer\u2014Dr. Jud as he\u2019s called. Dr. Jud is an internationally renowned addiction psychiatrist, neuroscientist, habit change expert, and author. He\u2019s a professor in the School of Public Health and the medical school at Brown University. His 2016 TED Talk, \u201cA Simple Way to Break a Bad Habit,\u201d has been viewed more than 19 million times. He\u2019s the author of several books, including <\/span>The Craving Mind<\/span><\/i>, the <\/span>New York Times<\/span><\/i> bestseller <\/span>Unwinding Anxiety<\/span><\/i>, and a new book. It\u2019s coming out on February 20, 2024. It\u2019s called <\/span>The Hunger Habit: Why We Eat When We\u2019re Not Hungry and How to Stop<\/span><\/i>. Dr. Jud, welcome.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Judson Brewer, MD, PhD:<\/b> Thanks for having me.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK, I want to start with something that I learned from reading your book <\/span>Unwinding Anxiety<\/span><\/i> that I would say is one of those, what? Really, could this be true? Which is that anxiety in your view, from your perspective, is a \u201cbad habit\u201d that we can break. And as somebody who has worked with my own anxiety my whole life, I never thought of it as a habit. I always thought of it as a condition. And so I\u2019d like to understand and have our listeners track with us how you came to this discovery. I realize it\u2019s a big opening question here, that anxiety could be looked at as a \u201cbad habit.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Well, it actually started with me struggling\u2014so I\u2019ve certainly had my own run-ins with anxiety. I used to get panic attacks during residency. But I was getting anxious with trying to help my own patients with anxiety, because prescribing medications, the best ones out there, it\u2019s about one in five that show a significant reduction in symptoms. The term is called \u201cnumber needed to treat\u201d and it\u2019s 5.2, meaning it\u2019s about one in five. So basically I was playing the medication lottery. I didn\u2019t know which of the next five patients that came in was going to benefit and what to do with the other four.<\/span><\/p>\n

And I started wondering what the heck I could do to help my patients besides prescribe medications. And my lab at the time had been studying habit change, and I bring that in because I started looking at the scientific literature. And it turns out that back in the 1980s, ironically around the same time that Prozac was first released, there was a psychologist named Thomas Borkovec who suggested that anxiety could be driven through a process called negative reinforcement.<\/span><\/p>\n

And when I read that, I had this aha moment, because negative reinforcement is what I\u2019d been studying in terms of habit formation and habit change. And I\u2019d never thought to apply that mechanistic perspective to anxiety itself. And the way it works is that the feeling of anxiety tends to drive the mental behavior of worrying. And that was the big connection that I hadn\u2019t seen before until I read about it. And then I saw it all the time in my patients in my clinic, where it\u2019s like the feeling of anxiety drives this mental behavior of worrying.<\/span><\/p>\n

And what the research had shown was that it\u2019s rewarding enough\u2014that worrying\u2014because people feel like they\u2019re in control. Even if it doesn\u2019t give them any more control than they had before, it makes them feel like they\u2019re in control or at least doing something. And from a brain perspective, that\u2019s enough of a reward for our brain to say, \u201cHey, remember that behavior? Do it again the next time you feel anxious.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK, I think I\u2019m with you in terms of I feel the sensations of anxiety and now I\u2019m going to start worrying. OK, I have control over whether or not I continue worrying or I don\u2019t continue worrying?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Well, any behavior can be learned, and any behavior can be unlearned if it can be learned. And so we have some level of control, and we also don\u2019t have\u2014we may not have control, and where we can gain control is by learning how the system works as compared to trying to force the system. So I\u2019m sure there are plenty of people that have noticed that worry isn\u2019t that helpful in their life, and they just try to stop worrying. And if they\u2019ve tried that, they\u2019ve probably also noticed that just trying to apply willpower doesn\u2019t work so well. And so here I would say we have control once we know how the controller works.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Tell me more.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah, well, I will start by saying\u2014and we can double-click on this later if it\u2019s helpful\u2014but the willpower piece seems to be where most people have been focused, whether it\u2019s anxiety or overeating or anything in terms of changing any behavior. But from a neuroscience standpoint, willpower is not even in the equations when it comes to habit formation and habit change.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> That makes really good sense to me and has also been my instinct as someone who has a really strong will. I have not found it helpful when the worrying train is off and to the races.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> So here what we\u2019ve found over the years is that just understanding how the process works is a really helpful start for people. And our brains are set up to not like uncertainty. So uncertainty is a driver for us to do something. If you think of our ancestors and they heard some rustling out in the bushes outside of the cave or whatever, they couldn\u2019t just roll over and go to sleep and say, \u201cIt\u2019s probably nothing.\u201d Because it probably could be something that\u2019s going to eat them.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so our brains are set up to really try to minimize uncertainty. And what that does is give us this mechanism so that we will go and get information. Now, that\u2019s all well and good from a survival standpoint, but in modern day when we take that uncertainty and we apply it to future experiences where we don\u2019t actually have control or we can\u2019t actually get information, that\u2019s where we get this evolutionary bottleneck where\u2014think of the uncertainty piece. That\u2019s what drives fear often, and fear is a very helpful survival mechanism, but when you apply fear to the future, then we tend not to do so well from a survival standpoint.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, just to be clear, planning and thinking about the future is one thing that can actually be helpful, and that\u2019s more recent evolutionary mechanism that humans have. But when you take that and you mix it together with fear, when it becomes fear of the future as compared to planning of the future, that\u2019s when we start to get stuck in these worry loops. And what\u2019s been shown is that when we worry, we actually have more trouble planning and thinking into the future and we just feel pretty bad right now.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> All right, Dr. Jud. Here, I think most people are tracking with you and they\u2019re saying, to themselves inside, \u201cA lot of the things I worry about are very uncertain. There are no answers. If I could find answers, my worry, go look this up, go do this, go do that. Find the answer from this person. How are they really feeling about you? Get more certainty about economics, about future weather patterns, about the political situation, all kinds of things. Uncertain, uncertain, uncertain.\u201d So that\u2019s the information that comes back. We\u2019re left with our worry that isn\u2019t being productive. Now what?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> So this is where we can start to map out when we are getting stuck in a worry habit loop. And so there are three elements for any habit loop to form. The first element\u2019s a trigger, the second\u2019s a behavior, and the third is a reward, from a neuroscience standpoint. I like to think of it pragmatically as a result. And so if we map this out with regard to anxiety, the feeling of anxiety is the trigger for the mental behavior of worrying. And that mental behavior of worrying results in this feeling of control, which then feeds back through this negative reinforcement loop to say, \u201cHey, next time you feel anxious, you should worry.\u201d And so there we can just start to map out these processes. I can give an example if it\u2019s helpful with a\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Sure.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> \u2014clinic patient. So I am thinking of a patient who was referred to me for anxiety. Uncertainty. I have no idea what his anxiety was related to. And when he walked in my office door, he looked pretty anxious. And so when I started taking his history, he was describing how he\u2019d been anxious. He was about 40 years of age when he came to see me, and he had pretty severe anxiety for the last 30 years since he was about ten. He used to get pretty severe panic attacks, and his panic was getting so bad that he was getting panic attacks when driving on the highway and then he was avoiding driving on the highway.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so I just sat down after taking his history, sat down with him and just pulled out a sticky note, like a five-by-seven yellow sticky note. And I wrote on there Trigger, Behavior, Result. And I said, \u201cLet me see if I\u2019ve got this right. These thoughts that you might get in a car accident that trigger you to avoid driving on the highway, which results in you not having a panic attack.\u201d And he said, \u201cYeah, that\u2019s right.\u201d And then I drew arrows between those three and showed that that\u2019s actually a loop.<\/span><\/p>\n

And his eyes got really wide, and he said, \u201cI never knew that my brain worked that way.\u201d And so for me, I find it very helpful as a good place to start is just to help people map out some of these loops that they might be stuck in and help them understand that this is a survival mechanism that just might\u2019ve gotten a little mis-wired in modern day.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Can you share with us from your own experience a loop that you were able to identify and then how you broke that repetitive pattern?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Sure. I will think of one. Fortunately, I\u2019m thinking I haven\u2019t had a severe panic attack in a while, but I am thinking of a time when I was in the ocean. And it was not too long ago and I was caught in the middle of some wave sets that were kind of coming down on my head. And so starting to panic a little bit, because not so helpful if you can\u2019t breathe. And I noticed that that panic was coming up and, at this point, I\u2019d been practicing mindfulness for about 25 years, and so I could start to notice those as thoughts and I could start to notice the feeling of panic.<\/span><\/p>\n

And by noting those, I could also see that that wasn\u2019t going to actually help me in that moment. It was actually going to make things worse. Panicking was going to use up my energy and not help me do what I needed to do. And so just noting those and being aware of them helped me not get caught up in that, in getting into a panic cycle, and then go back up for air and do what I needed to do. And then obviously I made it through that.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> When it comes to generalized anxiety, sometimes I think it\u2019s hard to know what the trigger is. It\u2019s the end of the day. Now I\u2019m not working anymore. I have a chance to just sort of be with myself. And I\u2019m not even sure what I\u2019m feeling anxious about what happened. Was it what I said during X, Y, Z conversation? I could have done this. Or why is it what this other person\u2019s thinking? Is it, who knows? So do we need to know what the trigger is to start to break and unwind, as you say, anxiety?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> I\u2019m glad you bring that forward, because that is often what the logical brain thinks. It\u2019s like, if I can just find the triggers, I could deal with them, I could avoid them, I could work with them, I could change them. When you look at it from a neuroscience perspective, the triggers are only the thing that sets the wheel in motion, but they\u2019re not what strengthens it or weakens it. And so from a reinforcement learning standpoint, this is called reward-based learning for a reason. Because if something\u2019s rewarding, we\u2019re going to keep doing it. And if it\u2019s not rewarding, we\u2019re going to stop doing it.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so here the triggers are actually the least important part of the equation. And with generalized anxiety, for example, people often wake up in the morning and just feel anxious first upon waking, and then they start to worry and then spiral out throughout the entire day. So more often than not, most often I would say, they can\u2019t actually find specific triggers and it just drives the cycle even more.<\/span><\/p>\n

So often just that feeling of anxiety triggers the mental behavior of worrying. And when we can zoom in on the worrying itself, we can work and see that it\u2019s a cycle. We can not only help to unwind the behavior of worrying, but we can also learn to change our relationship to the feeling of anxiety itself.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Let\u2019s talk about that, because I think it\u2019s one thing to interrupt the pattern of worry, that mental addiction, if you will. \u201cOK, this isn\u2019t helping, but now I have all these feelings in my body. They\u2019re very uncomfortable; they\u2019re very uncomfortable. I feel\u2026\u201d People could use different words: \u201cI feel dysregulated, I feel butterflies in my stomach, I feel a shakiness inside, wobbliness inside,\u201d whatever the language might be to describe this feeling of \u201cI\u2019m not solid inside.\u201d Oh my, what do I do with all of that, all of those sensations?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Well, the first thing that can be helpful is just to understand what our survival brain\u2019s going to want us to do. And it\u2019s going to try to drive us in a certain direction. So anything that\u2019s unpleasant is by nature going to drive our brain to say, \u201cHey, do something to make this unpleasant thing go away.\u201d That\u2019s the basis of negative reinforcement. And so just knowing that helps us start to understand and map out the process. So once we\u2019ve been able to recognize that and map that out, we can then start to see what our habitual reactions are to that unpleasantness.<\/span><\/p>\n

And typically, especially in these days, I see a lot of people distract themselves. So I love the term that Cornell West gave our smartphones: he calls them these \u201cweapons of mass distraction.\u201d [LAUGHS] So often we have a distraction tool right at our fingertips. And so whether it\u2019s checking our social media, our email, checking the newsfeed, doing whatever, there\u2019s something out there that can surely distract us for a few moments.<\/span><\/p>\n

So just recognizing what some of these old habits are and how well they serve us is a helpful start, because if we can see that they\u2019re actually just serving to give us this brief distraction but actually not helping us change our relationship to these unpleasant sensations, they\u2019re just going to keep us stuck in that cycle. And at the same time, we\u2019re not going to learn what I think is a critical survival tool in modern day, which is distress tolerance, meaning if there\u2019s something unpleasant, we can actually learn to be with things that are unpleasant, like emotionally unpleasant, unpleasant thoughts, et cetera.<\/span><\/p>\n

But in modern day, more and more and more we\u2019re being trained in very subtle ways to not tolerate any type of distress\u2014whether it\u2019s a little bit of physical pain, quick take a painkiller, whether it\u2019s emotional pain, quick distract yourself or eat some food or something like that, as compared to saying, \u201cHey, discomfort, that\u2019s actually part of life.\u201d Not that we should look to make our lives to wallow in suffering, but just to see that this is a natural part of life and that we don\u2019t have to run from it all the time.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Now I want to talk more about growing our distress tolerance, but before we do, let\u2019s talk more about distraction. It works, it seems, for a few. It seems like if I watch a movie, if I scroll on my phone, if I do that for a period of time, I notice I feel better afterwards. And I think, \u201cHuh, did I waste a couple hours, or did I somehow \u2018self-medicate\u2019 in a way that didn\u2019t actually cause any harm?\u201d Nothing bad happened. I didn\u2019t go to open the refrigerator and eat a bunch of stuff or smoke a bunch of stuff or say mean things. I just played with my weapon of mass distraction, and I feel kind of better. So why do I feel better when I\u2019m distracted? And what\u2019s so bad about that?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah, so this isn\u2019t to say that there\u2019s something terrible about distraction, and sometimes that\u2019s the only mechanism that some people have at their fingertips in the moment. What it doesn\u2019t help us with is learning to develop that distress tolerance. And the other thing that it can develop is our dependence upon distraction.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And so there are a couple of things there that we can all explore in our own experience. One is that we become\u2014our brains are set up to habituate to different behaviors. And so if my distraction tool is to look at cute pictures of puppies on Instagram, for example, over time my brain\u2019s going to, if I go to Instagram every time I feel anxious, my brain\u2019s going to say, \u201cOK, show me the cute puppies.\u201d And then it\u2019s going to say, \u201cOK, I need cuter puppies because these are not cute enough anymore.\u201d And then it says, \u201cOK, puppies and kittens. Puppies, kittens, and babies.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

You get the idea, which is very similar to somebody starting to drink alcohol as a way to try to distract themselves from anxiety. Then they have to drink more, and they become tolerant, et cetera. So it\u2019s the same mechanism. It\u2019s just slightly different from a chemical standpoint, because alcohol is directly affecting the dopamine system, whereas these behaviors are affecting the dopamine system but not specifically hitting the benzodiazepine receptors, for example.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So I don\u2019t know if that gives you a little bit of a sense for how distraction can be helpful in the moment but might not be a long-term solution. I think of it as if we have poison ivy and it itches and we scratch it, it might feel better in the moment, but it\u2019s actually going to keep that rash around for a while longer.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Well, the reason I\u2019m bringing this up, and I\u2019m going to stick with it just for another moment, is in <\/span>Unwinding Anxiety<\/span><\/i> you talk about the importance of the disenchantment process when we become disenchanted with whatever\u2014this is my language now\u2014whatever coping strategy we have to not feel quite so terrible, to deal with our distress. And it\u2019s one thing\u2014I can understand getting disenchanted. You use the example right now of scratching the poison ivy. It\u2019s easy for me to see getting disenchanted with that, because the poison ivy spreads and the red thing gets much worse and it\u2019s all over my arm and face now, and I don\u2019t want to do that.<\/span><\/p>\n

And even with worrying, I can see I\u2019m getting so upset and I\u2019m just becoming like a dark mess. I don\u2019t want to do that. I\u2019m getting disenchanted. But when I\u2019m distracting myself, I\u2019m going quiet in a way. Help me get disenchanted with distraction, Dr. Jud.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Well, and I think you\u2019re bringing up a really good point, which is if it\u2019s helpful and we don\u2019t see the downsides to it, we\u2019re probably not going to get disenchanted with distraction. On the other hand, if there are moments where we try to distract ourselves and it doesn\u2019t work or we don\u2019t have our tools of distraction, whether maybe you don\u2019t have your phone or maybe there\u2019s some reason that we can\u2019t distract ourselves, then our brain really goes nuts and says, \u201cHey, I need my distraction. Where is it? What are you going to do for me?\u201d And things can actually get worse.<\/span><\/p>\n

So there we get to learn about our dependence on these distraction tools, and then we can start asking, \u201cWell, is there a better way?\u201d And that\u2019s where we start to become disenchanted with things. If something doesn\u2019t work all the time, I\u2019m going to be less excited about it than if it worked all the time. And so here I think the disenchantment comes when we can find something that is more reliable and at the same time helps us live a better life, live a happier, healthier life.<\/span><\/p>\n

And I would suggest that learning how our mind works and learning how to work with our mind helps us not only be able to tolerate unpleasantness more, and so it empowers us, but also helps us develop wisdom so we can generalize some of these learnings to other aspects of our lives.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK, help us develop our distress tolerance for those of us now who are, \u201cWe\u2019re willing. We\u2019re interested. We get it, that distraction isn\u2019t really the best we can do. We\u2019re inspired.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Well, our research has shown that the first\u2014well, there are a couple of steps. So I think of this as a three-step process. The first step is just mapping out whatever the issue is. So let\u2019s say anxiety and worry, because we\u2019ve been talking about that. So if we\u2019re able to map out that when we feel anxious, we start to worry\u2014and we can also use distraction as well\u2014we can start to ask ourselves a question which moves us into the next step, which is, \u201cWhat am I getting from this?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And here it\u2019s really interesting, because we can look at modern psychology and say, \u201cWell, why is this an important question?\u201d We can look at modern neuroscience, which actually highlights these\u2014there are actual equations of behavior change, which focus very much on what\u2019s called \u201cchanging the reward value\u201d of a behavior. And we can also look as far back as Buddhist psychology, where the Buddha\u2019s reported to have said karma is based on cause and effect.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so if you look at cause and effect, it\u2019s actually a very nice description of modern-day psychology in terms of reinforcement learning. And what I mean by that is if we do a behavior and it\u2019s rewarding, we\u2019re going to keep doing it. If we do the behavior and we pay attention and it\u2019s not rewarding, we\u2019re going to become disenchanted with it and stop doing it. And there are actually explicit passages in the P\u0101li Canon about this where\u2014I\u2019ll summarize\u2014where the Buddha talks about exploring gratification to its end. And he said, \u201cIt wasn\u2019t until I explored gratification to its end, that knowledge and vision arose.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So that sounds important. And so we said, \u201cWell, can we apply that to modern day? How does that work?\u201d And it\u2019s actually pretty simple. So for example, when my patients come in and they want to quit smoking, instead of telling them to stop smoking, which they\u2019ve all tried\u2014they tried their willpower and it hasn\u2019t worked; otherwise, they wouldn\u2019t need to see me.<\/span><\/p>\n

Instead I say, \u201cHey, pay attention as you smoke that cigarette and tell me just how good it is.\u201d And so I send them home, and they come back, and they come back often with this wild-eyed look and they say, \u201cHow did I not notice this before?\u201d And they describe how cigarettes taste crappy. It feels like burning going into their lungs. It smelled really bad. As one patient put it, he said, \u201cAll the cigarettes I smoked today were disgusting.\u201d He wasn\u2019t telling himself that they were disgusting. He simply paid attention.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so there\u2019s a great example of exploring gratification to its end, where he just paid attention as he smoked and he realized that cigarettes were actually pretty crappy. And that helped him become disenchanted with the cigarettes. We see the same thing with worrying. If we really look at worrying and ask, \u201cWhat am I getting from this? It\u2019s not keeping my family member safe. It\u2019s not helping me solve a problem.\u201d Whatever our brain has told us that worrying is going to help us with, when we really look at it and see that it\u2019s not doing that, then we become disenchanted with it.<\/span><\/p>\n

And we\u2019ve even seen this with eating and overeating, where we have people pay attention as they overeat. And it only takes 10 or 15 times for that reward value to drop below zero and for them to shift their behavior. So that\u2019s the second step. And I would say that is a critical step for helping people step out of these habit loops.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Now, in your new book, <\/span>The Hunger Habit<\/span><\/i>, I was curious to see that you had a chapter on trauma. And I\u2019m bringing that up at this point because when I hear you talk about anxiety, I think of the nervous system being stuck in the past, somehow stuck in the past. So I\u2019m telling myself, \u201cWorrying doesn\u2019t work. I\u2019m definitely disenchanted with it. It doesn\u2019t work. It makes me feel terrible.\u201d But it seems like this deep, body-based nervous system thing is doing its own thing.<\/span><\/p>\n

And that\u2019s\u2014once again, I\u2019m coming back to my very original question: Is this a condition, or is it addiction that I have a choice over, that I can change? And so I was interested to see how you now are writing about trauma and if that impacts your views at all on habit change.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> It does, absolutely. And so here, the best analogy that I\u2019ve come up with is that our brain\u2019s like a smoke detector in the kitchen. And when it\u2019s calibrated, when the smoke detector is calibrated correctly, it\u2019s going to help us detect when there\u2019s a fire on the stove versus boiling water and its steam. Now, if it\u2019s miscalibrated, it\u2019s going to go off and give us false alarms when there\u2019s actually no danger.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And that\u2019s what I see with conditions like\u2014and I\u2019m not a huge fan of terms like \u201cconditions.\u201d The only condition I think that we really have is the human condition, but there are all these things that they use in psychiatry, so bear with me there. So when somebody has had a traumatic history, let\u2019s say, their brain is often miscalibrated in the sense that they\u2019ve had something very traumatic happen to them. And I say, my heart goes out to anybody that\u2019s had a traumatic experience where their brain has gotten locked in this danger signal, where their brain is registering in modern-day danger, danger, danger when there might not actually be danger.<\/span><\/p>\n

And that causes two problems. One is it\u2019s harder for them to see when there is actual danger, because their brain is constantly saying, \u201cThis is dangerous, this is dangerous, this is dangerous.\u201d And it\u2019s also putting them in this heightened state of arousal that\u2019s just not only unpleasant but is not great for flourishing, let me just put it that way. And so the way I think about trauma is that just understanding how this works on a neurobiologic level can help us start to find ways that can help us recalibrate that system.<\/span><\/p>\n

And one thing that I\u2019ve found helpful as a tool to work with some of my patients is to help them see how that danger signal can actually be somewhat habitual, because their brain is signaling danger when it\u2019s triggered by something that\u2019s not actually dangerous. When they see that, they can also take a moment to honor their past self, which often it came up with a strategy in the moment to keep them safe, and then it kept that strategy going forward, and that strategy may not be as helpful for them now.<\/span><\/p>\n

And the way I think of that is it\u2019s like a pair of shoes that somebody put on, and they fit at the time and it helped them not damage their feet, but now they may have outgrown those shoes and those shoes may actually be hurting them in that sense. And so being able to honor our past selves and really give that place in life its due and say, \u201cI did the best that I could in those times,\u201d gives us the opportunity to open to the present moment and ask, \u201cHey, is this helping me now?\u201d And if it\u2019s not, open to being able to change the habitual behavior that comes with that hyperarousal. I\u2019m not saying it\u2019s easy, but that can help us start to explore that, as compared to just being stuck in it.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK. So say a bit more about this, and maybe you could give an example of someone that you\u2019ve worked with who had a trauma history, and it could be inherited family trauma or early childhood trauma. And they say, \u201cI understand conceptually what you\u2019re saying about honoring this old pair of shoes that I don\u2019t want to wear anymore. It does not fit. I don\u2019t want it. But my nervous system biology still has this wiring in it, and I haven\u2019t yet developed the distress tolerance you\u2019re talking about. I want to, so I want to hear more about that, but there\u2019s a lot of distress here that feels outside of my ability to work with it. It just goes off; it\u2019s unconscious. The calibration is so far off.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. So I\u2019m thinking of just a representative of many people. So a patient that, I think he was in his 60s when we started talking about this. And he had had early childhood trauma, and his only\u2014as a kid, the only thing he had control over was his own mind. And so he started worrying as his coping mechanism, because that was what made him feel like he had some semblance of control. And he had carried this forward with him for five, six decades.<\/span><\/p>\n

And when we started talking about this\u2014this is where the shoes analogy came up; it was actually working with him\u2014and he realized that it was actually holding him back. And so what I do with anybody that\u2019s struggling in this way is, first, find ways that they can ground themselves in those moments. And there are lots of wonderful techniques that can help people ground, whether it\u2019s bringing awareness externally. I sometimes have people just use this mantra, \u201cFeel my feet.\u201d I learned that from somebody years ago where it\u2019s just like our feet tend to be a pretty safe place, and they can help ground us.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so just bringing awareness to our feet for a few moments or taking some grounding breaths. Or you may be familiar with the five-finger breathing exercise where as we breathe in, we trace up the outside of our pinky. As we breathe out, we trace down. And in the course of five breaths, we can trace each finger. We can do that again, pinky to thumb, thumb back to pinky, over a course of ten breaths. But something that helps us ground enough so we can ask a simple question, which is, \u201cAm I actually in danger right now?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And it\u2019s an important question not just to ask conceptually, but to ask experientially. Look around and really show our brains what\u2019s actually happening, so that our brain, which is saying danger, danger, danger, can\u2014if there is danger there, if we\u2019re about to walk into a busy street or something, we can take appropriate action. But if there\u2019s no danger there, it helps our brain see very, very clearly that no, this is a miscue. And when we\u2019re grounded a little bit, we can start to separate and unwind that learned association between whatever the trigger was and this hyperarousal in our autonomic nervous system.<\/span><\/p>\n

And over time, that\u2019s where we can start to unwind it. So there are lots of techniques like EMDR and other practices that help people do this type of dissocia\u2014dissociation is not the right word\u2014unlearning. And in these\u2014even simple practices, simple grounding and simple mindfulness practices, can be helpful here as well. But I find pairing that in the environment with that simple question is also really helpful for the rewiring piece.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK. I\u2019m going to ask you a really direct question, Dr. Jud. Do you think that anxiety is a mental addiction?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Not necessarily. So the feeling of anxiety, I wouldn\u2019t\u2014so the feeling itself is just the feeling. The definition that I learned in residency of addiction is \u201ccontinued use despite adverse consequences.\u201d And so here I would look at the mental behavior of worrying. And for some people they would swear that they are addicted to worrying.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so if you put the definition in, continued use despite adverse consequences, the consequences might not be terribly adverse like we think about with some chemical substances, but they can be pretty adverse for someone if somebody\u2019s worrying all the time to the point where it\u2019s interfering with their life. So I would say there\u2019s a spectrum, and for some people I would say they worry so much and it\u2019s interfering with their life so much, it might fit that definition, but not the feeling of anxiety itself.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Right. OK, good. I think that\u2019s a good, helpful distinction. So in terms of being with the distress of the feeling of anxiety, being with it, is it your experience working [with] people that the more we\u2019re able to be with it, that that creates some kind of natural resolution? Being with it, being curious about it, feeling it, questioning it, wondering about it, dropping our attention into this feeling\u2014what comes from that? My experience sometimes is that I can spend a lot of time in that state. It doesn\u2019t necessarily just like, \u201cOh, and now it\u2019s turned into something else.\u201d It\u2019s like, \u201cWow, OK. Spending a lot of time here.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah, yeah, it\u2019s a really good question. So here I\u2019m going to actually go back to some of the ancient Buddhist psychology, because I think it\u2019s really interesting some of the overlaps that we\u2019ve seen between that and the modern psychology. And there\u2019s a concept that\u2019s described as \u201cdependent origination.\u201d And the details aren\u2019t important, but what it describes is what\u2019s called a \u201ccycle of sa\u1e43s\u0101ra,\u201d this endless wandering. And in that cycle there are a bunch of links, but there are a couple that are really important.<\/span><\/p>\n

One is they describe these unpleasant or even pleasant feeling tones lead to craving, because if something\u2019s pleasant, we crave more of it. If it\u2019s unpleasant, we have aversion; we crave less of it. But that leads to what some can be translated as clinging, but also can be\u2014the word is \u201cup\u0101d\u0101na.\u201d I\u2019m probably not pronouncing it correctly, but it can also be translated as \u201cfuel\u201d or \u201csustenance.\u201d And that is really important because if we think of a fire burning, and often these cycles are described using the analogy of a fire. When a fire is burning, what keeps the fire burning is fuel or sustenance.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so when we have anxiety, think of anxiety as a fire. If we worry, that is like adding fuel to the fire. And so we can say, \u201cOK, how do I let this fire burn down?\u201d And that\u2019s through not adding more fuel to the fire. And so here, to get at your question, there are two ways that we can learn to work with the anxiety. One is to see if we\u2019re fueling it. Are we fueling it through distraction? Are we fueling it through worrying? And if we are, those are behaviors that we have control over. We can explore those, we can become disenchanted with them, and we can see what it\u2019s like not to distract ourselves.<\/span><\/p>\n

And on top of that, we can add in\u2014maybe think of it as digging a fire line around the fire so it doesn\u2019t spread, where we learn to\u2026 I think of this as bringing in curiosity as a superpower, I\u2019ll put it that way. And what I mean by that is that often when we feel anxious, we have this \u201coh no\u201d reaction. \u201cOh no, here\u2019s anxiety. I need to make it go away.\u201d And that\u2019s where we do something which actually just\u2014it\u2019s like blowing on the fire. It makes it worse.<\/span><\/p>\n

Instead, what if we flip that and we say, \u201cOh!\u201d And this is where phrases like \u201cthe obstacle becomes the way\u201d or this Stoic turn of words that was attributed to Marcus Aurelius, \u201cWhat stands in the way becomes the way.\u201d And what makes this interesting is that we can look at anxiety and we can, instead of running away from it, we can ask ourselves, \u201cWhat happens if I turn toward it?\u201d And if we turn toward the experience and what helps us turn, we don\u2019t try to force ourselves to turn toward it, but we use that curiosity as that guiding hand that says, \u201cOh, what does anxiety feel like? Is it tightness? Is it burning? Where is it in my body? What happens when I actually turn toward it?,\u201d we start to learn something really interesting and really important, which is that these feelings make up the concept of anxiety. And when we look at each element by itself, it\u2019s not nearly as scary as this big bad concept of anxiety. And on top of that, we start to notice that these sensations are constantly changing. So often we think, \u201cOh no. Anxiety, it\u2019s going to be here forever.\u201d But when we really turn and go, \u201cOh, well, is this sensation\u2014what happens when I look at it?\u201d These things start to change, and they\u2019re constantly changing. We can notice that change, and with that, we can start to learn, \u201cThis isn\u2019t as bad as I thought. I can actually learn to be with this.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And this is where the ability to develop distress tolerance comes in. It comes from learning to just lean in instead of run away. And when we lean in, that fear starts to dissolve somewhat because we can see what things actually are. We reduce the uncertainty. And we can also see that these things aren\u2019t permanent. They change on their own without us having to do anything.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK. I like this fire metaphor. So if it\u2019s OK, I want to make sure that I fully get it, because I understand the notion that if you add worry fuel in the form of worry logs, the fire\u2019s going to get bigger. I have a fireplace here where I have natural logs, and so I like to sit in front of it so I get it. If I don\u2019t put the worry logs on, it\u2019s going to go out.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, you said distraction also is a way that we feed the fire. And that\u2019s where I had a moment of thinking I don\u2019t understand that. How does distraction feed the fire?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> It\u2019s a good question. So I\u2019m just trying to think how that would fit with the analogy, because I think worry fits pretty well. Distraction might be not paying attention. And so when we don\u2019t pay attention, when we don\u2019t tend the fire, it\u2019s going to be more likely to spread if there is fuel around it. And so I don\u2019t know if that fits for you.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> That helps.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah. So I would say when we distract ourselves, there might be other tinder in the box that\u2019s going to catch fire because we don\u2019t know how to manage it.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> And then we\u2019re curious about it, where you could say that\u2019s a form of just watching it change and go out on its own accord. And that\u2019s what happens. Our curiosity is just that.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yes, absolutely. And what I found from my own experience with anxiety is that when there is less fear around it\u2014certainly anxiety still comes up. I still get anxiety, but I am OK with it. It\u2019s like, OK, here, this is pretty unpleasant. It\u2019s going to be here for a while. I don\u2019t know how long it\u2019s going to be here, but as long as I don\u2019t resist it\u2014there\u2019s this saying, \u201cWhat we resist persists\u201d\u2014as long as I don\u2019t resist it, it\u2019s going to go on its own accord. I don\u2019t have to do anything, and it may not stick around as long.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Your new book, <\/span>The Hunger Habit<\/span><\/i>, looks at how we can look at this whole question of what\u2019s driving our cravings and our desires around food. In terms of the conversation we\u2019ve had about anxiety, would you say this part of the conversation translates really well to issues of eating and food cravings, overeating, et cetera? And this part maybe doesn\u2019t map on quite so well, or it\u2019s all the same inner mechanisms? How do you look at it?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Well, what our research has shown is that the mechanisms are pretty similar. So the reinforcement learning piece is actually based on these ancient survival mechanisms around eating. We had to remember where food was. And so we learn where to find food through the mechanism of positive reinforcement, right? The trigger is we see food, the behavior is we eat it, and then our stomach sends this dopamine signal to our brain that says, \u201cRemember what you ate and where you found it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And then this negative reinforcement piece where we learn to avoid danger comes into play in modern day. Actually, both of these come into play in modern day, where we learn to associate food, for example, with celebration. So how many times have we eaten food when we aren\u2019t hungry, right? That\u2019s not a survival mechanism per se, because our body\u2019s saying, \u201cHey, not really hungry.\u201d But we\u2019re like, \u201cHey, this is a party. Let\u2019s eat.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And on top of that, we learn to eat food to comfort ourselves. That\u2019s where the term \u201ccomfort food\u201d comes from or \u201cstress eating,\u201d where if we\u2019re bored, angry, sad, think of all the different emotions that we\u2019ve learned to associate with eating as a distraction. And then we learn through negative reinforcement, \u201cIf I eat this food, I\u2019m going to comfort myself. I\u2019m going to feel better.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So both of those are at play so much in modern day that there\u2019s a term that has been\u2014I don\u2019t know when the term came about\u2014but recently there\u2019s a term called the \u201chedonic hunger\u201d that\u2019s used in scientific studies. It\u2019s a misnomer, because we\u2019re not actually hungry, but it\u2019s highlighting moments when we\u2019re eating in the absence of hunger driven by emotion, hence the hedonic hunger. That\u2019s in contrast to homeostatic hunger, which is the survival mechanism that says, \u201cHey, my stomach\u2019s empty. Let\u2019s fill that up.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Can you give us an example of someone you worked with who had a comfort eating habit and how your work was able to help them break the habit?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Sure. Actually, we can go back to my patient that I talked about before that had panic disorder. Because the thing I didn\u2019t mention about him was that when he first came to see me, he was 400 pounds. He was at a very unhealthy weight, and his weight was causing health issues for him. So he had fatty liver, he had hypertension, he had obstructive sleep apnea, and all of these were related to how much he weighed.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so he had, as I mentioned before, he had started getting panic attacks when he was about ten, and early in life he had started eating food as a way to try to cope with his panic, because he couldn\u2019t figure out a way to help it. And fast-forward 30 years, he described that he was addicted to fast food, and so he would eat fast food as a way to cope with his anxiety.<\/span><\/p>\n

So in his first visit, we just mapped out these anxiety habit loops, and I sent him home and had him start mapping out these anxiety habit loops. And two weeks later at his first follow-up, he came back and he said, \u201cHey, Doc, I lost 14 pounds.\u201d And I looked at him because I didn\u2019t think that we had actually talked about his weight at that point. We were just focusing on his anxiety. And he said, \u201cYeah, yeah, we didn\u2019t talk about this. But I was mapping out my anxiety habit loops, and I realized that anxiety was triggering me to eat fast food, and the fast food was actually just making my health anxiety worse. So I stopped doing that,\u201d in his words.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so the way I would put that is that he became disenchanted with eating fast food. It was no longer rewarding for him. It was actually anti-rewarding, if we can put it that way. And by becoming disenchanted, it was much easier for him to break that habit of eating as a way to cope with his anxiety. He went on to lose over a hundred pounds over the next year and said it was the easiest weight loss he\u2019d ever had, because he had tried everything before.<\/span><\/p>\n

But once he had learned how his mind worked, he could learn that he actually felt much better when he didn\u2019t eat fast food. And as he gradually lost weight, it was getting him into a healthier range where his high blood pressure went away, he was sleeping better, his hypertension went down. It was actually helping him be healthier physically as well.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK. Now, Dr. Jud, I want to make sure that the people who are joining us and are listening who are thinking, \u201cOK, I want to apply this in some way. I have this habit of eating\u2014\u201d I don\u2019t know, just come up with something. Potato chips seems like\u2014I am hungry. I drive to\u2014OK, I\u2019ll just pick them up on my way out of the convenience store, whatever it might be. I know that I don\u2019t feel well afterwards, so I get that. I can map that out, and then I feel bad about myself. I get all that. How is Dr. Jud\u2019s \u201cbreak a bad habit\u201d method here going to help me? What am I going to do? How am I going to work this on my own?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah. Well, I\u2019ll illustrate this with an example and then walk through how we can apply this. So I had a patient who used to eat an entire bag of\u2014large bag of potato chips every night while watching television with her daughter. And what I had her do was just start paying attention as she ate the potato chips. And I said, \u201cJust see how many you need to satisfy, scratch that itch of craving.\u201d And for her, you guess how many it took? I won\u2019t\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> I don\u2019t know, 20 chips?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah, it was actually two.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Uh-huh.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> And for her, that was enough salt and fat when she truly paid attention. She was like, \u201cOK, that\u2019s enough for tonight.\u201d [LAUGHS] And what that highlights\u2014for many people, it\u2019s probably not two. And so I remember her because it was a pretty striking\u2014I never imagined that she\u2019d come back and say, \u201cYeah, it was just two, Doc. That was it.\u201d But what we can all notice is where we hit what I think of as our \u201cpleasure plateau.\u201d So what that means is with each bite, we can pay attention and ask ourselves, \u201cIs this better than, worse than, or the same as the last bite?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

And what that helps us do is\u2014and I want to highlight this is not about thinking, \u201cI should only eat two bites of cookie or two potato chips\u201d\u2014but this is really feeling. We have to feel into this. Our feeling body is much stronger and wiser than our thinking brain. And so here, we just feel into the experience when we eat the potato chip, and we can really feel\u2014I\u2019m just imagining this now. Last time I had a potato chip, for me, potato chips are pretty salty. I haven\u2019t found a potato chip that\u2019s not salty. And so within a couple of potato chips, especially if I\u2019m not hungry, my body\u2019s like, OK, you\u2019ve hit your salt quotient for now. And it\u2019s much easier to put them down by imagining what it would be like to eat the next one.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so here we can really just leverage this power of awareness, this power of curiosity, so that we can really see how much is enough. And we can do that in the moment with potato chips. And then we can also look back\u2014for example, if we haven\u2019t paid attention and we\u2019ve eaten a whole bag\u2014we can look at it afterwards and ask the question, \u201cWhat did I get from this?\u201d And here we even did a study where we have this app called Eat Right Now, and we have basically awareness of where eating exercise as part of that, where we can use that to calculate the change in reward value in somebody\u2019s experience, so that when that reward value drops below zero, they shift behavior.<\/span><\/p>\n

And it only takes about 10 to 15 times of somebody really paying attention, for example, as they overeat for that reward value to drop below zero and for them to shift behavior. So pragmatically speaking, really the key thing to do, or the key ingredient for behavior change, is awareness. We become aware of the habit loop. We become aware as we\u2019re eating, and we ask this simple question, whether it\u2019s how much is enough or what am I getting from this, so that we can really feel into our body and have our body tell us when we\u2019ve had too much, or whether it\u2019s a food that we\u2019re really just not as excited about now as we might\u2019ve been before.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Well, a couple things here. One is in the example you gave, you have to really slow down. We\u2019re talking about eating those two potato chips. You\u2019re not just shoving a bunch of them in your mouth kind of thing, and then saying, \u201cI wonder how this feels?\u201d It\u2019s a serious, slow eating with awareness process. Yes?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yes. And I would say we don\u2019t have to spend 30 minutes eating a single potato chip, right?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> That\u2019s good.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> So it doesn\u2019t take that long to eat a potato chip. And so as long as we pay careful attention, we\u2019re not distracted, we\u2019re not shoveling a bunch down, we can get the picture pretty quickly. One thing I\u2019ll add to that is if we\u2019re hungry, it\u2019s important to note that it takes about 15 to 20 minutes for our bodies to register satiety. And so if we\u2019re really hungry, our body\u2019s going to say, whatever the food is, it\u2019s going to say, \u201cHey, get more calories in.\u201d And if we eat those really quickly and we don\u2019t give ourselves 15 or 20 minutes to register whether we\u2019ve had enough, we\u2019re going to be more likely to eat beyond satiety.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Now, you said curiosity is our superpower. And it seems like curiosity is the kale of our time, meaning I hear people talking about curiosity all the time. And I wonder how much it lands. Do people understand what that means exactly? What does it mean? I\u2019m going to use this superpower of curiosity to change my bad habits. Really? What does it actually mean?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah. So first, well, let me ask you, did you know that there are two different types of curiosity?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Only because I read <\/span>Unwinding Anxiety<\/span><\/i> do I know this.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> [LAUGHS] OK, so had you not read the book\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> I did not know that.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> OK. So I bring that forward because it\u2019s a great way to highlight the contrast between the two types. And so for anybody that doesn\u2019t know that there are two types, I\u2019ll just ask people to explore in their own experience, what does it feel like not to know? And that not knowing is actually one type of curiosity called \u201cdeprivation curiosity,\u201d which in a nutshell means we\u2019re deprived of information. As I said earlier, our brains don\u2019t like uncertainty, and that is the mechanism that gets us to go and do something to find that piece of information. And so that itch of, \u201cWhat is that? I don\u2019t know. I need to go find that out,\u201d that\u2019s deprivation curiosity.<\/span><\/p>\n

And I mention that because that\u2019s not the curiosity that I\u2019m talking about here. Certainly deprivation curiosity, very helpful for survival. But the curiosity that I think of as a superpower is the other type, which is called \u201cinterest curiosity.\u201d And interest curiosity, I like to think of these as deprivation is like a destination. When you get that piece of information, you\u2019re at your destination, you\u2019re there, you\u2019re back to baseline. And so you\u2019re deprived. When you get to the destination, you\u2019re not deprived anymore.<\/span><\/p>\n

Interest curiosity, on the other hand, is more like the journey. It\u2019s the joy of discovery as we go along life. So we\u2019re not looking for any particular answer; we\u2019re just enjoying the learning process. And pragmatically, I don\u2019t assume that anybody knows exactly what curiosity is, but I like to have people really explore it in the moment. And let\u2019s use worry and anxiety as the examples where we can use the contrast. So if somebody feels anxious, the mind tends to go into, have this, let\u2019s say, mental tone of voice that says, \u201cOh no,\u201d right? \u201cOh no, I\u2019m anxious. How long is this going to last? What\u2019s going to happen?,\u201d where we start to worry. And that \u201coh no\u201d tends to feel more closed down and contracted.<\/span><\/p>\n

In contrast, interest curiosity is more of that, \u201cWhat\u2019s this?\u201d And so we\u2019re just exploring. And when we go, \u201cWhat\u2019s this?,\u201d we tend to lean in and we tend to open to our experience. And so we can look at that as a marker, that opening as a marker, for tapping into this natural capacity that we all have of interest curiosity. And so that\u2019s something we can all explore ourselves. I like to have people play with one of two mantras, whichever works best for them. One is that \u201cOh!\u201d When we\u2019re feeling \u201coh no,\u201d we can go, \u201cOh, what\u2019s that?\u201d Or another is, \u201cHmm, what\u2019s this?\u201d And that gets us out of our heads and into our direct experience. Hmm really is a way to tap into that natural interest curiosity. Does that describe it enough?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Yeah. I have a question though, which is, so let\u2019s say I\u2019m experiencing\u2014because I am\u2014deprivation curiosity about solving anxiety forever as an issue. I feel deprived of that answer, and that makes me very curious. And what\u2019s wrong with that? Why is that a problem? That\u2019s a type of curiosity. I want to get to the bottom of something. I feel deprived of the answer.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> So again, deprivation curiosity, very helpful. And we can certainly look for answers. And if we find the answers, great. It\u2019s been very helpful. For something like anxiety, we can be looking our entire lives and not find it. And ironically, deprivation curiosity when we\u2019re not getting the answer can make us more anxious.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Now, I\u2019m not going to say hmm. That excited hmm I think feels a little farfetched to me in some situations. But the more subdued hmm, I think I might be able to get there. That\u2019s interesting. Like hmm, that\u2019s interesting. Hmm, I want to know more about that.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yeah. And\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Is that an interest curiosity?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Absolutely.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Hmm. I want to know more.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> So I think of it as a scale. It\u2019s not like it has to be off the charts, rainbows and unicorns. Wow, amazing. Like we\u2019re in awe. Like, \u201cOh, wow, isn\u2019t it amazing? I have anxiety.\u201d [LAUGHS] But we can start wherever we are. And one thing that I\u2019ve found helpful when somebody\u2019s like, \u201cI have no idea what you\u2019re talking about when it comes to curiosity,\u201d we just do this little exploration, which is, \u201cHmm, what\u2019s it feel like not to be curious?\u201d And with that, we have them explore, \u201cHmm, I don\u2019t know. What does it feel like?\u201d And they\u2019re actually starting to tap into at least a little bit of curiosity in that moment.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK. Two more questions about unwinding anxiety. One, this hmm, hmm, hmm. You mention in the book <\/span>Unwinding Anxiety<\/span><\/i> that we can use this hmm as a kind of mantra and actually bring the sound into our body in some way. And I found that I was very interested. My interest curiosity peaked highly at that point. And I wonder if you can share with our listeners how we do that.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Yes. Well, so there are a couple of ways we can do that. I like the auditory hmm, where we just\u2014it\u2019s kind of like warming-up vocal exercises. So we can warm up our curiosity just by going, \u201cHmm.\u201d What\u2019s it like to hmm? Or \u201cOh!\u201d I wonder what it\u2019s like, how do I feel when I go, \u201cOh\u201d? So it\u2019s kind of like me, me, me, la, la la, hmm, hmm, hmm, whoo, whoo, whoo, that type of thing.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

And the other thing that\u2019s so fascinating\u2014I love science. There\u2019s so many interesting things about learning about our world. This actually goes back, I want to say that even Darwin wrote about this, but I may be wrong. So if we look at our eyes, our eyes can be a big tell, not only in poker, but in life. And what I mean by that is we can look to see what our eyes are doing and how we\u2019ve learned to associate different eye patterns with different emotions. So for example, when we are angry, anger tends to be associated with focused behavior, because it says, \u201cI don\u2019t like this. I\u2019m going to make this change.\u201d And we can all think, \u201cWhat\u2019s it like when we are angry? What do our eyes do?\u201d Well, our eyes tend to narrow down, because we\u2019re not taking in information at that time. We\u2019re focused on action.<\/span><\/p>\n

In contrast to that, when we\u2019re really curious, what do our eyes do? They tend to open really wide. \u201cOh!\u201d Our eyes open because they\u2019re taking in information. And so can actually hack what\u2019s called somatic memory, where we\u2019ve learned to associate different eye patterns with different emotions. When we\u2019re not feeling that curious, we can actually open our eyes really wide and see if they actually help kick-start that process. It\u2019s kind of like throwing a car in second gear as you roll down a hill to jump-start it.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK. I\u2019m going to open my eyes really wide. I\u2019m curious about the title <\/span>Unwinding<\/span><\/i>. <\/span>Unwinding Anxiety<\/span><\/i>. I read that was your wife\u2019s idea, but tell me about this image of unwinding.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Well, with anxiety, we feel all wound up. We feel closed down. We feel contracted. And so when we bring curiosity in, we naturally let that spring\u2014when we\u2019re all wound up, springs are not, they\u2019re not\u2014from an entropic standpoint, springs want to naturally spring. They want to become sprung or whatever the verb is for that. And our bodies are not naturally prone to getting all contracted and wound up. We do that to ourselves. We add energy to the system and wind ourselves up.<\/span><\/p>\n

And so here, by bringing curiosity in, for example, and bringing kindness to ourselves, we can naturally let that unwind. And I think my wife\u2019s title for that is just a beautiful portrayal of what naturally happens when we bring in curiosity and kindness to ourselves.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> I\u2019ve been talking to Dr. Judson Brewer. He\u2019s the author of the <\/span>New York Times<\/span><\/i> bestseller <\/span>Unwinding Anxiety<\/span><\/i> and a new book. It\u2019s out on February 20, 2024. It\u2019s called <\/span>The Hunger Habit: Why We Eat When We\u2019re Not Hungry and How to Stop<\/span><\/i>. And I just want to thank you, Dr. Jud, because sometimes when I\u2019ve spoken to people who are habit change experts, I don\u2019t feel the level of compassion and respect for early trauma and the kind of field of love that you\u2019re bringing to the topic. And I so appreciate that, and it makes me feel really welcomed into the conversation and optimistically curious about what will come from practicing your approach. So thank you so much.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JB:<\/b> Well, thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> And if you\u2019d like to watch <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i> on video and participate in the aftershow Q&A session with our guests, come join us on Sounds True One, a new membership community featuring award-winning original shows, live classes, community learning, guided meditations, and more with the leading wisdom teachers of our time. Use promo code PODCAST to get your first month free. You can learn more at join.soundstrue.com. Sounds True: waking up the world.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"template":"","meta":{"_expiration-date-status":"","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[]},"class_list":["post-20559","transcript","type-transcript","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nEnding Worry Addiction And Unwinding Anxiety - Transcript<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Read the full transcript from this Sounds True conversation with Ending Worry Addiction And Unwinding Anxiety. 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