The Art of Manliness - #96： Hardwiring Your Brain for Happiness With Dr. Rick Hanson

00:00:00.000 Brett McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.

00:00:18.920 So our brain has a built in negativity bias, which causes us to focus on negative things

00:00:25.140 and sort of ignore the positive.

00:00:27.120 And this has an evolutionary purpose because it allowed our caveman ancestors to be on

00:00:31.940 the lookout for things that could kill them.

00:00:33.940 But in today's modern world, when there aren't any saber-toothed tigers roaming the streets,

00:00:38.520 that negativity bias causes us to focus on things that aren't really problems, like the

00:00:43.940 guy who cut you off while you're driving, annoying emails, whatever it could be.

00:00:48.460 And that causes us to be agitated, depressed, irritated, lonely, angry, whatever.

00:00:53.300 But according to our guest, with just a few seconds every day, we can actually train our

00:00:58.420 brain and hardwire it to overcome that negativity bias when it's not useful.

00:01:04.180 His name is Dr. Rick Hansen.

00:01:06.040 He's the author of the book, Hardwiring Happiness, the New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm and

00:01:10.500 Confidence.

00:01:11.120 And today we're going to talk about how to hardwire your brain for happiness so you can

00:01:14.880 be more resilient.

00:01:16.160 Let's do this.

00:01:21.120 Dr. Rick Hansen, welcome to the show.

00:01:23.680 Thank you, Brett.

00:01:24.820 Okay.

00:01:25.140 So your book is Hardwiring Happiness.

00:01:27.820 You've written other books, but this one is the most recent.

00:01:31.060 And I think a first good question to ask before we talk about how you hardwire happiness is,

00:01:35.740 what exactly do you mean by happiness?

00:01:38.820 Is it a bliss?

00:01:39.760 Is it pleasure?

00:01:41.080 Is it optimism?

00:01:42.280 Is it a life of meaning?

00:01:44.000 What's happiness?

00:01:45.260 That's a great question.

00:01:45.980 I think of it mainly as well-being.

00:01:49.120 And well-being has two aspects to it.

00:01:51.500 People talk about it as hedonia and eudaimonia.

00:01:56.480 You may be familiar with those terms already.

00:01:58.320 Oh, we are.

00:01:58.720 Hedonia.

00:01:59.200 Yeah.

00:01:59.580 Hedonia is the happiness of sort of passing experiences, ranging from watching your sports

00:02:05.860 team win.

00:02:06.640 Like I watched the Golden Gate Warriors win last night.

00:02:09.660 I'm happy about that.

00:02:10.660 Or hanging out with my family while we watched it.

00:02:12.840 That was making me happy.

00:02:14.020 Or, you know, going for a run with your dog on the beach.

00:02:16.620 Seeing a beautiful sunset.

00:02:18.440 Making love.

00:02:19.600 That's all kinds of happiness.

00:02:20.940 Ordinary hedonia.

00:02:22.280 And then there's so-called eudaimonia, which has a sense of meaning or fulfillment or purpose

00:02:28.220 in life.

00:02:28.960 For example, I think about parents walking their crying baby at three in the morning.

00:02:34.400 It's not something that they're particularly happy about, but it's the most meaningful and

00:02:39.020 fulfilling thing they've ever done in their life.

00:02:40.940 And the two together are what I would call happiness, which, by the way, is not to be

00:02:45.620 poo-pooed. 0.64

00:02:46.340 You know, as you well know, I think, you know, when people are happier, they're tougher.

00:02:50.660 They're more resilient.

00:02:51.640 They're more able to bounce back.

00:02:53.000 They have a stronger immune system.

00:02:54.840 They live longer.

00:02:56.540 They have more fulfilling relationships.

00:02:58.340 You know, the pharmaceutical companies could patent a happy pill based on the research

00:03:03.520 proven benefits it has for us.

00:03:05.540 We'd be seeing ads for happiness every night on TV.

00:03:07.780 So I was interested, is there been any research about happiness in men, specific to men, or

00:03:14.160 is it just sort of like happiness is great for whether, whether, either gender, but I'm

00:03:18.680 just wondering if there's any specific research, research towards men, if men have a hard time

00:03:22.540 being happy or if they need to do things that, you know, how does it benefit men differently

00:03:27.580 than women? 0.99

00:03:28.200 Or is there-

00:03:28.460 That's a really interesting question.

00:03:30.280 I'm not a specialist on, you know, sort of gender distinctions in terms of research.

00:03:34.880 It would not surprise me if there are specific studies.

00:03:39.040 I mean, what is known is that men tend to suppress their feelings more, which can block

00:03:46.020 happiness because then you're, you know, the mind-brain system is not like a flush toilet.

00:03:52.160 It's like a septic tank and that stuff sticks around.

00:03:55.120 So if you just shove it down, it's not like you can send it off to the ocean somewhere.

00:03:59.320 It's with you.

00:04:00.100 So on the one hand, on the other hand, women are more vulnerable to anxiety and depression,

00:04:05.140 certainly statistically, partly because of socially constructed events, you know, discrimination,

00:04:11.260 sexism, and whatnot, as well as physical health problems.

00:04:14.340 So I suspect that it's kind of a toss-up as to which gender or sex is happier in general.

00:04:21.600 I do think that men can draw upon, you know, kind of classic masculine things like, you 0.96

00:04:29.940 know, the desire to get more and more competent at stuff.

00:04:33.100 And also men can steer clear of the obstructions that drag down our happiness, like, you know,

00:04:39.080 keeping all your feelings inside and sort of imploding internally.

00:04:42.460 Okay.

00:04:42.480 So, um, you talk about our, our, our temperament that there is a part of our temperament that's

00:04:48.600 genetic, that we don't have much control over, but you also say there is a part that we can

00:04:53.360 control, right?

00:04:54.400 Some of us are more prone to anxiety or depression, and some of us are more prone to, you know,

00:04:59.060 risk-taking and optimism.

00:05:01.320 Yeah.

00:05:01.400 I mean, what is the breakdown?

00:05:02.500 How much can we control of our temperament, whether we're, we have, we're prone to happiness

00:05:06.520 or, uh, Eeyore-ism?

00:05:08.440 Yeah, exactly.

00:05:10.320 Uh, the research, uh, on identical twins that are adopted into different homes, especially

00:05:16.000 when you correct for the ways that most, uh, adoptions occur into middle-class or upper

00:05:21.660 middle-class homes so that you reduce the impact of environment, blah, blah, bottom line at

00:05:26.620 one third, two thirds on average, about one third of the factors, the causes that determine

00:05:32.840 our happiness or really most any other psychological attribute, um, has to do with just DNA hardwired.

00:05:41.480 It's in our genetics.

00:05:42.620 Okay.

00:05:43.080 The other two thirds is based on, um, individual events in a person's life, both external environmental

00:05:49.520 factors.

00:05:50.020 Like, did you grow up in poverty or were you traumatized in Iraq somewhere?

00:05:54.100 Uh, and also efforts that we make inside ourselves to change ourselves for the better.

00:05:59.480 So, you know, I can live with the one third, I don't have control over, but I'm really zeroed

00:06:04.840 in on the two thirds.

00:06:06.260 I do have some control over and trying to, you know, maximize it, trying to do the best

00:06:10.600 I can each day to get really good at the two thirds that is under my own power.

00:06:15.160 Okay.

00:06:15.200 And this is where experience dependent neuroplasticity comes in, right?

00:06:18.760 You got it exactly right.

00:06:19.840 That's a mouthful, isn't it?

00:06:20.940 Yeah, it is.

00:06:21.480 Yeah.

00:06:22.860 Neuroplasticity, uh, just means, uh, the fact that the brain changes, plasticity means changeable.

00:06:27.640 So the bottom line is that we've got a brain and a nervous system broadly that's designed

00:06:33.140 to be changed by our experiences.

00:06:35.180 That's how we learn.

00:06:36.080 A lot of that learning is kind of trivial, factual learning, like, okay, what's your social security

00:06:41.500 number?

00:06:42.000 I mean, that's kind of useful, but where the real action is, is emotional learning, motivational

00:06:47.580 learning, social learning, attitudinal learning, honestly, frankly, even spiritual learning.

00:06:52.380 And, um, the research shows that that kind of learning, uh, which includes negative learning,

00:06:58.700 you know, becoming more anxious or traumatized or irritable or feeling, you know, less and

00:07:03.960 less sense of worth over time.

00:07:05.220 That too is a kind of learning.

00:07:06.800 And I'm sure we'll get to this, but we've got a brain that's evolved in negativity bias

00:07:11.820 that makes it really good at learning from bad experiences, but relatively bad at learning

00:07:16.980 from good experiences.

00:07:18.120 Even though learning from good experiences is the primary way to grow resilience, happiness,

00:07:24.900 insight, willpower, and other wholesome qualities of mind and heart.

00:07:29.000 Yeah.

00:07:29.080 Why is it that we are, our brains are evolved with the negativity bias?

00:07:32.900 What was the purpose of that?

00:07:34.800 Yeah.

00:07:35.380 Um, people can Google whatever or search on negativity bias.

00:07:38.720 There's a, so much research on it right now.

00:07:40.700 The basic rationale for it is that if you imagine back in evolution, let's say we've got a nervous

00:07:46.340 system evolving for 600 million years over that long run, you know, in effect, our ancestors,

00:07:52.720 uh, including early humans needed both to get carrots like food and avoid sticks like predators 0.85

00:07:59.740 becoming food for other animals, right?

00:08:02.460 Well, they're both important, but the difference is if you fail to get a carrot today, you'll

00:08:06.720 have a chance at a carrot tomorrow.

00:08:08.040 But if you fail to avoid that stick today, whack, no more carrots forever.

00:08:12.380 So we now have a brain that does four things and you can just see in yourself that we do

00:08:17.500 this, uh, continually scans for bad news.

00:08:20.500 One, two, when we find it, we hyper-focus on it.

00:08:24.300 You know, if you want to see the big picture, it helps to be having an emotionally positive

00:08:28.300 experience because when there's any kind of pain or threat, we lock down on it.

00:08:32.540 And then three, we overreact to it.

00:08:34.960 If you play two sounds for people, for example, inside an MRI, one is pleasant, one is unpleasant,

00:08:40.320 and they're equally loud.

00:08:41.540 The brain literally, wing, will react more to the unpleasant sound.

00:08:45.860 And then fourth, that whole package is fast-tracked into emotional memory.

00:08:50.480 We learn faster from pain than pleasure.

00:08:52.460 We remember, uh, you know, bad information about other people more than good information.

00:08:57.120 We're more affected by negative interactions in our relationships than positive ones.

00:09:01.960 And then in fact, fifth, the last thing is that all this negative experience sensitizes

00:09:07.260 the brain.

00:09:07.860 So it gets even more and more reactive to the negative.

00:09:10.420 All this might've worked back in the stone age, but for, and maybe for some people like

00:09:14.740 on a combat tour or living in, you know, a terrible environment.

00:09:18.740 All right.

00:09:19.480 Negativity bias is helpful, but for most of us, it's like a learning disability, a well-intended 1.00

00:09:25.320 learning disability, given that we have a stone age brain in the 21st century.

00:09:29.100 And it gets in the way of it, besides giving us a lot of unnecessary negative experiences,

00:09:33.880 it gets in the way of a lot of positive learning that would make us more resilient, happier,

00:09:39.460 and more effective and skillful in our relationships and at work.

00:09:43.400 Yeah.

00:09:43.540 So, I mean, this is why, you know, we can hear a nice compliment, but we'll forget it,

00:09:47.840 but we'll like think about and just dwell upon that one criticism, right?

00:09:51.180 Yep.

00:09:51.660 For days.

00:09:52.540 And it just eats at us.

00:09:53.860 Yeah.

00:09:54.500 Um, so, I mean, um, yeah, you said that we have this stone age brain in the 21st century.

00:09:58.140 Is there something about, uh, our, the environment today, and we're talking about affluent Western

00:10:04.600 societies where you're not having to worry about whether you're going to, you know, step

00:10:08.040 on a landmine or something like that, um, that makes having this negativity bias a detriment

00:10:13.520 as opposed to an asset?

00:10:15.840 Yeah, absolutely.

00:10:16.620 There you are in your, uh, going through your day and research shows that, uh, especially,

00:10:22.680 you know, in the three quarters of people in the world that are not living in terrible,

00:10:27.380 horrible conditions, um, in some of whom are, you know, here in America, let's say, uh,

00:10:33.040 generally speaking, most people are having predominantly pleasant or neutral experiences

00:10:37.820 interspersed with occasional negative ones.

00:10:40.460 Now, of course, there are many unfortunate exceptions to that rule, but what happens is

00:10:44.360 there you are, you're going through your day, right?

00:10:46.520 You know, you get up, it feels okay.

00:10:48.500 You, you know, I have breakfast.

00:10:49.800 It's fine.

00:10:50.500 Plenty to eat.

00:10:51.440 It's all pleasant, pleasant.

00:10:52.960 And then you go through your day and someone, let's say, flips you off on the freeway.

00:10:57.560 And, you know, it just hits that, it's upsetting.

00:11:01.760 Maybe you feel like, you know, male on male aggression, but you can't get the guy.

00:11:06.520 And you think about that event for the rest of the day, even though most of your day was

00:11:12.260 perfectly good.

00:11:13.460 So for me, the two practical takeaways are don't obsess about the negative.

00:11:17.800 If it happens, it happens.

00:11:19.160 I don't believe in positive thinking.

00:11:20.940 I believe in realistic thinking, see the negatives.

00:11:23.580 Okay.

00:11:24.460 React to them appropriately.

00:11:26.180 Do what you need to do.

00:11:27.520 Fine.

00:11:28.100 But don't dwell on it because your brain is like a sponge for any little bit of, I was

00:11:35.640 going to use a vulgar term that started with P and I'll leave it at that.

00:11:38.580 But anyway, any little bit of stuff that lands on it is going to get sucked in.

00:11:42.280 On the other hand, when you're having those ordinary experiences, you know, you get something

00:11:47.020 done, you finish an email, your partner is nice to you, you feel kind of, you look in

00:11:52.380 the mirror and you don't look too bad.

00:11:54.220 You know, you, you know, get to work and you, you know, people compliment you or you feel

00:12:00.380 good about yourself.

00:12:01.120 Maybe you do a workout and it feels good in your body.

00:12:04.020 Take the extra 10 or 20 seconds to really register that experience using the power of

00:12:10.480 experience dependent neuroplasticity to turn that passing mental state into a lasting positive

00:12:17.780 neural trait.

00:12:19.440 And this is, this is how you overcome the negativity bias.

00:12:21.560 Yeah, exactly right.

00:12:22.800 And it's a lot of little things that I, you know, my book is way into the, you know, how

00:12:28.080 to actually do it in a lot of depth and especially how to apply it, how to apply these general

00:12:32.860 skills to particular situations like feeling threatened in situations or feeling insecure

00:12:38.960 inside or feeling frustrated or disappointed in life and so forth.

00:12:42.800 They're dealing with addictions of different kinds, you know, or dealing with relationship

00:12:46.300 issues.

00:12:46.960 So that's cool.

00:12:47.680 But the essence is really simple.

00:12:49.460 Have it, enjoy it.

00:12:50.620 In other words, if you're having that beneficial experience, don't just skip on to the next

00:12:55.900 thing.

00:12:56.800 Give it to yourself.

00:12:58.040 You know, why not?

00:12:58.980 Why waste all that money?

00:13:00.600 In effect, why let that, why leave all that money on the table?

00:13:03.580 Why waste those experiences on your brain?

00:13:05.760 Why not take the extra five or 10 or 20 seconds?

00:13:08.900 It's private.

00:13:09.680 No one needs to know you're doing it.

00:13:11.520 Hang out with the experience.

00:13:13.660 You know, there's a famous saying, you may know it, neurons, neurons firing together, wire

00:13:18.640 together.

00:13:19.520 And in other words, what we're trying to do is extend the firing to improve the wiring.

00:13:26.200 We're also trying to intensify the firing by really feeling this positive, beneficial

00:13:31.700 experience, even though it's mild usually, but really feeling it.

00:13:35.840 To get those neurons firing intensively.

00:13:38.760 So they wire intensively and also experiencing the experience in your whole body.

00:13:43.400 So again, you get those neurons firing to wire that beneficial experience into yourself.

00:13:49.660 Any single time you do it won't usually change your life.

00:13:53.480 But think of the difference in like an interest rate for your savings account or your retirement,

00:13:58.020 you know, between, let's say, six and five percent or six and four percent.

00:14:01.700 On any given day, the difference between six and four percent is not a big deal.

00:14:06.100 But if you gradually accumulate that difference over a month, let alone a year, let alone a

00:14:11.680 lifespan, as it compounds, that little difference makes an enormous difference.

00:14:16.900 So I'd ask people, what's your growth rate as you go through your day?

00:14:21.980 You know, what's your learning rate as you go through your day?

00:14:24.200 Is it flat, shallow or steep?

00:14:26.820 And my whole focus is on helping people really steepen their learning curve by getting

00:14:33.340 competent at helping their brain change for the better.

00:14:37.160 But it isn't an overnight process.

00:14:39.000 Usually not.

00:14:39.680 No.

00:14:40.060 But that's part of what makes it legit because it's not a quick fix.

00:14:42.880 It's not pie in the sky.

00:14:44.020 It's not looking on the bright side.

00:14:45.720 You know, it's not just smell the flowers.

00:14:47.960 Although, hey, those flowers smell good.

00:14:49.760 Why not smell them?

00:14:50.680 You know, they're there to be smelled.

00:14:52.120 But I'm really talking about muscle.

00:14:54.140 And so, you know, you're building muscle, in effect, metaphorically speaking, in your

00:14:59.280 brain, not literally.

00:15:00.660 But you're building neural structures.

00:15:02.640 And studies show that you're actually changing your brain over time when you do these kind

00:15:08.080 of practices.

00:15:09.480 And I think, just to kind of finish on a point here, we're good, generally speaking, at having

00:15:17.200 beneficial experiences.

00:15:18.640 In other words, at activating useful mental states.

00:15:21.480 Most people suck at converting those passing mental states into any kind of lasting change

00:15:29.160 in neural structure or function. 0.90

00:15:30.840 In other words, we tend to be poor, whether professionally as therapists, let's say, or

00:15:36.160 informally as we're just trying to help ourselves along the way.

00:15:38.900 We tend to be poor at installation, at helping the experience really, really sink in.

00:15:44.760 And so, for me, it's a challenge.

00:15:46.100 And it's appropriate to take up the challenge to, you know, really help your brain capture

00:15:52.080 the benefit of your ordinary beneficial experiences instead of wasting them.

00:15:57.200 So, it seems like the negativity bias, if I'm right, correct me if I'm wrong, is this

00:16:01.260 sort of going on in a mammalian brain?

00:16:03.320 Like that sort of...

00:16:04.020 It's the whole brain.

00:16:04.840 It's the whole brain.

00:16:05.360 I mean, if you think about it, you know, lizards, man, they got to really learn from pain.

00:16:09.580 No, it's all over the brain.

00:16:11.000 I mean, it's all over the brain, the negativity bias.

00:16:15.280 Okay.

00:16:15.440 So, but it seems like you need to really use that prefrontal cortex to be self-directed

00:16:19.700 and kind of taking in these positive moments.

00:16:23.040 I think that's a good way to put it, Brett, in the beginning.

00:16:26.260 Okay.

00:16:26.540 In other words, in the beginning, we do it deliberately.

00:16:30.500 You know, you realize, hey, half a dozen times a day, half a minute at a time, that's less

00:16:35.260 than five minutes a day.

00:16:36.360 If I'm already having a little moment of feeling strong inside myself, let's say, or a little

00:16:43.100 moment of being satisfied or like I accomplished something, like I'm a success or a little

00:16:47.340 moment, let's say, of feeling connected to somebody else or being, you know, caring and

00:16:51.720 loving yourself.

00:16:52.660 Why not?

00:16:53.100 Right.

00:16:53.660 When you're having those little moments, show up for them, let them land, let them really,

00:16:59.680 really sink in.

00:17:00.300 So in the beginning, yeah, you do it deliberately, but there's this natural movement in learning

00:17:04.820 and psychology from deliberate to automatic.

00:17:07.520 And then it becomes a habit.

00:17:09.140 You start developing the habit of taking in the good in your flow of everyday life.

00:17:15.680 And also that habit increasingly is grounded in lower structures in the brain, not just

00:17:22.120 prefrontal structures that are motivational structures.

00:17:25.320 You start leaning toward the good and you start kind of being receptive to it in your body,

00:17:31.720 which is a very embodied, you know, lower brain kind of learning.

00:17:35.260 Okay.

00:17:35.620 But how do you do this when things get crazy, right?

00:17:39.280 Yeah.

00:17:39.500 Whenever, this is the, you know, I'll admit, I think you wrote and talked about this in

00:17:42.800 your book.

00:17:43.140 You tend to be anxiety prone.

00:17:46.240 Yeah.

00:17:46.500 I've even had my genetic, my genome sequence and I found out I have like the warrior gene,

00:17:50.280 right?

00:17:50.600 I've got that.

00:17:52.920 And so, you know, being, you know, resilient and focusing on the positive and not letting the

00:17:57.040 negativity bias get me down has always been a struggle for me.

00:18:00.140 And I'll get in these kicks where like, I'll do really well for a few weeks.

00:18:03.480 And then someday just something, just everything will just go completely nuts and I'll just

00:18:08.460 have this setback.

00:18:09.800 So how do you handle those setbacks?

00:18:11.980 Um, whenever you're just, everything's going crazy and you forget, you go into that reactive

00:18:17.080 mode instead of being responsive.

00:18:19.140 Yeah.

00:18:19.260 I know what you mean.

00:18:20.340 So, um, great question.

00:18:23.100 Wait, uh, uh, I think first and foremost, when you're in that setback moment is to ride out

00:18:29.280 the storm and not make a bad thing worse, not pour, you know, gasoline on the fire.

00:18:34.280 So, uh, I think that there are just three ways to engage your mind productively, uh, to number

00:18:40.500 one, be with what's there without trying to change it, just witness it, hopefully with kind

00:18:44.780 of mindful, spacious awareness to reduce the negative, you know, let go of those ideas that

00:18:51.720 aren't helping you release the feelings, let the tension drain out of your body, realize that you

00:18:57.520 can't drink like you used to when you were 20 years old, you know, let go of those unwholesome

00:19:01.380 desires, unhelpful desires and so on.

00:19:03.960 And then third way to engage the mind is to grow the positive, increase your inner strengths of

00:19:09.760 resilience, gratitude, compassion for yourself, compassion for other people, confidence, you

00:19:16.080 know, interpersonal skills, et cetera, you know, build the good, grow the good inside yourself.

00:19:20.980 So even though I've been focusing here so far on the third one of these, um, there it's in the

00:19:27.000 context of the other two.

00:19:28.100 So I would say that when everything goes crazy, um, you know, feel the feelings, uh, see what's

00:19:34.480 going on, explore your own experience.

00:19:36.120 Like what's going on inside me that I, you know, this stuff's happening.

00:19:39.760 But I'm having all these reactions to it. 0.88

00:19:41.840 It doesn't mean that you're a wuss. 0.83

00:19:43.480 It doesn't mean you're doing therapy on yourself. 0.61

00:19:45.880 Um, it means more like you're, you're being honest about what's really going on inside.

00:19:50.760 And you're, you have enough courage, honestly, you're brave enough to open to your own feelings

00:19:56.180 and tolerate them.

00:19:57.180 Okay.

00:19:58.000 But then usually in the moment, there's a transition.

00:20:02.600 Sometimes it's only a few seconds or minutes.

00:20:04.800 Sometimes it's hours or days where it's time to move out of just being with what's there.

00:20:09.760 Two, letting it go, you know, stepping out of the struggle with somebody else, letting

00:20:14.400 go of unrealistic ideas about what's going to happen here.

00:20:18.460 Um, you know, uh, apologizing for how you screwed up, let's say, you know, letting it

00:20:23.580 go.

00:20:24.000 And then third, looking for the lessons, you know, what's the takeaway here?

00:20:27.800 What's the learning I can acquire?

00:20:29.500 You know, well, how can I grow through this screwed up experience?

00:20:33.760 I was just caught in, right?

00:20:35.700 So those are the three ways.

00:20:36.740 And I think those three ways to engage the mind, give us a kind of roadmap.

00:20:39.540 So that's what a person can do in the moment.

00:20:42.280 And, um, then there's what we can do offstage to prepare for those moments.

00:20:47.480 And one of the things I love about your website in a lot of ways, it's about helping people

00:20:52.540 prep, you know, in the locker room, as it were, for when they're suddenly out there on

00:20:57.680 the playing field and they've got to draw upon what they developed inside themselves.

00:21:02.600 And so for me, that goes to what I call key resource experiences as a whole model of that

00:21:07.280 in my book.

00:21:07.920 The super fast version is that inside us all is a little lizard, a little mouse, and a

00:21:12.880 little monkey that, you know, metaphorically corresponds to the reptilian brainstem, mammalian

00:21:19.080 subcortex and primate human cortex, which loosely relates to our three core needs, safety,

00:21:24.980 satisfaction, connection.

00:21:26.140 So if you're talking about myself as someone, you know, vulnerable to anxiety or yourself

00:21:31.980 as having the war, the worrier gene distinct from the warrior gene, right?

00:21:36.540 I probably have both genes from my Scottish heritage, but anyway, um, you know, then you

00:21:41.720 think to yourself, okay, that's the safety system issue.

00:21:44.740 Worry has to do the safety system, feeling threatened when everything goes crazy.

00:21:48.280 So what I can do over time is build up an internal felt sense of different resources inside,

00:21:54.340 like recognizing that I'm actually okay, even when things are going crazy, or like feeling

00:22:00.320 protected, or like feeling that I've got others who are cheering me on and have my back, or

00:22:05.060 like feeling, um, a very strong sense of grit and hardiness and determination inside.

00:22:11.180 You know, I may have been whacked around hard here, but I'm not going to be defeated by this

00:22:15.680 stuff.

00:22:16.060 Right.

00:22:16.740 Yeah.

00:22:16.920 And then as you repeatedly through neurons that fire together, wire together repeatedly,

00:22:21.000 uh, install those key resource experiences that are targeted at an issue that you know,

00:22:28.400 you're dealing with a challenge.

00:22:29.740 That's going to come again around the bend.

00:22:32.160 You know, you know, it's going to happen as you grow those resources inside yourself.

00:22:35.940 Well, increasingly in many studies back this up, increasingly, you become able to deal with

00:22:40.740 the situations or the relationship issues, whatever the financial losses that used to

00:22:46.920 have you seeing red, you know, and pushing you over the edge.

00:22:50.000 But instead you can deal with the exact same tough times, tough situation while staying in

00:22:56.980 what I call the green zone where, you know, you feel strong inside, you feel centered inside.

00:23:01.800 Uh, you have a fundamental core wellbeing and happiness that this screwed up situation cannot

00:23:06.920 touch.

00:23:07.540 And on the basis of that, you're dealing with those challenges.

00:23:11.100 Yeah.

00:23:11.680 Whenever I have feel that, that cortisol surge when I'm getting like anxious, like I always

00:23:16.440 like stop and remind myself, like I'm not being chased by a saber tooth tiger.

00:23:19.940 Yeah.

00:23:20.580 Like I might, my, it's the, my life's not at risk. 0.56

00:23:22.960 Cause usually you get upset about these really dumb modern things that aren't really problems.

00:23:27.180 Yeah. 0.92

00:23:27.580 Our kids joke, they call them first world problems.

00:23:30.000 I can't get cell service, you know?

00:23:33.240 So you alluded earlier that this whole idea of hardwiring happiness is more about, is it,

00:23:38.840 is it, it's more than just feeling good about yourself, feeling good about life, being resilient.

00:23:42.780 It's about learning, uh, being a better learner.

00:23:46.160 I mean, how, how does that, how does all this play into being a, just a better learner overall

00:23:51.280 in your life?

00:23:52.560 Yeah.

00:23:53.340 Um, well, if you think about it, we can't do anything about the past, right?

00:23:57.960 It's done and the present moment when it boom pops into existence and then vanishes out

00:24:05.220 of existence to the next moment, boom, the present moment, you can't, it is what it is.

00:24:10.300 But what we can do something about is how much we learn from here that if you think of it as

00:24:17.980 our most fundamental property, it's, and it's also what we earn.

00:24:22.160 So I'm very, you know, old school, I've been a therapist a long time.

00:24:26.160 I think it's maybe nicer, but it's made me tougher.

00:24:28.420 You got to earn it.

00:24:29.440 You got to do the work.

00:24:30.340 But if, and I see, frankly, Brett, tons of people that will get, that will work hard to

00:24:35.720 get good at stuff that they will tell you don't matter much, like some software program

00:24:40.800 they're learning at work or some detail of, you know, dealing with their boss.

00:24:44.300 And they won't put much effort into getting good at stuff that they'll tell you do does

00:24:50.600 matter a lot, like becoming a better parent or a better partner or, you know, more skillful

00:24:55.860 and effective in how they deal with others or how they manage their own thoughts and feelings.

00:25:00.500 And so for me, it's, you know, the larger frame here is around competence and getting

00:25:05.460 competent at becoming competent.

00:25:08.320 In other words, learning the how of learning, which is a fundamental neuropsychological process.

00:25:13.740 And so for me, this is a really important thing that's been under our nose that we don't

00:25:18.760 pay enough attention to, you know, how do we actually learn and how can you use how your

00:25:23.340 brain learns to help yourself, you know, whatever it might be there they are reading, let's say,

00:25:28.940 you know, one of the extremely well-written, I got to say, pieces on your website or listening

00:25:34.300 to one of your podcasts.

00:25:35.520 Okay.

00:25:35.740 It's a momentarily interesting, beneficial experience.

00:25:39.340 Let's say it's interesting, but what's the takeaway and how can you help that

00:25:43.720 takeaway really sink in?

00:25:45.880 So you have a steeper learning curve rather than a flatter learning curve from whatever

00:25:49.920 you're doing in life, including, you know, listening to a podcast.

00:25:53.200 To me, that's what really interests me.

00:25:55.280 And how that is way simple.

00:25:58.000 It's, and it usually feels good because most, um, the basis for most inner strengths, like

00:26:05.200 resilience, determination, you know, uh, insight into other people inside into yourself,

00:26:10.880 many other aspects of, um, success in life and happiness and longevity.

00:26:15.720 You know, what we really care about, um, you know, much research shows that you really

00:26:22.300 can help yourself, you know, be a stronger man, be a wiser man, be a more loving and virtuous

00:26:30.460 man at the end of the day than when you were, when you woke up.

00:26:33.460 And that's what really interests me.

00:26:35.380 That's where the rubber meets the road every day.

00:26:37.080 Okay.

00:26:37.820 Well, I always like to end these, uh, our podcast with some, like just a practical takeaway.

00:26:42.560 All right.

00:26:43.300 So what's, what's one, one, one thing that listeners can do as soon as they're done listening to

00:26:47.440 this podcast that they can, that'll help them hardwire themselves for happiness and more

00:26:51.880 resilience.

00:26:52.740 Yeah.

00:26:53.840 I'd say one thing to do is a notice in this moment that you're actually basically all right,

00:27:00.740 that the body has enough air to breathe.

00:27:02.780 There's probably enough water in it and a food, you're not an agonizing pain.

00:27:07.800 The brain is actually designed to trick us into thinking that we're always not quite all

00:27:12.860 right.

00:27:13.160 So that we're going to scratch and claw and, you know, fight off the saber tooth tiger

00:27:17.160 to survive.

00:27:18.060 But in fact, that's delusional.

00:27:20.540 We're actually usually all right, basically in any moment.

00:27:24.080 And you can notice that and let that sink in.

00:27:26.460 I'd say that too.

00:27:27.580 I'd look for the opportunity to feel like, wow, I already have so many good things in

00:27:34.300 my life, including the opportunity to listen to a podcast like this with modern technology.

00:27:39.160 And it doesn't mean I'm not going to be ambitious.

00:27:41.820 It doesn't mean I'm not going to be passionate and, you know, competitive and so forth.

00:27:46.760 But I can do that on the basis of feeling like I'm already entirely satisfied in a kind

00:27:54.320 of deep way.

00:27:55.100 And you can let that sink in.

00:27:56.360 And then I would just finish by saying, pick one thing that you're trying to grow in yourself

00:28:00.660 these days.

00:28:01.360 What's that one thing for you these days?

00:28:02.980 It could be one thing today or one thing in general this week, this month, this quarter.

00:28:08.340 What are you working on?

00:28:09.240 Right.

00:28:10.140 And then look for opportunities to have an experience of that thing you're trying to

00:28:14.180 grow in yourself.

00:28:15.240 Are you trying to become more determined?

00:28:16.800 Are you trying to become more confident?

00:28:18.940 Are you trying to have a deeper feeling of your own worth?

00:28:21.520 Are you trying to help yourself be a better listener?

00:28:23.640 Because you can see that's going to work a lot better, you know, in your intimate relationships.

00:28:28.400 OK, what are you working on?

00:28:29.680 When you have opportunities to experience that positive, beneficial mental state, slow it

00:28:36.360 down.

00:28:37.860 Take a breath.

00:28:39.240 Stay with it.

00:28:40.360 Keep feeling it.

00:28:41.440 Come back to it.

00:28:42.600 Don't let yourself be distracted around it.

00:28:44.600 Hang out with it 12, you know, one, two, three dozen seconds in a row to really help

00:28:50.580 it sink into yourself and try to do that at least once a day.

00:28:54.280 And I bet, I predict that if a person does that 10 days in a row, you're going to fundamentally

00:29:00.540 feel different in important ways.

00:29:02.740 Awesome.

00:29:02.860 So, Dr. Hansen, where can people find out more about your work?

00:29:06.420 Oh, thank you very much.

00:29:07.380 My website, rickhansen.net, S-O-N, rickhansen.net is chock full of freely offered resources.

00:29:14.380 And they can learn all about me really at that website, rickhansen, S-O-N.net.

00:29:19.120 All right.

00:29:19.600 Well, Rick Hansen, thank you so much for your time.

00:29:21.100 It's been a pleasure.

00:29:22.120 Brad, it's been a pleasure for me as well.

00:29:24.240 Our guest today was Dr. Rick Hansen.

00:29:26.240 He's the author of the book, Hardwiring Happiness, The New Brain Science of Contentment, Calm and

00:29:30.620 Confidence, and you can find that book at amazon.com and bookstores everywhere.

00:29:35.000 You can also find out more information about his work at rickhansen.net, as well as his

00:29:39.600 foundations of well-being at fwb.rickhansen.net.

00:29:45.460 Well, that wraps up another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.

00:29:48.940 For more manly tips and advice, make sure to check out the Art of Manliness website

00:29:52.260 at artofmanliness.com.

00:29:53.980 And I'd really appreciate it also if you check out our Art of Manliness store at

00:29:57.240 store.artofmanliness.com.

00:29:59.220 You'll find all sorts of Art of Manliness products there, a coffee mug that's really

00:30:03.260 hefty.

00:30:03.700 You could bludgeon someone with it, Art of Manliness t-shirts, a Rudyard Kipling if poster.

00:30:10.020 And we also have a journal there inspired by Benjamin Franklin's Virtue Diary that he

00:30:14.140 created as a young man.

00:30:15.480 It's a one-of-kind product, and it's a great thing to use to kind of track your progress

00:30:19.840 on becoming the man you want to be.

00:30:21.420 Really appreciate it.

00:30:22.180 Your purchases there will support the podcast and the Art of Manliness website.

00:30:25.320 Again, that's store.artofmanliness.com.

00:30:27.600 And until next time, this is Brett McKay telling you to stay manly.

The Art of Manliness - January 09, 2015

#96： Hardwiring Your Brain for Happiness With Dr. Rick Hanson

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript