The Art of Manliness - Escape the Happiness Trap

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

00:00:11.340 Happiness is the subject of thousands of articles, podcasts, and scientific studies.

00:00:15.720 Yet all this focus on happiness doesn't seem to be making people any happier.

00:00:19.500 In fact, the more they try to be happy, especially by fighting to get rid of bad feelings and

00:00:23.880 clinging to good ones, the more unhappy people often become.

00:00:26.860 My guests would say that the first step in escaping this negative cycle is redefining

00:00:31.020 what happiness even means, thinking of it not as a state of feeling good, but doing good.

00:00:36.400 His name is Russ Harris, and he's a therapist and the author of The Happiness Trap.

00:00:40.120 Today on the show, Russ explains how struggling against difficult feelings and thoughts just

00:00:43.920 makes them stronger, amplifying instead of diminishing stress, anxiety, depression, and self-consciousness,

00:00:49.600 and how simply obeying your emotions doesn't work out any better.

00:00:52.300 He then unpacks the alternative approach to happiness espoused by acceptance and commitment

00:00:56.180 therapy.

00:00:57.100 With ACT, you allow both pleasant and hard feelings to coexist, and unhook from the latter

00:01:01.640 so they no longer jerk you around.

00:01:03.460 This allows you to focus on taking action on your values to create a meaningful, flourishing

00:01:07.120 life, or in other words, real happiness.

00:01:10.080 After the show's over, check out our show notes at aom.is slash happiness trap.

00:01:13.740 All right, Russ Harris, welcome to the show.

00:01:32.660 Oh, thanks for having me.

00:01:34.020 So you have a background in medicine, but then you made a shift in your career where you became

00:01:38.380 a therapist and you became a trainer in a form of talk therapy called acceptance and commitment

00:01:43.260 therapy.

00:01:43.920 So you do therapy, but you also do coaching.

00:01:46.000 And you got a book called The Happiness Trap, How to Stop Struggling and Start Living.

00:01:50.520 And you start the book off talking about how most human beings, they want to be happy.

00:01:55.520 So we have all these blog posts, books, apps, courses on how to be happier, but people aren't

00:02:01.940 happier.

00:02:02.300 Depression's up, life satisfaction is down.

00:02:05.800 So what's going on there?

00:02:06.440 We have all these resources, there are people researching scientifically how to be happier,

00:02:11.800 yet we still find happiness hard to achieve.

00:02:14.280 What's going on?

00:02:16.340 Well, there's a number of different factors, but probably the biggest one is the way that

00:02:22.640 we think about happiness itself.

00:02:25.600 Most people think of happiness as a good feeling or feeling good or a state of pleasure or content

00:02:32.180 And if that's your concept of happiness, then there's no such thing as lasting happiness.

00:02:38.040 How long can a state of pleasure or contentment possibly last for?

00:02:42.480 If you think of the happiest day of your life, how long were you feeling happy for before there

00:02:48.000 was some frustration, disappointment, anxiety?

00:02:51.400 In Western cultures, we don't really learn how to deal with those inevitable painful emotions.

00:02:57.760 We see them as the opposite of happiness, and we start trying to avoid or get rid of all

00:03:04.320 of those unwanted thoughts, feelings, emotions, all the uncomfortable stuff, and we start desperately

00:03:09.660 trying to create more of the good, pleasant feelings and clinging to those feelings.

00:03:14.980 And the technical psychobabble name for this is experiential avoidance.

00:03:20.740 Experiential avoidance is the ongoing attempt to avoid or get rid of unwanted thoughts, feelings,

00:03:26.440 emotions, and memories, all of that uncomfortable stuff that shows up inside us that we don't like.

00:03:32.000 Experiential avoidance is normal.

00:03:33.660 We're all, I don't know anybody who just loves having painful thoughts and feelings,

00:03:37.840 but what happens is high levels of experiential avoidance, where people are really kind of trying

00:03:43.480 very, very hard to avoid and get rid of unwanted thoughts and feelings,

00:03:47.740 well, high levels of this actually directly correlate with your risk of depression,

00:03:52.540 anxiety disorders, addiction, and many other mental health issues.

00:03:57.680 So if you're trying very, very hard to control your emotions, to avoid or get rid of the unpleasant

00:04:03.340 ones and create and cling to the pleasant ones, it's going to create a lot of problems for you.

00:04:09.500 You know, in my book, The Happiness Trap, it's called The Happiness Trap because popular notions

00:04:14.320 of happiness create this trap that actually pull you into this vicious cycle of avoidance that makes

00:04:20.180 life worse.

00:04:21.180 There's a very different way of looking at happiness, which doesn't come naturally to most people.

00:04:27.760 The kind of concepts of happiness I've just been talking about is really only become popular

00:04:32.180 in the last hundred years, this idea that it's about feeling good.

00:04:35.840 But if we go back over the centuries, for most of recorded history, happiness has not been about

00:04:41.060 feeling good.

00:04:41.920 It's been about doing good.

00:04:43.580 It's about living your values, behaving like the person you want to be, doing things that are

00:04:48.920 meaningful and purposeful.

00:04:51.440 And when we create a meaningful life, living by our values, doing the stuff that's fulfilling

00:04:57.120 and meaningful and purposeful, well, as we do that, we'll experience the full range of human

00:05:03.040 emotions, both pleasant and painful.

00:05:06.280 We'll experience the enjoyable emotions, love and joy, and we'll experience the painful ones,

00:05:12.200 fear and sadness and anger and anxiety and guilt.

00:05:15.420 These are all part of the rich tapestry of human life.

00:05:19.200 So if we could reconceptualize happiness as living a rich, full and meaningful life in which we feel the full

00:05:24.860 range of human emotions, both pleasant and painful, we'd be a lot better off.

00:05:30.780 Yeah.

00:05:30.840 And that second definition of happiness, that it's a meaningful life where you can experience

00:05:35.680 unpleasant emotions and feelings, but still have a meaningful life.

00:05:39.100 That's like eudaimonia from the ancient Greeks, like it's a flourishing life.

00:05:43.720 Yeah, very much.

00:05:44.840 That's much more in line with the kind of meaningful, fulfilling life that I'm encouraging.

00:05:49.580 Yeah, so you talk about when we define happiness as just feeling good, we engage in experiential

00:05:56.960 avoidance and you talk about there's different ways we can do that and you call it, we struggle

00:06:01.600 with an emotion or a feeling and there's different struggle strategies you describe in the book.

00:06:06.320 What are some common ways we struggle with an unpleasant emotion so we can get rid of it?

00:06:11.640 And the idea is that we'll feel that happy feeling again.

00:06:14.220 What are some typical struggle strategies?

00:06:16.060 Well, by far the most common that we all do is distraction.

00:06:20.400 It's so easy for us in our modern world with our phones always at our fingertips that we

00:06:25.840 can just distract ourselves.

00:06:27.860 We've got some unpleasant thoughts and feelings going up.

00:06:30.320 We start scrolling through social media or watching some YouTube videos or whatever it

00:06:35.800 is that we like to do on our phones and our devices.

00:06:39.220 And it kind of gives us a bit of short-term relief from whatever unpleasant feelings are showing

00:06:45.360 up.

00:06:46.060 And a little bit of distraction is not a problem at all, but we all know what happens when

00:06:51.820 we do excessive distraction.

00:06:53.600 I'm sure, I know I have, and I'm sure all your listeners have experienced that sense of

00:06:59.340 wasted time where you've just kind of been, you know, whether it's skipping through programs

00:07:05.140 on television, just trying to distract yourself from how you're feeling.

00:07:08.180 And it's not really very satisfying or fulfilling.

00:07:10.560 And, of course, it's only a temporary relief.

00:07:14.860 Opting out is another very common strategy.

00:07:17.820 We opt out of the difficult people, places, situations, or activities that bring up difficult

00:07:24.960 thoughts and feelings for us.

00:07:26.360 We procrastinate on things.

00:07:28.240 We avoid difficult conversations.

00:07:31.500 We stay away from perhaps social situations that we think are going to be challenging.

00:07:37.480 And again, this kind of opting out, procrastination, putting things off gives us a bit of short-term

00:07:43.040 relief.

00:07:43.780 But of course, in the long term, if we do too much of this, our life gets very small.

00:07:49.280 If we do too much procrastination, that leads to many other problems because we're not really

00:07:54.500 addressing the important things we need to do in life.

00:07:57.760 And so all of these struggle strategies, they have this kind of short-term relief.

00:08:02.000 But in the long term, they tend to make life worse if you do too much of them.

00:08:06.520 Another common one is just substances.

00:08:08.680 All of us, to some extent, put substances into our body to feel better.

00:08:13.840 Whether that's just aspirin, or whether that's a glass of wine, or whether that's some chocolate

00:08:19.760 cookies, or chips, or in the more extreme cases, hard drugs.

00:08:26.320 And again, very often when we do this, these substances give us some short-term relief from

00:08:31.920 pain.

00:08:32.460 But in the long term, if we overuse these substances, if we use them too much, too excessively,

00:08:38.620 then we get, you know, all sorts of health problems, whether that's from overeating, or

00:08:44.840 overdrinking, or addiction.

00:08:48.000 We also talk about many traditional therapy modalities.

00:08:51.520 They inadvertently, maybe, lead people to engage in struggle strategies.

00:08:56.760 What are some examples of that?

00:08:58.800 Well, I would say probably, again, that the two most common would be distraction techniques.

00:09:03.620 I mean, these are so popular, you know, some unpleasant thoughts and feelings show up.

00:09:09.600 And so you, you know, you go to your happy place, or you think of something positive, or

00:09:14.180 you, you know, snap an elastic band around your wrist and tell those thoughts and feelings

00:09:18.500 to go away. 0.66

00:09:19.860 And one of the big problems with distraction strategies is there's a sort of rebound effect.

00:09:25.600 So they do work in the short term.

00:09:27.640 For example, you know, snapping an elastic band and telling negative thoughts to go away.

00:09:31.680 Actually, in the short term, they do.

00:09:33.480 But what the research shows very clearly is that in the long term, they rebound with greater

00:09:38.660 and greater frequency and intensity.

00:09:41.240 It's the same with kind of squashing painful emotions down, suppressing our emotions.

00:09:46.180 In the short term, we can actually do it.

00:09:48.700 But again, in the long term, lots of research to show there's a rebound effect where the emotions

00:09:53.080 come back with greater frequency and intensity.

00:09:56.020 Many, many pop psychology strategies rely very heavily on thinking techniques, it might kind

00:10:03.720 of challenge your negative thoughts or try to replace them with positive affirmations.

00:10:09.620 And the thing with thinking techniques is they work quite well a lot of the time, if your emotional

00:10:17.680 pain is mild, if you're just a little bit sad or a little bit angry or a little bit anxious

00:10:22.780 or a little bit guilty, you can usually think your way out of it quite effectively with these

00:10:27.860 pop psychology strategies.

00:10:30.020 But the more intense your emotional pain and the greater the difficulty you're facing in

00:10:35.200 your life, the less effective those techniques become.

00:10:39.200 You know, take the example of someone you love is dying or has just died.

00:10:44.020 There's no positive thinking strategy that's going to enable you to think away your painful

00:10:48.940 feelings, you're going to have intense feelings of sadness or anger, maybe anxiety.

00:10:55.680 I mean, it depends on, you know, what your relationship was like with this person and

00:11:00.000 what's led up to their death and so forth.

00:11:02.180 But one thing's sure, there's going to be lots of painful emotions.

00:11:05.720 And you can't just think that away.

00:11:07.380 You can't expect to feel happy and think positively in the face of a great loss.

00:11:12.940 Same with other very really kind of challenging situations in life.

00:11:17.240 So people often get a bit frustrated that they're trying to use these positive thinking

00:11:21.760 techniques and finding they're not working and then it's what's wrong with me and it's

00:11:25.840 just setting people up for failure.

00:11:27.640 So they work okay with kind of mild emotional distress, but not with really big stuff.

00:11:32.920 No, I've experienced that because, you know, I've read books about cognitive behavioral therapy

00:11:35.940 and like one of the premises of cognitive behavioral therapy is that if you have this sort of negative

00:11:40.340 self-defeating thought, you're supposed to challenge it.

00:11:42.520 Let's think rationally and logically about this.

00:11:44.720 But I found sometimes when I do that, I can come up with all sorts of reasons. 0.99

00:11:48.160 Like, you know, if I'm like, well, I'm an idiot and then you're like, well, am I really 1.00

00:11:51.260 an idiot? 1.00

00:11:51.800 And then I'd be like, well, yeah, here's all the reasons why I can come up with like, 1.00

00:11:54.700 and it just makes it worse. 0.99

00:11:56.080 And I'm feeling, and then like you said, you're like, you feel dumb. 0.84

00:11:59.500 She's like, why isn't this working?

00:12:00.540 Why can't I get this thing, this, you know, cognitive behavioral therapy thing to work for

00:12:03.800 me?

00:12:03.980 And then it just goes down, just continues down in a vicious cycle.

00:12:06.700 So I can relate to that very strongly.

00:12:10.860 Yeah.

00:12:11.120 You know, and then of course that just gives your mind even more ammunition.

00:12:14.420 Yeah. 0.99

00:12:14.600 See what a loser I am. 0.99

00:12:15.900 I can't even do this cognitive therapy. 0.99

00:12:19.060 Okay.

00:12:19.500 So those are some struggle strategies.

00:12:20.860 So distraction, fighting with it, trying to like reason your way out of it.

00:12:24.820 You're not saying that there's like the cognitive behavioral therapy stuff isn't useful.

00:12:28.980 It's useful in some situations, but not all the time.

00:12:31.720 You talk about another thing that we often do when we experience a negative emotion or

00:12:36.760 feeling or thought besides struggling with it is obeying it.

00:12:40.980 What do you mean by that?

00:12:43.120 Well, a lot of the time our thoughts show up and we're not even aware that we're thinking

00:12:49.420 our mind says, do this, do that, do the other.

00:12:52.000 And we just go along with it.

00:12:53.740 Our mind makes a judgment or an appraisal of a situation.

00:12:58.020 You know, that person's bad.

00:12:59.920 You know, this situation's too hard.

00:13:03.380 I can't deal with it.

00:13:04.740 I have to do this.

00:13:06.180 I must do that.

00:13:07.320 I shouldn't do the other.

00:13:08.760 I can't do X until Y.

00:13:11.060 And we just go along with that stuff.

00:13:13.140 Our mind lays down these judgments and these rules and we just follow along blindly.

00:13:19.140 And the problem is that can keep us caught in a rut just doing the same old thing.

00:13:24.720 I mean, a good example of this is perfectionism, for example.

00:13:29.300 You know, our mind lays down all these rules.

00:13:31.560 I have to do it perfectly.

00:13:32.980 I mustn't let anyone down.

00:13:34.860 I have to stick at this and make sure everything's spot on.

00:13:38.620 And there's no point doing it unless I can do it perfectly.

00:13:41.420 And what happens is, if anyone's experienced this, I know I certainly have in my life, it

00:13:49.340 puts just massive pressure on you.

00:13:51.280 It doesn't even occur to you that these are arbitrary rules your mind has kind of come

00:13:56.420 up with, that you've got a choice about whether you follow them or whether you bend them or

00:14:01.280 whether you break them.

00:14:02.780 We just kind of go on to automatic pilot and do what our mind tells us to do.

00:14:07.540 You know, another common example is people-pleasing rules.

00:14:10.560 These play a big role in many people who suffer from depression.

00:14:14.760 It's like, I have to please others.

00:14:16.500 I have to put their needs first.

00:14:18.440 My needs don't count.

00:14:20.540 What they want is more important than I want.

00:14:23.380 And, you know, if you get caught up in that kind of people-pleasing routine, life gets pretty

00:14:29.460 miserable.

00:14:30.140 It's all about sacrificing yourself to please others.

00:14:33.640 So, we can identify our mind's rules by words like should, have to, must, ought, can't,

00:14:40.080 unless, won't, until, don't, because.

00:14:43.060 And we kind of want to have a look.

00:14:46.100 If I keep following these rules, is it actually giving me the life that I want?

00:14:51.060 Is it giving me the relationships I want?

00:14:53.520 You know, one of the problems with obeying these rules is they very often create tension

00:14:57.580 and conflict in relationships, particularly when we start imposing those rules on the

00:15:02.380 other person.

00:15:03.640 You should do this and you shouldn't do that.

00:15:06.760 And none of us likes being told what we should or shouldn't do, right?

00:15:11.240 No, no.

00:15:12.440 Okay.

00:15:12.720 So, we can either struggle with these negative thoughts, emotions, feelings, and that can

00:15:17.400 lead to a happiness trap because they usually just backfire.

00:15:20.160 It just makes the problem worse or there's a rebound effect.

00:15:23.000 Or we can obey it and just kind of follow along with it.

00:15:26.640 And that just continues just making us feel miserable.

00:15:28.900 It doesn't change anything.

00:15:30.760 Yeah.

00:15:30.960 Well, you know, just expanding the concept of obey, it's not just about obeying what our

00:15:35.620 mind says.

00:15:36.300 It's also obeying our emotions.

00:15:38.400 You know, anger shows up and there's an urge to shout or yell or fight.

00:15:43.500 You know, fear shows up and there's an urge to hide away, escape, avoid.

00:15:47.680 And so, again, we often obey our emotions.

00:15:50.580 Just let them jerk us around like a puppet on a string, pull us into patterns of behavior.

00:15:56.340 It's just kind of completely driven by the emotion itself.

00:16:00.420 So, we connect ourselves with their emotions, like we're fused too much with our emotions

00:16:04.740 when we obey.

00:16:05.540 Yeah, fused is the technical term.

00:16:07.440 Basically, the emotion dominates us and it just kind of jerks us around and pushes us around.

00:16:12.860 You know, in everyday language, we say, you know, I was in the grip of anger, for example.

00:16:18.080 But what that basically means is you're just allowing your emotions to rule you and dictate

00:16:23.740 what you do.

00:16:24.640 So, this applies to thoughts as well as feelings.

00:16:28.920 So, let's dig into how acceptance and commitment therapy approaches difficult thoughts and emotions.

00:16:34.280 And you talk about the first step of acceptance and commitment therapy is this idea of unhooking

00:16:40.040 yourself from the difficult thought or emotion.

00:16:43.060 What do you mean by that?

00:16:44.300 Can I just, before I answer the question, explain the name acceptance and commitment therapy?

00:16:51.480 Yeah.

00:16:51.900 Which for sure is, it was created by Stephen Hayes, a professor of psychology at the University

00:16:58.160 of Reno, Nevada.

00:16:59.900 And ACT is the shortened term for it.

00:17:03.200 And it gets its name because of one of the key messages, accept what's out of your personal

00:17:08.540 control and commit to action that improves your life.

00:17:12.260 So, there's basically three strands to the therapy itself.

00:17:19.280 One strand is this idea of taking action, committed action to do the things in life that are important

00:17:27.440 and meaningful and fulfilling.

00:17:29.140 So, you get in touch with your values, your heart's deepest desires for how you want to

00:17:34.480 behave, how you want to treat yourself and others.

00:17:36.740 And you use those values as a compass to guide your actions and motivate you to do the things

00:17:42.240 that matter.

00:17:43.520 The second stream of the approach is learning these unhooking skills, how to unhook from

00:17:51.760 difficult thoughts, feelings, emotions, and memories so that they can't jerk you around

00:17:56.720 and pull you all over the place.

00:17:58.760 Learning how to basically take the power and impact out of difficult or unwanted thoughts

00:18:03.140 and feelings.

00:18:03.640 And then the third stream of therapy is really focusing your attention, learning how to focus

00:18:09.840 your attention on what's important right here, right now, and to engage in what you're doing

00:18:15.040 so you get the most out of it.

00:18:17.660 So, unhooking skills are one of those three streams.

00:18:21.940 And it's basically a set of skills that really teach you how to respond to even the most difficult,

00:18:30.340 painful emotions, thoughts, feelings, and memories in a new way, in a way that basically drains

00:18:36.880 them of their power.

00:18:38.080 They're still there.

00:18:39.180 It's not a way to get rid of these thoughts and feelings, but it's a way to take the impact

00:18:43.640 out of them.

00:18:44.220 You learn how to let them flow through you.

00:18:47.060 Let them come and stay and go in their own good time without sweeping you away, without

00:18:52.980 crushing you, and without you fighting with them or trying to escape from them.

00:18:58.920 Okay.

00:18:59.320 So, the idea is you're not, instead of like, I'm trying to give you an example of incognitive

00:19:03.620 behavioral therapy, if you had a negative emotion or thought, the typical response would

00:19:08.220 be like, well, let's look at this.

00:19:09.680 Let's challenge that.

00:19:10.360 Do you have any real reason to feel like this?

00:19:13.380 And you'd kind of go through the self-dialogue.

00:19:16.720 In acceptance and commitment theory, when you have that negative thought and emotion,

00:19:20.020 that doesn't happen.

00:19:21.220 Like, you're not trying to get rid of the negative thought or emotion.

00:19:25.300 No, that's right.

00:19:27.160 Yeah.

00:19:27.540 So, it's basically, your first step in ACT would be just to acknowledge, oh, okay, here

00:19:34.480 it is.

00:19:34.980 Here's this difficult thought or here's this difficult feeling showing up.

00:19:39.140 Yes, I know this one.

00:19:40.400 Well, and then rather than, well, let's talk about thoughts and feelings a bit separately.

00:19:46.960 Sure.

00:19:47.260 They kind of overlap, but it'd be useful.

00:19:49.360 You know, if you've got a thought like, I'm not good enough, for example, the chances are

00:19:56.880 that thought has showed up hundreds of thousands, if not millions of times by the time you get

00:20:03.560 to therapy or read a self-help book or go and see a coach or something.

00:20:07.900 So, there's no delete button in the brain.

00:20:10.820 There's no way you're going to kind of delete the I'm not good enough story so that it never

00:20:15.720 shows up.

00:20:16.600 It's a deeply entrenched neuronal pathway.

00:20:19.760 And so, it's a bit pointless going in and trying to fight it and challenge it and dispute

00:20:25.340 it every time it shows up.

00:20:26.840 But what we want to do is basically lay down a new neuronal pathway in the brain so that

00:20:32.780 when I'm not good enough pops up, we can go, oh, there's the not good enough story or

00:20:37.760 oh, there's the inner critic or oh, there's my mind giving me a hard time.

00:20:42.460 Oh, I know this one.

00:20:43.520 I've heard this before.

00:20:44.960 You know, so that instantly takes a lot of the impact out of it.

00:20:48.860 Just kind of recognizing it, acknowledging it, and choosing not to fight it.

00:20:53.320 It doesn't mean that we agree with it and believe it and buy into it, but we kind of

00:20:57.340 start to see this is a thought.

00:20:59.620 These are words or sometimes words and pictures that are popping up in my head right now.

00:21:06.000 So, that's thoughts.

00:21:06.920 You can do the same thing with feelings as well, correct?

00:21:09.340 Yeah, so a painful feeling shows up, anger or sadness.

00:21:15.180 And again, the first step is just to, okay, here's sadness or here's anger.

00:21:19.160 I'm noticing, you know, his tightness in my chest, his knots in my stomach, his teariness

00:21:25.400 in my eyes, and just recognizing this is a normal human emotion.

00:21:29.740 This is an emotion that we expect to feel when life is tough, when things are challenging.

00:21:34.720 It's absolutely a normal part of being human to have painful emotions.

00:21:40.920 It's a normal part of being human to have negative thoughts.

00:21:45.020 And, you know, it's useful to recognize if we come back to thoughts, you know, our mind

00:21:51.100 generates these negative thoughts for a purpose.

00:21:53.720 It's not deliberately trying to beat us up and give us a hard time.

00:21:57.680 It's always, there's an underlying purpose.

00:21:59.920 Our mind is always trying to help us avoid things that we don't want.

00:22:03.880 Or get things that we do want.

00:22:06.680 The problem is, it very often goes about doing that in a way that is ultimately unhelpful.

00:22:12.360 I often compare your mind to like an overly helpful friend, one of those friends who's

00:22:18.000 trying so hard to help that they end up getting in the way and making things worse.

00:22:24.000 Have you ever had a friend like that, Brett?

00:22:25.800 Yeah.

00:22:26.980 And so, you know, if we come back to the idea of your mind beating you up, criticizing you,

00:22:30.880 telling you they're not good enough story, usually your mind's trying to help you change

00:22:35.600 your behavior.

00:22:36.320 It's telling you to shape up or it's warning you about what might happen if you keep on

00:22:41.560 doing these things, how you might get into trouble.

00:22:44.880 Maybe it's trying to save you from failure or save you from rejection.

00:22:49.120 But mostly it's trying to just help you shape up and do things better when it starts beating

00:22:54.060 you up.

00:22:54.780 If we take other common patterns of negative thinking, like worrying and predicting the

00:23:00.660 worst and catastrophizing, again, this is your mind warning you of potential dangers,

00:23:06.420 potential threats.

00:23:07.420 It's trying to help prepare you for the worst.

00:23:09.960 Make sure that you're as well prepared as you can be.

00:23:13.060 It's trying to keep you safe and avoid you getting hurt.

00:23:16.400 So if we look at pretty much any negative cognitive process, we're going to see that

00:23:22.180 there's always an underlying purpose.

00:23:24.040 It's always your mind trying to help you avoid something you don't want or get something that

00:23:28.180 you do want or both.

00:23:29.540 But it's just going about it in a very kind of clumsy way.

00:23:33.520 And so if we are, here's my mind again, here's the not good enough story.

00:23:36.820 I know this one.

00:23:37.840 OK, thanks, mind.

00:23:39.180 I know you're trying to help and it's OK.

00:23:41.320 I've got this handled.

00:23:42.340 So now we're not fighting with it, we're not arguing with it, but nor are we buying

00:23:46.520 into it, nor are we letting that kind of thought dominate us and push us around.

00:23:51.880 We're going to take a quick break for a word from our sponsors.

00:23:59.120 And now back to the show.

00:24:01.040 And what's weird about this is really counterintuitive.

00:24:03.400 By simply just accepting the negative thought or emotion, say, oh, yeah, there's that thought.

00:24:08.480 It diffuses things.

00:24:10.360 I mean, what's going on there?

00:24:11.340 Has there been research done?

00:24:12.760 Like why just kind of noticing it and accepting it just kind of takes the heat off of things?

00:24:19.260 Yeah, well, look, it's interesting because, you know, coming back to cognitive behavioral

00:24:23.860 therapy, I mean, like cognitive behavioral therapy and ACT are fellow travelers and they

00:24:29.980 actually do have a lot in common.

00:24:32.160 And Steve Hayes, the guy who created ACT, was intrigued by the finding in cognitive behavioral

00:24:39.500 therapy that improvement happened way before you got to the point where you start disputing

00:24:46.300 or challenging negative thoughts.

00:24:47.980 I kind of noticed that the first stage in CBT is that you just kind of acknowledge the thoughts

00:24:55.180 that are showing up and you non-judgmentally label them.

00:24:58.360 So, oh, OK, there's black and white thinking or there's catastrophizing.

00:25:02.240 And clinical improvement started at that point, just the kind of noticing and non-judgmental

00:25:08.900 naming of cognition, which in CBT is called cognitive distancing.

00:25:13.820 And so Steve Hayes kind of thought, well, what if instead of going on to challenge and dispute

00:25:18.840 those thoughts, what if we went in that distancing further, really helping people to kind of step

00:25:24.860 back and see their thoughts as nothing more or less than words or pictures?

00:25:30.280 And when we can step back from our thoughts, then we've got a lot more choice about what

00:25:34.560 we do with them.

00:25:35.560 You know, I often use the analogy that your mind is a lot like radio doom and gloom.

00:25:42.340 It naturally broadcasts a lot of painful stuff from the past, a lot of fearful stuff about

00:25:47.960 the future, and a lot of difficult stuff that's going on in the present.

00:25:52.100 That's a normal human mind.

00:25:55.200 And have you ever had the experience, there was a radio playing on in the background and

00:26:00.180 you were so absorbed in what you're doing that you hardly even knew the radio was there.

00:26:06.880 Right, yeah.

00:26:07.160 And then, yeah, yeah.

00:26:08.720 And then suddenly the radio, you know, the song changed.

00:26:11.360 One of your favorite songs was there and you were singing along and you were very aware

00:26:15.340 of it.

00:26:15.900 And then the song changed and the radio faded into the background again.

00:26:19.560 And this is what we're trying to help people do in ACT.

00:26:23.260 It's like focus on, you know, do the meaningful things, live your values, engage in what you're

00:26:29.520 doing, really focus on it and let your mind just chatter away in the background, broadcasting

00:26:35.880 all the stuff that it normally does.

00:26:38.200 If your mind's broadcasting something useful and helpful that helps you to live your life,

00:26:42.220 then by all means tune in and make use of that.

00:26:44.660 But a lot of the time, a lot of the stuff on that kind of radio is going to be fairly

00:26:50.680 unhelpful.

00:26:51.700 So, you know, it's like what happens if you start arguing with a radio?

00:26:56.460 What happens if you start trying to ignore a radio?

00:26:59.820 The more you try to ignore it, the more it bothers you or a loud voice in a restaurant

00:27:03.820 or a lawnmower outside.

00:27:05.700 The more you try to ignore something, the more it bothers you.

00:27:08.020 So just kind of learning how to let it be there, let it play on and take anything that's

00:27:12.900 useful that kind of gets broadcast along the way.

00:27:16.380 And in the book, you lay out some different strategies or techniques people can use to

00:27:20.300 unhook.

00:27:21.260 We mentioned just notice a name, which is just like, well, there I am thinking that I'm 1.00

00:27:25.800 an idiot. 0.99

00:27:26.620 That can work for a lot of people. 1.00

00:27:28.180 But what are some other ones that you have found useful with the people you work with?

00:27:32.480 You know what?

00:27:32.960 I'm wondering, could I take the listeners through a very quick exercise right now?

00:27:36.640 Yeah, that'd be great.

00:27:37.220 Okay, so if you're listening to this, I hope you're listening to this, bring to mind a negative

00:27:42.420 thought that tends to hook you, you know, a thought that when it shows up, it tends to

00:27:47.200 jerk you around, pull you out of your life, pull you back, pull you into a dark space.

00:27:52.400 If you're struggling to come up with ideas, then just pick some version of the I'm not

00:27:56.240 good enough story.

00:27:57.700 I mean, everyone's got multiple versions of I'm not good enough, whether it's I'm fat or 0.96

00:28:02.340 I'm stupid or I'm too old or I'm not enough of this or I'm too much of that. 0.98

00:28:06.480 And so bring to mind a kind of nasty negative self judgment. 0.99

00:28:11.440 And what I'll ask you to do is just for the next few seconds, I'm going to get you to buy

00:28:17.860 into that thought, believe it as much as you can, get all consumed by it.

00:28:23.040 So please don't challenge it or don't dispute it.

00:28:26.200 I want you to do the very opposite.

00:28:27.660 Let it hook you, let it pull you in.

00:28:29.960 And obviously, you'll feel a bit uncomfortable when you do that.

00:28:32.740 So I hope you're willing to feel a little bit uncomfortable to learn a useful new skill.

00:28:38.200 So maybe if we just give people about five seconds of silence just to bring this thought

00:28:45.860 to mind and buy into it. 1.00

00:28:47.740 I'm stupid or I'm not smart enough or I'm fat or I'm unworthy or any other thought that 1.00

00:28:57.500 really kind of tends to hook you, buy into it now. 1.00

00:29:02.080 Really let it grab you.

00:29:05.500 Really let it pull you in.

00:29:07.080 Now, silently replay that thought with these words in front.

00:29:16.380 I'm having the thought that. 1.00

00:29:19.940 I'm having the thought that I'm stupid. 0.99

00:29:25.260 Now, replay it one more time with a longer phrase. 1.00

00:29:31.780 I notice I'm having the thought that I notice I'm having the thought that I'm a lousy parent.

00:29:46.640 So I hope you viewers did that, Brett.

00:29:49.200 Did you have a go at it?

00:29:50.380 I did have a go at it, yes.

00:29:52.280 And what kind of happened for you?

00:29:54.600 Well, it just, it reduced the, there's like a distance put into it.

00:29:58.300 Like the phrase is like, I just noticed myself becoming more distant from that initial thought,

00:30:03.880 basically.

00:30:05.980 So yeah, that's the common experience.

00:30:08.880 If any viewer didn't have that experience, I just encourage you to try it again, pick a

00:30:13.880 different thought perhaps and try it again.

00:30:15.620 But that's a very simple, the technical name for what we're doing there, I think you mentioned

00:30:21.040 it earlier, is cognitive diffusion.

00:30:23.300 So kind of cognitive fusion means we get hooked by our thoughts.

00:30:26.900 They dominate us, they have huge power over us, whereas cognitive diffusion means we kind

00:30:32.420 of separate or distance from our thoughts and we can see their true nature.

00:30:36.380 We can see that their words or pictures or combinations thereof.

00:30:40.420 And when we can see that, then we've got a lot more choice about what we do when those

00:30:44.560 thoughts are present.

00:30:46.000 Now, I must say, I have occasionally had a client kind of react when I introduced this

00:30:51.900 exercise to them.

00:30:52.960 I remember one guy, he was massively overweight, kind of morbidly obese guy.

00:31:00.500 And, you know, I took him through that exercise and he said, but it's true, I really am fat.

00:31:07.860 And he like pulled up his shirt to kind of show me.

00:31:11.520 I was like, well, thank you for sharing.

00:31:13.660 And it's one of the things in ACT is we never, ever get into debates about whether these thoughts

00:31:19.780 are true or false.

00:31:21.340 So, you know, I said to this guy, he'd been referred to me because he was suffering from

00:31:26.320 major depression.

00:31:28.140 And so I said to him, look, I know you've seen other therapists before me and you've

00:31:34.160 tried debating whether your thoughts were true or false.

00:31:37.260 And was that helpful for you?

00:31:39.120 And he's like, well, no, because I am fat, you know. 0.61

00:31:42.220 And he had a very harsh inner critic, you know, I'm a loser, I'm killing myself by eating all 0.98

00:31:49.620 of this, I'm disgusting, look at all of this fat. 0.92

00:31:54.360 And so like really, really harsh, lots of harsh self-judgment. 0.98

00:31:59.040 And so I kind of said to him, I said, well, look, you know, your mind is actually a lot

00:32:03.140 like my mind.

00:32:04.100 We all have minds that are very quick to judge us and criticize us and label us and tell

00:32:09.860 us what's not good enough about ourselves.

00:32:13.420 And, you know, this is basically a normal human mind.

00:32:16.220 And I don't know how to stop your mind from speaking to you that way.

00:32:20.260 I do know that debating whether your thoughts are true or false is not likely to have any

00:32:24.820 impact at all, right?

00:32:26.600 So he's kind of nodding his head.

00:32:28.260 Yes.

00:32:29.020 And so it's like our aim here is to kind of learn a different way of responding to those

00:32:33.560 thoughts.

00:32:33.920 So that when they show up, you can take the power and impact out of them so they don't

00:32:38.040 have to jerk you around. 0.94

00:32:40.000 Because I said, you know, what normally happens when all of these kind of self-critical thoughts

00:32:44.960 pop up?

00:32:46.000 What normally happens when you get hooked by them?

00:32:48.720 Oh, you say, well, I'll get depressed, mate.

00:32:52.160 Okay.

00:32:52.620 And so then when you get depressed, what do you do? 1.00

00:32:55.920 Oh, I'll eat a load of shit, mate. 1.00

00:32:58.660 Okay. 1.00

00:32:59.260 So, you know, getting hooked by these thoughts isn't really helping you.

00:33:03.280 And then remember the other part of the model is about values.

00:33:07.180 So I kind of said, let's just put this unhooking stuff to one side for a moment and let's have

00:33:12.020 a look at your values.

00:33:13.900 And one of my favorite ways of getting people in touch with their values is I ask this question.

00:33:18.220 If I could wave a magic wand so all these thoughts and feelings that you're struggling with are like

00:33:25.300 water off a duck's back, they kind of flow over you without jerking you around, then what would

00:33:32.120 you do differently?

00:33:33.620 How would you treat your body?

00:33:36.000 How would you treat your friends?

00:33:37.560 How would you treat your family?

00:33:39.700 How would you treat your life differently?

00:33:41.980 What would you start doing more of?

00:33:44.520 What would you start doing?

00:33:46.200 What would you stop doing or do less of?

00:33:48.740 And so I asked this guy the same question.

00:33:52.740 Let's just kind of have a look at how you treat your body.

00:33:55.360 Wave this magic wand, all these depressing thoughts and feelings.

00:33:58.240 Use their power.

00:33:58.860 How would you treat your body differently?

00:34:02.080 And he said, well, I wouldn't sit around all day just watching the telly.

00:34:07.180 Okay, so what would you do differently?

00:34:10.080 Well, I might get up and exercise.

00:34:13.720 Okay, so you'd be exercising more.

00:34:15.620 You'd be moving more.

00:34:17.420 What else would be different? 0.97

00:34:19.360 Well, I wouldn't eat so much shitty food. 0.78

00:34:23.560 Okay, so you might be eating more healthy food. 0.71

00:34:27.180 Yeah, yeah.

00:34:27.820 Okay, so I'm going to say there's a very important value here that's getting lost.

00:34:32.800 I'm going to call it self-care.

00:34:34.720 And if you were in touch with this value of self-care, you'd be making different choices.

00:34:39.500 You'd be eating differently.

00:34:40.720 You'd be moving more, exercising more.

00:34:43.260 Yeah.

00:34:44.040 Okay, so when your mind comes in and it starts kind of beating you up and telling you the 0.93

00:34:49.000 not good enough story and telling you about, you know, I'm fat, I'm a loser and so forth.

00:34:53.260 If you get hooked by those thoughts, does it help you to live that value of self-care?

00:34:59.240 Okay, so there's no question here about whether they're true or false.

00:35:03.240 It's just a pragmatic choice.

00:35:05.740 Getting hooked by these thoughts isn't helping you to live your values, do the stuff that's

00:35:10.260 important.

00:35:10.660 So let's learn some unhooking skills here and let's not waste time debating whether things

00:35:15.680 are true or false.

00:35:16.920 So it's a massive paradigm shift for people, this approach, but a very liberating one.

00:35:22.500 And I imagine this takes practice to do.

00:35:24.720 It's not some one and done thing, right?

00:35:26.640 So you're probably, I think most people are probably just ingrained.

00:35:29.640 Like if you have a negative emotion, you got to fight it, you know, squash it down, distract

00:35:33.100 yourself.

00:35:34.400 It's going to, when you first try this stuff, you're not going to be very good at it, but

00:35:38.400 the more you do it, the better you're going to get at it.

00:35:41.120 Yeah, that's a great summary.

00:35:43.380 Yeah.

00:35:43.600 I mean, basically we're talking about a whole new set of skills in this approach and like

00:35:49.620 any new skill, it requires practice.

00:35:52.080 And as you said, you know, these things are counterintuitive.

00:35:55.360 They go against the grain.

00:35:57.360 They're not our default.

00:35:58.380 It's so, uh, it's so unusual for us to kind of learn how to, you know, let these thoughts

00:36:04.340 and feelings be there and just take the power out of them rather than fighting with them

00:36:09.340 or running from them.

00:36:11.000 Related to this idea of unhooking ourselves from emotions.

00:36:14.800 Let's say like you're, you're experiencing like a really strong emotion.

00:36:17.620 Like I'm just like, just big, severe, just anxiety or depression, or just this rumination.

00:36:24.000 You talk about, you need to make room for that.

00:36:27.180 Again, that's counterintuitive.

00:36:28.400 Cause you think, well, I'm feeling those things.

00:36:29.320 I want those to go away.

00:36:30.760 Why would I make room for it?

00:36:32.340 What do you mean by making room for difficult emotions?

00:36:36.900 Well, I think I often talk about this idea.

00:36:40.600 There's like a struggle switch at the back of your mind.

00:36:43.220 And as soon as a difficult emotion shows up, the struggle switch goes on and you start to

00:36:48.140 struggle with it.

00:36:48.860 So let's suppose anxiety shows up, struggle switch goes on.

00:36:52.860 Oh no, here's anxiety.

00:36:54.420 I don't like anxiety.

00:36:55.580 I wish this anxiety was gone.

00:36:57.280 Wow.

00:36:57.700 Now you've got anxiety about your anxiety.

00:37:01.220 Suddenly it's getting bigger.

00:37:02.680 Oh, oh, anxiety is getting bigger.

00:37:04.220 How do I get rid of anxiety?

00:37:05.260 This anxiety is really terrible.

00:37:06.680 Now you've got another layer of anxiety.

00:37:08.720 You've got anxiety about your anxiety, about your anxiety.

00:37:11.800 So the struggle switch kind of amplifies your emotions, makes them bigger.

00:37:16.300 You may then get angry about your anxiety.

00:37:18.880 Why does this keep happening to me?

00:37:20.440 Then you may start to feel guilty.

00:37:22.040 Oh, you know, there's starving kids in Africa.

00:37:25.140 What have I got to complain about?

00:37:26.840 Now you've got guilt about your anger, about your anxiety, about your anxiety, about your

00:37:30.920 anxiety.

00:37:31.700 So the struggle switch kind of massively amplifies your emotions, makes them bigger, stronger,

00:37:37.320 stickier.

00:37:38.000 They hang around for a lot longer.

00:37:40.380 So what we learn to do is how to switch off our struggle switch.

00:37:43.900 So anxiety shows up and it's not that I like it or want it or approve of it.

00:37:48.140 It's an unpleasant emotion, but I'm just not going to struggle with it.

00:37:51.880 I'm just going to let the anxiety be there.

00:37:53.840 I'll notice there's tightness in my chest and knots in my stomach.

00:37:56.660 And I'll notice radio doom and gloom in my head is broadcasting a lot of scary stories.

00:38:01.680 And I'll just allow that anxiety to flow through me.

00:38:06.380 I'll just let it kind of come and stay and go, not fighting it, not struggling with it.

00:38:12.140 And what happens is I find that, you know, the anxiety is then free to move.

00:38:17.400 It may get higher if it's a very challenging situation.

00:38:20.940 It may get lower.

00:38:22.560 It may move on quickly.

00:38:24.440 It may move on slowly.

00:38:26.180 But the point is, it's free to move and it doesn't get amplified and stuck when the struggle

00:38:32.580 switch is on.

00:38:33.660 So there's a number of different skills in the book that teach people how to switch off

00:38:38.280 this struggle switch.

00:38:39.520 And when you learn how to do that, how to just kind of turn towards your emotions with

00:38:43.580 openness and curiosity and notice what they're like in your body and kind of breathe into

00:38:48.160 them, make room for them. 1.00

00:38:50.400 It's so much easier to have them.

00:38:53.200 Without these skills, these emotions are always going to seem awful and unbearable.

00:38:58.120 And your default is always going to be to fall back into those struggle strategies.

00:39:03.320 So when I talk about opening up, that's just a metaphorical way of speaking.

00:39:08.140 Really, people have to kind of learn these skills that are all about tuning into their body

00:39:12.700 with openness and curiosity and noticing the different layers of the emotion and learning

00:39:17.880 how to kind of let that struggle dissipate.

00:39:21.180 And the research on this, again, is very powerful.

00:39:25.320 There's so many, I mean, there's over 3,000 published studies on the ACT approach with over

00:39:31.280 1,000 randomized controlled trials, which is like the gold standard of research.

00:39:35.920 And what we see is people with anxiety disorders, as they learn how to open up and drop the struggle

00:39:44.580 with anxiety and let it flow through them, what we see is that their symptoms of anxiety go down

00:39:50.420 and down and down and down and down, but not from doing the common sense things, not from trying to

00:39:57.100 control the anxiety, not from trying to push it away, not from trying to challenge the anxious

00:40:01.920 thoughts or squish the anxious feelings or replace them with relaxation feelings.

00:40:07.480 It's not from any of that.

00:40:08.980 It's from just learning this new way of kind of opening up and letting it flow through you.

00:40:14.820 So it's paradoxical stuff.

00:40:17.120 So yeah, if you're angry, the thing would be, okay, just notice I'm feeling angry and then

00:40:21.420 just letting it be angry and then just kind of getting curious about your anger, thinking

00:40:25.160 like, well, where am I feeling my anger?

00:40:26.860 What kind of urges do I have now that I'm angry?

00:40:31.240 You're just being curious about the emotion you're having and what this does counterintuitively,

00:40:35.960 it diffuses the emotion.

00:40:39.160 Yeah, absolutely.

00:40:40.200 And then again, looking at, you know, what kind of angry thoughts is my mind generating?

00:40:45.820 And if I go along with those in obey mode, if I obey those angry thoughts, where's that

00:40:50.460 going to take me?

00:40:51.200 Is that going to take me towards the life that I want to live or away from the life that

00:40:55.780 I want to build?

00:40:56.980 So, you know, then kind of bringing in your unhooking skills to unhook from the angry thoughts

00:41:03.400 while at the same time, using your opening up skills to let the angry feelings be there

00:41:09.220 in your body.

00:41:10.560 And what happens as you do that is you massively reduce the impact of those thoughts and feelings,

00:41:15.660 which then gives you a lot more control over your physical actions.

00:41:19.220 So this is the kind of committed action part of the model.

00:41:22.020 Instead of letting my anger control what I do, I come back to my values and I use those

00:41:27.640 to guide my actions.

00:41:28.980 I do things that are meaningful, important, life enhancing.

00:41:33.180 So, you know, once I've learned how to do this, I can feel angry, but act calmly.

00:41:39.300 I can say in a calm voice, I'm feeling furious right now.

00:41:44.140 And that's going to have a very different effect than if I start shouting and yelling

00:41:49.640 or doing all the typical things we do when anger is just jerking us around all over the

00:41:55.040 place.

00:41:55.860 And again, this is a skill that takes practice and it's not going to be a week.

00:41:59.720 It might take months, years to practice this thing.

00:42:02.560 Oh, you look, you can always get better at it, but, um, you know, there's lots of, uh,

00:42:07.880 good research showing that people can get benefits, uh, even within 10 weeks of regular

00:42:13.920 practice of this stuff.

00:42:15.540 So, you know, it's not a miracle cure or anything as you keep saying, and I'm glad you do.

00:42:20.440 It needs practice, practice, practice.

00:42:21.960 But at the same time, if you do practice it and embrace it, you can get some pretty, uh,

00:42:27.500 effective results in a short space of time.

00:42:29.640 So we've been talking a lot about unhooking ourselves from these negative emotions, but

00:42:34.000 as you said, act, isn't just about that.

00:42:36.200 Isn't it just about stopping the struggle with anxiety or anger or whatever.

00:42:40.560 It's about committing yourself to living a meaningful life, doing proactive, positive

00:42:45.760 things so you can live the life you want.

00:42:47.700 And that requires knowing what your values are.

00:42:49.880 So you walk people through how to figure out like what's important to them.

00:42:52.700 That's an important part of act.

00:42:54.140 Let's say someone's done that.

00:42:55.300 They figure out, okay, you know, I want to live a healthy life.

00:42:59.060 And they lift out a task that they want to do.

00:43:02.240 Those are like intentions we have.

00:43:04.080 We all have good intentions.

00:43:05.820 Sometimes stuff gets in the way of those intentions.

00:43:09.380 How can act help us to live up to our values when things get hard?

00:43:14.340 No matter how good you get at doing this stuff, there will be times where you just don't live

00:43:19.360 up to your values, where you do get hooked by your thoughts and feelings and pulled into

00:43:24.240 self-defeating patterns of behavior.

00:43:25.980 And when that happens, boy, does it hurt.

00:43:28.460 So, you know, we don't want to fall back into beating ourselves up.

00:43:31.900 We want to acknowledge it hurts and be there in a kind, caring way for ourselves.

00:43:36.480 However, you know, we can get a lot better at living by our values.

00:43:40.880 So there's all sorts of little ways to bring them into your everyday life.

00:43:44.600 You could start your day each day by thinking of two or three values that you just want to

00:43:49.000 sprinkle into the day ahead.

00:43:50.860 You know, maybe loving and caring and playful, for example.

00:43:55.660 And then you go through your day and look for little opportunities to be loving or caring

00:43:59.580 or playful.

00:44:00.840 When we start translating our values into goals and action plans, it can be very useful to write

00:44:06.840 those down, be, you know, what are my goals, what are my actions, and to really tune into

00:44:12.340 the values underlying them and to recognize that even if I don't achieve this particular

00:44:17.540 goal, there's still a thousand other ways that I can live the value underneath it.

00:44:22.360 If the value is being loving, there's thousands of ways that I can translate that into different

00:44:28.640 goals and actions.

00:44:29.560 So, you know, life will often get in the way of one particular goal, but it doesn't mean

00:44:34.260 we have to give up on the value of being loving or being kind or being playful or whatever

00:44:40.080 value it is that we're choosing to bring more into our life for that day.

00:44:45.000 And then another part of this is predicting how your mind and your body is going to make

00:44:50.860 this hard for you.

00:44:51.900 You know, what's your mind likely to say to try and talk you out of this?

00:44:55.640 And what unhooking skill are you going to use to kind of take the power and impact out

00:45:00.520 of that when your mind says it?

00:45:02.420 And what uncomfortable feelings are likely to show up?

00:45:05.480 You know, when we really start living a values-based life, that means we face up to our challenges,

00:45:11.320 we face up to our difficulties.

00:45:13.320 It's not a, going back to the start of the interview, when we live a meaningful life, it's

00:45:17.800 not a life that's just full of pleasant, enjoyable feelings.

00:45:21.500 As long as a meaningful life asks more of us, asks us to step up to our challenges and do

00:45:27.480 the uncomfortable, difficult stuff.

00:45:29.220 And so, of course, difficult feelings and emotions are going to arise.

00:45:33.240 And that's when we want to use our opening up skills to open up and let those feelings

00:45:37.900 be there and let them flow through us.

00:45:40.920 That idea of when you set a goal and it doesn't work out the way you'd hope, everyone experiences

00:45:47.560 that.

00:45:48.120 And I like the idea where ACT recognizes that just as your emotions aren't in your complete

00:45:55.040 control, right?

00:45:56.260 You have to give up on that and just accept you're going to have these bad emotions.

00:45:59.000 You also have to accept that outcomes that you have in life aren't under your complete

00:46:03.560 control.

00:46:04.280 And the only control you have is just trying to live up to your values, like you said.

00:46:09.580 Even if you set a goal to, I don't know, lose 20 pounds.

00:46:14.240 Maybe you don't lose the 20 pounds in the time you set, but you did in the process every

00:46:20.120 day try to live a healthy life, taking walks, watching what you eat.

00:46:23.260 And that's a success.

00:46:25.760 Yeah, absolutely.

00:46:26.980 You know, so let's suppose the value is self-care.

00:46:30.040 The goal is to lose a certain amount of weight.

00:46:32.720 Well, if you're living the value of self-care through exercising and through eating well and

00:46:38.520 so forth, even if you don't achieve the particular weight loss you want, you're improving your health

00:46:43.740 and you're improving your day-to-day quality of life through being self-caring.

00:46:48.320 So yeah, you know, we've all experienced that, that we don't follow through on our goals and

00:46:52.560 we've all experienced how disappointing that can be, but that doesn't mean we give up on

00:46:57.200 our values.

00:46:58.240 And, you know, the goal-focused life is a life of misery.

00:47:02.160 You know, it's always about achieving the goal, achieve, achieve, achieve.

00:47:05.600 And then if you do achieve the goal, a brief glimmer of some happy feelings, and then there's

00:47:10.500 the next goal and the next one.

00:47:12.640 Whereas the values-focused life, we get to kind of appreciate living our values from moment

00:47:17.280 to moment, from day to day.

00:47:18.880 So we still set goals, they're useful for motivation, but it's about living those values.

00:47:24.120 And if we embrace this concept, we can have instant success.

00:47:28.500 You know, if my aim is to live the value of being loving, I can do that right now.

00:47:35.340 And I don't have to wait until the day I've achieved a particular goal.

00:47:39.140 If I want to live the value of being playful, I can do that right now.

00:47:43.740 I don't have to wait until the day that I, you know, achieve whatever goal it is I've set

00:47:48.880 around being playful and so forth.

00:47:51.060 So again, it's very liberating.

00:47:54.240 The kind of goal-focused life can be very constraining.

00:47:57.360 Well, Russ, this has been a great conversation.

00:47:59.560 Where can people go to learn more about the book and your work?

00:48:02.900 Well, so The Happiness Trap, and very importantly, that folks check that you're getting the second

00:48:07.520 edition.

00:48:08.280 I rewrote it recently.

00:48:10.520 This has got about 50% new material compared to the first edition.

00:48:14.820 So just check.

00:48:16.300 Second edition is available in all good bookstores and even in some of the bad bookstores.

00:48:22.160 And my website, thehappenestrap.com, there's more information there.

00:48:28.080 Fantastic.

00:48:28.360 Well, Russ Harris, thanks for your time.

00:48:29.300 It's been a pleasure.

00:48:30.640 Thank you so much.

00:48:31.600 It was a pleasure for me too.

00:48:33.640 My guest today was Russ Harris.

00:48:34.860 He's the author of the book, The Happiness Trap.

00:48:36.560 It's available on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere.

00:48:38.900 You can find more information about his work at his website, thehappinesstrap.com.

00:48:42.420 Also check out our show notes at aom.is slash happiness trap.

00:48:45.320 Where you can find links to resources, where you can delve deeper into this topic.

00:48:55.600 Well, that wraps up another edition of the AOM podcast.

00:48:58.480 Make sure to check out our website at artofmanliness.com.

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The Art of Manliness - February 01, 2023

Escape the Happiness Trap

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