when you change how you think you change
how you feel
in this video you're going to learn
about neuroplasticity how you can change
the structure and the chemistry of your
brain by changing how you think
changing your habits can be really hard
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okay back to the video now imagine this
scenario
you're hurrying to work you're running a
little late but you know that it's your
co-worker's birthday today
and she loves donuts so you decide to
make a quick stop to the best donut shop
in town to pick up some donuts for the
office
if you hurry you'll make it just in time
for your first meeting with a few
minutes to spare
so you go to the store and it smells
delicious and there's only one guy
in front of you you start planning out
your order
but the guy in front of you is taking
forever he can't seem to make up his
mind
and he keeps asking dumb questions like
what's on that donut
which donuts have cream inside do you
have any donuts with sprinkles
okay the donuts are right there in front
of him and if he just
looked at them and if he just looked at
the signs he would know
what was in them as your frustration
mounts you start to feel worried about
the time
you're probably going to be late what is
taking him so long
you think why can't he just pick out
some donuts
and now he's asking if they have any
strawberry donuts they are right
in front of you you silently scream
inside of your head
okay so now you're angry what's the
matter with these people
at the very least he could see that i'm
waiting and step aside while he tries to
decide
you start thinking he is so rude
and he's stupid ah this is so irritating
you start thinking
you're furious right
with the help of the worker he finally
fills his box and he turns to pay
and that's when you see that he has a
cane and it's not just any cane it's a
long white cane with a red tip
the man in front of you is visually
impaired suddenly your anger melts away
instead of impatience you feel
compassion for him and a little bit
ashamed of yourself
the minute you realize that he's not
being rude dumb or slow
but instead he's actually doing pretty
good with the abilities he has
you feel completely different your anger
disappears and you're filled with a
completely different feeling
but what has changed here you're still
late
it still took the guy in front of you
eight minutes to order his donuts
you're still in the donut shop what
changed it wasn't your circumstances
that changed how you feel
it was your paradigm shift it was how
you thought about the situation that
changed
you went from thinking this guy is such
a jerk
which made you feel angry to thinking
this guy is so impressive
for being independent with a disability
which made you feel a sense of kindness
and awe and a whole lot more patience
max planck said when you change the way
you look at things
the things you look at change when you
change how you think
you can change how you feel this video
is number 16 in my course how to process
your emotions and this video is the
introduction to section 3.
this entire section of this course is
all about changing how you think
so let's talk about what is
neuroplasticity
you were born with a brain wired for
change scientists
psychologists they all used to think
that after you were about 20 your brain
was set in stone and there wasn't much
that could be done to change it
but new research and new imaging
technology has demonstrated
that when you change how you use your
brain you can actually change the
physical structure of your brain
and you can change your brain chemistry
this is called
neuroplasticity neural meaning brain and
plasticity meaning
flexible or changeable neuroplasticity
makes your brain extremely resilient
and it's how all learning takes place
it's how you learn to speak
and how you learn to walk or play an
instrument and it's also
how you learn from your childhood
environment whether the world is safe or
threatening
as a child your brain is extremely
flexible and as you get older some
things get
more hardwired but there's always room
for growth
and that's because your brain is wired
to change it's built to adapt to new
circumstances
and new ways of thinking neuroplasticity
enables people to recover after a stroke
or a brain injury by using different
parts of their brain to perform
tasks neuroplasticity makes it possible
for people to improve symptoms of autism
add learning disabilities and other
brain deficits
neuroplasticity makes it possible to
pull out of depression
and addictions and to reverse
obsessive-compulsive patterns
let me give you some quick examples
daniel kish was born with the ability to
see but he lost his eyesight as a baby
he learned to use echolocation to
navigate so he's completely blind but he
can ride a bike safely
and he does this by making clicks with
his mouth and then he listens to the
echo to know where objects are around
him brain scans revealed
that his brain adapted the visual cortex
the seeing part of his brain
to be able to process sounds instead of
light
let me give you another exciting example
talk therapy changes your physical brain
there is a lot of research on this
studies have shown that eight weeks of
therapy
can increase the size of the hippocampus
this is the part of the brain that
processes emotion and memory
talk therapy can also decrease the size
of the amygdala this is the fear center
of the brain
when we change how we think and act we
can actually physically change our
brains
cognitive behavioral therapy is
essentially talk therapy right it
focuses on
changing how you think and how you act
and cbt has been shown to be very
effective at treating mental illness
it's one of the most effective
treatments as
effective as medication but it has long
lasting benefits and
less physical side effects
so how do we change how we think here
comes a metaphor
your brain is like this sandhill as we
grow and as we develop our way of
thinking
and our understanding of the world our
brain is formed
just like the channels that water makes
as it runs down the sides of the hill
now
some of this is impacted by our
environment so
for example our brain is impacted by the
language we learn and the culture we
grow up in
and our home environment whether it's
you know safe or frightening and
some of our development our brain
development depends on our biology
uh this includes you know the
personality we were born with and
whether we're more sensitive or not and
this
impacts how we interpret our environment
and then
after that every experience we have and
how we interpret it
these are like water flowing down this
hill and these
form these little rivulets on this sand
hill
so for example if you were taught as a
child that everything is dangerous that
bugs are scary for example then as a kid
you're going to develop a more sensitive
fear response
and that fear pathway is going to flow
quickly and easily for you
and that's going to make it easier for
you to feel fear or anxiety as an adult
when you see a bug
but if as an adult you decide that you
want to overcome that anxiety
and you start doing exposure therapy
with bugs
then eventually your brain will learn
that grasshoppers are safe
and it starts using new neural pathways
so that you don't
feel so anxious anymore
the more you think something or the more
you experience something
the deeper those channels grow in your
brain
in your in your brain these are called
neural pathways these are the channels
that our thoughts
run along the ones we use the most
become smoother and faster and wider and
the ones we don't use so much
eventually get trimmed off so for
example if you have a habit of
constantly looking for the negative
it's easy for you to see all the bad in
the world and those brain connections
are strong and smooth
so if you start to make a habit of
looking for the positive your brain
starts to rewire
and over time it becomes easier and
easier to see the good in the world
so when we decide to change how we think
it's like trying to get water to run
down this hill in a different way
than it has been running now this is
difficult work because the old ways of
thinking
are easier but little by little we can
create new ways of thinking new neural
pathways
and this eventually becomes easier than
our old ways of thinking
i once worked with a client who had
symptoms of ocd
he would worry that his hands were dirty
and then he would compulsively wash them
and sometimes he would do that over and
over again to the point that they dried
out and they cracked and they bled
now this client always felt that he
needed to change his clothes and take a
shower
and he didn't like touching anything and
this kind of got in the way of his
relationship with his
girlfriend who he really wanted to touch
anyways we started working on exposure
response prevention this is
changing how he thought about his
compulsions
and understanding the nasty cycle of
avoidance
so compulsions are a form of anxiety
avoidance right you feel a little
anxious that your hands are dirty
and then you wash them but then that
anxiety comes back a little bit stronger
so then you wash them twice
and the whole point of a compulsion is
to avoid
that feeling of anxiety so together
we me my client and i we worked on this
skill of cognitive diffusion
and delaying the hand washing as long as
possible this is exposure response
prevention
and the longer he went without washing
his hands the more he began to learn
that it wouldn't hurt him
his brain started to learn that he
didn't have to believe his obsessive
thoughts
and as he worked hard to practice
willingness with his fears
they gradually didn't have so much power
over him
now a year later he no longer
obsessively washes his hands and he's
learned that anxiety doesn't have to
control his life
sometimes he still gets anxious thoughts
or feelings but they just don't impact
him as much as they used to
he has changed his brain
neuroplasticity means your brain is
wired to change
when you change how you think you can
change how you feel in the next eight
videos you're going to learn how to
change how you think by learning about
cognitive distortions
reframing cognitive diffusion
self-justification mindfulness and
more so stay tuned and
thank you for watching this video is one
skill from my 30 skill course how to
process your emotions
where i teach 30 of the most essential
skills for resolving depression
anxiety and improving mental health
emotion processing is an essential skill
for working through intense emotions
but most people have never been taught
how to do it i'm putting every single
main video lesson on youtube
for the world to access for free you
watching these videos
sharing them contributing to my patreon
and my sponsors make this possible
if you would like to access the entire
course in one place ad free with its
workbook exercises downloads extra
videos live q as
additional short readings and links to
extended resources
the link to buy the course is in the
description below
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