The Mel Robbins Podcast - The #1 Neuroscientist: After Listening to This, Your Brain Will Not Be the Same

Episode Date: April 11, 2024

Today, you are getting a step-by-step guide on how to change your brain so that it helps you get what you want. Joining Mel today is Dr. Tara Swart Bieber, MD, PhD. She has a medical degree from Oxford and a PhD from King's College London, and is a senior lecturer at MIT. This #1 neuroscientist will teach you how you can trick your brain into manifesting your goals and desires and use manifesting as a tool for success, happiness, and better health in 4 simple steps. She will also share the shocking link between stress and your brain and body. She reveals how stress leaks through the skin, is contagious, and gives you belly fat. You’ll also learn the 2 easy ways to reset your nervous system instantly, the 4 foods to eat for better brain health, the science of intuition, and how to use a vision board to achieve your most ambitious goals. Class is in session, because after you listen to this, your brain will not be the same.For more resources, including the link to Dr. Tara’s book, The Source, click here for the podcast episode page. If you are looking for more world-class free resources and support, sign up for Mel’s brand new free training, Make It Happen. This training is designed to help you make your next 6 months extraordinary. It includes a 29-page workbook and 2 video trainings that use the latest research to help you get clear about what you want and create a plan to make it happen.And the cool part? It takes less than a minute for you to get started. Just sign up at melrobbins.com/makeithappenIf you liked this research-packed episode, here’s one you should listen to next: What Makes a Good Life? Lessons From the Longest Study on Happiness.Connect with Mel: Get Mel’s brand new free course Make It Happen (which comes with a 29 page workbook and 2 exclusive video trainings)Watch the episodes on YouTubeFollow Mel on Instagram The Mel Robbins Podcast InstagramMel's TikTok Sign up for Mel’s newsletter Disclaimer

Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins podcast. If you've always wanted to know how to change your brain so that it can help you get what you want, holy cow, you are going to love our conversation today. It's MIT meets manifestation. Law of Attraction meets neuroscience. Today's guest is Dr. Tara Swart-Bieber. She earned her medical degree from Oxford and her PhD in neuropharmacology from King's College London. She's a neuroscientist and senior lecturer at MIT. She teaches a course called the Science of Intuition

and Dr. Tara says, manifestation is real. It changes your brain and you need to know step by step how to do it the right way. It's a tool for success, happiness and better health. And she has so many specific takeaways that are based on research that you're gonna learn today. In fact, a major mistake that Dr. Tara says you're making right now when it comes to trying to train your brain is you're not using glue to make it stick.

What does that mean? Oh, you're going to learn what it means in this episode and a whole lot more. Class is in session and after you listen to this, your brain will not be the same. I'm thrilled that you are here because by the time you're done listening and learning from our guests today, your brain is not gonna be the same. You're gonna learn today how to use science to rewire your brain so that it can help you get what you want.

This is so freaking cool. And before I introduce you to today's remarkable expert and we jump into the conversation, I have something really exciting that I want to share with you. As a thank you to you for helping make this podcast one of the most popular podcasts in the entire world, I created something incredible for you and I cannot wait for you to get your hands on this thing that I've created. It's a free gift. You can access it in less than one minute.

All you gotta do is go to MelRobbins.com slash make it happen. What is it? Oh, you're gonna love it. It is a two part video training. It's almost two hours long. It's brand new. It's backed by research. I created it and I teach it. And check this out, this two part video training. It's almost two hours long. It's brand new, it's backed by research. I created it and I teach it and check this out.

This two part video training, it comes with a free 25 page workbook. I'm holding this sucker right now. If you could see me on YouTube, you would see this gorgeous green workbook, 25 pages based in science. The training is called Make It Happen. And you can access it at melrobbins.com slash make it happen.

Now this free two-part training teaches you how to take confident, consistent, and inspired action. And that's important because when you start taking confident, consistent, and inspired action, you tap into the power that is inside you to create a better life. And I know you learn a lot listening to this podcast every Monday and every Thursday, and I love that.

And I love how it inspires and empowers you. And I wanna remind you though, I don't want you to just listen. I want you to apply what you're learning. I want you to act, because nothing in your life is gonna change unless you start doing something different.

Just consider this zero-cost training my thank you. Thank you for spending time with me. Thank you for spending time investing in yourself by listening to this podcast. And thank you for supporting the work that I'm doing. Just go to MelRobbins.com slash make it happen. Super easy to get your access to this. And it's going to help you go even deeper into everything that you're gonna learn today

on the podcast. So let's talk about the conversation we're gonna have today because world renowned Dr. Tara Swart-Bieber is in the house. Dr. Tara is a medical doctor, neuroscientist, psychiatrist, and senior lecturer at MIT Sloan School of Management, and she runs the Neuroscience for Business online program for MIT. She's also a bestselling author of the book The Source and the host of the podcast Reinvent Yourself with Dr. Tara.

I love her because she's a scientist who used to be a skeptic when it comes to things like intuition and manifestation. But today, she's here to teach you that, yes, you can change your brain. You can become the person that you want to become. You can train your brain to help you spot opportunities. You can learn how to make your thinking more positive. You can learn how to lead a company. You can become more agile and happy and successful in life. And Dr. Tara is here to give you the very tactical things that you can start doing immediately

based on the best research in the world. We're going to cover how to change your brain in three different ways. You'll learn the real science behind manifestation and the neuroscience that explains intuition. Are you ready? I know I am. Please help me welcome Dr. Tara Swart-Bieber to the Mel Robbins podcast. Oh Mel, it's so amazing to finally be here in person with you. I've been looking forward to this for so long.

Well thank you so much for jumping on a plane and flying all the way from London and spending time with us in person. I am so excited and I guess I want to start by having you speak directly to the person who is listening to us right now. Could you share with them how their brain or their life might change based on what you are about to teach them today? Yeah, so one of the things we're going to be speaking about is neuroplasticity, which is the fact that the brain can grow and change throughout life. Unlike the fact that we used to think that by the time you physically stop growing around the age of 18, that your brain is fixed, that your personality is fixed, your IQ is fixed,

we now know that those things are very fluid, depending on what you do. But I want to bring that down to the here and now just to make it feel really real, which is that by the end of our conversation, because the brain is being molded and shaped constantly by what you're listening to, who you're meeting, what you're recalling in your memory, the emotions that you're feeling,

our listeners' brains are actually going to be different at the end of this podcast than they are right now. How does that happen? Well, so neuroplasticity means that the brain is taking in information through the five senses. So everything we see, hear, smell, taste, touch, and kind of in real time thinking, how do I need to be to like survive in this world?

It usually comes down to survival. And what I think I'd love to do today is help people move from the brain reacting for basic survival to what else can you make your brain do to thrive in this world? I know we're going to go deep on this, but can you just at a high level tick off a couple things that you can train your brain to do that you might not know that you can train your brain to do? Yeah. So things like manifestation, visualization, looking at vision boards, which I actually call action boards, but we'll come to that, affirmations.

These are all things that prime the brain more towards thriving than just surviving. Because if you leave your brain to its own devices, all it wants you to do is live long enough to reproduce. So what's it going to do to make that happen? Make sure you put food on the table. That means pretty much that you need to turn up to your job daily and not get fired. So you need to keep a good relationship with your boss. You need to keep a good relationship with the person that you'll potentially reproduce with. That's not enough for most people. We

want more than that out of life. So if your brain's taking care of that anyway, what do you want to put front of mind to make your brain look out for opportunities for the things that you dream of that you really, really want with what I call magnetic desire. Magnetic desire. How do you define magnetic desire? Well, the way that neuroplasticity works in the brain is through repetition and emotional intensity. So let me take it back to the survival things we were just speaking about. If you think, you know, I want to get married and have a family because that's what all my friends are doing, there may not be a huge emotional intensity behind that.

That may be more to do with societal, parental, peer group expectation. If when you were a kid, you dreamt of being an actor, then if you actually try to start doing that, even if it's hard, that was your dream. That was what you feel you were put on this earth to do. You will endure barriers and obstacles and refusals and difficulty and keep going. Whereas for other things, you might not. You know, we all, we know that idea of giving up just before you dig up the gold, right? If you've got magnetic desire, you won't give up. That's where the motivation piece comes in. And all of these are the science behind what contributes to manifesting what you want. So let's talk about manifesting. Have you always believed in manifesting?

So looking back, I actually think I did it as a kid naturally. And it's so chicken and egg for me whether I got drawn to neuroscience and manifestation because that was innate in me from a child or whether I now live my life in that way because I've done so much research on it. I honestly don't know the answer to that. The more I do the research, the more I consciously bring these things into my life. I look back and think, that's what I was like as a kid. That's what I was interested in as a kid.

But I would say that once I studied the sciences in high school and then went to medical school, worked slightly differently in the UK and did my PhD in neuroscience, and certainly by the time I got my faculty position at MIT, I was a complete skeptic about manifestation. Those two things could not exist in the same world as far as I was concerned.

And that's partly down to how I had to live my life as a child because my parents were first generation immigrants from India to the UK. And I went to school in London, and I just wanted to be like all my friends and do the same things as them. But I would come home, my mother would be in a headstand, and there would be incense in the house. And you know, there was meditation and chanting and things like that. So I thought, okay, that happens at home, this happens at school. And I learned very well to separate those

things. So then I became a medical doctor specializing in psychiatry. And you know, you were diagnosing people with magical thinking and delusions and hallucinations. So you couldn't really say, oh, but I believe in manifestation, you know. So again, I had to keep those things really separate. And it wasn't really until I started doing my research to write the source that I realized how together these things could be. Was there a moment where you remember going, oh my gosh, this is real? Yeah, there are a few because I think these things sort of build up, don't they?

So, I was in 2017, I was the world's first neuroscientist in residence at a five-star hotel in London. So I was already doing quirky things with my career. And because it was unusual, there was a lot of press and I was approached by Penguin Random House to write a book. And they said, we've had really amazing books on, you know, one on meditation, one on diet, one on sleep, one on exercise. And we think as a neuroscientist, you could bring all of those together. And without thinking, I said, I could do that, but I've got an idea about the cognitive science behind manifestation and vision boards. And they just said, yes, straight away. So I think their response made me think that could be a thing, but I wasn't convinced myself.

So before I started writing, I went on a summer vacation with my laptop, which is unusual for me. And I just started looking into the laws of attraction and trying to figure out, is there cognitive science that can explain these things? And for somebody listening who does not know what the law of attraction or manifestation is, could you give us your definition? They're basically all about the fact that if there's something that you really want in life, then if you think positively about it or you believe in certain

vibrations of attraction in the universe, then you can bring that thing into your life. And manifestation is bringing into reality something that you want. But until I started looking into the cognitive science behind it, all the explanations so far had been to do with quantum physics. And for me, as an empirical scientist, that wasn't enough for me to believe in those things. And equally, I felt very disempowered by the fact that it was happening because of something outside of me. I wanted to feel like it was happening because of my brain power and that I had some autonomy

over it. And do you believe, based on the research that you've done, that you attract things into your life because of your brain power? I believe it 100%. When the book came out, people that I knew personally who were not scientists at all said, I've always been interested in this,

but I've never actually acted upon it because I couldn't understand how it worked. But now that you've explained the science, I'm actually doing the steps that I've heard of before actually, but that you've repeated in your book. So the writing process did bring it together for me quite a lot, but it was actually the response from other people. So it started with people I knew, and then it started on social media just being thousands of people that I will probably never meet in my life saying, because you've put the science to it, it's completely changed my view of these topics. So what are the steps to manifesting based on the research so you attract what you want

in life? So it starts with abundance. Now in the brain, we have the strongest gearing that we have in our brain is called loss aversion or loss avoidance. And that was the survival mechanism from when we lived in the cave, which was that if you saw a juicy apple on a tree

and you really wanted it, but you ignored the fact that there was a saber-toothed tiger standing next to you, you would die. So we had to want to avoid loss more than we wanted to get reward. So you've got to avoid the tiger more than wanting the apple. Exactly. And so we're wired toward, as you mentioned earlier, survival. Absolutely. And through manifesting, you're about to teach us how to rewire our brain

and train it toward abundance and thriving? Yeah, I'm not going to completely wire it the other way because we still need to be safe. Yes. Even in the modern world where the threats aren't so much physical predators, there are psychological threats to our safety like job loss, relationship loss, etc. But it doesn't serve us to be that strongly geared to loss avoidance. So what we want to do is balance that out a bit more or in a safe situation, understand that we absolutely can take healthy risks and believe that there's enough for everyone and not kind of live from that scarcity mindset. So that's the first piece. The second piece is magnetic desire, which we've already somewhat discussed,

but once you're feeling abundant, then if you can be really aligned in your head, your heart and your gut about what it is that you want, then that desire, that motivation will keep you going and help you get the things that you want that you might've given up on. So there is an element of patience required because this process of neuroplasticity involves neurons wiring together to form new strong pathways that are stronger than the pathways

that you had before. And so that means that it feels like a lot of hard work is going on. Psychological work is physical work going on in the pathways in your brain, but that nothing's changing in the real world. And there's a real tipping point where there's enough neurons in a pathway that certain new habits and behaviors or being patient becomes easier. And it kind of feels like nothing, nothing, nothing, and then suddenly, oh, you know, things are happening,

things are changing, I'm getting the things that I want. So if you put those three behind manifestation, then that is about priming your brain to notice and grasp opportunities in the real world that can bring you closer to the things that you want. It's exactly the same process as if you buy a new car, you suddenly notice that car all over, you know, it's the same. So it's a brain priming process. Oh, well, that makes sense. It's why you suddenly see jeeps everywhere when you are looking

at buying a jeep. Yeah. Can you explain to the person listening, the kind of neuroscientific, I don't even know what the right word is, what is the scientific explanation for why you see cars when you're interested in buying a car or how the new neural pathways are changing your brain in real time? What is actually happening when you tap into magnetic desire? So basically we're overloaded with information constantly. And the brain has a natural filtering mechanism called selective filtering. And this relates back to what I was saying about if you leave your brain to its job of just making sure you survive,

it will filter out all those other things that you actually really want but that are not essential to your survival. So that's why you have to make a list or make the vision board or remind yourself every day of what it is that you truly magnetically desire to put that to the top of the list for your brain. Because after selective filtering, it does selective attention and that is noticing the red car or the Tesla or whatever it is that you're noticing. So once you've filtered out the things that you don't want to notice, then you narrow it down to the things that you do want to notice. And then the third part is called

value tagging, which is the brain actually tags those things in order of importance. And it does that in two lists. So it does it in a logical list, and it does it in an emotional list. And that's where the magnetic desire is important. That's where you say, no brain, I don't want it in that logical order. I want it in this order. This is what is really important to me. This is what makes me feel alive. This is what makes me like understand that I have a purpose for my life and it's not just put food on the table, stay in your job, stay in your relationship. It's so much more than that. So a classic example is I really want to find a partner and settle down and get pregnant. Yes. How could you go through the steps of manifestation to help you achieve that?

I would explain the process of manifestation that's underpinned by neuroplasticity, which is a four-step process. Okay. The practical steps are raise your awareness, focus your attention, do deliberate practice, and hold yourself accountable. And it starts with raised awareness. I always say that's 50% of the battle because sometimes we don't really know why we're not doing the things we know we should be doing, or why we're potentially with self-sabotaging those behaviors. But instead of taking the supplements that would set my body up for good fertility, I'm going out

partying because that's the way I think I'll meet a new partner. The awareness piece comes very much from journaling or not so much speaking with friends sometimes because if they're in the same place or everyone has an agenda for, your single friends might want you to say single, that kind of thing. But, you know, maybe talking to a therapist or a coach or doing some proper soul searching and trying to understand why you're not doing the things that you could be doing,

why some of the things that, you know, you're doing really easily, why are they so easy? How do they fit into your lifestyle so well? And really what it is that you actually want. And a wonderful exercise for that is to place your hands on your forehead and ask yourself logically, is this what I really want and why? And then write that down. And then take five deep breaths and put your hands on your heart and ask yourself emotionally, why do I really want this? And then write down the answers.

Another five deep breaths and then hands on your belly. Intuitively, do I really want this? And again, write the answers down. And you know, if they're all aligned, happy days. If they're not, we might have a little bit of rethinking to do. When I've done this with clients, one of the things that's come up is, I really, really want a baby, but actually, I don't really

need a partner to get there. So, you know, that could change the, I need to meet someone and be in a loving relationship and have a baby could just be actually what I've always really wanted as a child. I'm getting to a certain age where waiting to have a partner be part of that might mean that I don't end up with what I really want. Got it. So, you know, that's the most important step. Okay, so let's say you've gone through step one and your mind, your heart, and your kind

of gut, your soul, your intuition is all aligned. Yes, I want this. The second step is focused attention. So that is at least a month of just noticing what you're doing, what you're not doing in regards to moving in that direction. What are you noticing? You know, depending on what your goal is. It might be yourself, it might be your interaction with others, it might be feedback from others, but it's kind of a data collection period because what won't work very well in a manifestation

underpinned by neuroplasticity is just jumping into doing without being first. So raising that awareness might have brought up things that you've never consciously known in the past. You can't suddenly then say, okay, I'm like on all the dating apps. You need to sit back and see what is it, are there patterns of behavior, I'm like on all the dating apps, you need to look, you know, sit back and see what is it, are there patterns of behavior that I'm doing that are leading to a bad result? Is there something that's holding me back from taking the first step that I really need to take? So taking, you know, and longer than a month if you need to get to the point where

you feel like I have enough data about myself that when I act now I'll be able to give myself really good feedback. So the third part is deliberate practice and that is doing the things that you know you need to do to bring the goal into your life. So whether that's taking certain supplements, whether that's going to sleep earlier than you usually do, whether it's being more socially active than you used to be. And then practicing, and that's an experimental phase. You might still make mistakes in that phase, but course correcting as you go on. Because at this third stage, this is where people could give up. Yes. And so the fourth part isn't really a stage, it's something like a theme or an umbrella overall

of this, which is accountability. So how are you going to hold yourself accountable that you will actually see this through? Now, the easiest way to do that is with an external party like a coach or a therapist. But ways to do that yourself are by recording it in your journal and reading back over your journal and, you know, continually reinforcing why I did this, why I didn't do it, what happened when it went wrong. I use an app called Habit Share because what I learned for myself, and this won't be for everyone, but it's quite a good one for a lot of people, is that it's easier to build up micro habits than to start the

year or your birthday or whatever it is with one big, this year I'm going to meet the person that I'm going to get married to. So I set out 12 micro habits at the beginning of the year and I pick three to focus on for the first quarter of the year. And I track them on this app until they become so habitual that I don't need them on the app anymore. And then I move to the next three. When I've done that, instead of setting big goals at the start of the year,

I've come to the end of the year and found that I have ten habits that I'm no longer even conscious of that I'm doing all the time that are leading me towards that bigger goal or those bigger goals that I really want. Why are there only ten if you start with twelve? Well, they don't all stick. I find that kind of along the way I just didn't actually make one or two of them into a habit. It's still a bit of a struggle. And I either decide that I'm going to drop it or I'll carry on into next year. How would you recommend you kind of like make micro habits or where would you start?

Because I know we're going to get flooded with questions about this. So I'm going to talk really directly to you like I would as if you were my client. Great. Which is that the habit that you're working on is not the other person and the relationship, it's yourself. So if the goal is a partnership with someone else, the habits are all around your self-worth, your deservingness, what you have to offer in a relationship, what boundaries you will have about somebody treating you in a certain way. And I'm sure a lot more, but those are the first ones, you know, that come to mind. So for example, a lot of

people cast a list of what they want in a partner. And there's two things around that one is make a list of what they want in a partner. Mm. And there's two things around that. One is, make a list of what you have to offer in a relationship, compare it to the list of what you want in a partner, and where all the gaps are, make those your micro habits. Okay, we got to stop right here and highlight, because we've all been in that situation where we have a friend and we keep seeing this person that we love dating people that we do not believe are up

to their level. And you do make the list of what you want in somebody else. I've never made a list of what I have to offer. No, no, neither had I till someone told me about that. And it doesn't even occur to me that I would make a list about what I have to offer. How does just making the list of what you have to offer change the way you view yourself?

So there's two things. One is it might highlight gaps between what you think, you know, what you want. But if you're not there, why would that person want you? So if you've got self-work to do, let's start with that. You know, that's why I said I will speak to you really directly like I work to a client, which is that we need to start here if you want to get there. The other one is that the focus can be so outward and external that you actually are not always aware of how much you have to offer.

And that's why when, unfortunately, in this day and age, the sort of behaviors that I'm hearing about on the dating apps, you could succumb to those. But if you have a very strong idea of what you have to offer, you're more likely to say no to bad behavior, right? Yes, it's true. I just think about this from my own life, that in periods of my life where I was in distress or disassociated or in peak toxic, mal mode in the past, college and law school come to mind, I had no clue what I had to offer, which is why I kept finding myself engaged in toxic behavior patterns

and with people that I was perpetuating them with. And so it makes a lot of sense that if you're not even aware of what your value is, how could you possibly attract something that's of a higher value? Or equal value. Or equal value. One of the things you speak about, Mel,

is the fact that we love our friends and family and children and pets more than we show that same care to ourselves. And so if a habit that you have with your partner is writing them a little post-it note of 10 things I love about you, well, obviously, if you're in partnership and they're doing that back to you, that's great. But if you're single,

write down 10 things that you love about yourself, or say to a friend, I'm gonna send you a list of 10 things I love about you. Could you please send me a list so I can see how I'm viewed, you know viewed by another person that I know cares for me?" So obviously there are affirmations, but you can also bring your tribe into saying, don't forget, this is what you have to offer, this is how lucky someone's going to be to get you.

And I don't think we do that enough either. I'm just starting to think about this because it's kind of sad that we don't do this. And how common is it that you're working with somebody in your practice and you ask them to make the list of 10 things and they can't do it? I feel like we all have some kind of like angel inside us and if you start, you'll be surprised that things will come out and that is such a good feeling. They can be really tiny things and they can be physical attributes or they can be like your kindness and your creativity, but they can also be like your vulnerability or the

fact that you maybe didn't used to be good at asking for help, but that's something that you've learned to do. You know, there's so many things it can be. So yeah, I would love to think that people would go and do it and I would love to think that people would be pleasantly surprised. And if not, then reach out to your tribe, because I'm sure you know, you'll get inundated with things that people could say about you. So whether you're gonna use manifesting to look for a job or look for a committed partnership

or to, I guess I shouldn't even say look for, whether you're gonna use manifesting to land a job or to land funding or to fall in love and be in a committed partnership or to achieve a health goal. Step one is the self-awareness that comes from you doing the work to get very clear about what you want. And you gave us that beautiful meditation

of going from your head to your heart, to your gut and asking yourself if you really want this. And you say we should saturate ourselves in the self-awareness of it, right? By journaling and talking to a therapist or a coach or a friend that you trust about it. And then the second one was noticing yourself. Are you acting consistently? What is happening? What's appearing around you? The third one is take actions that are consistent with somebody who is landing their dream job or who is attracting

a committed relationship or becoming a parent. And then the fourth is patience. Is that, did I get it? The fourth is accountability. Accountability. That's right. I don't want that one. That's why I forgot it. I want it to just happen like magic. So accountability meaning what? Accountability meaning that you don't give up, that you are still doing the consistent behaviors that you need to, to bring the thing that you want into your life. And that either you find a way of doing that yourself with technology or your journaling

or an external party, you know that they'll be asking you in a way of doing that yourself with technology or your journaling or an external party, you know that they'll be asking you in a month's time, did you go on the number of dates that you said you would, or did you send your resume out to as many places as you said you would? And in my work, I always say, if not, why not? If you didn't, there's a learning opportunity there. But if you did, great, what else can we do in the next month kind of thing? You know, it's so interesting that you say that because I personally have benefited profoundly

from having a coach. In fact, I spoke to the coach that I used for my business just yesterday and I love having the accountability and the structure that coaching provides because I personally find it challenging to hold myself accountable at times, even though I know how. So, Dr. Tara, I love this topic so much. I could just keep on going on and on and on, but I want to take a quick pause,

hear a word from our sponsors. We have so much more to cover. Don't you dare go anywhere, because when we come back, we're digging deeper into manifestation. And of course, you're gonna learn the mistakes that you're making. It has to do with vision boards and using glue, all of that and so much more coming up when we return.

Stay with us. Welcome back, I'm Mel Robbins. I'm thrilled that you're here today. We're learning all about the science of manifestation and intuition and how to wire your brain to thrive and be more successful with neuroscientist Dr. Tara Swart-Bieber. So what are the three ways that this changes your brain or you can change your brain? So the three mechanisms for neuroplasticity are myelination, synaptic connection, and

neurogenesis. Now myelination, people who do sort of like repeated weight training will be quite familiar with that. Myelin is a fatty substance that coats some neural pathways, making them fast conducting pathways. And there's a reason that we have fast conducting pathways and slow conducting pathways. So for instance, if there was a fire on the table here between us and you put your hand into the fire, your reflex to physically snatch your hand out of the fire is a fast pathway for obvious reasons, so you don't burn. But your pain pathways are slow pathways. Because if you became so incapacitated by the pain of the fire that you couldn't move, you wouldn't survive.

And that works for many different types of pathways as well. But to make a pathway more efficient, we want it to be myelinated. So if we're working on a manifestation, obviously we want the pathways for the behavior that will lead us to that goal to be more efficient. So just basically repetitive practice leads to more myelination of pathways. So that's relatively easy to do. The middle one in terms of difficulty is synaptic connection. So that's where neurons that we already have in our brain,

but that aren't necessarily connected to each other. At the end of every neuron, there's a bulb called a synapse. And neurons communicate with each other because chemicals flow in the gap between those bulbs and form new pathways. So making new synaptic connections is a step up in terms of difficulty. My favorite analogy for this is learning a language. So when we talk about manifestation or other psychological behaviors, it feels very intangible,

but the process is exactly the same as learning a language. So you go from not being able to speak this language at all, to picking up the basics, to becoming semi-fluent, to potentially becoming completely fluent in a language. And everything that we have spoken about so far, it's exactly the same process in the brain. So the myelination is when you start listening and you pick up the alphabet or a very basic vocabulary like my name is. And then the synaptic connection is when

you can say some sentences that's maybe enough for you to travel to that country on vacation and at least make an effort. Yep. And then the hardest one in the adult brain is neurogenesis. And that's because genesis means growth. So this is growth of baby nerve cells into fully formed nerve cells that then have to

make synaptic connection with other nerve cells and potentially those pathways get myelinated. So you can see how it's a building up process. Yes. Yes. And you had said magnetic energy. Magnetic desire. Magnetic desire is one of the fastest ways to change the brain or it's a required way. Talk to me about how that stimulates one of these processes happening.

Yeah. Okay, let me put it like this. If you and I both wanted to learn Spanish and you wanted to learn it because you were planning a vacation to Mexico, but I wanted to learn it because I had a Spanish boyfriend. Who do you think's likely to learn it more or better? You. Yeah. Magnetic desire. A real, you know, deep reason

for wanting to be able to speak that language. What I love about this example is that I now understand why manifestation works. Good. So magnetic desire, which you are helping us tap into by asking ourselves, by putting our hands on our head and our heart and our gut, what do I really want? You're tapping into the deep-seated magnetic desire behind any change that you want. And with that, you are fueling the change in your brain to help you both see more opportunities around you and also to help you stay motivated

to do the actions. So it's like training for your brain to be doing the work to make something happen in the future and to help you do it. All of that, and I would just add, even when you feel like giving up, even when it feels like it's not gonna happen, that's the difference between someone that will manifest and someone that will continually take it this far but never actually manifest.

Is there a trick that you teach people that are very negative or resigned or have a difficult background where they just have a very hard time believing things are going to work out? Is there something that added that you would suggest to somebody who's like, well, that's never going to work for me. I've tried that. You know, that your resignation stands in your way of the patience. Yeah, you know, I actually always struggled with that because I felt like it was such a privilege and a luxury to be manifesting in your life.

The first time I was challenged on that, I genuinely from my heart said to this person. There must be one or two really tiny tweaks that you could make that could just make your life a little bit better and your children's life a little bit better. We worked together to find that. It was when I had my friend Chanel Haynes on season one of my podcast, she played Tina Turner in London's West End. That's an incredible manifestation story right there. But I asked her the same question.

And she said, manifestation isn't a luxury. It's an essential. And you know, she came from parts of New Orleans that people would be scared to go to. And she built herself up through manifestation to having the career that she had and being the oldest person that ever played Tina Turner in London. So I think finding success stories like that, there's another piece of science that says

if you are trying to achieve something that you've never achieved before, sorry, if you're trying to achieve something, then the first step is if you've done something similar before, remind yourself of that. If you've never done it before, find an example of a person that you resonate with who's achieved the thing that you're trying to achieve. So anything from playing Tina Turner in the West End, all the way down to where you were saying somebody who's got a lot of adversity, who's had difficulty in their life, breaking out of that. There are examples of that in the world.

Of course. And interestingly, because you've already mentioned this, the third part of that is changing your negative self-talk. How do you do that when that is part of the wiring in your brain? You cannot undo wiring that's already in the brain. Before we understood about neuroplasticity, say that once your brain was in adulthood and certain pathways were set up as they were, like things about low self-esteem or things never working out for you, that it was impossible to change it because it's impossible to change

your height once you've stopped growing. But we know that's not true in the brain anymore. So we know that there's an opportunity for rewiring, but it's not through undoing wiring that's already in the brain, it's through overwriting it, which means repeating a new thought or behavior so many times with such emotional intensity that it becomes a more energy efficient pathway for your brain than the one that you've had until now. How do you do that? So one of the ways of doing it is through positive affirmations. Okay. It can't just be a random one that you make up. Okay. So the way that I help people to find their affirmation is if you have a recurring negative thought, it's not your thought

that is wired into your neural pathways, it's the belief that underlies that thought. Can you give us an example? That's never going to happen for me, that's a classic one. Things like that don't happen to people like me. So, and the answer to this will be different for different people, it could be different for you and I and you know anyone who's listening. But you need to either through therapy or by sitting down and really meditating on it, say, what is the evidence that things like this do not happen to people like me? And keep asking yourself that question until you come up with the answer. And if the answer is because I'm a woman,

or because I come from a lower socioeconomic background, or because I'm a person of color, or because it's never happened to anyone in my family before, let's say going to college. No one in my family has ever been to college before, so what are the chances that I'm gonna go? So once you've understood that it's because it's never happened to anyone in my family, then what you need to do is create a mantra or an affirmation that says, I could be the

first. That's just one that came into my mind, but into my heart actually, I really felt it there. But you know, it'll be very different for different people. That's why I can't give the answer to you, because it has to be your answer. When you said could, I deeply felt that. Because for me, it allowed the possibility that it might not, but there was something about the possibility of I could be the first to,

that opens the door to then wanting to try. Well, trying, yeah, wanting to try and then trying. And then if you keep saying something that has that magnetic desire, that's how you start to, what did you call it? Reprogram? Rewire or just, you know, overwrite. Overwrite. The wiring. Yeah.

I love this affirmation. I could be the first because it makes me believe that it's possible because of course it's possible. Of course it's possible. And I'll just share quickly, like I delayed starting this podcast for so long because I just felt like there were already so many out there. If I had had this affirmation,

but I could be the first or I could be successful, even though there's already all these podcasts. If I had had that, I probably would have started this sooner. So what do you do once you create this affirmation for yourself? And let's just run with this one. I could be and then fill in the blank. What's the steps? Well, I have one for you that just really came up in my mind that you could have had, which was, I could create a unique niche.

Because even though there were so many out there, I think your affirmation would have been, I could create something that's not out there yet. For a woman, you're just such an icon in this space. So anyway, regardless of what it is. I love that because I also do think my husband right now is finishing a master's and working on his first book. And what he battles every day is,

this has already been written, this has already been written. And so many of you listening have something that you wanna do and you're like, but there's already a bakery. But there's so many real estate agents. But, but, but there's YouTube, there's this, that if you start to take this one,

I could do something unique. I could fill this one, I could do something unique. I could fill a gap. I could do something different. You know, like, I love this. So what do we do once we have something that feels like, oh yeah, that's it, I could be? So remember we based this on an underlying belief that, you know, to do with sort of lack of deservingness.

Every time you have the thought that that belief underlies, so I shouldn't bother applying for that job, or that's not going to happen for me, or that's already been done. Every time you have a thought like that, you replace it with your affirmation. And you just say it to yourself? You can say it in your head, you can say it out loud, you can write it out and have it on your bathroom mirror. The one time I remember it got like quite, you can say it out loud, you can write it out and have it on your bathroom mirror. The one time I remember it got like quite, I was glad I'd been practicing it, was someone openly verbally challenged me. And I actually burst into tears, but then I said, I think I can.

Wow, that makes a lot of sense. And I want that for everybody. I want you listening to us to believe that you could be the first whatever or that you could do whatever. And so I think it is really important that you tap into and find the right sentence that kind of has that door open for you when you say it. So for season two of my podcast, Reinvent Yourself with Dr. Tara, I've actually focused on the new science of ancient wisdom. So what's interesting to me about this one is that Buddhists have known forever, replace every negative thought with a positive thought. That is part of Buddhism. Now, fast forward tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of years, neuroscience

says you can overwrite a negative thought or belief with a positive affirmation. I mean, hello. As long as you have magnetic desire attached to it. And I think that's the piece that is really important here, that there's this charge in the feeling around it that is really important for you to do the work to figure out for yourself. You just have this way of explaining very dense things in a really inspiring and accessible way and I just love that about you, Dr. Tara. I want to take a quick pause, hear a word from our sponsors who are bringing you this

information at zero cost. Stay with us. Welcome back. I'm so glad that you're still here with us. I'm Mel Robbins. We're learning all about the science of intuition with the amazing neuroscientist and senior lecturer at MIT, Dr. Tara Swart-Bieber. So as a PhD MD, what's the first thing you do when you wake up? So I literally do live my life in the way of everything that we've been discussing, so I'm just going to tell you the truth. Please. As soon as I am aware that I'm awake, I snuggle my face against my silk pillowcase and I say,

I love my silk pillowcase. And then I say, and I love my side sleeping pillow. And I love my wall mattress topper. And I love my I've created a bit of a haven in my bedroom. I love this. I'm like, I'm right there with you. So what else do you love? I'm grateful for my silk duvet. I'm grateful for my mattress.

I'm grateful for my bedding. You know, usually that's the minimum. I might do the temperature in the room or how quiet it is. Do you say it out loud or do you say it to yourself? I say it in my mind. Okay. Then I just do some deep breathing, you know, in kind of every direction of my chest, like it's a barrel, and just have a feel for if there's any areas of tension.

Then to actually get out of bed, I start thinking about how much I'm going to save on my cup of tea. And then I go downstairs and I take my probiotic, because I have to wait 10 minutes then until I have my cup of tea. I do my oil pulling. And then I make my cup of English breakfast tea or matcha like a complete ritual and sit and really savour it and enjoy it. And then I pick up my phone and look at my messages. How does this help you? And how does this help your brain?

So I think the thing about this gratitude practice that's to do with the tangible things that are around me is that it stops what usually happens to people is that you start thinking, what do I have to do today? What time is it? What kind of what am I going to wear today? And because I obviously I don't keep my phone in my bedroom, I can't reach for that and start like getting bombarded by the outside world before I've had a chance to to set myself up how I want to. There's a lot of scientific evidence for the benefits on your mental health and your health and your longevity of gratitude.

So basically I'm not letting my brain kick in. I'm just doing, I'm going straight to the gratitude so I can't even think about anything else. And of course then that makes me feel good already. What are other key habits that you have as a neuroscientist throughout the day that continue to help your brain to thrive like this? I'm going to be really honest with you and say I'd prefer to start by going to the end of the day because those are the real key anchors for me.

And I just want to keep it really real and say that there are days where I don't do anything else consciously in the rest of the day. I just like live, you know, just do my day. But I will come back to there are some things I will come back to them. But I would say second in importance is the fact that I have my vision board next to my bed. So it's the last thing I look at at night. Let's talk about the vision board, because you called it an action board. Yeah. Does a vision board work?

I've been doing them 15 years and I've manifested a lot of things through my vision board. Like what? What have you manifested through a vision board? I'm saying- Dr. Tara. So I started when I quit my job as a medical doctor and I started my coaching practice. I literally had no money, no clients, got to the point where I wouldn't be able to pay my rent and my bills. At that stage, I did include an actual amount of money that I needed to earn.

For the first three years of running my business, I doubled that figure each year. Then after that, I just put symbols of abundance because I didn't need it to be a specific amount. I've manifested a lot of travel, but sometimes spooky. So I saw a picture of a tanned girl snorkeling. And I love snorkeling. So I put her on my vision board just to have like a vacation that was that kind of vacation. And at this point I was single and I

used to go on like Christmas vacation holidays with my best friend who lived in Australia and we would often choose where to go because I would see how many air miles I had and say, oh, I can get a flight to this place. So the year that we decided we would meet in Rio de Janeiro was because that was the only flight that I could get with my points. And I suddenly had this inkling that I hadn't been aware of. And I went and looked at my vision board and in tiny writing under the snorkeling girl it said Rio de Janeiro. I have so many more examples of things like that as well.

What I also love about this is that you take it a step further and you don't say what a cool accident. You say I manifested that. And how does a vision board, which you call an action board, program your brain for thriving? So it is a vision board in the sense that most people will know what a vision board is. But the difference is, like I said about quantum physics before I wrote it through cognitive science, did give an idea that you

should create this vision either in your mind or on a board. Often it was quite fantastical compared to what the person's life was actually like. And I do believe it's got to be somewhat realistic and then sit at home on the couch and wait for it to come true. Wait for the check to come in the post, wait for the dream partner to bang your door down. I just don't believe that that's possible. I believe that you have to be out there doing things to move yourself towards those goals. So that the board is simply a reminder to do the selective filtering, selective attention and value tagging to your brain to keep those things at the front of your mind and not let life get in the way because it's so easy to just get busy

with kids and work and forget. Not every day, remember what are the things that you want, but if you're seeing the board every day, then it does just help to bring it back to the front of your mind. Also also some people can't do visualization. So especially for them, actually having the visual images ready to look at allows you to get into that next step, which is visualize it being true. So close your eyes after looking at the board and immerse yourself in the feeling of those things actually being true. You're in Rio de Janeiro, you're with your loving partner, you're doing really well

at work, like feel that through your five senses and then give gratitude for the fact, for that feeling of like, wow, you know, with my eyes closed, I can feel that I'm holding my partner's hand and our feet are in the sand in Rio and we could afford this vacation because we're both doing really well at work. Because what you're really summoning is that magnetic energy that you talked about. What's actually happening in your body and in your mind when you go through this process of creating a vision board and then visualizing it and allowing the wave of gratitude

associated with that happening to fill your body. What happens in your brain? So when you visualize something really strongly and you integrate your senses, your brain can hardly tell the difference between that being true and that being a created feeling by you. And because anything new is the biggest threat to the brain,

uncertainty and novelty are the biggest threat to the brain, uncertainty and novelty are the biggest threats to the brain, the more you visualize and embody the thing that you want, the more likely you are to take healthy risks to get it when it appears around you in the real world. So when you're feeling fear or shame or sadness, your blood is circulating a lot more of the stress hormone cortisol. When you're feeling love and trust and gratitude, you're circulating a lot more of the bonding hormone oxytocin. And those hormones are kind of on a seesaw. So if you're giving gratitude, then you're improving the release of oxytocin, and that's relatively

reducing the stress hormone. So basically, love or gratitude, trust, those sorts of things can't coexist with fear and shame and sadness. So the more you push your brain into those emotions which correlate with that hormone, the less you're living in that state of fright, flight and scarcity. So simply visualizing and feeling that wave of emotion that comes from being grateful for the visualization of something that hasn't happened yet coming true changes the chemical

balance in your body. When you are immersed in that feeling, yeah, and think of a couple of the things that you'd like to happen right now and how good it would feel if they were true, you'll release dopamine, the reward chemical. So that's very, that has a really strong impact on your body.

Then when you move it into, and now I'm giving gratitude for that, then you're also releasing oxytocin. So you've got this cocktail of like really feel-good hormones. What is one mistake that people make when they are making a vision board? I have now learned to leave a lot of space on my board because I don't believe that my brain is capable of knowing how much I could manifest in this world. So I love to leave a bit of room for magic. In the book where I do the chapter on actually how to make the board,

I say, you know, get the board, lay the images onto it. Really ask yourself, do I want everything that's an image on there? And if there's something that you thought you wanted, but it doesn't resonate, remove it. Have another flick through the magazines. And if there's an image on there. And if there's something that you thought you wanted but it doesn't resonate, remove it. Have another flick through the magazines and if there's an image that isn't something that you thought you wanted but it really speaks to you, try fitting that in. Leave it overnight, and I specifically said in a windproof, childproof, that-proof place. And then come back the next day after having slept on it, and if you're sure that it's correct, then glue it into place. And then I start speaking to people who say to me,

yeah, I've done all that, but I just haven't glued it yet. And so I said, oh, you know, did you do it yesterday? No, months ago. And I just can't bring myself to glue it down. I don't understand why. And I had, you know, having been an experienced coach now for 15 years, I just had, and the answer to that just came into my mind through my gut and it was, you don't want to glue it down because you don't really believe that

you deserve it. And the tears just came, you know, and it was, it was the truth. So it was, these are the things that I want, but if I glued them down, I'm saying that I actually think I should get them and deep down, I don't believe that. And that's why I haven't moved them down. So you might be listening now and think, oh, yeah, I've done that, too. But I didn't really know why. So hopefully it will help. What is the act of gluing? Signal to your brain. In terms about what you want.

And would you do that gratitude wash as you're doing it as a way to tap into magnetic energy? Because that's probably very thick old wiring. I actually said that to somebody recently where I was like, I don't even want to tell you that because I feel like I'm scared to say I want that thing. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I feel like if you're gluing it down, you really mean it, right? And so if there's hesitation, that could be hard. I have never thought of this before, but your idea is brilliant. If you do it whilst giving gratitude, it'll probably make it

feel much easier. It's a bit more like, I'll just be so grateful if this comes true. And I'm, you know, I'm happy to partially put it out there and partially make the effort to do it. When I had my first one, you know, when I was really broke, I was living in a studio apartment and it was in the bathroom, which meant that anyone that came to my studio would see it and it had a specific amount of money on it and it's very un-British to talk about money. How much money was on it? £35,000, so really not very much. How much money was on it? £35,000, so really not very much. So I thought, okay, this is a bit embarrassing. But then I thought, well, anyone that I actually invite into my apartment who then uses my

bathroom has got to be a close friend. So that just has to be okay. And I got so much positive feedback from people saying, oh, yeah, I looked at your vision board and I can help you with that thing that I saw and it was so sweet. I can hear everybody now moving their vision boards from their bedside table to the bathroom. Okay, we're going to put this right in the bathroom. What are some of the other habits that you have every day that keep you resilient, that keep your brain wired for thriving?

Okay, so I would say my next one, which is sort of like a ritual too, but also very good for your stress levels, is that I bathe in magnesium flakes. Huh, why is that good for stress? Because when you're stressed, your body leeches itself of magnesium. So magnesium helps you deal with stress,

but it also gets used up in stress. And the best way to take magnesium is through your skin rather than through a capsule or a tablet. Oh really? And so I find the easiest way, you know, with English weather is to bathe. There are also gels and sprays and lotions that you can use, but I like the ritual of bathing. The best way to check if you need more magnesium is if you ever get

that twitchy eyelid. Yes, I've had that. Yeah. Well, some people get tiny twitches in their fingers or their toes as well, but the eyelid is quite a good sign that you probably need to top up with magnesium. Because it's a sign that you're stressed. Well, the twitching is an actual sign of magnesium deficiency, but the reason you would be deficient is probably stress. Wow. Nobody's ever told me that before.

And it happens quite a lot. Try the, you can do a foot bath if you don't like a bath. Oh, I took a bath every night. Okay. I love a bath, but I've never done the magnesium flakes. I am doing it. So you take a bath with magnesium. What's something else that you do? So so so by this time

It's getting close to the time that I would eat because I do time restricted eating So I only eat between 12 noon and 8 p.m So, you know, I would obviously deal with any work admin or home admin that I have to but then I would I would cook While we're on the topic of food, what are the four foods that you eat for better brain health? Yeah, so the first thing I would say is that I make all of my dietary choices based on brain health. And if you think about it, people choose what they might eat based on, you know, it's delicious

or I'm trying to lose weight or I'm trying to build muscle. But I feel quite strongly that if you make your choices based on brain health, then it's actually good for your skin, your hair, your gut, the rest of your body. So on that I would say the dark skinned foods I've already mentioned, hydrating foods because you actually keep in more hydration from food than you do from drinking water. So your leafy greens and your salads kind of thing, and maybe like fruits like melon. And then the good fats, this is probably the largest part of my dietary intake. So oily

fish, eggs, avocado, nuts, seeds. And the fourth category is fermented foods like kimchi, sauerkraut, kefir, and kombucha. What I love is that at the very beginning of our conversation, you talked about the fact that our brain really was wired for survival and mating, and that you are teaching us strategies based on cognitive science, based on neuroscience, based on all of this research about how to program your mind for thriving, for longevity, for happiness. And every one of these examples, whether you're talking about the ways in which you can use this magnetic energy and these deliberate practices to wire your mind for thriving and attracting and spotting what you want.

Or whether you're now talking about the deliberate things you say to yourself and the deliberate practices and actions that you are creating in the morning, you are showing us exactly what you're doing to make your brain function in a way that helps you thrive. I would love to talk to you about intuition. I mean, you teach a course at MIT called the Science of Intuition. What do we need to know about intuition? So it's so interesting because I've been teaching at MIT Sloan for 10 years now and 10 years ago people would stand up in the class and say, okay this is really interesting but I'm obviously not going to make an important decision like fire or hire based on intuition. And what I did see was that the older people would say, well actually that's exactly how I would make that decision. And I've seen that change over time, which is so nice, which is now that more people get it. And it's just because I've just explained the simple, simple science.

So there's a process in the brain called Hebbian learning. It's named after the neuroscientist Donald Hebb, and it's basically neurons that fire together wire together. And so the things that we need, what we call our working memory, to live every day are kind of like held at the top of our mind. The things that have become like habits and behavior patterns, they've been pushed deeper into the sort of the limbic system of the brain, which is the size of your fist and it's in the center, the centre surrounded by the cortex. But also, apart from formal learning, you pick up life lessons,

you've picked them up throughout your whole life, right? Wisdom. But you can't remember everything that you've experienced in your whole life. But that learning has been pushed deeper into your brain stem, your spinal cord, and your gut neurons. And there is a massive connection between your gut neurons and your limbic system, which is where your intuition and your wisdom arises from in the brain. And so that's basically how intuition works. So you're tapping into your lifetime of wisdom and knowledge that has been pushed down from

your conscious mind all the way through your brain, down through the neurons that connect the brain and the gut, into your gut. So it's basically like tapping the iCloud of your body and your history. How does somebody learn how to trust their gut? For me, journaling was the absolute key to that. So journaling and reading back over your entries. So, you know, every time you make a decision, whether you made it by logic or intuition, whether they aligned or not, recording that, but then also seeing the patterns over the last three months, the last six months. So that's how I honed my intuition. But I think people will remember this more. When you're stressed, when you're bloated, when you've got indigestion symptoms,

isn't it true that you find it harder to access your intuition? That's how connected the brain and the gut are. Wow. Can you talk about how high levels of stress impact the functioning of your body and your brain? So cortisol is known as the stress hormone, and it absolutely correlates with emotions such as fear, anger, disgust, shame, and sadness. Cortisol isn't all bad. You know, we need it to wake up in the morning.

We need it to have an adaptive stress response to, you know, a car driving too fast on the street that we're trying to cross. So as long as it stays within that range, that's fine. But when something super stressful happens, like the saber-toothed tiger, you know, that we spoke about earlier, the cortisol levels spike. And that enables us to run away, to warn our tribe, and it should go back to normal levels quite quickly. Because cortisol is carried in the blood supply

around the body and it crosses the blood-brain barrier, there are receptors in the brain that monitor the levels of cortisol in a way to sense threat in our environment. When those levels are high, most of the time or all the time, or higher than the higher end of the threshold, the brain immediately thinks, I'm about to die, what is the biggest threat to my survival? And in some ways, because it's from so long ago, we're wired in such a cave person way, the first threat that the brain will consider is starvation.

Even though that's for most of us, thank goodness, not the biggest threat to our survival, in fact quite the opposite, so to try to protect us from dying of starvation, one of the things that cortisol does is lay down extra fat in the abdominal fat cells so that if we are unable to hunt or gather for some time we can digest that fat and stay alive until a food source becomes available. Wait, so are you saying that stress is causing belly fat? Yeah. It's not just causing fat, it's specifically causing belly fat. So you may not have changed your shape in the rest of your body, but if you're noticing

that your belt has become tighter, that's a sign that you could have chronic cortisol. And the other thing is that it's fat that's particularly stubborn. So if you do notice that the belt is tighter and you think, okay, I definitely need to move a bit more or eat a bit less, and you actually start doing one or both of those things, but the belly fat doesn't change because the cortisol is driving the fat there

regardless of your behavior in the physical world. And that's all initiated in the brain because the brain is picking up on higher levels of cortisol. Yeah. How does high levels of stress impact the functioning of your brain? So I'm gonna do brain and body if that's okay.

Yeah. So think of this cortisol as a corrosive agent that's literally flowing through your entire brain and body. So in the body, it starts to erode your immunity. So you might notice more colds and flus more often, or ones that last for weeks and weeks. I mean, I certainly remember during the financial crisis

when I worked with a lot of banks and hedge funds, people saying, you know, I've had this cold for four, six, eight weeks, but everybody has it. And I had to say to them, do you hear what you're saying? That it's not normal to have a cold for six weeks. And this is cortisol. And at the extreme end of that, people were dropping dead of heart attacks on trading floors. So, you know, lowering your immunity and corroding your body that much can cause

everything from colds and flus to heart attacks and cancers. In the brain, what happens is what I call low power mode, like on your phone. So once those receptors know there's an imminent threat to our survival, think of the highest functions of the brain. Thinking creatively, thinking flexibly, solving complex problems, overriding our biases,

and regulating our emotions. How are those going to serve us now that we're just trying to survive physically? We don't need those things. Don't send any blood supply to those higher functions. Bring it right down to get up in the morning, go and sit at your desk, look like you're doing your job even if you actually can't really do it. This is the reason that presenteeism costs businesses more than double what absenteeism does. In that low power mode, it would be better to stay at home for two days and recover and then come back to work and actually function and work with your team. Because stress impairs the higher functioning of the brain.

It just moves the blood supply away from it because you're not going to give up your precious and, you know, work with your team. Because stress impairs the higher functioning of the brain. It just moves the blood supply away from it, because you're not going to give up your precious resources for functions like that. And just to put that into context for you, Mel, the brain is a tiny organ. It's, you know, it's a tiny percentage of your whole body, like maybe 2 or 3 percent, but it uses up 20 to 30 percent of the breakdown products of what you eat. Wow. Yeah.

That's how hard it's working. It's using up 20 percent of what you ate that day when you're asleep. It's using up 25 percent of what you eat when you're working, managing, leading, running your family, you know, just thinking like right now we're probably both using 25%. But if you're stressed, it's using 30%. What Dr. Tara is stress contagion? So let's take this back to a couple of evolutionary mechanisms. So when we lived in the cave, we lived in tribes and we were either really quite nomadic

or at least the men would go off to hunt for a few days and then return to the cave. But at the more extreme end of being nomadic, if the men went off hunting and they went so far that they came to another cave of the same tribe, they would actually just stay there and never return to the original cave. So think back to what I mentioned about survival and reproduction. In those days, that was it. That was the only important, you know, they were the only important things. So before leaving a cave, the alpha male had to make sure that his genes would survive

in that cave in case he never came back. And in those days with predators and hypothermia and, you know, obviously like miscarriage and stillbirth and stuff like that, he really had to impregnate five women to make sure that at least one of the babies would survive. So to be able to make sure that five women would get pregnant at the same time, they had to be fertile at the same time. And that's why we had menstrual synchronization. And obviously we don't need that. There's an evolutionary reason for syncing up your menstrual cycle? Yeah.

Wow. So let's just start with how we synchronize first. Okay. So that is because steroid hormones such as the sex steroid hormones, estrogen and progesterone, okay, leak out of your skin through your sweat. Wait, what? Estrogen leaks out of your skin through your sweat? Yeah. The way that it works is through physical proximity. So obviously in the cave, we slept in a huddle. So if you live with your daughters or you work in a office with a lot of other women

and you're in close proximity with each other, then because your sweat leaks out around you about this far around your body, that has- Well, hold on a second. For people on YouTube, they saw about a foot. Oh. Yeah. Sweat leaks out a foot from your body? Well, okay.

Try not wearing antiperspirant and smelling how far you can smell your sweat. Oh, I guess that's right, because I'm not thinking about the fact that the odor is actually you emitting something. Yeah. Oh. Does that happen with stress too?

So yeah, so. Oh wait, let's say it's cycle syncing. I'm sorry, I'm so fascinated by this. I think we've kind of done that. We've said that we recognize it as a phenomenon. I've given you the evolutionary reason. Yes. We've talked about the physiological mechanism of it.

So what I want to do now is bring that same physiological mechanism to, regardless of gender, cortisol is also a steroid hormone. Oh. And, but there's, so there's no gender issue here, but there is a hierarchical issue. So the silverback gorillas' stress levels affect the other gorillas more than gorillas of the same status. And so it happens in business, and so it happens in the home. The leader, in quote marks, of the entity, their stress levels will impact other people more than the other way

around or people of equal status. So, you know, the highly stressed boss is an example. The highly stressed parent. Interesting. Yeah. Well, it makes sense because if you think about it, whether it's in the example of the silverback the the highly stressed parent. Interesting. Yeah. Well, it makes sense because if you think about it, whether it's in the example of the silverback or you take a family system or you take a work system, that if the person in charge of your paycheck is stressed out, that their stress is a direct threat

to your financial survival. And that's why it triggers you like that. And so that makes a lot of sense that stress would be contagious and affect everybody around you. Yeah. So if stress is contagious, how do you protect yourself from other people's stuff? Well, I think the answer to that is both,

how do you reduce your own stress if you're the stressed person and how do you protect yourself from other people's stress, is mostly through mindfulness activities. So activities that connect the brain and the body because, like I said, the glands in the brain are talking to the adrenal glands and creating this stress situation. So the way to decrease their activity is through activities like meditation, yoga, time in nature, journaling, gratitude, all of those things that reduce levels of cortisol, move your autonomic nervous system, which is a nervous system in your body rather than your brain from sympathetic, which is fright, flight, fight,

to parasympathetic, which is rest and recover. And, you know, lower your heartbeat, lower your blood pressure. So simply lowering your own stress insulates you from other people's stress? Yes, but with both versions of it, whether it's your own or others, addressing the root cause is important because what you don't want to be doing is just continually shielding yourself from something that's not changing. And the reason why this is important, if we bring it back to the brain and your ability to keep your brain in a mode for thriving and helping you attract what you want, is because when stress levels are crazy high, it impairs your brain's ability to do the higher functioning because the blood

goes somewhere else. Yeah. It's so interesting. Yeah. What impact do your friends have on your brain? So have you heard that phrase, you're the sum of the five people you spend most time with? Yes. So we do believe from a neuroscience perspective that you have a tribe that

influences your behaviors. So for instance, if your immediate friend group is overweight, then you're more likely to be overweight. And this is not because it's contagious in the sense of what we've discussed before, but because of what becomes socially acceptable. So again, like if most of your friends are really into exercise and healthy eating, then it's more likely that you're going to be like that as well. But there are some stats on social contagion, that for example, things like if someone in your social circle gets divorced,

you're more likely to get divorced. Now again, it's not because it's contagious, but it's because if your relationship was already struggling, but everybody else in your group was married and it felt shameful to be, you know, the one to break that, then if someone else does, it's almost like you then have a choice of either staying in a relationship that's not working or deciding does, it's almost like you then have a choice of either staying in a relationship that's not working or deciding that actually it's okay to end it. Does it work in the positive? Oh yeah, absolutely.

Because I tend to hear the examples of the negative, right? That if you are around smokers, you'll smoke, if you're on drinkers, you drink. But it works in the positive ways, too. As a neuroscientist, MD, PhD, is absolutely anyone capable of changing? Yes. Any age, any stage, any mindset. And I get a lot of questions from people who are neurodivergent, and neuroplasticity literally is hope for people. And what is the biggest barrier to somebody changing? Not wanting to. So when people come to you with excuses and time and self-doubt and past stuff and neurodivergent, like every excuse in the book, right? For you as a neuroscientist, it still comes down to not wanting to?

Well, you know, and that sounded very negative, so I'll give you like a... I actually don't think it did because I believe you're saying something extremely profound and way deeper than a desire to change at the surface level. Because you have very clearly stated, Dr. Tara, that from a neuroscience standpoint, absolutely any human being can change. Your brain structure can change in three different ways. That your brain can be rewired to align with the person that you want to become, the behaviors you want to exhibit,

the mindset that you want to have. It is scientifically proven, it is possible. We have the evidence. There's no debate here. When you say the word whether or not somebody wants to, can we go about seven layers deeper and can you explain what you're talking about? And that was very much the answer to the biggest barrier. So there are obviously other things

as well. But it's easy to say not wanting to, but it's that there's a reason that deep down they believe that they shouldn't be doing this thing. And the cutest reason I can think of is when I was working with a dad who was a banker and he had become quite overweight as well and he wanted to get back to his running, which was like three times a week, half an hour. And he said to me, but you know, Tara, I got married late in life and we had a child later in life. And I feel terribly guilty about not spending all my spare time with my child. I work long hours already.

And so I said, you know what, I completely get it. You would have to think that taking one and a half hours a week out of away from your son is going to make you a better dad. Otherwise you're never going to do it and I'm not even going to try and help you to do that if that's what you believe." And he just suddenly said, of course it's going to make me a better dad because it's going to make me live longer. Because right now in my state of health, I don't know if I'm even going to see him turn

18. And it was just like that. And I'm not saying I make that kind of change And it was just like that. And I'm not saying I make that kind of change with my clients all the time, but I just knew there was no point trying anything else. If he thought it was going to make him a worse dad, he just was not going to do it. But when he had that insight himself, he started running and kept it up for a long time and lost all that weight. And it was really lovely.

What you're basically talking about is having it tied to your deepest value in life. And that's a super clear example. What final words do you have for the person listening? I really want people to realize how amazing their brains are and how much potential they still have in their brain, regardless of the age they're at or the job they're in. I think for me, the thing I'm most passionate about is helping people get unstuck.

And so a new way that I've got people to ask themselves the question that gets them unstuck is, when was the last time you were really seen for being who you want to be? And what's the first small step that you can take to get back to that? Beautiful. Well, Dr. Tara, thank you so much for being here, for giving us such specific, actionable strategies that we can use in our life, starting right now, tonight, tomorrow.

I'm grabbing my glue gun. I'm making another fishing board. It is time. But I just wanna thank you with all of my heart. It was just absolutely fantastic to finally meet you in person and to learn from you and to be in your spirit and in your presence. And I just love everything we learned today so thank you. Like I said to you offline, I admire you so much and I'm so

grateful that I got to be interviewed by you. Oh well, we're the beneficiary of that and I want to be sure that you know as you're listening to us in case nobody else tells you I Wanted to tell you that I love you. I believe in you and I believe in your ability To take everything that you learned today and get serious About training and wiring your mind for abundance for thriving for success for happiness You now have the strategies, the tools, things you need to eat to do that. So go do it and I'll talk to you in a few days.

Is this thing on? Okay, good, because instead of bloopers, I'm gonna use this time to tell you about a free two-part training that I just created for you. It's called Make It Happen. It is designed to help you push through the fear and take action.

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