My good buddy The Very Good Doctor Glenn Livingston interviews me about the evolution of my coaching over the past 20+ years. We talk about my origins in very conventional approaches to behavior change, and some of the refinements and changes I've made along the way.

We look at the impact of my work with Josh LaJaunie, who helped me shift from making everything as easy as possible to looking for opportunities to build my clients' "struggle muscles" in pursuit of goals.

We cover the influence of Glenn's own approach to conquering binge eating, and how I folded it into the ACT framework.

And we explore my recent pivot into memory reconsolidation and the relentless search for symptom coherence as a way to shift clients from helplessness to agency. Based on relatively recent brain science, this approach seeks complete and permanent and effortless transformation rather than focusing on strengthening the "competing" impulses and setting up supportive environments.

All the approaches I've ever learned and used are still part of my toolkit, and I continue to grow and learn as a coach.

Links
If you'd like to work with me, visit PlantYourself.com/coaching to find out more and schedule a conversation.

Find out more about Glenn at DefeatYourCravings.com.

My interview with ACT co-developer, Steven C Hayes

Another ACT interview with Russ Harris, author of The Happiness Trap

Memory Reconsolidation interview with Tori Olds, PhD

My Coaching Evolution: Glenn Livingston interviews Howie Jacobson: PYP 567

Conversations on consciousness, healing, and creating a world where everyone gets to life their best life

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Self-Improvement

A "Walk and Talk" episode about the question that can help us go from fixating on problems to creating the future we want. 

I take you on a sonic tour of Sitges, my home in Spain, from the high suburbs to the beachfront promenade to the old city, as we talk about the neurobiology of a problem-focus.

We'll see that the mind treats problems as threats, which diminishes our capacity to respond to them creatively and effectively.

We'll listen to busking street musicians, couples strolling by while scuffing their sandals on the stone walkway, and wind and surf.

And we'll explore the "magic question" that you can ask yourself and others, that transforms problems into opportunities to create the future you want. 

Do you enjoy this kind of episode? Let me know, and I'll either do more or fewer of them based on your feedback.

Transform Problems into Opportunities with This Magic Question: Dr Howie Jacobson on PYP 585

Mark Butler was blindsided by burnout in the middle of a successful career in sales, marketing, and management.

He lost the ability to focus. He had trouble remembering the names of his team members. He missed deadlines and starting producing subpar work.

It got to the point where he was asked to step away from the work.

It hit so hard, he needed to know what happened. So he embarked on a second career in mental health, learning everything he could about what makes humans tick, and what can derail us.

His key insight: burnout is essentially what happens when we suppress an emotional response for long enough. It's one way that, in the words of Gabor Maté, the "body says no."

After years in clinical settings, working with clients one-on-one and in small groups, Mark realized that he wanted to work "upstream" -- i.e. in prevention.

And prevention, for Mark, meant working within the settings and systems that produce burnout and other mental health problems.

His work now spans helping individuals practice radical self-care, physically and psychologically; and working with organizations to create anti-burnout cultures and policies.

In our conversation, we look at the nature of burnout, why it's so prevalent, and what we can do -- individually and collectively -- to create workplaces that prioritize human wellbeing over profit-at-any-cost.

Sound Bites
"Burnout in its essence is actually suppressing an emotional response or emotional needs.""The brain doesn't know shit. The brain is locked in a dark box.""It's more important that we get to say the words we need to say than it is for the other person to hear it.""Working out should be about mental health, feeling better about ourselves, and feeling good.""Our bodies are like cars that need to last the journey, and how we treat them determines how they carry us.""The future is human, and organizations need to recognize the importance of looking after their people."
Links
MarkButler.com.au

Emotional Intelligence 2.0, by Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves

When the Body Says No, by Gabor Maté, MD

The Body Keeps the Score, by Bessel van der Kolk, MD

What's the Deal with Burnout? Mark Butler on PYP 584

I share with Glenn my admiration for the book Immunity to Change, by Kegan and Lahey. It shows how resistance to (seemingly) desired change is often rooted in deep-seated beliefs and identities, which are typically unconscious.

Now we know the neurological details of that phenomenon, as well as the precise experiences necessary to overcome it. The science of memory reconsolidation has given us tools that we can use to rewrite old beliefs that keep us from achieving what we want.

That's not a new concept, especially in the touchy-feeling self-help world. What's new, and incredibly useful, is the understand of the conditions under which neural patterns in the brain can become "labile" -- that is, open to change.

This gives coaches and therapists -- and anyone who wants to help other people grow into their best selves -- a powerful protocol for creating transformational change.

We now have an alternative to "counteractive" strategies, such as willpower, external constraints, and repeated exposure, to keep bad old habits at bay.

Glenn asked me to demonstrate the process with an issue he'd been struggling with.

He needed to restart his YouTube channel (about defeating food cravings and regaining control over one's eating), but he hadn't done so. Despite his clear knowing that it was an important step in building his business.

He was aware that part of the issue was his appearance; he had put on a few pounds since the last time he made lots of YouTube videos, and felt uncomfortable showing himself on screen to people who would turn to him for, among other things, weight loss.

Rather than coach him to "make a plan" and "put it on his calendar" and ask him lots of motivational interviewing questions about why this was important, I sought to help Glenn discover the emotional necessity of not putting his slightly heavier self on display.

What we got to first was a recognition of why his reluctance to make videos made perfect sense. Once he "owned" his agency in producing that symptom, he was able to disconfirm the core belief behind it.

And he reconnected with an essential part of his mission: to act with kindness and abolish shame in everyone he comes in contact with.

Enjoy!

LinksImmunity to Change, by Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey

Unlocking the Emotional Brain, by Bruce Ecker, Robin Ticic, and Laurel Hulley

How to Remove Trauma Response, by Alun Parry

The Art and Neuroscience of Transformational Change: Dr Tori Olds on PYP 553

Removing Trauma Response with Yes/And Healing: Alun Parry and Yael Zivan on PYP 572



Uprooting Resistance to Change: A Memory Reconsolidation Demo with Glenn Livingston, PhD: PYP 583

Behavioral economist Matt Nagler returns to the podcast to discuss the urgent question of whether acting "as if" can lead to genuine transformation.

Standard economic theory holds that we have innate preferences, and that life is more or less about going around getting those preferences met. People who like chocolate go to work and make money so they can buy chocolate. People who are into danger and thrills take up skydiving. And so on.

But that's not the way we actually work. We can acquire tastes, not just for lima beans and beer, but for activities as well.

If you want to become a runner but the thought of breaking a sweat leaves you cold (I hear the approaching sirens of the "bad writing" police), you don't have to wait until you magically change your mind. Instead, you can just start running. According to Daryl Bem's Self-Perception Theory, seeing yourself running, day in and day out, will signal to your mind that you do like running. Because, it reasons, why the hell would you be doing it every day if you didn't?

And that mind hack is the key to behavior change. As God is reported to have said to the children of Israel at Mount Sinai, "Na'aseh v'nishma." That is, "You will do and you will listen." The "DO" part comes first.

In our conversation, we cover lots of ancillary behavioral economics topics and follow Matt's roller coaster mind as it ranges from Mel Brooks to Japanese art films to Bayesian Updating (which blew me away and totally put my work on Memory Reconsolidation into a very cool theoretical framework).

Enjoy, and let us know what you think in the comments. 

Links
Matt's "Zen and Economics" Substack (free)

To Be Or Not to Be (Mel Brooks movie) trailer

Shall We Dance? (Masayuki Suo movie) trailer

Daryl Bem's Self-Perception Theory

Jon Connelly's Rapid Resolution Therapy

Bayesian Updating explained

Fake It 'Til You Make It?: How Action Can Trigger Transformation: Matt Nagler on PYP 582

“Trauma is perhaps the most avoided, ignored, belittled, denied, misunderstood, and untreated cause of human suffering.” - Peter A. Levine

Drawing upon healing traditions that go back thousands of years, Peter Levine, PhD has created a method of healing trauma that has the power to revolutionize the mental health field. His modality, Somatic Experiencing (SE), takes the client on an inward journey to where they can access their own body's wisdom and instinct toward wholeness.

His books Waking the Tiger and In an Unspoken Voice share his methodology. One of the most stunning demonstrations of SES can be found on YouTube. In the video, Peter helps an Iraq War vet overcome a persistent facial tic by guiding his body to complete a movement sequence that had been abruptly interrupted by the explosion of an IED.

His new book, An Autobiography of Trauma: A Healing Journey, is a deeply personal, courageous, and clear-eyed look at the events, forces, and people who shaped Peter's life, worldview, and work. It's not for the faint of heart. Peter recounts a brutal rape that was perpetrated upon him at the age of 12, as well as deeply unsettling family scenes from his childhood.

He also talks about the dreams and synchronicities that have guided his path -- and the ones that he ignored to his detriment.

One chapter pays homage to the women who influenced his professional and personal development, including body and breathwork pioneers Charlotte Selver, Magda Proskauer, Ida Rolf, and Mira Rothenberg. Another chapter explores his relationships with brilliant men of science, including Ilya Progogine, René Thom, Leon Harmon, and T. Berry Brazelton. Much of Peter's life and work has been to integrate the archetypically masculine world of measurement and replication and the archetypically feminine domain of spirit and intuition -- a synthesis that lends SE much of its power.

In our conversation, we talked about dreams. I asked Peter why meaningful dreams come to him, and how others (me!) might go about inviting dream insights. He responded with many stories and suggestions that I'm already incorporating into my evening and morning rituals.

At one point, Peter referred to the unconscious as "she," and spoke of it as a source of great wisdom. Given my familiarity with the neurological basis of his work, I had thought of the unconscious as a more or less infantile part that was concerned solely with survival. I thought all it could do was fight, flight, freeze, fold, or socially engage (based on Stephen Porges' Polyvagal Theory).

Peter shared his understanding, following Jung, that the unconscious contains drives and impulses beyond those of physical survival. He cited the drive for wholeness, referenced in the subtitle of In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness.

We talked about his year-long "active imagination" mentoring by Albert Einstein in a California restaurant, and his later discovery that Einstein had saved his parents' lives when his mother was 8 months pregnant with Peter.

We also spoke about the Dine (Navajo) ceremony to reintegrate returning warriors from battle to community, and his encounters with healing and wisdom teachers from a variety of ancient lineages.

The mic drop lines, for me:

"Given the right tools, trauma won't rule."

"We can stop reliving and start living."

Enjoy!

Links
An Autobiography of Trauma: A Healing Journey, by Peter A Levine, PhD

In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness, by Peter A Levine, PhD

Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma, by Peter A Levine, PhD

The Somatic Experiencing website

Trauma and Recovery, by Judith Herman

Children with Emerald Eyes: Histories of Extraordinary Boys and Girls, by Mira Rothenberg

Let There Be Light -- John Huston's movie about healing trauma in US servicemen following WWII

My Grandmother's Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies, by Resmaa Menakem, MSW

The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, by Bessel van der Kolk, MD

The Pocket Guide to the Polyvagal Theory: The Transformative Power of Feeling Safe, by Stephen Porges, PhD

My Coaching Evolution: Glenn Livingston interviews Howie Jacobson: PYP 567

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