The Neuroscience of Compassion with Doug Richens

The Neuroscience of Compassion with Doug Richens – YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF6xR0m8tZQ

Transcript:
(00:00) when we are altruistic towards another we feel different we become different our cells heal um and then and then it just goes on you know the chemical benefits the neurological healing and benefit that you get when you serve someone is tremendous when you receive that and you really receive it right you don’t just like Shadow game deflect or thank you but I’m unworthy kind of crap right but when you really receive it you get the same neurological hit if you will and then if You observe it if you are if you live life in a way
(00:44) where you notice the power of kindness happening all around you and you pay attention and you see this person offer and this person receive you can have that exact same hit and you’re and you’re just a you you could be watching it on YouTube you could be you know three aisles over in the supermarket and just observe a moment and and you can have that Activation so it’s it it’s it’s just it’s just so powerful hello everyone and welcome to the flow over fear podcast where it is our mission to help you to rise above
(01:25) fear and realize your ultimate potential in leadership and life I’m your host Adam Hill and it is my goal to share with you the human side of high performance my guests share their experience with fear anxiety struggle Challenge and most importantly despite all of it how they Rose above it to achieve incredible results so if you’re ready to rise up let’s get started well hello everyone and welcome to flow over fear thank you so so much for being here today I have a great guest with me today his name is Doug richens and he is a
(02:04) relationship and performance educator and Coach with over 25 years of professional experience and his work has included Frontline exposure to the most tragic of human conditions around the world where he has helped organizations and people to overcome heal and progress through their hardships he has an advanced degree in the neuro in in Neuroscience of compassion for from Stanford University and he is and he currently teaches online cour courses and live workshops to individuals and couples seeking to develop their
(02:40) capacity for deeper emotional and relationship satisfaction he also offers private and group coaching services for well-motivated adults who were ready for lasting change Doug has founded with his wife the Grays space experts company which is an extensive network of Neuroscience backed therapist therapists coaches subject matter experts helping people find the therapeutic resources they’ve been looking for and that’s where individuals and couples can overcome their deepest wounds and Achieve greater satisfaction and passion
(03:12) within their own personal and professional lives and if that’s not enough he’s got uh six children at home which is which is also a lot to handle uh but welcome thanks for being here yeah that’s right thanks for being here I really appreciate you you joining me today you’re welcome it’s good to be here yeah absolutely so I I love to start off by talking a little bit about origin story you know uh you you seem you and your wife seem to be driven by compassion and you know the neuroscience and and you
(03:44) know Advanced degrees a lot of Education in that space how did you get started and and start to get to work in this field you know it came out of a place of tremendous frustration um you know it it I was a young teacher in in a religious education system that was enormous and I had students who had disabilities and I had no training I had I had a couple degrees and I was on my way as a as an educator and and growing and learning and I had these students and I and I started to ask my my upline people um how to best support these
(04:28) students and honestly at That season of life it was 20 plus years ago 25 years ago I couldn’t find answers inside of that Network so I got kind of upset and said I’m going to go figure this out and it began there understanding teenagers brains bodies um the label of disability was kind of the the launch pad um and from there it just it just just grew what I learned I taught to my colleagues eventually that took me uh to a senior Global administrative and director position to effectuate you know Improvement in
(05:15) Ministry Improvement and education Improvement and all these different things around a lot of sensitive subjects all over the world and um but it really started off me just being confused frustrated angry um you know like I’m going to go figure this out and uh that’s where it started yeah a couple of books and a few mentors and off I was I was up and running that’s great well I I I mean that that whole idea is it certainly resonates with me and I I’d love to kind of dig in a little bit to that where where you were frustra
(05:47) frustrated were you working in a high school at the time what what kind of educational yeah these were high school and University a students I had classes at um in Oregon I was you know adjacent the high schools um I had lynfield College beautiful beautiful lynfield and some other universities there I’d go and teach um teaching a lot of teachers so you know even as a brand new out of the gate I didn’t know anything kind of role I had an enormous region if you will and it it was uh it was demanding work
(06:26) and yeah was this was this primary like with with with the challenge that you were having where you weren’t getting the support was it with um more of the mental mental health disabilities or or was it physical disabilities what kind of what what were you seeing that was challenging the institutional knowledge around the support of individuals with with whatever kind of disability was was very very low yeah and where it did exist it wasn’t elevated it wasn’t made accessible um it was easier to get traction around
(07:01) some disabilities some life struggles that were more obvious easy to spot at 20 30 ft away um and that next layer the invisible disabilities loss and grief disability anxiety yeah uh the trauma um we’re all experts at hiding that sure yeah teenagers sometimes are really really good uh at hiding that and yet it affected their ability to be okay with themselves to learn yeah and I remember there was there were a lot of years of teaching teachers quite literally all around the world and them just not believing you know that was a season of
(07:47) disbelief that that these things were really in the classroom these realities were really happening and um I don’t know maybe some of those guys kind of retired and um uh fresh eyes eventually came to the scene and and things have improved yeah yeah well I mean even today I mean within our own life we we have some you know challenges with u you know mental health and our family obviously I I grew up with it you know my uh kids are struggling with that and um and we’ve seen that too that the resources it’s
(08:22) very challenging to come by and and that so when you mentioned that frustration even as a parent I kind of like you know resonated with that as a teacher I could only imagine where that you know where that leads with the lack of of resources but you say we’re we’re starting to do a little better with that I think there’s a yeah there is a socially acceptable yeah and increasingly so to to have these kinds of discussions to um within a home within a faith community within a work setting to kind of raise these issues as
(08:57) you know functional realities that are impact act in your life yeah um it’s not as universal as you’d hope there’s still uh you know mentality and some pockets of where the disbelief and the the other minded approach um prevails so it’s still a tremendous amount of work but better than ever and around the world and different countries um the models of mental health of of support very so much yeah um in in central Africa a couple years ago I was interviewing a group of uh extremely qualified educated what we
(09:43) would refer to as therapists or counselors and for about an hour they just made fun of what we do in the United States they say so so let me get this right Doug someone comes to you and they’re depressed yeah and so you bring them in a little room with one little window and you sit them down and you just make them sit there and just talk and they’re like where’s the drums where’s the where’s that nature where’s you know all the things that they uh so often are able to incorporate um this’s
(10:15) just a mindset difference a difference of adopting these these you know modalities of of mental health and how they apply them in their culture so it’s been fun to to learn from all the different moving Parts yeah so so are we in the United States at least I mean where most of the listeners are I think with this are we doing it broadly speaking I know this is a total generalization but are we doing it wrong or are others doing it right and we need to adopt new ways or boy that is like walking into a comic book
(10:47) store and asking who’s the best superhero you know I mean really that’s a huge thing and I I’ll just give you my take yeah and the world can disagree but um modern psychology comes out of the big three Freud young and Adler of the three two Freud and young were were they were the Publishers they were the self-promoters and their their modalities really encapsulated the the movement and and set the the stage for a lot of what we would recognize today in a therapy session yeah however I’m an adarian
(11:30) I think he had it right I don’t I think that you get to choose the meaning you associate with any event and in um that we don’t have to unpack necessarily or or like Express or explain the event in order to reframe and and heal from it um and so yeah there’s so much good happening with so many amazing professionals um sometimes I would you know I I definitely approach things from a uh a corner that I think is very very effective and helpful and maybe uh not as common you know but to that point like all of my clients they’ve all been to 10
(12:22) 12 years of traditional therapy and they come with me and they say what the hell like this helps right and so I don’t know um yeah so can you help us understand the difference between like an ad adarian psychology and and Yung or Freud like what we’re traditionally singing seeing what does that look like oh there’s so many layers to it I think I think the the easiest to comprehend is how we address uh the discovery of the cause of your pain MH in a broad sense the the approach of of the Freudian and the Jong
(13:02) there is a we have to understand the cause um and why people did all these hurtful things in order to heal from it right and that’s not picture perfect but in a general sense they’re there that’s where they’re at um and in that laran is that it’s impossible to really know the cause and and there’s actually a tremendous amount of value of saying I I will never know all the reasons this happened to me or that person chose to do this to me but I can choose what interpretation and what meaning I give
(13:42) it and from those seedlings boy you just you just grow out these enormous schools of thought and and uh if you you know you you you just think about the last week of your life life mhm I mean you could spend the next 50 years of life figuring out just last week that was maybe perhaps kind of mundane let alone uh a global event a catastrophic event um a space of tremendous victimization and and innocence betrayed so I I find tremendous power not just in in an adarian approach but um from a solution focused um and and
(14:33) then Stanford changed me studying the Neuroscience of compassion studying really like chemically what happens in the brain when we are kind or receive kindness um what’s activating what can prevent that from activating um it’s a pathway to enormous insight into to how to live life without anxiety to stay in a state of activated compassion which doesn’t mean you run around just loving everyone you’re still in the world and and smart and wise and everything else but you’re in a space of acceptance you’re calm you’re creative
(15:19) it’s really powerful well this yeah and and I really want to dig into that Neuroscience of compassion piece because I know that’s where your you know your specialty noice are so many out there who whose names I would just love to list off for you that that would give you really the big answers but I’ll do my best yeah no but it’s I mean but having you it seems like you switched like especially when you um you know when you had that frustration you you pursued this knowledge and then you found Stanford you started working with
(15:48) in the Neuroscience of compassion can you just kind of give us a broader overview of of I you know I think you know we I think we conceptually understand there’s neuroscience and we could seually understand that there’s compassion how are the two intermingled how do how do they mingle together ah boy this is like candy for me Adam I’m just G to tell you this is so fun um I think most of us are are have the framework that compassion you know we have language to to express that and often that falls in the spa in space of
(16:24) our spirituality or our faith our religion um it falls into the space of how we you know what we were taught as children to be good and kind and honest and you know everything we betrayed by the third grade the um the language for me the language that I had to explain goodness my choices to love others was was framed in about really in a couple of places first it was framed in side of my spiritual life right the language of of wisdom literature scripture whatever you want to call it m it was also framed inside of the mental
(17:07) health models that I had studied up to that point I was understanding choice and belief and and and some of these moving Parts but really it wasn’t until I had access to to see what was happening neurologically on on a chemical level what hormones were moving where what parts of the brain were involved yeah where the behaviors of my life could create barriers for those chemicals to do what they need to do and if I could change those chemicals I can change my outlook on life I can move to a state of activated
(17:46) compassion the the Neuroscience of compassion and Stanford there’s so many un universities collaborating their research is off the charts I’m nothing but a front-end user I am a hack compared to what they’re doing like I just drink it as fast as I can I just love it but but really they’re validating our lived experience that when we are altruistic towards another we feel different we become different our cells heal H um and then and then it just goes on you know the chemical benefits the neurological healing and benefit you get
(18:29) when you serve someone is tremendous when you receive that and you really receive it right you don’t just like Shadow game deflect yeah or thank you but I’m unworthy kind of crap right but when you really receive it you get the same neurological hit if you will wow and then if You observe it if you are if you live life in a way where you notice the power of kindness happen happening all around you mhm and you pay attention and you see this person offer and this person receive you can have that exact same
(19:10) hit and you’re and you’re just a you’re you could be watching it on YouTube you could be you know three aisles over in the supermarket and just observe a moment wow and and you can have that Activation so it’s it it’s it’s just it’s just so powerful and I that’s yeah yeah go ahead oh no go ahead oh yeah yeah know I’m sorry I apologize for interrupting but it just it triggered this thought on me because this is so powerful how we you know I think instinctively in what I’m
(19:40) hearing is that that listening or or absorbing acts of compassion like just around us you know and noticing them appreciating them helps us to you know become more compassion helps us to be more fulfilled happier all this kind of stuff is what I’m hearing and you know in recent you know it throughout the course of the show I’ve learned that human beings have this negativity bias though like that there’s this negativity like that that you know we we consume negative information because that’s what
(20:10) sells that’s what we’re attracted to or that’s what we you know we’re we’re we’re more driven by negativity than we are by positivity yeah so is is this a task where we have to actively like switch our brains from that from that negativity bias into something that’s more positive um thankfully no good um it does feel like there is this negativity bias Among Us yes the media sells sex sells violence sells sadness and um and we are bombarded by it neurologically speaking your brain my
(20:46) brain has a couple of prime directives one to Keep Us Alive to keep us safe the other another prime directive is to lead us to a partner and to lead us to uh to sex right to reproduce and and there’s there’s a there’s a few other these deep deep hardwired Prime directives anxiety fight or flight kind of chemical response is essential for us to stay alive it is essential that that happen so we could find a partner and reproduce and but the truth is as often as it is and as important as anxiety and fight or flight
(21:33) are there a drop in the bucket compared to how often the compassion chemical Cascade activates and functions in your life compassion has saved your life a thousand times to one over fight or flight H you are infinitely more hardwired for this response than you are anxiety or panic yet we have an anxiety and panic fixation yeah my beautiful little girl you know at age 10 I picked her up from school how was your day she it was good but boy I had a lot of anxiety today you know she’s framing the normalness of her day inside
(22:17) of language of anxiety and so then we come back to choice and and the meaning that we give events and in that moment of noticing what’s happening around us yeah and giving it meaning in that moment we can we can completely activate a state of calm awareness control we want to be connected with people we don’t hate the world we don’t want to isolate or we can choose to buy into the anxiety track and boy those chemicals will flood just as fast right right oh yeah guilty all of us Char right I mean and
(23:03) it and it can hit and um even as a a student of this and and seeking to be noticing and an aware boy it can just roll over the top of you in the wrong way as fast as as anything yeah the big change though is as a student of this and for my clients and those who you know study and work with us we’re still going to feel anxiety we’re still going to feel some anger and fear and all those things but we don’t stay in that state sure and and it doesn’t have to trigger a a a week long or a TW month long C you
(23:43) know spiral into uh in in into Dark Places and for for many those those spirals you know the chemical realities and the the mental health issues are are extremely complex but in the in the course of the daily flow of things we really can make great choices to to to decide what we’re going to believe about things how we’re going to associate them yeah back to the that’s kind of back to the adarian psychology kind of stuff yeah um so you mentioned something about compassion there that compassion saves Our Lives you know more
(24:26) than like fear cuz I I know you know certainly fear has saved our lives like you know if I’m approaching a a cave that is dark or an alley that’s dark you know don’t enter that maybe it save saves our lives but can you give an example of how compassion might save our lives yeah or or yeah in those moments where we see behavior of others that’s you know according to our the hidden Rules by which we live our life they’re outside the boundaries right they’re they’re rude to someone they cut us off on the road um that
(25:01) moment of of moving on being patient um airing on the side of Mercy uh when maybe Justice is really on our side right um and in our in our in our most important relationships in our home and our our friends our family um we don’t have to feel betrayal when someone disappoints us we can know they’re growing and they’re just as human as me yeah and um temper rage you know the the those things all kind of simmer down when we when we you know practice this I love the traditions of mindfulness the language of of of that the the practice
(25:55) of meditation but those things alone are not turning on the compassion response they’re leading the mind to be in a state of awareness but ultimately it’s that moment of choice where we’re flipping a switch one way or the other yeah so it’s so it is a it is a choice to feel compassion versus say anger or or or another negative that the negative phrase is that this is where it gets so cool because you know in your in your body you have all these autotop responses your heart rate your digestion your so many functions of your body that
(26:40) are are happening without the conscious uh awareness of it and and there’s an element of the compassion response that is is autotop as well it comes from our long-term memories so as you go through the day and you have all these events and your brain gets kind of gets filled with everything that happens and you have a great sleep like you know get the right amount of sleep you get that deep sleep your brain clears that out and puts the essential memories in your long-term memory um we we put stuff into long
(27:19) memory long-term memory when during sleep during sex or when we’re scared mhm which is why sexual abuse and Trauma can be like so cemented in someone’s long-term memory right oh wow yeah okay and those long-term memories Trace back that’s what we call a Gestalt they they they daisy chain back to some activating event that’s going to release some kind of a physiological response you know a sweat a a fear or whatever and so our work in the here and now is to live different and we also reframe those long-term memories so they don’t
(28:04) activate the same emotional or physiological responses H maybe I’m getting kind of technical here I’m I just I just see it here’s here’s how where the rubber meets the road is a client will come in and they’ll you know kind of give the fly over of some big life challenges heavy stuff our office doesn’t have the the light fun you know little thing like it just seem it’s all heavy right but there is a there is such a power as as people Elevate those problems out of being a moral issue out
(28:51) of being a character flaw out of being like oh this this thing I did was sin right yeah I love you can you can go there and you can repent and you can have your space to deal with these issues as a moral issue at the right time but first let’s let’s adust let’s treat this as a brain issue and so as we Elevate the problem up out of the moral kind of yeah and and into this brain neurological State oh my gosh people are just like oh okay I I can see a pathway forward yeah so when you’re saying so when
(29:32) you’re saying moral like you know you’re talking like moral versus neurological uh and maybe I’m hearing this is are you meaning like kind of that human feeling of like maybe shame or or yeah that kind of thing it and you know someone it could be they have a compulsive sexual tendency or they’re you know they’re looking at enormous amounts of pornography and they their spouse feels Fidelity from this and say okay kids let’s let’s just pause yeah first let’s look at this as a brain issue yeah what does what
(30:10) does pornography do in the brain how do we change the chemical Cascades the draws the you know the seeking all of those kind of behaviors and and at the right time then you come back to address the sense of betrayal a partner might feel or a moral conflict they feel from their behavior um it’s definitely all important yeah the sequencing of it I think is more important yeah yeah and I I I would imagine I mean this that that so so coming from me I mean and there’s I you know recognize there’s a big
(30:49) difference between compassion and empathy and it might be like a a a good to get into that but you know I feel like I for from my personal perspective like when I’m when I’m in a room I feel the energy and I kind of absorb it and I feel like you know I imagining like you know a bunch of like a variety of people coming into a room with with something some big challenges like that it could get overwhelming but is is that something I mean as far as you know that compassion I know that you’ve been around the world
(31:21) you’ve dealt you’ve you’ve been in incredibly traumatic SC scenarios and things like that does that affect you and how are you able to tap into that feeling of compassion and get not and not get overwhelmed by the the traumas that you’re seeing I failed at this for a long time um in my in my employment I was you know it was a it was a global assignment and I was addressing suicide mental health abuse yeah um equality racism I I mean oh my gosh oh my gosh and I and I didn’t have the skills early on to to do
(32:04) exactly what you’re describing um one of the big breakthroughs came inside of this study of compassion is when I uh discovered the difference between compassion and empathy H um so let me just do it this way with you um I’m going to give you a scenario and I want you just to role play with me and you’ll you’ll do awesome you’re brilliant you’ll do awesome so uh we run into each other on the street we haven’t seen each other for a couple of years you’re like oh my gosh Richmond what’s going on how are
(32:37) you and I you know we greet each other it’s good and and then you look closely at me and you say how are you Doug and I say this I said you know Adam things are rough um my daughter they’ve been married three years they just lost a child and we’re heartbroken yeah what do you say to me oh man that’s hard I I’m so sorry I’m so sorry uh you know that that’s what I would say what I and internally like you know what my initial response is is like oh my gosh I got to solve this I I want
(33:13) I want to help help solve this how does this solve because it makes me feel you know sad uncomfortable you know that kind of thing yeah and and I know you I know you would want to solve it right when you say to me in that scenario Doug I am so sorry MH Adam in that moment you have changed the relationship you have given me an obligation to comfort you mhm wow H right because then my next sentence is oh I’m okay or you know you don’t have to own this yeah the empathy is is the experience of coming up to
(33:57) some someone helping in a way that you lose your energy owning the problems in a way that you lose your energy and you’re making them more obligated to help you than than you’re providing wow compassion is the experience of showing up to this moment that we’ve described and and being there for the person helping them in a way that does not switch the roles or take your energy so if the roles were reversed in this little role play here and I and and it was you that said this this hardship you were going through I I could say
(34:42) something like you know uh Adam I don’t know of anyone in the world more capable I don’t know of any family more prepared for this kind of a hardship than you guys I’m here mhm mhm I’m I’m shielded my energy is is given but not in a way that I’m depleted and so it’s a boundary it’s a subtle difference and and I and you know listeners may may have a different way of framing empathy and compassion this works for me sure um but the act of of being um in the space with someone to show up and to not be depleted to not be
(35:32) so wounded which was the mistake I made for a lot of years I I threw myself at these huge Global issues in a way that I became very sick I put on a lot of weight I Str struggled with sleep I was owning these things in a way that my energy was just depleted yeah but not anymore yeah so what what was the how how did you know to make that switch cuz I mean or or at what point did you realize that enough was enough as far as that and you were able to do it oh I wish it hit hit sooner I got quite sick though yeah I mean it was um from the
(36:14) outside someone would just say it was burn out from work or whatever but it was deeper than that and the the exploration around compassion was giving me new language and the skill of an absolute brilliant trauma therapist who now works for us um she came into my life and Shepherd me through some of these shifts taking this language all this understanding all these perspectives and saying now how do you manage your energy um one day she she said to me April said to me she said uh you’re not allowed to spend more than 70% of your
(37:00) energy on any one given day now that’s that’s this just an unmeasurable kind of thing but it made sense to me and and I did have a way to kind of understand what she meant and and it gave me some guide rails as to how emotionally engaged how far I would go when I shut the day off um to manage the energy um during that season of like rebuilding now yeah the tank is full and and the management of those kind of things flows in a in a normal healthy way yeah I well I love that philosophy too because uh we we are so governed by
(37:43) this idea like you know Ian I mean just in addition to not not just absorbing the you you know that that or losing or or depleting our energy because of those situations but the idea that we have to give 110% all the time nonsense yeah and you know so I’ve had I’ve been you know working through the philosophy of I you know I when I hear that I think well what if we just gave 80% instead I mean 70% is probably a better option but yeah know it’s great um and and and I mean so and yeah so that that’s that’s powerful
(38:18) and so that that switch of just kind of it’s almost taking care of yourself too to be able to take care of others in the way that they need to be to be as comp as you need to be years ago I was um I was about I was in a small village in in the country of Rwanda it was a couple hours outside of the capitol city MH and I was KNE to knee with a group of of individuals who had survived the 1994 genocide and there’s one woman in particular she sat right in front of me and with the help of this interpreter
(38:56) she she shared shared with me her journey um that overnight her whole world fell apart during the genocide that her husband had been murdered her two children at the time had been murdered chopped into pieces hung in trees like I mean just off the charts horrible and then Adam in a way that you just with the gentleness you can’t even imagine she turned and just gently pointed to another man in the room and she said and that’s the guy who did it that that that killed my family oh my gosh I was waiting for
(39:35) knives to come out I was I what what are we talking about here and then she looked at me and she’s she was so calm and she said I love him now he’s The Godfather to my grandchildren I mean I no I don’t I was so lost I have I’ve studied forgiveness I’ve studied the com compassion I couldn’t comprehend what she was saying I asked him to come up and he pulled a chair sat right next to her and I said tell me your story he told me what happened and I finally got to the point where I was able to say you guys would
(40:12) you tell me how you reach the point of complete reconciliation from events that I just could never imagine and they talked for a long time about what they did how they moved forward they had a they had a community meeting and this man stood in the middle and people asked him every question they wanted to ask and it’s it’s it’s a beautiful tradition they have in Rwanda as a perpetrator reintegrates with society and she said to me she said after I had asked rert every single question I wanted to ask and he was so
(40:56) honest with with me she said there was nothing left to hate wow and she framed this in context of her her faith that God gave her the peace and all of which is part of my faith and I love yeah and I also had that part of my will just spinning about the ability for the brain to override hate fear anxiety regret and to move to a space of kindness forgiveness and compassion yeah man I mean that’s such an incredible story but and and it it’s so hard to grasp it even even still as you describe it because it’s just you know the fact
(41:49) that a person can live through that to see that horror to see that tragedy and to still have still live with the person there I mean in my mind it still seems like there’s this pedestal that that she is on of of compassion that uh that is is almost almost in you know from from at least where you know we’re at now or many people are at we can’t get to but how do we how do we get to that level and should we get to that level I mean is that the thing is it’s it’s absolutely already in US yeah yeah it
(42:26) doesn’t take enormous loss to activate that kind of generosity and kindness to an unforgiving world or to a neighbor who built their fence six inches on our property or whatever right much lesser things yeah yeah seems seems pretty small obviously in comparison it is already in us um our our body is built for uh to reach this kind of of a state it it makes us safe it leads us to Partners it leads us to happiness it creates family it creates meaning and when we are addressing um incredibly complex and difficult situations that have happened
(43:15) in the lives of our clients um the modalities that we we would use and and the and the the process of moving people forward can get you know quite complex but at its Essence yeah we’re moving them into allowing these chemical Cascades to rule their life again to take them to a state of trust and and compassion yeah what are some what are some steps that just people can take now who might be feeling like you know they they’re on the other side of that they might be feeling a little more anxiety or fear or or
(43:59) sadness or or but but where compassion can help them what what’s what do you recommend that they what do you recommend that they would do you know just some simple strategies we are what we focus on MH and that’s so simplistic we are our choices um to get up in the morning and say I’m going to choose compassion I’m going to choose compassion it’s not a mantra is is it’s not about you know this this this positive statement but it is about activating the the noticing mind um brains are tremendously good at
(44:48) thinking and bad at remembering um brains are really good at noticing and not so good at taking that information and and creating the right meaning from it so as we activate the noticing brain and and we’re a little bit more conscientious about the the words and the language we use to describe others um we do change I got a household I have six children uh from 24 to 12 and only one’s out of the house right now another will be at college got one in an NBA program they’re all over the place couple in high school in our
(45:30) little Caboose and um it’s so easy to frame up one of my kids’ Behavior as you know just enough to drive you crazy right oh yeah yeah and and yet um you know my my 15-year-old can come in and he’s he’s so good oh my gosh Adam he’s so good and he’s figuring things out and he just is so stupid you know is just so 15 and so he comes in at 9:30 at night or 10:00 at night and we’re about done for the day and he wants $20 to spend on a video game and like he wants to WRA up this whole thing and my my world my adult brain has
(46:15) to notice what is it like to be him to be at the mercy of Dad’s wallet yeah and and to remember what I felt like at 15 when I had to go ask my dad for $3 right and allow myself to notice what he’s striving for in a in a in a deeper way that he’s not trying to interfere with my sleep he’s unaware yeah how cool is that that he doesn’t have to worry about what I worry about so pretty quickly I could get really angry and it does happen some times but I could get you know I could really go over the edge with it
(47:02) or I can notice something on a different level starts in our home it starts with noticing um where there is trauma um we we release we change we we we uh we move people through that and kind of clear the clear that stuff out um and allow for new patterns to come in and and it’s just tremendous progress tons of energy comes back into their life and it’s just a different flow Al together and so this this uh this place that you work uh to help people is is grce space experts right and and uh can you tell us a little bit about that and
(47:46) and you know what what you all do how you how you operate yeah I’d love to know uh Janine and I my my wife and I we founded the gray space experts because of uh a lot of reasons um I had to get back to the front lines I I couldn’t do uh Global work anymore I just needed I needed to be knee to knee with people in a more direct way um so grce space experts is uh it’s a it’s a neuroscience centered coaching and I don’t know of any other Neuroscience centered coaching companies in the world the way we are MH
(48:25) we have health and wellness we have licensed clinical psychologists that have you know that can do the heavy trauma work we have educator coach people that come in um we do a lot of work around relationship around parenting family you know personal relationship work um healing from from abuse a lot of addiction recovery um and then just and then also just this enormous space of people saying I’m stuck yeah I’m frustrated with my community my church my whatever I need some ideas on how to get a little you know energy going
(49:13) here to something new in my life um we don’t work with people for you know years and years and years we um three to six months is kind of the high end of of what we would be doing with anyone individual um it’s a lot of fun our our our experts are all over the country yeah yeah I’m reading your website you have a lot of experts here and a lot of and different others that aren’t even on the site like we are so behind in just getting things updated but we have some I just some beautiful amazing people um
(49:57) and intentionally we’ve we’ve said let’s find that wide variety if someone comes in and they uh they want to understand a mindfulness development and a and a meditative practice we wanted to make sure that was in our house right and so right um we could we could direct them to sessions and experiences there uh we’re based out of Utah mhm um but you know that’s that’s just home base for my family and our our administrative work and our our group here um but we’re having so much fun so
(50:35) you do so you do uh inperson and virtual right because I know you have some some courses or workshops you have too as well we do and I’m okay I’m about to the point where I’m just gonna say you got to fly in um I love everyone I work with wherever they are um and we can get a lot done online and we do um I think I’m just about at the point where I’m gonna say if if this is what if this find what you need you’ve got to you got to come into town we need to do a couple days intensive whatever and let’s let’s
(51:11) get you moving haven’t pulled the trigger on that but that’s looming well yeah I mean it’s it’s hard to argue with but you know in person especially with the in a treatment related capacity is so much more valuable to be just eye to eye in person and U it’s huge and and this isn’t talk therapy I mean you know we’ve got the screens and the whiteboards and object lessons hidden in every cupboard and they’re up they’re moving and um uh couple a day when was it two days ago had a some parents and their 13-year-old
(51:47) son in um this this young man is just he’s just amazing his he’s 0 hhhh HD you know he’s the he’s the real deal and and we did a three-hour session I mean give me a break who does three hours with a 13-year-old with ADHD right yeah yeah yeah yeah it just flowed he that kid was breaking the code on a million things and listing and figuring it out and we have so much fun and so it’s um I love the creativity that this company allows me to bring into the space of education and coaching yeah and
(52:24) so this this approach it’s not it’s not an ongoing like you know I like for instance I’ve been in with working with a therapist for 12 years you know but this is just a you have a structure six months and and it’s done yeah and it you know brains are interesting brains are tough and bodies the realities of what works and how it works um with everyone is different so uh but generally speaking um we you know we we get to the core issues quickly yeah we we address the fundamentals and and create
(53:12) accountability and things to to really change how people think and live and and it’s not us saying well time’s up we’re done with you it’s them saying I’m good yeah like yeah yeah I’ll call you if I’m if I’m stuck had one of them today one of my favorite clients of all time she is just off the charts awesome yeah and she called she’s like I don’t know what’s next and I said nothing we’re done call me when your whatever comes up if something bubbles give me a call other than that
(53:46) we’re good she’s like oh my gosh I love this okay oh that’s uh that’s incredible I mean I know yeah I know a lot of of uh resistance to that is is this idea that you’re forever in therapy and and all that kind of stuff and it sounds like it’s a good you know it’s it’s a good it’s just it’s positive to hear hear all of that and um and um and yeah so I think that I I it’s such an incredible yeah you’re right I mean from my perspective where I don’t know much
(54:17) about the brain at all and we still don’t we probably still know less about it than we do about space and right and everything but um but this has been such a a great conversation I know we could like dig in for for hours on on the subject but um I’d love to help people know where they could find you how can they get in touch with Grace Bas experts you know how where would you like people to get in touch with you so they can just look me up as Doug richens uh gspace experts.com is our website you’ll
(54:50) you can list that in the in the cast notes there and um uh you know we just get on a call we just have a phone call or a zoom call and we just we just have a start with the conversation I I hope I haven’t represented our services as like in your face because it’s actually incredibly gentle um I get animated in these kind of conversations but ever I I think one of our greatest attributes as a as a company is that the the softness the gentleness to which we we help people move forward is just a beautiful experience and we we move
(55:32) people forward that way so people just reach out and have a phone call and um and and just just be patient with us as we you know can can make that happen as quickly as we can um and it’s uh we just love to talk to anyone excellent well if you if you do want to reach out to if you’re listening and you want to reach out to Doug or uh gray space experts then yeah please check out Grays space experts.
(56:01) com got tons of resources on there and uh and yeah reach out to Doug this was a great conversation Doug I’m so grateful that you were here thank you for everything that you’re doing to bring more compassion to the world and uh I appreciate you being here thank you Adam you’re a wonder you’re awesome thank you so much thank you and to everyone else out there thank you very much for being here and joining us today we’ll see you next time hey everyone Thanks for tuning in to the flow over fear podcast if
(56:29) you’d like to learn more about getting into flow and learn the foundations of flow I have a free video series on my website at www. adamclick hill.com called the foundations of flow feel free to go there and download it and start your journey to Rising above fear and achieving greater flow in your life if you like this episode and I’m guessing you did if you stuck around for this long then please do me a favor and hit the Subscribe button and you will receive notifications when I have new interviews new Recaps and new trainings
(57:02) that pop up on YouTube thanks again for joining us