#66: The Root Cause of Depression (And How to Heal It for Good) With Dr. Ardeshir Mehran
The Root Cause of Depression (And How to Heal It for Good)
Are you tired of hearing the prevailing notion that depression is an unchangeable mood disorder necessitating lifelong medication? What if there was a different path—a way to heal, rebuild, and reclaim your joy without relying on pills?
Welcome to Beyond The Pills, the groundbreaking podcast hosted by Dr. Ardeshir Mehran—a psychologist, behavioral researcher, transformational leader, and bestselling author. Holding a Ph.D. and M.Ed. from Columbia University, Dr. Mehran brings over 30 years of experience to the table. He challenges conventional notions of depression, focusing on the real culprit: the unfulfilled life we lead when we deny our birthrights.
In this podcast, Dr. Mehran introduces The Bill of Emotional Rights, a manifesto for lifelong motivation and fulfillment. He offers science-based, medication-free solutions that empower individuals to heal at the root level—without numbing the pain or suppressing symptoms.
If you’ve ever felt stuck, powerless, or frustrated by traditional approaches that don’t address the deeper causes of depression, this podcast is for you. You deserve more than just symptom management—you deserve a real, lasting transformation.
🌱 It’s time to take control of your emotional health. Subscribe to Beyond The Pills today and start your journey toward true healing—without medication. Your breakthrough starts here.
For more information about Dr. Mehran and his groundbreaking work, visit ardeshirmehran.com.
Transcript
Hello, hello, everyone.
Speaker:Welcome to this episode of
Speaker:Beyond the Pills.
Speaker:I'm Josh Rimini, pharmacist turned healer.
Speaker:And today we have a very special guest,
Speaker:Dr. Ardashir Maran,
Speaker:who is disrupting the mental health field,
Speaker:delivering more effective
Speaker:practices to heal
Speaker:depression and to ease the
Speaker:emotional suffering of
Speaker:people across the world.
Speaker:He is the author of the bestselling book,
Speaker:You Are Not Depressed,
Speaker:You Are Unfinished.
Speaker:Everyone else portrays
Speaker:depression as an immovable cause,
Speaker:a mood disorder that must be treated.
Speaker:Dr. Marin busts this myth
Speaker:and focuses attention on the real culprit,
Speaker:the unfulfilled life we
Speaker:must lead when we deny our birthrights.
Speaker:He is the developer of the
Speaker:Bill of Emotional Rights
Speaker:based on thirty years of research,
Speaker:coaching, and clinical work.
Speaker:You can read about his
Speaker:fulfilled life and his
Speaker:fulfilled life manifesto on his website,
Speaker:artistshearmaren.com.
Speaker:He is a psychologist, trauma therapist,
Speaker:behavioral researcher,
Speaker:and a leadership and team coach.
Speaker:He has a PhD and a master's
Speaker:in education in counseling,
Speaker:organizational,
Speaker:and research psychology
Speaker:from Columbia University.
Speaker:I love the backed by science stuff.
Speaker:He has served in leadership
Speaker:roles in corporations and
Speaker:consulting firms.
Speaker:Ardashir has advanced
Speaker:training in psychoanalysis, group therapy,
Speaker:and team dynamics.
Speaker:He is currently writing his new book,
Speaker:Break It,
Speaker:and that's on the science and
Speaker:healing practices for generational trauma,
Speaker:another awesome topic I
Speaker:love to talk about.
Speaker:And he lives in Burlingame with his wife,
Speaker:son, and Lucy,
Speaker:the family golden retriever.
Speaker:Dr. Merrin's passions
Speaker:include spending time with his family,
Speaker:running marathons, hiking, swimming,
Speaker:photography, and music.
Speaker:Welcome, welcome, Dr. Ardashir Merrin.
Speaker:Great.
Speaker:Thank you so much, Josh.
Speaker:I'm so excited to be here
Speaker:with you and with your audience.
Speaker:And thank you for that rich introduction.
Speaker:Just see me as a science
Speaker:geek that got tired of a
Speaker:lot of theory in graduate
Speaker:school about healing people
Speaker:that I felt that we are not
Speaker:helping people.
Speaker:that when we tell people
Speaker:come back next week for another session,
Speaker:another session,
Speaker:and then goes for months and years,
Speaker:then I start to realize
Speaker:this is not working.
Speaker:It wasn't working for me as
Speaker:I was struggling to my
Speaker:emotional struggles.
Speaker:So I went on a journey about
Speaker:what exactly is mental
Speaker:illness and had two questions.
Speaker:What is depression and why
Speaker:Depression takes so long to heal.
Speaker:People who are in the
Speaker:therapy or they go to therapy,
Speaker:they know depression is
Speaker:almost like a glue,
Speaker:sticks to your body and never leaves you.
Speaker:And the reason I was
Speaker:interested in depression
Speaker:because depression, you don't see it.
Speaker:You see anxiety, you see ADHD,
Speaker:you see bipolar, obsessive compulsive.
Speaker:Depression is a heaviness you feel.
Speaker:And we accept it as a fate, as a mood,
Speaker:as a way of being.
Speaker:And I realized, no, that's not.
Speaker:Depression is a story.
Speaker:It's a person's story.
Speaker:And the reason it doesn't get healed,
Speaker:we're trying to treat it, medicate it,
Speaker:and more or less manage it.
Speaker:No, depression is something you unleash.
Speaker:It's the story that hasn't been told.
Speaker:Once you listen to your story,
Speaker:Depression actually tells
Speaker:you what you need to do, dude.
Speaker:You need to go and do stuff.
Speaker:You're playing small.
Speaker:Depression is your own soul
Speaker:screaming at you, tormenting you to say,
Speaker:get up, do things.
Speaker:The life you have, you're not playing it.
Speaker:You're playing in junior league.
Speaker:You need to go to a big league.
Speaker:Well, welcome to this episode.
Speaker:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker:I couldn't have.
Speaker:time that any better you
Speaker:talked already about
Speaker:symptom management versus
Speaker:healing true healing right
Speaker:this podcast is all about
Speaker:blending this ancient
Speaker:wisdom with modern science
Speaker:for true healing we're not
Speaker:talking symptom resolution right the
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:I want to dive in because mental health,
Speaker:especially depression is
Speaker:such a big thing right now.
Speaker:And I loved what you talked
Speaker:about in the shamanic world
Speaker:when I'm learning on the
Speaker:energy world is instead of
Speaker:being in the story,
Speaker:you become the storyteller.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:And so let's dive in on this
Speaker:because this is huge, huge, huge stuff.
Speaker:So
Speaker:you went through your own
Speaker:journey to get to this discovery.
Speaker:This wasn't something that
Speaker:like you read in the books you were,
Speaker:was it something that
Speaker:clicked with you in after
Speaker:you were already in
Speaker:counseling with people?
Speaker:Or was it something that you
Speaker:did before you got through all this?
Speaker:I'm curious on your own.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:You know, there's a great question.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:there's a statement that life
Speaker:finds you that, um,
Speaker:So I grew up in a very troubled family,
Speaker:mom and dad.
Speaker:And I remember mom and dad,
Speaker:they had certain expression.
Speaker:There were six kids, mom and dad.
Speaker:We didn't have much money,
Speaker:dad working hard,
Speaker:mom working hard to take
Speaker:care of the kids.
Speaker:And there was a look to my mom's face,
Speaker:her eyes, and my dad that they were there,
Speaker:but they were not there.
Speaker:And at that time, I was wondering,
Speaker:where is mom?
Speaker:Both of them were magnificent people.
Speaker:But at the same time,
Speaker:there were a period of time,
Speaker:there were love, affection.
Speaker:Two hours later, it was violence, physical,
Speaker:emotional abuse, yelling, neglect,
Speaker:and a lot of hurtful things
Speaker:that I know they didn't want to do that,
Speaker:but they were exhausted.
Speaker:And I was just thinking, where is mom?
Speaker:Where is dad?
Speaker:there were several pivoting point.
Speaker:As I left the field and I came,
Speaker:went to graduate school and
Speaker:I was doing my clinical
Speaker:training in Bellevue
Speaker:Psychiatric Hospital in New York City.
Speaker:So as a rookie therapist,
Speaker:you have protocols, template to follow,
Speaker:how you do patient intake,
Speaker:the question you ask,
Speaker:the statement you have, even all they do,
Speaker:you say, great question, tell me more.
Speaker:I was good at it, I was a good student.
Speaker:Then I noticed when patients
Speaker:talk about their schizophrenia,
Speaker:about their suicidal thoughts,
Speaker:about their depression, addiction,
Speaker:If I listen to their symptoms,
Speaker:I would go down one way that, you know,
Speaker:they would tell about their body,
Speaker:their angst, their breathing,
Speaker:their crazy thoughts.
Speaker:But if I look at them as a human being,
Speaker:that they were hurt, they were abused,
Speaker:they were rejected, they were violated.
Speaker:Honor them, not as a patient,
Speaker:as a man and woman who
Speaker:didn't get a decent
Speaker:beginning in life,
Speaker:and really respect and call them Mr.,
Speaker:Mrs.,
Speaker:and really honor them in those sessions.
Speaker:And instead of asking them
Speaker:clinical questions, ask them,
Speaker:how are you?
Speaker:Where were you when all
Speaker:those things happened?
Speaker:Who was in the house?
Speaker:Did anybody hear you?
Speaker:Did anybody embrace you?
Speaker:I would see two things.
Speaker:Their demeanors, their crazy thoughts,
Speaker:right away would dissipate.
Speaker:They would become a vulnerable,
Speaker:scared and hurt individuals.
Speaker:And their stories made sense.
Speaker:They were crazy.
Speaker:The craziness wasn't the cause,
Speaker:was the outcome of a life
Speaker:that really fragmented them.
Speaker:They couldn't feel.
Speaker:And I started to see they make sense.
Speaker:Then they would tell me a story.
Speaker:I was listening that they're
Speaker:telling the story.
Speaker:They wanted to be held.
Speaker:They wanted to love.
Speaker:They want to go a place that
Speaker:they were honored.
Speaker:They wanted to like their
Speaker:body and their body was protected.
Speaker:Nobody touched them.
Speaker:Nobody violated them.
Speaker:They want to be seen.
Speaker:They wanted to express themselves.
Speaker:And I noticed they're
Speaker:telling me something about
Speaker:they want to be in certain ways,
Speaker:a way of human dignity that
Speaker:was denied of them.
Speaker:Then I realized that they, people,
Speaker:different diagnosis,
Speaker:different clinical background.
Speaker:They keep telling me stories.
Speaker:I hear them.
Speaker:I couldn't decipher that.
Speaker:Then very soon I realized
Speaker:that was my own story.
Speaker:That was my mom's story.
Speaker:That was a time to realize, you know what?
Speaker:This field of psychotherapy
Speaker:is overwhelming.
Speaker:I cannot handle that.
Speaker:I'm going to go to corporate environment.
Speaker:get to work in like a culture, you know,
Speaker:like experts, change management,
Speaker:leadership,
Speaker:and make a lot more money and
Speaker:work with normal people.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Corporate environment, oh my gosh,
Speaker:these are crazy people in
Speaker:mental hospital.
Speaker:And then what blew my mind and, you know,
Speaker:doing psychological testing
Speaker:as part of the leadership
Speaker:development with those leaders,
Speaker:I saw so many leaders in key
Speaker:executive roles, high level of depression,
Speaker:anxiety, substance abuse, addiction.
Speaker:Even they would tell me
Speaker:about their marital
Speaker:infidelity at the rate all
Speaker:of these well above the
Speaker:normal population.
Speaker:That's the day I realized
Speaker:There's a story behind so
Speaker:many people with credentials,
Speaker:big gold Rolexes and
Speaker:successful demeanors that
Speaker:you're suffering in silence.
Speaker:They didn't want to go to therapist.
Speaker:They didn't trust the therapist.
Speaker:And more than anything else,
Speaker:they didn't even know
Speaker:there's anything wrong with
Speaker:them because they were the
Speaker:master of resiliency.
Speaker:In our society, we admire resiliency.
Speaker:Resiliency is the ability to,
Speaker:you fall down, you get up and go again.
Speaker:They learn how to mask and power too.
Speaker:Resiliency can kill actually.
Speaker:That we want to be resilient,
Speaker:but we want to be authentic.
Speaker:And resiliency, what I learned,
Speaker:and fulfillment,
Speaker:they are two different things.
Speaker:It's not how will you try.
Speaker:Are you trying and doing it the right way?
Speaker:So as I was trying to leave
Speaker:the clinical field away,
Speaker:the clinical field was keep
Speaker:dragging me back.
Speaker:Dude, you're a therapist.
Speaker:You're a healer.
Speaker:All these experiences you have,
Speaker:they are data points about
Speaker:why we get ill.
Speaker:And how do we come back?
Speaker:How do we come back?
Speaker:So
Speaker:It lasted well over thirty years.
Speaker:And finally, about ten, twelve years ago,
Speaker:I realized there's a
Speaker:research book inside me
Speaker:that I need to write,
Speaker:which finally I wrote it
Speaker:and came back and it
Speaker:reached the Amazon bestseller status.
Speaker:And I had no idea, Josh,
Speaker:I'll be doing this work.
Speaker:I had no idea.
Speaker:I was just trying to, to be honest,
Speaker:save me so I could become a better father,
Speaker:better spouse, and better sibling.
Speaker:That's powerful.
Speaker:Man,
Speaker:I love these conversations because not
Speaker:even knowing all of your story, right?
Speaker:Just the background and
Speaker:where you came from.
Speaker:The stories of...
Speaker:becoming your true authentic
Speaker:self and serving at this
Speaker:highest level is really
Speaker:where I feel is our purpose in life,
Speaker:right?
Speaker:It's like when I talk to people like this,
Speaker:I resonate so much because
Speaker:I too have been in that
Speaker:space of resiliency,
Speaker:of going through my whole stages of life,
Speaker:of putting almost...
Speaker:It's almost like a pride backpack of like,
Speaker:I'm resilient because I
Speaker:went through a broken
Speaker:family and I went through
Speaker:cancer and I went through
Speaker:this and I went through that.
Speaker:And I'm very proud of where I came from,
Speaker:but that resiliency can
Speaker:have a shadow to...
Speaker:living an authentic self, right?
Speaker:This authenticity is
Speaker:something that's new and not new,
Speaker:but like people are
Speaker:becoming more in that space.
Speaker:Cause why I love when you
Speaker:like this fulfillment,
Speaker:we have to have to lift and
Speaker:heal that depression to get
Speaker:into our purpose.
Speaker:And I love this.
Speaker:I only got into this to help myself.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And then you felt compelled
Speaker:to help others because of that.
Speaker:That's the true definition
Speaker:of a healer in my perspective.
Speaker:One, thank you for bringing it up.
Speaker:But two, that's it's for me, that's the,
Speaker:that's the formula.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:We all go to life finds us and we all go,
Speaker:there's a term.
Speaker:research research really
Speaker:what we were doing is me
Speaker:search what was going on
Speaker:with me why why am I stuck
Speaker:in this mode and then at
Speaker:certain point you start to
Speaker:see pattern and as you
Speaker:share realize my story your
Speaker:story is everybody's story
Speaker:everybody's heroes burning
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yeah, sharing that.
Speaker:You want to be the hero in the journey,
Speaker:not the victim or not the savior.
Speaker:It's your journey.
Speaker:And going through your own
Speaker:journey doesn't mean it's, you know,
Speaker:quote, unquote, puppy dogs and ice cream,
Speaker:right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:the journey to self the
Speaker:journey to wholeness the
Speaker:journey to fulfillment I
Speaker:love that research versus
Speaker:me search I love that I
Speaker:I've said the same thing in
Speaker:the space of like we become
Speaker:human doings not human
Speaker:beings that's right that's
Speaker:right absolutely absolutely
Speaker:I mean and this is what
Speaker:makes all of us bond
Speaker:together I mean in fact
Speaker:when I was walking with a
Speaker:neighbor we both have
Speaker:golden retrievers and then
Speaker:And she said that,
Speaker:I know she and her husband
Speaker:struggled a lot in their lives.
Speaker:And she said that, Arashir,
Speaker:the way we people, we should be,
Speaker:everybody has a story, private story.
Speaker:We shouldn't judge them
Speaker:because we don't know where
Speaker:they come from.
Speaker:And then that resonated with me.
Speaker:We all have a story,
Speaker:but then persona of the roles, title,
Speaker:wealth, the car we drive, we mask it.
Speaker:But there's a private
Speaker:stories and we really don't
Speaker:have a place to talk about it,
Speaker:to be that individual.
Speaker:And through the work you're doing, Josh,
Speaker:is that show up and tell
Speaker:your story is everybody's story.
Speaker:And my sense is that people
Speaker:listen to like your podcast
Speaker:because through your story,
Speaker:they find themselves.
Speaker:There are people like me.
Speaker:This is our story.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Well, and I think that's, we've,
Speaker:I've gone through the, oh my gosh, you,
Speaker:me, everyone.
Speaker:Like we've gone through all
Speaker:the science of all of this, right?
Speaker:All of the intellect of all of this.
Speaker:And moving back in full circle into this,
Speaker:not simple, it's complex, but it's simple,
Speaker:right?
Speaker:Simple doesn't mean easy,
Speaker:but what you're talking
Speaker:about is human connection.
Speaker:That's right, that's right.
Speaker:And we just had a recent episode,
Speaker:may not have aired yet,
Speaker:we talked about just about connection.
Speaker:And now we're talking about fulfillment,
Speaker:being unfinished,
Speaker:because what I heard you
Speaker:say is that outside story
Speaker:of what everyone sees is
Speaker:very different than our inside story,
Speaker:our story with ourselves.
Speaker:And that's why I think I
Speaker:identify with the tribes or
Speaker:the places that I hang out
Speaker:with because we're growth
Speaker:seekers from the inside out.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:And in fact,
Speaker:it's interesting you mentioned
Speaker:about them.
Speaker:When I was still in my
Speaker:twenty working in that
Speaker:corporate environment,
Speaker:it was in downtown
Speaker:Manhattan in a wonderful building.
Speaker:There was a very frequent happening.
Speaker:So senior leaders,
Speaker:they were all older than me.
Speaker:I was twenty, late twenties.
Speaker:It would go like this.
Speaker:Hey, Ardeshir,
Speaker:come here to the room and
Speaker:close the door behind you.
Speaker:You're a nice guy.
Speaker:You're a good listener.
Speaker:I've seen you on the different meetings.
Speaker:I want to talk with you.
Speaker:And they would tell me about themselves.
Speaker:You know, like, you know what?
Speaker:That session,
Speaker:you saw me like really
Speaker:getting angry and pound the table.
Speaker:This is what's going on.
Speaker:They would tell me about their life,
Speaker:the family struggle they had,
Speaker:the financial struggle they had,
Speaker:and so on.
Speaker:And I was thinking, who do they talk to?
Speaker:Why do they select me to talk with that?
Speaker:And I was, to be honest,
Speaker:I was overwhelmed because
Speaker:when you're in the company,
Speaker:you don't do therapy.
Speaker:You know, there are boundaries.
Speaker:You thought so.
Speaker:You thought so.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:What they wanted really,
Speaker:somebody please listen to
Speaker:me and don't judge me.
Speaker:realized what they were.
Speaker:I wasn't getting excited.
Speaker:I wasn't judging them.
Speaker:Still,
Speaker:I saw them a very respectful leader
Speaker:who wanted to talk to
Speaker:somebody and honor me.
Speaker:They would feel comfortable
Speaker:and feel more whole after
Speaker:they shared what was going on.
Speaker:And a lot of time,
Speaker:they knew what they were supposed to do.
Speaker:I was thinking,
Speaker:so where do they go for
Speaker:something like that?
Speaker:Why can't we have
Speaker:more opportunity that we can
Speaker:talk to somebody about me, about me,
Speaker:what's going on with me.
Speaker:Does it make sense?
Speaker:We go to therapy,
Speaker:but therapy is one experience.
Speaker:We don't talk to our spouse,
Speaker:to our colleagues,
Speaker:definitely not to our boss like that.
Speaker:So the way we are, we built in loneliness,
Speaker:isolation, that I cannot be me.
Speaker:I need to as a persona.
Speaker:I need to play.
Speaker:It's a dad after what
Speaker:becomes a jail and we need
Speaker:to break out of it.
Speaker:I love this.
Speaker:This is why I've been so...
Speaker:Probably they're the last...
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:fifteen years I've been really
Speaker:involved in men's work and
Speaker:having men's circles.
Speaker:And because this is exactly
Speaker:the outlet for men who have
Speaker:been told not to feel when
Speaker:it's really it's, you know,
Speaker:we say this a lot in these
Speaker:kind of like traumas and things like,
Speaker:but people really want to be seen,
Speaker:heard and understood.
Speaker:None of those none of those
Speaker:have anything to do with fix me.
Speaker:None of those have to do
Speaker:with there's something wrong with me.
Speaker:It's just I just need an outlet to share.
Speaker:That's full authenticity.
Speaker:Brene Brown says it's vulnerability,
Speaker:but it's authenticity too.
Speaker:It's like being able to tell
Speaker:your story without the filters.
Speaker:This isn't the movie of your story.
Speaker:This is the real story,
Speaker:the documentary of you.
Speaker:And so that's why I've been
Speaker:so drawn to a lot of these
Speaker:different avenues,
Speaker:because it is the true
Speaker:essence of human connection.
Speaker:When you can connect, because you said it,
Speaker:Ardashir,
Speaker:is like your story is my story
Speaker:and my story is someone else's story.
Speaker:That's how we connect.
Speaker:It's like, oh, my gosh.
Speaker:That's me too, and now I want to do that,
Speaker:right?
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:Let me build on that then.
Speaker:Please.
Speaker:For your listeners,
Speaker:for us to progress in the
Speaker:journey of our betterment and healing,
Speaker:the following needs to happen.
Speaker:You, dear listener,
Speaker:you need to tell your story.
Speaker:In your own language, in your own demeanor,
Speaker:in your own metaphor.
Speaker:It's your language.
Speaker:It's not a language of the
Speaker:corporate being espoused.
Speaker:It's your language.
Speaker:Number one, your story needs to be heard.
Speaker:Your story needs to be heard.
Speaker:By whom?
Speaker:By an atoned witness.
Speaker:Atonement is different than empathy.
Speaker:Empathy is like I hear you, like Josh,
Speaker:you say something and I can say, Josh,
Speaker:I hear that you're upset.
Speaker:I see that you're pissed off.
Speaker:I see that you're in love.
Speaker:Atone sees your entire you.
Speaker:Atonement is creating a
Speaker:space that as you talk about,
Speaker:I don't get excited, get judgmental,
Speaker:I don't tune out.
Speaker:I create a space for you to
Speaker:share and be yourself.
Speaker:And I see your face,
Speaker:I see your body movement,
Speaker:and I see your presence.
Speaker:What I'm really doing is
Speaker:Creating a space for you to
Speaker:take your space.
Speaker:That this is me.
Speaker:Please hear me.
Speaker:And so tell your story to
Speaker:somebody who pays attention
Speaker:to you in an atonement.
Speaker:And because that creates a
Speaker:wholeness for you.
Speaker:Absence of that is
Speaker:loneliness and for us to
Speaker:isolation and for us to
Speaker:talk in cryptic language.
Speaker:In fact, what we know words
Speaker:That is a part we can talk more.
Speaker:Emotions are not in our language.
Speaker:Emotions are in our bodies,
Speaker:in our nervous system.
Speaker:In fact, we raise our kids and say,
Speaker:sit over there, don't be fidgety,
Speaker:put your hands down, just use words.
Speaker:When you act, like even your listeners,
Speaker:I don't know if they're seeing me,
Speaker:I'm very...
Speaker:Moving, my hands moving.
Speaker:This is how we show emotions.
Speaker:We act our emotions.
Speaker:We express emotion.
Speaker:Our voice goes up and down and so on.
Speaker:When you do that,
Speaker:your whole being feels connected.
Speaker:You become whole versus just
Speaker:sitting here talking head,
Speaker:expressing sentiments and analysis.
Speaker:So tell your story, my friends.
Speaker:That is the first and a very
Speaker:powerful step toward claiming you.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:I was just recently in a
Speaker:conversation around this
Speaker:same concept of like,
Speaker:step one is the way I would
Speaker:say to speak my truth, right?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:When I when I made that
Speaker:let's just call it bold
Speaker:decision or courageous decision.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:when I was a pharmacist and I was
Speaker:living a lie because I knew
Speaker:that I could do more for
Speaker:people and I could for myself too.
Speaker:And it was like,
Speaker:Medications aren't the fix to everything.
Speaker:They're just symptom management.
Speaker:I knew so much.
Speaker:And then all of a sudden I was like,
Speaker:you know what?
Speaker:It don't matter.
Speaker:I don't care.
Speaker:I'm going to speak my truth
Speaker:and I'm going to start
Speaker:because it was true.
Speaker:It was my truth,
Speaker:but it was also a truth for me.
Speaker:And as soon as I did that artist here,
Speaker:like as soon as I kind of made that,
Speaker:let's just call it the step
Speaker:right out of out of what I
Speaker:thought other people would know,
Speaker:like like for real,
Speaker:like I was a pharmacist and
Speaker:then all of a sudden people
Speaker:were listening.
Speaker:and then all of a sudden
Speaker:there's pharmacists in the
Speaker:room who want me to get on
Speaker:stage and talk about it and
Speaker:then all of a sudden it was
Speaker:like this whole thing
Speaker:happened it was yeah it was
Speaker:it wasn't this magical
Speaker:moment where I got a degree
Speaker:and got a job and did the
Speaker:thing it was literally just
Speaker:speak speaking my story and
Speaker:my truths from a place of
Speaker:not like ego,
Speaker:not anything I wanted to get out of it.
Speaker:There was no backstory to it.
Speaker:And I think that's what's
Speaker:really important for people,
Speaker:especially when we start
Speaker:talking words like
Speaker:authenticity and moving
Speaker:people into their own story
Speaker:and speaking that.
Speaker:I love what you said is like
Speaker:from by an atoned witness, right?
Speaker:This isn't fitting,
Speaker:like you're not talking,
Speaker:this isn't water cooler talk.
Speaker:This is like real-
Speaker:You want that safe,
Speaker:sacred space where someone can hold that.
Speaker:And generally,
Speaker:and I'm sure this is what
Speaker:your book is about,
Speaker:and I want to talk about
Speaker:your book and why this is
Speaker:so important for people to know,
Speaker:because you kind of know
Speaker:when you have that
Speaker:container with somebody.
Speaker:It's not superficial,
Speaker:and you can kind of tell
Speaker:when it's not that, right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:That is so true.
Speaker:There is an element of let's
Speaker:get real with life.
Speaker:What I learned through my
Speaker:journey of working with corporate people,
Speaker:emotional development,
Speaker:and people in the clinical setting,
Speaker:when life body blows happen
Speaker:childhood adversity trauma
Speaker:and the struggles what
Speaker:happened actually two
Speaker:things happen one is that
Speaker:we don't get to experience
Speaker:the things we should have
Speaker:experienced love attention
Speaker:a space to grow, a space to be ourselves.
Speaker:We don't get to have that enough.
Speaker:Or instead,
Speaker:we get a lot of things we
Speaker:shouldn't have experienced, neglect,
Speaker:abuse, hurt.
Speaker:So what happened,
Speaker:we developed in a compromised state.
Speaker:We fit in.
Speaker:We're trying to, almost like a Houdini,
Speaker:trying to go into a box as
Speaker:a way to get by.
Speaker:That's what mental illness is.
Speaker:Depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive,
Speaker:ADHD, these are all adaptive responses.
Speaker:We started to behave in a
Speaker:certain way to get by, to survive,
Speaker:and it's our...
Speaker:mental so-called mental
Speaker:illness is our rebellious
Speaker:action is or really say
Speaker:that I am pissed off and
Speaker:this is the way we show our
Speaker:you know like defiance
Speaker:through our mental illness
Speaker:As we come out of depression, ADHD,
Speaker:anxiety, what we will see,
Speaker:we're almost coming,
Speaker:people who come out of like
Speaker:darkness for a while,
Speaker:their eyes cannot see the sunlight,
Speaker:we learn we didn't develop
Speaker:certain life skills of connecting,
Speaker:relating, being authentic.
Speaker:So as we come out of the
Speaker:shackles of mental illness,
Speaker:The journey of development
Speaker:and growth and learning begins, in fact.
Speaker:This is what I call, instead of therapy,
Speaker:is restoration.
Speaker:We didn't develop certain skills,
Speaker:but we need to do it right now.
Speaker:So some of the work I do with couples,
Speaker:as the couples learn, instead of fighting,
Speaker:criticizing, belittling each other,
Speaker:as they start to settle,
Speaker:they learn that we don't
Speaker:know how to talk
Speaker:respectfully to each other.
Speaker:how to create a space.
Speaker:I don't need to raise my
Speaker:voice to get my needs met.
Speaker:I don't need to make myself
Speaker:small to be loved.
Speaker:The journey of healing is
Speaker:the journey of relearning, showing up,
Speaker:and creating your new you.
Speaker:Some people don't want that.
Speaker:I agree.
Speaker:Some people say,
Speaker:I was better when I was depressed.
Speaker:You know, like,
Speaker:I just want to go to another.
Speaker:I want to go into the darkness.
Speaker:It's almost like you realize
Speaker:that you own you.
Speaker:Show up.
Speaker:This is the best part of life.
Speaker:And so...
Speaker:some to be honest you know
Speaker:some of the clients is that
Speaker:you know what I'm okay with
Speaker:therapy I I can't go this
Speaker:far after that I will get
Speaker:back to you but some other
Speaker:people said no I know what
Speaker:freedom looks like I want
Speaker:to go all the way I want to
Speaker:go all the way yes and I I
Speaker:think that's so key like
Speaker:it's there's no wrong or
Speaker:right to humanity to your
Speaker:own consciousness to your own world yeah
Speaker:And I say,
Speaker:the way I say is when you're aware,
Speaker:you cannot be unaware.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:You can certainly make a choice.
Speaker:It's the one way street.
Speaker:Awareness is the one way street.
Speaker:Now you have a choice on
Speaker:what you want to do with it.
Speaker:Cause some people like I'm a
Speaker:big consciousness explorer.
Speaker:I love exploring my consciousness.
Speaker:Like I love to go out into
Speaker:the far depths of the
Speaker:universe to explore who I
Speaker:am and my wholeness and my
Speaker:connection to the,
Speaker:the wonderful part of this
Speaker:whole universe and the quantum.
Speaker:And yeah,
Speaker:are some people and I call
Speaker:it seekers right we're
Speaker:seeking us and there's some
Speaker:people and and that's also
Speaker:for your own authenticity
Speaker:this is new for me like I'm
Speaker:I just turned fifty and in
Speaker:in year forty nine like I I
Speaker:found these deep depths of
Speaker:who I really am over this
Speaker:period of time and it was
Speaker:like these things awakened
Speaker:inside me like you said
Speaker:freedom freedom is such a
Speaker:powerful world word is because
Speaker:And a lot of us stop on that outside,
Speaker:right?
Speaker:The outside part.
Speaker:But like,
Speaker:I love where you said like depression is,
Speaker:it's not like this thing
Speaker:where you diagnose,
Speaker:it's this downstream effect
Speaker:of all of that stuff that happened.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:And it's the human experience.
Speaker:I don't think I've met too
Speaker:many people that says,
Speaker:I got all my needs met when I was a kid.
Speaker:Everything was fine.
Speaker:Like, great, if that was who you are.
Speaker:But most of the people,
Speaker:maybe I'm attracting them now.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:But like most of them, no one's broken.
Speaker:No one needs fixing.
Speaker:But everyone needs healing.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:And so let's talk a little
Speaker:bit about your formula here,
Speaker:how you wrote your book.
Speaker:Because I imagine we're talking about the,
Speaker:let's just call it the root
Speaker:problem or the root cause
Speaker:But there's a way towards
Speaker:this healing that you found
Speaker:in yourself and why it
Speaker:compelled you to write this book.
Speaker:So I want to talk and unpack
Speaker:that formula a little bit.
Speaker:That's great.
Speaker:It's really awesome,
Speaker:but I want to give people
Speaker:practical things that we can think about,
Speaker:whether it's finding a guide,
Speaker:reading a book.
Speaker:But I want to talk a little
Speaker:bit about your formula here.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:And let's bring some science to this.
Speaker:Please.
Speaker:I love the neuroscience part.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So if you go and do search
Speaker:depression and anxiety,
Speaker:obsessive compulsive, causes of that,
Speaker:you always come down to
Speaker:something say genetic, family background,
Speaker:environment,
Speaker:and more or less stays there.
Speaker:So then you look at- Or
Speaker:neurotransmitter imbalance.
Speaker:Exactly, exactly.
Speaker:They also need medication.
Speaker:So you look at it, so that's one way.
Speaker:The source of that is psychiatrists.
Speaker:American Psychiatric Association,
Speaker:which is a very important body,
Speaker:which they were looking to
Speaker:see how do we address-
Speaker:the prevalence and an
Speaker:ever-increasing report of
Speaker:so-called emotional issues.
Speaker:And I'm struggling.
Speaker:I don't want to use mental
Speaker:illness because the term
Speaker:mental illness actually is incorrect.
Speaker:There's nothing mental.
Speaker:It's in the entire being.
Speaker:So it came from the,
Speaker:started like the fifties,
Speaker:American Psychiatric
Speaker:Association and the
Speaker:emergence of psychogen,
Speaker:pharmaceutical medicine
Speaker:that they were doing magic, you know?
Speaker:So everything became very, the,
Speaker:There's another body of research.
Speaker:There's a study that by
Speaker:Kaiser Permanente Foundation,
Speaker:longitudinal study of its
Speaker:largest in the US, it's called ACE,
Speaker:Adverse Childhood Experiences,
Speaker:that they tracked people over time.
Speaker:and it shows that early
Speaker:adverse impact in childhood,
Speaker:whether it is a trauma,
Speaker:the childhood sexual abuse, war, poverty,
Speaker:mom and dad having
Speaker:incarceration and so on and so on.
Speaker:Those individuals over a
Speaker:period of thirty years,
Speaker:they have a highest
Speaker:rate of depression, anxiety, mental issues,
Speaker:medical issues, social issues.
Speaker:And so early experiences
Speaker:predicts future illnesses, cancer,
Speaker:fibromyalgia, autoimmune, and so on.
Speaker:So what happens?
Speaker:So this is how human development happens.
Speaker:So when you go to American
Speaker:Psychiatric Association,
Speaker:they present all those medical,
Speaker:mental condition as popcorn.
Speaker:Somebody becomes a schizophrenic.
Speaker:Somebody become obsessive compulsive.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:It's almost like, you know, why?
Speaker:Why this person?
Speaker:So this is how it happens.
Speaker:The very first experience we
Speaker:have is anxiety.
Speaker:Anxiety is the culprit of everything.
Speaker:First is the stress.
Speaker:then anxiety.
Speaker:What is the difference?
Speaker:The stress is you hear a corn horn,
Speaker:like a bang on the wall, you fall down.
Speaker:The stress is something happened,
Speaker:your body goes to sense,
Speaker:things are not normal.
Speaker:And right away,
Speaker:there's a rush of
Speaker:adrenaline and cortisol in your gut,
Speaker:your body gets ready to do something.
Speaker:Your body goes into being very active.
Speaker:Anxiety is when your body
Speaker:becomes mobilized.
Speaker:You become hypervigilant.
Speaker:If you're in a bad marriage,
Speaker:you have bad parents,
Speaker:you work in an abusive company,
Speaker:you become hypervigilant
Speaker:and trying to respond to the world.
Speaker:Anxiety can happen at early
Speaker:childhood experiences.
Speaker:One of the core element,
Speaker:which I'm gonna spend a lot
Speaker:of my time in the upcoming
Speaker:months and years to talk
Speaker:about early adaptive mother
Speaker:and child relationship,
Speaker:whether it's a caregiver and child,
Speaker:because that's the very
Speaker:first time a child experienced anxiety.
Speaker:The way a mother holds the baby,
Speaker:the calmness of the mother,
Speaker:The voice, hi, sweetie, how are you doing?
Speaker:The stroke in the face, being there,
Speaker:looking in the eyes of the body,
Speaker:what is happening is called mirroring.
Speaker:The child is absorbing the
Speaker:mother's reaction
Speaker:And saying that somebody looks at me,
Speaker:that person projects the love and warmth.
Speaker:I feel good about myself.
Speaker:And I project that relationship,
Speaker:that experience to them,
Speaker:to the mother and becomes a
Speaker:circular give and take, give and take.
Speaker:What I just shared with you
Speaker:happens in the movie and
Speaker:children's books.
Speaker:Doesn't happen.
Speaker:Mother is busy.
Speaker:There are other kids.
Speaker:There's the financial issues.
Speaker:Mother is there and is not
Speaker:paying attention.
Speaker:Yesterday, through yesterday,
Speaker:I was walking my golden retriever home.
Speaker:I passed by a park and the
Speaker:mother and the toddler on a
Speaker:swing pushing the baby back and forth.
Speaker:Happened yesterday.
Speaker:And the mother was on her iPhone.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:And I was thinking,
Speaker:so the child sees that.
Speaker:Mom is with me.
Speaker:Mom is not there.
Speaker:I'm sure there's good reason mom is there.
Speaker:And that becomes that you
Speaker:can be there and you'll be checked out.
Speaker:So when that happens,
Speaker:first anxiety happens.
Speaker:And then the second thing happens.
Speaker:The root of ADHD,
Speaker:a lot of medication these
Speaker:days goes is in your brain,
Speaker:in attentiveness or your
Speaker:impulsivity or combination of both.
Speaker:I have ADHD all my life,
Speaker:especially really blossom
Speaker:in my adult years.
Speaker:What happened,
Speaker:brain goes into a cycle of
Speaker:trying to look for attention,
Speaker:for calmness, for reaction,
Speaker:for the eyes that mirrors
Speaker:me and pays attention to me.
Speaker:So that's the beginning of a
Speaker:person who didn't get
Speaker:developmental needs met and
Speaker:there's a hunger for attention.
Speaker:attention, for feedback,
Speaker:for reciprocity of the external world.
Speaker:That's where the foundation
Speaker:of ADHD happened.
Speaker:Why we have so many kids
Speaker:with ADHD and we are medicating them.
Speaker:I get several times a month
Speaker:mothers about their kids.
Speaker:These are distracted families.
Speaker:The children are still
Speaker:looking for family stability.
Speaker:The third thing happened.
Speaker:is by the time you get to
Speaker:age three and beyond,
Speaker:that emotional needs,
Speaker:and in my book talk about
Speaker:there are seven emotional needs,
Speaker:that'd be all humans.
Speaker:We are wired for them.
Speaker:These are cradle to grave needs.
Speaker:Those needs is the need for connection,
Speaker:need of belonging.
Speaker:That's I belong to somebody.
Speaker:that I belonged to a loving family,
Speaker:that my emotional needs were met.
Speaker:Many people just struggle with that.
Speaker:The next need is,
Speaker:which in fact is quite fascinating,
Speaker:is the need what I call, I am boundless.
Speaker:We don't understand our bodies.
Speaker:Our body at this point is a
Speaker:vehicle to move our head
Speaker:from meeting to meeting, place to place.
Speaker:Our bodies, we go to doctors and say,
Speaker:my gut hurts.
Speaker:I have a heart issue.
Speaker:My shoulder hurts, and so on.
Speaker:We are one.
Speaker:Our bodies are source of information,
Speaker:source of perception,
Speaker:source of experiences.
Speaker:We don't know how our body experiences.
Speaker:All we know is pain, sensation, tightness,
Speaker:diarrhea, constipation,
Speaker:and heart palpitation.
Speaker:This is about being atoned to your body,
Speaker:to know how you're feeling in your body,
Speaker:have a sense of body integrity.
Speaker:And this is what happened early in life.
Speaker:We tell our children, sit there,
Speaker:don't be fidgety, don't use your hand,
Speaker:be quiet, versus we know in classrooms.
Speaker:when you allow students to
Speaker:stand off against the by
Speaker:their desk or against the
Speaker:wall they think better they
Speaker:are more attuned and they
Speaker:they are more attentive to
Speaker:the class the same thing in
Speaker:corporate environment you
Speaker:have a brainstorming
Speaker:meeting instead of having
Speaker:people sit around the table
Speaker:bring butcher paper
Speaker:wallpaper give everybody a
Speaker:pen get up there and write
Speaker:your brainstorming we think
Speaker:with our entire body.
Speaker:We think in three
Speaker:dimensional versus just
Speaker:cognitive processes.
Speaker:So part of the healing is
Speaker:that bring your body into this process.
Speaker:Here's a data point.
Speaker:Every day across the US in
Speaker:primary care settings,
Speaker:up to one third of visits
Speaker:is due to depression.
Speaker:And patients go to doctors,
Speaker:talk about what is called
Speaker:functional illnesses,
Speaker:my migraine headache,
Speaker:the pain that I have, my gut hurts,
Speaker:all sort of pain.
Speaker:Doctors run tests,
Speaker:they don't see anything.
Speaker:And many doctors know disease, depression,
Speaker:emotional related,
Speaker:they don't know what to say.
Speaker:So they prescribe medication.
Speaker:That's how opiate crisis started.
Speaker:There were a lot of pain in the society.
Speaker:The next need, I call it, I am complete.
Speaker:That when you look at your past,
Speaker:there's a sense of,
Speaker:I may have had a struggle,
Speaker:but I don't carry shame, blame, guilt,
Speaker:and a sense of
Speaker:unfinishedness in my life
Speaker:that you feel I'm still
Speaker:struggling with how I was treated.
Speaker:Your past is a source of
Speaker:dread and heaviness versus
Speaker:sense of it was beautiful.
Speaker:It was struggle.
Speaker:We had a lot of struggle,
Speaker:but it brings me joy.
Speaker:Many of my clients don't
Speaker:want to go home for holidays.
Speaker:They send emails,
Speaker:they send a bouquet of
Speaker:flowers to mom and dad in
Speaker:different states.
Speaker:They say, I don't want to go home.
Speaker:The memory of home wasn't a
Speaker:good one for me.
Speaker:They don't feel complete.
Speaker:So part of that,
Speaker:how do you let the past pass and move on?
Speaker:The next need is the need,
Speaker:I call it I matter.
Speaker:is that as a member of the society,
Speaker:there's a sense of dignity,
Speaker:sense of honor bestowed upon you.
Speaker:Like having come from a
Speaker:corporate environment,
Speaker:there were so many times I
Speaker:would see in a conference room,
Speaker:somebody enters the room,
Speaker:nobody turns around and look at them,
Speaker:call their name,
Speaker:ask their opinion in the room.
Speaker:You always turn to the
Speaker:leader or the superstars.
Speaker:There were a lot of invisible people.
Speaker:From psychologically being seen,
Speaker:being valued, being included,
Speaker:it means so much.
Speaker:That's the reason
Speaker:recognition for those folks
Speaker:in the COVID environment means so much.
Speaker:Somebody sees me,
Speaker:somebody give me a pat on the shoulder.
Speaker:Recognition even carries
Speaker:more weight than financial rewards.
Speaker:Somebody sees the value of me.
Speaker:The other need is the need I make.
Speaker:Everybody's doing something in this world.
Speaker:Everybody's doing.
Speaker:We pay attention to the rich
Speaker:and superstar people, fancy house,
Speaker:fancy cars, and so on.
Speaker:The question is, the thing you're doing,
Speaker:is that your thing?
Speaker:Versus are you there in the
Speaker:company to pay the bills,
Speaker:kids in the college, your mortgage?
Speaker:And we all do that.
Speaker:But we all are here, every one of us,
Speaker:to do something on this earth,
Speaker:to make a difference.
Speaker:What are you doing?
Speaker:Not being in a good job is tormenting us.
Speaker:Going to the company Gallup
Speaker:that surveys American
Speaker:workforce year after year,
Speaker:and year after year,
Speaker:the survey says up to
Speaker:two-thirds of Americans are
Speaker:in a job that report low
Speaker:engagement score.
Speaker:We know also from another
Speaker:research from Gallup that
Speaker:low engagement correlates
Speaker:with higher depression and anxiety.
Speaker:So it's not about more
Speaker:engagement practices, team building,
Speaker:so on.
Speaker:It's that, are you in the right place?
Speaker:Are you doing the thing
Speaker:you're supposed to do?
Speaker:The next need is what I call I am.
Speaker:That everybody has a voice.
Speaker:Everybody has an opinion
Speaker:about what I call Katy
Speaker:Perry's I Roar song.
Speaker:Everybody has a roar.
Speaker:Life teach us to be polite,
Speaker:keep your voice down, try to fit in,
Speaker:only speak to the level
Speaker:that you can be accepted
Speaker:and don't ruffle the
Speaker:feathers versus that you
Speaker:need to say your thing, your truth,
Speaker:what matters.
Speaker:This is the area that many
Speaker:women struggle with.
Speaker:When my clients come to me, I see,
Speaker:especially in terms of husband and wife,
Speaker:the men,
Speaker:when they want to express their needs,
Speaker:they overshoot.
Speaker:They're very strong.
Speaker:This is what we think we
Speaker:should do in terms of our family.
Speaker:Women look at the husband,
Speaker:and their voice is very gentle,
Speaker:very sweet.
Speaker:And I ask them that,
Speaker:give me your Katy Perry's I Roar song.
Speaker:that what would it look like
Speaker:for you to say, this is what I want.
Speaker:This is what I believe in.
Speaker:And it's not a coincidence.
Speaker:Many women experience and
Speaker:report pain in their jaw,
Speaker:in their neck and tightness
Speaker:around their shoulder
Speaker:because they're holding
Speaker:these muscles tight.
Speaker:That even their voice speaks like that.
Speaker:And when I asked them to
Speaker:say with your backbone, with your spine,
Speaker:they struggle with that.
Speaker:They are not used to that.
Speaker:Show me your voice.
Speaker:The final one is what I call, I soar.
Speaker:There's a statement on the
Speaker:wall behind me by Maya Angelou.
Speaker:There is no greater agony
Speaker:than bearing an untold story inside you.
Speaker:An untold story.
Speaker:We all have an untold story.
Speaker:We all have a story, seven billion people,
Speaker:seven billion of story.
Speaker:Do you know your story?
Speaker:Are you living according to your story?
Speaker:Once we know your story,
Speaker:you become the rock of Gibraltar.
Speaker:You stand for your story, for your mandate,
Speaker:for your covenant on this earth.
Speaker:These seven needs collectively,
Speaker:we are meant to teach our
Speaker:children that that these
Speaker:are lifelong lessons
Speaker:parents don't give it to us
Speaker:teachers politicians and so
Speaker:on we are wired for these
Speaker:needs from cradle to grave
Speaker:our best gift to our
Speaker:children is to practice
Speaker:them and know they have
Speaker:these emotional rights
Speaker:that's what I call them
Speaker:your emotional rights which
Speaker:they evolve over time but
Speaker:once you have them
Speaker:Depression is a signal that
Speaker:one or several of these
Speaker:needs have been violated, never expressed,
Speaker:and that's what you feel like.
Speaker:And once you experience them,
Speaker:you realize them,
Speaker:you will be surprised how
Speaker:fast depression dissipates.
Speaker:Depression turns to anger, says,
Speaker:I am pissed.
Speaker:I don't want to live like that anymore.
Speaker:I don't want to play a small anymore.
Speaker:I'm going to claim my rights
Speaker:even if I have to leave this relationship,
Speaker:this job, this company, this city.
Speaker:It's your time to claim your
Speaker:rights because that's how
Speaker:you go from unfinished.
Speaker:Move toward finishing the
Speaker:journey that is your life journey.
Speaker:I love that,
Speaker:that's reminded me of Dr.
Speaker:David Hawking's work when
Speaker:he talks about the map of
Speaker:consciousness and going from an anger,
Speaker:anger is the catalyst
Speaker:to action that's right how
Speaker:do you become unfinished is
Speaker:you got to tell your story
Speaker:you're not in your story
Speaker:you become the storyteller
Speaker:when you make these action
Speaker:items because of you know
Speaker:frustration comes to anger
Speaker:anger is the catalyst
Speaker:that's why anger all
Speaker:emotions are meant to be
Speaker:felt all emotions are
Speaker:experienced we always kind of
Speaker:draw away from the so-called
Speaker:negative ones and we draw
Speaker:into the feel-good ones,
Speaker:but they're all supposed to be felt,
Speaker:but they're also supposed
Speaker:to dissipate when we hold them on.
Speaker:I love your analogy of when
Speaker:you don't tell your story
Speaker:and the physiological
Speaker:components of what that is because
Speaker:We treat the body in parts,
Speaker:but we don't correlate that
Speaker:there's this beautiful
Speaker:body-mind connection.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:We treat it with chemicals,
Speaker:which is a physiological thing,
Speaker:but emotional body, the mind...
Speaker:and that's why I think this
Speaker:is getting to that root
Speaker:cause when you're feeling
Speaker:in your purpose and you're
Speaker:authentic and you're telling your story,
Speaker:you have, and I love that,
Speaker:that is the essence of what
Speaker:we can teach our children
Speaker:and our children's children.
Speaker:And this is how we get out
Speaker:of generational trauma.
Speaker:Absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker:And then the thing you mentioned, Josh,
Speaker:it's very important.
Speaker:Anger,
Speaker:means there's something's been violated.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That you see that.
Speaker:And then we teach,
Speaker:we don't like anger in this society.
Speaker:We tell them, oh, no, no, no.
Speaker:Name your anger.
Speaker:And then what would you like to do?
Speaker:First, you need to experience it.
Speaker:What is it you see happening?
Speaker:Anger, when it's held back,
Speaker:it does damage to our body.
Speaker:Physical pain, back pain, shoulder pain.
Speaker:And in fact, when you look at my book,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:there are example after example
Speaker:that people who come to me
Speaker:when there's an emotional need,
Speaker:depression, anxiety, ADHD,
Speaker:almost always there is a
Speaker:physical discomfort component to that.
Speaker:Once you bring that body is
Speaker:start to connect.
Speaker:It doesn't become just head
Speaker:and the body becomes one being and
Speaker:you turn anger into action
Speaker:anger means something case
Speaker:in point literally happened
Speaker:late last week with a
Speaker:client who the husband that
Speaker:for years he was having
Speaker:very tight jaws that my
Speaker:jaws been hurting for years
Speaker:I take advil medication
Speaker:never goes away as we start
Speaker:to talk about this is what
Speaker:I did say that put your hand
Speaker:against your face,
Speaker:your jaw is speaking to you.
Speaker:Your jaw has energy, has motions,
Speaker:has memories.
Speaker:Just as you do this,
Speaker:instead of saying that,
Speaker:I want the pain go away, invite the pains,
Speaker:say that, talk to me.
Speaker:What are you seeing?
Speaker:What are you sensing?
Speaker:And what is that pain wants to do?
Speaker:So the client, it went like this.
Speaker:For people who may listen to this,
Speaker:gradually open his mouth.
Speaker:So what I'm doing,
Speaker:open my mouth and close it and say that,
Speaker:stay with it.
Speaker:What is it coming up?
Speaker:Say that, I was a young kid.
Speaker:I was angry.
Speaker:And he had memory of how he
Speaker:was told to sit quiet and
Speaker:like basically he was what
Speaker:is called too much child.
Speaker:That just be quiet,
Speaker:mind your manners and keep
Speaker:your voice down.
Speaker:And he wanted to show anger
Speaker:through biting.
Speaker:And what he did,
Speaker:he know that's not a proper behavior.
Speaker:He just kept his mouth shut.
Speaker:And I told him that,
Speaker:what is it you want to say now?
Speaker:This is forty-five years later.
Speaker:And he said,
Speaker:I just want to say that stop that.
Speaker:That hurt.
Speaker:You know, like I was ridiculed.
Speaker:I was humiliated.
Speaker:I was dismissed.
Speaker:And as he was doing that,
Speaker:he was saying that, oh, my gosh, darn it.
Speaker:What happened?
Speaker:Where's that feeling?
Speaker:Where's that hurt?
Speaker:His jaw started to loosen up.
Speaker:He was holding on to anger
Speaker:for all those years of the
Speaker:frustration that he could not express.
Speaker:Healing, the pain we have, depression,
Speaker:anxiety, ADHD, those are stories.
Speaker:Once we bring them into our being,
Speaker:have them share what is it
Speaker:they're trying to say,
Speaker:our pain and our discomfort,
Speaker:our symptoms and labels,
Speaker:they morph to life story very quickly,
Speaker:actually.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:And that, that's full circle for me.
Speaker:So thank you for putting
Speaker:awareness and attention to that because,
Speaker:you know, that's, that's a physical,
Speaker:that's a, that's a great story,
Speaker:an authentic story to talk
Speaker:about how our emotional
Speaker:body is that energy that is
Speaker:created that doesn't
Speaker:let's call it healthy
Speaker:dissipation because we know
Speaker:there are unhealthy ways to
Speaker:express our anger.
Speaker:We're not asking people to
Speaker:do these things.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:But as children or even as adults,
Speaker:if the energetic component,
Speaker:this is why when people say
Speaker:it stores in your body and
Speaker:they can't understand that
Speaker:because we're associating
Speaker:body with chemicals and matter.
Speaker:But if we have a thought and
Speaker:a thought can create
Speaker:a chemical cascade like
Speaker:cortisol or adrenaline,
Speaker:because we know the thought
Speaker:is connected to the component.
Speaker:Well, the opposite is also effect.
Speaker:These thoughts that don't can be trapped,
Speaker:and that trap physically
Speaker:manifests into some dysfunction.
Speaker:This is where you can track
Speaker:the energy centers,
Speaker:and there's so much science.
Speaker:It's not pseudoscience anymore.
Speaker:So I'm glad that you brought up,
Speaker:because...
Speaker:Treating the body,
Speaker:the mind and the energy
Speaker:energetics of it are all in play.
Speaker:And it's like you change
Speaker:that blueprint and look how
Speaker:fast something that lasted
Speaker:for forty five years.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Not just physical.
Speaker:I took medication.
Speaker:It didn't work.
Speaker:And all of a sudden we just
Speaker:started to ask the body, like,
Speaker:what do you need?
Speaker:What's going on here?
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:And once it's kind of just.
Speaker:so beautiful because this is
Speaker:the essence of the body
Speaker:truly does want to heal itself.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:Thank you for bringing that
Speaker:up because it's so key to
Speaker:this critical component of
Speaker:we're talking healing, not curing,
Speaker:not fixing.
Speaker:We're healing.
Speaker:The body mind is so
Speaker:connected that we can
Speaker:actually reverse these
Speaker:processes in the ways that
Speaker:are healing ourselves,
Speaker:empowering ourselves.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And yes, it could be you could be.
Speaker:And there's another thing I wanted to say,
Speaker:too,
Speaker:is not all these traumas are like
Speaker:people think of trauma as
Speaker:like an emergency room
Speaker:trauma to our brain.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:But it could be as simple as
Speaker:getting left at the bus stop.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:When you're a kid, right?
Speaker:The severity is just part of
Speaker:the equation because most
Speaker:of us have had some unmet
Speaker:needs in our childhood that
Speaker:we've brought into our adult behaviors.
Speaker:And these are unconscious,
Speaker:subconscious things too.
Speaker:These aren't things that
Speaker:we're consciously aware of
Speaker:and we're acting and we're
Speaker:saying certain things.
Speaker:So thank you for building that
Speaker:model for us and moving it from that.
Speaker:So how do people get your book?
Speaker:Is it Amazon?
Speaker:Yes, Amazon.
Speaker:And they do my name, Ardeshir Mehran.
Speaker:Or the title of the book is
Speaker:You Are Not Depressed, You're Unfinished.
Speaker:And just take a look at the
Speaker:book and read the reviews.
Speaker:And the book, what it has,
Speaker:those seven emotional needs
Speaker:that I talked about,
Speaker:that I talked about,
Speaker:where did it come from?
Speaker:What is the science behind it?
Speaker:And I have multiple examples of parents,
Speaker:professionals,
Speaker:their mom and dads and teenagers.
Speaker:And then every chapter ends
Speaker:with a Spotify playlist of a dozen songs.
Speaker:So what is fascinating,
Speaker:those emotional needs,
Speaker:once you learn them, you realize,
Speaker:almost the whole art, literature,
Speaker:and I love music,
Speaker:especially country music.
Speaker:People talk to us in codes.
Speaker:We don't hear it.
Speaker:Realize people talk about emotional needs.
Speaker:I want to express myself.
Speaker:My body's aching.
Speaker:My past sucked.
Speaker:You know, like I wanted my future.
Speaker:That there are ways that
Speaker:people share their stories through music.
Speaker:And suddenly all those country songs,
Speaker:Garth Brooks, Taylor Swift,
Speaker:Bruce Springsteen, so on,
Speaker:they're telling the story
Speaker:of emotional needs in their own songs.
Speaker:So I appreciate that.
Speaker:There are two chapters, XI and XII,
Speaker:I talk about what is trauma?
Speaker:What happened to our bodies
Speaker:when we experienced trauma
Speaker:and how we come out of it?
Speaker:Because part of the healing
Speaker:is knowing is your body
Speaker:stuck in a trauma mode
Speaker:And how do you bring
Speaker:yourself out of the trauma
Speaker:lockdown mode so you can do
Speaker:the journey of healing?
Speaker:So I will talk about all of this,
Speaker:which is really,
Speaker:it's about integrated healing.
Speaker:So my book has it.
Speaker:You can also go to my website,
Speaker:Ardashim Mehran.
Speaker:I have a website with freebies.
Speaker:You see my, like I have a YouTube channel.
Speaker:You can see some of me
Speaker:talking about various science about this.
Speaker:I love it.
Speaker:No, it's so important.
Speaker:And I love the playlist
Speaker:thing because I can't wait
Speaker:to dive into the book
Speaker:because music is an
Speaker:expression of our story, of our emotions.
Speaker:And we connect through
Speaker:vibrational frequencies.
Speaker:We connect through these things.
Speaker:And I know you said it
Speaker:earlier on our episode here,
Speaker:but we also we we don't see
Speaker:we don't we don't.
Speaker:do all of our perception isn't linear,
Speaker:right?
Speaker:We see in symbols,
Speaker:we see in these different
Speaker:ways of how do we,
Speaker:how do we actually
Speaker:interpret all of this information?
Speaker:We're multidimensional beings.
Speaker:So we're looking at this
Speaker:from this perspective.
Speaker:So I love that your,
Speaker:your passion for music is
Speaker:brought into your professional space,
Speaker:like,
Speaker:cause that's part of the equation and,
Speaker:and we should get up and move more,
Speaker:right?
Speaker:Like you said,
Speaker:you're moving and you're talking all
Speaker:dance is attached to music, right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Inside you see the space behind me,
Speaker:clients who come here,
Speaker:I have your yoga mat.
Speaker:They're hardly sitting because in fact,
Speaker:healing it, the, when you sit,
Speaker:you don't heal because as
Speaker:you feel the emotions,
Speaker:you need to bring your body
Speaker:in and it's literally
Speaker:impossible for us to heal without
Speaker:unless we have body memory.
Speaker:Your body needs to feel it
Speaker:and then brain register that.
Speaker:So when people says,
Speaker:I want to express myself,
Speaker:I want them to have more...
Speaker:easier way to discuss with
Speaker:my spouse let's say I
Speaker:invite them to stand up and
Speaker:say that show it what it
Speaker:looks like that's what we
Speaker:do in acting well we get
Speaker:when we can't exp I love
Speaker:when you say so it's hard
Speaker:to express the emotion or
Speaker:the feeling with words
Speaker:right that's right you have
Speaker:to express it this is what
Speaker:the whole concept of
Speaker:embodiment work is that's
Speaker:right I was just thinking
Speaker:when you said that like
Speaker:look at tai chi or qigong
Speaker:your movement of energy
Speaker:energy is always moving.
Speaker:So if we're sitting there still,
Speaker:we can't express in ways that we need to.
Speaker:And this is just that
Speaker:beautiful analogy of like
Speaker:in the school room where
Speaker:you're forcing kids to sit still.
Speaker:And then when they don't sit still,
Speaker:you medicate them.
Speaker:And it's like,
Speaker:they're not expressing themselves.
Speaker:When my kids go to school,
Speaker:like when they were little,
Speaker:they used to jump on the
Speaker:trampoline for five minutes
Speaker:before they went into school.
Speaker:Like I love that.
Speaker:I knew that they could get it out, right?
Speaker:This is why we all need recess, people.
Speaker:We don't just need it when we're children.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:That's the embodiment practices, right?
Speaker:You're bringing that in your psyche.
Speaker:In fact,
Speaker:there's a friend of mine who says
Speaker:that we were born to crawl, stand up,
Speaker:and then we're told to sit.
Speaker:I mean, like, you know,
Speaker:we are lion and lionesses in Serengeti.
Speaker:But, you know, by the time you stand up,
Speaker:you learn how to be active.
Speaker:You're told to sit hours and
Speaker:hours and use your brain.
Speaker:I mean, it's not evolutionary.
Speaker:That's the sickness we think,
Speaker:like even ADHD.
Speaker:No, this is a body needs to move.
Speaker:We were designed that way.
Speaker:That healing is in that
Speaker:whole movement embodiment.
Speaker:Yeah, I love that.
Speaker:And that's such a great
Speaker:capper for this because, you know,
Speaker:get up and move is free.
Speaker:There's no cost to this.
Speaker:You can throw on your own, whatever's mute,
Speaker:regenerative music, not the music that's,
Speaker:you know, we know the difference.
Speaker:You get up and go.
Speaker:That's it.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:So if, if,
Speaker:We got to wrap up because
Speaker:I'm sure there's plenty
Speaker:more we could talk about.
Speaker:Obviously,
Speaker:I can't wait to dive into your book.
Speaker:And then, of course,
Speaker:when you finish your new book,
Speaker:I totally want to dive into that.
Speaker:There's so much good stuff
Speaker:in generational trauma that we can do.
Speaker:If you wanted the listeners here,
Speaker:if there was one thing you
Speaker:wanted them to know or do
Speaker:out of our conversation today,
Speaker:what do you think that would be?
Speaker:One thing is that actually two things.
Speaker:One is that you may have a
Speaker:sense that you may already
Speaker:have a diagnosis.
Speaker:Many people do on medication.
Speaker:Consider that there's
Speaker:nothing wrong with you chemically,
Speaker:physically, mentally.
Speaker:Instead,
Speaker:there's an opportunity of a new
Speaker:version of you,
Speaker:whether it's two point or
Speaker:three point or there's
Speaker:another version of you is waiting.
Speaker:And the way to ask that in a gentle way,
Speaker:a question that at this moment,
Speaker:this afternoon,
Speaker:whenever you hear this podcast,
Speaker:what is one thing, one, not five,
Speaker:not three,
Speaker:one thing you like to do that
Speaker:you feel more joy, more energy,
Speaker:more flow?
Speaker:What is one thing you, dear listener,
Speaker:want to do?
Speaker:Start with you.
Speaker:I want this and I will do this.
Speaker:You are not broken.
Speaker:It's about you not having
Speaker:had enough opportunity to be you.
Speaker:And we change in small, tiny steps.
Speaker:Nothing big, tiny.
Speaker:Just one thing that you like
Speaker:to do and do it.
Speaker:The tinier, the more joyful base,
Speaker:the better it is.
Speaker:Do one thing tiny that you liked it,
Speaker:then do it again.
Speaker:Do another one.
Speaker:Do another one.
Speaker:It's only you that decide that.
Speaker:You are the decider.
Speaker:That's so beautiful because
Speaker:that's the true essence of
Speaker:what we're talking about is do, do,
Speaker:I did this experiment this summer.
Speaker:I had called it, um,
Speaker:my surrender experiment.
Speaker:Michael Singer's book is like,
Speaker:I just said yes to
Speaker:everything that resonated with me.
Speaker:Resonance guys,
Speaker:this isn't unhealthy behaviors.
Speaker:These are the things like I want to dance.
Speaker:I want to learn.
Speaker:I want to go to a concert.
Speaker:I want to go camping.
Speaker:I want to go for a hike.
Speaker:Like these things that give
Speaker:you joy in this beautiful re uh,
Speaker:in this beautiful building way, right?
Speaker:And everyone has their own definition.
Speaker:That's the beauty of this world.
Speaker:So thank you for that.
Speaker:Thank you for that reminder.
Speaker:Thank you for all you're
Speaker:doing in the world to help
Speaker:not only heal people,
Speaker:but get them to truly
Speaker:understand and find their
Speaker:authenticity and their
Speaker:trueness in this world.
Speaker:Because that's, in my opinion,
Speaker:the true essence of being in this body,
Speaker:in this human component
Speaker:that we live right now.
Speaker:So thank you so much for that, Archer.
Speaker:Thank you so much, Josh,
Speaker:to you and to your
Speaker:listeners and be well and
Speaker:be moved toward on
Speaker:finishing to finish your work, your work,
Speaker:your life's work.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:Thank you everyone for this
Speaker:awesome episode.
Speaker:Thank you artists here.
Speaker:So beautiful.
Speaker:Until next time, everybody stay well.
