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TAKE CONTROL – Own Your Actions, Own Your Life · Motivational Podcast

0:10
Speaker 1: What should I do, how should I live? And whom
0:14
Speaker 1: should I become? We need the guidance of both ancient
0:22
Speaker 1: wisdom and modern science to get the balance right. What
0:29
Speaker 1: is the meaning of life? Why do some people find meaning, purpose,
0:35
Speaker 1: and fulfillment in life but others do not? Where does
0:44
Speaker 1: happiness come from? For what the flesh desires is opposed
0:54
Speaker 1: to the spirit, and what the spirit desires is opposed
0:58
Speaker 1: to the flesh. For these are opposed to each other.
1:03
Speaker 1: To prevent you from doing what you want. If passion drives,
1:08
Speaker 1: let reason hold the reins. Desire and reason are pulling
1:15
Speaker 1: in different directions. Feelings of guilt, lust, or fear are
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Speaker 1: often stronger than reasoning. Freud said that the mind is
1:26
Speaker 1: divided into three parts, the ego, the conscious rational self,
1:32
Speaker 1: the super ego, the conscience sometimes too rigid commitment to
1:37
Speaker 1: the rules of society. And the id, the desire for pleasure,
1:43
Speaker 1: lots of it sooner rather than later. Human thinking depends
1:49
Speaker 1: on metaphor. The driver, the ego, struggles frantically to control
1:56
Speaker 1: a hungry, lustful, and disobedient horse, the id, while the
2:01
Speaker 1: driver's father, the superego, sits in the back seat, lecturing
2:06
Speaker 1: the driver on what he is doing wrong. For Freud,
2:13
Speaker 1: the goal of psychoanalysis was to escape this pitiful state
2:17
Speaker 1: by strengthening the ego, thus giving it more control over
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Speaker 1: the id and more independence from the superego. The older
2:30
Speaker 1: metaphors about controlling animals work beautifully. Throughout recorded history, people
2:36
Speaker 1: have lived with and tried to control animals, and these
2:40
Speaker 1: animals made their way into ancient metaphors. Buddha, for example,
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Speaker 1: compared the mind to a wild elephant. In days gone by,
2:51
Speaker 1: this mind of mine used to stray wherever selfish desire,
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Speaker 1: or lust or pleasure would lead it. Today, this does
3:00
Speaker 1: not stray and is under the harmony of control, even
3:04
Speaker 1: as a wild elephant is controlled by the trainer. Plato
3:12
Speaker 1: used a similar metaphor in which the self or soul
3:17
Speaker 1: is a chariot and the calm, rational part of the
3:20
Speaker 1: mind holds the reins. Plato's charioteer had to control two horses.
3:27
Speaker 1: The horse that is on the right, or nobler side,
3:31
Speaker 1: is upright in frame and well jointed, with a high
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Speaker 1: neck and a regal nose. He is a lover of honor,
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Speaker 1: with modesty and self control, companion to true glory. He
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Speaker 1: needs no whip and is guided by verbal commands alone.
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Speaker 1: The other horse is a crooked, great jumble of limbs,
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Speaker 1: companion to wild boasts and indecency. He is shaggy around
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Speaker 1: the ears, deaf as a post, and just barely yields
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Speaker 1: to horsewhip and goad combined. It's no accident that we
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Speaker 1: find the carnal pleasures so rewarding. Our brains, like rat brains,
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Speaker 1: are wired so that food and sex give us little
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Speaker 1: bursts of dopamine, the neurotransmitter that is the brain's way
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Speaker 1: of making us enjoy the activities that are good for
4:23
Speaker 1: the survival of our genes. Plato's bad horse plays an
4:28
Speaker 1: important role in pulling us toward these things, which helped
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Speaker 1: our ancestors survive and succeed in becoming our ancestors. The
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Speaker 1: controlled system allows people to think about long term goals
4:44
Speaker 1: and thereby escape the tyranny of the here and now,
4:48
Speaker 1: the automatic triggering of temptation by the sight of tempting objects.
4:54
Speaker 1: People can imagine alternatives that are not visually present. They
4:58
Speaker 1: can weigh long term health risks against present pleasures, and
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Speaker 1: they can learn in conversation about which choices will bring
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Speaker 1: success and prestige. The automatic system has its finger on
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Speaker 1: the dopamine release button. The controlled system, in contrast, is
5:18
Speaker 1: better seen as an advisor. It's a writer placed on
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Speaker 1: the elephant's back to help the elephant make better choices.
5:29
Speaker 1: Once you understand the power of stimulus control, you can
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Speaker 1: use it to your advantage by changing the stimuli in
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Speaker 1: your environment and avoiding undesirable ones, or, if that's not possible,
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Speaker 1: by filling your consciousness with thoughts about their less tempting aspects. Buddhism,
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Speaker 1: for example, in an effort to break people's carnal attachment
5:52
Speaker 1: to their own and others, flesh develop methods of meditating
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Speaker 1: on decaying corpses. By choosing to stare at something that
6:02
Speaker 1: revolts the automatic system, the writer can begin to change
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Speaker 1: what the elephant will want in the future. The writer
6:12
Speaker 1: can see farther into the future, and the writer can
6:15
Speaker 1: learn valuable information by talking to other writers. The writer
6:20
Speaker 1: is an adviser or servant, not a king, president, or charioteer,
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Speaker 1: with a firm grip on the reins. It is conscious
6:30
Speaker 1: controlled thought. The elephant, in contrast, is everything else. The
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Speaker 1: elephant includes the gut, feelings, visceral reactions, emotions, and intuitions
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Speaker 1: that comprise much of the automatic system. The elephant and
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Speaker 1: writer each have their own intelligence, and when they work
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Speaker 1: together well, they enable the unique brilliance of human beings.
7:00
Speaker 1: To understand the most important ideas in psychology, you need
7:04
Speaker 1: to understand how the mind is divided into parts that
7:07
Speaker 1: sometimes conflict. We assume that there is one person in
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Speaker 1: each body, but in some ways we are each more
7:15
Speaker 1: like a committee whose members have been thrown together to
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Speaker 1: do a job, but who often find themselves working at
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Speaker 1: cross purposes. Human rationality depends critically on sophisticated emotionality. It
7:32
Speaker 1: is only because our emotional brains work so well that
7:36
Speaker 1: our reasoning can work at all. Reason and emotion must
7:47
Speaker 1: both work together to create intelligent behavior. The moment one
8:03
Speaker 1: stops trying to suppress a thought, the thought comes flooding
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Speaker 1: in and becomes even harder to banish. When controlled processing
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Speaker 1: tries to influence thought, don't think about a white bear.
8:17
Speaker 1: It sets up an explicit goal, and whenever one pursues
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Speaker 1: a goal, a part of the mind automatically monitors progress
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Speaker 1: so that it can order corrections or know when success
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Speaker 1: has been achieved. When that goal is an action in
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Speaker 1: the world, such as arriving at the airport on time.
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Speaker 1: This feedback system works well, but when the goal is mental,
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Speaker 1: it backfires. Automatic processes continually check, am I not thinking
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Speaker 1: about a white bear? As the act of monitoring for
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Speaker 1: the absence of the thought introduces the thought, the person
8:55
Speaker 1: must try even harder to divert consciousness. Automatic and controlled
9:00
Speaker 1: processes end up working at cross purposes, firing each other
9:05
Speaker 1: up to ever greater exertions. But because controlled processes tire quickly,
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Speaker 1: eventually the inexhaustible automatic processes run unopposed, conjuring up herds
9:17
Speaker 1: of white bears. Thus, the attempt to remove an unpleasant
9:22
Speaker 1: thought can guarantee it a place on your frequent playlist
9:26
Speaker 1: of mental ruminations. We sometimes fall into the view that
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Speaker 1: we are fighting with our unconscious, our id, our animal self.
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Speaker 1: But really we are the whole thing. We are the
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Speaker 1: writer and we are the elephant. Both have their strengths
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Speaker 1: and special skills. Marcus Aurelius wrote, the whole universe is change,
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Speaker 1: and life itself is, but what you deem it. Buddha
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Speaker 1: taught what we are today comes from our thoughts of yesterday,
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Speaker 1: and our present thoughts build our life of tomorrow. Our
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Speaker 1: life is the creation of our mind. Events in the
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Speaker 1: world affect us only through our interpretations of them, So
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Speaker 1: if we can control our interpretations, we can control our world.
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Speaker 1: There is no reality, only perception. The art of pop
10:36
Speaker 1: psychology is to develop a method beyond lecturing and hectoring,
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Speaker 1: that guides people to that realization. Self help books and
10:47
Speaker 1: seminars sometimes seem to consist of little more than lecturing
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Speaker 1: and hectory people until they understand this idea and its
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Speaker 1: implications for their lives. To take something philosophically means to
11:02
Speaker 1: accept a great misfortune without weeping or even suffering. We
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Speaker 1: use this term in part because of the calmness, self control,
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Speaker 1: and courage that three ancient philosophers, Socrates, Seneca, and Boethius
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Speaker 1: showed while they awaited their executions. But in the Consolation
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Speaker 1: of Philosophy, which Boethius wrote while in prison, he confessed
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Speaker 1: that at first he was anything but philosophical. He wept
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Speaker 1: and wrote poems about weeping. He cursed injustice and old
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Speaker 1: age and the goddess of fortune who had blessed him
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Speaker 1: and then abandoned him. Then, one night, while Boethius is
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Speaker 1: wallowing in his wretchedness. The majestic apparition of Lady Philosophy
12:02
Speaker 1: visits him and proceeds to chide him for his unphilosophical behavior.
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Speaker 1: Lady Philosophy then guides Boethius through reinterpretations that foreshadow modern
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Speaker 1: cognitive therapy. She begins by asking Boethius to think about
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Speaker 1: his relationship with the goddess of Fortune. Philosophy reminds Boethius
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Speaker 1: that Fortune is fickle, coming and going as she pleases.
12:36
Speaker 1: Boethius took Fortune as his mistress, fully aware of her ways,
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Speaker 1: and she stayed with him for a long time. What
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Speaker 1: right has he now to demand that she be chained
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Speaker 1: to his side? Lady Philosophy presents Fortune's defense. Why should
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Speaker 1: I alone be deprived of my rights? The heavens are
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Speaker 1: permitted to grant bright days, then blot them out with
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Speaker 1: dark nights. The year may decorate the face of the
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Speaker 1: earth with flowers and fruits, then make it barren again
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Speaker 1: with clouds and frost. The sea is allowed to invite
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Speaker 1: the sailor with fair weather, then terrify him with storms.
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Speaker 1: Shall I then permit man's insatiable cupidity to tie me
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Speaker 1: down to a sameness that is alien to my habits.
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Speaker 1: Lady Philosophy reframes change as normal and as the right
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Speaker 1: of fortune. The whole universe is changed. Aurelius had said
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Speaker 1: Boethius was fortunate, Now he is not. That is no
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Speaker 1: cause for anger. Rather, he should be grateful that he
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Speaker 1: enjoyed fortune for so long, and he should be calm
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Speaker 1: now that she has left him. No man can ever
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Speaker 1: be secure until he has been forsaken by fortune. Lady
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Speaker 1: Philosophy tries several other reframing tactics. She points out that
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Speaker 1: his wife, sons, and father are each dearer to him
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Speaker 1: than his own life, and all four still live. She
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Speaker 1: helps him see that adverse fortune is more beneficial than
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Speaker 1: good fortune. The latter only makes men greedy for more,
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Speaker 1: but adversity makes them strong, and itcraws Boethius's imagination far
15:02
Speaker 1: up into the heavens, so that he can look down
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Speaker 1: on the earth and see it as a tiny speck
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Speaker 1: on which even tinier people play out their comical and
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Speaker 1: ultimately insignificant ambitions. She gets them to admit that riches
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Speaker 1: and fame bring anxiety and avarice, not peace and happiness.
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Speaker 1: After being shown these new perspectives and having his old
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Speaker 1: assumptions challenged, Boethius is finally prepared to absorb the greatest
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Speaker 1: lesson of all, the lesson Buddha and Aurelius had taught
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Speaker 1: centuries earlier. Nothing is miserable unless you think it so.
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Speaker 1: And on the other hand, nothing brings happiness unless you
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Speaker 1: are content with it. When he takes this lesson to heart,
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Speaker 1: Boethius frees himself from his mental prison, He regains his composure,
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Speaker 1: writes a book that has comforted people for centuries, and
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Speaker 1: faces his death with dignity. Epiphanies can be life altering,
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Speaker 1: but most fade in days or weeks. The writer can't
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Speaker 1: just decide to change and then order the elephant to
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Speaker 1: go along with the program. Lasting change can come only
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Speaker 1: by retraining the elephant, and that's hard to do. When
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Speaker 1: pop psychology programs are a successful than helping people, which
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Speaker 1: they sometimes are, they succeed not because of the initial
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Speaker 1: moment of insight, but because they find ways to alter
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Speaker 1: people's behavior over the following months. They keep people involved
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Speaker 1: with the program long enough to retrain the elephant. When
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Speaker 1: pleasure or pain comes to them, the wise feel above
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Speaker 1: pleasure and pain, do not seek to have events happen
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Speaker 1: as you want them to, but instead want them to
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Speaker 1: happen as they do. Happen and your life will go well.
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Speaker 1: Happiness comes from within, and it cannot be found by
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Speaker 1: making the world conform to your desires. Our life is
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Speaker 1: the creation of our mind. Thinking makes it so