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Episode 21: Miracles and Manifestations | A Conversation with Harvard Psychiatrist Srini Pillay
91 Plays4 years ago
On this episode of Doorknob Comments, Fara and Grant talk with Srini Pillay, a remarkable coach, author and business person who is adept at opening up minds, fostering creativity and unhinging people in the most delightful and loving way. Learn about his book Tinker, Dabble, Doodle, Try, including simple ways to optimize your creative problem-solving skills, and join in our lively and mind-altering conversation.
Learn more from Srini Pillay here:
https://twitter.com/srinipillay and https://twitter.com/ReulayOasis
https://www.instagram.com/drsrinipillay/
https://www.facebook.com/SriniPillayMD
https://www.facebook.com/NBGCorporate
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Transcript
Misconceptions about Productivity
00:00:04
Speaker
the ways in which so often people think that the way to productivity is just, you know, focus, focus, focus, fatigue.
Introduction to 'Doorknob Comments'
00:00:14
Speaker
Thank you for joining us on doorknob comments, a podcast that we created to discuss all things involving mental health. We take the view that psychiatry is not just about the absence of illness, but rather the positive qualities, presence of health and strong relationships and all the wonderful things that make life worth living.
Meet Dr. Srini Pillay
00:00:31
Speaker
I'm Dr. Farah White. And I'm Dr. Grant Brenner. We're very, very happy to have a friend and colleague, Dr. Srini Pillay here. Dr. Pillay is a Harvard-trained psychiatrist, brain imaging researcher, and author of the amazing book, Tinker, Dabble, Doodle,
Dr. Pillay's Professional Achievements
00:00:49
Speaker
Try.
00:00:49
Speaker
unlock the power of the unfocused mind. He is globally recognized for translating complex findings from psychology and brain science research into practical suggestions to help people improve productivity, creativity, and self-connection. As CEO of Neurobusiness Group, voted one of the top 20 movers and shakers in leadership development in the world, he works with nonprofits and Fortune 500 companies globally.
00:01:18
Speaker
to help leaders understand how to change brain blood flow to manage risk, uncertainty, and volatility, and to harness creativity. He has founded three startups in the brain science technology space. He is an in-demand keynote speaker and widely sought after by the media. He has been featured on CNN, Oprah Radio, Fox TV, The New York Times, The Boston Globe,
00:01:43
Speaker
Forbes and Fortune. He can be reached at SHRINI at neurobusinessgroup.com. That's S-R-I-N-I at neurobusinessgroup.com.
Inspiration for Dr. Pillay's Book
00:01:54
Speaker
Welcome, SHRINI. It's amazing to have you here. It's really lovely to be here, Grant and Farrah. Thank you for having me. Thanks for joining us. I'm really looking forward to hearing about your book and about any other projects that you have in the works.
00:02:09
Speaker
Absolutely. I'm happy to start wherever you'd like me to start. I'd like to start with the inspiration really, where this sort of came from and how it's been for you to see this too, fruition.
Enhancing Productivity with Less Focus
00:02:22
Speaker
Yeah, the book actually came from a discussion with my agent who asked me what I wanted to write about. And I told her that I didn't know. And so she said, well, why don't you just speak for like 30 minutes on like everything, anything you want to speak about continuously stream of consciousness and let's see what happens. And maybe we can start with what you're doing.
00:02:41
Speaker
And so I started to say, well, you know, I'm a psychiatrist, a clinical psychiatrist. I've done brain imaging research. I'm also an executive coach where he was brain based coaching and working on this technology company, which is really exciting. At the time I was working on a musical that I was trying to finish and also working on some poetry. So she was like, and you're getting stuff done. And I said,
00:03:02
Speaker
Yeah. She said, well, maybe like, is there anything you can say that's interesting about the fact that you can be doing many things at the same time and still be productive? Because we live in a world right now where everyone's preaching focus and preaching focus as a way to advance your life. Is it possible you could say something that may be counter narrative? I was happy to contribute to the counter narrative and that conversation evolved and
00:03:27
Speaker
eventually a Tink or Dabbledoodle try came out of that.
Creativity and the Default Mode Network
00:03:31
Speaker
And so the book is really a book about the ways in which so often people think that the way to productivity is just, you know, focus, focus, focus, fatigue. Like most people are just scheduled hour after hour.
00:03:43
Speaker
And if they've got to-do lists, then we're going to get stuff done. And a lot of that is while it's useful, obviously, when we all need to focus, to really optimize focus, you have to manage your brain's fuel more effectively. And so really what I prescribe in this book is at a meta level going between the prefrontal cortex, which is involved in very focused activity, especially when it's connected to the sides of the brain.
00:04:09
Speaker
in the parietal lobe. And then another network that's responsible for a different kind of intelligence, which we used to think of as the do-mostly-nothing network, the DMN, but it's actually the default mode network. And this network is responsible for a lot of interesting functions. So often, for example, people think that the focus is the only thing that's helpful.
00:04:32
Speaker
But focus can deplete the prefrontal cortex. And in fact, there's been a study, for example, that looked at people making moral decisions about trying to help other people. And they found that if you really focused in a video and compared to the group that didn't focus in the video, you are much less likely to care unless somebody fed you glucose. Now, with everything that I'm saying, the one caveat is
00:04:54
Speaker
most studies need to be done and there's no final idea.
Science and Self-Evolution
00:04:58
Speaker
I thought you were sort of anti-science nowadays. Isn't that paradoxical to be citing research and also to be questioning the validity of data? You can do that. I think overwhelming conflict of most doctors. Yeah, I don't think I would say I'm anti-science. That's a little too poor. I would say I'm anti-science.
00:05:19
Speaker
I don't want to get in trouble. I don't mean to be libelous or something. It was William James, I think, who pointed out that the nature of science is to perversely to live from destroying itself. So I think the evolution of science has to do with looking at data and finding a better way over and over again.
00:05:41
Speaker
People don't understand that fully, right? No, I think that's why people say, like, how can I believe you? Like yesterday you said this was good. Today you're saying this is not good. And so people tend to think, well, that means that science is useless. But the reality is that you can have science, you can have witchcraft, and you can have autocratic science and witchcraft. And then you can have the kind of science that I would respect, which is science and continuous evolution questioning itself.
00:06:07
Speaker
and trying to improve on itself. And I think that's the type of science that I tried to include in this book. But aside from depleting the prefrontal cortex, focus is also problematic in many respects. If you think about the fact that focus really keeps you focused on one particular point, and as a result, it's like you have these blinkers on. You can't really see what's happening in the periphery. Or if you're really just focused on one thing, you can't really see what's coming up ahead.
00:06:36
Speaker
Focus is also, if you focus, you focus on one point. So with creativity, you often have to connect two or more ideas. And the self-circuit in the brain, which is very extensive, but includes major components of the default mode network,
00:06:52
Speaker
is also requires a fair amount of unfocused because the default mode network is one of those networks that can pick up information in the nooks and crannies of your brain metaphorically so that you know not just the overt things about you like your LinkedIn profile or like the bio you read about me can be communicated but also subtle things that actually matter to identity like the scent of your grandmother or what you think about
Strategic Unfocus Techniques
00:07:18
Speaker
the
00:07:18
Speaker
fall, things that are not necessarily that overt. So I wanted to emphasize that I think that there's certainly a lot of examples in the world of people who have made major discoveries in their off moments. I think most of us can relate to having ideas in the shower. And so I just wanted to help people understand ways in which they could cultivate strategically building these unfocused periods into their lives.
00:07:43
Speaker
That's the story of my inspiration and some of the constructs. The diffuse meandering network, the default mode network. I want to ask you about creativity. I was reading about personality and executive function, and I'm suppressing the urge to ask you whether standing on one's head helps with blood flow. But I had read that somewhat, what's the word that book agents like for something which is counterintuitive?
00:08:11
Speaker
that inhibition increases creativity. Inhibition is associated with divergent thinking because people inhibit the routine ideas that are less original and more repetitive. Do you address that in Tink or Dabbledoodle Try? Or how would you think about that for our listeners to leverage their own possibility?
00:08:33
Speaker
Well, I address it in different ways. I think one of the things is that people often think they're either creative or they're not. And there have been a large number of studies that have examined whether creativity has a genetic component. And there is a genetic component overall, but it's really not the dominant component. So I think most people would agree today that creativity can be developed.
00:08:55
Speaker
Then I think, to your point, people often think that creativity has got to do with expressivity and really just letting it all hang out. And the question is, is there a way in which that can interact with inhibition of certain things? And I think you do have to inhibit certain things, like the impulse to come across as normal, for example. I'm not worried about that. I am very worried about that.
00:09:20
Speaker
The impulse or coming off as normal? What were you saying, Srini? Self-control. I think one of the, to your point, the more recent studies have shown people used to talk about right brain and left brain. And so the right brain was this free flowing part of the brain and the left brain was this very sort of focused brain. I think most experts in creativity in the brain would agree that you really need both sides of the brain
Daydreaming for Creativity
00:09:46
Speaker
to be able to do something.
00:09:47
Speaker
You need the part of the brain that is flowing, picking up ideas, making connections, and you need the part of the brain that is doing something with that. Otherwise, you might end up metaphorically with Picasso and no art. So someone who's super brilliant but not able to put anything out there in some kind of time-ordered sequence.
00:10:05
Speaker
There's a balance, yeah. There's a story of life, don't you think? That so often, this notion of balance, I think, is implicated in how you can best pull off something. I also think it's dynamic. So what feels balanced to me is always, I think, self-checking against one's humanity and then also advancing. So I think balance as a metaphor is great, but I wouldn't want to communicate
00:10:31
Speaker
that you should be middle of the road and you should be a little bit of thinking and a little bit of flow. I'm not sure that that's key. Oh, I wonder from your point of view, because there is so much in the narrative about how to focus and how to
00:10:47
Speaker
you sort of optimize and execute and organize as a less focused person on the spectrum that those have been helpful to me. But when you're looking at someone who is really getting bogged down in execution or organization or those types of details, how do you have them relax and just, you know, get into that other neural network?
00:11:09
Speaker
So I think there's this overarching framework that I will often describe to people, which is, I think you paradoxically have to be strategic about your unfocused. So you've got to be focused about your unfocused. And I think what I'm saying is, if we don't stop ourselves and we're ambitious people in the world,
00:11:26
Speaker
We're probably going to just sit here all day and do something hour after hour. And what I suggest to people is to consider the fact that for close to 50% of the time, a little less, we're engaged in mind wandering anyway. So why wouldn't we build strategic unfocus in ways that have been shown to enhance brain function?
00:11:47
Speaker
You know, ideally, I think most people, there's no absolute number on this and I definitely don't think there's any research pinpointing this number. But I think experientially, I would say approximately 20 minutes, two to three times a day, set aside time for specific ways to unfocus. And there are ways in which you can do this, depending on
00:12:08
Speaker
your work environment, depending on your own inclinations. I would suggest people try this. And when they try this to actually see if it improves their lives or not over a period of four to five weeks. So napping, for instance, five to 15 minutes of napping can give you one to three hours of clarity, which is pretty good because a lot of times
00:12:28
Speaker
We're trying to push through the day and we're like, oh, I got it. I just have one more thing to do. Huge nap fan here. And I just think napping is a much more efficient way of managing your brain fuel. I mean, you wouldn't go across country without filling any fuel in your car. Why wouldn't you refuel your brain in the course of the day? Sleep refills the brain. My dad used to call it, and he grew up in the Great Depression era, he used to call it Superman naps.
00:12:54
Speaker
Yeah, because I think you actually do feel emboldened in that way. And you feel like you're a new person. And in any case, there's always a time in the day when you're feeling like your brain is on low energy. It's like sometimes directly after lunch, middle of the afternoon, near the end of the day. So, so napping is one of those things. There's a doodling is a little bit controversial. So doodling can improve memory significantly, according to a study by Jackie Andrade.
00:13:22
Speaker
But recently there's been a study in doodling showing that you probably have to doodle on the subject that's being discussed, so if you're in a conference call about what to do next in the strategy and the company.
00:13:35
Speaker
you're doodling with apples and oranges, it's probably not that helpful. What does that do in the brain to doodle about the subject of interest, do you think? I don't
Limits of Science and Unconventional Thinking
00:13:44
Speaker
know, but there are two things. One is that I think when you're doodling, what you're doing is you're relaxing your attention. And so the brain is absorbing information metaphorically, not like a stiff sponge. It's actually just sort of
00:13:59
Speaker
letting information seep in. When you're doodling on the subject, you're probably also enhancing associative functions so that the ability to retain that information is greater. As far as I know, I don't think that mechanism has been studied.
00:14:16
Speaker
I'm thinking about some of those studies where they have people solve problems, and in one condition, they have to keep their arms still, and in the other condition, they just have people move their arms around. I'm curious if you have thoughts about the embodied cognition angle. Yeah, I do. I can't remember the specifics of this research, but my memory, because I actually wrote about this in another one of my books, was that the way you move your hands actually matters. There are studies looking at moving your hands in circles versus straight lines,
00:14:43
Speaker
when you're trying to solve a math problem. And I do think that at a very literal level, cognition must be embodied because it's not like you have brain activation and then everything stops. I mean, there's a reason I can lift my hand up. If I can lift my hand up because I'm giving my hand an instruction,
00:15:02
Speaker
then when I am thinking something or trying to remember something, that memory often resides not just in my brain, but in my body. So I think, I feel very strongly that, and I have noticed this a lot, you know, if I'm playing tennis, for example, and how so often it's the body memories that it's like a, it's like a feedback feed. It goes back, like I remember something in my body and the way my body moved. And then I figure out,
00:15:28
Speaker
where to move. So I do think that embodied cognition is an important piece of this. And so I think
Anxiety and Fear of Freedom
00:15:35
Speaker
doodling is an important way. Right. There's this mirror neuron thing too. And when you move, the other person wants to move that way, right?
00:15:44
Speaker
I remember I did a risk communication training with Vincent Cavallo, who studies a lot of risk communication right after 9-11. We had a hundred people or more in the room. And he started out saying, you know, who here has ever felt stress when they're responding to a disaster? Raise your hand. And he raised his hand. And like I had to raise my hand, even though I've never felt stress. Yeah, I mean, neuro neurons are very powerful. Isn't that a rap song that references that?
00:16:12
Speaker
When you move, when I move, you move just like that. Can you sing a little bit for us? Martini in hand. I told you I can believe I can be shy sometimes. Well, I remember where we are, so I'll go on to method number three. Method number one was napping. Method number two was doodling. Method number three was positive constructive daydreaming. Did you say snacking? Just thinking about things I like to do.
00:16:40
Speaker
Yeah, only two. I'm a huge snacker. Snack therapy. Snack a napper. Yes. Positive constructive daydreaming is a phenomenon that was studied for many years and from the 1950s by Jerome Singer. And what Singer said was that if you just sit at your desk and daydream, it's not that helpful. Or if you're remembering the pionides in discretion, you had too much to drink. It's also probably not that helpful. But what is helpful is positive constructive daydreaming. If I just summarize what that is,
00:17:09
Speaker
I'd say there's three basic things first set aside time approximately 20 minutes, secondly, you have to be doing something low key.
00:17:17
Speaker
So the classic examples are knitting or gardening or walking, something that doesn't require a lot of energy, but that is embodied so that you are wandering with your body. And then the third thing is that while you're doing this, just let your mind go into positive wishful thinking. So imagine running through the woods with your dog or flying a yacht. By letting your mind sort of loose in that way, your mind just sort of roams around.
00:17:42
Speaker
And then collects this important information, which can then be, which can often be put together, like a lot of times with our focus minds, we collect very, you know, large information metaphorically. And the subtle, the points are missing,
Resilience and Emotional Management
00:17:57
Speaker
so we can't really complete the story, or we can't have an aha moment. But when you're involved in positive, constructive daydreaming,
00:18:04
Speaker
you increase the chances of having an aha moment because the brain can put these puzzle pieces together because it finds these other little pieces and is able to complete the story. So I think those are three methods in the book I talk about many others and happy to continue to talk about those methods.
00:18:20
Speaker
if that'll be helpful. I think this is so important. And it reminds me of a lot of the types of, I guess, different endeavors, like more mystical endeavors that people embark upon. And as a psychiatrist, I am sort of just like alongside that. But I wonder for you, you know, it sounds like you're talking about a state of reverie, like this dreamlike state where people can really visualize what they want.
00:18:47
Speaker
Are there times when this, you know, positive, constructive, you know, daydreaming might, I don't know, bring them someplace that they didn't expect? And
Clothing and Personal Expression
00:18:58
Speaker
then how would we sort of reconcile that?
00:19:01
Speaker
Yeah, so there's a lot of interesting, sometimes conflicting and disparate information on this. So for example, one way the question is asked is, you have mind wandering, which sounds great, but what about mindfulness, which is focused attention on your breath? What's the difference? And I think there's been one study that's shown that mindfulness is really good for analytical problem solving, and mind wandering is good for creative problem solving. So maybe that's one framework we can think about.
00:19:28
Speaker
But mindfulness meditation is not just about staying focused on the breath or even in transcendental meditation on the word because the focus takes you into an unfocused zone which most people would say is a kind of transcendental space where you do encounter phenomena that are not available to ordinary consciousness.
00:19:50
Speaker
I do think that in the book, I talk about this a little bit. My editor wouldn't let me go too far with this. I don't find it that weird that consciousness can evolve beyond a regular day-to-day consciousness, as I was saying to Grant recently when we met up. 2021 is going to be a year for miracles and manifestation.
00:20:10
Speaker
And really what I think is that there are ways to come to solving problems that are not linear or expectable. In the book, I talk about Kerry Banks-Mollis, for example, who discovered a way of making synthetic DNA, PCR.
00:20:26
Speaker
His lab mates, if you
Desire and Societal Norms
00:20:28
Speaker
actually read online, he got the Nobel Prize for this. And his lab mates were like, yeah, he wasn't much of a scientist. He didn't follow the scientific method. Because scientific method, of course, is the kind of method that is very disheartening to most scientists, because most scientists never, ever get anywhere. So sometimes I wonder, what's with the scientific method that doesn't get most people anywhere that they want to actually get to?
00:20:51
Speaker
But what he did was he, when he describes how he came upon this, he was driving from Berkeley to Mendocino. He was with his girlfriend. They had had a little bit of wine. They were going up these winding roads to a small log cabin type place. He suddenly stopped along the way, jumped out, started scribbling on a rock face. Girlfriend was tight, she didn't really want to talk. They went back to the log cabin. When he got there, you know, she was just relaxing. He just decided that all of a sudden he had these realizations. And so his lab mates made it sound like it was luck.
00:21:20
Speaker
He said, you know, he just was not following the prescribed line of thinking. And I think most people would agree that the prescribed line of thinking may be the safe way of getting somewhere. But there are also ways of thinking that are associative, ways of thinking that are unconscious, ways of thinking that we don't immediately, we don't really understand that get people there. You know, Einstein, when he talked about his theory of relativity, said it was a musical perception. It wasn't like he thought of something overt.
00:21:49
Speaker
So anyway, I think there are examples of this. A lot of people talk about the times that they took, that taking this time off was a way that they accessed this level of consciousness. Just by their very nature, miracles don't really... The criterion for what a miracle is, science is not really designed to authenticate.
00:22:10
Speaker
You know, science wants things that happen over and over again. Repeated miracles are rare events. Science wants things that are understandable, that you can explain. Miracles are things you can't explain. All you know with the miracle, you know, like the Lord's miracles, these medical miracles, which people have documented for ages, are things, and scientists have been on these boards and they've seen that some people who are
00:22:32
Speaker
paralyzed, became not paralyzed. There was a woman who presented with inflammation of the lining of the abdomen, who got completely cured. They got cured at different points. Nobody can explain how, but this happened. And I think if you asked a scientist, I think some people would say, well, when you have faith, what you have is
Embracing Love over Polarization
00:22:50
Speaker
you have a change in your brain chemistry. You're more motivated.
00:22:54
Speaker
to get better, dopamine, because you also get a decrease in some of the stress hormones. So maybe that plays a role in reversing what's going on. So certainly, I think miracles are not built to be well understood by science, but they are fast phenomena. And I think a lot of people who made major discoveries feel very lucky for not having kept themselves held by a noose to what the scientific method is.
00:23:21
Speaker
The scientific method, I think, is a wonderful board from which one can jump into other states of
Where to Find More about Dr. Pillay
00:23:28
Speaker
consciousness. I think a lot of scientists would say, I got lost in the work. And that's part of the joy of the science. The logic, I think, is very helpful to operationalize, to set in order a lot of very difficult to articulate ideas. But I find logic not that helpful as a way to lead you into discovery.
00:23:49
Speaker
It's okay up to a point, but letting go to me is super important. And I think most humans are afraid to let go. I think, you know, I ran an anxiety service for many years at McLean Hospital and, you know, I started out thinking, oh, this is gonna be like, okay.
00:24:06
Speaker
not that bad, you know, SSRIs, a little bit of benzos, you do some cognitive therapy, we probably crack the code, people would feel better, and some people felt better, but I think I ran into, for the long-term care, I ran into this notion that I think made me think deeply about Kierkegaard's idea that anxiety is the dizziness of freedom, that we say we want to be free, but most people build lives so that they hold themselves to those lives with balls and chains, because not
00:24:33
Speaker
They call this grounded sometimes, but a lot of times it's trapped. And I think for us, it's important to ask ourselves, are we grounded or are we trapped? Do we really want freedom or does being free make us feel like we don't have the gravity of our own consciousness?
00:24:52
Speaker
to keep us connected. And I think the unfocused mind and practicing these things allows us to navigate the space of freedom with less ambivalence so we can let go of our anxiety. In fact, one of my passions this week is thinking more deeply about how I feel like we have been indoctrinated into believing
00:25:14
Speaker
that worry is necessary for success. That we got to get up in the morning and worry about the money and worry about the day and worry about what we haven't finished. Like worry is this kind of conditioning. And I'm even suspicious of some of the systems we've set up to help us practice that. You know, go to school, do well, take an exam, make sure you're on top of your class. If you're not on top of your class, if you want to do something, interview. All of life is set up in the system of worry. And I think that there's something that I would call the light.
00:25:43
Speaker
that is far more attractive to grow in. And I think worry as a habit is such a strange addiction. I think a lot of the conflicts that are going on, I think people have become addicted to conflict as an external way of making them feel alive.
00:26:01
Speaker
Right. And so everyone's sort of taking sides on this or that, and it's just perpetuating this. I think if we pause for a moment and realize that our growth is actually stunted in these worry circles, very few people grow in those worry circles. That growing in what I'm calling the light can be, I think, much more advantageous. What I've been wanting to think about is how do you give up your attachment to worry so that you can begin to embrace the light, just to go into the spiritual zone you're speaking of.
00:26:31
Speaker
Like analysts talk about binding anxiety with worry, and sometimes the literature says that rumination is useful because you're mulling thoughts over, like chewing and digesting and moving forward, but I think a lot of times in our culture we're conditioned to strive for these
00:26:50
Speaker
specific goals and then and then you get stuck in this mindset where you know that's kind of like the first stage of a rocket like once you finish your formal education you should then be more open-minded but but the systems of learning train closed-mindedness
00:27:05
Speaker
Yes, absolutely. And I think, you know, it serves us to a large extent. If you look at the research in Wari, I think if you ask most Wari researchers, why do people Wari? I think one of the leading theories is the contrast avoidance theory, which is that in life you have peak experiences and you have these trough or valley experiences and warriors keep themselves in the middle because they don't want to go from falling in love to someone just died. The fall is too much.
00:27:32
Speaker
they'd rather go from, even if I am in love, let me just keep myself in this worry zone, so the contrast is not as great. Like a status quo effect. Yeah, and so when you do that, you keep people, you live your life in the middle zone, and you never have these exceptional experiences, because exceptional experiences are intimidating, because they make you think that if something, because inevitably bad things happen, and then you end up falling, like that, you know, it's sort of, it's like,
00:27:56
Speaker
And I think we practiced this for a long time. My association takes me to repetition compulsion and some of Freud's initial observations of children. And when people report this, I'm always amused by how unamused they are by neurologists, child psychiatrists not having a sense of humor. Like the initial thoughts were they were watching children playing in a cart and they were like,
00:28:19
Speaker
This is like really weird behavior. They throw out the things that they own. Like you wouldn't go to your house and start throwing out your furniture. These are things they wanted. Now they're throwing it out. But what's even weirder is that they cry about it after they throw it out. They're like, wait a minute, you threw it out. Now why are you crying? Then the mother brings it back in these experiments and the child's really happy. And then the mother goes away and the child throws the toy out again. They're like, there's something weird about this behavior because yes, you can see the child's playing.
00:28:47
Speaker
But what's really striking about it is that there's something similar between the behavior of children and adult humans. And that is that children really practice mastery over disappointment rather than seeking fulfillment. And we want to be really good at life sucking. We want to be like, you know, life's horrible, but I'm so good at it. I can hunker down and make this work.
00:29:11
Speaker
And I think we overemphasize the practice in mastering disappointment, rather than thinking about ways in which seeking fulfillment could also provide some of the light that I'm speaking about. Well, it's like risk management. Dr. White, you look like you're vibing with something.
00:29:27
Speaker
Yeah, I was sort of wondering because there is a lot of talk of resilience, but it sounds like there are some important distinctions, right, between managing disappointment versus being resilient, that maybe there is some overlap there. Risking disappointment, like I'm willing to be disappointed, you know, like I have a fail.
00:29:48
Speaker
in order to succeed. I can't avoid failure. I'll never get anywhere. Well, the thing about emotions is sort of interesting that I think we live in a society where being well practiced at them is a skill. You know, like a lot of people will say things like, oh my God. I'm like, is that surprise or is that a phrase?
00:30:07
Speaker
I'm not sure what that actually is, or that's so funny. It's like, it's so funny why you're not laughing. Like we've cognitized a lot of different responses. Certainly I learned something even, my mother just died a few years ago and it was very remarkable to me because I think of myself as a generally emotionally facile person. I can empathize with sadness, I can feel sad, I can feel
00:30:32
Speaker
But when that happened, it just disorganized my entire emotional infrastructure. And I suddenly realized that there was the power in feeling what that whole range of emotion was, and not because I was able to commit to it, because it had no control over it. It was just what I was feeling. I was feeling, and I was like, wow, is that what people mean when they're emotional? They feel this, that's kind of out of control-ness.
00:30:56
Speaker
And so I think I resisted the temptation to manage it. And I was more curious about it when I could be. And I just in some way deeply trusted that it would go on until it wouldn't go on. And I think when you let emotions do that,
00:31:13
Speaker
you're less interested in managing them. And managing them means allowing them as well. It's like if you're managing children, you wouldn't just say, sit there. Don't go anywhere. Don't play. Don't run. There's a certain amount of allowing and then a certain amount of restraining. And I think when we talk about resilience sometimes, we're too heavy-handed with that. I'm going to be fine. Stop crying. Don't do this. I see things, and suddenly I'd be like, oh my god, I never used to be this kind of person. I was never the kind of person who would just
00:31:42
Speaker
This is kind of weird. It's interesting to evolve in that way. And so I think resilience is sometimes a little bit too harshly applied as a learned skill. But there's also anti-fragility, you know, Nassim Taleb's whole idea that it's not just about bouncing back from adversity, but also about using that adversity as a tailwind.
00:32:04
Speaker
And certainly I do think, I don't think I tried to do this, but I do think that there were a lot of disorganizing advantages to what I would identify as a sad event in my life when my mother died. Because it was disorganizing, but it also allowed me to reorganize myself in a way that I don't think I could have done cognitively.
00:32:26
Speaker
It's like identity. Yeah, I think that's what, I think the reason people like, I think, the self-scrambling effects of psychedelics is that psychedelics get right in there and scramble the self-circuits, probably in a way that's different. It reminds me of somebody studied that against grief. It increases brain entropy.
00:32:48
Speaker
which is the number of possible states you can be in. You know, a lot of these things are labeled as crazy. I think our society has pathologized sort of madness. And of course it can be very generative, but it can also unleash the dark destructive forces. Yeah, and I agree resilience can sort of be overused. Grit, you know, I don't like grit, you know. Yeah, sort of a lot to put on someone who maybe doesn't want to be resilient.
00:33:15
Speaker
Can I ask you, Srini, viewers, listeners rather, you know, to that point, you know, when we've gotten together quite often, I've noticed that people around you will comment on your clothing. Most recently, you were wearing an enormous, amazing
00:33:33
Speaker
I don't know where you got a Danish or Siberian black Ermine, the ladies next to us. And at one time at the plaza, you were wearing these cow forearm braces, cow skin and the lady next, you know, I would like to ask you about clothing and your relationship with clothing, if that's OK. How much time do you have? We have enough time.
00:33:59
Speaker
So I love experimenting with clothing. And I think one of the things about clothing that's interesting is that it's perceptual initially. So and it's controllable in a certain way. And it allows you to connect the inside with the outside in a particular way. In fact, I just recently designed a fashion show that's based on brain science that I think I'm on the verge of potentially producing because I'm
00:34:26
Speaker
interested in connecting the inside with the outside. In general, I just like clothing. I like entertainment, and I like things that I like, and I like things that make me feel better if I acquire them. So there's that very simple thing about acquiring an item of clothing that I like.
00:34:42
Speaker
But I think to the extent that I express myself in clothing, I think I take the expression of myself as a certain kind of luxury to be able to experiment with myself. In the Zoom time, for example, I will often dress up, even if I have no meetings, just so I can see what I feel like.
00:35:02
Speaker
in particular clothing. So for me, I think clothing offers an avenue for experimentation and self-discovery. And I think it also emphasizes and challenges you about what you want to express from the inside. On that particular day, I was very happy to have the big hat because it was freezing cold outside. So I think it definitely, I don't think I chose it. I have chosen fashion statements that are uncomfortable before, but in that instance, I chose it because it was comfortable.
00:35:32
Speaker
But it intrigues me how how the outside and the inside are connected. And there are all these dots that have not joined, you know, things like the connection between the skin and the brain, the connection between the gut and the brain, between the gut and the skin and where bacteria reside. And so I think there are a lot of loose associations as well. Well, this I'm sorry, the skin and the gut are one contiguous surface.
00:35:56
Speaker
People are topologically, we're donuts. And they both, I mean, I think the skin has like, I think the second largest number of bacteria on it compared to the gut. So at any case, what I can say is they both share a lot of similar things that like to live on them and in them. Right, but what I mean is like the inside of the gut and the outside of the skin actually contain the body. Because the inside of your mouth and your gut is actually outside of your body.
00:36:24
Speaker
Well, I have so many things to say about that, but I'm going to restrain myself, you know, because the, I think in embryology, in vagination, as a construct is such a, I think it's one of the things that really ends up confusing us about the relationship between our bodies and the outside. And suddenly like these things split up and you've got a tube within a tube. And, you know,
00:36:51
Speaker
what mucosa is and there's a lot to say here but I well it seemed like you were going there. I'm just being mathematically dude. Okay I'm willing to accept that.
00:37:04
Speaker
But that I have a choice. Yeah. Well, I'm sure it's fascinating because people have really interesting relationship with how they present themselves. And a lot of people are it's it's it's uniquely interesting in the animal kingdom. Right. Like we display things visually.
00:37:23
Speaker
Sorry, I was going to say, I think particularly now what you said about dressing up even if you don't have a meeting is probably good practice because this has gone on so much longer than anyone thought. Sometimes I look at my closet and feel a little sad. It doesn't stop me from wearing anything other than sweatpants, but I imagine what it might feel like to just put on different clothes and remember a different time.
00:37:50
Speaker
Yeah, because there's a certain theater also to living, right? I mean, the whole Shakespearean all the world's a stage. I mean, whether we're dressing up for that stage or not, it's very hard to be exactly who you are. Sometimes you find yourself in the masquerade, you find yourself on the stage wearing these items of clothing that are
00:38:13
Speaker
allowing you to feel something completely unrelated to them as well. Yeah, you can change your identity. And I think I remember you saying or reading something you wrote about imagining you're someone else in a positive way. And that can give you a lot more options. But I'm wondering sort of how you think about desire then.
00:38:31
Speaker
and how people express desire because I think along the lines of what you were saying in our culture, people are very wonky, weird about how we deal with desire. We can be incredibly libidinous and unrestrained and then turn around in a second and just repress everything. And the movies and the shows we like to watch
00:38:53
Speaker
are just incredibly off the hook. I just started watching Westworld and it's completely lush and unrestrained, but of course it's confined to this little rectangle. Yeah, desire is of great interest to me, both experientially and psychologically.
00:39:09
Speaker
one of those states of being that can provide immense satisfaction and guilt. And the fact that we're constantly riding this wave, making sure we're staying within the satisfaction realm and not spilling over into the guilt realm. I think people feel guilty because of the intensity of their desires.
00:39:27
Speaker
And a lot of times the burnout that I see is a burnout from not expressing the fullness of desire, as opposed to needing to relax more, not being exhausted. I think people are exhausted about not being themselves. That's really what causes burnout. And I think desire and the taming of desire is a culprit that is part of the burnout that I see. I think there's something very frightening about desire to people
00:39:57
Speaker
who do not want to be desired. I think you understand that, Grant. There's a way in which I think a lot of people want to be desired from afar, but if you're desired from up close, it creates, it activates all these fantasies of being consumed. And so people are afraid of wanting to consume others and also being consumed.
00:40:21
Speaker
Well, it's different to be afraid of being consumed if you've already been consumed at some point, though I wonder if Farah has anything to add just as close. Really holding myself back.
00:40:37
Speaker
I think it's a very interesting topic and particularly for women because desire, whether it's erotic or whether it's any other type of ambition, intellectual or financial, has been a really taboo. I think it's one of the last taboos in a way and trying to reconcile the guilt over not being fully happy with what we have and wanting something more, but that's also part of human nature.
00:41:07
Speaker
But do you think feminine desire is more taboo than masculine desire in a way? Yeah, I do because I think that it's seen as something that is very powerful, very dangerous, and that we're still learning. And I think this is what's happened throughout with the Me Too movement, that how do you wield that, right? It seems like this
00:41:29
Speaker
this sort of uncontrollable beast, really. And so I do think that women are taught from a very young age to rein it in, right? And that women that are too open with their desires, well, they have names, right? And that, so I think we're sort of on the precipice of being able to manage our own feelings, our own collective feelings about femininity and, and women as leaders, like,
00:41:55
Speaker
vice president, you know, and people of color, but I wonder if men have womb envy, you know, because women can create life. I do think that there's one of the unconscious factors and sometimes conscious factors that determines the restraint for women is this burden of having to carry the burden of sexual desire should they have to carry a child, because it's not like
00:42:20
Speaker
the man's going to be running around for nine months carrying a baby and doing it. So I think there is this restraint around that has to do with that as well. Controlling production, you know, almost in a Marxist sense. Yeah, I think there are different kinds. I'm not sure that it's more or less in terms of the differences. I think sometimes there are some stereotypes, for example, where men will express their desire openly in terms of wanting to have sex.
00:42:45
Speaker
and women might respond with, can you make love to me and not just wanna have sex? And men are like, what, express my actual desire? No, like, I'm just gonna like express my sexual desire. And so there's that stereotype, which I think is, so I think that desire is a point of suffering for men and for women. And I think, you know, one of the things I'm wanting to do this year as well is in terms of creating a counter narrative, I feel like there are so many advantages to highlighting
00:43:14
Speaker
where there are actual vulnerabilities in the world, you know, like race, with gender, with socioeconomic conditions. But I also feel like there's this unmonitored polarization that is beginning to infect our society.
00:43:30
Speaker
where somehow, if you continue this narrative between men and women, there's likely to be distancing, or between different races, there's likely to be distancing. And I want to really make sure that while we're focusing on what the justice is, there's certainly obvious things. For example, I think women need, according to the World Economic Forum, some absurd amount of time to catch up with pay with men,
00:43:55
Speaker
Just like, you know, I think that can be fixed easily. So I think you should focus on those kinds of things you can focus on. But I still think that I'm not in favor of anything that perpetuates hatred or polarization. You're all about love. I am. And I'm actually not joking. Yeah. No, I mean, I think love is really important. And I think that I don't want to really overindulge the conversation of, you know, guys at the bar being like, oh, those women.
00:44:25
Speaker
woman being like but guys I hate you know like I think there's like you can do that selectively to the point that's realistic but I don't want that to be the all engulfing narrative of my life because I think people are just stupendously different and amazing and there is a way in which it doesn't have to be like a cognitive inclusion of the other
00:44:46
Speaker
but a little bit like the delicious taste of hot and sour soup. I think differences don't have to be debated. I think there's an art that can begin to embrace what differences are. Nicely said. Yes, beautiful.
00:45:01
Speaker
On that note, um, if people want to hear more about what you're up to, where can they find you? Where can they find your book? Um, you can find me on dr. Streamy Palais.com. Okay. We are S R I N I P I L L A Y.com or on N B G corporate.com where I do my corporate work, neural business group. So
00:45:23
Speaker
You're a neuro, you're a business and group, all on work. And you can find me on Facebook, on Twitter, on LinkedIn, and on Instagram. I like sharing my thoughts from time to time and love hearing about it. You have some amazing poetry on medium.com as well. Yeah, because of what I was saying about living in a data-less existence, I thought I would start just writing more poetry online. Wonderful. Thank you. Okay, thanks so much. Thanks for talking with us today. This was amazing.
00:45:56
Speaker
One disclaimer, this podcast is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute the practice of psychiatry or any type of medicine. It's not a substitute for professional and individual treatment services and no doctor-patient relationship is formed. If you feel that you may be in crisis, please don't delay in securing mental health treatment.