Okay, theory of constructed emotion.

This is this is wild, guys. Theory of

constructed emotion suggests that 50% of

the emotion that we experience up to

50%.

Modifiable.

We create our emotional experience. And

the reason that we are so emotionally

[ __ ] up is because no one taught us

that. See, we go through life thinking

that our feelings are not ours to

control. And this is what's so

unfortunate. We have this like weird

therapy speak kind of epidemic going on

where people are like, you're entitled

to your feelings, right? Your feelings

are true. We sort of take feelings as

something that we are given and it it's

sort of like the feeling is not

changeable. It's not modifiable. You

shouldn't even try to change it. You

should just accept it. Like if you feel

angry, you're entitled to feel angry. We

what we sort of say is that if you have

an emotion, you should accept what it

is. Accept your emotion. Don't try to

change it. Don't try to control it.

Don't try to suppress it. And then down

the road, sure, your feelings are valid.

Your conclusions based on those feelings

may not be valid. The behaviors that the

feeling is driving you to do may not be

appropriate, but the feeling itself is

not something that you have any control

over. So just accept it. Your feelings

are true. not the consequences of the

feeling. We're not saying if you feel

angry you should attack people. That is

wrong. But the feeling itself is totally

fine. That's not what the Buddha said.

And this is what's so interesting is

like you know an a psych in psychiatry

we get trained that there's no such

thing as a good feeling or a bad

feeling. They're just all feelings. And

there's a good argument for that, right?

So we've evolved to have anger and

anxiety for reasons. They all serve an

evolutionary purpose. But hold on a

second. Don't we strive for more

positive feelings? We have words

positive feeling and negative feeling.

That just happens to not be true. So

here's the here's the insane thing. You

can actually control what you feel. And

by control, I don't mean suppress. You

can control what your emotional gen what

emotion is generated in response to a

particular situation. And that sounds

insane except it's not. And we do this

every single day because when someone

comes in with a generalized anxiety

disorder and experiences anxiety when

they're ordering a hot dog and when they

go to work and when they're checking out

at the grocery store, we will literally

alter their the creation of emotion

within them over the course of

treatment. That is literally what we

will do, what we will train them in.

Interesting, right? Because we look at

some people and we envy them because

they're like, "Oh my god, this person

responds to this situation with so much

resilience, whereas I feel hopeless in

the same situation. There's something

special about them." And but hold on a

second. The only way that that's true is

if we start with the assumption

that the emotion that I create is not

modifiable by me. And as we have sort of

moved towards this emotional acceptance,

we've actually given up like we've sort

of thrown in the towel on a very very

very

difficult battle, very important battle,

which is that you can actually generate

a certain kind of emotion. You can alter

your emotional experience. Another

really good example of this is imposttor

syndrome. When you look at people with

imposter syndrome and they do a good

job, they generate a certain kind of

emotion which is fear.

So literally what happens in their head

is they when they do a good job they

attribute their successes to

circumstances and they attribute the

successes of other people. When somebody

else does a good job it is through their

hard work, talent or effort. When I do a

good job, it is because of my

circumstances or luck. The situation is

the same. I got an A, you got an A. When

I look at you, my mind generates a

certain kind of answer. When my mind

looks at me, it generates a different

kind of answer. Those two things also

generate a different kind of emotion. So

when I look at somebody else succeed, I

feel admiration. I feel happy for them.

When I look at myself succeed, I feel

panic. And this is torture. It's

adaptive. Because when I do a good job

and I feel panic, what do you think I do

next time? I don't relax. That panic

drives me to keep doing well. Keep doing

well, keep doing well. Which is why we

see so much imposter syndrome at places

like, so I went to medical school at

TUS. I did residency at Harvard. way

more imposter syndrome at Harvard than

there is at TUS. Toughs is like a bunch

of people who are like basically kind of

chilling. We like work pretty hard. We

do a pretty good job. We're not the

smartest group kids in the class. We're

sort of okay with that, right? We got

some gumption. When people hear about

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description below to see if coaching is

right for you. But you can literally

create your emotional experience. You

can create which emotions come up in the

first place. And I think Buddhism is I

think the best system for this. Hinduism

in that way is kind of like eh not so

concerned about that. They're like

transcend the mind entirely. Just like

leave it all behind. Whereas the

Buddhists, they're like cultivate

compassion, cultivate equinimity, you

know, cultivate all these positive

emotions. So you can change the way that

you emotionally react to things. you can

generate a different set of emotions.

And at the beginning, this requires a

little bit of work because you have to

usually it starts with cognition.

Literally think about the situation in a

different way. Cultivate compassion for

this person. What is it like to be this

person? Let me really try to understand.

And another really good example of this

is like take a look at think about

someone who's like your bully. And often

times bullies the weird thing, right, is

that bullies are often times popular.

And so you think to yourself like why is

someone this way when they have

everything? When they have friends,

they're captain of the football team.

Like what must it be like to have so

many of the things that I don't have?

The things that would make me content?

The things that would make me feel so

much happier? And if I had all of those

things, what would have to be going on

inside me to be an ass to other people?

Changes your perspective. And then what

happens? This is the cool part. This is

why it requires training, conditioning,

neuroplasticity. The first time that we

think a different way, it's really hard.

And then as we think a different way

again and again and again and again,

then it starts to become automatic. This

is what we do in psychotherapy for

generalized anxiety disorder. We alter

the baseline emotional response that

people have as they navigate through the

world. And you can do it too. When

you're talking about me changing at the

fundamental level and not the

environment, are you talking about

changing the ego sense of self? I'm

actually talking about even a deeper

layer than that. So your ego or your

sense of self is your identity. What

we're talking about is changing the

automatic response that is generated by

you in a particular situation. Ego

responds to that.

How does ego death affect that? It's

going to [ __ ] it's going to be a

riot. Okay. Near-death experiences and

personal values. Near-death experiences

reportedly foster value transformations

and decrease suicidal ideiation.

89 survivors of near-death experiences

judged values related to material and

social success as less important than

did 175 control subjects. So, here's

what's really interesting. I observed

something very strange as a

psychiatrist.

If you look at the data on risk factors

for suicide, one of the

risk factors, no surprise, is a history

of prior suicide attempts. Another risk

factor is completed suicide

in the family. Now, there's a problem

with these risk factors, which is that

what we do with risk factors is we look

at a large population. Let's say we look

at 10,000 people and we look at let's

say the thousand people the 10,000

people who attempted suicide and then we

discover that okay out of the 10,000

people that attempted suicide 3,000 of

them attempted it before. So we say

that's a risk factor. Makes sense,

right? But 7,000 people didn't attempt

it before. So often times even though

something is a risk factor, it's not a

risk factor for everybody. And something

really strange happened. And I I once

had a patient and they had a history of

multiple suicide attempts and I was

doing a a safety assessment one day and

I said, you know, do I need to be

worried about you attempting suicide?

And my patient said no. And I said, why

is that? And he said, well, you the last

time I attempted suicide, I realized

that I'm trying to kill myself and there

is something within me that wants to

live more than I want to die. So even

though I want to end my life, my heart

wants to keep living. My liver is

detoxifying things. My respiratory, my

lungs are like breathing no matter how

much I want to stop. So something in me

wants to live more than I want to die.

And that's why I won't try to kill

myself. And I was like, that's a really

[ __ ] profound answer, man. So here's

the other thing.

One of the most protective factors, and

I'm not suggesting that you go do this,

and if you're, you know, having thoughts

about hurting yourself, you should

absolutely see a mental health

professional and call 911 and go to the

emergency room. I really believe that

stuff, okay? I believe that as someone

who's worked in the emergency room and

helped people when they're thinking

about suicide,

immediately tried suicide, I really

don't think it's a good option. But the

weird thing is that a passion for life

can sometimes come from almost dying.

And this is something that I know sounds

crazy, but it's actually not when you

think about it, right? When someone

almost dies and they survive, they have

a zest

for life. And it's really interesting

because if you look at this paper, what

they sort of show is that when someone

almost dies, they divest and detach from

social and material success. And it kind

of makes sense like sometimes when

people someone almost dies that their

subjective experience will be as like it

made me realize what's important in

life. And that a lot of their lust for

life improves because they no longer

care about money as much. they no longer

care about being well-liked as much. The

really interesting thing is that if you

look at this paper, there's actually um

let me show you guys. It's fascinating.

Yeah. So, it did not find that the study

group valued self-actualization,

altruism, or spiritual spirituality more

highly than did the control group. I

think this is a really cool finding

because it's not like spir almost dying

brings you closer to God or makes you

meditate more or anything like it.

Actually, doesn't do that. doesn't make

you like a better human being.

All it does is causes you to divest from

material and social success as things

that are important to you.

And it decreases your desire to die.

Fascinating.