How to Stop Letting Your Own Thoughts Make You Sick, Stressed, and Stuck with Dr. Ellen Langer

Most of us are so certain about, well, everything. We think we can predict what's coming, what that off-hand comment really meant, what that look was about, what's going to go wrong. And according to Dr. Ellen Langer, that certainty is making us miserable… and possibly making us sick.

Dr. Langer is a psychologist, Harvard professor, and the "Mother of Mindfulness." In her book The Mindful Body, she makes the case that the way we think directly shapes the way we heal, age, stress, and recover. Her conclusion: the mind and the body were never two separate things to begin with. And we have far more agency over both than we've been led to believe

In this episode you'll learn:

➡️ What mindfulness (and mindlessness) really is

➡️ The one question that can dissolve stress almost instantly

➡️ Why the story you tell yourself is more powerful than what actually happened

➡️ The study that proved people lost weight without changing their diet or exercise

➡️ The difference between nervousness and excitement (and why it matters)

➡️ Why certainty is a sign of mindlessness (not intelligence)

➡️ How your body heals faster or slower based on what you believe

➡️ Why "fighting" an illness is the wrong mindset

➡️ The simple reframe that turns every negative trait into a strength

➡️ Why confident people don't need to rely on certainty

In this conversation, Ellen makes the case that virtually all of us are mindless almost all of the time. And the moment you recognize that, everything opens up. Your health, your relationships, your ability to recover from hardship.

The obstacle, it turns out, has always been the assumption that there was nothing left to question.

This… is A Bit of Optimism.

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To buy a copy of Dr. Ellen Langer’s books The Mindful Body: Thinking Our Way to Chronic Health and Finding Happy, head to: https://www.ellenlanger.me

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Chapters

00:00:00 Stress Is a Story We Tell Ourselves
00:01:27 What Mindfulness Actually Means
00:02:59 Why Everything You Know Is Probably Wrong
00:04:29 One Plus One Doesn't Always Equal Two
00:06:59 Are We Wired for Stress or Taught to Be Stressed?
00:08:16 When Ellen's House Burned Down: Finding Gifts in Tragedy
00:13:19 Is This a Tragedy or an Inconvenience?
00:19:24 Nervous or Excited? The Olympic Athletes' Secret to Reframing Stress
00:22:26 The First Step to Mindfulness: Embracing Uncertainty
00:23:15 Behavior Makes Sense From the Actor's Perspective
00:33:24 Context, Context, Context: Who Gets to Decide?
00:42:41 Mind Over Matter: The Stories That Started It All
00:46:24 The Counterclockwise Study: Turning Back Time in Five Days
00:47:07 The Chambermaid Study: When Work Becomes Exercise
00:49:47 Wounds Heal Based on Perceived Time, Not Real Time
00:52:01 Are We Mindless Almost All the Time?

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Simon is an unshakable optimist. He believes in a bright future and our ability to build it together.

Described as “a visionary thinker with a rare intellect,” Simon has devoted his professional life to help advance a vision of the world that does not yet exist; a world in which the vast majority of people wake up every single morning inspired, feel safe wherever they are and end the day fulfilled by the work that they do.

Simon is the author of multiple best-selling books including Start With Why, Leaders Eat Last, Together is Better, and The Infinite Game.

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Website: http://simonsinek.com/

Leaderful: https://simonsinek.com/leaderful

Podcast: http://apple.co/simonsinek

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Simon’s books:

The Infinite Game: https://simonsinek.com/books/the-infinite-game/

Start With Why: https://simonsinek.com/books/start-with-why/