WEBVTT 00:00:12.854 --> 00:00:14.319 Wow. 00:00:15.210 --> 00:00:17.211 So what I want to do here, if I could, 00:00:17.211 --> 00:00:22.346 is share with you a very simple, yet powerful method, 00:00:22.346 --> 00:00:24.001 grounded in neuroscience, 00:00:24.001 --> 00:00:29.491 for turning passing experiences into lasting structure, useful structure, 00:00:29.491 --> 00:00:30.569 inside our brain. 00:00:30.569 --> 00:00:34.858 In other words, turning experiences into the happiness, or the resilience, 00:00:34.858 --> 00:00:38.710 or the other inner strengths that we really want inside ourselves. 00:00:38.710 --> 00:00:42.459 I sort of stumbled on this method when I was in college, 00:00:42.459 --> 00:00:45.856 but to explain the context, I have to take you back a little before, 00:00:45.856 --> 00:00:48.390 into my own up-and-down childhood. 00:00:48.390 --> 00:00:53.749 So, I grew up in a loving home - good parents, intact family - 00:00:53.749 --> 00:00:56.351 but I was very, very young going through school - 00:00:56.351 --> 00:00:58.470 I have a late birthday and I skipped a grade. 00:00:58.470 --> 00:01:04.110 And that combined with my kind of shy and seriously dorky temperament - 00:01:04.110 --> 00:01:08.119 you know, skinny, glasses, picked last for baseball, the whole thing. 00:01:08.119 --> 00:01:10.271 Well, what it lead to 00:01:10.271 --> 00:01:15.879 were lots of experiences of being left out or put down by the other kids in school. 00:01:15.879 --> 00:01:18.413 Now, what happened to me was very small 00:01:18.413 --> 00:01:21.781 compared to, unfortunately, what happens to many, many other people, 00:01:21.781 --> 00:01:25.980 but we all have normal needs to feel cared for, to feel cared about. 00:01:25.980 --> 00:01:28.632 We're the most profoundly social species on the planet. 00:01:28.632 --> 00:01:32.661 You know, as we evolved in the Serengeti, exile was a death sentence. 00:01:32.661 --> 00:01:34.122 Causes have effects. 00:01:34.122 --> 00:01:38.402 And if we don't get the supplies that we need, bit by bit, 00:01:38.402 --> 00:01:40.982 it's kind of like we're living on a thin soup. 00:01:40.982 --> 00:01:42.793 You can survive, you can make it, 00:01:42.793 --> 00:01:46.182 but there's a hollowness, an emptiness inside. 00:01:46.182 --> 00:01:49.302 In my own case - hopefully this will work; yes - 00:01:49.302 --> 00:01:54.672 I ended up with lots of bad thoughts and feelings inside of me as a result. 00:01:54.672 --> 00:01:56.257 Then I went off to college, 00:01:56.257 --> 00:02:01.381 and I began to notice something really powerful and interesting. 00:02:01.381 --> 00:02:04.279 You know, some small, good thing would happen. 00:02:04.279 --> 00:02:06.694 You know, a girl would smile at me in the elevator, 00:02:06.694 --> 00:02:09.943 some guy would throw me the football at intramural football and say, 00:02:09.943 --> 00:02:12.203 "Good catch, Hanson," that was really good. 00:02:12.203 --> 00:02:14.360 Or guys would invite me to go our for pizza - 00:02:14.360 --> 00:02:16.723 you know, basic stuff of everyday life. 00:02:16.723 --> 00:02:18.763 And then I would have an experience, right? 00:02:18.763 --> 00:02:22.933 I would feel a little included, or a little wanted, a little appreciated. 00:02:22.933 --> 00:02:25.820 Then the question is, what would I do with that experience. 00:02:25.820 --> 00:02:29.244 If I dealt with it like I usually did, which was to kind of ignore it, 00:02:29.244 --> 00:02:34.074 you know, let it pass along, I kept feeling lonely and inadequate. 00:02:34.074 --> 00:02:38.559 But I began to notice that if I did something different, 00:02:38.559 --> 00:02:42.676 if I stayed with it a dozen or so seconds in a row, 00:02:42.676 --> 00:02:46.243 it felt like something was gradually coming into me 00:02:46.243 --> 00:02:47.722 that was actually good. 00:02:47.722 --> 00:02:51.205 And I began feeling better and better and better, 00:02:51.205 --> 00:02:52.684 and more confident. 00:02:52.684 --> 00:02:56.686 Any single time I did this wasn't a mind-blowing moment - 00:02:56.686 --> 00:02:59.701 I had a few of those through other means - but ... 00:02:59.701 --> 00:03:00.964 (Laughter) 00:03:00.964 --> 00:03:04.095 the good things really did add up over time for me, definitely. 00:03:04.095 --> 00:03:08.343 And now, years later, many years later, as a neuropsychologist, 00:03:08.343 --> 00:03:11.615 I began to understand what I was actually doing. 00:03:11.615 --> 00:03:15.675 I wasn't just changing my mind, I was actually changing my brain. 00:03:15.675 --> 00:03:17.913 That's because, as the neuroscientists say, 00:03:17.913 --> 00:03:21.015 "Neurons that fire together, wire together." 00:03:21.015 --> 00:03:24.936 Passing mental states become lasting neural traits. 00:03:24.936 --> 00:03:28.545 Bit by bit, I was actually weaving these resources 00:03:28.545 --> 00:03:32.205 into the fabric of my brain and therefore my life. 00:03:32.865 --> 00:03:34.566 There are many examples of the ways 00:03:34.566 --> 00:03:38.095 in which mental activity can change brain structure. 00:03:38.485 --> 00:03:41.873 For example, taxicab drivers in London at the end of their training 00:03:41.873 --> 00:03:45.597 have a thicker brain in a key part called the hippocampus 00:03:45.597 --> 00:03:47.727 that does visual-spatial memory. 00:03:47.727 --> 00:03:49.448 In a different kind of example, 00:03:49.448 --> 00:03:53.203 I don't know if anybody in here experiences stress, right? Occasionally. 00:03:53.203 --> 00:03:55.866 Well, if we have the experience of stress, 00:03:55.866 --> 00:03:59.435 that releases cortisol in the body, it goes up into the brain. 00:03:59.435 --> 00:04:03.234 Cortisol gradually stimulates the alarm bell of the brain, the amygdala, 00:04:03.234 --> 00:04:05.924 so it rings more loudly and more quickly, 00:04:05.924 --> 00:04:10.299 and cortisol weakens, it actually kills neurons in the hippocampus, 00:04:10.299 --> 00:04:12.675 which besides doing visual-spatial memory, 00:04:12.675 --> 00:04:15.904 calms down the amygdala and calms down stress altogether. 00:04:15.904 --> 00:04:18.145 So this mental experience of stress, 00:04:18.145 --> 00:04:21.146 especially if it's chronic and moderate to severe, 00:04:21.146 --> 00:04:23.314 gradually changes the structure of the brain, 00:04:23.314 --> 00:04:27.085 so we become progressively more sensitive to stress. 00:04:27.747 --> 00:04:30.397 The mind can change the brain to change the mind. 00:04:30.397 --> 00:04:34.677 Knowing this is really valuable because the inner strengths - 00:04:34.677 --> 00:04:36.818 to go back to the beginning of my story here - 00:04:36.818 --> 00:04:39.919 the inner strengths that we all want: happiness, positive emotion, 00:04:39.919 --> 00:04:44.707 determination, feeling love, confidence, the virtues, the executive functions, 00:04:44.707 --> 00:04:46.999 those are all built out of the brain. 00:04:46.999 --> 00:04:51.827 The question is how to actually get them into the brain. 00:04:51.827 --> 00:04:52.997 The interesting thing 00:04:52.997 --> 00:04:56.844 is that most of the wholesome qualities of mind and heart 00:04:56.844 --> 00:05:00.287 that help us cope with life, including coping with hard things, 00:05:00.287 --> 00:05:04.657 and have a lot inside ourselves to give to other people, 00:05:04.657 --> 00:05:06.899 most of those inner strengths 00:05:06.899 --> 00:05:11.318 are built from positive experiences of those strengths. 00:05:11.318 --> 00:05:14.049 If you want to feel more confident, for example, 00:05:14.049 --> 00:05:16.930 have more experiences of accomplishment or coping. 00:05:16.930 --> 00:05:19.078 If you want to have a more loving heart, 00:05:19.078 --> 00:05:22.800 practice more moments of compassion or kindness for others. 00:05:23.858 --> 00:05:29.631 The problem is that to get these experiences into our brain, 00:05:29.631 --> 00:05:34.839 we have to overcome the brain's hard-wired negativity bias. 00:05:35.238 --> 00:05:37.356 This negativity bias means 00:05:37.356 --> 00:05:41.318 that the brain is very good at learning from bad experiences 00:05:41.318 --> 00:05:43.708 but bad at learning from good ones. 00:05:43.708 --> 00:05:47.378 In other words, good experiences kind of bounce off the brain 00:05:47.378 --> 00:05:48.900 unless we do a little thing 00:05:48.900 --> 00:05:51.000 that I'm going to tell you about in a moment; 00:05:51.000 --> 00:05:54.311 meanwhile, bad experiences sink right in. 00:05:54.311 --> 00:05:56.251 The reason for the negativity bias 00:05:56.251 --> 00:06:00.001 is that our ancestors had to pay a lot of attention to bad news. 00:06:00.001 --> 00:06:04.102 Because if they survived it, they had to remember it forever, right? 00:06:04.102 --> 00:06:06.251 Once burned, twice shy. 00:06:06.251 --> 00:06:08.840 These days we have ordinary experiences of this - 00:06:08.840 --> 00:06:12.690 think about a relationship you're in with someone you live with, work with, 00:06:12.690 --> 00:06:14.000 sleep with, whatever. 00:06:14.000 --> 00:06:17.021 You know, let's say ten things happen in a day with that person. 00:06:17.021 --> 00:06:20.952 Five of them are positive, four are neutral, one is negative. 00:06:20.952 --> 00:06:23.881 Which is the one we tend to think about as we go to sleep? 00:06:24.161 --> 00:06:27.311 That's why a lot of studies show that a good long-term relationship 00:06:27.311 --> 00:06:29.362 typically needs at least a five-to-one ratio 00:06:29.362 --> 00:06:31.521 of positive to negative interactions. 00:06:31.521 --> 00:06:33.643 That's a cautionary tale, right? 00:06:33.643 --> 00:06:35.182 (Laughter) 00:06:35.182 --> 00:06:38.511 Alright, so that's the negativity bias. 00:06:38.511 --> 00:06:41.106 It creates a fundamental bottleneck in the brain 00:06:41.106 --> 00:06:44.162 that creates a weakness in both informal efforts 00:06:44.162 --> 00:06:48.532 and formal efforts to grow, to heal, to train ourselves in different ways. 00:06:48.532 --> 00:06:51.952 Whether you're a psychologist like me or a meditation teacher like me, 00:06:51.952 --> 00:06:54.853 or a corporate trainer, or a coach, a parent - 00:06:54.853 --> 00:06:57.301 I'm also a parent, with my wife - 00:06:57.301 --> 00:07:00.010 or you're trying to help people in one way or another, 00:07:00.010 --> 00:07:03.493 we tend to be very good at "activating" positive mental states, 00:07:03.493 --> 00:07:06.573 but are we very good at helping people install them in the brain? 00:07:06.573 --> 00:07:07.570 I don't think so. 00:07:07.570 --> 00:07:09.521 There's been this longstanding assumption 00:07:09.521 --> 00:07:12.522 that if we just get a good thing going, somehow it will sink in. 00:07:12.522 --> 00:07:13.860 What can we do? 00:07:13.860 --> 00:07:16.552 We can learn to take in the good, 00:07:16.552 --> 00:07:19.042 to pop open this bottleneck in the brain, 00:07:19.042 --> 00:07:23.880 and gradually weave good experiences into the fabric of our brain and our life. 00:07:23.880 --> 00:07:26.352 So I thought we could actually do it here right now - 00:07:26.352 --> 00:07:27.811 something experiential. 00:07:27.811 --> 00:07:29.419 It is Marin county, 00:07:29.419 --> 00:07:30.372 (Laughter) 00:07:30.372 --> 00:07:31.400 we could go for it. 00:07:31.400 --> 00:07:32.742 We'll just try it right now. 00:07:32.742 --> 00:07:35.161 It's a little weird, a little artificial - why not? 00:07:35.161 --> 00:07:36.162 Just go for it. 00:07:36.162 --> 00:07:38.812 So I'll take you through this kind of informally, 00:07:38.812 --> 00:07:40.522 then I'll explain what we just did. 00:07:40.522 --> 00:07:45.672 So if you could, bring to mind someone that you know cares about you. 00:07:45.672 --> 00:07:48.330 It could be a pet, it could be a group of people, 00:07:48.330 --> 00:07:52.163 it could be a person in your life, in your past, doesn't really matter. 00:07:52.163 --> 00:07:55.111 What you're trying to do is have a good experience, 00:07:55.111 --> 00:07:58.504 a simple good experience of feeling cared about. 00:07:59.191 --> 00:08:03.431 You're trying to help the idea of this person, or the image, or a memory 00:08:03.431 --> 00:08:05.091 become a feeling. 00:08:05.665 --> 00:08:07.572 Okay, want to try it? 00:08:07.572 --> 00:08:09.822 And then once you get it going - 00:08:09.822 --> 00:08:13.432 you're moving out of concept to experience - 00:08:13.432 --> 00:08:15.082 stay with it. 00:08:15.431 --> 00:08:18.984 It's kind of a critical mass of time, a threshold. 00:08:20.304 --> 00:08:23.233 Things have to last long enough in our experience 00:08:23.233 --> 00:08:26.941 to transfer from short-term memory buffers to long-term storage, 00:08:26.941 --> 00:08:29.053 including emotional learning. 00:08:29.694 --> 00:08:33.092 And meanwhile, you could sense that this experience is going into you, 00:08:33.092 --> 00:08:34.874 you're absorbing it. 00:08:35.523 --> 00:08:38.403 It's sinking into you, feeling loved, 00:08:38.813 --> 00:08:40.943 as you sink into it. 00:08:50.103 --> 00:08:51.932 A simple moment - 00:08:53.014 --> 00:08:56.733 10, 20 seconds usually won't change our life. 00:08:56.733 --> 00:09:00.743 But bit by bit, it can really make an enormous difference. 00:09:01.053 --> 00:09:03.873 I'd like to tell you the little steps of taking in the good, 00:09:03.873 --> 00:09:08.505 they're very simple - I even have a clever acronym that you can use to remember them. 00:09:08.505 --> 00:09:11.074 Our daughter thought of the last word in the acronym - 00:09:11.074 --> 00:09:13.184 very important, so I want to give her credit. 00:09:13.184 --> 00:09:16.384 So, in the first step, have a good experience. 00:09:16.384 --> 00:09:19.795 We've got to activate it, we've got to get it going. 00:09:19.795 --> 00:09:22.625 The brain is like an old-school cassette recorder. 00:09:22.625 --> 00:09:27.795 It records the music by playing it - we have to have an experience. 00:09:28.065 --> 00:09:31.548 In the second step, enrich the experience. 00:09:31.548 --> 00:09:37.974 Help install this activated mental state into your brain as a neural trait. 00:09:37.974 --> 00:09:40.675 You know, let it last, help it grow in your body, 00:09:40.675 --> 00:09:42.804 help it become increasingly intense, 00:09:42.804 --> 00:09:44.485 give yourself over to it. 00:09:44.485 --> 00:09:47.125 And in the third step of taking in the good, 00:09:47.125 --> 00:09:48.654 absorb it. 00:09:48.654 --> 00:09:51.334 Sense an intent that it's sinking into you. 00:09:51.334 --> 00:09:52.874 This will prime memory systems. 00:09:52.874 --> 00:09:56.265 This will sensitize them so they'll be more efficient 00:09:56.265 --> 00:09:59.995 at encoding the experience into neural structure. 00:09:59.995 --> 00:10:03.614 And then, if you want to, the optional step, 00:10:03.614 --> 00:10:07.704 is to link the positive experience with something negative. 00:10:07.704 --> 00:10:09.755 You've got to be a little careful about this 00:10:09.755 --> 00:10:12.282 because you don't want to be hijacked by the negative, 00:10:12.282 --> 00:10:14.374 but if you can stay strong with the positive, 00:10:14.374 --> 00:10:16.572 it will gradually associate with the negative - 00:10:16.572 --> 00:10:18.935 "neurons that fire together, wire together" - 00:10:18.935 --> 00:10:22.344 and it will go into the negative to soothe it, ease it, 00:10:22.344 --> 00:10:24.064 even gradually replace it. 00:10:24.064 --> 00:10:26.324 And you can use this step of taking in the good, 00:10:26.324 --> 00:10:28.375 where you're linking positive and negative, 00:10:28.375 --> 00:10:32.135 for yourselves, or for children, or for clients, students 00:10:32.135 --> 00:10:33.645 or others you care about, 00:10:33.645 --> 00:10:37.844 you can use this method to heal old pain or neglect, 00:10:37.844 --> 00:10:39.754 whether in adulthood or childhood, 00:10:39.754 --> 00:10:42.620 even reaching down into young parts of yourself. 00:10:42.926 --> 00:10:44.355 To kind of sum it up here, 00:10:44.355 --> 00:10:48.176 we have four steps that become an acronym: HEAL. 00:10:48.176 --> 00:10:49.833 It's an easy way to remember it. 00:10:49.833 --> 00:10:51.105 Have it. 00:10:51.584 --> 00:10:54.445 Enrich the experience to begin installing it in your brain 00:10:54.445 --> 00:10:56.745 once it's activated in your mind. 00:10:56.745 --> 00:10:57.754 Absorb it, 00:10:57.754 --> 00:11:02.392 and, if you like, link it so it really becomes a part of you. 00:11:02.672 --> 00:11:04.603 Now, this may seem a little complicated, 00:11:04.603 --> 00:11:06.585 we all know how to take in the good, 00:11:06.585 --> 00:11:09.815 we all know how to help some good life lesson land, 00:11:09.815 --> 00:11:11.723 some good experience with other people. 00:11:11.723 --> 00:11:14.064 We know how to let these things land. 00:11:14.064 --> 00:11:18.274 In a nutshell, this whole thing boils down to - all my verbiage here - 00:11:18.274 --> 00:11:19.556 to four words: 00:11:19.556 --> 00:11:22.294 Have it and enjoy it. 00:11:22.294 --> 00:11:26.045 Alright? Especially enjoy it so it becomes a part of you. 00:11:26.045 --> 00:11:30.625 This is not about covering over negative truths, right? 00:11:30.625 --> 00:11:33.274 Paradoxically, the more we take in the good, 00:11:33.274 --> 00:11:36.911 we're more able to see the bad and do something about it. 00:11:36.911 --> 00:11:41.091 In fact, this is about taking control of the brain's stone age bias 00:11:41.091 --> 00:11:46.984 in the 21st century to excessively focus on the bad and over-worry about it. 00:11:47.494 --> 00:11:50.545 Any single time we do it isn't going to change our life. 00:11:50.545 --> 00:11:52.435 But the gradual accumulation, 00:11:52.435 --> 00:11:56.605 both in the flow of our day and at special times if we want to, 00:11:56.605 --> 00:12:01.513 like at meals, or at nighttime before bed, or after meditating or a workout, 00:12:01.513 --> 00:12:04.520 we can gradually build this up inside ourselves. 00:12:04.520 --> 00:12:07.307 You know, I think of it as the law of little things, right? 00:12:07.307 --> 00:12:10.904 It's usually lots of little bad things that take us to a bad place. 00:12:10.904 --> 00:12:15.255 And it's lots of little good things that take us to a better one. 00:12:15.255 --> 00:12:18.257 There's this saying they have in Tibet - I think about it often. 00:12:18.257 --> 00:12:20.985 They say, "If you take care of the minutes, 00:12:20.985 --> 00:12:23.466 the years will take care of themselves." 00:12:23.466 --> 00:12:26.425 I find that so helpful, isn't it? 00:12:26.425 --> 00:12:29.665 What's the most important minute in your life? 00:12:29.975 --> 00:12:31.856 It's the next one. 00:12:31.856 --> 00:12:33.471 Can't do anything about the past. 00:12:33.471 --> 00:12:36.588 A few minutes in the future, we start losing a lot of influence. 00:12:36.588 --> 00:12:40.290 But the next minute is a phenomenal opportunity for us. 00:12:40.290 --> 00:12:43.356 Like me back in college, or any one of us today, 00:12:43.356 --> 00:12:45.106 or over the course of this evening, 00:12:45.106 --> 00:12:48.418 what will we do with the most important minute in our life? 00:12:48.732 --> 00:12:50.873 And especially, what will we do with the good 00:12:50.873 --> 00:12:53.629 that's authentically available to us in it? 00:12:53.629 --> 00:12:54.837 Will we waste it? 00:12:54.837 --> 00:12:58.008 Or will we, a few times a day, or even more, 00:12:58.008 --> 00:13:00.408 actually take it into ourselves? 00:13:00.408 --> 00:13:02.007 For me, there's a Buddhist saying 00:13:02.007 --> 00:13:04.868 that really speaks to the heart of the opportunity 00:13:04.868 --> 00:13:07.378 in the most important minute of our life. 00:13:07.378 --> 00:13:08.879 It goes like this: 00:13:08.879 --> 00:13:13.259 Do not think lightly of good, saying, it will not come to me. 00:13:13.259 --> 00:13:16.409 Drop by drop is the water pot filled. 00:13:16.409 --> 00:13:20.469 Likewise, the wise one, gathering it little by little, 00:13:20.469 --> 00:13:22.169 fills oneself with good. 00:13:23.359 --> 00:13:27.219 So, may you, and I, and all beings everywhere, 00:13:27.219 --> 00:13:29.688 little by little, fill ourselves with good. 00:13:29.688 --> 00:13:31.260 So, thank you. 00:13:31.260 --> 00:13:33.589 (Applause)