No.1 Brain Scientist: Your Brain Is Lying To You! Here's How I Discovered The Truth!

You've bought a present for me in this

box and I feel nervous and excited.

>> So, this is a human brain with a spinal

cord. Such a masterpiece. But what

people don't know is that we have four

different structured parts of our brain

that automatically shape how we think,

feel, and behave. But what if it's not

unconscious? What if we could pick and

choose how we want to be in any moment

on purpose? Like we can manifest our own

mental health. And by the end of this

conversation today, you're going to

teach me how to do that.

>> Absolutely. You're going to so get it.

>> Harvard neuroscientist Dr. Jill Bolty

Taylor

>> has transformed how we understand the

brain through her research and own

traumatic experience. She's teaching the

world how to unlock every part of their

brain to regain control of their

thoughts, emotions, and behavior.

>> We have a problem. We are skewed as a

society to the two parts of the left

brain which focuses on me, the

individual. How do I fit myself into a

society? And trauma is living in there

as is cravings and addiction. And we

need this. It protects us. We get in

trouble when this is the only portion of

our brain that we value because look at

the world we currently live in.

>> So is there a strategy for making sure

that you don't act upon it?

>> Well, so many people are trying to get

rid of their emotional reactivity. But

the way to heal it is not to get rid of

it. I mean, we're wired for this. Why do

I want to just put myself in a little

box and say, "I don't want to have pain.

I don't want to be mad. I want to be a

robot. I don't want to be a robot. I

want to be a whole human with a whole

brain. Like this is life and it lasts

this long and then it's gone. And it

took me losing the left side of my brain

for 8 years to realize just how how

precious this thing is.

>> So how do I control and protect my brain

at all costs?

>> Well, there's a lot. So you ready?

Want some hot stuff?

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you.

[Music]

Dr. Jill Balty Taylor, what have you

spent your professional career

endeavoring to understand and why does

it matter?

>> I am fascinated with how does our brain

create our perception of reality and

based on that information what a wonder

it is any two of us can communicate at

all. I think I am fascinated by what we

are as biological creatures. And most of

us are so consumed with everything

outside of ourselves that we have missed

the wonder of what we are as this

biological conglomeration of cells. I

think we're absolutely beautiful. You

know, none of us came into this world

with a road map about how to get it all

right. And the road map is the brain

cells. And when we understand the brain

cells and what they do and how to work

with them and how to keep them well,

then we can manifest our own mental

health.

>> And do you think the average person

understands the brain?

Did you understand the brain before you

started studying it?

>> Well, I understood it because I had a

brother who was diagnosed would be

diagnosed with a brain disorder

schizophrenia. So I became fascinated by

five or six about what are we and why is

he the way he is? We are so different

from one another. Our interpretation of

our experiences are so different from

one another. What's what are we? I just

I just became a philosopher very young

and fascinated with the biology and the

anatomy of what we are. What do you

think an understanding of the brain, the

understanding that you're going to

communicate to myself and my audience

today,

>> how do you think that can help me

improve my life?

>> Oh my goodness. If I understand what

part of me interacts with the external

world and is smart and is good with

details and is well organized, then I

know how to use that part. And that's

this. We are skewed as a society to that

leftinking portion of our brain. In

fact, as far as traditional medicine is

concerned, that thinking portion of our

brain is the only portion that is

actually conscious. So then we live our

lives literally with our left emotional

tissue, our left our right emotional

tissue and our right thinking tissue all

as part of our unconscious brain. But

what if it's not unconscious? What if we

actually know what those groups of cells

also do? So that when I'm experiencing

my pain from the past, I can actually

call on the portion of my brain that

knows how to self soothe me so that I

can lift myself out of my pain, learn

from those experiences, and then live a

more fulfilled life. It's the power to

choose who and how we want to be in the

world when we understand what our

choices are.

>> So is it possible to choose which part

of your brain to use in a certain

moment? Once

>> you do it all the time, you're just

probably not aware of it. Let's say

you're going to have a business call and

uh you got your stats and you got your

data and you pick up the phone and you

say, "Yes, this is Steve and blah blah

blah." And you work into your details

and then let's say uh someone peaks in

to to let's say a little dog comes

running in. Okay. Well, you're going to

have a couple of responses potentially

responses. One, you're going to smile,

right? You just smiled. You just moved

into, "Oh, I love my little fuzzy." And

yeah, okay. Now you know now you're a

little gentler because now you shifted

into a different portion of your brain

that is open to the present moment and

now you just got uplifted. So we have

these four different anatomically

neuroanatomically structured parts of

our brain and we can pick and choose who

and how we want to be in any moment when

we know what our choices are. But we

don't know what our choices are as our

society because we are functioning

skewed to that left thinking portion of

our brain and everything else is running

on automatic.

>> And the left thinking portion of the

brain is the what more logical

>> logical rational analytical likes to

control people's places. There's a me uh

definition ego center of I exist. I am

Joe Bolty Taylor. This is my phone

number. This is where I live. I know

that this is where I begin and end,

where my skin meets air because a group

of cells tells me where I begin and end.

But you've probably had flow moments

where you were doing your sports or you

were making love or you were whatever

you were doing and and you didn't begin

and end here. You were vast and open and

you were this big energy ball that you

are. But the left hemisphere focuses on

that little group of cells and those

skill sets and the right and the wrong

and the good and bad and that that

portion of the brain defines the social

norm. And we all have to fit ourselves

in the social norm. But it's only a

quarter of our brain.

>> Is it making us unhappy the way that we

use our brain currently?

>> Well, we're out of balance. We're

completely out of balance because we're

at the balance of the value of that left

brain. What's going on in the right

brain? The right brain is right here

right now. We spend so much of our time.

So fundamental differences between the

right hemisphere and the left

hemisphere. And I know this only because

I lost my left hemisphere and that's all

I had for eight years. I had to use what

I had currently going on in my right

hemisphere after I lost those cells of

the left hemisphere in order to rebuild

the skill sets of the left brain so that

I could become completely functional

again. Are we unhappy? Well, that's not

a happy part of the brain. When you're

being analytical and organized and

structured, you probably got that that

burr that frown right there. You know,

you're and and it's a different

expression. Then as soon as, as I said,

a little puppy comes in and then all of

a sudden your face happens. Well, what

happens is you're shifting into a

different part of your brain. And that's

what we do. We're running it on

automatic. So, if we are running our

brain on automatic, imagine how much

better we might do if we were actually

picking and choosing who and how we

wanted to be on purpose.

>> And you're telling me that's possible.

>> Absolutely.

>> And by the end of this conversation

today, you're going to teach me how to

do that.

>> Absolutely. You're going to so get it.

And it will. And once you see you, you

will no longer ever not see you. And

then you're going to see these four

characters inside of yourself. And now

you're going to be looking at your

partner who you speak about often. And

you're going to be going, "Oh yeah, I

recognize all four parts of her, too."

But what that means is that any

relationship that we have, there's eight

of us. There's eight of us. Eight very

specific personalities

in every relationship. So I have four

very predictable character profiles, as

do you. It's the way the anatomy of the

brain is built.

>> You've bought a present for me in this

box.

>> I did.

>> What is in that box? This is a very

special brain with a spinal cord.

>> This is a real brain with

>> This is a real brain with a spinal cord.

>> A real spinal cord. A

>> And do you own this brain?

>> This I did this dissection and uh yes,

this brain was specifically donated to

me for educational purposes.

>> How old was the person? What was

>> in their 40s?

>> Do you know how they passed away?

>> Brain cancer.

>> And can you see the brain cancer?

>> You cannot. Not until I cut this open.

And I've had this brain for over a

decade and I haven't cut it open. It is

very rare to have an dissection which is

actually brain and spinal cord. Usually

you dissect the brain and we learn about

the brain but I wanted to have the brain

and spinal cord because that's the

central nervous system and it's a

spectacular dissection.

>> Um I feel nervous and excited.

>> Excited is good. I'm excited

>> cuz you're right here right now going,

"Oh my gosh, something new."

>> Yeah,

>> it's exciting. Right here, right now is

an exciting time. Are you ready?

>> I am ready.

>> Okay.

>> Should I put my gloves on?

>> I encourage you to do so. Okay.

So, this is a real human brain. And

right now, it is um hydrated in rubbing

alcohol. So, that's what this is.

So, you don't have to be afraid of that.

So, this is a real human brain

and spinal cord.

And I think what I'll do is I'll just

move this over here.

>> Yeah.

>> Out of the way. Okay. So, this is a

human brain.

>> What's that skin on the top of it

>> with a spinal cord?

>> This thing here.

>> We'll get there.

>> Oh.

>> So, you've heard about menitis.

>> Yeah. It's layers that support between

the bone and the brain tissue and it

protects it. So this is called these

there are three layers called the

meninges. So when you've heard of

menitis. So this is the dura mater. It's

very tough and you'll feel that. It's

like a really tough lettuce. And this is

is essentially strapping the brain into

the cranial vault and holding it into

position because you don't want this

thing flopping around and having

wounding and uh injury.

>> So it it straps it into here.

>> It well it straps it in certain spots.

Yes. And generally often when you do a

dissection, you actually have to uh put

a like screwdriver in there to peel the

dura off the bone. So it straps it into

position. It's kind of like a bra for

the brain.

>> Okay.

>> Okay. So this is the dura and then what

I'm touching now is called the arachnoid

and that's the second layer of the

meningis. And what you're looking at in

there is blood is blood inside of the

blood vessels. So one of the things

about why the brain is so fragile is the

blood vessels are transparently thin.

>> So the pressurized system of what's

going on inside of the cranial vault has

to be highly regulated. And it's

actually the pressure of the cranial

vault versus the pressure in the thorax

of the chest and the pressure of the

abdomen. It's a system and they all work

together in order to to keep everything

well regulated homeostasis a state where

the cells are happy and so the third

layer is like right here and it's you

can see this layer is peeled away the

arachnoid and under here I'm now

touching pia and pia is the external

layer of the brains brain cells

themselves the brain tissue so so this

is a beautiful brain and it would be

positioned in my head like this.

So front of the brain, back of the brain

coming down, hanging down as the spinal

cord. And then as you look at the spinal

cord, this is called the cottoina or

cotquina. And these are the nerves that

are actually going to go down into your

lower extremity. So all the information

that's going to go down into your lower

extremity to control your body is

controlled and the sensory information

is coming in through those nerve fibers.

>> Looks like a bunch of wise.

>> It does. Well, you know, we are quite a

welldesigned machine in its own way. It

a difference is we are organic. We are

biological. And I think one of the

biggest mistakes that we make as a

society is we think ourselves and we

think ourselves as a machine. Push it,

push it, push it, push it, push it, push

it, push it. Well, you can do that with

a computer. You plug it in and it stays

on until you turn it off or it blows up.

We have to go to sleep. Yeah. Have a

good time with that.

>> Yes.

It's okay. We won't hurt it.

>> Wow.

>> We hope. Gosh.

>> Uhhuh.

Beautiful.

Our design such a masterpiece. We are

this massive conglomeration of 50

trillion molecular geniuses making up

our form.

Beautiful.

>> It's so crazy that every single person

listening right now has one of these

processing my voice as you're hearing my

voice. That's right. And it is this, for

anyone that has never felt a brain

before, which I imagine is most of you,

it is like this very, very soft but

dense sort of tofuy.

How would you describe the feeling?

>> Pork roast.

>> Pork roast.

>> It's very soft though. Do you know what?

It makes me It makes me realize

>> Yes.

>> how easy this would be to damage. Now,

this has been in alcohol or from

aldahhide for since at least 2008,

probably earlier. And when you first

pull a brain out, it's even softer. It's

like a it's like a tough jelly. So that

when you first bring out a fresh brain,

if you take your finger and you just

poke it into the tissue, it'll squeeze

right in and then you pull your finger

out and then it goes it'll scrunch right

back together again.

>> Oh, okay.

>> Yeah. So, so this is a prepared specimen

and and we have to do that and and lock

together the proteins or the lipids in

order for us to be able to handle it for

educational purposes.

>> So, this is the computer and then this

is the wires that control the rest of

the body. Well, it's part of the system

because um this this what you're holding

is the central nervous system and then

the central all of it and then the

central nervous system sends u between

each of the vertebrae. Here you have

different vertebrae between different

vertebrae. You will have different

nerves coming out and then going around

the body. And then you're also going to

have vagus nerves coming off of the

brain stem area and going down into the

abdomen taking care of the visca.

>> The first time you saw a brain like

this,

>> how did it change your perspective of

life?

>> I love it. I love it. I was I was very

blessed to have an aunt who was a

debutant back in the years where

debutants did not get jobs and she

wanted to be an emergency room uh doctor

but there was no way that she was going

to do that. So she would actually

encourage me to pick up roadkill and we

would take it home and dissect it. It's

beautiful. See that look? We have two

responses. The left brain says, "Oh my

gosh, this is disgusting. This is the

worst thing I ever had." And that's a

part of your brain that's designed to

kind of critically judge and say, "No,

it's not safe. It's not cool. Push it

away." But the right hemisphere comes

online with curiosity. So people see

these things and they go, "Oh, no, not

my thing." Or they go, "Oh my gosh, that

is like so cool."

>> I feel both at the same time. I feel I

feel um

>> I have like almost a respect for the

person.

>> Yes. who grew the brain, whose brain

that belongs to

>> and then the other part of me is just

like totally fascinated and it almost

you know when you look at it you go you

you still don't realize that you have

one of those in your head.

>> I still don't.

>> Now so you you're still looking at that

as that's a one thing. I don't look at

it like that at all. This is a brain.

But what's important about this brain is

our brain health, our brain abilities is

100 dependent on the cells that make up

that brain. So most people, many

neuroscientists talk about the brain and

how the brain does in the external world

and the behavior and the

neurotransmitter systems and all of

that. I go down to the raw data of the

cells. So, I am a cellular

neuroanatomist and so I care about the

cells making up the nervous system and

how do we how do we interact with them?

How do we relate to them? How do we care

for them? How do we feed them? How do we

provide for them so that they can be

healthy so that I can live a whole brain

life in a healthy way?

>> For context, where did you do your PhD?

You did your PhD in neur neuron anatomy

at Indiana State University.

>> Indiana State. And my research was at

the IU School of Medicine, Indiana

University School of Medicine. So that's

where I focused on neuro.

>> Yeah.

>> And uh then from there I went to Harvard

Medical School.

>> Yeah.

>> And uh did two postocs, one in

neurobiology and then one in psychiatry.

>> And when I say the 10th of December,

>> yes,

>> 1996.

>> Yes.

>> Which was

4 years after I was born roughly.

>> Mhm.

>> You're 37 years old.

>> Yes.

What happened on that day? Can you give

me a playbyplay?

>> Yes. Well, the day before that I was

teaching and performing research at

Harvard Medical School and I am a gross

anatomist which means cadaver entire

body as well as hisytologology which is

tissue as well as neuro. So I am all

about anatomy. So I teaching and

performing research at Harvard Medical

School. And uh I woke up the next day

and I was experiencing a major

hemorrhage in the left half of my brain.

So I woke up, I sat up and I immediately

had a pulsing pound behind my left eye

and uh generally I didn't have that and

it was pretty severe and it got all of

my attention and I have my before and

after is before and after that morning.

>> What happens next? So, you've got a

pulsing pain be behind your left eye.

What did you do then?

>> Well, I thought, "Wow, that's weird."

And it was the costic pain that you get

when you bite into ice cream. It's like

that freeze brain.

>> Uh, and I thought, uh, okay. And I felt,

uh, I felt suddenly weak. And, um, and I

thought, okay. So, I got up and light

was, um, kind of burning on my eyes. It

was I didn't want light in the morning

that day. So, I closed the curtains and

I thought, well, let's get my blood

flowing. Maybe I'll feel a little

better. So, I jumped onto my cardio

glider, which was a whole body full

exercise machine. But I'm looking at my

hands and realizing that my hands look

like primitive claws, grasping onto the

bar, and I look at my body and I'm

thinking, "Whoa, I'm a weird looking

thing." and my perception of reality

shifted away from my perception of being

the one on the machine having my normal

morning experience to wow I was

witnessing myself having this experience

and I'd never had that happen before and

I thought okay so this isn't helping so

I get off the machine and I uh head

across my living room table and I'm

realizing Every movement is very rigid

and very precise and I'm actually kind

of directing. I felt very robotic

getting into the bathroom. So I remember

pulling on the water and when the water

came out, it smashed into the tub and

the volume just reverberated in my

brain. It was so loud the sound was

amplified and it pushed me against the

wall. But when the volume hit, I'm a

neuroanatomist. So what that means is

that I'm teaching students about all of

the anatomy here and which fibers are

coming in and going where and what is

the tracks of everything. And so sound

comes into the ears and it goes right

down to the pawns region of our brain

down here. And this is where life and

death is. This is where those cells, if

you're going to inspire, you need your

pounds and and your your medulla in

order to have those cells functioning.

So, when mine went were being disturbed,

that was the moment I realized I've got

a problem. This is a grave problem. Uh,

this could kill me. So, I got out of the

shower. I dressed mechanically, just

dressed. I'm still going to work. And

then my right arm went totally paralyzed

by my side. And and it's really strange

when a limb goes paralyzed. It doesn't

just like drop down. It goes bomb. I

mean, it's a heavy entity. And I

thought, "Oh my gosh, paralysis. Oh my

gosh, I'm having a stroke." And then I'm

thinking, "Okay, you know, oh my gosh,

how many brain scientists have the

opportunity to study their own brain

from the inside out?" And I literally

thought, "Okay, I'll do this stroke

thing for a week or two and then I'll

get back to my job." Right? So then it

was a matter of I have to get help. I

have to communicate with the external

world. And a problem was that the

hemorrhage was happening inside of the

left thinking portion of my brain which

is where language is. So I was drifting

for 4 hours. I was drifting in and out

of the consciousness of the present

moment. And the present moment the pres

in in the present moment I don't know

who I am. I don't know what I am. All I

can know is what's in the present

moment.

>> So explain that for me. So yeah,

>> the left side of your brain

>> was where the stroke was happening.

>> Yes, it was.

>> So you were in the right side of your

brain.

>> I was waffling back and forth because it

was growing. It started small. So I had

what we call an arteriovenus malf for an

artery which is a high pressure system.

It's bringing blood into the system. And

then I have a vein and the vein is a no

pressure, low pressure system. And then

we have these little capillary networks

in between.

Yeah, this is an es schemic stroke. I

had the the uh the hemorrhagic stroke.

So when you think about stroke, most

people think, oh, blood clot

>> and the blood clot blocks a So the thing

about um arteries is they taper taper

taper taper taper until they get down to

the capillary level, which is where the

blood uh the red blood cells kind of

line up in single file and pass through

that. And it's a very low pressure

system, and then it absorbs back up into

the vein. Well, what I had was the

hemorrhagic stroke and a blood vessel

exploded. And when it exploded, then the

blood goes out into the extracellular

matrix, which is extracellular between

the cells and the cells cannot function.

Blood is essentially poison to cellular

communication. So, it's no good. And

whatever blood wherever it goes, those

cells start going offline. And then as

that uh hemorrhage grows inside of the

brain across time, more and more cells

are becoming incapacitated.

>> So you were in that moment unable to

remember how to speak properly, unable

to

>> nothing. I had nothing. I didn't even

have me. I had no Jill Bolty Taylor

because she was over in the left

hemisphere. And eventually that whole

hemisphere ended up swimming in a pool

of blood and was nonfunctional. But it

took four hours to get there. So, I was

waffling into the present moment,

blissful euphoria. I didn't exist. I h I

know who I am and that I exist at all

because I have a tiny little group of

cells inside of my left hemisphere that

tells me who I am. Have you ever

awakened in a hotel somewhere because

you've traveled so much and you're

going, "Where am I?"

>> Yeah.

>> There's this blank, right? And it's

like, "I don't know, but the bed's

comfy." You know, what a nice room. you

know, and all of a sudden you're just

right here, right now, and you're not

about the past, and you're not about the

future, and you're just in the present

moment. And joy lives in the present

moment. Love lives in the present

moment. Laughter lives in the present

moment. The present moment is a

fantastic place. And we are wired to

that by literally half our brain.

So why wouldn't we spend more time over

here

or at least balance it out? That's all I

ever ask for. I am not here to uh uh you

know uh as a waving the flag of the re

of the right hemisphere. I want whole

brain living. I want people to

understand the different parts of their

brain what they do so that it says okay

so let's say do you meditate

>> sometimes.

>> Okay sometimes. What's it like for you?

>> Difficult.

>> Okay. Why?

>> Because the you start thinking about

stuff.

>> Okay. Because this part of your brain

won't be quiet.

>> The left is that that's

>> left thinking brain. We're languages. it

won't be quiet. Or uh you just had a

little argument with your with your

sweetheart and so down here now you're

in your emotional system and you're not

really feeling peaceful and you got on

that airplane and things weren't like

perfectly smooth. So now you're kind of,

you know, ruminating about, you know, oh

my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, you

know, and whatever. And that takes you

away from the present moment. But the

present moment

is it's not about me, the individual. I

think about this the the so I look at

the brain it's divided into four

categories very specific anatomically

each one of those result in a

constellation of skill sets and then

that constellation of skill sets

actually manifests in our lives as

personalities and we all have all four

now do we all practice all four

of us do we usually have a dominant you

seem to like your left thinking brain a

lot. When do you have fun? What does

Steve do for fun?

>> This.

>> This?

>> No. Also, I watch I watch Manchester

United play and I

>> You lift weights.

>> Yeah.

>> What's that like for you? Is it work or

is it refreshing to be in your body?

>> Oh, when I'm at the gym, it's Yeah, it's

I'm just in my body, which is Yeah.

>> Okay. But no, not just But when you're

at the gym, you're in your body. Now,

can you go back in your own mind and

have that feeling?

>> Can I?

>> Yes.

>> How?

>> Well, go there in your mind.

>> I actually imagined myself on the

treadmill at my favorite gym and how

that felt. And I had a brief moment of

that feeling emerge in my mind.

>> And what did it feel like?

>> Present.

>> Present.

>> Yes.

>> Okay. And any other emotions that you

can attach to it?

>> Just like calm, peaceful, without

without concern. Very present.

>> Yeah.

>> Very present.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. So the present is a nice place for

you.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. Okay. What else do you do to get

there?

>> Massages.

>> Massages. You receive massages. Okay.

>> Okay. And what happens to your brain? Do

you analyze what's coming and just work

your butt off? Or do you allow yourself

to actually drift and shift into the

present moment of, "Oh my gosh, I'm so

glad I'm here."

>> I allow myself to drift.

>> Good. Where do you go?

>> I don't know. It's like a fuzzy.

>> Yes.

>> Middle ground place.

>> Yes. No boundaries.

>> Some kind of limbo.

>> This portion of the brain up here is

going to be the part that says who you

are as an individual. It's your ego

center. This hemisphere, the left

hemisphere, has the picture of nature

with you in the middle because you exist

in your left hemisphere.

>> That's where the the world revolves

around you.

>> The world revolves around you. In the

right hemisphere, you don't even exist.

You exist as a part of it all. So what

you hear gets integrated with what you

smell, with what you feel, gets

integrated in the excitement of

possibility. So, I'm not working from a

plan. I'm not in the past. I'm not in

the future. I'm not all about me. I'm

just here. So, when you're on a table,

massage table, and you're allowing

yourself to go fuzzy,

that's essentially the skill set of

what's going on in the right hemisphere.

When you dive into water, you swim.

>> Uh, not not not well.

>> Okay. But do you dive into water? I do.

Yeah.

>> Okay. Or even just in the shower. When

you feel when you dive into water and

you feel the water, the pressure against

your body, the temperature of the wa of

the water, you feel the phenomenon of

wetness. This is a present moment

experiential opportunity diving into the

water. Now, a lot of people might dive

in the water because I'm racing and the

whole goal is to get to the end because

I got that left brain thing going on and

it's that's the goal. But if I'm just

being, this is, you know, are you being

or are you doing, right? When we're

being, we're simply being here. We're

being alive. We're being aware. We're

being in experience. So, as I take in

this room, I take in this whole room. My

left brain says, "I'm going to focus on

you, and I got these books, and I've got

these things, and I got the brains, and

everything, and everything's a thing."

But to the right brain, everything is

one thing. And when I live my life

knowing that I can shift out of the

stress circuitry of that left brain that

says more cortisol, more cortisol, do do

then when I it's the it's the that's the

push. The right brain is the pause. And

that's why I was saying before, we're

not a robot. We're not a computer. We

are a biological organism. And so we

don't plug ourselves in and turn it on

and it stays on and forever until it

dies and then we buy a new one. We have

rhythms. We have natural patterns and we

have to push and we have to pause and we

have to pause because we are 50 trillion

molecular geniuses that are eating and

creating waste and we need to clean up

the mess and that's what happens during

sleep.

>> And so when you were stood there you'd

put your clothes on the left side of

your brain was offline. So you were very

much in this sort of blissful, euphoric,

present moment state. What did you do

next?

>> I I go through all the details of trying

to get myself help. And that meant to me

the one plan I could get between

shifting black back out into the

euphoria of my right hemisphere where

I'm just in bliss. I'm just happy. I'm

just there and I don't have a plan.

>> Why didn't you call 911?

>> Because it was just floating in a pool

of blood. It wasn't there for me.

>> What do you mean? Well, when you look at

where my hemorrhage happened, it

happened. So, so language, the creation

of sound and language, dog, dog is a

sound. It's going to come out of uh

Broca's area. And then Waricki's area

back here is going to place meaning on

that sound. And my hemorrhage was

impacting this whole area. And in there

with language is numbers. 911 didn't

exist for me. Was not an option. you can

remember 911

>> didn't exist for me. It'd be kind of

like I say to you, um uh what's 8,322*

4 million?

It doesn't exist for you until you

figure it out.

>> 164,374.

I'm checking

>> exactly. So 911 didn't exist for me. So

I had to when I would come back into the

left hemisphere consciousness, then I

would I got to my phone and I put have a

phone pad here and I spent 45 minutes

waffling in and out right hemisphere,

left hemisphere and finally I found my

business card that had my phone number

of work and I had to set the pad of the

phone pad up against right next to the

business card and match the shapes, the

squiggles in order to figure out how to

call my office because I had no idea

what numbers were.

>> And what did you say when the person

answered on the other end?

>> I said, "This is Jill. I need help." And

what came out of my mouth was.

And then I thought, "Oh my god, I sound

like a golden retriever." And then he

spoke to me and I thought, "Oh my god,

he sounds like a golden retriever." I

had had a golden retriever and they're

very verbal.

So I knew at that point I did not know

because I could still hear myself my

language inside of my brain language is

very complex in this because different

cells do different things and in this

this left thinking portion we can read

we can write those are completely

different circuitries we can speak we

can comprehend when others speak I mean

it's complex so this is a busy busy busy

place but as long as this is the only

portion of our brain bra that we value.

Then we live based on the values of that

portion of the brain. And what that

brain values is me and mine and I want

more. And that's the world we're living

in.

>> It's selfish. Well, it certainly is

>> because people talk about there being a

spiritual crisis in society at the

moment with many of the things you're

describing, the individualism, the

narcissism, sociopathism, the leaders of

the world being very

>> uh zero sum and how they approach

>> Yeah.

>> economies and how they treat others.

>> You're saying that's because we're so

>> right there over here

>> on the right side.

>> On the right side, it's right here right

now. And in the right here, right now,

what do I care about? I care about

connection because I'm not

individualized here. I'm a part of the

whole. I am. We are all standing around

this beautiful planet. And I, man, is

equal to all the other creatures and all

the other life and to the life of the

planet. We are one construct here. And

we either figure out how to nurture and

support and be one thing. We are one

human family in our right hemisphere.

You are my brother. I love you. I can

support you. I can nurture you. I can

encourage you because you're a part of

me. And then the left hemisphere comes

online and says, "Oh, Jill, that is so

inappropriate for you to say."

and he has his body space and I have my

body space and we need to be formal and

we need to right and wrong and good and

bad and we need to establish how the

construct of the social norm is that we

are now going to take the mass of all

that we are and fit ourselves in that so

that we can communicate with one another

and run a world

>> you make that phone call

>> you you sound like a golden retriever um

what happens next does your colleague

get

>> he recognizes it is me it is I and he

comes to my home and back in those days

we had a managed care so you have to go

to the right place or you don't get

coverage. So he took me there and then

they took a picture of my brain and then

they they put me in an ambulance and

sent me to Mass General Hospital and as

and I'm still curled up in a little

fetal ball going hold on hold on and I

was slowing down and I knew that I was

becoming weaker and weaker and I

wondered how detached from my own

ability my own body can a person become

before they can never get back inside

this tiny little body because I felt

that I was literally energetically as

big as the universe.

And what did that scan show? It showed a

a

>> major hemorrhage in the left half of the

brain. Yeah, about that size. Actually,

it was a little bigger than that on that

on that day. Uh but by the two and a

half weeks later when they removed uh

that's why we have a golf ball a golf

ballized blood clot from the left half

of my brain. Two and a half weeks later,

December 27.

And then I woke up and I had this huge

hemorrhage. I I mean I had this huge

scar, but my mother comes rushing in and

she says, "Speak to me. Speak to me

because this is my language. If my

language cells are gone, I will have no

language and I will struggle the rest of

my life for language." And I I whispered

to her, "I'm better. I'm better." And

what I meant by I'm better was that I

felt bright again. I felt bright. I felt

like whatever life was going to give me

at that point in time, I had brightness.

I was still alive. I did not die that

day. And when, you know, so many people

have said, "How what motivated you to

get better or or how can you could you

have been so happy?" And it was like I

did not die that day. And that meant no

matter how disabled I was, I could not

walk, talk, read, write, recall any of

my life. I became an infant in a woman's

body at the age of 37. I completely fell

off the Harvard ladder and none of that

mattered. All that mattered was I was

alive. And what that meant was I had the

potential to grow and heal and become

whatever I would become. And it didn't

matter. And it still doesn't matter.

What matters is I'm alive. It's the gift

of life. And that's for me the wonder of

what we are as living beings. And we,

you know, we are at a time where we are

in a mental health crisis. And our

mental health is 100% dependent on the

health and well-being of the brain and

the health and well-being of the brain

is 100% dependent on the health and the

well-being of the brain cells. So how do

we nurture those cells and love those

cells so that we can live the life we

want to live and we can live in joy. We

can live in present. We can live feeling

connected to something that is is

magnificent as a life force power of the

universe and have this magnificent left

brain that allows me to have language

allows me to be a part of society in an

effective way and allows me to have pain

from my past so I can learn and grow

from experiences that have happened to

me that I would rather not repeat.

>> What is the complex range of emotions

you're experiencing as you recount the

story?

Oh, I feel such awe for life. Life. This

is life. This is life and there is

death. And we have life. And life is the

miracle construction of the universe.

Argue about it all you want. Have a

million conversations about it. Analyze

it to death. But the fact of the matter

is you are alive in this moment. You are

alive. You can say you have eyes that

can see and ears that can hear. And you

have a digestive tract that can bring in

nutrition and you have manual dexterity

and you have mobility. You have legs

that can run around the planet and you

have this magnificent mind so that you

can do what you want to do. You are a

miracle and we have forgotten that. And

for me, it took me, this whole stroke

experience took me straight back to the

part of my brain, that right thinking

part that connects me in that

transformation or that trans

transcendence experience of being so

much more than just a little human being

running around the planet. Oh my gosh,

life is this miracle.

And it makes me feel awe and wonder. It

excites me so much. If everybody had

that and recognize that and could grasp

that and hold that, imagine the

different world we'd be living in.

>> Eight years.

>> Eight years

>> of recovery.

>> Yes.

every day, every breath, every

everything I thought of nothing else

other than what can I do and what's in

the way of being able to do what I want

to do next and rebuilding using what I

had in the right hemisphere to rebuild

the circuits. I knew I had language. I

knew I could speak. I knew I had

vocabulary. I knew I had ideas. I knew

somewhere in there I had numbers. It

took eight. It took four years for me to

uneven understand what's a one.

I mean, wow.

Wow. I did not die that day. I did not

die that day. And so, I have all the

possibility of what will be. And it was

wide open. I wasn't going to be a

neuroscientist again because that left

hemisphere. I never held myself to

returning to whom I had been before the

stroke. That girl died that day as far

as I was concerned. But the phenomenon

was that as I'm a gross anatomist so I

taught K cadaavver lab and when you are

teaching you have a whole body there and

you're teaching medical students about

what's inside of there. You get your

hands in there and you say, "I want you

to slip in behind the stomach and I want

you to slip this hand in here and I want

you to know the relationship between the

stomach and the deadum and the liver and

and the splenic nerve and the kidney. I

want you to feel it because I want you

to have a three-dimensional image of

that inside of your mind so that you can

use that information."

Very rightrained. So when we learn, we

learn facts and details with the left

brain, but we learn context and big

picture with the right brain. So we have

these two very different ways of working

it out.

I've had so many founders speak to me

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>> So, you said there's four personalities

in everybody's brain.

>> What are those four personalities? As

we're looking at the brain, just from an

anatomical perspective,

the way evolution happens for the

mamalian brain is that there are

creatures who have a spinal cord and

they have and then and there are

creatures like that like worms and then

a little brain, a little medulla will

form at the top of that tissue and then

now that brain controls and streamlines

information processing to the rest of

the system and Then we add a pawns.

What's that?

>> It's just a structure of cells. So this

is the medulla.

>> Yeah,

>> we would have spinal cord there. And

this is the pawns. Call that the pawns.

It's a group of cells. Yeah. It's a

smaller brain. And in relationship to

that pawns is this cerebellum. And the

cerebellum has this gorgeous cell in it

called the perkenji cell. And they're

they're like a hand. They're like, you

know, two-dimensional. And they all line

up like this. And then fibers run

through those.

And it's part of the mechanism of timing

so that you have fluidity of movement

because of the way those cells are

aligned. So not all cells are created

equal and not all cells look alike.

Cells have the right shape for the right

job. So as then we we grow and now we

have the mamalian brain. We're going to

have the hippocampus. You've heard of

that for learning and memory. The

amygdala, you've heard that for am I

safe?

>> Am I safe?

>> Are you safe? the amydala. Yeah, the

there's a group of cells right there

that is scanning constantly. Am I safe?

Am I safe? Am I safe? And you're fine

until you're not safe.

>> Okay. So, like threat detection.

>> Yes, that's exactly what it is. You have

two emotional systems.

>> One in your left hemisphere and one in

your right hemisphere. And the right

hemisphere is going to be right here

right now. Am I safe in the right here

right now? So, let's say all of a sudden

a snake ro went by and we would jump. we

would startle because it's your right

amydala saying, "Oh my gosh, am I safe?"

And then the left hemisphere is going,

"Oh my gosh, it's a snake. No, I'm not

safe. Push it away."

>> And when we're calm, that's when the

hippocampi, because we have two amydala,

one in each hemisphere, two hippocampi,

one in each hemisphere. And when the

amygdala are calm and you feel safe, now

you can learn and focus, focus with the

anter with the singular gyrus and learn

new things. So, so you know these groups

of cells. Now, if you wipe out an

amydala, you're not going to feel any

fear. You wipe out a language center,

you're not going to have any language.

You wipe out motor skills to your index

finger and you can't, you're paralyzed.

So, every ability you have is because we

have these brain cells that perform that

function.

So, for the four parts of us, so we have

an emotional system in each hemisphere.

The emotional system of the right

hemisphere. This is a right here, right

now machine. Right here, right now.

That's all it has. Doesn't have the

past. Doesn't have the future. Doesn't

know who you are.

>> Doesn't have anxiety, depression.

>> Well, it has anxiety,

but most of that is going to be based in

the left hemisphere because this

machine, the left hemisphere, has

linearity across time. So, this

emotional system is remembering every

traumatic event that ever happened to

you that you don't want to have happen

again. Is that where trauma lives in the

brain?

>> Trauma is living in there as is

addiction. Addiction, there's a group of

cells in here called the insular cortex

and that's where craving is and that's a

part of the lyic system of the left

hemisphere. And if you wipe out craving,

do you still have an addiction? So this

is so so let me just keep going. So we

have these two emotional systems and

then we have these two thinking systems.

And the thinking system is what

distinguish us as humans from all other

mammals. Okay? So our mammals, our dogs

love us. There isn't any question about

that. Our dogs can punish us when we're

not very, you know, we don't show up and

we've sent them to doggy care if they're

not happy about that. So mammals have

other forms, but we have this higher

executive functioning. And in the right

hemisphere, it's right here right now.

And in the left hemisphere, it's all

about me. Because in there in that

thinking is my ego center in that

preffrontal region. I me I exist back

here orientation association area. I

begin and I end here. This is the

package of me the individual. I have a

language. I can create language. I can

understand language. I can read. I can

write. I have mathematics in there. And

this motor system controls the opposite

side of my body. So that's a

personality. So what are the to

summarize then what are the four types

on

>> okay so I when I look at a brain and

this is totally randomly named um and I

did that because I had to communicate

about it somewhere so I call left

thinking character one and I actually

give that part of my brain a name I call

her Helen hell on wheels she gets it

done you're talking to Helen right now

she's giving you facts and details she

is all about what is right and wrong and

good and bad how do I fit myself into a

society how do I use my words in order

to communicate

So this is the part of us that goes to

work. It's our A type personality.

Character one left thinking

>> and that's that's on this side here.

>> Yeah. Well, it's all it's it's this

outer this outer layer of cells is

called the cerebral cortex. And the

cerebral cortex is actually in human

made up of mostly six layers of cells.

It's very complex. In some areas,

especially where you have uh sensory

systems, it's just going to be four

layers. But this is a complex portion of

the organ that separates us from other

animals.

>> What about character 2?

>> So character 2 is going to be the left

emotion. Now the difference between the

the the things you can say predictably

about the left hemisphere is it has

linearity across time and it has me the

individual and my emotional system then

has my past pain and it wants and and

it's kind of always looking for a reason

to knee-jerk react and have emotional

reactivity. So so many people are trying

to fix or heal or get rid of their

emotional reactivity when re this is a

portion of our brain which is running

constantly in the background to protect

us from in the present moment when new

information comes in. So we want to work

with that and we want to appreciate it

and we want to love on it and we want to

be kind to it because it's generally not

very happy because it is storing all of

our pain from the past.

>> And would you call that

>> character two? I call mine Abby. We

could spend a whole

semester talking about character two

because character two is our pain from

the past and in our society everything's

about our pain from the past and our

professional self. Character three is

going to be the emotional content of the

right hemisphere. Well, this is right

here right now. What am I experiencing

emotionally? Experiential. This is where

what's the temperature of the air? What

does it feel like to have clothing on?

What does that feel like on your body

>> when when you meditate? They ask you to

be become aware of your environment,

right?

>> And focus on your breath. Exactly.

Because because they want you to expand

yourself one out of the thinking

consciousness and right and wrong and

good and bad structure, the box that we

think in of the left thinking and they

want you to stop, you know, thinking

about your girlfriend and boy, we didn't

really end it very well or boy, I had a

great morning this morning. Okay. So, so

this is playful. So, character three,

it's young. We have two little people

inside of ourselves and that's the

emotional. They're immature. We are

feeling creatures as biological

creatures. We are feeling creatures who

think. So a lot of character 3es

actually we have character 3 moments

that land us in jail because it's not

thinking about consequences of behavior.

It's just thinking, "Oh yeah, the

neighbor's pool. It's 3:00 in the

morning. They won't notice. Let's go

jump in their pool." And then the next

thing we know, you know, we've been

arrested. So then character four is the

thinking portion of our brain. This is

our w this is our wisdom. We we go and

we have experiences and we learn because

neuroplasticity is real and every we

have to have neuroplasticity these and

this is all about the cells neurons in

real time reaching out making new

connections constantly but their cell

bodies are in position but in order for

me to make an association between you

and something else then I actually grow

to you and I grow to the something else

and then I learn about that. So our

capacity to learn is what neur is the

underlying feature is neuroplasticity. I

would not be sitting here talking to you

today if neuroplasticity didn't turn on

fire when I needed it for eight years

and it took eight years for me to use

what I had in this brain to rebuild the

skill sets of this brain. But the

thinking portion, the character 4

portion of our brain is the wisdom that

we gain from the knowledge that we have

had and we have associated it and we can

relate to it. And this part all it cares

about is that emotion that I felt that

morning which was all all that I'm

allowed alive at all. And when we can

connect to that people, people people,

you know, it's billiondoll industry of

meditation to quiet what's going on in

the left hemisphere so that we can open

up the possibility to what's going on in

the right hemisphere. And and it's it's

our peace. We are wired at the core of

our being of our right thinking tissue

to feel peace. And we do not exist in a

world that is peaceful. So if we are

functioning on an extreme left brain

left thinking and we are emotionally

volatile when people insult us and we're

all about the me me and we have

forgotten about the we look at the world

we currently live in. And right now we

are so skewed to me the individual and I

want more and I'm against you because

you're not a part of my tribe.

And we balance that by knowing that I'm

alive. It is this incredibly precious

gift. The odds that I had to beat just

to be here. Have you ever stopped to

think about the odds you had to beat

just to be here? Think about this now.

First of all, think about this. The

little egg cell that would evolve into

you eventually, it took form. It's about

the size of of uh you know, it's an egg

cell. It's tiny, but it took form during

your mother's fifth week of gestation.

So, your mother your your grandmother's

pregnant, right? And that little egg

cell that would be your mother has now

made it into the womb. And during the

fifth week of being there, the little

egg cell that would grow into you took

form. It differentiated into the OAM.

And so you, the little egg cell, witness

the next eight months of your mother's

gestation, your mother's birth, your

mother's screaming, your mother's

toddler years, your mother's learning to

sing and laugh and play and learn

geography and mathematics all the way

through her puberty. And then so she's

born with some 400,000 egg cells in her

of two ovaries. And out of those 400,000

egg cells, approximately 500 of those

egg cells are going to be the next

follicular eruption month by month by

month with her period. And your little

egg cell, imagine you're hanging out in

your little ovarian follicle and it's

your turn and you're getting all prepped

by the hormones of the body and you're

going, "Oh my god, it's my ride." Right?

and you're this little egg cell and then

the hormones swoop by your little egg

cell and it beams you out and the

fimbria the fallopian tubes gather you

up and you begin your prominade your

fallopian prominade on the way road to

your mother's sacred womb and in that

moment

your father was there for you and you

were one of the lucky ones and you beat

the odds of all those egg cells you beat

the odds and How can that not be

something that we celebrate the wonder

of the odds you had to beat just to be

here? And then for the next nine months,

that little egg cell is going to

multiply its DNA, repackage that DNA.

One cell becomes two, becomes four,

becomes eight, becomes 16, becomes 50

trillion cells over the course of nine

months. And you're multiplying egg cells

as a at a rate of 250,000

new cells per second.

per second, not per minute, per second.

You're this explosion and literally the

energy of the universe is what is

fueling all of this from happening. You

are nothing other than mass and energy

working together. And then there's you.

And it's like, how on earth can I have

mental health problems and not

acknowledge and have awe for what we

are? Oh my gosh. And that's what that

was the gift that stroke gave to my

life. And you can see I get a little

excited about it

>> a little. Yeah.

>> We are so beautiful. We are so

beautiful. We are perfect and whole and

beautiful just the way we are. And it's

like if we would become balanced as a

society, we would I truly believe truly

believe with every essence of my being

that our number one job is to love one

another. When we love one another and we

support one another and we encourage one

another, we all grow and we will benefit

as humanity. And when that happens, we

will really recognize we have fragile

resources on this planet and we need to

nurture the planet as a part of us

because we have a symbiotic relationship

with this planet.

Chokes me up.

>> Why? because it's

you know lots of conversations about are

we going to make it or are we not going

to make it. What is the future of

humanity?

Where do we go? How do we how what

happens? We we live in a threat every

day of our exist of our uh you know

existence being completely blown apart.

Okay.

>> What are these?

>> I would like for you to put those on.

>> Okay.

>> Now.

Okay. And I just want you to sit in that

for like oh just uh you know 30 seconds

20 seconds. Actually it's pretty good

look on you there.

>> Minute black.

>> Yeah. Exactly. Okay. Now I would like

for you to pull your right one. The

little Do you see how it's got a little

little edge? Yeah. Yeah. Flip it up.

It'll flip up. Yeah. And flip it all the

way up. Now what you're doing right now

is you are bringing light in from the

lateral portion of your visual field.

What does that mean? Of that eye. So

close one eye and open. Leave one eye

open. Okay. That's a ball. Okay. Down

the middle is an artificial line.

>> Yeah.

>> Outside the outside portion that is

called lateral

>> and the inside side is called medial.

>> Okay.

>> And so the lateral light is now coming

in and that hits the the medial side of

your retina. Okay.

>> And the retina is the back of the

eyeball.

>> Okay. So, the light's coming in from the

the outside of my eye and it's hitting

the inside of my eye.

>> It's hitting the in it's coming out from

the outside of your visual field. It's

hitting the uh medial internal side of

your retina and then those fibers are

boom crossing over to the opposite

hemisphere.

>> Okay. I'll put a diagram on the screen

for anyone that's Yeah.

>> Yeah. So, right now you are purposely

stimulating your left hemisphere. So I

just want you to just how do you feel

inside of your body? Just describe a few

things to me. How do you feel

>> feeling analytical about anything? Think

about

>> my back has got a little bit of a pain

in it. Um but otherwise just very

focused on doing this job as the host of

the D of CEO.

>> Beautiful. Just focus which is what that

left hemisphere should do. So go ahead

and flip that down.

>> Okay.

>> Yeah. And then just like stay for like

20 seconds and let everything kind of

equilibrate to whatever the darkness is

that's in there.

>> Yeah.

>> All right.

Okay. Go ahead then and pull up the

other side.

It's a good look. It's like a little

flag right there. Mhm.

>> Yeah. Okay.

How do you feel?

Weirdly I felt more relaxed.

>> Now or before?

>> No, now I feel more relaxed.

>> Your whole body just went calm.

>> Yeah.

>> What else? Tell me something more. Any

aches or pains in your body?

>> I just feel way more relaxed. I feel

like I'm laying low on a sun lounger.

>> Yeah, that's what the right brain feels

like. So you're bringing less

information in from that the light of

the lateral side of your visual field.

It's hitting the medial portion of your

retina and crossing into your right

hemisphere. So what you're doing right

now is you're sending light energy

photons into the right hemisphere and it

is pushing through. And now this is a an

easy easy way for people to control and

choose how they want to be between their

two hemispheres and really get to know

oh

>> how do I know this isn't just a placebo

like how do I because I said I do feel

way more relaxed like I can't be

bothered to carry on this

>> well if you look at the anatomy if you

look at the the anatomy this is where

light is coming in on the um you can't

really see it on here, but that's going

to be information from your eyeballs,

which would be sitting right here, right

there.

>> This is fibers. You're wired for this.

This is how you are wired. That's why

everything about you, this isn't about a

placebo having a behavioral impact. This

is about the anatomy of the brain.

>> Have they tested this in trials to see?

>> Oh, absolutely. In fact, they just did a

brand new one at Harvard um and and

showed it on fMRI.

Yeah. And um

>> have they done like a double blind

control trial where they they put these

glasses on and then ask people how they

feel?

>> Well, even more than that, they're doing

they're manipulating the light source in

different kinds of ways. I'm not

involved with that work, but I know that

Marty Tyer at Harvard as well as

Frederick Schiffer. Now, Frederick

Schiffer is a psychiatrist who has been

doing psychiatry at Harvard Medical

School for his whole career. and he

would use these types of of glasses with

his psychiatric patients and would show

the patient that there is a part of them

that is less well and one side that is

more ill. And so he would use the

relationship between these two different

characters, these two different

personalities to find more peace and

healing.

>> I feel very I it's weird. I felt I just

lifted up the right side again and put

the left side down and I immediately

felt well not immediately but it took a

little while to 20 seconds I felt

focused again.

>> Mhm.

>> Is that is that just placebo? Am I

>> No, that's what your why that's that's

why you can feel focus because of the

cells that you are now stimulating. In

the other hemisphere it's not about

focus. It doesn't care about focus. It

cares about the big picture and your

relationship to the big picture. So,

it's not like the brain is just this

soup of cells. These cells are very

specifically organized. Every ability

you have is because you have brain cells

that perform that function. And all

you're doing right now is preferentially

stimulating certain cells. It's kind of

like, okay, I'm going to stim I'm going

to open my eyes and I'm going to

experience vision. Well, that's not a

placebo. If I want to be able to

actively switch between these different

parts, these four personalities in my

brain so I can be most effective in a

given situation.

>> Yeah.

>> Is there a practice where where I can

control my brain in that way?

>> Absolutely. In your life, this is a

practice.

>> You don't just learn it and then go do

it. This is a practice. You got to say

to yourself, first step, step number

one, recognize in this moment, am I

using my leftinking judgment, listening

to this conversation, and what is my

judgment? Is my judgment, yes, this

makes sense. This is interesting. I want

more. Or is this, oh, this is just crap.

I just can't go there. I got to turn it

off. Or, okay, I'll give you an example.

Uh once you know who your four

characters are, once you have really

thought about them, studied about them,

paid attention to what your when they

come out in you, what they feel like

inside of your body. I can I can jump

between all four in an instant because I

know them so well.

>> But would you is there a practice you

have to say?

>> So this is what I do. So this is what I

do. Well, once you know the four of

them, and the only way to know them is

to practice with them, get to know them.

>> When do you get really unhappy? Who

unhappies you?

>> When do you want to growl at people?

>> I would name my name.

>> Don't name a name. But, you know, see,

you went straight into that character

too part of you. That's the only part of

you that holds grudges.

Your right thinking doesn't care about

that. It doesn't even know about that

because that's in the past.

So when so so here's the key. Step

number one, observe yourself. When am I

being a character? One, when am I at

work? When am I speaking and organizing

and making a to-do list and when do I

like to be the boss and when do I like

to control people, places, things, and

time and all of that? When am I doing

that? Well, you know that part of

yourself very well. He's probably called

Steven.

The part of you that is not very happy.

You know, your parents probably know

this part of you. Your girlfriend

definitely knows this part of you,

right?

>> Yes.

>> Okay. When are you playful? What does it

feel like? It feels completely different

than when you're at work or when you're

not happy. When are you at play? And if

you're not at play much, then you might

want to give yourself a little bit more

play. So, I was working with a group of

physicians because physicians are very

busy people. And right now, the

physician is a very high level of

suicide. So, I care passionately about

this population because they're not

finding any peace because society

expects them to be left thinking all the

time. They're supposed to be the

authority and they can't have any mental

health issues because they're the ones

we go to for mental health issues. So,

all they can do, they don't have time.

They are busy, busy, busy and they're

not very happy about it. And our system

is a mess. So, they're having to deal

with that. So I was working with a group

and I said, "Okay, I want you to take a

pair a chalk outside of the ER room and

I want you to draw a hopscotch." And

what happened was all these doctors in

and out and these medical professionals

were hopscotching in and hopscotching

out. And that just that helped them

bring their glee back just for a moment,

just for an instant. So, this is the

glee and it's exciting and it's fun and

it's like figure out what brings you joy

and do that and know and and and this is

why it really helps to know this because

if you're going to say, "Okay, I'm going

to go uh I'm going to go play

basketball. I come from Indiana.

Everybody plays basketball. I'm going to

go play basketball and I'm going to go

do it for 20 minutes and my character

one is over here saying, "We don't have

time for you to go shoot some hoops,

girl. We got business to take care of.

We're on a deadline." And little

character three comes in and says, "I

will refresh you. I will be your pause.

I will refuel your spirit. I take the

stress away from that subject. I release

I I have all kinds of endorphins and

excitement stuff going on. And then I go

back and I do such a more creative and

open job because I made space instead of

just the drive drive do linear linear

linear." The beauty of being a human is

you have all four parts of this brain.

This is our design. But we are

functioning with only one online as

conscious. Imagine.

Imagine if you could say in this instant

I want to um I want to I want to feel as

though just feel as though whatever your

spiritual beliefs or your beliefs about

a higher power whatever just call it the

universe because we know there's a bunch

of rocks spinning around in space and

we're on one of them hanging on for life

just being human right so that's all

happening. So, oh my gosh, I can say

thank you to all those rocks for being

in the positions they're in so that

we're still here and I can feel this

deep sense of gratitude and as soon as I

feel that gratitude and that awe, oh my

god, I existed all and it could be over

like that and then it's over, but right

now it's a party. Life can be play.

>> Did I ever tell you about the uh data

breach that we had at my previous

company?

>> Yeah, I remember hearing about that

>> which which um was a total nightmare.

So, I'm glad that we now use One

Password.

>> What actually is it, Steve?

>> It's called um One Password, and they're

the sponsor of the podcast now. And they

have this feature called Enterprise

Password Manager, which means that if

any of our passwords across the team are

compromised or leaked, then it notifies

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you can also store all of your sensitive

information. and it's helping us to move

closer towards pass keys, which means

eventually everybody will be able to log

in to pretty much everything without

ever having to put a password in.

>> Sounds like a good addition.

>> Yeah, I think it's like the single most

impactful security addition you can make

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>> How long do you think emotions are

supposed to last?

>> 90 seconds. From the moment you think a

thought, we're only doing three things

inside of our brain at any moment in

time. We think thoughts, we feel

emotions, and we run physiological loops

to what we're thinking and feeling. So,

let's say I'm going to think a thought

like you did. I said, "Uh, think of

somebody you're not happy with." And you

went and you thought about it and then

you felt it and we could see it in your

body. So, you thought the thought, "Oh,

that's the person. I'm mad at them." And

then it's like, "Oh, I'm really mad at

them." You could see you feel I'm really

mad at them. And then you either act on

it or you don't act on it. But if you

simply observe it, it will loop right

through just like a a muscle reflex.

It's an a emotional reflex. less than 90

seconds, which means, and everybody's

saying, "Oh, I can stay mad for a whole

lot longer than 90 seconds." But what

you're doing then is you're rethinking

the thoughts. That's restimulating the

emotional loop, restimulating the

physiological response and and it just

goes on forever.

>> When you feel that emotion, is there a

way to is there a strategy for making

sure that you don't act upon it or you

don't reloop?

>> Well, I enjoy it.

>> You enjoy the emotion?

>> I enjoy it.

>> Even if you're angry.

>> Even if I'm angry. Thank God I'm

capable. I am wired to be mad. I am

wired to be angry. I'm wired to push

things away and say that is not okay. I

get big. I get ugly. I get I make myself

heard because that's a healthy boundary

I'm going to establish. So I celebrate

the fact that I'm capable of anger. I I

love that I can be sad. I'm glad that I

can grieve. Oh my god. Grief is this

powerful emotion that can consume us,

totally envelop us, take us to our

knees. And it's like it's like I have a

friend right now who's about ready to

pass away. Beautiful, beautiful person.

She's been great. Wonderful friend in my

life. I love her. And I will celebrate

every time the wave of emotion hits me

because that's how much I loved her.

That's how much I loved her. I

celebrate. I'm capable of being taken to

the floor in that kind of pain and just

weep my whole soul. I mean, I'm wired

for this. This is life. Why do I want to

just put myself in a little box and say,

"I don't want to have grief. I don't

want to have pain. I don't want to be

mad. I don't want to do this. I want to

be I want to be a robot. I don't want to

be a robot. I want to be a whole human

with a whole brain. I want all of it.

It's delicious. Oh my gosh. And it lasts

this long and then it's gone.

Thank you.

And I'm guessing your headache feels a

little better.

>> Why did you say thank you?

>> Because it's so rare that people will

really connect with another human being

for anything more than like three

seconds and then I'm uncomfortable and I

can't do that anymore. But we're here to

love one another. You're the gift of my

life. People on this planet are the gift

of my life. We are the gift of your

life. And if we are constantly judging

each other negatively and pushing each

other away and killing each other, we

are violent against each other. And it's

like, oh my gosh, we are so off track of

what we could be as whole breed living.

I truly believe the next step for our

evolution

is waking up the whole brain. And if we

wake up our whole brain, the game is

changed. And that becomes no. It's not

okay for us to create war. It is not

okay for us to create hate. It is not

okay for us to make that division

anymore. That is not what we we respect

and that is not what we want as

humanity. We want to be whole. We want

to be the next level. We want to feel

safe with each other.

>> Are you hopeful?

>> Completely 100%.

That doesn't mean

we couldn't be gone in an instant. But

absolutely. That's the beauty of the

right hemisphere is it is hope. It's

possibility. And that's why when you

talk to me about AI, yes, I think a lot

about AI. AI is uh wow. I listen to your

podcast. There's a whole lot of wow and

I don't have that. And this is why

>> sensory,

>> you know, it's hard. It's hard. You've

had some really difficult conversations

about, you know, the reality of of the

potential dangers. But here's why that

doesn't bother me. Because I have a

whole brain. And my whole brain says,

"Yes, that is that and that is going on

and that is scary." And I think about it

through the the perspective of a

neuroanatomist. So I see the internet as

like this higher level of consciousness

that we're feeding ourselves into and

everybody's plugged in. And now we're

creating robots and consciousnesses that

we'll think independent of us. So we're

essentially creating an other that we

cannot control. Well, I can't control

who's got those nuclear codes.

So from my perspective, I'm just glad I

wake up every day and it's like, oh, I

get another great day and it's like,

woo, possibilities. So,

>> have you always been like this?

>> No, this is this is really came with a

stroke. This so much came with a stroke

because I lost all of the box. I lost

the box.

>> The box.

>> The box of thinking this is right. This

is wrong. This is the way we're going to

do it. Uh, I value money. I was climbing

the Harvard ladder. Uh, you know, I was

a little girl from Indiana. I was

climbing the Harvard ladder. I mean,

that was pretty big deal to a little

girl in her family. And so, so I was

climbing the Harvard ladder. And then

bam, that was all gone. And when that

was all gone, what I gained was

connection, heart, time, possibility. I

my business perspective has shifted in

that I don't reach out to people. I

don't solicit. I don't hustle. I don't

need to because if I'm working, great. I

love to work. I love my work. It's

yummy. I mean, it's like, how can I not?

But I love to paddle board. I live half

of a life, half my time on a boat out in

a beautiful cove pretty much in

isolation with the bear and the deer and

the fish and the bobcat. I live in

nature. I live the life I want to live

and then I get off the boat and I come

and visit people and we talk or I go and

I do whatever it is I'm doing.

>> Had you not had the stroke, how

different do you think your life would

look? Oh, I'd be probably a professor of

neuroanatomy at Harvard Medical School,

teaching and performing research, doing

that thing. That was my dream.

>> Do you think you'd be happier or less

happy?

>> Oh, no. I'm so glad I had that stroke. I

am so glad I had the stroke. It set me

free. It set me free. Having the stroke

set me free from having to live a life

based on other people's expectations

about what my life should be

>> because it changed something in your

brain.

>> Because that went totally offline and it

wasn't going to be a choice anymore.

>> Is it still offline?

>> No.

>> So it went offline which allowed you to

focus on other things. Think about the

brain and think about your consciousness

and think about you have four parts of

you and all four parts are always

running and they're kind of vying for

the microphone. Who's going to talk in

this moment, right? Who's going to think

what? Who's going to perform what? Who's

going to do what? So, we have these

these whole brains and um and then

imagine that you lose your business

sense. You lose that guy. Character one.

>> Character one falls off the planet

>> which is the facts, factual part, the

working part. So that would leave me

with just the sort of emotional part and

the present part and the wisdom.

>> Yes.

>> Yeah.

>> So do you miss it? Well, it's gone. Your

ego has pretty much dissolved because

that's a part of it.

>> So, but you might be angry. You might be

angry because I was doing so well and I

was living a life and I liked those

facts and d I wanted to do more business

and I wanted to do more businesses and I

I and you are that guy. I mean you are

so diverse in your business. You are so

good at being character one. But let's

say he goes offline. What do you have

left? So my character went offline.

Would you still value? Would you have

value? What value would you have if you

weren't him? Tell me.

I think my girlfriend would appreciate

me still. My dog would probably

appreciate me

>> maybe more because you probably spend a

little more time with it.

>> Yeah, probably. Yeah, my girlfriend

would definitely appreciate me more.

>> Mhm.

Mhm. Because you'd have time. You

wouldn't be running that wheel.

You'd be a different part of you. And

then if you can master and help heal

your pain from the past or your

disgruntled self that well, you know, I

had this problem and now I can't use my

left arm and so I'm going to be a

miserable human being the rest of my

life because my left arm doesn't work

anymore.

>> How do we do that? How do we heal our

trauma from the past from a neurological

perspective?

>> Well, I think what we do is we recognize

first of all um the question everybody

wants to heal it. So the way to heal it

is not to get rid of it. I cannot get

rid of my trauma from the past. My pain

from the past is real and it is mine and

it is expansive and it is mine and

everybody has their pain from the past,

their trauma. We all have trauma. So

what do I do with that trauma? Do I let

that trauma just fester in that

character two part of my brain and then

I just look at everyone else who's not

like me now and say, "Well, you didn't

have any trauma. You know, you're better

off than I am." You know, I start making

a negative, hostile judgment about,

"Well, this is my trauma and I want to

protect it." The purpose of trauma is to

say to you, you're a biological

creature. You're in the present moment.

You're a real human being. You have a

life. my life, part of my life is my

trauma. And I will bounce from trauma to

trauma to trauma to trauma. And if I

look at the trauma and say, "This is a

horrible thing." Well, maybe it was a

horrible thing. And maybe that was 30

years ago and that was a horrible thing.

And you're keep the more you think about

it and you root into it. And the more

often we run a circuit, the more of that

circus, stronger that gets and begins to

run on automatic. And so now I'm always

worrying about, oh my god, am I going to

have more trauma? and I put all my

energy into that trauma. Well, what am I

doing? It's just the same as if I'm just

a workaholic and doing nothing but

character one. And and so the power of

whole brain living is to know that I I

have four parts of me. And that trauma

is important information. And let's say

I I I was attacked or I was raped or I

was I had a horrible experience with a

person. And now in the future whenever I

see a person that looks remotely like

that I kneejerk away from that because I

perceive myself from my drama that

that's not safe. So I push it away. That

is an appropriate response. But then I

say, "Oh, but this is actually a

different person." And I can open up my

right hemisphere and with curiosity look

at this new person and say, "Well, you

might look like somebody who hurt me

many years ago, but you're not that

person. Who are you?" and make a

connection in the present. So the trauma

is supposed to be information. We get in

trouble when we turn it into a

lifestyle.

So how do I heal that? I acknowledge it.

I value it. I say thank you to it. I

acknowledge its its purpose and I pull

my energy into the other parts of my

brain. My character four, Queen Toad,

can come in and self soothe me and hold

me.

>> And what would character 4 say to the

trauma?

>> You're loved. You're okay. Thank you.

Thank you for this information.

Thank you. And hold it. Well, trauma

needs to be heard. Needs to be held and

it needs to be heard. And and then it

can like transform itself into into the

next level of, oh, okay, I'm okay. Even

though I had that trauma, even though I

I had this stroke that all but killed

me, I'm not resentful. Why would I be

resentful? It's my life. This happened

to be the life story of me. We all have

a life story. So the question is, how

much energy am I going to put into that

and hold myself back when I have all

these other incredible possibilities?

And if I was hurt or I was raped, then I

can actually if I want to take that

anger because I matter than hell about

it, then I can I can advocate for other

people to help women get self-defense

courses so that we can actually protect

ourselves. I mean, I can turn it into

something else. I can make lemonade out

of lemons. We all can. We're wired for

that. You've talked a lot about how you

think about the brain from a cellular

perspective and how we keep it healthy

from a cellular perspective. So I wanted

to get some of your advice on lifestyle

choices that I should be making to have

an optimally healthy brain at the

cellular level.

>> Number one, sleep. Sleep is everything.

Sleep, sleep, sleep. These are

billions, 800 billion

cells that are eating and creating waste

for you to have a consciousness in every

instant. Imagine the number of cells it

takes for you to just look at me and

have a relationship in this moment with

me. I mean, your brain is working hard.

So, it's eating, it's creating waste. Go

to sleep. Sleep should be a priority.

And if you sleep then the micro ga can

come out and then all the garbage and

waste can get cleaned up. The waste gets

pushed away and you wake up crisp and

fresh the next day because your brain

cells have been taken care of. What are

you feeding them? If you are feeding

them preservatives, you are preserving

them. Oh my gosh. Pay attention to what

you're consuming. Fresh fruits, fresh

vegetables.

try to do it if you know I know we exist

in a world where not everybody can eat

organic but boy pesticides are poison.

So paying attention to what we are

consuming. How much sugar are we eating?

Sugar. Sugar is just not a healthy

choice

no matter what. Now I love chocolate and

I'm going to eat chocolate. It's my, you

know, vice. I'm going to do it anyway.

Dark chocolate. It's a bean. It's a

vegetable.

Somebody said that to me once and I

believed him. Okay, so um what are you

eating? Movement. You have to move your

body. You are an organism. So many of us

think that especially if we're in that

character one left thinking brain. My

body is designed to like move my left my

brain around. No, you are an organism.

So finding ways to get yourself into the

different characters is great for you.

If you can't get into your body, name

for me a song if you would that as soon

as you start in on it, your body goes.

What gets your beat going?

>> Give me one.

>> Why did I think of gigs walking the

hardest? Um Um

>> then do it.

>> No, I can't I can't do it.

>> Yes, you can do it.

>> It was No, it was I was thinking of cuz

it was playing outside before we started

recording. I was thinking of Olivia

Dean's new song, Man I Need, but I can't

sit here and sing Man I Need. And then

the little

>> Well, then don't sing it. Just give. So

for me, she's like

>> Exactly. Yeah.

>> Yeah. But that was forced. Now, can you

do it like you mean it?

>> We ought to put the glasses back on you

and see what happens. Okay. For me, I'm

disco era.

I want some hot stuff, baby. This I

cannot not do this. I become my body.

All of me. It's like dance like nobody's

watching. That's what character 3 is all

about.

>> So why is that important for a healthy

brain at a cellular level?

>> Oh my gosh. It's the break. It's the

pause. It's the fun. It's the joy. It's

the present moment connection. What is

my life going to be like if I don't have

any of those things I just listed?

>> So exercise, quality sleep, nutrition,

>> hydration.

>> Hydration.

>> Hydration.

>> Why is that so important?

>> Oh my god. Your body is nothing but

cells connected to one another. And

cells are filled with water and the

space between them is filled with water.

And it's a delicate balance of what what

atoms and molecules are inside the cells

versus outside the cells. But you're

just a big liquid ball.

>> Excuse me.

>> Yes, you are. I said it and I meant it.

That's what you are. You are a fleshy

ball of you. That's it. Water. You need

to be hydrated. Now, you can't

overhydrate. If we overhydrate then

we're we're distilling

uh what's going on in those populations

of in the cell or extracellular matrix.

So don't just you know drink your weight

in water every day but you have to stay

hydrated.

>> What about learning? Is it good for the

brain or

>> Oh yes. Yeah. It's it's wonderful. When

I learn let's say I'm going to learn to

do a sport.

>> Yeah.

>> So uh and let's say that sport's going

to be uh tennis.

>> Yeah. And so I'm going to go to my

character one. And character one is

going to say, "Okay, this is how you

hold the racket." And um and this is how

you hold your body and this is where how

you're going to swing that. And try

that. And so left hemisphere comes in

and gives you the plan and it gives you

the details and you you do that. And

then uh at some point you've done it

enough that now you're just going to

start whacking a ball, right? Whacking a

ball. And you're going to practice it

over and over again. And then it gets

like really fun. And then it's back in

your body and now we're back to girls

just want to have fun, you know? I mean,

we're back into character three.

>> Well, we know alcohol's bad.

>> Well, you're drunk because your cells

are drunk. I mean, just think about it.

If I'm going to consume alcohol, it's

going to suck the water out of those

cells. They're going to de they're going

to be dehydrated and I'm going to end up

with a headache. And when they get

fragile because the membrane has been

drunk, drunk, drunk, drunk, you know,

abused, abused, abused, eventually they

tend to cremate and blow up and that's

the end of those cells. So alcohol is

not good. Addiction is um you know, we

exist in a society and and I think that

this is important. We exist in a society

where the left hemisphere, especially

character 2, where our cravings and

addictions are. Is if I'm not happy

because I'm not living a fulfilled life

because I'm on YouTube or I'm watching

social media and all these people are

getting all these clicks and I'm not

getting all these clicks and I'm not

living this lavish life that these other

people are living and I'm down on me and

I'm just like not very happy. I'm going

to make poor choices because that is

what that part of us is designed to do.

So I say take responsibility for the

energy you bring into a room. And if you

pay attention to who walks in and what

part of you walks in and you come in as

a whole person, now I am completely

available to master the moment, whatever

the moment is.

>> Dr. Jill Balty Taylor, uh

>> oh,

>> if you if you had a closing message for

my audience, something that maybe maybe

we've a subject we've missed.

>> Yeah.

>> Or something that you think is the most

important thing to close upon, what

would it be? Your life is worth 30

seconds.

If you're in your car and you're getting

ready to pull out between those two cars

that are coming, your life is worth 30

seconds. Take a breath. Take a pause and

save your own life. It has changed my

life. As soon as somebody said to me,

Jill, isn't your worth your life worth

tw 30 seconds? And I thought to myself,

oh my gosh, actually it is.

>> And what does that mean? It means just

relax. It means I'm not going to try to

squeeze myself into boxes where I maybe

don't fit or belong.

I'm going to pause

physically. I'm talking about physical.

Physical. So, seriously, if you're

driving,

>> okay, so you're saying slow down.

>> Slow down. 30 seconds. Your life is

worth 30 seconds. Be conscious about it.

>> Thank you. Very fascinating. Incredibly

fascinating. You have a remarkable

energy and you have a wonderful way of

reminding me of the I guess

transitioning me from the uh the working

factual part of my brain to being more

present in the moment. And I imagine

you've done that for everybody that's

listened today. There's a real puress to

you that I wonder if many of us might

have just lost along the way somehow.

So, thank you so much for being who you

are and your your journeys are

unbelievably incredible, unbelievably

inspiring. And the fact that you've

you've been so centered on gratitude and

an appreciation for life despite

all that you've been through is a

remarkable thing. We have a closing

tradition on this podcast with the

Alaska leaves a question for the next

not knowing who it's for. And the

question left for you

is what do you do when your life doesn't

turn out the way that you had hoped?

>> I thank the universe that option wasn't

for me.

Next.

So easy.

So easy. Thank you to that right

hemisphere consciousness that connected

to the universe with all those atoms and

molecules and big old rocks floating

around that that wasn't meant for me.

Something better is on its way or I'm

going to go paddle board. I'm perfectly

good with that.

>> Thank you so much. Thank you.

[Music]

>> If there's anything we need, it is

connection. Especially in the world

we're living in today. And that is

exactly why we created these

conversation cards. Because on this

show, when I sit here with my guest and

have those deep, intimate conversations,

this remarkable thing happens time and

time again. We feel deeply connected to

each other. At the end of every episode,

the guest I'm interviewing leaves a

question for the next guest, and we've

turned them into these conversation

cards. And we've added these twist cards

to make your conversations even more

interesting. And there are so many more

twists along the way with the

conversation cards. This is the brand

new edition. And for the first time

ever, I've added to the pack this gold

card, which is an exclusive question

from me, but I'm only putting the gold

cards in the first run of conversation

cards. So, if you want them, join the

wait list now and you'll get early

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[Music]