This Is Why You're Still Suffering (No Matter What You Do) | Dr. Joe Dispenza

1. 0:00 – 1:17

   Choosing elevated emotions: how fast can change happen?

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:00

      You know, one of the core ideas I get from your work is that we all have a choice. We can choose and practice the way that we wanna feel so that we actually start feeling it every day. You mentioned victim mindset a little bit already, and I wanna talk a little bit about that shortly because I think many people will say, "I'm the way I am because of this." And w- we'll get to that in just a second. Bef- before we move to that, for someone who is watching this or listening and is intrigued and they go, "Okay, I'll... I, I, I understand. I've got a choice. I can practice feeling an elevated emotion." They also hear you saying that this can take time. If you've spent 10 years in stress, it ain't gonna happen overnight.

   2. JDDr. Joe Dispenza0:50

      And sometimes it does, though.

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee0:51

      But sometimes it can do. How quickly might someone, if they wake up and they don't reach for the phone and don't put the news on, and they decide to engage in a meditation, maybe with a premeditation ritual like you do, how quickly might someone start to feel a difference? One day, two days? Or is it realistic that within seven days someone's gonna start to feel quite differently?

2. 1:17 – 2:42

   Why understanding the “why” makes meditation work

   1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza1:17

      Okay, let's talk about this because, uh, I don't wanna mislead anybody. Knowledge is the forerunner to experience. The more people understand what they're doing and why they're doing it, the how gets easier, and this is a time in history where it's not enough to know. This is a time in history to know how.

   2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee1:36

      Mm.

   3. JDDr. Joe Dispenza1:36

      The practical application in understanding that philosophy, that theory, that intellectual knowledge, that information, once you start to apply it and personalize it and demonstrate it, the more you can understand that why you're doing and what you're doing it, you get greater value out of it. So we have people that are diagnosed with serious health conditions that are nurses, that are cancer researchers, that are physicians, that are engineers or, or just a, a person who just really wants to understand the content. Now, this is... It's so much easier to forget this information than to remember it.

   4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:11

      Yeah.

   5. JDDr. Joe Dispenza2:11

      It's just... I, I, I always laugh at myself 'cause I have to go back and relearn it again, and I think I know it pretty well, and yet I forget.

   6. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:18

      Mm.

   7. JDDr. Joe Dispenza2:18

      I don't know why, but it's just the way it is. So, so when our meditations get stale, it's 'cause we forget what we're doing, right? So the person who really, really takes the time to study instead of watching Netflix, instead of scrolling through TikTok, instead of getting on their phone and doing mindless texts or whatever, they're gonna set aside an hour a day, and I'm gonna learn this information. When they sit down to do the work, they're present.

   8. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:42

      Yeah.

3. 2:42 – 3:40

   Rehearsing a new self: genes, brain “hardware,” and self-talk

   1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza2:42

      They're, they're... They understand if they feel this emotion, that they're gonna signal a new gene in a new way. If they feel the other emotion, they're gonna downregulate that gene and upregulate the gene for their disease. So now it's a, it's, it's an understanding.

   2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee2:55

      Yeah.

   3. JDDr. Joe Dispenza2:56

      If I rehearse how I'm gonna be mentally, I'm gonna install the hardware in my brain. If I keep doing this, it's gonna become a software program. I'm gonna start acting that way. Okay, if I say, "I can't, it's too hard, I'm too tired, I don't feel good," those are the things that stop me.

   4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee3:09

      Mm.

   5. JDDr. Joe Dispenza3:09

      Okay. But what if I just start saying, "Anything is possible. I believe in synchronicities"? What if I, with my intention and attention, just really get clear on that? Would that be the no- new voice in my head? So now the person who's truly present and not thinking about their shower or the emails they have to do or their cell phone or their texts or when they have to take their kids to ballet or whatever, you're gonna get to all of that. The person who's truly present, if they follow the instructions, we've seen them have very significant changes, first

4. 3:40 – 4:00

   Early feedback: small subjective wins that signal progress

   1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza3:40

      in their subjective experience of themselves.

   2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee3:42

      Mm.

   3. JDDr. Joe Dispenza3:43

      Like, "Huh, wow, my back pain isn't fair. That's kinda weird," or, "God, I slept better last night." These small indicators are feedback to tell you that whatever you're doing inside of you is producing a result outside of you.

   4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee3:59

      Mm.

5. 4:00 – 6:11

   Trauma and the defining moment: staying with discomfort in meditation

   1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza4:00

      Keep that up over a period of time, and you see instrumental changes taking place in the person. Now, another person who has had a series of traumas, been, uh, abused in some way from, from childhood, uh, is facing a lot of health conditions, a lot of emotional and psychological conditions, we don't want them to heal in one week. We want them to work on overcoming those emotional states-

   2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:29

      Mm

   3. JDDr. Joe Dispenza4:29

      ... and those are the victories. So sitting down in the meditation, and when their body starts getting agitated or starts getting anxious, instead of quitting and saying, "I can't meditate," 'cause that would be the extent-

   4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:41

      Mm

   5. JDDr. Joe Dispenza4:41

      ... of that person, just be curious. What's on the other side of this? Can I, can I lower the volume to this emotion? My body's craving this emotion. Let me settle it down into the present moment. That would be a victory.

   6. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee4:54

      So that person with a lot of trauma, there's a m- moment in the meditation where they feel uncomfortable. The easy thing would be, "Hey, I'm gonna stop. I'm gonna..." Are you tired of waking up exhausted even when you've technically had enough sleep? Do you feel like you're constantly doing everything right, yet you still feel stuck? You're not broken. You're just running the wrong habits. I've taken everything I've learnt from helping thousands of patients and boiled it down into five tiny daily habits that can transform your life in just 30 days. No overwhelm, no pressure, just small shifts that reset your energy, mood, and mind. If you're ready to stop surviving and start feeling like yourself again, download my free guide now. Just click on the first link in the description box below or scan the QR code on screen. You've got absolutely nothing to lose except the version of you that's been running on empty for far too long.put on Instagram, I'm gonna get a coffee, I'm gonna do anything else to distract me.

   7. JDDr. Joe Dispenza6:05

      Right, right, right.

   8. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee6:05

      You're saying that's the key moment. You wanna sit with that and hopefully break through that.

6. 6:11 – 6:56

   No such thing as a bad meditation: ‘only you overcoming you’

   1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza6:11

      What I'm saying is there's no such thing as a bad meditation. There's only you overcoming you. People think, "I'm doing my meditation wrong." No. [laughs] You're doing it right.

   2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee6:21

      Even if it's difficult?

   3. JDDr. Joe Dispenza6:22

      That is the moment that is going to define the person. So, so then the person goes, "Oh, God, I feel really uncomfortable. I, I'm not a good meditator. There's something wrong with me. It's my trauma, it's my past, it's my parents, it's whatever." The person who says, "N- no, no, I'm gonna sit in the presence of this anxiety, and I'm gonna keep working with my body, and I'm gonna keep lowering the volume to that emotion." Now, listen, you keep lowering the volume to that emotion-

   4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee6:46

      Yeah

   5. JDDr. Joe Dispenza6:46

      ... you're gonna take your attention off that past problem, because you only put your attention on that past problem because of the emotion. I'll never tell anybody to go back and review their past. I'll say, "Overcome the emotion. Overcome the emotion."

7. 6:56 – 11:30

   Processing trauma vs. leaving it behind: why insight alone can trap you

   1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee6:56

      Now, this is a key point, I think, which I really wanted to talk to you about today, Dr. Joe. Trauma, right? There's a lot of awareness growing now about trauma, the impact of our childhoods, how we're spoken to, the beliefs we take on as kids, how that impacts us as adults. Now, one approach to deal with trauma is to go there, to go and unpick it and uncover it and see a therapist, and detail what happened, why it happened, you know, get an understanding of why you're behaving a certain way as an adult. Now, I think for many people, I include myself in this, that can be incredibly powerful and incredibly important. But I also see, when I think of your work, I, I wouldn't say it's mutually exclusive necessarily, from the outside at least, but is there a danger that we can spend too long in our trauma, processing our trauma, trying to think about it? Because effectively, a key message from your work is don't get stuck in those emotions of the past. Don't let your past define you. Think about that vision of the future. Start to feel what you wanna feel in the future so you can experience it right now. But can someone go back, revisit their trauma, try and process it?

   2. JDDr. Joe Dispenza8:23

      Mm-hmm.

   3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee8:23

      And is that approach consistent with yours? Or would you say it's a better approach or a different approach is to not spend time there, just create the new reality?

   4. JDDr. Joe Dispenza8:36

      Yeah. I think I'm, I, I'm down the middle on this, okay? I, I, I think there are, uh, many modalities that work for trauma. What I've discovered is that insight never really changes behavior. You can see that your father was overbearing or was an alcoholic, or you could see all these different things, you know, uh, like, you could come up with the insight of all these different things. The problem that I see with people is then they tend to excuse their change by saying, "Oh, I had a rough childhood. That's why I am the way I am." They are excusing their pre- present position. So, and again, trauma's a difficult thing, but for me, [laughs] the person who's living by the identity in their life that they were traumatized as a child or whatever it is, or they've had a trauma in their life, I'm not saying forget the trauma and create another emotion. I'm saying that the person who's willing to go through the emotion and keep working on lowering the volume to it. The, the... We have had so many people in this work with brutal pasts, really, really difficult pasts, do the work, and finally they reach that point where they just break free from the emotion. They look back, and I have interviewed enough of them, it's the same thing. They look back at their entire past, and they don't wanna change one thing in their past, 'cause it brought them to this elegant moment where they're liberated.

   5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee10:12

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8. 11:30 – 12:31

   The body holds trauma: freeing energy by overcoming emotion

   1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza11:30

      They see their betrayers. They see their abusers. They have nothing but love for them. Now, the side effect of that, and many times they'll say, "It was like my heart blew wide open." They had to pass through the valley of the shadow of darkness to get there, and they just thought, "I, I don't know if I can go any further," and they went one more time. And the body literally was liberated from the past, right? 'Cause the trauma's not just in the brain. The trauma's stored emotionally in the body. So you wanna take the body out of the past, out of the knownWhat do you think the body's gonna say if it's been conditioned to be the mind? The unknown is a scary place. You step out into the unknown, you're gonna be unprepared for that trauma. You don't know how it's gonna happen. And so the person keeps clinging to the known. And but when the person finally overcomes the emotion, the body literally is freed from the chains of the past. The side effect of that is seeing the past from a greater level of consciousness. Lo and behold, there

9. 12:31 – 17:17

   Memory, storytelling, and the addiction to suffering

   1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza12:31

      goes the suicidal tendencies, there goes the dysfunction, there goes the irritable bowel syndrome. That was because the body was still living in that past event by living by the same emotion. So the research on memory is kind of fascinating, and I just, I've studied it enough and, and, and it- the way we recount the past is not the way it happened, even if you absolutely think you remember it being that way. So we don't have the same brain as we did when we were eight years old, or 12 years old, or 20 years old. We have a different brain. We have a completely different brain. So the fabrication of the story for many people, they embellish the story and make it seem even worse than what it was. But you're really, what you're saying is, "I changed in those moments, and from a biological standpoint, I haven't been able to change since. So let me tell you why it's been so hard for me to change." And the story becomes dramatized or embellished. A, a person works them up far, themselves into this emotional froth, and then fires and wires the same circuits in the brain, and they're actually reaffirming their limitation. Now, there's nothing wrong with that. I think, I think we're just, we're just taking too long, right? So 50% of that story isn't even the truth. It means, in a sense, we're reliving a miserable life that we never even had, and we don't want. But, but the, but the, the unknown, people would rather cling to their suffering. And, and this is not a judgment. We all do this. We'd rather stay in the known than take a chance in the unknown, because those emotions of survival are saying what? "Run from the unknown. The unknown is a scary place." So now the unknown, you gotta come up against that moment where you're gonna actually leave that behind and step into the unknown. This is not a intellectual process. This is, this is David and Goliath. There's a battle going on where the body keeps wanting to go back to its familiar state, 'cause it's subconsciously been conditioned to be the mind and stay in the known. So then if the person keeps revisiting the trauma from the past, I'm not certain enough that when they revisit the trauma from the past, unless they learn how to desensitize their emotional response to it, that it's gonna work for them. What I learned is that if the person overcomes the emotion, the memory without the emotional charge is called wisdom, and now you no longer belong to the past. So the body gets frustrated in the meditation. Instead of taking your, uh, blindfolds off or turning the lights on to say, "I listen to the voice. I can't meditate. This is too much." The sincere person says, "What's on the other side of 'I can't'? What's on the other side of this emotion? Let me see if I can s- settle my body back down out of that emotion and recondition it to a new mind." And the act of doing that in the beginning is very tedious. Then all of a sudden, the person starts getting better at it, and they're telling their body it's no longer the mind, that they're the mind. They're executing a will that's greater than that program. And just like training an animal, you stay. You're not gonna die. I'm gonna feed you. You can check your emails. You can check your texts, but this is my time right now. And you keep doing that with the body, keep settling it down to the present moment. It acquiesces. It surrenders to a new mind. And when that happens, we've seen this, we've measured it, there's a liberation of energy. We go from particle to wave. We go from matter to energy. That emotion is liberated from the body, and now, now there's energy to heal. [laughs] There's energy to create a new life. It's, it's, it's available energy. It's free energy.

   2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee16:07

      Yeah.

   3. JDDr. Joe Dispenza16:07

      So the person goes, "Wow, I, I see it from a different level of conscious. I have nothing but love," or, "My goodness, I, I'm, I'm no longer that person." Uh, and, and they're now free from the past. Now, the side effect of that is that there's a biological upgrade. There's a neurological upgrade. There's a chemical upgrade. There's a genetic modification that's taking place. Why? You think the same way. You make the same choices. You do the same things. You create the same experiences. You feel the same emotions. Your biology will stay the same 'cause you're the same. [laughs] Now the person's thinking differently. They're making different choices. They're doing different things. They're behaving in different ways. They're having new experiences, and they're certainly feeling different emotions. The body reorganizes to-

   4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee16:55

      Yeah

   5. JDDr. Joe Dispenza16:55

      ... a new chemistry. And, and, and they'll tell you, "I'm not that person any longer. I'm literally not that person." And, and their betrayers, even if they're family members, they have forgiveness for them. And what is forgiveness? You take your attention off the emotion. You overcome the emotion. You don't pay attention to the person or the problem. Now you're free. You free yourself, and you free them and-

10. 17:17 – 19:14

    Forgiveness as biology: from grudges to oxytocin and heart coherence (Dispenza’s view)

    1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee17:17

       W- w- what if someone says to you, Dr. Joe, "Look, uh, I, I get what you're saying, uh, but my ex-husband cheated on me," right? "They shouldn't have done it. I cannot forgive them for what they did." And the reason I'm asking is because this is exactly what happened with one of my patients. 'Cause this often happens. So I talk a lot about forgiveness, and a lot of people push back. They go, "Yeah, I want to, but you don't know what happened to me. This was really, really bad. Like, this cannot be forgiven." What would you say to that person?

    2. JDDr. Joe Dispenza17:48

       I'd say to them, "I want you to think about something in your life that you've done that you would like forgiveness for, that you don't feel good about, and forgive that person the way that you would wanna be forgiven, and you would be forgiven yourself." I mean, we all have done, we've all had indiscretions. Nobody's, [laughs] nobody's, nobody's-

    3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee18:07

       Yeah

    4. JDDr. Joe Dispenza18:08

       ... perfect. So, so that person that is in that state is still in the emotional state. The problem with that is that no new information can enter the nervous system that is not equal to the emotion the person experiencing, because it's not relevant. So-The question really is, is how long do you wanna do that? How long do you wanna do that? And, and again, knowledge and information about what that is doing to that person's health and their biology. If you reason with... Um, we, we've had this happen enough times in our work. That's not an uncommon situation. When the person finally, finally takes their attention off that and puts it on something else, they notice that they feel differently.

    5. SPSpeaker18:54

       Yeah.

    6. JDDr. Joe Dispenza18:54

       If they can- Uh, you can't just tell a person to forgive, uh, 'cause it's an eth- it's, it's, it's kind of an etherical thing. It's a, it's a subjective process, right?

    7. SPSpeaker19:03

       Yeah.

    8. JDDr. Joe Dispenza19:04

       So if you're... We've seen this. Our oxytocin levels in a lot of our participants go up 200 times, right? That's a l- that's a lot of, that's a lot of love. Oxytocin signals nitric oxide.

    9. SPSpeaker19:14

       Yeah.

11. 19:14 – 25:53

    Mood → temperament → personality: how long-held emotions define identity

    1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza19:14

       Nitric oxide signals another chemical that literally causes the arteries in your heart and lungs to actually expand. There's more energy. There's more blood going into your heart. Okay. So when that person takes their attention off their ex, takes their attention off their past, and starts looking at themselves, denaturing that identity that's built on the past. See, that person had a reaction to that circumstance, and that reaction produces a refractory period of chemicals and emotions, right? And if you don't know how to control that refractory period, and it lasts for hours or days, it's called a mood.

    2. SPSpeaker19:50

       [laughs]

    3. JDDr. Joe Dispenza19:51

       You keep that same refractory period going on for weeks or months, now it's a temperament. One long emotional reaction.

    4. SPSpeaker19:57

       [laughs]

    5. JDDr. Joe Dispenza19:57

       You keep that refractory period going on for years on end, that's a personality trait.

    6. SPSpeaker20:01

       Yeah.

    7. JDDr. Joe Dispenza20:01

       And most people's personalities are defined by, "I am this way because my husband cheated on me." What you're really saying is, you haven't changed in 10 years, and you're giving your vital life force to that person. Who is worth 10 years of your life?

    8. SPSpeaker20:19

       Yeah.

    9. JDDr. Joe Dispenza20:19

       Who's worth it? So then the stronger the emotion we feel, the more we pay attention to the cause. Where you place your attention is where you place your energy. That person's giving their vital life force to heal, their life force to change to that person or that circumstance. [laughs] Lower the volume to that emotion-

    10. SPSpeaker20:42

        Yeah

    11. JDDr. Joe Dispenza20:43

        ... you take your attention off that person or problem. It's not the person or the problem. They're using unconsciously that person or that circumstance to reaffirm their addiction to that emotion. That's why they keep thinking about it. If they weren't addicted to that emotion, they would stop, they would stop thinking about it. So then, is it the person? No. It's the, your left... We'll ta- we'll take your ex-husband and put him in a, a rocket and a straitjacket. Let's shoot him to the moon. Now what? Now what? Now what, now what are you gonna do? You still have that-

    12. SPSpeaker21:12

        Still got it

    13. JDDr. Joe Dispenza21:12

        ... embossed in your brain and conditioned in your body. At what point? So then the research on oxytocin, is you can't, you can't, you can only talk around this. [laughs] You, you can't say to someone, "Forgive," if they still feel the emotion. That's, uh, they're separate from the act of forgiving.

    14. SPSpeaker21:29

        Yeah.

    15. JDDr. Joe Dispenza21:29

        Imagine feeling so much love by, by... No one's doing it to you. It's actually coming from within.

    16. SPSpeaker21:37

        Yeah.

    17. JDDr. Joe Dispenza21:38

        What, you have that em- you have that moment, that catharsis, where you feel that emotion. Oxytocin levels go up just slightly in the research. Just a little bit more elevated. An elevation in oxytocin makes it impossible to hold a grudge. They've done the da- the research on the data. You cannot hold a grudge. It's impossible.

    18. SPSpeaker21:59

        Yeah.

    19. JDDr. Joe Dispenza21:59

        You just, you just go, "I like this feeling better than that feeling. And because I like this feeling better than that feeling, you're okay. Forget about it."

    20. SPSpeaker22:06

        Yeah.

    21. JDDr. Joe Dispenza22:06

        "Like, like I'm good. I'm good." That person who falls in love again, that, whose husband cheated on them, who falls in love again and finds a person who is intelligent and caring and kind and, and loving and, and provides, all of a sudden they can forgive that person. Like, "Oh, well, God, I got... That wa- had to happen because now I have a-

    22. SPSpeaker22:26

        Yeah

    23. JDDr. Joe Dispenza22:26

        ... better person in my life." Well, well, your, if you don't let go of that, you're never gonna have this. In fact, if you bring that into the next relationship-

    24. SPSpeaker22:34

        You're gonna have a-

    25. JDDr. Joe Dispenza22:34

        ... you're not gonna have a healthy relationship 'cause there's gonna be a trust issue on every level. So then you want an equal? Write down exactly what you want and become that person and see what... In the experiment, see what comes to you. Try it out. Try it out as an expe- If I forgi- if I really work on, "My God, this emotion is... Actually, now that I understand the science behind this, this emotion is actually weakening me every day. It's, it's, it's knocking my brain and body out of homeostasis." [laughs] Stress is when our brain and body are knocked out of homeostasis and balance. Turning on the stress response just by thought alone. Hormones of stress downregulate genes and create disease. My thoughts are making me sick. Is that person or that circumstance worth it? If my thoughts could make me sick, is it possible that my thoughts can make me well? Well, now you gotta come up against the belief. "No, I don't really wanna believe this." Then that really means that you wanna stay in that [laughs] emotional state. But go to the, go see some testimonials of people who, who've had that and see their l- the life that they're living now. They, they, the, the miracles, the synchronicities, the opportunities, the coincidences, the healings. They bless their past. They say, "Ah, my, my disease, that, that condition, that was my greatest teacher."

    26. SPSpeaker23:51

        Yeah.

    27. JDDr. Joe Dispenza23:51

        "That was my greatest teacher." And, and now the, the soul is free. Like, let, let's get on. We're in, in eternity. It's a big place.

    28. SPSpeaker23:58

        Yeah.

    29. JDDr. Joe Dispenza23:58

        You gotta hold on to that emotion for how long? You're not doing anything wrong. You're just taking too long. That's all.

    30. SPSpeaker24:04

        Yeah.
12. 25:53 – 28:20

    Emotional balance outranks perfect lifestyle: the ‘root of the root’

    1. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee25:53

       It's, you know, it subjectively feels better to forgive and practice gratitude and joy, but biochemically you change as well. This particular patient, when she did ultimately learn how to forgive, 'cause her lifestyle, her diet was fantastic up to that point, but she had chronic high blood pressure. As soon as she started to learn how to forgive, blood pressure starts coming down.

    2. JDDr. Joe Dispenza26:15

       Sure.

    3. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee26:16

       And y- you, you know this full well. Like, it's, yes, subjectively feels great, but it is literally changing your physiology-

    4. JDDr. Joe Dispenza26:23

       [laughs]

    5. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee26:23

       ... at the same time. And you know it-

    6. JDDr. Joe Dispenza26:25

       Oh, oh, let me just say one thing about that. 'Cause you could have the most organic, vegan, gluten-free, ketogenic f- triple filtered water, take all your vitamins-

    7. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee26:36

       [laughs]

    8. JDDr. Joe Dispenza26:36

       ... take all your nutrients, work out, do Pilates, do yoga, do b- your breathing, do all of that, get your body chemically balanced, get your body physically balanced, but if you're not gonna get your body emotionally balanced, forget it.

    9. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee26:52

       Yeah.

    10. JDDr. Joe Dispenza26:53

        Because [laughs] the moment you get emotional, your body literally goes to the past. That's the, that's the one that matters the most.

    11. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee27:00

        Yeah.

    12. JDDr. Joe Dispenza27:00

        And then people, once they realize it's the emotion that's signaling the change, [laughs] "Oh, my God, I better start really taking care of my emotional balance as much as I do with my physical exercise and my diet and all that other stuff."

    13. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee27:12

        Yeah, I completely agree. This is... You know, for many years I was focused on food and movement and sleep, and I still am.

    14. JDDr. Joe Dispenza27:20

        I am, too.

    15. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee27:21

        Those things are important.

    16. JDDr. Joe Dispenza27:22

        I am, too.

    17. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee27:22

        But I realize, actually, if you wanna get to the root of the root-

    18. JDDr. Joe Dispenza27:27

        Yeah

    19. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee27:27

        ... it's up here.

    20. JDDr. Joe Dispenza27:28

        Yeah.

    21. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee27:28

        It's how you think. It's how you deal with conflict. It's how you approach the world. It's, it's also, Dr. Joe, what you said about awareness. Like, the, the really powerful idea, one of the many powerful ideas I get from your work is it's about evolution, right? So if you never meditate before, sure, start meditating. Learn how to meditate. Have a great meditation. Great. That, that's gonna be better than if you weren't doing it. But then learn, oh yeah, no, I had a great meditation, but I still was judging my coworker. I still reacted to my boss. Okay, cool. Tomorrow I'm gonna see if I can show up and not react in that way. So it's not... And again, we're talking about trauma. You're not saying don't go back and revisit it. You're just saying, hey, maybe don't stay there too long. Maybe if you've been trying to process it for 10 years and you're still there-

    22. JDDr. Joe Dispenza28:17

        Yeah

    23. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee28:17

        ... maybe it's time to shift a little bit. I, I-

    24. JDDr. Joe Dispenza28:20

        Yeah

    25. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee28:20

        ... is that fair to say?

13. 28:20 – 30:48

    Rehearsing the future vs. reliving the past: practicing presence and gratitude

    1. JDDr. Joe Dispenza28:20

       Yeah, and look, I mean, look, I mean, we're human beings. We're s- s- we're so programmed for survival. And when you're in survival and you're threatened and there's a danger, you prepare for the worst.

    2. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee28:30

       Yeah.

    3. JDDr. Joe Dispenza28:31

       So the person who's traumatized is actually anticipating the event to happen-

    4. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee28:36

       Yeah

    5. JDDr. Joe Dispenza28:36

       ... again. And they're preparing themselves for the worst case scenario, because there's better chances of survival if you prepare for the worst. So the brain naturally fabricates an outcome, but actually in, it actually says, "Well, what if this happens, and what if that happens?

    6. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee28:51

       Yeah.

    7. JDDr. Joe Dispenza28:51

       And I'm gonna be like... And now we're actually [laughs] we're, we're, this is a really vivid imagination, but it's working against us-

    8. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee28:57

       Yeah

    9. JDDr. Joe Dispenza28:57

       ... in a lot of ways. So there's nothing wrong with this. I mean, we've all done it. You've had a trauma, you've a- you've had an insult, you've had, you know, a betrayal, you have whatever, and then you're s- you get wise from the experience, but then you're always, if it's really a strong trauma, then you're expecting it to happen again, right? So the brain is selecting out of the infinite potentials in the quantum field the worst case scenario-

    10. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee29:20

        Mm

    11. JDDr. Joe Dispenza29:20

        ... and then emotionally embracing the outcome-

    12. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee29:24

        Mm

    13. JDDr. Joe Dispenza29:25

        ... before it happens. A thought and a feeling, an image and an emotion, a stimulus and response, and they're conditioning their body [laughs] into the mind of that emotion. Their past is n- they're reliving their past in their future every single day in the present moment.

    14. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee29:41

        Mm.

    15. JDDr. Joe Dispenza29:42

        And now it becomes a very visceral and subconscious process. So it takes an enormous amount of will.

    16. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee29:50

        Yeah.

    17. JDDr. Joe Dispenza29:50

        It takes an enormous amount of awareness and energy to break that apart. And we have so many brain scans of people that have severe anxiety. And, and you cannot be anxious if you're in the present moment. And they just kept catching themselves going to that thought and feeling that feeling and bringing it back.

    18. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:10

        Bringing it back.

    19. JDDr. Joe Dispenza30:10

        And then getting frustrated and going, "Ah." And then all of a sudden they're there again. Well, why are they there? Because they've been practicing that. You know, you keep practicing feeling anxious, you get really good at it.

    20. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:21

        Yeah.

    21. JDDr. Joe Dispenza30:21

        You start practicing feeling gratitude, you get really good at that. We're doing a study with children in Australia, and I say to them, "You practice being angry, you'll get good at being angry. You practice being kind, you get really good at being kind, and it feels better."

    22. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:36

        At its core, it's that simple.

    23. JDDr. Joe Dispenza30:37

        It's that simple.

    24. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:38

        It really is. You know, what you practice, you get good at.

    25. JDDr. Joe Dispenza30:41

        Exactly.

    26. RCDr. Rangan Chatterjee30:41

        [upbeat music] If you enjoyed that short clip, I think you are really going to enjoy the full conversation, which you can check out here.

Episode duration: 31:03