If You Struggle With Stress & Anxiety, This Will Change Your Life

Loneliness is a global epidemic. Data shows that globally 330 million people go two weeks without speaking to a friend or a family member.

Two weeks?

Two weeks. The risk of death of loneliness was equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

Wait.

The first step always when you're going through a difficult experience is to normalize and validate that difficult experience. You are doing so much better than you think you are. Anywhere you are, when you are in a room of 30 people and you think, "Oh, I'm probably the only one who's feeling this way," you are not alone. It is not your fault. Just look at the data.

Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast. I am so excited that you're here. And first of all, it is always such an honor to be able to spend time together with you. I am so excited about today's conversation because I know that by the time we're done today, you're gonna just feel more peaceful, you're gonna feel more in control. And I so want that for you. And I also want to take a moment to welcome you. If you're brand new, this is the first time that you've listened to an episode, welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast family. The fact that you've hit play on this episode tells me something important about you. It tells me that you're the kind of person that truly values your time, that you're making time to listen to something that can help you improve your life, that can help you feel better. And today's conversation is absolutely going to do that. And we're gonna talk about stress, and we're gonna talk about ways that you can lower your stress. But I wanna put this inside a much bigger context for you, because this episode happens to be releasing on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day here in the United States. And a couple weeks ago, I had the extraordinary honor of sitting down with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s son and his daughter-in-law. They have a brand new podcast called My Legacy. It was an extraordinary experience. And during that wide-ranging conversation, which I can't wait for you to listen to, we covered so many topics. We, of course, talked about the let them theory. And I've been talking a lot about the let them theory, which is a simple mindset tool that helps you identify in a moment what's in your control and what's not in your control. And there was something that Martin Luther King III said to me on his podcast My Legacy that I wanted to share with you, because I think it sets up the conversation that we're about to have in a much more powerful and profound way in terms of what's available to you based on what you're gonna learn today. And here's what he said as we were talking about this issue of recognizing when something is out of your control, and that true power lies in your response. And we're gonna really focus on that today, but I want you to hear these words from Martin Luther King III. As he was reflecting on the power of the let them theory, he said, "Mel, when you say 'let them,' this is a truth that defined my father's leadership, that true power lies in our response. My father believed that non-violence was not passive, but it was the most courageous form of action. Choosing peace when hatred tries to provoke. By refusing to react with bitterness, we reclaim our power and shape a better future." I just love that. He went on to say, "Let them doesn't mean you're giving away control. It means you're reclaiming it. By choosing how we respond, not by feeding into anger, hatred, or negativity, we exercise the ultimate power over ourselves." As both my father, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy says, and his father, Daddy King, and their vision of non-violent action. You know, Daddy King once said, Mel, "In the face of unimaginable loss, I refuse to let hatred reduce me." And when you recognize the strength that you hold in your response, you realize that you hold the power and that you can transform your family, your community, and even the world. And today we are gonna be talking about the fact that true power lies in your response. And if you're feeling stressed out or overwhelmed by the world around you, that today you're gonna get this deep sense of validation that you're not alone, that there are forces outside of you right now. And in fact, you're gonna learn about three things that are causing probably the most amount of stress for you or for the people that you love, because these are the three things that our expert today, Dr. Aditi Nerurkar, based on her research, is saying are things that are out of your control and they create an extraordinary amount of stress for you. When you hear these things, you're gonna feel validated. And more importantly, we're then gonna talk about how your power is not in those things out there, it's actually in your response to them. That's what the conversation is about, and you're gonna absolutely love it. So let me tell you a little bit about Dr. Aditi. Dr. Aditi is a Harvard medical doctor. She's a researcher. She's a best-selling author. She's a world-renowned expert in stress and in public health. She is a lecturer at Harvard Medical School. She's also a mother and she's married, and she's busy just like you, and she understands the pressure that you're in. She was the medical director of Harvard Beth Israel Deaconess Hospitals Integrative Medical Program. What does that mean? That means she ran the largest stress management clinic, seeing patients every day and teaching them all of these integrative approaches, these evidence-based approaches that helped her patients feel better.And today, that's what she's gonna do for you. She is going to help you feel more peaceful. She is going to help you get your power back. She is going to help you focus, not on all the things out there, but on the power in here, and the power of your response. And today specifically, she's gonna highlight three key struggles that she sees in her patients every single day. She is gonna validate how you are feeling. And more importantly, she's gonna give you your power back because you do have the power to change your response to the forces outside of you, and today you're gonna learn how. So without further ado, you and I are gonna go to our Boston studios where Dr. Aditi Nurikar and I are gonna have this extraordinary conversation with you. Let's do it. Dr. Aditi Nurikar, I am so excited to see you. Thank you, thank you, thank you for coming back to the studio.