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Follow along with the transcript below for episode: How Animals Help Us Heal with Dr. Joanne Cacciatore   [INTRO] [0:00:08] PF: Welcome to Happiness Unleashed with your host, Brittany Derrenbacher, presented by Live Happy. In this episode, Brittany is joined by Joanne Cacciatore, better known as Dr. Jo, a professor at Arizona State University and Director of the Graduate Certificate in Trauma and Bereavement. Dr. Jo also is founder of Selah Carefarm near Sedona, Arizona, which offers 20 acres of farmland where grieving family members can heal amongst rescued animals that have been abused, neglected, or discarded. Dr. Jo is here to explain how animals and humans can help each other through their painful journeys as they recover from their grief. Let's have a listen. [INTERIVEW] [0:00:48] BD: You're doing something really unique and profound out in Sedona with animals. You've created an intentional community where people can come and heal from trauma and grief surrounded by animals and earth-based practices. Can you tell us more about that? [0:01:06] JC: Sure. Selah Carefarm, we have been around literally seven and a half years, but in planning about eight and a half years, and we have 20 acres here, and we are on what's called Oak Creek, which is more like a river. The headwaters are in Flagstaff. So, we have 2,000 or so feet on Oak Creek, and all of our animals are rescued. So, they've all been rescued from varying levels of abuse, or torture, or homelessness, or starvation. We have goats, and sheep, and cows, and pigs, and horses, and donkeys, alpacas. I mean, dogs and cats, of course, and I'm sure I'm missing somebody. But we have a lot of different animals here. They are profoundly meaningful for the people who come here. That's one of the things, I'm a professor at Arizona State University, and one of the things in my research that we have found is that people love the counseling they get here, because everyone is trained in traumatic grief, and everyone has their own – all of our counselors are required to have their own practice and do their own deep work, which is not something that you see across the board with therapists, right? So, people love coming here for the animals and they love – I mean for the humans, the counseling and the nature and each other. But over and over and over again, in the research, the animals emerge as the number one most transformative thing for people. I didn't expect that. I mean, I knew the animals would be meaningful for people. I just didn't know how meaningful it would be for them to interact with animals, who also have known loss, and terror, and trauma, and grief, and sadness, and loneliness, and despair. It's this sort of connection in capital O, Oneness that creates kind of almost – it is. It's a magical, albeit painful interaction. [0:02:54] BD: Have you always had a special relationship with animals in your life? Is there a reason that you chose to bring these two communities together? [0:03:03] JC: Oh, man, that's a great question that I don't get a lot. Yes. I always have had a special thing with animals. When I was one and a half years old, a wild blue jay – we lived in Manhattan. My parents were immigrants. So, we lived in Manhattan and this wild blue jay flew into my house. I was one and a half. I have no cognizant memory. But a wild blue jay flew into our house and attached herself to me, and was with me, I think several days. So, my father called a reporter and they came out and took a picture. So, I have a picture of me, I believe, it was the New York Times, in the New York Times, with his wild blue jay sitting on my little dress. I have always had a soft spot for animals. I haven't eaten them since 1972. I have always known that they had some kind of existential self or soul. I've always seen in them deep emotions, and not just sort of the primal things that you would think of, and not just the domestic animals, but even in my limited interaction, because before the Carefarm, I had limited interaction with farm animals. But even before we had the farm, and I and I interacted so much with farm animals, which people kind of think of as these blobs with no personalities. I had a sense people were wrong about them. I had a sense that they knew. Of course, I saw some videos early on, which is what converted me to stop eating animals. I was only seven years old when I did that. As I watched these videos of these animals, to be honest, in slaughterhouses, I could see the fear in their eyes and I thought to myself, “Oh, when I'm afraid, that's what it feels like to me.” Those eyes, the wide eyed, all the whites around your eyes showing. The look of terror on your face. And I had been afraid. I remember being afraid as a child. I was raised in an interesting religious cult, and they talked a lot about Armageddon. I remember being very, very afraid of Armageddon. So, I really related to these animals who also had this look of fear and terror in their eyes. So, there was just always something in me that knew they were more than just blobs, and it wasn't just dogs who had feelings, and emotions, and attachments. But it really wasn't until we got the farm animals and we started rescuing them, because farm animals until they feel safe, they're not free to be who they really are. That's the interesting thing about them. So, like our goats, when we first rescue them, they run around terrified of you. So, you can't see their personalities. All you see is fear. Same thing with human beings, by the way, who have been abused, right? Human beings who have been tortured or abused, you can't see the full fruition of their character, their personality, because all you're seeing is fear and terror. All you're seeing is the flight, fight freeze response, and it's the same thing with these animals. So, once they started to feel safe, then they could become who they really were. So, now, we know that Gretel, the goat, is very timid and very shy, but also loves affection and warmth. And we know that Kurt loves affection and warmth too. But if food is available to him, he'll take food over affection and warmth. Now, we know that Captain von Trapp, we call him Mr. Loverboy. He gets very jealous when another goat is getting more affection than he is. So, he'll come and push the other goat away. All of their personalities and character illogical propensities come out when they have the freedom to be who they really are. Again, which is the same thing as human beings, when we're free to be who we are, and we're accepted, and we're liberated from coercion and pressure to be someone we're not, then we can experience the full manifestation of what our true character is. [0:06:42] BD: Both spectrum self. The name for the Carefarm in Hebrew, Selah means to pause and to reflect. I'm assuming that's intentional. [0:06:52] JC: It's quite intentional. It's an intentional space to pause and reflect on grief and those we love who died. It's a word that I found many, many years ago, probably two decades ago. I always knew like something special has to come from this word, because it's such a powerful word. So, it was quite intentional. It was quite intentional to give a nod to the poetry of feeling our feelings. [0:07:18] BD: Yes. That's beautiful. How do the animals at the farm teach us to live again? [0:07:24] JC: Well, I think it's a less direct path than that. Right? I think what it is we – our farm is built on a principle called Ahimsa, which is oneness, literally, and oneness and compassion, non-violence for all beings. Once we create this space where we can recognize that there is no capital O, Other. As Chief Seattle said, “What we do to the web of life, we do to ourselves.” And many religious and mystic traditions have always recognized this. But once you realize that, and you have an experience of oneness, it's very hard. It's like taking the red pill. You can't undertake it. It's very hard to see the world through the lens of an anthropocentric view. So, when people come here, and they have this experience of this animal we've just rescued, who won't let anyone within 12 feet of his space, because he's so terrified. Then, they see him six months later getting love and cuddles, and opening his heart to the possibility of trusting in the world again, people start to see themselves reflected in this creature, who without any effort. I mean, I think that's the beautiful thing about it. Animals just by being who they are, show us the way, because they're non-coercive. They just do it naturally. If we can connect with that inner animals, we're all animals, human beings, or animals, we're just human animals, as opposed to non-human animals. So, we're wired very similarly. If we can see ourselves resonated in an animal who has been on death's door, and literally had given up hope, for life. We can see that animal flourish and watch it flourish, watch him or her flourish, and deeper than that, maybe even be a part of that flourishing. Wow. I mean, it's a profound connection for people. So, they start making these little linkages between what did that animal need, and what did that animal do to get where he or she is? Needed good support, tenderness, care, love, non-judgement. The animals don't walk around judging themselves about their feelings. The animals don't walk around going, “Oh, my gosh. I can't believe I'm so fearful. I can't – why am I so anxious.” They just work with what they have and people start making those linkages and it is incredibly profound when you see it happening. It's beautiful, really. Many of our clients in the outtakes surveys call it magical, what happens here. [0:10:04] BD: Explain to the listeners what can clients expect coming in? What can participants expect coming in? What would a day at the farm look like? [0:10:17] JC: Most people come here and average of four or five days. It's a residential facility, so they stay on-site. If they come for an actual program, then it's reasonably structured. So, they wake up in the morning, there's yoga. They don't have to participate in the program, but most people want to. So, there's yoga. There's time with the animals. Usually, a few hours with the animals taking care of the animals, brushing the animals, meeting the animals. They can do more with the animals too, if they so choose. If someone has horse experience, for example, and they want to go spend time with the animals or pick the horse's hooves or something, then we can accommodate that. A lot of people who come here don't have farm animal experience, though. Then we have an art therapist on staff. We have group meetings. We have individual counseling in some of our programs. We have yoga. We have meditation. So, it depends on when they're coming and what their needs are. [0:11:10] BD: What's some of the biggest lessons that you've learned in your time at the farm? [0:11:14] JC: I think getting back into your body, especially if you've had traumatic grief is one of those things that is very difficult for people, because we can't get back into a body that doesn't feel safe, or we're much more reluctant to get back in a body that doesn't feel safe. How do you feel safe in a body when everyone around you is telling you there's something wrong with you? Because that's always the intimation about grief. You're grieving too hard. Not doing it right. You're grieving too long. You should feel better by now. There are all these intimations that surround grieving people constantly, that create a feeling of unsafety and loneliness. So, why would they want to be back in their bodies? Not to mention the trauma alone creates a sense of heightened fear and terror in being in our own bodies. I do think it's a combination of things for sure, as you said, and I also think the animals are tantamount. They're the centerpiece of everything that we do here. [0:12:13] BD: How do the animals on the farm model that safety to feel? What does that interaction look like? [0:12:21] JC: I just think there's a spaciousness about them. They're not in a hurry. They don't hand you a Kleenex and say, time to move on. They just accept people for who they are and how they feel in the moment. If we have somebody on the farm and they go sit underneath the willow tree, and they're crying, Gretel or Captain von Trapp, some of our more affectionate goats will just go and sit next to them and lay next to them. Or a dog will do that. The horses are incredible beings. Horses, there have been several studies that show that horses more accurately interpret and predict human emotion than even our closest relative, non-human animal relatives which is primates. Our horses help people be more aware of themselves, and themselves in space, and their own emotions. For example, Chamaco, my horse, he's the whole reason the farm exists. He can tell when someone is extremely anxious. And if someone is very fearful around him, or is having high anxiety, which is the same thing as fear, he'll back up, he'll take several steps back away from them. Not toward them, but away from them to give them space. Then they noticed that he does that, and then usually what happens is, they'll look to me, and I'll say, “Just notice how you're feeling.” And they're saying, “My heart's beating really fast. I'm having a lot of fear. I'm afraid of horses, or I'm thinking about my son and his love of horses, and I'm missing him. And I'm having a lot of fear come up.” Or whatever. But it helps raise their self-awareness of their own current emotional state in the moment, emotional state. And as they talk about it, and process it, it starts to dilute it or dissipate. And as it does, Chamaco will come toward them. So, I mean, and the beautiful thing about it is it says without any words at all. Words get human beings in trouble. Brittany, I don't know if you notice that. But word get human beings in a lot of trouble. We have way too many words, that when we should just, “Sshh, sshh.” Animals just naturally communicate compassion and care, and also boundaries without any words at all. [0:14:28] BD: Animals show up for us so differently than humans do, which is, I mean, it's humbling, right? Because as a therapist, I can watch my emotional support dog, Violet, go lay on my client and sooth them in a way that I cannot. [0:14:45] JC: Myself and colleagues conducted a study and we asked – we wanted to find out who was providing the best grief support subjectively from the experience of grievers. I mean, there's all kinds of talk about grief support in the empirical literature, but very few studies allow grievers to define what good support is. So, we asked about the actions and actors of good grief support. One of the first things that we found was that emotional acts of caring and emotional support were the types of support that grievers most often wanted. They also appreciated practical support, like meal trains, people cleaning their house and help with childcare. Those were helpful. But by far, in the data, emotional support and emotional acts of caring were significantly more important than any other kinds of support. That was the action. And then we asked, who are the people who are providing the best kinds of support? You name it. We asked about every human group there was. Then, just before we were getting ready to hit publish on the survey, I had a thought. I said, “You know what, I'm going to throw pets and animals in there. Just to see what happens.” I can tell you that pets and animals blew every human group out of the water, blew every human group. They came in at 89% satisfaction. The next highest group, the second highest group came in at 67% satisfaction and that was support groups. That's one of the things I say when it comes to good grief support, be an animal. Just sit and stay. [0:16:11] BD: Yes. That's beautiful. How has your work with animals empowered you in your grief journey? [0:16:19] JC: Oh, wow. Well, there's somewhere out there as a video, where someone was interviewing me and I said, pretty much every adult around me abandoned me. That's how it felt. They all wanted me to be who I was before, they wanted me to be better. They wanted me to stop crying. They thought I was going on and on and on. Just have another child, it'll be okay. You can't interchange kids, guys. That's not how it works. [0:16:45] BD: It doesn’t work that way. [0:16:47] JC: So, I remember that my dogs, I had two dogs at the time, and they were amazing for me. I would just be in a moment of absolute utter despair, sobbing on the couch, and my dogs would come up, and just put their heads on me and just sit with me. They didn't say, “Oh, you should stop crying or you should feel better by now.” Or, “You're taking this too far.” They just sat with me and accepted me. And the other being who sat with me was my three-year-old who is smarter than every adult around me. I remember the time when she sat on the arm of the – I was crying and it was a hard morning. And she came and sat on the arm of the couch with me. She said, “Mommy, it's okay to be sad. And it's okay to cry because babies aren't supposed to die.” I just looked at and I go, “You're a genius. You're a genius. All the adults around me are idiots, but you are a genius.” So, I guess I realized, I mean, I've always had a love for animals. But I guess I realized in that moment, that the smarter people, the more sophisticated people around me didn't really know what was happening. We’re not emotionally intelligent, and that animals and children seemed to be much more emotionally intelligent to me. My dogs played a really key role in helping me feel a little less lonely in the grief experience. And then fast forward to eight years ago, going on nine years ago, I met a horse named Tumaco. His video is out there as well. He's sort of a famous horse. He was the most tortured animal we have on the farm. His entire back, had bones protruding from his skin. He was 600 pounds underweight. He had huge, this big, gaping wounds on both of his sides, where the metal of the saddle was strapped against his bare muscle. He was tortured, literally tortured beyond anything I've ever seen. And people just wanted to go on their vacation. They just wanted to have fun. And they walked past him over and over and I just came upon him. But people literally were doing this as they walked by, so they didn't see him. They were averting their gaze, literally averting their gaze, because they wanted to have fun. I remember thinking to myself, that's what it felt like when my daughter died. People averting their gaze. They didn't want to see my pain because it made them sad. Because it ruined their holidays, or their good time, or their football game, or whatever was happening. I knew I was going to have to fight to rescue him. I did. It was quite a fight to rescue him. But I did because he was worthy of rescuing. And also, because he was me. I am that horse and that horse is me. We are no different. He was on death's door, and hopeless, and terrified, and uncertain he could live, and I was the same way in 1994, 1995, 1996, right after my daughter died. I was the same way. No one wanted to look at him. No one could bear to really see him and many others could not bear to really see me. So, rescuing him, saving his life, very worthy life, was saving my own life. My decision every day to live a compassionate life, and to make choices that don't harm others. Others broadly defined, both human and non-human animals. Both the planet that we live on. My decision to live that way, is a decision to also take care of myself, because I am one with everything, and they are one with me. I think animals taught me that. Again, I've always had a soft spot for them. But I think they taught me that. I think they helped me awaken from this very human-centric model of the world and see that what we're doing to this planet, we're doing to ourselves and our descendants, and all beings with whom we share this planet. And what we do to a baby cow and her mother we're doing to our own babies, and to ourselves. That, for me, is the only way I can live my life. I can't live my life any other way. So, I would say animals probably have played more of a role than anything in my life more than spirituality, my spiritual practice, more than my academic studies, more than friendships and family relationships even, because it's helped deepen all of those things. It's helped me really stay awake. [0:21:12] BD: We've spent a lot of time talking about how animals show up for us. How animals can teach us mindfulness. How they can teach us to feel. How they can support us through our trauma and grief. How can we show up for them? How can we better show up for them? [0:21:28] JC: Well, I'll be honest. We have to stop exploiting them. We have to – so, here on the farm, for example, we don't ever say use animals. We engage our animals. We invite our animals, but we don't use them. The animals are never haltered and never forced to interact with anyone they don't want to except for the vet. They don't love the vet, but they have to get their health care, and they don't always love it. But they're never coerced, they're never forced. This is an egalitarian model. Egalitarian is built into our model. It's called the attend model. And it's an acronym and, the E stands for egalitarianism. That means that we balance power. The humans here are not more important than the animals. So, the animals well-being is prioritized just as high as the human well-being. We try, we make every effort never to exploit our animals, and to give them free choice, and free will around with whom, and when they interact. If they're tired, and they don't want to come out, they don't have to come out. Having said that, this is a unique place. So, how do we live in accord with nature and in a way that respects the autonomy of our animal brethren? That's a tricky thing, because our agricultural system is set up in such a way, our research system is set up in such a way, our beauty system is set up in such a way that animals are routinely exploited for human benefit. That's a tough thing. It's a tough system to crack and all we can do is vote with our dollar and change. So, what I tell people is just start educating yourselves. Just start slowly. We move mountains. The Chinese have a saying, “We move mountains one stone at a time.” And so slowly, slowly start to learn about the agricultural system, about big agriculture, and how animals are exploited and what they do, for example, to ducks for down. Or what they do to sheep for the wool. Yes, of course, sheep need to be shorn because they're bred to have too much wool. But the ways in which we do it matter. There are several videos that people can watch. Start with something like what, the health. The beautiful thing about animals is when we treat animals with respect, our bodies end up benefiting from it. The same beauty that we give to animals, if we choose with our dollar, to eat differently, to put our makeup on differently, or do our hair differently, or wash our bodies differently. It happens to also benefit us. [0:23:58] BD: Dr. Jo, thank you so much for coming on Happiness Unleashed. This has been an honor to talk to you and thank you so much. [0:24:07] JC: Thank you for having me. [END OF INTERVIEW] [0:24:08] PF: That was Brittany Derrenbacher talking with Dr. Jo Cacciatore. If you'd like to learn more about Selah Carefarm, follow Dr. Jo on social media or discover her book, Bearing the Unbearable. Visit our website at livehappy.com and click on the podcast tab. Of course, Brittany will be back here next month to talk more about how pets can bring us joy, help us heal, and be some of our best teachers. Until then, for everyone at Live Happy, this is Paula Felps reminding you to make every day a happy one. [END]

Follow along with the transcript below for episode: Create a Humor Habit for 2024 With Paul Osincup [INTRODUCTION] [00:00:02] PF: Thank you for joining us for Episode 450 of Live Happy Now. What's so funny about 2024? You're about to find out. I'm your host, Paula Felps, and today I'm talking with Paul Osincup, a speaker, corporate trainer, and author of the forthcoming book, The Humor Habit. Paul recognizes the importance of humor as a tool to relieve stress, improve our physical and mental health, and to make the world more enjoyable for ourselves and those around us. He's here today to tell us how we can create our own humor strategy for 2024, and make it a healthier, funnier year. Let's have a listen. [INTERVIEW] [0:00:39] PF: Paul, welcome to Live Happy Now. [0:00:41] PO: Thank you, Paula. This is my first time doing any kind of show or back and forth with a Paula. So, I'm excited to do it with Paula. [0:00:50] PF: I know we can do like Paul and Paula Show. [0:00:51] PO: That’s right. [0:00:54] PF: I'll run that up the flagpole and let you know how it goes. [0:00:56] PO: Yes, check with the supervisors. [0:00:59] PF: So, I'm really excited to have you on the show. For me, it was a great way to start the year, because you are all about humor and how we can develop it and use it. And honestly, coming into 2024, there's people with a lot of trepidation, and they're not feeling that there's a lot of humor right now. So, we want to kind of get into that. But first, I'm interested to know how you got into the subject of humor? How did you study it, learn its benefits? And like, are you a naturally funny guy? [0:01:28] PO: Well, I mean, I suppose there's part of the natural proclivity for it, because I'll tell you a quick story. The first time that I noticed the impact of humor, I was in third grade, and my third-grade teacher, Mrs. Temple, I was speaking in class again when I wasn't supposed to. And Mrs. Temple looked at me and goes, “Paul, you have diarrhea of the mouth.” The whole class goes, “Ooh.” Like, “Sick, burn.” And I was on the spot, and I was feeling like, totally cornered. She goes, “You have diarrhea of the mouth.” So, I put my hand under my chin and I go, “Oh, sick. It's running down my chin.” Everybody laughed and the whole class. Mrs. Temple goes, “You need to go to the principal's office.” So, I went to the principal's office, and I realized even in that moment that my little sophomoric yet, age-appropriate come back there, it got me out of this stressful situation where I was feeling put on the spot by my teacher. But then in the principal's office, and a principal, there was another adult there, said, “Well, why are you here, Paul?” And I told him, “Well, she said I have diarrhea of the mouth. I said, it's running down my chin.” And they were trying to be stern, but I could see they were kind of smi – they were like, “You know you shouldn't do that, Paul.” And I was like, “They can't be that mad at me because it's kind of funny.” I remember that moment of thinking, “Oh, this humor thing got some power to it.” But then, fast forward to my career working with college students in distress, like severe mental, cooccurring mental health and substance abuse issues. I was kind of living this double life. I was also performing stand-up and improv, and I was noticing at work how humor helped disarm people at times, helped bring my team together. So, I started researching it. I was just really interested and I kind of just became a humor nerd. I started doing some presentations on what I had learned on the power of humor, how I use it, and one thing led to another. Now, that's what I do for a living. [0:03:27] PF: That's fantastic. I love that because I think we really underestimate humor, and we try to put it in its place. Because throughout – I'm sure you heard this throughout your life as well, where people would say, “Well, humor is just not appropriate here.” It's like, “Yes, it is.” There's almost always a way that humor can be used appropriately in any situation. For me, it's been like the great stress reliever. Make somebody laugh or even make yourself laugh. It changes the tenor of the situation entirely. [0:03:58] PO: Yes. I mean, how sad is it if we spend a third of our lives at work? So, if there are people saying, “Well, it's just not appropriate.” Here, it's like, “Well, I don't want to live in a world where we can go a third of our lives without accessing a basic part of the human experience, which is our sense of humor. I mean, that's just crushing the human spirit to me. [0:04:20] PF: It is, and what happens because as children, we like to tell little jokes, and we like to laugh, and we kind of get away from that. We become grownups and think that humor is like we can go to a stand-up comedian show. We can go laugh there. We kind of reserve the spaces where we incorporate laughter. How does that happen? [0:04:39] PO: Yes, it's interesting you bring that up because I call it chronic seriousness. Over time, we develop this chronic seriousness. So, if you are someone who identifies as an adult, you may be suffering from chronic seriousness or may become an adult someday, but what happens there's a study Gallup’s World Happiness Report, over 1.4 million people surveyed across 166 countries that are propensity to laugh, like nosedives, when we hit about age 23, which is coincidentally, when we start to hit the workforce. We graduate from college and we get families and we complicate our lives with these things like jobs and promotions and variable rate mortgages. It's like, all of a sudden, I got to be serious, and I got things to do, and everything is just so serious. We don't start gaining those laughs back again. As you said, as kids, we laugh a lot more, have a lot more fun. We don't start gaining those laughs back again until we're nearly 80. [0:05:37] PF: Oh, my god, that's a long stretch. [0:05:40] PO: Fifty-year desert of laughter, where we're limiting our own access to a resilience tool that's built into the human psyche. [0:05:48] PF: Well, talk about that a little bit, because what does laughter and humor do for our overall health, our physical health, as well as our mental health? [0:05:57] PO: Yes, well, on a real basic level, like when we find something humorous, and when we laugh, but you don't have to laugh necessarily. Even just when your brain finds something funny, we get a dose of all these feel-good chemicals that flood our brain. By dose, I literally mean dose. Dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphins flood our brain. We get all this like feel-good chemicals coming into our brain, and it lowers cortisol, which causes us stress, when we find something funny. That even happens just when we smile, when we start to smile. So, for all the listeners, if you're listening to this right now, just put the shape of a smile on your face. You don't even have to mean it. You could be thinking anything right now. Like, he has no idea if I'm doing this or not, or whatever. I really have to pee right now. Whatever you're thinking, it’s fine. But just by putting that shape of a smile on your face, or finding something amusing, you're changing your brain chemistry to all of a sudden start having some happier chemicals in there. But a next step further, people who use humor to say, cope with life's struggles, I call a developing a humor habit. Like, there's all these habits we can create to see the humor in life more often and rewire our brain to do it. People who do that actually end up becoming more positive, more optimistic, more resilient in the face of adversity. People who develop a humor habit, believe that they are more likely to get through traumatic situations and get through to the other side. So, there's a lot it does for our own wellbeing and mental health. [0:07:24] PF: So, what about people who have dark humor? Does that have the same kind of effect? [0:07:29] PO: Yes. Dark humor could have the same kind of effect. I mean, it kind of depends. I mean, there's a lot of research about, say, people in professions like police officers, medical professionals. Dark humor is really needed in terms of resilience to help people get through those difficult times. It is said too, that like dark humor, people who really liked dark humor, may have even higher intelligence levels as well. That being said, if you get really into super dark, or sarcastic humor only as your only type of humor, there is some research that shows that that can start to go the other way for you a little bit and you start to depress yourself. [0:08:08] PF: That's good. So, you can kind of balance it, like the kind of humor you use and that you listen to. That's an interesting point, too. If you say to skew toward dark and sarcastic humor, and you think like, I might be having a dark humor problem, can you correct that by listening to say lighter types of humor? [0:08:26] PO: Yes. That's a good question. I mean, I haven't seen necessarily research on it. But I know from my own experience, and working with people all over the world around this, that the more you explore, and I call it even like lowering your humor threshold. One of the habits that I talked about is letting yourself laugh more. I was somebody who, like, as a comedian, you think I'd laugh all the time, right? But I wouldn't laugh very much. I have a friend who just laughs all the time, really gregarious, and I was always jealous. I would watch my favorite comedies or go and see a comedian. I would kind of just sit there intellectualizing all of it, like, “Ah.” Do you ever do that to where you’re like, watch a show, it’s like, genuinely, something's funny. But you say to yourself, like, “That's hilarious.” But you don't laugh, right? Why not laughing if it's so hilarious? So, I would find myself doing that, and I thought, well, this can't be good. I should be laughing more. So, I kind of trained myself to let go and laugh a little more. The first step is to go into situations, whether it's watching a movie or a show, or going to a comedy club, with the intention to laugh. And instead of thinking like arms folded, like, “This better make me laugh”, thinking, “I can't wait to laugh”, and go into it with a smile on your face. Then, the second is to kind of fake it till you make it or kick it up a notch. So, if there was something that would kind of make me smirk or smile a little, I would just let out a little, “Huh.” And if there was something that gave me like a little, “Ha-ha”, I would purposely kind of push it to, “Ha-ha-ha.” Eventually, as I just – not crazy amounts, but I would just push it just a little more than normal. I found myself genuinely laughing out loud more often until now, I laugh out loud, genuinely at things, maybe funny things friends say, or TV shows, or my dog getting trapped in a blanket and running around. I'll laugh out loud numerous times a day. [0:10:18] PF: And that, in addition to the benefits of humor, laughter has its own set of benefits for us, like both physically and mentally. So, you kind of get like a double, they kind of piggyback there together. [0:10:29] PO: Yes. To me, part of it is finding a way to let yourself experience life in a lighter way, like finding the levity, just day to day, in day-to-day moments instead of – I had a job early on in my career, and I was like, fresh out of grad school, and I'd always been real light-hearted and gregarious, and I found myself in this job being really critical of everything. I was really negative. I didn't know where all that came from. There was a lot of drama going on at the place I worked and I was really embroiled in that. I remember thinking to myself, I don't want to live my life as an actor in a drama, just to reach the end to find out. I was the director and it could have been a comedy. The amount of evidence that supports just that thought that we actually have a lot of control over our own happiness, there's a ton of it. [0:11:21] PF: I love that you say that, because as we talked earlier, we've started a new year, no secret, and 2024, a lot of people have anxiety about it. We have a big election coming up. People are concerned. It doesn't matter where you stand. People are concerned. There's so much going on, wars, discontent, division, and people are like, “Okay, how am I supposed to be happier, funnier? How do I find more humor this year?” You have some great tips, like how can we incorporate humor into our lives, even in challenging and uncomfortable times? [0:11:59] PO: Yes. So, one of the things that's important to consider is the overall kind of rewiring of your brain. Just like you would you would do with anything else. I want to learn a foreign language or a musical instrument. It's by incorporating small habits over time, because the priming effect is like our brains are wired to see what we set them up to expect. You're going to buy a new car. You’re like, I really want a Jeep and you start looking at Jeeps on the Internet. And now everywhere you drive around town, there's a Jeep everywhere, and you see all these Jeeps. Well, we can do that with humor, and start to rewire our brain to see the humor more often in life. Instead of everywhere you see Jeeps, you see jokes. Here's one way to kind of start doing that. One of my favorite habits is a humor jar. You have a jar, glass jar, say, and some slips of multicolored paper, and you could do this at work, in your office, or you could do this at home with the family, or both. In your humor jar, you've got those slips of paper, and then when funny things happen randomly, which they do, someone does or says something funny, and everyone cracks up, you write that down on a slip of paper, put it in the jar, and then depending on how many people you have doing it over the course of time, you go back at the end of each month, or quarter, or year, and relive all your funniest moments. And this is bound in positive psychology research about savoring the moment and also reminiscing on past good moments. But you're also wiring your brain to look for the funny moments, savor those funny moments. Remember those funny moments in life, so you'll see more and more of them, because that's what we're looking for. [0:13:36] PF: That's so cool. You know what, like, one thing I do that really helps me and I've got a couple of really funny friends. So, our friends, Doug and Jolene, we text a lot with them. Sometimes it's just like, out of the blue, I'll be like, “I'm not maybe having a great day. But I'm like, what can I say that's going to make them laugh, because then they're going to try to top whatever I texted to them.” And it works. It's a rabbit hole that we go down. And it helps me change my state. [0:14:03] PO: That's great. Why I liked that, too, is it kind of taps into – in my life, things changed a lot for me when I started focusing more on giving a laugh than getting a laugh. I want other people to laugh for them, not necessarily for me. So, it sounds to me like that's what you're doing. Another one of the habits is I call having a humor homie, and you could do it like as a one-week trial where you and your humor homie just make an agreement that like every day this week, or this month or whatever, we're each going to find something that cracks us up and send it to the other with no obligation of a reply back like, “Oh, now I have to watch this video and I don't really have time right now.” Because sometimes you feel like, “Oh, gosh. This one person sends me all these memes or whatever.” But it's just what we're doing is we're holding each other accountable to you look for something funny, I'll look for something funny, and we're going to share it with each other and you're also building up your comedy treasure trove of funny stuff. [0:15:02] PF: Oh, that's terrific. So, you've got a couple of other practices I wanted to talk about, and one is having a mantra. Right now, everyone's like, they're setting their word of the year, they're setting their intentions, they're creating their mantras. You have a whole different take on that. [0:15:17] PO: Yes. Part of it, maybe it's because I'm so into comedy and humor, is that I'm like, I'm a cynical person, right? So, I've been through a lot of workshops and wellness seminars and stuff like that, and some of the stuff really resonates with me. And other stuff is like, I cannot picture myself or take myself seriously doing this. Some of these serious mantras, they work. I mean, the research is out there. They work. So, if it works for you, great. But for me, I can't take myself seriously sitting at my desk going, “I am not angry. I am calm. I am not angry. I am calm.” If I'm doing that, I'm about to put a five iron through my monitor and do snow angels on the carpet or something. [0:15:59] PF: You just sounded like the Headspace app right now. [0:16:01] PO: Exactly. Yes. Except if I was that app, it would be Headcase. Yes. So, you can still have a mantra, but have it be something funny or less serious. For example, Bud Light had these commercials for a long time where this king only liked to drink Bud Light and all the peasants would bring him all these drinks like these fine mead wines or whatever. When he didn't get what he wanted, he would say, “To the pit of misery” with this guy who brought him like a wine or whatever. And the whole town would yell, “Dilly, dilly.” So, for some reason, my wife and I anytime things were not going well in life or whatever, it was like our cross-country skis one time flew off the roof rack and got run over behind us. It’s like, “Dilly, dilly.” [0:16:50] PF: I hope you were on the way back from the vacation. [0:16:54] PO: Yes. It was all the way to, and two skis. It was two skis, but it wasn't like one pair. It was one of hers and one of mine. Like, come on man. But that mantra dilly, dilly like she ended up engraving dilly, dilly at a money clip she gave to me one year for Christmas because it's just an easy way to reframe and go, okay, these sucks but whatever. [0:17:17] PF: So, did it make you laugh? You just lost basically two sets of skis because you can't just buy like a single. Did it change the situation when you're like, dilly, dilly? [0:17:26] PO: Yes. It doesn't always make me laugh. What it does is gives me perspective. It helps my brain remember that like, okay, although this may not be funny right now, there is humor in this. So, taking out of the freak-out from a nine to a six? Hey, your perspective in this whole situation, it's okay, dilly, dilly to the pit of misery. [0:17:47] PF: So, how did someone really start finding that mirthful mantra? Because you can do a song. It might be hard for someone to be like, “Oh, what's that going to be?” Because we can't – I mean, you kind of topped us with the Budweiser, dilly, dilly thing. [0:18:02] PO: Yes. So, it could be something like that Budweiser thing started as kind of an inside joke, so it could be like an inside joke, or saying that happens with you, and your colleagues at work, or at home. It could be a song that you turn into a mantra. You could take a serious mantra, and give it a little makeover, serious mantra makeover. So, take your serious mantra, and in your head, or out loud, if you can do it out loud. Just picture a funny voice saying that mantra. Like, Gandalf, from the Lord of the Rings going, “This too shall pass.” Or Elmo like, “I have a choice and I choose peace.” And that might just give you a little perspective to make you laugh a little bit and go, “Okay. It's not the end of the world.” [0:18:47] PF: I love that. When you do this, how long does it take for it to kind of become second nature? Because we're trying to override all this negative stuff that's been thrown at us all day long. How much work does it take to let the humor override that? And how long does it take to make it a habit? [0:19:07] PO: Like anything. It's different for everybody. But I think, that's why I really liked the ones that start out as little inside jokes or things that you're already doing or saying that you think, “Wait a minute. We may already have some kind of a mantra that I'm just not using that that much.” There was this one hospital team I was working with and a woman said that she was rushing around, running around room to room and there was this one patient she had this woman with a real southern twang voice. She came in real quick to check on her and a woman grabbed her arm and said, “Breathe baby, breathe.” She told her other nursing staff that their whole team now when somebody's getting worked up, they all just go, “Breathe baby, breathe.” So, those types of ones I think are the easiest because they're already in the lexicon. I had one when I was working with college students that were having a hard time, and I had to have disciplinary conversations with them and stuff, and sometimes it didn't go well. I remember this one student at the end of the day. It was a long week. The end of the day, the student and his attorney, and mom left my office, they're angry, and I hear the student just yell, “I hate this F’n school.” I walk into the office and my colleague goes, “How you doing?” I go, “Oh, you know, changing lives.” And that changing lives kind of became one of those mantras where both good and bad. Sometimes we'd have breakthroughs and we'd be like, “Hey, changing lives.” And other times, it'd be like a tough day, like, “Changing lives.” But it kind of gave us a perspective that we’re in it together. [0:20:41] PF: I love that. I love that. So, as the year gets dicey, not that it will. If the year feels dicey, how can we then like make sure like really double down on our humor? Really make it, like find ways to make ourselves laugh, and make ourselves think everything's okay? [0:20:56] PO: One thing is, at times, you don't have to make everything okay. The great humorous Charlie Chaplin once said, “In order to really laugh, you need to be able to take your pain and play with it.” If you're into theater, or comedy, movies, or TV shows. I mean, the real great comedy comes from the pain points in life. The struggles. No one wants to watch TV show where the guy wakes up and loves his job, and everything's great with his family. It's like, who cares? But it's the funny things happen with the struggles. So, what I teach with groups and workshops is to be able to take your pain points, and play with them a little bit. Start with minor things. There's something called humorous reappraisal, where we take minor stressors that we had, and then look back and see how can I reframe that with humor? Or I call it play in the what I could have said game. How can I look back and go, “What could I have done or said in that stressful moment, to add some levity to it so that I didn't get quite so worked up?” That's a good way. There's a lot of research about that, that doing that, actually increases our overall positive emotions and decreases negative emotions more than just normal positive reappraisal. Numerous reappraisal does so even more. So, I can give an example. I always tell people, just start with real minor things, and then work your way up to more real difficult personal traumatic things. But like, let's say you're in an important meeting at work, with all the leadership team there, and you go to make a brilliant point, right? You spill your mug of coffee all over the table. And now, you're immediately flustered, your next getting red, your face is getting red. And you're like, “Oh, my gosh, I'm so sorry.” Apologizing profusely and embarrassed, and then you realize later, like, “I didn't even get to make my great point. And why did I let myself get so flustered about this? I wish I could have handled that with some levity.” Go back and play the what I could have said game. What would you have done? What would you have said to lighten the mood and settle yourself down and others down? Maybe you spill it and go, “This is going to generate a latte excitement.” Or, “It's okay, everyone. It's just half and half. Half on the table, half in my lap.” Whatever it is, it doesn't even matter if what you come up with when you're doing this exercise cracks you up. Because you're training your brain to associate these minor stressors and working your way up to major stressors with humor. Eventually, what will happen is, you'll think to play the what I could have said game like a couple days later, and then a day later, and then a few hours later, until eventually your brain is starting to make this humor connection closer to real time than retrospect. And you're starting to be hardwired for humor. [0:23:36] PF: I love that. I love that. There's so much that you can teach us and we're going to tell people how they can find you and where they can see your TED Talk and just all the great stuff that you've done. But before you go, I love this, I want you to tell us about a comedy chaser, because this is something we started doing in our house before like we didn't even realize it how to name. But it was something we had to do this because we couldn't go to bed with anything else in our mind. So, tell us what a comedy chaser is and how we can use this. I love it. [0:24:04] PO: Yes. And that's cool to hear that you've been doing that too, because that's just actually helped me a lot as well. But I'm not going to like screen shame anyone. We all have our screen habits where maybe we're on a certain app too long, or depending on what you like to watch. For some reason right now, True Crime documentaries, and like serial killer documentaries are huge. Some of us watch the news way too much. Whatever it is, it's fine. But a comedy chaser is at the end of the day, make the last thing you watch funny. After you've binged your True Crime thing, before you go to bed, or maybe it's before you get to work or sit down to do some work, make the last thing you watch something funny. Watch a couple of funny TikTok videos or whatever it is that makes you laugh, because then what you're doing is you're replacing stress-inducing hormones with stress-reducing before you go to bed, or get to work, or see your family, or whatever it is. [0:25:00] PF: Then, that's what's stuck in your head too. When you lay down, you're like rethinking that joke, rethinking what you just saw, and it's a much more pleasant experience. [0:25:08] PO: Absolutely. All of those benefits of humor and laughter are flooding your body before sleep, or whatever the next thing is that you're going to do, for sure. [0:25:19] PF: What I've noticed has happened with me is I've started doing that. I tend to have really funny dreams. I don't always remember them, but I will wake up laughing. [0:25:28] PO: Really? Oh, that's great. [0:25:28] PF: Yes. Then, sometimes I'm like, “I got to write that down because I got to try that.” As I've started doing comedy, before I go to bed, I see that happening more and more, where it's like – [0:25:38] PO: That’s awesome. [0:25:39] PF: – you just kind of wake up and you're laughing. You don't know why. It's like, it must have been a good dream. Wish I knew what it was. [0:25:45] PO: See. You're rewiring your brain for humor, and it's even happening in your sleep. That's amazing. [0:25:49] PF: That’s so easy. I can do it in my sleep. [0:25:51] PO: That's right. That's right. Very good. I need you to write something for me. “So, easy. You can do it in your sleep.” [0:25:59] PF: Well, Paul, you are a delight to talk to. I'm glad you could share this with us. Again, thank you for coming on. We're going to tell everyone how to find you and make 2024 a happier, more humorous year. [0:26:12] PO: That's right. Have a great 2024 everyone. [END OF INTERVIEW] [0:26:19] PF: That was Paul Osincup, talking about the power of humor. If you'd like to learn more about Paul, follow him on social media or learn more about his book, The Humor Habit, just visit us at livehappy.com and click on the podcast tab. That is all we have time for today. We'll meet you back here again next week for an all-new episode. Until then, this is Paula Felps, reminding you to make every day a happy one. [END]

Follow along with the transcript below for episode: Managing Family Dysfunction During the Holiday Season With Trakida Maldonado [INTRODUCTION] [0:00:03] PF: Thank you for joining us for episode 447 of Live Happy Now. What would the holiday season be without a little family dysfunction? Well, actually, nobody knows. But this week's guest wants to help us find out. I'm your host, Paula Felps. And today I'm sitting down with Trakida Maldonado. A licensed professional counselor with Sondermind who has more than a decade of clinical experience. She's joining me to talk about why our mental health takes such a hit during the holidays and the role that families play in increasing our holiday anxiety and conflict. Then she'll tell us what we can do about it. Let's have a listen. [INTERVIEW] [0:00:42] PF: Trakida, thank you for sitting down with me today. [0:00:46] TM: Thank you, Paula, for having me. [0:00:47] PF: This is a fun time to talk because it's the holiday season and it is a really challenging time for a lot of people. I guess to kick things off, can you talk about why our mental health takes such a hit during the holiday season? [0:01:01] TM: Well, Paula, as you and I all know that during the holidays we are expected to just have so many – so many people have expectations of us. Our family, our children, nieces, nephews. During that time is already a very stressful time mind. And when we bring in traditions around that, it can create a lot of negative emotions and stress. That is why, during the holiday season, it's very, very stressful for so many individuals because there is so much that. It's put on us all at one time. [0:01:36] PF: Yeah. And we've also got that end of the year coming up. If you're in business, a lot of times, it becomes a very busy time there too because people are trying to get things wrapped up for the end of the year. [0:01:48] TM: Absolutely. Business closing out the year. Work is extremely busy. As we all know, everyone is shorthanded as far as manpower. It's a lot of different things that is put upon us during the holidays. And to include that we're talking about family. A lot of family time. And that adds on another stressor. [0:02:13] PF: Yeah. And as we talk about that, how does the perception that we need to create this perfect holiday just add to that stress and kind of make it worse? Because a lot of people do. They try to create the ideal holiday. They want Christmas to look like a Christmas card. They want everything about the holiday season to just be perfect. And what does that pressure do to us? [0:02:37] TM: Well, for many of us, unfortunately, those traditions that everyone expects of us, it causes a lot of stress. Rather we're having issues in our relationship. Or it can be things that's going on in work or with our children. And so, at that time, we're trying to actually create this love and happiness during this holiday season. And we have so many other things that's going on. And it can really affect our mental health. And so, because of that, we face so many challenges during the holidays and the seasons of just everyone being happy and wanting you to be happy. Taking these pictures with family members and seeing family we haven't seen in a while. We have to protect our mental health during that time. It's very, very important for us to do that. I'm a licensed therapist and I see a lot of different people during the holidays because of the stress that holidays bring. And we go through different coping skills and things that can be done to kind of minimize the stress of the holidays. [0:03:41] PF: That's great. I want to dive into a few different scenarios that are kind of common that people might be going through and talk about those. Because, first of all, can we talk about – you kind of alluded to it. Sometimes relationships are not going well and you still have to see their family. You still have to take him to see your family. It's not comfortable. And you're trying to present something that's great for the sake of the kids. You don't want to ruin their holidays. How do we do that? If we are in a relationship, it's not going well, maybe we're not even going to continue that relationship after the New Year. What do we do kind of get through that and make it more comfortable for everybody? Including ourselves. [0:04:23] TM: Well – and I'm glad you brought that point up, Paula. Because one of the things that we have to automatically do is acknowledge our feelings. We're typically so busy putting on a face for everyone else and making everyone else happy that we tend to not acknowledge our own feelings. And so, we want to make the holidays great during that time. And it's, again, like you say, for the family and the family members that are all looking and not even possibly knowing the stress that you're dealing with. And acknowledging your feelings and knowing, "Hey, this is the holiday time. And during this time, I know that we are not in a good place, but I am putting on the best face that I can for our families." However, we can't minimize how we're feeling within. We can still smile but we need to acknowledge we're not in a good place. I know I need to acknowledge that instead of acting like everything is okay. It makes it a lot easier to get through those times. And remember that your feelings are valid. Whatever you may be going through. And I can speak from personal experience. I was married for 25 years. And towards the end, I knew during the holidays we were going to visit family. And that was going to be very difficult. However, what I decided to do was acknowledge my feelings. I set certain expectations during that time. And I was very, very clear and strategic about what would be talked about and what we would discuss why we were with family. And it made a difference. It made me feel a lot better. And again, that comes from validating your feelings. It's so important that we do that during this time. [0:06:02] PF: That's great advice. I love that. And then, also, we're dealing with extended family. And when we have children, that can be even more challenging. Because I see a lot of people being pulled to meet the expectations of grandparents and extended families. Every grandparent wants to have the kids there for Christmas morning or whatever their tradition is. And frankly, the children they're doing it for are exhausted by the end of the holidays. As a parent, how do you set boundaries without causing a World War because? This is the way the family's always done it. How do you kind of carve out your place to protect your family time and to make sure the children actually have a good holiday season? [0:06:45] TM: That goes back to adjusting your expectations. Strategizing what you're going to do. Talking about it with your partner or just making sure that you have a plan. How long do you plan on spending when you're visiting maybe your in-laws or grandparent? Discuss exactly how much time you going to spend with that person in a conversation. And it's very, very important that you and your partner or your significant other, if you all are talking about this, have some sort of hand gestures, or some sort of wink, or something that you all can stay on track. Adjusting your expectations and strategizing prior makes a huge difference. Remember, what we have to do is set boundaries. The kids are being pulled in different directions is exhausting for the children and everyone. You strategize and say, "Hey, we're only going to spend two hours with our in-laws." And you make sure that you go by that and have that boundary. And you said it from the beginning, we are going to be here for this amount of time. Remember, we can't make everyone happy. And the holidays are so stressful in itself. We all come from totally different walks of life. I mean, my family, I'm going to see them for Christmas. And they may be listening to this podcast today. And I'm not really looking forward to five whole days with my entire family. [0:08:06] PF: Well, you know what? If you say enough about them, you might not get five whole days with them. [0:08:10] TM: Well, you know, Paula, you would think. But I doubt it. They would torture me just on purpose at that point. But it's very, very important that we understand it. We just set some expectations and have boundaries. And I think that is keeping things healthy for yourself and for your family. And those boundaries are just important during the holidays. And they're important anyway. But if you set those boundaries early on before the holidays arrive, making the decision early. Where are we going to be attending? Or how long we're going to attend someone's home? People will understand, especially when you've made this decision, and they know prior to the event. Or you're telling them that once you arrive, "Hey, we're only going to be here for this amount of time." Again, managing boundaries, healthy boundaries, to continuously get you through the holidays with less stress and also for your family to not be as stressed out as well. [0:09:06] PF: I love that. Because we tend to think of this as just kind of an organic thing. We're going to show up and we'll leave when we leave. Or when they're done with us or what have you. But it really does require a solid strategy to get through with your mental health and your energy intact. [0:09:22] TM: Absolutely. It's setting those healthy boundaries. Because like you say, you end up somewhere. You're there for hours. And now, these conversations that you're not – someone is pushing your buttons and giving advice that they're not experts in it. And so, it's very, very important to set those boundaries. And again, you're not going to make everyone happy, but it keeps your mental health intact. And also, it helps with the family overall because your family in itself is happy. That was enough time with grandma, or grandpa, or in-laws, mother, father, whoever. But I think it's very important to have those boundaries already set prior. And it really makes you feel a lot better going into the holiday. [0:10:07] PF: Yeah. It does. And that's a great plan to have. But what happens if you have your plan, and you're there and then things go off the rails? Your spouse says, "No. Honey. Let's just go ahead and stay for a couple more hours. Because mom really wants us here." Something like that. What do you do? How do you correct things if someone's trying to change it in the moment? And it could be too, say, one of the grandmas is like, "Well, oh, no. Can't you just stay a little longer? I'm so disappointed." They kind of start using some of the guilt things. How do you handle it in the moment if you've already set the boundaries? You have a strategy and someone is now contesting it. [0:10:45] TM: That's the anticipation of conflict. And that's the worst part of it. [0:10:51] PF: You know there are cases where it's coming. And someone is out there listening saying, "Yeah, we can try that. Wink-wink." [0:10:58] TM: Absolutely. Absolutely. [0:10:58] PF: And it's not going to happen. [0:10:59] TM: Again, that is one of the reasons why setting these boundaries in place prior. Allowing these individuals to know this is what we – once you set that boundary, you must stick to it. And that's not always comfortable. There needs to be a conversation prior. And that partner needs to understand that this is the boundary that we set. And we cannot allow someone else to talk us into doing something different. Again, that is not always easy. But we have to set those boundaries and we have to really stand by them. Because other than that, we are putting ourselves in a position where we're stressed out. And I get it, stress is normal. But it should not rule or ruin your health. And it should not be a time that you're dreading the holidays. It's supposed to be a time to enjoy. Again, I stress the fact that boundaries are so important. And sometimes we're like, "Well, this person's not going to abide by my boundary." Well, that is something that we have to work on. [0:11:57] PF: One thing that's pretty common for people is they have relatives that they've had prior conflict with. And for some reason, it's going to bubble up either at the dinner table, or during drinks afterwards, or something like that. Two points that we want to make here is, first of all, how do you go into that situation? And then secondly, if you are there and it starts to occur again, what do you do? [0:12:24] TM: That's a good one, Paula. And I've heard that very, very often in my practice. And that is the time that we have to press pause. We have to press pause and we have to decide, "Hey, I need a timeout." And I think it's very important to express those feelings. And I'm really big on communication. Sometimes overly communicating. But you have those family members, and we all have them, that continuously just want to have these discussions that their opinions defer from politics and religion issues and views. And it can ruin the entire day that you're spending with your family. And one of the things to do a lot of times is to get up and ask for a moment. I just need a moment so I can get my thoughts together. Sometimes walking away. Disengaging in those conversations. A lot of times what we do is, because we get annoyed with the individual, we will say, "Well, we don't engage in these conversations. Because they're pointless. And we're upset because these opinions are so different." And it can derail very easily. But it's important for us to just decide that I'm going to step away from this for a moment. And when these conversations start, we disengage from them. There are certain conversations that we know that can go bad with particular family members. We disengage immediately before we even get ourselves in that. We don't want to get angry and definitely open up a bag of worms and cause chaos at the family's gathering. [0:13:56] PF: Can you say I am going into a situation that didn't go well last year? Or didn't go well last time we were together. How do you go in and set boundaries? Maybe whoever's hosting it. Or people who are attending and saying, "Look, I know we've had this conflict." Because everyone knows, it's the elephant in the room, right? Can you say, "Look, this has been a problem area for us before. Let's agree not to discuss this." Or how do you handle that if you know that's – [0:14:26] TM: Absolutely. I like what you said. I'm sorry. I love what you said about maybe having that conversation with who's hosting the family gathering. Before you encounter these situations, it would be very helpful to encourage the family members or the family to put that out. That these are conversations that we won't have. These particular subjects – or what happened last year, the year before last, they are off the table. We're not having them. Instead of getting angry, consider just opening a sentence of like, "We're not having this – we're not discussing religion this year." Or we're not discussing health care. Whatever it may be. Just put that out there very early on just to avoid that conflict. Now that can be uncomfortable initially because it's like everyone's like, "Well, no one was talking about that." I get it. But before we even go there, from what happened in previous years, this topic is totally off the table. We won't discuss it. And if someone is hosting it and they're open to saying, "Hey, this is what happened two years ago. Is it possible that you can put that out? You're hosting the family event this year. Can you say, "Hey, these are the things that we're not going to discuss. Because we want everyone to have a great time." That is definitely something that can be done. I think that sometimes it's very, very important, again, setting those boundaries and allowing everyone to know from the beginning this is not what we're going to talk about. It would be very, very helpful. Especially if you have support from your family say, "I agree with you. We should not be talking about these particular topics." And I think it's very, very important that that is possibly discussed prior. [0:16:05] PF: And then who's in charge of – I don't want to say monitoring it. But sometimes people will do it anyway. They're still going to bring something up. Who's in charge of saying, "Hey, remember? We're not talking about that." [0:16:17] TM: Well, you know it goes back to, Paula, like we were talking about earlier. That is those families. We all have those particular family members. [0:16:24] PF: Oh, yeah. [0:16:26] TM: Will not stop. I can't tell you the anxiety I feel about just having everyone in one location. Those are the moments where you have to make a decision. And what I mean by that is once you tell the person, "Hey, we've already discussed we're not having this conversation." If you walk away or disengage and they're continuously, which we know this happen very often, that someone just will not avoid conflict, it may be time that you say, "You know what? For the sake of my mental health and my family, we're not going to subject ourselves to this. Because I already see where this is going." And it may be one of those situations where you end up leaving early. Of course, you're not trying to ruin a day. But what you're not trying to do is be around family. Have a bad day. This thing – a lot of times when we have these issues during the holidays, I cannot tell you how many individuals I see early on in the beginning of the year that are so stressed out about what's going to happen in the family. I recently had someone for Thanksgiving. And basically, one of the kids found out dad did something really big for the other daughter and it became this huge fight. And it's Thanksgiving. We have to disengage from those things. It may be one of those things where you say, "Well, I can tell that you want to continue with this conversation that's going to create so much havoc. So, I'm going to leave. Or I'm going to disengage from this." And again, those are uncomfortable situations. But a lot of times, if we press pause, we walk away, we disengage. We come back and things can possibly be in a better place. But again, there is no blueprint to when we're dealing with family. [0:18:04] PF: Yeah. [0:18:06] TM: We go in and we have these expectations. And we can sit here and say all day, "We're going to have expectations and boundaries. And we're only going to stay at the in-laws for 30 minutes or however we may go about it." Truth be told, we only can do so much. Family is family. Family comes with a lot of dysfunction and a lot of times a lot of stress just dealing with them. However, it's very important just to really try to stick to those boundaries that you create. But there is a strong possibility that someone is going to push over them. Someone is going to push the limit. But that's when you have to definitely stand on what you believe. Stand on what you said and follow through. Because again, stress is normal. But it should not ruin or rule over your health and mess up the holidays. Because we have family members that are just not willing to participate in a healthy way. [0:19:00] PF: Right. Right. We've managed to make the holidays sound like a horrible experience on this episode. [0:19:08] TM: It actually can be. It actually can be very stressful. [0:19:10] PF: Yeah, 100% can be. What's one thing that you want people to remember? As they go into the holidays, how do we make sure that it is merry and bright as the saying says? And what can we do? What do you want them to keep front of mind? [0:19:24] TM: Well, this is a season of gratitude. Throughout the holidays, always be gentle to yourselves, to others. We have these expectations around the holidays. And of course, we want it to be perfect and beautiful. And sometimes it doesn’t work that way. But this is a season of nothing but gratitude. And we have to remember that we are grateful for the families that we have, and the good, the bad, the ugly. And just focus more on just relaxing and enjoying the moment. We are all here on – we don't know the time and hour when our time here on Earth will be gone. And we have to just love on the individuals that love on us. And family, although we're all different, it's a great time to catch up with nieces, and nephews, and in-laws and our children. And just try to remember that this is really the season of happiness and it should be a happy time. Not always as happy. But if we can make the best out of it. Because we don't get to really spend that much time with our families, extended families especially, throughout the year. We're so busy. Focus on the good and try to relax and set those boundaries and stick to them as much as you can. [0:20:37] PF: I love it. Thank you so much for sitting down with me today. You gave us a lot to work with. I think we've given people a lot of information today. And I appreciate you sitting down and taking the time to do that. [0:20:47] TM: Thank you so much, Paula. Thank you for having me. And you have a great day. [OUTRO] [0:20:56] PF: That was Trakida Maldonado talking about handling family dysfunction during the holidays. If you'd like to learn more about Trakida or read some columns on how to protect your mental health during the holiday season, just visit us at livehappy.com and click on the podcast tab. That is all we have time for today. We'll meet you back here again next week for an all-new episode. And until then, this is Paula Phelps reminding you to make every day a happy one. [END]

Follow along with the transcript below for episode: Practicing Forgiveness for the Holiday Season With Barbara J. Hunt [INTRODUCTION]   [00:00:02] PF: Thank you for joining us for episode 445 of Live Happy Now. Studies show that our world is becoming less optimistic, but this week's guest believes we can change that. I'm your host Paula Felps. Today, I'm talking with Dr. Emily Bashah, a psychologist whose private practice specializes in mental illness, collective trauma, grief, and relationship dynamics. She's also co-host of the Optimistic American Podcast, where she and co-host, Paul Johnson, strive to create space for a positive and hopeful view of America and help us feel more optimistic about the future. Emily's here with me today to talk about why we're feeling less optimistic these days, what we can do about it, and importantly, how we can make it through the holiday season with our optimism intact. Let's have a listen. [INTERVIEW] [00:00:53] PF: Emily, thank you for joining me here today. [00:00:55] EB: Thank you so much, Paula. I'm really excited about your mission, and learning more about you, and what you're contributing to positivity and optimism through your podcast. So thank you. [00:01:07] PF: Well, I'm excited about everything that you have going on, and we're going to talk about the Optimistic American movement and also how this relates to the holidays. But I wanted to know, in your private practice with everything that's going on in the world today, how do you see that affecting, say, your client's optimism? [00:01:26] EB: I see people going in one of two directions. Either they're totally closing themself off from the world and shutting people out and really focusing on living a day-to-day existence with what am I trying to accomplish today and really in a survival mode. Then to the other extreme, absorbing everything, impacted by everything, very distressed, highly anxious, more and more paranoid and concerned about what is happening in the world today, feeling more despair, a sense of hopelessness. Helplessness is quite big and grief-stricken, honestly. [00:02:10] PF: So is it more than you had seen in the past? [00:02:14] EB: I think it's kind of this continuation that we've seen from COVID and rising impacts of extremism that is happening nationally, ever-changing polarization in politics that's happening in our nation. That's creating more of a rise of tension and hate and a divide and trying to classify people into these groups of are you my friend or my foe because you can't – you have to be an either one of those two categories. There isn't any – [00:02:49] PF: There's no in-between anymore. [00:02:51] EB: There's no in-between anymore, and it's wild to me just to see that people are even allowing themselves to force people into those categories, where really they know nothing about different issues, aren't educated about the different issues, don't really care to be more educated about the different issues, and yet are willing to go that extra mile in forcing people into these real black and white categorizations and allowing themselves to be skewed and misinformed by propaganda. That really is concerning for me, especially for young people today. I think that a lot of it adds to this rise of despair and a sense of victimhood or fear and wanting to make sense of things that just seem so senseless. [00:03:50] PF: What you have described is such a true depiction of what our society looks like today, and that's it's bleak. When you lay it out like that, that just feels really, really bleak. I know your Optimistic American movement is meant to counter that. So before we kind of dig into how it's doing that, tell us what it is, and please tell me how it started. [00:04:13] EB: Yes. So my partner, Paul Johnson, was the former Mayor of Phoenix. Him and I co-authored the book called Addictive Ideologies: Finding Meaning and Agency When Politics Fail You. We were really inspired by this book and wanted to really help people focus on how can they preserve their own agency and power and a sense of control in their life in taking responsibility and accountability for what is within their own power. There's so much more there than I think people in general are willing to see and practice. So we used a lot of psychological theory and things that I've learned throughout my private practice in clinical and forensic work that I've done, how people facing death penalties or facing life sentences have found ways to completely transform their lives, knowing that there's no hope in getting out of prison. But yet we compelled by finding meaning, purpose, and value in the life that they had, despite facing a life of incarceration. We looked at my parents’ story surviving persecution out of Iraq as Jews. We studied genocides across the world and really searching for answers and trying to understand what are the main tenets behind extremism and terrorism. So the latter half of our book, we really highlight these seven ideals and finding meaning, not necessarily happiness. Looking for the we, not necessarily the me. We co-host these podcasts where we've branched out some of these different teachings and looked at different social issues and dissected them and talking about how people can remain optimistic, hopeful, and practicing agency in their lives today. [00:06:19] PF: So why is optimism important. Like from a mental health perspective, what does it do, and why do we need to really focus on regaining that optimism? Because I know a lot of people who are really not optimistic right now. [00:06:33] EB: The doom and the gloom and the terror and the grief can be so overcoming. I think you don't have to look too far on social media or the news to feel really overcome by despair. So we have to really work even harder at protecting optimism. Of course, there's so much research there on stress and how that affects one's mental health, especially if it's chronic and prolonged. If people are feeling helpless and there's no way out. Or they have a sense of a victimhood. That has detrimental effects on cardiovascular disease, on the way that your brain operates, and how neurons are firing, and also chronic fatigue, and how you're sleeping and whether or not you're self-medicating with substances or other cognitive distortions that are impacting you from really being able to think clearly and reason, think sensibly. There's something called the amygdala hijack. I think it's really important to know if you're allowing yourself to be viewing or seeing a lot of imagery, and you're – that's making you go into this fight, flight, freeze response. It's activating your limbic system in the brain. It's a very primitive part of our brain. It's necessary for survival. But if you're operating on that or allowing yourself to be manipulated by social media and things that you're watching, that you can't really utilize your frontal lobe to the best capacity at that point because your reasoning is being overrided essentially. You can't think clearly about consequences of your decisions. You can't make good, rational, sound judgment. You're going to be more impulsive. That can be okay in the short term, especially when you have this heightened sense of threat that you need to protect yourself. But when that is chronic and it's prolonged and it's chronically activated, that's going to lead to all kinds of physiological, mental, and emotional dysfunction and have some really serious long-term consequences. [00:08:51] PF: The holidays are coming. So we know that adds more stress, a little bit more anxiety. A lot of that anxiety that I'm hearing about now is because people are going to be dealing with family members who are also divided. So as we enter this holiday time, first of all, how do we just remain optimistic for ourselves? Before we even get to the dinners that we have to sit down and survive, how do we do that? How do we have an optimism practice, if you will? [00:09:22] EB: Yes. I would say be courageous and have faith and belief in yourself that you're going to be able to get through it. Rather than looking for the doom and gloom, look for things that inspire you. Look for the opportunity to learn something new from someone else that you disagree with, while still remaining open to them. That can be challenging, but you're also going to be building your struggle muscles and being able to tolerate the discomfort as you're hearing a different opinion or something that you disagree with, and that's okay. What it's doing and saying is you're strong enough to have some difficult conversations and in a respectful way and still preserving the peace and joy and prosperity and gratitude, which is what the holidays are about. I would say think really intentionally about what you are, one, really grateful for. Really practice and embody that in your life, and commit to doing something that is uncomfortable, whether it's opening yourself up to learning more about a family member that you just have a difficult time accepting or you have a different point of view. I mean, if it's really bad and you think, “Okay, this – we shouldn't be having these conversations at the dinner table because this is just going to get into a full-blown extremist ideological rant,” and that can happen. I would say equip yourself with some knowledge or maybe go-tos. If a person is really radical in their beliefs, know what is off-topic or try to put those topics off the dinner table. You could say, “Hey, I really respect and appreciate your opinion on this. Can we get together maybe for coffee and talk about it more?” Or just shift the subject to something that you know is going to bring you and that person more together like their children or their new job or their pet or a hobby or interest that you share. Something else that you know is going to get them off that topic. So you might have to be really strategic here. Know who you're speaking to and going into those events, knowing what you're wanting to get out of. If it's peace, love, harmony, connection, gratitude, open to learning something new, open to doing something difficult, open to leaning in and assisting and helping when possible. You're probably going to be the better person and get something so much more wonderful out of the holidays that you didn't really anticipate. I know a lot of people struggle with control, or they see themselves as like, “Oh, if I give in and I don't argue my point, then I'm not standing up for myself, and that makes me a weaker person.’ I say you might want to re-evaluate what you're telling yourself about that. How is that even helping you? [00:12:37] PF: Yes. I was – I did. I wanted to ask you about that because one of the worst things in my opinion that you can do is engage someone who has a very different belief because you're not going to change their mind. All you're going to do is upset yourself and the people around you. So getting involved in a debate, discussion, whatever you'd like to call it, it's not beneficial for anyone, truly. [00:13:00] EB: Yes. If you're getting in it, and you see it as like a win-lose, and you just want to have the last say and prove your point and where you see that person has that kind of rhetoric or radicalization, then, yes, absolutely. You're not going to change an extremist at a dinner conversation. You're not going to change their ideology. In fact, they're quite immune at that point to any kind of facts. Challenging on them directly on the ideology is just going to further push them away. Now, if you are talking to somebody who has agency which is ideal, that is aspirational, that is what we all should want to strive for, I hope, then that's going to be more of a fun conversation. You don’t – you're not going to feel like you have to self-monitor as much. You've already got the trust and respect and the rapport established with that person. You can try and really push that intellectual edge without feeling like this is a moral superiority challenge, where somebody's going to end up being inferior, and somebody's going to be superior, and I don't want the inferiority one to be me. So how do I just dominate this person because, yes, that's just not going to be helpful. I would just say it's a trap. I would just say avoid it. Now, someone in-between, we call them tribalists. So these are people who maybe identify with a particular group. They're not totally bought into to the extremist, and you can still have conversations with them. They still might move and be open and quite flexible and adaptive to having a different flow and be challenged. I'd say just be conscientious because cognitive dissonance tend to be at play for people who are more tribalist. Meaning, they're going to be more prone to defend their group if they feel like their group is being threatened or challenged. Then they'll go to the point of absolving their group of any wrongdoing because they want to defend their group at all costs. So that's when you start – they start to get pushed in that us versus them or the victim versus the oppressor mentality. Then it gets hard to really have some of those more open conversations and dialogues. So just be aware of those three different kinds of ideologies; the person with agency, the tribalist, or the extremist. Then gauge your conversation based on that. [00:15:35] PF: How important is it to as you go into the holiday, like beforehand? Say you're hosting. Or say a parent is hosting, and you say, “Hey, Mom. Let's make sure that everyone knows we're not going to – these topics are off the table. We're not going to discuss these things, and here's what we want to focus on.” What about that? How does that work in terms of keeping it peaceful and making it more enjoyable for everyone? [00:16:01] EB: Yes. I think it's great to have allies that are also proponents in preserving the peace and the harmony during the holidays and maybe some other family members that might say, “Hey, come for a walk with me. Let's walk the dogs. Or let's take a stroll after the meal,” because that can be helpful to have some people that are just observant and mindful and conscientious of where things are going to maintain the peace and calm and not spiking the anxiety and that tension. I think that can be really helpful. Again, the best way to go in is really thinking about how do I want to feel about myself leaving. You can't control everyone. You can't control outcomes. But I think if you're flexible and, in general, people want to experience some peace and joy and happiness and celebration and but also adaptive if things don't entirely go their way that that's also okay. They don't have to control everything or everyone at all times. Really, the most important thing is being in control of yourself. [00:17:15] PF: Yes. So what are some ways like not just for the holiday season but going on? We know we're born with a negativity bias, so optimism can be difficult, and it's – we have different levels of that, depending on our personal makeup. So how do we fight our negativity bias or overcome it and become more optimistic? [00:17:34] EB: Yes. I think one of the things that I personally practice, and this even extends to some of the forensic or clinical work that I do, is I don't take things personally. Somebody can say something directly to me, and it could be a direct threat. I think it says more about them than it does about me. I don't need to defend myself to them. I mean, I'm not talking about anything physical, like if it's a physical threat, obviously. But if it's not physical and there isn't a risk of violence, I just see that as me practicing self-protectiveness and resilience. If I'm not amplifying the threat in my mind, I don't need to be reactive to that person, which is probably what they're wanting you to do anyway. Sometimes, the best response is no response or just say, “Huh, okay. I'll think about that.” [00:18:35] PF: But that's a gift. That's a mindset that takes a while to cultivate because people's words hurt, and we do take things personally. It's hard to learn not to. [00:18:45] EB: Yes. Especially if it's somebody whose opinion of you matters. That's when probably it can hurt more. Like this is a person who should love you, who should be there for you, who should defend you, who should protect you, who should die for you. Sometimes, we find out that it's not necessarily the case. It’s okay that people think differently than you, and it doesn't mean that they necessarily reject you as a person. That could be your own interpretation of it, even though it feels so personal. But there could be more opportunity there to really build some resilience and courage and leaning in. [00:19:28] PF: As we go into the holiday season, what's the number one thing that you want everybody to keep in mind about optimism? [00:19:35] EB: I think there's a lot of like frantic energy that's out there. Everybody feels rushed to like do everything and get everything done. It can feel like a lot, and I think it's okay that some things fall off your plate. I would say know what balls are made of glass and which balls are made of rubber, so you know which ones to allow to drop. Obviously, the relationships are the ones that are most fragile and most important. Really thinking about that we, not me. What do what do I have that I can contribute that can be helpful to my community, helpful to my family, make me a better partner, make me a better parent? What are those things that I want to commit and set my intention on that take me out of myself into a sense of belonging and a commitment to something bigger than myself in this shared humanity and this experience that we have all together in the small world that we live in? [00:20:47] PF: That's great. That is a great way to approach it. I thank you for spending time with me today. I’m going to tell our listeners how they can find you, how they can find your book, how they can learn more about the Optimistic American movement. I hope you'll sit down with me again, and we'll talk some more. [00:21:01] EB: Absolutely. Thank you, Paula. [END OF INTERVIEW] [00:21:08] PF: That was Dr. Emily Bashah, talking about optimism. If you'd like to learn more about Emily, check out her book, Addictive Ideologies: Finding Meaning and Agency When Politics Fail You, follow her on social media, listen to her podcast, or download free worksheets for self-improvement, just visit us at livehappy.com and click on the podcast tab. That is all we have time for today. We'll meet you back here again next week for an all-new episode. Until then, this is Paula Felps, reminding you to make every day happy one. [END]