Episode 429 Dr. Stephen Sideroff Rewiring Your Brain for Resilience Transcript
This transcript is from episode 429 with guest Dr. Stephen Sideroff.
Scott DeLuzio: [00:00:00] Thanks for tuning in to the Drive On Podcast where we are focused on giving hope and strength to the entire military community. Whether you’re a veteran, active duty, guard, reserve, or a family member, this podcast will share inspirational stories and resources that are useful to you. I’m your host, Scott DeLuzio, and now let’s get on with the show.
Hey everyone. Welcome back to Drive On. I’m your host Scott De Lucio, and today my guest is Dr. Stephen Sideroff. Dr. Sideroff is a psychologist, a professor at UCLA, an author, a consultant, and a thought leader in the field of resilience, uh, peak per performance and transformational psychology. And he’s known for establishing innovative training and, uh, treatment programs across the globe and for hosting summits where he interviews world leaders in longevity, resilience, and leadership.
And Dr. Sideroff has also [00:01:00] made significant contributions to brain and behavior research. And he’s here today to discuss his new book, The Nine Pillars of Resilience, The Proven Path to Master Stress. Slow aging and increased vitality, and we’ll get into, uh, a lot more, I’m sure. Um, but, but, uh, before we get into all of that, uh, Dr.
Sideroff, welcome to the show. I’m really glad to have you here.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Well, it’s really a pleasure to be here, Scott, and I’m looking forward to giving your audience some very useful tools.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, absolutely. And, uh, you know, one of the things that I think in the military, we, uh, we get, We get various tools kind of drilled into us, uh, from the very early days of, you know, basic training. We, we learn a bunch of different things, but, but sometimes dealing with stress or, you know, resilience and things like that, sometimes it either gets lost along the way or, um, we, we just don’t know how [00:02:00] to apply it in, in the day to day life.
And, um, you know, I guess maybe let’s just start off with why, why do people have such difficulty with managing their stress? so much.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: This is a very important question, and it’s important for people to realize they’re not alone in that struggle. Everybody has difficulty with stress and there’s some structural reasons for it and practical reasons for it as well. So it’s important to begin by realizing that one of the difficulties is that stress is not just bad.
That it’s a survival mechanism. And so your audience. We’d be particularly aware of that. And so it’s so ingrained right down to our DNA, right down to our genetics. And so I like to, to begin with, to reframe stress [00:03:00] and the stress response as a useful tool, as long as we keep it in balance. And that’s always, so that’s the key. And it’s important to, again, to realize that we’re all struggling with it because If you think about all the successes in your life, you will realize that all of them have been accompanied by stress.
Scott DeLuzio: That’s right. Yeah,
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: So think about that. Every time we are, have a success, stress is part of the package. So what happens in our brains, our brains have put those two things together. Stress, success. And it could be, you know, success achievement, or it could be success just, you know, avoiding getting killed if we’re in a battle situation.
So we have to realize that it serves us, but we have a responsibility to find our stress sweet spot. [00:04:00] The level in which our both performance and our health is optimized because most of us shoot beyond that optimal level into the danger zone. And that’s because we have so many situations in our day, in our lives that trigger the stress response throughout our day.
But we don’t have any or very few triggers. of the opposite. We’re safe. We can relax. We can let down our guard. And so we have to, that’s where our intention comes in, to find time and places to engage in that recovery branch of the stress response.
Scott DeLuzio: So that’s interesting that so many of us just live in the stress world, right? And you said the danger area of stress. Um, and when you think about how [00:05:00] stress and success are correlated the way you mentioned, and before you mentioned that, I hadn’t really thought of it that way. I, I, I’ve correlated, uh, you know, failures.
with success. Like you, you, you typically, there are a lot of times there’s, there’s failures, um, where you, you try something, doesn’t work. You try it again, doesn’t work. You try something different and you keep making adjustments until eventually, hey, I got something to work and it, you know, kind of works.
I’m successful, but there’s got to be a lot of stress wrapped up in that, right? Because I, I, just the other day, my, my son was trying, he was trying to learn a magic trick and, and he was, he was doing this thing with the cards and it just wasn’t working out. And you could see in his face, he was getting so frustrated and the stress and, you know, for him and, you know, he’s 11 years old, so it’s, you know, relative, but, um, You know, for him, he was getting all stressed out about it, because it’s like, I’m doing, I’m doing what the thing tells me to do, and [00:06:00] it’s not working, you know, and he’s getting all frustrated.
And, um, you know, I’m like, man, better to, better to learn a little bit of stress now than, uh, you know, years down the road. So, you know, in a way, it’s kind of a good thing, right? Um, but it’s, it’s got to be, uh, you know, that’s, it’s a good point that you made, that there, there is stress. Accompanied with all of the accomplishments that we have had, right?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Right, right. And you know, talking about your son and his situation, one of the key lessons in this process of engaging in stress throughout our day, throughout our lives, is learning the lessons of the encounter.
Scott DeLuzio: Mm hmm.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: So, you know, people talk about resilience as the ability to bounce back. And I say that that’s outdated and that really [00:07:00] resilience is the ability to bounce forward.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: And what do I mean by that? So your son is, is struggling to learn these magic tricks and we can relate that to any any stress in our lives where we’re struggling or we have a stress coming up and we’re worried am I going to be successful we are anxious what’s going to happen or we may think of the negative consequences and then the the stressful situation occurs And we’re successful. Now, here’s the key. What happens with most people is they bounce back from stress, meaning that what they take away from that experience is how anxious and stressed and worried they were, and they were successful. They have put Anxious worry [00:08:00] together with it turned out okay. This is one of the reasons why anxiety is perpetuated because our brain takes the position that the anxiety contributed to things turning out okay.
So bouncing resilience, bouncing forward is learning a new lesson, reframing what happened. No, it wasn’t the anxiety. I worked hard. to figure this out and I was successful. The lesson is I was successful. The lesson is I’m competent so that the next encounter you will be less anxious, less worried. So that’s a very, very important distinction of how we want to experience our stressful encounters.
Learn the lesson. Make sure you learn it right so that the next time you will be less anxious, less worried.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, and that makes [00:09:00] sense too, because when you have, um, when you’re tying these things together, your, your anxiety being tied to the successful outcome of whatever the thing is, um, then you’re like, well, I guess if I’m just anxious all the time, I’ll be successful all the time. It’s, it’s maybe like the way your, your brain is, is working,
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yeah, and it’s not, it doesn’t have to be conscious. It’s an unconscious process, right?
Scott DeLuzio: yeah, yeah, exactly.
Exactly. Um, you, you may not even realize it, but you just. You kind of associate those two things, uh, the, the anxiety with the success. And it’s like, well, fine. If I, if that’s what I need to do to be successful, I want to be successful. I’ll just be anxious all the time. And that’s not going to help things.
Right. Um, but let’s talk specifically maybe about folks in the military, maybe even the veteran community, um, you know, specific challenges that they have, uh, with regards to, you know, resilience and, and, [00:10:00] and this type of stuff.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: It’s a very good question. And one of the things that is important to understand, is that you know what conditioning means. Something happens and keeps happening. Now you begin to expect it, right?
Scott DeLuzio: Yes.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Well, it’s important to realize that our nervous system itself can be conditioned.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: What does that mean? Well, if you’re in dangerous situations, Your nervous system literally becomes sensitized to potential danger, and your nervous system, we call it neuroception, and it happens below the level of awareness.
So you’re going about your day, and suddenly your nervous system picks up on a signal, and it’s [00:11:00] sensitized, and your nervous system starts to react with a stress response.
Scott DeLuzio: Mm hmm.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Now you’re going about your day and suddenly you notice this physiological reaction and you go, oh my goodness Or it could be unconscious.
There must be a danger. Let me look for the danger. There’s no danger, but your body is telling you there’s a danger and you trust your body. And so this is why so many situations we go into, which really are not dangerous, we have this, uh, uh, danger reaction to. And so what’s the lesson of this? The lesson is if you know that your nervous system is sensitized and can get triggered even though there’s no danger, when you notice that, the first reaction that you want to have is a [00:12:00] cognitive response.
message to yourself. There may not be any real danger right now.
Scott DeLuzio: Right.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Uh, rather than there’s a danger, let me look for it. And if I don’t find it, it’s just that it’s there somewhere, but I can’t find it.
Scott DeLuzio: You didn’t find it yet, right?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: so, so it’s a, in a process that we can all engage in to reverse that reaction.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. So as you’re, as you’re talking, I like to kind of just make analogies to, you know, other, other real life situations, and you’re talking about getting conditioned to certain things, and immediately the thought popped in my head, because it’s so funny when it happens, is my dogs, when, when it’s time for them to be fed, when we open up the container of food, they come running.
I don’t care where in the house they are, they hear it, and that sound means It’s chow time. We’re, we’re about to eat and [00:13:00] they come charging and then they, you almost start tripping over them cause they’re like right at your feet and they want that food. Right. Um, and so they’ve been conditioned to hearing this particular sound equals the good stuff’s coming.
We’re about to get, uh, we’re about to get fed. Right. If. That sound, because right now that sound to them is associated with something great. They, they, they’re very food motivated, and so when, but if instead, if that sound was made and You dropped a 10 pound rock on their head every time that it happened instead of running towards you They’d go running away because they don’t want that to happen.
They’re now associating that sound with something bad and In the military, you know when especially folks who’ve been deployed to combat zones and things like that Um, um, You hear a loud [00:14:00] boom, well, that’s a bad thing, that’s typically, that’s an explosion, that, that equals potentially death or injuries or, or things like that, you don’t want to be around that, and you want to find out is there, is there something else that’s going to go boom, and you want to make sure that you’re not near that thing that’s going to go boom, and you, you try to get to, to safety if, if you, if you can, and so when you hear a dump truck dropping off its load, On the other side of the road or wherever it is, and you hear this loud boom in this crashing, you’re, you’re just conditioned to hearing that loud noise.
And, um, and now you, you’re ducking for cover. You, you don’t want to be around those types of things. And, and so, so that makes a lot of sense, um, that, that things like that get conditioned into people. Um, and, and I would imagine it could probably happen rather quickly, uh, with, with. [00:15:00] Experiences being what they are.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: so the more dangerous the situation, the more quickly it happens,
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: because it’s a survival mechanism, and if it’s, if the danger, if there’s real danger, we learn quickly, and sometimes what we learn may be appropriate in one environment and not at all appropriate in another environment.
Scott DeLuzio: That’s right. Yeah. So, um, approach, uh, you know, talking about your, your book, uh, The Nine Pillars of Resilience and, uh, you know, some of the work that you do. Um, how does this address this type of conditioning and how do we, I don’t know if unconditioned is the right word or how do we desensitize that, that conditioning?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: So it’s interesting you use the word desensitize, because I’m going to answer you in part A and part B.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: So part [00:16:00] A is that I actually use a desensitization process to help in this kind of situation. And by desensitization I mean the body can’t handle two opposite responses at the same time, okay? So now if I use a technique such as Meditation, or one of the things I use is biofeedback, in which you monitor the person’s physiology, feed that information back to them so they can learn to get that physiology under their control.
So they can learn to turn down the activation of their nervous system, literally.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: So now I train them to come down that continuum of activation, and when they’re at a deep place of calm. I introduce, or have them [00:17:00] introduce, some of the stressful situations that they still react to. Now, I’ll have them create a hierarchy, and then we’ll take the least problematic, of the hierarchy and start there.
So they’re, they’re in the state of calm and now they bring in the image of something stressful, but because they’re at this place of calm, what happens is through this process, the brain is able to take these memories, you know, we can say are sort of sitting on the desktop and transfer, transfer them into their, hard drive into their deeper memory so they’re not so reactive.
And we can gradually work our way up this hierarchy. So that’s what I do for post traumatic stress disorder, as well as other, you know, difficult situations that people have. [00:18:00] But the Part B answer, which is a more general answer to this, is to realize that these conditioned effects are literally in our neural networks. That’s what, that’s what happens with conditioning. We have representations of them in our neural networks. So we realize on the one hand that that’s powerful, but the good news is what else is powerful is neuroplasticity and neuroplasticity is our brain’s ability to literally rewire themselves with appropriate intention.
Focus and training. And so anytime you have a bad, a pattern that doesn’t serve you, you want to identify a pattern that would serve you and gradually practice that new pattern and hold the intention of doing it. But [00:19:00] to, for it to work, it has to be ongoing, consistent, and to practice.
Scott DeLuzio: So, eventually, that uh, reaction that you would have to whatever you, whatever that stimulus was, or the, the trigger was, eventually that gets replaced with something better. Something in, in your words that, that serves you, uh, is, is kind of what you’re talking about, right?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yes, it’s a, it’s a long process. And the more. impactful the, the lesson and the conditioning, the longer it will take. And it’s a gradual process. It starts by the event having gradually less and less of a reactive response. Even though the memory and the recollection and the emotional reaction is still there, but it’s a gradual, you keep, [00:20:00] when that happens, you keep going over to the healthy response, which might be, okay, I’m in a different environment, it’s a much more safe environment, I don’t have to react like that, I could react in this way, and so you’re beginning to literally rewire the brain.
Scott DeLuzio: It’s, it’s amazing how the brain works and how it, it can be rewired in that way, um, Some of those, those run deep, um, you know, especially with how, uh, dangerous the situation might have been and, um, that might just be, uh, you know, for lack of better words, like, that memory has got its heels dug in, uh, to your brain and, uh, it, it doesn’t want to move.
But With time and consistent effort, and, um, I’d imagine, uh, the recommendation is to do, do this with, uh, under the supervision of a [00:21:00] therapist of some sort, uh, who, who’s able, who’s trained in this, uh, to be able to help with this, um, but with time, you, you can, you can start to reverse some of that,
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yeah, you can, and another one of the keys to the process, which is connected to my fifth pillar of resilience, is mental balance and mastery, and in this case it begins with the, with the notion of a growth mindset. A growth mindset means whatever I’m noticing about myself right now, I don’t have to be stuck here, I can find a way to grow out of it.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Okay, and combining that with a I’m going to do whatever it takes attitude. Okay, this is terrible. And right now it’s grabbing me and it’s got me, but I’m committed. to [00:22:00] doing whatever it takes to shift away from this pattern. So that plus a growth mindset facilitates, it literally helps to activate neuroplasticity.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, uh, because there are people who get stuck, and they, they don’t have what you described as the, that growth mindset, it’s maybe more of a, a victim mindset, or a, um, I’m trying to think of another word for it, but they get stuck in it. That place that they’re in and they, they can’t seem to get themselves unstuck.
But I guess part of it is, is that just the will to want to get unstuck, right?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yeah, now we have trauma, it actually [00:23:00] creates what we call the freeze response
Scott DeLuzio: Mm hmm,
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: and it, it actually leaves us less capable. of that growth mindset. So we have to acknowledge and recognize that that’s a piece of the puzzle.
Scott DeLuzio: right,
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: However, just like everything else, if you apply the growth mindset to how you’re stuck, you can shift out of that, but you have to have patience.
You can’t go like two days later and say, Oh, this isn’t working. It’s like, no, if you’re, if you’re following a process, The goal is to trust that eventually you’ll start to notice something shifting, but you know, it’s the, the, how long it takes is going to be different from one person to another.
Scott DeLuzio: yeah, and it probably depends, too, on how traumatic the, that, that initial response was or, or that [00:24:00] initial event was, um, and what that response was to it, um, but as, as you work your way into it, you’re, it’s kind of like a, that you dug yourself. And now you’re at the bottom of this hole and you’re, every time you’re, you’re working on it intentionally and, and, and trying to get, uh, better with that growth mindset, it’s like you’re taking one step up the ladder, uh, on your way out of that hole, right?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yes, and, and I’m glad you used that illustration of digging a hole, because in many of these cases, it’s not that we dug the hole, we fell into a
Scott DeLuzio: Sure.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: right? Right. A lot of times we judge ourselves because we’re not getting out of the hole fast enough. We’re not doing the right thing. And so here, the other piece that’s so important is to be loving and accepting with yourself instead of [00:25:00] critical and judgmental.
This is my first pillar of resilience, our relationship with ourselves. And when you’re going through this process. You want to come from a place of compassion towards yourself, not judgment. You want to come from a place of acceptance, not I should have done better. And you want to give yourself time and patience.
Those are key ingredients in a loving and healthy relationship with yourself that will facilitate the process.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, absolutely. Um, because if you’re, yeah, if you’re not, uh, you’re not, uh, you’re not You know, comfortable with that. Um, you know, you’re, you’re going to be hard pressed to, to find a reason to want to overcome this, I would think. Um, you know, and for some people, the stress and the idea of overcoming the stress and, and changing the [00:26:00] way you respond to things, uh, it, It’s a little bit overwhelming, uh, to some people because, uh, and I, and I can understand this because if you think about the response that you had to a really traumatic event, so let’s say, you know, there was a explosion that potentially could have injured or killed you or, you know, in, you know, something happened, right?
And Your response was to duck and cover and and you know, whatever it was that you did That’s the response that you had and that’s what kept you alive. That’s what kept you safe. That was the successful outcome That you were talking about earlier Why would you want to turn that off in some people’s heads? It’s like, I need that because if that should happen again, I want to keep that, uh, I want to keep that tool in my toolbox. Um, and so, you know, this, this whole idea of [00:27:00] like, let’s change that mindset and everything could be kind of overwhelming.
How do you help people get beyond that feeling of overwhelm with this?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: it reminded me of a client I had who was a very well known comedian. And so he was coming to me because of all his neuroses. we realized in the middle of working with him that he was very resistant to the healing process. And when we got down to it, he was afraid that if he got healthy and norm, normal, he won’t be funny anymore.
Scott DeLuzio: Oh, I could see that. Yeah.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: so what you’re saying is, is relevant because we can feel like I don’t want to lose my edge. And so we have to realize that the goal isn’t going from this mindset [00:28:00] over to this mindset where you’re just relaxed all the time. The goal is to expand. and include this more calm mindset because we always have the capability, the flexibility of shifting back into this when it’s required, when we need to.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: But the other issue about overwhelmed is, is Another way of thinking about it, which is so relevant. So a lot of the, what happens with people is they think, Oh, to be more resilient, I have to do this. I have to do that. It’s like the patient that goes to the doctor and the doctor says, well, you have to get more sleep and you have to stop drinking and you have to get more exercise.
And patient walks out saying, I got to get a different doctor. And so, One of the ways that I address this in my book, [00:29:00] which is so important because we see the goal as being so far down the road, where there’s so much that needs to be done, is I talk to people about this notion of the path. And the path is alongside us every moment of every day. And the path is defined by By my nine pillars of resilience, and so in my book, I guide people today, right at this moment, if you do a couple of steps based on my model, that puts you on the path, and then once you’re on the path, you’ve succeeded for today. You’ve achieved success because that path is going to take you to greater and greater resilience.
And therefore, all you need to do is get onto the path and you can always take a few steps that put you on the path. And people feel such a sense of [00:30:00] relief knowing that it’s so simple to get onto the path and that being on the path is the goal. And it’ll take us where we need to go. So it’s how I address this notion.
which we all experience of overwhelm about how much stress we have in our day in our lives.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. And it’s, it seems like it’s, it’s just take one step at a time, um, with, with that. Right. As opposed to like, you were saying the doctor, Oh, you have to get more sleep and you have to eat better and you have to exercise and you have to do this, that, and the other, and it gives you 20 things to do. And it’s like, yeah, I’m going to find time for that.
You know, that’s just not going to happen, but you take small, small chunks, uh, you know, bite sized chunks and, and you. You apply them and you do. So just doing that, that one first step, getting on the path and, and that will, that’s good enough for today. We don’t need to pile on 30 other things [00:31:00] that you need to be doing.
You, you got on the path that, that is, that’s good enough. A success for today, and tomorrow will be another day. We have other things that we can worry about tomorrow. Um, but then tomorrow, continuously doing the work and, and progressing, um, you move down that path to, you know, a better place. And, um, and I like the thing that you said earlier about, um, how we expand our, um, our capabilities, right?
So it’s not like you’re losing the ability to react to a dangerous situation. That, that’ll, that’ll kick back in, in a fraction of a second. If there truly is a dangerous situation, you’ll know what to do. It’s not like you’re going to forget. Um, it’s probably more ingrained than, uh, you know, the, It’s like riding a bike kind of thing.
It’s probably even more ingrained than that. Um, where if you need it, it’s [00:32:00] there, you’ll have it. Now you got to learn this other skill of how do you react to something that trigger stimulus, um, when it’s not a dangerous situation and you, and you know, it’s, it’s not a dangerous situation, you know, uh, You know, some box drops in the grocery store, you know, the guy’s putting stuff on the shelf and a box drops It makes loud noise.
Well, chances are you’re not coming under fire in the grocery store. Just, you know, depending Well, maybe depending on where you live, you never know But you know in all seriousness Chances are you’re gonna be just fine. You’re gonna go in that grocery store. You’re gonna get your stuff You can go pay and leave and you’re gonna be fine.
And It’s really just, I guess, the way you’re saying, just kind of rewiring the way your brain reacts to those types of things, uh, given the situation, right?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yeah. You know, I want to say something else here that’s so important. It’s related to my fourth pillar, which is [00:33:00] physical balance and mastery. And it’s important to realize that if you are, um, hypervigilant, Or reactive as we’re talking about. There is an additional cost to that. Okay. So we all have a limited amount of personal energy. Our bodies are like factories producing energy for everything that we do in life. Out in the world, but also internally. In other words, we need energy to send to our kidneys so that it appropriately filters our blood to help our blood stay in its best condition. You know, a study was done in which a high stress and low stress group were given 10 centimeter incisions in their [00:34:00] skin.
This is an old study, you can’t do it these days. But the high stress group took twice as long for that. wound to heal. And so stress, uh, produces our, our bodies want to go into defend and protect the fight or flight response in which we’re using our resources to prepare for, for fight or flight. And that uses up precious energy that needs to be recovered.
which is why we have to keep the nervous system in a place of balance between the stress component sympathetic and the recovery component parasympathetic. all of us spend much more time with stresses in our lives than safety, recovery. So we have to hold the intention to find time to go into [00:35:00] that recovery mode at night, in the evening, when we sleep, but even throughout the day, but like when we sit down for a meal, we want to say, okay, right now, while I’m eating, I’m safe.
I can relax, which by the way, will help your digestion.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, I was actually going to say, it’s got to have an effect on a whole host of different things in your body. Um, you mentioned digestion as just one of those things, but, um, going back to the concept of our bodies are like a factory of energy and there’s only so much energy. And, um, a lot of times when you’re feeling like you’re low on energy, that’s when you start.
snacking on junk food. They give you that quick boost of energy and that’s not good for you. And so that leads to other health issues. And, um, you know, just that stress is so important to, to be able to have that under control because it [00:36:00] could lead to so many other things like you were talking about and, and it could just make, uh, make things so much worse.
And I know now, now people are like, Oh, great. Now you gave me something else to stress about, but, you know, um, but seriously, it’s, it’s, uh, You know, something that you should, should consider and, and when you’re, you’re looking at this, like, uh, gee, I don’t know if I, I really, uh, want to put that time, time and energy into it.
It’s, it, it is that important. You, you really should, uh, consider, uh, Getting that kind of under control. Um, now, uh, what are some maybe practical strategies or techniques that, that people can use to help develop the resilience in, uh, you know, in their day to day lives?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: So let’s just take what this topic we’re talking about right now. our personal energy. So you want to hold the intention [00:37:00] as a regular tool, how you start your day, how you think throughout the day. Am I keeping my, the two branches of my nervous system in balance? And for most of us, in order to do that, we need to practice some form of of relaxation, meditation, biofeedback, something that activates the recovery branch of our nervous system. happen on its own and if you think that every time we engage in stress we activate and then we activate for the next stress and the next stress we can see that very quickly in our day we’ve stretched the resources of our body. And so it’s important throughout the day to find these, what I refer to as zones of safety, 10 minutes, even five [00:38:00] minutes where we can say, okay, for five minutes, let me just breathe and relax.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: And let me just turn everything off for five minutes. so that I retrain my body to go deeper into this, this continuum of activation. We’re training it up all the time. I need to find times where I train it down. So that’s, that’s at the very heart of staying in a place of balance. The second,
Scott DeLuzio: oh, go ahead.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: the second key has to do with our relationship with ourself.
And here it’s important to start noticing the messages we give to ourself, what our inner voice is saying, and be aware and notice how we can be critical with ourselves, negative with ourselves, judgmental with ourselves, punitive with ourselves, okay? [00:39:00] All of those things create additional stress and tension. And so I like to say that any time that you’re upset, in your life is you can probably trace it back to some negative message that you’re giving yourself either about yourself or let for example you’re going into a room with a group of people your voice may be saying be careful don’t make a mistake or you know you may say the wrong thing or people are going to judge you all of those are messages that create unnecessary tension so here’s the key Here’s the way to address that. I like to identify the qualities of a healthy internal voice, or I like to use the word internal parent. Those qualities are coming from a place of love, compassion, acceptance, [00:40:00] support, care, and joy. That’s the model. That’s the model of a healthy internal parent that we all would have loved to have growing up with. Well, whether you did or didn’t have that growing up, you can give it to yourself now. And so the process is when you’re upset, notice the negative message, or even when you’re not, notice the negative messages and you go, No, this doesn’t serve me. Let me come over to here and listen to what my healthy internal parent would say to me, coming from those qualities. And that is probably one of the most effective approaches. Again, it’s a retraining, a relearning, a rewiring, but if you hold the intention and stay persistent with that, you will literally shift your relationship with yourself.[00:41:00]
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah. Sometimes I, I find people that I talk to, uh, who, you know, They, they’re like, yeah, that, that internal voice just beats me up, you know? Um, and if you think about it, that, that internal voice, if, say you had a friend who was going through the same exact scenario that you’re going through. Would you say the things that that internal voice is telling you?
Would you say that to your friend? You know, 99 percent of the time, no, you’re not going to say that to your friend because the friend would be like, man, you’re a jerk. Like, don’t, like, I don’t need this kind of, kind of help. Like, that’s not helpful at all. And, and so it’s like, so if you wouldn’t say it to your friend, why are you saying it to yourself?
And I get it, trust me, I get it, because I’ve, I’ve been there too, I’ve, I’ve had that [00:42:00] internal voice who’s said all that negative stuff, and I’m like, and I’m sitting there listening to it, and it’s not a great place to be, you know, logically speaking, it, you know, why, why listen to it, you know, just don’t give it, don’t give it the time of day, and, and like you said, these thoughts aren’t serving me.
So I’m gonna replace it with something that that does serve me. What what are my goals? What are my objectives in life? And you know, you’re you’re maybe it’s your career. Maybe it’s in your family Maybe it’s you know, whatever it is that you have going on You know, like is this helping me achieve that goal?
Is this gonna get me closer by constantly being Beating myself up and knocking myself down or, uh, you know, all these other things that you might do or, um, you know, ducking for cover every time a dump truck dumps its stuff off, you know, none of that stuff is going to help you in, in those other areas. So, you know, why not replace that with something [00:43:00] else?
And that, um, that makes a lot of sense.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: yeah, so you have to have a rationale and a process. So what I say is the process is to de legitimize that voice.
Scott DeLuzio: Uh,
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: And the way to de legitimize that voice is number one, is to realize that it’s not part of your DNA. You weren’t born with it. You learned that in your childhood environment. The next is to realize, is to be able to say that, was my childhood environment the optimal environment to grow up in?
And no one can say yes to that, okay? No one can. And so the next is, well, If I wasn’t born with this and these are lessons that were given to me that I didn’t decide on, I didn’t determine, let me put a stop to them and let me [00:44:00] figure out what are the best lessons. And that’s when you could say no to that, this doesn’t serve me, let me come over to this healthy voice. Which is the optimal, which is the way I would’ve been, would’ve loved to have been raised. And let me start speaking from that voice, and I think your example that you gave a moment ago was really very useful because when you said, you know what, what I, if I said this to, to a friend, by doing that, what you’re doing is you’re taking it from the subjective to the objective. In other words, we’re subjective about ourselves. But we can be more objective when it comes to friends or our children, where we don’t get caught up in these messages of childhood. So, that’s a use, could be a useful tool. What would I say to a friend? Or [00:45:00] if I make a mistake and I’m beating myself up, if my friend came to me having made that same mistake, what would I say to him or her?
And we would be much more loving and caring and accepting. So these are all useful tools to begin shifting that internal voice.
Scott DeLuzio: Now on the, on the topic of, um, You know, talking about friends and, and maybe children or a spouse or, you know, other relationships. There’s, there’s some social support networks and maybe even community type networks that, um, you know, that have an impact on, uh, an individual’s resilience, right? Um, you know, how can, how can these people develop these support networks to, uh, kind of help people?
improve their resilience, and maybe even the resilience of the other folks who are involved in these these [00:46:00] networks.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Well, this has to do with two other pillars of my model. My second pillar. is relationship with others. And my third pillar is relationship with something greater. So let’s start with relationship with others. We’re just talking about the optimal way of treating ourselves, coming from that loving place and not being critical or negative.
Well, that should be guidelines in terms of the relationships that we establish. and the relationships that we spend our time in, where we eliminate or minimize relationships where the other person is critical or judgmental or in competition with us, uh, and look more for relationships that are loving, relationships in which we feel safe and can let down our guard, because when we’re in a healthy, [00:47:00] loving relationship and we can let down our guard, what we get from the other person is emotional nourishment, and that’s just as good as good food. with something greater, and this is how we connect to the larger community. And here it could be spirituality, uh, it could be finding meaning and purpose in our lives that give, uh, gives us a bigger horizon to our lives and that connects us to community. And there, it could be participating and being a member of a group that has the same positive, loving, supportive, Um, direction, and it’s giving service, which helps us give back, but connects us to the larger community so we don’t feel alone or isolated.
We feel supported. And if you look at all the so called [00:48:00] blue zones around the world, communities around the world that have the highest longevity, community relationship is a key component of their longevity. And so we can take a lesson from that and look for that in our own lives.
Scott DeLuzio: Interesting. Yeah, and I feel like that that does make sense because when you have something bigger than yourself to to either serve, maybe it’s in a volunteer capacity, maybe it’s, it’s just the, the community that you live in. It’s just something bigger than yourself. You talked about spirituality and religion and stuff that that’s certainly something bigger than yourself.
Service to your country or your community or whatever. That’s, that’s something bigger than yourself. It gives you something [00:49:00] to work towards, uh, you know, it gives you something to, um, get out of bed in the morning and be like, I, I need to get better so I can be better, I can show up better for those people, I, I can be the best fill in the blank, whatever it is for those people, I can be the best podcast.
One of those things, uh, for those people, um, you know, just taking it to a military context, uh, I’m gonna get out of bed, I’m gonna go do my exercise, and I’m gonna, uh, go do my training, and all that stuff, uh, in the military, because I want to be the best soldier that I could be, so I, I can serve my country in the best way possible.
Um, you know, if, if you’re, um, You know, spirituality, um, you know, I want to have the, uh, uh, uh, close relationship with, uh, with God, with whatever your religion happens to be, you know, I, I want to be the best that I can be, uh, you know, with that. And so that gives you something bigger to work towards, um, and, uh, I can [00:50:00] definitely see how that, that, uh, Impacts the longevity of those, those people who have more of that community connection.
Um, because in addition to helping the community by getting better, that person on an individual level is also getting better. And that, you realize quickly the things that don’t serve you. in serving whatever that other, uh, bigger thing is. And you, you do work to get, not, not get rid of, but, um, make sure that they are not impacting you, uh, as, as much as, as they could be if you were in isolation, maybe.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Well, it’s also giving you opportunities to feel good about yourself.
Scott DeLuzio: Okay. Yeah. That’s a good, good
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: And that’s, that’s very important. My sixth pillar of resilience is emotional balance and mastery. [00:51:00] One of the keys to emotional balance and mastery is being able to go into a state of gratitude and love. And we actually know that when you’re in a state of gratitude, it actually supports optimal physiological functioning.
The balance that I was talking about are the two branches of your nervous system. So, With my fourth pillar, I was mentioning practicing some form of relaxation. If you incorporate into a practice of meditation or relaxation, going into and practicing gratitude, you are encouraging your nervous system to also go into this place of balance.
Scott DeLuzio: And all of these things, They may not be second nature to that person who is [00:52:00] in that high stress, um, you know, they’re, they’re, the muscle memory just isn’t there, if you will, right? They, it’s something like you said, you have to be intentional about this. You have to really be Uh, you know, focused on this is the thing I want to accomplish.
I want to, uh, focus on meditation or, or my, my gratitude or, you know, all these other things that we are talking about, you have to be, uh, in that position where you are, um, intentionally trying to achieve that, um, in, in your life
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yeah.
Scott DeLuzio: versus just, just happen to you. Like it’s, it’s not something that just happens, uh, the same way that, uh, the way you might’ve gotten yourself into that, you know, where, where maybe a traumatic event might’ve happened to you, no thought about it whatsoever.
And it happened and your body is now reacting to it. [00:53:00] Um, you, you’re going to have to do the work to get out,
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yeah. So, I mean, that’s why Michael Ovitz referred to this as a handbook for living your best life. Because a lot of this, most of this is not second nature to us, you need some guidance. And the way I’ve designed my book is to make it easy for people to take it step by step by step. So any morning you can open up the book to almost any page.
and read one page and it’ll give you one tool, one technique for you to pay attention to that day and get good at that. Next day you read another page that gives you another tool technique to follow for that day.
Scott DeLuzio: And I think, like you were saying earlier, that consistency is key, um, you know, think about anything that, um, that you do, [00:54:00] if you do it once or twice, uh, you know, you’re probably not going to be super proficient. Um, you know, even, even think, think about learning to play a sport or something, you know, whether it’s, you know, throwing a baseball or hitting a golf ball or, you know, something like that.
You go out and you practice once or twice, you’re not making it into the pros, you know, you’re not going to get there. Um, you know, if you, if you just practice on occasion here and there, um, might be fine if, if it’s just a casual hobby. that you have, but you’re not going to get proficient. And, and in this case, we’re looking for, uh, you know, people to, to get, uh, rather proficient in, in this so that they build that resilience within themselves.
And, and it does require practice. And, and we were saying earlier about that analogy about falling into a hole and then having to climb out. Um, that falling into a hole, it’s like that thing I was saying before that happened to you, that, that traumatic event, maybe that happened to you. Um, It’s really easy to [00:55:00] fall into a hole, um, that gravity does all the work, and, and it gets you into that hole, um, but it’s going to take a little bit more effort to climb your way out, and, and that, that’s why I, I really do like that analogy, I’m glad that you, you mentioned that, um, because, uh, because it, It does take more work to get out that way, um, than it does to get in, and so, you know, with any of this, it’s gonna take some work, um, but with all the tools that you outlined, and I know your book, um, has more, I obviously don’t want to give away everything from the book, I want people to go out and get a copy of it, but again, the book is the nine pillars of resilience, the proven path to master stress, Slow aging and increased vitality.
Um, so, uh, I do want to encourage folks to go out and get a copy of that book. Um, before we wrap up, uh, is there, there anything else that you’d like to share, uh, with the audience? Maybe, uh, where they can go to find out more [00:56:00] information, uh, about you or, or the book or anything like that?
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Yeah. I want to make two final points.
Scott DeLuzio: Yeah, sure. Please.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: thank you. The first one is we have to keep our eye on the benefits of what we’re talking about. That’s so important that we realize the benefits are staying healthy, less pain, less symptoms, less illness, slowing the aging process and increasing our health span, staying functional well into old age, those and performing at our best.
Those are the benefits of what we’re talking about. So that’s, that’s so important for all of us to realize. However this, we feel like this is a lot of work, what’s the alternative, right? Okay, so that’s number one. And number two, you know, what I’m making available to your audience is my resilience assessment booklet.[00:57:00]
That defines, that gives a definition and description of my nine pillars of resilience. But includes a questionnaire that everybody can take, self score, and derive their personal resilience profile, showing the areas of their strength and areas that they need greater work on. So that’s an amazingly useful tool as a starting point.
Scott DeLuzio: Great. Um, thank you. And you’re right, uh, it takes a lot of work, um, but, but like you said, you know, consider the alternative, um, it also takes a lot of work, uh, to not age gracefully, let’s put it that way. Um, you know, so, so it takes, it does take a lot of work, you know, when, when those illnesses are constantly, uh, keeping you from the things that you want to be doing or the, the injuries or the other things that are happening.
Um, that take time. That takes a lot of work, too, to recover from all of [00:58:00] those things. So, imagine if you just didn’t have to, and you could, you can live life in a happy, healthy way, and, and deal with the stress effectively. So,
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Right. And that’s what we’re talking about.
Scott DeLuzio: perfect, exactly. So, I will have links for the listeners, uh, in the show notes to your book and, you know, other information, your social media, your website, and things like that for folks to, uh, you know, reach out and find out more information if they’re interested, um, uh, but it has been a pleasure, uh, talking with you today, uh, Dr.
Sideroff, and, uh, really looking forward to, uh, you know, hearing, uh, from the listeners what they, you know, They think of this and, uh, you know, what they’re taking away from it, uh, you know, when they, they get a copy of your book. So, uh, looking forward to that, um, and thank you again for taking the time to come on.
Dr. Stephen Sideroff: Thank you. It’s been my pleasure. [00:59:00] Thanks.
Scott DeLuzio: Thanks for listening to the Drive On Podcast. If you want to support the show, please check out Scott’s book, Surviving Son on Amazon. All of the sales from that book go directly back into this podcast and work to help veterans in need. You can also follow the Drive On Podcast on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and wherever you listen to podcasts.