Welcome to she persisted I'm your host Sadie Saxton a 19 year old from the Bay Area studying psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. She persisted is the Teen Mental Health podcast made for teenagers by a team in each episode. I'll bring you authentic accessible and relatable conversations about every aspect of mental Wellness. You can expect evidence-based, Tina, proof resources, coping skills, including lots of DBT,
insights and education. In each piece of content, you consume, she persisted Offers you a safe space to feel validated and understood in your struggle. While encouraging you to take ownership of your journey and build your life worth living. So let's Dive In. This week on she persisted they can start to feel so grim and hopeless. You think, oh my gosh, how do I
even get out of this? You know I can't even see the light but in working from a more strength based approach because idea of believing this possibility for you like let's go walk toward it and small ways every day. Like, I'm just marching forward toward a better future, at least I felt better about myself at least where I had some self-respect and I was falling through One. What I'd said I was going to do that is healing in and of itself. Hello.
Hello and welcome back to another episode of she persisted. I'm so excited because we are covering two topics that we haven't really discussed on the podcast before which are developmental psychology and positive psychology with an amazing expert in both Fields, dr. Sasha Heinz. So I'm so excited to dive into this conversation. If you're not familiar with dr. Hines, she is a developmental psychologist. Life coach and an expert in
psychology. And an expert in positive psychology lasting Behavior change and the science of getting unstuck in our coaching capacity. She teaches clients, the tools to change their lives for good. And she also received her ba from Harvard. Her PhD in developmental psychology from Columbia and her Master's in applied positive psychology from Pain go Quakers.
I love having pain professors and pain graduates on the podcast and dr. Hunt has both she served as a faculty member and got her Master's here, so excited for you guys to hear this conversation. And here, all for insight on developmental psychology, positive psychology. Help you can implement the tools and principles from each into your lives.
Some wisdom from her own mental health, journey and things that worked for her and things that she found helpful when she went through her own coaching Journey, which I loved hearing about. So, as always, if you like this week's episode, make sure to share it with a friend or family member, leave a review posted about it on social media, all of the things, it really does help support the podcast and things. As for listening, let's dive in. Well, thank you so much for
joining me today. Dr. Hines! I'm so excited to have you and she persisted. Hi Sadie. I'm so psyched to be here. So, I would love to hear about your background before we dive into all things, positive psychology, perfectionism, all of the things. But how did you start working?
And the positive psychology field which was a very new field when you did your training and then how you became a coach, rather than a psychotherapist or working in Clinical Psychology, which is the path that many people take the on, The answer is in total faceplant in my life, plus double lock, really? Honestly, that's how it happens. I had no intention of becoming a psychologist, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life at all. I had and I, you know, I went to
Penn for graduate school. I know you are kind now so I can imagine, you know, your colleagues and your friends at school pain is challenging. It's one of the top schools, right? It's hard to get in to I imagine like many of you guys, I had, you know, I just myopic focus on College. I wanted to get into the best college I could get into and was obsessed with this goal, but the truth was like, Beyond getting there. I had no idea what I was actually interested.
I was so kind of locked on this goal, and I was like, I have no idea who I am, what I want to do, what I'm interested in what I'm good at, you know, everything was always about and externally oriented goal. I wanted to accomplish something and so then I Contort myself to accomplish the goal, and learned a lot persistence grit. All these wonderful things I can grind it out. I can work really hard, that's all awesome, but I didn't really have a relationship with myself.
So I got to college. And it did not go very well and would not my happiest, four years of my life. And I left College, totally lost and moralized unhappy and and just feeling defeated in so many ways. And vowing, never to go back to school. Cool ever. Yeah and then I worked for a few years in New York. Still kind of not really knowing a word in production. I worked in advertising agency.
I just added a bunch of different things but nothing that really felt a calling or something that I really deeply wanted to do. And in this time of sort of feeling lost and struggling and I was struggling with an eating disorder and very open about that. I think not enough women. Talk about yeah, recovering from eating disorders. You know, people still talk about it like a shameful things. Like that's what I went through. Like the number of rows that struggle with body image issues
and body. Dysmorphia like, more people should be talking about it. Yeah, it was a symptom of a lot of things and it was just my system, kind of giving me a message of hey you got to heal some things, like you've got to pay attention, you know, it was like a very, very bright flashing, light an alarm going off.
So I was in 12-step program trying to work on the eating disorder and trying to get my life back together honestly because I was just a mess I was you know bulimic And just trying to get my life back into some relatively normal life. And I ended up finding this coach and this was early days. I mean, goodness gracious. I'm like a dinosaur compared to you guys, but this is 2000 in what to that was before. I was born. Okay, that is so crazy. Yeah, so 2002 like coaching was what?
What is this thing? Like coaching? It didn't really even exist, no one even knew really, what it was and it's woman. Her name is Caroline Miller and she had written. She'd also gone to Harvard. She was an athlete. So was I All of a sudden we had very similar, you know, parallel lives in so many ways and she had written a book about her recovery from her bulimia and in it on the dust jacket cover. It said she's a life coach in Bethesda, Maryland. And I was like, what is this
thing? So, you know, to make a longer story is somewhat shorter after hanging up on her. The first time I called her back was, like, I'm ready. So tired of this. I'm really ready to do the work. I'm not going to mess around, I'm not going to try to control it. Whatever you tell me to do, I'll do, I was just so desperate to heal and to change and to not be you know, in the throes of an addiction, it just was a
horrible way to live. So anyhow I worked with her and I loved it and I had seen therapist but it just it was the first time, you know what it was for me. It was like in therapy and I have had some fantastic therapist over my lifetime and I am such an advocate of people working with us skillful therapist unravel, some of their
own stuff. It's so important to have that particular relationship and Is but for me at that time and the people that I had been working with, I didn't really know who to see side to side with anyone. There was this aspect of therapy which was sort of like validating my messiness. Yeah, trust me. I needed it. I needed someone to be like, I know things are hard, I see you. It's okay. But there is this other part of
me is like I just need help. Like I need to live a day where i'm not mess and I'm breaking promises to myself every darn day. It was just awful and working with Caroline was the first time that she had kind of held me to a higher standard. She's like you're better than this. Let's do this. Are you in or you out? And I was like oh my gosh yeah it reminded me of my sports coaches who sometimes it'll start with me you know yes to hello. Come on Sasha I can do better than this.
You can work a little harder. It wasn't this feeling of being pressured or pushed. It was like someone was actually holding a vision of what was possible for me that I totally could believe in because she believed in it. And instead of me focusing on what wasn't working and how You play in the pit I was and just had no idea how to get out of it. She was like, if you just do what I tell you to do and just stay on this protocol with me and I will support you through it.
I promise you in six months or life will be totally different and she was right. That was the beginning of me getting really serious and joined a 12-step program and got a sponsor and simplified my life in many ways and so just focus on that. And it really did totally change my life. And just from working with her findings, Her and being in, just a complete place of Despair, that changed my life. And from that moment on, I wanted to be a coach. I love it.
What you're saying? I remember the exact same experience with more typical. Psycho talk therapy versus DBT. I remember, I had this therapist when I was at boarding school where I, what do I do and he would like what do you think you should do? I don't think that's not what you're supposed to say. You're supposed to tell me what to do. How would I know? I'm the one that got me into this mess. Where is in DB T? They tell you exactly what to
do, all of the time. Tell you what skill to use to get from point A to point B. And what skill to use when you're feeling overwhelmed and what skill to use if you're struggling with a self-harm merge or suicidal ideation. And I think, especially for people that struggle with that emotion regulation and know very well that they caught themselves into this mess. Having someone that can guide them through things and give them gills and advice, and
wisdom is so necessary. And so so, so helpful and getting to the other side. Totally. I think that what you're saying is interesting. When you were talking, I was like, I have not thought this before, but what you just said, made me think I'm thinking about it now. From a developmentalist perspective, which I am now developmental psychologist.
Yeah. Interestingly both types of therapy are effective and are necessary, but I think the critical thing is the order of operations because you wouldn't evolved into a self authored mindset yet which is a higher order developmental stage. It's so therapy. That's focused on. What do you think and is eliciting from the person? What's your opinion? How would you solve this problem and actually trying to help them be more self offered to orient? Their self-concept internally,
that's good. We want to get there but for a lot of people they haven't mastered the skills. Some what we call, socialize mindset of just sort of basic, how do we get along in society stuff? Which is really necessary. But yeah. Child and adult development. And so, it makes so much sense to me because I think that's exactly where I was to. I'm like I needed help in emerging adulthood just adulting, I needed the Dalton skills and how to take care of
myself and not treat myself. Like absolute garbage and I needed to learn how to do those things. So interesting. Because at that developmental stage, I really did need someone to sort of say, here's what you were going to do. And give me that confidence, that that she knew to help me in the same way that for you DBT offer. Out for you. And I think as I've gotten older, that approach is less appealing because I've evolved. Don't tell me what to do. I'm going to talk, you know, mentally.
I think that our task as we develop evolving, grow is to become more self bothered and to orient ourselves internally and to not be taking everybody to temperature like how do they do? It was okay. Yeah, do. Well, I do a lot of that work with my clients who are secretly like kind of feel secretly childish that I can't make a big decision about my life without asking 30 people. What? They think, and I'm like, oh my God, that's a developmental issue, they just haven't
learned. The skill sets yet of that sort of more stuff authored mindset. But I think that's true and I don't think that many people therapists are thinking about it from this perspective. Like, what is the treatment that this person needs given? Where they're at developmental? Like me, a fifteen-year-old like suicidally depressed. She thought she didn't deserve love. Should not be doing the internal look inside for the therapeutic Solutions but yeah, and it's definitely something I agree
with you. Now looking inwards. Really understanding where my values align and what relationships feel right and what decisions feel like they're at my highest good is something. Now that I really do enjoy and value and is important. As you get into that self authored, places you were talking about. But at some point you just not there and it's not effective to be trying to find the answers alone. Yeah, you just need. You need the guidance. You need the support. You need the guard rails.
You need to learn how to practice and so much of our mental health. And I'm not talking about like, Mental Health, Health, as opposed to mental illness. I'm talking to us like our thriving as human writ large, and managing our mind, is the skill set. And nobody talks about it like that. We talk about it, like you just won the genetic lottery, or you didn't, or you won the trauma lottery, or you didn't, you didn't have these horrible things happen to you.
So you're okay, or you had amazing parents who maybe were more securely attached. And so you have an easier time with your anxiety and rumination and all those things. And so we sort of talked about in this as, if it's this, like, you either, got lucky and you didn't in some coffee. It's not true. It really is like anything else. There is a genetic Factor, right? This epigenetics is gene-environment interaction sure. Genetics play A Part.
Sure. Your environment plays A Part, as well, they interact together and you have a lot of autonomy and in the same way that someone who's never run a marathon before, can learn how to run a marathon, or someone who's never Ever picked up a tennis racket. You can learn how to swing a forehand. The same thing is true with our mental Fitness that we can become much more skillful in managing our mind, we can become much more flexible in tolerating
are challenging emotions. We can be much more resilient in the face of disappointment and all this and we can learn how to deal with all of the resistance to taking action in a more. Skillful way we can absolutely learn to do these things. There's not just like you won some Lottery. Yeah. What skills that you learned during that initial coaching period with Caroline and then completely turning your life around?
Pulling yourself out of that Rock Bottom, do you still utilize today to maintain that mental Fitness and progress that you made? It's so funny. I happen to be going through kind of a tough but, you know, just in my own life, like, I had to make a really hard decision, and hopefully was so emotional for me, and so hard, and I felt so raw and I'm married. Now, I have two kids and my husbands really supportive of me.
I've known him for 20 years, you know, I met him when I was still very messy and you sort of been through this whole journey with me and I was seeing him like a she don't I feel in some way like just as raw as they did back. When I was graduating from college, is feeling completely unraveled, but I have different skills.
Now, to deal with it, right? And I've been through that, like, it doesn't scare me in the same way, but I think one of the things I said to him was like, okay, I know exactly what to do, go back to basics. Yeah, there's going to be six, you know, I mean, simple, simple things like Taking care of myself and my exercising. Am I eating? Well am I sleeping a reasonable amount? Amaya prioritizing time to be outside.
I'm making sure that you know I am spending time with people that feel really supportive and loving am. I letting them know kind of where I'm at? Like hey yeah, no problem going back to those really basic things that do just make an enormous difference to just
feeling better. So at least, You feel like you're on Terra Firma and then you can weather the storm, you know, it's okay, you can you can get through it, but I do think that that's something I learned, you know, with working with Caroline all those years ago, was my life is so chaotic, any addict, their life is so chaotic, like it's just such a mess, it's just messiness all over the place and so it was just an exercise of cleaning things up and doing like the next right? Thing?
You know, and Back to Basics, like am I following my food protocol? Am I going to bed on time? Just that kind of my making sure that I'm getting some sunshine and exercise like, it really was just simplifying things. Yeah, I think the biggest difference for me that I've identified is the coping skills that I use. Now, when I have having a rough day or a rough couple of days or wrath moment, they're either keeping me in the same place mental health wise, they're making me feel a little bit
better. Whereas the coping skills I used to use, would put me like six steps backwards and be like, leaning on a codependent relationship, self-harming suicide, attempts engaging in suicidal. Creation, which just became a more condition pattern of coping strategy. In an extreme way never processing through an emotion. So just either just staying where you are not making things. Worse is a huge thing or if you can engaging in those habits that will make your life better
like getting enough sleep. Making sure that you're fueling your body, making sure you're getting outside, getting exercise. All of those things are simple. They are Basics, but they're so powerful and maintaining your mental health. Yeah. It's I think that what you said is, absolutely right. Which is you forget but the Reality is it's so much about what you don't do. Yeah. Yeah. Right.
I mean, I think when things still challenging often is about the choices that you're making, we were saying like, I'm not going to engage in that thing that I know is adding fuel to the fire. Yeah, on some level even though it, maybe give me momentary relief, choosing not to engage
in that. It's almost like it's more about weeding out and pruning out than it is about adding it like it's just sticking to these sort of basic things and saying like Okay this is not available for me right now. Now, yeah, it's like setting that boundary yourself and it doesn't have to be like, okay, I'm going to try one hour meditation or I am going to do a silent Retreat like, no need to do that the big job so effective and exhaustible exactly right?
I mean, it really is that basic, I think that's such a great Point. People thinking, oh, I need to go to some, I need to go to a yoga retreat or a meditation. Please. Do I need to do something drastic. It's like, no. Here are some few things you can do. Don't drink not drinking. Drinking is going to make your anxiety worse and it's not going to improve.
It will give you a momentary feeling of relief, and it will exacerbate things the next day or later, like, there's just the way it works anxiety and they talking about it on Tick, Tock to think, like, it will just add gasoline to your anxiety fire for sure. You know, it also will disrupt your sleep and things like that. So that whether it's any kind of substances that give you, sort of that momentary relief. I call it emotional novocaine. Like, it's just really about
staying away from you. Ocean and Advocate the things that will numb, that the challenging feelings momentarily. But end up exacerbating them because they allow you to kick it down the road and avoid it. And so the only way through anything is just by committing to it and recognizing like, this is what I'm going through. It's hard. And my only job is to like stick with the basic and say present with us.
Yeah. So talk to me about where positive psychology fits into all of this, was this something that you now look back and I like I was using these Suppose or you then realized how effective it was and started using it with your clients. After the fact, when I went to Penn, I wasn't working with clients. I was just purely going to graduate school, you know, to learn. But obviously I always say, it's me search, right? And I mean, I don't find me a
psychologist. Who's like, in this field on some level? It's not me search. I was I think that I loved this idea that I didn't have to constantly, sort of be rolling around in my own muck to get Clean like this idea that's absurd psychoanalysis like pulling apart all the things and then it just wasn't really working for me and it's emotionally exhausting also to just constantly be in that. Mmm.
Yeah you can start to feel so grim and hopeless, you think, oh my gosh, like how do I even get out of this? You know, I can't even see the light.
But in working from a more strength based approach is idea of believing this possibility for you like let's go walk toward it and small ways every day like I'm Marching forward toward a better future, at least I feel better about myself at least where I had some self-respect and I was following through on what I'd said I was going to do that is healing in and of itself. Right? Just the erosion for especially for people in addiction, like the erosion of their relationship with themselves.
Because every day, they break promises with himself every damn day. That's all they're doing. So in, you know, as you begin to rebuild that sense of trust with yourself like okay, It's you start to like yourself a little bit more. You start to feel a little bit better and what I found for me was it the more the better I felt about how I was showing up every day. The easier it was for me to actually do the healing work, I needed to do because I had a stronger foundation.
So I found that this counterintuitive thing happens which was the more I focused on what was working and what was right and just taking small actions to to just feel better. The easier it was for me to sort of to actually Like, okay, this is what happened. And this is, you know, how in some ways I was wounded or things fell apart, and was able to do some of that, like, I was able to handle the grief and
able to handle my feelings. It was just able to handle them better because I had a stronger Foundation from you start, you know, that develops. So, you know, I just encourage people that this idea that it has to be either one or the other, like, you've got to pick a lane, like that's complete nonsense. They can do them together. Think that both approaches Complement each other. So, well, today's episode is brought to you by teen
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She persisted again. That is teen counseling.com says, she persisted to find a therapist today. What are a couple ways that listeners can Implement positive psychology principles and their life? Is it like rewiring a thought pattern is it certain behaviors that you're engaging in? You talked about working to not break those promises with yourself. How do Recommend that people begin to implement these practices. That's a great question. How do we begin to implement these practices?
One of the things I think that positive psychology, well, positive psychology to me, offered a totally different framework of thinking about mental health for me, so that I loved which was like oh we don't actually have to talk about ourselves through the lens of pathology. I can actually have a conversation about growth and development. That is you know, a high-level conversation about Optimal human functioning and growth and
development and well-being. That's outside of the context of what's not working disease, disorders functions, ethology. So that alone was really wonderful. And I think that one of the other things about positive psychology, sort of implicit in the field, is this idea that? I mean, there's a developmental psychologist. I'm looking at, you know, developmental arcs, right? So, but I think, with my positive psychology had on, I'm looking at the possibility of a positive are, right?
I'm like, I'm positive pivot. And I think that lens of always, sort of looking for like we, you know, how do we make something better? How do we help people thrive or how do we help people see things in a way that enhances their meaning or, you know, their relationships Etc?
That we're always looking at something through that lens of like, instead of mitigating Armada, getting a weakness mitigating, some kind of wound, it's actually looking at enhancing strengths and so that approach alone is just more fun. It is just More fun, it really is like one of the reasons and there's been some interesting studies.
Acacia Park said she was actually a getting her doctorate at Penn. Wait, Avalon was like, 2005, but they were doing she, and Marty Seligman did a study looking at.
It was called something positive Psychotherapy, and they had different treatment groups in one of them was a positive psychology intervention, treatment group is where the group of clinically depressed people and they had a really good outcomes with the positive psychology intervention and and one of the highwomen How does this was? Well, it's just more fun and people engage what they wanted to do it more. Yeah, I am. You're giving someone who feels a sense of hopelessness.
A sense of hope. Right? It's like it life and I think that was it for me. This feeling of like this isn't it? Life can get so much better. Yeah. And that little flicker of light is what gave me the motivation to go for it. You have to have that, you have to see it. You had to see the possibility and Rick Snyder, hope researcher called This Way power, right? You have to see that. That it's possible for you to overcome these obstacles, if you don't think it's possible, why
bother 100%? I remember, every single time I did DBT, did a lot of times, the last one was, when it really stuck. The first thing that they do is ask you about your life worth living. And for me, and so many other patients, that's not even something that they fathomed. This idea of living a life where again it is worth living where suicide isn't a question where you have things you look forward to people aren't thinking about
that. I was reading, I don't know if you've read lost connections by Johann Hari, but he talks about how When people are really depressed, they lose the sense of the future. They did a study where they asked adolescents that were highly emotionally.
Distressed one group was individuals that were struggling with anorexia and one group was individuals that were struggling with depression and they were reading like a comic book, they're watching the comic and asking, like, how does this character feel 10 years from now and the kids that were struggling with anorexia? Who were deeply, emotionally distressed, we're able to say, oh well, he probably feels this way, or this is the context and the kids that were struggling
with depression. We're not even able to explain that or fathom it or try and contemplate what that would be like because they were so focused on like the emotional distress in the present and that sense the future was just completely gone. And I think that's something that's really true for people that are struggling with depression and anxiety and all these things that you lose that sense of hope you lose that sense of the future. And so DBT, they always start with that.
What is your life worth living like, get really detailed about it? What are your relationships that are in your life? How do you feel in those relationships? What behaviors, do you engage in? How do you feel when you wake up in the The morning, what is your schedule look like? So you have a goal that you're pursuing and you have something that you're working towards when you learn all these skills and when you do all this work because that's not always clear.
And I think people just think like, oh, people are aiming to not be depressed or not, be anxious or not, be struggling. I'm for me, that wasn't even a goal. I thought was possible. I thought that I was meant to be depressed for the rest of my life and so maybe I was learning the skills, but what was the point? Because there wasn't another side. And so I love that concept of providing that hope.
And really making that positive trajectory transparent with the client with the patient because it's something that's so lost and forgotten about for so many definitely. And I think the other thing that causes psychology has done, which has been really important in often I think overlooked is because it gets a lot of flack for. So it's happy ology, especially in what we call business, as usual psychology and I say that from being on both sides of the
aisle. But I think one of the things that pause psychology has offered is a much broader a much richer. Understanding of what well-being actually is, it's not just, oh, I'm happy, it is a whole host of things that it's about. Meaning it's about the quality of your relationships. It's about positive effect, but it's not just Joy. It's also curiosity Amusement piece. Hope like there's so many other positive emotions to explore outside of just feeling happy.
Yeah, yeah, right. Understanding the role of setting a goal achievement having a dream taking steps towards that, and then also engagement in flow and the role of what we call Peak Human Experience in a life, well-lived or someone that self-reports very high. And so, and life satisfaction is there deeply engaged in flow activities? So it's just given us a much
richer. Understanding of what well-being actually is. And I think that has been enormously helpful in the work, I do with my clients because I think that people feel Like I just didn't get that happy gene or whatever. It's like who cares there are so many other avenues towards a meaningful, Rich, wonderful, adventurous life and it doesn't necessarily have to do with your own temperament, you know. Yeah, I love that. Especially because for so many people, the goal is being happy,
the coal stop being sad. But if you are so far from that goal and it feels so unattainable to not have that broken down into having these passions and feeling like everyday. You have Level of satisfaction and feeling emotions Beyond just Joy or quote unquote happiness. I think that is very motivating and gives a lot of hope to get a lot more clear on this abstract thing that is being happy and it makes it a lot easier, not even easier.
But for me, someone who hates and certainty, it feels a lot better to be able to have these goals that you're working towards rather, than this abstract thing being like, I want to engage in Hobbies, I don't know. Five out of seven days a week or I want to communicate and be connected. And relationships that make me feel supported every day, whether that's a text or an email, those goals feel so much more achievable, and attainable than this like abstract. Oh, I'm going to try and be
happy. Exactly. I mean, happiness is something that it's sort of a byproduct. It's not, it's not the goal itself, it's the byproduct of the journey and I think more. So, you know, the goal I love Barbara, frederickson's research on positive emotions but you know she talks about love as being the master of positive emotion and heard understanding. And definition of Love Is That we are experiencing love. Anytime we're sharing a positive
emotion with someone. We're experiencing love so you and I geeking out about this topic, which we love so much. We're both interested in it, right? We're both at deeply engaged in this conversation. We're having a moment of Love Like that's what this is. My neurons are firing and mirroring yours. Like that's what's happening. Biologically, even though we're on Zoom same, it's still happening happen over the phone. I think that really to me is the goal.
It's like, can we can we amplify the amount of Love that we experience in our life and I mean that broadly like sharing an interest sharing curiosity sharing a moment of awe like going to a football game and everyone whatever singing together that's all doing the wave, it doesn't have to be done in a religious context, sharing a moment of Joy, sharing a moment of comfort of care, compassion, whatever it is.
That's experience of love. It love is truly ubiquitous it's available all over the place for all of us all the time. And when thinking about like if my All is to enhance and amplify. The amount of love that I'm experiencing in life and feel that my life is Meaningful to me and a part of something bigger than me.
That my life is valuable to others in some capacity that my existence for this brief little blip on this planet matters and then I think like you're on your way to living a pretty amazing life. You know. It's really just like the word happiness is sort of made this also murky. I think positive psychology is done us. Absolute service and really making this so much more sophisticated the way that we talk about what well-being really is, you know, what is the
good life? How do we understand this? How do we think about it? Using the scientific method to question it? Poke holes ask questions all of the above but I think it gives you a totally different lens in which to think about this. It's not the sort of very in some way infantile dichotomy between like sad or happy. Yeah. Yeah and it's so much more nuanced. You mentioned happy. And positive psychology obviously has become quite the
buzz word and Buzz concept. What are some things that you wish people knew that you could debunk these myths that are floating around where you're like. This is just so not with positive psychology is we gotta stop talking about it this way. What are some things that come to mind? And boy I think there's still this lingering. It's really interesting. Why positive psychology has become such a lightning rod, it was from the beginning like the idea that we're studying Well,
being makes people angry. Yeah, 300 me, but it's so weird. Yeah. I mean, when I was at seriously, when I was at Columbia, I wrote a paper on a favor. The, by the way it was Journal article, you know, it was in one of these like handbooks or whatever it was a white paper that I'd written with a professor at the time. And it was on positive psychology and developmental
psychology. And I had, in my mind, been very balanced about the holes in positive psychology, from a developmental perspective and what like what it off Is what it doesn't, what? They focus on what they have and etcetera. So it to me, it was a fairly measured and balance. However, I remember, my professor was not a fan of the whole positive psychology world.
I would tell people Sotto voce that I had, I had a degree in positive psychology when I got to Columbia at for my doctorate but and by the way, I love the pain program is so phenomenal. And I've taught there and it's just, it's a really rich and wonderful learning is one of the richest learning environment
I've ever had. The fun of being a part of, but in any case, I wrote this article and the feedback from my professor was like you have to stop letting them tell you like what you believe you need to think for yourself. And that's why she was so upset that I didn't go this the rate them and that it wasn't a scathing review of positive psychology. And anyway, I ended up removing my knee, I wrote with her what she wanted, and then at the end
I said, I'm so sorry. But I'm going to remove my name from this because I don't believe what we're publishing. This is not What I believe in and she was so upset about this and it was such a funny reaction and I felt like that was always kind of dare this feeling of like you study happiness, and that's not important. What's important is truly, you know, people are suffering people have real problems and
you want to focus on optimizing. Someone's well-being like that is frivolous like, that really was the party line for sure. Definitely. If you know, in the same way, you know and I think this makes sense because like Psychology kind of grew out of in some way mimicking, the medical model same idea really? Curing cancer is more important than, you know, helping someone become me be more fit. I we have this hierarchy of what's more important, right?
What's, what is more urgent? And there's valid reasons for that. But it is so fascinating to me how agitated it made people that like people were actually interested in studying what makes life worth living like yeah. Like that's offensive it was so interesting. So Why people get so upset and then I find this other sort of bit so the lingering of that like that's been going on since what I really 2000s then I would say the newer version of that is is like oh I'll just toxic
positivity. Yeah right I take umbrage with this. Toxic positivity is not positivity. Its denial. Yeah, it's invalidation. I did an episode on that with a woman that wrote but it was called toxic positivity at the hospital Whitney good men. And she was like, no, it's It's not positivity, its invalidation. It's like an inability to feel these emotions to process them. It's distraction, it's a pressing these emotions. They're two different things. Right.
And so I haven't heard that term, it's invalidation, but that is exactly right. It's using the language of positivity, but it's a completely different Arena. Yeah. Maladaptive coping mechanism. That's what it is. So I get asked this a lot about what toxic positivity and like don't you think that we're all obsessed with me? Positive all the time. I like, oh, seriously, like take a look at the landscape. You think everyone's obsessed with being positive?
Like I think it's not really the opposite. Yeah. I think not like know, most people we have a negativity bias. At the way, our brains are wired. We attend to, you know, negative emotions are louder and stronger for a good reason. We have to offset that negativity bias with a higher ratio of positive emotions. Even people with clinical depression, feel more positive effect than that. Of effect truly.
So, you know, I think this is like gross reduction of the actual science, and it sort of makes positive psychology again. It's like trying to put us in this like Lindsay unimportant box and I'm like, I'm sorry. Yeah. What is more important than actually having a high-level conversation about what is the good life? How to get there? Like, Really Brave down? Making it clear? Accessible, is what we, just You know, Scholars theologians philosophers, great, thinkers
from time. Immemorial had been asking this question, right? I've been, you know, wrestling with this question. So I think it's deeply important and I love that. Some really brilliant mind are out there and and engaging in research that for the first time in a long time. And this is a real shift in like the late 90s and the early 2000s, where research dollars are actually being put into like let's study why? Do we have positive emotions. What's the point?
What do they do? Self-report is high in life satisfaction? What are they doing? That other people are not like these are critical questions, they're not unimportant, they're deeply important. So there's this sort of Hangover of, you know, you just want to focus on, you know, positivity and you don't want to tend to reality like no, no, you know, in the immortal words of Scott, Peck, mental health is a commitment to reality at all
costs. So, yeah, we are, we are Getting with the premise that to be well means that we have to live in reality nor actually attending to the demands of reality. Yeah, I just think about the number of tick tocks, we podcasts and articles. I see like these successful people are doing this or these top-earning people are doing this in their lives and it almost makes me think that like so many people do struggle to reach happiness or feel
satisfied, or feel successful. From a mental health perspective that it's almost like coming at it from a scientific lens and really breaking down how to get there. People are like, no. Oh I should have figured it out like no that can't be right because if it was that simple and straightforward than I would have already been able to do that and it's so interesting that that's the reaction.
I think it has something to do with people making the assumption that what people are trying to say is like I'm doing life better than you. Yeah, you know I'm living more more elevated or more evolved than you are and that is not the
point. In fact, if you actually you know engage with the literature and positive psychology, one thing that you will know very well is there are Big biases, and heuristics of the brain, and if you don't understand what they are, you can get yourself in big trouble, right? We have this rule of the brain, you know, this heuristic of hedonic adaptation, which is that the human brain, the human mind will adapt to the good, the bad, the ugly. Right? It will adapt.
We are adaptable. Which is awesome. Thank goodness, that we are right. It's amazing. The - hard things that we can adapt to and tolerate. And Continue to move forward with. And on the other side of that we also adapt to things being awesome. Okay. We need to understand this because if you don't understand this but you will be mystified by the fact that you keep achieving all of these things and yet you're still not happy. Why is that? Oh, because it becomes The New Normal.
It becomes not exciting anymore. Yeah, right. So you then you have to have strategies of like, okay, this is the way my brain operate. If there is a rule book for how my brain operates here, it is. Okay. Noted now can I knowing this very important fact about my brain? Can I come up with ways to manage this and one very useful way to manage. This is when I'm feeling down to moralize defeated whatever. You know what I use. I use my past self.
My past self is my absolute best friend because, you know, what, Sasha, ten years ago would say about Like the failure I'm feeling today, she would be like, oh my gosh, you're upset about this? Yeah, it's amazing. Look what you accomplished. I'm so proud of you. Yeah, truly the me 10 years ago, I'm wearing my pH, my friend made this for me, it says, pH done, but I would never gave it to me, but like that was a dream. Ten years ago, I was like in it. I was in my doctorate chewing
glass. Meringue, right? So my ten years ago self is like woman, your kids are awesome. Here's that you couldn't figure, you know, you glue the camp registration, you didn't get them into the camp, he wanted to get into which a feeling terrible, whatever. Right. Whatever the the drama of the day myself, 10 years ago is lycos please. Yeah, right. Like what you've done is incredible. So looking at the game and using my past self as that reference point of like she's so proud.
Oh my gosh. My 22 year old self is literally like, she's losing her mind. She can't believe what we've been able to do. None of this thing possible to her, right? So, but when I'm looking at, from the vantage, point of I'm now 43 and I'm and I'm in my 43 year-old self, I can get all in despair about all sorts of
stuff. If there was one thing, you wish, the general public knew from either your developmental psychology World positive psychology that you think, would be really beneficial to put things in perspective or just kind of Understand about how we function that most people aren't aware of what would it be? I think the other one that I wish that everyone really understood. Like, I mean, understood to the point where I was like yeah I you know it was I taught kindergarten every app on my
sandwich away. You understood things from day. One is what we call the availability heuristic which means that you are always going to reference yourself to the most proximal example. What do I mean by this? I mean that At this is like past self versus now self, right? You're always going to reference yourself according to your peer group. So as you become more, skillful at something, like, let's say, I'm not a musician at all, but let's say you're somewhere my brother and you don't.
And, you know, when you're little and you're in third grade and you're comparing yourself to like the other kids that are in your little teachers recital group, and then You know, you get pretty good and you then start playing in a local like children Symphony and then you move up to chair one and then and so on and so forth or first chair whatever it's called, okay? And as you become better and better and better guess what? So your peers.
Yeah because you get picked for some Elite thing and so did those other people. So you are no longer comparing yourself to like little Susie who was playing violin with you. In third grade that you are much more skillful, the violin that she is now. They are not comparing Stuff to her anymore. You're comparing yourself to the other first chair. So, as you increase your skill set in anything, your peer group, also increases its skill
set, that's the way it works. So you're never going to feel like you've arrived, you're never going to feel like you're good enough. You're never ever going to feel the kind of confidence that you think you will feel if you accomplish something. Wow, like you are always referencing yourself based on that group. So, if you just know this from the beginning, you know, And I remember the revealing story, I was at Penn for some meeting.
This is maybe five years ago or longer than that, but I already finished my doctorate and I was at a meeting at Penn. And there was like, amazing people, Angela Duckworth and Marty Seligman, and the number of other incredible Scholars. I'm sitting at the table and you know what? I'm feeling like a peanut. Yeah, I feel like a total key on compared to these guys and normally in an environment like
that I would be so jazzed. I'm learning so much and I mean, just listening to what they're working on, it would be so fun. Anyway, came home, my shoulders are slumped and I my husband's like, what's going on, why are you so down? But you were just with all these amazing people and I was like I'll never be as you know, researcher like Angela and my husband's like, oh my gosh, like seriously, he's like, I think you just finished a doctor at that just like pronounce that
you are an expert? Like yeah. But not like her. Right. So you know what I mean? And then you sort of have a moment where you're like, oh my gosh, shoulda had a V-8, right? That's what I'm doing. Is I'm making my comparison group, insane. The comparison group is like, is Angela Duckworth, right? It's so unrealistic. And, and she's such a phenomenal human being.
I just like really respect her so much, but it just goes to show that, you know, in my fantasy of like oh when you finish your doctor, you're going to feel really awesome. All the touch waiting with so many people that just finished their doctorates as well. Correct, that's right. All of a sudden you're like, nope, this is now New Normal. We've reached the Baseline. If you are still feeling like, you know, gosh my comparison group is so competitive or so
amazing, right? Yeah, that's a good thing. It means that you're growing and you're becoming more skillful and becoming in developing more Mastery and whatever Arena you're in and that's a wonderful thing. But you just have to own that it's not going to feel physically. So I'm going to emotionally feel as good as you imagined it was going to feel, but if you can manage your mind around it and recognize what's happening. Binet. You can look at it as a positive
thing. Like, oh my God, this is actually pretty exciting. Yeah. Yeah. But I wish everyone understood that this is really for all those of you listening. If you go look at online and just type silver, Medal winner phases, it's hilarious. But yeah, least. Happy person on the Olympic Podium is always the silver medalist. Why has the bronze medalist? Their reference group is the person that got fourth place that isn't on the Liam. You're like man looking pretty
good right now. I could have gotten no metal and forgotten for the rest of history but I'm going to be in the history books. I'm on the podium like yeah, sitting on the bronze medal at the Olympics. Okay, the silver medalist is not referencing. Like I beat the bronze medalist know they're thinking I missed out on the gold there. Proximal reference point is the gold medalist and so if you look at pictures of Olympic podiums you will see a pattern and it by and large the Silver metal is
always pissed. This is going to be a tick tock. This, I would have put pictures of all of them over this audio. I can't wait to look that up. That's so funny. So, you know, if you're feeling a little bit like that, right, you know, like it just never feels as good as you think. It's going to feel like you're right on track. Yeah, nothing's wrong. You know, I wish I think that's
really what I think. Positive psychology is given is it's like, it's offered a framework for normal developmental human challenges so that we don't have to put pologize. This like, it's not something wrong with you. You don't have a, some terrible imposter syndrome. It's like know, your brains operating the way your brain is supposed to operate. I love that. Your job is to develop a little bit of Mastery over this crazy toddler amazing.
And I've never heard that before about the availability heuristic, but it makes so much sense. And it's such a powerful thing to remind yourself of and to compare yourself to your previous self and put those things in perspective because it's something that is very easily. Forgotten totally. Yeah, Where can people continue to consume your content connect with you? I know you have a course, tell listeners where they can consume everything.
I am on Instagram at dr. Sasha Heinz odrs aasha, agin Z and my website. The same dr. Sasha heinens.com. My team and I are changing things up. And I'm really excited about we've been doing courses. Mind your mind courses, and changing things up. So, starting in October on October 1st mind, your mind is becoming a monthly or a membership Community, which I'm so excited about.
So, like sort of concept of a self development gem, a personal development, Jim a place to go to implement the work, to practice it, to learn the skills and and to practice them in real-time, to have adult study hall, have a body double to work with to a little extra support, to do hard things and to tackle things together. So, you don't feel so isolated and then tons of experts that are coming in to do. Ask me. Anything is on Variety of
topics. So I'm really excited about this new Endeavor that we're launching. It's really just fits what I've always wanted it to be, you know, we develop as human beings from Cradle to grave, it does end. So you know, having a community that you can always be a part of and you can make it more intense or less intense, you know, as your life can handle at any given time I think is really what it's what I've always wanted to create. So I'm so excited about that.
And then also asynchronous courses that also have That will be a part of the membership but you could buy or view or do all the cart as well. So yeah, this is very excited about it. Awesome. All of that will be in today's show notes. Thank you so much for joining me. This was just such an amazing and insightful conversation that I know. It's going to help so many listeners. Well I just want to applaud you so much. I have so much empathy.
I think you're brilliant. What you're doing is so not it's just not easy in college. I could barely talk about anything. Yeah, I was So ashamed of all of my struggles and I just think it's such a beautiful thing that you are so open and I love the way that you talk about it is like it's skill-building cuz you're absolutely right. And this is the way we should all be talking about it. There's nothing shameful about learning, how to manage your mind. Nobody teaches assist, you know?
Exactly. So I love what you're doing. Keep it up. Thank you, thank you. Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of she persisted. If you enjoyed, make sure to share with a friend or family. Family member, it really helps out the podcast and if you haven't already leave a review on Apple podcasts or Spotify, you can also make sure to follow along at at she persisted podcast on both Instagram and Tick-Tock and check out all the bonus resources content and
information on my website. She persisted podcast.com, thanks for supporting, keep persisting and I'll see you next week.