Grief Talk w/ Vonne Solis
As an Author, Angel Healing Practitioner and bereaved mom since 2005, through guest interviews and coaching, I share great content that is informative, inspiring and practical to help anyone who has suffered a loss, or other adversity, manage grief and heal. Topics focus on loss, grief advocacy, grief support, healing, personal growth and consciousness expansion for holistic wellbeing.
Grief Talk w/ Vonne Solis
Ep. 113 From Limbic to Sage Brain in Seconds: How to Shift and Build a More Joyful, Resilient Life
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
In this powerful kickoff to Season 7, returning guest Mitch Weisburgh reveals what’s really happening in your limbic or survivor brain and how to shift to the sage brain in seconds to reclaim clarity, control, and intentional living in every decision and moment of your life! ⚡
⏱️ Did you know that the limbic brain can generate 30–40 reactions in less than a second? That it's constantly scanning for threats that prime us to react to danger? To respond to situations and be resilient and joyful in all areas of our lives requires access to our Sage brain.
In this episode offered as a masterclass, you’ll learn practical skills and techniques of MindShifting to interrupt your survivor brain reactions and engage the prefrontal cortex to enjoy more clarity, creativity, and connection in your relationships and life. 🎯
The foundation of all great relationships, whether personal or professional is positive connection. Understanding how the brain works - especially in trauma and utilizing the techniques of MindShifting will help you sharpen your conflict resolution skills and elevate your skills related to decision-making, partnerships, leadership, parenting, personal growth and self-confidence.
In this masterclass Mitch unpacks: 🧠 💪🧘♀️
• understanding the Limbic brain’s role in our survival, cultural conflict and group mentality
• recognizing and managing limbic reactions in conflict
• the five styles of conflict (compete, accommodate, avoid, compromise, collaborate)
• the neurological and biological drivers of the limbic brain
• the Sage system and practical techniques working with the OODA Loop (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act)
• why stress hormones (cortisol and adrenaline) must settle before rational thinking can occur and the 5 powers of the Sage brain
• what happens in the Sage brain when happy hormones (DOSE) kick in to support higher-order thinking and emotional resilience
• How Vonne applies MindShifting tools in trauma when defaulting to survivor brain patterns
• the 5 types of situations that lead to conflict
• practical techniques to shift from Limbic to Sage in just seconds to be more resilient and joyful
⚖️ Join us in this jam-packed masterclass and learn how to shift from survival to intention, reactivity to wisdom, and conflict to collaboration using MindShifting tools starting today!
Your sage brain is available – starting now! 🌱
Link to Part 1 Ep. 108: "MindShifting for Success: How to Escape Survival Mode and Unlock Your True Potential"
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2021182/episodes/17939753
Connect with Mitch:
https://www.mindshiftingwithmitch.com
Connect with Vonne:
https://vonnesolis.com
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Vonne Solis 0:00
You say that the limbic brain can evaluate 30 to 40 different possible reactions in less than a second.
Mitch Weisburgh 0:07
Right.
Vonne Solis 0:08
Wow!
Mitch Weisburgh 0:08
Well, because the limbic brain is all about survival. So, it's got to be able to really quickly assess, you know, am I in danger? And it's primed to look for danger, right? And that's what happens when you're in trauma, also. It's primed to look for danger and then, like, what do I do? And then concentrate the whole organism on staying safe. And that could be fleeing, it could be fighting, it could be freezing. And because the first thing that it comes up with, it's going to rule out, but it's going to come up with something much quicker, which is get angry at a person, or get angry at yourself or blame or whatever. It's going to come up with that. And then you're thinking part of the, you know, we think of the thinking part of the brain, the sage brain, the prefrontal cortex.
Vonne Solis 0:57
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 0:57
Is like channelled and says, Well, okay, why is this the right thing to do? And it says, Well, I can answer that, and it'll come it comes up with a rationale. But it's really because your limbic brain has reacted to a situation, come up with what it's going to do, and then your rational brain comes up with a rationale for it.
Vonne Solis 1:15
This is the Grief Talk podcast with Vonne Solis, helping you heal after loss and life's hardest hits. Today's returning guest is Mitch Weisburgh. As an educator, author and speaker, in today's episode, Mitch shares practical techniques and strategies from his latest book, "Conflict and Collaboration MindShifting with Mitch Volume Three", to help you move out of survival brain into the sage brain system to shift your thinking and change your life. Blending cognitive science, lived experience and real world application, Mitch's MindShifting framework shows you how to break free from the thought patterns keeping you stuck, using practical skills to respond to life with greater clarity and start creating a more authentic life that is aligned with who you truly are.
Vonne Solis 2:04
Okay. So welcome to the show Mitch. I've done your introduction. Pop in and say hi to my audience.
Mitch Weisburgh 2:11
Well, Vonne, thank you for having me back. It's a pleasure to be back and looking forward to having another really interesting conversation.
Vonne Solis 2:20
Absolutely. So for my audience, we're going to get right to this. But this is a jam-packed episode, and I told you, Mitch, that I read your book on my holidays, just after Christmas, and so that, and so that tells you how good it was. And I'm not saying I'm the best critique, but it it's a really good book. I wanted to briefly just say to the audience. Mitch, I know that you kind of work with you're in thought, leadership, entrepreneurial stuff, leadership, coaching, business. Like I'm just really putting it in a large umbrella here, you don't traditionally work in grief. And do you in grief?
Mitch Weisburgh 2:59
No, no.
Vonne Solis 3:00
No, right.
Mitch Weisburgh 3:01
No I don't. I've taught in education, but that's, you know, people are grieving the status of the education system. But, you know, it's very different.
Vonne Solis 3:11
So, so for my audience, you might wonder, Well, why is the Grief Talk podcast hosting for a second time, Mitch? And that is because I do have a traumatized brain, and I do live with PTSD, which I am somewhat public about. And Mitch your work, along with some other tools and work I have done by participating in psychiatric clinics online for free, with the wonderful Bessel van der Kolk and other top notch psychiatrists, mostly in the States and Canada. And I've been fortunate enough enough to learn a lot since about 2018 participating in some of those free clinics and treating it myself, applying what I've learned there. What is PTSD? What is a traumatized brain, how it works, and so on and so forth. We do live in Survivor Brain 100%. Mitch, your work is all about about the brain. And I did point out this is Mitch's second visit. I will put a link to Mitch's first chat with me back I think it was last fall, so you can watch that audience and learn a little bit more about what MindShifting is. That one was more to do with what MindShifting really is. This one is taking us from the limbic i.e. Survivor Brain to Sage brain system or thinking or functioning and and I already put the tools to work Mitch as I was reading book.
Vonne Solis 4:39
And so I want to say I acknowledge that you are not a doctor. You, you and I talked the last time and said, both of us, you know, along with others and, you know, doing this kind of work, you know, teaching and sharing with others. We don't profess to be the experts in a lot of the information we're grabbing and taking and modifying to create our own bodies of work. And you're very open about that. So you've created MindShifting from numerous sources, resources, and it is fantastic. You come from an educating, educator-type background. So I see, and I told you that, like when I emailed you, that I feel the teacher in you, and it's very succinct, and you give great examples. So in the book, which I'm going to pop up on screen here for you folks, the the book is filled with tools and methods and examples and how you can apply what we're going to be talking about today in your everyday life. So please stick with me if you feel no, this isn't why I tuned into Grief Talk. I want to hear more about grief. No, this is fabulous for actually disciplining, I'm going to say disciplining the trauma brain. At least I found it for me, because in PTSD, with trauma, we always live in Survivor Brain. Always, always and unless you treat it and you can actually get rid of the condition, the disorder, which I have not simply because I have not gone for treatment for it. You know, you have to manage it. So everything we're going to be talking about today, Mitch, you can use in every area of your life. And that's what you say you wrote the book for was basically to just help people have a fabulous life. Create the life that they really, really want.
Vonne Solis 6:24
So with that, I invite anybody who is tuning into this via video or traditional podcasting app that please, please, please understand that what we're talking about today, it takes a long time really right, to incorporate this into your life. We're talking about the brain here. So anybody who loves stuff to do with the brain, we're going to, you know, really dissect that. What the limbic system is and what the sage system is, and how you can return yourself to Sage. Not necessarily stay in it and live in it, but as long as you know what sage is, there's no excuse to not discipline yourself to return to it, right? That's the key. That's the key for me. So with that audience and Mitch, I just want to briefly say what we're going to cover so my folks can stick around. So we're going to talk about the book, who it's for. I want to just touch a little bit on current and cultural conflict. We're going to actually talk about what conflict is, the different types, again, briefly, because you delve into it much, much more in your book. The neurological and biological drivers of the I think it's the limbic brain you're talking about there. Why? Why do we go into our survivor thinking, or actually can't even get out of it to be, you know, basically, is the better way of saying that. Psychological processes, processes around work, with regard to conflict. We're gonna talk about how to recognize the limbic brain, that when you're in it, you know, and and really what it feels like, and what it's like to actually be in Sage. And I want to be talking a little bit about the, I think you pronounce it OODA model?
Mitch Weisburgh 8:10
Right. OODA, O O D A, right.
Vonne Solis 8:13
O O D A model. We're gonna help talk about that. And last but not least, basically just tools to incorporate what I call an incredibly powerful mind shifting practice into our daily lives. And so what I'm trying to do is always remember, recognize when I'm in limbic and fall back on what I can do to get out of it within seconds. And we're going to talk about seconds here. So I also wanted to leave before I start with my first question, and leave the audience with this fun fact that you say that the limbic brain can evaluate 30 to 40 different possible reactions in less than a second.
Mitch Weisburgh 8:56
Right.
Vonne Solis 8:58
Wow.
Mitch Weisburgh 8:58
Well, because the Limbic brain is all about survival. So it's got to be able to really quickly assess, you know, am I in danger? And it's primed to look for danger, right? And that's what happens when you're in trauma, also. it's primed to look for danger, and then, like, what do I do? And then concentrate the whole organism on staying safe and that could be fleeing, it could be fighting, it could be freezing. And and it's, it's not necessarily going to come up with, you know, because the first thing that comes up with, it's going to rule out, but it's going to come up with something much quicker than you can be conscious of. It's before your language abilities, your thinking ability. You know, we think of your thinking abilities, even wake up, and so it will come up with the thing to do, which is get angry at a person, or get angry at yourself or blame, or whatever. It's going to come up with that. And then you're thinking part of the, you know, when we think of the thinking part of the brain, the sage brain, the prefrontal cortex, is like channelled. And says, Well, okay, why is this the right thing to do? And it says, Well, I can answer that. And it comes up with a rationale. But it really because your limbic brain has reacted to a situation, come up with what it's going to do, and then your rational brain comes up with a rationale for it.
Vonne Solis 10:21
Yeah, it's crazy. And you and you also say, and this is important audience to think about that. So number one, everything that Mitch just said. And that you say, the only way to drive the process from conflict to collaboration and connection, which is what we're going to be talking about today is you're all into, you know, the the resilience, collaboration, connection, and you'll explain that. We talked a lot about that in Part One, by the way, but you say the only way to drive the process to that is if you are in sage mode. And and you say you cannot do it if you're in limbic mode, obviously, which I which because, again, what you just finished saying. So let's turn to it. It's going to be an awesome, awesome episode. I want to just actually ask you to briefly, you know, explain who you wrote the book for in your own words, and what you want people to get out of it as well, so that they can think about this as we talk about these major points from your book that I'm going to be asking you questions about.
Mitch Weisburgh 11:27
So I teach three different courses. I teach a course basically on the brain itself, on how to be resourceful. I teach a course on how to be resilient, how to react to different situations, and I teach a course on conflict and collaboration. And I teach those generally in that sequence. And the first book was on the resourcefulness part of it. But in the last two years, when I've been teaching the conflict and collaboration course, people have been Oh my gosh. This is why I get triggered. Oh my gosh. This is why when I say these things, people don't follow through. People, people get angry at me, and this is why society is so argumentative right now and we can't, we can't come up with anything. And so that was the course that got the biggest reactions. And it's like, you know something? If I can help people get into the frame of mind where they can be, they can have equanimity as they're dealing with other people, and they can help other people so that you can jointly problem solve and you can jointly come to solutions, then that's what everybody seems to be crying for. And so I wrote the book so that people could return to enjoying the company of other people and being able to talk about subjects that right now we're afraid to talk about, because we're afraid that we're going to say something and either we're going to get angry or the other person is going to get angry.
Vonne Solis 12:49
So true. So let's talk just briefly. I just want your opinion. This is just your personal viewpoint in the work that you do and the people that you're teaching and what they're talking about, and what you just finished saying, this is what they want. So, what is your actual and I just want to give it a context for people to think about as we go into into the brain part of it. What's actually happening in the in the world, or at least North America, or even just the United States? I'm in Canada, but we have similar kind of issues. What is happening culturally right now? I don't want to get into the politics. I know politics plays a part of it, but just what do you see? Is it partly that people are so dependent on digital stuff that they've forgotten how to communicate with each other? Is this a growing problem? Have we always had problems with conflict? Like culturally, is it even a thing that culturally, this is contributing to conflict? But there's a lot of strife in the world and angry people. Angry.
Mitch Weisburgh 13:53
Yeah, yeah, really, really angry. And I think it is worse than it was 20, 30, 40, years ago, 100 year ago.
Vonne Solis 14:00
Okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 14:00
And I think a lot of it is that we have, I'm getting a little bit on my soapbox, but we have, we have a corporate society, and corporations have studied how to get people to do the things that they want people to do. And so they're feeding that to us. And in social media, it's how do you keep people interested? You keep people interested by showing them the content that has them continue to click on your media, and very often that content is the content that gets them riled up. And so we lose the ability to stop and think. We lose the ability to you know, kind of long-form reading. We lose the ability to just interact with people without getting upset. And, you know, and with all of those social influences, we're getting more and more into our bubbles, and we don't, we don't spend time with other people. And then and then, like, because we have a bad experience talking to somebody, it's like, Well, okay, I'm just going to avoid it, or I'm just going to go back to the people who already agree with me and and I'll stick with my bubble. And then you see, like, well, these people believe this, so they're obviously wrong, and we should get rid of them. We should get them out of the country, or, you know, or you know, they're stealing all of our resources and so, um.
Vonne Solis 15:27
So that just, I just want to pop in really quickly, that really speaks to the group mentality. And we're going to be talking a little bit about group mentality, but that is a huge piece to consider. Because, again, personally, professionally, culturally, socially, if you don't belong to part of the pack, you get left behind, and it's very isolating, and it does a lot of damage. And for the trauma people out there, or people who are just in grief or feeling isolated in any other way, anything that happens. So I am a bereaved mother since 2005 having lost my daughter to suicide, I immediately, immediately felt left out of the mainstream as the biggest community group there is as we defined it 20 years ago. It's a little different today, and it has been an isolating journey. Well, it's not as isolating, but it's still, it still is isolating. So anytime something happens to us, and the more we evolve culturally, don't you think Mitch, the more we make room for people to feel more isolated and different from the pack?
Mitch Weisburgh 16:36
Well, and then you look at what happens in people's brains when they're when they don't feel part of a group or when a group turns on them because they're a little bit different.
Vonne Solis 16:47
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 16:47
And so when they when they do FMRIs on people's brains, they show that the pain of being chastised by your group or punished by your group is the same pain is like being burned or physical pain. That the same parts of the brain light up. And so we have this we're human beings. We're social animals. We have this drive to be a member of groups or a group. And when that group then turns on us, we have this physical pain. So we do whatever we can to stay in our group. And if our group is is, I guess, chastising another group or disagreeing with another group vociferously, then we get acculturated to doing that more and more. The first step is like, you know something? I'm not going to I disagree with this, but I'm not going to say anything. And then the second time that happens, it's like, well, you know, something, maybe there's stuff, maybe I'm wrong, maybe there's something to them doing it. And by the time it's a third or fourth or fifth time, it's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, this group is bad, you know, we're good. They're wrong. We should punish them, you know? And so we get, we get acculturated into that, into the group norms.
Vonne Solis 17:59
Yes. And didn't you say in your book? I wasn't going to focus on this. I was going to bring up the fMRI, because I thought that was so interesting. But doesn't it kind of, in the group mentality just become black or white, this or that, right? Wrong? Isn't that a huge, sort of key feature of group mentality?
Mitch Weisburgh 18:19
Right. And it's the same thing as the limbic brain, because it's just easier to say, this is right, this is wrong. It's a binary situation. And so you always the limbic brain, or survival parts of the brain, are like, this is the right thing to do. This is the wrong thing to do. Groups op groups operate the same way. And you counter that by first of all, being able to take, you know, a pause and say, Well, wait a minute. You know, what are my values? Or you you counter that by belonging to other groups. Or you counter that by deliberately seeking out people who disagree with you and forcing yourself to have conversations where neither of you get upset.
Vonne Solis 18:58
Right.
Mitch Weisburgh 18:58
And you, you know, any of those three things, then increases your ability to deal with ambiguity and differences.
Vonne Solis 19:06
Yeah, for sure. So it's so interesting. And again, I just want to wrap that piece up. Culturally, I think, I think we can see that when we see protests and things like that and and things that are shifting the way we embrace new things into our sociology, our cultural norms for our country, and we're seeing it around the world. This isn't unique to North America, but it always seems to be centered around basically right or wrong. You know, you know my way or or my way.
Mitch Weisburgh 19:40
Right, right, right.
Vonne Solis 19:41
My way or my way. And I also did want to say. I forgot to say this in the beginning, but I was thinking as I started to read your book that pretty sure that a lot of people believe that the other person is wrong and especially and personally. Like most of us would, it's natural. That's part of the Survivor Brain. It's like, my way, I'm right. You do talk about this in your book. But I also want to read the quote from Zamina Davila is: "We are the problem, the path of resolving it and the solution". And I love that. I love that, which means that we're not always right. And so when we talk about conflict, and so now we're going to move into that piece, Mitch, and I wanted you to so there's so we agree. There's a lot of conflict in the world. A lot of it is based on right or wrong, you know, my way or my way, or our way, or our way, and we don't even want to hear about what you have to say. And this is happening also in families, personal relationships. I believe it's entered workplace spaces. Where I'm not in the workplace space, but I do have family in workplace, and younger people, and I won't name names, and they're seeing things creep into the workspace that people feel they have a right to have, and maybe it's not the norm, and we wouldn't even think about it five or ten years ago.
Mitch Weisburgh 21:05
Right.
Vonne Solis 21:06
So it's creeping into all different areas of life. Hard to ignore it, except to kind of hide away and kind of go like, I don't even want to be part of this. If that sounds personal, you would be right, and retreat, because in a, in a, even in a trauma brain and even just my values, okay, it becomes all too much for me. And yes, we're all responsible for how much news we digest and how we conduct our lives. But even so, I'm a person that has been in metaphysics and spiritual for many, many, many, many years and decades, and the fight for the goodness sometimes just feels like it's a never-ending, you know, like attempt at nothing's going to change. In fact, it's getting worse. So now that's just a personal little thing that my brain wants to tell me, and then that sage part of me is like, no, no, no, no. And we're going to talk about that. How do you do that? You center yourself and this, that and the other, and positive talk and blah blah blah. I don't mean blah blah blah. It's not important. I mean, we're getting to that soon. So it's very, very important to think. And I'm just this is coming to me, is for the audience. And, you know, listening to this, to where are you on the spectrum? Where are you in listening to what we're talking about, in what your beliefs are? Do you know what you believe? Are you being led? Are you being swayed? Are you vulnerable? Are you retreating? Are you just, I don't care. Are you like does that is that making your life feel super toxic and like there's no hope? What's contributing and we're not going to talk about this, but the to the hopelessness that I read people in Gen Z feel? What? What?
Mitch Weisburgh 22:46
And as you were talking about right or wrong, I just want to go back, because I don't want to let or skip it okay, because it's such an important part of conflict and every you know, everything else that we you know we talk about in mind shifting and healing.
Vonne Solis 22:59
Right.
Mitch Weisburgh 23:00
If, if you are absolutely positive about something.
Vonne Solis 23:04
Yes.
Mitch Weisburgh 23:05
That's a sign that you're in your survival or your limbic brain.
Vonne Solis 23:08
I love this.
Mitch Weisburgh 23:09
Period. So, so if you're in trauma, and if you're sure that people are being mean to you.
Vonne Solis 23:16
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 23:17
Because you know, then that's saying, Well, wait a minute. You know, they may or may not be being mean to me, but because I'm sure of it, I know I'm in my survival brain, and the first thing that I need to do is I need to return to a resourceful equanimous state, and get yourself into that state.
Vonne Solis 23:35
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 23:35
And that's true, you know that's true in trauma, that's true with disagreements. It's true with groups. Whenever you you know, you know that this is the right thing to do. You know this person pushed you so you have to push them back.
Vonne Solis 23:49
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 23:49
You know that you have to buy this thing. Otherwise you're not going to be happy. You have to take this course otherwise you're not going to be happy. As soon as you know that. You as soon as you can realize that you that you know something is true, then that's a signal, Well, wait a minute. That's my limbic brain because the resourceful brain, naturally is curious. And so if you're in a curious state of mind, like you're playful, you're wondering what's going to happen. It's like, well, you know, what are the what are my different options? If you're curious or playful or exploratory, then you are in your resourceful brain, and you can proceed, you know, to come up with, with with solutions, come up with things to say, work with other people as you're reacting with them, so that you can resolve the conflicts and move forward. But if that realization is is the key thing, and I think the,
Vonne Solis 23:49
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 24:05
the, you know, metacognition or the self-awareness, oh my gosh. I am absolutely sure I have to do this. I am absolutely sure I have to yell at this person. Wait a minute. That's limbic. Let me pause a second.
Vonne Solis 24:33
Yeah, and, and as you're talking, and I also feel myself like take it down a tone Vonne. Anyway, I tend to get excited a little bit. Um, when you were talking, I was thinking. So to apply that to yourself personally, if you are in grief. If you are feeling isolated. Uh, in pain from anything, and certain the world is against you. Certain your partner is this way or that way, or any family member, or any relationship you have, because our natural go to when we're in pain is nobody gets me. Nobody understands me. Nobody can help me, and you're in this fight alone.
Mitch Weisburgh 25:45
You're going you're blaming. You're either blaming yourself. You're blaming the other person, or you're blaming the situation. Blame is Limbic.
Vonne Solis 25:53
Yes. So moving to Sage for me started when I was already, I already had a sage brain like that I could go on up to that point, because when my daughter died, I had already been 23 years in a spiritual practice, which is very sage, you know, and but I had to do a reset, because everything fell apart. So I had to learn it all over again and do a reset. And my understanding is in a trauma brain and PTSD and that your neurons are firing differently. So it's, it's a very physical thing. It's not like, Oh, get better. No. Your brain's actually changed. I actually, personally call it like, now just me personally, like, it's almost like there's damage to the brain, and you can't help it. And when I learned that in 2018 holy smoly, I just took all the like pressure off of me to be somebody different and better and not blame myself for decisions and stuff I made, because I understood my brain was functioning in a way that it hadn't functioned before, which was really not not correctly. So what I'm trying to say is, so for me, the feeling of so when I'm reading your book in December right? January. The feeling I'm getting is like, Okay, what's sage for me? Now, you give wonderful tips, and we're going to be talking about that audience very soon here. But what I'm just giving you a sneak peek. So for me, it's automatically, don't make the other person wrong. Don't jump to conclusions. Mostly that's my husband, but other people, too. Don't jump to conclusions, right? Take a step back. And how can you be the bigger person here, but not take responsibility for somebody else's actions? Very, very important. And what do you want out of it? And we're going to be talking about all of this, but you really helped me understand, What do you want out of this conversation or this situation? Part of sage. So I'm just giving you an early sneak peek audience, so you can keep with us and get through all these parts.
Mitch Weisburgh 27:46
And that's a really important thing because if you're thinking, what do I really want long-term, or what are my, what are my values here? Then almost by definition, you're in sage. And you been able to switch from being in limbic because you can't think that way when you're thinking...
Vonne Solis 27:47
That's right.
Mitch Weisburgh 27:53
I'm gonna yell at this person. This person is wrong.
Vonne Solis 28:07
Yeah. So what I'm saying is, by watching this episode with you and me, and maybe even other episodes that you do, but I'm just I only know this experience with you, we can already get people to to tune into sage, right? Switch to sage even, even just through, through moments of this episode. Because I believe you said and you cannot stay in sage because we're not the brain isn't physiologically built to be in sage. But we can return to it right? Repeatedly, repeatedly, and choose it when we are reacting, and everybody reacts. So it isn't about never acknowledge we're in survivor. You talk about that a lot and give examples in the book about your own personal stuff when you react.
Mitch Weisburgh 28:52
No, I thought I was perfect. What do you mean?
Vonne Solis 28:53
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 28:54
Are you accusing me of being wrong sometimes? No. I am always in sage. I don't know what you're talking about.
Vonne Solis 29:00
Slow down Mitch, calm down. Yeah. How can I help you calm down?
Mitch Weisburgh 29:04
Right. Oh, thank you. Thank you. I get into overreacting.
Vonne Solis 29:08
Yeah, see, so we're just giving examples, and we're triggered by lots of different things in regular life, never mind the trauma brain, which we're triggered a lot, unless you understand and recognize your triggers. But we're all triggered, and so it's for me. And I didn't know I was going to say this in this, in this episode with you, Mitch, but really, you have an opportunity audience sitting right here, listening, watching, if you're curious enough about yourself, right? Sage. What are your values? What do you think about the group you just joined? What group are you thinking of joining? Why? Do you want to join a group? What do you do to stick up for yourself, right? How well do you know yourself? Do you feel you have agency? All of these like questions start helping you understand your authentic being. And I'm not throwing the word around authentic, you know, loosely. It was a word I used to value very much. It's become a word thrown around a little too much lately. So your genuine, true self. It's never too late to get, reset that button and get to know you before you start throwing yourself in everything else, right?
Mitch Weisburgh 29:33
Right. And here's another question.
Vonne Solis 29:42
Sure.
Mitch Weisburgh 29:43
Because the questions that you asked Vonne, were like, right, right on. Those were great questions. Another way is to think about the other person is like, you know you because you're thinking this person is wrong. To think, well, you know something? Yeah, this person is wrong, but how might they be 10% right?
Vonne Solis 30:31
Yes, thank you for pointing that out. Thank you. Because, yeah, that is something that any of us in conflict with our relationships. And let's face it, what else can we be in conflict with besides maybe ourself and our own decisions? It's usually someone else, right?
Mitch Weisburgh 30:50
Right. You know, an example that I used in the book. You know, if I'm, if, if, if I'm sitting at breakfast and I'm reading the paper and my wife says to me, you know something, it would really help me out a lot if you help with the help with the dishes or something like that. Okay?
Vonne Solis 31:12
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 31:13
Then then my response is probably a calm like, oh yeah, yeah. I can put the paper down. I can help. If my wife's response and again, same situation. At breakfast. I'm sitting, I'm reading the paper, and she says, What are you reading the paper for? I've been working all morning. I you know? You're just doing nothing. You need to help me out. Now, my automatic response to that. My default response isn't going to be to get angry back. It's like I'm gonna eat. My mirror neurons will fire up. Even though, even if I'm not in trauma, it's like, you know, the the mirror neurons right? She's angry at me. She's attacking me. I'm going to attack her back. But I can also, at that point, say, Well, wait a minute. Yes. This feels like an attack. That means I'm in, I'm in survival mode, okay? I'm in limbic mode. You know, what do I really want? You know what I want? Is I want to have a really good Saturday. And if I fire back at her, that's probably not going to be what, you know, something? Maybe, maybe she's maybe I could help out, you know? And so you can, you can do this self-realization and realize you know something? This isn't you know, yes, maybe she could have phrased it better in that, in that case, but, but it's like I'm responsible for my own reaction. I don't have to get angry. I'm getting angry, but I can calm my I can realize that that's a limbic reaction. What is there that 10% right in what she's saying? Oh, yeah, yeah. I'm just lazing around while she's doing all the work. That's wrong, you know? And then I and I can come to a different conclusion.
Vonne Solis 32:51
Yeah. And while you were talking, I was thinking that the person might be more than 10% right. But, you know, just if you're, if you're a starter. You know MindShifting, 101, 10% we'll go with that. But when you get advanced, you might go, you know what they might be completely right? Who knows?
Mitch Weisburgh 33:07
Right.
Vonne Solis 33:08
You know?
Mitch Weisburgh 33:08
But it's easier to start off with 10%. So, you know, you you can't fight the limbic system. You're own limbic system. When you say, if I were to say to myself, Mitch, you're being an idiot here. Stop being so angry. Calm yourself down. I'm doing like limbic to limbic in my own head, and I can't that's not a way to calm down. What I have to do is I have to use statements that open me up. So so the statement, how could this person be 10% right? I'm probably two minutes into considering why they're 10% right, I'll come up with the fact that maybe they're 50% right or 60% right, but the 10% right is something that my limbic system isn't going to fight.
Vonne Solis 33:54
Yes.
Mitch Weisburgh 33:55
So it allows me then to open up my resourceful brain.
Vonne Solis 33:59
Good point and good point. And we probably all having, having said that. We probably all have to start with the 10% to get to even 50 or 60, which does take self-awareness and all kinds of other things. I was thinking when you were saying that. So in a partner situation like that. The other thing I did want to, want to say is, is, and I won't talk, say it's your wife, but somebody asking a question like but when we're demanding something from our partner, and I do it. I do it, I obviously, but there is something, there's another need that is going on, so that's coming from limbic audience, too. When we're being demanding of our partner or somebody else, a friend, or whatever, something is telling us that a need is not being met within us. It's coming from our limbic system. Our survivor. And that's why we're not actually expressing ourselves in a way that would be much more tolerant, compassionate and gentle. And it does take daily practice, daily practice, to kind of go, ughh. Especially if your partner or the other person in any situation is not self-aware.
Mitch Weisburgh 35:06
Right. And so this other person, and let's say this other person might even be a child or or some other relative. And so when we when the when the child misbehaves, and our reaction is, why can't this child behave? We're throwing it on, you know, the child, and that's not a particularly helpful thing to say. When we say, Oh, this child is behaving. They're probably experiencing some emotion that they can't cope with. They're probably disregulated. How can I help them get regulated first. And so it could be with a child, it could be with a spouse. So when, when and you know, like, I've been, I've been married for over 40 years. So it's not like, you know, we it's not like we only fight 60% of the time. It's work you know. So you know, it's not like we fight all, all the time. But you know, you can't. You know, things happen. So when, if, if, using my wife as an example, you know, she says, you know, why are you sitting around doing nothing? It's like, if I can say, Well, wait a minute, something is really bothering her. Let me see if I can get to the root of that. Rather than he's attacking me, I can turn it around, and I can say, Oh, look, it sounds like you're really upset.
Vonne Solis 36:22
Yeah, well, obviously, when we want help with something, there's a whole ton of things going on. But you know, as you're again, as you're speaking, I'm coming up 35 years married, so right with you there, in long-term. And then when you have major, major things that you deal with throughout your marriage, which we all do. And then you have to do, you know what you're doing is helping me and can help other people even reconnect in our longer term marriages, for God's sake. Because, because, as we learn this information Mitch, it's like applying it to those things that we've become habituated to responding or reacting. Oh, he's at it again. Oh, she's at it again, and the eye roll and whatever. Because somehow people think they have a right to, you know, sort of critique their spouse or anybody else, maybe even their kids. I don't know. But when we feel comfortable enough to just assign a level of of, of, oh, I can't think of the word, but an understanding of them, and they need this, or this is just the way they are, or blah, blah, blah, make assumptions, huge assumptions about another person. That is not right, folks. And we can only make assumptions about ourselves. Not another person, but we can certainly, through mind shifting, be curious enough, and if you're really lucky, lucky, playful, but at least curious enough to explore different ways of communicating with your partner that you've otherwise, as I say, become habituated to certain ways, and you don't even bother being curious about them anymore.
Mitch Weisburgh 37:58
Right. And one of the one way to do that is with what we call in the book is you know, strength-based feedback. Feed with the strength of the other person. So though, when the other per, you know, when the other person does something and it's getting you angry, it's like, okay, so what strength are they showing? Are they showing independence? Are they showing courage? Are they showing, are they showing a sense of humour? Are they showing, you know, so, so and you lead them, like wow, you know something? As you said, that I'm just, I just remember how, how I've always, you know, I've always really appreciated how independent you are. That's a real strength of yours. Now, at the moment that independence may be really getting you upset, okay? But just by turning it into a strength, you tend to disarm the other person, and so you're much better able than to have a conversation rather than a mere, mere conflict.
Vonne Solis 38:56
Yeah, good point. Good point. And again, as you're talking I'm sitting here thinking, you know, we do all change. And just because, you know, we get older and older and older, for some people, you know, we do have different circumstances that arise in our life and have to face them. Retirement, job changes. A whole bunch of different thing. Aging, you know. My spouse and I have 11 years between us, so he's got different needs than I have, and so recognizing that is kind of like, Oh, crap. And, you know, how am I dealing with this? And how am I going to deal with this? And, you know, it just goes on and on and on, and that can be a threat to our brains. I want to tell you right now. It can because, because because all of a sudden you can feel like that security or the stability is not going to be there, and one day you're like, it's actually really going to change. I'm talking to you estate planners out there. One one day you're and, I mean, you can be really young, but anybody doing that, you know, estate planning, for example, you're telling your brain something could change one day. I got to plan for that, too. Oh. So what I'm just saying is mind shifting gives you the opportunity to be curious about how you're changing, how your environment's changing, how your partner may be changing if you're with a partner, and what you want out of it. And so by being curious instead of feeling threatened. So that's really, really curious. And I just want to give give a nod to mirroring here. I didn't have it like as a segment, but you want to just explain that Mitch before we talk briefly about the five types of conflict?
Mitch Weisburgh 40:30
Sure. So one of the attributes that really all mammals have, and really have evolved in people, is we have these mirror neurons, and the mirror neurons are it's such a strength that we have as people, because that is what allows us to learn from others. To watch other people and learn what they're doing, to pick up culture, to pick up language. You know, so much of what we do as a society and as groups of people have been because we have these mirror neurons that allow us to learn from each other and interact with each other. But they're not always right. And so they're they're also, you know, they're also picking up the affectations of the other person. So we pick up that enough that when the mirror neurons say that another person is criticizing us, which is the same as which could be the same as attacking us or thinking that they're better than us, the mirror neurons are telling us we have to react back the same way.
Vonne Solis 41:39
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 41:40
And so when we're around people who are putting us down, our mirror neurons, pick pick that up. When, when we're when, when somebody suggests that, you know something? I don't like the way your sweater looks. I don't know. And so it's like, wait a minute, they're attacking my taste. No, I, you know, I don't like the way your glasses look, okay? And so we that's our natural reaction. But because we have also the ability of accessing our self- awareness and our prefrontal cortex, we don't always have to follow our mirror neurons. So when a person, we especially if we're prepared. So you're going to go into an interaction with another person, and you know this person triggers you, you can prepare for that. You know it's hard in the moment, but you I know I'm going to be talking with this other person. This other person is going through a hard time. I'm going through a hard time, and we always end up yelling at each other, okay? Okay, so now my neuro, my mirror neurons, I know are gonna pick up that this person is attacking me, and my natural reaction is to attack back. You know something? What are five things that I could say to them so that when they say these statements that would normally trigger me, that they would tend to diffuse the situation. Now probably the first thing that I say isn't going to diffuse the situation because they're already wound up. They're going to say, you know, I don't like your sweater. And then I'm going to say, oh, you know, thank you for giving me your opinion. And then they're going to say, that's all you can say about that? You're not going to, you know, you're not throwing out this, you know. So, so they're probably going to come back three times, four times, six times, with things that would normally trigger us. So could you make a game out of it and say, You know something, I'm going to have this meeting with this other person. We very often get into these triggering conversations and fights. What are five things that I could say back that are calm, that might diffuse the situation? And if I can get through those five, if they don't diffuse the situation, at least I got that far, and maybe next time, I could get ten. And so we can counteract our mirror neurons, because the longer we stay calm and resourceful, their mirror neurons are going to pick that up and they're going to want and they're going to be those mirror neurons are going to be pressing them like, hey, wait a minute. This person is really interested in you. Hey, this person is really asking you, as is asking you questions because they're really trying to understand your your point of view. Maybe you should try to understand their point of view, and so their mirror neurons are then naturally going to go work on them as well. So we can, we can use those mirror neurons, but our first impulse when we get upset is it's probably our mirror neurons that are picking up that we're being attacked.
Vonne Solis 44:39
Yep.
Mitch Weisburgh 44:39
Whether we are or not, and we can realize what? You know, I don't, I don't have to obey that. It's hard to do in the moment, but it's a lot easier to do if you know you're going to be getting into a conversation with somebody where this always happens.
Vonne Solis 44:53
Yeah. So key point audience, I just want to say there is number one, if you can recognize that you just don't want the same old, same old argument, or the same old, same old feeling of being attacked, or whatever, whatever person you're you're sparring with, you do have the ability to choose what, what Mitch is just saying here. Stop. I'm going to and if you can't even just go, I'm going to make game of it. Just stop. How can I think about this? And this is split second. How can I just not react the same way, but respond differently, and try and change the game up a little bit here, and change those mirror neurons. And again, I think that's really, really key for for partners who are having differences or losing a connection, or children. You deal with a lot of those examples in your book, Mitch, so I do encourage, encourage people to get that book. Again, I'm going to pop it up on the screen here for you to take a look at the cover. So it's just really, really, we have the opportunity every day, many times throughout the day, to get ourselves into the sage. That's part of sage, right? Stopping the mirroring, thinking differently. Being curious, being a little bit, you know, I don't want to say forceful, but taking a chance. Sometimes we just have to be the leader.
Vonne Solis 46:09
And so that was the other point I wanted to make. Is when we choose to do this to salvage any kind of relationship situation, we do have the opportunity to to mirror different neurons back to other people and help change them. Really, really. And you give many, many examples about in education. So for anybody in academia here, you give examples for teachers how to work with different students in different situations, parents with
Mitch Weisburgh 46:34
Parents.
Vonne Solis 46:35
children, very, very important. And relationships work everything, every area of our lives, which is why we're doing this. And and so I think it's just really, really powerful, and we're the ones that benefit, because it's our situation and right? And even if the other person doesn't change, or the situation doesn't change, our relationship to them or it does, and that's key. Do you get what I'm saying? So if we see a person differently, or we see our situation differently, even though we can't change it - yet.
Mitch Weisburgh 47:10
Right.
Vonne Solis 47:11
Right? It has changed for us, and I've been through that many, many times. So when you feel stuck, or whatever, you start to look at things, be curious about the situation. Why you're in it. What you'd like out of it. How you could change it. What would you do if you couldn't change it? Are you resilient enough, like, you know? What can you see? Can you flip and be more positive, right? Are you too negative a person? And actually, also, while you were talking about the mirror neurons, I was really thinking about toxicity and how a lot of people, they feed off of that with each other. So you phone a friend you know, and you're having a crap day. I don't do this because I don't allow myself to have crappy days. I have, can have crappy and moments, and I don't even call them crappy, just challenging, but I would never pick up the phone and go boo hoo hoo. I outgrew that years and years and years ago, because that's what you get back. That's what you're going to get back so do you want to call a friend, phone a friend, or phone anybody, and have them just feed the toxicity you're already feeling in your life when they can offer a viewpoint that might be a lot more hopeful, bright, positive. So we can get stuck In that way of thinking, which is really not healthy when we don't open ourselves up to like you, saying even 10% the situation could be different. So not even just the person, but 10%. I have to say that, because somebody out there will probably benefit from that. Hey, Mitch, let's talk about the five types of conflict. Don't have to get into it deep, because people, you can read the book and learn much, much more. But I wanted to move into the five types of conflict, knowing there isn't just one type. And also, then let's move quickly into what's driving the limbic system, the limbic brain, when, when we're in conflict.
Mitch Weisburgh 48:58
So there's a there's an instrument that, you know, people can take. I think it's cost about $50 that's listed in the book. And there's a URL in the book you can take it, which tells you what styles of conflict resolution that you tend to use. And there are, there are really five different styles. And it's kind of, it's a, if you think about it, there's like a vertical axis. You can have a two by two matrix. So on the, you know, on the bottom of the vertical axis is where you're completely unassertive, and on the and on the top is where you're very where you're assertive. You're telling people what you need. And then the horizontal axis, the it's, you know, that's going towards the bottom. On the left is where you're not really interacting with the other person finding out what their needs are.
Vonne Solis 49:52
Okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 49:52
And then on the right side of that is where you are interacting with the other person, and because you're concerned about their needs. So if you take a look at that top left, where you're you're very you're assertive about what your needs are, but you're not you're not interactive. You don't really care about the other person's needs. That style of conflict resolution is called compete. And then the compete style is basically you're telling people what you want them to do, and you don't care, you know, like you're just going to keep on hammering it, and you know, you have to do this. You have to do that. And then when, when you're using the compete style, what you're expecting the other person to eventually do is to be on the bottom right. So on the bottom right is there, on the right side of it is they're able to figure out what you want, but they're not asserting themselves at all. So they're on the bottom and so they're being they're accommodating. So the compete style is expecting the other person to be accommodating, which is the second style.
Vonne Solis 50:57
Okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 50:57
Very often when we're dealing with people who are using the compete style, we'll try to avoid them. Avoiding is on that lower left. So we're not telling them what we need, and we're not caring about them. We're just trying to avoid them. And that's the third style. And then, and then on the top right is where we're interacting with the other person a lot. We're really trying to figure out what they want, and we're asserting what we want, and that's collaborate.
Vonne Solis 51:28
Okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 51:29
Then in the middle is a is a fifth type, which is compromise. And in English, we think of compromise and collaborate very often as synonyms. But in in psychology and in social work, they're regarded as two very different things. In compromise, it you're trying to just come up with something that's good enough, and so you're kind of splitting the difference. Like, Okay, you want me to do this and this, I want you to do this, that and that. What if I did one of these and you did one of these, we'll meet in the middle. And so neither of us is 100% satisfied, but we're able to get through the the differences and get on to something else that's probably more important. Whereas in Collaborate, if we're both collaborating, we're both trying to figure out what's really important to the other person and to us, so maybe we can come up with a different solution that meets all of our needs and that that probably takes a lot of time. So we, you know, everybody says, oh, so collaborate might might be the best, but no, collaborate isn't the best. The best is to be able to use all five different styles.
Vonne Solis 52:42
Yes.
Mitch Weisburgh 52:43
Depending on the situation.
Vonne Solis 52:45
So it's about, it's about knowing, so I just want pop in and say this. So it's about really knowing what type of conflict. Is it, okay, let me ask this. Is it about knowing what type of situation is presenting what type of conflict? Or is it more about you personally and your that's your go to style?
Mitch Weisburgh 53:02
Well, so by default, it's your go to style. But to be effective, it's to understand what the conflict is and what the other person's style is also. So for example, okay, I may want to collaborate. I may want to go to you and I say, you know Vonne, I know you you you want to do this and I want to do this. Let's figure out what we can both do. Okay? But your style might be compete. Your style might be, you know, something? I couldn't care less what Mitch wants, okay? I want this, and I'm going to get it. So when a compete goes against collaborate? Every time the collaborator gives the person something that they want, the compete says, Okay, I won that. Now I have to go and win the next thing. They wanted that. And so compete will beat collaborate every time. If you're going against somebody, going against is probably the wrong word. But if you're involved in a interaction with the other person, and the other person really doesn't care about what you want, you can't collaborate, or you can't accommodate.
Vonne Solis 54:05
No.
Mitch Weisburgh 54:05
Basically, you either have to compete or avoid first. Maybe you could get maybe, you know, this is a person who's toxic, and I never want to deal with them, and you can just avoid them. Maybe you can be, you know, something? This person right now is all worked up. Maybe we can just take a rest for 20 minutes and come back and we can have an argument. We can have a discussion where we're not so worked up, okay? And that would be, you know, using avoid. Or, it's like this person is making these demands? I'm going to make these demands, and I'm not coming off of them until the other person shows that they're willing to collaborate also.
Vonne Solis 54:40
Right.
Mitch Weisburgh 54:41
And so I.
Vonne Solis 54:43
So that would be compete and compete, right?
Mitch Weisburgh 54:45
Compete and compete. I've had this with business partners. I've had this with people I work with. I've had this with family members. If you're, if you're dealing, if you're dealing with a narcissist, you can't collaborate. You know, you accommodate. You're always going to accommodate. You know, until you stand up and say, No, I'm not going to put up with this. Until you go to the compete style, back to yourself, you're, you know, you're, you're always going to be giving in, and you're always going to be miserable.
Vonne Solis 55:09
Yeah and so again audience, I want to point out in the conflict we could have depending on how we're living our lives, conflict moments every day, throughout the day and you might not. Again, depending how you live your lives. It could be just as simple as one little statement between two partners that you know, it turns into a conflict. Just even if your mind, if you do retreat, you know, and just, ahh I'll deal with it, whatever, anyway, so. But again, your book goes into this in quite a bit of detail, offering examples for various types of situations, and I think the struggle would be for a lot of people. Well, first of all, how many of us think about how, what, what type of person we would be in a conflict? I've never really thought about it before reading your book, and I still haven't really thought, because I think I would change my style a little bit, but I know I'm a terrible negotiator. I'm not looking for a business opportunity, so I can say that. But you know, but you know what I mean to negotiate anything. But this is helping me kind of understand the collaboration piece. And when you become more interested, this is my viewpoint about the other person and what their needs are. And you lay out examples in your book about situations where for business. I know you gave some examples in business, so I need this. I need this. And then what the various styles of conflict, how you are in conflict, what results they're going to produce. And I found that really interesting. And we don't have enough time to go deep into that today, but again, your book lays it out.
Mitch Weisburgh 56:44
Oh, darn. You mean, people are gonna have to buy the book?
Vonne Solis 56:47
They're gonna have to buy. Oh, oh, hey, so.
Vonne Solis 56:50
But you know what I'm saying, it's a book that you can, you know, return to sections that go, what did he say? What did he say? I mean, I took copious notes through it so I can just go back and understand different things like that. And I'm never going to understand all of it, but I but I do know the key piece for me was, what do you want out of the situation? So conflict? Even if it's compete, compete, both sides want something. So if it can start with understanding and being curious about what is it you want again? Well, here's what I want. And that's when the collaboration and compromise pieces they come in. But, if and not to get political here at all, but if you are dealing with somebody, and it would be a tremendously difficult job going up against in any area of your life, a relationship, work, politics. I don't care what it is. If you're going up against someone whose only style is compete? Unless they themselves have the skill and the and the will to compromise or collaborate? I'm not sure that the conflict could be solved.
Mitch Weisburgh 58:01
Right, right. And so it may in those circumstances, maybe the best thing that you can do is to leave the relationship.
Vonne Solis 58:09
Right.
Mitch Weisburgh 58:09
And that's avoid, because the person is not, is not going to change. Or maybe once they see that you aren't backing down. That you've come up with what, what is important to you, and you're not backing off of it, and you can...
Vonne Solis 58:24
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 58:24
you can, you can back that up, then maybe at that point they and you can change to a different style.
Vonne Solis 58:32
Exactly. So even again, in this episode right now, right this moment, folks watching, listening, think about if you're in a conflict right now, one that is or is not of your choosing. What style are you in that situation? Because it can change. You can change your tactics. The more you are self-aware, you can change your tactics. Is this something you can actually deal with? Can you get the other person to compromise through mirroring? You know, mirroring techniques? Can you get somebody else to collaborate if they are they willing? This this kind of mind shifting exercise, thinking about it, even if it's not happening, what would you do? Is, I think, a huge piece in becoming self-aware, Mitch. I really do.
Mitch Weisburgh 59:20
I think you hit you hit it. Yeah, Vonne.
Vonne Solis 59:22
Yeah. And practice, practice, practice. And I think this would make me a better negotiator. So if I ever am looking for a deal with someone, which I'm not it, this is making me understand. No, seriously, what do I really need from this? And they must need and want something, too. So how can we come together and compromise, and I think I'm gonna ask you.
Mitch Weisburgh 59:22
Or collaborate.
Vonne Solis 59:27
Collaborate.
Mitch Weisburgh 59:29
Compromise would be splitting the difference. But maybe by exploring what they really want.
Vonne Solis 59:50
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 59:50
And exploring what you really want, you'll come up with something that's better than either one of you would have come up on your own.
Vonne Solis 59:56
Right. And in a collaboration, would you say that it doesn't end up really mattering if they get a little bit more, or that you think they get a little bit more, or you have to shift. Like in a in a true collaboration, you just want everybody to win, right?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:00:11
In a true collaboration, you want to make sure that you feel that you're winning and that the other parties feel that they're winning as well.
Vonne Solis 1:00:18
Thank you. So
Mitch Weisburgh 1:00:19
And a little bit that's left on the table, like, who cares? We have more important things to deal with. Let's get going.
Vonne Solis 1:00:25
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:00:25
Let's go on to the next thing.
Vonne Solis 1:00:27
Yeah. So settling, even though that's not a type of conflict. Settling, though, would be when you're agreeing to something, but you're not getting anything. You're not getting anything. And compromising is when you both get something.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:00:41
Right, right. Nobody gets exactly what they want, but, but everybody gets something.
Vonne Solis 1:00:47
But collaboration, you're winning. Everybody.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:00:50
Everybody's winning, right.
Vonne Solis 1:00:51
Yeah, so that's a really neat way of thinking about it, folks. All right, I wanted to turn quickly here Mitch, to what's driving. I just wanted and we don't have to go deep, but I did want to talk about the psychological, sorry, the neurological and biological drivers of limbic. So everything we've talked about now we've set the audience up for like, Ahh, my life's a mess, or, Oh my god.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:01:17
Hopefully, not. Hopefully they're you know, they're, they're, they're realizing that, oh my gosh, I've been in these arguments. I was in limbic but I don't have to be that way. I can be happier. That's what I really want.
Vonne Solis 1:01:27
Okay But audience, stay tuned, because right after this, we are actually going to talk about Sage. And this is where you want to get out of all of that stuff that feels chaotic to me. Um, so now we want to understand what's driving this Survivor Brain, okay? So you did speak a little bit about neurological and biological drivers and how they influence us to react to situations that are conflict. So what is driving? What's driving? What's driving? What's going on in the brain Mitch, when we're like, urrrrr.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:02:04
Well, the first thing that's going on is it's assessing a situation and seeing, first of all, is there a danger, or is there something that I already know how to do, that I don't have to think about, or what is everybody else doing? And so those are, like, the first three things, and the danger is the first thing. And when it, when it's looking at those, it's coming up with, really five different types of actions or or ways of talking, where you don't have to spend a lot of time thinking. It's we are all familiar with fight, flight and freeze. Okay, those are the first three. And then, then things that are habits, or that we're fluent in. Things that we don't have to think about. Like, you know, as I'm talking to you, I don't have to think about just taking a drink.
Vonne Solis 1:02:50
Right. Right.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:02:52
Okay. I can just, I can just do it, okay? Or, if I see a person and I say, and the person says hello to me, or, How are you? I know to say, Fine, I'm not, I don't have to think about, well, gee, you know, something is my blood pressure up, am I feeling you know, it's just like a limbic habitual reaction. So that's the second thing. Is, the is the things that are habits that we're fluent in or that, that's the fourth thing. And then the fifth thing is, what is our tribe? What is our group doing, and if everybody's doing it, it's the easiest thing for me to do is to just continue with it. Everybody, you know, I'm with a group of kids, and everybody is teasing this kid. It's like, oh, it's funny. I'm going to do it too, because everybody else in my group is doing it. How bad could it be? If they can't take a joke it's it's their problem, right? So, so those are the five types of limbic reactions. And once the brain has has decided on one of those directly challenging it, then causes the brain to go into this fight, flight and freeze, and it releases a flood of stress hormones, adrenaline and cortisol, and those, those two reinforce fight and flight.
Vonne Solis 1:04:03
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:04:03
And they shut down our prefrontal cortex. And so we can't come up with other, you know, other ways of talking, other ways of doing, because we're so busy defending whatever it is that would that our limbic system has already decided to do. And to get out of that, one of the things we have to do, or the first thing we have to do, is we have to be aware, okay? I'm aware. I'm in limbic and then if we're in fight, flight or freeze, we have to allow those stress hormones to dissipate. And that takes like, 90 seconds. And so somehow or other, we have to do this pause for 30, 60, 90 seconds, so that those stress hormones can get out of our brain, so that we can access our prefrontal cortex, and we can be playful. We can be we can, you know, use empathy. We can explore. We can consider what we really want. We can decide to do things that, knowing that things might not turn out right the first time, but we can...
Vonne Solis 1:05:07
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:05:08
keep at it.
Vonne Solis 1:05:09
So this is the sage system. So Mitch, how long does it take the brain to make that decision - danger and then assess what we're going to do?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:05:20
Well, the parts of the brain, that's a great question, because, because Vonne, the parts of the brain that are our survival brain, I mean, they evolved hundreds of millions of years ago.
Vonne Solis 1:05:30
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:05:30
And you know, it takes two one hundredths of a second for them to wake up. And you know, as you pointed out in the beginning, you know, they can be going through different things to do, and you know, 30 or 40 of them in one second. So so that the sage part, the prefrontal cortex, wakes up in two to three seconds.
Vonne Solis 1:05:35
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:05:37
Generally, that's after our survival or limbic system has come up with what we're going to be doing. And that's why the default mode of our prefrontal cortex is to rationalize or justify what emotionally we've decided to do.
Vonne Solis 1:06:05
Right. So audience, I want to just point out from you know, someone just listening to Mitch. Mitch, you're a pro in teaching this stuff, so I am listening to it and figuring out in my layperson brain here. So what was key to me is what you said is that it takes 60 to 90 seconds for the hormones, the adrenaline and cortisol, to get out of get out of the - well is it getting out of our brain? Where is it going?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:06:31
Right they're flushing, they're just
Vonne Solis 1:06:33
Through the system?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:06:34
Flushing through the system. And then get, I guess the the, you know, it's a good question. The kidney and liver, then we're not, you know, so any
Vonne Solis 1:06:44
like, we're not, so we're not trying to, I'm just trying to understand as a person. So if I go danger, and then it's this type of danger. You're gonna, you know, run, freeze, or, you know, what is it? Fight? Oh, I don't really fight.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:07:00
Fight.
Vonne Solis 1:07:00
Fight, flight, freeze. So all that's done in less than a second, right? Like hundredths of a second, boom. But then now, I need to stop, because now I'm flooded with cortisol and adrenaline, and that's when our body starts to shake and.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:07:16
And imagine, and imagine that you're in trauma, you're grieving or something, and when you're at trauma, it's it you're, you're, you're, you're getting triggered more often, those stress hormones are coming in. But if you realize, oh my gosh, I'm feeling this way, somehow or other, I have to give myself 60 to 90 seconds to calm down.
Vonne Solis 1:07:38
It's very, very, very, very real what's happening when you're in trauma, anxiety, and you're triggered and your your brain is doing this. So I want to give a visual to people. So the brain has already decided it's danger, it's this type. You need to do this, right? Done. That's a done deal. But then, like you said. You've got to stop, oof! And then allow that up to 90 seconds for the nerves to stop. Like you're literally shaking and feeling nauseous and sweating and hyperventilating and all of these things, all of that's happening probably from the cortisol and adrenaline, I'm thinking, so that needs to flush through the system. Again. We're not doctors, but look up and see yourself what happens in the body. And then, and but here's the other key piece. So the prefrontal cortex is basically for all purposes, shut down, and this is where sage system lives. This is Sage is in prefrontal where it's giving us the opportunity now to go, no, no. And I do this in my daily life, in all my daily life, but when things really scare me, okay? And then that, then I have to start going through my choices, which is what we're going to turn to now, is the sage. We're going to finally bring you and calm it right down and get into the sage system. And so this is where I want you to talk a little bit Mitch about you outline it very beautifully, about things people can do, choices that, that we can make in sage. I don't want to speak for you. But anyway, what is going on when we've flushed the system and now, and this is where I'm not quite sure if this is where you in your personal life, would immediately implement OODA, which I'm going to let you talk about. But it is kind of a great, a great model. And I want you to explain OODA, and what else we can do to basically train, I think it's training the brain to get into prefrontal, into sage, where we can take a deep breath and and go, okay, and tell ourselves, basically talk ourselves out of the danger.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:09:49
Right.
Vonne Solis 1:09:50
So, yeah. So you can, you can take it away and talk Sage now. Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:09:54
Okay. So in, when we're in Sage, we are curious or playful. And so if we're curious or playful or exploratory, then we can tap into our ability to empathize with people. We can tap into our ability to explore other things to do. We can tap into our ability to come up with with new things to do, to innovate. We can tap into our ability to align with what we really want, which I call navigate in the book. What do I really want out of this situation? And then we can also tap into our ability to be prepared that whatever we try isn't necessarily going to work right away.
Vonne Solis 1:10:38
Oh, okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:10:38
But we're prepared that we're going to try something, we're going to see the results, and then we're going to adjust based on those results. And so those are the, really, what I call the, you know, the five powers of the of the Sage system. And then where OODA comes is that OODA was O, O spelled O, O, D, A, it's, it's, it's an acronym. So it's observe, orient, decide and act. And it's actually an OODA loop. And so the OODA loop, if we're thinking about things that we're going to say, I'm going to go into an OODA loop about this, we're thinking, you know, something, I'm going to come up with things to do. And then, even if it doesn't give me the results that I want or expect, I'm going to use that to come up with the next thing that I'm going to be doing. The process begins with observing. You see what's happening. You hear something, you see something, you feel something, you're observing. And then the second step is, is Orient. That's the step where you're coming up with, these are the things that I could possibly do right now. And so you're taking what you've observed. You're analyzing it, you're coming up with new things. You're exploring, you're coming up with a with a few different things that you could possibly do, what you expect could happen, okay? So you end the Orient stage with, I could do this, or this or this, and then you decide on one or more things to do. And then you act. And you act with the purpose of being able to observe again. Observe what happened and how you did, so that you can then come up in the Orient stage again for the next things that you're that you could possibly do, and then decide on one of them or more than one, and then act again, and then observe. And you're just going around that loop. If you're thinking about situations as this loop, then you're no longer thinking about things as judgmental, like it's I either succeeded or failed, or they succeeded or they failed, or it was good or bad. You're just thinking about information. So it takes you out of that, the situations where you're going to get triggered, and brings you up into your prefrontal cortex into your Sage mind, so you're always looking at information so that you can figure out what to do next.
Vonne Solis 1:13:07
Yeah. Now here are a couple things that it's very important I want to say. So first of all, I want you to remind folks, biologically, neurologically, what's happening. The hormones that are flooding the prefrontal cortex when we've given that 90 seconds and in that space. So we've cleared out the cortisol and adrenaline and we're and what now is happening biologically and neurologically in prefrontal?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:13:34
Well, so we have, we have the happy hormones, okay, okay? Because whenever we're learning, and we're really solving problems, and we're really focused on things? Our brains are being flooded with with the like, they're called the dose hormones on D, O, S, E. Oxytocin, serotonin, endorphins, and now that I'm here, I just forgot what the D stands for.
Vonne Solis 1:14:02
Dopamine.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:14:03
Dopamine, thank you. And dopamine. And so, you know, we, we, we enjoy, you know, hard work when it's fun, hard work. And so those are those, those hormones then really activate our prefrontal cortex and focus us on, Gee what you know, what else what else can I try? And we're enjoying that. And if we're doing it with other people, we're enjoying it as a group. And so that's really what's what's happening.
Vonne Solis 1:14:30
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:14:30
Is we're in our prefrontal cortex. We're flooding our systems with those, those DOSE hormones, and we're in a state that Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi was a psychologist from University of Chicago. He called a State of Flow, and we're when we're in that state of flow. It's a very enjoyable state, and especially if we're in it with other people and we're working together in order to accomplish something or solve a problem.
Vonne Solis 1:14:59
Yeah. So you give many examples of it. So I just want to remind folks. So this was important for me again, so I'm speaking again from for me, always endeavoring to be as calm as possible understanding I will get triggers. I will especially get triggers at certain times of the year that I didn't even know were there. Christmas, you know, etc. So they're so so I just want to say so, from the trauma brain side of things, and for people in grief, I've learned not to fight those feelings. And I've learned that when I am in a certain way, I honour it. So when I'm in fear or anxiety, here's here's a this is not a fun fact. This is just a fact. A lot of bereaved parents, when they lose a child, they're really, really scared they're going to lose another child. And so we live with that fear, a lot of us. I'm not saying every parent, but we do live with a fear. So that that would be one of the biggest fears in my life, is losing my surviving son. And it's not fair to him, so I certainly don't allow him to know all the times I get super, super, super scared. But I have said this before on the podcast, and I continue to say it. At 33 I'm so grateful he's allowed to have Find Me on the iPhone so I can always see where he is. Isn't that nice of him?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:16:17
That's really nice of him.
Vonne Solis 1:16:18
One day, he might remove it, you know, but the fear, the anxiety I lived with, with not knowing where he was, was so great that he just did that for me, and while we all we did it all for each other in our little family. But it doesn't mean those attacks from the survival brain have gone. So it can, the brain can take it right down to even seeing where he is, but it might be moving in a direction that this is unusual pattern, or, Oh, someone's abducted him. You know what happens? What's happening? And I'm not saying this to make light of it. It's a horrible, horrible thing to live with.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:16:54
Right.
Vonne Solis 1:16:55
So I read your book and I understand what's happening in prefrontal. So DOSE, it was pretty easy for me to remember. I've written it down, though, so I can read it, dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin and endorphins. And you know what? I thought, wow. That must be why people take drugs, right?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:17:12
Well, the drugs are emulating what the brain naturally produces.
Vonne Solis 1:17:15
Yes. But that's what I went, wow. That must be why there's such a drug epidemic everywhere because people just want to feel good, right? Like I'm not. I'm not making dismissing it. Anybody. I absolutely...
Mitch Weisburgh 1:17:31
But those drugs also inhibit your ability of the brain to produce its own chemicals, so you become dependent on the on the chemicals that you're getting, and addiction and...
Vonne Solis 1:17:42
Right.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:17:42
happiness.
Vonne Solis 1:17:43
I'm not making light of it, folks, and for anybody experiencing this in the family or anything, it's a horrible situation, but it has turned into an epidemic, where I in Canada, and probably other parts. I don't know. It's terrible in our country, and I was just like, what, like, why? And then I and then I read this, and I went, well, that's what's happening in the brain, but thank you for saying that it inhibits the brain otherwise. But so if folks, we can get ourselves to feeling that. So letting those hormones. Are they hormones?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:18:15
Yes, right, yep.
Vonne Solis 1:18:16
Okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:18:17
They're happy hormones.
Vonne Solis 1:18:18
Happy hormones come into the prefrontal and just let them. So, so if you're dealing with something that is is a repeat trigger, anxiety, trauma, whatever, and you're worrying and it's the same story. Same, the brain it knows. Okay, I'm scared, and I'm telling you these things, this is the opportunity we have to use OODA and observe what your brain's telling you, and I'm just saying this from my personal experience. Orient myself to what I want it to be telling me. My son is safe, right?I decide that. I'm going to believe this and then act. And so make myself turn off the phone. Turn off Find Me. Stop checking. Um, you know, act a different way. Trust and then it that's on repeat loop. And so I'm just using that as an example, Mitch as a very, very personal example, because we can apply that to everything that that scares us or makes us feel uncomfortable, can't we?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:19:22
Yeah, I think so. And I'm just, I'm going to go back to another thing, Vonne, that you said, which was also brilliant, which is that we can't fight those negative emotions, okay? Because when we try to fight them, they're they're going to fight back. We can honour them. And I think one of the ways, and it's one of the ways to honour them is to understand that those emotions are communicators. They're communicating something that we should be aware of, but they're not commanders. They're not something that we should necessarily we should be obeying. And so when we say, you know, thank you for alerting me to this situation.
Vonne Solis 1:19:59
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:20:00
We don't, but we tend to also think that they're commanding us to follow them. No, they're alerting us. And when we treat them as as scouts rather than as our bosses...
Vonne Solis 1:20:13
Yes.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:20:14
then that gives us agency. It gives us power to then flush out the adrenaline and go into an OODA loop to be able to go into a flow state.
Vonne Solis 1:20:24
Okay. So just to be clear, are you calling triggers the scouts?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:20:29
Right. Well, the trigger, okay, so I would call the trigger as the situation. So something happened.
Vonne Solis 1:20:33
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:20:34
The trigger triggered some emotion. Like, we get really upset, like, oh my gosh, I could be losing my child, or, Oh my gosh. I need to, I need to react this way. It's like, okay, this is an this is an emotional reaction. It's telling me to be aware of some situation. Thank you for telling me to be aware. I'm going to use that information. I'm going to calm down, go into my sage brain, and now I'm going to come up with a couple other things that I can do.
Vonne Solis 1:21:02
So if I hear you right, I just want to get this right for me. So it's kind of like the emotions I'm experiencing can be the scouts to tell me what's going on. So it's the emotions that are the scouts, if you will. Because I love that image, and I'm going to remember that. That's amazing. And I know this is a lot. Again, you go into many different types of situations where you can use OODA. I'm giving what isn't necessarily drastic sounding to other people, but is drastic for me to experience, and is the most drastic thing in my life that I deal with. It can be myriad other things for you folks. You could have one recurring trigger that is constantly on your monkey, like a monkey on your back, and you want to get rid of it. So really Mitch, to kind of bring this to a conclusion, the transition from limbic to Sage is the goal. And let's wrap this up with you offering some of the techniques now that can help people move to Sage and keep them there as a powerful practice of MindShifting.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:22:08
Well, I think so there's, there's like 50 of them in the book, and there's probably a thousand that one could use. You know, one one technique is gratitude. So coming, you know, having a handy list of the things that you're you're grateful for. You know, I'm grateful for the sun being out. I'm grateful for being able to turn on the the water and have water come out. I'm grateful for my my wife. I'm grateful for my family. So having a list of some things to be grateful for, and then reviewing that list and feeling it is one of the ways that you can then calm down that limbic mind and get into your Sage mind. Remembering something that was a wonderful moment and being very, very detailed about how you're remembering, it. Like, not just remembering that you were having dinner with your husband. It's like, I remember, like, two nights ago, we were in this restaurant and, you know, and I ordered a vegetarian salad, and it was delicious, and we had sparkling water, and it was, it was fresh, and we were laughing the whole time, and the lighting in the restaurant. And so you the more things that you can remember about that, the more it's going to take you out of that feeling of stress, anxiety, fear, the negative emotions. And so that's a that that's a second thing. And then a third thing is also have a list of the things in your life that you've accomplished. Especially the things that at one point you were sure you couldn't do.
Vonne Solis 1:23:58
Oh, that's an interesting one.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:24:00
So if you have a list of things like, like, I never thought I could write a book. I never but I did. And there were times when I was writing the book that I wanted to stop because I was sure it wasn't going well and nobody was going to read it, and I wasn't going to be able to finish it, but I persisted and I did the book. And look, I've heard from some people who've read the book, and they and and it's changed their life. Okay, so there's, you know, there's one thing on on my list, but if you can come up with a list of lists, well, everybody can come up with a list of five things. If you do come up with a list of five things and write out those five things, thinking about those five things is another way that gets you to kind of flush out those hormones. Calms your your negative emotions, and allows you to tap into your Sage brain. So those are three.
Vonne Solis 1:24:50
Yeah, and I just want to add you do talk about constructive dialogue. So, positive talk. So,
Mitch Weisburgh 1:24:57
Oh yes.
Vonne Solis 1:24:58
To continually tell yourself positive things, and also distraction. And you talked about, just give a couple of examples, because when we talk about distraction, you talk about it a little differently. So we're talking about immediately getting out, but then also longer-term to train yourself to continue to come back to Sage.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:25:19
So, so just even those things that I mentioned before, you know, coming up with things that you're gratitude, that you're grateful for. You know, thinking about the ... , what you're doing is you're distracting your mind. You're changing your focus.
Vonne Solis 1:25:31
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:25:31
But, meditation is a great way. Taking a walk, taking a walk in nature. Listening to music where you're really your music is running in the background, but you're thinking like, Oh, let me listen to the flute here. Oh, let me listen to the guitar. Let me listen to the vocals. Oh, let me listen to the drums. And so you're really using your senses to listen to the music. Looking at art, doing art, doing sports, working out, if that, if you like, working out. Anything that gets your brain to be thinking about something else...
Vonne Solis 1:26:05
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:26:06
allows the hormones to dissipate, gets you back to a equanimous, equanimous state, a sage brain, so that you can then tap into your five sage powers.
Vonne Solis 1:26:20
Yeah. So again, it's, it's like there's so many things that you can do as an individual audience, beyond what, what Mitch, you're just talking about here. I briefly want to just close with, we're going to we're going to close on the five types of situations, because we kind of didn't get a chance to talk about that. So we know we've got the styles of conflict. The five types. But then the brain is also assessing situations. I don't want you to go too deep in that, but I did feel that was a very important part of the book, is understanding what we make things into.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:26:59
Right.
Vonne Solis 1:27:00
And that is sometimes the whole reason for the conflict, right?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:27:05
Well, very often it is, yep, yep. So, so we have a natural tendency to think, to look at a situation and think that there's, there's a right way to do it, or a right way and a wrong way. Which then makes it that anybody who disagrees with that is wrong, okay? And so we just have to convince them that, that we're we're right and they're wrong, and we're also convinced that we're going to be we're going to do whatever the thing that's right, and it's going to solve the problem. And there really are situations like that. You know, there's, they're generally very simple. Like, you know, which restaurant do I want to go to, or what am I going to have for dinner you know? That's a bit silly, but it's an obvious, you know, there's, there's, there may be one obvious right answer. You know, I want to write something. Oh, here's a pen. I can, I can, I can just write it. But there's far more problems where it's going to take some more data. It might take some analysis. It might need some expertise to come up with a solution. And those are called complicated problems because we we can't just obviously come up with an answer. It's going to take some work.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:28:23
In most complicated situations, is actually more than one answer that could be. Okay? So buying a car, you know, whether I bought this car or that car, if it's a good used car, or if it's a good car, you know, like there's 40 different cars that I could buy, and I'll be able to drive any of them. Now, there may be trade-offs. There may be some have better sound systems. Some are less expensive, some are more expensive. But any car is going to solve the problem. If I want to design a building, and I talk to six different architects, I'm going to get six different designs.
Vonne Solis 1:28:59
Yeah, yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:29:00
Probably any of those designs is going to give me a building that's going to meet my needs. Again, there may be some trade-offs. Some might have bigger office space, some might have bigger bedrooms or whatever, but it's much less important which of those six solutions I do than that everybody involved is willing to work hard to make sure that that solution comes about.
Vonne Solis 1:29:26
I just want to, I just want to back up for a quick second. So when we talk about the situations like, I guess my question is, how fast do we assess the situation and then make it one of the five? And I have them here and correct me if I'm wrong. Simple, chaotic, urgent, complicated or complex. Is that right? I might have them wrong.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:29:45
Okay, so, so urgent and chaotic are basically the same.
Vonne Solis 1:29:49
Okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:29:50
Okay, okay, so and so, so I would say there's four, and then there's a fifth state where we we're not sure what kind of situation it is.
Vonne Solis 1:29:58
Okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:29:58
So, okay. Okay, so, so, so simple, there's one right answer. Complicated. Our brains naturally go to simple.
Vonne Solis 1:30:06
Oh, they do.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:30:07
Okay. Our brains naturally go to simple because we're always sure that that, that our solution is, that's the default. Our solution is the right one.
Vonne Solis 1:30:15
Okay got you. Okay, got you. Simple one, simple, one answer.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:30:17
One answer. Everybody should know it. Anybody disagrees is wrong, and it's gonna solve the problem.
Vonne Solis 1:30:25
And is that a split is that a split second brain decision?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:30:29
Usually it's a split second brain decision. It's like, okay.
Vonne Solis 1:30:32
Okay. Well, let's go to chaotic urgent, because that is the trauma brain. That is our trauma brain.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:30:39
So chaotic urgent is, is, like, there's one thing that we have to do, and we have to do it right now.
Vonne Solis 1:30:46
Okay, yeah,.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:30:48
Okay?
Vonne Solis 1:30:48
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:30:49
But the situation is, is a dangerous situation. There's a situation, and the first thing we have to do is we have to get safe, and so we have to do this. And so so the the the way you solve chaotic or urgent situations is you do something that will make you safer. Now long-term, you may need to do other things, like if your house is burning down, long-term?
Vonne Solis 1:31:22
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:31:22
You want, you want your house to be fireproofed.
Vonne Solis 1:31:25
Right.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:31:25
But right now, if your house is on fire, you have to get to safety first.
Vonne Solis 1:31:29
You gotta get out, right?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:31:30
You have to get out. You have to get your your family out. You have to get your pets out.
Vonne Solis 1:31:34
Yeah. So that's not a that is that applies to certain situations, but not every situation in a well-functioning mind is chaotic or urgent, right? Most of them...
Mitch Weisburgh 1:31:47
But a lot of, a lot of, I guess, leaders, will try to convince you that a situation is urgent, and will try to scare you. Because if you're scared and you think something is chaotic and urgent and dangerous, you're much more likely to follow what the person says.
Vonne Solis 1:32:09
Okay, so this is good. Again, you got, wait, a lot of examples. I'm just trying to give people a real overview here, so see how the brain is working. And so, but someone who like, say, a boss like that, it's urgent, urgent, urgent, do, do, do, and also someone whose conflict style is compete, well, you're like, that's really going to overload you with a lot of really nasty feelings. But making situations chaotic and urgent can also be a, intentional choice for somebody who, who is a competitor, and, you know, wants things done a certain way, and also to keep the rest of the people in fear and obeying, essentially.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:32:49
Right.
Vonne Solis 1:32:49
Complying. Okay, then what's the next situation? Do you move to complicated then?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:32:54
So, so, so, comp, so I would, I would move, yeah, from, you know, I'm thinking of these like going around in a circle. So.
Vonne Solis 1:33:02
Oh okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:33:04
So on the lower right, you know, you start off with with simple, and then the one kind of above, it is complicated.
Vonne Solis 1:33:11
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:33:12
Because I don't, you know, it's funny. It's like, that's how they were originally explained to me. You don't, you go from simple and consider chaotic or or or urgent situations.
Vonne Solis 1:33:24
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:33:25
Let me just just one other thing between simple and urgent situations is when people think a situation is simple.
Vonne Solis 1:33:33
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:33:34
They don't think about, they don't think about alternatives or different things that they can do. And very often, they're not thinking of, they're not thinking about what, you know, what they really want to happen. And eventually the system breaks. And when the system breaks, it becomes an urgent problem. Bureaucracies are, you know, bureaucracies just want to roll. Like don't expect them to think like you. You come in with a loan, you don't meet these, these conditions, therefore you don't get the loan. Yeah, if it it says, I have to do this, this, this to approve the loan? Okay, I did this, this, this. The fact, okay, but without any of these considering extending extenuating circumstances.
Vonne Solis 1:34:12
Right. So, so just a simple situation, there's a right/wrong answer. One way to do something, and that's it, and that's that's basically it.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:34:22
And the person who came up with this said simple situations simple is where good ideas go to die. Because there may be maybe a good, a real reason to come up with that rule. But from that point on, nobody thinks about it anymore.
Vonne Solis 1:34:37
Yeah. I'm trying, yeah, I'm trying to think about this more on an individual, when a person is actually looking at themselves and going, what do I do that I just think is so simple, and there's only one answer and then you never let your brain become curious to kind of understand that, No you could actually do other things. That's kind of the context I'm thinking here.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:34:37
Somebody, somebody asks you to do something, and you automatically say yes. And they ask you to do something else, and you automatically say yes and you're always in this pleaser mode, until you blow up.
Vonne Solis 1:35:08
Okay.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:35:08
And then it's a ...
Vonne Solis 1:35:09
I'd say and then it becomes chaotic.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:35:12
It becomes chaotic because somehow or other, you got to get rid of that, that anger and the and the blow up and whatever, you know, whatever the consequences are.
Vonne Solis 1:35:19
Yeah. So we don't have enough time really to go through it, but you do write again about all the situations in your book. And I guess the reason I just wanted to bring that up very quickly is for people to become aware of whether they are on a personal level, making things in their life more complicated than they need to? Or, not necessarily putting enough attention on a situation that has become something that's more complicated.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:35:46
And I do want to cover complex.
Vonne Solis 1:35:48
Okay, let's do that.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:35:49
Okay.
Vonne Solis 1:35:50
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:35:50
I know you know, because, because it's really because most things that involve people are complex.
Vonne Solis 1:35:55
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:35:56
And in in complex situations, there is no right solution. In complicated situations, there's always things that will work. I know if I go to this architect, I'm going to end up with a house, or I'm going to end up with a building that's (indecipherable).
Vonne Solis 1:36:10
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:36:10
In a complex situation, like Covid was a complex situation. Dealing with a disagreement that you have with another person is a complex situation. You don't, you there's no way to know that you're going to say this and then that person is going to is going to calm down.
Vonne Solis 1:36:26
Yeah, yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:36:26
Okay.
Vonne Solis 1:36:26
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:36:26
And so in a complex situation, what you need to be able to do is come up with different things that you can try, knowing that the first thing that you try is very likely not going to work, but you'll get some feedback, and then you can try something else. And so that's also where the OODA Loop comes in, because if you're always this is a complex situation. I'm going to come up with something to try. I expect it's going to do this, but I don't know. I'm going to do it. Oh, this is the result. Now, it wasn't what it didn't solve the problem. So what's the next thing that I can do? What do we expect to happen? Let me try that.
Vonne Solis 1:37:07
Yeah.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:37:08
And so with complex situations, also, it means you don't beat yourself up when you try something and it doesn't work, because nobody knew what was going to work.
Vonne Solis 1:37:17
Yeah. Yeah. The pandemic, I still think we're dealing with the aftermath of that five years later? I really do in many, many ways, because it's, you know, restructured a lot of things. Again. I just want to quickly say, for the audience, and we're going to wrap this up, is that you gave wonderful examples. Give wonderful examples in the book, parent, child situations that are very complex, teacher, student situations, worker to worker that are very complex. So, I, the point of the situations was to understand, as I said earlier, we make them in our mind. I don't know if the brain deduces situations, or do we do that?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:37:53
Well, the brain assumes that everything has one answer. And so that's the survival, the survival brain, which is the fast part of it. We have to catch ourselves and say, no, no, this, let me pause a second. This is something. It's not complex because it doesn't really involve people. I just need some expertise. Or it is complex, so I have to learn, you know, I may need some expertise so I know I don't do anything stupid, but I can't really, there's no expert that's going to tell me what to do, because nobody really knows what's going to work.
Vonne Solis 1:38:23
Right. So it sounds to me like the situation already exists, and the brain helps us to assess it and...
Mitch Weisburgh 1:38:32
Right.
Vonne Solis 1:38:32
turn it into one of these types. And this, this is the work of someone else. I don't expect you to name
Mitch Weisburgh 1:38:38
Dave Snowden, right? Dave Snowden.
Vonne Solis 1:38:39
Dave Snowden worked on this. Oh okay, that's wonderful. So if anyone's interested, check out Dave Snowden's work. All right. Well, Mitch, man, this was a conversation, and I'm ready to conclude it, and I thank you so much again for your time and coming back on the podcast to discuss these aspects. I want to leave the audience myself with the idea that we can all get ourselves into Sage Brain system. Calm, calm. Activate that prefrontal. Not choose to stay in everything's bad and the world's out to get you. Do you have any last thoughts? Did I miss anything that you wanted to leave the audience with Mitch?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:39:19
I thought it was brilliant, the way you've taken, you know, general things, and the examples that I've come up with, and you've applied it to things that people listening here can can use in their in their lives directly and especially regarding grief. So I just thought that you were masterful.
Vonne Solis 1:39:36
Well, thank you. I think about it a lot because I really don't like to suffer myself, and I don't suffer anymore. I'm 20 and a half years, almost 21 years as a bereaved mom, but it has been a choice to help others and say my piece and share what I've learned, but it will be a lifelong journey. And I just heard from a medium I was watching on YouTube the other day. He's a famous medium, and he was saying on grief that grief never goes but he loves to see it grow. And right or wrong, I thought, well, that's interesting, because a lot of people in grief are constantly fighting themselves to get over it and again, join the masses who want to be immune to it, because people don't like bad things happening. And again, the limbic system would be responsible for that. Keep me safe, keep me safe. Let it happen to them, but not me, not me. So everything wraps into that. The whole group thinking, group mentality, follow, and if you don't follow, well, then you're left out. And if you're left out, you're not safe and secure and blah, blah, blah, and on it goes. So it's a really interesting, I feel, in a way, it's like the tip of the iceberg. But I really appreciate you dedicating work to understanding the brain. Other people do it, you know, as well, but in the educating and really, you know, we need to talk more about shifting into Sage. And I don't know who's who came up, well you mentioned who came up with that term, and so you can find out about it in the book, people. That's not your term.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:41:10
It's Shirzad Chamine.
Vonne Solis 1:41:13
Oh okay, and I won't get you to spell that.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:41:16
Thank you.
Vonne Solis 1:41:18
Anyway, that wraps this one up, Mitch. Thanks again, so much for sharing everything and helping folks in in my community. I really appreciate it.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:41:29
Thank you for having me back.
Vonne Solis 1:41:30
Yeah, and by the way, your book's available, I'll have your link to your website MindShiftingwithmitch.com and your book's everywhere, right? Like, is it?
Mitch Weisburgh 1:41:40
It's on Amazon? It's basically on Amazon.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:41:42
Okay, but they can find it through Amazon or your website and buy the book, folks, because it's a, it's a really great book Mitch. So thanks for writing it. I was, How many hours did that take him? No, not hours. How many months did that take you or years? I don't know.
Mitch Weisburgh 1:41:58
Years, years.
Vonne Solis 1:41:58
I really appreciate it. Holy Smoley. Okay, cheers. I'm going to end this one off.