Why Anxiety Won’t Go Away (And What Actually Works) | CBT & EMDR Explained

In this episode, I sit down with my longtime friend Dr. Thomas Whitfield — clinical psychologist, PhD in health psychology and clinical science, and someone who specializes in CBT and EMDR for anxiety and trauma.

We go deep into anxiety disorders, trauma treatment, OCD, attachment styles, avoidance, and the systems that actually help people change. Thomas shares why he prefers working with anxiety over severe depression, how he approaches complex PTSD, and what makes EMDR such a powerful trauma therapy.

We also talk about the personal side — his early experience caregiving after his mom’s brain surgery, developing OCD behaviors, years in therapy, and how that shaped the way he shows up as a psychologist today.

If you’ve ever struggled with anxiety, trauma triggers, overthinking, or feeling stuck in the same patterns — this one’s for you.

And please make sure to follow/subscribe and share it with someone who struggles with anxiety, trauma, or OCD.

Dr. Thomas Whitfield is a clinical psychologist specializing in anxiety disorders, trauma treatment, CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), and EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing). His background includes research in health psychology and clinical science, and he works extensively with trauma, OCD, and attachment patterns.

Click for more information about Dr. Thomas Whitfield,

You can write to me at: Questions@MindBodyMethodPodcast.com

You can follow me at @JoshGrimm_FITNUT

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome to Mind Body Method, the podcast where health and fitness go beyond the weights and the workouts. I'm your host, Josh Grimm, and every week we'll dive into what it truly means to build strength, not just in your body, but in your mind and your life. From movement with purpose to building a resilient mindset, this podcast is about empowering you to thrive in every aspect of your life, inside and outside of the gym. So let's get started. Hi, and welcome back to the My Body Method podcast. And I am your host, Josh Grimm. Today I'm really excited to be talking with my friend Dr. Thomas Whitfield. He is a clinical psychologist, and I have known Thomas for well over a decade. Two kids running around New York City and actually probably observing each other, growing into the men that we are today. Thomas's approach to his psychology, from what you'll see on his social media, is like kind of a no-nonsense, direct, thorough, and concise approach. And that's what I'd like to talk to him about a little bit today. Um, so please welcome Dr. Thomas Whifield.

SPEAKER_01 1:06

Thank you. Yeah, that was a great intro. All of that is accurate. I co-sign it. Um, except for the part about knowing each other for a little over a decade. I think it's probably closer to a little over 20 years, which is crazy to think about. It as we get older, time goes faster. And I feel like living in New York City, the time just goes exponentially faster.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

I'd like to live in my my era where it's like, let's pretend I'm slowing down time a little bit. Yeah. But yes, I think you're you're 100% right. It's been like 20 years since we've met. And we've we've kind of grown into watching each other through our careers and like hairstyle differences when you had really long hair.

SPEAKER_01 1:43

There have been a lot of hairstyles.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

There's been a lot of hairstyles. Yeah. You know, you went from like the long dark hair to now like the shorter.

SPEAKER_01 1:51

I've I've grown my hair out that long, like three times in the middle of my back. It's it's been insane. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:56

Is that gonna go back?

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Uh I don't think so. You're settled. I don't think so.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

You're settled now.

SPEAKER_01 2:01

Yeah, I think I think I'm settled on it. It's good. Um but yeah, we I think we've seen each other through a lot of probably different iterations of not only hair, but personality and points in life. And uh and it is an interesting thing to sort of step back and reflect on.

SPEAKER_00 2:18

So the first thing I'm gonna do is I I want you to um introduce yourself and tell people what you do, who you are, and yeah.

unknown 2:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:27

So I'm a clinical psychologist. Um, I have a PhD in health psychology and clinical science, which is sort of this focus on how mental health impacts physical health and physical health impacts mental health. Um, so I'm always bringing that into my sessions with clients. Um, I mostly specialize in cognitive behavioral therapy and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing. So specifically, I gravitate towards people that have anxiety, anxiety-related disorders, and people that have been through trauma.

SPEAKER_00 2:55

And that is EMDR, right? EMDR is eye movement desensitization and reprocessing. I have I've done it before, and I just whenever you said it, I'm like, I forgot I kind of forgot what the acronyms stand for. So for but yes.

SPEAKER_01 3:06

No, no, no. Psychology is filled with acronyms and some people automatically know what CBT is or EMDR is, but yeah, it's a mouthful.

SPEAKER_00 3:14

Okay. Um, so why why did you choose this direction for your practice? And you know, what encouraged you and what led you to this niche?

SPEAKER_01 3:23

So when you are when you're getting a PhD or or any degree in psychology, you work with a lot of different populations to sort of figure out where it is that you fit in, what it is that you enjoy, what it is that you connect with. And myself, I am a fucking doer. Like I love a checklist, I love to mark things off, I love to get things done, I love to go after a goal. And people that have anxiety have a lot of energy. Okay. They like to sort of get things done. And you can work with those people on sort of just pointing that energy in a different direction in something that's more helpful for their goals. Whereas when someone is in a depressive episode or experiencing a ton of depression, you know, the main treatments are medication and behavioral activation. And for some people, when they're depressed, it's really difficult to get them motivated to do anything. And I really struggle connecting with that. So it seems uh, it seems sort of broad to be like, I don't generally enjoy working with people that have depression because you would think, oh, mental health, depression's a huge part of it. But the spectrum of mental health disorders is so huge that there are areas that you specialize in and other areas that you just don't.

SPEAKER_00 4:39

Is it is it actually frustrating for you to work with um patients that have that sort of depression, or is it just not interesting for you?

SPEAKER_01 4:49

Uh I think both. Yeah. I think both. I have been depressed, absolutely. I've had my own plethora of mental health uh issues. And even with the depression, I can still force myself to be behaviorally activated. I can still force myself to go to the gym, eat the food that I need to eat, get the sleep that I need, get up off the couch. And um, there are moments where I might think I don't want to, but I can make myself do it anyway. And when people are very depressed, it's difficult for them to get out of this space of hearing themselves say I can't and believing the I can't, as opposed to recognizing it as I don't want to.

SPEAKER_00 5:30

Right. Okay, so it's not that you don't so you understand where they're coming from, but you don't, you don't, I mean, you you never fit that same program. Like you don't necessarily believe that they actually are incapable.

SPEAKER_01 5:41

Yeah, I think that I think that's where the difficulty comes in, is because so much of getting over depression is having to do things that you don't want to do. Right. And I feel like my entire life I have had to do things that I don't want to do. And I don't get stuck in that place. So it's really difficult for me to relate with. That makes sense. And I get frustrated by it. So I just choose to not work with that particular population for the most part.

SPEAKER_00 6:07

Well, yeah, because your needs are used better elsewhere, or your your talents, excuse me, are used better elsewhere.

SPEAKER_01 6:12

Yeah, for example, I love doing trauma work. I can sit with someone for an hour, hour and a half, whatever it is, and hear about the most horrific events that one could ever imagine. And I can hold that space for it. I can be compassionate, I can be empathetic, I don't carry it with me. I don't think about it after, and I can do that work and feel amazing about it. And not everybody has the capacity to do trauma work. Right. Um, but for me, I just really connect with it and really enjoy it.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

Have you switched your focus over the years or like to to your trauma work now? Like where did you kind of begin whenever you first started?

SPEAKER_01 6:49

Yeah, when I started, it was very just sort of anxiety and depression. Well, hang on, let me go back. When I started doing my more clinical work, it was focused on anxiety and depression. Before that, I had done a lot of research work um, doing evidence-based interventions, utilizing things like motivational interviewing, so behavior change over time with things like getting people who are at high risk for HIV to adhere to their PrEP medication. So the medication that would stop them from serial converting from HIV negative to HIV positive. So when I started dipping my toe in psychology, it was all from a research perspective of how can we get people to engage in more health-related behaviors. And then when I actually started doing more clinical work in a private practice setting, then it turned into a focus on anxiety and a focus on depression. Then when I did my internship year, so to get a PhD is like 11 years of school. Right. It is a long freaking time. Right. After you've done your dissertation, all of this longer than we knew each other. Uh just by your math, yes. Um and uh so then I when I did my internship year, I worked at a at a hospital setting in Pennsylvania, and I was exposed to all of these other presentations, things like trauma and OCD. And I was like, oh, this is so fun. I love doing this work. I learned about exposure therapy for anxiety, exposure therapy and habit reversal training for OCD, um, and then cognitive processing therapy, prolonged exposure therapy for trauma. And then after I did my postdoc and had my own practice, I decided to learn about EMDR as a treatment for trauma. But it was really um doing the prolonged exposure work with people that had been through horrific events that I was like, this is amazing. This is so much fun. And, you know, in part, I've loved horror movies since I was excited. I know like a huge horror fan. Yes. And I think that kind of ties into loving trauma work to some degree. Like I find it so interesting and it doesn't scare me.

SPEAKER_00 8:53

So back up even farther, what were like the I mean, when did you decide that you wanted to go into this field in general?

SPEAKER_01 9:00

To to some degree, I feel like it picked me as opposed to me picking it. Yeah. Um, my mom had brain surgery when I was a kid. Um when I was about nine or 10. I believe her actual surgery, I was 10. Um, and after that, she was a completely different person. They literally took parts of her brain out. And following that, my parents got a divorce. Um, my mom was a completely different person. And I sort of became her her emotional caregiver and physical caregiver to a certain degree. At about 10 years old, I was putting her to bed at night as opposed to her putting me to bed at night. Right. Um, and her relationship with my sisters changed. I became kind of my mom's best friend, her confidant. Um, and you know, I was there with her to kind of hate my father. I was there for her to listen when her friends got mad at her. And I started to engage in a lot of sort of OCD behaviors. I was engaging in a lot of safety seeking. I would do a lot of counting, I would do a lot of praying, I would engage in all of these behaviors that I thought if I did them and I did them enough or I did them well enough, that I would stop bad things from happening. So what that so what that would specifically look like is if I thought that my mom and sisters were going to fight, I would have to say, like, I love Jesus 10 times in a row, uh, 10 times, 10 times in a row as fast as I could without making any errors. And if I did that, then that would mean that my mom and my sisters weren't gonna fight. And if I fucked it up, then I had to start all over. And that's you know, that's what OCD looks like. Um and my parents sent my sisters and I, not not for that, they didn't know that was going on. I never talked about it. It was just something that I did. Um, they sent my sisters and I to a therapist when they got a divorce. Probably the best decision they ever made for us. Um, so we went to a few therapists sort of off and on. And then when I came out, I was in eighth grade and my mom wanted me to go to a therapist. Not for like conversion therapy, she just didn't know what to do and wanted me to have someone to talk to. So I started going to a therapist then. Um I moved out of Michigan to New York a week after I graduated high school. I had been in a relationship and we broke up, I want to say like a year after that. I started, I started having thoughts about self-harm. I would go to get on the subway and think about stepping in front of it. Not that I had the urge to do it, but that thought was coming up and I was really depressed and really sad. So I thought, okay, I've gone to therapy in the past. I think it's time that I go back. So I found a therapist that I really liked, and I stuck with her for about 10 years, off and on. Um, so therapy had always been a big part of my life. And then in my mid-20s, uh, one of the things that was coming up for me over and over again is that I was trying to date people that did not want to date me, essentially, chasing after people that were not chasing after me back. And I was noticing that I would get really anxious about it. And in talking about this with my therapists, I realized, like, oh, I have an anxious attachment style. And when someone isn't giving me the love or the attention that I want, that makes me want them more. Yeah. And that ties directly back to what my relationship was like with my mom. And your nervous system was probably overfiring and overacting. Yeah. And recreating that same dynamic that I had with my mom. Because if I made her happy, then she would be nice to me. If I was up, if I did something that was upsetting, she would be mean to me. So the love was always kind of conditional. And that's what I learned to see love as. So we so often recreate the house that we grew up in in every relationship that we have. And I realized that that's what I was doing. So I talked with my therapist about it. I started reading these self-help books, and I started to notice that not only was I chasing after people that weren't chasing me back, I was also specifically chasing people that I thought needed to be helped or fixed. Because that's where I was finding my value. So having taken care of my mom, I was earning her affection by trying to help her or fix her and constantly thinking, if I'm good enough, then pre-brain surgery, mom will come back. And once I had that realization, I was like, oh fuck, this sucks. I'm just trying to fix people that don't want to be fixed. And then I read this book called Uh The Rhythm of Life by Matthew Kelly. And one of the things that it talks about in the book is how when we identify something that isn't helping us in our life, we have to decide do we want to try to change that thing or do we want to embrace it and use it as a superpower? And I realized what I was doing and I was like, look, if I have this deep want or need to help people, I can either work really hard and try to change that, or I can embrace that and turn it into a career. And then everything sort of made sense. And within I think six months of that, I was in school for psychology.

SPEAKER_00 14:11

Do you feel like that career path, you need to have some sort of emotional detachment in order to be understanding, empathetic, sympathetic towards your patients?

SPEAKER_01 14:25

So that's a great question. I think that it is very helpful if you are able to compartmentalize what happens in the session from your life outside of it. Otherwise, it will eat you alive. You can't take on everyone else's issues all the time. So, you know, I do think of my clients outside of session. They cross my mind, but when they cross my mind, it's usually that I see something that reminds me of them or I see something that I think they would like. And then I there's part of me that like wants to tell them about that. But I don't worry about them. But I know therapists that do. Right. I know therapists that specifically will not do, for example, trauma work because they worry about their clients outside of session, or therapists that won't take on clients that are experiencing suicidal ideation because they don't want to worry about them outside of session. Right. And I I do what I need to in the session so that I don't have to worry about it outside of session.

SPEAKER_00 15:20

So I'm someone who I've done EMDR probably five or six times and I love it, right? Tell me a little bit about why you chose, because there's not a lot of therapists that are like well certified to practice at EMDR. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_01 15:35

Uh it's becoming more and more available, but uh EMDR is becoming more and more available. But yeah, it it's a road to get your certification. So I am certified by um the EMDR International Association, Mdria. Um and yeah, it it costs a lot of money and it takes a lot of time to get certified.

SPEAKER_00 15:55

Um What do you think about it itself? Like, do you think that's very, very beneficial for your patients? Is it is it recommended for everyone? Like, is there certain criteria that you feel like that people need to meet before they even go down that road?

SPEAKER_01 16:08

So, yes and no. So the thing with trauma treatments is that there are sort of four main ones. So there's prolonged exposure, there's cognitive processing, there's written exposure therapy, and then there's EMDR. Those are kind of the four main ones, and they all have similar outcomes. And it isn't that one is necessarily better than another one for an individual, but there are certain things that make some of them potentially more effective. So, for example, if you are someone who has been through one significant trauma, so uh I have trigger warning for anyone at this point we're talking about trauma, so need one, but uh, I have worked with a client who was in a mass shooting. Okay, who survived a mass shooting. Um, so that was a very specific event that we worked on reprocessing. And we actually use prolonged exposure therapy for that. And what prolonged exposure therapy looks like is you close your eyes and you tell the experience out loud from beginning to end, uh, as though it's happening to you again in first person. So I am standing in this place, I am feeling this thing, I am hearing this thing. Um, and and the person tells the entire narrative. You find the hot spots, and then you go back through and have them go over those hot spots again and again and again until they can go through the entire narrative without experiencing any sort of uh physiological discomfort. Outside of that, they're also doing exposure work outside of outside of the session. So someone that's maybe been in an in an event like that might have a difficult time being around crowds or loud noises. So you create sort of a, not even sort of, you create a list of what those exposures might be for them to engage in outside of session and start with the ones that you think are going to be the least activating, up to the ones that are gonna be the highest activating.

SPEAKER_00 17:55

So you're almost like repairing the house that broke down, right? It's like you're building a new a new framework for them to kind of go and like live their lives in a better, healthier place, right?

SPEAKER_01 18:04

Yeah, absolutely. So so much of trauma and anxiety is about avoidance, avoidance of the things that make us uncomfortable. And if you continue to avoid the things that are making you uncomfortable, you're going to continue to not do those things and your life is going to stay in the same path. And that goes for depression, anxiety, trauma, all of them, even with depression. If if it's uncomfortable for you to get out of bed, so you stay in bed, then again, you're you're avoiding that that discomfort. So prolonged exposure is really great for sort of an individual trauma. And you, you know, you somewhere between six and ten sessions usually to reprocess that that entire event. Um, whereas EMDR can be used for an individual event. There's no reason that it can't be. But if you are someone that has more uh more complex PTSD presentation, so someone who's been through a similar event over and over and over and over again, then EMDR is going to probably be quicker and more effective. You can still do the prolonged exposure, but you're gonna have to do each event individually. So let's say that you were in a physically abusive relationship and you have 10 to 20 specific events that stick out in your mind.

SPEAKER_00 19:15

I see.

SPEAKER_01 19:16

Yeah, you're gonna have to do all of those individually with prolonged exposure, whereas with EMDR, you still do them individually, but they tend to move more quickly from one to the next.

SPEAKER_00 19:26

Right, that makes sense. Whenever you going back to, you know, alluding to a person, a client, a patient that is so depressed they can't get out of bed or whatever, do you think that sometimes that is um their actual belief? Or is it like that's just what they want to say for someone to help pull them out? Or is it attention seeking? Or I guess it depends on the other.

SPEAKER_01 19:46

I think it can be all of those things. Uh yeah, I think that it can be all of those things for different people.

SPEAKER_00 19:54

How would you, speaking of trauma, how would you define trauma in more layman's terms that that's not event focused, but something that can help anyone understand like what trauma is?

SPEAKER_01 20:05

Yeah. So trauma is subjective. So that's the first thing people often think that trauma has to be, you know, you saw someone killed in front of you, that you went off to war. Um, when really it's any sort of an event that you've been in that when you think back to, you can feel the physiological sensations in your body and you have some sort of a maladaptive thought about yourself or the world. Some people sort of define these things differently as like small T trauma, big T trauma. You know, however you want to look at it, it's still something that has happened in your past that's impacting how you're behaving now.

SPEAKER_00 20:39

Right. Would would trauma also be considered things that are, let's say you're entering into a new relationship and you're getting some of those weird feelings in your nervous system about someone's behaviors, like things that are coming up from that trigger you from past. Is trauma and triggering kind of the same thing? Do they kind of go hand in hand? Are they do they live in the same house? Sure.

SPEAKER_01 21:01

I I would call them, I would say they live in the same cul-de-sac. Okay, okay. And and sometimes they have barbecues. Right. Um so God, trigger is so trigger is thrown around. So much, I know, I know. Much.

SPEAKER_00 21:17

It's a triggering word.

SPEAKER_01 21:18

Yeah, the the triggering trigger the idea of something being triggering is triggering. Um so it so there are absolutely triggers that happen with trauma. Um, but a lot of times when people throw throw around this this word trigger, what they can actually just be experiencing is some discomfort. And that can be really unhelpful if when you're experiencing discomfort, you automatically call it a trigger. Because what that says to everyone around you and yourself is this thing must now be avoided. Right, right. Which is not the same as a a real a real sort of trigger trauma response happens inside you.

SPEAKER_00 22:00

It also feels like then you believe that's un unfixable. Yeah. If you, you know, if you're going, I need to avoid this because it's I can't fix this. I can't, I just have to walk around it.

SPEAKER_01 22:09

Yeah, this is sort of something that I see a lot in couples therapy. Yeah. Where two people will be, I'll be the therapist, and two people will be the couple. And um, they'll start having a discussion about someone's behavior, and that person's real response will be, I'm triggered, I'm triggered, I can't have this conversation. And it's like, okay, I get that this is uncomfortable, and maybe you're quote, triggered, but it's not the same thing as a trauma response. Your body and mind are not shutting down, you're just uncomfortable and think that because it's uncomfortable, you don't want to have the conversation. So I'll see things like this come up where it even has to do with like someone's infidelity. And then the person's like, I can't talk about this right now. I'm triggered, I'm triggered. And then the other person is like, but you cheated on me, and whenever I want to talk to you about it, you tell me you're triggered, which means it's off limits. So then we never get to talk about it and nothing gets fixed. Right, right. Um, whereas a real trauma trigger is neurological, it's uncontrollable.

SPEAKER_00 23:08

Do you see patients that sometimes like you see trauma in their past or you see trauma in their behaviors or from their explanation and like they don't even recognize that they have trauma? Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_02 23:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:19

Maybe like that you have to point out to them that there is trauma where they might think that they just have some sort of um behavioral issue that they're working through or something, but you've actually recognized there's trauma from the past that you have to deal with. Is that common?

SPEAKER_01 23:32

Yeah, yeah, comes up quite a bit. Uh, usually the sort of the the things that lead me to ask more questions about it, because I will ask people during an intake like, are there do you think that you've been through traumatic events? Just as like a blanket question. Um, and most people will say no. And then as I start working with them, stuff starts to show up. And sometimes the way that shows up is they'll talk about an interpersonal uh situation where they're having a conversation with someone and noticing that they have this response that they don't understand. So then when you're curious about it and unpack it, you often find out, like, oh, that response that you were having sounds really protective. What were you thinking you needed to protect? And then that'll go back to some situation in their life where they felt like they really needed to protect themselves. And that's what they were trying to do.

SPEAKER_00 24:23

And then you guide them through.

SPEAKER_01 24:25

Yeah, and then I talked to them about that situation. And I, you know, in in something like that, I will we'll talk about that specific situation and then I'll ask about other times where maybe they felt similarly, and then I'll suggest to them, you know, this might not be the type of trauma that you would think of when you hear the term trauma, but some of the things that you're describing sound like it's it's really stuff that's coming up for you now from past events, and we could do some work on those past events so that you're not re-experiencing some of that stuff now.

SPEAKER_00 24:57

How do you stay so focused during your sessions? And you know, just I mean, I I think I'm a pretty like I, you know, I have clients all the time that don't need as much attention, of course, as your patients need from you. And I I find myself pretty okay and able to retain information and things like that with those sessions. But you know, what you're when you're working with actual patients that need a lot more help, mental health, and things like that, how do you stay super focused on what they're saying without letting your thoughts go awry and you know being in those 45-55 minutes, you know, really one-on-one with them?

SPEAKER_01 25:28

So the the answer I'm supposed to give you is that you, you know, you do X, Y, Z and you're just able to, or there's this special ability that I have. But the reality is, is sometimes you lose focus. Right. And that is also good information to have about myself, about the client, about the dynamic. What is it that's happening there that's leading me to sort of not maintain everything that they're saying? So I would, you know, I would love to tell you like, oh no, I remember every single thing that a client has ever said, and I'm pretty good about it. I think most of my clients would be like, yeah, I think he probably does remember everything that I say. But because I was trained in CBT, I'm always noticing patterns. I'm always looking for patterns. So there are times where a client will start to tell me a story, and I kind of already know exactly where it's gonna go because I know the client and I know, and I can pause them and be like, I'm guessing that this, this, and this is what happened next. Is that right? And the vast majority of the time it's yeah, that's exactly what happened.

SPEAKER_00 26:32

Is there a um perfect patient? A perfect patient for you. I mean for you. Like is it is it like, do you like to hear about relationships? I mean, besides trauma, like do you do you like when it's about relationships? Do you like when it's talking about family dynamics?

SPEAKER_01 26:45

For me, it isn't so much about the topic, it's about are they do they want to change and are they doing the work? Right. Um, because I have I'm I'm working on it, we're all works in progress, but I have a low distress tolerance for people that want to whine and complain without doing anything to change what's happening. I have a very hard time with this helplessness and and hopelessness. And I can I can hold space for it, I can work with it to a certain degree, but every now and then there is a client that is bringing up the same thing over and over and over and over again, and then saying things like, no one will help me, no one will do anything. Like, hello, I'm giving you the tools. Yeah, yeah. And the reality is, is like, and I've had to have this conversation conversation with clients. Like, I have I have talked to you about all of these different things that you can do, and you refuse to do any of them. I'm trying to help you, but I can't make you do these things. Right.

SPEAKER_00 27:46

That aligns with my work too, by the way. It's like, I mean, I've had that, I had that conversation with many people about like, well, I'm not losing the weight, I'm not gaining the muscle. I'm like, well, you're on a Zempic and you're not working out, you're not eating protein. That's why you're not gaining muscle, and you're not losing the weight because you're going out drinking five nights a week and you're having a beer and wine. Well, it's just beer and wine. Well, it's empty calories going into your body. I'm telling you what you need to do. You're just not doing them. You're choosing not to do them. So that's on you, bro.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

Like, yeah, and and that's and that's exactly how it feels as a behavioral therapist. And then you, you know, for myself, having to go down that road with people about like, okay, so what are the what are the things that are coming up for you that are leading you to go have those five drinks with your friends? What are those things that are leading you to not be doing the cardio? What are those things that are getting in the way? And often um one of the things that I struggle with in those types of interventions is that people will have a ton of excuses. So I used to um do evaluations for bariatric surgery and be so much preparing for bariatric surgery or like the stomach surgery, a tummy tuck, is all of the behavioral changes that you have to make beforehand. Because if you don't make the behavioral changes, you'll get the surgery, you'll you you'll lose the weight, you'll continue to eat the way you were before and you'll gain the weight back. And then you can't always have a revision because the stomach is stretched so much from the original. Uh, but people will have so many excuses for not have making those behavioral changes. I've heard people say things like, I don't like the taste of water, I can't drink it. I've had people say, Well, you need to tell my wife she makes all the food. And it's not, it's this. I think the thing that gets to me sometimes being a therapist and with certain clients is not wanting to take personal responsibility for their lives being the way that they are. And you know, you had mentioned earlier on about how often with my social media and with my clients, like I'm very directed to the point because I genuinely want them to make the changes that they need to. I'm not telling them the changes they need to make. I'm listening to them tell me what their goals are and then telling them, based on research and science, how they can achieve those goals. Right. But if you're not willing to do the work for them, there's only so much space that I can hold for that. I'm just not the therapist for people that want to talk about doing something but not do anything about it.

SPEAKER_00 30:16

Do anxiety and trauma live on that same call de sac. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 30:21

Yeah. People that have been through trauma experience so much anxiety. Uh yeah, I wouldn't. Yeah, I wonder if they might live a little bit closer, even than a trigger like the trauma response. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:37

What are some daily habits to help regulate anxiety?

SPEAKER_01 30:41

So I'm glad I'm glad that you asked that question. I'm glad that you asked it in that way because there's a difference between regulating anxiety and getting rid of anxiety. And usually the first step in treating anxiety is getting someone to begin to regulate or manage their anxiety. And what that means is engaging in mindfulness. That means breath work, that means some meditation, that might mean yoga, um, getting that energy out in different ways. So physical health is huge. If you have anxiety but you start going to the gym, you are going to be working some of that extra energy out and the anxiety will decrease. Now, if you're going to the gym and drinking, you know, a ton of pre-workout beforehand, right? It's probably not going to work as well. But doing things that connect you to yourself. And when I start doing anxiety work with people, you know, I'm not telling them that they need to have an hour in the morning to get their day going. Like nobody has that time. No one has time for that. And that's so much of this like self-help guru bullshit that I see online is like, you need to drink this tea and do this exercise and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And that's not realistic for the vast majority of the world.

SPEAKER_00 31:54

Unless you're living in Bali and like on your little like social media um founder platform sitting over there every morning, then yeah, it's impossible.

SPEAKER_01 32:03

Exactly. And uh, and if you have that lifestyle, you're probably not experiencing that much anxiety to begin with. Um, so what I always start people off with is this really great two-minute uh meditation called Leaves on a Stream. It is, it's on YouTube, you can Google it. There are a million different videos, they range from two minutes to 15.

SPEAKER_00 32:25

That's the actual name of the there's more. Okay, I leaves on a stream. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 32:29

Yeah, if you just go on YouTube and type in Leaves on a stream, it is this meditation that asks you to close your eyes, visualize that you are sitting next to a stream, that leaves are falling into the stream, and every leaf that goes by, you put whatever thought is in your mind on that leaf. You don't judge the thought as a good thought, as a bad thought, as helpful, as unhelpful. You just put it on the leaf and watch it go. Yeah. Add two clouds. Yeah, same idea. Yeah. And the idea being that you're just observing your thoughts. And that is a muscle that you can build over time so that you become an observer of your thoughts as opposed to having to respond to them. Right. So that is a really so that is a really quick and easy way to begin a mindfulness practice that will help your anxiety in managing it. Now, now, when it comes to actually getting rid of the anxiety, that's when you have to do the really, really hard shit. So you can make time for mindfulness, you can make time for meditating under five minutes a day. Absolutely. It's that avoidance that keeps anxiety really strong. When we decide not to do things because we are uncomfortable, we are sending a message to our body and our mind that when I avoided it, the anxiety went away. Therefore, that was something that needed to be avoided. So I'm going to continue to avoid it. When the vast majority of the time, the things that we are avoiding are objectively safe.

SPEAKER_00 33:57

Do you think that's a large percentage of your patients enter into that stage and that phase of this avoidance? With there's okay. Yeah. Is it hard to convince them that they're perhaps thinking unclearly or improperly about that topic?

SPEAKER_01 34:13

It can be. It depends on the presentation. Right. Um, you know, there is a an amazing list of what are called cognitive distortions or thinking traps. I want to say there's 12 things on it. This is, you know, validated list of thinking traps that people fall into. I send them a sheet. I'm like, here is a black and white printed sheet of these 12 different things and what they look like. How does this show up for you? And when you show someone something in black and white, it's really difficult for them to look at it and go, oh no, that's that's not real. That doesn't apply to me. And it's like, well, it actually does. So things like that are on that list are like jumping to conclusions. Okay. You know, thinking that you know how something is going to turn out, even though you have very little evidence to actually support that, or black and white thinking, where you see everything as either good or bad. And once you start to recognize those patterns, then you can change them, and then you can start to engage in some of the behaviors that you've been avoiding. So, for example, if you are considering having a difficult conversation with a partner, but you're avoiding it because of the anxiety that you feel about it, you're also probably telling yourself a story about I'm going to say this, my partner's going to say that, then I'm going to say this, and then we're just going to end up in a fight, nothing's going to get resolved. So then you avoid having that conversation. Your anxiety goes down until the next time that something comes up that maybe that conversation could be had. And then it's, oh, well, I avoided it before and everything was fine. So I'm going to continue to avoid it.

SPEAKER_00 35:40

Right, right. I know that you are completely always working on your mind and helping people work on their mental health. Um, let's talk a little bit about your physical health and your physical journey and your habits and your practices. I know that you are um a handstand guru too. Like you had this like, I don't know if I would say guru. So I can do one. Wait, but well, you were you've been okay, right. So guru is the wrong words. I know that you have been um working on your handstands because I've been seeing you on your social media. And I actually had um another guy in my podcast recently who is a handstand coach and um expert. And so it's fun to see like your progressions on your social media. So now you can do one, right? I can do a handstand, yeah. Yeah, okay. Um that was a goal.

SPEAKER_01 36:20

It was a goal. I, you know, a goal that I decided when I turned 40. I was like, now seems like the perfect time to decide. Can you do a handstand? Can I do a handstand?

SPEAKER_00 36:29

Uh what is what are your daily practices for your your uh you know, your your mindfulness and your physical health?

SPEAKER_01 36:35

So I do I am someone that has about a 20-minute daily practice in terms of my mental health. So I wake up, I uh burn a little bit of sage, I do a meditation, I have some mantras that I go through, and then I'll pull three tarot cards just to get as sort of like a beginning, middle, and uh for the day and what it is that I'm coming into the day with, what I would like to focus on, and what the outcome might be that I can look for. And that just sort of gives me a focus for the day. I'm not necessarily using it to tell the future as much as like, okay, I want to focus on something today. What's gonna be helpful for me? And that's what I do in the morning to get going. And then in terms of my physical health, I do work with a nutritionist and a coach. Um, so I have a coach that programs all my workouts online, and then um I track all of the food that I eat throughout the day. So depending on if we're we're bulking or we're cutting.

SPEAKER_00 37:28

Are you diligent with that?

SPEAKER_01 37:29

With your tracking? I'm really diligent with it. That's correct. But I also am a creature of habit and I eat a lot of the same things. Yeah. Uh so I know what's I know what's in stuff because I've tracked it so many times. Right. And that has actually been really helpful for me in my own journey of getting comfortable with my body. Um, because I've definitely had some body image related issues, and being on a system with a person that I trust and tracking those things takes so much of the guessing work out for me. And it really helps me to calm my anxiety.

SPEAKER_00 38:02

Yeah. I mean, it allows for all the freedom of doing what you want to do with your work anyway. I'm the same way. Like I like the systems in place. A lot of people think I have um, I hate to say OCD, especially to a therapist. I don't think it's OCD, but that's you know a general term of saying, like, I like things a certain way, and I'm kind of I'm very anal about them, right? I need them to perform at my best. So I like systems too. So having someone tell me what I I mean, I tell myself and I keep track of myself and my my my diet and things like that, but I just like having the same thing over and over. I have my same same habits in the morning, my same practices. Um, what is your um do you have rest days for workout for your workouts? Or not really?

SPEAKER_01 38:41

No, not really.

SPEAKER_00 38:42

Because on a on active rest or what?

SPEAKER_01 38:44

Uh so on a day that would be more rest, I'm probably still doing some amount of cardio or a little bit of physical therapy for my shoulder. Right. Um, or working on handstands. Like movement, just movement.

SPEAKER_00 38:54

We're older, we're over 40.

SPEAKER_01 38:56

Yeah. I mean, I've got to do something. Yeah, I don't, I mean, going to the gym and getting exercise is a huge part of my mental health routine. For sure. If I don't get to the gym, I don't feel at my best. And I'm not one of those people that's like, oh, you have to be at your best at all times. You know, it's uh it's not that mentality as much as that I notice that I feel physically and mentally different if I don't get the exercise that I know is good for me.

SPEAKER_00 39:24

What did you do today? Or what are you doing?

SPEAKER_01 39:26

I'm going later. What am I doing? I have no idea. And the reason I don't know is because I have an app that I look at that tells me what to do. So it's and I love it because in the past, it would be going to the gym and being like, oh, what do I feel like today? What did I work on two days ago? Am I ready for that? I could kind of just do this. But with this app, I'm like, oh, okay, this tells me exactly what I did last time and how many reps that I can push that more today. And this is the order I'm doing it. It takes so much of the guestwork out of it. And I am, I definitely maximize my time to a point that I could potentially be called a workaholic by some, and they probably wouldn't be wrong. Same. With that said, I also have a lot of systems in place so that I can accomplish the things that I want to accomplish.

SPEAKER_00 40:13

I love it. We're the same person. I'm gonna ask a few questions, a little rapid fires. What is the biggest lie that people believe about themselves?

SPEAKER_01 40:22

That they can't do things. Yeah, that they can't do things. I think that people, and and I mentioned this before, having this thought of I can't. It's rarely I can't. It's generally always I don't want to. I don't want to. And I think it is a huge lie that so many people tell themselves that stops them from being able to achieve so many things that they want to. I can't doesn't really exist. What is the common form of the most common form of self-sabotage? Negative self-talk. Yeah, carrying negative beliefs about ourselves, about the world, thinking that we know how things are going to go because it stops us from doing anything new and then we just stay in the same patterns. A mental habit that we should all build daily. Curiosity. Stop asking why questions and start asking what questions. When you're engaging in a conversation with someone, ask them what do you like about that? What led you to that, as opposed to why did you do that? So curiosity. Just lead with curiosity, and it is going to open so many doors for yourself and others. And it's fairly simple to do. Literally thinking when you're speaking to someone, how can I phrase this as what instead of why? Why instantly leads people to feel defensive. Let's just say, even that you say you like Mexican food, and I say, Why do you like Mexican food? It puts you on the defensive as though, like, oh, I have to defend why I like Mexican food. Whereas it's what do you like about Mexican food? Oh, I love the chips, I love the margaritas, I love the salt. I, you know, you learn so much more about people when you don't instantly put them on the defensive food.

SPEAKER_00 41:56

I'm gonna make this my daily practice. Besides answering with why, what is one thing that people should stop doing immediately?

SPEAKER_01 42:03

Oh, picking up their phone first thing in the morning. Oh, we have to stop doing it.

SPEAKER_00 42:07

We've had this conversation today in this very room with this other podcast I did. He said the exact same thing. And I talked about my my habits. I don't do it either. So there's three of us that have been in this room today that are all in agreement.

SPEAKER_01 42:19

There is this sweet moment of neuroplasticity when you first wake up that you people are giving it away. They are wasting it. Wait 10 minutes and look at your phone. Nothing is going on.

SPEAKER_00 42:31

Literally, before you walked into this place today, I did a I did a podcast on neuroplasticity.

SPEAKER_01 42:36

Yeah, yeah. I see it with my clients all the time. They are starting their days by picking up their phone and getting wrapped up in the algorithm machine that is feeding you shit that you don't need. Yeah. Take five minutes laying in bed, put your hand on your heart, your hand on your stomach, and think about what do I want to do today? For me, that's often like I want to lead with being open. I want to lead with love. I want to lead with curiosity. And I sort of envision myself what I have planned for today, going through those moments, engaging in that aspect of myself. Then I'll get up and then I'll look at my phone. Right. And even then, it's checking an email. I don't get on social media. I try not to get on social media until at least afternoon. Yeah. Because I'm just not ready to be activated for it.

SPEAKER_00 43:22

Listen, I want to thank you for today. You're always so fun to talk to. I always learn something from you and I care about you. So thanks for being here. I appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me. This was so great. Good. So uh if you want to learn more about Thomas um across his social media channels, he won't check them until afternoon. It's Dr. Thomas Whitfield. And uh, if you have questions for me, you know questions at Mind Body Method Podcast. And um, please like, subscribe wherever you're watching. And um, yeah, I'll see you every Wednesday. Thanks. Thank you for joining me today on Mind Body Method. This podcast is part of Pride House Media, hosted by me, Josh Grimm, produced and edited. By Josh RosenSmike, original music composed by Neil Balabin. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. And while you're there, leave us a rating and review. It really helps others to discover the show. I'd love to stay connected with you, so join the conversation by following me at Josh Grimm underscore fitnet on Instagram and by emailing me at questions at mindbodypodcast.com.