Welcome to episode four of Up and Not Crying. This is your host, Beth Repp. I am a physician and certified life coach. In this podcast, you will learn self-improvement and coaching tools to engineer your mindset, your mood, your schedule, your life. We're going to make your real life feel better. In this episode, episode four, we are going to talk all about buffering. So what is buffering? I first learned about buffering from Brooke Castillo, who is the founder of the Life Coach School, and she describes it as relying on a behavior, to make us feel better. So basically, it's any behavior that we routinely turn to in order to avoid or distract ourselves from any type of negative or uncomfortable, uncomfortable emotion. So these behaviors or actions include, and it's not limited to these, but these are really common ones. These include overeating, drinking alcohol, over-shopping, either in person or online, smoking, reliance on pain medications, gambling, gaming, social media, serial romantic relationships or affairs. And the feelings we are trying to avoid by using these behaviors are boredom, anger, resentment, sadness, grief, irritation, shame, or confusion, to name a few. Now, we all do this. Ev-every human being turns to a cupcake occasionally when they're feeling sad. Every human being has a night out with their friends where they're like, "This was a tough week. I'm gonna have a drink. Pour me a drink." Everybody sometimes indulges in retail therapy. In order to call it buffering, it has to lead to a net negative result in your life. So that those results include, but are not limited to, an overweight body, debt, clutter, relationship problems, health problems, not meeting deadlines, getting up way too late every single morning 'cause you're staying up too late at night scrolling social media for hours, so you're getting up too late, you're getting to work too late. These have to lead to net negative results in your life that you are frustrated by and want to change you may not even be aware that you're indulging in these behaviors. This can be on a chronic subconscious loop. So a lot of people aren't even aware that you're do- that they're doing this Why do we do this? Why do we turn to these behaviors? All of these behaviors give us a hit of chemicals that are involved in the brain's reward system. Now, there are different molecules, different chemicals in our body involved in each of these different parts of the reward system. So there's the pursuit of a reward, the attainment of the reward, and then the enjoyment of a reward. And there are different molecules that play different roles or are increased to different levels in each part of that reward system. But to simplify for this podcast, to simplify, I'm gonna use dopamine and endorphins, okay? So a lot of times I'll even just shorten it to dopamine for this purpose. From the NIH-- okay, so when you're, when you're googling and looking up what do these molecules do and how are they involved, I got this information from, the National Institute of Health, so the NIH. If I were to inject each of you with exogenous, meaning from a source outside the body instead of something that's endo-endogenous, which your body makes. So endogenous dopamine and endorphins come from inside our own bodies. If I were to inject you with exogenous dopamine and endorphins, you would suddenly feel intense alertness, extreme pleasure, a flood of motivation and drive, and profound, rapid pain relief. Doesn't that sound wonderful? So you think you want food. You think you want a giant pizza and a cupcake. What you really want is rapid pain relief. You want the brain's reward system. You think you want new shoes. What you really want is immediate, profound pleasure, okay? You think you want to date someone different. What you really want is the intense alertness and motivation that comes with a novel, new relationship, okay? So really what we're trying to do, what our body and our brain is trying to do is find this reward. It's trying to find pain relief, intense alertness, motivation, relief, okay? So let's all use-- let's use eating as our example. Most people can relate to this one. Have you heard... I'm sure you've heard the phrase emotional eating, or he's an emotional eater. So when I first started learning about this and thinking about this, I pictured someone in the opening scenes of Biggest Loser, you know, who was well, well overweight. And they had a gallon of ice cream in front of them, or someone on My 600-lb Life who has enormous amounts of food every day to avoid feeling any pain. So I'm picturing that. I'm thinking, "Yeah, I'm not I don't think I'm an emotional eater." And most people, when first, kind of encountering this, tend to think that they're not. So you may think, "I don't do, I don't do that. That's not me." But let me blow your mind for a moment here. Okay? Any time you eat for reasons other than hunger, for reasons other than to sustain life, you are emotionally eating. Okay, let me repeat that 'cause it will blow your mind. Any time you eat for reasons other than hunger or to sustain life, you are emotionally eating. Now, this is not a bad thing. Okay? A lot of us, most of us, everybody eats out of joy. So our celebrations, yesterday was Memorial Day, and we all, I'm sure, ate more than we usually do 'cause we're celebrating. We're eating as part of a cultural event. We eat for religious gatherings. We eat at family gatherings. We eat at any type of celebration. If you get a promotion at work, you get a great exam score, you get engaged, all of these things. And the feelings that we are, that are driving us to eat in those situations are a feeling of celebration, a feeling of relief, a feeling of love, of gratitude, of nostalgia. This is not a bad thing. And again, none of this is bad when done in moderation. Okay? Now, many of us, though, reach daily for food or sugary beverages in order to feel better, to avoid any type of negative emotion. This is just to get through the day at work, out of boredom, when worrying about something that you have to do or a conversation that you might have, when you're worrying about someone else, when you have so much on your plate that you just want a moment for yourself. You just wanna have something for yourself. So these feelings that you that is driving your action to overeat might be anxiety, boredom, fear, overwhelm, resentment Now, as an aside, I'm gonna say it is really common, and I might even say necessary for people who go through medical training, and medical training is what I know, but I assume that other really intensive educational or training programs are similar. It's really common and maybe even necessary to suppress your own emotional and to some extent, physical needs. You have to get through 30-hour shifts. You have to answer sometimes a couple pages at once. You have to get through marathon study sessions. You always have another exam to pass. You've got to stay on schedule. You have to prove constantly to everyone around you that you are cut out for this. You are strong enough to do this, that you have what it takes to do this. So all of us learn to avoid, distract from, ignore our emotions and our own needs, and subconsciously, without even knowing we're doing it, we can really turn to buffering or, pathologically becoming separate from our emotions. So it, it's time if this is you or if for another reason you've really been avoiding or separating yourself from your emotions, it's time to come back to yourself. You need to start to uncover what you're feeling, start to uncover and allow what you're feeling So our first step in buffering is just developing an awareness of the pattern. Recognize your own behaviors. Do you have a drug of choice? Do you turn to something pretty regularly that might be causing you a net negative result? Okay, this might be overeating and being overweight. This might be overdrinking, which is causing you health problems or relationship problems. This might be overshopping, which is leading to financial problems or clutter. It might be a whole host of things. Do you have a drug of choice? And at first, I don't want you to try to change anything. I don't want you to try to change it or stop your behaviors, just recognize and observe yourself. Let this take time, okay? We're gonna allow and uncover what's beneath it. Our second step, after you realize that you have a drug of choice and then you have indulged, okay? So after you have overeaten, and you've really overeaten, you've indulged in your drug, drug of choice. Recognize that you did it. Recognize that that's what you did. You buffered. Okay, I buffered. I really overate. Then ask yourself why. What led up to that this time? What feeling drove that? Was I feeling sad? Was I feeling shame? Was I feeling resentful? Was I feeling bored? What thought led to that feeling? And I want you to go back and review the previous podcast about that. And then what was the circumstance that I had a thought about and I had a feeling about? So again, you're gonna go back to that self-coaching model and work through it. Circumstances occur in our lives. We have a thought about it that leads to a feeling in our bodies, then that leads to an action. In this case, our action is overeating. So what led to that action of overeating? And just be gentle with yourself. Give yourself grace. Say, "What was going on there? What happened there? What was underneath all that?" You're gonna do a behavioral autopsy. So go back and try to identify the feeling, the thought, the circumstances that all led to your behavior of overeating Now you're gonna repeat this second step a few times. You're gonna repeat it over and over again for a while until you start to see your pattern. You start to see which feelings are driving you towards your buffering behavior. Let this take time. It took years to develop this buffering habit. Allow it to take as much time as needed to unravel it. Okay? Sometimes, when you rush into change, when you only focus on the action step, when you only focus on, "I'm not gonna eat as much. I'm gonna lose weight by not eating as much." When you rush into it, it's not sustainable. So really allow this to take time. Allow yourself to unravel your pattern that's been going on for years. Any change that I have managed to make in my own life has taken years. So I recognize that if there's something that I wanna change now, I recognize it's gonna take time. I'm gonna take-- let it take all the time I need. It is worth it to make the change slowly and completely. Okay, our third step now is then to recognize in real time when you're doing the behavior or about to do the behavior. Okay? So suddenly you start to recognize, "Ah, I am lingering on Facebook. I am actively lingering on Facebook. I am shopping aimlessly. Here I am in the store. I don't even know what I'm looking for. I don't even know what I'm trying to find. I'm shopping aimlessly. Here I am standing in front of the pantry just scavenging. What do I need? What am I looking for? I'm just scavenging. I've gone to the fridge fourteen times here and just opened it up and closed it. What am I looking for?" So you're recognizing in real time that you are partaking in your behavior of buffering, and I want you to say the following mantra when this happens: "I don't want food. I want a dopamine bath. I don't want a new shirt. I want a dopamine bath. I don't want to see what everyone else is doing on Facebook. I want a dopamine bath." Okay, so you're gonna say... You're gonna identify whatever your behavior is and say, "I don't actually need or want that. I don't need new shoes. I want to be just bathed in dopamine and endorphins and serotonin." Okay? Now, these behaviors are not always bad things. Well-timed small treats can be the secret to great days. But if those treats are excessive and leading to an overall negative result in your life, an overweight body, health problems, debt, clutter, relationship problems, you name it, it's time to dig in and address them Now, fourth step, we're gonna start to find natural ways to boost our dopamine. This can be moving your body for even five minutes, just some gentle movement of your body. This can be walking, stretching, any type of moving your body. Stepping outside, simply getting outside into the sunshine, into nature, stepping outside. Accomplishing one small task. Petting a dog. Doing some type of hobby. Now, this one I prefer for you to have some type of little hobby that can be mobile. Take a pen and a sketch pad, take a Sudoku book, take your yarn and your knitting needles. Take something that's mobile that you can pull out even for five minutes when you need to. Read an actual paper book. Listen to music. Listen to positive podcasts. All of these are natural ways to boost your dopamine. Now, our fifth step is to allow yourself to grieve the loss of your buffering behavior. Okay, now this sounds really strange 'cause a lot of people have a love-hate relationship with overeating, or you may think you just have a hateful relationship with it, like, "Why do I... I, I'm out of control. I don't want to do this. Why do I do this? Why do I shop so much?" But for years, you turned to this drug of choice as your form of comfort, as intense pleasure, as pain relief. This was your friend. This gave you pain relief every time. It was very reliable, okay? So this can be one of the reasons that people have a really hard time losing weight only once, or quitting smoking only once, or never overshopping again. It feels so good. This is the thing that gave you so much relief. It's been your constant source of pain relief for so long, so recognize that. And if you're able to still indulge in doing this in a moderate way, great. But some people really have to get, pretty rigid with themselves if they're gonna fix this problem. If you're not one of them, if you can indulge in alcohol occasionally with friends, if you can indulge in sweet treats and sugar occasionally, great. But sometimes people find that they really have to cut it out Your sixth step is allowing yourself to feel negative emotions, feel discomfort. Allow yourself to sit with boredom, to feel frustration, to have resentment bubble up in your body. And I want you to refer to episode three for feeling those feelings. Remember, we have waves of negative emotions that last only 90 seconds. So feel those feelings for 90 seconds rather than immediately picking up your phone, immediately reaching for something to eat. Your seventh step is to start to ask yourself, "What do I need to work on here? Do I need to start working on my thoughts? Do I need to change my thoughts about this circumstance to equally believable thoughts? Or do I need to change some things in my life? Do I need to change some circumstances in my life? Do I need to think differently about what work fulfills me? Do I need to think differently about how to approach my relationship, my marriage, my relationship with my kids? Do I need to think differently about what kind of home I live in, where I live? What kinds of things do I need to start changing in my life or what thoughts do I need to adjust in my life to lead to less suffering in my body?" Okay, so let's just review here. Buffering is something that we turn to, a behavior that we turn to, to avoid any type of negative emotion. In order to be considered buffering, it has to lead to a net negative result in your life. This isn't the occasional drink out with friends or the occasional dive into Ben Jerry's. This is chronic repeated behaviors that lead to a net negative result in our life, something we really want to change. The steps in, identifying and addressing your own buffering. First step, develop awareness. Do I have a drug of choice? Second step, start to recognize buffering after you did it. So after you have overindulged in your behavior, ask yourself why you did it. What was going on there? Third step, start to recognize in real time when you are buffering or when you are going to buffer. Okay? And, and repeat this mantra: "I don't need a cupcake. I want to bathe in dopamine." Okay? Your fourth step, start to find natural ways to boost dopamine. Move your body, get outside, accomplish something, have a pet, do some type of hobby. Your fifth step, allow yourself to grieve the loss of your buffering behavior. Recognize overeating, you were a great friend to me. You provided me a lot of relief, but also you've now given me a whole lot of problems in my life. So let's start to, let's start to walk back on this as you being just my, my only true friend. Okay? So grieve the loss of it. Ask yourself if you can enjoy it in moderation or if this is something you really need to cut out. The sixth step, allow yourself to feel negative emotions. Allow even the intense, intense waves of really negative, uncomfortable emotion for 90 seconds at a time. The seventh step, start to ask yourself, "What do I need to change so that I have less chronic suffering in my life? Do I need to change some thoughts? Do I need to change some circumstances?" Now, if you take one thing only from this episode, it is this. Ask yourself, "Do I do this? Do I have a drug of choice that's causing me an overall negative result in my life? An overweight body, debt, health problems, relationship problems. I'm late to work every morning because I'm not able to get out of bed in the morning 'cause I'm exhausted 'cause I was up late Netflix binging or on my phone for two hours longer than I intended to be." All right, friends, until next week, stay upright, find the good. And if you can't find the good, at least make it funny. You can find me at bethrep.com, B-E-T-H-R-E-P as in pizza, P as in pizza.com, hello@bethrep.com or Beth Rep Coaching on Facebook. And finally, the disclaimer. The content presented in this podcast is for general information only. Reliance on this information is done at your own risk. Until next week everybody, bye.