Grab a can of A.N.T. spray. This is your daily message from Chad number 589 and this message is dedicated to the wise Dan Amen.
Dr. Daniel Amen is a medical doctor and wrote the book Change Your Brain, Change Your Life. He is one of the world’s leading psychiatrists focusing on clinical neuroscience. What does that mean? He studies the brain! And he’s done it a lot! He’s performed over 100k SPECT scans on patient’s brains over the past 40 years. Those are the computer images that create a 3D likeness.
The brain is beyond amazing. It is the most powerful force in the universe. That is not hyberbole. The possible interactions of neurons in our brains outnumber all the particles in the universe. It is the most expensive realestate in your body. Size-wise it is only 2% of your body, but consumes almost a third of your energy. And you don’t know how to use it. And you definitely don’t feed it well. This is what Dr. Amen has spent his life learning and studying.
He writes in his book Change Your Brain, Change Your Life, “Psychiatrists then and even now are the only medical specialists who virtually never look at the organ they treat. Think about it. Cardiologists, neurologists, gastroenterologists, orthopedic doctors—in fact, every other medical specialist—look; psychiatrists guess. Before imaging, I was throwing medicine-tipped darts in the dark at my patients and had unintentionally hurt some of them, which horrified me. There is a reason that most psychiatric medications have black box warnings. Give them to the wrong person and you can precipitate disaster. …“
His treatment is holistic. He is big on nutrition, exercise, and sleep. That should not be surprising. He is also big on learning to control your thoughts. He cointed the term ANTs, which stands for automatic negative thoughts. Again Dr. Amen writes, “I coined this term in the early 1990s after a hard day at the office, during which I had several very difficult sessions with suicidal patients, teenagers in turmoil, and a married couple who hated each other. When I got home that evening I found thousands of ants in my kitchen. It was gross. As I started to clean them up, the acronym came to me. I thought of my patients from that day—like my infested kitchen, my patients’ brains were also infected by the negative thoughts that were robbing them of their joy and stealing their happiness. The next day, I brought a can of ant spray as a visual aid and have been working diligently ever since to help my patients eradicate their ANTs.”
Have you been plagued by any ANTs lately. Do you have any spray on hand to get rid of them? Part of his solution to ANT infestations is to overwhelm them with positive thoughts. This is the core of my practice of telling myself smart stories. You can’t just ruminate on your negative thinking and whip yourself for it. ANTs are automatic. Everyone deals with them. What isn’t automatic is good thoughts. But you can train your brain for better stories. Send me an email at fromchadsmith@gmail.com if you want some more tips to start saying smart stories and search past articles on ways to get rid of ANTs. Thanks for listening!
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5IlK0B4MFVPsT5HyPkvFge?si=9O_NpGtRTPuo0ZukwxcKAQ
