In a recent enlightening episode of "The Joy of Living" podcast, Dr. Laurel Mellin had the pleasure of speaking with host Barry Shore. What unfolded was a profound conversation about the transformative potential of joy, not merely as an emotion but as a powerful medicine deeply intertwined with neuroscience and emotional well-being. Dr. Mellin, a distinguished psychologist and researcher with a Ph.D., delved into the essence of joy, presenting it not as a fleeting feeling, but as a fundamental aspect of our neurological makeup. She emphasized that joy is not just something we passively experi ..read more

The EBT Journey is full of aha moments, discovering the messages encoded in our unconscious mind, mostly implanted there by circumstance, and rewiring them into messages of our choosing. Step by step, spiral up by spiral up, we change the architecture of our own brain. What happens when we have rewired our brain so much that we not only feel like a new person, but on a cellular level, we are one? What happened for me was a desire to have an object, one that signified the experience. I was in Hawaii with my parents, as they had become too encumbered with health problems to make their annual tr ..read more

In a team meeting a month ago, one person asked, "What is EBT anyway?" What a great question! I responded, "It's a process." The EBT process is on the app; however, it's not quite that simple. Self-regulation (reliably and quickly getting from stress to joy) and reconsolidation (the skill of using that same process with enough precision and vigor to rewire out-dated wires and the neural leftovers of traumatic experiences) are core to the survival of the species. The process that impacts us the most That tagline in the brain of "survival" means that the processes are strongly encoded. Whatever ..read more

Some 20 years ago, when neuroscientist and physiologist Igor Mitrovic began collaborating with me on the development of EBT, I began learning more about how the method was changing the brain. As you start your EBT Journey, appreciate that switching over to this new brain-based paradigm of thinking about life and reshaping your automatic responses requires using the method and moving through the EBT Program gently over time. The ideas of EBT are all pure neuroscience, but they are so radically different from the cognitive or medical models that it takes hearing them many times and in many ways ..read more

Last night, my husband Walt was dealing with the results of mega-back surgery and was aware that another surgery had been planned in two weeks. It's a stressful time. I'm grateful that both of us are "EBTers" as we can navigate those difficult periods in life so much more easily. Walt was sitting on the big chair in our living room, and I was sitting on the sofa across from him, our "usual places" when we were in that room. I knew that my job was to be at Brain State 1, as that state in my own brain would help me make good decisions about how to support him, and my Brain State 1 would be auto ..read more

Last night's Spiral Up session with Dr. Laurel focused on "I feel hurt" and how to use EBT to mend a broken heart. Below is an excerpt from it. The discussion was about choosing to make your dreams come true, at work or at home, and the inevitability of getting "hurt." I don't mean sad—it's more than that. I don't mean wounded—that sounds born of powerlessness. Nobody knows for sure, but the closest scientific explanation for "broken heart syndrome" is the biological equivalent of putting on the brakes of the car and the accelerator at the same time. The sympathetic nervous system and the par ..read more

I always resist change. It's my nature. I have the same round oak kitchen table I had in my 20's. I like to wear clothes that hug my body, the same styles over the years. I am usually pretty happy, but then life changes, and my brain circuits become out of date. That's when my brain state takes a bit of a nosedive. I can count on feeling worse until I relent and do a Cycle. Then, there is another and another (sometimes more than I want to do). The Cycles become annoying, but my brain has been EBT-trained, and I keep digging deeper until I get to Brain State 1. Bob Dylan said, "He who is not b ..read more

It all started with Valerie Yerger, ND, a professor at UCSF who enrolled in an EBT group at the university when two family members passed away. The skills were life-changing for her. She began giving talks on EBT in support of her work in smoking cessation. Then in January, she was successful in gaining support from President Joe Biden's Cancer Moonshot. Thank you, Dr. Yerger! Below is video of Dr. Yerger. She is now a leader in EBT and presented a talk and panel discussion on reaching the underserved at last year's EBT Annual Meeting. In the video above, Dr. Yerger speaks about how she intr ..read more

In writing 1-2-3 JOY!, I thought a lot about the relationship between chemicals and circuits, not immediately a conversation topic – but really important for anyone wanting to experience optimal health. In fact, you can make a case that the reason we have epidemics of mental health problems, addictions, chronic diseases, and obesity is that most of us don't appreciate that the most natural and efficient way to self-medicate is to switch from a circuit that spews harmful chemicals to one that unleashes healing chemicals. Yet that is what an EBTer does 10 times per day. Do I want to switch circ ..read more

Weight loss drugs can be useful for some people, but they do not address the root cause of chronic hunger, cravings, lethargy, and weight gain. EBT does. There are 100 documented causes of obesity, but all of them lead to increased stress. By knocking out stress with surges of dopamine that create joy, the drive to overeat and gain weight can fade. I wrote this new book during the last two months when my husband Walt was recovering from a very extensive back surgery. Our home was turned into a special recovery spot with ramps, a hospital bed, and more. He suggested that I write a small book o ..read more