Discover the Hidden Superpower Within: Unleashing the Potential of Wise Mind - Video Transcript

Hey, everyone. I'm Kristen, the anxiety therapist. Today, I want to talk about a concept called Wise Mind. This is something that I share with pretty much every one of my clients because I think it's such a helpful framework and a nice way to think about how our brain works and processes things. At the end of this video, I'll leave you with a little challenge so that you can practice something on your own.

The idea of Wise Mind comes from dialectical behavior therapy, also known as DBT. Marshall Linehan developed this treatment approach and is very skills-based and effective for people who have been through trauma. I like to explain it as if you think about your brain having two parts: your emotional brain and your logical brain. Most of us tend to live in one extreme or the other. The goal in Wise Mind is to have them meet in the middle, finding a balance between the two and having those two parts of our brain exist in harmony.

Let me tell you a little bit about each part. If we're leading with our emotional mind, our feelings will control our thoughts and behavior. We might act impulsively without considering the consequences. Decisions will be based on what feels good, and we might be reactive or defensive. Acting in our rational mind, we're driven by logic and approach situations intellectually. We make decisions based on what makes intellectual sense and focus on facts. However, in this state, we might suppress or ignore our emotions, be cut off or numb to them, rationalize unacceptable behavior, avoid or deny emotions, or minimize and shrug off our feelings as unimportant.

Living in either extreme is not healthy. We want to reach a harmony and find the middle ground. This is what Wise Mind looks like: seeing a situation from multiple perspectives, taking both emotions and logic into account, and living mindfully while striking a balance between the two parts of our mind. We want to recognize, honor, and respect our feelings while responding in a rational and reasonable manner.

Now, the challenge I'm going to leave you with is to think of an experience you've had with each of the three states of mind. Recall an experience where your rational or reasonable brain was in charge, another experience where your emotional brain was in charge, and finally, an experience where you were able to be in Wise Mind and have those two parts in harmony with each other.

I hope this video was helpful. This is something that I personally do all the time if I'm feeling emotionally charged about a situation or if I find that I'm intellectualizing things too much. It's a helpful technique to apply in different situations in life. If you have any comments or questions, feel free to leave them below. You can also visit my website, cathartic space counseling.com, for more information or subscribe to my YouTube channel, The Anxiety Therapist, where I post weekly videos with helpful tips for managing anxiety. I hope you all have a good week. See you next time.