Empty: How Anhedonia Steals Our Light with Tanith Carey

0:01 This is the light inside. I'm Jeffrey Besecker.

0:05 Welcome to this, our opening episode of Season 5.

0:09 Emptiness. We've all felt it.

0:11 There are times throughout our life when we all feel a little

0:14 hollow. Imagine waking up each morning

0:17 to a world that once sang with colors and melodies.

0:22 Now shrouded in an unrelenting haze is a psychological

0:26 phenomena and Hedonia, the silent thief of joy, wraps his

0:30 cold fingers around every inch of your being.

0:34 Not only is it the lack of happiness, but also losing the

0:38 ability to fill anything, leaving behind an overwhelming

0:42 sense of emptiness. The egg that accompanies

0:46 Anhendonia unlike any other. A constant, dull pain that gnaws

0:50 at the heart, reminding you of the emotions that use the course

0:54 through your veins. The vibrancy of laughter, the

0:58 warmth of a smile, the electric thrill of anticipation, all of

1:02 it gone, as if your world has turned grayscale.

1:06 You're left yearning for a glimpse of the vibrant hues that

1:09 wants to find your existence. And then there's the numbing of

1:13 the senses. The taste of your favorite meal.

1:16 Bland. The touch of a loved one's hand,

1:19 absent of tenderness and even the scent of freshly bloomed

1:22 flowers failing to stir a single emotion.

1:26 It's as if the vibrant orchestra of life has fallen silent,

1:30 leaving you in a void of muted sensations.

1:34 Yet amongst this desolate landscape remains A flicker of

1:37 hope, a longing for the comfort of emotions, the return of the

1:41 Symphony of feelings, the moments of our deepest despair.

1:45 It's often hard to feel like there's a light at the end of

1:48 the tunnel, and for those who experience anhandonia is often

1:52 difficult to feel emotions at all.

1:54 Today we learn Anhandonia is not a permanent state.

1:58 It's a chapter in the complex story of being human, And as we

2:02 navigate through the shadows, we strive to find a way back to the

2:06 light, heralding the return of happiness and the reawakening of

2:10 our emotional core. Join us as we embark on this

2:14 emotional journey with author Tanneth Carey as we explore an

2:18 hindonia from all angles, sharing tan the story of

2:21 resilience. We shed light on the path to

2:24 discover the beauty of emotions and guide you through the

2:27 labyrinth of the feelings that shape our lives.

2:30 TuneIn to find out how when we return to the light inside, we'd

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3:00 www.thelightinside.us. Our emotions ride the roller

3:07 coaster of life, shaping our experiences With their

3:10 everchanging currents, they inform our decisions, color our

3:14 memories, and guide our senses through the world.

3:17 When emotions are absent, we're left bewildered, adrift in the

3:21 sea of confusion and longing for the spark of hope that ignites

3:24 our connection to the vibrant tapestry of our human existence.

3:28 And for those who experience Anhedonia for a brief instant,

3:32 none of this exists. This is a solemn reality author

3:36 Tanneth Carey knows all too well.

3:40 Tanneth, I'm excited to share this conversation with you

3:42 today, looking at a condition called Anhedonia.

3:45 In your book Feeling Blah, you detail how it robs us of our joy

3:50 and steals our light, leaving us feeling as if we're sleepwalking

3:54 through life. Can you give us a brief overview

3:57 of how you personally experienced Anhindonia and how

4:00 this condition impacted your life?

4:02 OK, so I first came across Anhedonia in my own life.

4:06 I'm an author and I was expecting some news from my

4:10 agent. And they rang me and they said,

4:12 yeah, the book deal I'd been waiting for, it was going to go

4:14 through. It was more money than we

4:16 expected. It was everything we'd hoped for

4:18 for a book deal. And as I was on the phone, I was

4:21 going, yeah, that's great, fantastic, great.

4:23 Yeah, brilliant. But then as I put the phone

4:25 down, I realized that it was like a disembodied version of

4:29 myself, and I actually didn't feel the joy of what I was

4:32 saying come through me. It was like I was sort of acting

4:36 it out, but I couldn't feel the really the good news.

4:39 I couldn't feel the joy. After that, I was about 10 years

4:41 ago, I started to get really curious, and I tend to write as

4:45 a journalist about what I need to learn.

4:46 And I started to notice this feeling this kind of like blah,

4:49 kind of unable to access this kind of good feelings.

4:53 More and more so, you know, I love Christmas, but on Christmas

4:56 Day I just couldn't really be in the moment.

4:57 I I never felt pure euphoria, you know, I I just wasn't

5:01 entirely present, you know, I'd be at parties or even nice times

5:06 with my family, you know, I've got a lovely husband, gorgeous

5:09 children, and you know, they all be having fun, but I just wasn't

5:12 there with them. So then I think that very much

5:15 like feeling blah or feeling numb or emotionally flat lining,

5:19 it tends to be a bit of a guilty secret because you know.

5:23 I know a lot more about mental health now.

5:24 But, like, we tend to think, well, what am I moaning about?

5:26 You know, there are a lot of people who are a lot worse off

5:28 than me. They might be depressed.

5:30 They might be like, you know, I have a really serious mental

5:32 health disorder. And hold on, you know, I've got

5:34 all the things I'm supposed to want.

5:35 But yeah, why aren't I feeling happy?

5:37 But you don't want to say that because you sound incredibly

5:39 ungrateful. So one night while my partner

5:42 was asleep next to me, I secretly Googled in the dark,

5:45 and I just thought, OK, I want to know because especially after

5:48 we came out of COVID and everyone was expecting, couldn't

5:51 wait to get back to it. And it was kind of.

5:53 Post COVID and I just felt the same.

5:55 I didn't feel very excited about anything.

5:57 So I googled the question. I said why aren't I enjoying my

6:00 life? I know I did a load of research

6:02 and then gradually up popped this word anhedonia.

6:06 Wow, Kovid was already challenging enough.

6:10 I can only imagine how difficult that must have been for you.

6:13 Let's start out by looking at one definition of anhedonia.

6:17 Can you explain what Anhedonia is and how it often relates to

6:21 emotional avoidance in dissociation?

6:23 And Anhedonia is. A word for and it was really

6:28 interesting, Anna Donia. Because it's great because you

6:29 can, even when you hear it, if you've never heard it before,

6:31 you have an idea of what it's about.

6:33 It's like from the Greek and it's from without joy.

6:36 You know, the opposite of hedonism.

6:38 And it is the loss of enjoyment and the loss of motivation to do

6:41 the things that you used to love, you know, and also the

6:44 inability to feel joy. And I realized there was this

6:47 whole Bank of research out there and I was like, well, you know,

6:50 I'm, I write on psychology, you know, I'm reasonably well burst

6:53 by child psychology, but I never heard of it.

6:55 And what struck me was, in the modern world, we talked so much

6:58 about joy at one end of the spectrum and sadness and

7:02 depression at the other. But like, what about the kind of

7:04 some more nuance in the middle there?

7:06 What about the feelings of overwhelm and lack of joy that

7:10 you do get in the modern world because you're just so inundated

7:13 with inputs and burnout and all the rest of it?

7:16 So I just thought I really wanted to bring this word out

7:18 into the more general discussion, because I think it's

7:20 the missing word in our mental health discussion.

7:22 Or one of them, anyway. You mentioned how we so often

7:25 throughout our society are programmed to kind of stuff

7:28 those emotions down as a condition pattern.

7:31 How do you feel that might influence someone's ability to

7:35 connect when they're experienced?

7:37 In Hindonia you mentioned that whole aspect of feeling like I

7:41 have this distance myself from this as part of the underlying

7:45 effect. Yeah.

7:48 I mean, I think when you're in Anhedonia, you're not connecting

7:50 with what's happening or with the people around you really.

7:53 I think that's what's happening. I mean, you know, I sometimes I

7:55 would even I love my children, but sometimes I would even

7:57 struggle to be in the moment with them because you're just

7:59 kind of, I think I would say there's there are many, many

8:02 reasons for annadonia. And it's like in the book what I

8:05 do is I explore the various different ones and there might

8:07 be a cocktail of reasons for each person.

8:10 So some of it's biological, some of it's environmental, and some

8:13 of it's to do with your childhood and your expectations

8:16 of joy. And So what I did was like, for

8:19 example, let me just go back to my personal situation.

8:21 For example, was I realized that some of the reason I couldn't

8:24 feel joy in the moment and connect, as you point out, was I

8:27 had disassociation. Disassociation was like what was

8:32 from my childhood. And this was a journey I went on

8:34 in the book where, you know, I came from a background where

8:37 there was a lot of chaos, a lot of warring parents being moved,

8:41 countries, divorce, acrimony. So what happened was that I

8:44 hadn't realized this until I was like, you know, 55.

8:47 Five or something that in moments of great emotion, I was

8:51 disassociating. Because when I was a child, if I

8:54 felt great emotion, whether sort of, you know, I would take

8:57 myself out of my prefrontal cortex and then into another

9:00 place where I would feel like I was looking at myself down a

9:02 long tunnel. So one of the reasons I realized

9:05 that I was unable to feel joy as an adult was because I've been

9:08 wired to do this as a coping mechanism as a child.

9:10 So I wasn't connecting with people.

9:12 So I talk in the book about I married my husband 25 years ago

9:16 and I remember like. Walking down the aisle and as

9:19 this lovely man waiting at the also with me and he's literally

9:22 got tears in his eyes and I'm looking at this and I cannot

9:24 take it seriously and I'm like, I'm not there.

9:27 I am just kind of, I can't enter into the emotion.

9:30 And it was only afterwards that I realized that that was

9:32 dissociation. So in order to protect yourself

9:35 from any sort of moments of big emotion, whether positive or

9:38 negative, that's what you tend to do.

9:40 So some of my journey has been to ground myself when I noticed

9:43 that. So there are many different

9:45 elements to yes, sorry, is that just answer a question?

9:46 I don't know. But yeah, Anna Doni is about

9:48 disconnection. Yeah, it is.

9:50 What a disconcerting feeling to experience.

9:53 From that perspective, what are some of the more typical ways an

9:57 individual might experience in Hindonia, and how do they first

10:01 begin to notice how it's surfacing?

10:03 Yeah. So I think it would be as I did.

10:05 You're like, oh, OK, well, everything's going OK Um, you

10:08 know, I'm ticking loads of boxes.

10:10 I've got the things I'm supposed to want, but, you know, you're

10:13 there and you're not really enjoying it.

10:15 The world doesn't feel like it's in full color.

10:18 Maybe you feel like you're looking at your life through a

10:20 pane of frosted glass. It's like, you know that there's

10:24 something you should be feeling joy, but it's just not coming.

10:28 So it's almost like you. It's your reward system is not

10:30 really circulating as it should do.

10:32 So there are various reasons for that.

10:34 And yeah, I guess think your scope, like, you know, I

10:36 remember when I was in Annadonia, if I laughed, I'd be

10:38 like, who? Who's that?

10:39 Do you know what I mean? I just didn't laugh very often.

10:41 I was quite a heavy presence. Do you know what I mean?

10:44 Whereas now I think when you, when you get to the bottom of

10:47 Annadonia and you let those feelings flow, then you lighten,

10:50 you gradually lighten. So I think people who here and

10:53 Hedonia know what I mean, if they are in it or they've been

10:56 through it or you know, it's black apathy, lack of

11:00 motivation, mayor. Like a zombie emotional

11:04 flatlining. It's all those things.

11:06 It's like, you know, you may not even cry at appropriate times

11:09 because you just feel your emotions feel blocked.

11:12 Do you feel from that perspective that it's sometimes

11:15 hard to kind of pinpoint some of those underlying symptoms and

11:19 where self diagnosis might be kind of a misleading path to go

11:24 down sometimes? Yeah, I agree.

11:27 I think that we can all do and that's whoever we are.

11:30 Whatever state we're in is to improve our.

11:32 Vocabulary. Use our introception to notice

11:36 how we really feel, what bodily sensations we feel as we are in

11:39 certain situations, and I think having more nuance in our

11:43 description of mental health. I mean obviously some people

11:45 will be able to work out for themselves others way.

11:48 I mean I'm as rainy you could start therapists.

11:50 So I mean obviously I would heavily recommend anybody who

11:53 feels like that because Anazonia is also about becoming the whole

11:56 person as well. So you know, if you feel you

11:59 need help understanding what's blocking your access to joy and

12:02 full emotion, then obviously I would partly recommend that

12:05 anybody gets that help. I mean some people are more able

12:08 to access that and others you know or access these feelings in

12:11 themselves, you know. So it takes practice.

12:13 I consider myself quite an. Emotionally aware person, but I

12:16 mean it took me the book and reaching 55 before I got here.

12:20 So I'm hoping the book will speed it up for a few people.

12:23 And we've mentioned throughout the course of our program the

12:26 importance of introspection and introception, how the two are Co

12:30 related and how that kind of forms the basis for our self

12:35 reflection. Yeah, well, I mean emotion,

12:39 noticing your emotional States and how to manage that.

12:42 I mean, that's one of the greatest skills that we can

12:44 develop in ourselves and pass on to our children.

12:47 So yeah, it's like awareness, isn't it?

12:49 Awareness and just a willingness.

12:51 I mean, I find it really interesting as a training

12:53 therapist, sometimes you speak to people and they just do have

12:55 no idea how they feel. They just cannot describe that,

12:57 you know, I mean our emotions. That can be one of the more

13:00 challenging roles and aspects I feel, of emotional regulation.

13:05 Most of us, in a typical scenario, have not traditionally

13:09 grew up with that language or framework to name those

13:12 emotions. Absolutely.

13:14 Yeah, I agree. So my husband, for example, he

13:17 grew up with none of that, being married to me.

13:20 I think sometimes if we divorced as children from our authentic

13:23 selves, if we're told what to think, for example, or told how

13:27 we should feel, then sometimes in early childhood we just don't

13:31 get the benefit of that. And then we start to kind of put

13:34 in various coping mechanisms. And defense mechanisms.

13:38 So for him it's like people pleasing and just not really

13:41 being able to recognize his needs and meet them.

13:44 You sort of mean, but as I mean I had a very different to where

13:47 I kind of brought myself up, so I was able to do that.

13:49 So yeah, we all come from a different place, but I think

13:52 that's always possible, you know, with work, with practice

13:55 to just try and tap into those feelings and if you need help,

13:59 then get some help to help to do that.

14:02 From that regard, it's interesting to see how we each

14:04 kind of develop those emotional languages based on that

14:07 conditioning and receiving things such as naming our

14:12 emotions certain emotions, right or wrong, You know, guilt and

14:16 shame around certain emotions. And how that itself then might

14:21 become kind of a reflective pattern of dissociation when you

14:26 start to repress those situations and stuff them back

14:29 again. Absolutely.

14:30 Shame. I mean, my gosh, it keeps so

14:34 much. And it's also very difficult

14:36 through shame, isn't it? That's when I think an awareness

14:40 of shame, like how you're just closing down or defending

14:43 yourself against that and deflecting back that.

14:45 That's when I think sometimes you do need a professional to

14:48 help you breakthrough that. Yeah, it was a pattern for me,

14:51 specifically growing up in an environment where emotion become

14:55 that expression of anger, then dealing with that guilt and

14:59 shame myself. Here I am.

15:01 I'm not realizing as a child why I'm triggered.

15:04 I carry that through into adult life and repressing that back.

15:08 So I've had my own journey with that.

15:10 Did you have a very authoritarian form of parenting

15:13 then, growing up? I did, in one regard.

15:15 Well, actually, in both regards. Both parents surfaced in

15:18 different ways. But yeah, you know, I would say

15:21 there was a lot of authoritarianism there, that

15:24 throughout its course I've had to kind of learn to manage and

15:28 navigate throughout life, you know, how to shift toward a more

15:31 healthier perspective. So did you?

15:33 Did you have to learn an emotional vocabulary then

15:36 yourself? I had to learn a broader

15:39 emotional vocabulary and learning those underlying

15:43 stimuluses, you know, because that one emotion of anger was

15:47 the one that always stepped to the forefront.

15:49 The lot of it was implicit memory.

15:52 Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, of course.

15:54 So anger was your defense mechanism or to hype form.

15:57 Yeah. So looking at that path of

16:09 anhandonia, we're going to kind of roll this back a little bit.

16:12 We've ventured off a little side path there thing because we've

16:16 gotten to share some very real experiences.

16:19 Since our show is focused on the unconscious patterns of

16:22 behavior, let's look at the psychological pathway first, if

16:25 we might returning later in our conversation to the connection

16:29 to the physiological side of things.

16:31 Can you share with our listeners the role emotional intelligence

16:34 place on the psychological side of the in hand Dhoni, now that

16:37 we've kind of ventured into that ballpark?

16:39 Well, I would say generally is like people don't even know that

16:44 there's a name for this or some a reason for this.

16:47 So I think that even though people didn't took nothing or

16:50 else away from the book or the podcast, the fact that they know

16:53 anhedonia is a psychological state and that they can address

16:57 it. Is progress and awareness in

17:00 terms of like what I did in the book, I did a lot of newer

17:03 science. So I interviewed some of

17:04 America's top neuroscientists. Because my point in the book is

17:08 in modern life, we're talking about all we want to do.

17:11 If you say to someone, what do you want to be in one life, they

17:13 would they say, oh, I want to be happy.

17:15 But yeah, you go up to that same person, say, well, what's

17:18 happening in your brain when you are happy?

17:21 And I would say 99% of people don't actually know what is

17:23 happening in their brain when they feel good.

17:26 So from a psychological point of view and a newer sized point of

17:29 view, one of the central chapters in the book.

17:32 Is a description of from the moment you want something and

17:37 you want something pleasurable, what happens in your brain's

17:40 mesolimbic reward pathway all along?

17:42 What is that journey of that dopamine around your brain?

17:45 OK, So what I'm trying to do there is obviously the brain is

17:48 a highly complex organ and obviously we've had to open,

17:51 simplify and not even neuroscientists know exactly how

17:53 the brain works, but a simple explanation of how pleasure is

17:56 made in your brain. I think there's a real advantage

17:58 in the world we live now because I think that, well, the point I

18:03 make in the book is that the brain we have now is the one

18:05 that was designed for us to help us survive 100,000 years ago

18:08 when we were hunter gatherers. So it is a brain designed for

18:11 short, sharp spikes of cortisol in, you know, high survival

18:16 situations. Now what we're doing up with our

18:18 brain now is we overwhelm it with constant cortisol Jags.

18:23 So our cortisol and our stress levels never get a chance to

18:25 return to normal. So.

18:27 Also, what I wanted to do in the book was from a psychological

18:30 point of view, was explain the kind of how to get the dials a

18:34 little bit more even on that dashboard of our brain.

18:38 And actually that this is not always out of our control and

18:41 that we can do things to tweak those dials up and down

18:44 ourselves. So that's the other thing.

18:46 What was your original question? Sorry, I've gone off looking at

18:50 the role emotional intelligence plays and I feel we've kind of

18:54 tiptoed into that from the beginning of our conversation.

18:56 You know, looking at the role higher emotional intelligence

19:00 plays in our ability to recognize and name our emotions

19:04 1st and then also form those healthy coping mechanisms,

19:08 especially in response to our. Yeah, I know, Exactly.

19:12 So I mean, that comes about emotional intelligence.

19:13 Is, is, is EQ, isn't it? It's like kind of it's isn't

19:17 that what we were talking about? It's like introception.

19:18 It's like noticing what your emotions are, recognizing why

19:22 they're there. I mean, as you say at a deeper

19:25 level, you know, what is triggering this emotion?

19:27 Well, what is the core need? What is the defense mechanism

19:30 which is making me react in this way?

19:33 So I mean, antidonia is it's more of a symptom, It's not

19:37 really an emotion. Do you sort of mean?

19:40 So I guess what you would say is that you'd have to look at

19:43 what's happened to you emotionally that's caused this

19:46 numbness. Why is your brain overwhelmed?

19:49 How are you overwhelming your brain?

19:51 You know what I mean? It's like, as I say, it's a

19:52 symptom rather than a kind of an emotion in itself.

19:56 It's like an absence of emotion. It's sort of like sometimes in

19:59 the book I call Annadonia, like depression without the guilt and

20:02 the pain. Do you see what I mean?

20:04 You mentioned that role that arm environmental conditioning, our

20:08 family units, our experiences play in programming a lot of

20:13 that language of our emotionality.

20:15 You know, we also can look at the role past implicit memory

20:19 plays. We're somewhat recording in our

20:21 brain, in our nervous system, those things that have kind of

20:25 triggered us and storing those later on, projecting them back

20:28 out towards our outcomes. Yeah, looking at that from the

20:32 level of then becoming an ego filter or an emotional filter,

20:36 where it's that lens of protection coming in.

20:39 Yeah. No, that's a good point.

20:40 I mean, I talk in the book also about Terra Phobia.

20:43 Which is fear of happiness. So you know, if as a child, as I

20:46 was, you know, you didn't let yourself be happy because

20:50 something could happen that was like an adult could take it away

20:52 from you or something very unpredictable could happen.

20:56 So what happens is that. You don't let yourself slip into

21:00 joy because you fear it's going to be snatched away from you.

21:02 So rather than save yourself from disappointment, you wire

21:05 yourself not to allow yourself to languish and feelings of joy.

21:09 You know, you protect yourself. So I thought that was a really

21:13 interesting thing that I had never heard before because I I

21:15 always remembered like I was always scanning for the other

21:18 thing about my childhood and this you all listeners, my

21:19 religion, this was, you know, as a child of quiet sort of vicious

21:22 divorce. I was also hyper vigilant.

21:24 So I was also hyper vigilant for threats.

21:27 And so that made me constantly not be in the moment because I

21:30 was always looking for the next threat Because, you know, one of

21:33 the biggest enemies of joy is anxiety and is stress and is

21:37 that inability to be in the moment because you're always

21:39 worrying about what's happening next.

21:40 Is this moment going to be taken away from me?

21:42 What do I need to be aware of? How do I need to protect myself?

21:45 So I think, yeah, that can definitely come from childhood

21:47 and I had to address that as well.

21:49 And also it's like the role modeling that your parents and

21:52 your family give you. Like, you know, is joy?

21:54 Is it plentiful in your family? Do the.

21:57 Adults in your world know how to enjoy themselves.

22:00 You know, are they kind of workaholics who are using

22:03 workaholism as a defense or coping mechanism for their own

22:05 childhood? Now, how much joy was in the

22:08 home where you grew up, you know, how much was role modeled

22:11 to you? It was play in your house, you

22:14 know. So that's also a big factor.

22:16 We look at that role from that aspect of some of the

22:20 conditioning we received. You know, just buck up and be

22:23 happy. What do you have to feel bad

22:25 about? Sometimes that guilt and shame

22:27 again coming in. I agree with you.

22:29 Yeah. Yeah.

22:30 Like, yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

22:32 And I also think if you, as a child, you don't have your needs

22:34 met and you do not feel listened to.

22:36 Or, you know, if you cry, you're told you're being manipulative.

22:40 Or you're turning the taps on or to man up.

22:43 Or to just get on with it or do what your siblings do.

22:46 Or maybe you get the implicit message from an adult, like, oh,

22:50 I don't really have time for this.

22:51 You're taking up too much room. You know, all of those things

22:54 will also impact your emotional vocabulary and your ability to

22:57 kind of let the joy flow. And as you say, you know, cover

23:01 it up with Shane Gill. Because in order to feel joy, we

23:03 have to be in an authentic space, don't we Really.

23:06 We mentioned this previously, but I'm going to go ahead and

23:09 frame it with the question, What role does emotional trauma play

23:13 in the development of an handonia, and how might it

23:16 influence and the individual's perception of pleasure and

23:19 reward in that regard? Yeah.

23:20 No, that's a good point. Yeah, Um, yeah.

23:23 I mean, I think that as I say like whatever defense mechanisms

23:26 we put in place as a child because you know, a lot of our

23:30 personalities, we think it's our personalities, but actually

23:32 they're defense mechanisms, if they are defense mechanisms that

23:35 were meant to, I mean for example.

23:39 Workaholism is a defense mechanism.

23:41 It's like if you didn't feel important enough or you didn't

23:44 feel worthy enough as a child, you might try and seek it

23:47 through your job or to by overdoing it or constantly

23:51 seeking validation through your work.

23:53 And it's very difficult to, I think if you're a workaholic as

23:56 I was, actually to feel joy because you're constantly like,

23:59 oh, I I can't go out and have fun because I have this deadline

24:03 that I have made sure that I have to keep myself busy and

24:05 validated. So yeah, so I think you need to

24:08 work. Through the reasons why you're

24:10 not feeling joy, we just wrapped up a pertinent episode on this

24:14 topic similar to this topic on the role of happiness,

24:17 addiction, Toxic positivity, where we become somewhat

24:22 conditioned to then constantly seek that dopamine hit and

24:25 reward rather than allowing our emotional cycles to happen,

24:29 where we then start to use that happiness as a form of emotional

24:34 suppression. Yeah, but is it real happiness

24:37 or is it just? Cover up or sticking plaster.

24:40 I mean, it's impossible to be happy all the time and our

24:43 brains aren't designed to be happy all the time.

24:45 And it wouldn't be a desirable state anyway.

24:47 I mean, it's supposed to be up like this, isn't it?

24:49 Up and down from an energetic level, you know that's our

24:52 natural ebb and flow. We're getting ready to do some

24:57 episodes on that coming up into our fifth season here where

25:00 we're talking about healing, energetic, so.

25:02 Absolutely. Very relevant topic to portray

25:05 because when we study Nature, there's the same pattern of

25:08 energetic fractals that just simply repeat over and over and

25:12 over. It's the same pattern.

25:14 Exactly. Yeah, that's a really good

25:15 point. Yeah, absolutely.

25:16 But I mean, I think Modern World has sold us a lie that we're

25:19 supposed to be happy all the time.

25:20 And I kind of chart this in the book.

25:21 It's like kind of, you know, starting in the 60s when we had

25:24 instrumented cameras and like, but whenever anybody's pointed a

25:27 camera at you, you're supposed to stay smart, you're supposed

25:29 to look happy. You know, the Victorians didn't

25:31 bother doing that. Do you know what I mean?

25:32 But like and then advertising, it sold us this lie that, you

25:36 know, if you have this. Product you will be happy then.

25:38 It showed a lot of people looking happy in ads and stuff

25:41 like that and somehow, you know laugh tracks on comedies that

25:44 everyone supposed to be laughing the whole time.

25:46 I mean life was never supposed to be like this.

25:47 I mean, I talk in the book, it's like, you know, our hunter

25:50 gatherer ancestors first laughs. Were a signal to the tribe that

25:55 oh, we're safe now. The kind of the Saber tooth

25:58 tiger has gone away Now it's a kind of form of relief.

26:01 So they were trying to survive. They weren't trying to be happy

26:03 all the time. I mean, that's the thing about

26:05 our brains. Our brains are not happiness

26:07 generators. They are survival machines.

26:10 But we seem to have gotten to this point where we think, oh,

26:13 if we're not happy all the time. There's something wrong with us.

26:14 There's nothing wrong with us. It's just like that is emotion

26:17 ebb and flows. You know what I mean?

26:19 But my point is that emotion should be allowed to ebb and

26:21 flow freely. And not feel blocked and

26:24 suppressed and pushed under so any of your emotions, not just

26:28 joy. But like anything you should get

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28:00 mobile app. For better or for worse, we

28:07 often find ourselves anticipating life and the tender

28:11 dance of anticipation. Our emotions under normal

28:14 circumstances, intertwine. We grow to expect life to be a

28:19 Symphony of highs and lows. Yet like fleeting stars that

28:22 shine with each dawn, new patterns emerge.

28:25 And in daytodays embrace, we find ourselves simply writing

28:30 the currents of expectancy wrapped in life's ever changing

28:34 Grace Tanith. We talk about patterns, our life

28:39 moving in patterns, a circle of life.

28:41 You know, that concept being a pattern.

28:43 Yet sometimes it can feel a little conflicting when we look

28:47 at some patterns. From that regard, how does an

28:50 Hamdonia contribute to rumination and circular thinking

28:53 patterns? And what impact does it have on

28:56 an individual's ability to break free of these cycles?

28:59 Yeah, that's a really good point.

29:00 So basically when you're on anhedonia, you are, you lose the

29:04 motivation to do the thing that would make you feel good.

29:06 So definitely if you're ruminating a lot and you've got

29:09 anhedonia, then you're sitting in your room, the same thoughts

29:12 are going around and round and round again, but you are missing

29:17 the drive to go out and and break yourself out of that

29:20 pattern and to pivot and to do something that would make you

29:23 feel good. So yeah, Anhedonia is definitely

29:26 not going to help. I mean, I talk in the book a lot

29:28 about behavioral activation. Which is a research based

29:32 approach for annadonia and some people kind of get a bit

29:34 irritated by it, but like the research shows, it works and

29:37 that is the idea that do whatever used to make you feel

29:40 good. Do it even if it's just for 5

29:43 minutes at a time and do it consistently until the good

29:46 feelings return. Because, you know, if we don't

29:48 do the things that are going to make us feel good, you know, of

29:50 course we're not going to feel any better and we don't feed our

29:52 brain positive inputs. We're not going to feel any

29:55 better. So Anne Hedonia is about

29:56 breaking free of Anne Hedonia. It's like realizing that instead

29:59 of like we should be made happy, we have to go and make our own

30:03 happiness, You know what I mean? We have to go and do things like

30:06 I did a reel this week and I was like looking at some glimmers,

30:09 you know, the kind of little moments of.

30:11 That you've noticed throughout the week.

30:12 And then you notice and appreciate.

30:13 And I looked at all my glimmers for the week and I realized they

30:15 had all been things that I had consciously got out of the house

30:19 to do to go and seek. You know what I mean?

30:21 If I'd been in my room and if I'd been in this room now, I

30:24 wouldn't have had that happiness.

30:25 But you know, I went to the park.

30:26 We went and picked some blackberries, I went to an art

30:29 gallery show. Sometimes you do have to go and

30:32 seek happiness. It's just not gonna happen to

30:34 you. We have.

30:35 I think it's a happiness takes a little bit more conscious work.

30:38 Than we've been led to believe so, yes, Reinforcing belief in

30:41 gratitude, finding those enriching moments.

30:45 One of the interesting things I learned when I spoke to

30:47 Professor Kent Barrage, who's like one of the main

30:49 neuroscientists about the reward system, is that like, joy and

30:53 happiness are not one thing. They are actually three things.

30:56 The anticipation, because dopamine is actually the

31:00 neurochemical of anticipation, not actually of reward.

31:02 So the anticipation of something that you're looking forward to,

31:06 the appreciation of it in the moment, so that you are in the

31:08 moment with it and you can languish and sink into those

31:11 good feelings and then after that.

31:13 Memory of what you did, what made you feel good.

31:16 So you want to go and do it again.

31:18 So I know that gratitude, it's become a bit of a corny word and

31:21 all the rest of it. But like, you know, writing down

31:23 at the end of the day what you really enjoy doing so that you

31:26 do more of it in future is actually a pretty wise move.

31:29 I mean, I find when I do gratitude and I I didn't even

31:31 want to put gratitude in the book.

31:32 I don't think I actually use the word because it's become such a

31:35 cliche. But the science and gratitude is

31:37 just astonishing of what it can do for you and how it can change

31:40 your mood and your way of framing the world.

31:43 So yeah, I think, you know, you brought up gratitude and I grew

31:46 that. It's like, what did you enjoy

31:48 today? Just crystallizing it so that

31:51 you want to do it again. What a wonderful way to simply

31:54 introspect and jot down what creates value and meaning for

31:58 you. If you don't know what creates

32:00 meaning, if you don't revisit it often, we tend to forget we

32:04 can't push it back. We tend to focus on the other

32:07 things, absolutely. And of course, you know, all the

32:10 survival mechanisms that made our brains the most superior on

32:13 the planet are like, for example, we have a negativity

32:16 bias. Because obviously, you know,

32:17 when we were 100,000 years ago wandering across the tundra, we

32:21 had to take more notice of the threats than the good things

32:24 because if we wanted to stay alive and we still have that

32:26 negativity bias, so. Being aware of the brain's

32:29 natural tendencies so that we can work against them is really,

32:32 really, really important. I mean I think what we have here

32:35 is we have like a very ancient brain in a very in over

32:40 stimulating modern environment and then we're wondering why

32:43 we're not happier. You know, and it's like, I think

32:45 the plus side is that thanks to FM RI scanners, we can now see

32:49 how emotion is made in the brain and we can harness the

32:52 neuroscience so that we can get our brains on side.

32:55 Because what's happening at the moment is we're like falling

32:57 into a gap here. And that's why mental health in

33:00 the first world is in free fall. I mean, since the 50s, every

33:03 generation has got less happy. So it's time to kind of harness

33:07 what we know about happiness and how emotions are made and

33:10 actually use it to our advantage.

33:11 Because at the moment, we're not.

33:14 And our brains are kind of losing out, which is why a lot

33:16 of us are not as happy as we should be.

33:18 And as we change and evolve and adapt, we're also finding out

33:22 the miracles of our central nervous system.

33:25 We're also able to witness how that action plays out.

33:28 We're also able to kind of witness our field of energy

33:32 absolutely up, even how that connects to our vibrational

33:35 frequency and our experience of the salt.

33:38 Yeah, topic we're going to also lean into in the near future.

33:42 Feeling that back, can you discuss the link between

33:44 anhandonia and maladaptive coping mechanisms and how these

33:48 coping strategies might perpetuate feelings of

33:50 helplessness and self victimization at times?

33:54 Absolutely. Yeah.

33:55 I mean, yeah, you do see many people in Annadonia.

33:58 And I mean, that's part of the problem with Annadonia is they

34:00 don't see a way of getting out of it.

34:02 That's the kind of. It is.

34:04 There's a hopelessness and a despair about annadonia, which

34:07 is, which really means why it needs to be talked about more

34:10 generally, because people who are stuck in it just don't see a

34:12 way out. That's a really good point.

34:14 But I mean, the book is here to say that if you know what this

34:18 is and you have a toolbox, you can pick your tools and then

34:23 hopefully bit by bit, your brain's reward circuit, which

34:26 has probably been interrupted by something you know, which I talk

34:29 about in the book, whether it could be burnout or childhood

34:31 trauma or. Overwhelm or even like things

34:34 like diet and hormone shifts, it's to kind of find out if you

34:37 know where your anhedonia is, then you can start to address it

34:40 and you can start to do the things that make you feel

34:42 better. So you can gradually move out of

34:43 anhedonia and the good feelings will return and the dopamine

34:46 reward circuit will get back on track.

34:48 I mean, that's what it's kind of about.

34:50 I mean, most cases of anhedonia are your brain's reward circuit

34:53 is not working well. You know you're not getting the

34:55 reward, you're not getting the free flow of the dopamine

34:58 through various different reasons.

34:59 So if you can find what? That's a really cool problem to

35:04 address. But most people are just seeing

35:06 the symptoms of that, aren't they?

35:07 And then blaming themselves. You know, I don't want people to

35:10 blame themselves. There are lots of different

35:12 reasons that they're outside you.

35:13 It's not your problem. You know, like I said, I felt

35:16 guilty that I felt like numb like this.

35:18 I don't want people to feel guilty.

35:19 I want them to feel like empowered that they can do

35:21 something about it. And then they're not alone.

35:23 We look at that aspect of healthy boundaries, how we're

35:26 relating both from our introspection and then how we're

35:30 also projecting out at others our self concept playing an

35:33 important role in that relationship.

35:35 We develop the ability to also step beyond that framework with

35:40 a healthy psychological distance.

35:43 What steps from your perspective, Tanneth can we take

35:46 to maybe improve that self esteem and self worth when we're

35:50 experiencing these symptoms of anhedonia where we feel somewhat

35:54 disconnected? Well, the first thing is to see

35:57 that it's to stop blame, because, I mean, blame is a big

36:00 contributing factor and guilt, it will tip it into depression.

36:05 So that's even even more intractable situation.

36:08 So I think this to kind of lift that kind of.

36:10 There's something wrong with me. I shouldn't be moaning.

36:14 This is my fault. Why am I so miserable?

36:17 Why am I such a miserable person?

36:18 I'll have no fun to be around. So I think just.

36:22 Letting go of that and then being more solution focused I

36:25 think is really helpful because I think that, you know, if

36:28 you're no fun to be around then you're in a feedback loop and

36:30 then you feel like people don't want to be around you and you

36:32 stop going out. So I just think what helped with

36:35 me also was to kind of re parent myself and then to go back to

36:38 the kind of authentic, joyful child I've been.

36:40 Because I mean. As a very young child, I've been

36:42 a very joyful little girl. I've been kind of, I was the kid

36:45 who'd like, you know, sing on the plane or, you know, dance

36:49 spontaneously, but like something had got in the way.

36:52 So I just think that remember, like when we came out into the

36:57 universe, we were joyful, authentic, whole beings, you

37:00 know? And to try and get back to that

37:02 place by looking, maybe you know, if you can, what got in

37:06 the way, what happened for you where you no longer feel that

37:09 joy? I think that's really important

37:12 because it's there, It should be there in there.

37:14 I mean it is, it is natural for humans to for joy.

37:16 It is. I'm not saying it's a constant

37:18 state, but it is part of our emotional repertoire.

37:21 So I think those, those, that's the main question and what can I

37:24 do about it. That sense of inner turmoil and

37:27 conflict can be a very stressful experience for all of us.

37:32 Let's kind of segue, if we might, into the more

37:35 physiological side of an handonia.

37:38 Now how from that regard, first and foremost as chronic stress

37:42 play a role in intensifying an handonia?

37:45 And what are some of the effective strategies for

37:47 managing and reducing our stress so we may not creep into that

37:51 realm? Well, I would say burnout is one

37:53 of the main contributors to Anhedonia, because especially

37:56 it's cortisol overload. And as I point out in the book,

37:59 once cortisol is spiked in the human body, it will stay in your

38:03 body for an hour. Dopamine, once it's spiked, will

38:06 only stay in your body for 5 minutes.

38:08 So what's happening is, is that we are so overloaded with

38:11 microstressors like kind of deadlines, the 24 hour news

38:15 cycle exposure, the comparison culture, social media.

38:20 All these things may basically mean that our course soul levels

38:23 are constantly high, and then of course we have no boundaries

38:25 around work, so anybody can get a hold of us at anytime at all

38:28 that they want. So basically we never have a

38:30 moment for the Course soul levels to truly reset because

38:33 we've always got our phones in our hands or we're always

38:35 looking at a screen. So burnout is really what

38:37 happens when that becomes relentless and you're just, your

38:41 brain basically starts to kind of metaphorically kind of close

38:44 down, and then you start to become cynical, Your range of

38:48 emotion becomes narrower. You just feel like a zombie,

38:52 like you're going through the motions.

38:53 And so I think that if you are aware of your burner, I mean,

38:58 again, that's about introception.

38:59 So for example, one of my reasons for Annadonia was I was

39:02 a national newspaper journalist in the UK.

39:04 I had numerous different editors.

39:06 I had two young children. I had constant deadlines.

39:09 Everything I had to write had to be accurate, you know, it was

39:11 just like I was interviewing those of different people.

39:14 I had so many demands on me that by the end of the day I was just

39:16 completely burnt out. I couldn't feel anything.

39:19 But now I would take steps in order to kind of I would notice.

39:22 So if I have a hatch on a scale of 1 to 10 and like where one's

39:27 feeling really good and ten's feeling really stressed, once I

39:30 get to a six, it's gone up to a six, then I know I need to take

39:34 steps to kind of reduce the load before I get higher.

39:37 And I I stopped being able to help myself.

39:39 So again, it's about realizing I think also in families

39:43 particularly, it's about sharing emotional load.

39:46 I think sometimes the work we do in families is a bit, a little

39:49 bit uneven and we tend to take lots on our To Do List, but we

39:52 don't take things off our To Do List and then we start doing

39:55 stuff and we think no one else can do it.

39:56 So we only we can do it. So I think sometimes you just

39:58 need to step back and really look at what you really need to

40:00 be doing, what's good for you, and just rebalance so that you

40:05 don't become overwhelmed in that state, which steals joy because

40:08 you know you're no use to anybody if you're burnt out

40:10 anyway. So I don't know what's driving.

40:12 It might be your work holism. It might be your feeling you

40:15 need to fulfill. You need to provide but like I

40:18 guess to try and understand what's going on there.

40:20 For me that kind of resonates with Poly vagal theory in the

40:23 concept of the autonomic ladder. You know, the autonomic ladder

40:27 is basically measuring that degree where our energy is at,

40:31 where our level of stress is at, yeah.

40:34 In our optimum state of operation, we're up there in

40:38 ventral vagal activation. Veins are in alignment, things

40:42 are in flow, Things come to us and we manifest them easily.

40:47 Our energetic levels are activated.

40:49 You were in our best self, dare I say as we dip down.

40:55 You know our. Looking at that concept, is your

40:57 cup half full, half empty? Are you pouring from an empty

41:01 cup? As we move down those levels of

41:04 activation, You know, the more we get kind of activated in our

41:07 emotion, the more we overextend our energy.

41:09 We move down that ladder to the bottom into dorsal vagal

41:14 activation. In that state, we're triggered

41:18 fight, flight, freeze, and then at the very bottom shut down.

41:24 That's it. Yeah.

41:24 I'm. I'm so glad you're taking that

41:25 approach because I totally agree.

41:27 I mean, you know, the head is not just a sort of a lollipop in

41:30 the end of the stick, you know, we are nervous systems, aren't

41:34 we? And we just try to do it in our

41:36 head. That's not enough.

41:37 Traditionally, we may not have had all that data present for

41:41 us, kind of maybe somewhat substantiate that stance.

41:46 You know, we're just now learning a lot of this.

41:49 I think it's an incredibly exciting time really because you

41:52 know, I'd had talk therapies but like it just went around and

41:55 around so only when I had somatic mortgage style therapy

41:58 that I could see it in my life and my body as a whole.

42:02 You know, and that's why I'm, you know, of all the modalities

42:05 that I'm training in, Gestalt was actually because I thought

42:08 people like Abu maternal was this completely new, but

42:10 actually it was in Gestalt therapy.

42:12 So you know what I mean? So I think this Matic approach

42:15 is incredibly useful and like, you know, the holistic

42:17 psychologist and Nicola Prey and all these people like that and

42:20 Peter Levine, it's just exciting really.

42:24 So looking at that role of the physiological aspect of

42:30 anhendonia, what role do neurotransmitter imbalances play

42:34 in contributing to Anhendonia? You know, we're kind of making

42:37 that bridge between the head and the body.

42:40 Yeah. I mean, obviously

42:42 neurotransmitters is very, very complicated and the balance is

42:44 different to everybody. But like, you know, modern life

42:48 is not particularly kind to the healthy flow of our

42:51 neurotransmitters, for example. I mean, we're kind of like we

42:55 can get anything we want within pretty much 5 minutes.

42:58 So our dopamine circuits are always getting spiked and you

43:02 know, and it and the length is being very good on this.

43:03 It's like when everything is supposed to feel good, nothing

43:06 feels good anymore, you know, So even when we, yeah, the things

43:11 we think we're supposed to want and you know, the pleasure goes

43:13 down and down and down and we're not getting dopamine in measured

43:16 releases, are we? We're just getting micro spikes

43:19 all the time. So, you know, she talks about,

43:21 you know, going on dopamine, like taking a break from it so

43:24 that that can reset. I mean the other thing that

43:27 contributes to an imbalance in our happiness moment is also our

43:31 modern diet. So you know, we now know that

43:33 90% of serotonin is made in the gut.

43:35 But we tend in America and the US to eat a lot of processed

43:39 foods, a lot of inflammatory foods.

43:41 And we now know that not only can that interrupt the

43:44 microboat, so which contributes towards the serotonin, but that

43:48 inflammation that it causes can also reach the brain and can

43:51 also interrupt the smooth running of the brain's reward

43:53 system. So that's another thing in

43:55 modern life which is making it more difficult to feel joy.

43:59 So it's just it's coming at us from every different angle

44:02 really. Well, you look at that role of

44:04 stress in how that also creates some of that inflammation and

44:08 imbalance. Yeah, absolutely.

44:10 And you know, many of our lifestyle illnesses like

44:13 diabetes and obesity, I mean, these are also inflammatory

44:17 illnesses. So then you have a really

44:19 interesting thing there where, you know, and then you have the

44:21 government saying, oh, you must do this to do that.

44:24 You know, if you're obese, do this, do that.

44:26 If you're diabetic, eat that either, but then if you have

44:29 annadonia as part of that then you haven't got the motivation

44:32 to make those lifestyle choices. It's really interesting and like

44:35 also with COVID-19 is that the research now shows that

44:38 Annadonia is now listed as a symptom of long COVID because

44:42 obviously viral illness, the body responds, the body causes

44:45 inflammation to fight off the virus and that's that

44:49 inflammation can also reach the brain.

44:51 So then we have in the UK for example, we have a lot of people

44:53 who just never came back to work because they lost the

44:56 motivation. They didn't know how to get out

44:58 of that. You know, I mean, obviously

44:59 that's not the only reason you don't, but it's certainly not

45:01 helping if an hedonia is a symptom of your lung COVID.

45:04 So I just think there needs to be more of a discussion about

45:07 its role in how we're functioning as a society.

45:10 We need to be taking more care of our brain's reward system

45:13 because we're either overloading it with dopamine or we're

45:17 overloading it with stress. And then what happens?

45:19 Cortisol suppresses the action of dopamine.

45:22 So like I say, the dials are all out of sync, you know?

45:25 That's just why we're not feeling good.

45:27 From my own experience from long COVID, after you know, we had

45:30 COVID. I had that classic brain fog and

45:34 trouble remembering. One of the interesting side

45:36 effects for me was I have a history of gout, you know,

45:40 started about two years ago, starting to have a little

45:43 history with gout coming out of long COVID or through long

45:47 COVID. I had gout in my right knee to

45:50 the point where I couldn't walk for two weeks.

45:53 Was by the doctor's assessment triggered by some of those

45:57 inflammatory effects of COVID? Absolutely.

46:01 You know, I mean, I say sometimes it's imaginatively

46:04 when I sometimes when I say some of the stuff people like really,

46:07 uh, where you going this from? Research is all there.

46:09 You know, I mean, if you read Edward Bullamore, you know,

46:12 he's, I think he's a professor of neuroscience at Cambridge.

46:15 You know, the studies and the brain scans show that

46:17 inflammation can also affect the smooth running of the reward

46:21 system. You know, and you know, I guess

46:23 also people go what you eat, it's going to make you like,

46:26 yeah, but unfortunately, yeah, I mean we now know about the gut

46:29 brain connection, don't we? So it's whole body, isn't it?

46:32 You know, it's not just what thoughts we think, it's our

46:35 lifestyles. And also the other thing is

46:37 that, you know, a lot of people will talk report and herdonia in

46:40 like middle age because we have hormone shift.

46:43 So when the estrogen levels in women go down that also has a

46:46 direct knock on effect on the reduction of dopamine.

46:50 So you are going to feel a little less joyful and you're

46:53 also going to feel a little less able to cope because cortisol is

46:56 more exposed as the as the Eastern goes down.

46:58 So you're going to feel a bit more stressed, you're going to

47:00 feel more anxious, more self-conscious.

47:02 So I just think we just need to know about this incredible

47:05 chemistry set inside our brains and use this knowledge to get

47:09 that chemistry set a little bit more in control than we've been

47:12 led to believe it is. We are energetic,

47:15 multidimensional beings living in a somatically embodied

47:19 experience. You must be energetically

47:23 aligned with me today because discussing hormonal imbalance

47:27 was my next line of questioning and how that might influence

47:32 women who are experiencing their menopausal stages through those

47:35 menopausal interactions. Aren't thyroidal issues also a

47:39 common occurrence? Yeah, you're absolutely right.

47:42 There was one I was going to bring up because basically a lot

47:45 of thyroid imbalances is mistaken for low mood and

47:48 depression. So I think it's, you know, it's

47:50 also really helpful to, you know, go and get your physically

47:53 checked out and also if you're going through a period of

47:55 antidonia, think back about your health.

47:56 Like, have I been through an illness that I haven't quite got

47:59 over? Is this link to another illness

48:01 I might be having, for example? I mean, what I also found really

48:05 intriguing was that antibiotic overuse, because basically

48:08 antibiotics when overly used, they can also affect the micro

48:12 BIOS of the gut and they can also affect the, I said the the

48:16 production of serotonin. But you know, why don't we think

48:19 about this? You know, we're not thinking,

48:20 we're not thinking enough about happiness in the whole, you

48:23 know, we're just thinking about it as a kind of whether or not,

48:26 you know, everything's OK psychologically.

48:28 It's just it's a lot more complex than that.

48:31 Was just watching a program last night called Inner Worlds, Outer

48:35 Worlds, looking at our microbal biomes.

48:39 I think I'm saying that right, but how?

48:41 That's nothing more than an energy system.

48:44 When that chemical imbalance first happens, then so to erodes

48:49 our energetic exchange, so to erodes that energetic

48:54 interaction with what we're gaining, our sustenance and

48:57 nutrition from those food sources.

49:00 Yeah, that's a good point. Absolutely.

49:01 Yeah. I mean, I tend to sort of use

49:04 food as part of my energy. Like, no, it's obviously all

49:06 foods energy. But what I think very carefully

49:08 about what I eat and how it's going to make me feel and how

49:11 it's going to make my brain function and how it's going to

49:13 affect my mood. So I don't just eat to feel

49:15 full. I eat to feel good.

49:16 Do you know what I mean? So that's been very liberating.

49:20 It's also interesting to see that correlation with eating

49:24 disorders or eating as an emotional coping mechanism that

49:28 can become a vicious cycle to me, where 1 adverse pattern

49:33 feeds the other adverse pattern. Absolutely.

49:37 Yeah. But you know, as with any 18

49:38 store, it's like, what are you trying to address?

49:40 I guess, you know, I mean, I mean, in my work I'm possibly

49:42 about like peeling about the layers.

49:44 You know you think you've got to one layer, then you need to get

49:46 to the next layer and all the rest of it.

49:48 Looking at recent research into neurodegenerative diseases, it's

49:52 interesting to see how Anhendonia surfaces at times as

49:56 a result of these conditions. Could you share more about your

49:59 findings regarding this effect? Yeah, so I mean, obviously

50:03 Annadonia is a big symptom of Parkinson's and also

50:07 schizophrenia. So I mean to be honest in the

50:10 book I didn't go that much into that because I felt that was a

50:14 very kind of specialist area. So it certainly is a symptom of

50:18 those two things. And I I've, I mean obviously in

50:20 Parkinson's it's about dopamine dysregulation, isn't it?

50:23 And any kind of doping dysregulation will affect your

50:26 brain's reward system. Schizophrenia.

50:28 I'll leave to the experts, but yeah, I know, totally, yeah.

50:31 It's crucial then to notice that inflammation there again starts

50:35 to pop up. Yeah, as one of the core

50:37 underlying factors that it interacts and has been shown to

50:41 lead to both Parkinson's in an Alzheimer's there again can also

50:45 lead to that connection to our healthy diet and any toxins that

50:49 might be in that diet. We'll just vaguely put that out

50:53 there. That might open the door for

50:55 another episode down the road. I'm glad we've acknowledged

50:57 that. No, that's a very interesting

50:59 point. Looking at the process of

51:01 neuroception and our neurological state traumatic

51:05 brain injuries that are also significant for an increased

51:08 potential for an handonia. As our past guest Keegan Hadley

51:12 Shear, resulting from his years of playing semi Pro Football and

51:15 having experienced multiple instances of traumatic brain

51:19 concussion, could you reiterate from your perspective how

51:22 traumatic brain injury might influence anhandonia?

51:25 Yeah, absolutely. And also when you speak to a lot

51:28 of people think you are in very kind of deep anaerdonia that

51:32 they've been over prescribed antidepressants and that has

51:35 thrown off their reward system. There's a lot of people who feel

51:37 that that is an issue as well. Again, I didn't go into that

51:41 because it was just like probably too much for this book.

51:43 But yeah, though that is something that other people do

51:45 need to look at if they are really, really just stuck, very

51:48 badly stuck. The other interesting thing I

51:51 came across was like a lot of people who were heavy users of

51:54 porn also reported to Annadonia because they were just basically

51:57 overloading their bodies with kind of like massive dopamine

52:00 hits until, you know, it just became it stopped working for

52:04 them. And they didn't just stop that.

52:05 They stopped feeling the pleasure of looking at porn, but

52:09 that extended to everything else as well.

52:11 So they didn't feel joy in anything.

52:13 I just, I think what's really interesting about anhedonia is

52:16 it can take like it can affect different sensate experiences.

52:20 So it can affect your taste, so that can dial it down.

52:23 It can affect your appreciation of music.

52:26 It can affect your sensual touch feels and your appreciation of

52:30 sex. So it's all these different

52:32 elements to it. It's like a point of mosaic, you

52:34 know? And it's kind of a cornucopia

52:37 then, kind of a Cascadian effect between hormonal and bounds.

52:41 You've got these sensory and bounces and it stands to reason

52:45 then how we kind of numb out and check out, Yeah, that emotional

52:49 interaction. That's a really good point

52:51 because I remember, I mean, my daughter's a classical musician

52:54 and I would go to her concerts and I would be there looking at

52:56 something incredibly moving music.

52:59 And like, you know, I'd remember like if like when I was younger,

53:02 when I heard that kind of music, you know, literally you'd have

53:04 that kind of the hair standing up, that tingly feeling.

53:07 And I also noticed I was in and had only when I couldn't feel

53:09 that kind of the chills, that music that was incredibly

53:12 beautiful. And I knew that I was coming out

53:14 of Annadonia when I could feel the chills again.

53:17 So that's a really nice, simple indicator for people like, how

53:20 are they doing? How is their pleasure circuit

53:22 working? Do you know what I mean?

53:24 Because at the end of the day, it does.

53:25 You're right. These are all manifestations of

53:27 the reward system cycle in your brain not working that well.

53:31 So of course you're not going to enjoy sex as much.

53:32 Of course you're not going to enjoy music, but it just might

53:34 be a marker that you know you need to do some work to protect

53:38 that and nurture that mesolimbic reward pathway in any way you

53:41 can. For me, it's kind of interesting

53:44 to look at that and associate with what we regard as

53:48 existential pain or the source of our suffering in life.

53:53 Just going to earmark that because I feel that's a pathway

53:55 we might potentially look at in the future.

53:58 I think that's an opportunity for us to open a door and

54:00 explore in that regard of looking at pain.

54:05 Are there associations with chronic pain itself?

54:08 That might be related to in Hindonia, Yeah.

54:12 No, Annadonia is a symptom of chronic pain basically because

54:15 of course, it's very difficult to be in the moment or when you

54:20 have that pain, which is like a total nagging and takes you out

54:23 of the joy of the moment. So yeah, it's very, very

54:27 pervasive. Annadonia.

54:28 Definitely. It's interesting to look at that

54:31 level of chronic pain and there again, you know we're working

54:33 within the brain circuitry and neurotransmitter systems.

54:37 We're dealing with medications that sometimes suppress those

54:41 interactions. We're also dealing with

54:42 medications that then as our system kind of interacts, we're

54:46 going back to some of that inflammation, we're getting tie

54:49 ins there. We're also seeing where then

54:51 kind of we learn that pattern. We turn to that pattern of

54:55 numbing the pain sometimes on the harsh end where it becomes

54:59 addiction. Yeah, that's true.

55:00 And of course, like in pain, your body is reacting with the

55:04 cortisol response and cortisol dampens down dopamine.

55:07 So yeah, it's all related. You're right.

55:09 Absolutely. Yeah, definitely.

55:13 This has been so insightful today, Tanneth, to wrap things

55:17 up. Can you highlight a few points

55:19 for us to consider before we go? And suggest some potential

55:23 outlets for treatment for someone who might be

55:26 experiencing and handonia. Well, I would say, you know you

55:29 need to workout what your reasons are and they like you.

55:32 We've covered so many of them today and I think you need to

55:35 kind of find your top three and which are manageable or which

55:41 can be helped. So, you know, like if your

55:44 anhedonia stems from a childhood fear of happiness or

55:47 disassociation, then, I mean you're gonna have to go do a

55:50 little bit of kind of going back into your childhood, maybe doing

55:53 some reparenting, maybe being the kind of the safe, warm adult

55:58 that you needed to comfort you then.

56:00 I've certainly found that extremely helpful.

56:03 If you think it's to do with a hormone shift, you've noticed it

56:06 in, like, even as a man in andropause or a woman in

56:10 menopause. We know there are ways for not

56:13 everybody, but for a lot of people to go and get that

56:16 hormone situation rebalanced. So and you know, there's a lot

56:20 of research that shows that HRT is linked to improvement in

56:24 mood. I think that it's really

56:26 important to do things that get those dials a little bit more In

56:31 Sync. So for example, you know,

56:33 knowing to for me that dopamine is the molecule of anticipation,

56:37 I just do something really simple like I every week I make

56:40 sure I have something to look forward to and something that's

56:43 new because the human brain is also, well, for novelty and it's

56:47 also wired to anticipate. So then, you know, I do

56:49 something with my husband, we'll go to somewhere we haven't been

56:51 before. And I also feed my, my brain

56:54 positive inputs. You know, I mean, I was lucky

56:56 that I was probably, I was in dysphoria, I was probably mildly

56:59 depressed. I wasn't deeply depressed.

57:01 So, I mean I didn't need medication.

57:02 And as I say, the book is not for people who are deeply

57:05 depressed or need medication. This is for people who are

57:07 getting on with life, who are, you know, everything seems to be

57:10 going OK, but they are just not enjoying it as much as they

57:14 probably might have hoped or they feel there's some room for

57:18 improvement, you know? So it's feeding your brain

57:20 positive inputs. It's curating your life.

57:22 I think as well, we're curating your social media, speaking to

57:25 people who inspire you, following social media accounts

57:28 that are positive. If you're going to be on social

57:30 media, it's like curating your life, you know?

57:33 Does that sound simplistic? But it is simple.

57:35 But yeah, you know what I mean. There is simplicity and beauty

57:40 you're woven within all of life's complexity.

57:43 From my perspective. I want to thank you for sharing

57:46 this very eye opening perspective with us today.

57:49 I know this is a hot topic for me now because I'm just now

57:52 discovering it and it's just now coming into my radar.

57:56 So thank you for bringing this to light for us today, Taylor.

57:58 It was a pleasure. Very interesting wide range of

58:02 conversation. I really thank you for that.

58:03 Thank you for sharing your brilliance with us today.

58:06 Namaste. The lighten me acknowledges the

58:09 lighten you dear. Oh, thank you.

58:14 Tanneth and I discussed how Anne Handonia has surfaced as an

58:18 often overlooked symptom, leading to a decline in our

58:21 emotional and mental health. We also shared how this

58:24 misattributed phenomena can lead us to lose meaningful

58:27 connections to our emotions. We explain the many different

58:31 ways the psychological experience can surface in the

58:35 role it plays in a physiological health as well.

58:38 Overall, this episode underscores the significance of

58:41 introspection, interception and emotional intelligence play and

58:45 selfreflection, emotional regulation in the cultivation of

58:49 healthy coping mechanisms. However, in the face of

58:52 Anhedonia, amidst this desolation, there remains A

58:55 flicker of hope in the return of emotions, in the Symphony of our

58:59 feelings. Despite the difficulty of seeing

59:02 a light at the end of the tunnel, the vibrant tapestry of

59:05 human existence is always waiting inside.

59:09 If you found meaning in the show, please share it with a

59:11 friend or loved one. And as always, we're grateful

59:14 for you are valued listening community.

59:17 This has been the light inside. I'm Jeffrey Besecker.