Best of VVV – Loretta Breuning Making Peace with the Animal Inside

Loretta and I became friendly while I still lived in the Los Angeles area, and she is even MORE awesome in person.  Meeting Loretta and understanding her concepts and ideas was the one of the most life changing encounters from doing this podcast.  Her ideas fundamentally changed the way I think about stress, sadness, loneliness and just the ups and downs of life.  If this is your first time hearing Loretta, please don't let it be the last, check out her website, meet her in person, read her books...your life will be better if you let it.  Now that's a BEST OF VVV!

Loretta Breuning, PhD is the author of several books including Habbits of a Happy Brain, Beyond Cynical, and I, Mammal.  She is a teacher and a mom.  She found conventional theories of human motivation didn't ring true for her.

While volunteering in Africa with the United Nations, she learned about the mammalian custom of bribery.  This led her to learn that many of our motivations and behaviors are shared with other mammals.  "Our brains see things as a matter of survival because natural selection built a brain that focuses on survival

Loretta Breuning Vroom/Veer Stories

Story of having an "veer moment" while giving a lecture she no longer was aligned with
Our ancestors choose to stick with "the jerks" in their group despite their frustrations so they could survive
All groups of mammals have internal tensions, but they stick together because there is a common enemy
Romantic love does more to get your genes alive than many other things, so the brain rewards romantic love with all the happy chemicals
Story about how when an elephant in a zoo gets to eat a sheet cake for his birthday, that becomes like a drug to him.  It meets his food needs so much better than eating tree branches all week

This is similar to how humans become addicted to drugs, the brain learns that the drug meets it's need some much better than real life ups and downs of say writing resumes and trying to find a new job
There is no benefit in questing for an infinite high.
A better goal is to learn to feel confident with an ability to manage your ups and downs and even things out.

The "Happy" Chemicals

Dopamine - I can do it! The feeling you get when you see a way to meet a need.
Serotonin - I'm top dog! I'm cool!  I got it gonna on!
Oxytocin - I trust you
Endorphin - I'm feeling no pain for about 15 minutes...after which (if you live) you should feel pain.

We get a small dose of endorphin when we laugh because it jiggles our innards.

Unhappy Chemical - Cortisol

The feeling that one "must do something fast" maybe healthy, probably not

Myelin is used by the brain during childhood to create superhighway circuits

These are circuits connected to activities that to us feel:  effortless, normal, natural and safe.
When you try new activities, you are creating new pathways in your brain will feel difficult, strange, unnatural and scary.

Mirror Neurons - empathy and learning by modeling
Making new pathways

45 days of repeating a new "preferred" strategy
Know that this will feel bad
You will still want to reach for the old circuit to fill the need

Loretta Breuning Links

The Inner Mammal Institute

Habits Of A Happy Brain: Retrain Your Brain to Boost Your Serotonin, Dopamine, Oxytocin, & Endorphin Levels – December 16, 2015

by Loretta Graziano Breuning (Author)