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**Adam Stacoviak:** That's right. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** It might have been true when you were in third grade, it might have been true when you were in junior high or high school, or it could have been true in your early twenties, but it doesn't mean that that is always only ever true. |
**Adam Stacoviak:** So are you saying that your feelings, as they evolve over time, you should always be confirming "Is this still true?" |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Well, I would offer up that feelings aren't facts, but they are feedback. So if I don't put my lid on, if I don't actually look at things through a process of self-reflection or repetition, i.e. looking at other data, then I'm apt to just allow my emotions to lead, without considering that... |
The interesting thing actually with emotions is that they're actually really important when it comes to connecting with other people... And that route would look like empathy. When I talk about empathy, I wanna distinguish empathy from sympathy... Because I'm a word girl; language matters. |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Well, help break that down then. What's the difference? |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** So I would say, Sympathy is sort of like "Oh, too bad. It sucks to be you." |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right, "Bummer." |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** But empathy is so much more of like "Wow, I can only imagine if I were you, had your background, and was going through that experience - how bad that it hurt." Or like "Ugh, I would be so inflamed!" So empathy is much more my ability to see somebody's perspective from their perspective, no... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Gotcha. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Because that comes across -- like, I would say sympathy to some degree has more of a component of judgment, whereas empathy is more like "Hey, I'm with you dude. I'm stuck in this elevator too, trying not to panic", right? |
**Adam Stacoviak:** It makes sense, yeah. I like that a lot; the way you break that down is pretty interesting. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** \[23:55\] And so because we're fundamentally hardwired to connect, then it means that we're all going to fare a lot better when we have other people that we can walk alongside with. Think about the kinds of individuals that you relate well with. Usually, you share probably similar hobbies,... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** I think that you've said before "your people", and I don't know what you really mean by that, but I think it's probably the people you identify with, the people that maybe even are easy to empathize with... And as you mentioned, likes/dislikes, things like that. You need your people, right? And with... |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Sure, sure. That one's got a whole other layer to it... But even that gets at that sort of gang mentality, |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right. "We have to band together to survive." |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Correct. That's how we started, was farmer or tribal, right? And social psychologists have actually looked at this in terms of the research, and they go "How is it that tribes can value their people so much, but then sit there and commit atrocities, brutalities against other tribes?" and i... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** This is why we don't start testing like "Hm, I wonder what would happen with this drug if I tested it on humans." That's the last case after we test in all these other ways, because humans fundamentally hold a different value. And so, why is it that we can't begin to see everyone with a ce... |
One example I think of is, you know, I grew up in the Midwest, both my husband and I - from different states in the Midwest... And we always joke about the difference in the way that people are, where it's like it can have been years without seeing friends, etc. from back then (because he moved away when he was an adul... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Meaning that you have a past, and so it's easy to reconnect, or...? |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** No, that there's just a shared sort of understanding. We can even look throughout the country and go "It's different being in the South." I've lived a lot of places throughout my life; I did my graduate training in Southern California, and so I've been on the West... I've been on the East ... |
Somebody was joking about the Pacific North-West people, and how as a general rule we're -- not mean, but we just sort of answer a question and then go back to what you were doing... Whereas if you're in the South, you ask somebody for directions and they start telling their story, and like "What are you here for?" and... |
\[28:17\] Another example for me is having grown up more in athletics, and having coached competitive gymnastics for a number of years - I love being around people who are fit, and love to take on a challenge, and be like "Yeah, let's try a Tough Mudder or a marathon", or whatever. Whereas other people might be like "N... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** "That's my workout." |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** \[laughs\] Or "Dude, I walked around the block. I parked far out, at the grocery store." |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Yeah. "Second row, man..." |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** \[laughs\] But that it makes a difference in terms of, you know, this shared understanding to go -- think about the people that you wanna spend your time with; these are people where you don't have to catch them up and be like "Oh yeah, okay, here's my entire history" or "This is who I am.... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right. I'm almost thinking like -- there's certain words you've used... We said "designed to connect". I've heard you use the word "attachment" before, which has not just its surface-level meaning, but a different meaning in neuroscience... But then I'm also thinking like "relating". So what you're ... |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Yeah. I think of shared understanding. |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right. What other words describe connecting though? ...that you can think of, that we can identify. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Well, I talked about empathy, and going there is a sense of feeling understood... Like, I don't have to give a whole explanation that I sort of share something and you have a sense of how that might make me feel... And to care about that. Connection is really about finding ways in which th... |
Where I live, there's a huge military population, and so we have a lot of families where -- husbands, generally speaking, but some wives too are out to sea and raising kids in that 0 to 5 age, when spouses are gone for 3, 6, 12 months at a time. And they're home. They're doing their life, trying to raise kids, and it's... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right. The backlash. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Yeah. They're trying to figure out "Who can I do life beside?", and if somebody needs to watch my kids or I have a doctor's appointment, like... A lot of them don't have family nearby, because this is a duty station; it's not where they live full-time. |
The other thing that's really important when it comes to connection is touch. There's some research which really shows how just the fundamental of embracing another -- I forget if it's 20 seconds or what, but having a longer embrace, like a hug... The way in which it helps buffer stress; it reduces arousal and reactivi... |
\[31:59\] We can also see this in parenting. You hold babies, they're close to you. That touch. And some years ago there used to be orphanages, and the challenge was that these babies, these infants weren't tended to, and when they didn't have touch, they didn't survive. |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Because touch is that crucial. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Touch is that crucial. |
**Adam Stacoviak:** It's probably a feeling thing too, but there's a chemical process that's happening there, too. I know that's a thing with newborns; there's the concept of skin-to-skin, or the idea of the mother holding the child within seconds, and what a big impact that makes on the child for the rest of their lif... |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Yeah, because think about it - they were confined to this itty-bitty space, totally tethered to mom; and now, "Oh my word, there's just all this space, and I'm not confined... And where's my human?" Because skin feels different than other things. Not to mention hearing the heartbeat... Bec... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** And then it goes away for that moment of the birth process; they're out, they get cleaned up, whatever, the suction, and they let them cry... There's certain processes that happen, that the doctor and the nurses feel good about, and then they're like "Okay mom, healthy baby - here you go. Congratula... |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Yeah. And we're talking with moms, but it can be dads, too. Just the value of touch... And I would say just the proximity; I think about when people aren't well, and you find out a loved one is in the hospital - where do you wanna be? |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right there next to them. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Exactly. Because there's comfort in touch. And when we can't touch people, hold people and really have a connection with people, we're lonely. |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right. A companion even. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** Right? I think about this with so many workforces being far more distributed... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Yeah. |
**Mireille B. Reece, Psy.D:** And while it's an awesome advantage and helpful in the workplace, it also has other potentially deleterious effects, of going like "Where's my people? I'm not touching anybody, I lose the visual data...", which I think we've alluded to this in the past, or mentioned this briefly, about emp... |
**Adam Stacoviak:** Right. Like maybe sitting down for a one-on-one meeting; great conversation, but the person keeps looking down at their watch, or they keep looking at their phone... You know they're still listening to you, because you know how sound travels, but it seems visually, based on their face and their deme... |
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