The path to a healthier, happier, and longer life starts with your integrative mental wellness. Dr. Margaret Cochran, a Psychologist and Integrative Mental Wellness expert based in California and host of The Relationship Doctor, joins the conversation to blend traditional psychology with unique, integrative approaches for deep and lasting change. Discover her simple yet powerful technique, “Vitamin G” (gratitude practice), for rewiring your limiting beliefs and neural pathways in just 30 days. She also shares personal stories, discusses how boundaries create intimacy, and offers one ultimate question to conquer fear and unlock your full potential: “What would I do if I weren’t afraid?
The information presented in Fully Alive is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition or treatment and before making changes to your health regimen. Guests’ opinions are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the podcast host, production team, or sponsors.
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Unlocking The Mind: Achieve Lasting Integrative Mental Wellness With Dr. Margaret Cochran
Welcome back to Fully Alive, where we explore what it truly means to live a healthier, happier and longer life, mind, body and spirit. Our conversation dives into one of the most important pillars of healthy longevity, our mental and emotional wellbeing. I’m joined by Dr. Margaret Cochran, a Psychologist and Integrative Mental Wellness expert based in California. Dr. Cochran brings a unique and powerful perspective to her work by combining traditional psychology with more integrative approaches to help people create lasting change from the inside out.
In this episode, we’ll explore how integrative psychology can unlock deeper healing, how we can rewire limiting beliefs and why healthy communication and emotional awareness are essential. Not just for better relationships but for a more balanced fulfilling life. If you’ve ever felt stock, overwhelmed or disconnected on the inside, then this conversation is for you. Let’s welcome Dr. Margaret Cochran to the show.
Dr. Cochran, thank you so much for joining us. Ever since we have the chance to meet, I’ve been excited to learn from you, for our audience to learn from you and your amazing wisdom, experience and expertise and all the things that you bring to this life. Thank you so much for being here.
Thank you for that warm welcome. It’s such a pleasure.
Dr. Margaret Cochran’s Origin Story: Blending Traditional & Integrative Psychology
I’m excited to dive into your story and for readers to understand how they can maximize their experience of life through the expertise that you’ve acquired over the years. Maybe we could start, though. I’d love to just hear. You have this unique background and you blended traditional psychology with a more integrative approach. I’m just curious. What drew you into the work that you’re in? How did you end up where you are now? What was your origin story?
I was baited. I started out as a school teacher. My first master’s degree was in Education. As I taught, more and more people would come to me with things that were much bigger than what was going on in the classroom. I realized I felt compelled. There’s a beaten up first carrot. I had to get another degree and I learned more about system psychology then I went on to get another one. I learned more about clinical psychology and then I went on to get another one. It’s incredible.
I went on to get another one. There are a lot of carrots here. I went on to get another one and that’s interest in personal psychology, which looks at the bigger parts of life. Not just the ego, but the things that go beyond the ego. As I said, it’s like a path. Each time I took another step, I realized deep in my soul this is where I need to be. This is what I was brought to this world to do. It’s been a pleasure and an honor all the way.
You’re getting to truly live out your life’s purpose. I’m sure that’s super enjoyable every day. Were there pivotal moments along the way for each of those evolutions that you took or that you realized, “I need the next thing?” How did you make those decisions to continue on and continue towards this more integrative approach?
The Power Of Trance: How Hypnotic Anesthesia Works
I’ve always worked in medicine. First in pediatrics and then in adult medicine. I do hypnotic anesthesia in the operating room. I have done a lot of work with family court and things like that. I’m helping people navigate their way through sticky situations. The most important thing I can say is, if you want something to change, you have to change something. Please remember that one. Now, what does that mean? Often, my work is like the work of a hairdresser. People go into the hairdressers to say, “I want a whole new look, but don’t change anything.”
If you want something to change, you have to change something.
You’re hamstrung right there. It’s not all you can do, and that’s true. In the world of emotion as well. If you want something in your life to change, you have to be willing to alter your perspective. Possibly your physical habits, the way you eat, the way you interact with nature and music. A lot of things. What gets people stuck often is that fear of change. I want things to be different but I don’t want to do anything differently.”
The problem there is that the only constant in the universe is change. You can find it and fuss and spirit about it but it’s going to happen whether you like it or not. Your best shot is to find an integrated way to go along with that change, be in charge of that change, create that change for yourself and shape it the way you want it to be.
I love that. Thank you for sharing that. If you want something to change, you have to change something. You mentioned hypnotic anesthesia. Tell us a little bit about that.
There are some people who are either intolerant of a lot of drugs or they don’t want a lot of drugs. I basically put them to sleep and then they do surgeries on them. I’ll tell you a funny story about that. I was doing a patellectomy. This police officer has gotten shot in the knee and it hurts me just to say that. We had to put a new joint in for him. I was talking to the patient. I’m at the head of the patient and there’s like a cloth or a drape so the surgeon can’t see you.
I’m putting the patient to sleep and everything’s going along. All of a sudden, the surgeon says, “Stop talking.” I said, “What is it?” I picked my head up over the draper and said, “Dr. Smith, is everything?” He said, “I was getting very drowsy.” He was going along with what I was saying, so I had to change my tone a little bit so he’d stay away to finish the surgery.
You’re able to hypnotize someone into a state where they’re asleep. They don’t feel any pain and therefore, they don’t need anesthesia.
The thing about that is all of us can be hypnotized. A lot of people say, “I can’t be hypnotized. I’ve never been hypnotized.” You have, and here’s a good example. Have you ever been in your car? Maybe it was raining and the windshield wipers were going. All of a sudden, you were at your destination and you didn’t remember a lot of the ride. You remember to take the right exits and take the right turns, but you don’t remember consciously. “Turn left to go here.” That was all gone. That’s a level one trance. Sometimes, you might just find yourself staring and that’s also a little trick too.
We all can experience these hypnotic states.
It’s just focused concentration. That’s all it is.
Hack Your Brain With ‘Vitamin G’ (Gratitude) In 30 Days
I’m sure you have all kinds of amazing stories then. That points to the fact, as you mentioned before, that the body and the mind are one thing. Before you talked about how to hack our brains, train our brains to maximize our experience of life. Can you teach us how to do that? Walk us through how we do that.
No problem. We can do that. You can. The first and most important piece of hacking your brain is understanding a little bit about how it works. When you think a thought or have a feeling over time, you literally dig a groove in your brain. It’s a neural track. The more you think or feel that thing, the deeper the groove gets. After a while it becomes reflexive. You don’t realize any more that you’re making a choice about what you feel or what you think. It just seems like the only thing you can do.
If we bring you back to the point where you realize it is a choice, your feelings are a choice. The way you think is a choice, then you can begin to create new tracks that will change your experience of life. The best way to do that is with something I call Vitamin G, which is gratitude. This is so simple and so easy to do. If you do it, in about 30 days, it will change your brain. It will rewire the way you think and feel in a very positive way.
Now, here’s what that looks like. You wake up in the morning and maybe get in the shower or maybe still laying in bed. You just go through a list of things you’re grateful for like, “I’m so happy and grateful that I have a wonderful partner. I’m so happy and grateful I have a roof over my head. I’m so happy and grateful I have a job that I like and I have wonderful friends.” Whatever it is on your list. In addition to that, you also talk about how happy and grateful you are for the things that you want to have. You begin to create the reality that you want to have in your life.
For example, I’m so happy and grateful that I get that raise at work. I’m so happy and grateful that I get along well with my boss. Even if those things aren’t happening, as you begin to visualize that in your practice. What will happen with that, you realize in it is you will go in with a different attitude. When your attitude changes, people’s attitude toward you changes. People won’t know what it is. Oftentimes, when people are doing their gratitude practice, others around them will say, “There’s something different about you. What is it? Did you like to lose weight or change your hair?” “No. It’s just me.”
When your attitude changes, people’s attitude toward you changes.
All of a sudden, people begin to have things come into their life that they weren’t expecting. Here’s an example. I had a lady. She came to me. She’s an executive but she wanted to be a big executive. She just Could promotion and she was so frustrated. She told me, “I get good reviews but my boss always says, ‘Next year. You need to develop this or that.’ I just don’t get it.” I said, “If you get this promotion, what will happen? Corner office, executive office, and bathroom key. What do you get?” “I get that stuff.” I said, “How about money? Would you get more money?” She said, “Yes.” I said, “You don’t look very happy about that.” She said, “Money’s the root of all evil, so if I get that money then people don’t like me anymore. Probably my family will resent me.”
There it is right there. She’s going into her meeting with her boss saying this, “I want it but don’t give it to me,” and her boss responded. When I talked to her, I said, “Money is not the root of all evil. The thing about money is what you do with it. Whether you have fun with it and you let it take care of you or you worship it and become an idol for you. If people don’t like you because you’re successful, they didn’t like you in the first place.”
She thought about it for a while. When she went in for her next promotional interview, he said, “I don’t know what took us so long. I don’t know why we didn’t do this sooner.” She said, “I do but that’s okay,” because your attitude changed, his attitude changed and her life changed in a phenomenal way. That mindset we carry into situations and our interactions with other people make all the difference. We have tons of data to show that people, for example, when they’re ill.
If they have a good attitude and a support system with a positive attitude, they’re outcomes are far superior to people who don’t. Everything happens in the brain. Love, sex and creativity happens in the brain. Everything South of that is just basically appendages. Tools to help you achieve what you create.
Mindset For Health: Rewiring Your Brain For Better Outcomes
I love that. As you said, there’s tons of data to back that up even. Once that says they’ve scientifically proven that optimists live 15% longer than pessimists. That’s the big chunk of life. That mindset does make all the difference. To go back to the story you just shared too, people often miss quote that passage that money is the root of all evil. For the love of money is the root. A lot of important things are covered there. Do you have any other stories like that of people who maybe were sick or not in optimal health that maybe have changed their path by changing their mindset?
Money is not the root of all evil. The thing about money is what you do with it.
A number of them. People who have chronic pain and people who always feel like they’re on the outside looking in. That part of things. If you begin a simple meditative practice, it’s going to help your pain. Often, they get very angry with me like, “How’s that going to help?” “I’ve taken a bunch of drugs.” Their body basically has gotten to the point where it’s saturated. You can put as many opiates in there as you like, but it’s not going to change your perception of pain. Why? It’s because it happens in the brain. You have neural pathways to say, “You’re in pain. You’re in pain. You’re in pain.” That’s all you think about. When that’s all you think about, that becomes your world. That’s not a very nice world.
One of the simplest things is vitamin G, where we started. The other is, usually I start people off with a little exercise where they close their eyes just sitting in a chair or laying down or whatever they want. I have them picture themselves in a park and it’s Autumn. There are lots of trees and beautiful colors. The leaves are just falling off the trees and falling to the ground. Their job is just to sit there and watch a leaf slowly drift from the tree down to the ground. All the way down to the ground and then the next leaf comes all the way from the top of the tree down to the ground, down to the bottom of the ground.
As your mind does, it interrupts you with thoughts like, “The laundry. Did you do the market analysis?” As you’re watching the leaves just slowly go along, you say, “There’s that thought and there’s my leaf. It’s going to the ground.” You do that for a couple of minutes. Only to start. It’s not very long. All of a sudden, you come out of that and you feel different. People talk about, “I feel different.” I’ll say, “Can you tell me about what that feeling is?” “I feel at peace,” and that’s when I zoom in with, your sense of peace does not come from out here. It comes from the brain. People ask me all the time, “How do you do what you do? I don’t get it. I could never do your job.”
I said, “That’s good. Put me at work.” I don’t want that to happen but sincerely, every hour everyone comes to me with, “I don’t know what they’re coming to me with.” I have no idea, and people are a little bit flummoxed. It might come with ambiguity but that comfort comes from, I don’t know everything. No one can know everything. Einstein said, “The more I know, the more I know, I don’t know.” That’s so true. What I do have confidence in is, “I’ll figure it out.” That’s when I have confidence. Whatever you hit me with, “I’m not sure about that thing. I’ll look it up. I’ll check some references. I’ll talk to a colleague.”
I’ll do whatever I need to do or maybe we just need to sit together and figure it out. I don’t know what that looks like. It’s about trusting that process and realizing there’s not something external to you. It’s in the body. A very important part of that is your brain-heart connection. The way you feel about things largely determines your experience of life. I know I said that before. You’ll probably be sick to death when you hear me say it, but it is so powerful. It will change everything for you in a very positive way. People have done what they believed was impossible.
For example, I had a woman come to see me. I was working in a clinic years ago. She was working at McDonald’s. She’s a lovely Hispanic lady. She was living in this little teeny tiny postage stamp apartment with her two boys. Her husband had deserted her and he wasn’t paying her child support. He left the country so she was all alone.
She was so sad and desperate and didn’t know what to do. I said, “I’m so sorry to hear about your circumstances, but if you did have what you wanted. What would you have?” She just looked at me with hate in her eyes. “Why are you asking me that? Can’t you see I can’t have what I want?” I said, “I understand. I do, but just humor me for a minute. What if you have what you want? What would that look like?”
She said, “I’d have a house with a picket fence and a little yard in the back. Each of my boys would have their own bedroom and we’d have a dog.” There. Do you feel better? Are you happy now? You made me look at what I can’t have.” I said, “Right, you can’t have that. Again, humor me. What if you could have that? How would that happen, do you suppose? How would you get into a house like that?” “I couldn’t.” I said, “I know you can’t but if you could.” She said, “I’d call up one of those rental places and see what they had available but I couldn’t afford the rent for the house like I want.” “You can’t. That’s true, but what do you have to lose?”
She’s mad and storms off. She came back and said, “I did it.” I said, “Did you?” She said, “I called one of those rental places and I found just the house I wanted. It’s a fixer upper but it’s nice. I can’t afford the rent. It’s twice what I’m paying now.” I said, “You can’t have it.” “That’s right, I can’t have it.” I said, “What if you could? What would you do?” She said, “I guess I could write to the landlord and ask. My brothers are in construction. Maybe I could offer to fix up the house while I’m living in it if he reduced the rent but he’ll never do that.” I said, “He will never do that. Don’t even try. Don’t even bother.”
She goes away and she’s mad. She came back and said, “I did. I’m in the house.” I said, “You are?” She said, “My brothers are fixing it up. It’s very wonderful.” I said, “That’s fantastic.” She said, “The rent is just exactly what I’m paying now. I’m just so happy.” I said, “That’s wonderful,” then she said, “I don’t understand. This can’t be happening.” I said, “It is.” She comes back a little later and she’s mad in a wet hand. She says, “You are a bad person.” I said, “Why now?” She said, “Now that the house is fixed up, the landlord wants to sell it and I can’t afford the house. I’m right back at square one and it’s all your fault.”
I said, “Of course, you can’t have the house and you can’t afford it and all that stuff. If you could, how could you do it?” She said, “I could ask the landlord.” “If maybe he would carry the paper form instead of going through a bank,” if he would let her finance through him. “He’d never let you do that. I’m sure he’d never let you. Don’t even bother asking him.” She leaves and she comes back and says, “I’m buying the house. He’s letting me do what you talked about.” I said, “Relly?” She said, “There’s one more thing I know I can’t have. Will you tell me why I can have it anyway because that’s what you do.”
I said, “What is it that you want?” She said, “I don’t want to work at McDonald’s anymore. I want to make a decent living for my family.” I said, “What is it you want to do?” She said, “I want to be a seamstress like a couturier. I want to make beautiful costumes and outfits for people.” I said, “Of course, that’s not going to work out for you. We know that, but if it were, what would you do?” She said, “I would go to some of the bridal shops and do a little free work so they can see how good I am then they start sending me stuff.” I said, “That’s an idea that probably won’t work, but a great idea.”
Everything happens in the brain–love, sex and creativity. Everything south of that is just appendages, tools to help you achieve what you create.
I will tell you, long story short. I know this is going on well. She now dews for the San Francisco Opera, the San Jose Opera, and mini bridal stores. She does a lot of high-end couturier stuff. She’s making probably ten times what she made when she was working at McDonald’s. It started in the brain. She could not see any way out of where she was. When I said, “What if we did step out of that?” It made her angry, “What do you mean that’s the solution to my problem? I’m busy suffering here. Can’t you understand that I’m unhappy. You have no right to interfere with my happiness.” I do. I appreciate that. Being able to think outside the box is what allows you to get outside the box.
Breaking Limiting Beliefs & The Trap Of ‘Consensual Reality’
I love that. You helped change and shift her limiting beliefs. That story happened over many months or probably several years. You helped her to see in a different way little by little. The scales come off one at a time.
I often say beware of consensual reality. Consensual reality says things like, “You can’t have your cake and eat it too.” That’s just ridiculous. Who would want cake if you can’t eat it? Now I’m a frosting girl myself, but you have to have something to hold up the frosting, so I’ll take the package or money doesn’t grow on trees. It does if you’re an arborist. It does if you raise fruit. Those are silly things made to convince you. Not to dream. Not to go beyond what someone else can see for you. First is what you can see for yourself.
Again, it all starts in the brain. Being able to be in your mind, doing your gratitude practice, watching your leaves fall and visioning the things that you want to have happen. Now, does it magically happen? As in the story of my lady, she had to do some things. She had to make calls, write letters, take risks and do all that stuff. We still have to take an act of role in our life. If we can’t vision it, we won’t have it.
I love that. Thank you so much for sharing that story and previous to that, the visualization, that meditation of watching a leaf fall. I’ve learned before that people who meditate or practice contemplative prayer of some kind, how it rewires our brains or restructures. It shifts our physiology and even found that people who meditate or practice contemplative prayer have longer telomeres than those that don’t. It does enhance our health span and our longevity.
They’re also loaded with oxytocin, which is not oxycontin, by the way. Oxytocin is the hormone in our body that makes us feel bonded, feel loved and touch is a very important part of that. There’s an interesting study done where they put someone in an MRI machine with just their arms sticking out. They had three people in their lives who touched them but the person had no idea who was out there. There is a spouse, a dear friend and a total stranger.
As we measured oxytocin in the study, in every case, when the person was touched or held their hand, their oxytocin levels went up. Without knowing who was touching them, when their spouse held their hand, it was highest. Next highest was the friend, but even with the total stranger there was oxytocin released. Which is why we have the urge to hug someone when we see them. Either in distress or we’re excited to see them.
All of those things combined go to why Optimism does live longer than pessimist. If you have an optimistic worldview and you think, |Isn’t life grand? This is amazing.” If we practice gratitude, we’re grateful for life and we’re excited about life, then all things are working together. Our relationships are better, which leads to better health outcomes and shifts our physiology as well.
The other thing is, if we’re in a gratitude space we recognize that life is a series of wonderful things punctuated by a series of awful things and followed by a series of wonderful things. When something happens that you perceive to be bad, it doesn’t necessarily mean it is but your perception in the moment may be that it’s bad. The first thing to think of is, “What’s a good thing that will come with this?” Even if it’s death. People will say, “How can you say that? My grandmother just died.” I said, “You miss her. She’s still with you but in terms of her corporeal existence, her physical existence, she’s no longer there.”
When someone dies like that, it may mean people get money. It may mean people are drawn closer together because they have to reorganize the family and someone else becomes the matriarch or patriarch of the group. It may mean that people feel free to explore other opportunities. They’ve been taking care of grandma and that was their life. Now, they can go do something else. Something good can come of it in many different ways if you’re willing to imagine.
I love that, a series of good things punctuated by some awful things followed by a series of good things and finding the positive or what could be the best and highest to come out of all of these things.
In my mind, when something happens to me that I don’t like. The first thought I have is, “Something good is going to come next,” because I didn’t like that. I’m sure this is going to be equal or better than.
Holistic Wellness: Food, Movement, And Why Boundaries Create Intimacy
You mentioned earlier, we need to think about gratitude and practice healthy emotional health but then there’s also other things that we need to do as far as movement and food. How do you see all these things interrelated? Maybe you could share some of the things that you’ve helped people accomplish in terms of shifting their overall health.
A lot of it comes from taking responsibility for your health. If you’re not doing things that your body needs you to do, because your body is a machine that you live in, basically. If we’re in a car and we’re driving and we don’t do maintenance on the car. It’s going to break down. If you don’t put gas in it, it’s going to stop going or if it’s battery. If you don’t charge it up, the vehicle won’t move. What you have to recognize is, what is your vision about your body?
Often when people abuse their bodies, it’s because they don’t feel good about themselves. A lot of it’s about getting to that root cause. There are a great many people who are addicted to one thing or another because they had very bad childhood, frequently sexual abuse was involved. Being able to find those root causes and change your neural pathways about them makes all the difference about the way that you treat yourself day to day.
Back to our cake again. Does that mean you can never have chocolate cake again? No. You can. Life would not be worth it without chocolate. That said, it doesn’t mean you have chocolate cake every day. It’s like anything else. Boundaries create intimacy. Whether its boundaries with the way you use food or how you use exercise, which allows your body to get better or whether it’s in your personal relationships where you understand, where you stop and start or the other person stops and starts which allows you to be closer. Boundaries are key, whether it’s about your physiology or your psychology.
I haven’t heard something like that before that boundaries create intimacy. Could you break that down a little bit more for us?
If I don’t know who I am and I don’t trust who I am then I am going to pick a partner who’s going to tell me who I am. They are going to shape how I think, what I say, and what I do. They may abuse me. When people think of abuse, they usually think of physical abuse but there are lots of other kinds like psychological, emotional and spiritual abuse. There are a lot of different ways. If you don’t understand who you are, then you’re going to attract people who tell you who you are. Once you do that, then you become so enmeshed with that other person or system, if it’s a family. You feel like a puppet.
Your life becomes a misery and you get stuck like our lady with the house. She was stuck in that pattern of thinking, “I’m a poor person. I can’t have what I want.” Again, she was so angry because I wouldn’t agree with her. Having boundaries, knowing who we are and trusting who we are is what allows us to pick a partner who will come to know us and trust us as well and who we can know and trust. That makes for wonderful relationships, creative relationships, loving, fun, warm and delightful relationships.
Boundaries create intimacy.
Thank you for sharing about that and that’s what we all want. If we think about wellness and how we extend our health span and live as healthy as we can for as long as we can. There’s all these different dimensions to it like social, spiritual, vocational, emotional and intellectual. It’s not just the physical side of things, but all of these other aspects and dimensions.
Anytime you put all our eggs in one basket, a couple of those eggs break and we’re in real trouble. When it comes to love, I always say it’s important to diversify your assets. You have a number of gene pools that you’re drawing from friends, family, and romantic relationships. Multi-generational relationships are very important as well. Understanding that love does not come in one color and behave only in one way.
I appreciate that. I get to enjoy multi-generational relationships. Some of my closest friends are 40 years older than me or twice my age now. We get together for coffee and talk about life just like any other friendship. I’m so grateful to learn from people who’ve walked a lot longer down the road than I have and vice versa.
They are grateful for you I guarantee it.
Dr. Cochran’s Daily Practices: How To Live A Fully Alive Life
I also have friends that are much younger than you that are half my age. I learned from them and enjoy that as well. I’m curious. You practice this with other people in your practice and you’re helping other people live or fulfill their dreams and helping them dream bigger dreams. I love that and it’s amazing what they’re doing. How do you incorporate this into your own life? What does a day in your life look like? What practices do you follow to ensure that you’re practicing what you preach or living life to the fullest?
Love does not come in one color and behave only in one way.
That’s such a good question because I always practice what I preach, and there’s a reason for that. Not only because it’s good for me, but because I can’t look people in the eye if I’m not being authentic with them. I have this weird phobia about water. I don’t like jumping head first. I don’t know if I drowned in another life. I don’t know what’s going on, but there’s something about jumping ahead first. I don’t care for it.
Some friends and I were camping up in the boundary waters between Canada and Minnesota. Beautiful wilderness. Everyone’s jumping off this cliff into this beautiful water. It was clear. You can see the bottom of the water. “Come on. Jump in. It’s fun.” That’s okay. I’m reading my book.” I hear them splashing around having fun. I get up and put my book down. I go to the edge of the cliff and I look over. I go back to my book and I read some more. I got back up and looked over the cliff again and said no.
I go back to my book and then I put the book down. I go to the edge of the cliff and I jump off. I’m climbing out like a drowned rat. My friends said, “You did it. You jumped off. I thought you didn’t want to. Why did you do that?” I said, “I’ll tell you in a minute.” I got up and I jumped off again. They said, “Why did you do that? You said you hated it.” I said, “I did. I hated it, but here’s the thing. I will not let my fear control me. I will not do it.” Fear is a wonderful teacher as in, don’t stick your finger in a light socket but it’s a horrible master if it begins to control your experience of life.
Fear is a wonderful teacher, as in, “don’t stick your finger in a light socket,” but it’s a horrible master if it controls your experience of life.
The first time I jumped off the cliff was for me because I’m not going to let my fear control me. The second time I jumped off the cliff was for all the people I work with who come to me afraid, uncertain, unclear and terrified. I did that for them. I practice gratitude every day. I don’t eat reflexively. I eat intuitively. What feels good to my body now? I make sure that there’s movement somewhere in my day. It could be that I just stopped for a minute, put some music on and danced. Maybe I will do some stretching.
Maybe if I have a little more time, I’ll do walking or some resistance training. Whatever I can do. I have four dogs. I interact with them every day and we have fun together. We train because training is an important part of intellectual stimulation for them. By the way, we have lots of studies that show that when we interface with animals our oxytocin levels go up. Guess what? There’s due to, which is why people who not only are optimistic live longer, but people who have animals in their life to love live longer as well.
You acquired many degrees along the way. In your office, it’s filled with books. What are you doing now to continue to grow intellectually or to stimulate yourself intellectually? You mentioned just now you train with your animals, your dogs, your pets. What do you do for your continued intellectual growth?
There are two things. I am a voracious reader. I read all the time. It’s so interesting. I was reading a study about putting a person on an FMRI scanner. With an FMRI, basically what we can do is scan you but we shoot you full of dye. It’s able to represent in real-time which parts of your brain are working. There was a scan done of some kids reading books and a scan done of kids playing video games. The kids reading books had all kinds of parts of their brains activated. The kids who are playing video games only a little bit. There’s no imagination there.
A lot of visual spatial coordination but they were not dreaming, imagining and not using those muscles that they need to create the life they want to create. That’s why people who pupu child’s play. No. Play is so important. In fact, it’s one of the three pillars of romantic intimacy, passion, play and productivity. You have to have play in your life. It’s vital. People who lose their ability to play or convince themselves they’ve lost their ability to play are unhappy and missing out on so much.
People who lose their ability to play, or convince themselves they have, are unhappy and miss out on so much.
It’s challenging. In this world, remember to play and make time and space for that.
I’ll tell you. Here’s a little dirt on me. I was in the grocery store and I was looking at a couple of things. This song came on. It was one of my favorite songs. I started dancing in the aisle listening to a song. I was not aware because I was busy dancing. This man comes up with his cart. There’s a little boy in there and he says, “Some good moves there.” I was a little startled and I said, “Thank you. How about you? Do you like to dance?” He said, “No, I don’t dance.” I took his hand and we started dancing in the aisle.
The little boy who’s probably about three, he goes, “Me too.” I took him out of his car and we started dancing around the aisle. The man said, “Thank you for that.” I said, “Thank you. It was fun. I enjoyed that.” He said, “I can’t wait to tell my wife about this. I’m going to make sure my son tells the story first because his version will be better. I guarantee it.”
That’s great. I love that. We need not to maybe just not take life so seriously all the time.
If you get caught up in the minutiae of life, the tiny goofy things. It’s like being trapped in a knit. Your freedom is gone. Your creativity is gone. Your joy is gone. I would not wish that on anyone.
The Ultimate Mindset Shift: What Would You Do If You Weren’t Afraid?
It’s not what we’re here for. You’ve given us so much already and so many amazing little tips, nuggets and practices. If you could leave us with one last mindset shift or practice that would help immediately improve our mental wellness or relationships. What would you leave us with?
I would say, always ask yourself the question. What would I do if I weren’t afraid? You’ll know exactly what to do. No matter what the situation. Whether it’s about what to do at work or how to address your spouse or how to solve a problem. What would I do if I weren’t afraid? That will get you where you want to go.
I love it. It’s simple.
It’s funny. Life is very simple. We often work very hard to find that out, but that’s where that consensual reality comes in. You can say, “This is hard. This will be difficult for you.” When people say that to me, they’ll say, “I need to change this. This is going to be a long road. This is going to be difficult.” I’ll say, “Only if you keep talking like that.” The road can be very short. It can be very easy unless you can continue to convince yourself, “I can’t have what I want. It’s not going to work out for me. This will be too hard. It’s too much.” That’s what your experience will be.
We’re creating our realities.
It’s true and just something simple. I can remember working with a little girl and she was about eight years old. She could not read it at all. Everybody has given up on her, but I kept working with her. She was what’s called a tactical kinesthetic learner, which means she needs to touch things and feel things. When you’re learning to read, there’s not a lot of that. That’s more of an oral process or visual process. I started making these little 3×5 cards with words on them. We write the word in glue and then we put glitter on it.
She’d have the words to touch and that’s how she learned her words. She had this little box she carried around with all their cards in it. We would play games about knowing words and stuff. A big part of working with children is learning how to be a winner and learning how to lose. You are able to do both.
A big part of working with children is learning how to be a winner and a loser. You are able to do both.
On this particular day, I made myself lose badly. I said to her, “I didn’t do a very good job. I just hardly knew any words.” She’s packing her little words in her box and said, “I’ll let you take my words home with you and if you practice, I know that you will win next time.” I cried just thinking about that. It didn’t matter how many words I taught her. What I taught her was to persist, don’t give up and you can have your dreams. That’s what it’s all about.
That’s amazing. I’m certain that all of those reading this message and learning from you are going to dream bigger dreams because of it. Thank you so much for enlightening us and sharing your amazing wisdom and experience of life. I’ve enjoyed this conversation. Where can people find you? How can we connect with the work that you’re doing? Where would you send us?
I have a show called The Relationship Doctor. That’s on Apple and Spotify and all that stuff. The best way to get in touch with me is at DrCochran.com.
Thank you so much for joining us. I’ve enjoyed this conversation. I want to express my gratitude for you and the work that you’re doing and sharing that with us.
Thank you so much. Live in joy.
You as well. Thank you so much.
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What an amazing and enlightening conversation with Dr. Margaret Cochran. She is the host of the show called The Relationship Doctor. You can find her at DrCochran.com. A few things that I’ll highlight that we mentioned in our conversation are Vitamin G, gratitude and practicing that every day. I’m so happy and grateful. Start off with the things that we have and also include things that we want. That can shift our mindset and our longevity. That makes all the difference and how we experience life.
I love how she helped us shift our limiting beliefs by asking that question over and over. What if you could? It’s not letting fear control us. That was a theme throughout our conversation. Where she left us there at the end is, what would I do if I weren’t afraid? That can help us live out our dreams and maybe even dream bigger dreams. I hope that you’ll practice these things, find fulfillment and emotional wellbeing. Check out Dr. Cochran’s work. She is an amazing human and is doing amazing things. Thank you so much. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.
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