
Today’s guest is Dr. Susan David, who is one of the world’s leading management thinkers and an award-winning Harvard Medical School psychologist. I became familiar with her work through her book, “Emotional Agility,” which describes the psychological skills that are critical to thriving in times of complexity and change. We get into a lot of the nuance of this today.
Her work is really important right now and in this episode, we go through everything from what emotional agility is and why it’s so important. She gives strategies for being emotionally healthy in an uncertain world and we talk about the problem with the modern happiness movement. We also go deep on something I mentioned on here before, but how the words “I am” and “because” are so powerful to our subconscious and ways that we can use a more powerful inner language. We finish up by talking a lot about parenting strategies and how we can help pass these same skills onto our children from a young age. So a very, very impactful episode and I hope this interview impacts you as much as it did me.
Episode Highlights With Dr. Susan David
- What emotional agility is at a basic level
- Why emotional agility is so important
- The important truth that life’s beauty and life’s fragility are interwoven
- Strategies for being emotionally healthy in an uncertain world
- How we become fused with our stories about events and assign a causal relationship
- A simple way to start putting space between stimulus and response
- The problem with the modern happiness movement
- Why words like “I am” and “because” are so powerful and how to be aware of their power
- What thought blaming is
- Type 1 vs Type 2 thoughts and how to differentiate them
- Emotional superpowers that help create the distance between stimulus and response
- Why discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life
- Her thoughts on the current happiness movement and “toxic positivity” and why this can actually make things much tougher
- Why forced positivity is an avoidant coping mechanism and what to try instead
- The importance of values and how to know and cultivate them
- How emotions are signposts and what these tell us about our values
- Responsiveness vs Reactiveness to an emotion
- What emotional contagion is and how it affects our lives
- Why true happiness is a byproduct of living a life that feels concordant with values, not of chasing happiness
- Reasons to be aware of “I will be happy when….” thoughts and emotions
- Why forcing children to share or have empathy backfires and what to do instead
- Ways to help our children (and ourselves) to develop this inner core
- How emotional granularity and labeling emotions accurately is helpful
Resources We Mention
Emotional Agility by Susan David
Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl
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