technology use

I think it’s fair to say that human beings have got it pretty good. Compared to most of our evolutionary history we have never been richer, safer, or lived longer lives. Yet, despite that, more of us are struggling with our health than ever before. What’s going on? This is the question that my guest today has spent years trying to answer.

Dr Anders Hansen is a Swedish psychiatrist, a globally renowned speaker with his own TV series exploring the human brain and he is also the author of multiple bestselling books, including his latest two The Happiness Cure and The Attention Fix.

He believes we can start to understand the struggles of modern life by looking to the brain, where our emotions are created. The brain did not evolve for intelligence, creativity or even happiness. Its sole purpose is to help us survive and reproduce – to make it to tomorrow, alive. We have inherited the evolutionary defence mechanisms that kept our ancestors hyper alert, fearful, and able to evade danger.

The trouble is that modern life has evolved at a pace our genes and brains have been unable to match. So today, these incredible survival skills that once helped us, now show up as unwanted feelings like chronic anxiety, distractibility, an urge to overeat, under exercise and even gamble. We often see these as mental health failings – something broken that needs to be fixed, says Anders. But when you look at them through the lens of evolutionary psychology, these behaviours all start to make perfect sense.

We no longer live on the Savanna: we live in a world of abundance and super-stimulation – and, if we want to thrive, we need to work against our brains’ natural instincts.

Easier said than done? Perhaps, but this conversation contains some excellent practical advice to get you started.

Anders is someone who really wants all of us to learn how exactly our brains are wired -  so we can more easily understand ourselves and our daily behaviours. He is passionate, knowledgeable and a brilliant communicator. I thoroughly enjoyed my conversation with him, I hope you enjoy listening.

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Everyone feels under greater psychic pressure these days, but we adults hope that children, who have always been seen as naturally resilient, have been spared the stress. Unfortunately, kids are increasingly experiencing mental health problems like anxiety at younger and younger ages, and this trend has been going on for years.

My guest today wrote a cover article for The Atlantic on the causes and cures of this phenomenon. Her name is Kate Julian and we begin our conversation today by describing the extent to which problems like depression, anxiety, and even suicide have been on the rise among children, and how these issues correlate with continued problems later in life. We then talk about the possible causes behind the increase in childhood anxiety, and whether technology and social media are to blame. We then delve into the idea of how parents are perpetuating their children's anxiety through their own anxiety and their willingness to make accommodations to keep their kids calm and happy. We get into the idea that getting your children comfortable with being uncomfortable can inoculate them against anxiety, and end our conversation with a discussion of whether more exposure to the news of a tumultuous world might actually make kids more resilient.

Get the show notes at aom.is/childhoodanxiety.

Esther Wojcicki discusses the current education model and how we can fix it and shares her powerful TRICK acronym, Esther’s secret for raising happy, resilient children.

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