Positive Leadership

Psychologist Ethan Kross: Emotions Aren't the Enemy

• Jean-Philippe Courtois • Season 12 • Episode 12

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The voice in your head has been talking since before you finished this sentence. For most leaders it is the least managed instrument they own, and the most consequential.

Ethan Kross is the psychologist and author who has spent over two decades studying that inner voice. He directs the Emotion & Self-Control Laboratory at the University of Michigan, advises Fortune 500 leaders and Navy SEALs, and wrote the international bestsellers Chatter and Shift. He also discovered his single most-cited tool by using it on himself, at 3am, mid-spiral, when he caught himself typing "bodyguards for academics" into a search bar and said out loud: "Ethan, what are you doing?"

I came to this conversation with my own history with that voice. I spent my career in high-pressure rooms where the most important conversation was often the one running inside my own head, and nobody ever handed me the manual for it. Ethan has spent twenty-five years writing that manual, and he makes it practical: self-talk you can actually change, anxiety you can read instead of fear, emotions that become information. And as a new grandfather, I did not expect a conversation about the brain to end up teaching me so much about grace.

In our conversation, we explore:
→ Why your emotions are information to read, not problems to delete, and what changes the moment you believe that
→ Distanced self-talk: how the simple shift of using your own name reroutes the way your brain handles pressure
→ Why self-awareness is only step one, and the mental tools that have to follow it
→ The business case for mental fitness: how unmanaged emotion quietly consumes the attention your organisation is paying for
→ How a leader gives hard feedback from a secure base, and why leadership falters when we shy away from it

"This brain over here does not come with a user's manual." Ethan Kross, psychologist and author

If you have ever read to the end of a page and realised you absorbed none of it because your mind was somewhere else, this episode hands you the beginning of that missing manual.

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[00:00] JP: Hello, and welcome to the Positive Leadership Podcast, the podcast that helps you grow as an individual, as a leader, and ultimately as a global citizen. I'm Jean-Philippe Courtois. Today, I'm thrilled to welcome one of the world's leading scientists of the inner life, researcher who has spent over two decades exploring the question that sits at the very heart of leadership. How do we govern what happens inside our own minds? He's an award-winning professor at University of Michigan's top-ranked psychology department and its Ross School of Business, where he directs the Emotion and Self-Control Laboratory. He has participated in policy discussions at the White House, spoken at TED, and consulted with Fortune 500 leaders and Navy SEALs alike. His first book, Chatter: The Voice in Our Head, Why It Matters, and How to Harness It, became an international bestseller, translated into over 40 languages. His last book, Shift: Managing Your Emotions So They Don't Manage You, is already of course a bestseller. And, Ethan Kross, a very warm welcome to Positive Leadership Podcast. I'm really excited to have you on the show.

[01:12] EK: Jean-Philippe, thanks for, thanks for having me. It's an honor to be here with you and- Spend some time together talking about this, incredibly important topic.

[01:22] JP: Thanks so much. Ethan, I always like to start my conversation by understanding where someone's journey, when someone's journey began, right? The childhood, the family, the values that shape you when, who you become. So I understand you grew up in Brooklyn, and you've spoken movingly in particular about your grandma, Dora, Holocaust survivor, and most of the time she seemed calm and steady, but once a year in your synagogue, she would break down completely. And as a child, you were confused by that incredible emotional contrast. So when did you first understand that this contrast, emotional contrast, right, with your grandma-mother's basically had shaped everything you would go on to study? What was the trigger? What, [laughs] what was the moment?

[02:13] EK: That's a, it's a great question. I don't know that there was one aha light bulb moment. What I realize when I look back is that my grandmother, and grandfather as well, were always these undercurrents that I took with me wherever I went. And when I think about them right now, I think about them as one of my superpowers, my last resorts, because whenever stress befalls me, and although I study how to manage emotions effectively- And not get stuck in chatter, I still experience those challenges at times. We all do. That's one premise of- My work. whenever it feels really heavy, I jump into what I call my mental time travel machine. And I go back to the, 1940s and spend some time with my grandparents, and- They had just had their family slaughtered. They were homeless for several years, never knowing when they might be killed. And boy, is that a powerful, powerful tool for putting one's own pers- experiences in perspective. So I had been doing that reflexively growing up, and it just, when I sat down to write really the second book, the, all the pieces began to fit together.

[03:40] JP: . So Ethan, it's obviously a pretty big, I guess, crucible as, Bill George called it in his book. We all have crucibles in our life, those moments that shape us. And, in this podcast, I had many different guests as well reflecting over their family dinners, tables, discussions, right? particularly, Indra Nooyi, the former CEO of PepsiCola, and she told me how every night her mom would ask her and her sister to write a speech about what they would do if they were president or prime minister. And at the end of the dinner, the mother would decide who she would vote for. so in a conservative family in Chennai, because she was living in India at the time, before the US, that simple exercise planted the seeds in her of an extraordinary ambition and self-belief. So I know this is a pretty big analogy. I'm not gonna ask you about if you are dreaming to become president [laughs] but beyond your grandmother, I'd love to hear about the broader family environment that shaped you, right? Tell us about your parents, your upbringing, Brooklyn. What are the values that you, your family instilled in yourself, in your mind?

[04:58] EK: It's a, it's a very timely question because I have two daughters, right now, ages 12 and 16. Let me pause, just make sure I didn't get that wrong. Jean-Philippe, the moment I get their ages right, their ages change, and so it's- [laughs]

[05:14] JP: I know

[05:14] EK: It's a very tricky topic.

[05:14] JP: That happened to me all my whole life. No worries. [laughs]

[05:17] EK: Yes. [laughs] So, but I am right with 12 and 16, and I'm, I'm often reflecting on- Their experience now navigating through junior high and high school and thinking about college and how similar but also very, very different it was from my own. - There were, there were probably three pivotable, pivotal forces in my childhood that contribute- To where I am today. One was my dad. My dad was a very colorful, interesting character. On the one hand, I describe him as fitting the stereotype of a, of a gruff New Yorker. So what do by that? Big bushy mustache, unkempt hair, frayed New York Yankees baseball cap. Never, didn't graduate from college. Loved driving aggressively on the roads of Brooklyn. had extreme dexterity with the usage of his middle digit on the road, if you understand- What that means. [laughs] Right? And it was just, cursing expletives. So there was that one side of him, very abrasive, but then there was this much more introspective side of him. He didn't graduate from college, but he was consumed with Eastern philosophy. In his spare time, he would either watch the New York Yankees or read the Bhagavad Gita and Yoga Sutras. [laughs] So this was someone who was, truly captivated with the life of the mind and loved talking to me about what he was reading. And from the ti- from the earliest of ages, he always spoke to me like I was an adult. I was the only child, - His, his, I think, legitimately best friend. And so I'm three years old, and he's talking to me about the importance of introspection, about going inside, about using your mind to- To get unstuck, to advance forward. The ability to detach, - Took me to get a mantra to learn how to meditate- When I was five years old, and I've done it intermittently. So that was one very important factor contributing to my- The interest I ultimately developed in the mind, but also the awareness that I could manage the mind with the right kinds of tools. second force was both of my parents. Expectations didn't run high in my family. Dad didn't, Dad was not a career guy. Held down- A series of different jobs, no college. Mom was a community college grad who ultimately went on to get her master's degree in education, was, - An elementary school teacher her whole life. - Education was important, but I didn't, To put it in perspective, I ended up going to the University of Pennsylvania as an undergrad, this- Ivy League institution. I had never even heard about it until a few- Weeks before I applied. [laughs] University of Pennsylvania, what's this? So the expectation was do well, like study, but you don't ever have-

[08:18] JP: There's no pressure

[08:19] EK: To leave Brooklyn. Yeah, no pressure. But there was also this belief that was instilled within me that, as cliché as it sounds- I could do whatever I wanted to do if I tried hard. This notion that I could always do better and get better, and that's a core belief that I carry with me to this day, and it's something I try to instill within my girls, and it's something that I have, fell back on every time- I have failed, which is much more than I have succeeded, right? The list of failures, much, much greater- [laughs] but I rebound, and I attribute it to that. the last feature is a quick one. I grew up in Brooklyn, and- I hated Brooklyn. I did not like-

[09:07] JP: You hated Brooklyn

[09:08] EK: Brooklyn. Yeah, this was-

[09:09] JP: This was-

[09:09] EK: Not Brooklyn of the current era where it's, boutique, clothing shops and high-end coffee- Matcha lattes. This was-

[09:19] JP: Chic and nice and glossy, yeah. [laughs]

[09:21] EK: Yeah, this was, this was rough. This was muggings. This was fistfights- And, difficult race relations, and- I knew that I wanted to get out of Brooklyn and never- Go back, and so I w- worked really hard to get to that point. So those were the three childhood forces that led me to where I am now.

[09:42] JP: No, very interesting to hear the way, actually, your parents-- it seems that your parents, are not putting your words in your mouth, so it and lack of ambitions in a way for your career instill a deep sense of confidence in yourself. Which s- which sounds like a paradox, but actually, I'm sure has been a very powerful force for yourself, knowing that you could do whatever you want to do. You- You just, you just try. I don't know, I'm just-

[10:06] EK: I think-

[10:07] JP: Listening between your lines. Yeah

[10:08] EK: I think there w- there was I think, they gave me confidence and belief. But what, what wasn't coupled with that was these expectations of where- I needed to be. And, I think about that with my daughters now because, my wife and I try to give them the same- The same, "Look, just try hard. Things will work out. You do whatever interests you, it will work out." But, they've got two Ivy League grads for parents, and every- [laughs] couple of days there are interesting people coming over for dinner- Who themselves are And so the culture- That creates a different set of standards implicitly, even when we try to- Diminish it. That- That creates a different culture that they're, they're growing up in.

[10:57] JP: Yeah. So continuing a little bit on, again, on your journey, Ethan, you went on to study at University of Pennsylvania for your, for your undergraduate degree, then earn your PhD at Columbia before founding your lab at Michigan in 2008. That's remarkable academic journey, obviously, and along the way, something must have crystallized your calling. So what is the moment, or was there any personal crisis that made you commit your career to emotion regulation specifically rather than any corner of psychology or something else?

[11:32] EK: Yeah, there were a couple of spikes on the timeline. I wouldn't say they were crises. We'll save those for the late 20s, early 30s. [laughs] But, as an undergrad, so coming from Brooklyn, if you did well in school, there were two career paths and only two career paths. You wanna guess what those were?

[11:53] JP: Let's say join, maybe the mafia was one. [laughs] [laughs]

[11:59] EK: That was for a different, different, - Different zip code. But yeah, that was legitimate.

[12:03] JP: No, keep going. [laughs] [laughs]

[12:05] EK: Well, if we put mafiosa aside, it was become- A doctor, a real doctor, that is- An MD, and-

[12:12] JP: A lawyer

[12:13] EK: Or, or a lawyer, right? Those were the paths. And so like a, like a dutiful student- I got to Pennsylvania and, got to Penn. And I loaded up on pre-med classes and- Very quickly realized that this was not for me. I experienced- No joy. I didn't do particularly well in those courses either. And then at the end of that semester, I remember one relative said to me, so my GPA after my first semester was- Was a 2.98. it was not great, and I had just- Come from being valedictorian of my high school, never got anything less than an A. [laughs] And I remember one relative said to me, "Well, maybe, maybe you should think about transferring to another school." And I was like, "Huh. Not talking to you anymore about this stuff." It was in my head. - That was like a pivot point, like- "No, I'm gonna reinvent how I approach work- And I'm gonna do I'm gonna excel." And so I did that. ended up graduating, like, with a s- very high GPA. I think I got- I don't know that I got, Maybe I got one, one B the rest of the time in college. Changed the way I studied, took classes broadly in psychology, economics, international relations, folklore. And, at one point, I-- early on, I took a psychology class, and about halfway through the semester we got to this topic of introspection, which is the scientific- Study of turning inward, which reminded me- Of conversations I had had- With my dad early on. And in that class, I learned, first of all, wow, this is an amazing superpower of the human mind. This is what lets people do extraordinary things. But then I also learned that this same tool is a source of massive human suffering. Because we have problems, we try to work through them, but we get stuck. We ruminate, we worry, we experience- What I call chatter. That to me was fascinating, and it just lit a fire inside me where I wanted to learn more. Why does this happen? W- and when people get stuck, what can they do to get- Unstuck? And I f- I would find myself, I would often study in the bookstores, and I remember- I'd take a break from studying, and I would go to the psychology section. I would, like, thumb through the psychology books. And I would talk to my friends about this stuff on, like, a Saturday night when they'll be going to meet girls at the bar or a party. [laughs] And on the walk over, I'd be, "Hey, did that some people are ruminating?" And my friends would look at me and go- [laughs] "What's wrong with you? Why are you talking about this now?" [laughs] And so, at some point I had this awareness that if I was- Spending my spare time thinking about these things- Maybe I should make that my life. - And so that was the epiphany that led me to apply to go down that route. I thought initially it was gonna be I was gonna become a clinical psychologist. And I did all the things that one should do to get into a clinical PhD program. but at the very last minute I realized when I was looking at faculty interests, all of my interests had to do with human nature and emotion, just- An understanding of really how people work when it comes to their emotional lives. Those were the faculty doing the work I cared about. And so- The very last minute took a leap of faith, and went to apply to those social personality psychology programs- As opposed to abnormal. And, the last bit I'll say here, that was a pretty big leap for me because- I wasn't sure if I wanted to be a researcher or a clinician. I loved-

[15:56] JP: Practitioner

[15:56] EK: Interacting with people. And this re- this required putting aside those practitioner aims. I've been able to come back to that later on in life, but, - But anyway, that's the journey that got me to grad school and, - [laughs] grateful for it.

[16:14] JP: A- and do you have any regrets or none at all of not, having gone the other way, being a practitioner, basically taking care of patients and people who suffer day and night?

[16:25] EK: I have no regrets about, - Going the route within psychology that I did. A lot of what I do now and, there was a moment in my career that allowed me to get back to helping people more directly, and I love balancing the two, and I like dealing with people who are just sh- dealing with the muck of everyday life. So I have no regrets about it. Every so-- every now and again, I'll sometimes think about, - Medicine and healing in that regard. I think it's, fascinating and, a great gift to spend every moment of your day helping others- At their most vulnerable. but I don't lo- I don't lose any sleep over that.

[17:10] JP: Good. Good for you. [laughs] So in- Chatter, Ethan, you share a deeply personal story. The moment you receive a death threat from a stalker and catch yourself thinking, "Ethan, what are you doing? Bodyguards for academics? Are you serious?" That instant, [laughs] when your own name punctured a spiral of fear, became one of your most studied phenomena. What does it mean to be a scientist who discovers one of their most important findings on themselves, by the way, and how did that terrifying personal experience reshape your research?

[17:46] EK: Well, so just to, recap what happened, I was, - A few years into an assistant professorship here at Michigan, had just published this high impact paper, or it was a paper published in a high impact journal- Which as scientists, junior scientists, that's the goal. And, I re- it was a remarkable moment. It was an unpredictable moment. the study looked at the overlap between the experience of social and physical pain, so social pain, being rejected, for example, by someone else. And the, At the time, people had noted- Hey, there's this puzzling phenomenon when people are socially rejected, they use the language of physical pain to describe how they feel. Like, "Oh, I, my s- I'm, I'm my heart hurts. I'm in pain. I'm suffering." And it had led many people to wonder, is there a unique relationship between physical and social pain experiences? And so what we did in this study is we demonstrated that when people experience rejection, it actually activates parts of their brain that are involved in physical pain sensation. So that was a big deal, kinda gave new meaning to this notion that, rejection hurts. And I remember I was one moment teaching 300 undergrads, about the psychology of attraction, and on the break I s- check my email, and there was a note from a producer, I think it was CBS Evening News, saying, "Can you be available for, for an interview a lo- " I don't know if it was live or not, but, "later today." And so I'm rushing to a TV studio, and it's on every newspaper, and life is pretty good for a couple of days. I'm walking around with my chest high, and I just had my first kid- [laughs] and it's all working out. And then I walk into my, office one day, maybe it was a couple days later, and there's this envelope that's hand-addressed to me. Kinda strange even back when this happened-

[19:54] JP: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah

[19:55] EK: To get hand-addressed notes. And I open it up, and I don't know about you, Jean-Philippe, but- There are moments where I interpret something as a threat, and I immediately- Have a fight or flight reaction. Like sh- sweat- I have to go to the bathroom.

[20:11] JP: Yes. Yep. Yep.

[20:11] EK: And that's what happened. I, 'cause I open this up and it's this ugly letter with- Threats and drawings and- Ethnic slurs. And- I remember showing it to my assistant just to get some perspective. I'm like- "Do you think this is as bad as I think it is?" And they're like, "You need to call someone." And so I ended up- Police station. And-

[20:30] JP: Yeah. [clears throat]

[20:31] EK: And it really, it really, caused a chatter spell within me. - So I really worried and ruminated. I Googled the return address. I saw it wasn't far from where I live. And so for several nights I'm not sleeping. I'm pacing my house. I'm thinking to myself- "Why did I, why did I go on television? Why did I do these interviews?" Like, I screwed it all up. I'm being exceptionally self-critical, which is very- Out of character for me. and then I had this moment where at one point where I was really, it was like 3:00 in the morning, and I was really just, spinning. Not, hadn't slept well for several nights before. [chuckles] I start typing bodyguards for academics. [laughs] and I didn't hit, the send button because in my head, like I literally typed it, 'cause I had this awareness, number one- You are out of your goddamn mind. Who, what industry has bodyguards for academics? [laughs] This is not a high need. and number two, I thought to myself, if anyone sees that I've searched for this, they'll think I've lost my mind. So I go ahead and write a book that, lots of people read to publicize the story. But what snapped me out of- In that moment was- This automatic response, right? "Ethan, what are you doing?" I said it to myself using my name. I directed myself like I would my best friend.? "Jean-Philippe, what are you doing? Get your act together." That linguistic shift-

[22:04] JP: Yeah. Yes

[22:05] EK: Ended up rerouting my psychological experience, and then we went into the lab and started doing the research on this, and it turns out this is a useful tool that many, that anyone can use- To get some psychological space from, from their experience. so I think it was a lesson in just being open to- To finding new phenomena around you.

[22:25] JP: Now, thanks so much for sharing that, very particular moment when you became aware of that chatter. And, I want you to, we, want the two of us obviously to dig down into that now a little bit more, Ethan, because you've given, you've given this name, you measure it, you mapped its effects on the brain, and your research shows that chatter obviously impairs performance by consuming attention, it damages relationships, and even degrades physical health. So what is your own definition of chatter precisely, and why does a healthy, healthy mind actually produce it as well?

[23:04] EK: So chatter is a phrase I use to refer to getting stuck in a negative thought loop. So you've got a problem. It's either something out there in the world, something you imagine in your mind. You're motivated to work through it. You start to do so, but you just, you keep looping over and over, not making forward progress. If it's chatter about the past, we tend to call that rumination. If it's about the present or future, we sometimes say that's worry. The idea is that there's a common mechanism in this looping that characterizes those states. and it's, as I've, I've argued many times, or not argued, I've just stated the literature here, it's one of the big problems we face as a species. It's a universal- Predicament. it's likely affected us as long as we've been roaming the planet in our present form, and it undermines us in three areas of life that I think most of us care a lot about. It makes it hard to think and perform, it creates friction in our relationships, and it undermines our health and wellbeing. Now the question is, well, why do we, get stuck in this? it's a phenomenally interesting question. On the one hand, our brains evolve to allow us to do these extraordinary things. your inner voice, for example, is, an evolved tool, that lets us use language silently in our minds- To, - Keep information active. So Jean-Philippe I'm guessing, like, you go to the grocery store sometimes- You think to yourself- "Hey, what was I supposed to get?" And you go down a list. [laughs] That's your inner voice or, - You wanna memorize someone's name or phone number, 209-0501, 200- That's your inner voice. have you ever gone over what you're gonna say before an important presentation you have to give or an im- Important meeting?

[24:56] JP: Absolutely, yes.

[24:58] EK: That's your inner voice. You ever, you ever Do you exercise? [lips smack]

[25:04] JP: I do.

[25:05] EK: What, what do you do?

[25:07] JP: What exercise? So I run. I do some, jogging as well. I do some swimming from time to time as well. Yeah.

[25:14] EK: Do you ever talk to yourself while you're running?

[25:17] JP: A little bit. Yes, for sure. It's probably one- Of the times we, I get some of the best ideas or thinking, yes.

[25:23] EK: That's, very, very common to- Talk to yourself, to brainstorm- To motivate. And of course, when we struggle with our lives- We turn inward to try to make meaning. Your inner voice- Helps you do all of those things. It is a remarkable tool. Now, here's the problem, and here's how we get to chatter. Chatter's the dark side of your inner voice, and the problem is we are conditioned [lips smack] to focus very narrowly on our problems- To make sense of them when we're struggling. One of the first things we're, we're taught to do as kids is, you got a problem, roll up your sleeves and focus, focus, Jean-Philippe.

[26:00] JP: Focus. Yeah.

[26:01] EK: Focus.

[26:02] JP: Oh, yeah. [laughs]

[26:02] EK: Right? And so the problem is when you focus on an emotional issue, those emotional elements cloud your ability to think- Reasonably. And so what we've learned is that in those instance-- And that's what leads us to get stuck in chatter, 'cause you get trapped by the emotion, and then- The emotion metastasizes in ways where, it's extraordinary. Within a few seconds, people often feel like the world is caving in. - I'll, I'll often ask folks, and this is from the C-suite to the mail room and everyone in between, "Hey, have you ever, ever, ever had any, problems with chatter in the middle of the night?" Every hand goes up. 2:00 a.m.- [laughs] 3:00 a.m. chatter. And then I ask, "Okay, so just tell me if this sounds right. Y- y- middle of the night you wake up and when you went to bed, life was great, but in the middle of the night, you've just lost your job, your family, your bank account-" " all within a matter of six seconds." And everyone just breathes a sigh of relief. [laughs] That's how quickly this- Can go the wrong way, and it's an example of a very powerful tool that is miscalibrated. Let me be concrete there, and then I'll give you an example. Our ability to game out worst case scenarios, vitally important. Jean-Philippe- You are not where you are in life without the ability to be strategic in that way. Our ability to go back and reflect on the misfires in our lives and learn from them, crucially important for success. The problem is it's very easy to take those exercises to an extreme. And if you get stuck in the what if this happens, what if that, but can't bring yourself out, that's when you get really stuck. It's like nuclear energy. [laughs] we think of, like, nuclear weapons are the most, one of the most destructive forces on the planet. But nuclear energy, which underlies it, is actually one of the greatest innovations that exists. It's clean energy.

[28:11] JP: Absolutely. Yeah.

[28:11] EK: And it's the same thing with this brain over here, and it does not come with a user's manual. One way of- That I think about my mission is to use science to help develop a user's manual for allowing people to be agentic and control their emotions and mind rather than the other way around.

[28:35] JP: Love it. I love, I love this analogy again of this, in- nuclear energy power that we have in ourselves that we need to nurture actually and understand. You I- in your book, Ethan, you describe what you call Solomon's Paradox, named after King Solomon, who was wise to his kingdom but famously blind to his own affairs. And it's the observation that we are vastly better advising others than ourselves. That happens to me as well. [laughs] What does the science actually tell us about why this asymmetry exists, and how does Solomon's Paradox become the master key to your work? [lips smack]

[29:17] EK: Well, when a problem isn't happening to you have perspective. You can look at that bigger picture, and you're not trapped by the emotional elements that- Blind us to solutions in some cases. And so on the one hand, one insight that emerged from Solomon's Paradox is other people can be a vital resource when we are experiencing chatter. If the right people- They can be just instrumental for helping us steer through it, 'cause the problem- Isn't happening to them. The deeper insight, however, is that we can become an observer to ourself. Imagine if you could shift your perspective and adopt the, adopt the perspective of someone else now weighing in on your problem. That is what psychological distance involves. It's a shifting of a perspective to think about myself as though I'm giving advice to another person, someone I care about. And it turns out there are many ways you could do that, and it further turns out that is one very powerful secret to helping people steer their emotional lives profitably, to Diminish and avoid ultimately chatter episodes.

[30:39] JP: Yes. Yes. Thi- this actually, makes me think, Ethan, to the conversation I had with, Daniel Goleman in his podcast, I'm sure well, [laughs] about emotional intelligence. And Daniel emphasized that self-awareness, the ability that we have to see ourselves clearly, is the foundation for leadership. and I would agree with him actually. In your research on distant self-talk that you just mentioned, speaking to yourself using sometimes your own names, seems to offer a practical bridge to that self-awareness. Your lab, I think, has shown that this linguistically small shift reduces cardiovascular stress and dampens amygdala activation and shortens the duration of negative moods. So how does something so linguistically small, like using your own name instead of I, can produce effect that are neurologically measurable?

[31:39] EK: I think there are two points I wanna make based on the way you've described all of that. number one on self-awareness. Self-awareness is, I think, critical to being, effective at leading your own life. I teach a course here on self-leadership, and self-awareness is step one. But it is a step. I think there's another step too. I think on the one hand, you have to have awareness of where you are and what your goals are. You also then need to have competency in aligning your thoughts, feelings, and behaviors to meet those goals. So if we use the, exercise as a metaphor- I need to have the self-awareness that I'm not in good shape. My arteries have a little bit more plaque than I would like. And there are things that I could do about it to get better. But that in and of itself is not enough. I also need to know, here's how I need to eat, and here are the specific kinds of exercises I need to do, and in what order and frequency. It's that pairing of awareness and knowledge- Of actual tools that I think provides the sweet spot for success. Now, in terms of the linguistic shift, this is such an interesting ex- phenomenon. many people have Other f- other researchers have shown, for example, that many people spontaneously, we think without knowing- Use their own name and you to guide them through difficult problems. Just-- they just kinda do it without understanding. No one's told them to do it. Why do we think it has these, I describe it as a low effort, high return strategy. Why, why do we think it has those properties? We think it has to do with the power of language to shape thinking, right? Like language, it captures the cognition process and puts you on a different trajectory. Think about how frequently you use the word you in your life to refer to other people. probably every day, right? And as I would say, probably like ninety-nine percent of the time when you use that word. It's a high frequency word. And most of the time you're using it, you're virtually exclusively using it to think about and refer to others. So in your brain, the connection, the link, the association between you and another entity, it's about as strong as you can get. Now, when you use that word you to refer to yourself- You're essentially activating the brain machinery for thinking about someone else. But you happen to be that person. So it's almost I describe it as a type of psychological jujitsu move.

[34:33] JP: Yep. Yep.

[34:33] EK: A jujitsu technique, if you're not familiar with it- Jujitsu is a powerful martial art, but it's one that requires you're using your opponent's energy to win the match. In a sense here, you're just piggybacking on the way language works to reap these benefits. and so that's the reason we think it has those qualities, although more work is needed.

[34:59] JP: No, no, I love that, jujitsu practice as well, and the way to grow our capability in that space, Ethan. So let, let's expand the discussion now with your new book, Shift, where you've been expanding the frame beyond the inner voice to the full spectrum of emotion. You challenge a fundamental cultural assumption that emotions are problems to be managed away, and instead, you want us to see them as information, as a biological intelligence system. So what changes practically in how we relate to our own emotional states when we make that shift in framing from seeing emotions as problems to seeing them as information?

[35:44] EK: Liberation, is number one.

[35:47] JP: Liberation..

[35:47] EK: I think it is my experience personally and, working with clients, is that when you realize that there's nothing wrong with you if you're experiencing anxiety or sadness or anger, this is just the way your brain works, and it actually serves some benefits. Boy, is that liberating because, one of the, one of the, critiques I make in the book has to do with this so-called toxic positivity movement where- There's this mission to optimize p- you should be positive all the time. I don't, I don't endorse this for two reasons. Number one, you're giving people an unattainable goal, right? We evolve the capacity to experience negative emotions for a reason. They help us. Anxiety- When it's experienced in the right proportions, not too intense, not too long, it motivates us to think about potential threats. This is really important. If I have an important business transaction or speaking engagement, I have this, like, internal alarm system that effectively says, "Hey, pay attention. Prepare. Something important is coming up." Without that alarm system, I show up unprepared. Anger is an emotion that motivates to us to take action when our sense of what is right and wrong is transgressed. This is important. Now, just knowing that there's nothing wrong with you if you experience those emotions, that's a step in the right direction. The second piece of awareness that is critical, however, is understanding that you can do something about those negative emotions if they are experienced too intensely or for too long. Because that's when things get problematic. Surprisingly to me, not everyone believes that you can manage your emotions. One of the, A major, major spikes on my research timeline was, - About, maybe 10 or so years ago, I came across an article where, re- researchers reported that about 40% of adolescents reported not being able to control Like, they didn't think they could- [laughs] you can control your emotions. That was astounding to me because- If you don't, if you don't think you can control- Your emotions, why would you make any effort to do so? So you need to have both. Like, number one, this is what emotions are. They're tools, and tools can be useful or destructive. A hammer- Can build a house or kill someone. Anxiety is not that different. Anxiety can propel you to greatness if it's- Controlled, or if it's triggered too intensely, can really lead you astray. And so what we need to do is understand the different tools that exist for keeping those emotional responses proportional and in tune with whatever your goals are for leading the life that you wanna live.

[38:58] JP: Yeah. So, -

[38:58] EK: That's what I discuss in the book.

[39:00] JP: Yeah, no, I love it, and l- and I love this delicate balance we have to do in our life, Ethan, you talk about. I'd love to come back to one argument you just made, given the fact that, this is Positive Leadership, and that's the name of the show. I'm gonna talk about positivity, and you just- Mentioned it, right? [laughs] And so you're right about what you call the reframing paradox, the finding that positive thinking can actually backfire under intense emotion. And this resonates with me. I had on this show a number of people I'm sure well, like Kim Cameron, obviously, co-founder of the Center of Positive Organization at your own University of Michigan, whom I hosted on the podcast. And Kim showed that the top-performing teams maintain a ratio of roughly five positive statements to every negative one. But he was careful to say that [laughs] positive leadership is not about suppressing the negative. It's about creating conditions where people can actually face hard truths from the foundation of genuine support. And your framing paradox seems to challenge the oversimplified version of that insight. So on that background, what is going wrong in our brains when we try to think positive [laughs] under pressure, and how do you reconcile your findings with the broader field, again, of positive psychology?

[40:16] EK: Well, so let's start with, positive psychology. positive psychology, is specifically about trying to understand what makes positive experience tick and how do you optimize those experiences. Let me be very clear. I have nothing against optimizing positivity. - I tend to score very high on optimism dispositionally myself. I really like living on the positive end of the spectrum, and I would consider myself to be a positive leader in the way that my Michigan colleagues describe that concept. So there's nothing wrong with positivity. I do think, however, that when it comes to both leadership of self and others and living- You can't only focus on the positive. You also need to understand the negative because- It's the yin and yang. They're inextricably linked, and so, I strive to maximize positivity and minimize negativity, not eliminate negativity. [laughs] I use negativity. I try to harness it as a tool to help me be better, to help my kids be better. there's a place for it in my life as a leader, as a father, as a husband, as a human being. so I think, positive- Psychology I see as really just focusing on this positive end of the spectrum. I think we also- Need to acknowledge the negative, too. And I think Kim's description of, the five-to-one ratio- Is in sync with the perspective that I'm articulating here. what he's describing there is creating a sense of psychological security in an- Organizational context where-

[42:15] JP: Safety. Yep

[42:16] EK: You Safety, where you can actually deliver negative feedback to help people grow, to help us- And, as I say to my team all the time, we all No one is perfect. We're all trying to grow. And if I'm gonna give you feedback on this product, or on something I've noticed within you, this is because I care about you and want you to grow. And the moment we start shying away from delivering that feedback- From a secure, safe stance, that's when I think leadership begins to falter.

[42:55] JP: I'm 100% with you, Ethan, and to me, who's been also a practitioner trying to learn, of course, on positive psychology along my career over the last many years at, at Microsoft in the past in different capacity as well, I could see that all the work I could do and others could do in creating that safe environment for people to bring their best every day, create, an atmosphere where everyone is heard, respected, and show authenticity, vulnerability as well, create particularly that moment when, as a leader, you can have others actually meeting their failures and when there's some disappointments happening in a very human way- As opposed to it's a very awkward, feedback session that managers are trying to apply in their one-to-one with their people, which is always pretty ugly, by the way. [laughs]

[43:47] EK: It's so interesting. I often sometimes think about the analog or lack of analog between home dynamics, family- And work. Both are intimate relationships, intimate obviously in different ways. But, I have, I have often, prefaced meetings where I know we're gonna discuss something- Where people who respect one another differ quite, quite significantly. I say, "Look, we are allowed to disagree." My wife and kids disagree with me every single day. [laughs] They have no hesitation in- Articulating when my view is wrong in their view, and I-- and back and forth, and we are a, an incredibly tight-knit, functional family. But when you go to the workplace, at least in this culture, in, - In the US, there's often it depends on the industry, but there's often this- Refusal to be direct- Because it's a sign of doom and gloom, and I think the best- [laughs] leaders recognize that this is no way of functioning, so it's-

[44:59] JP: Absolutely. I'll come back to that later on a different discussion on leadership, Ethan. Now, so Shift argues that emotional regulation is not a trait we either have or we don't. You said it's a skill that can be trained. But here's a question I want to press you on. is, isn't there a risk that in teaching people to regulate their, their emotions more effectively, we also make them actually more compliant and less inclined to rebel against situation that deserve rebellion? So-

[45:31] EK: Yes. These are-

[45:33] JP: Do you agree, disagree with this, -

[45:35] EK: I-- Well, I think it's-

[45:37] JP: Position?

[45:37] EK: I think that's the tip of the iceberg. I think these are tools. These are powerful tools we are giving people, and if you apply them without a sophisticated understanding of emotion, I think it can get you in trouble. This is why I started the book with this concept that your emotions are tools. You don't want to always avoid them. For example, moral outrage can be very effective, right? When you- When you witness something that violates your perception of right and wrong- You experience an emotion, and the evolved functionality of that is to get you to fix the situation, extricate yourself from it, do something to ch- If you are so skilled at managing your emotions that you can just immediately diminish that might allow you to be compliant in situations- Where you shouldn't be. I know someone who- Was so unbelievably effective at positively reframing things- That they, it got them into trouble because they- Never took the negative feedback to heart and- Lost a job as a result. So there's a, there's a very delicate balance and, in my experience, this is something that people struggle with, even when they know these tools, and this is where having- [clears throat] emotional advisors or coaches can be so helpful. It's knowing when to lean into the emotion and when to, when to lean out. And every, every situation that we are presented with is a little bit, just a little bit different from the other. - It never ceases to amaze me that, there's always a new curveball I haven't faced.

[47:30] JP: Yes. [laughs]

[47:30] EK: And it happens seemingly weekly. Some are easier to hit because I've seen stuff that kinda looks like this. But when you get a new one, which you most assuredly will, then the question is, are you gonna be able to hit it or strike out? And I think what the tools do is- And this knowledge does, is they make it a lot more likely that you will not strike out. But we're not talking about a perfect- Batting average. We're talking about half the time or three-quarters.

[48:04] JP: For sure. Yeah. That's very helpful. I'd like to focus a little bit on, on the workplace, Ethan. You just mentioned the fact that in some ways you said, home and the workplace could, could, could, could, could meet some si-similar situations for people. And you hold a joint appointment at Michigan's Ross School of Business and, ps-ps-psychology department, and that unusual combination I think is not accidental. You've been making the argument with growing urgency that if a company cares about performance, it has to care about emotion regulation. So my question is, what is the business case for the inner voice, and why should leaders and organizations invest, and how should they invest, by the way, in emotion regulation? Which is not an easy [laughs] practice.

[48:52] EK: Well, the business case is, twofold. Number one, if you care about the performance of your organization and its profitability, you can't afford to not care about emotion regulation or what I, what I call mental fitness is- Because we know that people who are incapable of managing their emotions well, they don't think and perform optimally. And, a concrete example that I think will resonate with you and everyone who's listening is, have you ever had the experience of trying to read a report or a few pages in a book when you were ruminating about something, and you've read the pages, but you get to the end but don't remember anything you've read? Has that happened?

[49:38] JP: Absolutely. Oh, yeah.

[49:39] EK: All the time.

[49:40] JP: That happens a few times.

[49:41] EK: It's predictable. It's because we have-

[49:43] JP: It's-

[49:43] EK: Our attention is limited. Emotional information consumes attention. So just in terms of thinking and performance, if that's something that your organization cares about, which, by definition- Almost all do, you have- To care about this. You have to care about giving leaders tools so they can manage their own mind. And then you have to care about pushing those tools out throughout the organization to enhance the organization's fitness. That is purely the bottom line argument for the- Necessity of these tools. Many organizations nowadays also care about their organizations being places where people actually want to work. Places that care about the welfare of their employees. And if you care about those dimensions as well, here we see mental fitness and emotion regulation are equally relevant. - My experience in the business school over the past, six or seven years has been that the moment you pierce through and get- Executives or people who are just starting out to talk about this, everyone immediately recognizes just how critically important this set of skills is. It's truly remarkable, and so there's been enormous receptivity to it, in the organizational world.

[51:07] JP: So you've been consulting, right, with some of the world's most high-stakes performance Fortune 500 executives to Navy SEALs. So when you work with people, again, at that level of pressure, what do you find is the most common and most costly gap in their emotional toolkit, right? Or the lack of toolkit maybe.

[51:27] EK: You just said it. It is the lack of toolkit. - It is the recognition that they are operating under enormous emotional weight, but not having a sophisticated understanding of the different tools that exist for managing those responses. I'll use the gym metaphor once again. Most of the people I work with, they understand how to do the equivalent of a mental pushup or sit-up. But you go to a gym, there are 50 pieces of equipment. There aren't just pieces of equipment, but there are ways of threading those different exercises together, and that's- Something that folks are, are never, never really taught. So that's one piece that people benefit a lot from. Another piece is, goes back to Solomon's paradox, and I'm sure this- Is something that you've experienced in your own, practice as well. Being able to talk to someone who has your best interests in mind, who has knowledge of the terrain you're, you're operating under, as well as an understanding of how these tools come to bear. Being able- To just talk about these experience, to vocalize them, that in and of itself is also quite important. It helps people normalize these things. So many people feel all alone- In the struggles they are going through. And it's remarkable- When you're not-- when they're talking to me or someone like yourself, like- I get it. It's awful. But what? Tens of thousands of people have gone through this before, and they've made it. [chuckles] This is totally normal. Guess what? You have a high-stakes business negotiation. You have a challenging partner or boss. You're stressed. Good. Welcome to the human condition. That's your mind working the way it should work, right?

[53:25] JP: Indeed. Indeed. So, I want to expand the discussion at the global level, Ethan. For many years, many decades, I've been a global executive at Microsoft and was managing teams across 120 countries, and I learned the lessons, I can tell you, as I was traveling like crazy to Japan, to Brazil, to Korea, to the US, to South Africa. pick your favorite country. I've, I've done 120 of them actually. [chuckles] That, it-- that actually emotions, express themselves differently when you go to a different place. And on this podcast, I had someone you may know, I don't know. I don't know if Erin Meyer. She's the INSEAD professor and author of "The Culture Map," which is a great book. And well-- and then, and I used her book and also knowledge to help me actually, make sense of that global, challenging [chuckles] emotional system. And so in this book, she maps eight dimensions of cultural difference, including emotional expressiveness and how trust is built. She shows that emotional expressiveness is not the same as comfort with open confrontation. Brazilians, as, as an example, are highly expressive but avoid direct, direct conflict, while the Dutch embrace head-on debate. I can relate to that, absolutely-

[54:43] EK: Me too

[54:43] JP: With my, with my friends [chuckles]

[54:46] EK: Dutch colleagues.

[54:46] JP: Friends in Holland. So has your research explored how chatter and emotion regulation differ across cultures, and is there an international emotional map that global leaders should understand to lead more effectively?

[55:01] EK: Yes, but. [laughs] Yes, but not enough. So, I am, it's interesting. Michi- the psychology department in Michigan is home to perhaps some of the top cultural psychologists in the world, and so it's impossible to be here- [laughs] And not really embrace the critical importance of culture in shaping people's emotional lives. And so- We in our own work in my lab have looked at cross-cultural generalizability of some of these tools. - We find some interesting nuances, nothing that flips effects altogether. But- It's funny, while you were talking I it made me think of the first time I gave a talk in another country. I was a graduate student, and I was giving a presentation in Istanbul. And- It was a very exciting moment. It was one of I hadn't traveled much internationally. Here I am on the stage. And I had given this talk several times before, and as you give a talk a few times, the jokes that land, and-

[56:12] JP: Yeah. [laughs]

[56:12] EK: They land every time. And so I, here I am on stage, and I go and I give the joke- [laughs] and nothing, just a sea of blank stares. And then, and I it threw me. I like s- And then I think to myself, "Ah, it didn't translate." everyone-

[56:30] JP: Yes. [laughs]

[56:30] EK: Had their little headsets. And it was the first, my first personal experience with the power of culture in these regards. I don't know of-- I know of many cultural dimensions that- Characterize how people in different nations respond, so it sounds like this book did a wonderful job- Mapping that out in an accessible way. I think it's a fantastic idea to give executives a, an emotional/culture cheat sheet so that they get a briefing-

[57:01] JP: Yes. [laughs]

[57:01] EK: Before they go to any nation that explains- Here are the norms that dictate how things work. There is an important feature of, being successful in cross-cultural contexts that we call, when it comes to emotion regulation, we call it goes by different names- Grouping flexibility or discriminative facility. The idea here is that being successful requires you to be able to understand the context that you're walking into and then- Modify the way that you interact accordingly. And it's critical, and I'll, I'll, I'll give you one more personal example of this. In New York, and I'm sure you've had it, lots of interactions with East Coasters- There's a tradition of you don't wait for someone to finish speaking before you start, right? [laughs] You jump in there mid-sentence, you interrupt, and it's actually perceived as a sign of, interest.

[58:04] JP: Interest, engagement. Yeah, yeah.

[58:06] EK: That engagement that you c- you just, it's, you're going rapid fire back and forth. You're finishing each other's sentences. I moved- I've been educated on the East Coast my whole life, lived there. It's my first job. I moved to Michigan, and I remember I'm interrupting everyone. [laughs] And they're looking at me. They're taken aback with this Midwestern politeness.

[58:24] JP: Yes. [laughs]

[58:24] EK: I was I did not realize that here that is viewed as an affront. So now, if I'm in the Midwest, I wait.

[58:32] JP: You calm down.

[58:32] EK: And sometimes it's actually hard. I gotta like write notes- To remember what I wanted to say. [laughs] But when I go back to New York, it's big bang. So that's an example- Of how that knowledge, I think, has served me well. You just preferably don't want someone to have to, learn on the job, have them be trained ahead of time.

[58:51] JP: Yeah. Yeah, I think there's so much to uncover in this, lost in the chatter translation globally, right? [laughs]

[59:00] EK: Yes, exactly.

[59:00] JP: And try to map, to map it out. So now I'd like to shift gears, Ethan, and I want to zoom out from the corporate world to something even more urgent, I think. Jonathan, Haidt, in his number one bestseller, "The Anxious Generation," documents the rates of depression, anxiety, self-harm, and suicide among adolescents surged from the early twen- 2010s, precisely when the smartphone became the centerpiece of young lives. And Haidt argues we shifted from a play-based childhood to a phone-based childhood, and that this great rewiring is fragmenting attention, fueling social comparison, and driving loneliness on a global scale. And as someone who studies the inner voice, this connects, I think, directly to your work. So what does your research tell us about what social media, the phone-based childhood are doing to the inner voice of an anti-generation? And what are the tools from your science that could help young people reclaim control?

[60:02] EK: Well, these are, these are big, open questions. -

[60:05] JP: Yes. [laughs]

[60:06] EK: And so let me, let me share a couple of, thoughts. social media and technology is, of course, rapidly changing the way It ha- it has changed the way human beings interact, and we're moving into a new phase of that right now with AI. - Is it the reason for these changes and massive changes in depression, anxiety, and so forth? that's a big open question, and within the academy it's a heavily debated topic. I think one point that is often missed in these discussions is not the technology itself and its stickiness, but rather the way it transmits information about what is acceptable and what is not. And so let me share another thing- That I think about often, which is when I was in, high school and elementary school- Perhaps the worst thing that you could do to me was ins- is tell someone that I'm in therapy. This would be a scarlet letter that- I would have, done anything to avoid. We have normalized talking about mental health problems, going to therapy, and on the whole, I think this is a really good thing. But concomitant with that normalization- Is the willingness to endorse- Having certain kinds of experiences. That's a cultural phenomenon- Not necessarily a technological phenomenon. That is not to say that there aren't elements of social media usage that- May be contributing to mental health issues for certain populations. There is some evidence that certain demographics are, are vulnerable to it.

[62:06] JP: Yep, yep.

[62:06] EK: I think the cultural shift here is the bigger story, and it's one we don't hear, talked enough about. with respect to your inner voice, there's-

[62:17] JP: There's-

[62:17] EK: It's phenomenally interesting how technology interfaces with it because, for a while, the prompt on Facebook actually was, "What's on your mind?"

[62:28] JP: Yes. [laughs]

[62:28] EK: It was actually beckoning you to reveal what is, what go- what your inner voice is saying. And- And that can, that can get really tricky, right? 'Cause on the one hand, we know that when people experience strong emotions, they're often highly motivated to express them, to share them with others. In everyday, non-technologically mediated life, there are obstacles that prevent us from sharing our emotions. Number one, there's not always someone around in person- Or even to take our call. So you gotta wait. Like, if I expe- I get an email that pisses me off, my wife's not here. She's, she's away. I have to- [laughs] And she can't get the phone. I have to wait three hours. Guess what happens in three hours? [laughs] Something else is bothering me. Like, I'm not upset at Time tempers that. With social media, the moment an emotion is triggered, we can get in there and report it, share it. And because there's just a screen that we're sharing to, there's no feedback we're getting. Like- This entire conversation, Jean-Philippe, you've been curating how you talk about things to me- And I have been doing the same to you. - That curation has been a function not only of what I think is mutual respect, but it's also- About all the information you are giving me as I talk. Your face is moving in particular ways. You're, you're giving me affirmations. "Yeah, yeah."? Like, and I'm calibrating. No calibration online.

[64:02] JP: No calibration, yes.

[64:02] EK: And that's how you get into so many problems where people say things that, in the worst cases, they lose their jobs. So, - Again, what's, what's fascinating about social media technology but also this broader space is few people that I have met- Can test how relevant this information is for people's lives. We grapple with emotion every single day, and we seem culturally okay with just leaving it up to business as usual, that people will figure out how to steer this space. And, like, we don't do that for physical health. We have personal trainers. We have exercisers. We don't do it for nutrition. We don't do it- For strategic thinking or financial operations or accounting, yet when it comes to emotion and our emotional lives- We just don't, we don't pay attention, and that to me is a mind-blower.

[65:12] JP: Yeah. Well, that's the billion or trillion dollars question, I guess, [laughs] for- For you or for all of us [laughs] and for, for the new generation. Ethan, you've said that there's not a single magic pill for managing the inner voice, and you said that actually through this conversation as well. You insist on what you call a toolbox approach, the idea that, different tools work for different people in different situation. That made me think actually ab- about a conversation I had with a neuroscientist on my show. Her name is Dr. Caroline Leaf. Don't know if her. And Caroline developed, the Neurocycle, and she basically, which is basically a structure of five steps mind management process. Number one, gather awareness. Number two, reflect. Number three, write. Number four, recheck. And number five, active reach. practice over 63 days, she argues that, the smart, that actually, the protocol can literally rewire toxic thought patterns through directed neuroplasticity. Your toolbox approach seems a bit different, more flexible, more situational, but how do you think about the tension between a structured protocol like Caroline Leaf's Neurocycle and your more flexible toolbox approach, go to the gym, use the 50 equipments you have in a room- [laughs] To be fit?

[66:43] EK: The flexibility in the toolbox approach is dictated by what I know of the science, and- I'm trying to reach as many people as possible, and what I know from data is that different combinations of tools work for different people in different situations. Sometimes the three or four tools that work for- A person on Monday are different from the three or four things that work for them on Thursday. We see the science. Now, what we do not yet know, and I wish we did but we don't, is we don't have frameworks that allow us to take someone like Jean-Philippe and- Okay, I know who you are, your genetic profile, your psychological- Experiences, and I know what situations you're gonna be challenged with, and now let me prescribe specific tools personalized to you. We don't have the frameworks yet to do that. We are working to develop them actively, but until we find those frameworks, the best that I can do is- Give you tools with guidance for how to implement them and challenge you to self-experiment to find the ones that work best for you. Now, that's one approach that I'm taking to intervention- That I think- Has the potential to have high impact. This is not to diminish, Caroline or anyone else's work.

[68:13] JP: Yeah. Different approach.

[68:13] EK: There are many people who have developed s- more specific constrained frameworks-

[68:18] JP: Yep, yep

[68:19] EK: That guide people through, three to five steps that- I'm sure have w- benefits. And so it's a, it's a different approach, and it's about, in my case, trying to reach the most people, with the most flexible approach that I can offer.

[68:37] JP: No, got you. one of the most elegant ideas in your work that I liked actually a lot, Ethan, is what you-- is a sense of wonder. The fact that a sense of wonder can silence chatter. Experience of a starry sky, a cathedral, a mountain, great music temporally diminish the self and interrupts rumination. So, how do you actually, prescribe those moments of wonder, and what does it mean that one of sense most powerful emotion regulation tools is actually beauty?

[69:13] EK: I like that.

[69:13] JP: How did you prove that?

[69:15] EK: I think there's a beauty to that. And so the phenomenon here is, experiencing the emotion of awe, which is an emotion we- Experience in the presence of something vast and indescribable, and for many people, that's a beautiful sunset or, - Just garden or their-- its nature, but it can be a skyscraper. It could be a spaceship. It could be a- Beautiful work of art. And, I just find it captivating that, y- there's so much sophistication that we layer on to trying to help people with these, these problems, and we do these brain imaging studies to identify the neural networks, and we talk about- Epigenetic processes and how gene expression turns on and off. And what? At the end of the day, one of, one, one of the most powerful tools out there is an ancient tool. It's getting- Outside and putting yourself in a position to experience awe. How do you weaponize that for people? you can. What it- Involves doing ahead of time is thinking about what are the three to five awe triggers for you. Being deliberate about what they are so that when you're struggling, you can, you can seek those triggers out. So I know about five-minute walk from where I'm sitting right now is this beautiful arboretum- And it always fills me with awe. To my right are pictures of my family, and we know that looking at- Pictures of a family after experiencing a problem, like, reduces how distressed you feel. - There's awe and wonder that my kids give me. And so- Being mindful about what those triggers are, I think can be very, very helpful.

[71:00] JP: No, super, super helpful actually for all of our listeners. Now I want to get-- to take us into new territory, and you briefly mentioned it, but I want to at least have a question about AI. [chuckles] When you've got a billion people on the planet using LLMs, and that actually some of the most common questions are about reflecting on what is on my mind [chuckles] and having- A discussion with, ChatGPT, Claude, Mistral, pick your favorite, Gemini. So you've You spend your career studying the voice inside our heads. Now, for the first time, there's a voice outside our, our heads that can actually take our context, our experience that we share day and night, and that can mimic as well somewhat of the inner voices does. So is AI replacement for inner voice a new external shifter or something else entirely? And what is your relationship with AI yourself, Ethan?

[71:58] EK: I think AI is fascinating. we've done some work on it in my lab. I've seen other work. The frequency with which people are using it to deal with emotion regulatory issues is astounding. It is further remarkable to me that no safeguards exist on how this technology is being leveraged. I've spent much of- My career trying to identify myths that characterize emotion and emotion regulation. Myths by definition are, culturally pervasive ideas in my- Operationalizing of it. If you think about how these LLMs are operating, like they're drawing from common wisdom of the internet. Like- We have no sense of what advice and support people are getting. How is this possible? this is just the human responsibility we have to innovate, to research this- I think is tremendous. I think- There's a lesson here for scientists. I think if- AI is fast-moving. Science is the opposite. We are slow. We are deliberate. We focus on precision. It takes years for us to publish a paper. I read a paper recently on AI, it was based on models that were, like, ancient at this point. [laughs] If we don't come up with new frameworks for doing science and collaborating, my fear is that we are- Going to lose that scientific guardrail- For understanding- How to profitably incorporate AI into our lives. You asked me how I use AI. - I'm a l- late, late adopter, but I love it. I'm increasingly reliant on it. I have- Found, I don't really use it for these kinds of personal issues, but, - As a, as an executive assistm- assistant and thought partner, I am- Continually amazed at how, how much time it saves me. it's-

[74:07] JP: Saves you

[74:07] EK: Remarkable. Yeah. Do you as well use it?

[74:10] JP: Oh, yeah, a ton, a ton. Less for personal emotion as well regulation, by the way. Maybe it's, I don't know if it's a question of generation, by the way, because I know there's a lot as well, going on in terms of that emotional connection with, use. But, - But it's incredibly helpful and incredibly, yeah, amazing in terms of pushing yourself as well to new territories- Every day. Yeah. So coming almost to the end, a couple of more questions, Ethan. I'd love to go back to actually, something very important in your life that you briefly talk about. You're a father of two daughters. parenting is one of the most [laughs] obviously emotionally intense experience any of us will ever have, and, - Have the pleasure myself as well to go through that for many years. I know I'm also a granddad, so I can start having that with a grandson as well. Very small, but small guy. So how has becoming a parent change your understanding of emotion regulation?

[75:09] EK: Well, it certainly presents me, has presented me with new personal challenges at times. [laughs] it has also, on the one hand impressed upon me just how vitally important it is to share this information with others. I remember my, one of my daughters when she transferred to a new school several years ago, was more demanding, and she had all this homework, and one night I saw she was visibly distressed before bed. And she was like, "I d- I don't know what's happening. I don't know what I'm-- what, what, what is this feeling?" And I asked her to describe it to me, and I'm like, "Oh, that's anxiety. Welcome. Welcome to the club." [laughs] " it's about time you had some of this. Here's what that means. You've got something important going up, ahead of you, and your mind is telling your body to pay attention. We need to get ready." And the moment she had that understanding, it went down [snaps fingers] instantly.

[76:10] JP: Jumped down, yeah.

[76:11] EK: So, the op- it's just so important to know about this stuff. I guess grace would be the word- That comes to mind on a very personal human level. -

[76:23] JP: Love grace.

[76:23] EK: Grace is not, It's interesting. I'm Jewish. - I was not raised, like, with the centrality of grace in one's life. I know it factors very prominently to other religious institutions. Having gra- giving grace to yourself, - And to others, I think that's been the biggest learning experience for me as a parent because- It's messy, even for the experts. And recognizing that messiness and, - That you just need to keep, keep trying and going, - I think has been an important lesson, so that self-compassion, as a take-home there.

[77:09] JP: No, I love, I love, I love that grace. it's certainly very, very nicely said, very lovely said actually in terms of elevating again, others and ourselves actually. W- Ethan, what is a question about the inner voice that you still cannot answer today? [laughs] And what keeps you awake professionally speaking?

[77:36] EK: I think the biggest question is this, we touched on it, which is- How can we prescribe personalized sets of tools to help people manage the- Difficulties that they are struggling with? It's still a little bit of trial and error. I have rerouted a significant portion of my research portfolio to- Tackling this question. for years, decades, the approach in psychology has been to study one single tool and carefully- Understand how this tool works with precision. What we've learned, though, is that people seldom use one tool when they're trying to manage their emotions. They do multiple things. And we just lack any coherent framework for making sense- Of how those tools combine. And, we have the tools to answer those kinds of questions. We just need to bring them to bear. And so that's the question that really, engages me right now.

[78:39] JP: Well, maybe you should work on developing a, an AI product, Ethan, with your own methodology so that anyone- Can benefit from your tools in a self-serving fashion. [laughs]

[78:51] EK: Yeah. Yeah. Huh, funny. I-

[78:53] JP: Who knows?

[78:53] EK: I may have, I may have heard that before. [laughs]

[78:55] JP: I'm sure you did. So Ethan, before, before we close, I want to share a quote that actually I like. it's been q- it's been often actually attributed to Lao Tzu, and that quote has stayed with me for years. It says the following: "Watch your thoughts, for they become your words. Watch your words, for they become your actions. Watch your actions, for they become your habits. Watch your habits, for they become your character, and watch your character, for it becomes your destiny. [laughs] So as someone who has devoted his life to the science of thought, [laughs] how do you personally practice watching your thoughts so they become the right words, the right actions, the right habits, and maybe the right destiny?

[79:40] EK: . well, we end on a light note, I see. [laughs] y- y- y- I'm comfortable not being self-aware until I have- To be self-aware. And it's much like, to me, this notion of riding a wave. I don't wanna be monitoring things all the time. I don't wanna be regulating all the time. I wanna be able to live life, in a very engaged, immersed way, and when I encounter obstacles, intervene swiftly to bring me back on track. And I do try to practice what I preach. I'm not- Perfect by any means. But I'm fairly good and constantly trying to get better and constantly trying to help others get better, too, so

[80:38] JP: Super. So my very last question now, I promise. You studied the inner lives of leaders, athletes, Navy SEALs, parents, children. You've seen what happens when the inner voice becomes an ally and when it becomes an enemy as well. With all that wisdom, what is your own definition of a positive leader?

[80:58] EK: A positive leader is someone who, is committed, who has the awareness to recognize that they're not themselves perfect, i.e., they have humility, who has knowledge of tools they can use to lead themselves more effectively. It's a leader who also has, enormous empathy, on the one hand, for the people they work with, and a genuine motivation to, improve, help those people improve to reach their maximal potential. But it also is someone who has the rigor to recognize when difficult decisions need to be made with respect- To an organization or a workforce, and the ability to act decisively, but with compassion in those instances.

[81:53] JP: Well, very well said, Ethan. Thank you so much for this, very exciting, insightful, discussion, opening the box of our inner voice [laughs] in your life. And it's a powerful reminder again that the most importf- important conversations we ever have are the ones we have with ourselves so that we can have better discussion with others as well. So listeners, I hope that Ethan's insights, of course, inspire you, that you're gonna practice many of the tools that he shared with you, [laughs] and that you take care of yourself. And again, feel free to leave a comment, to put even a five stars rating, always appreciated, and subscribe to the Positive Leadership newsletter. Thank you so much. Again, Ethan, it's been a pleasure, a delight to work on my own, inner voice while listening to you. Thank you so much.

[82:41] EK: No, it's been an honor to be here. Thank you. [outro music]