Episode 72: Squishy Nut Brain

This week we wrap up our discussion of Meditation for Fidgety Skeptics and start exploring a new book: The Idiot Brain by Dean Burnett.

Turns out, your brain is amazing… but also kind of a jerk.

We talk about why your brain lies to you, how memories are actually formed, and the surprising reason motion sickness makes you want to throw up.

We also dive into ADHD quirks, audiobook listening strategies, and the strange way emotions can lock memories into your brain forever.

Basically: your brain is fascinating, complicated, and occasionally an idiot.

How to find mental health help when you're struggling. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists
https://washingtoncountyhumanservices.com/agencies/behavioral-health-developmental-services
https://www.alleghenycounty.us/Services/Human-Services-DHS/Publications/Resource-Guides
Apps - Just search mental health where you get your apps.
EAP programs are a great place to look for help!!

Additional Resources (Sports Related):
https://globalsportmatters.com/health/2020/12/04/mental-health-resources-2/

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:08

So uh later on this week, if you're listening in order and as they come out, which I know you all are, um, you will hear me talking about how at this point, after taking trzepatide for uh almost three years, that when I go to give myself a shot in the belly, I make myself sick. Like I d there's no reason for it. There is no there is no like you don't make yourself sick. Like you don't stick your finger in your throat. Like it's a physical response. My my body reacts to me just touching the needle and touching the vial. Well, actually just looking at them, thinking about it makes me nauseous. Do the same in the same kind of nauseous that I had for the the time I was taking the the medication. So um we are gonna we are gonna wrap up the uh meditation for fidgety skeptics this week, and we're gonna move on to a new book. Um first we're gonna talk about that new book because that's the segue, and then we can wrap up fidgety skeptics at the at the end. Um, but because we both have ADHD, um finishing things isn't gonna be our our working genius. That is not gonna be how we get shit done. Um, we are gonna have great ideas. We are gonna be super excited about those ideas. And when the rubber meets the road, we're gonna go down that road about a hundred yards. And then we're gonna watch it all crash and burn and move into the next one. Oh, hey, is that another car? Right, right. Used to be, used to be was, as your dad would say, we would, at least I would try to make myself feel bad enough to finish the the thing because that's what that's what I'm supposed to do. And now I have like I'm 52. I have this like uh unearned sense of freedom where I'm like, I don't have to finish that book if I don't want to. So I don't. I did in this case read the rest of the book, but um I didn't.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

I didn't fuck that book. I didn't I didn't do it. I'm not gonna be told what to do. I do what I want. Unless I have to be home at midnight. True. I did really want to read it, but it's just it's been a rough, it's been a rough it's a it's a hard time of year.

SPEAKER_00 2:25

It's real shitty outside. Um, it feels like the world is burning. So, you know, hard to hard to focus on day-to-day activities, um, like reading books about meditation. Um, anyway, so uh so I I was looking for a new book and I found this book called The Idiot Brain. And I don't know who who wrote it right now because I don't have it in front of me. It's got the worst book cover ever. It does. I was like, that can't be it. I don't want to read it. Um, it is a face, but it's a face that you could turn upside down or sideways, and it looks like a face all the time. It's very upsetting. It's just a collection of shapes that your brain turns into a face, and that's why it is there.

SPEAKER_01 3:09

But it is written by Dean Burnett.

SPEAKER_00 3:13

Right. And it is read if you're reading, if you're listening, like I like to listen to these books. Um, it is read by a lovely little man from the UK who is awfully good at it.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

Can you like see him in your head? Um this is gonna be my first, I'm gonna fully finish this via Audible. I realized at some point I got a bunch of Audible books and I was like, oh, I guess I should start listening to them. Like, I've never really, really tried because I feel like it just goes in one ear and out the other. But um, I feel like if I can learn music lyrics, right? I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 3:49

I don't I'm gonna give it a try. I'm gonna give it a try. Here's here's my here's my audible tip. Like uh the gaster tip of the week. Oh yes, I like this. I like this. Um, I can't be doing anything that requires words at the same time that I'm listening to the audible. Like I it has to be driving, crocheting, sometimes cooking, if I'm just if I'm just in the kitchen like cutting vegetables. If I'm reading a recipe, then no, I can't. Um so you can't be like listening to the audible and looking on Facebook because that requires you to read and that you you can't.

SPEAKER_01 4:29

Like you can't like that. Did you just stop yourself from saying fuck? I don't think so. That sounded like you were gonna say that fucks you up. Okay. Um, so I can't listen to it while I'm working, which is like yeah, kind of obvious. Um I feel like I don't drive enough.

SPEAKER_00 4:43

Yeah, you probably don't. Like I live in the middle of nowhere, so I drive all the time.

SPEAKER_01 4:48

Like, I mean, the past few weeks I've left my I mean, the one one week, actually it was two. I didn't leave my house for two weeks.

SPEAKER_00 4:55

Like I haven't been outside since Sunday. And then I just went outside in my pajamas to pick up groceries. So Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:02

Stop. Anyway, I'm gonna find a time, I'm gonna be able to do it. What about if I'm playing one of my games? Like I'm playing like a rush hour game. Can I do it then? No, because it's not, it's I have to be concentrating.

SPEAKER_00 5:14

That's why that's why it's in and out. You know what would be nice if you if you feel the urge to do some diamond art and audible books. Go really well together. Like I am working on a sweater for Liv and a sweater for um Jen at the same time. So I just pick up one of those. I could do this.

SPEAKER_01 5:37

I can do this. What about puzzling? Making a puzzle, doing a puzzle?

SPEAKER_00 5:40

Yeah, yes. Because as long as you're as long as you're able to listen and process the words. Like that's the that's the trick for me, is that it can't be two word things. And I can't like and that might be the ADHD. Like other people might be able to do it, but I definitely have to pick the one thing. It makes sense. It makes sense. Okay. Also found out um, not through this book, but just casual conversation, that not everybody with ADHD is bothered by two noises at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 6:11

Weird. I think everybody should be bothered by noises altogether. It just yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:19

And I've I've kind of narrowed my irritation. The the thing that irritates me is when they're the same volume. Like when they're the same volume, I can't pick which one. Like I can't, my brain can't pick which one to so it even if there's a sound, like noise in here and noise out there, if that noise is louder, but the same volume in here, you can't do that. There's my I will short circuit and I will throw something at you. Like I really don't have like I don't, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 6:51

It's just uh all the noises, any noise. Like once I grab onto it, uh like the noise our floors make. That's drives me. That might be OCD. Bonkers. Bonkers.

SPEAKER_00 7:04

Oh, am I talking about?

SPEAKER_01 7:06

I think that that's just rage. I think that's just rage that we built this house five years ago, and these motherfuckers that built it would not do anything about the fact that our floors made noise like they do. And we're like, that's normal. It's like I've lived in a lot of houses, really old ones, brand new ones. And never have I lived in a place where my floors made this much noise. That's not fucking normal, and you should be able to fucking fix it.

SPEAKER_00 7:35

Sorry. All right, all right, back to the book, back to the book and all these brain things because it's super fun. This is this is not a meditation book. This is not a connection between brain and meditation book. This is a book about your brain. And I think it is fucking awesome if you like that kind of stuff. Like it talks about free prefrontal cortexes, it talks about hippocampuses, hippocampi, if you will, which is the proper plural of hippocampus, hippocampus.

SPEAKER_01 8:07

Like, what's the what's this one? Amygdala? Where's the amygdala?

SPEAKER_00 8:09

Is that amygdala is your lizard brain? It's the thumb that gets tucked in.

SPEAKER_01 8:13

Oh, I'm so proud of myself that I remember that. I I had it on the outside. It gets tucked in though.

SPEAKER_00 8:18

Yeah, it's tucked because it's it's lizard and it's it's early functioning. Um the first uh the first chapter it introduces us to some of the ways that your brain is an asshole. Um this guy is a neuroscientist and he he he's very articulate about what the brain can and can't do. He's like, if you want to upset a room full of neuroscientists, he's like, make sure you walk in and start talking about how the brain is like a computer. He's like, it's not. I mean, if you had a computer that constantly opened files from 1984 for absolutely no reason, and you had a brain that was fairly uh disorganized and where it put your stuff and sometimes uh wouldn't let you find them. He's like, if you had a computer like that, you would take it immediately back to the place you bought it and throw it at the person. Your brain is not a computer, your brain is a collection of neurons and synapses. And I was like, huh, yes, of course it is. What is a what is a neur what is a neuron again? So he talks about neurons, which are the the um long uh electrical cells in your brain with these uh connectors on the end. Uh you guys, if you're not watching the YouTube, so I'm disappointed.

SPEAKER_01 9:39

Um I feel like you talk, like you do the smart talk, and I'll do these things.

SPEAKER_00 9:43

Okay, yeah. Like uh, like a synapse. It's a long thing, it carries a message. Like when I want to raise my eyebrows like that, there's like 14 bajillion uh reactions that happen. And the neurons connect uh through neurotransmitters. Yes, exactly like that. Neurotransmitters. So there are chemicals that go from one to the other and say, Hey, could you raise her eyebrows? Thanks. Um, and it talks about how we make memories, like how we go from short-term memory to long-term memory and why our brains have evolved like that. Careful. Oh, is that your funny bone? That's okay. Yeah, that was my funny, but there's a thousand synapses that just went fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. Your synapses are pissed. The neurotransmitter for that one is fuck.

SPEAKER_01 10:34

That neurotransmitter is my favorite. I have lots of those.

SPEAKER_00 10:38

But fascinating stuff. But he also kind of goes into what we're talking about with the there's absolutely no reason for me to feel nauseous at this point when I'm giving myself a shot of GLP one. There's not. Yeah. Like I will feel like a little off the next day, but I'm not, I'm not nauseous. No. I just don't feel like I just don't feel like eating. So he talks about how one of the best examples he can give you uh about how your brain uh constantly tells you lies um is motion sickness. Oh, you say that and I just think of the Disney cruise. Right. Immediately what I thought of like six hours of us going, it's rough today, isn't it? Rough, right? These are rough seasons.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

This is terrible. Are we going down? Are we are we hit an iceberg?

SPEAKER_00 11:27

We and Herman Melville novel. What what is happening outside? And the everyone on that, everyone else on that boat was like, beautiful day today.

SPEAKER_01 11:38

I was like, apparently they live on these boats.

SPEAKER_00 11:42

Right. Same same reaction. And he he goes through the the reason that you feel like you want to throw up when you have motion sickness is because your lizard brain, your uh reptile brain, this guy, he thought you said rectal brain. No, no, no, didn't say that. Um reptile brain. Reptile brain, not rectal brain. No, no, rectile, reptile. That's not even a word. Rectile isn't a word. Not even close. Rectal. Rectum. Stop it. Hey, this is the serious part of the podcast. Stop crying.

SPEAKER_01 12:28

What is wrong with me?

SPEAKER_00 12:29

Uh I think I got into the Willie's remedy a little too early. Like look making yourself laugh. Fucking hysterical. Um, so your lizard brain is where all of your uh good protective instincts uh from evolution get stored. And okay. Those those instincts keep you alive. Um which is funny because that part of the brain um works really, really well. And it has for eons, centuries, if you will, um decades, millennia, however long people have been alive. Um I don't know since we since we since that little fishy crawled out of the ocean and walked on land on legs he didn't have with lungs he didn't.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

Sometimes, yeah, sometimes years like are like inches, like I I don't fucking know. Feet, like measurements in general, I'm not good at. I wish they had metric ears. That would be easier. Ugh, yeah. None of actually none of that makes sense to me at all. But okay.

SPEAKER_00 13:28

Um so back in the day, we uh uh we developed a uh proprioception. What's it called? Say it again. Proprioception. Proprioception. Right. It's the ability to know where you are in space. Okay. So when I put my hand behind my back and I give you the middle finger behind my back, my brain knows that I'm still doing this, even though I can't see it. It knows where my hand is and it knows what is happening with my hand. Um I have my eyes closed and I pick up, lift up my foot, like it's how I know where my foot is. So we've developed that. And we have uh a motion detection system in our ears and a couple of other places in our brain that helps us understand what that feels like. Like head back and forth. And it has evolved slowly. Uh, so it doesn't really recognize when you're not walking. Like it doesn't recognize really riding a horse so much. It doesn't really um recognize uh car travel. It it definitely doesn't recognize when you're on an airplane or um when you're on a boat. Like it just doesn't get these things because it expects you to be moving and it can see like your eyeballs can see the moving and it expects you to be walking, which doesn't feel the same to the ear parts and the other parts of the brain that are supposed to be good at being like, hey, you're fine. This is just what walking feels like. Yeah. So your body is like, hey, hey, hey, hey, I'm not entirely sure what's happening, but I feel really disoriented. So I'm gonna make you vomit. But and well, that was his question. He's like, Why would why would my natural reaction, why would my lizard response to that be giving up the food that I've obviously fought saber-toothed tiger to put down? And the answer, the answer was so obvious and also so stunning. It thinks you're being poisoned. Like, I know, right? Like your your body, your body is like, wow, this is I'm really disoriented. Obviously, I've eaten some bad um dinosaur meat. So we gotta, we gotta get rid of it. We gotta hurl it up. Let's do it. Come on. Right, right. While that that is stored in everybody's brain. In different, in different measures. Yeah. Which is which is really kind of he's like, and I think that might be the interesting part. Once you get over the the wow of I my body thinks I'm being poisoned when I'm on a boat with Mickey Mouse. Right. You're fine. So that it that's how the the book starts off. Like I like that. Right. It's it's quite the hook. And I was like, tell me, tell me more. Tell me more. Tell me more.

SPEAKER_01 16:20

Tell me more in your little British accent, Audible.

SPEAKER_00 16:23

Right. Oh, oh, it's so it's just so delightful and and uh you know, soothing. Um so that was the one story. And then it was talking about uh skip ahead uh a little bit, and this might be in chapter two. I did a bunch of reading yesterday or a bunch of listening. Um it's talking about how memories get made and how in modern times we can take pictures of what's happening inside your brain and we can tell which parts are doing which things. Yeah. So, like the the places that tell you how to talk and the places that make the memories, so which is super amazing. So in between your neurons in your walnut-shaped brain, which I like to think of as like I never realized that it looks like a walnut, like a yeah, squishy squishy nut.

SPEAKER_01 17:17

I feel like I did you cannot know. I feel like you know me well enough to know that saying squishy nut is not something that you can say to me. I'm gonna let it go because it the because we because we have to be off to. I'm gonna let it go.

SPEAKER_00 17:32

Squishy. Anyway, um squishy nut brain. Right. In the internal uh stuff of the squishy, squishy nut, um, there are those neurons that are firing, and there's also the synapses, which is how you make a memory. So what happens is the synapse is a chemical reaction to making a memory. So things will come in and out in your short-term memory. Like if you think about how you memorize a phone number and you're like, okay, 384-38989 is my is my phone number from when I was little. Um, okay, 384-3898. And you repeat it and you repeat it, and what happens is your hippocampus says, Oh, um, are you uh it feels like it feels like you're telling me something. Right. 384-3898.

unknown 18:26

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 18:26

Right. And you're 785-7128. Right. Your oh your hippocampus is writing it down, creating a synapse, and then it's and like the memories look like they go out from the from the hippocampus. So it makes it and it puts it here, and then the next one gets made, and then they just get they push them further out, which is super amazing to me.

SPEAKER_01 18:51

Yeah, that that is something that um I don't know, the whole memories. I feel like I feel like there's so much more to that that I would like to know. Um, just based on like the shit I do remember and the shit I forget. I'm like, how what the fuck? Why does it how do I remember what shirt I was wearing at this time in 1992?

SPEAKER_00 19:16

Right. Because at some point your brain was like, hey, this is nice. And there's a theory out there that everything from your short-term memory gets makes its way into long-term memory. The problem is it's tough to find it. Yeah, I feel like it gets too filled up. Like your short-term memory gets really cluttered because you're thinking about a lot of things at one time while you're trying to do things. And you don't necessarily you don't necessarily need that stuff in long-term memory. Like, I don't need um to know how to talk, right? Because that's that's there's I do it, I do it all the time. I don't need to know uh where the toothpaste is, even if I'm thinking about that right now. Yeah. Because I'm gonna go rebrush my teeth because my mouth is pretty dry. But like all of the things that you're doing at one time just go in and out, like the um, like the waiting room at a doctor's office. Like things come in and things go out, and nothing really needs to stay permanent until uh and until there's a reason to make it permanent. So latch in there. Right. And where ADHD brains struggle sometimes is figuring out which of these things is the is the thing to remember. It's tough. Right. I'm like, hey, you should leave the house. And at some point at the right time, I was like, you should leave the house. And that went put it on right. And then I didn't think about it again. But the the the storage of those is is just fascinating. And the book talks about how we decide how your brain decides what to store and where to put it in like how you can remember the your first kiss in it was at the Rostraver Ice Garden. And you had also earlier that day bought a your first copy of The Smith Strange Ways, Here We Come. And you had that in your purse with the liner notes, and you were reading them at the Rostraver Ice Garden. And that same time you got skates that were a little bit too tight, so they were hurting your feet. Wow. I mean, I'm sure somebody had that experience. It definitely wasn't me, but we were doing different things at the Rostraver ice garden. Yeah, we were. Yeah, we were a hundred percent. Like I was I was reading, I was like, isn't Morrissey like the most sad, tragic? Like, don't you want to just sit down and talk to him? I was out back smoking SIGs. I know. I was like, hey, big academic games tournament this week.

SPEAKER_01 21:56

I mean, listen, kids, look where it got us. Go her route. Go her route. That's the route to go. I mean, I'm fine. I'm doing fine in life. It's fine. But go her route. Go be a mix of both of us. Don't don't do the don't be the smoker outside at Ross Javer Ice Garden.

SPEAKER_00 22:13

Or or do that. I mean, just to understand. Understand that comes with that comes with different experiences.

SPEAKER_01 22:20

Yeah.

unknown 22:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:21

Um anyway, so that like the emotional impact of of that, like having the the experience of loving. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Hey, it's time for me to call Olivia and wake her up. That means she needs to hurry up. Right. Anyway, the emotional attachment, like loving that album so much, made it so I could remember the rest of that day in finite detail. And then every time I hear that, that's the trigger that'll pull up all of the memories of everything that happened the first time I heard that album on tape. I feel like that, well, that's a whole other that's a whole other discussion. But this book, this book is really fascinating. It's got really like cute little anecdotes like that. And it it also helps me understand why I can't remember that we had a bird. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:11

Um You didn't give a fuck about the bird.

SPEAKER_00 23:14

No, no, I yeah, I wasn't there. I was in college and I didn't give a fuck if we had a bird or not. Like I wasn't emotionally attached to the bird.

SPEAKER_01 23:21

But you weren't in college. It was just similar to drive. No, we didn't have a bird at 410 Second Avenue. It was similar drive.

SPEAKER_00 23:27

No, we didn't. There was no bird there. Oh my God, stop. Your brain is an idiot. I I know you're talking to yourself. Well, well, we're gonna we're gonna keep reading this book and figure out why one of us remembers a bird and one of us doesn't.

SPEAKER_01 23:42

But here's the thing three of us remember a bird and one of us doesn't.

SPEAKER_00 23:46

Like legitimately. Like, I remember, I remember kind of like you guys have convinced me that we had a bird, but it was in 410, it was at 4'10 seconds.

SPEAKER_01 23:56

Yeah, I do remember this now. We were talking about it because Mummy said it was in the laundry room where I was like, but I feel like then maybe we had two birds because I swear to God. No, it was at 4'10, but I do swear that we had one at Simolo Drive too. Because at 4'10 is when the bat got up into my room where daddy had to catch it with the Kennywood flower in his undies. And I thought it was the bird that was flying in my room, and it took me a nanosecond, excuse me, to realize that's not pretty boy or pretty bird or whatever the fuck we called him.

SPEAKER_00 24:28

It definitely wasn't pretty bird. We got that from the dumb and dumber.

SPEAKER_01 24:33

Yeah, but I God, there's some fuck. We had a bird. We called him pretty bird. He never had a name. He never really had a name. Wasn't it a girl? Wait, anyway, this is how do you how can you tell if a bird is a weird one? I have no idea. Like I would it's not like it has a wiener hanging out.

SPEAKER_00 24:49

They're all girls.

SPEAKER_01 24:51

Did you see the name of today's substack?

SPEAKER_00 24:54

Uh no, I didn't look at it yet. Is it about wieners? Is it about Sidney Crosby's wiener?

SPEAKER_01 24:59

I had to check the transcript to see whose wiener we were talking about before I used it. Definitely. I don't know why that made a difference. Oh man. All right. Let's let's wrap this up. Yes, yes. Uh skeptics, fidgety skeptics. Let me just the two-minute rundown.

SPEAKER_00 25:17

Let me sum up. Um, there are other barriers to meditation. Bianca seems to have them all. Dan Harris's wife seems to have them all. Um, so uh she does the meditation uh grudgingly. Um, and they continue on their journey and they meet different people who have different skills in meditation, including one to overcome each one of these things. It continues on the theme of sometimes you're gonna feel stupid doing this, and sometimes people are gonna make fun of you, and sometimes you're gonna feel like it's not working. Um stay the course, I think is the overall theme of this. And following the tiny little meditations that are in there while you're listening to the audible book is like I'm fucked up on this one that I should have done the audible on this one with the meditations. But if I'm if I'm uh headphoning and and like walking around the house putting away clothes, which is also a good activity to use uh to do the audible um cleaning and those things, um like then I'm I'm like I'm not gonna meditate. Now I'm just listening to Jeff Warren tell me about meditation. Like it seems, it seems uh like it, it's it's a good book just to get chapter four. Like chapter four is this has a lot more value than people are willing to uh to concede, right? Like listening to the military guys talk about how it makes it easier for them to drown in the blood of their enemies. Yeah. Seems counterintuitive, but also like right in line with, you know, this is for everybody. Yeah. So keep keep giving that a go. We're gonna talk a little bit about the brain. And then I think for our next book, we gotta dive back into like some psychology. Yeah. We get to do some mental health and mental wellness kind of things. I feel like all of this is awesome. Yes. Really looking forward to keeping uh hearing more about idiot brains. Um yeah. I love it. So fun. I love idiot brains. It thinks you're being poisoned. That's crazy. Isn't it wild? Like it was my it's my favorite thing that happened this week. Yeah. I was like it is.

SPEAKER_01 27:26

I mean, it's not what I was I mean, it was good hook. It's definitely a hook. Definitely a good hook because it's not what I expected.

SPEAKER_00 27:31

No. I was like, well, you know, maybe back in the day the the motion of walking made someone sick. Nope, nope. Yeah, no, no, your body's just really, really good at get the venom out of your belly, protecting yourself. Like strange, but also not that great because at the same time, oh, I forgot this part. Okay, one more. Like at the same time that your your body recognizes the motion and your body also knows that walking is good for you. Um, it also gives you 8,000 reasons. It serves them up on a platter. 8,000 reasons not to. So we'll talk more about that. We'll talk more about that next week.

SPEAKER_01 28:10

Asshole brain.

SPEAKER_00 28:11

Okay. All right. Um, that's it. That's all I got. Love you. All right. I don't want to go to work. Right. No one does. No one does. It's gonna be terrible.

SPEAKER_01 28:18

Uh by the way, going to work means doing this.

SPEAKER_00 28:21

Right, right. Yeah. No, I'm not gonna do it. I have to go put pants on. But then um, but then I do have to sit in front of the computer. It's gonna be a bit contentious. All right. Uh until next week. Love you. All right, love you, bye. Love you, bye.