#108 How to Worry Less and be Ten Times Happier with Owen O’Kane

Dr Rupy: Have you ever sat down to a meditation or tried it for a period of time and just felt absolutely distracted, almost like the meditation was perhaps making things worse? Or perhaps you've dealt with ruminations, recurring thoughts, worry, stress, sleeplessness, all whilst the world and social media are telling you to be present, worry less, further deepening your anxiety and feelings of failure. Well, you're not alone. First of all, I can certainly identify with some of those thought patterns and I'm someone who's been practising meditation for years and trying to live and breathe the wellness promise. And Owen O'Kane, former NHS clinical lead for mental health in London, is on the podcast today chatting to me about how we can achieve happier, calmer lives with less judgment and more reality. And let me tell you, he is very, very real. And with that number of years experience in the NHS, he's certainly got all the tools to help you do just that. He is the Sunday Times bestselling author of Ten to Zen, which is a quick and simple mental workout that allows us to focus on what's important, our mental wellbeing. And on today's podcast, you will learn about Owen's past, growing up during the troubles in Northern Ireland and being bullied because of his sexuality, what his experience with terminally ill patients during his palliative care years taught him about life. We talk about the different types of therapy that exist and what they might be appropriate for, why meditation and mental health is not the pristine social media experience that we've become accustomed to, and also how to tackle imposter syndrome as well as trolling online from other health professionals. We touch on why worry is addictive and how to manage the thoughts in your head that are primed to be negative, and also why comparison is the thief of joy. His book is absolutely fantastic. I've read it cover to cover and it is honestly one of the most real books I think that are out there on the subject of meditation and just how to feel happier. So if you do want to deepen your understanding of this and actually come away with some practical tips, I highly recommend getting his latest book, Ten Times Happier. For now, here is my conversation with the wonderful Owen O'Kane. I've listened to a lot of your stuff and and and the stuff on social media as well. And it was through Bev's team that I reached out actually, because I was like, oh yeah, I completely forgot that you're represented by Bev, who is a wonderful person.

Owen O'Kane: Yeah, she's amazing.

Dr Rupy: Amazing, yeah. And I listened to you on Holly's podcast, which I'm addicted to listening to. Honestly, I listen to Holly every week. She's just so inspirational and motivating herself.

Owen O'Kane: She's incredible. She's quite infectious, isn't she, when you're around her?

Dr Rupy: She really is. And I found that podcast really, really useful just to get an overview of of you, because that was recorded a couple of years ago now, right?

Owen O'Kane: Probably yes, well over a year ago. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, it would have been, probably a year and a half ago I recorded that.

Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah. And I think that gave a really a great sort of intro into into you and your background. So I wanted to start there actually, rather than diving straight into the book and your work and the NHS and stuff. I thought to give some context to your own journey and your own life story, maybe we could start from from when you were a child and where you grew up.

Owen O'Kane: Yes, so I grew up in Belfast and grew up really in the 70s and 80s. So that period is known as the troubles. So that was kind of all the sectarian conflict really between Protestant and Catholic. So right up until I was probably about 19, 20, my experience really was trauma. It was, I lived in a working class part of Belfast, I lived in a Catholic area, and it was right in the, it was basically a hub really for conflict. It was, you know, almost sandwiched between the Falls and Shankill, so it was kind of a hotspot for conflict. And I grew up there and yeah, I mean it was, I didn't realise at the time actually that how anxiety provoking it was, because the kind of the bombs and the bullets and the riots, you just became so accustomed to it that it was a way of life. And it was only when I left that I realised, my God, I mean this, this hardwires you to be in fear mode a lot of the time. But you know, the people are great. It was, you know, my family are just a very ordinary working class family. There was a lot of love around in my family. Growing up was tricky. I was different, you know, and that was clear. I was playing piano. The other kids identified I was different. Later on in my early adulthood, I, you know, I come out as gay and obviously as a gay teenager growing up, that was identified very quickly by the other kids. I couldn't put a word or a name on it at that stage, but they identified difference. So I was bullied quite a bit in my teen years particularly. So growing, you know, basically my formative years were tricky, you know, between the troubles, between being bullied. I'm Catholic, Irish Catholic and gay is a great combination for shame. You know, it's a, so there was all of that stuff going on and, but you know, I, you know, I survived it and I got through and I think I developed a lot of resilience. I think a lot of my own personal resilience, you know, really comes from growing up in that background, but I developed an interest in people and believe it or not, I spent three years in a monastery. I was quite religious and spiritual when I was younger. And I spent three years in the Catholic church then when I finished my A levels and stuff, that's what I did. I went into a monastery for three years. And that was incredible actually. It was a really, really interesting time of my life. I mean, it was, I met some incredible people. Some of the projects were amazing. I worked on a homeless project, I worked with people who were drug using, did a palliative care stint in a hospice. So the whole work, I mean, it was very much every day work reaching people who were struggling. And then of course, a couple of years in, realised that it wasn't for me and, you know, a life of celibacy didn't quite, didn't quite appeal when I got to my early 20s. And I hadn't come out either, which was the other thing.

Dr Rupy: Oh, so you hadn't come out before you went, oh, wow.

Owen O'Kane: And actually, if I'm being honest, I still wasn't, still trying to work it out in my own head. It was quite well repressed at that stage. And then I did come out of the monastery and then literally came out as well, which was interesting.

Dr Rupy: How was that received? I mean,

Owen O'Kane: Well, it's a double whammy. I mean, there is a laugh and joke about it. I mean, one day my parents thought they were, you know, had the next Pope in their hands. And 24 hours later, they've got a gay son and they were like, what is this? Oh my word. And I actually wasn't planning to tell them. Telling them was an accident because I'd I'd told a friend and sadly, she broke my confidence and it got back to my brother. And I'd literally, I'd only left the monastery not less than 24 hours and my brother contacted me and he said, is there something you want to tell me? And I said, what do you mean? And he said, well, when are you going to tell mom and dad about this gay stuff? Oh, wow. And I thought, how do you know about that? And he said, well, I know. And he said, and his wife knew. And he said, well, if we know, it's quite a small community. He said, how long's it going to be before everyone else knows? So yeah, within a period of 24 hours, I'd come out of the monastery and then had to tell my parents quickly, which was interesting. Yeah, I can imagine. Wow. All sorts of reactions and stuff, but you know, they got there. I got a whole list when I sat them down to tell them one night. My mom, who's sadly no longer here, she went through this list of, I said, I've got something to tell you. And before I could even say it, she said, are you on drugs? I said, well, I've just been in a monastery for three years, so hardly likely. Have you got someone pregnant? No. Are you involved with a married woman? Are you in debt? I mean, none of it, none of it made any sense because I'd just literally come out of a monastery. So none of the, and the very last thing she said was, oh, tell me you're not gay. So which was really interesting. And I said, yeah, I am actually. And that was, you know, it was difficult for them because it was Catholicism everywhere. It was very wrong. They didn't know how to deal with it. And the irony was, I mean, this, there's a brilliant story here. The night before I told them, so I'd come out, came home, and a gay sauna or something went on fire in Dublin at this point. And it was on the news. There was a big scandal about this sauna going on fire and I think a priest had been spotted in there and stuff. So there was all sorts of TV outrage about this. And this came on telly and I remember my mom saying, God, that's really shocking. And I thought she meant the priest, but in the gay sauna. And she said, God, this is really shocking. And I said, what? And she said, because I thought gay people lived in New York. And I'm like, wow. My word. Where do I go with this? So she was really in for a shock then. A few shocks coming her direction. So, so my, so my upbringing took a long story short was a real mix of a lot of things. There was a lot of love and there was a lot of kindness and there was just a lot of challenges and difficulties. And actually, when I then moved into my adult life and then trained as a therapist, there was a lot of trauma there as well, which I'd never really dealt with or named or done anything with. I didn't understand it. And of course, as a therapist, you've got to have your own therapy. And I learned about all of that stuff. And I suppose ultimately, all of my story made me curious about people, how we behave, how we respond, how we react. And I think what I tried to do is I tried to use every single part of my story, even the difficult stuff. And especially the difficult stuff because, you know, I know what it's like to be an underdog. I know what it's like to feel anxious. I know what it's like not to feel good enough. I know what it's like to feel like the outsider. And I don't mean that in a kind of self-pitying way, but I do know experientially what that feels like. And I also watch people struggle with that sort of stuff in therapy. So I suppose one of the, the privileges that gives you is that when you've kind of walked the walk in some ways in life, I think it then helps you become a more authentic therapist and you're not, you're not driven by theory and textbook and how it should be delivered. I think you then deliver your work as a human being. And that's really what I try and do with the books and my work generally is just to put a human face on, on the work.

Dr Rupy: It really does come through. Now you're describing it like that, because when I, I listened to the book, the latest book, you know, you put such great examples and it's clearly imbued with the wealth of your experience within the healthcare system that you're able to do that. But before we go into your NHS work, I just wanted to ask you about your own therapy experience. So what, what age were you when you actually first went to therapy? Because at that, if I'm thinking it was after you went to the monastery, you would have experienced bullying, homophobia, obviously PTSD, you know, a whole host of issues. What, what was that like?

Owen O'Kane: It was a lot of stuff actually. I mean, the irony of all of this, my, my first therapist turned out to be an Irish Catholic nun, which was, and that was, that was a whole thing in itself really, because I, I'd been given her name, her name was Kathleen, and she sometimes follows my work and if she listens, she won't mind me talking about this, but I, I'd been given her details and I'd come out, I'd literally come out literally and metaphorically, and I thought, I better talk to someone. I've got a lot going on and I should talk to someone. And I actually, interestingly, I started to feel for the first time ever, I started to feel a sense of panic that I couldn't quite understand, particularly when I'd come out of the monastery and I went back to Belfast and I was having these panic symptoms, which turned out to be very marked panic attacks, but my GP didn't know what they were. I didn't know what they were. I just kind of felt panicky. And I went and I, and I spoke to her and her name was Kathleen and I got there, was given the address and when I got there, it was a, it was a school, but there was a convent attached to the school. And I thought, this is all a bit weird. Why am I going to a convent for this therapy? And of course, I got there and she was in plain clothes, she wasn't in the nun's outfit, but she was a nun. And, and she turned to, she was probably one of the most influential people in my journey because she turned out to be incredible because she wasn't driven by any of the rules of value. She was, well, I mean, she was in her professional life, but as a therapist, she, she got it and she, she helped me understand my story. And interestingly at the time, I mean, I'm, I often say to people, we, we, we all tell ourselves two different stories. So we have the rehearsed polished version. And then there's the real story. So I went with the rehearsed polished version of, you know, well, you know, my family are lovely and I've been in a monastery for a few years and, you know, education, I've done pretty well and stuff and, you know, I think I'm a pretty decent person. So that was the polished version. And then she just wasn't buying any of it at all. I mean, she was like, okay, like, you know, can we have a, you know, a more real version of what it's, what it's been like for you? And that was great for me then because it opened up my own story and what it was like to, to be there really in that kind of, um, it was a bubble almost of threat that was going on everywhere. You know, there was threat at home, there was threat externally, there was threat broadly. There was nowhere that felt safe. And I think that was the key thing I hadn't realised. Nowhere really felt safe when I was growing up because there was elements of threat everywhere and I was always on guard about not being found out because it was like, I mean, to come out in my teens would just wasn't even an option. So it was always kind of watching out about not being caught, not being noticed. My first gay pride I ever went to in Belfast, there was probably only about 50 people at this gay pride, which would have been, I don't know, 20 years ago or whatever, maybe, maybe longer. And there was one float and I remember being intrigued by this and I stood in a side street and I watched. I was really excited, but I was terrified someone would spot me. And when you think there a gay pride last year had about 50,000 people at it, it's, it's incredible to see how things have moved on. But the therapy experience was great actually. It was about, it taught me about honesty, it taught, it taught me about non-judgment. It really taught me about compassion and being kind to yourself because, you know, part of me realised that there was quite a critical voice in my head that was trying to protect me from everything that was going on around me, but I was, I became aware that I, I'd listened to that critical voice. And of course, that feeling of not being a good person, that came up as well. I would say that I was a good person and I would do lots of things to try and demonstrate that I was a good person, but I didn't feel like I was a good person. And that all linked to the Catholicism and the, you know, you're going to go to hell, this is wrong, this is sinful, it's dirty, it's bad, all of that stuff. So that then developed my interest in shame and how that impacts on people. So, you know, I, I went through my own therapy and obviously over the years, we have to be in therapy in blocks as part of our work. And I've met different therapists along the line. Some of them have been amazing, some of them not so good. And that's always fascinating as a therapist when, when you're on the receiving end of judgment or someone who's forming opinions and not really listening to the story because they're coming from their own values. So it teaches you a lot about how you are as a therapist when you're in therapy because, you know, you experience what it is to be in a room with somebody giving everything to them and, and what you need to create for that to happen safely. So, yeah, therapy, therapy is important.

Dr Rupy: It's, it's super important. And I'm just trying to get into the mindset of, um, a listener who has never had therapy themselves before, um, haven't thought about it. And, and I think one thing that you mentioned there about the stories that we tell ourselves, the rehearsed polished ones versus the true gritty stories that perhaps we don't even want to tell ourselves because we're too afraid of what emotions that might bring up. And if you are new to the concept of therapy and you want to sort of dip your toe, where would you start? And if you have started and you've read your books, for example, or some other authors, you've watched some stuff online, how do you actually find a therapist that will get you and your situation and be able to identify and empathise with you, you know, considering everyone's story is completely unique?

Owen O'Kane: I mean, it's a good question. I mean, you can do all your usual research and, you know, find out what type of therapy you're looking for. You know, some people, you know, I'm trained in a couple of different models of therapy. So if somebody wants to change how they're thinking and their emotional responses and how they deal with anxiety or depression, OCD, panic disorder, my argument would be cognitive behavioural therapies are probably most effective. That's where the evidence is, you know, you get around 70% effectiveness with cognitive behavioural therapy. If somebody wants to explore their childhood and understand themselves a bit more, it may be a more psychodynamic approach may be appropriate for them. If somebody's got, you know, significant trauma or PTSD, I'm also trained in a model called EMDR, which is I, I don't know if you've heard of this, but we use rapid eye movement to process. And my experience of that is it's quite powerful for processing trauma because you cut through language. And when you cut through language, you, you can get, you can get to places much quicker. So I think it's about identifying what is it you want help with? What is it you want to work on? What may be the best type of therapy for you? Some people just go generically and think, oh, I just need to find a therapist and don't really know what they're looking for. So I think it's about knowing what you want help with, asking around, get recommendation, get, get opinions. It's always good to talk to somebody who maybe know has had therapy. And you think what type of personality type they are and if they say actually my therapist is good, and you kind of suspect that you'll get on well with the therapist based on your relationship with that person, then recommendations can be good. But you know, sometimes you might rock up a therapy and you meet the therapist and you don't get on, or you don't build trust quickly, or the rapport, you know, it's like every day life, sometimes we meet people and we, we just really hit it off and we like them. Other times we meet people and sometimes it's just not there. And that can happen in therapy as well that, you know, if that, if that connection isn't there and you don't trust the therapist, then don't waste your time. You know, you know, obviously it doesn't happen instantly, but I think if you're a few sessions in and things are not beginning to move or evolve, then you look for another therapist. But give it a bit of time, you know, not jumping ship quickly, but trust is everything really. And being in the room with somebody that get, you know, really gets you so that when you're telling them stuff, you know they're hearing you. I think that's the key thing. But it's not as scary as it sounds, you know, it's quite liberating, really liberating. And I, I said it's part of the job I love actually because you see people at all the different stages. They come in at the beginning and often really struggling. And then you go through all of that stuff with them and then you get to a kind of point of balance and equilibrium and you can see things levelling out and things beginning to improve. And then you get to the end of therapy and you, you've watched somebody reclaim their life and rebuild and get out there again. And that's quite a powerful moment because you've always, you've always got that image of session one and two when things have been really dark or difficult or challenging. And then you're watching the progress. And of course, as a therapist, you've always got a mix of people. So I might have one client who's just arrived and you're dealing with the, you know, the difficult stuff, but then I might be finishing up on another client who's, you know, really in a much better place. So there's something fascinating about that because you're moving in and out of different states when you're working with people, but I think it keeps you really charged in your work because we become tired like everyone else, you know, and we have moments like everyone else, but I think because often you're watching people evolve and develop, there's always that stuff to hold on to.

Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah. It's, it's interesting doing this virtually because, um, I, I have therapy sessions myself and there's always that time, that, that slight one, two second delay when you want to say something, but then then someone else says something and there's that glitch here.

Owen O'Kane: I know, and I'm an Irish man, so you know, I talk a lot.

Dr Rupy: I really like the way you've set out those different types of therapies there because I think that's really helpful for people to at least find a framework because it is scary. When you, when you start thinking about it, you know, I think the, the immediate reaction for me as a, as a guy as well, maybe I'm probably making a huge generalization here, but you know, it was quite scary to even admit to myself that I might need help and in that help might be in the form of a talking therapy. And I think just, just knowing what's out there, how it works, what the evidence base is, it's quite, you know, it, it, it's more intriguing. It's, it's, and it's comforting to know that there are ways in which you can engage in it.

Owen O'Kane: Every organ in the body can sometimes run into problems. You know, the heart, the kidneys, the lungs, the liver, they can all become, you know, for whatever reason, it could be pathology, it could be disease, it could be an infection. And I think we're often a bit bemused that that our minds are not functioning well all of the time, but the human mind, like every other organ in the body, may not function the way you need it to. You know, it can become tired, it can become depleted. Neuro pathways may not fire in as ordered a fashion as you need them to because of experience, because of trauma, because of hard wiring in your own story. And, and this is the thing that's really important to say actually, you know, we are not the content of our minds. And sometimes our minds do not work for us in the way we need them to. Sometimes they're firing in threat mode all of the time when they don't need to be. Sometimes there are patterns there that have just been installed, you know, whether it's family, upbringing, culture, religions, you know, that are critical, judgmental, harsh. And that doesn't define who you are. It just defines your experience. And of course, good therapy is about helping you realise you don't have to engage with all of this content. You can rewire, you can quieten the mind. You don't have to be in this threatened state all of the time. And I think what I see all of the time with people coming to therapy is they come in the door and they believe that they are all of the awfulness that goes on in their head. When actually they're not. This is just background stereo noise that plays out sometimes very loudly and creates difficulties. And I suppose really I see my work as a therapist and I'm sure most therapists would agree, what you're trying to do is to pull people back and create space between the noise and the reality. And often that, you know, it does involve work and not getting over immersed in the content so that you can create the time and space. My first book, as you know, Ten to Zen was exactly about that, how you create space in your day to turn the volume down, to create space so that you don't get over involved. And then you can reframe stuff because I know even in my own life, you know, those moments of just stopping and taking time out, they're everything. You know, if I don't meditate every day, the quality of my day is totally different. You know, my tolerance is less. You know, I'm grumpier than normal. My focus isn't as good, you know, and I know this, you know, so I just kind of think this is what excites me about therapy because you, you're given ownership back to people to say, you can take charge and you can manage this much better than you realise. And I think when people then find that, that when the negative thoughts, the critical thoughts, the judgmental thoughts come up, they have the power and the choice to say, this is not true. There is no evidence. This is just an old script that plays out over and over and over again. I'm doing a thing shortly on imposter syndrome, this panel thing that I'm doing. And I we were doing a rehearsal for it yesterday with the other people on the panel and we were talking about imposter syndrome. And you know, I was saying like, even with that, imposter syndrome is just, you know, it's just an old script that's been delivered, you know, and I often laugh about my own imposter syndrome, particularly if I'm doing big events, it will jump in and think, what are you doing here? Why are you doing this interview? How, why are you on this stage? And I've got so used to the noise and the, you know, I know what it sounds like now, which is really, really interesting. It's got a tone, you know, and it sounds very familiar. So it's about how we recognise all of this stuff and then you can pull back and think, oh, I know what that is. And then I can park it and leave it be rather than getting engrossed in it. So, um, yeah, learning to manage your mind is, you know, super important.

Dr Rupy: Totally. I mean, podcast listeners can't see this, but I'm like furiously nodding away to like everything that you're saying at the moment. And it's, uh, you know, it's definitely something that I've had experience of myself, all those different things actually, particularly ruminations based on, um, childhood, uh, perceptions of myself or what I've been told as well, like you're the academic one, you're the one who's always on time. This is, you know, you're going to be a doctor. This is how, you know, you need to act and behave and and all those different sort of labels that we put on ourselves, which on in some degree are really helpful and they add structure and other degrees, they are quite limiting and they they can be detrimental later on in life. Before we talk about all those different elements and and how you can rectify that or to use a a softer word, maybe, you know, create space like you said, so you can actually explore feelings and and and give yourself some some head space. I want to talk about your experience, uh, in palliative care. Was it your your time in the monastery that gave you that experience that that that led you to go into palliative care?

Owen O'Kane: Yeah, one of the placements in the monastery was in a hospice in Dublin and I really got a feel for the work. I really got interested in the work and I became fascinated by the, yeah, the kind of the journey people would take, you know, towards the end of their life. Not only the person, but their family. And so when I, when I left the monastery, as I was saying to you earlier, I, I was a nurse initially before retraining as a therapist, did accident and emergency for a few years. Loved the pace of that, loved the speed, the challenge, the thinking quickly, learned to think on my feet very, very quickly. And then I can remember, I didn't get bored, that's probably be the wrong impression, but I can remember becoming frustrated that the quality of care sometimes wasn't what I wanted it to be. I often felt I was firefighting and not doing enough and, and I started to get frustrated by that. And then that sort of led me to palliative care and I went that direction. And of course, I loved the work. I thought everything about it was fascinating and it was interesting. And above everything, it was a privilege. People think, oh, that must have been tough or that must have been really sad. And actually it wasn't. It was really life affirmative. But when I was doing the work clinically, I realised that most of the distress I was coming across every day, I mean, we could prescribe and do X, Y and Z at that stage. But I often discovered that people were psychologically really distressed. And I didn't feel equipped or skilled to deal with that. I could be a human being and I could do my best and I could do all the medical stuff and prescribe X, Y and Z and suggest all of these medical interventions, but the psychological distress I felt out of my depth. And that was the motivation and I thought, well, I know what I'm going to do. I'm going to go off. There was an opportunity in the trust I was working for at the time to go off and do a masters and I remember saying to them, I want to do a masters in psychology. I want to train to be a psychotherapist. And they, they blocked it. And they said, no, it's not appropriate to your discipline. I was in palliative care at the time. And the, the lead in palliative care at that time said, it's not appropriate. I mean, you need to do something medical. And I said, but I've done loads of medical stuff. I want, I believe that, you know, psychological distress is a huge part of this and I want to do my masters in psychotherapy. That's the direction I want to go. Anyway, it got rejected. And I was really disappointed. So I felt so strongly about it. I went to the head of education at the trust I was working and I said, I just don't feel this is fair. Can you give me some advice? And she said, you need to appeal it, appeal the decision. She said, but you need to come up with evidence to support why you should do this. And of course, there was a mountain of evidence out there on psychological distress and stuff. So I looked at the evidence, put together a report and I said, you know, I'm identifying a need in my practice for the patients I'm looking after and I think this is important. Anyway, it got you turned and they, they agreed. And I went off and that's what I did next. And of course, in my early days of therapy training, I was using it within a palliative care context. And that was really about helping people with a number of things really, make that adjustment from one day their life being normal to suddenly finding out that they had limited time left. You know, how they came to terms with that. Often then conversations about reflection, their life. I became fascinated by, you know, people talking about regret, things they would do differently, how they would manage their time. And I almost noticed, not with everyone, but with a vast majority of people, there was a change in perspective that you just, you know, you and I in our everyday lives or most people can't find. Whereas I often noticed with patients who were dying or were told they were dying, there was this sudden wake up awareness of actually this is what matters, this is what's important. And of course, I was then part of those stories every single day. Whereas, you know, particularly when I worked in, I worked in a hospice at one period and I remember I used to do lots of night duties and they were incredible. You'd be sat there at three o'clock in the morning with a cup of tea with someone and they would just be talking about their entire life. You know, and that was just gold dust. Those conversations at three in the morning with a cup of tea when this kind of wisdom was being given to you was powerful actually. And I remember when I, when I got the opportunity to do the books, I remember thinking, I'm not just going to write this as a therapist, I'm going to write as a human being. And a therapist, but I also want to include all of my kind of 10 years of learning in that arena from people who were dying, you know, their wisdom, because they never talk about, you know, you never hear anybody in that stage talking about how much they've earned or qualifications they had, what their status was, how big they became, how many followers they have on Instagram, you know, all of these things that we measure as successful, you would just hear conversations about people and the time away and the holidays and the things that matter to them. And I just kind of think you can't be absorbed in that world day in and day out and not be impacted by it. And I remember, I mean, there was something quite powerful about it. I would go into work some days and, you know, I'd be, I don't know, buying a flat or something or whatever I was doing at that time and I'd be stressed about the mortgage and the survey hasn't come through and all of this stuff and the dog needs to go to the vet. And I'd be getting really stressed by it all and worked up to, you know, God, it's all terrible. And then I'd go into work and you'd sit down with this young guy, 25, you know, with a month to live. And you'd be like, oh my God, I mean, just none of this matters. You know, none of it really matters the way we tell ourselves it do. So there was always, you know, I'd drive home then and my perspective had gone 300, you know, just gone in a completely different direction. And that was a privilege of the work. And I suppose I try as best I can really to weave that into, to my work clinically, you know, in practice and obviously in the books and talks and that the importance of valuing our lives really and where we prioritise and how we live and the choices we make.

Dr Rupy: It's incredible, isn't it? I've had the privilege of in my position as a general practitioner and some of the work I've done in secondary care and and more specialist care centres to work with palliative care patients. And I don't think I've had proper in-depth conversations like you might have had where, you know, you've you've had the time and you've had the space to talk about it. But there is so much that you can learn from people in the unfortunate position of having limited lifespan on actually what is important right now. Because what you just described there before you talked about the young chap who had a month to live was literally what I think about like on a weekly basis, you know, I've got to take the dog here, I've got to do this, I've got to think about mortgage, you know, I need to get a, I need to look at my salary, I need to do my accounts and all this kind of stuff. It's just constantly like constantly in your head. And I guess like what what are the the key things that, I mean, you've written about in the book, so there's quite a few, I'm sure, but what are the key things that you've learned on a personal level from your experience in palliative care that you that you try and put into practice most days?

Owen O'Kane: I think it's about, I mean, the whole, the whole time and space thing is really important for me. You know, the, it's really easy and I get it and I still do it, you know, it's a trap that we all fall into all the time. You think, God, I've got all these things to do and I've got to plan this and I've got to do that and I've got to do more. And I think it's about the ability to be able to stop and recognise when you're falling into that trap. I think it's, it's just constantly and I don't think we, most of us never really get on top of it totally. I think it's a work in progress and most of us have to constantly stop and evaluate and think, okay, I'm going that road again. I think I've also learned about values, about, I suppose doing what matters, you know, doing stuff that matters to me and not kind of been taken in a direction that I don't want to go. I think for me, in all of the work really, it has to be, if this doesn't matter to me and it doesn't feel authentic, then I can't do it. And really listening to that voice, I think it's really taught me about that, about trusting my own instinct a lot more. And the impermanence of everything really as well, just about like, I mean, the value, you know, the time and the energy we invest in believing that that we're in control and that we're here forever and that, you know, we need to be doing X, Y and Z. It's just that reminder sometimes, none of us are here forever. We're all, we're all on this kind of adventure and none of it's going to last. And that's okay because that's the nature of human life. That's the nature, that's how it's meant to be. And actually, how do we make the best of that? How do we stop getting caught up in trying to plan, predict, control everything because actually we don't have this. And I think it's, it really taught me about that. And I, I'm good at being able to spot when I'm deviating off and going to a place I don't need to be and finding a way back. And the other thing too was about people. I think it really taught me about people. I was always struck by conversations always led back to, you know, relationships, family, best friends. And I think it really now makes me think about the people, my social circle is now way smaller than it used to be when I was in my 20s and 30s. And deliberately and consciously because I think when I was younger, I felt I had to have a huge mountain and network of friends. And I think the older I get and that work taught me about, I know who my inner circle are. You know, I know who those key five, six people are. And then I know there are people almost in another outer ring. And they're great people and they're part of my life and that's it, but the relationships are not of the same quality. And then there are people out there broadly and and that's okay. And I've got much better thinking, not everyone can be in that inner circle. It's just not possible. And sometimes, and I talk about this in the book a lot, you know, sometimes people behave badly in life. You know, sometimes people do behave badly and sometimes people's behaviours can be toxic. And it's okay to step out of that and not get over invested. So I try really to surround myself with people that energise and lift me up. To help sustain me in my work. And I think that's really, really important. If I'm around people and they're angry or they're negative about the world or they're envious or any of that sort of stuff, I'm not good around people who behave that way and I can almost feel it on my skin. I've got a really good sense of when I'm around people that are not good for me. And and I think it's really taught me about surrounding myself, knowing who my tribe are, but surrounding myself with the right people. And I think a lot of my early experience reinforced that also about who you trust. So, you know, that, yeah, the lessons were absolutely invaluable. I mean, it's probably one of the biggest privileges of my life actually, that work.

Dr Rupy: Definitely, yeah. I mean, one of the things that you said there was this, this concept around control and the impermanence of life. And it's, I think it's a Buddhist concept about getting comfortable with the fact that nothing is forever, you know, nothing is infinite. And this year of all years has taught us about the impermanence of everything, whether it be your job, relationships, the current environment, etc. And getting comfortable with that is something I've struggled with personally. Like the the anxiety and the knowledge that, you know, I am going to go through bereavement and grief and all these different things. It's super, super uncomfortable. But I think it's, you know, practices and stories and and the things that you've just described there that that help us come over that.

Owen O'Kane: Yeah, I mean, it's again, the basis of human struggle, you know, an intolerance of uncertainty creates anxiety. You know, we know, we know that. That anxiety is about not being able to tolerate the not knowing. And, and of course, the last year has been all of that and more. And of course, the impermanence thing has been reinforced quite strongly as well because we've been watching lots of people die. And we've been hearing on a daily basis about lots of people dying. So I think for a lot of people over the last year, you know, the, the key fundamentals of life really that, you know, nothing is certain and nothing is permanent. You know, the basis of, you know, Buddhists talk about this a lot, but it is the key foundations of life. I think the last year has, you know, reinforced that more than ever actually for most people. And I think a lot of the kind of destabilization that we're seeing at the moment is the fact that it has really made a lot of people uncomfortable. But we can do stuff with that. You know, what I've been trying to with people I've been working with is thinking, okay, well, you know, this, this can be used as an opportunity to, to reset and to recharge and to re-evaluate. Now, not always possible and sometimes a bit tricky with all the challenges of everyday life, but I do think it offers an opportunity. I certainly have started to think about, God, how much did I take for granted before all of this? And part of me thinks I should know better. I mean, you know, I've done all this work and these different things in my life, I should know better. But then I suddenly think, my God, I did take all of that jumping on a plane and lying on a beach for a week, going to the pub, having a paint, you know, just simple things. Now I'd be like, oh my God, that would be like luxury. I mean, imagine, imagine just saying, I'm going to go down to Barcelona for a week. I mean, and I would often do that, you know, just, you know, we would just trot off for a week and say, we just take a week and lie on the beach. Now that just feels like that would just be incredible. And that I'm excited by that actually, because I do think when we evolve back into normal or more normal times, I just think there has to be a new found appreciation for all of the things that we took for granted. Absolutely. Even the simple things, sitting in a coffee shop. I mean, God, I'm writing my third book. To just to sit in a coffee shop at the minute, I mean, I would pay big money to do that. Just to sit with my laptop with a coffee and a cake and watch the world go by and do a bit of work and, you know, just because you know, probably like everyone else, you know, I'm at home a lot of the time doing stuff and my other half's at home trying to do work. And that in itself is a challenge. I mean, I'm sorry, but I'm not cut out to be with the same person seven days a week, day and night. I'm not primarily hardwired for that. And I don't think my other half is either. So that's been quite interesting to try and find corners of the house. Is there a cupboard I can hide in for the minute?

Dr Rupy: Absolutely. I, I, I wanted to talk about this actually because, um, the, the, you mentioned something about hardwiring earlier, um, and the steps that which by which we can take to, to try and rewire and, and, and, and learn new things. And, and I've heard you talk about how most of our thoughts are negatively skewed as well. And I think, you know, this year is, is, it's good in a way in that when we go back to normality, whatever that looks like, we will be a lot more appreciative. So we will learn new things and that's an exercise in rewiring, I guess. But, but how else, what what are the tools are there to, to change the stories that we tell ourselves?

Owen O'Kane: I think the first thing is you, you have to know the story. You have to be aware. So awareness is key really. And I think that's a big part of the challenge. Most people just go through their everyday life taking their patterns of thoughts, their behaviours as a norm. This is just who I am. So I hear often, people who are anxious will often say, I'm just a warrior, or people who are negative or think the worst will just say, well, that's just me. I, you know, I just think the worst about everything. So the awareness is key. Once you know, okay, this is what you do, and then the, the insight, but you can do something about that. And you can understand why you might be that way. So most people are taught how to worry, or they're taught how to think negatively, or they're taught how to undermine themselves. We don't, you know, we don't, you know, this doesn't come up as a given as a young kid. You know, young kids, we have a lot more psychological flexibility, but we learn how to become all of these things. We learn how to become more negative, more fearful. So the knowing that is really important because once you understand that it's just been a learned habit, then the liberation is the fact, well, if you've learned how to respond and think that way, well, you can actually unlearn that. And the way of unlearning that is always to look at the evidence. So for example, if you have a thought, you know, if a client comes to me and says, I just think I'm not good enough. I'll say, okay, well, you know, tell me a bit more about that. And then, you know, you'll see them scrambling for detail, but and I said, well, where's the evidence that you're not good enough? Can you concretely give me evidence that tells me that you're not a good enough human being or that you're less than other people? And then people get tongue tied because they really struggle thinking, well, not really, but and then they'll try and capture something else. And then you can bring in a different direction and you can think, well, can you think of things in your life that you can celebrate? What are you proud of? Think of things you have done, think of the adversities that you have overcome. Think of that time, and I will always find an example, the time you told me you did this, this and that. You know, that's incredible. So where within that are you not enough? And then people then stop and pull back and think, oh, actually, you have a point. And that's where you then learn to reframe because once you're aware, you can recognise the type of thoughts that are proven problematic, then you can create distance between them, see them for what they are, where's the evidence? If there isn't evidence to support it's true, well, then you can reframe it or you can make a decision to let it go. And of course, the more you do that, then you're hardwiring your brain to function and respond in a different way. So if you think of neuro pathways as being quite chaotic when the when the mind's in a dysfunctional state, what you're trying to do is you're trying to then implement new behaviours that create a more ordered state. Does that make sense? So essentially it's reprogramming, but to reprogram, you have to recognise, you have to be able to stop and you have to really find the courage to allow yourself to reframe and look at the evidence. And that can be a challenge. It doesn't come automatically, it doesn't come quickly, but with practice, and in the books I talk about it a lot, how you do that.

Dr Rupy: Exactly. Yeah. I think the the one of the key things is identifying it and then practicing it as well, because it's very easy to, you know, just say, okay, we just, just, just do this and then recognise that's it. But it's a lot of work. It's a lot of homework. And and and on that note actually, I mean, you, you told this story about meditation that made me feel very good about my own meditation regime where you've been doing it for a while, you know, I think you was a, you were a trained therapist at that point. And you did this meditation, you're already stressed and the stress day. I'll I'll let you tell the story, but it but it really, it really made me feel better about the fact that when I meditate, I feel like, you know, I've been doing this for years now and I'm no good at it.

Owen O'Kane: I know, it's pretty, it was, um, I, I was off, I was doing this really intensive course with Oxford and, um, it was learning to be a meditation, mindfulness meditation teacher. And it was hardcore actually. You'd be up, you'd be at six o'clock in the morning, you know, you'd be like going right through to 10 o'clock at night. And I went and it was great. And there were a lot of people, now I don't want this to sound in any way judgmental because I don't mean it to be, but there were a lot of people on there that I would describe as kind of professional meditators. They even looked like meditators and they had the blank, you know, the whole, the blankets and the, the kind of the shawl and the whole thing going on and incense and and, you know, had like a serene, um, loveliness about them actually. Part of me was a bit envious and I was there and I just kind of, I was there with my, my hoodie and my jeans and all of it kind of, you know, my own imposter syndrome coming in thinking, God, I'm really here with the kind of hardcore meditator lots, you know, and I had good, I had good clinical grounding behind me, but the meditation thing, I thought, God, this is, you know, I do it and I try to do it. So anyway, I had a brilliant, I mean, talk about luck, but I got a brilliant coach, a lady called Melanie Fennell and she does a lot of work in self-esteem and meditation and stuff. And I ended up having her as one of my, um, coaches basically. And so between each session and stuff, we would have an often one-to-one time with them and chatting through our experience and that. So one day we went in and we were doing this, I mean, it's ironic, God, I'm embarrassed talking about it, but it was, I think it was like loving kindness meditation or something. And we're all sat in this room and stuff and, um, we're all, it was, it was going to be 45 minutes and there was a guy beside me and he had the whole outfit going on and the guy beside me was breathing really loudly and then there was somebody making noise outside. So anyway, this beautiful loving meditation was going on and in my head the whole time, I was just irritated and angry and, you know, it was like, if he, if he doesn't stop breathing any second, I'm going to punch him. And then somebody would like bang a door and I'd be like, what's wrong with these people? So anyway, this ongoing, I mean, commentary was an understatement. So I'm there and actually by the end of it, I, this was day four of this thing and I thought, you know something, I mean, talk about feeling like a fraud. I thought, I can't do another 10 days of this. I mean, there's no way I'm going to survive this. I'm not cut out for this. I'm not a meditator. I'm kidding myself here. So anyway, I genuinely went to the, the lady who was my coach and I said to her afterwards, I'm going to go. And she said, oh, why? And I said, look, I really do feel I'm in the wrong place. I'm not here. And I said, look, I said, I'm going to be really honest. I said, let me just talk you through my loving kindness meditation. She said, okay, go ahead. And I said, well, I really did feel like punching the guy beside me because he was breathing too loudly. That woman who kept coughing, I said, I can't even tell you the names I was calling her under my breath. I said, you know, all these people with their shawls and their mats and stuff. I said, I said, they were all irritating me. I said, it was proper anger and stuff. And I said, but no, I did keep coming back to it. And then anyway, she just sat there and she said really, really quietly and she said, um, that sounds like it was a great meditation. And I looked at her and I said, I said, you're having a laugh here. And she said, no, no, no, it's great. She said, what, what were you expecting it to be? And I said, well, I thought it was going to be lovely and warm and peaceful and serene. And she said, God, no, that's not what meditation's about. Meditation's the recognition where you are and what's going on for you and the ability to spot that but keep coming back. Happens again, you recognise it, you come back. Happens again, you recognise it, you come back. She said, it doesn't matter how many times the mind goes off or an emotion comes up. It's the recognition and the ability to come back. There is where you're training your brain to quieten and there is where you're reprogramming. And that was liberating for me actually, because all of my notions about what it was to be a good meditator went out the window. And I suppose then I could show up, um, meditating and just allow things to be. And I also then realised about, you know, my own self-judgment. You know, other people are better than you. Look at him. He looks like the Dalai Lama sat there and look at you, sat here in your hoodie, in rage with everyone in the room. So it's just like all of these judgments that were coming in, um, were incredible. And of course, that awakens up everything. You think, God, I'm really beginning to understand how I tick as a human being. And that, that's the power of good meditation, I think.

Dr Rupy: I'm telling you, that story was really liberating for me because, you know, I think if we're very honest with ourselves and authentic with ourselves, when, when we meditate, whether it be the first time, whether it be the 300th time, and those things still come up, you can be very judgmental about yourself. You know, you don't look the same way, you don't, you know, you've been doing this for so long, you're, it's meant to be getting better with practice. It doesn't feel like it's going in that direction at all. I actually had a conversation with my, my, um, partner about this and she was telling me, you know, uh, I, I, I basically told her this. I was like, you know, when I'm meditating, I do this and this and this is what happens. And she's new to it. And she was like, oh my God, I thought I was the only one. I thought I was just really bad at this and I was never going to get it. So I think actually this is super important because this is the process and everyone comes at it from a different, different, you know,

Owen O'Kane: And everyone, everyone in the room will have varying degrees because our emotional states are not, you know, they're, they're fluid, they're not steady. So, you know, you cannot rock up to your meditation feeling peaceful, calm and contented every day. It's just not possible. Some days you're going to rock up angry, sometimes you're going to rock up tired, sometimes you're going to rock up feeling a bit sad or isolated or whatever the context may be. And that is the human condition. And I suppose it's one of the things that I get annoyed about in the, in the kind of self-help and the guru world, you know, you've got so many people telling us how we should be and how, you know, we, we need to be this and we need to be more of that. Actually, we just need to be more human and more compassionate. It's no more complicated than that because being human means that we're a mix of everything. And sometimes that's messy and it's imperfect. And that's absolutely fine because that's how it's meant to be. That's where we grow. Whereas we've got so many people telling us that, oh, we need to think positive all the time.

Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah. And that, that's, I think that, that's kind of where it spirals into this toxic positivity notion. And I, we were chatting just before we started recording about my, my colleague who's a consultant psychiatrist. And while she's a big fan of, um, you know, mental health becoming a little bit more, uh, we're all becoming a bit more aware of mental health and the ability to reach out and the need to talk about it. It's kind of starting to get a veneer that's similar to clean eating where everything has to look a certain way or be a certain way. It's a certain shade of colour on a beautifully created social media platform. And that's not the reality that she sees. You know, she sees a complete different perspective. And I think it's really important to, to remember that. It's, it's not,

Owen O'Kane: It's a really, it's a brilliant point actually, because I think we need to, we need to stop trying to tidy up mental health. You know, because it's, it's, you know, I get a bit, you know, I get a bit frustrated when I hear that, you know, one in four people and all of this stuff. You know, and I can understand why those figures are out there, but if you look at it practically and realistically, it's four in four people. If you have a, you have your brain in the top of your head, you have mental health because that brain produces thoughts and sometimes those thoughts are unpleasant and uncomfortable and they're difficult. So we all have mental health. We all, but it fluctuates. One day we might feel a bit more anxious than normal. One day we might feel a bit flat or a bit lower or a bit demotivated. And that is part of the human condition. And I think sometimes there's a danger that that we over pathologize and we over label people. Now, sometimes, don't get me wrong, there are times when a diagnosis is important. If someone's got a very complex disorder that needs specific medication and treatment, there is a, there is a time and a place for it. But I think we need to kind of stop labelling the, the kind of the ordinariness and the humanity of the fact is sometimes we all struggle. Yeah, yeah. Rather than making it, you know, you're right when you know, the kind of trying to make it flashy or clever hashtags and stuff and you just think, no, no, this is just a part of being human. And we all need to get better at just about one, having the conversations, but two, accepting sometimes the untidiness of it and what it can teach us because we're all looking the, you know, we all want the feel good stuff, don't we? You see this on Instagram all the time. We all want to feel happy, we all want to feel positive, we want to feel strong, we want to feel resilient. But you've got all of these other emotions and you look ironically, my book's called Ten Times Happier. So, you know, this might sound ironic coming from someone who's written a book on happiness, but as you know from the content of the book, happiness is also about getting really comfortable with the other stuff. So all of these other emotions, sadness, fear, anxiety, rejection, disappointment, loneliness, they're all there for a reason. They can be used really effectively if you allow yourself to lean into the emotions and not be frightened of them and see what they're trying to teach you because I believe every emotion has a function. And often our emotions are just trying to get us back to a point of stability. But what we do a lot of the time is we push down the dark stuff, thinking I don't like this, it doesn't feel good, can I get rid of it? And then we try and we latch on to the good stuff, but I think if that's all life is, then we just lose all this other material, all these other experiences that are there to help us. And I think this is what my worry around mental health that there's this drive to try and get us all positive and motivated and on top of the world all of the time. But actually no, because, you know, particularly young kids and stuff and teenagers and younger adults growing up, we need to learn that sometimes life doesn't go to plan. Sometimes things don't work out. Sometimes things go wrong. Sometimes we're lonely, sometimes we're a bit sad. And learn how to navigate those emotions and let them teach us. And I think this is what we need to get better at. You know, we need to stop trying to tidy it on place, sprinkle fairy dust over it all. You know what I mean? And that's where, you know, that's where the grumpy old man and me does come out. In a warranted way, in a warranted way, but I do think, yeah, that that conversation has to happen.

Dr Rupy: One of those emotions actually that you dedicate a whole chapter to in the book is worry. And I think in this, in this age where we're constantly being bombarded with, um, news, and it's a great thing that I'm more aware of things going across the world, whether it be racial injustice, atrocities, um, something that's affecting my own sort of, uh, background at the moment in, in, um, India where there's farmers protests going on, some of the biggest in the world right now. There's this constant worry, right? You have this constant worry of things outside of your control as well as things inside your control, like, you know, mortgages, where you're going to send your kids to school, are you going to have to move out? What's going to happen with my job in COVID? You mentioned something in the book that I thought was super powerful just to understand about how we're almost addicted to worry. It's almost something that we're drawn to in a way. It makes us, in, in some cases, it makes us feel a little bit more whole that we've got something to, to do, to think about, you know?

Owen O'Kane: I mean, there actually, there are theories and this, it's a very normal and intuitive sense to have to, to start to develop really positive beliefs about worry, where we can tell ourselves that to worry is a good thing because if I worry, it will prevent harm, it will stop something go wrong, and it will make me feel like I'm in control. So very often when I'm working with somebody who struggles with anxiety and worry, often what they'll do is they will list a number of things that they're worried about and they will over engage with the worry. And obviously build it up and and when you then start to explore that with them, you say, well, what what value does that have? And in that moment, short term, it gives them a sense of control. So of course, the human mind at the time, that kind of threat system on the right hand side of the brain, the amygdala, when it's over activated, it will of course help produce a lot of content. So in psychology terms, we call it metacognitions, many thoughts. And worries are like building a snowball. One will start, God, what if I lose my job? What would happen then? Will I lose my home? What if I'm not able to pay the mortgage? What if I can't feed the kids? It just goes on and on and on until suddenly it starts to become catastrophic. And what we realise from all of the research and science is that the majority of 90% of worries don't come to anything. You know, and that's clinically researched and evidence. That's not saying that, sometimes, you know, if you were poorly and there was something significant going on, it's normal to worry about that or if a member of your family was ill, we're not saying that you can never, you know, worry shouldn't be there. Of course, there are times when worry is going to have a useful function, but it's the times when you over invest in worry and more importantly for me is when it's starting to get in the way of your life because worry comes with a depletion in mood. And it's exhausting and it's debilitating and and it creates all sorts of secondary problems. And I think when, when I weigh it up with people when I'm working with them, you think, okay, all of this time and energy is going into these worries. Okay, well, let's look at the time and energy that you've spent over the last five years. You know, give me your top 10 worries over the last five years. And then I'll say to them, was any of that time necessary or warranted? And most people will say, no, it was wasted time and energy because the catastrophes didn't happen in the way they thought they would. So it's that kind of weighing up thinking, okay, well, if you're going to invest in worry as a positive thing, you need to then also be mindful that it comes with a price tag. And are you willing to be exhausted, you know, frustrated, tired, you know, sad, demotivated, overwhelmed? Are you willing to pay that price to try and hold on to some control? So then it becomes about a negotiation of, okay, well, what would it be like to start dropping these worries and start to drop the behaviours that because often with it then come, we we talk about safety behaviours in psychology. People develop safety behaviours that they think make them, you know, short term make them feel better. If I worry more, it might stop it happening. If I check this 20 times today, then maybe I, I can then be absolutely sure. Maybe if I avoid doing X, Y and Z, then it won't happen. So these are all safety behaviours and when people over invest in safety behaviours, what they do is short term, they feel a little bit better, longer term, they end up more anxious. So you're working on dropping these safety behaviours. So essentially worry is about letting go of trying to control everything, which is hard and really difficult, but it's doable. And the liberation that comes with being able to let those worries go and the freedom that comes with that, you know, you can't question that.

Dr Rupy: I I wonder if um, given that, you know, our our brain is geared towards negativity, um, and perhaps the tasks and collecting those tasks of of worry, um, whether that's, whether that's all connected in in a way that could be, um, rectified using a tool like journaling where you, where you, where you expressively write, where you, you know, you just write down your worries and then you and you look at them and then you assess them. Is is that a tool that you use in practice?

Owen O'Kane: Yeah, the evidence is good. I mean, you, you know, we're talking about primal hard wiring. So you've got about 80,000 thoughts per day roughly. That's the kind of, that's the numbers. And, you know, the neuroscientists tell us about 60% of those are either fearful or negative in nature. And that's kind of how we've been, you know, that's primarily we're going back to Neanderthal times, we're kind of, you know, we're primed to, to be on the lookout for problems. But we're much more sophisticated in every way, shape and form. So our, you know, our brains have evolved, our language has evolved, and we have evolved, but actually the brain will still produce content that may have been appropriate back in the Neanderthal. So we don't need to be as guarded as we were, but the brain will still function that way where it will create content that's quite difficult. And with worry, for example, one technique you can do is a thing called worry time. And that is if you're somebody who worries a lot, you, you make a decision that if worries pop into your day, you make a decision that they're not for now. So, you know, if I'm doing worry time with someone, people normally do it like 7, 8 o'clock in the evening. So if a worry popped in now, oh, God, I haven't, um, I haven't got enough money this month or I haven't got enough gigs booked in or whatever the context may be. The moment you notice the worry, you think, okay, not for now. I'll bring it to worry time later. So you're not, you're not disowning the worry or you're not pushing it away. You're saying, I know you're there and I hear you, but we're just not going to go there at the moment. So you park it. And then the fascinating thing and the really entertaining thing, I used to do worry groups in the NHS where I'd have like 12, 16 people in the group and once people got to know each other and the banter started to move into the group, you would be doing these kind of worry time stuff with people and you'd often have good laugh in the group when people would say, God, you know what's happening to me now when I get to worry time, I've forgotten what I'm worried about. And they're like really annoyed. I've got, I've got nothing, you know, I've got no worries because I've forgotten them all. And then you think, well, there you go, they can't have been that important. Exactly. But if you think about how our day gets derailed, if we then decide to start engaging with it. And I think then if you get to worry time, you can get down a few worries do come up. What I'll say to people is, okay, list the top five that are really bothering you today. You know, the things that are really on your mind. People do that. And then you stop and you evaluate and say, okay, is there one of those worries that you can do anything about today? Is there any of those worries that are within your control? And most people will say, yeah, maybe one of them. I say, okay, well, what, what about making that a focus and whatever actions you can take today that give you a sense of control around dealing with that, you do that because then you're not avoiding your worries. These other four or five, six, whatever they are, that you've got zero control over today, you're acknowledging that they're there, but what you're going to do is you're going to park them because you haven't got the power or the control to deal with those today. So then suddenly the person goes from having a mountain of worries spinning at one time to then suddenly feeling they've got the permission to say, okay, well, this is not for now and I can't manage this at the moment and I don't need to manage this at the moment, but I'll focus on the one thing that I can, that I do have control over. So then suddenly overwhelm begins to drop off because most people want to try and manage them all at one time because that's, that's human nature to try and keep control. So, I mean, it's a powerful mechanism.

Dr Rupy: Definitely. It's so funny you say that about how your whole day can be derailed by a worry or thought system because now that we're in front of our computers most of the time, you know, we can just Google what we're worried about straight away. Like, oh, you know, whether it's accounts or finances or job or or children's schools or whatever, you just Google it straight away and then straight away you are derailed and to the next worry. And that whole, I, I first learned about, um, scheduling your anxiety from Mo Gawdat, who, uh, who's been studying happiness now for the last, I've, I've read his book, Solve for Happy. It's a lovely book. He's a lovely book. Yeah. I'll have to connect you. Yeah, yeah. He's brilliant. Yeah. He's a wonderful human being as well. And he told me about scheduling, one of his colleagues, I think, she's like, oh yeah, I, I don't do anxiety. I just schedule it. Like whenever it comes up during the pandemic or whatever, I just schedule my worry. You know, I don't look at the news until this time and that's it. I don't really think about it. Um, but yeah, that, that's, that's interesting that it's come up again. It's brilliant.

Owen O'Kane: And it's actually clinically, it's quite a powerful tool actually. I should say any of these techniques or tips I'm talking about today, they're all clinically evidenced. I mean, because I often think with psychology, you know, you can imagine a listener thinking, do they just make this up as they're going along? Do they just sit and think, okay, what, what about trying this today? I mean, most, I think that's what's so validating about your work as well is because you do have that, that sincere, authentic experience with patients.

Dr Rupy: You see it work clinically, you see it work in the room with somebody, but actually, you know, the great thing, particularly around cognitive behavioural therapies is, you know, there's been a lot of time and energy invested in in research. So then we begin to look and we begin to understand human behaviour a lot better and we think, okay, what we know from the research and some of them are pretty decent studies, you know, particularly around mindfulness and the neuroscience and the mind and how it works. Some of those studies are pretty impressive. When you look and you think, okay, you can't really argue with that evidence because when they're presenting data on MRI scans that show you significant changes in the brain, you think there's nowhere to go with that. I mean, this is pretty concrete evidence. So I think that's what gives me confidence in my work really because there's often a lot of research to back up what we're saying, but obviously in, in clinical practice when you see it come to life and you know time and time again, this works for most people, there's power in that because you can use that well. My job is to convince people, you know, to invest in these things that I think can be incredibly helpful for their lives.

Owen O'Kane: Yeah. What, what's your relationship like with, um, social media?

Dr Rupy: Oh, that's a good question. I mean, you should ask Bev James about that one. Bev is, you know, is my, my manager and agent with the books and stuff. And when, when we met and I was doing my first book, um, she said to me, um, what are you like on social media? And I said, well, what, what do you, I said, well, I've got a Facebook account. Is that what you mean? So I mean, Instagram, I mean, this, we're talking two years ago here, so this, this will just give you a context of where I was at. And she said, she was started talking about something and she was going on about hashtags because my book was coming out. She said, so you need to be hashtag. And I said, just before you go on, I'm going to stop you. And I said, what is this hashtag? I said, is that another thing or what is it? She's like, do you not know what a hashtag is? I said, no. She was horrified. So Bev is laughing. You know, she'll be working with all these other clients who have all these big Instagram accounts. She's like, I think you better get on Instagram. I said, okay, so I'll do it. So the interesting thing for me about Instagram, so I went on literally, um, brand new to the whole arena, no clue, literally what to do or where to go with it. Now it's been fascinating for me because, you know, there's, I think over 20k followers on there at a minute and I had zero experience and I mean zero experience on what to do or what the audience was like. And what I do on there is I just try and put out content that I think may resonate with people and help them. And I work with the premise, look, if I whack out a video and 10 people watch it, and one or two of them get benefit from it, then I've done my job. I try and think less about numbers or broad reach. I just kind of think if it touches one or two people, it's done, done its job. What, what I, what I've discovered, I find Instagram quite a warm place to be. I genuinely don't get a lot of hassle on Instagram. I find it warm, I find it interesting. I, I, I find there's a lot of energy goes into making it happy and, you know, it's glossy, isn't it? And I think that, that can come with its challenges because that isn't the real world for most of us. I think the version of life that you see on Instagram for most people isn't the reality. And I think it's always important because I, you know, you can do it sometimes, can't you? You can go on there and you think, God, they're having a great old time. Oh, massively. I mean, I think one of, yeah, one of your chapters is comparison is the thief of joy. They're having a great old time and stuff or, my God, I mean, they've got like 200,000 followers and they've got like two posts. And then you suddenly realise people buy followers and then you suddenly realise there's this whole other world around. So I'm always very conscious that what you see and what you get are two very different things. I find Twitter a very different experience. I mean, I think I find Twitter generally cold. I don't feel comfortable on Twitter if I'm being entirely honest. I find it, I go on to it sometimes and I think I was saying to you earlier, I had a bit of a troll episode last week on it. I just done a TV interview and I had a bit of a troll from a couple of professionals interestingly, who, you know, slagged off my work and what I was doing, you know, with no real credibility or kudos behind what they were saying, but I just find that really interesting that no matter who you are on a, on a platform like Twitter, there will always, always, always be people who are out to give you a hard time or to undermine you or to try and demoralize you or, and I just think that's toxic. And look, the documentaries this week, you know, um, there was a Caroline Flack documentary and the other documentary with, um, Roman Kemp talked about his friend's suicide. And they both documentaries both covered social media and the negative impact it can have. And I think it, look, I know this has been said a hundred times, but social media allows people to behave badly. You know, and my premise is, if you would not say this to another person's face, then you do not make the comment. If you don't have the courage to say that to the individual, do not bother putting it out, you know, onto your forum or onto your thread. So I think, you know, look, there are people, you know, I'm, you're doing great stuff on there. You're trying to educate people, you're trying to support them, you're using your experience with nutrition to try and enrich people's lives. There are forums there that are incredible and they're useful and they're powerful. So that excites me that many people are using the platform well. I think the flip side and the dark side of the coin is there are also people who manipulate it and abuse it and use it as a means to vent and spill out their own anger and frustration. And that sadly causes damage for a lot of people. And I think we all need to get much, much better at calling people out on their behaviour.

Dr Rupy: Yeah, definitely. You know, it hurts somewhat more when it's coming from a professional. It kind of cuts a bit deeper. I mean, I've had my own experience with this a couple of times online and whether it comes from a place of envy, jealousy, or I can't explain it, particularly when it's a purposeful misinterpretation of your work and, you know, your description of your event was after you just did a big TV event, you know, and it's, oh, all of a sudden, you're, you're, you're not a genuine psychologist, a professional. What happened prior to that? You know, there's clearly some element of jealousy there. So, but, but, but still it does, it does cut you. And even now, I, even though it's been so long for me since I've had some negative comments that I felt really deeply about it, I still think about it with a lot of resentment.

Owen O'Kane: Yeah, I think it's about, I mean, it is a part of disengaging and not, you know, the moment you, the moment you engage with it, then that's the, that, that's, you know, you might as well forget about it then because it's just like that, you're, that's fuel to the fire, isn't it? And I just kind of think, but you know, it's always about coming back to, I have this with every aspect of what I do and every aspect of my work is just about coming back to that really simple question. You know, do I know why I'm doing what I'm doing? And I do know that. Do I believe in what I'm doing? And I do. And they're the, that's two questions I ask myself every time I'm doing a gig or I'm asked to do something or I'm engaging in something, you know, do I believe in what I'm doing? And do I believe this matters? If I can go there and answer yes to those questions, then I'm happy to go ahead. And anything else that goes on, whether that's a criticism or a judgment or an opinion, then it's noise. And, and sometimes I'm open to that. If someone gives me constructive feedback and they disagree with me or they have a, that's absolutely fine. I'm well open to that. If someone comes in and tells me that I'm a twat and I don't know what I'm doing, and they've never met me or they've never spoken to me, or this guy's an idiot or, you know, I won't use expletives, but I've been called a few things along the way. But you'll know this from working in A&E. I think I've been called every name there is. When you do a stint in A&E for a number of years, I mean, I've heard it all before, you know, there's nothing I haven't been called. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. It gives you a, it gives you a bit of armour, I think sometimes. Obviously, it's a bit of a thick skin, doesn't it?

Dr Rupy: Definitely, definitely, yeah. I mean, I've only been a doctor now for about 12 years, so I've still got a few, few more experiences to be had, but even my relatively short experience has given me some insight into just dealing with that kind of behaviour. But you know, when it's online, it's, um, it's a different sort of, it's a different feel because, you know, it's, you can't excuse it because they're not sober or, um, all the other things that would happen in an A&E setting.

Owen O'Kane: I mean, I think somewhere down the line, they will have to get better at regulating it. I mean, I think there's, I mean, I don't know how far off we are, but you, you would imagine there must be a point we get to when people are being toxic and they're being deliberately, you know, horrible to another human being. There must, there must come a point, I think, that we were able to, you know, have a regulator of some description that can say, no, inappropriate. Now, I believe in freedom of speech. I really believe in freedom of speech and I believe in opinions, but what I don't believe in is annihilating another human being, whatever the context. That I don't believe in. And I think this argument around freedom of speech becomes an excuse in some ways to promote bad behaviour because freedom of speech, you can have an opinion, it can be done respectfully and it's, it's given take and it's the ability to listen. If you want freedom of speech, then you also have to have the freedom to listen. It has to cut, it has to cut both ways. It has to. And if it doesn't, then it's not, you know, there's, there's no point in it. Everything has to be about dialogue and the ability to listen. So I do feel sometimes when I hear that argument used, well, it's just freedom of speech. If it's being toxic or nasty or just basically annihilating someone else, you think that's a poor excuse for bad behaviour. And I think we, we, we all have to get better, not only at challenging that, but naming it when we see it.

Dr Rupy: Yeah, absolutely. I totally agree. Absolutely agree. Owen, this has been brilliant. I, I love your work. Honestly, I really encourage you to keep up with the social media despite any odd comments you might come across.

Owen O'Kane: Oh no, I do and I will continue just to use, use the platform as best I can, you know, that's,

Dr Rupy: Yeah, and you've got a great audience that's growing and I'm sure it's going to, you know, skyrocket. Not that that's validating or anything because, you know, even if, actually, I remember you telling a story about, um, somebody who reached out to you, uh, privately messaged you after doing a video.

Owen O'Kane: This was, yeah, this was, this was really back in the, the very early days of Instagram actually, and, um, there's a very long, I won't go into the details about that, but there was a long journey getting me onto camera with Instagram. So to give you context, my first ever video took me a day to shoot and it's, it's, it's about a minute. So, I mean, talk about, I mean, I didn't realise about myself. I've been used to teaching and stuff over the years in the NHS and doing talks, but I've never really done, prior to the books, I haven't done any radio or TV or any of this sort of stuff. I was completely new to it. And I thought, oh, this will be, I think I'll be able to do it, but I didn't realise that when it comes to sitting down in front of a camera, that at that point that something in my brain didn't function well. I, I would freeze, literally. And like, my other half is a television producer and say, what is going on with you? I mean, we know you. So, um, yeah, I would, I would get all fixated on the camera. I just, I really got in, into my, you know, I really couldn't get out of my head with this camera thing. And I had to really work hard at just literally forgetting it was there and just thinking, I'm just talking to someone. And that took a good few months. And then when it got there, I, I've been able to relax around it. But I, I did a video one day and I was feeling a bit exposed and the book was out and the book was doing great and I was doing articles and stuff and I was doing Instagram, but I was still a bit conflicted about being on Instagram and all of this and I wasn't quite sure where I landed with it. And one day I, I'd put a video on about managing mood and someone messaged me privately and they had said, um, I just want to say thank you. I watched your video earlier. And I said, lovely. And he said, I was about to kill myself. I had plans and I had, it was set up and I was going to my garage and he was able to outline what he was going to do. And he said, something you said in the video made me stop and it's made me feel that I can maybe get help. And he went and he told his wife and his wife brought him to GP and the GP put him on antidepressants and they had referred him in for therapy. And it was literally a line in the video that made him stop and think and get help. So in that moment, I remember when I read that message and I thought, there is value in this. There's value in this. I need to, I need to step out of my own worries about what it looks like or how it sounds or is it okay? Like actually it doesn't matter, none of it matters. It is okay because it's helped this guy today. And that, that changed everything actually. I just stopped thinking about the rights and the wrongs or whether I should be doing it or I shouldn't be doing it. If it stopped, if it made him get help and stopped him killing himself that day, then it was worth doing. And I think that's the power of all of these platforms for all of us really. I mean, you just never know. And I think even with the books sometimes, when I sit down and I'm writing the books, one sentence can be a pivotal turning point for someone or one interview, it can just be a thought or something that someone identifies with and think, oh my God, this is me. And I didn't think that other people had this or I didn't think other people had these thoughts or whatever the context may be. And then suddenly you've normalized humanity. And that suddenly makes it all a bit easier for people. And I think this is the, for me really the the joy of this work is that you never ever know where something's going to land or why it's landing or where it is, but I think if you just treat it all with equal importance, the big gigs, the smaller gigs, the smaller articles, the big books, it doesn't matter because you don't know where the content's going to land. And that's how I approach it.

Dr Rupy: I totally agree with that. I really do. And you know, it reminds me of something my mom said to me the other day. Um, I just done a live TV stuff and, um, it all went fine, but I remember saying to her like, I was a bit nervous before. And she was like, well, you didn't look nervous. And I was like, yeah, but I felt nervous. She was like, just, just remember, when you are nervous, that's just your ego because your work is to educate others and try and help other people. You're just the vessel for the information. So it doesn't matter about what you look like or how you feel that you look like. It what matters is the fact that you're getting your information across and just remember that. And I find that was really comforting and I think it, it mirrors somewhat with your story in that, you know, you're embarrassed to put this video out, but that video is super powerful.

Owen O'Kane: Of course it is. And and and it's easy to forget sometimes why things are important and why we do what we do. Even when, you know, when we're doing these interviews and we're chatting and stuff, you know, it's a, it's a public forum. People are listening to the conversation. So I often feel, you know, I have a duty and a responsibility to, to just, you know, I suppose essentially you give out what you're, you give out your experience, your wisdom, your insight, call it whatever you want, or the things that you've seen work with lots of other people. And I think, you know, I want to give that out because I think that's, we all have an obligation to do that, you know, if I've seen something work or I've had an experience, then I think, okay, we'll pass that on. And then hopefully the person listening to it, passes it on. And and that we, we all do that. I love your mom's analogy about the anxiety. What I try and do is when it happens to me is I try and think, okay, I'm anxious because I care. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that really helps me, you know, if I, if I'm getting a bit worked up about something and I'm a bit anxious, I don't think I ever go on to any interview not feeling slightly anxious about it ever. Podcast, radio interview, just having a briefing call about something I'm about to do. There's always some degree of, oh, but actually I've got much better thinking, that's all right. Absolutely okay because I'm, you know, if I get a bit anxious about it, it's because I care about what I do. And then I can use it well rather than get held back by it, you know, and I think,

Dr Rupy: Absolutely. It means you care. It means you care. Owen, this has been fantastic. Thank you so much, mate.