>> Hi, I'm Lewis Howes, New York Times best-selling author and entrepreneur, and welcome to "The School of Greatness," where we interview the most influential minds and leaders in the world to inspire you to live your best life today.

And in this episode, we sit down with Nicole LePera, number-1 New York Times best-selling author and clinical psychologist.

And today, she shares how we can heal ourselves, overcome stress and anxiety, and change the beliefs that may be holding us back.

I'm so glad you're here today, so let's dive in and let the class begin.

♪ >> I'm a believer that most of us have some degree of a traumatic experience in our past.

I'm a big believer in expanding the definition of trauma beyond the big "T," the way we typically think about it.

>> It doesn't need to be a physical trauma.

It can be emotional, psychological.

>> Oftentimes, it's emotional.

It's interpersonal.

It's not feeling seen, not feeling loved, not feeling accepted as the authentic being that we are by, typically, our earliest relationships -- our caregivers, our schools, our things like that.

>> Our best friends or whatever, yeah.

>> Yeah.

So, expanding trauma -- I mean, I throw the net quite wide.

Like, I really have yet to meet people that don't tick some of the boxes that are, in my opinion, traumatic experiences.

>> What's the greatest trauma most people face or feel right now?

>> I think not feeling significant, not feeling authentic in themselves, which began not feeling seen and authentic as being a separate being in their earliest relationships.

I think we all carry a version of that.

>> Really?

>> 'Cause it's incredibly difficult for a human to show up for another human, an infant, their infant, 'cause of the -- We're modeling things, directly, indirectly.

So any conflicts, any struggles, any imbalances, any conditionings that's not so positive that caregivers, that parents, you know, have struggled with probably is gonna be modeled in the exact same way.

And this is where intergenerational patterns happen.

If you look back in your families, you'll see the same sort of patterns, you know, as you start to become conscious and as you start to observe these.

>> Your parents and their parents did this to them, and their parents did this to them.

>> Right.

And if you really want to go into the physiological layer that we're talking about now, I mean, you were grown -- right?

-- as a baby, as an embryo in a body, right?

So that human's body that's housing this little developing fetus is, in some version, a physical regulation or disregulation, right?

So, if you really want to go back, you know, these imbalances are affecting you in development.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> So then you come out, and your body and how it functions is affected by the food you eat, by the choices you make in terms of how much sleep you get.

How do you handle stress?

Essentially what you do all day is gonna affect whether your body is regulated or not.

>> So you have to heal the body first?

Is that what I'm hearing?

>> You have to engage in a process, 'cause this is long term.

We don't make one change again overnight, and our body doesn't -- >> It could take decades to fully -- >> It could take a long time.

I mean, I've been on the healing journey for some time and I'm still releasing areas of inflammation that I'm carrying in my body.

My digestion is still working its way out from a lifetime of digestive issues related to -- >> This tension and stress.

>> Yes, yes.

And I'm years in.

You know, it got significantly better, you know, along the way, but start by healing the body.

And, definitely, if you're out there and you're listening and you have nervous-system disregulation, if you always feel on edge and in that fight or flight, if you've heard that you have adrenal fatigue -- now we have a medical diagnosis for it -- you need to be adding some version of -- whether it's breath work or some version of nervous-system regulation, 'cause that's gonna give you the balance or some foundation to then be able to dive in and create deeper change.

>> Okay.

So, the bottom of the pyramid is the body.

>> The body.

Look at the choices you're making around your lifestyle, how you care for your body.

Is there any things that you can add, change, decrease?

And also look at your nervous system and -- I do a daily practice of breath work still, and I will always do it.

>> I just think it's a no-brainer.

I think there's so many apps and programs and experts out there teaching it because it works.

It's helping, and it's powerful, and people have been doing meditation and breath work for thousands of years because it keeps them grounded, centered, calm, and not in a stressful environment.

So, bodies first, and then what's after that?

>> Some moving up then to the mind.

>> The mind.

>> And developing consciousness, creating -- For a lot of us, it means creating the distance from our thoughts, based in the reality that none of us are our thoughts.

>> Mm.

>> We believe we are.

We believe we're our thoughts.

We believe we're the story that we've told ourselves about who we are.

This is my narrative.

That's all created.

It's all created by our past conditioning.

So, even the who we think we are is not the who that we are.

Those are patterns of thinking in our head.

Those are stories that our ego is telling us all day long, about who we are compared to who other people are.

Who we are is the awareness that sits behind our thoughts.

So, this is what this kind of tier of thinking mind work is to first create that separation.

I suggest doing it in a meditation practice.

>> Yeah.

>> Our goal is to do it all day long, but when we're sitting and we're quiet, even if we're meditating for one minute, which is definitely the amount of minutes that I suggest a new meditator to meditate for, because it's a long time.

This is difficult.

For some of us, it's the first time we're tuning in to our internal world.

It's not always comfortable in there.

A lot of us like to run away from it.

A lot of us spend a lot of our day running away from it.

So, once we learn how to observe our thoughts -- So by closing our eyes, by sitting in a quiet room, thoughts are gonna come.

That gives you the first experience of being separate, 'cause who's watching them?

You're who's watching them.

The goal, though is to build the bridge and to do that all day long, but it doesn't come over night.

Once we become an observer of our thoughts throughout our day, then we get to do the deeper work that I'm always talking about of the ego and the inner child, 'cause you're gonna start to see the very repetitive patterns in your thinking that are causing you to then have very repetitive consistent feelings in your body which are physiological.

That's why they're real, too.

When we're stuck in consistent feelings, you know, it feels very invalidating to have people to say, "Well, just stop feeling like that."

>> Right.

>> I can't because -- >> I've been one to blame myself.

I was doing that to people in the past, too.

>> Yeah.

>> Until your really, like, go through this process, you can start to have empathy and compassion for everyone's journey.

>> Quite literally, we get stuck in feelings.

Feelings are physiological events in our body.

They become familiar.

So my story about me in fight or flight, my most frequently visited motion was stress, was chaos.

>> Yeah.

Every day.

>> If you would be talking to me, Lewis, I would say all I want in life -- I'm a hippie at heart.

I just want to throw peace signs.

Peace and freedom.

That's all I want, right?

But the second I would find myself what could be experienced as a moment of peace or freedom -- you know, maybe I'm sitting quietly somewhere -- that was so uncomfortable.

>> Stressful for you.

>> Really?

>> It was uncomfortable.

My body registered it as unfamiliar.

You're not used to this.

So, then -- No one was around.

I would start to worry about the thing yesterday that happened or maybe tomorrow, right?

So, now I'm creating a change in my body 'cause the more I think a stressful thought, the more I release stress hormones, right?

And now my body's back into that zone of comfort.

It loves being stressed.

It's what it knows.

>> Right.

>> If a person was around me -- This is where it gets really fun and complicated, bringing our relationships into the picture.

If a person was around me, watch out because before I knew it, if I was in that unfamiliar peaceful space, I might agitate the situation.

Before you know it, I might be picking a bit of a fight with my partner or whoever is around me.

>> Why are you doing this?

>> Increased the stress, back to my zone of comfort.

That's how I'm used to feeling.

So, that's back to that concept of stuck.

We're stuck because we're subconsciously stuck in our familiarized comfort zone, even though that's not the place it's -- or those aren't the behaviors, those aren't the thoughts, those aren't the ways that we're gonna feel to get us the life that we want, but that's what's familiar to us.

>> Wow.

Okay.

>> So, the more you practice self-observation, the more you get to see yourself living -- also very uncomfortable.

This is uncomfortable work.

>> And you get to reflect and say, "Okay.

You know, on a scale on 1 to 10, how traumatic was that feeling all day?

Or how stressed out was I?

I was an 8 all day.

Okay.

Why were you an 8?"

>> Mm-hmm.

>> What would it take to drop it 2 points," or whatever.

This is how I think.

>> What do you imagine would happen if you dropped it.

>> Yes.

What could you create in your life.

>> Yes.

But also negative.

>> How would your relationships be.

>> Some of us get caught in a negative feeling, as counterintuitive as this might sound, in fear of what life would be like without.

>> Right, and fear of the good things happening.

>> Yes.

It's very complicated.

>> Why are so many people afraid of more good things happening to them.

Do they think they're not worthy or deserving of it?

>> What did you ask me when we first started, right?

What is the trauma -- the most prolific trauma?

Not being seen, heard, feeling enough as a child.

>> Wow.

So if we have a deep-rooted feeling of not enough or not worthy -- Those are the two frequent iterations -- >> Why should good things come to us.

>> Why should they come to us?

>> Wow!

>> And it doesn't matter if logically you really want that good thing.

If subconsciously, you're an unworthy human being, you're not gonna get it.

>> So how do we come to a place of worthiness, or truly feeling and knowing we are enough and we are deserving of goodness in our life?

>> I usually do it in a two-fold process 'cause I think the first layer of the process is observing all the times you're telling yourself you're not enough all day.

>> Replace that.

Replace it.

>> Yeah, but you can't stop that, so I want to just acknowledge that 'cause this is another moment we can become very shameful, frustrated.

>> Beat yourself up, yeah.

>> Why is this still here?

I know it's there.

Turn it off.

Nope.

So, I observe it being there.

>> Yep.

>> But I don't -- You said something important earlier.

I don't spend that much time in it.

>> Yeah.

Few moments, move on.

>> Subconsciously.

I'm gonna state a fact.

Feelings have an end.

They come and they go.

We do not allow them to go because I say we bring them up to our mental world -- >> And hold on to them, yeah.

>> So, if you then repeat -- So if that thing happens in your environment and your subconscious offers you that the reason that that thing happened is because you're a loser, which it probably still will do, you can still subconsciously say, oh, thank you, subconscious.

Thank you for reminding me of that, but I'm not gonna -- That's not how I am.

That's not who I am.

So I can now remove my attention, put it anywhere else.

What am I doing?

Maybe I put my attention on my breathe.

Just get out of that script.

Stop repeating it to yourself, to simplify it.

>> Mm-hmm.

Chance the script.

>> That's the difference between it going.

So using your language of changing the script.

Or just removing your attention from your thinking mind.

Ground yourself in your body.

>> Breathe.

>> Feel the room you're in.

Do those deep belly breathes.

Go for a walk and pay attention to your legs walking, as simple as that sounds.

Get out of your mind.

Because the more time you spend repeating, "I'm a loser, I'm a loser, I'm a loser," now you are gonna carry that feeling home.

>> You are that.

>> You might carry it into next week.

Some of us have lived in past feelings that originated decades ago.

So, if I had something loser happen to me at lunch, I'm probably gonna find the loser thing that happened to me at dinner and right before bed, and again, I could really start a snowball rolling down a mountain in a not helpful way.

>> The first thing is observe it.

>> Observe it.

>> What's the next thing?

>> Remove the focus from it.

>> Remove focus.

>> Without judgement.

And then this is where affirmation work can happen.

Right?

If we want to start -- >> Replace it with something positive or... >> First we want to decrease the amount of time and the fallout of negative thinking that a lot of us have been overpracticed.

And then we can become impactful if you are someone who -- I mean, affirmation is what they are, simply, and new thought.

So then if you do start to practice telling yourself that, "I am worthy," that might -- You might have a chance over time of actually believing that.

And then you might have a chance over time of actually seeing instances in your environment of your worthiness.

>> Yes.

>> But that doesn't work, and this is why, in my opinion, affirmation work in and of itself is kind of called woo-woo, and a lot of people become frustrated, and it doesn't work, and it won't because if you do -- Maybe you have a morning routine where you tell yourself some beautiful affirmations.

If for the rest of your day, as a lot of us are, you're back in your subconscious and you're not practicing consciousness, the rest of the day, your subconscious might be reminding you of how not worthy you are.

>> Yes.

>> And that's why I don't think affirmations are as successful as they can be.

So, until you start to remove that focus all day long and just be consciously present to what is happening without judgement, then you can start to give yourself a chance at believing over time that, "I am worthy," or whatever it is that you would prefer to believe of yourself.

>> I love that.

We got the body.

The next step, the mind.

What's after the mind?

>> So, once we understand -- So, once you've done a significant amount of time observing yourself, now you really can dive into the world.

So, like, the deepest tip, if you will, of the work is the whole world of the inner child, of the ego, of the wounds that we're carrying with us that are collaring our experiences and our environment.

But you can't do that work, as a lot of us want to do, until you have these other tools in place.

>> Until you take care of your physical needs, the body, until you help with breath work, meditation, calming the body, relaxing the body, then observing yourself, your thoughts... why you're reactive, why things are stressful for you, you can't heal the inner child of the ego until you do those first two things.

Why is that?

>> Well, first and foremost, you won't be able to see it happening.

>> You're too stressed?

>> Because you go -- I say, you go unconscious.

Back to our examples, right, of our arguments.

I'm unconsciously living in my past in that moment, so you can't really see.

To be observational, you need to be there in your conscious.

You can't see what's happening.

You only see the reality of what you're feeling.

You're just feeling in that moment.

So, I'm upset that you hurt me.

I'm upset that you what-have-you me, right?

You're not actually observing what happened and what the story yourself was about the dish -- go back to that example -- that led you to be so incensed.

The dish did nothing in this example, right?

The dish is just a dish on a table.

But when you saw that dish, you said something to yourself.

You went through some filter that then colored how you're feeling, and then what happened next?

>> They don't care about me.

They're abusing me.

They're whatever.

>> And until you show up consciously and practice seeing, observing that, you have no idea.

You actually think that dish was the problem, right?

You're so stuck in it.

You're unconscious to it.

So, it can't be done until you start to develop that distance and that space that I'm talking about.

>> [ Sighs ] >> Because even when you're doing the ego work and the inner child work, those reactions are still there, alive for you.

So if you don't have that space, you're gonna continue to choose those old reactions.

So as you practice consciousness, that's what gives you that space.

So, they can be here and be happening in your world, in your subconscious world, and you can still be online and making the choices, not allowing them to make the choices.

>> This alone -- This part of this interview is just gonna transform so many people's lives, just by understanding the process, 'cause I think a lot of us try to just do breath work and think we're gonna get healed.

Just think about our ego and healing trauma or the inner child world.

But this process alone is gonna change a lot of lives, so I'm very grateful we're going through this.

Is there another step to this pyramid of healing?

Or is it the body, mind, and ego?

>> Well, then I would ask you to draw a big circle around it.

And say "in repeat for life."

Never ends.

>> Just like a circle that just keeps going.

>> That's the final piece, and I joke when I say that, but I mean that wholeheartedly, because just as much as I don't know where to start.

I want to just work on one thing, a lot of people, myself included, want to hear when the end happens.

>> Never.

It's never done.

>> Yeah.

>> The healing journey is a lifelong journey until the day you die, probably.

>> And just as much, right?

If you do all this work and you get to this great place, if you stop making these choices, if you let your body fall into disarray, you're right back into that deregulated state before you know it, right?

If you stop being conscious, before you know, you're on to some other -- Like, maybe it's a different narratives or different habits that you're now living, but you're still living in an unconscious state.

>> What is the practice every day then?

Breath work/meditation/prayer.

And then what would the practice be on observing self, thoughts in the mind?

Is it kind of just an all-day practice?

>> Yeah.

So, what I do is, I show up, and I do meditation every day, just in a contained way just to keep -- I mean, it's a mental exercise.

>> Yes.

>> So that I can carry that then practice throughout my day.

So, not everyone has to have a structured meditation practice.

I just think it's helpful.

>> Start the day with calm.

>> Every day, right.

And to remind myself, "Okay.

This is what you're about, Nicole.

You're not those thoughts."

Some days, my brain is much louder than other days all day long, depending on what's happening.

Sometimes, I have resources to make new choices, you know, that I want to make, and some days, I don't.

I fall right back if I'm tired, if I'm hormonal.

You know, some days, I still react in those old ways.

So, I keep a consistent daily practice as that mental training, as I start my day in peace.

And then I practice all day long.

And then I can start to uncover, oh, this is my ego still, you know, telling me this story about myself.

Or, oh, this is my wounded child who really just wants to be seen in this moment.

>> Gosh.

>> Right, so then it becomes a varied experience on the daily, but once you're conscious, then you can being to navigate your daily life in a new way.

>> I think as a people pleaser myself of the past and still recovering people pleaser, it's been really hard to learn how to say no for the last few years, but I'm getting better and better at it without feeling like I'm letting someone down or someone's gonna be upset with me.

As a kid who never had friends growing up, it's always like, I don't want to ruffle the feathers of the friends that I had.

And so I have to learn how to be like, if they're upset and they don't understand, there's nothing I can do, but I'm giving them my best.

So, how do we say no without apologizing?

>> Yeah.

It's hard.

This is really grounded, Lewis, and like a lot of us, I mean, I totally resonate with people pleasing.

I've been calling it an epidemic of co-dependency.

>> Right.

>> Back to this childhood, where if we're not enough, what we do, we're very adaptive.

So what most of us do, similar to what you did, right, with your friends, not having much friends, you know, you became you so attuned to the -- to the friends that you have to keep those relationships, right?

We do that within our caregiving units, our family structure.

We find a way to keep the things that we need, which are connections with other humans.

Love from another human.

We are an interpersonal species.

That is it.

We actually need to be bonded together, like I said earlier, out of developmental necessity and then just generally in life.

I mean, think back to evolutionary days and tribes, and there's very real research out there now.

The stress goes down when we are interconnected with other humans.

Aside from division of labor, "Oh, you can help relieve the stress of my objective life," just the emotions, and we actually release oxytocin when we're connected to another human.

We need those hormones, so we need to be connected.

So we get very adaptive, and we find the way.

So if we've developed in a household, right, where we're not seen as a separate entity and able to develop connections and relationships with other separate entities in our family -- again, I talk a lot about an enmeshed, codependent family in our last talk.

That's what I come from.

You get very externally oriented, is what I say, right?

I start to become so attuned to the outside world so that I can manage how I feel by showing up to friendships or doing the thing or answering the phone call, by not saying no.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> So once we come to that realization and we want and we understand the impact that always being available has on ourselves and our relationship and -- >> Hurts us.

>> It hurts our relationship.

>> It does.

Hurts relation with ourselves, too.

>> Yes, and what happens, though, is, sadly, over time, if I always say yes to you and I'm -- even if I mean no, before I know it, I don't like you, Lewis.

>> Right, and I'm like, "Why you upset at me for?

You've been saying yes."

>> I'm, like, not really liking you -- >> 'Cause you're resenting the fact that you're saying yes.

>> I'm mad at you, but I'm really upset -- if I really look down at it, I needed to start saying no.

How would you know?

I mean, we like to believe that other humans, especially when they're our partners are mind readers.

We love this idea that people see the same reality as us.

>> [ Laughing ] Tell my girlfriend that.

I'm not a mind reader.

>> Right?

But when we're talking about -- you just don't.

You're never gonna have the same reality as another person.

>> Yeah.

>> So we like that idea.

So we say the yeses, and then we get upset at the person.

So it really is damaging of our relationships.

And I know I lived the hard way.

I had to learn how to say no.

My go-to was not necessarily "no" with an apology.

I liked apologies.

I peppered those in.

My preference was "no" with the excuse, with the "why."

>> "Here's why I can't do it."

>> I needed to validate the reason I was disappointing someone with this belief that it wasn't enough just to not to want to or to feel like it or just to be somewhere else in any given moment.

>> So how do we say no without an excuse or an apology, then?

>> Yeah, practice.

I mean, it's hard.

You know, it's very, very difficult.

First and foremost, it's accepting the reality that you're -- you have every -- you're welcome to say no, you're allowed to say no, and that saying no doesn't diminish who you are or the relationship.

Again, this a deeper -- this is an evolution of work.

We don't just turn off, you know, the belief that I have to say no to maintain these friendships.

We don't just overnight come by a new belief, right?

So we can practice.

And I suggest practicing, I say, like around the periphery, right?

Start to say no.

So what this looked like for me, I started to put up boundaries or to say my "nos" in my professional world, where it felt a little easier, right?

So some request that would come in, and from people that I maybe didn't really know, it would feel -- and it's virtual, so I can even send the e-mail, throw my phone, which has happened before, and run away, and come back later to see what happened.

>> Hope they didn't react.

>> You know what I mean?

So easier for me.

So I practiced there before I practiced maybe saying no with my immediate family or with my partner.

>> Uh-huh.

>> There might be some relationships that are -- it might be even easier.

Maybe you do have that one friend that is, like, casual about it.

You know, you're gonna find the moment to practice, but the theme for today -- you have to practice, because it's gonna be really hard when you're faced with that -- saying that no, and what's gonna happen is everything that happens in your mind that prevented you from saying that no for however many years you've not said that no, it's gonna happen in your mind the second you -- well, first of all, before you say the no, trying to convince you out of saying the no.

So before you know it, you're saying yes again, right?

This is where consciously, you have to, "No," you have to say, "No.

No," period, the end, or, "No," whatever you want to deliver the message being.

And then on the backside, once it's delivered, your mind is gonna try to convince you out of that no still.

"Oh, you're terrible.

Oh, this person is gonna hate you.

Oh, it's been two hours since they responded.

Clearly, this relationship is over."

Right?

Now the work is still on you.

Don't spend time in that thought, just like we were talking about earlier.

But don't expect it not to be there.

I call them the feel-bads.

The feel-bads have haunted me around every boundary I've set for quite a long time before they've diminished.

And they still are there every now and again.

I still find myself feeling bad almost into saying yes.

Maybe I'm even feeling bad once I've said the no.

But I'm, like, carrying that.

But I get to choose, how long do I want to live in this feel-bad?

>> It's not good, yeah.

>> And a really cool thing happens as you practice.

You start to learn and see.

Sometimes you do get that feared response.

Sometimes, exactly what you imagined would happen that's not positive does.

I got that a lot from my family.

Not all the time.

So if you focus on the moments where the thing that you feared most didn't happen, that relationship didn't end, those friends still were around and asked you to the movies next weekend, that's what I urge you to pay attention to, 'cause that's gonna help you keep saying the nos and help you shift out of the pattern.

>> I think if -- you know, it's not the end of the world if someone reacts in a negative way to your "no" because if they get so upset that -- unless it's, like, something so imp-- like, my wedding or whatever and you've told them months in advance or you've given them time, like, it all depends on the situation, but if it's a friend who just, like, gets upset because you're busy one weekend for whatever reason, then is that a great relationship?

>> Yeah, that's information, too.

>> You know, do you want to spend more time with them?

A couple of things that you said on how to say no without apologizing -- you said a couple responses would be, "I won't be able to make it, and I'm grateful you invited me," not apologizing.

>> Yeah, "Thank you for the invite, and I can't come."

>> You don't have to give a reason why.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> You also said, "That sounds amazing.

It's just not something I can commit to right now."

>> Mm-hmm.

>> So simple solutions you can use without having to say, "I'm sorry I'm not gonna be able make it.

Ah, I wish I could."

You know?

Things like that.

So I really like that -- how to say no without apologizing.

I want to acknowledge you again for being here, for showing up, for teaching us so much.

I think your traumas and learning and going through it allow us to heal through our traumas.

And by you sharing what you're learning and practices, for me, this is a book.

This interview was a book in itself that we could print off and give to people.

So I'm excited to dive into this more.

I know it's gonna help heal a lot of people, and I'm just really grateful for the work you do and acknowledge your wisdom, the ability to connect to your inner child and really, you know, have a deeper conversation and share with us how we can do that.

I think it's really powerful.

So I appreciate you.

I'm grateful for you.

You're amazing.

>> Thank you, Lewis.

I mean, you -- you've been an inspiration to me beyond just from your personal journey to your professional journey.

So I am indebted with gratitude every time you have a conversation with me.

>> Of course.

We'll do it again soon.

I appreciate it, Nicole.

Thank you.

Amazing.

>> We hope you enjoyed this episode and found it valuable for your life.

Make sure to stay tuned for more from "The School of Greatness" coming soon on public television.

Again, I'm Lewis Howes, and if no one has told you lately, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter.

And now it's time to go out there and do something great.

If you'd like to continue on the journey of greatness with me, please check out my website, lewishowes.com, where you'll find over 1,000 episodes of "The School of Greatness" show, as well as tools and resources to support you in living your best life.

>> The online course "Find Your Greatness" is available for $19.

Drawn from the lessons Lewis Howes shares in "The School of Greatness," this interactive course will guide you through a step-by-step process to discover your strengths, connect to your passion and purpose, and help create your own blueprint for greatness.

To order, go to lewishowes.com/tv.

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