Every September feels like New Year’s to me, I guess because I spent so many years in school. So right about now I’m thinking about what I want to learn.

And even more importantly, what do I want to unlearn?

What lousy piece of advice did I get way back then that doesn’t make any sense to me today? I’m just going to check in and make sure I’m not believing everything I was taught.

For example, one of my professors in medical school actually told us, during one of his physiology lectures, “life is pain, and everything you do is to try to avoid pain.” He said this more than once, over the couple of years that he lectured to our class.

The good thing about hearing this, over and over, was it made me realize that I didn’t believe him.

And now that I know a little more about the human brain than I did back then, I realize that my professor was believing his “lizard brain.”

The brainstem contains, evolutionarily, the oldest parts of our brain. It contains the part of our brain that allows us to fall asleep and wake up, that controls our basic bodily functions, and that also broadcasts FEAR. The reptile, or “lizard,” brain evolved over the millennia to keep us safe. A million years ago, it made sense to spend our days “avoiding pain,” running and hiding from predators, grabbing as much food as possible to avoid starvation, and avoiding new environments that could be dangerous.

So if my professor lived a million years ago, he’d be right on with his “life is pain” lecture. But he lived in New York City in the 20th century. Granted, they call NYC a jungle, but he wasn’t spending his days avoiding being chased by tigers, he was in a laboratory doing research when he wasn’t lecturing to idealistic young students.

His problem was that he still believed the messages his lizard brain was sending, even though he was very rarely in any true physical danger. Martha Beck calls these “lack and attack” messages. (from her book Steering by Starlight) The messages are either:
• There isn’t enough money, (or food, or time, or champagne,) or
• They’re out to get you (drag you down, take your job, remove you as President of the PTA)

Everyone’s lack and attack messages are specific to them, but they are also universal. As Martha says, almost everyone’s had the “I’m going to end up a bag lady,” thought.

My “lack” message is usually about lack of time:
• I don’t have enough time to write,
• I don’t have enough time to eat,
• I don’t have enough time to get this house clean.

When I catch myself saying one of these repetitive phrases to myself, I realize it’s my lizard brain talking, and I am able to let it go by countering the thoughts, rather than just repeating them:
• I have enough time; I have the same amount of time as everyone else on the planet.
• I have enough time for the things that are important to me.
• Do the thing that’s right in front of you.
• Just sit down and eat, already!

This usually works for me. What is your lizard brain saying? Is it true? Once you examine those lack and attack thoughts, you will see they aren’t true for you most of the time.

If you are being chased by a tiger, feel free to ignore the above and RUN!

If not, relax, take a deep breath and notice that you are not in any danger. Now, that’s not painful, is it?