Love Your Brain with Dr. Daniel Amen

Ending the stigma and idea of Mental Illness and cutting edge strategies for a healthy brain! Mental health can be a touchy subject for all of us. Whether you are enduring it personally, watching a loved one go through it, or are struggling to understand it at all, it is a subject that has affected millions of lives directly and indirectly. Because of its impact and the general lack of understanding surrounding this topic, I brought in the BEST of the BEST to answer your burning questions and to provide clarity to the issues that have been circling in your mind. I am excited to bring you the brilliant mind of my friend Dr. Daniel Amen, a world-renowned leader in mental health and well-being. He is America’s #1 psychologist, a five-time New York Times best-selling author, and treats some of the most successful people in the world. Dr. Amen is attempting to end the idea of “mental illness” right before our eyes… As mega-achievers, our drive for perfection can lead us to feeling depressed, anxious, or extremely stressed. We become overwhelmed. We aren't able to see how our current circumstance is working FOR us and not against us and leads us to believe that there is something fundamentally wrong with US... but this isn't the case! Dr. Amen shares with you cutting edge strategies, and nutritional concepts that can change your entire life. He blew me away with his proven techniques that teach us how to have a healthier brain and is now revealing them to you. He confirms that our thoughts don’t cause us to suffer, our attachment to our thoughts does. His concept of ANTS is groundbreaking and I can’t wait for you to learn about it! You'll learn concrete ways to optimize brain health and treat the 11 major risk factors that steal your mind. We talk about the severity of concussions, circulation, inflammation, and easy, actionable ways you can start feeling better TODAY. I asked specific questions about prescription medication, marijuana, hallucinogens, and natural remedies so that you have ALL of the information to serve you and your loved ones best. Whether you struggle with mental health, know someone who is or you feel like you just can’t find a way to wrap your mind around it…..this interview is going to give you the ANSWERS you have been searching for. Get your brain right, and your MIND will FOLLOW! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Ed Mylett?

  I hear so many small business owners say the exact same thing. They just never have enough time in the day. Well, I measure time differently. I've compressed, condensed, heck, I've bent time. My first day is 6:00 a.m. to noon. My second day starts at noon and goes till 6:00 p.m. And my third day, 6:00 p.m. to midnight. I now get 21 days a week. Stack that up over a month, over a year, over five years, and my life's completely different than it would have been otherwise. And if you want to win as an entrepreneur, you have to compress your time too. And you definitely can't afford to waste it. Waiting weeks on a big bank for capital? Your best bet's to work with my friends at Cardiff. They know how to compress time for entrepreneurs. They get your business approved in minutes and funded the very same day. They're America's favorite small business lender, and for good reason.

• 0:45Ed Mylett?

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• 1:01Speaker 01

  Mr. President, my company, for me, of the explosion on our rig.

• 1:05Speaker 02

  On October 2nd.

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  Causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami. They all heap the blame on me.

• 1:11Speaker 02

  Tom Cruise is. Digger got us into this mess. And Digger's gonna dig us up. From the director of Birdman and The Revenant.

• 1:18Speaker 01

  What would happen if I stopped drilling? You stop, you freeze to death, that's what.

• 1:22Speaker 02

  With great power comes great deniability.

• 1:25Speaker 01

  I'm not the first nanny.

• 1:27Speaker 02

  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17. Not a minute without parent.

• 1:38Speaker 03

  This is The Ed Miler Show.

• 1:46Ed Mylett?

  Welcome back to Max Out, everybody. You know, I pride myself on having the world's best on the show in a variety of different areas of topic. And today's topic, which is going to be mental health, brain health. I have America's number one psychiatrist with me. I have a man next to me who's done 170,000 brain scans on people from 120 countries. And is a world renowned leader in mental health and mental well-being. And he helps people's lives get better by helping their brains get better. And he's helped me in that area as well, and we're gonna talk about that today. So this is Dr. Daniel Amen. Thank you, my friend.

• 2:22Daniel Amen?

  Ed, thank you.

• 2:23Ed Mylett?

  So good to have you. He's got a new book out, everybody, that's coming out called The End of Mental Illness that you can either preorder right now, or that you can order if you've watched this interview after the release date. So theendofmentalillness.com, they can get access to it, or Amazon, or anywhere else.

• 2:38Daniel Amen?

  Endofmentalillness.com, or anywhere great books are sold.

• 2:41Ed Mylett?

  Anywhere they're sold, and you're gonna wanna get your hands on this. We're gonna tap into it a little bit today, but I want you to read the book, so we're not gonna get into all of it. But the term "mental illness," that term, you don't like that so much.

• 2:52Daniel Amen?

  I hate it.

• 2:52Ed Mylett?

  And why is that?

• 2:53Daniel Amen?

  And I've hated it for 40 years. I decided to be a psychiatrist 40 years ago because someone I loved tried to kill herself. And I took her to see a wonderful psychiatrist, and I came to realize if he helped her, it wouldn't just help her. That ultimately it would help me, it would help her children, even her grandchildren. I fell in love with psychiatry because I realized it has the potential to change generations of people. But I hated that term because it's shaming, it's stigmatizing, and it's wrong. Because these aren't mental illnesses, they're brain health issues that steal your mind. And that one distinction just changes everything.

• 3:38Daniel Amen?

  Because people see their problems as medical and not moral. So it decreases shame and guilt, it increases compliance, because people want better brains. Nobody wants a mental illness, everybody wants a better brain. And it also increases forgiveness and compassion.

• 3:57Daniel Amen?

  From their families. No one is shamed for heart disease, or cancer, or diabetes, even though all of those have lifestyle contributions to them. Likewise, no one should be shamed for bipolar disorder, ADHD, depression, panic disorder. Get your brain right, and your mind will follow.

• 4:20Ed Mylett?

  You would get your heart treated. You would get a broken leg treated. But that shame factor causes people not to get help oftentimes, and then that situation could exacerbate it. So, let's talk about some basic things first, and then we'll get a little bit more detailed. Because I know everybody right now that was driving, a lot of them are pulling over now, getting their notepads out, because now they know the topic, and they know who's on the show this week. And I'm curious, or those of you that are watching on YouTube, you'll do the same thing. Let's start with something very basic, which is your approach overall. Just the standard approach. Tell them what the four circles are. Would you discuss that for a second?

• 4:50Daniel Amen?

  So, when I was in medical school, our dean, I went to a Christian medical school, Oral Roberts University. And the first week, the dean comes in, and he says, "Never think of your patients as their diagnosis. Always think of them in these four big circles." And on the board, he wrote biology in the first circle. So, it's the actual physical functioning of your brain and your body. And then he wrote psychology with the next circle. And this is your mind, and how your mind works. And I also think it's your development, it's your successes, it's your failures, it's your relationships, your dad and the past

• 5:34Daniel Amen?

  that still breathes fire on the present. And then, the third circle is the social circle. Who do you hang out with? You become like the people you spend time with. You know that.

• 5:46Ed Mylett?

  Absolutely.

• 5:47Daniel Amen?

  And then, the fourth circle is the spiritual circle, which is, "Well, why the heck do you care? Why are you on the planet? What is your deepest sense of meaning and purpose?" And so often, people go see a psychiatrist, and they tell them their symptoms. "I'm depressed." And then they'll give you a diagnosis with the same name. "Oh, you're depressed." And then they'll give you an antidepressant, completely ignoring the other three circles.

• 6:14Daniel Amen?

  And I'm known for our brain imaging work and people really sort of pegged me in the biology

• 6:19Ed Mylett?

  Yes.

• 6:19Daniel Amen?

  circle, but we can never forget you have a mind and so many people's minds are undisciplined. You and I talked about the ants.

• 6:29Ed Mylett?

  Yes.

• 6:29Daniel Amen?

  The automatic negative thoughts that steal your happiness.

• 6:32Ed Mylett?

  Tell them this, because you've helped me with this so much. And this concept of ants that you just described has helped me so much because I think I was sort of the king of a little bit of this the wrong way, even though I'd produced all these results in my life, the jets and the houses and the great family and all those things, but I kept, why, why do I not feel better? Why is it that everything isn't perfect all the time? I found out through you, it's not supposed to be perfect all the time. But this ants concept is, I want everyone in the world to hear it, so please share.

• 7:00Daniel Amen?

  So you, you have such a strong spiritual circle and such a strong social circle, but your brain wasn't as healthy as it could have been.

• 7:09Ed Mylett?

  My brain, right.

• 7:09Daniel Amen?

  And your mind, a bit undisciplined, so many of us are because they don't teach us this. So, um, many years ago, I had a really hard day at work. I saw four suicidal patients and that's stressful. I saw two couples who hated each other and two teenagers who ran away from home. And I came home and I was stressed and nobody was home, except I had thousands of ants in my house. It was an ant infestation in the kitchen. And as I'm cleaning them up, when you're a medical student, you have to learn 50,000 new terms the first year. And so we're always making up acronyms and mnemonics as a way to remember things.

• 7:52Daniel Amen?

  As I'm cleaning up the ants, I think to myself, automatic negative thoughts. The thoughts that come into your mind automatically and ruin your day. And I went, my patients are infested. With ants. And so, I came to work the next day with a can of Raid. Ant and roach killer. And I just put it on the coffee table. I'm saying, "We're gonna kill these ants today." And then later, it morphed into, "I got an ant puppet and an anteater puppet." Because it's less toxic. But you don't have to believe every stupid thing you think. And that is such a powerful concept. So, we'll talk a lot about tiny habits.

• 8:35Daniel Amen?

  Smallest thing I can do today that'll make the biggest difference. Whenever you feel sad, or mad, or nervous, or out of control, write down what you're thinking. And there are eight different types of ants. All are nothing-thinking, blaming ants, guilt-beating ants, fortune-telling ants. Identify it, and then start talking back to it. Right? I mean, I don't know if you were good at talking back to your parents when you were a teenager. I was excellent.

• 9:06Ed Mylett?

  So was I. And I have two that are very good at it that live here.

• 9:09Daniel Amen?

  But I was not any good at talking back to myself. And whenever you have a thought, unless you question it, you believe it. And even if it's a lie, you act as if it's true. And they can devastate your life. They can steal your happiness, your joy.

• 9:31Ed Mylett?

  Everybody, this was, you know, personally, everyone, this is a big issue for me. And when you said that to me, you know, you don't have to believe everything you think. I'm a 48-year-old man. I've coached some of the top people on planet Earth. Some of us coached, Dr. Amin, I've coached some of the same people, right? And I thought, "The hell hasn't anybody said that to me before?" And that, it starts to lose its power over you. And I've done, because he's asked me to do it, guys, over the, and recently, I've been doing more of it. Writing down what I'm feeling, what I'm thinking when I do those thoughts, questioning those thoughts. And I found, I have a lot of BS thoughts. I have a lot of thoughts that aren't true. And the more I realize that, the more I'm cognizant of it. To your point, it's lost some of its power over me. And in some cases, it's entirely lost its power over me.

• 10:12Ed Mylett?

  Is there a daily habit, or one small thing you would recommend for people going, "Oh, my gosh, I got a lot of ants." Other than just being aware and writing it down, anything else you would recommend?

• 10:21Daniel Amen?

  Whenever you feel sad. Or mad, or nervous, or out of control. Write down what you're thinking. And then there are five questions I have people ask themselves. Is it true? So I like to give the example, I've had this thought, my wife never listens to me. My wife has ADD, we did a whole show on ADD together. And she can get distracted easily. And so, I had that thought, my wife never listens to me. Question number one, is it true? Well, no, actually, it's not true. I've written fourteen public television specials, she's listened to each script at least three times. No, it's not true. The second question, is it absolutely true? With a hundred percent certainty? And if one is no, two is automatically no.

• 11:06Daniel Amen?

  The third question, how do you feel when you believe the thought? Tana never listens to me. I feel sad, I feel lonely, I feel irritated. I actually give myself permission to be rude to her. So even though it's not true, it drives loneliness. And I give myself the permission to sort of be a jerk to her. The fourth question is, how would I feel without the thought? If I couldn't have the thought, well, I'd be a good husband. And then the fifth question is, take the original thought, my wife never listens to me. And turn it to the opposite. My wife does listen to me.

• 11:50Daniel Amen?

  Don't do the narcissistic opposite, she always listens to me, because that isn't true. And, and this is not pie in the sky, happy thinking? It's, because I'm not a fan of positive thinking. I'm a fan of accurate thinking. Because positive thinking is, I could have the third piece of cheesecake at lunch, and it won't hurt me. No, let's, let's tell ourselves the truth. The don't worry, be happy people die the earliest from accidents and preventable illnesses. So let's not go there. But, the opposite is, Tana does listen to me.

• 12:30Daniel Amen?

  And I can come up with a hundred examples where she listens to me. And so that thought has no power over me. The thought's a lie. I don't need to attach it. It's not the thoughts you have that cause you to suffer. It's the thoughts you attach to that cause you to suffer.

• 12:49Ed Mylett?

  That's brilliant, and I practice it in my own life. And everybody, this is why I want you involved with Dr. Amen's work on whatever level it is. If you go get a scan, or if you get one of his books, whatever you do, is that there's strategies to brain health. There's strategies to mental health. And someone like me who's performed at a high level, or teaches other people how to be happier, even I are trying to find nuances. These five steps have really, really supported and helped me. And I'm so grateful for you for that. Let's talk a little bit about, I want to only touch on a few things in the book because I want them to get the book. But I want them to have some idea of this bright minds concept too. But just a few things that, guys like in my scan, for example, when we looked at it, I want to touch on a few things that impact the brain that people listening or watching this may not be aware of.

• 13:32Ed Mylett?

  And one for me was circulation. So can you talk about that? That's one of the markers that you look at. I want you to get the book to hear all the markers, everybody. But this concept of circulation, why is it important? And are there things we can do, listening to this, watching this right now, that could improve that automatically for somebody?

• 13:51Daniel Amen?

  So a long time ago, I realized, so the imaging work I do is just so important because it just took mental illness, put it to the side, and went, "Brain health." So how do you optimize brain health? You have to prevent or treat the 11 major risk factors that steal your mind. And the mnemonic bright minds, that just helps us remember them. And the B in bright minds is for blood flow. Low blood flow is the number one brain imaging predictor of Alzheimer's disease. It's also associated with depression, ADHD, and schizophrenia. It's clearly not a good thing. So what? Blood brings nutrients to the brain.

• 14:35Daniel Amen?

  And the brain is the most hungry organ in your body. So I love where you live. I just love where you live. And I want you to think of the brain. It's sort of like a great place to live. It's like Beverly Hills, or Newport Beach, or Laguna Beach.

• 14:56Daniel Amen?

  Two percent of your body's weight, yet it uses twenty to thirty percent of the calories you consume, twenty percent of the oxygen, and twenty percent of the blood flow. And anything that lowers blood flow to the brain prematurely ages the brain. And in fact, the study we do is this study looks at blood flow and activity. And you're, you had a sleepy brain, and that's not good for it. And so if you go, I have all this, but I sort of feel down sometimes. It's because it's not getting enough energy, which is not your fault. And so with all of these risk factors, so know it, avoid things that hurt it,

• 15:41Daniel Amen?

  and do things that help it. So I'm the master of how do we make this as simple as can be? Yes. So the things that hurt blood flow. Nicotine. Yeah. Caffeine. Caffeine was a biggie. Not exercises. So that's not your issue. But people who are sedentary lowers blood flow. Hypertension. As blood pressure goes up, blood flow to the brain goes down. Any form of heart disease or vascular disease is bad for the brain. And erectile dysfunction, people don't think about it. How is that related to the brain? Well, if you have blood flow problems anywhere, it likely means they're everywhere. Right. And so, so what do I do?

• 16:27Daniel Amen?

  So one, get rid of caffeine, nicotine. Get your blood pressure healthy. Do what the doctor says about your heart, for sure. And then exercise. Supplements like Ginkgo. I'm a huge fan of Ginkgo. Foods like beets, oregano, cayenne pepper, rosemary. All increase blood flow. And my favorite form of exercise? Coordination exercise. People who play racket sports live longer than everyone else. Is that why you play racket sports? That's why I play racket sports. Plus, I love table tennis, and I'm good at it. So I like to do things I'm good at.

• 17:08Daniel Amen?

  People who played football and soccer, they live less long than everyone else. Swimmers was good, runners were sort of in the middle. Coordination because it works your cerebellum in the back bottom part of the brain, which I think of like the CPU, the central processing unit. Gets your cerebellum healthy, the rest of your brain is healthy.

• 17:30Ed Mylett?

  Hey everybody, you're welcome so far, by the way. I know you're all going, "Wow", right? And first thing that this, why I want to cover this topic too in the detail we're doing it is, every time we go through one of these steps, we're only going to cover two or three of them today. It should be an indicator for all of you who are suffering with any brain health issues, or know somebody who is, that that is what this is. It's not a mental illness necessarily, it's brain health. There's ways that you can improve the health of your brain. You referenced soccer and football as not being quite as healthy. And the other thing Dr. Amen's done is he's done the first and largest ever study on the brain scans of NFL football players. And, you know, one of the things that you asked me immediately is, "Have you had any significant concussions in your life?" And oftentimes, I was reading in the book,

• 18:15Ed Mylett?

  that sometimes bipolar can be misdiagnosed when someone's had a significant concussion in their life. And there are probably people, if you went back to your childhood, if you've fallen off a bike, you got hit in a football game, you know, even as an adult, a car accident or something like that, if you had a concussion, that can affect your brain health.

• 18:31Daniel Amen?

  For the rest of your life, if nobody knows it and takes care of it. There's a brand new study out on homelessness. Fifty percent of the homeless people had a significant brain injury before they were homeless. If we don't put the brain in the center of the homelessness epidemic, we lose. And, because a lot, some of my friends are going, "Oh, that's a big mental illness." And it's like, "Oh, great, let's put them on more psychiatric drugs, without giving them good food, looking at their brains, teaching them how to optimize the physical functioning of the brain. We're going to get more of what we have, which is a nightmare.

• 19:10Ed Mylett?

  So everybody evaluate that for yourself or people that you know. And everyone, I want to go back to the book and I'm not a big book pusher typically on the show. But I have to tell you, this topic is central to the happiness of everybody's life around you, including yourself. And if you can get a scan at one of his many clinics, some of you may not be able to go there, do that, afford that. A book like this can answer so many of your questions in one book. For a nominal fee, you could learn so much about yourself and the people around you that you love. I gotta tell you, go get the end of mental illness, everybody. Please go get it for your well-being. And it's been a game changer for me as well. Couple other little areas on the brain I want to talk about. Can we talk a little bit, and by the way, guys, my brain, when we looked at it,

• 19:54Ed Mylett?

  you know, I'm a pretty functional person. When we looked at it, there was some, you can see visually in these scans, my goodness, like, mine had the holes in it and the spotty stuff and you can see it wasn't as smooth as we would want it to be. And so it helped me understand why not everything's always perfect in my brain all the time, right? And even in myself, sometimes I carried, like, I'm this guy who's making everybody happier and perform, yet I'm not always at that level. And it helped me get rid of any guilt or shame I had about that. What about the idea of, you mentioned heart disease earlier too, which more and more people are saying is inflammation oriented in the body. More and more dis-ease in the body has to do with inflammation. How about its impact on the brain?

• 20:36Daniel Amen?

  So the eye in Bright Minds, the first eye is inflammation. Because it's a disaster for brain function. It's associated with Alzheimer's disease and depression. And so, and it's rampant. Why? Over 90% of the population is deficient in omega-3 fatty acids, which helps quell inflammation.

• 21:02Daniel Amen?

  Lots of us have gut health issues which increase inflammation. And gum disease, so periodontal disease, people aren't serious about seeing the dentist, flossing, really the health of their gums. That's actually the first place it starts. And I really didn't really care about my gums and my teeth. I just really didn't think about it until I started reading the studies of periodontal disease and dementia, depression, heart disease. And you've just got to take care of these things. That's why I'm a huge fan of fish oil for everyone and probiotics to help their gut get well and flossing.

• 21:46Daniel Amen?

  And it's like I have to love how my immune system works. And so measuring inflammatory markers, there's one called C-reactive protein, your omega-3 index. And I did a study, we looked at 50 consecutive patients who came to AMN clinics. We took a drop of blood and we went, so what's your omega-3 index? It should be above eight. Forty-nine of them was not above eight.

• 22:16Ed Mylett?

  No kidding.

• 22:17Daniel Amen?

  And it was terrible. It was just horrifying to me.

• 22:22Ed Mylett?

  See, I knew, the cutting-edge in people that are doing heart work, everybody, you know, this idea that you can go to an orthodontist and get a study done of the bacterias in your gums, and if that's prevalent there, it's prevalent in your heart, is a very dangerous thing with heart disease. I did not know that as it related to the brain. I didn't even know that even as we've been working together. And so that's a new one for me. Why the big emphasis on vitamin D also? What does that do for us? And everybody hopefully is writing this down too, but why is that such a big deal?

• 22:51Daniel Amen?

  So the second eye in bright minds is immunity and infections. And vitamin D is actually the universal risk factor for illness. So the normal levels between 30 and 100, people who are above 40.

• 23:06Daniel Amen?

  Have half the risk of cancer of those under 20. And when I first measured mine, and like you, I live here in Southern California, was 17. I was horrified. And when vitamin D level is low, leptin, the hormone that tells you to stop eating, doesn't work. People become leptin resistant. And when I took vitamin D, my appetite went away. Like I had been trying to lose like the extra 20 or 30 pounds I was carrying and tried every diet, but I was always hungry. And when I increased my vitamin, and my appetite went away. And, you know, I could lose the weight because I published two studies that says your weight

• 23:50Daniel Amen?

  goes up, the size of your brain goes down, which would just scare the fat off anyone. And I looked just this weekend, some people are watching the Super Bowl, I'm working on my laptop, and I looked at 20,038 patients. And I mapped each area of their brain compared to their BMI or their body mass index. So we looked at healthy weight, overweight, obese, and morbidly obese. And it was a linear correlation. As their weight went up, the function in every area of their brain went down. Which is just shocking.

• 24:30Daniel Amen?

  When you think of 72% of Americans are overweight, 40% of us are obese, it's the biggest brain drain in the history of the United States. And now it's a national security crisis because 70% of people who apply for the Marines and the Army and the Navy and the Air Force, they don't take them because they're not healthy. And the Congress is going, well, we should relax the requirements. It's like, do you really want that? Do you want an unhealthy fighting force? I mean, I'm an Army trained. I was an Army medic. And then I was a military doctor, an Army doctor. And it's like, no, I don't want you to lower the standards. How does that make good sense?

• 25:13Ed Mylett?

  Right. Guys, this is just remarkable. Now let's talk about something serious. This is touchy. So, when is it in your mind, I guess you can't explain the exact situation, but there are people listening to this who have family who are on Lexapro or one of these drugs that are being treated, so that are being treated beyond natural treatments, but medically, is there a place for that in your mind in certain cases? And I think someone who's obviously on those drugs should be careful just carte blanche, getting off of them obviously, but what is your feeling about pharmaceutical treatment in some cases for brain health?

• 25:52Daniel Amen?

  So I'm not crazy.

• 25:56Daniel Amen?

  Your brain can have problems, it's like your art can have problems. And sometimes, if I had someone with real bipolar disorder, they should be on medication, or it could cost them their lives. Someone with schizophrenia, you bet, they should be on medicine, but they should also be doing everything else right. As far as things like anxiety, depression, ADHD, my bias is, well, let's try natural things first. And in the book, there's a chapter on mind medicine versus nutraceuticals. And too often, the physicians go, oh, there's no science behind nutraceuticals. And my comment is, do you read?

• 26:40Daniel Amen?

  Because all you have to do is go to PubMed.gov and type in saffron, and you'll see it has A-level scientific evidence for depression. And as opposed to ruining your sex life, which many of the SSRIs like Lexapro do, it's pro-sexual, it will help your sex life. And so, in that one chapter alone, there's 286 scientific references, things like fish oil, Sami, saffron, St. John's Wort. And, but if those don't work... And you're thinking of killing yourself. Medication can be really helpful, but think about this.

• 27:22Daniel Amen?

  Eighty-five percent of psychiatric drugs are prescribed by non-psychiatric physicians in seven-minute office visits. So you can go to your family doc and go, "I'm not sleeping, I'm anxious and depressed," and leave with a prescription for Ambien for sleep, Lexapro for your mood, and Xanax, which is addictive and now we know it increases your risk of dementia, in a seven-minute office visit. How we're doing this pharmaceutical thing in this country is a scandal. And we can do better. And most people don't know, as soon as you start one of these medications, they're insidious. And that they change your brain to need them in order for you to feel okay. And so, why not?

• 28:07Daniel Amen?

  Well, let's do the natural things first, because in medical school, they taught all of us, first do no harm, use the least toxic, most effective treatments. But if they don't work, and my patients, when I decide to put them on medication, and I told you beforehand, Justin Bieber is one of my, his docu-series seasons just came out, and he said publicly, "I've been his doctor." And the turning point for him is he came into my office, and he said, "My brain is an organ like my heart's an organ. If you told me I'd have heart disease, I'd do everything you told me. So I'm gonna start doing that." Which was really helpful for us. And medicine was important for him.

• 28:47Ed Mylett?

  Was important for him. It's interesting, everybody, so that you know, he talks about Justin Bieber. One of the ways that I was led to Dr. Am, whom I've watched for years on all the public specials you've done, and I've read other books, and here's the memory book I read, the last book yet. And the amount of people who have sat in these seats, that after the interview, that I work with or want me to work with them, so many of them also worked with you. And so, he's helped many of the people that you see on TV, or on my show, and different sports as well. And so, he's been a godsend to so many of us. I want to finish this topic about prescription medication, because it's clearly something, it's an epidemic in the country of over-prescriptions in these seven-minute office visits that you've referenced. I also love you for saying there is a space for it, though, because I believe that to be true.

• 29:30Ed Mylett?

  There's a member in my family who should be treated, in my opinion, with prescription medication. However, if you're listening to this, and you have a loved one who's on, I just want your counsel in this, because... People sometimes overreact as well because you said your brain begins to need it when you take it. So I have a family member and I kind of have a... Where this started from everybody, I want to just say this. When I worked, most of you know that I started working in that orphanage McKinley Home for Boys. And one of the things that would break my heart every morning and night was there would be a line of my boys, these little precious eight and 10-year-old boys, whom at the time unknowingly, I'm told, each of them had their box of pills. And I would feed these little boys their medications at the time.

• 30:11Ed Mylett?

  I didn't even know what they were. I just knew that Jose was supposed to take one of the blue and one of the green. And we were medicating these poor little boys over and over again. And the process of getting off of that medication someday is a dicey situation as well. So what would your advice be that your parent listening to this and your kid's been diagnosed with a mild form of ADD and they've given them some medication for it? Or you personally, you know, weren't dealing with your aunts, weren't treating it with the different supplements that you could be taking? And you're on Lexapro right now or one of these other drugs. What would your advice be for them to consider the process of getting off of it? How should that work for somebody? I know it's a hard question.

• 30:52Daniel Amen?

  Well, I think the first thing before you even think about stop taking it is work to get your brain healthy. And so know which of the 11 risk factors you have and attack each one of them as soon as possible. Work on getting your diet right, work on killing the ants, and then work with an integrative psychiatrist or a functional medicine doctor who's really, like, they're measuring your vitamin D level. They're measuring your omega-3 index. They're really working to optimize the physical functioning of your brain. And then it becomes much easier to decrease them slowly and see if you still need them.

• 31:35Daniel Amen?

  Right? So they're not the Antichrist, they're not evil, but are they necessary?

• 31:42Daniel Amen?

  For you.

• 31:44Ed Mylett?

  Got it.

• 31:44Daniel Amen?

  And if they are, we thank God for them.

• 31:47Ed Mylett?

  Okay.

• 31:48Daniel Amen?

  And if they're not, if they're more problems than they're worth, like, I'm like a huge, like, I don't like benzos, like Xanax, Klonopin, Ativan, Valium, all of those, because I see what they do to the brain.

• 32:02Ed Mylett?

  Okay.

• 32:03Daniel Amen?

  But I also don't want people to be so anxious they want to kill themselves.

• 32:06Ed Mylett?

  I understand.

• 32:06Daniel Amen?

  And so you're always balancing, can I do this naturally? And if I can't, I'm like embracing the medication.

• 32:14Ed Mylett?

  Okay, let's talk now about, uh, thank you for this. I'm enjoying this so much, and I know the world's getting so much value out of this. Let's talk about self-medication now. And so you referenced Justin earlier, and this idea, you know, a lot of people now are big believers in marijuana use, um, to self-medicate, to sleep at night. It's sort of gone from this area where, you know, it was for people with chronic pain, and that kind of line has moved now to where it's a culturally very acceptable thing. I wonder what your stance is on marijuana use?

• 32:49Daniel Amen?

  Yeah, I'm a bit horrified by the whole thing. When Cory Booker, so there's this presidential debate, and Joe Biden is saying, you know, I'm just not sure about this. And Cory Booker goes, are you high? Like, it's been decided that this is innocuous by, um, I published a study on a thousand marijuana users. Every area of their brain was lower in blood flow and activity. That's what I've seen over time, that it's not innocuous. Now, if your father-in-law, like my father-in-law, uh, was dying of pancreatic cancer, I'll go buy it for him, because it helps him eat and it makes him more comfortable.

• 33:31Daniel Amen?

  But the two big innovations in psychiatry over the last couple of years? Marijuana for virtually everything, and hallucinogens, like ketamine. These are the big innovations, and I'm like, well, what about vegetables? And what about omega-3 fatty acids? And what about brain health, right? They're, no one's talking about, let's get this organ healthy. And I have friends who've smoked marijuana for 50 years and they go, "It's not hurt me at all." And then they come see me and their brains are devastated. It's not a good thing.

• 34:07Daniel Amen?

  And it's hard to break because once you let your brain do something, it's going to want to do it again. I mean, that's how habits become formed and stopping yourself is hard. And I remember, so my first clinic was in Northern California, right next to the Napa Valley. I have a clinic now in Walnut Creek, close by. And they were actually funding studies showing that alcohol was a health food. And so you probably remember this. It's like you have to have two glasses of red wine a day. It's good for your heart. It's total nonsense.

• 34:45Daniel Amen?

  People who drink every day have smaller brains. And when it comes to the brain, size matters. It's the only organ where size matters.

• 34:57Ed Mylett?

  Millions of men are thanking you for that statement right now.

• 35:03Daniel Amen?

  But my wife's a nurse and why does she put alcohol on your skin before she gives you a shot? Is it kills the bugs?

• 35:12Daniel Amen?

  Do you really want to be killing the bugs in your gut? You have 100 trillion of them. It's a whole ecosystem. And they make neurotransmitters. They digest your food. They detoxify your body. They help you with hormones. No, you don't want to be killing them. You want to love them and take care of them because it decreases inflammation. So I'm not a fan. Less alcohol is better.

• 35:38Ed Mylett?

  Love the answer. One thing he says to me all the time is, "Love your brain," right? And so if you're studying these brains and their circulation is less, the brain is smaller. That's an answer. That's all I need to know, right? I've never smoked marijuana, but if those of you that do, perhaps you should be listening today. Couple more factors, then we'll get into something fun and I'll say thank you to you. In my case, cholesterol was a little bit of an issue for me. So we finish up my situation. So some of you that are out there on statins, this is at least something to be cognizant of. I've mentioned this, people, some have said to me, "Well, there's cholesterol in your body, but your brain makes its own cholesterol as well." How important is markers like your cholesterol measures for your brain as well? Because that's not talked a lot about in the book and I thought I'd just ask you today.

• 36:22Daniel Amen?

  It needs to be a balance.

• 36:25Ed Mylett?

  Okay.

• 36:25Daniel Amen?

  And so, really high cholesterol, I'm talking like over 230 or 250, you want to be careful with.

• 36:33Ed Mylett?

  Okay.

• 36:34Daniel Amen?

  Especially if it's high, um, little technical, B particles for LDL. So, people think of LDL as bad cholesterol. It's not bad cholesterol, right? They have big fluffy A particles that bounce off and they're just no problem. Little tiny demon B particles, they're the problem. So whenever you get your cholesterol done, it should be fractionated. So tell me about my LDL, basically. And 225 has actually been shown to go with longevity and cognitive function. Under 160, and a lot of cardiologists don't tell you this. They're like, statin, statin, statin. I want your cholesterol as low as possible.

• 37:19Daniel Amen?

  But they're not telling you, under 160 is associated with depression. It's associated with suicide, with homicide, and death from all causes. I have a brother-in-law who has heart disease, and his doctor is always pushing it, low, low, low. And whenever he goes under 150, he calls me and he's like, I'm so sad. I want to die. And I'm like, and so I have to get on the phone with this cardiologist and go, it's a balancing act because 60% of the solid weight of your brain is fat. And cholesterol makes up a lot of that. And so you don't want it too low, which is why I'm not a fan of low-fat diets.

• 38:03Ed Mylett?

  Okay. There's a lot, everybody, right there. You're, you're, all these, there are different factors that you need to be looking at. Okay, now off the medical stuff and the lab studies and those. Any daily practices you'd recommend? We talked about ants earlier. Are there daily practices and strategies that someone right now says, I've got anxiety, I've got worry, or? You know, any of those factors, I am not focused enough, I'm not happy. It would be a daily practice you would recommend strategically.

• 38:30Daniel Amen?

  So in the book, there are a bunch of tiny habits. The small things you can do will make a big difference. What I do, it's actually on the top of my to-do list. Whenever I fire up my computer in the morning, on the top, it says, "Today is going to be a great day." And I've trained myself, when my feet hit the floor in the morning, just tell yourself, "Today is going to be a great day." And then my mind, which is so powerful, will find why it's going to be a great day. I get to hang out with you today. That makes me happy, right? So it'll begin to retrain the negativity bias that is so hurtful and so common in people.

• 39:11Daniel Amen?

  And then I have a practice, before I go to bed at night, I say a prayer, and then I go, "What went well today?" And I'm always amazed, because like you, I'm busy, and I just like sort of get through my day, but I find these nuggets of awesome experiences. And we just adopted my two nieces, who I actually dedicate this book to. And at breakfast, "Why is today going to be a great day?" At dinner, "What went well today?" I mean, I want to know what went wrong and what we can do differently, but I want to train your mind to look for what's right,

• 39:54Daniel Amen?

  because from an evolutionary standpoint, we already look for what's wrong.

• 39:58Ed Mylett?

  Right, survival mode.

• 40:00Daniel Amen?

  And you need to know, right, that don't worry, be happy people die the earliest. But I want to train away the negativity bias to help you be in a happier place.

• 40:13Ed Mylett?

  It's funny that you say that, because I write that in my book as well. Gratitude exercise, what went well today, who do I love, who loves me? And I've had people say, "Yeah, I tried, that didn't work." And what I need everybody to understand is that, yeah, if you did it one day out of 11, it won't work. But if this becomes your habit, your routine, your behavior, your culture, it will absolutely transform your life. You will begin to see things that were always there, that always existed, that were outside your filter, outside your periphery. When you begin to look for these things regularly and remind yourself, that is brilliant, brilliant, brilliant advice. Couple of things, what about sleep?

• 40:46Daniel Amen?

  So the S in bright minds is sleep because it is so crucial. Teenagers who get just one hour less than their peers have a higher incidence of depression and suicide. When you sleep, your brain cleans or washes itself. And if you're not sleeping seven, seven and a half hours a night, it's not giving it enough time for the cleaning crew to do their job. And if you snore loudly, stop breathing at night, you're tired during the day, you might have sleep apnea, which triples the risk for Alzheimer's disease. So getting that properly assessed and treated is crucial. Sleep is so important.

• 41:28Daniel Amen?

  And on average in 1900, Americans got nine hours of sleep at night. Now, the average is six hours and 40 minutes. You can't go through that big change in such a small period of evolution without a dramatic negative impact on the population. And a lot of it is the blue light and the gadgets. So I'm actually a fan of blue light in the morning.

• 41:53Ed Mylett?

  Okay.

• 41:54Daniel Amen?

  But not after dark because it decreases...

• 41:58Ed Mylett?

  You talk a lot about social media contributing to brain health issues. Would you just reference that as you go through?

• 42:05Daniel Amen?

  Well, in the book, I love this writing device that basically said if I'm an evil ruler and I wanted to increase the incidence of mental illness in America, what would I do? And I'd create free social media apps that make everyone else's life look amazing and by contrast, yours sucks. Be one of the first things I do. And the kids who spend the most time on social media have the highest incidence of depression and obesity. You have to be very careful with the gadgets. And the gadgets were purposefully made... To be addictive. They're after mind share. So you know, in the grocery store, the bottom two shelves go after your children

• 42:49Daniel Amen?

  because they're going after stomach share. How much of your stomach share can I get? But for Silicon Valley, it's mind share. And I don't want them to have my mind. I want to be careful, but the variable reinforcement, they know exactly. It works just like Vegas.

• 43:09Ed Mylett?

  So, I'm just picturing a teenager and these combination of factors. All the exposure to social media blue light. They smoke marijuana. Their diet is terrible. They're a bit overweight.

• 43:21Daniel Amen?

  And then think of pornography. That, you know, I mean, when you and I were young, if we could find Playboy magazine, and I was like, awesome. But now, on their phones, or their friends' phones, if their parents are smart enough to put parental controls on, which they absolutely should, they have free access to something that will shrink their frontal lobes. Now, why don't you want frontal lobes that are smaller? Because they run your life. That's the CEO, the executive of your life is in the front third of your brain. And exposing, you know, young boys to non-stop pornography is a disaster for development.

• 44:02Ed Mylett?

  You're so amazing. I love you, by the way. Thank you for everything you've done for me. There's probably something I didn't ask you today, or an idea or a thought you have about brain health overall, or your mission right now, the book itself, The End of Mental Illness. What would you just want to tell everybody?

• 44:17Daniel Amen?

  We didn't talk much about the imaging. It's like, well, why, you know, because I've gotten myself into all sorts of hot water with my colleagues. I'm a distinguished fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, but probably I'm more psychiatrists hate me than any other psychiatrists in the world. Why? Because I think if you don't look, you don't know. And we need to stop lying about that. When, in 1979, I decided to be a psychiatrist, I tell my dad, and he asked me why I don't want to be a real doctor, why I want to be a nut doctor and hang out with nuts all day long. And my dad didn't get Father of the Year Award. And he hurt my feelings, but forty years later, I completely get it.

• 44:59Daniel Amen?

  What medical specialty never looks at the organ they treat? And that's just dumb. It's wrong. And the fact that I look, and that's why we built this big database. And despite incredible opposition, but it's the stories that it's like, if I don't look, I don't know. I mean, that's why we went up against the NFL, because the NFL said, oh, there's no long-term evidence. The play football causes brain damage. And I'm like, are you dumb? The brain is soft. The skull is hard. The skull has sharp, bony ridges. If you went, hey, Daniel, single most important thing you've learned from 170,000 scans? Mild traumatic brain injury ruins people's lives.

• 45:43Daniel Amen?

  And nobody knows, because nobody looks. And so, in the book, I really, you know, I plant my position really clearly. If you're struggling and no one's looked at your brain, well, how would they know what to do? Based on what you tell them? Really? Would a cardiologist act like that? Or an orthopedic doctor? No. And so, I know the title's not going to get me more friends, but it's not mental illness. It's brain health issues. Get your brain right, your mind will follow.

• 46:19Ed Mylett?

  I think you're so important, you've been so important in the world for so many decades because of the work you've done, but right now may be the most important. And the reason for that is, I think this book can be a catalyst to change that whole paradigm of shame and keeping it quiet and being embarrassed by it and understanding that your brain is an organ, that it should get looked at, that you can treat this, that it is a medical issue, correct? This is something that can get healthier and get better. And guys, you gotta get the book. I mean, it's to get this much information from this man who's done hundreds of thousands of brain scans with people from all over the world. You can get this in a book. You need to get it. And so I highly recommend you go get the End of Mental Illness. You can go to endofmentalillness.com. You can go wherever great books are sold.

• 47:03Ed Mylett?

  Thank you so much. I love you. I love today. I'm so grateful you're in my life. And I just know that we changed and helped lives. And you know what else? Saved some lives today. So thank you so much, brother.

• 47:14Daniel Amen?

  Yeah, I love you back. Thank you for the opportunity.

• 47:17Ed Mylett?

  I love you. All right, everybody. Hey, you know, I bring you the best people in the world every single week on this show in their era of competency. And I want to engage with you more. I want to know more about you so I know who to bring you. And so for that reason, every day on Instagram, and it's a lot of work, but I do the max out two-minute drill every single day on Instagram so that I can connect with you. I read all your comments, thousands of them. And so here's how it works. When I make a post, I make them at 7:30 Pacific, 10:30 Eastern every day on Instagram. When I make a post, if you make a comment, you're in a drawing every day to win. The other way you can get into the drawing is to make a comment on people's comments. So you're connecting with each other. Thirdly, if you miss the first two minutes, just make a comment every day on the five posts I make every week. Every single day, just make a comment at any time and you're in a drawing. You can win coaching with me, coaching with my guests,

• 48:01Ed Mylett?

  tickets to see me speak, max out gear, a group just won a ride on my private jet a few weeks ago. It's all fun stuff so I can connect with you. So I'll see you on Instagram. God bless you and max out.

• 48:16Speaker 03

  This is The End of Mental Illness Show.