[00:00:00] Shireen: In today's episode of our podcast, we'll welcome Dr. Eva Selhub, a physician and internationally recognized expert in stress, resilience, and mind body medicine. We'll discuss daily practices for building resilience, effective stress management techniques, and holistic nutrition tips to combat chronic stress and burnout.

Stay with us.

Dr. Eva Selhub is an internationally recognized expert in resilience, is a physician, author, keynote speaker, and spiritual advisor. Her work redefines our approach to resilience, health, and leadership, encouraging her audience to believe in the possibility of transformation and discover optimal resilience.

Let's find out about this. So welcome Dr. Eva Selhub. 

[00:00:54] Dr. Eva Selhub: Thank you for having me. 

[00:00:56] Shireen: Such a pleasure. So diving right in our episode today is really about honing in and really understanding resilience, um, stress management and just our overall health as a result. Could you share a little bit more about what your journey has been like to get here? What really drew you to this field of health and resilience? 

[00:01:15] Dr. Eva Selhub: Well, that's a, that's a long question considering that I started my journey as a child wanting to be a healer, a medicine woman, and of course as a daughter of a scientist, a doctor. So my interest in health and healing has been a lifelong journey.

Um, and then it was my own trials and tribulations that pointed me to, um, what caused disease, what caused, uh, mental and physical health challenges and the stress that I was going through personally. Um, and it was my, uh, second year in my residency when I had a really challenging year. I was, um, stuck, I was doing a procedure, was stuck with a needle that had, uh, was infested with HIV, with AIDS.

This is, this was 1996 when people were diagnosed. literally just dying from the disease. And, uh, so that was a big sort of stop, stop your life right now and really think about what's, what is it that you want if you survive this. Um, and it was quite devastating. I had to go on medication for six weeks to prevent conversion.

I thought I was going to die. I thought I was going to die alone. I thought I was not going to be able to work. I thought I was going to be stuck with, my parents were going to be stuck with loans that they co signed for. Um, and really sort of rethinking my life of what am I doing. Um, and that year was quite a devastating year.

I did not get HIV, but my dog died and my grandfather died and my apartment burned down and my father had a heart attack within like a five month period. So, needless to say, This was in 1996 and, uh, I shut down and went through a sort of, I would say, a massive depression and a lack of desire to want to exist, a sort of, uh, a giving up period and really thinking about what's the point of working so hard and trying so hard when you're really so helpless.

And a friend took me out, probably, this was probably a year had gone by at this point, Um, and a friend had taken me out and said, we miss you and I can't, I don't know, I told, I've told the story a million times and I just don't know what it was that, uh, created the awakening. But I realized that I was asking the wrong question as opposed to asking why me, which is the victim state.

I, you know, I could have been asking why not me, which is that life happens. That nature just as soon lets a forest fire burn as a flower bloom. It's not personal. And I was taking it personally. I was feeling victimized by my life when truly I wasn't a victim, you know, and I needed to figure out why that was that I thought that way, why I felt that way and that how I coped with the challenges in my life were affecting me physically and mentally, emotionally and socially.

And if it was happening to me, it was happening to everyone. So when I got out of my residency, I started working at the MindBody Medical Institute at Harvard, where I soon became their medical director a year later and just learned about stress and learned about meditation and nutrition and exercise and all the things that enable an individual to be resilient.

And I was combining that with my actual, um, medical practice. for five years. Um, and then after doing that, I said, I don't really want to have this medical practice anymore. It's not doing what I want to do. It's not actually helping people become resilient. It's actually, um, supporting people to stay victimized and weak.

You know, these patients who are looking to other people to fix them and not, you know, taking responsibility or knowing that they can take responsibility for themselves to become more resilient. So I left my primary care practice in 2002. And in 2003, after studying with healers and Chinese medicine practitioners and energy workers, I opened up my own practice, combining all of these modalities for healing to support individuals to heal themselves.

So it's, it's You know, that was 2002, 2003. So we're, you know, 20, 21 years later, um, that's what I've been doing. 

[00:05:19] Shireen: What a remarkable story, Dr. Selhub. And, you know, it's, it's, uh, and I love what you touched on in the story that you mentioned, your own personal story, which is like, you come out of that victim mentality and you go, why not me?

And that is such a powerful shift from why me? Right. Um, and speaking of a force what this episode is regarding resilience, can you can you speak a little bit more about? And you've written, by the way, extensively about resilience and stress management. How do these concepts interrelate in your approach to helping individuals really thrive, right?

And that's really the goal. How does it enable someone to thrive in this modern lifestyle in very high stress environments? 

[00:05:59] Dr. Eva Selhub: Well, so that it's a really, really good question, because ultimately, everyone's resilient. So resilience is the ability to bounce back from stress, from a challenge, from a fall, right?

And all of us fall and get back up. Now, how we feel after we get back up is what's gonna sort of make and break us, literally, right? So a child that falls and gets back up, bounces right back up. Like, no harm, no foul. As an older person falls down, they could break something. Um, or they're hurting for days.

So they're, they're recovery. So resilience is about recovery. The ability to recover from challenges. It's not about not experiencing challenges, but it's about how we recover from these challenges, how quickly we recover and whether or not we recover and get back to original form, which is the definition of resilience to incur a stress and be able to recover.

bounce back to original form. But not only that, but be able to bounce back to even better form, right? So we see athletes who put themselves under extreme stress and they get stronger and better, right? We call that hormesis, the ability to grow and get stronger from stress. So understanding that we all are resilient because all of us has been through trials and tribulations to even get here, even to get through the womb.

is a big deal. To be born is a big deal. To get through your childhood is a big deal. And many people had traumas in their childhood or illness or getting through school. Like, things are really hard. Life is hard. The fact that you've gotten here today means you're resilient. Now the question is, is where are you on the scale of resilience?

So this resilience is like a bell shaped curve. So on the, the lower end, we've got burnout and sickness. Right? In the middle, we've got, I'm okay, wellness. Wellness is sort of this in between category. And our markers for wellness in medicine is like, your blood pressure is okay, your BMI is okay, your cholesterol is okay, it really doesn't tell us much.

Because it doesn't really tell us what's happening in here. All we know is when somebody's sick, or burnt out, and when somebody is thriving and flourishing. Those are the two ends. When you're fit, you're healthy. Like, you know, fit, thriving, and flourishing. Now we'd all love that. We don't really want to be on this end of the scale.

However, most people actually are on over here. They're in between wellness and sickness. The majority of people have no idea where they are because they don't know what it feels like to thrive. They don't know what it feels like to have boundless energy because we get used to just living. and being able to overcome our challenges and keep going, not paying attention to the fact the body screaming, that the soul is screaming, the spirit is screaming, saying, this isn't right for me.

I'm not getting enough sleep. I'm not getting enough nutrient rich foods. I'm not getting enough social support. I'm not getting enough connection with spirit, whatever that may be. And so what happens is, is we get a tendency towards burnout or sickness or something comes by and knocks us down versus getting stronger and happier and more thriving and more flourishing despite the challenges that happen.

So that's ultimately where we want to be, and that's the work that I do with people with regard to the all encompassing nature of what resilience means, which I bring into Six Pillars. So there's the physical vitality. So what is it that we do to take care of our physical health? We all know that we're sleep deprived.

We look at the world too much. And that's what brings us to our mental fitness, our mental health, our mental toughness, our ability to have a growth mindset. So resilience is very much about the ability to look at our challenges as opportunities for growth and learning, as opposed to that victimized state.

How can I make this work with me or for me rather than against me? So to be able to get in that growth mindset, we need to have that physical vitality that we can indeed handle something. You're like, bring it, I got this, but if I'm tired, I don't want to deal with anything. If I'm inflamed, my brain's not going to be able to think clearly and stay open minded.

That stress response is going to be affecting me physically. So that mental openness, mental mindset, the growth mindset, mental toughness, that's the second pillar. The third pillar that's going to affect both of those are my emotions. When I'm in a negative emotional state, my tendency will be to be more victimized in life.

to follow negative behavior patterns. Right? I'm not going to, like, my tendency is to go and like eat a bunch of comfort food as opposed to, you know, go for a run or whatever that may be. So our emotional state affects our decisions. It affects our, our mental capacity and it affects how we feel about ourselves and about our world.

So that emotional equilibrium is the third pillar to be able to take care of our emotions, to be able to regulate them effectively. The fourth one is about knowing that we are social creatures. We're not meant to exist alone. If we really are, you know, want to be resilient, we need a community. And it's through the, the shared values and shared support that we actually thrived as a species.

We didn't exist by ourselves. So that fourth one is our relationships. The relationship pillar is healthy and loving and supportive relationships. And many people don't have those. No, they're alone. They don't have that sense of community and togetherness, which brings us to that fifth pillar, which is again, that sense of belonging, but not only the sense of belonging socially, but that sense of belonging to something greater than, which I call, which is our spiritual connection.

So that really is going to allow us to transcend much of life's hardship through that, again, that knowing that the universe or love or God or nature or whatever that may be, is working with me or for me rather than against me. That I'm connected to something greater than, that there is a timing and a place for everything that allows me a semblance of patience, of knowing that all is okay as it is.

Again, that allows us to be in that mindset. And then the sixth one, the sixth pillar is one of knowing that I do not exist in isolation. That everything I do affects everything else around me. That a boulder and a pebble both create ripples on the water. One is bigger than the other but there are ripples nonetheless affecting everything else.

So that we do not exist in isolation. So it's understanding our role as leaders in our lives. But you don't have to be a CEO or, or head of a family that in your own right, you are always a leader. You are not alone. You are part of a community. You're part of a greater whole and that everything that happens within you is affecting everything outside of you.

And we take that into account. We take out into account that what I do and how I live affects others and vice versa. Again, it's going to enable us to take on a more resilient mindset. So those are the six pillars.

[00:13:20] Shireen: I love that. And, you know, just to double click on the sixth one, cause that, that one always makes me, it's quite, it makes me very curious, right.

To understand, like, so if we're all creating those ripples, What, in essence, we're saying is my actions impact someone else and their reaction perhaps impacts me. Right? How do we, how do we move into a positive shift of understanding both the impact of our actions? Because we cannot control somebody else's reaction, right?

Um, how do you sort of move around the world and sort of Take ownership and a sense of responsibility, of course, for your own actions, but then also know that you cannot control everything else around you. 

[00:14:03] Dr. Eva Selhub: Well, again, it's knowing that we have shared humanity. So that first step is the self compassion of knowing that we have shared humanity.

We all have stress. We all have a triggers. We all hurt. And when we are in a state of separation, we suffer. And when I'm in a state of wholeness in a state of love, I don't. And so for me, it's all I'm responsible for is functioning from a state of love, as best that I can, from the highest place, from the highest good.

That's all I can do. It's all I can do. And if I'm triggered by somebody else's reaction, I take care of myself. And when I take care of myself, I get into a place of love, of highest place for highest good. It doesn't mean that somebody's behavior is condoned, it's that how I then manage it and deal with it will be very different than if I'm reactive and angry and all those types of things.

If I'm in a negative emotional state, I will fight back. I will feel victimized. I will react in a way that's reactive rather than responsive. So I'm only responsible for my behavior, for my responses, my reactions. 

[00:15:11] Shireen: And that's that's incredibly powerful from to operate in that space, right? You also do quite a bit of work as the director for the mind body medicine at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

Could you share a little bit more about this mind body medicine? Help us understand that a little bit. And then what does it look like on a day to day basis for an individual?

[00:15:33] Dr. Eva Selhub: Well, so, so that I, uh, haven't been there for many, many years. So that I left the, um, Benson Henry Institute in 2016. So I've, this is sort of my, my own practice that I have, but the mind body medicine basically says that there is a three legged stool to health and well, health and wellbeing, that there is.

Uh, procedures, uh, pharmaceuticals or whatever things, you know, medications you put into your system. And then there is the third leg, which is what you can do for yourself or self care. And it's knowing that the mind and body and spirit are all interconnected, that they're not separate, that you don't trust, treat one and not the other, that the mind affects what happens in the body and what happens the body affects the mind and all of it is then connected to the soul and the spirit.

And so in mind body medicine you're addressing all of the above. You're addressing spirituality, you're addressing meditation and relaxation, you're addressing the stress response, you're addressing nutrition, exercise, social support, um, being out in nature. all the different modalities that are going to affect your mind body spirit connection so that it can be at its best so that your natural ability to heal is at its peak.

And don't we all want that, right? Like, don't we want to peak it? Don't we all want to heal at that level? Well, we do. The problem is for most people is they don't want to do the work. Right? It's because it's not like you just go to a doctor and they do it for you. You don't just take a pill and have it be over with.

This is behavior changes, right? It's, it's, it's a regular practice of self awareness, of noticing how you feel and making, It's an intention to make changes in your life that will, that'll support you to thrive versus die. And it's not easy. It's not an easy task to change habits that you've been using for your entire life.

The problem with a lot of these habits, even though they help you feel better, they're also making you sicker. And to be able to give them up when they've helped you. in the past is not an easy thing to do. So it's, it's a lot of rigor that's involved in, you know, really being able to get to that point that the, when you do get there, it feels great.

[00:17:57] Shireen: You know, uh, even as we're talking about what you mentioned earlier about like the physical and what we're putting into our body, you mentioned nutrition in your experience. What are some of the most effective ways to sort of mend that relationship and to sort of nurture your body and the most thoughtful way to build that resilience, particularly for those who are struggling with any kind of mental chronic stress that they may have.

[00:18:22] Dr. Eva Selhub: Well, first of all, you want to, I, I like to think of thinking of what is nutrient rich. I don't even talk about healthy food because I don't even know what that means. People don't know what healthy is. So we want to think about what is nutrient rich food and do I love myself enough to nurture myself with nutrient rich food, right?

And to start paying attention to how different things cause me to feel. If I eat too much sugar and and processed foods, I'm depressed and irritable the next day. Now, if you paid attention, you would notice that that's true because that the gut brain is like completely in cahoots with one another, the gut brain axis.

So we want to think about if, you know, if I was driving a really expensive car, I would put in high octane fuel in there. I wouldn't put in vegetable oil. But we do that to our bodies. So the question is, how much do I care about my body? How much do I want to really love this body, knowing that it's the vessel that houses the spirits, to enable me to enjoy life as much as possible?

So that's the first thing, is to make a choice, to believe that your body is a vessel of beauty, no matter what it looks like in the mirror. It's incredible. It's incredible. You've got billions of trillions of cells working together to create forms so that you can live in this world. So, how do I want to treat it?

What kind of fuel do I want to put in it? And then we think about nutrient rich fuel. And that's not very difficult because nutrient rich is going to include things that come from the earth. They're not going to be things that come from a factory. It's just not. I mean, your body does not recognize stuff that comes from a factory.

It's going to recognize stuff that comes from the earth because your body comes from the earth. So then we think, okay, well, what is it that my body really likes? Well, it's going to like all kinds of colorful fruits and vegetables. And it's going to like, you know, lean proteins and that gets a little bit confusing for a lot of people and that's going to vary on person to person.

But we might try to think about did this living being that I'm consuming, was it happy? Or does it, or is it itself filled with stress hormones? Do I want to put stress hormones and stress in my body because that living being was stressed in its life? You know, everybody has different philosophies on, on what they're going to eat, but the majority as we know that the plant based foods.

A variety of plant based foods of 30, at least 30 different plant based foods that are colorful in nature. They're going to be filled with antioxidants and vitamins and minerals and proteins that my body needs and that my body can thrive off of. So it's figuring out what's the right fuel for me. That's not going to be the same for everybody, but those are sort of the major pointers.

[00:21:20] Shireen: I do want to switch real quickly and talk about mental health. Now you've explored how natural environments can really benefit mental health. Can you elaborate on how environmental factors influence stress levels and resilience and how individuals can harness this knowledge in their daily lives? 

[00:21:40] Dr. Eva Selhub: Um, also a very good question.

I think what people want to remember is, like I just said, you came from the Earth. You didn't come from a factory. And our brain wants nature. Our brain is comfortable in nature. Nothing in nature is ugly to our brain. It's curious. It's fascinating. It's scary. But it's not ugly. As opposed to a computer screen in a concrete jungle.

And buildings and gray and dirt, man made, human made dirt, that is ugly to the brain and it's very stressful. And we know that the more screen time that people, um, have, the less nature exposure that they have, the higher the mental health issues. And we can, you know, we can mirror the increase in depression and anxiety and narcissism even with the screen time and lack of nature exposure.

So all you need is like 20 minutes even a day of nature time, whether you want to garden or just lie on the ground or go for a mindful walk or, you know, get out for a hike or whatever that may be, bring plants into your home. You are, we are human beings that require nature. It, it, it ignites our creativity.

It's like a drop of morphine that goes into the brain that reduces stress, reduces stress hormones, even improves the immune system. Allows us to feel better about ourselves and more connected to that greater whole that I talked about earlier. We need nature. So, that is all. One way of supporting your mental health is by getting out to nature and bringing nature into your environment where you spend a lot of your time, even if it's aromatherapy or photos of nature or screensavers of nature, bring, like I said, plants and what have you, getting a pat, there's all different ways to incorporate nature into your life.

[00:23:47] Shireen: We're coming up toward the end of the episode here. I would like to squeeze in just one last question here. You know, mindfulness is a key component of, uh, stress reduction strategies. What are some common misconceptions around mindfulness and how can mindful eating factor into the strategy?

[00:24:05] Dr. Eva Selhub: Um, I think one of the things I don't know about misconceptions about mindfulness, but I think that I don't think people actually get what mindfulness is for the most part and all it is, and if you haven't done meditation in your life, I do think this is one of the easiest ones to start with.

And what it is about is nonjudgmental moment to moment awareness. So what does that mean? It sounds like a mouthful. It means being fully present right here, right now using all your senses to explore and witness right here, right now without judgment. So it's not like you're saying, Oh, I like that red flower.

You're saying, Oh, red flower. And you're just present with the red flower and you might appreciate the way it looks, the redness. You might appreciate the shapes. You might appreciate the aromas coming from this red flower. You might appreciate that it's spring and it's blooming or that it's closed. You might appreciate how long it took for it to come up from the earth and when it was planted, or who had planted it.

All in that moment of the awareness of this flower as it's there, the experience of the flower. I'm seeing this flower. So it's a moment to moment awareness. You can practice mindfulness with your own emotions. I'm noticing that I'm feeling a rise of anger and that rise of anger is expressing itself as tension in my chest.

So it's just observing and witnessing from moment to moment and so you can bring that practice into every aspect of your life. And when we're in the moment of the now, we're not in yesterday, and we're not in tomorrow. We're in the here and now. And in the here and now, you're not thinking about your stress, you're not thinking about what is and what isn't.

You're not separate. You're in now, which means we're in wholeness. So you can eat mindfully. You can appreciate the colors of the plate using your sight. You can appreciate the aromas, your smells. You can appreciate the sounds, your hearing. You can appreciate the feel or the texture. You can appreciate what images come to mind, let's say, with the smells and the sounds and the tastes and the feeling that's happening in your body when it comes into your body and appreciate that you're nurturing your body.

As it's coming through. You will eat more slowly. You will be more, um, you'll take care with what it is you do put in your body.

And you will probably digest your food better because you're now eating mindfully with appreciation, even appreciating who like the farmers who made this food, you know, who grew it in their, in their farm or the gardeners. . So in that experience, you bring in a sense of gratitude or joy, but simply because you're fully being present, engaging your senses in the experience of the now mm-Hmm.

And that's mindfulness. 

[00:27:41] Shireen: Love it. On that note, we are toward the end of the episode here, Dr. Selhub. What, what a calming episode. Let me say that . Um, we thought we'd love for our listeners just to know how they can connect with you and learn more about your work.

[00:27:54] Dr. Eva Selhub: Um, you can, uh, visit my website, DrSelhub. com, d r Selhub.

com, and on all the, I think I'm, I believe we are on all the, um, social media channels. So we're Twitter and Instagram and Facebook, um, LinkedIn, and so we're constantly posting new materials. And on Medium, I usually am posting some type of blog. The blog is also on my website, but the new stuff that I usually tend to put on my medium channel, which you're welcome to come to that.

And then eventually it will make it to my website. 

[00:28:26] Shireen: Love it. Love it. Absolutely love it. Dr. Selhub, thank you so very much for your time. To our listeners, by the way, we've linked up everything as far as social media channels is concerned down at the bottom. So scroll down below and you'll be able to find that.

Um, so to our listeners, thank you so much for joining us on another episode of the Yumlish podcast. We have a quick question for you that you can go answer on our social media pages. It's going to be at Yumlish on Facebook, on Instagram. Answer below to tell us what are some strategies you use to to manage stress for yourself.

Again, head over to our Facebook, Instagram, find us at Yumlish, find this podcast post and comment below to tell us what are strategies you use to manage your stress. We'll continue the conversation there with that. Dr. Selhub, thank you so very much for your time. Thank you.

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