5 Minute Facts - Neuro-sync: Discovering the Empathetic Bonds that Bind Us

This is episode 246 of the Empowered Team podcast. Welcome to the Empowered Team podcast where we explore how to optimize your performance in career, sport and life. And now your host, executive coach and life strategist, Kari Schneider. Welcome. Welcome to Performance Power. This is our monthly special event where we get to answer all your your questions about training, health, nutrition, performance. And today we've got this geeky topic, neurosync Discovering the empathetic bonds that bind us. Basically, it's neuros nervous system coupling. Now before you feel like you are going to get a geek overload, think about it this way. When you are lying in bed next to your loved one and nothing's been said but you feel like something's off, you feel attention, your body has anxiety in it, you're feeling like something's a little off and you ask your partner, is something wrong? And they say no, but you can tell by the tension. And then finally out it comes. Something happened at work, something happened in their life. So why were you picking up on their energy, their stress, their body, their nervous system? It's called this nervous system coupling and it can impact us massively. So this is our 5 Minute Facts topic today is this neuro sync that we have with other people, this coupling that happens with other humans. So Here are our 5 minute facts and then we'll dive into your questions and I've got a few that are here that I can field and we'll take some questions live as well. So number one, five minute facts in this nervous system coupling. A key factor that's at play when we are interacting with anyone, never mind if it's our loved ones or close connections or not, is empathy. And there's two types of empathy. One is cognitive empathy and this is the kind where we understand, we can understand and conceptualize something that's going on for them. We can do this with this part of our brain called our prefrontal cortex and these mirror neurons that we have so we can interpret and understand what their emotional state is by inferring their thoughts, intentions and feelings. The second type of empathy is affective empathy. And this is where we literally share their emotional state. We are feeling what they're feeling. We are having this emotional contagion again through our mirror nerve neurons, this neural circuit. However, we are experiencing what they're experiencing. That's effective empathy. So that's fact number one. Fact number two is our autonomic nervous system is affected by other people. Now our autonomic nervous system is in two parts there's our parasympathetic, that is our rest and digest, our relaxed. So we can literally be affected by someone else's calmness. And there's our sympathetic nervous system. This is our fight or flight, also freeze or fawn, we can go into those another day. However, those parts of our nervous system are also affected by someone else's anger, anxiety, tension, that stressful response. So that's fact number two, is that our autonomic nervous system, consisting of parents, sympathetic and sympathetic, are also involved in this coupling. And fact number three, when we perceive another person's specific emotional or physical state, our autonomic nervous system tends to respond. So we tend to also have an increased heart rate or increased sweating or increased agitation. So and also when someone else, we're observing their calmness, that is also affected. So that can trigger our parasympathetic nervous system to result in a decrease in heart rate and a sense of relaxation. That's fact number three and fact number four. And this is really where it's at. So there's scientific evidence that suggests that there's this physiological coupling between humans, especially during an emotional type connection. This phenomenon is referred to as physiological synchrony. Physiological synchrony or interpersonal physiological coherence. The real sciency names. But what it refers to is this mirroring or alignment of physiological responses between individuals who, who are experiencing some sort of emotional closeness. So when you think about this, this is when you walk into the room and somebody's really excited and you become excited, but you don't even know what's going on. This is when somebody's upset in a meeting and you find that you are physiologically agitated all day long because you've picked up their upset in that environment. So it means that when people are emotionally connected that our physiology becomes connected too and that their physiological processes become similar or synchronized to our physiological processes, especially heart rate variability. So imagine that you are, you have a friend, you have a loved one, and whatever their emotional state is, your heart and the rhythm that it beats at, the way that it beats ends up mirroring theirs. So this can be pretty profound if you want to be in a very relaxed and calm and focused state, yet they are in an agitated or angry state. So that's where it can really come into being a problem. And number five on our five minute facts is that when there is an uncoupling, so you've got this synchrony between another person or there is a breakdown in the relationship, then we literally go through a withdrawal type feeling feeling when we separate or uncouple from the other person. So there are a number of physiological and emotional responses. So there can be effects like increased physiological arousal. We're agitated, we're confused, there's emotional states of change, activation of our stress hormones, disrupted sleep patterns, sadness or grief, anguish or distress, anxiety or fear. You can imagine all of this in a breakup, a loss of a loved one. But it also happens whether the breakup is there or not, or whether someone has died or not. This uncoupling can happen when we're separated from their nervous system. So you can feel this type of thing happening when they have not when their system is separated from yours. So this is a really profound thing that is going on behind the scenes all of the time with any, anybody that we are very connected to. And a lot of us who are more aware of our physiological or our emotional states can feel when we've uncoupled from somebody that's with us. So that can be something that really affects us on the day to day. We may not know why. So hopefully this explains to you why you might feel some of the ways that you feel when you've got this coupling and someone else is agitated or this uncoupling and you feel that disconnection and it ends up bringing agitation or emotional stress or physiological stress towards you. So super geeky topic today. However, I think it's so important when we are in those close work relationships, when we are in those close family relationships and our health and our physiology and our emotional state is being affected by someone else. So Those are our 5 minute facts today and we want to open it up to questions. I've got some questions that people have sent in and we've got some live options as well. So if you have a question on this topic, type it in the chat or unmute yourself. Or if you have another question on any other health training, performance, nutrition topic that you want to ask. So we'll open it up for questions now. All right. Peter says how can you re establish that connection? So that's an excellent, that's an excellent question. So there's a couple things. There's actually two possibilities here. When there's reestablishing the connection or creating protection from being affected by someone else's connection. So the re establishing the connection, one of the best ways, and there's a hormonal effect of this is a hug. Now the problem is that it may not be appropriate to hug your boss at work. However, a hug would do it as long as it was A meaningful hug. As you wanted to hug, you wanted to get that closeness. So the hug would be appropriate for the spouse, for the child, for the close friend. But that hug, and if it is appropriate and not, not a sexual advance or anything like that, then actually going skin on skin, so maybe it's with your child or it's with your spouse, and you can lift your shirts and go belly to belly. That will create a hormonal response that will release oxytocin and release seroton. And it will literally help you do this for at least one minute. And when you do it for at least one minute, it will help that physiological bond and that that coupling occur again. Now, another way you can do it, say it's not appropriate to hug your boss or your coworker or someone else that you've got this, this coupling with, and you want to reestablish that coupling. Another appropriate way is to practice those empathetic bonds. So remember the first point that I mentioned was the cognitive empathy and the affective empathy. And if you can reestablish those bonds by really understanding how they feel and truly empathizing with them, that will help them reconnect with you and help you reconnect with them by tapping into our prefrontal cortex, our mirror neurons, and how our emotional brain connects with, with our intellectual brain and thereby helping to connect with them with that empathy. So those are two ways. The physical touch and hugging. If you can do that, that will create a very fast physiological connection and emotional connection as long as it's desired on both parties. And then if you can't do that, hug. The second one being really getting into the empathy. Empathize with them as much as possible. Articulate the empathy. They can start to empathize with you perhaps, and that will re estab that coupling or that neural neuro syncing as we're calling it. Other questions, what else? It could be this topic or another topic, Whatever you have. Ask away questions questions, pop it in the chat or unmute yourself. Yes. Okay. The question is, is there a difference in reasons why and approach regarding male or female? Or we could even say masculine energy or feminine energy, men or women? So in the research, the brain is very complex, but there is a very strong emotional center in our primal brain called our limbic brain. And this is really important when we think of work environments, marital relationships, and we have this primal brain, this limbic area of our brain. However, we've got this prefrontal cortex, our most evolved and advanced portion of our brain, that also has Emotional capabilities, but our primal brain has massive emotional capabilities. There is some evidence in research suggesting, and I really want to be careful with this because it's not, it's not absolute. There is some evidence suggesting that women have some. I don't want to say that it's better or worse, but maybe a little more of a connection between their emotional brain and their, their prefrontal cortex or their cognitive thinking and planning brain and decision making brain. And so sometimes, not always, but sometimes for women it's faster to make the emotional and cognitive connection versus men might be a little more separate from their emotional connection. Plus there's a societal factor. So there is some evidence showing that women have more of a connection there, but it is not absolute. It is not for every woman. Lots of men have this strong connection between their emotional center and their cognitive and thinking and planning center. So that can be a physiological one reason for some women and some men, however, it can be very influenced by upbringing, environment, societal norms. And that ends up a large role into whether we are emotionally empathetic towards someone else. And that empathy really fosters that coupling, that physiological coupling. So yes, there is a difference between men and women. It's really not well understood. It is very, very complex. And some research suggests that women have a better connection between the two. But I hesitate to even say that because it's not well founded. And there's lots other evidence as well that contradicts that. So. And there's the hormonal factors. Women are very complex and in a lot of areas there are differences and more emoting that happens there as well. So I know that that might create a little more mud instead of clarity on that particular question. But I think that's the norm when it comes to men and women as it is. Other questions that we have. I hope that creates more mud instead of clarity. No, I hope that creates more clarity just in that it's complex and not well understood. Other questions that we have on this topic, and if it's not this topic, we can always go into anything else. It could be a rehabilitative training question, nutrition, health question, you name it. What, do you have other questions, and if not. I had a question come in recently. Do we have one? No. Okay, so I have a question here, and it has to do with libido. So this person anonymously asked, I'm gonna bring this in here. Yes, this is happening right now. This person anonymously asked about their libido. They are the healthiest they've ever been in their life. So they don't understand why their libido has dropped. And I asked a few more questions of this person and they also indicated that their stress levels were up a little bit more. And so, and they weren't mentioning that in the beginning, but there were some things going on in their life and their stress levels were up. And that is ultimately what we, we honed in on was the stress levels. Because it wasn't just the libido that went down. It was also the feeling of connection with the other person. And here's what happens when stress levels go up and cortisol goes up. The other thing that happens is that we simply are not able to perform our best in a whole slew of areas, including the empathy that I was talking about earlier. So we aren't, when we are stressed or we are overwhelmed, that's when we tend to not show up as our best in any area, any area at all. So it includes the libido. When cortisol is up, there can be some effects on testosterone, effects on overall adrenaline, and it doesn't, it doesn't tend to support libido. And this is where with stress, it's not just something like libido, it's also when we express ourselves in our most loving way that doesn't typically exist when we're overwhelmed and stressed. We're not showing up as our best selves. We're simply stepping back into one of those states where, oh, I didn't really want to do that. I didn't mean to say that I didn't. That's not how I wanted to show up today. And when you say those things, that's usually due to stress. So to sum that question up, without pointing to anything that's nutrition based or exercise based, because this person is very dialed in on those realms, it ended up pointing more towards the stress. And the stress has a very, very big impact on our lives overall. So that was one of the questions that had come in and I wanted to address it in a way that allows other people to see some of the impact of stress. It's not just on us. It ends up being on our, our sexual desire, it ends up being on our loved ones. It ends up being on our overall performance in how we can be productive in our work lives as well. So that was one that I wanted to address because I thought it would be helpful for other people. And I figured that no one would ask that live. So that was the assumption that I made. Other questions, what else do we have? We've got time for about one Maybe two more questions. Any live questions when I give another chance there before we, we go into a. You can unmute yourself or you can pop it in the chat. Just have a couple people on today. Not, we have a low number, so not a huge, not a huge audience. Okay, we'll go to another one of the questions that came in. This one, this one stemmed from the. What was the topic we had a month ago was all about poop. So what it prompted was the person started to observe the toilet bowl and they noticed that they were, they were floating and sinking again. I'm going with the greatest, the greatest topics here on the questions, but these are what's coming in. So I got to deal with them. The floating or the sinking. And the person realized that they now, as they changed how they were eating, had more sinking bowel movements. And they were unaccustomed to this. But they had heard on our last thing that this was healthier than floating. But they didn't understand why this was happening. And the only thing that I could figure out when I took another look into this is that everything that points to whatever we're eating producing more gas. And, and when we're eating something that's producing more gas, it's not necessarily that it's us producing our gas. It's that the bacteria that's feeding off of what we're eating is producing more gas. And I'm not talking about our own flatulence, I'm talking about gases that are in the bowel movement. That's what makes it float. So it's the bacteria that is actually doing a lot of things. And when we're feeding food to certain bacteria, they end up responding in different ways and then that affects our bowel movement. So when we're feeding food that really feeds the good bacteria that we have and is really nutrient dense for us, then it tends to be a sink and a less of, a less, less gas content filled and more substance content filled. And that's what ends up impacting the poop. So that was a follow up question from our last performance. And however embarrassed I am with talking about it, I think it's important to be able to talk it, talk about it openly and freely because this is what's going on in our lives, right? Libido, nervous system coupling, poop. It's how we optimize our performance as leaders and people in life. So that's where it all comes in. All right, any other questions? Live. What do you got? Do we have another question here? No. Okay, here's One more. We've got time for one more question. And this one was about an old ankle injury. So the person writes, I sprained my ankle 20 years ago and it hasn't been a problem for the last 15 years. However, now I notice that I have more cracking in that ankle and it tends to feel stiff. It's not moving as well as the other foot. Is this something I should be concerned about? So what I would say with this one is that typically when someone has an old ankle injury, most people have a sprain and it's called an inversion sprain, where they roll their ankle, they've sprained their ankle, and what happens with that is that the ligament ends up being pulled. The ligament connects bone to bone. When the ligament is pulled in that ankle sprain, usually people's first ankle sprain, then it creates laxity or kind of a stretched out ligament. The ligament isn't as solid as it once was. So then you go for years and it's healed, it's perfect, everything's fine, it performs just like the other one. You don't have another injury, everything's been awesome. Some people re injure it, but you have to remember that the integrity of that joint is slightly looser than it had been before. So now you add accumulation of years to that situation and 10 years later or 15 years later, that joint has been moving a little bit more than it would ordinarily have moved when that whole, when the joint and the ligament was in full integrity. So what happens over time is there can be just a little bit more wear and tear on the other tendons, ligaments, and then any of the articular cartilage between the bones. So if you're someone that's put a lot of impacts in, like running or just lots of movement, maybe sports and cutting and playing or things like that, then there's just more subtle micro movements or micro shifts that are going on in that joint and that can create some of the stiffness that's going on. If there wasn't another mechanism of injury and it's simply that old, old thing, that's likely what you're seeing flashing forward a decade or two decades later. This is where as when you get over 35, over 40, we start to notice some of those old injuries because there may be just some other things that are moving around in that joint that have created a little, a little swelling or a little extra damage over time. So unfortunately that's the case. But there are so many cool, innovative things going on right now, whether it is stem cells, whether it is PRP injections. There are just so many great things that can really help those joints and give them some fresh cells, some fresh blood to be able to bring down any of that inflammation and have a greater healing effect. So that is our last question of the day. Have a fantastic rest of your Monday and here's to stepping into your optimal performance as a leader in life and your leadership. Because you are serving other people, when you are your best, you are able to give your best. So keep going and have a wonderful rest of your week. If you enjoy listening to the Empowered Team Podcast, you'll love being on the Empowered Team. The Empowered Team is our group coaching and accountability program where we provide the tools, skills and community for you to grow your self mastery as a leader and optimize your results alongside other leaders. The Empowered Team runs year round to learn more about our leadership consulting for Business and our Empowered Team Group coaching, head to www.theempowered.com. That's www.thempowered.ca.empowered. learn more. We can't wait for you to join us. Let's.