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It really drives me crazy when people, even actual neuroscientists go around saying that dopamine is pleasure

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because it clearly isn't.

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And we've known this for like 15 years and they're still going on about like,

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"Oh, dopamine, it's so fun."

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And like dopamine kids and all this.

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And it's like, "No, like that is not how it works at all."

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But what dopamine does seem to be involved with is making you want more.

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And sometimes that is pleasant and sometimes that isn't.

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Welcome to the Re-Patterning Podcast where we believe your mind body system is your domain

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and that choosing the beliefs, habits and patterns that best support you is your birthright.

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I'm your host, Arden Leigh, creator of the Repatterning Project,

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an eight week course in learning to free yourself from the patterns of your past

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and program your mind for your dreams of the future.

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Join me for these extraordinary conversations as we unpack the keys to creating our reality.

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Hello, everyone and welcome back to the Re-Patterning Podcast.

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Thank you so much for being with us today.

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And if you're enjoying these conversations, I do want to remind you before we get started

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with today's episode that you can support us on Patreon for as little as $5 a month

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and that does give you access to our private Discord channel.

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So come find us at patreon.com/therepatterningpodcast

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and with that out of the way, I am so excited you guys about today's guest,

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Maia Szalavitz. Maia, I have been fangirling over you ever since I'm probably dating myself with this,

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but ever since I read your article in Elle magazine about Kent Barrage's research on dopamine.

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And I'm so excited to ask you, like there's been so many things that I've like ever since then

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I wanted to ask you and talk about. And so let me introduce for any of you who are listening

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or unfamiliar. Maia Szalavitz is an acclaimed author and journalist in the fields of neuroscience,

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addiction, drug policy, and recovery. She is the author of several books, including her most recent

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book, Undoing Drugs. And my favorite book, Unbroken Brain, which I have my copy of here. And as you'll

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see, it's like got all these underlinings and stars. It's all, I must have read it like at least

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three times already. It is Unbroken Brain, a revolutionary new way of understanding addiction.

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And she's also the author of Help at Any Cost, which is a book that takes a look at the troubled

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team industry. So I'm excited to talk about that a little bit today too. She is a contributing

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opinion writer at the New York Times and her work has also been featured in Time Magazine,

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Scientific American and the Guardian. Maia, thank you so much for being here with me today.

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I am so excited to talk with you about these subjects. Thanks so much for having me. By sheer

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coincidence, I was speaking with Kent Barrage yesterday for something that I'm working on.

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No kidding. Oh my god. Well, now I'm curious. Can we start there? What are you working on with

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Kent Barrage? I am just, I'm working on a piece for the Times about AI and addiction. And it has

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to do with wanting and liking. And it was so funny when I interviewed him for that L piece who

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is so excited because I think he had a teenage daughter at the time and she was just like,

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that was more impressive than a lot of his scientific publications. But he's lovely and I'm always

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interested in the work that he's doing so it was good to catch up with him. I'm so curious about,

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so I guess the first thing to do is probably unpack a little bit about that research that he did

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on dopamine. And I know from me when I read that article, what struck me was basically the understanding

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that liking and wanting are driven by two, there's two separate drives in the brain. They're not the same

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thing. So you relate this to drug addiction in particular. But when I read that, I remember relating to

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it with my relationship with my then partner because I was like, I have to be around you. I'm so

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anxiously attached. I didn't know what anxious attachment was back then, but it was like, but now looking

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back at it, I was so anxiously attached. I was like, oh my god, I can't stand to not be with you,

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but I can't stand to be with you either. It's this idea that as our cravings increase, our actual

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enjoyment of the thing that we're craving can decrease. And this blew my mind at the time. I was like,

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how do we, how do I even like be in relationship if that's, if that's how this works? So yeah, unpack

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a little bit about that. And I'd love to know how that intersects with AI. Sure. So basically in the brain

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and Kent Barrage was one of the people who sort of elucidated the way this worked. But in the brain,

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there's sort of two kinds of pleasure you might call them. And sometimes they're not actually

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pleasurable, but we'll get into that in a minute. So there is wanting, which another person that I cite

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in the book called the sort of the pleasures of the hunt, right? And so that's about like, oh yeah,

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I'm going to get this. I'm psyched like I am, you know, on top of the world and I can do anything and

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I'm, you know, I'm the cat who's definitely getting the mouse, right? So that is wanting. And wanting can

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be pleasurable because like, you know, watch the cat enjoy the chase, right? But infinite wanting is

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bad because if it's not satisfied in sex or anything else, it is no fun, right? And liking is the other

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piece. And so you can compare that to what poetically is called the pleasures of the feast where you are,

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you've caught your whatever and you are sitting down to eat and it is all good. You can also think

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about this in sort of more crude terms as like desire versus orgasm and after, right? And it's

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important because what can happen and some of Barrage's more recent work is actually looked at this

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is you can want something that you really don't like anymore. And he has actually trained rats to sort

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of want pain. And so that's kind of relate to those rats actually.

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Nice fact, we all can. And yes, these are sort of the techniques of the bad boy friend. And you sort of,

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you really, and so in relation to AI, I was looking at it sort of, so if you think about it for

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was Barrage drugs first. So wanting is kind of like the stimulant experience like cocaine or

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methamphetamine where again, you just feel like very powerful and you want something and you're

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going to be able to get it and it feels great. And so that's the sort of early stage wanting where

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it's pleasure. And drugs like opioids and alcohol are sort of, they simulate more the liking and the

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satiation of desire. And so again, if you want to look at it sexually, the desire part is one thing,

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the climax in after that is a different thing. And if you have the first without a second,

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it's often not very fun. And so you can and I did end up really, really wanting something that I

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didn't like anymore. And this becomes really acute with cocaine. And this seems to be driven by

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the way dopamine works in the brain. And so it really drives me crazy when people even actual

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neuroscientists go around saying that dopamine is pleasure because it clearly isn't. And we've

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known this for like 15 years and they're still going on about like, oh, dopamine, it's so fun and like

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dopamine kids and all this. And it's like, no, like that is not how it works at all. But what dopamine

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does seem to be involved with is making you want more. And sometimes that is pleasant and sometimes

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that isn't. And as you get addicted to something, a person, an activity, an AI, whatever,

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what happens in the brain is that the region where dopamine is activated shifts over time. And it

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goes from an area where you are sort of consciously wanting something and you like wanting it. And

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it's all right to an area where it's kind of automated and the desire is just kind of built in. And

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your actions become sort of less voluntary around that wanting. And for me, this really happened

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very clearly with cocaine. And so I would be just crazily wanting it because I wanted to achieve

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that sense of, you know, things are all right. I could do it and I'm going to get what I want, but

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what I would get towards the end when I was like shooting up dozens of times a day, what I would end

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up with is anxiety and paranoia and fear and shaking. And like, I knew before I injected the coke

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that this is what was going to happen. And yet I could not stop myself from doing that. And it was

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just a maddening horrifying experience. And this was, you know, eventually licked and turned

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over to the recovery basically because when you desperately want something that you don't like,

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it's awful. And, you know, so many people think that, oh, you know, people's addiction are just

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having so much fun and you need to kick them in the butt to make them get better because like,

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they're having so much fun, they would never stop. And it's like, no, not fun at all. This is really

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not fun. You try having infinitely escalating desire and it not being satiated. Would you really

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think that was fun? Seriously. So, you know, but anyway, the dissociation between these two experiences

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is really important. And this is again, which drives me crazy about the oversimplification of dopamine

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because dopamine really does seem to be involved in the pleasure of wanting, but not so much in

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the pleasure of liking. And the pleasure of liking seems to be more opioid mediated. And so,

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if you think about the way stimulants versus depressants act, like stimulants are, you know,

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exciting and up and getting you doing stuff and depressants are calming and mellow. And that's what

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the opioids in your brain are sort of, therefore, they are there to calm the stress system and to allow

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you to chill and to feel safe, warm, loved and comfortable. And when people don't get that in their

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lives or are missing the sensation of that, opioid drugs become obviously especially attractive.

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And so, this is why when, like, Yohan Hari puts it like, you know, the opposite of addiction isn't

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recovery. It's connection. And I think this is true. It is also more complicated, but it is very

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true that a lot of the times what people with addiction are looking for from their substances is

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a feeling of being wanted and loved and okay and, you know, not hated. And when you are actively addicted,

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you do not feel these things very often. And you, you know, at first the drugs give them to you.

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And I mean, one of the real differences between opioids and say a drug like cocaine is that even

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when you are very deeply addicted to opioids, they still work. It's not like you take the opioid and

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you get the opposite effect that like happens with stimulants. What happens instead is you take it and

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you feel okay, but you're not really getting to that kind of amazing euphoria of okayness that

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you used to get to, but it's not like you active. And this is actually what's speaking with Ken

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Barraj about this because one of the challenges to his theories around addiction and

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their wanting and liking is that like opioids don't produce that kind of very sensitized wanting in

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as explicit away as the stimulants do. So one of the challenges to his idea about the way addiction

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works is that opioids don't produce as pronounced a dissociation between wanting and liking as

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stimulants do in later stage addiction. And so you could make the argument that like, oh,

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this means that this does not apply to opioid addiction, but it does. It's just not the dissociation

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is just not as extreme at least in my view and at least in in his view of the way the literature looks.

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And from my understanding too, and in my experience, we can build a tolerance to nearly anything.

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Like for me, it's actually it's kind of funny that I'm such a fan girl of your work and I've never

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experienced what anyone on the outside would look at as addiction. I've never had a problem with

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substances. I didn't start using substances until I was really like kind of in my late 20s and by then,

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you know, I was I was able to kind of find, you know, the sweet spot in I mean, yeah, I might have had

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a night or two that was, you know, but but for the most part, it would it never became a habit. And

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I actually I picked up your book in early 2017 because I was in love with someone who was struggling

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with addiction and I was also I didn't know it at the time, but I was definitely codependent and was

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one of those, you know, like, let me figure out what your problems are. And I started reading it.

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And all of a sudden I was like, wait a minute. This also describes me because what you talk about

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when you talk about addiction as a learning disorder is and this is become, you know, I've sort of

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paraphrased your concept of addiction to come up with my own my own definition of it is I've started

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to call it that addiction is a pattern we have over learned beyond its usefulness because when we

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start out like it's if it didn't work the first time, we wouldn't do it again, but then we do it

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again and again and we build up that tolerance, you know, like we were saying. And so for me, as

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someone who has never been addicted to a substance, at least in any overt kind of a way, I still very

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much recognize myself in the pages of these books because there are certain things in my life that

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again, I would crave, you need more and more and more of the thing to be satisfied.

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Yeah. And I mean, this is fundamental to how you learn anything because what we do is like if

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everything remained new, we couldn't learn it because it would be new all the time. So we wouldn't

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recognize that it's familiar. And so making something from new and scary into safe and familiar

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is basically going to talk. It's going from, you know, sort of being sensitized like, oh, this is new

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I'm a little scared to, oh, yeah, I know this, it's fine. And so, but in order to learn anything, you kind

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of have to be in that sweet spot where you're not overwhelmed by the newness, but you are a little bit

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out of your comfort zone so that you can notice the novelty, incorporate the novelty and then you

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have learned, okay, understand how to deal with whatever this thing may be. So we couldn't learn

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without tolerance. And it is sad that like with drugs, for example, you get tolerant to the liking and

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the good feeling and not to the wanting and the sort of desperation of craving like that escalates

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because I mean, you could imagine a situation where the drug would, if liking, if you didn't get

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tolerant to liking, the drug would just get better and better in smaller and smaller doses.

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Right. And we couldn't learn anything because we would just be in this little bliss, right? So

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there is a price to pay and I guess it kind of goes back to like the tree of knowledge or something,

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but anyway. Yeah, it's funny you mentioned the tree of knowledge too because I was thinking about your

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research and specifically about building tolerance and I was thinking about applying that understanding

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to my magic practice recently because magic is it's that same kind of dance of wanting and liking

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because when you cast for it, you know, in intention, whatever you're doing, you put that intention

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out there, you cast that spell, you do that ritual, whatever it is and you're in that like, oh, I want

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this thing. And then you get it, right? And you get it, you know, hopefully if your magic works,

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right? But then it's like you have to really watch and make sure that you're not overlearning that

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pattern to where nothing is satisfying you. And I'm noticing like because, you know, and I'm autistic,

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you know, as you are as well. So you know, as you talk about in the book and also also by the way,

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your book also helped me to learn that I was autistic too. So thank you also for that. But yeah,

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noticing that pattern and thinking like, oh, this could get dangerous for me. I could get to a place

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where I have the entire world at my feet and yet nothing is satisfying to me. So I guess I'm curious

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how do you or how do we make sure to, I mean, partly, I suppose it's like it's moderation,

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but how do we also make sure that we just in living our lives or in going about the things that we

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want to achieve that we're not desensitizing ourselves to the very things that we set out on that path for.

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I mean, I think like the real, the only way to manage that is to just keep learning and to keep

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challenging yourself and to, you know, there are sort of pleasures that are kind of easy like

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drugs if you're not addiction, that, you know, you just take this, it works and it doesn't require

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effort or learning, right? But if you try to learn a complex system, music, like, which is I am struggling

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with and trying at the moment, um, and, you know, whatever it may be, like, a sport, uh, dance, um,

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art, writing, you know, whatever it is like or loving people, you know, connecting with people,

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all of those things, you have to get into that same kind of sweet spot where you're a bit challenged,

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but you're not like overwhelmed. And I think people on the spectrum, we sensitize really easily,

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which is why we tend to want like repetition and seameness and avoiding novelty sometimes.

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So, you know, there, there is a balance to be had there because if you get overwhelmed, especially

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if you have, you know, anything that gives you difficulty regulating yourself, that can be problematic.

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So you need to sort of stay far enough out of your comfort zone to be challenged, but not so far

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as to be like overwhelmed. And I think I've been thinking lately like so much of life is just about

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like trying to stay in that spot where you are still learning and there's good novelty and who are

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engaged, but you are not overwhelmed. And I think like one of the goals that I had with that book is to

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have people understand that addiction is not this crazy, alien thing that like people who don't

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have it can't understand. It is basically what it is like to be in love with something or someone.

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And when that happens, you get, you know, your motivations change and you get craving and you get

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attached to that person or a thing. And if it's a helpful, productive thing, that's great. You know,

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now you get married and have kids or whatever the version of that is for you. But if it's if you are,

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you know, addicted to an AI or a person who's bad for you or a drug that's bad for you, then,

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you know, you end up in that compulsive behavior despite negative consequences state. And

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the coping that you got from it doesn't really work that well over time anymore.

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Yeah, I actually speaking of that, I would love to read my favorite quote from your book,

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which is the same thing that distinguishes addiction from passionate interest also divides unhealthy

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love from that, which is the highest experience of humanity. That is love is real when it expands and

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enhances your life and troubling and problematic when it contracts or impairs it. Whether you love a

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person, a drug or an intellectual interest, if it is spurring creativity, connection and kindness,

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it's not an addiction, but if it's making you isolated and dull and mean, it is.

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Thanks. Yeah. That's my favorite paragraph. Yeah, sometimes you hear your old stuff and you

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cringe, but I was very pleased with that one. So the that is like, I wanted on my tombstone.

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But yeah, no, I mean, I think I really think that that is the core of it. And I think a lot of times

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people mistake addiction independence. And they think that like if you need something or someone

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to function, there's something wrong with you. And we're all interdependent. People on the spectrum

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need people just like anybody else does. It may be in a different way and in a different amount,

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but it still is the case that like our stress system, the reason we have those opioids in our stress

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systems is so that a mom can comfort a baby or a lover can comfort the partner or we can comfort our

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friends like our stress systems are designed to be millowed out by kind social contact. And you know,

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you can see this physiologically. It doesn't matter if a mom is like holding a three-year-old or

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if she's like 90 and her daughter 70, the blood pressure of both of them is going to go down when

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they are, if they are in supportive relationship, because we can also mess with each other. But if they are,

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then we are soothing each other's stress system. And you know, we often think of yoga or running

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or whatever for soothing your stress system, but we're designed for it to be through relationships.

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And that means we are interdependent. And it doesn't mean that like yoga or running or whatever

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works for you physical wise is bad. It just means that without, you know, loving social support,

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we can't be healthy. And again, different doses for different people, different ways of achieving

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that for different people, but it is still fundamental. And so if we think that like, oh, being dependent

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is codependent, or if we think that if you need something too much, there's something wrong with you,

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no, if you need something that's hurting you or somebody else, that's a problem. But if you just need,

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you know, someone in order to be healthy, that's being part of human race. Again, that doesn't have

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to be your romantic partner. It can take many different forms, but you know, being a hermit is just not

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healthy. Yeah. And what I love especially about what you unpack in that quote too is that, I think for me,

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for a very long time, my own weakness was like a neuro linguistic programming that have that concept

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of like chunking down or chunking up, like, you know, where chunking down is like to focus on the details.

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And I would do that. I would get so narrowly focused on, you know, every, every last little, it's like,

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it's like the same thing that I do when like, you know, if you have like, like a zit or something,

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and you're like, oh, god, I got to get this zit. And then you like, you back up and you're like, oh,

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now, now, what was a tiny speck on my face is now like a giant crater when I back up and look in the mirror.

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So like the chunking up, being like the backing up and looking in the mirror. And for a long time,

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I was very incapable of doing that in my own life, that sort of zooming out and seeing the full picture of it.

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And so that ability to really take a greater perspective and say, is this actually working for me?

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Is the thing that I'm doing working? And that really like, you know, much, you know, thanks to your work,

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thanks to like the body keeps the score and attachment theory and things like that. That really is

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what I created the Re-Patterning Project out of was realizing that I have these underlying needs.

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And like you talk about in the book, you talk about that addiction is not so much the problem in itself.

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It is a bad solution to an underlying problem. And so whatever that underlying need is is legitimate.

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It's the fact that I'm doing something that I think somehow in my head is going to work because maybe it

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worked once, you know, or maybe it worked inconsistently. We can talk about like, Skinner and the,

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you know, the pigeons and the intermittent reinforcement that like, if something works inconsistently,

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there's no better way to get a human being or a pigeon or whoever, you know, to repeat that behavior,

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you know, which, which feels so illogical when you zoom out and think of it that way.

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It also makes sense in the, in sort of light of the fact that like, no human being is going to be

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perfect at providing the reinforcements that you want, you know what I mean? And like, that's a good point.

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This is really adapted for like love and parenting and friendship, like any kind of social thing,

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because like nobody can meet anybody's needs perfectly. And if we only learn from

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100% consistency, we wouldn't learn anything. So in order to, you know, there's a reason we get

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trapped by intermittent reinforcement. We have to be careful not to let commercial interests use that

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against us, but in terms of, and also like bad boyfriends or girlfriends, you know, but there is a reason

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that that sort of hard to get or inconsistency like is attractive. And it is not necessarily bad

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in and of itself. It is only bad in a context. Yeah. I'm wondering also, I wonder if there's a way

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for two people to have a secure relationship and sort of like microdose that inconsistency in a

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way that's actually healthy and consensual to keep things, you know, because there is that classic

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sort of thing about, oh, the person who's always there, I'm not interested in, but the person who's,

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you know, messing with me or whatever is, is very interesting to me. And I think about this a lot,

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like, are there ways for two people to basically understand like, okay, if this is kind of how our

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brains work, can we infuse this relationship with, you know, something that's going to keep it a little

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more exciting? Esther Carell speaks of this a lot, you know, where like the book "Mating in

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Captivity" where I love her work too. And so I do think that we have a love for novelty and a

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love for seameness. And they've was obviously in conflict with each other. So it is never going to

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be perfectly encapsulated, but yes, like I think keeping some sense of mystery and doing new things

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with your partner, like, you know, one of the things like my husband's really into like, we do dance

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lessons and it's like scary, but like, you know, it's a fun eventually, you know, eventually I get

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slightly better. But the, you know, it's like, it's again, it's like like that bit of challenge and,

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you know, also like something that is just inherently enjoyable, like moving to music, you know,

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yeah, like keeping, like having some kind of adventure within your relationship, like that,

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you know, I think is is good. And he's also really into kayaking, which I like to do the boring kind

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of kayaking and he likes to do the challenging kind and that's fine. But it's just like, yeah, you have

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to like work within each other's risk tolerance is basically. I'm curious also, you mentioned earlier

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about learning music. Are you open to sharing about what you're, what you're doing with that?

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I'm sure. So I'm like attempting to learn to sing and learn music theory. And so, you know, I have

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a pretty okay voice. It is really interesting to like kind of try to learn how to actually use it and

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to learn or part words and harmonies and like, scales and all these kinds of prieds, whatever. So it's,

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I'm really enjoying it, you know, I was just in between this was just like trying to play these

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chords terribly. But like I'm really learning like how it works. And I love music so much that it is

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I just can like sit there for hours listening to things and I can hear things that I couldn't hear

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before. And it's just really amazing. And so, you know, it's just something that like I always loved and,

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you know, in high school, I had a friend that we just sing together and she is back in my life,

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which is moved back to our area. And so we are going to do some more music, which is great. But it's,

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yeah, so it's, it's just like, you know, one of those things that like I always like wanted to

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be able to do more and know more about, but that I really, you know, didn't have the time or

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energy to pursue when I was kind of trying to get my career to work. So it is, it's been super fun. And I,

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I mean, one of the things like that music, I think is really interesting is that like it really works

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on like your brain sort of trying to predict the next thing. And so you're like, you have the form

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of Western music in your head because you've just listened to it all your life. And so you're

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expecting certain things, which music theory can tell you what they are. But there's also more creative

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ways of doing those things that if you predict it, but it's actually better than predicted. So that

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like makes you happy. It's like what they call a positive prediction error. And this is dopamine

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seems to be involved in like prediction error to some degree, a negative prediction error. This is

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why disappointment sucks because you not only did you not get the reward that you predicted,

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now you're punishing yourself for like having made a wrong prediction, positive prediction error

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on the other hand is great. And so you're listening. And it's like, oh, I think next

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gonna be this and oh, it's that, but is that's even better? And so it's like, I don't know, I'm just

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really enjoying it. And it's really, yeah, I mean, I think everybody has like some kind of art or

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physical activity music. There's just something that you love in the world that can be a crafter

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practice. And it's infinite. What you can learn about music. I mean, it just you can't even possibly

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listen to all the good music in the world. So it's great. And this does give you the, you know, you

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always have something to like look forward to. And yes, like you're going to suck for a while, but,

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you know, oh well. That's so cool. Yeah, I'm also I'm also a singer. And I write music too. So

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so I'll just put it out there officially whenever you're ready, you know, for Arden and the Wolves

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featuring my as all of its fly out to LA will write a song will we'll figure out. But yeah, I love for

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that reason. I'm a big fan of switching up my lyrics on the second chorus because you've heard

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the first chorus the first time and you think you know what's happening. And then like you get maybe

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like three like that that third line that A B A B, right? And that that third line you switch up

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the lyrics a little bit and you kind of throw something in there and it's like it's so satisfying to my

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brain. But then of course, I can't do that in every song because then it becomes too bad. Right. And

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then then you've got to deal as a bridge at some point. So, uh, bridges are like my favorite part

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of a song because I feel like the I feel like the bridge is like when you drop in and you really

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get real with what you're saying because that's it's like the point in the song where like you're

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it's again, it's exactly what you're speaking of that pattern changes, you know, it's verse,

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verse, verse, verse, and then all of a sudden it's the bridge and it's this opportunity I feel like

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in a lot of songwriting, I feel like the thing that is really being said in the song kind of happens

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in the bridge. Yeah. Yeah. That's the part you're getting on. Modulate correctly to whatever key is

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going to actually work, which I don't know very much about yet. But and I think like, right,

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the hardest parts and the best parts are the transition. Yeah. Also, I know that music, you know,

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music and dopamine interact quite a bit. And I remember when I realized it was like I guess about

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five years ago, I realized that I had ADHD because I have I didn't have the typical signs of aid. I was

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I was a dissociative daydreamer. I was not like the restless hyperactive kid when I was growing up.

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In other words, you are exactly. Yeah. I was socialized female, you know, and autistic at the same time.

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But I remember when I realized that like my my addiction to crushes was basically serving my dopamine

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deficiency because I realized around this, I was like, Oh, this is why like when I have a crush on

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someone, I feel like I'm going to do all these things and I'm going to, you know, when I feel so alive.

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And then like when I'm I don't even have to be with a partner, I just have to have an interest in

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someone like I've had like a plan, you know, and when I don't have that, it'd be like, you know,

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I'd be like home from college break or whatever, like walking through the mall with my mom and I'd

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be like the difference between like, I'm going to wear this to that party and, you know, versus like

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this is just all a bunch of capitalist junk and everything is pointless.

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But yeah, I mean like that kind of anodonic state is really really difficult to manage. And I mean,

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you know, for me sometimes that actually I have a baseline of medication that I need to like

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not go there, but it is like sort of I find like the link between like music and motivation and dopamine

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because dopamine like is not just about prediction or wanting. It's also movement. And so like

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motivation and movement are like inherently linked not just linguistically. And right, it's like

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when you have that like sort of food aspect of dopamine, the sort of wanting, the confident wanting,

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then right, you're just in it. But when you don't and when you have no sort of special interest or

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special person that is like driving that, then you know, it can be very hard for people like us.

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Yeah, yeah. So there I was, you know, it's like 2021 and I was I was in the stretch of time because it

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was also the pandemic was happening. And I was in like my longest stretch of like going without a

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crush like just without any romantic interest whatsoever. And I was so like, you know, and I remember

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like when it finally clicked for me, what this was. And it was it was because I actually I remember

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I had done magic about it. Like there was a person who I just like couldn't get out of my head and

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you know, like the last person that I had caught a crush on. And it was like I really need to like

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go that whole situation. They moved across the country and everything. And so I cast a spell to like

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rid my mind of them. And it was like less than 24 hours later. I remember seeing some posts on

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like Facebook or something like that. And it was stuff about dopamine. It was stuff about like,

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you know, and for whatever reason, whatever it was, it clicked for me. I was like, oh, this is the

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thing. I have a dopamine deficiency. This is what is serving this. And so of course I started

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looking up like, all right, well, what are some natural sources of dopamine or whatever. And here I am.

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And you know, I'm in the middle of making this like this album at the time, et cetera. And one of

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the things was like, oh, well, listen to music. And I was like, but I'm cute. But I think I think

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actually in some ways writing music, it's that same process of like you start writing a song. And

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you know, it feels so amorphous. And every time I'm writing, I'm like every other success I've had

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was a fluke. I'm not going to be able to do it. You know, I'm like, everything's coming out of my brain

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is just mush, like forget it. And then you know, you get a foothold and you finish it and then it comes

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out and it's, you know, it's this process. And I think for me, like, finding that has also been that

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that source of dopamine that I'm doing something. I'm completing it. And then it's out there and it's

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done. But I'd be curious, like, what else you think is the relationship between music and dope? But

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like for those of us who are dopamine deficient, like how do you think that music serves that?

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Well, I mean, I do think that because it is like a pattern of repetition that your brain is just happy

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to predict it. And like that, like sort of motivates you. And it, you know, you might want to dance, you might,

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you know, you just feel the emotion of the music, like moving you. And that I think it's lately different,

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like playing or like beating music, but even just listening, if you're really into it, you will be

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like engaged in that. And like we love to have patterns that are just predictable enough. Like,

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and you know, again, it's that finding that sweet spot there. But that's what good music does for you.

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And I mean, I don't know about you, but like, I will listen to something a zillion times. Like if I just,

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I follow was songs all the time and like, I will just listen to this thing to death. And I will still

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really like it later, but it's just like, I feel like I'm learning something from it somehow. And then

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once I've learned that I've kind of incorporated it and I still like it, but it's not like that, like,

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I must cure this again. I'm kind of saying that happens when I'm just like really sort of engaged in

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trying to understand something music. So I think it's all of those things. And I think, you know, we do

370
00:37:59,040 --> 00:38:04,880
get a fundamental pleasure from curiosity and learning. And I think especially like people who might

371
00:38:04,880 --> 00:38:11,360
have some dopamine deficiency or whatever you want to call it, you would be especially drawn to that

372
00:38:11,360 --> 00:38:18,480
because that combination of novelty and predictability is giving you a sense of confidence.

373
00:38:18,480 --> 00:38:24,640
Yeah, I love that. Switching topics, but I wanted to make sure that we covered this also as part

374
00:38:24,640 --> 00:38:30,240
of this episode. I'm really also curious about your work looking into the troubled teen industry. And

375
00:38:30,240 --> 00:38:34,640
and I'll be transparent. I have not yet read help at any cost, although now that it's on my radar,

376
00:38:34,640 --> 00:38:43,200
I really want to. But some of some of what my work has dealt with is, you know, I never intended to

377
00:38:43,200 --> 00:38:49,120
create the Re-Patterning project. I was a theater major at NYU, you know, I intended to be a performer. And

378
00:38:49,120 --> 00:38:53,520
yet having to sort of solve these problems that came up for me and that have, you know,

379
00:38:53,520 --> 00:38:58,560
that have come up for others has has given me, you know, a sort of dual sense of purpose now in my life.

380
00:38:58,560 --> 00:39:03,760
And so so much of what I deal with is the shortcomings of the mental health industry and

381
00:39:03,760 --> 00:39:11,040
look on your fate for anyone who's not watching the video or anyone who's listening to just the audio

382
00:39:11,040 --> 00:39:19,120
of the podcast. My face was priceless when I just when I just said that. And, you know, and ending up

383
00:39:19,120 --> 00:39:24,400
working with people, especially who have been failed by other sectors of the mental health industry.

384
00:39:24,400 --> 00:39:31,440
And looking also at especially at mental institutions and places that are supposed to care for people

385
00:39:31,440 --> 00:39:35,760
and they're actually doing more harm, you know, in the last season, we have our, yeah, our,

386
00:39:35,760 --> 00:39:43,200
first of all, like for kids, we have zero good mental health care. I mean, almost zero. Even the richest

387
00:39:43,200 --> 00:39:48,080
people in the country can't like find decent care. This is how you have like Paris Hilton ending up

388
00:39:48,080 --> 00:39:54,480
being a spokesperson for the harms done in the trouble teen industry because she was getting sent to

389
00:39:54,480 --> 00:40:01,760
basically the same place that the Medicaid kids were getting sent to. And it is astonishing how

390
00:40:01,760 --> 00:40:06,800
bad it is. Like I have a friend right now who's dedicated, who's dealing with some of this stuff. And

391
00:40:06,800 --> 00:40:15,040
it's just like we just do the stupidest things. And even the like most professional people in the

392
00:40:15,040 --> 00:40:22,400
area sometimes do incredibly stupid things around pharmacology. And, you know, it's just, it's crazy.

393
00:40:22,400 --> 00:40:33,040
So the help at any cost was basically the first investigation into what I label and the survivors

394
00:40:33,040 --> 00:40:40,320
labels the trouble teen industry. And what that is is a group of residential facilities or wilderness

395
00:40:40,320 --> 00:40:46,560
programs, emotional growth, boarding schools, Christian programs, there's all kinds of different ones.

396
00:40:46,560 --> 00:40:53,520
But fundamentally, the thing that marks the trouble teen industry is that the abuse is the treatment.

397
00:40:53,520 --> 00:41:03,440
The idea is we will break you to fix you. And this comes out of a lot of really literal cults

398
00:41:04,080 --> 00:41:11,280
that also came to dominate the adult addiction treatment system in America. So I want to talk about

399
00:41:11,280 --> 00:41:18,080
like rehabs as well because I know you've had also experienced, yeah. All of that. Famously, there was

400
00:41:18,080 --> 00:41:25,760
a cult called synonym, which was founded by a guy in AA who thought that AA wasn't tough enough. And so

401
00:41:25,760 --> 00:41:33,360
they ended up having these very confrontational and humiliating encounter group kind of things,

402
00:41:33,360 --> 00:41:38,400
where, you know, they thought they were getting bail and honest by being really mean to each other. And

403
00:41:38,400 --> 00:41:46,400
the thing about it is that when somebody treats you cruelly, we have a sort of natural instinct to think

404
00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:54,000
that wasn't meaningless, I deserved it. Or that wasn't meaningless, that helped me. And so people

405
00:41:54,000 --> 00:42:02,320
started engaging in this. And because at the time research on heroin addiction was in its infancy,

406
00:42:02,320 --> 00:42:07,520
people just thought there's no cure for this. And this guy's developed a cure. And literally states from

407
00:42:07,520 --> 00:42:13,280
all over like, you know, New York scent people like this to this guy founds a facility where basically

408
00:42:13,280 --> 00:42:21,120
the treatment is screaming at you. And, you know, so New York state sends people like California sends

409
00:42:21,120 --> 00:42:25,120
like all over the country. They're like, look, this guy cured heroin addiction. Let's like learn from

410
00:42:25,120 --> 00:42:30,960
him. All anecdotes, no data. In fact, the only, this is where I have to give props to New Jersey.

411
00:42:31,760 --> 00:42:38,480
The only state that did any data gathering on this was New Jersey. And New Jersey was like, okay,

412
00:42:38,480 --> 00:42:43,280
let's look at the data. And they're like, Oh, gee, what happens is basically 80% of the people who go

413
00:42:43,280 --> 00:42:51,600
to this place drop out in the first few weeks. And of the 20% that stay 85% of those do okay. And so

414
00:42:51,600 --> 00:42:57,040
basically what you're doing is you're selecting for the people who are most motivated to quit.

415
00:42:57,040 --> 00:43:01,200
Like, because if you really want to quit, you'll do whatever they tell you.

416
00:43:01,680 --> 00:43:09,360
And so, but you probably would have done fine anyway. Yeah. And so, but by selecting for the natural

417
00:43:09,360 --> 00:43:16,480
recovery rate and not counting dropouts as part of your measurements of treatment success,

418
00:43:16,480 --> 00:43:21,280
like this, they still do this. Like rehabs all over the country will still say, we've got an 80% success

419
00:43:21,280 --> 00:43:26,080
rate with graduates. And it's like, okay, but 80% dropped out in the first few weeks and you have to

420
00:43:26,080 --> 00:43:31,680
count them. And if you don't count them, that is not a good study. There's known technically as

421
00:43:31,680 --> 00:43:36,560
intention to treat analysis. And if you are going to look at any outcome study of anything

422
00:43:36,560 --> 00:43:41,600
psychological, you need to look at that. And my silly example of this would be like, if you had

423
00:43:41,600 --> 00:43:47,120
an antitabressant that caused itching in 99% of people that was unbearable, and you only counted

424
00:43:47,120 --> 00:43:52,320
the one person for whom that was not an issue, we would not call this a viable drug.

425
00:43:53,760 --> 00:44:00,640
We the FDA would not allow that, right? But in behavioral and mental health care, we allow

426
00:44:00,640 --> 00:44:06,960
anecdote to be data all the time. And we end up with this horrific system. So these trouble team places

427
00:44:06,960 --> 00:44:13,760
were sort of modeled on this cult. And until at least the 80s, about 50% of publicly funded

428
00:44:13,760 --> 00:44:19,520
addiction treatment that wasn't method on basically was these places where people scream at you for 18

429
00:44:19,520 --> 00:44:27,360
months. And synodon wasn't just like a fake cult. They were a full-fledged cult so much so that basically

430
00:44:27,360 --> 00:44:33,440
they started requiring people to swap partners. They required men to get bisectamies. They had

431
00:44:33,440 --> 00:44:42,240
women get abortions. They started stockpiling weapons. And when a lawyer started suing them, they

432
00:44:42,240 --> 00:44:48,240
took the rattle off a rattle snake and put it in his mailbox to try to kill him.

433
00:44:48,880 --> 00:44:56,160
And so fortunately, the guy, he did get bit, but his dogs were there and his neighbor was there,

434
00:44:56,160 --> 00:45:04,400
and he got saved. So the police went to arrest the founder of synodon, who was obviously this great

435
00:45:04,400 --> 00:45:12,160
example of sobriety and recovery for conspiracy to commit murder by rattle snake. When they showed up

436
00:45:12,160 --> 00:45:21,680
to get him, he was drunk. So anyway, but like that did not shut synodon and that did not end the

437
00:45:21,680 --> 00:45:27,520
prevalence of this model called the therapeutic community in the field. Like we still hear like,

438
00:45:27,520 --> 00:45:33,200
yeah, I want to be fair, there is a therapeutic community model that is based in Europe that is

439
00:45:33,200 --> 00:45:39,040
different than the American model. But any American program that calls itself a therapeutic community

440
00:45:39,040 --> 00:45:45,680
and is for addiction, at least originated in the synodon cult. And like either it originated by like

441
00:45:45,680 --> 00:45:51,360
somebody from synodon came and founded it or somebody who founded the thing went and studied synodon

442
00:45:51,360 --> 00:45:56,880
or went and studied someone who had studied it synodon. This was like enormously prevalent.

443
00:45:56,880 --> 00:46:04,800
Any 18 month addiction rehab in the United States from like the 60s through the mid 2000s at

444
00:46:04,800 --> 00:46:12,000
least was basically based on this. And so, you know, the 28 day rehabs like the hazeldoons and stuff

445
00:46:12,000 --> 00:46:19,280
like that, they also took up some of this for a while. But by the mid 80s, they started realizing that,

446
00:46:19,280 --> 00:46:24,560
you know, this may not be such a great idea that like, you know, oh, wow, like we got a lot of

447
00:46:24,560 --> 00:46:29,200
traumatized people here and retraumatizing them might not really be the best way to get them into

448
00:46:29,200 --> 00:46:35,200
recovery. But there's still a lot of that kind of crap and there's still an enormous amount of

449
00:46:35,200 --> 00:46:43,120
this ridiculous behavior stuff that that lives in treatments for addiction or depression or any of

450
00:46:43,120 --> 00:46:51,120
these residential things for kids, they often have this idea that what you need to do is like, you know,

451
00:46:51,120 --> 00:46:58,720
okay, you have to earn X number of points for good behavior or we'll take away your right to talk

452
00:46:58,720 --> 00:47:05,920
to your parents or will, you know, and you can't graduate until you earn X number of points. And

453
00:47:05,920 --> 00:47:11,760
oh, gee, this happens to coincide with our financial interests because of stay the more we get paid.

454
00:47:11,760 --> 00:47:13,440
Of course.

455
00:47:13,440 --> 00:47:21,360
You know, and it's just like nobody learns that way. Like, you don't like learn from like if you try

456
00:47:21,360 --> 00:47:25,920
to teach me singing by slapping me when I got a no wrong note, I'm not really going to

457
00:47:25,920 --> 00:47:30,080
grow as a singer very much and I'm also probably going to start to hate singing.

458
00:47:30,080 --> 00:47:34,720
Yeah. And also this does not give me any technique.

459
00:47:34,720 --> 00:47:41,680
You know, like we don't expect people to learn math by, you know, okay, we're going to punish you

460
00:47:41,680 --> 00:47:47,280
if you don't know addition by the end of the day. Like, we recognize that there are skills needed.

461
00:47:47,280 --> 00:47:53,600
And similarly with mental health care, there are skills that people who have,

462
00:47:54,640 --> 00:48:01,360
you know, most mental illnesses and being on the spectrum involve some kind of emotional dysregulation.

463
00:48:01,360 --> 00:48:08,880
And you tend to try to self-medicate that with like, you know, steaming or with drugs or with whatever

464
00:48:08,880 --> 00:48:14,800
worse for you. And oftentimes what worse for you is not the greatest idea. And so you end up in trouble

465
00:48:14,800 --> 00:48:23,040
or hurting worse than you were before. So people need skills to be able to develop new ways of coping.

466
00:48:23,040 --> 00:48:31,760
And you know, most people with addiction have either a predisposition to mental illness or severe

467
00:48:31,760 --> 00:48:38,720
childhood trauma. More often, severe childhood trauma leads the predisposition to become a mental

468
00:48:38,720 --> 00:48:45,360
illness and then the person self-medicate. So without understanding that when you're just trying

469
00:48:45,360 --> 00:48:51,040
to humiliate people into stopping, which is most of what our treatment has done for a very long time

470
00:48:51,040 --> 00:48:55,520
outside of the medication, which was used in the system, this very racist and humiliating in a

471
00:48:55,520 --> 00:49:02,960
different way, the, you know, what people actually need. Addiction is defined as compulsive drug use

472
00:49:02,960 --> 00:49:08,080
despite negative consequences. This means that it does not respond to punishment by definition.

473
00:49:08,080 --> 00:49:19,600
So what people need in order to get better is to learn new skills. And that requires wanting to

474
00:49:19,600 --> 00:49:26,400
learn new skills and understanding what those skills are and being taught them and making all the

475
00:49:26,400 --> 00:49:31,280
mistakes you're going to make because nobody learns anything perfectly at first. Like anything you

476
00:49:31,280 --> 00:49:37,040
are trying to learn, you are going to make mistakes and you're not going to be able to get any skills

477
00:49:37,040 --> 00:49:41,600
without practicing. And you're going to practice and make mistakes and then you learn how not to

478
00:49:41,600 --> 00:49:47,520
make the mistakes. Yeah, something I'm really curious about is I know there are a number of charities

479
00:49:47,520 --> 00:49:52,640
and especially I mentioned, you know, that I also have my my music project and in the music industry

480
00:49:52,640 --> 00:49:59,520
there are a number of charities that work to help musicians, you know, overcome things like addiction

481
00:49:59,520 --> 00:50:04,080
and also, you know, get them access to healthcare and things like that. And I'm hoping that, you know,

482
00:50:04,080 --> 00:50:09,840
in the not too distant future, I can be in a place where I can advocate, you know, for better mental health

483
00:50:09,840 --> 00:50:18,320
treatment and I'd really love to know what would you advise me to say, like if I get to a place where I

484
00:50:18,320 --> 00:50:24,640
have that that access and that platform, what would I say to a really well-meaning music industry

485
00:50:24,640 --> 00:50:31,840
charity that is paying, that is giving their money that they've raised to these rehab centers,

486
00:50:31,840 --> 00:50:37,360
like, oh, here's 10k to take care of this musician. Right. And then because I've had friends who have

487
00:50:37,360 --> 00:50:42,720
gone, you know, and they weren't helped by the rehab, they were helped by what I

488
00:50:42,720 --> 00:50:49,040
saw and noticed in them instead, you know, so how would one, yeah, how would one advocate to a charity

489
00:50:49,040 --> 00:50:53,760
and say maybe your money is not going in the best place? I mean, I think, you know, so there,

490
00:50:53,760 --> 00:51:00,000
there is an organization that is trying to create sort of national quality standards for addiction

491
00:51:00,000 --> 00:51:08,720
treatment. I still think they aren't quite there yet, but I do think that understanding that

492
00:51:08,720 --> 00:51:15,040
our treatment is not mostly based on evidence and that, you know, 12 step programs are absolutely

493
00:51:15,040 --> 00:51:21,840
fabulous for some people, but you can get all the 12 step information and all the 12 step support

494
00:51:21,840 --> 00:51:28,240
for free in virtually every church basement in this country. So we shouldn't be paying for 12 step

495
00:51:28,240 --> 00:51:34,960
facilitation or for these groups in rehabs that cost $10,000 a day or some, you know, crazy amount of

496
00:51:34,960 --> 00:51:40,960
money for what you can get for free. What you should be learning in rehab is you should be getting a

497
00:51:40,960 --> 00:51:47,200
complete psychiatric evaluation, which you usually don't get. You should, because figuring out what's

498
00:51:47,200 --> 00:51:52,000
underneath the addiction is fundamental. And yes, you're not going to address trauma while somebody's

499
00:51:52,000 --> 00:51:59,920
detoxing, although people try, what you want to do is understand what this person's strengths are,

500
00:51:59,920 --> 00:52:07,920
what this person's issues are, what's underneath why this person is using drugs compulsively,

501
00:52:07,920 --> 00:52:14,880
and finding alternatives for, you know, and I mean with musicians, like people who are doing music

502
00:52:14,880 --> 00:52:21,280
tend to have a meaning and purpose that they get for music, right? But that by itself is not enough.

503
00:52:21,280 --> 00:52:28,960
And they will need the, maybe they have depression that needs medication. Maybe they have

504
00:52:28,960 --> 00:52:33,760
tell-to-trauma and they need to, you know, sort of work through that in various ways.

505
00:52:33,760 --> 00:52:39,760
There's a million different reasons that people self-medicate, but if you just take away the medication

506
00:52:39,760 --> 00:52:45,040
and scream at them and tell them to go to meetings, for a lot of people that does not work.

507
00:52:45,680 --> 00:52:51,360
And for the people who say that screaming at me worked, it worked, you know, well, you,

508
00:52:51,360 --> 00:52:57,040
unless you have 10 identical twins who weren't screamed at, you don't know that that's what worked,

509
00:52:57,040 --> 00:53:02,800
right? This is why we don't rely on anecdotes for the rest of medicine. We real,

510
00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:08,960
the medicine started advancing when we actually did controlled clinical trials and started to try to

511
00:53:08,960 --> 00:53:14,800
like see, you know, what works for different people. Like you can't just say like it worked for

512
00:53:14,800 --> 00:53:21,360
me, so therefore it will work for you because that is just not the case. So that's a really difficult

513
00:53:21,360 --> 00:53:27,600
question and I like struggle with people all the time who need help. Like where do I send them?

514
00:53:27,600 --> 00:53:34,640
You know, and there are starting to be better options, but I think and the sort of whole world of

515
00:53:34,640 --> 00:53:42,640
harm reduction is a good place to sort of start with that because like that whole idea that like we

516
00:53:42,640 --> 00:53:50,320
have to meet people where they are and reduce harm first and foremost is especially fundamental when

517
00:53:50,320 --> 00:53:59,120
you have a dangerous drug like fentanyl out there or a thing like HIV. What happened when people

518
00:53:59,120 --> 00:54:05,520
started taking, you know, doing things like syringe exchange for HIV, they realized that, oh wow,

519
00:54:05,520 --> 00:54:12,240
a lot of what people need is to be heard and be treated respectfully and kindly. And when you

520
00:54:12,240 --> 00:54:19,680
start doing that, people are sort of like, oh, well, I really kind of might like to stop this. Like,

521
00:54:19,680 --> 00:54:24,480
okay, this is good. I've now, you know, I'm musically needles now and so I've got rid of the HIV risk,

522
00:54:24,480 --> 00:54:29,040
but you know, this is not really going so great for me, but you know, the last time I went to treatment,

523
00:54:29,040 --> 00:54:39,120
I got screamed at. So, you know, this allows people to get into decent care and the people who work

524
00:54:39,120 --> 00:54:48,080
at these places often know the ways to, you know, the good treatment places and sort of how to help

525
00:54:48,080 --> 00:54:53,200
somebody who needs more that, you know, because I mean, what's also interesting with addiction is

526
00:54:53,200 --> 00:55:00,480
a lot of people do stop on their own even from like very severe addiction. And what happens in

527
00:55:00,480 --> 00:55:07,120
those circumstances? Well, often they fall in love with somebody, they get a new job. Some kind of

528
00:55:07,120 --> 00:55:15,760
opportunity opens for them that gives them hope. And they are able to let go of that coping mechanism

529
00:55:15,760 --> 00:55:21,200
in a way that they couldn't if they didn't have that help. Now, obviously, this doesn't happen for

530
00:55:21,200 --> 00:55:29,280
everyone. And a lot of times people are going to need assistance, but the main thing that people need

531
00:55:29,280 --> 00:55:35,360
is to get their chemistry sorted out in their heads, whatever, you know, maybe they need some kind

532
00:55:35,360 --> 00:55:40,000
of medication, maybe they need some kind of talk therapy, whatever it is, like whatever that underlying

533
00:55:40,000 --> 00:55:46,320
thing is. And then they need a sense of meaning and purpose and a decent life to live. Because if you

534
00:55:46,320 --> 00:55:53,200
just like take the drugs away from somebody who, you know, has no education, no job, no house, no

535
00:55:53,200 --> 00:56:02,000
relationships, like, why would you get so? Like, you know, like, you need people need to have an

536
00:56:02,000 --> 00:56:11,360
opportunity to live a life that is good for them from their point of view. And if we don't have people

537
00:56:11,360 --> 00:56:17,360
having access to opportunities for that, like, you're really going to expect me to give up the

538
00:56:17,360 --> 00:56:23,200
only thing that gives me safety and comfort and meaning and purpose for nothing. Like, really?

539
00:56:23,200 --> 00:56:31,200
Yeah, seriously. Those are great. Thank you. And thank you. I'm going to revisit this episode

540
00:56:31,200 --> 00:56:36,720
in the future when I hopefully one day, you know, have, have more access and have a voice to be able to

541
00:56:36,720 --> 00:56:42,480
advocate and not feel I want to invite Tomi to come on and ask her question. And because we're

542
00:56:42,480 --> 00:56:48,000
nearing the end of our episode. So Tomi, do you have a question for Maia today? Yeah, I was really glad

543
00:56:48,000 --> 00:56:52,720
that you brought up Maia's work with the troubled teen industry because that was her work I was first

544
00:56:52,720 --> 00:56:59,760
introduced to and kind of taking this from less of a place of concern and more a place of, like,

545
00:56:59,760 --> 00:57:06,880
almost active hate. I'm having to deal with waves of, I'm frankly wanting to get your opinion on

546
00:57:06,880 --> 00:57:13,520
what do we do about the resurgence of conversion therapy coming back in many states where, like,

547
00:57:13,520 --> 00:57:18,320
I really thought this was going to be a thing of the past as I got older and now it's coming back

548
00:57:18,320 --> 00:57:24,640
with a vengeance despite more evidence than ever that this doesn't work. So as someone who's worked

549
00:57:24,640 --> 00:57:29,520
in a more generalized setting against these troubled team camps, what do you recommend people do to

550
00:57:29,520 --> 00:57:36,640
push back against something that's so fueled by, frankly, bigotry? The conversion therapy stuff

551
00:57:36,640 --> 00:57:44,320
grew out of the awful techniques used in the troubled team industry. A lot of it did. Now,

552
00:57:44,320 --> 00:57:49,200
there's some different strands of it, but there was something one of the biggest

553
00:57:49,200 --> 00:57:55,360
conversion therapy places was based on street incorporated, which was one of the most abusive

554
00:57:55,360 --> 00:58:01,440
troubled team programs and it directly used the exact same techniques and same people. So we know

555
00:58:01,440 --> 00:58:08,640
it was directly related. The best way to counter this and one of the things, there was a recent

556
00:58:08,640 --> 00:58:17,360
Supreme Court decision that sort of seemed to say that the states can't ban conversion therapy,

557
00:58:17,360 --> 00:58:22,320
but it's actually slightly more complicated than that, which is good because there still is

558
00:58:22,320 --> 00:58:28,400
room to be able to ban them. And I think, you know, because the Supreme Court sent it down to a lower

559
00:58:28,400 --> 00:58:37,520
court. And hopefully, you cannot have a standard of care for mental health care if you cannot ban

560
00:58:37,520 --> 00:58:45,440
certain ideas because the standard of care is going to be something like trying to change

561
00:58:45,440 --> 00:58:51,680
somebody's gender identity or sexual identity is not going to work. You know that this does not work

562
00:58:51,680 --> 00:58:56,400
and it does harm and it has led people to die by suicide. If you're going to have a standard of

563
00:58:56,400 --> 00:59:04,160
care, it has to ban things that are harmful. And what we need to be able to fight is this idea that

564
00:59:04,160 --> 00:59:13,680
I should be able to say I'm a therapist and I am using medical care to convert somebody.

565
00:59:13,680 --> 00:59:20,960
Like, A, that's not possible. And B, it's harmful. And C, that is not medicine. Like, if you're going to

566
00:59:20,960 --> 00:59:27,520
sell something as therapeutic, as medical, as healthcare, as something insurance should cover,

567
00:59:27,520 --> 00:59:33,760
you need to meet a standard of care. Otherwise, there is absolutely no point in regulating mental

568
00:59:33,760 --> 00:59:40,000
healthcare in any way because I can just set up my stand on my head rehab and make a lot of money.

569
00:59:40,000 --> 00:59:44,960
And I don't have to prove it works because I can just get the unmotivated people to not stand on

570
00:59:44,960 --> 00:59:51,920
their head and off over whatever I'm doing. So I think this fight isn't lost yet and I think that even

571
00:59:51,920 --> 00:59:57,920
in the courts, it's not lost yet. So I'm hoping to write about this more soon because I do think that

572
00:59:57,920 --> 01:00:04,240
professional speech should be regulated. There is simply no way around that if it's going to be

573
01:00:04,240 --> 01:00:11,360
professional speech. Like, this woman who wants to provide like, conversion therapy, fine, just don't

574
01:00:11,360 --> 01:00:17,440
give her a license. You know, don't let insurance pay for it. Don't let it be covered, you know,

575
01:00:17,440 --> 01:00:22,320
be part of the mental health, you know, get it from your church. If that's what you want, you know what I

576
01:00:22,320 --> 01:00:28,480
mean? Like, you can't offer a therapy that isn't a therapy. Like, otherwise the word therapy isn't

577
01:00:28,480 --> 01:00:35,920
meaningful. So I'm with you. Thank you all. Look forward to seeing some anti-conversion therapy,

578
01:00:35,920 --> 01:00:41,920
writing, hopefully in the times. And yeah, I appreciate the encouragement or at least that glimmer of hope

579
01:00:41,920 --> 01:00:47,040
that maybe things are not as black and white as they seem. Now, I mean, and it is like, I'm not saying

580
01:00:47,040 --> 01:00:52,560
it's not bad. I'm just saying that like, there is some wiggle room in this, in this decision such that

581
01:00:52,560 --> 01:01:00,720
it may not be as bad as we think. And I think also like, over time, people are going to realize that like,

582
01:01:00,720 --> 01:01:06,800
if mental health care is to mean anything, any kind of talk therapies, to mean anything, you have to be

583
01:01:06,800 --> 01:01:13,760
able to regulate it in some way. And if you think that demeaning people is helpful when all we know

584
01:01:13,760 --> 01:01:19,600
shows that it's not, you shouldn't be able to sell that. You should be sued for malpractice if you

585
01:01:19,600 --> 01:01:25,280
sell that. And that's, you know, what we kind of need to work on. Yeah, so much, so much treatment out

586
01:01:25,280 --> 01:01:31,440
there that in my opinion, deserves to be sued for malpractice. I'll just say one more thing.

587
01:01:31,440 --> 01:01:37,200
So go ahead. Yeah. We need more lawyers to be able to take these cases. Like one of the best ways to

588
01:01:37,200 --> 01:01:42,560
regulate this stuff is to allow something called a private right of action, which basically six

589
01:01:42,560 --> 01:01:48,160
and army of lawyers on these people. And that way, even if the government doesn't do its job,

590
01:01:48,720 --> 01:01:57,360
the lawyers who want to make money, nice. That is good to know. Definitely that idea that,

591
01:01:57,360 --> 01:02:01,920
you know, if we want to call something therapy, it needs to actually be proven to work. Yeah.

592
01:02:01,920 --> 01:02:08,480
Which, you know, like as with as with any theory, perhaps, you know, is a bad solution

593
01:02:08,480 --> 01:02:14,160
to the, to the underlying problem. We have an FDA for drugs. Who knows how long we will continue

594
01:02:14,160 --> 01:02:20,160
to have it, but we do have it now. And the, you know, the whole point of it is that the thing has to be

595
01:02:20,160 --> 01:02:24,640
safe and effective before you can sell it. And I think anything medical that should be true for.

596
01:02:24,640 --> 01:02:30,000
And yes, that makes it difficult with measuring efficacy of talk therapy. But you know what?

597
01:02:30,000 --> 01:02:36,960
Do the research. Amen to that. Thank you again so much, Maia. This has been such a pleasure. I've

598
01:02:36,960 --> 01:02:42,240
so enjoyed talking with you. This is again, it's been like the past 10 years that your work has

599
01:02:42,240 --> 01:02:48,160
informed my work. And to be able to talk with you here and have these conversations like, and there's

600
01:02:48,160 --> 01:02:53,040
a million more things that I could go on about to barely got even to like half of the points that I

601
01:02:53,040 --> 01:02:58,560
had written down. But this was such a wonderful talk. Thank you so much. I am such a fan of your work.

602
01:02:58,560 --> 01:03:02,560
So thank you for being here today. Oh, thank you so much for having me. And thank you,

603
01:03:02,560 --> 01:03:09,920
listeners for tuning in. And this has been the Re-Patterning Podcast. So stay tuned. And we'll see you next time.

604
01:03:09,920 --> 01:03:16,480
Go forth and Re-Pattern. Thank you for listening to the Re-Patterning Podcast. If you're curious about

605
01:03:16,480 --> 01:03:21,360
the Re-Patterning Project, the eight-week course in mental mastery and creative freedom that inspires

606
01:03:21,360 --> 01:03:26,960
these conversations, you can check out more details at the repatterningproject.com. We run a cohort

607
01:03:26,960 --> 01:03:31,280
twice a year, or you can download the self-study version of the course and get started today.

608
01:03:31,280 --> 01:03:36,480
We also offer a four-week course on narrative magic and archetype titled "Mits and Magic,"

609
01:03:36,480 --> 01:03:41,120
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610
01:03:41,120 --> 01:03:47,040
the Re-Patterning Parlor on Discord, you can sign up for five dollars a month at patreon.com/the

611
01:03:47,040 --> 01:03:51,760
Re-Patterning Podcast. Thanks to everyone who makes the Re-Patterning Podcast possible.

612
01:03:51,760 --> 01:03:56,880
Firstly, our award-winning producer, Tomi Trembath, of the Keymaster Collective Network of

613
01:03:56,880 --> 01:04:02,800
Podcasts. She also produces transcending comics, vision in the void, and giant-sized violence.

614
01:04:03,280 --> 01:04:08,640
Thanks also to Animation Studio Mortis and Madriacs, who created the video for our introduction,

615
01:04:08,640 --> 01:04:14,400
as well as to Andrew Means, who composed and produced our theme music. And also thanks to Al Alvarez,

616
01:04:14,400 --> 01:04:18,240
who took the photos of yours truly that you see on the cover of each episode if you're watching

617
01:04:18,240 --> 01:04:23,760
the video version. And finally, thanks to you, our listeners, who give meaning to this work.

618
01:04:23,760 --> 01:04:28,400
Our greatest wish is that whatever you've heard today inspires you to live freely and begin

619
01:04:28,400 --> 01:04:38,080
creating your reality from the inside out. Thanks for tuning in and we'll see you again soon.

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