 That's right, in this video we're going to be talking about the best, the best mental health philosophy of all time. What is up everybody? This is Chris from the Rewired Soul where we talk about the problem, but focus on the solution. And if you're new to my channel, my channel is all about mental health and what I like to do. I like to pull different topics from the YouTube community to teach you how to improve your mental and emotional well-being. So if you're into that stuff, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. And I want to just thank everybody again. I know I tweeted it and put it up on Instagram, but everybody who came out this morning for our first of many monthly charity live streams where we were donating money to Project Beauty Share, which that Taylor is donating to. Like, thank you all for coming out and donating. We raised over $400 for the first live stream, pretty freaking sweet. And look how beautiful I looked. Hello. But yeah, anyways, let's jump into this topic. All right. So this one's going to be a little bit different. Sit back, relax. I'm going to tell you guys a little story. All right. So back in the day, way back in the day, not even too long ago. Well, yeah, kind of long ago, before I was born, 1920s-ish. All right. And by the way, everything I'm about to tell you, feel free to go Google it. It's all true. All right. Because I was a huge like pessimist. I'm like, I don't, I don't really think you guys are telling me the truth about this. But anyways, back in the 1920s, addiction was an issue, right? Remember prohibition and all those things, right? Well, anyways, one of the things was is that nobody knew how to treat addiction. OK, like back then they didn't even have typical rehabs like you see today. You know, there's like detox facilities, therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists and all that kind of stuff. And they like give you like evidence-based treatment, like cognitive behavioral therapy and all that stuff. Back in those times, like if you were an addict or alcoholic, you were pretty much screwed. OK, like if you went in there, basically what they would do is get you medically stable and they're like, good luck. But if you were what they classified as hopeless, you were probably going to die. OK, they said one of the three things that's going to happen in any of you who listen to Macklemore, you've probably heard this. It's going to be jails, institutions or death. Right. So basically, they said, you're either going to die, you're going to go to jail or you're going to go to a psych ward for like the rest of your life. Like people who were struggling with alcoholism or addiction, they would tell them like you need to hire like a bodyguard to keep an eye on you. Twenty four seven, right. And anybody who's in recovery from addiction, like, you know, you know what they mean, like people with addictions, they want to use even when they or they use even when they don't want to use. They drink when they don't want to drink. Like that was the story of my life for many, many, many years. So anyways, like I said, this was back in the 1920s and so many people just didn't know what to do. So basically what happened was there was these two guys, there was these two guys who, quote unquote, recovered from addiction. OK, like this is back in a time where like, think about this, like think about how bad addiction used to be where if you got 90 days, if you got three months sober, they used to think that you had a crap ton of sobriety time, right. Like, think about that real quick. Now there are people who have been sober since before I was born. Back then they thought three months was a long time. So there was two guys and what they ended up doing was they would travel around to these different, you know, what they had is rehab centers back then and they would go in and they say, hey, do you have any alcoholics or addicts that we can talk to and maybe help out, right. And they would start going in and they would start talking to people and they would just share their story. They would share their story about how they were covered. And all of a sudden you started seeing people stay sober and you're like, wait, what, right. Like doctors were even baffled by this, but it kind of made sense. It kind of made sense. So a lot of us, no matter if you're struggling with addiction or mental health issues, a lot of us aren't 100 percent honest with doctors or even psychologists or therapists. Like, come on, let's be honest right now. How many of you have seen a doctor or therapist and you lied to them or you didn't tell them the whole truth? Like me, for example, like how much do you drink? Oh, not that much. You know what I mean? Are you taking any other drugs? No, you know, like, unless they were going to drug test me or like, how are you feeling? Oh, I'm fine. You know, even though I'm depressed, you know, all these other things like a lot of us have trust issues. We don't open up. And one of it is, is this fear of being judged, right. But what they found was that even though the patients weren't opening up to doctors or psychologists or anything like that, when these guys would go in and start talking to somebody who had these issues, you would see the person open up, right? Just open up completely. Like what we often find is we might not open up completely to our friends, to our family members, to professionals and all those things, right. But when we find someone who's been through what we've been through, all of a sudden we just open right up. And one of the reasons is because they get it, right. There's something about that openness that they share, that insanity that they've gone through, sharing about the crazy thoughts that have gone through their head, but they're doing better now. Something about that where we just naturally open up. So anyways, those of you who don't know this story, it is actually the story of how Alcoholics Anonymous was created. So I know a lot of people have different opinions and stuff like that on Alcoholics Anonymous and other 12 step programs. I have my own and everything like that. But we know, we know even to this day that they develop one of the best mental health philosophies of all time, okay. Which is somebody who's been through something and is now doing well is some of the best help you can find for somebody else, all right. And this is why support groups are so, so, so crucial. All right. This is why when AA started there were the only people on the block, right. But now you have NA, Narcotics Anonymous, Gambler's Anonymous, you know, all the other Anonymouses. There's even like Sex and Love Anonymous, you know, all sorts of things, but it doesn't even stop with different forms of addiction, like Overeaters Anonymous. This is where, you know, different mental health scientists and professionals got the idea for support groups, okay. There are mental health support groups all over the place. Like you probably have mental health support groups. Like there's like grief and loss support groups. Think about the VA, like veterans getting together, working in treatment. I know that first responders, they prefer to be together because even in a treatment setting, you have people from different walks of life. This is why there's LGBTQ groups and all of that because it's a lot easier to open up to somebody else when you know that they get it, right. It's just part of our human nature is opening up to people who understand, okay. So no matter what you think about 12 step programs, it has been proven time and time and time again that it is a lot easier to open up to somebody who's been through it. And like I mentioned in a video not that long ago, if you want what they have, you gotta do what they do. So no matter what you're trying to overcome, whether it's anxiety, depression, trauma, you know, an eating disorder or whatever, it is very beneficial to talk to somebody who has been through it. Now, now I know what some of you all are thinking but Chris, what about mental health professionals? I always tell you to go see a professional, all right. Go see you a professional. But even in this book, this is something that I read to my clients all the time. It's on page 133 if any of you happen to have this book right here, but it says this. But this does not mean that we disregard human health measures. God has abundantly supplied this world with fine doctors, psychologists and practitioners of various kinds. Do not hesitate to take your mental health problems to such persons. Most of them give freely of themselves that their fellows may enjoy sound mind and bodies. Try to remember that though God has brought miracles among us, we should never be little a doctor or psychiatrist. Their services are often indispensable in treating a newcomer and then following his case afterwards. Basically that is what that saying is do both, do both. Individual therapy, group therapy, right? Individual therapy, support groups, whatever it is. Do both, okay? You have options, take advantage of all of them, all right? That is why it's so important. But for anybody who's in a 12 step program and just real quick, I've heard of people, you know not really liking the vibe in there because some people are against like you taking mental health medications. Like for example, my sponsor, he was not happy with me taking Lexa Pro which is an anti-depressant and anti-anxiety medication. Even though it's a non-narcotic, right? But even here in this book, it says to never disregard, you know these professional mental health measures, all right? So if you have the resources, make sure that you are seeing a professional. But like we have support groups on Facebook and Discord with a bunch of people who have been through a bunch of things. So that might be something that can help you. But we ain't over yet. So let's talk about depression specifically and depression and anxiety tie in a lot together, okay? Because for some people, anti-depressants actually don't work the best. And this is something that I've talked about in many, many, many, many videos, okay? Anti-depressants are not the cure all. Studies have actually proven that anti-depressants only help about this much. So I am on an anti-depressant but I know there's a lot more work that has to go into it. So anyways, this guy on the screen right now he might look familiar to some of you. This is Johann Hari, okay? So in his book, Lost Connections, which I have recommended to all of you a million times, I even did a giveaway of some, I think five free copies of Lost Connections not that long ago, like best book on depression you can ever read. But anyways, what he talks about is he tells a story about this psychologist I believe he was, he went to Cambodia, okay? He went to Cambodia and he went to this village and he was talking to them about anti-depressants. And there's not really a word in Cambodian for anti-depressants, right? So he starts to explain to them what it is. And the village, the people in the village is like, oh, we already have that. We already have anti-depressants. He's like, wait, what? Like, cause he knew they didn't have pills. So he's like, okay, maybe they need some herbs or something like that. Well, anyways, what happened was there was a rice farmer in the fields and he was working and he stepped on a landmine, blew his leg right off, right? So they made him a prosthetic leg but he couldn't work because it was very painful to continue being a rice farmer. And this guy fell into a deep, deep, deep, deep depression. So what the people in the village, what they started to do was they started to go and spend time with him. They just started listening to his issues, his problems, what was making him so sad, all right? So what they realized was that he started lacking purpose because he couldn't work. So what they ended up doing was a bunch of people got their money together and they bought this dude a cow and boom, not that long after this dude was, happy as can be, okay? So what they told that doctor who came to the village was, yeah, we have an antidepressant for him. This cow was his antidepressant. And one of the things that that book talks about and I've mentioned this in other videos and gone through some of the other stories in the book as well as scientific studies, like check out the video I did on the right opinion, exposing like depression or something like that. But anyways, antidepressants, like the pharmaceutical version of them is a very small part of overcoming depression, okay? We need connection, we need meaning, we need purpose, we need all sorts of things, all right? So make sure that you are not isolating and you get connected to people. That's another reason why we set up these support groups so you can get connected with other people. I have some other videos that I'm gonna do on this and like the importance of connection, but it is so, so, so difficult, if not impossible, for most of us to do this on our own by isolating, okay? I have a whole back catalog of videos explaining the science of why this does not work, okay? So again, I am not telling you to quit taking your antidepressants or anything like that. Again, I take mine, but there's a lot of other work that goes along with it. And a lot of that has to do with the support group that I've surrounded myself with, all right? But anyways, if you wanna check out the book Lost Connections, by the way, it is down in the description below. I'll put it in the pinned comment as well if you would like to check it out. And again, thank you everybody who came out to our first charity live stream. You're all amazing, love you all. Thank you for helping support. Project Beauty Share and next month, we're gonna be doing a live stream event to help out the AFSP and I'm super excited about it. All right, but anyways, that's all I got for this video. If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up. If you're new, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. And a huge, huge thank you to everybody supporting the channel over on Patreon. You are all amazing. And by the way, I answered all of your questions in the live stream, so go check that out. All right, thanks again so, so much for watching. Get connected and I'll see you next time.