Dr Jud Brewer is a New York-based surfer (yep!) and psychiatrist and neuroscientist specialising in habit change and he's helped thousands of people quit smoking and overcome binge eating. But his latest research treats anxiety like it's any other habit.

I reached out to him because I'd tried out his technique and it worked…substituting fretting for curiosity as a meta approach to life!

In this chat we unpack one of my own gnarly, ugly anxious thoughts (bit exposing!) using Jud's three-step solution (his alternative to willpowering our way through) and he gives practical advice for how we can all be more curious about our anxiety.

Try it!

Studies and books and things we mention:

Jud's latest book is called Unwinding Anxiety: New Science Shows How to Break the Cycles of Worry and Fear to Heal Your Mind and it's out now.

Read more about the Harvard study which found we spend 47% of the day ruminating: https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2010/11/wandering-mind-not-a-happy-mind/

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DR JUD BREWER: On curiosity as the fix for anxiety