Arthur C. Brooks

To begin with, there's nothing weird about you.

There's nothing abnormal about that, even though it feels really horrible.

Think about it this way.

I'm going to make a prediction about something your great grandfather never said when he came home to see your great grandmother at dinner.

He never said, I had a panic attack behind the mule today.

And here's the weird thing about that.

To begin with, his brain was working the way it was supposed to work.

Our brains were designed 250,000 years ago to work and work hard and have relationships in real life.

That's what our brains are designed to do.

And when we don't do that, things are going to be wacky in our lives.

And that's what you're experiencing.

you're actually looking to self-soothe normal problems.

I mean, you go away and you go to college and there's anxieties, et cetera, et cetera, and you self-soothe in a way that actually torques your brain.

It's making your brain work really, really differently than it should.

And so the answer is to live more like your great grandfather.

Now, you already know this.

You worked on an oyster farm.

I have a son who, when he was your age, it was the same problem, really addicted to his phone.

He went away and joined the Marine Corps.

He was a sniper in the Marine Corps.