Today, I talk to Dr. Gabor Maté. A celebrated speaker and bestselling author, Dr. Gabor Maté is highly sought after for his expertise on a range of topics, such as addiction, stress, and childhood development. Dr. Maté has written several bestselling books, including the award-winning In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction; When the Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress; and Scattered Minds: The Origins and Healing of Attention Deficit Disorder. He is also the co-author of Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers. His works have been published internationally in more than thirty languages.

Dr. Maté generously shares his deep understanding of childhood trauma, vulnerability, grief, and emotional distress. He explains what real trauma is and how time doesn’t necessarily lead to healing, how vulnerability is ingrained in us since we are young and the importance of these formative years to mold our emotional health, and the societal expectations we always try to meet but have never truly given us real fulfillment. We also exchange thoughts on dealing with grief, how we struggle to identify with the people we look up to, and how childhood experience varies for every child even when they are raised in a similar environment.

Trauma is a wound that has not fully healed which can be triggered at any point in our life so it matters that we are able to find a common ground and stay firm in what can give us healing, emotional stability, and happiness.

What We Discuss:
00:00:00 Intro
00:03:12 How do you define trauma?
00:06:32 How is healing defined?
00:08:45 Time itself does not heal emotional wounds
00:11:38 We are all born vulnerable
00:13:55 The inherent expectations we all have
00:20:00 The societal standards we try to live up to
00:25:15 It’s not possible to love kids too much
00:29:35 Grief is essential for life
00:32:19 When the past dominates the present reactions
00:35:16 There is no healthy identification
00:42:11 Why are we set on things staying the same
00:44:38 No two children have the same childhood
00:50:19 The difference between loneliness and being alone
00:53:54 How do you see human nature?
01:02:24 Suffering has to be acknowledged
01:06:27 Getting closure and start moving on
01:10:04 Spirituality becomes commoditized
01:15:56 Dr. Maté on Final Five