Essentials: The Science & Process of Healing from Grief

essentials:悲伤疗愈的科学与方法

Huberman Lab

2026-05-28

39 分钟
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单集简介 ...

In this Huberman Lab Essentials episode, I explain the neuroscience of grief, including how the brain maps relationships across three dimensions — space, time, and closeness — and why losing someone requires a remapping of those neural circuits. I describe how grief differs from depression, the role of oxytocin in driving yearning after a loss, and why people move through grief at different rates. I also discuss science-based tools for grieving adaptively, including how to access feelings of attachment while decoupling them from episodic memory. Finally, I explain how foundational biology — particularly sleep and cortisol rhythms — shapes our capacity to navigate the grieving process. Read the episode show notes at hubermanlab.com. Thank you to our sponsors AG1: https://drinkag1.com/huberman LMNT: https://drinklmnt.com/huberman Eight Sleep: https://eightsleep.com/huberman Timestamps (00:00:00) Grief (00:01:47) Myths of Grief, Kubler-Ross & fMRI (00:03:56) Brain Mapping Experiment, Proximity (00:07:05) Inferior Parietal Lobule; Space, Time & Closeness (00:09:20) Episodic Memory & Remapping After Loss (00:11:28) Sponsor: Eight Sleep (00:14:21) Tool: Dedicated Time, Counterfactual Thinking & Guilt (00:15:52) Oxytocin & Individual Differences in Grief (00:18:21) Prairie Voles, Monogamy & Nucleus Accumbens (00:22:30) Sponsor: LMNT (00:24:48) Vagal Tone, Emotional Disclosure & Bereavement Writing Study (00:29:40) Cortisol Rhythms, Complicated Grief & Sunlight (00:33:03) Sponsor: AG1 (00:34:59) Rational Grieving, Neuroplasticity & NSDR Disclaimer & Disclosures Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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  • Welcome to Huberman Lab Essentials, where we revisit past episodes for the most potent

  • and actionable science-based tools for mental health, physical health, and performance.

  • I'm Andrew Huberman, and I'm a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine.

  • Today, we are going to discuss how we conceptualize grief, both at an emotional and at a logical level.

  • I'm going to teach you about the neuroscience and the psychology of grief and incredible findings

  • that have been made in just a few key laboratories

  • that point to the fact that we essentially map our experience of people in three dimensions.

  • I'll just give you a little hint of what those dimensions are.

  • They relate to space, where people are, time, when people are, I'll explain what that means,

  • and a dimension called closeness, and how those three dimensions of space, time,

  • and closeness are what establish very close bonds with people and are what require remapping,

  • reorganization within our emotional framework and our logical framework when we lose somebody for whatever reason.

  • The important thing to point out is that grief is a process.

  • Like any biological or psychological event, it has a beginning, a middle, and an end.

  • And I do believe that being able to orient in terms of where you are in that process can be immensely beneficial.

  • Not just for predicting how long it's going to last,

  • but in order to conceptualize the person or animal that you lost in a way that allows

  • you to best preserve their memory while maintaining your own functional capacity in life.

  • Along those lines, I want to point out that grief and depression,

  • while they can feel quite similar in certain ways and have overlapping symptomology, loss of appetite, challenges