Speaker 1: Are you feeling stressed about the holidays, the pressure to
Speaker 1: make everything perfect, the tricky family gatherings, trying to keep
Speaker 1: everybody happy, And for some of you it's the opposite,
Speaker 1: it's the feeling of being alone. Either way, it's a lot.
Speaker 1: So if you're feeling overwhelmed, know that many others feel
Speaker 1: the same way. But this year can be different. Join
Speaker 1: me in the one you feed community for a free
Speaker 1: online event on December tenth at twelve pm Eastern. You'll
Speaker 1: learn a simple wise habit that can help you let
Speaker 1: go of holiday stress and find more peace, steadiness, and
Speaker 1: real connection. Picture yourself getting through this season feeling grounded,
Speaker 1: present and clear without all the pressure to be perfect.
Speaker 1: Give yourself this free gift of support, learning and genuine
Speaker 1: connection with others who get it. Sign up now at
Speaker 1: oneufeed dot net slash holiday. If you're unable to attend live,
Speaker 1: we'll be sending the video to people who have registered.
Speaker 1: So go to oneufeed dot net slash holiday and change
Speaker 1: the way you experience the holidays.
Speaker 2: So many of us don't live in the present moment
Speaker 2: and can't feel grateful for what's available because we're focusing
Speaker 2: on how much we wish it wasn't the case right here,
Speaker 2: right now, when we can sit in radical acceptance of
Speaker 2: what is here now, when we can maybe change the
Speaker 2: way we're filtering, giving ourself the opportunity to possibly springboard
Speaker 2: us into a future that's different.
Speaker 3: Welcome to the One You Feed. Throughout time, great thinkers
Speaker 3: have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have, quotes
Speaker 3: like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you think,
Speaker 3: ring true. And yet for many of us, our thoughts
Speaker 3: don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self pity, jealousy,
Speaker 3: or fear. We see what we don't have instead of
Speaker 3: what we do. We think things that hold us back
Speaker 3: and dampen our spirit. But just about thinking our actions matter.
Speaker 3: It takes conscious, consistent and creative effort to make a
Speaker 3: life worth living. This podcast is about how other people
Speaker 3: keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed
Speaker 3: their good wolf.
Speaker 1: Hello everyone, I am doing the intro this week instead
Speaker 1: of Christopher because this is a special episode of the
Speaker 1: One You Feed podcast. We've done these in the past,
Speaker 1: and what we do is talk to some of our
Speaker 1: favorite people about one single topic, and the topic we're
Speaker 1: going to explore in this episode is gratitude. For those
Speaker 1: of you in the States, you know, it's Thanksgiving week
Speaker 1: at least if you're listening to this right when it
Speaker 1: comes out, So gratitude is top of mind for many
Speaker 1: of us. But even more than that, this topic is
Speaker 1: really important because it is one of the most impactful
Speaker 1: practices is that we can use to meaningfully improve the
Speaker 1: way we experience our lives. But very often we struggle
Speaker 1: to make it a regular practice. So why is that
Speaker 1: and what can we do about it? And why should
Speaker 1: we try or even care? I'll explore these questions and
Speaker 1: more with our guests Martha Beck, Ajjacobs, doctor Nicole Lepera,
Speaker 1: Susan Cain, and Corey Allen. I really hope you enjoy it.
Speaker 1: Now onto this special episode all about gratitude.
Speaker 3: Up first on the Gratitude episode from the Holisticpsychologist dot com,
Speaker 3: Doctor Nicole Lepera, What does.
Speaker 1: Gratitude mean to you?
Speaker 2: I think the most simple definition that I like to
Speaker 2: offer for gratitude is acknowledgment of what is being I
Speaker 2: think fully present, and I'm being very intentional about adding
Speaker 2: this step in. I think a lot of times when
Speaker 2: we think of gratitudes right feeling grateful, appreciative, or some
Speaker 2: version of appreciation for something we have or and or
Speaker 2: receiving the appreciation from someone or something for some aspect
Speaker 2: of us. I think what is really important, in my opinion,
Speaker 2: to incorporate into the definition of gratitude is that presence
Speaker 2: around what is not in judgment, not in criticism, around
Speaker 2: just the pure objectivity of what is present, here and now.
Speaker 2: And the reason why I'm emphasizing that in particulars so
Speaker 2: many of us aren't living in the present moment. We're
Speaker 2: recycling past moments, past trauma that lives in our mind
Speaker 2: and body, and that is coloring our experience, our interpretation
Speaker 2: of what may or may not be present, or limitations
Speaker 2: that may or may not be here, right here, right now. However,
Speaker 2: again it's a remnant of our past. So grounding ourselves
Speaker 2: in the present moment objectively around what is and then
Speaker 2: allowing us to expand into that feeling of appreciation, I
Speaker 2: think is how I operationally kind of talk about the
Speaker 2: embodiment of the practice of gratitude, which I believe is
Speaker 2: foundationally important and healing.
Speaker 1: So, what are some of the practices for gratitude that
Speaker 1: you most recommend for people.
Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of different ways we can
Speaker 2: practice that acknowledgement, just again highlighting the first aspect of
Speaker 2: that which is becoming conscious even to the present moment,
Speaker 2: to what is here available you know what the reality
Speaker 2: of it is. And that happens when we activate our
Speaker 2: conscious awareness, when we tune into not the stories in
Speaker 2: our mind, not to rehashing things that happened weeks ago,
Speaker 2: years ago, not to worrying about tomorrow, or most of
Speaker 2: us spend our time to be grounded and present to
Speaker 2: what is to turning our focus onto our physical body,
Speaker 2: to extending it out into the external environment, seeing for
Speaker 2: ourselves things that are present here and now. That is
Speaker 2: how we become available into what is here and now.
Speaker 2: And then, of course, if we want to add in
Speaker 2: the appreciation. People have had success with journaling, listing things
Speaker 2: that we're grateful for. For me, even just acknowledging its
Speaker 2: presence can be so incredibly healing for all of us
Speaker 2: that are coloring the present moment with our pay experiences,
Speaker 2: because so many of us are filtering out the reality
Speaker 2: of what's here, based again because of those past filters
Speaker 2: that we've been applying so that means becoming active, becoming present,
Speaker 2: maybe even verbally stating for ourselves or writing in the
Speaker 2: notebook things that are present in each given moment, and
Speaker 2: that can help us activate that feeling of appreciation, because
Speaker 2: appreciation can only happen if we're aware of something that
Speaker 2: is there.
Speaker 1: Well, that's interesting because normally gratitude, the way it is
Speaker 1: done is very often not a present moment thing. I'm
Speaker 1: grateful for the coffee I had this morning, I'm grateful
Speaker 1: for the herons I saw land on the lake this afternoon.
Speaker 1: Where what you're saying is coming present. So is it
Speaker 1: your belief that if we were to be able to
Speaker 1: come to the present moment without the heavy conditioning of
Speaker 1: the past, without everything else that in that contacting the
Speaker 1: present moment as it is, a feeling of gratitude would
Speaker 1: naturally emerge.
Speaker 2: I think a feeling of connection and presence with that
Speaker 2: moment emerges, the awareness of what is available, because oftentimes
Speaker 2: when we want to practice gratitude, typically it's because we're
Speaker 2: so focused on what's not present, what we don't yet have,
Speaker 2: what we want to be the case. And when we
Speaker 2: can become present to what is here, I think we
Speaker 2: can open up our filter and see all of the
Speaker 2: different maybe needs that we do have consistently or at
Speaker 2: least in this moment, being met, the space that we
Speaker 2: actually are choosing to inhabit in this moment. I think
Speaker 2: that we most often do have available something right, that
Speaker 2: is actionable, right, some need that has safety, or we
Speaker 2: even have a house a roof over our head.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 2: These are small things that I think aren't small, and
Speaker 2: that we so typically overlook because we've become so familiar
Speaker 2: with those being part of our present existence. Yet we
Speaker 2: diminish and instead of focusing on what we have here,
Speaker 2: we tend to highlight what isn't yet here.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I've been doing a lot of reading about the
Speaker 1: psychological research on gratitude, and it's clear that one of
Speaker 1: its really salient features is the ability to almost counteract
Speaker 1: hedonic adaptation.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 1: The adaptation mean we just take for granted what we're
Speaker 1: used to, and gratitude being a way of actually not
Speaker 1: taking things for granted, of being a way of connecting
Speaker 1: the fact that, like, well, what would it be like
Speaker 1: if this.
Speaker 3: Thing wasn't here?
Speaker 1: Okay, now I can get back to appreciating what I
Speaker 1: already do have, which really does seem to be one
Speaker 1: of the keys to a happy life is to appreciate
Speaker 1: what we have, spend more energy there than on what
Speaker 1: we don't have.
Speaker 2: When we free up the energy of focusing on what's
Speaker 2: not yet present, we're actually then saving conserving the energy
Speaker 2: to create change in that direction.
Speaker 6: Should we choose?
Speaker 2: So many of us expend so much energy. Recording the
Speaker 2: previous podcast, we were talking a little bit about autopilot
Speaker 2: and how that actually conserves caloric energy for our brain.
Speaker 2: How we do prefer to just cruise into that familiar
Speaker 2: accepting things just as they are without thinking about them,
Speaker 2: because physiologically, actually there's a benefit of doing that in
Speaker 2: terms of the chloric intake, with my brain already needing
Speaker 2: the most of it. So again, it allows us to
Speaker 2: be present, to see the things that we've become unconscious too,
Speaker 2: as a way to oftentimes conserve energy, and when we
Speaker 2: have that then energy back not spinning around wishing hoping.
Speaker 2: Now we can use that energy to being grounded in
Speaker 2: the present and to actually creating the steps in that direction.
Speaker 1: So what do you do in your own life? Do
Speaker 1: you consciously practice gratitude in any sort of consistent way
Speaker 1: or is it just become part of your orientation for you.
Speaker 1: How does it operationalize?
Speaker 4: So two ways.
Speaker 2: I think my most consistent practice of gratitude is staying
Speaker 2: really grounded and connect it to the present moment, coming
Speaker 2: to the awareness of how disconnected I had spent the
Speaker 2: large majority of my life. That is a daily habit
Speaker 2: in practice, always checking into where is my attention, always
Speaker 2: pulling it back, always being observant of what is here,
Speaker 2: what is now? I think that's kind of the most
Speaker 2: number one foundational aspect of gratitude that I integrate into
Speaker 2: my day to day. And then there's a more kind
Speaker 2: of acute moment by moment, and I give myself the
Speaker 2: opportunity for me, it's a shift in thinking or language around.
Speaker 2: So typically when I don't want to do something, you know,
Speaker 2: I have an event, an opportunity, something coming up, a project, Right,
Speaker 2: I have to if you will, I tend to, you know,
Speaker 2: roll my eyes. Whish I didn't have to focus all
Speaker 2: of my internal monologuing on how much I shouldn't maybe
Speaker 2: have to do right this thing we talked about taxes
Speaker 2: when we recorded a podcast. Right, I don't want to
Speaker 2: do this thing. Language right now, I'm shifting the shift
Speaker 2: I offer myself is I'm grateful for the opportunity to
Speaker 2: do my taxes so I can have a thriving business.
Speaker 2: I'm grateful for the opportunity to have this conversation right
Speaker 2: connected to what my intention is, so that the message
Speaker 2: gets out there. I'm grateful for whatever event I don't
Speaker 2: want to do, because this might take me one step
Speaker 2: closer to this goal I have for my future. I'm
Speaker 2: grateful for the opportunity. I sometimes even just use that,
Speaker 2: even not being specific on what it is. Shifting again
Speaker 2: that internal monologue because against so many of us don't
Speaker 2: live in the present moment and can't feel grateful for
Speaker 2: what's available, because we're focusing on how much we wish
Speaker 2: it wasn't the case right here, right now, when we
Speaker 2: can sit in radical acceptance of what is here now,
Speaker 2: when we can maybe change the way we're filtering, giving
Speaker 2: ourselves the opportunity to possibly springboard us into a future that's.
Speaker 1: Different, wonderful. Well, thank you so much for taking a
Speaker 1: couple of minutes to talk with us about gratitude. I
Speaker 1: am grateful that you did.
Speaker 2: I'm grateful for the opportunity.
Speaker 3: Up next is journalist, lecturer, and author of four New
Speaker 3: York Times bestsellers, AJ Jacobs.
Speaker 1: Take the can story kind of from the top.
Speaker 7: Sure, I know this is deemed to Thanksgiving, And I
Speaker 7: wrote an article a couple of years ago about how
Speaker 7: I'm trying to make Thanksgiving a little more creative and
Speaker 7: stretch our gratitude muscles on. And one thing I noticed
Speaker 7: was that the can. You know, we have canned pumpkin
Speaker 7: pie filling. We should make it ourselves, but we don't.
Speaker 7: And I noticed that the cans have little ridges on
Speaker 7: the side, And I looked it up and those ridges
Speaker 7: are not there by accident. Someone came up with that
Speaker 7: idea because it makes the cans harder to dent. So
Speaker 7: thank you to the engineer who came up with the
Speaker 7: idea to have little ridges on the side of cans.
Speaker 7: Something totally never thought about, something I completely took for granted,
Speaker 7: something you'd never notice unless you thought about it.
Speaker 1: That is a great one. The numbers of those things
Speaker 1: are really endless, the things to be grateful for. And
Speaker 1: as I've looked into gratitude a little bit more preparing
Speaker 1: for this episode in some different things, one of the
Speaker 1: things that gratitude researchers think gratitude can be really helpful
Speaker 1: for is to forestall hedonic adaptation to some degree, right,
Speaker 1: which is basically the fact that we do take everything
Speaker 1: for granted. So your health, you could wait till it's
Speaker 1: gone and then you will wish you had it again. Right,
Speaker 1: But by practicing gratitude is a way of actually sort
Speaker 1: of not taking things for granted. And the number of
Speaker 1: things that at least in my life I take for
Speaker 1: granted is stunning.
Speaker 7: Right, Yes, that is a real danger the hedonic treadmill.
Speaker 7: And you think, oh, I'll be happy when I get X,
Speaker 7: you get X. Ten minutes later you'll bea well, I'll
Speaker 7: really be happy when I get why, you get why,
Speaker 7: and then it goes on and on. And the way
Speaker 7: I've found to battle it is through gratitude and through
Speaker 7: listing almost cataloging all of the things that I do have.
Speaker 7: So again it's an active discipline, the classic writing five
Speaker 7: things down. I do it with my mom. We trade
Speaker 7: emails every morning of something that we're grateful for. So, yeah,
Speaker 7: that is for me, the only way to battle that
Speaker 7: evil hedonic adaptation.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I loved that idea that you and your mom
Speaker 1: exchange a thing every day that you're grateful for. That's
Speaker 1: such a lovely practice, and how much better to be
Speaker 1: able to share gratitude with someone than just do it
Speaker 1: on our own.
Speaker 7: And I will tell you it's challenging because I have
Speaker 7: a rule with myself. I don't want to repeat, So
Speaker 7: I don't want to say I'm grateful for my dog,
Speaker 7: even though I love my dog. So I have to
Speaker 7: come up with a new one every day, and it
Speaker 7: gets harder and harder, but it's good. It is a
Speaker 7: good exercise.
Speaker 1: Are you able to repeat with variation? Because one of
Speaker 1: the other things that I've seen, as I again have
Speaker 1: looked at gratitude is that specificity can be really helpful.
Speaker 1: So it's one thing to say I'm grateful for my dog.
Speaker 1: It's another thing to say I'm grateful for when my
Speaker 1: dog does that really cure thing where she buries her
Speaker 1: head in the pillow and shakes her butt around or
Speaker 1: whatever like. So are you allowed to repeat as long
Speaker 1: as you're reflecting on a different aspect or once you've
Speaker 1: thanked your wife, it's over, no.
Speaker 7: What you said. I love The more specific the better,
Speaker 7: And yes, I can be thankful for different parts, well
Speaker 7: not different parts different that sounded weird, but different aspects
Speaker 7: of my dog, the cuddling or the playfulness and what
Speaker 7: you said. And I have a section in my book
Speaker 7: about writing thank you notes, and I found, at least
Speaker 7: for me, the most effective were really getting specific. I
Speaker 7: remember I wrote a thank you note to the people
Speaker 7: who are inspectors on the farms, and they have to
Speaker 7: spend all their time and outdoors, and I could have
Speaker 7: just said thank you for being out there and inspecting
Speaker 7: the coffee farms, but I tried to picture what their
Speaker 7: life was like. You know, I thank you for putting
Speaker 7: up with the mosquitos that I'm sure you have to
Speaker 7: put up. Thank you for baking in the hot sun.
Speaker 7: And the more specific I think is better for both
Speaker 7: parties because you get a little more empathy and then
Speaker 7: they're like, well you put some thought into it.
Speaker 1: Well I think that is a great place to wrap up.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for coming on. Like I said,
Speaker 1: I really did enjoy the book. You're an outstanding writer,
Speaker 1: and thank you it's been fun.
Speaker 7: Well. Thank you Eric, and thank you to your producer
Speaker 7: of course, and thank you to the people who made
Speaker 7: your microphone, etcetera, etcetera.
Speaker 1: And Riverside Dot f This could go on a long time.
Speaker 3: Up next is author, speaker, and founder of the Wavefinder
Speaker 3: Life Coach training program, Martha Beck.
Speaker 1: Hi, Martha, Welcome to our special Gratitude episode.
Speaker 6: Thank you so much, Eric. I am grateful to be here.
Speaker 1: I am grateful that you agreed to be here. You know,
Speaker 1: maybe let's just start off by getting right into it.
Speaker 1: What does what does gratitude mean to you? And why
Speaker 1: is it important to you?
Speaker 6: You know, I honestly came to it first through my brain.
Speaker 6: I was trained in social science, and I was also
Speaker 6: pretty depressed in my early life. So I read that
Speaker 6: gratitude was really good for you. It wasn't that I
Speaker 6: was never grateful for anything, but when I began reading
Speaker 6: the positive psychology on gratitude, it had such a massive
Speaker 6: impact on people's health, their relationships, everything like that, and
Speaker 6: I thought, I've got to find a way to get
Speaker 6: into this. And I tried to fake it and it
Speaker 6: didn't work. And I've coached people who've tried to fake it,
Speaker 6: and I will tell you this, if you're afraid or
Speaker 6: if you're depressed, the first thing you have to do
Speaker 6: is express love to yourself, to the part of you
Speaker 6: that is depressed or anxious and just say it like
Speaker 6: you'll be okay, I'm right here with you. You can
Speaker 6: feel whatever you're feeling, and immediately those parts will flood
Speaker 6: you with gratitude for having been noticed, for having been loved. So,
Speaker 6: for me, gratitude starts with self compassion, and if you're
Speaker 6: having trouble or if you're forcing it, it doesn't work.
Speaker 6: But if you love the parts of you that aren't
Speaker 6: feeling grateful, they are so grateful to be loved, but
Speaker 6: it will fill you up.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: You wrote somewhere that it's not just the appreciation that
Speaker 1: we feel that makes gratitude good, but it's the release
Speaker 1: of all other thoughts and feelings, right, So it's in
Speaker 1: essence when we move into a grateful feeling, by the
Speaker 1: nature of the thing itself, Yeah, other things have to
Speaker 1: fall away. Yeah, So it strikes me that that is
Speaker 1: one of the real problems with gratitude practice. At least
Speaker 1: for me, it does get dry sometimes where I'm like
Speaker 1: sort of going through the motions. Now, I still think
Speaker 1: it's valuable for me to go through the motions because
Speaker 1: there is at least an orientation that makes me start
Speaker 1: looking for gratitude more right, It's kind of like, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes I don't want to exercise, but I do. But
Speaker 1: at the same time, just grotely writing down three things
Speaker 1: you're grateful for day after day after day with no
Speaker 1: feeling isn't really going to give us what we want.
Speaker 1: And I think for a lot of people that's why
Speaker 1: the practice ends, because it's doing it that way isn't
Speaker 1: really giving us the enormous benefits that we can get
Speaker 1: from gratitude.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 6: And I tried it the same way you're describing, just
Speaker 6: writing it down by rote and not getting there with
Speaker 6: the genuine sensation of it. So, along with loving the
Speaker 6: parts of you that aren't grateful, the thing that works
Speaker 6: best for me if I want to get into that
Speaker 6: state is to move it into my sensory mind. So
Speaker 6: do something that gratifies your senses. And I would tell
Speaker 6: you my favorite thing. It's embarrassing, but I'll tell you
Speaker 6: I like to get in bed. King size bed doesn't
Speaker 6: have to be king sized, but I'm really grateful that
Speaker 6: it is because when no one's there, I get in
Speaker 6: my pajamas, I get in bed, and I just roll
Speaker 6: and roll and roll. I just roll around. And it's
Speaker 6: like if your whole body is immersed in this procedure.
Speaker 6: Stay in the tension that you're in most of the time.
Speaker 6: So anything you love with your senses, add it all together,
Speaker 6: put on something fuzzy, get something that's tasty, and treat
Speaker 6: yourself well physically, and again this simple animal body will
Speaker 6: flood you with gratitude.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of people who study
Speaker 1: gratitude and talk about gratitude. They really emphasize savoring things
Speaker 1: that we have to stay a little bit longer with
Speaker 1: the experience that's enjoyable, go deeper into it with all
Speaker 1: of our senses as much as we can. Not only
Speaker 1: does it make it better then, but it's actually going
Speaker 1: to make it better when we look back on it
Speaker 1: and reflect on it as a grateful moment later. It's
Speaker 1: going into it as much as we can. That's really powerful.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's interesting because as I was sort of getting
Speaker 6: ready to come on, I thought, you know, all my
Speaker 6: gratitude practices are very simple and very physical, and I
Speaker 6: remember being in Africa on safari and being very close
Speaker 6: to these wild animals, which I love, and being so
Speaker 6: excited and trying to grasp the experience right like instead
Speaker 6: of being grateful, I was actually anxious that it was
Speaker 6: about to end. And when I take other people, they
Speaker 6: get the same way, Oh, it's going to end. And
Speaker 6: the way I tell people to come down from that
Speaker 6: is to start doing really really long exhales, because that's
Speaker 6: something a fleeing animal never does, and so it brings
Speaker 6: the brain down, It takes it out of fight or flight,
Speaker 6: which is that grasping feeling. And I just tell them
Speaker 6: just breathe and breathe and breathe. And when I breathe consciously,
Speaker 6: it is like that experience with that animal lives inside
Speaker 6: me all the time, and it's the same thing with
Speaker 6: a child or with a wonderful experience of any kind.
Speaker 6: Breathe into it, breathe it in, and then breathe all
Speaker 6: the way out. I think it actually does something in
Speaker 6: the brain where it codes it in there more deeply.
Speaker 1: That's really interesting. Yeah. I have really had to work
Speaker 1: with myself over the years. You know, two days into
Speaker 1: a vacation, I start counting how many days I have
Speaker 1: left and dreading it, you know, and I've really had
Speaker 1: to learn to be like, all right, let's not ruin
Speaker 1: this whole vacation. Yeah, By worrying that it's going to end.
Speaker 6: In those circumstances, it really is good to say, you
Speaker 6: know what is here that I can taste, touch here, smell,
Speaker 6: feel with my skin, and then just really really focus
Speaker 6: on that. So, yeah, anything that takes you to the
Speaker 6: right side of your brain, which is breathing, sensory experience, comfort, love,
Speaker 6: all of those things will allow gratitude to emerge naturally
Speaker 6: and stay longer.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Another practice that you write about is something you were
Speaker 1: trying out for a while called the three to one
Speaker 1: gratitude practice. Can you share a little bit about that.
Speaker 6: I think I'm so grateful that you read that, because
Speaker 6: I probably wrote it during an all nighter that I've
Speaker 6: forgotten about.
Speaker 4: But what I.
Speaker 6: What I would guess I said is that every time
Speaker 6: I have an experience that is unpleasant and I'm thinking, ah,
Speaker 6: waiting that caprin, I switch and I think three things
Speaker 6: that have happened that are good, sometimes to the same event,
Speaker 6: sometimes that just happened unrelated to that in the same day.
Speaker 6: But it takes those three things. Because we have a
Speaker 6: negativity by us in our brains that has evolved there,
Speaker 6: we actually have to push a little harder to get
Speaker 6: into the positive side of our emotions than into the negative.
Speaker 6: We slide into the negative, we sort of have to
Speaker 6: bring ourselves back to the positive. So that's why I
Speaker 6: do three appreciation and gratitude moments for every moment that
Speaker 6: I'm being obnoxious and ungrateful.
Speaker 1: I think that's a great practice. It makes me think
Speaker 1: of the researcher on couples, John Gottman, who's done so
Speaker 1: much research and he came up with a ratio of
Speaker 1: positive to negative and based on his research, this is
Speaker 1: the ratio he came up with. Again, who cares if
Speaker 1: it's three to one, five to one, four to one, right,
Speaker 1: But for every negative interaction that occurs in a relationship,
Speaker 1: you need five positive ones for that relationship to really thrive.
Speaker 1: And most people in their relationships and relationships I've been
Speaker 1: in before before I was with Ginny, were almost the
Speaker 1: exact opposite. It was really almost five negative things to one.
Speaker 1: And it's no wonder that those relationships were disastrous.
Speaker 6: Or maybe they were disastrous already and you had the
Speaker 6: less to be grateful for Who can tell?
Speaker 1: Who can tell?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, That's.
Speaker 6: So interesting because I've noticed in our family, maybe because
Speaker 6: of my son who has down syndrome. There is more
Speaker 6: thank you being said in our house than I ever
Speaker 6: remember in any other house that I've been in, Like
Speaker 6: thank you for picking up my fork off the floor,
Speaker 6: thank you for oh my gosh, you were so amazing,
Speaker 6: Like everything gets thanked out loud. Yeah, and I think
Speaker 6: it got even more during the pandemic. There's such an
Speaker 6: intense circle of thank you in our little hideaway from
Speaker 6: the pandemic that it kind of almost created this vortex
Speaker 6: of gratitude.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 6: And I don't know, I actually felt strange feeling so
Speaker 6: grateful at a time when so many people were having
Speaker 6: a rough time, and then I would just be so
Speaker 6: much more grateful that I was happening.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a rabbit hole. We do not have time
Speaker 1: to go down. Boy, is it an important one us too?
Speaker 1: Here with Ginny and I, it's just a very conscious,
Speaker 1: you know, thanking for kind of all sorts of things,
Speaker 1: just being appreciative of what the other person brings to
Speaker 1: the relationship, what the other person does around the house.
Speaker 1: When I taught at Omega last weekend, it won't be
Speaker 1: last weekend for listeners. One of the new spiritual habits
Speaker 1: we unveiled was gratitude, And I read a study that
Speaker 1: said division of labor among couples is obviously important, right,
Speaker 1: who does what? But there also seems to be a
Speaker 1: lot of research that shows, in addition, it's really important
Speaker 1: that you are appreciating what the other person is doing,
Speaker 1: you're actually thanking them for that. And there's a lot
Speaker 1: of other research about how gratitude in a relationship just
Speaker 1: creates this cycle that gets stronger and strong. Right, if
Speaker 1: you feel grateful and express gratitude to the other person, well,
Speaker 1: now they feel better, so they're going to act more
Speaker 1: warm to you, or they're going to do something that's
Speaker 1: going to make you feel more grateful. And the more
Speaker 1: grateful you are, the more you want to invest in
Speaker 1: that relationship. And it's just this cycle that gets rolled.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: I wrote about this in my book about my son
Speaker 6: when he was about five. I had three kids at
Speaker 6: the time, and all of them were allowed to open
Speaker 6: one Christmas present on Christmas Eve. And my girls opened
Speaker 6: their presence and they were like, oh, that's nice. It's
Speaker 6: not quite what I wanted, but it'll do. Then Adam
Speaker 6: opened his present and someone had given him an automatic
Speaker 6: toy with batteries, but they wrapped the batteries separately, so
Speaker 6: what he opened was a package of batteries, and I thought,
Speaker 6: oh no, I was like, oh honey, that's not the
Speaker 6: real president. He was like batteries. Oh my god, batteries.
Speaker 6: I mean, he didn't say oh my god, but he
Speaker 6: was like, oh my god, baggies, buddies, batteries. And he
Speaker 6: started running around the house going I could make it
Speaker 6: work this, and I could make it work this, and
Speaker 6: I could wring.
Speaker 1: Oh wow.
Speaker 6: He was like insane with delight and gratitude for having
Speaker 6: these batteries, and that is why we give him stuff. Yeah.
Speaker 6: It really showed me how much that genuine, thrilled expression
Speaker 6: of gratitude makes you just want to throw more stuff
Speaker 6: at the person.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's powerful, it really is. I think, you know, so
Speaker 1: much of what limits gratitude and some of us is
Speaker 1: expectation or entitlement.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we think that what we're getting is what we
Speaker 1: deserve or what we are owed, or we know it's
Speaker 1: coming and we should get it. And I was reflecting
Speaker 1: on this something recently where a really good thing happened,
Speaker 1: but it was a good thing that I knew was
Speaker 1: going to happen for a while, and when it happened,
Speaker 1: I just was strangely.
Speaker 3: Sort of like hm.
Speaker 1: So I had to cultivate really going back to where
Speaker 1: did this come from? What was life like before this?
Speaker 1: You know, it's that old it's paraphrase much better than this.
Speaker 1: But you know, be thankful because you're the person that
Speaker 1: your old self wanted to be, or you have the
Speaker 1: things that your old self was wishing for.
Speaker 6: That's really true. And I also think that we get
Speaker 6: that kind of experience when we have been building towards
Speaker 6: something that isn't a sole level desire, society level desire.
Speaker 6: It's what we've been told will make us happy. We
Speaker 6: all achieve something, we all have a certain financial level
Speaker 6: or whatever, and those are really important. But when we
Speaker 6: get them, and I see this with clients all the time,
Speaker 6: there's no sense of satisfaction because the only sense of
Speaker 6: satisfaction comes from the soul level, which is when you
Speaker 6: yearned for something and then it came and then it
Speaker 6: was like the relationships in my life, it is like
Speaker 6: rain on drought every day all day, year after year
Speaker 6: after year. Just like so much gratitude the other stuff
Speaker 6: that I've got because I tried really hard and they
Speaker 6: told me that going on Oprah would make me happy.
Speaker 6: I'm very, very grateful to have done that, but afterwards
Speaker 6: I was like, that's not really landing. When Oprah read
Speaker 6: one of my books and really really got it, it
Speaker 6: landed like I didn't want the bells and whistles. What
Speaker 6: I wanted was the connection of souls. So I would
Speaker 6: tell people, give yourself a break if something doesn't explode
Speaker 6: your mind with gratitude, but then look at what your
Speaker 6: soul has asked for and what it's created, and look
Speaker 6: back on the things you yearn for. And even if
Speaker 6: it's just like I was really cold and now I
Speaker 6: have a warm bed, go back to the times when
Speaker 6: your soul is yearning and then just revel. I call
Speaker 6: it time travel, go back to the one who was
Speaker 6: yearning for this thing, yes, and just roll around a
Speaker 6: warm bed and just say, oh, thank god, I'm not
Speaker 6: still stuck on that broken ski lift or whatever it was.
Speaker 6: And that kind of time travel and the yearning of
Speaker 6: the soul, those are two things that really make my
Speaker 6: gratitude practice sort of sharper well.
Speaker 1: I think that's a beautiful place to wrap up, because
Speaker 1: we are back to rolling around in a big bed
Speaker 1: where we started. Kind of.
Speaker 6: So, Eric, I'm going to take that recording of you
Speaker 6: saying that, and I'm going to play it for everyone
Speaker 6: and they can just make their own conclusions. I went
Speaker 6: rolling around in a big bed where we started, me
Speaker 6: and Eric Zimmer. There's some gratitude coming at you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Martha, Thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Eric.
Speaker 3: Number four on our Gratitude episode is speaker and author
Speaker 3: of many books such as Quiet Power and Bittersweet. Susan Kin.
Speaker 1: Hi, Susan, it's so nice to talk with you again.
Speaker 4: Hey, Eric, so good to be back here with you.
Speaker 4: I've been enjoying our correspondence in between interviews about Leonard Cohene.
Speaker 4: That's always nice to get your emails.
Speaker 1: Yes, me too, and I'm so happy to talk to
Speaker 1: you again so soon after we did the first time.
Speaker 1: You know, your episode was definitely one of my favorites
Speaker 1: over the last couple of years. So if listeners you
Speaker 1: haven't heard it, I highly recommend it, as well as
Speaker 1: her book Bittersweet. But we're here to talk about gratitude,
Speaker 1: so I guess let's just start off. When I sort
Speaker 1: of bring up topic of gratitude, what comes to mind
Speaker 1: for you? Kind of right off the bat.
Speaker 4: You know what comes to mind is my grandmother. When
Speaker 4: I was a little kid, she really loved going to
Speaker 4: the botanical gardens. Like she had spent most of her
Speaker 4: life living in cinder block housing where there weren't many
Speaker 4: flowers around, and she loved flowers and trees, and she
Speaker 4: would go I think it was the Brooklyn Botanical Garden.
Speaker 4: I'm not sure which one it was, but you know,
Speaker 4: I got carted along when I was a kid, and
Speaker 4: I just remember her saying, ah, it's so beautiful, It's
Speaker 4: so beautiful. And the time I was a little kid,
Speaker 4: and I was like, ah, it's just some flowers kind
Speaker 4: of boring, you know, they're just sitting here. But I
Speaker 4: think of her all the time now because I kind
Speaker 4: of feel the same way, like I'm just constantly exclaiming
Speaker 4: to my kids over how beautiful this thing or that
Speaker 4: thing is. I find every time you stop to exclaim
Speaker 4: over it or just silently savor it and appreciate it,
Speaker 4: it lifts you up. Yeah, and it's also just true.
Speaker 4: It's also just like stating a truth of like, oh
Speaker 4: my gosh, here's a daily miracle. There's another daily miracle.
Speaker 4: They're all over the place.
Speaker 1: You mentioned the word savoring, which is definitely a key
Speaker 1: part of gratitude. As I've done research on gratitude, I
Speaker 1: created a new program for our Omega workshop around gratitude,
Speaker 1: and it's certainly that idea of really being able to
Speaker 1: notice what's around you and try and savor it and
Speaker 1: appreciate it is really good for gratitude, not just in
Speaker 1: that moment, but also for our ability to look back
Speaker 1: on things and be grateful because we've made them more
Speaker 1: real and present, and thus our recollection of them later
Speaker 1: is also more real and present.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah, I think that's right. And one of the
Speaker 4: insights that I really came to when I was researching
Speaker 4: the whole Bittersweet book is about the extent which we,
Speaker 4: as modern people who are scientifically inclined, tend to kind
Speaker 4: of like break down the things around us by understanding
Speaker 4: what they're causes are, or you know that they're composed
Speaker 4: of atoms and molecules and like that, which is wondrous
Speaker 4: and fascinating in and of itself. But the problem that
Speaker 4: we have is I don't think we're aware in the
Speaker 4: way people hundreds of years ago were of just how
Speaker 4: constantly we're surrounded by the miraculous. And I don't mean
Speaker 4: the miraculous in a supernatural kind of way. I just
Speaker 4: mean in the like, can you freaking believe that this
Speaker 4: thing exists exactly?
Speaker 1: One of the guys who wrote a lot about and
Speaker 1: studied a lot about gratitude is named Robert Emmons, and
Speaker 1: he has a quote. I'm not going to get it exact,
Speaker 1: but it's something along the lines. A scene with grateful
Speaker 1: eyes requires that we see the web of interconnection in
Speaker 1: which we alternate between being givers and receivers. When I
Speaker 1: think about the miraculous, I think about that web of interconnection,
Speaker 1: how everything is connected to and caused by something else,
Speaker 1: and in a very literal sense, the entire universe had
Speaker 1: to happen in the way it happened to get me
Speaker 1: to this beautiful moment here. That is such a deep
Speaker 1: mystery and such a deep beauty.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it really is, It really is. And then at
Speaker 4: the same time, whenever I hear about or talk about
Speaker 4: the idea of gratitude, I always feel like there's an
Speaker 4: untruthfulness to the discussion unless we can also make space
Speaker 4: for the fact that there are aspects of existence for
Speaker 4: which we really do have no reason to be grateful,
Speaker 4: you know, just like horrors and malevolence and all kinds
Speaker 4: of things that are also part of existence, and that
Speaker 4: I don't know. I mean, maybe somebody else would say
Speaker 4: we should feel grateful for all of it. I don't
Speaker 4: feel that way. I don't think it's true. I don't
Speaker 4: think we can, or really even should feel grateful for
Speaker 4: those things. I more just think what's really helpful is
Speaker 4: to understand that existence encompasses, you know, the beautiful miracles
Speaker 4: and then the horrors and the sufferings, and that's how
Speaker 4: it is. Take it all in, accept it, and turn
Speaker 4: in the direction of the beauty, and feel grateful for that.
Speaker 4: I find that a much more manageable way of living
Speaker 4: than the direction I feel were often told to go in,
Speaker 4: which is just like, you know, only feel gratitude and
Speaker 4: don't notice the rest of it.
Speaker 1: I couldn't agree more. I mean, I think gratitude should
Speaker 1: not be a way of escaping the realities of our lives,
Speaker 1: or the difficulties in our lives, or the things that
Speaker 1: need to change. Like if you're in an abusive relationship,
Speaker 1: you don't want to be grateful. Find the good things
Speaker 1: about your abuser and be grateful for them. You want
Speaker 1: to get out. Yeah, you know a lot of things
Speaker 1: in life we can't get out of a lot of
Speaker 1: the type of horrors that you're describing. So I think
Speaker 1: we do need to take in the whole human condition.
Speaker 1: And it's interesting, however, to see certain people like Levizel
Speaker 1: I think I'm saying that correctly talk about how gratitude
Speaker 1: was really an important part of him surviving. You know,
Speaker 1: he was in concentration camps, and he also writes deeply
Speaker 1: about the horror and how terrible it was, right, and
Speaker 1: so he really shows both of those things. You know,
Speaker 1: these can both be true. There are things in life
Speaker 1: can be grateful for, and there are things in life
Speaker 1: that we can be suffering through, and both those things
Speaker 1: can be accurate at the same time or true at
Speaker 1: the same time.
Speaker 4: That I think is the key thing to understand. They
Speaker 4: can both be true at the same time, and to
Speaker 4: embrace one doesn't mean to deny the existence of the other.
Speaker 4: And I think that's something that we can really live
Speaker 4: with because it's telling the truth. There's this quote from
Speaker 4: the musician Glenn Gould that I came across the other
Speaker 4: day where he talks about. I don't have the exact
Speaker 4: words in front of me, but it's something like the
Speaker 4: purpose of art is not for the momentary spurt of
Speaker 4: adrenaline that a beautiful artwork gives you. It's rather that
Speaker 4: it leads you in the direction of kind of like
Speaker 4: the slow accumulation of wonder and serenity in your life.
Speaker 1: Oh that's beautiful.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, and it's so true. That's why I think
Speaker 4: turning in the direction of a beauty for which we
Speaker 4: can be grateful, or turning in the direction of gratitude itself,
Speaker 4: is so sustaining because it has a way of fortifying
Speaker 4: you in the direction of wonder and serenity. You know,
Speaker 4: it's like the more you do it, the more you
Speaker 4: get to turn in that direction.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, I mean I think, you know, when we think
Speaker 1: about gratitude, we first have to sort of be paying
Speaker 1: attention to what's around us and then noticing the goodness
Speaker 1: kind of like you're saying, And then I think there's
Speaker 1: an element of recognizing the gift of it. You know
Speaker 1: that this art, you know, let's just take a beautiful
Speaker 1: piece of music, a Leonard Cohen piece of music, like
Speaker 1: I receive that.
Speaker 4: As a gift totally.
Speaker 1: It is a gift to me, and so I think
Speaker 1: that's the key is recognizing these benefits. And I think
Speaker 1: one of the things I love about gratitude. I think
Speaker 1: it's both one of the biggest benefits of gratitude and
Speaker 1: one of the biggest hindrances to gratitude is our ability
Speaker 1: to take literally everything for granted. I think that blocks
Speaker 1: is feeling grateful, But conversely, if we try and look
Speaker 1: through grateful eyes, it's a way of starting to not
Speaker 1: take the really good things in our lives quite so
Speaker 1: much for granted. Our families, our health, the fact that
Speaker 1: we have drinking water. I mean, there's just so many
Speaker 1: things that are truly amazing that if I'm not cultivating
Speaker 1: the mindset, I just will take for granted and think,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't have anything good right right.
Speaker 4: And we all have that experience of like you get
Speaker 4: a really bad cold or something, you feel so crappy,
Speaker 4: and then the first day that you feel better, you're like,
Speaker 4: oh my gosh, it's so amazing to feel healthy. I
Speaker 4: Am going to appreciate this every minute of every day
Speaker 4: for the rest of my life. And then you know,
Speaker 4: the appreciation starts to wean and you start focusing on
Speaker 4: other things instead.
Speaker 1: Yep, six minutes later, you've got a complaint. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know, it's so funny. I think about that when
Speaker 1: I'm in pain. When I'm in pain, the only thing
Speaker 1: I want is that pain to go away, and it
Speaker 1: is a deep desire, Like if it's really bad, it
Speaker 1: blocks everything out. And like you said, I just think, well,
Speaker 1: if it would just go away, I will be content.
Speaker 1: And it goes away, and I'm like, well, I have
Speaker 1: to cultivate appreciation that it's not there. Otherwise, our tendency
Speaker 1: towards adaptation and our tendency to note what's negative around
Speaker 1: us kind of overwhelms those basic things.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And you know, you keep coming back to the
Speaker 4: idea of noticing, And I do think that's one of
Speaker 4: the most important insights. Our brains only have the ability
Speaker 4: to pay attention to so many things at once, and
Speaker 4: or maybe even only one thing at a time, and
Speaker 4: we have some ability to direct our attention in the
Speaker 4: direction of our choosing. And you can choose to direct
Speaker 4: your attention towards the things that are a bummer, or
Speaker 4: you can choose to direct it towards the things for
Speaker 4: which you're grateful. And I think this is especially true
Speaker 4: in our relationships with other people, you know, because we're
Speaker 4: all so incredibly flawed that if we want to, we
Speaker 4: could easily find the flaws in everyone we encounter and
Speaker 4: dwell on those. Or you can find the miracles in
Speaker 4: each other's personalities or just the things we enjoy and
Speaker 4: focus on those. And that's a choice we can make
Speaker 4: at every moment.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, And I don't know who's said this quote. I
Speaker 1: get leary anymore of attributing anything to anyone because it's
Speaker 1: just every time I turn around, it's like, Nope, he
Speaker 1: never said that, she never said that. But the idea
Speaker 1: is it's good to look for the best in people,
Speaker 1: and often they will act that way because of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, gratitude has been researched kind of out the wazoo,
Speaker 1: and there's research about a virtuous cycle that starts in
Speaker 1: couples when they start to appreciate gratitude for each other.
Speaker 1: Because as one person does that, you know, the other
Speaker 1: person feels appreciated then wants to invest in the relationship,
Speaker 1: and then as you invest in the relationship, the relationship
Speaker 1: becomes something that's more precious to have because it's better
Speaker 1: and the cycle kind of keeps rolling. So I think
Speaker 1: there's so many ways that it can be a really
Speaker 1: helpful tool in our lives. And kind of back to
Speaker 1: your point, it isn't it the exclusion of noticing what's
Speaker 1: difficult or hard or painful. I think of it more
Speaker 1: as sort of a day to day tool in that
Speaker 1: it's like you said, where's the orientation of mind? Mind going?
Speaker 1: And I know where mind goes when I don't consciously
Speaker 1: redirect it. It does not go to beauty and gratitude
Speaker 1: and appreciation. That's not where it naturally goes. And I
Speaker 1: think most people are that way, and some of us
Speaker 1: probably more than others. It goes to what's not here,
Speaker 1: what's missing.
Speaker 4: I think that's right, and I think it's also useful
Speaker 4: for people to figure out what are the aspects of
Speaker 4: their lives that really get them to marveling at how
Speaker 4: amazing things can be. And I'll just give you an
Speaker 4: example of what I mean. I took this via character
Speaker 4: strengths test some years ago. It helps you understand what
Speaker 4: the strengths are in your own character, and I think
Speaker 4: they are like twenty four different ones, and it just
Speaker 4: sort of ranks them, and my number one strength was
Speaker 4: one I hadn't even considered before, and it was appreciation
Speaker 4: of beauty and excellence. I was like, oh, gosh, that's
Speaker 4: really interesting because I do you know, like I'll see
Speaker 4: a perfect figure skating routine or something, or just an
Speaker 4: article that's amazingly written and it fills me with a
Speaker 4: sense of awe and excitement. And so I just know
Speaker 4: that might seem sort of quirky to somebody else, but
Speaker 4: I know for me like that beholding something excellent is
Speaker 4: incredibly elevating. So the question is what is it for you?
Speaker 4: And you and you, like we all have different aspects
Speaker 4: that elevate us. And taking the time to figure out
Speaker 4: what it is for you, I think is one of
Speaker 4: the best gateways to gratitude that we have.
Speaker 1: I couldn't agree more. I think it is what is
Speaker 1: it for me? Because it is different for everybody, because
Speaker 1: some people when they see excellence and beauty, it causes
Speaker 1: almost an envy, not appreciation of it. For people that
Speaker 1: have that orientation, that may not be the right direction.
Speaker 1: A similar idea that's been on my mind lately is
Speaker 1: I tried surfing for the first time in Europe this
Speaker 1: summer and I loved it. And then I've gone to
Speaker 1: La and done it again. And it's a stupid hobby
Speaker 1: for an Ohioan, however.
Speaker 4: Not a traveling Ohioan.
Speaker 1: That's exactly right. However, it is the first thing in
Speaker 1: years that makes me fist pumpingly joyous. I don't experience
Speaker 1: that level of pure joy anywhere else. It's not to
Speaker 1: say that I don't have subtle flavors of it, but
Speaker 1: that level of it. And so I've just been like,
Speaker 1: you know what, I'm going to make a choice to
Speaker 1: cultivate that because that feels important. It feels like turning
Speaker 1: towards beauty and all and all that there's something about
Speaker 1: the combined experience of it all that is really special.
Speaker 1: And I think that kind of points to what you
Speaker 1: were just saying about finding your thing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely, and I totally get that. By the way,
Speaker 4: I feel that exact thing when I played tennis, which
Speaker 4: is a lot more convenient for me because I can
Speaker 4: just go to the local tennis court. But I know
Speaker 4: exactly what you're talking about, and I would fly across
Speaker 4: the country too to feel that way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, tennis has been on my list of things
Speaker 1: to take up, and it just hasn't happened yet. Giny
Speaker 1: and I we were going to take it up as
Speaker 1: a couple, and things with balls and flying at her
Speaker 1: just don't go well at least you mind me sharing
Speaker 1: that our first tennis lesson together ended in tears, so
Speaker 1: it wasn't the right couple's activity. However, I'm going to
Speaker 1: pursue it at some point.
Speaker 4: I think it's a good idea and as a couple,
Speaker 4: maybe you should try pickleball. I just tried playing it
Speaker 4: with my son last week and it was amazing. It
Speaker 4: elicited the same exact joy. But it's like a whiffle ball,
Speaker 4: so Jinny might be happy with that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, pickleball is definitely on the list of things to
Speaker 1: do also well, Susan, I'm with one question here, which
Speaker 1: is is there anything you do besides the conscious turning
Speaker 1: of beauty to practice gratitude in your life or is
Speaker 1: that really your core practice?
Speaker 4: Gosh, I don't know. I feel like it's something I
Speaker 4: do a lot as a parent, partly because my kids
Speaker 4: knock on Wood so far have had really good lives
Speaker 4: and I want them to be aware of how fortunate
Speaker 4: they are. But I think it's just something that happens
Speaker 4: naturally as a parent. We live on a quiet street
Speaker 4: and we often go out onto the street to play catch,
Speaker 4: you know, and I'll be like, oh my gosh, We're
Speaker 4: so lucky that we live on this quiet street where
Speaker 4: we can do this and don't have to worry about cars.
Speaker 4: So I'm constantly pointing those kinds of things out to them,
Speaker 4: and hopefully they don't find it annoying. They don't seem to.
Speaker 4: I do think there's something about being a parent that
Speaker 4: can orient us in that direction of noticing these things.
Speaker 1: I love that. I think that's a really great practice,
Speaker 1: like if we are orienting our children in that direction
Speaker 1: and at the same time choosing to orient ourselves in
Speaker 1: that direction exactly. Yeah, Well, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: coming on. It is always such a pleasure to talk
Speaker 1: with you. And I appreciate you coming on and talking
Speaker 1: about gratitude today.
Speaker 4: You are so welcome. Love talking to you, and yeah,
Speaker 4: thank you for reaching out on this.
Speaker 3: And closing out this episode is author, meditation teacher and
Speaker 3: podcast host at The Astral Hustle Corey Allen.
Speaker 1: Hey, Corey, it's good to talk to you again.
Speaker 5: Good to talk to you again.
Speaker 1: As always, this has been a bounty of riches as
Speaker 1: far as talking to you, I feel like I've done
Speaker 1: it more over the last several months, and it took
Speaker 1: us several years to get in So this has been great.
Speaker 5: Glad to be connected again.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So we are talking about gratitude, and I guess
Speaker 1: I'll just start off broadly and ask you, you know,
Speaker 1: when I bring up the topic of gratitude, what comes
Speaker 1: to mind for you?
Speaker 5: A couple of different things. I think the first thing
Speaker 5: is I think about the general things that people associate
Speaker 5: with gratitude. What is in my life that makes me
Speaker 5: feel angry and safe and fulfilled. Those things are relationships,
Speaker 5: my career, the things I'm able to do and share
Speaker 5: with people, and just the general systems that I have
Speaker 5: in my life that are really meaningful to me. And
Speaker 5: then of course there's just the abundance of modern living
Speaker 5: that I'm really grateful for. As far as you know,
Speaker 5: I live in Austin, Texas, and so it's so easy
Speaker 5: to get numb to like the ways that we live,
Speaker 5: of like what's available to us as far as you know,
Speaker 5: things like clean drinking waters, even stuff like that, where
Speaker 5: it's like sometimes I just stop and remember that it's
Speaker 5: easy to forget that that's a real luxury. It's just
Speaker 5: so plentiful. Where we are kind of blows my mind,
Speaker 5: you know, think about the wow. You know, but you know,
Speaker 5: all that stuff people are pretty used to and they're
Speaker 5: familiar with those ideas are on gratitude. But to go
Speaker 5: a little bit deeper, I'll say this, and I'm curious
Speaker 5: how you think about this. How do people apply gratitude?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 5: Like, how do people take the idea, whether it be
Speaker 5: sort of along the lines of what I just described,
Speaker 5: or if it's kind of this memification idea of gratitude,
Speaker 5: and how do you actually apply that to life to
Speaker 5: where it has real, consistent and daily resonance. Because most
Speaker 5: people think about gratitude I ascertain from observing the Internet
Speaker 5: is people look at gratitude with the way it's talked
Speaker 5: about as some type of solution. So it's like, oh,
Speaker 5: I'm feeling down today, Well remember all of the good
Speaker 5: things in your life, you know. Or I'm like in
Speaker 5: this crazy challenge right now and things feel really difficult.
Speaker 5: It's like, okay, but now tap back into gratitude and
Speaker 5: remember all the things you have going for you, everything
Speaker 5: that you've got them to this point. And so what's
Speaker 5: trying to happen there is that they're using gratitude in
Speaker 5: a time where they're struggling to apply it to the
Speaker 5: challenge the negative emotions, to offset the feeling of negativity,
Speaker 5: to try and bring themselves back into balance. Right now,
Speaker 5: there's nothing wrong with that, certainly, but are we short
Speaker 5: changing the deeper level of our gratitude by using it
Speaker 5: in that way? So if we only look at gratitude
Speaker 5: is an active way to minimize negativity, are we missing
Speaker 5: the deeper gratitude available to us in daily lives that
Speaker 5: exists on its own terms, not in relativity to challenges
Speaker 5: or negativity, but for its own sake. So that's something
Speaker 5: I think about and I have various ways of working
Speaker 5: with that, But I'm curious what you think about that
Speaker 5: and how you might approach that same idea.
Speaker 1: I first have to ask, are you grateful for your voice?
Speaker 1: Because as a podcaster, usually in every conversation, like I'm
Speaker 1: doing all right over here, but every time I get
Speaker 1: on with you, I'm like, that guy has got a
Speaker 1: great podcasting voice. I hope you're grateful for it.
Speaker 5: I am thank you, and I will say, is that
Speaker 5: with the great power, great responsibility, and so I try
Speaker 5: and use it wisely. But also it is kind of funny,
Speaker 5: is that it's like, I suppose if someone is like
Speaker 5: seven feet tall, every person that they meet is like, wow,
Speaker 5: you're really tall, and they're like, I know that, thank
Speaker 5: you for putting. And it's kind of a funny thing
Speaker 5: is that every conversation I have on the phone, you know,
Speaker 5: on podcasts, random conversations, it's only the first thing that
Speaker 5: comes up. So it is kind of one of those
Speaker 5: funny things for while I'm grateful for, it's also like
Speaker 5: kind of always being brought to me, which is funny
Speaker 5: on its own. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Actually, what you just ended there with I think is
Speaker 1: interesting because you know, when I think about gratitude, I've
Speaker 1: been thinking a lot about hedonic adaptation and the idea
Speaker 1: that gratitude is both the greatest antidote for that, but
Speaker 1: that hedonic adaptation is also the greatest block to gratitude.
Speaker 6: You know.
Speaker 1: So one way of looking at that is if we
Speaker 1: look at it through the paradigm you just said, which
Speaker 1: is I use gratitude to counteract certain negative things. Right,
Speaker 1: we could use gratitude as a way of counteracting the
Speaker 1: fact that we just get used to all the good
Speaker 1: stuff in our lives. We just do. Our ability to
Speaker 1: adapt is a good and bad thing. Right When terrible
Speaker 1: things happen to us, our ability to adapt to them
Speaker 1: is a good thing. However, it also means we take
Speaker 1: literally everything for granted. But it's also interesting to think
Speaker 1: about if I were to work with the donic adaptation
Speaker 1: more skillfully, might that unlock gratitude for its own sake,
Speaker 1: to just have the depth of gratitude as an orientation
Speaker 1: to life versus a tool that I bring in exactly.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And should we define the hedonic treadmill real quick?
Speaker 5: Or have you talked about that on your podcast before?
Speaker 1: I'm sure we've talked about it, and I'm sure not
Speaker 1: everybody hears it all the time. Why don't you define
Speaker 1: it real quick?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 1: Sure?
Speaker 5: Yeah, So, basically, think about a donic that's pleasure. And
Speaker 5: so as we continue to evolve in our lives get better,
Speaker 5: we very quickly get used to the luxuries and the
Speaker 5: good aspects of our lives, and it makes it harder
Speaker 5: for us to see them in the big picture of
Speaker 5: everything that's going on. So the adaptation or the treadmill
Speaker 5: analogy both, or you're just always sort of running towards
Speaker 5: more pleasure and missing what you have because it's in
Speaker 5: our nature to once we acquire something, just normalize it
Speaker 5: to a new baseline.
Speaker 1: Yep, exactly. The adaptation is a principle is us as
Speaker 1: humans adapt to whatever we're given. If we're giving bad things,
Speaker 1: we have a remarkable ability to adapt to them. That's
Speaker 1: the positive side of it. And then the hedonic adaptation
Speaker 1: is the negative side of it, which is we take
Speaker 1: everything for granted. You know, you and I were talking
Speaker 1: beforehand about how fortunate we both are to do the
Speaker 1: kind of work that we do. Yet, if I don't
Speaker 1: actually sometimes make an effort to remember that, you know,
Speaker 1: this thing that I dreamt of for so long, I
Speaker 1: thought if I just get that, I'll be happy. No
Speaker 1: longer makes me happy.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: Gratitude is actually a tool, I think, So this is
Speaker 1: back to is gratitude a tool, Is it a state
Speaker 1: of mind? I think it's all of those things. But
Speaker 1: for me, it's a tool of kind of getting back
Speaker 1: to appreciating the things that I actually do have. If
Speaker 1: you're not using it as a tool, how do you
Speaker 1: think about it or what do you find to be
Speaker 1: a more useful orientation.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and also I don't think it's really for me anyway.
Speaker 5: It's not a black and white there's definitely gray where
Speaker 5: I do use it as a tool sometimes, but as
Speaker 5: far as trying to look at a deeper relationship with it,
Speaker 5: I really apply it through the abundance of presence, So
Speaker 5: just being aware of being aware and really melting into
Speaker 5: the present moment with everything that you're experiencing and getting
Speaker 5: to that root level of Oh, right, I am a
Speaker 5: aware agent of consciousness flowing through time in the middle
Speaker 5: of outer space, and I know that I'm a wave
Speaker 5: of consciousness and a meat space suit. This is unreal, right,
Speaker 5: This is so crazy and fun, and it's a good
Speaker 5: way for me. I just remember that and think about
Speaker 5: that every day. I suppose it just crops up once
Speaker 5: or twice a day. I don't really have to work
Speaker 5: at it too much, but I think about it and
Speaker 5: it just really grounds me and it does pull me
Speaker 5: back to that original mind place that you were talking
Speaker 5: about of like whoa, I think about everything that, like
Speaker 5: I've experienced in life, you know, good and bad, the
Speaker 5: circumstances and like the infinite self organizing possibility of all
Speaker 5: that could be. And this is the meat taxi that
Speaker 5: my brain is in mind is taking a ride, and
Speaker 5: you know, like this is crazy. And then, of course,
Speaker 5: as I said, it always gets meta where I think
Speaker 5: the fact that I can think about this and I'm
Speaker 5: aware that I'm thinking about this is unreal. And to
Speaker 5: me that like kind of zooming out and zooming in simultaneously.
Speaker 5: It's a way to get the big picture and the
Speaker 5: granular picture at the same time. And then that's whenever
Speaker 5: you know, you can get into that state of the
Speaker 5: classic thing of washing the dishes and feeling you know,
Speaker 5: it's an incredible experience because you're actually there for it.
Speaker 5: You're not somewhere else. You're actually really tuned into just
Speaker 5: how brilliant it is to even be aware of.
Speaker 3: The fact that you're aware.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's three aspects of gratitude I've been thinking about.
Speaker 1: For gratitude, I think to find its full expression, all
Speaker 1: three of these things have to be happening. And one
Speaker 1: is we have to be paying close attention. Yes, it
Speaker 1: doesn't really work if we're not. And then the next
Speaker 1: is to notice the goodness that is there right, you know,
Speaker 1: from your perspective here, the goodness is just the wonder
Speaker 1: of what is this? You know, what is this? And
Speaker 1: then the last is sort of recognizing it as a gift, right,
Speaker 1: recognizing like I am not the creator of any of this,
Speaker 1: Like I couldn't have made all this happen on my own,
Speaker 1: So again, who the giver is? We don't need to
Speaker 1: get lost on that if you want to. But to me,
Speaker 1: that's not what's important. What's important is I wasn't the
Speaker 1: source of it. Kind of what you were just describing,
Speaker 1: you sort of summarized all three of those things, right,
Speaker 1: this deep attention to the present moment, This recognizing that
Speaker 1: indeed it is good just to be, and that the
Speaker 1: fact that I am is a gift of sorts in
Speaker 1: that I didn't create it. I can barely create a podcast,
Speaker 1: let alone you know this multiverse we live in.
Speaker 5: Well, I mean, don't short change yourself. Eric, I think
Speaker 5: that you are the creator of all things and the universe.
Speaker 5: I think you are an omnipotent being. I don't like.
Speaker 5: Another important part of it is not getting real heavy
Speaker 5: handed with it, you know, yeah, because it's easy for
Speaker 5: a person to get in there and be kind of
Speaker 5: feeling like they need to play the role of what
Speaker 5: we're talking about to like feel what we're talking about.
Speaker 5: But it's a lot more light than that. Because I
Speaker 5: feel like one of this type of conversation crops up.
Speaker 5: There's a potential for a listener to try and put
Speaker 5: on that outfit a little bit and wear it in
Speaker 5: their own lives. And the reason it works is because
Speaker 5: it's light. It's not a like I'm going to sit
Speaker 5: down and like really curl my brow and like get
Speaker 5: deep into this, you know, emotional thing. It's like, no, no,
Speaker 5: just like lighten up. Let go just feel that you're
Speaker 5: here and like notice how amazing it is, and then
Speaker 5: you're good.
Speaker 1: Yep. And is that enough for you? Or do you
Speaker 1: find that it actually helps to in some way consciously
Speaker 1: cultivate gratitude or do you find it comes simply by
Speaker 1: being present?
Speaker 5: To me, it comes by being present. But also my
Speaker 5: mind is very curious and extrapa lady at the same time,
Speaker 5: and so I'm always peeling back and thinking about those
Speaker 5: things and expanding. I will say that I think a
Speaker 5: real benefit to practicing gratitude for gratitude's sake and just
Speaker 5: getting into that baseline energy of like oh right, like whatever,
Speaker 5: there's always ups and downs. Things suck, then they're awesome,
Speaker 5: then they suck again, then they're awesome. That's just the
Speaker 5: way that life goes, and you can mitigate some unnecessary
Speaker 5: suffering by being active. But okay, there it is. It's
Speaker 5: cool that we hear this is fun, this is beautiful,
Speaker 5: and let's just feel it for a minute. To me,
Speaker 5: I've noticed, because I've I kind of experimented and tried
Speaker 5: to do this out of curiosity, is that that baseline
Speaker 5: of gratitude builds a really useful foundation because then whenever
Speaker 5: you do hit a low point and you're feeling the
Speaker 5: weight of the negative side of the spectrum, it can
Speaker 5: make it a lot more difficult for you to have
Speaker 5: all that weight that's pushing on you make any cracks.
Speaker 5: I've tried to reach my bottom and like have the
Speaker 5: bottom fall through for fun. Really in curiosity where it's
Speaker 5: like if I've gotten into a negative mind state, that
Speaker 5: is fortunately it's pretty rare, but if I do start
Speaker 5: feeling like I'm sliding into that area of feeling like
Speaker 5: just hopeless or something like that, I'll flirt with it.
Speaker 5: I'm like I'm curious if I could get to the
Speaker 5: other side of that, Like what does it feel like
Speaker 5: to just give up? And I can't get there, Like
Speaker 5: I've really tried out of you just to see what
Speaker 5: it's like. As I was in that area, being like,
Speaker 5: come on, like let's let go and like really give up,
Speaker 5: just to feel it, and maybe a part of it
Speaker 5: being able to splunk into the like dark side is
Speaker 5: like that it's because I know that I'll come back,
Speaker 5: because I'm just I always cheer up real easily.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 5: I wouldn't recommend this for someone who's dealing with depression
Speaker 5: or anything.
Speaker 1: I was going to say, we got to put a
Speaker 1: disclaimer at the top of this show at this point.
Speaker 5: Good. I hope that all of our shows have disclaimers
Speaker 5: going forward. But it's like I, as I was like
Speaker 5: doing that, I was like, oh, yeah, I can't get
Speaker 5: through there because there's that layer of foundational awe of being.
Speaker 5: That's what the ground floor is, and so all of
Speaker 5: the weight doesn't end up cracking through that because that
Speaker 5: is the root of everything, So all the stuff above
Speaker 5: it can't get through it.
Speaker 1: Well, any last words on gratitude.
Speaker 5: I don't think so I'm grateful for you. Thank you
Speaker 5: for everything you're doing in the world and the person
Speaker 5: that you're being and sharing out there, and thank you
Speaker 5: for thinking of me for this conversation, and thank you
Speaker 5: for everyone for listening through the weirdness and making it
Speaker 5: to the end.
Speaker 1: All right, Thanks Corey, Thank you.
Speaker 3: If what you just heard was helpful to you, Please
Speaker 3: consider making a monthly donation to support the One You
Speaker 3: Feed podcast. When you join our membership community. With this
Speaker 3: monthly pledge, you get lots of exclusive members only benefits.
Speaker 3: It's our way of saying thank you for your support.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: We are so grateful for the members of our community.
Speaker 3: We wouldn't be able to do what we do without
Speaker 3: their support, and we don't take a single dollar for granted.
Speaker 3: To learn more, make a donation at any level and
Speaker 3: become a member of the one you Feed community, go
Speaker 3: to one one you Feed dot net slash join The
Speaker 3: One You Feed podcast would like to sincerely thank our
Speaker 3: sponsors for supporting the show.