Speaker 1: When we shame ourselves, the centers of the brain that
Speaker 1: have to do with learning shut down, so we literally
Speaker 1: paralyze ourselves. We keep ourselves stuck in the very habits
Speaker 1: we want to change. Welcome to the one you feed
Speaker 1: Throughout time. Great thinkers have recognized the importance of the
Speaker 1: thoughts we have, quotes like garbage in, garbage out, or
Speaker 1: you are what you think, ring true, and yet for
Speaker 1: many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us.
Speaker 1: We tend toward negativity, self pity, jealousy, or fear. We
Speaker 1: see what we don't have instead of what we do.
Speaker 1: We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit.
Speaker 1: But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It
Speaker 1: takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life
Speaker 1: worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep
Speaker 1: themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their
Speaker 1: good wolf. Thanks for joining us. Our guest on this
Speaker 1: episode is Dr SHAWNA. Shapiro, a professor, author, and internationally
Speaker 1: recognized expert in mindfulness and compassion. Shauna has published over
Speaker 1: a hundred and fifty journal articles and three critically acclaimed
Speaker 1: books translated into sixteen languages. On this episode, Eric and
Speaker 1: Shauna discuss her book Good Morning, I Love You Mindfulness
Speaker 1: and Self Compassion Practices to rewire your brain for calm,
Speaker 1: clarity and joy. Hi Seanna, welcome to the show. Thank
Speaker 1: you delighted to be here. I'm excited to have you on.
Speaker 1: We are going to discuss your book Good Morning, I
Speaker 1: Love You Mindfulness and self Compassion Practices to rewire your
Speaker 1: brain for calm, clarity and joy. But before we get
Speaker 1: into the book, let's start, like we always do, with
Speaker 1: a parable. There's a grandmother who's talking with her grandson
Speaker 1: and she says, in life, there are two wolves inside
Speaker 1: of us that are always at battle. One is a
Speaker 1: good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love,
Speaker 1: and the other is a bad wolf, which represents things
Speaker 1: like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandson stops.
Speaker 1: He thinks about it for a second, and he looks
Speaker 1: up at his grandmother and he says, grandmother, which one wins?
Speaker 1: And the grandmother says, the one you feed. So I'd
Speaker 1: like to start off by asking you what that paragul
Speaker 1: means to you in your life and in the work
Speaker 1: that you do. Well. First of all, I love that
Speaker 1: My dad told me that parable when I was a
Speaker 1: little girl, and what it has always meant to me,
Speaker 1: even before I became a scientist and really understood the
Speaker 1: science behind it, is that where we put our attention,
Speaker 1: where we put our energy, as what we grow. And
Speaker 1: if we are practicing negativity or fear or anger, that's
Speaker 1: what we're growing. And if we're practicing kindness and generosity,
Speaker 1: that's what we're growing. That's what we're feeding. As the
Speaker 1: grandmother said. And I think what we know now from
Speaker 1: neural plasticity is that whatever we are practicing grows stronger.
Speaker 1: And so what really matters in life is focusing on
Speaker 1: what you want to grow, what you want to feed.
Speaker 1: And I think the other thing I love about that
Speaker 1: parable is it reminds us that none of us are perfect.
Speaker 1: We all have good and bad inside of us, and
Speaker 1: that's normal, that's natural, And it really is about choice
Speaker 1: and having the freedom to choose what parts of ourselves
Speaker 1: we want to strengthen. Yeah, I love that part of
Speaker 1: the parable too, that I don't think people talk about
Speaker 1: that much, which is the normalization that the human condition
Speaker 1: is a struggle and that we have all this stuff
Speaker 1: going on inside of us. I love the way the
Speaker 1: parable sort of described is it sounds like it's a
Speaker 1: pretty close battle, you know, it sounds which we just
Speaker 1: you know, really reinforces that this just goes on. So
Speaker 1: I love that idea, And you know what you said,
Speaker 1: they're out. What we practice grows is one of the
Speaker 1: real key messages in your book, which is what we
Speaker 1: practice grow stronger. And also how we practice, which is
Speaker 1: something we're really going to get into here in a minute.
Speaker 1: But I thought I would start by asking you to
Speaker 1: tell us a little bit about what led you into
Speaker 1: your initial encounters with mindfulness. Well, I was introduced to
Speaker 1: mindfulness at one of the lowest points in my life.
Speaker 1: I was about seventeen, and I had just had spinal
Speaker 1: fusion surgery, so I had a metal rod put in
Speaker 1: my spine for scoliosis. Um. It was very unexpected, and
Speaker 1: so I went from this healthy, active teenager, kind of
Speaker 1: starved my volleyball team and my whole life senator on
Speaker 1: my physicality to lying in a hospital bed, unable to walk.
Speaker 1: And I remember during that time the physical pain was significant,
Speaker 1: but it was really my mind that tortured me most.
Speaker 1: It was the fear of the future. What I ever
Speaker 1: recover and the incredible sense of loss, and I just
Speaker 1: didn't have the tools to cope. And it was at
Speaker 1: that time that my father introduced me to mindfulness, and
Speaker 1: it was one of those moments where just I can't
Speaker 1: explain it, but it's like you just know, there's a
Speaker 1: deep knowing. And when I started reading this book, he
Speaker 1: gave me Wherever you go, there you are by John Cabots,
Speaker 1: in the first line said, whatever has happened to you,
Speaker 1: it's already happened. The real question is now what? And
Speaker 1: there was this sense of hope, like there was a
Speaker 1: path forward that I perhaps could be happy again. And
Speaker 1: that journey led me some years later to Thailand and
Speaker 1: Nepal to a monastery to actually study and practice meditation,
Speaker 1: and it was there that I experienced for the first
Speaker 1: time this sense of freedom from the pain of my
Speaker 1: body and a sense that there was the power of
Speaker 1: the mind to actually shift both our physical health and
Speaker 1: our mental well being. And that really led to the
Speaker 1: last twenty five years of my life. Yeah, you mentioned
Speaker 1: that sort of instant recognition. I was introduced to Zen
Speaker 1: Buddhism in in high school by a teacher, and I
Speaker 1: just remember there was this almost instant like draw, And
Speaker 1: I think the draw was similar to what you're describing,
Speaker 1: because it was basically saying, you know what, outside of
Speaker 1: you can be chaos and pain and suffering. And I
Speaker 1: was a serious young man as a as a high schooler,
Speaker 1: and and so I'm reading all these novels and I
Speaker 1: know that the world lots of bad things can happen,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden this thing comes along and says,
Speaker 1: but even in the midst of that, there's a way
Speaker 1: to be okay. And I just immediately like that, that's
Speaker 1: what I want. And that's what was so extraordinary about
Speaker 1: the monastery was I remember as I was leaving, feeling
Speaker 1: the sense of well being, the sense of happiness, and
Speaker 1: reflecting on the fact that nothing much had changed in
Speaker 1: my life. Right. I hadn't me money, it didn't all
Speaker 1: of a sudden have a boyfriend. My spine still had
Speaker 1: its metal rod and scars on my body. But there
Speaker 1: was this sense of happiness, and I realized that it
Speaker 1: wasn't our external circumstances that determined our happiness. It was
Speaker 1: really this interior landscape and that we have some control
Speaker 1: over that. Yeah, So you were at the monastery and
Speaker 1: you're describing a little bit about how, you know, you
Speaker 1: had some initial glimpses of mindfulness that were really positive,
Speaker 1: but then you got into sort of being there and
Speaker 1: it was a real struggle. And one of the struggles
Speaker 1: was that the monks that didn't really speak much English.
Speaker 1: So you had an English speaking monk finally show up
Speaker 1: and you guys kind of get into a conversation about
Speaker 1: your struggles and he gave you some pretty important ideas. Yes,
Speaker 1: it was really extraordinary because before going to the monastery,
Speaker 1: had had this one experience with meditation where there was
Speaker 1: this infinite peace and bliss, and by the time I
Speaker 1: got to the monastery, I had this expectation that meditation
Speaker 1: was going to be peaceful and joyful and easy, and
Speaker 1: when I started practicing, it was the exact opposite. It
Speaker 1: was my mind going all over the place and just
Speaker 1: kind of feeling more and more frustrated and impatient and struggling.
Speaker 1: And when this monk arrived who spoke English, I shared
Speaker 1: with him my struggles and he looked at me and
Speaker 1: he said, oh, dear, you're not practicing mindfulness. You're practicing impatience, frustration, judgment.
Speaker 1: And then he said these five words that I'll never forget.
Speaker 1: What you practice grows stronger. Exactly what we were talking
Speaker 1: about with the parable is whatever we practice grows stronger.
Speaker 1: And we know this now with neural plasticity. Are repeated thoughts, emotions, behaviors,
Speaker 1: they shape our brain. They actually changed the physical architecture
Speaker 1: of our brain. And so he explained to me that
Speaker 1: if I was meditating with judgment, I was growing judgment.
Speaker 1: Meditating with frustration, I'm growing frustration. So he helped me
Speaker 1: understand that mindfulness isn't just about paying attention, which is
Speaker 1: what we normally think. It's just about being present. It's
Speaker 1: about how you pay attention. Your attitude is what is
Speaker 1: really essential. I wish I had learned that lesson twenty
Speaker 1: years earlier, because and listeners have heard this story. I
Speaker 1: wasn't on again, off again meditator for a long time,
Speaker 1: and there are a variety of reasons for that, but
Speaker 1: certainly one of them was the fact that I always
Speaker 1: felt like I was doing it wrong. You know. It
Speaker 1: was this constant like, all right, I'm supposed to keep
Speaker 1: my mind on the breath, and I can't do that,
Speaker 1: so I'm not doing it right. Gone it and frustration
Speaker 1: and who wants to do something you feel like you're
Speaker 1: failing at every five seconds. And so I know that
Speaker 1: the books I was reading we're telling me come back
Speaker 1: non judgmentally too, But I almost feel like it has
Speaker 1: to be stated, at least in my case, in almost
Speaker 1: over the top language about how kind I approached this,
Speaker 1: because there is something built into the way we even
Speaker 1: the basic meditation instructions that I don't think anybody can
Speaker 1: come to them anymore without preconceived notions and the preconceived
Speaker 1: notion of oh, my mind should be quiet, which is
Speaker 1: nobody's mind when they start. And so you know, I
Speaker 1: think that that's one of the key pieces that's so
Speaker 1: important about what you're talking about here. And you talk
Speaker 1: about three pillars of mindfulness, but you say, you know,
Speaker 1: a really big one and the one that's most neglected
Speaker 1: is this one about our attitude exactly. And what you're
Speaker 1: saying is so important and so universal. When I came
Speaker 1: back from the monastery, I started my PhD program, became
Speaker 1: a scientist and clinical psychologist, and I started working with
Speaker 1: people teaching them mindfulness, and every single person I worked
Speaker 1: with had the exact experience you did whether they were
Speaker 1: women with breast cancer, or high level CEO s or
Speaker 1: stressed out college students, every single person had this tremendous
Speaker 1: self judgment. And it wasn't just about meditation. It wasn't
Speaker 1: just like I'm doing the meditation wrong. It's like I'm
Speaker 1: doing life wrong. There's something wrong with me. What happens
Speaker 1: when we judge ourselves. What happens when we shame ourselves.
Speaker 1: And so I started studying shame, and what I learned
Speaker 1: is that shame doesn't work. It doesn't make you a
Speaker 1: better parent, it doesn't help you become a better meditator,
Speaker 1: it doesn't help you lose weight. When we shame ourselves,
Speaker 1: the centers of the brain that have to do with
Speaker 1: learning shut down, so we literally paralyze ourselves. We keep
Speaker 1: ourselves stuck in the very habits we want to change.
Speaker 1: And that's why I started focusing on this attitude of kindness,
Speaker 1: that this is a pillar of mindfulness. And if we're
Speaker 1: not practicing kindness, we're not practicing mindfulness, and we certainly
Speaker 1: aren't going to heal and change and grow. There's so
Speaker 1: many things you said in there that I think we
Speaker 1: should spend time on because it's so fundamental. There's a
Speaker 1: Stanford researcher, B. J. Fogg who's written a lot about
Speaker 1: how bit change, and he's got a line in his
Speaker 1: latest book that sort of summarizes what we're saying here,
Speaker 1: which is that people change better by feeling good than
Speaker 1: feeling bad. It just works way better. And yet there's
Speaker 1: a sense if we're really hard on ourselves. You know,
Speaker 1: we had Kristin Knephon not too long ago. We've had
Speaker 1: her on a couple of times, this idea of this
Speaker 1: compassion and kindness. And I always say when I'm working
Speaker 1: with coaching clients, I say, it's not just that it
Speaker 1: feels better and that's good, Like feeling better is a
Speaker 1: really good thing. Being kind to yourself actually makes your
Speaker 1: internal landscape more hospitable and habitable. But more than that,
Speaker 1: it's that it works way better. And that's what you're
Speaker 1: talking about here exactly. Well. I I usually say the
Speaker 1: opposite of people. I say, if beating yourself up work,
Speaker 1: I'd say go ahead and do it. It just doesn't work.
Speaker 1: That's really the key to this idea of kindness and
Speaker 1: compassion is that they not only feel better to us,
Speaker 1: which is lovely, but they actually are effective. What happens
Speaker 1: when we're kind and from passionate is we release opening
Speaker 1: into our system. We turn on the learning centers of
Speaker 1: the brain, and we turn on the motivation centers. So
Speaker 1: this attitude actually gives us the resources we need to change,
Speaker 1: and I think that's so important. What we know now
Speaker 1: is that change is something that we actually can learn
Speaker 1: to do. You know, it's another core thing that I
Speaker 1: talk with coaching clients about. People think I just can't,
Speaker 1: I'm lazy, I'm I'm It's not you, it's your approach.
Speaker 1: And so we know so much about change, and so
Speaker 1: much of making successful change is about learning. You know,
Speaker 1: there are people now who are starting to say that
Speaker 1: they think addiction is largely a learning disorder. It's an
Speaker 1: inability to learn. And so what you're saying is so
Speaker 1: critical because any kind of change we want to make,
Speaker 1: we have to be able to learn. And yet when
Speaker 1: we shame ourselves, we shut down the ability to learn.
Speaker 1: So let's talk a little bit more about the neuroscience there.
Speaker 1: What's happening when we're shaming ourselves. When we shame ourselves,
Speaker 1: the amygdala triggers this cascade of nor pronepherine and cortisol.
Speaker 1: It floods our system, It shuts down the learning centers
Speaker 1: of the brain, and it shuttles all of our resources
Speaker 1: to survival pathways. We literally go into a fight or
Speaker 1: flight freeze response because of our own attack. We're attacking ourselves,
Speaker 1: but the body doesn't know that, and so it literally
Speaker 1: robs us of the resources we need to do the
Speaker 1: work of changing. And I agree with you about addiction
Speaker 1: because one of the hallmarks of addiction is shamed and
Speaker 1: shame keeps people stuck. And that's why for me, my
Speaker 1: work in the world is to help people change. And
Speaker 1: I'm very interested in the processes of learning. And what
Speaker 1: I found as a professor is that mindfulness is foundational
Speaker 1: to learning. It creates this environment that actually is conducive
Speaker 1: to learning. And so in all my class says whether
Speaker 1: or not we're going to talk about mindfulness, we begin
Speaker 1: with mindfulness practice just to prepare the mind for learning.
Speaker 1: And in what ways does mindfulness prepare the mind for learning?
Speaker 1: Or what sort of mindfulness practices prepare the mind for learning?
Speaker 1: Answer that either way, I guess yeah, it's a great question.
Speaker 1: So there are many different mindfulness practices, and for me,
Speaker 1: the most important thing for people to understand is that
Speaker 1: mindfulness is separate from meditation. Mindfulness is a way of being,
Speaker 1: It's a way of living moment by moment, and meditation
Speaker 1: is kind of the exercise, the workout, like going to
Speaker 1: the gym that strengthens your ability to be mindful through
Speaker 1: your day. And so mindfulness is defined as these three
Speaker 1: key elements, intention, attention, and attitude. And so I'll have
Speaker 1: my students practice those three elements in different ways, but
Speaker 1: those are the core of mindfulness, and I'll just talk
Speaker 1: about each. The first is intention and not simply knowing
Speaker 1: why am I paying attention? Right? What is the most
Speaker 1: important thing to me? Your intention is your values, what
Speaker 1: you care about. So I like to say your intention
Speaker 1: sets the compass of your heart says this is the
Speaker 1: direction I want to go. This like the grandmother said,
Speaker 1: this is the wolf I want to feed. That's your intention.
Speaker 1: The second element is of course, your attention, and this
Speaker 1: is about learning how to train our attention in the
Speaker 1: present moment. And what we've learned is that the mind
Speaker 1: has a really hard time staying focused. In fact, the
Speaker 1: mind wanders forty seven percent of the time on average,
Speaker 1: So that's about half of our life, that we're not here,
Speaker 1: we're lost in the future, we're sucked into the past,
Speaker 1: and we miss this moment. And if you think about it,
Speaker 1: you know, people say that time is our most valuable resource.
Speaker 1: They're wrong. It's our attention that is our most valuable resource.
Speaker 1: So mind host trains our attention. And then the final element,
Speaker 1: the third element, is our attitude, which is what we've
Speaker 1: been talking about, having this attitude of kindness and curiosity.
Speaker 1: And so we want to be practicing all three, zeroing
Speaker 1: in on what's most important, capturing stabilizing our attention, and
Speaker 1: then attending with kindness. And that practice of mindfulness, which
Speaker 1: can be done when we're listening, when we're eating, when
Speaker 1: we're dancing, when we're walking, when we're making love, and
Speaker 1: when we're meditating. That practice creates this host environment of learning,
Speaker 1: of evolving, and of growth. One of the things that
Speaker 1: I think is the biggest challenge to mindfulness and one
Speaker 1: of the biggest challenges I would say, to spiritual practice
Speaker 1: in general. And I know that we could say mindfulness
Speaker 1: is or isn't a spiritual practice. I don't want to
Speaker 1: go down that rabbit hole, but is forgetting It's like
Speaker 1: we get up, maybe I do your good morning. I
Speaker 1: love you practice, I get myself out on the right foot.
Speaker 1: Maybe I meditate, and then I walk out the door.
Speaker 1: And the next time I think about any of that
Speaker 1: stuff is like ten at night, I'm laying down, going
Speaker 1: how is my day? So I'm kind of curious from
Speaker 1: your perspective, what are some ways that we can we've
Speaker 1: mindfulness in through more of our lives. I've got a
Speaker 1: I've got a program called spiritual habits, and that's the
Speaker 1: whole goals. It takes, you know, behavioral science and spiritual principles.
Speaker 1: So I have some of my own ideas, but I
Speaker 1: would love to hear your thoughts on how we can
Speaker 1: bring more of this to our day to day life,
Speaker 1: particularly around the problem of forgetting. Yes, beautiful. So what's
Speaker 1: interesting is the word mindfulness in Polly means to remember.
Speaker 1: So it's this process of forgetting and remembering and forgetting
Speaker 1: and remembering, and that is what I believe is the
Speaker 1: whole of spiritual practice, right, is we forget who we
Speaker 1: truly are and then we remember and so as we
Speaker 1: go through the day. I love what you just said
Speaker 1: about having habits, and it's really building in habits throughout
Speaker 1: our day that help us remember. So with my students,
Speaker 1: we create different habits, different practices that that will support
Speaker 1: them through the day. And as you start to grow
Speaker 1: these muscles of awareness of mindfulness, they become more natural. So,
Speaker 1: for example, like you said, when you wake up in
Speaker 1: the morning, I think when you wake up in the
Speaker 1: morning and when you go to bed at night, those
Speaker 1: are the most important times to practice. And that's what
Speaker 1: most spiritual traditions say right morning and evening. But there's
Speaker 1: actually research that came out of you see San Francisco
Speaker 1: last year showing that your mood in the morning and
Speaker 1: your mood in the evening are the best predictors of
Speaker 1: your physiological health and longevity. Your mitochondria. Um there are
Speaker 1: the health of your mitochondria predictive of whether or not
Speaker 1: you're in a good or bad mood in the morning
Speaker 1: and evening, and the length of your telomeres, which are
Speaker 1: the best predictor we have of how long someone's going
Speaker 1: to live. So anchoring yourself in these practices in the
Speaker 1: morning and the evening is really beneficial. But like you said,
Speaker 1: there's this whole day in between, and so it's important
Speaker 1: to kind of create pauses to schedule time in your day,
Speaker 1: and it doesn't have to be to meditate. It could
Speaker 1: be pausing to write down what you're grateful for. It
Speaker 1: could be going out in nature, you know, doing what
Speaker 1: dak Or Keltner calls an aw walk, where you walk
Speaker 1: in nature and you look for the beauty and the good.
Speaker 1: So much of our day is focused on the negative.
Speaker 1: You know, there's something in psychology called the negativity bias,
Speaker 1: and it's really important to start to balance that by
Speaker 1: specifically orienting or priming the mind to look for the good.
Speaker 1: So one practice I wrote about this in the book
Speaker 1: is when I wake up, I say, I wonder what
Speaker 1: surprising and magical thing is going to happen today. And
Speaker 1: what that does is it primes my mind to look
Speaker 1: for the good, to look for the surprising instead of
Speaker 1: to scan for danger. I'm I'm actually looking for the good.
Speaker 1: And as I practice this over and over again, it
Speaker 1: grows stronger. Yeah. I think that's one of the ways
Speaker 1: that a formal gratitude practice helps me, is that if
Speaker 1: I'm doing one regularly, and I like to think of
Speaker 1: it as gratitude slash appreciation, like gratitude could be like oh,
Speaker 1: I've got a home to live in. But appreciation could
Speaker 1: be this cup of tea or the way the light
Speaker 1: shines on that leaf. By trying to recount what those are,
Speaker 1: it does what you're describing, which is sort of gets
Speaker 1: me on the lookout. It's the same way like having
Speaker 1: like a photo a day goal gets my mind sort
Speaker 1: of looking at what's what's beautiful around me. It is
Speaker 1: a priming of the mind. I like that. So I
Speaker 1: want to talk a little bit about mindfulness in general.
Speaker 1: You you've sort of devoted your adult life to it.
Speaker 1: It's undergone some stunning growth over the last five years now,
Speaker 1: I would say, and you talk about one of the
Speaker 1: concerns is that you say the recent interests often lead
Speaker 1: to its oversimplification and over commodification, and it can quickly
Speaker 1: turn into a character of itself that loses its transformational power.
Speaker 1: So talk to me about what ways does mindfulness lose
Speaker 1: its transformative power. What are some of the things we
Speaker 1: want to be on the lookout for. So one of
Speaker 1: I think the greatest pitfalls of mindfulness is that it
Speaker 1: can turn into a self improvement project where we're using
Speaker 1: the practice as more way to beat ourselves up. When
Speaker 1: we don't measure up to this kind of gold standard
Speaker 1: of perfection. And so for me, a huge realization was
Speaker 1: recognizing that this practice isn't about self improvement, it's about
Speaker 1: self liberation. And what I mean by that is this
Speaker 1: liberation from our constant self judgment, are constant comparing mind.
Speaker 1: Am I good enough? And I measuring up into a
Speaker 1: sense of freedom and a sense of relating to ourselves
Speaker 1: and to life with with greater kindness, greater openness, and
Speaker 1: greater flexibility where there's there's not such control or trying
Speaker 1: to get certainty, but there's a way that we can
Speaker 1: flow and move with life with greater trust and faith,
Speaker 1: both in ourselves and in life itself. Yeah. I loved
Speaker 1: that line from the book that you know, we've got
Speaker 1: to change our mindset from one of self improvement to
Speaker 1: one of self liberation. I think that's such a great
Speaker 1: way of saying it. I used to ask this question
Speaker 1: a lot on the show early on, and the question
Speaker 1: I would ask is, how do we balance this desire
Speaker 1: to improve ourselves and by that I just mean to
Speaker 1: be better, happier people. How do we balance that with
Speaker 1: the very fact that that striving gets in the way.
Speaker 1: It's endemic to all spiritual practice, I think to a
Speaker 1: certain degree. At least I know for me, it's when
Speaker 1: I let go of wanting anything to be different that
Speaker 1: I experienced my greatest spiritual freedom. And yet there's an
Speaker 1: engine that pushes me forward to engage in spiritual practice.
Speaker 1: And so I love that improvement versus liberation. But talk
Speaker 1: more about that. Yeah, well, there's this exquisite paradox. And
Speaker 1: I think this is where our intention becomes very powerful,
Speaker 1: because our intention really sets the stage for what is possible. Right.
Speaker 1: It reminds us again and again of why we're practicing,
Speaker 1: why we're engaging in these practices. And yet our intention
Speaker 1: is a direction, it's not a destination. And so again
Speaker 1: and again we reset our compass. We say, this is
Speaker 1: the direction I want a head. But we don't get
Speaker 1: fixated on a destination, and we don't get fixated on
Speaker 1: some idea of perfection. I think that's the greatest problem
Speaker 1: is when you think there's some end goal that you're
Speaker 1: going to get to. Perfection doesn't exist. In fact, the
Speaker 1: only time it exists is you know when you're dead
Speaker 1: right about it. Perfection is the antithesis of evolution. We're
Speaker 1: all throwing, We're always changed. Once you reach perfection is over.
Speaker 1: So the goal is not the end. The goal is
Speaker 1: the living and the evolving. And what mindfulness does for
Speaker 1: me is creates this liberation where every moment becomes precious
Speaker 1: and every moment is in a sense and end to itself.
Speaker 1: And if I take care of this moment, I'm going
Speaker 1: to be preparing myself for the next moment. I love that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Audio Shanti said to me once, if you want a
Speaker 1: perfect spiritual teacher, find a dead one, you know, because
Speaker 1: because the living ones are gonna disappoint you if you
Speaker 1: get to know them well enough, like they just will.
Speaker 1: They're human. I love that idea. You say that perfection
Speaker 1: isn't possible, but transformation is. And then also that change
Speaker 1: is a direction, not a destination exactly, and that it
Speaker 1: happens in small increments if you think about it. Change
Speaker 1: doesn't happen overnight. And I think that is where most
Speaker 1: people lose hope, is they give like a big push
Speaker 1: and then it doesn't change overnight, and they give up.
Speaker 1: But I write about in the book is something called
Speaker 1: the five percent principle. And I love this and I
Speaker 1: use it every day in my life is can I
Speaker 1: just be five percent kinder? Or can I just exercise
Speaker 1: five percent more? And it was really interesting because my
Speaker 1: son was having his mid term exams and he's in
Speaker 1: high school as he's a freshman, so it's like the
Speaker 1: first time he's ever had a real exam, and he said,
Speaker 1: I just can't study for it. It's just too much.
Speaker 1: And I said, let's just do five percent, like you
Speaker 1: don't have to deal hunter percent. Let's just take a
Speaker 1: little five percent end. And you can see how it
Speaker 1: softened and opened him where there wasn't so much pressure
Speaker 1: and so much urgency. And I think all of us
Speaker 1: are children especially, are living with so much urgency and pressure.
Speaker 1: And what the five percent principle says is let's just
Speaker 1: go in that direction. We don't need to do it perfectly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's one of the biggest teachings on this show over
Speaker 1: all the years, is just those baby steps, just little
Speaker 1: steps at a time. I'm working on a sort of
Speaker 1: a Dharma talk for a Zen center that I'm doing
Speaker 1: later this week, and I was talking about that very thing,
Speaker 1: you know, comparing like these these Hollywood ideas of these
Speaker 1: big moments. You know, I've had a couple in my life,
Speaker 1: like the moment I realized I'll die if I don't
Speaker 1: go into treatment, Like it's a big moment, but it's
Speaker 1: not really that much bigger than the twenty seven thousand
Speaker 1: others after that that I chose to go to a meeting,
Speaker 1: call my sponsor, stay sober, Like those all are so important.
Speaker 1: And there's the idea of the marginal gains. There's the
Speaker 1: story of the British cycling coach who you know, he
Speaker 1: didn't even do five percent. He was like, if we
Speaker 1: get one percent improvement in lots of different areas, it
Speaker 1: adds up to this really big change, exactly. And so
Speaker 1: it's again just like which wolf are you going to feed?
Speaker 1: You have to feed them on a daily basis, right,
Speaker 1: And so it's just this little bits of am I'm
Speaker 1: moving in the direction that's an alignment with my heart,
Speaker 1: that's an alignment with my soul. That is my deepest desire.
Speaker 1: And I think that idea of remembering because we forget
Speaker 1: so easily, right, we forget. So what's important, and that's
Speaker 1: what these practices are about, is remembering. Because the way
Speaker 1: people get off course is not because they just all
Speaker 1: of a sudden veer off the cliff. It's like these
Speaker 1: little minor broken commitments and these these minor errors that
Speaker 1: are one percent in judgment. And you know, if you're
Speaker 1: one percent off and you're driving from California, Texas, you're
Speaker 1: not going to get there in a different direction. And
Speaker 1: so what we're trying to do is just re course
Speaker 1: correct every day. Am I in alignment? Am I living
Speaker 1: the life I'm supposed to live? Yeah? I love that idea.
Speaker 1: I think you're you're speaking my language. Let's go back
Speaker 1: to intention for a second, because one of the things
Speaker 1: about intention is when do you set intentions? Do you
Speaker 1: set an intention for the day? Do you set an
Speaker 1: intention when you sit down to meditate? Do you set
Speaker 1: an intention for the hour? Do you like what? What
Speaker 1: are your thoughts on what are the places to set intention?
Speaker 1: And how important is it to keep one intention or
Speaker 1: to change your intentions? Or let's just talk more about
Speaker 1: the practical implementation of intention. Absolutely, it's a great question.
Speaker 1: So our intentions are evolving, they're always changing, So you
Speaker 1: don't just set an intention like a New Year's resolution
Speaker 1: and that's it for the year. And so the way
Speaker 1: I work with intention is when I sit to meditate.
Speaker 1: I always begin with an intention just to make the
Speaker 1: meditation alive. So it's not just like, okay, now it's
Speaker 1: trying to meditate. I'm doing it again. UM. So I'll
Speaker 1: set my intention then and and they change, you know.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's just made this be of benefit in my
Speaker 1: life and in the world. There's this kind of sense
Speaker 1: of an offering a dedication. Um. But sometimes the intentions
Speaker 1: are more specific. And I'll give you an example. Some
Speaker 1: years ago, I was away teaching in Europe, and I
Speaker 1: was gone for about two weeks, and my son at
Speaker 1: the time was nine years old, and it was the
Speaker 1: longest we've ever been apart. And I distinctly remember flying
Speaker 1: back from Copenhagen and I was kind of in the
Speaker 1: coach middle seat, kind of squished up, and all of
Speaker 1: a sudden almost having an anxiety attack because I was
Speaker 1: so worried that I had ruined my relationship with my son,
Speaker 1: that I had been gone too long, I had broken
Speaker 1: our attachment bonds. I made the wrong choice, And instead
Speaker 1: of spiraling into shame and guilt and doubt, I set
Speaker 1: a clear intention when I get home, the most important
Speaker 1: thing is to reconnect with my son and So when
Speaker 1: I got home, I made a commitment for twenty four
Speaker 1: hours not to unpack, not to check mail, not to
Speaker 1: do email. And I this very clear intention, and I
Speaker 1: said to my son, we live in California. I said,
Speaker 1: do you want to go to the beach because something
Speaker 1: we both love? He said sure. So I start packing
Speaker 1: up the perfect picnic and all his perfect foods and
Speaker 1: his gear, and I'm ready to go to the beach
Speaker 1: and wave into the neighbors saying like, look what a
Speaker 1: good mom I am. And I go back inside and
Speaker 1: I'm like, hey, Jackson, you're ready to go? And he's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't feel like it. I'm like, what, We're gonna
Speaker 1: go to the the beach and I'm gonna show you how
Speaker 1: much I love you, damn it. So he gets on
Speaker 1: a swim Shottenson. I'm out at the car and I'm
Speaker 1: ready to go, and I'm in agenda mode, like I
Speaker 1: want to get to the beach of the perfect sunlight
Speaker 1: and the perfect time for our picnic. And he's sitting
Speaker 1: on our front porch and I'm like, hey, let's go,
Speaker 1: and he doesn't even look up at me, and I
Speaker 1: start getting impatient, and I'm about to kind of just
Speaker 1: be like, get in the car, when all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: I remember my intention. What's the most important thing? Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: all I want to do is reconnect with my son.
Speaker 1: I don't care if we go to the beach. And
Speaker 1: I walked back over to where he was sitting and
Speaker 1: he was watching these ants and I sit down next
Speaker 1: to him and we're watching the ants together, and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, I feel his little body begin to soften,
Speaker 1: and I feel his shoulder lean into my shoulder, the
Speaker 1: sun on our backs, and that was it, That was
Speaker 1: the most important thing. But we forget, and so our
Speaker 1: intentions they remind us, That remind us of what do
Speaker 1: I really care about? Yeah, And so we can have
Speaker 1: an intention for a day, but we can also have
Speaker 1: an intention for a situation, a meeting, a conversation, a dinner.
Speaker 1: What's my intention at dinner tonight with the family. My
Speaker 1: intention is to be present. My intention is to be kind.
Speaker 1: And it changes the whole trajectory when you go into
Speaker 1: a board meeting, when you even for this podcast that
Speaker 1: we're recording. Before we started recording, I set a really
Speaker 1: clear intention that would be of benefit. And there's a
Speaker 1: way in which it shifts the entire direction of what's
Speaker 1: happening because you get back in alignment with what's important.
Speaker 1: It's just like saying grace before dinner that it changes
Speaker 1: the feeling. Instead of everyone rushing in and you know
Speaker 1: everyone's on their phone and what not, to actually have
Speaker 1: that pause and remind yourself this is a special time.
Speaker 1: I think that that intention before meditation is a really
Speaker 1: important piece. That again another thing that I spent most
Speaker 1: of my life not doing. I just I still do it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I just sit down and I write in and
Speaker 1: I just find that by stopping and thinking about why
Speaker 1: I'm doing it makes a big difference. It's essential, and
Speaker 1: I believe it's essential to keep this practice up to
Speaker 1: keep up your motivation, because otherwise you forget about why
Speaker 1: you're doing it and it becomes one more chore. Meditation.
Speaker 1: Lauren Roche, who is one of my dear friends and teachers,
Speaker 1: he says, it's a love affair with life that you
Speaker 1: sit down and you reconnect with your deepest truths, with
Speaker 1: your deepest felt sense, and to set that intention right.
Speaker 1: May this liberate me, May this help me be more compassionate,
Speaker 1: May this help me be more present? So I'm not
Speaker 1: missing my life. And there's a way in which sometimes
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm embarrassed to admitted it, but I'm a scientist,
Speaker 1: so I do it. Sometimes I'll sit down there and
Speaker 1: I'll be like, oh my god, I really should be
Speaker 1: writing another book chapter of helping our kids with their homework,
Speaker 1: and I'll just say, no, no, no no, right now, I'm
Speaker 1: strengthening my immune system, and I'm improving my sleep quality
Speaker 1: and decreasing cortisol. And I'll just kind of remind myself
Speaker 1: of all the benefits, just to kind of remotivate myself, saying, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm taking care of myself by doing this, that is
Speaker 1: my intention. Yeah, let's go through some of those benefits.
Speaker 1: What what are some of the benefits to a regular
Speaker 1: meditation practice or a regular mindfulness practice. Well, what's truly
Speaker 1: extraordinary is that there's such a wide range of benefits
Speaker 1: that not only does it reduce stress, reduced court as all,
Speaker 1: lower blood pressure, strength in our immune system. It also
Speaker 1: helps with cognitive capacities, so it increases our attention and focus,
Speaker 1: but it also increases our memory, our ability to learn,
Speaker 1: our ability to innovate and create. And then some of
Speaker 1: the things I'm most interested in is Meditation increases our
Speaker 1: empathy and compassion. It increases our self compassion, It increases
Speaker 1: our happiness levels. It increases our ability to shift perspectives
Speaker 1: so that we have more cognitive flexibility, we don't get
Speaker 1: stuck in these rigid thought patterns, and it reduces our
Speaker 1: cultural by is. It allows us to see each other clearly.
Speaker 1: And I think, more than anything, this is what our
Speaker 1: world needs is greater compassion, greater clarity, and greater capacity
Speaker 1: to sense our inner connection. When you instruct somebody in
Speaker 1: a basic meditation practice, what are your basic instructions? Well,
Speaker 1: you can try it right now. I'll guide us through
Speaker 1: a very short one. All right, listening, if you'd like,
Speaker 1: you can let your eyes close, and if you don't
Speaker 1: like to close your eyes, it's fine to keep them open.
Speaker 1: You can just focus on one point and then just
Speaker 1: begin by reflecting on your intention. So your intention right
Speaker 1: now might just to be present and curious, open, and
Speaker 1: then gathering your attention into your body and watch your
Speaker 1: mind's gonna want to wander off. It's like, oh, this
Speaker 1: is my break, it's not your break. Come back. Feel
Speaker 1: your body, wiggle your toes, feel your feet. Practicing these
Speaker 1: neural pathways of presence, of attention, feel your breath, and
Speaker 1: then infusing this with kindness. So maybe soften the body
Speaker 1: five more, bring five more openness, curiosity, and just practicing
Speaker 1: for another moment your intention, attention, attitude. You can take
Speaker 1: another breath in and out, notice how you feel, and
Speaker 1: if your eyes are closed, you can let some light
Speaker 1: back into them. Good simple m And so as that
Speaker 1: practice goes on, do you encourage people to stay with
Speaker 1: the breath, the sensations of the body, the intention, or
Speaker 1: all the above? Exactly, it's all of the above. It's
Speaker 1: this kind of mindfulness, is this synergistic co rived rising
Speaker 1: of these three elements. And so there's this sense of
Speaker 1: because if I just focus on my attention, it starts
Speaker 1: getting a little bit tight and I start getting a
Speaker 1: little bit like rigid. And so then I infuse it
Speaker 1: with kindness, with openness, with with curiosity, with gentleness. And
Speaker 1: if I'm sitting there and I'm getting a little spacey,
Speaker 1: It's like, why am I doing this in the first place?
Speaker 1: What's my intention? And so we're softening opening at the
Speaker 1: same time that we're heightening our attention, and there's this
Speaker 1: really interesting combination of this laser light clarity and this
Speaker 1: total ease. And it's not often in more life that
Speaker 1: we feel this in life, you know, maybe athletes, you know,
Speaker 1: they described that flow experience, and it's for me very
Speaker 1: similar to that of this this flow within myself and
Speaker 1: with life where I'm not spaced out, I'm perfectly clear,
Speaker 1: and yet I'm at ease. I love that. I think
Speaker 1: that's a beautiful description of it. We're nearing the end
Speaker 1: of our time, but I wanted to ask you briefly
Speaker 1: about your practice. That there's the title of the book
Speaker 1: called good Morning, I Love You, So let's talk about
Speaker 1: the good Morning I Love You practice. It's the title
Speaker 1: of my book in the United States. However, in the
Speaker 1: United king it was titled Rewire your Mind. Because good Morning,
Speaker 1: I Love You did not translate into British. I'm teasing
Speaker 1: a little bit, um, but it was re titled Rewire
Speaker 1: your Mind. But good Morning, I Love You is really
Speaker 1: the essence of the book. And I know it's a
Speaker 1: bit of a hokey title, and as a scientist, they said, no,
Speaker 1: people aren't going to take you seriously. But this practice
Speaker 1: is the most powerful practice I know. It completely changed
Speaker 1: my life and I learned it about ten years ago
Speaker 1: when I was going through a very difficult divorce and
Speaker 1: I was waking up every morning with this pit of
Speaker 1: despair and shame and judgment, and no matter how hard
Speaker 1: I tried, you know, to shoot those those negative thoughts away,
Speaker 1: they kept coming back. And my meditation teacher suggested I
Speaker 1: start practicing some self compassionate highness. And she said, I
Speaker 1: want you to say I love you, Shawna every day.
Speaker 1: And I said, no way. It felt so inauthentic and contrived.
Speaker 1: And she said, how about just saying good morning when
Speaker 1: you wake up? She said, put your hand on your
Speaker 1: heart and releases oxytocin. It's good for you. She knew
Speaker 1: the science would get me and say good morning, Shawna.
Speaker 1: So the next morning I woke up, put my hand
Speaker 1: on my heart, took a breath, and said, good morning, Shawna.
Speaker 1: And it's kind of nice, right Instead of the avalanche
Speaker 1: of shame, I felt this flash of kindness. And I
Speaker 1: kept practicing, and as I practiced, I noticed a little
Speaker 1: bit more kindness, a little less harshness. And a few
Speaker 1: months later it was my birthday and I was down
Speaker 1: at a place called Escelin and Big sur one of
Speaker 1: the most magical places on earth, and I was all alone.
Speaker 1: I was my first time away from my husband and
Speaker 1: my son on my birthday. And I woke up and
Speaker 1: I went down to these mineral hot springs and I
Speaker 1: slid in. It was before the sun was rising, and
Speaker 1: I put my hand on my heart to do my
Speaker 1: good morning practice, and all of a sudden, this image
Speaker 1: of my grandmother came to me, and before I knew it,
Speaker 1: I said, good morning, I love you, Shawn, a happy birthday,
Speaker 1: and it was as if the damn around my heart burst,
Speaker 1: and this love just poured in my my grandmother's love,
Speaker 1: my mother's love, my own self love. And I wish
Speaker 1: I could tell everyone that every day since then has
Speaker 1: been this bubble of self love and I've never felt
Speaker 1: judgment or shame again. And that's not true. But what
Speaker 1: is true is is this pathway of kindness was established,
Speaker 1: and every morning I feed it with this practice of
Speaker 1: good morning, I love you, And some days it feels
Speaker 1: awkward and lonely, and some days I feel profound love.
Speaker 1: And what I know is the most important thing is
Speaker 1: I keep practicing. And so I invite everyone who's listening
Speaker 1: to practice to tomorrow morning, wake up, put your hand
Speaker 1: on your heart. In fact, maybe just put your hand
Speaker 1: on your heart. Now. It's this really interesting sensation of
Speaker 1: self care, you know, this gesture of kindness. And for
Speaker 1: some people when you do it, it feels really uncomfortable,
Speaker 1: that's okay, and for some people it feels really soothing.
Speaker 1: That's okay. But to bring five more kindness, to bring
Speaker 1: five more care to yourself, and you can put your
Speaker 1: hand back in your lap. But I invite you to
Speaker 1: try it tomorrow morning and to actually add the words
Speaker 1: good morning and your own name, or if you're brave,
Speaker 1: good morning, I love you, wonderful. Well, you and I
Speaker 1: are going to continue talking in the post show conversation.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about something you said in your
Speaker 1: book that it's possible to change our happiness set point,
Speaker 1: which is really news to me. So I would love
Speaker 1: to explore that further and some other ideas in the
Speaker 1: post your conversation listeners. If you'd like access to that
Speaker 1: and any episodes, add free episodes and support the show,
Speaker 1: you can go to one you feed, dot net slash join.
Speaker 1: So thank you so much Seanna for coming on. It's
Speaker 1: been such a pleasure. To talk with you. Thank you.
Speaker 1: If what you just heard was helpful to you, Please
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