Speaker 1: I'm starting my seventh week since I quit my full
Speaker 1: time job to focus on the one you feed, and
Speaker 1: some of you have stepped up wonderfully, but we still
Speaker 1: have a long ways to go to get where we
Speaker 1: need to be, and I'm not panicking. But if you
Speaker 1: love this show and you value it, your support is
Speaker 1: more important than ever. Also, there are great rewards for
Speaker 1: the sponsors of the show. At the five dollar level,
Speaker 1: you never have to hear a sponsor request or one
Speaker 1: of these pitches again. You get ad free episodes and
Speaker 1: you can listen to them in your podcast player. At
Speaker 1: the ten dollar level, you get all the bonus content
Speaker 1: of the post show conversations that I have with guests,
Speaker 1: and those are often every bit as good as the
Speaker 1: episode itself. And coming soon will be a new format,
Speaker 1: weekly mini episode that will have a teaching It will
Speaker 1: have a piece of poetry that I love as well
Speaker 1: as a song I love, and we'll see what else
Speaker 1: gets put in there. But that's at the ten dollar level.
Speaker 1: So again, if the show is important to you, we
Speaker 1: need your support today when you feed dot net slash
Speaker 1: support again, when you feed dot net slash support, and
Speaker 1: for those of you who are supporting the show. Thank
Speaker 1: you for sponsoring this episode. If I'm in this space
Speaker 1: and I see this thing happening again, what am I
Speaker 1: going to do differently this time? Welcome to the one
Speaker 1: you feed Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance
Speaker 1: of the thoughts we have. Quotes like garbage in, garbage out,
Speaker 1: or you are what you think ring true. And yet
Speaker 1: for 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. Hey everybody, it's Chris and we have a
Speaker 1: fun one for you today. Because this was recorded live
Speaker 1: at the Columbus Podcast Festival, so it will sound live,
Speaker 1: that will have all the energy of liveness, liveliness, will
Speaker 1: say liveliness. The interviews with Brandy Lust, who is the
Speaker 1: founder of Learning Lab Consulting, which is a company that
Speaker 1: seeks to improve the quality of life and performance of
Speaker 1: individuals and organizations seeking to grow in a more mindful,
Speaker 1: connected and creative manner. Her book is Myths of Being Human.
Speaker 1: Four Paths to Connect with What Matters, And of course
Speaker 1: you can go to the show notes and there's a
Speaker 1: link there to buy the book and you do help
Speaker 1: the One You Feed podcast when you buy books through
Speaker 1: that link. And here's the interview with Brandy Lust. Hi. Brandy,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show. Hi, thanks for having me. Um.
Speaker 1: We'll discuss your book, The Myths of Being Human, Four
Speaker 1: Paths to Connect with What Matters in a minute. But
Speaker 1: let's start the show like we normally do with the parable.
Speaker 1: There's a grandmother who's talking with her granddaughter and she says,
Speaker 1: in life, there are two wolves inside of us that
Speaker 1: are always at battle. One is a good wolf, which
Speaker 1: represents things like kindness and bravery and love, and the
Speaker 1: other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed
Speaker 1: and hatred and fear. The granddaughter stops and she thinks
Speaker 1: about it for a second. She looks up at her
Speaker 1: grandmother and she's a grandmother. Which one wins? And the
Speaker 1: grandmother says, the one you Feed so I'd like to
Speaker 1: start off by asking you what that parable means to
Speaker 1: you in your life and in the work that you do.
Speaker 1: I've been thinking of the bad wolf as just generally
Speaker 1: and distraction, anything that is distracting from the current moment
Speaker 1: that I'm in, and the good Wolf is focus. And
Speaker 1: so I think if I can stay in a place
Speaker 1: where I am in this moment and I'm operating from
Speaker 1: a sense of stillness, than the idea of something being
Speaker 1: right or wrong is less important to me in the
Speaker 1: moral sense, because I have a deeper sense of what's
Speaker 1: right for this particular moment. Your notes aren't coming up
Speaker 1: that I took, so we're gonna have to wing this, Okay,
Speaker 1: no problem. I wanted to start off though your book
Speaker 1: really does. There's four things in the book. You talk
Speaker 1: about four myths that we have as people, and then
Speaker 1: four paths to take towards a better life. So let's
Speaker 1: start with a couple of the myths, and then I
Speaker 1: think those might lead us into the paths. And the
Speaker 1: first one is the myth is that we are rational
Speaker 1: creatures that we make. This is based on our mind,
Speaker 1: and that's primarily what we are. And emotions just kind
Speaker 1: of come along for the ride, and what you say,
Speaker 1: the reality is is that that's not really true, that
Speaker 1: we are primarily emotional creatures, that our emotions are in
Speaker 1: fact behind a lot of the decision making that we make,
Speaker 1: and oftentimes our reason kind of comes in after that
Speaker 1: to justify or to give give a logical reason for
Speaker 1: what we've chosen to do. So that's really interesting because
Speaker 1: I think it connects with what I was saying uh
Speaker 1: in the beginning, which is that we inside of our
Speaker 1: actual bodies, not our minds, we do have this quiet
Speaker 1: place that we can move from, and if we are
Speaker 1: only focusing on the thoughts that we're having, we're not
Speaker 1: even able to connect with that. So I think, UM,
Speaker 1: some of the research that's really interesting to think about
Speaker 1: with this is the trauma based research about how we
Speaker 1: can become disconnected from our bodies. But so we hold
Speaker 1: hurt inside of our bodies that UM, it's a place
Speaker 1: that is active in our daily experiences in ways that
Speaker 1: we aren't even aware and that we act through UM.
Speaker 1: But when we're when we're only paying attention to this
Speaker 1: one part of our experience, we completely shut off from
Speaker 1: the rest of what's happening. So I would even go
Speaker 1: further and say it's not even that we're emotional beings,
Speaker 1: but instead that we're feeling beings. And what I mean
Speaker 1: by that is we have sensations. So rather than thinking
Speaker 1: about anger, we have a sensation of our face burning,
Speaker 1: or we have a sensation of sickness in our gut,
Speaker 1: and that that stuff that's going on is really the
Speaker 1: thing that we can listen to that's going to tell
Speaker 1: us more about what we need to know in any
Speaker 1: given moment, rather than operating from our heads, which is
Speaker 1: just us trying to interpret all of the stuff that's
Speaker 1: going on in our bodies on a moment to moment basis.
Speaker 1: You reference to Massio, Is that how you say it?
Speaker 1: I think we've actually got an interview with him coming
Speaker 1: up in the future, but you talk a little bit
Speaker 1: about the research that he's done. It really shows the
Speaker 1: importance of feeling. And his latest book, he talks about
Speaker 1: the idea that what we just described as feeling, which
Speaker 1: you use a sensation or a general like or don't
Speaker 1: like sort of thing that happens, and he's sort of
Speaker 1: tying that back how far back that goes evolutionary way
Speaker 1: back before you know, back and when you start getting
Speaker 1: into multi cell organisms, how that general sense of sensation
Speaker 1: and feeling is what derives most every creature, you know,
Speaker 1: what I think is really interesting. So when you think
Speaker 1: about mystical experiences and like where they occur in the brain,
Speaker 1: it's the part of the brain that's not, uh, the
Speaker 1: prefrontal cortex, which is the more new part of the rain, right,
Speaker 1: So this is just a random thing that I'm thinking about.
Speaker 1: Other creatures don't have that same developed sense of their brain.
Speaker 1: So what is it like for them to go through
Speaker 1: daily experiences and are they more connected with that sensory
Speaker 1: experience of a you know, being connected to what's around them,
Speaker 1: but also be being more physically reactive to what's happening
Speaker 1: in the moment. So we cognitively are trying to grasp
Speaker 1: with what's happening in the moment. But I wonder if
Speaker 1: we were another type of creature, if we would have
Speaker 1: a totally different experience of that. And I think when
Speaker 1: you were talking about the even like single celled organisms
Speaker 1: have those physical sensations, It just makes me wonder what
Speaker 1: those experiences are like. Yeah, there's a thousand different directions
Speaker 1: to go with that. My dogs experienced the world in
Speaker 1: a very very different way, um, which does seem to
Speaker 1: be a lot more present. What that brings me to, though,
Speaker 1: is interesting because we are, as far as we know,
Speaker 1: the most evolved species, and so can you talk about
Speaker 1: the prefrontal cortex? Right? Prefrontal cortex is the reason that
Speaker 1: we can sit here and have a conversation. It's the
Speaker 1: reason that microphones exists, and buildings exist and all that
Speaker 1: stuff that humans have that no one else does. But
Speaker 1: it makes me think of how someone once said, you know, um,
Speaker 1: evolution has been remarkable for our ability to survive and
Speaker 1: the things that it has wired into us. The way
Speaker 1: that we react to the world has been why we
Speaker 1: are the species we are, and yet it's not really
Speaker 1: well designed for what we would consider happiness or contentment,
Speaker 1: because the basic evolutionary drive is survival and survival as
Speaker 1: things like eat and reproduce, and you know, so it's
Speaker 1: our nature to be discontent if I eat and then
Speaker 1: I'm like, well that's good, I'm done. Right. If I
Speaker 1: don't get a desire to eat again, I'm going to perish.
Speaker 1: And so you have this drive that comes out evolutionary
Speaker 1: wise to keep us constantly wanting and moving forward, and
Speaker 1: that you have these wisdom traditions or even certain branches
Speaker 1: of modern psychology that say, hey, you know what, it's
Speaker 1: that wanting all of the time. It's that always thinking
Speaker 1: you need the next thing that causes you to suffer
Speaker 1: and be unhappy. And I just always find that to
Speaker 1: be a fascinating paradox because I don't think the answer
Speaker 1: is you roll yourself back to an animal, yeah right,
Speaker 1: But I also don't think the end of the story
Speaker 1: is you live here in your prefrontal cortex. And so
Speaker 1: it's always interesting what does that mean for us in
Speaker 1: how we live our lives. I think we have this
Speaker 1: really unique capacity to be a part of the creative
Speaker 1: process in a way that other species don't. So I
Speaker 1: mean that in you know, the very physical way like
Speaker 1: we create things. But then I also mean that in
Speaker 1: regards a band called two Cow Garage that I assumed
Speaker 1: was cows making good music. But I could be wrong
Speaker 1: about that. Yeah maybe, but maybe it's a miraculous thing
Speaker 1: that I just need to learn more about. That's a
Speaker 1: Columbus band, you know, shout Columbus um. The ability to create,
Speaker 1: I think, in tandem with the universe is maybe unique
Speaker 1: to humans in the capacity that we have within our brains.
Speaker 1: I think what I mean by that is we have
Speaker 1: a choice for how to engage the world in a
Speaker 1: way that's very different than other creatures have. And with
Speaker 1: that decision, you can almost have a conversation with the
Speaker 1: moment that you're in if you're able to completely feel
Speaker 1: into that present moment and act from it, and that's
Speaker 1: very different than desiring something in the future. If you're
Speaker 1: able to fully be present in the moment that you're
Speaker 1: in right now and get a sense of rightness for
Speaker 1: what is called for in that moment, that becomes the
Speaker 1: point of desire, that rightness that you feel when you're
Speaker 1: doing the thing that you need to be doing in
Speaker 1: that moment, And then of course you can be offered
Speaker 1: on target. I guess with that right you can fall
Speaker 1: in and out of that understanding, but it provides a
Speaker 1: completely different frame than the frame of success or prestige
Speaker 1: or ego or any of those things. And so that
Speaker 1: reframing has been really helpful for me. It's not that
Speaker 1: I don't still get caught up in you know, like
Speaker 1: I just wrote this book, it's never enough people right
Speaker 1: who are going to read this book at this point,
Speaker 1: right right, Um, it's never going to be enough people.
Speaker 1: And yet, if I can pull myself back into the
Speaker 1: moment that I'm in right now, what really actually matters,
Speaker 1: and what I know matters, like in myself, is having
Speaker 1: an authentic conversation with you in this moment, in being here,
Speaker 1: and so that has become the thing that's driven me,
Speaker 1: not looking for what I'm going to get out of
Speaker 1: the experience, right. I think that I talked about it
Speaker 1: on the on the show. Sometimes listeners have heard this
Speaker 1: idea of it's never enough, whatever that thing is. If
Speaker 1: you're if your metric is external, it's never enough. Right
Speaker 1: Like if when I started this show, if you said
Speaker 1: to me you're going to have X number of listeners,
Speaker 1: I would have thrown a week long party, right Like.
Speaker 1: I would have been like, that's no way, never gonna happen. Right,
Speaker 1: But I can. I'm perfectly capable of looking at where
Speaker 1: I'm at and going it's not enough anymore. How do
Speaker 1: I get more? And so what I always find is
Speaker 1: that we talk a lot about motivation. Um, intention is
Speaker 1: a word people use, and so for me, when I
Speaker 1: find myself in that spot, it's important to go back
Speaker 1: to what's the underlying motivation for why I'm doing this.
Speaker 1: I would say, again, though that's cognitive, like you're still
Speaker 1: dealing with it on this like level of Now, I'm
Speaker 1: going to have a thought about, like, what's really important
Speaker 1: in this moment I am really interested in right now
Speaker 1: is actually sinking into the experience of the moment and
Speaker 1: like being in that place where it's operating from a
Speaker 1: completely different space than the space in our minds or
Speaker 1: even like the space in our chat It's like this
Speaker 1: a morphous kind of idea that if I can really
Speaker 1: be in this conversation, like I have a sense of
Speaker 1: rightness in that moment. Well, I think what you're describing
Speaker 1: to some extent is the date of maybe flow. You
Speaker 1: hear it referred to a lot of ways flow, egolessness, um.
Speaker 1: But what it is is I think those moments and
Speaker 1: that being present to the moment and what's really happening
Speaker 1: is to some degree a loss of myself and what
Speaker 1: I want being the primary driver of what's happening. I'm
Speaker 1: operating at a deeper level, and one of the things
Speaker 1: that I'm always intrigued by is the inner play of emotions, thoughts,
Speaker 1: and behavior because they are so intimately connected. And I
Speaker 1: used to think, like, what does a thought cause an
Speaker 1: emotion or does an emotion cause a thought? And I'm like, well,
Speaker 1: both right, and and even what you're talking about this
Speaker 1: dropping into a direct experience, there's the emotional piece around it,
Speaker 1: there is a cognitive piece, there's the behavior. And I
Speaker 1: just always think it's really interesting how we work with
Speaker 1: those different things, which is why I think on the
Speaker 1: show we focus so much on behavior, and so much
Speaker 1: of your book has things you do, things you do.
Speaker 1: You know the classic phrase I use over and over
Speaker 1: as you can't think your way into right action. Sometimes
Speaker 1: you have to act your way into right thinking. And
Speaker 1: and your book is so focused on doing and and
Speaker 1: I find that the behavior. The reason behavior is so
Speaker 1: important is because I feel like it's a lever that
Speaker 1: I can use to move thoughts and emotions where I
Speaker 1: can't really particularly emotions, I can't grab them directly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think you're right about that. So from my personal experience,
Speaker 1: I would definitely say that there are tools that I
Speaker 1: use on a daily basis to help myself myself stay
Speaker 1: in that place of I'm going to operate from this moment.
Speaker 1: So for sure, daily mindfulness practice, uh, limiting the amount
Speaker 1: to which I'm on social media, particularly if it's anything
Speaker 1: that I can check alis or stats of any kind, um,
Speaker 1: you know, not checking my email when my kids are home,
Speaker 1: taking long walks outside. All of those behaviors connect with
Speaker 1: how I am able to operate from that place. So
Speaker 1: I think you're absolutely right. I would also say that
Speaker 1: sometimes we just have these moments of revelation that are
Speaker 1: totally outside of our control and can give us this
Speaker 1: other level of understanding of who we actually are. I guess.
Speaker 1: And so when I'm talking about like operating from a
Speaker 1: place of rightness, I'm talking about like who am I
Speaker 1: actually and how do I express that in and authentic
Speaker 1: way in this conversation? And so, yeah, who are you really? Uh,
Speaker 1: that's a really good question, said that sort of flip,
Speaker 1: but it's also a serious question. Like when you say
Speaker 1: when I you know, when I act from who I am?
Speaker 1: I'm just curious what does that mean for me? What
Speaker 1: it means is I'll talk about it on multiple levels.
Speaker 1: The first level that I would say is the experiential,
Speaker 1: like what's happening right now, right now? Who I am?
Speaker 1: Feels like a cool, centered, empty ball. That's what it
Speaker 1: feels like like in my gut, That's what it feels like.
Speaker 1: That's where I feel like I'm operating from in this moment.
Speaker 1: On another level, I am my grandmother's granddaughter, and I
Speaker 1: am living her legacy every single day. I'm my mother's daughter.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm incredibly grounded in the place that I'm
Speaker 1: coming from. And that is true also, if that makes sense. Yep, Well,
Speaker 1: I relate with that. You and I were talking earlier.
Speaker 1: And there's been a number of challenges in my life
Speaker 1: over the last year. I mean lots of different things,
Speaker 1: you know, Alzheimer's diagnosis, for relatives, falls and hips, you know,
Speaker 1: putting to sleep too, doll. I mean, the list goes on, right,
Speaker 1: And yet throughout all that, I really have felt I
Speaker 1: think what you said about this centered. I don't feel
Speaker 1: like anything is wrong, and I think the things that
Speaker 1: are happening are are tragic in some cases and sad
Speaker 1: and but not wrong. And I feel very in a
Speaker 1: good place. And we were saying before, I was saying
Speaker 1: that's kind of a testament for me to all this stuff,
Speaker 1: all this personal development crap that we all do is
Speaker 1: the testament is really does it serve us in times
Speaker 1: when it's difficult. It's very easy to be present. It's
Speaker 1: very easy to talk about being present. It's very easy
Speaker 1: to do all that stuff when life is agreeable. When
Speaker 1: life is disagreeable, that at least for me, that's kind
Speaker 1: of the test And I oftentimes think, you know, I
Speaker 1: say this somewhat jokingly, but I think sometimes the best
Speaker 1: we can do with some of this stuff is not
Speaker 1: make it worse. You know that a lot of this
Speaker 1: stuff I've learned, call it spiritually or whatever, is just that, like, Okay,
Speaker 1: someone close to me has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, right,
Speaker 1: There's a lot that comes with it. There's emotions, there's
Speaker 1: all this stuff. What I've gotten better at doing is
Speaker 1: not making it worse by you know, we say shooting
Speaker 1: the second arrow, right, I don't suddenly go into it's
Speaker 1: not fair, why me? This shouldn't be happening, you know,
Speaker 1: all the other stuff. And so I just sometimes think
Speaker 1: that's what a lot of this can do for us too,
Speaker 1: is it doesn't I think some people look towards spirituality
Speaker 1: or personal development as a place where I'm just not
Speaker 1: going to feel pain anymore, it's going to be disappointing
Speaker 1: if that's what we're looking for. If we're looking for, though,
Speaker 1: a place to stay calm in the midst of a storm,
Speaker 1: this stuff is very useful. I would add a yes
Speaker 1: and to that, because I've had the stand mix keep
Speaker 1: wanting to throw a butt in there. I see it,
Speaker 1: You're you're going, however, and but I know you can
Speaker 1: see it. I think yeah, because you know, I think
Speaker 1: suffering has this really important place on the spiritual journey.
Speaker 1: And yes, I know what you mean about operating from
Speaker 1: when you're in the midst of struggle, having that center
Speaker 1: that you can go back to you But I think
Speaker 1: for so many people, in order to get to that place,
Speaker 1: you go through this place that is like literal I
Speaker 1: shouldn't say literal, it feels so much like hell, you know.
Speaker 1: And so I think that that can be a pathway.
Speaker 1: And I think it's probably going to happen again to me.
Speaker 1: I think it's probably going to happen to you again.
Speaker 1: And I have seen that even in the midst of success,
Speaker 1: I can have these incredible internal tumultuous storms that will
Speaker 1: just come up and then I have to sort of
Speaker 1: process through that and it doesn't feel calm at all,
Speaker 1: you know, And so I think that's part of it,
Speaker 1: is really not being in that calm space, but like
Speaker 1: sometimes engaging with the storm that arrives. And even in
Speaker 1: regards to what I was talking about with trauma, you know,
Speaker 1: we we hold that stuff in our bodies, and there's
Speaker 1: a lot of studies even with epogenetics that past trauma,
Speaker 1: our parents trauma is still sort of in there. And
Speaker 1: I think as you begin to engage in this work,
Speaker 1: some of that stuff comes up and then you have
Speaker 1: to sort of work with it in this different way.
Speaker 1: How I handle it differently now is that I'm not afraid.
Speaker 1: It used to be almost like I haven't thrown up
Speaker 1: physically since I was twenty one years old, and it's
Speaker 1: my worst fear. Just can't even imagine the idea of it.
Speaker 1: And that's what it's like. Before it's like I don't
Speaker 1: want to throw up. I don't want to throw up.
Speaker 1: Oh please, like don't let me throw up. And now
Speaker 1: it's kind of like I'm about to throw up everywhere.
Speaker 1: Like that's the difference. I think Calm is not the
Speaker 1: word I probably would want to scribe. I mean, first
Speaker 1: I agree with you, any any degree of wisdom I have.
Speaker 1: I have gotten a difficult way by a great deal
Speaker 1: of suffering and just you know, lots and lots of mistakes.
Speaker 1: But I don't think it's I don't think calm is
Speaker 1: the word. It's a bigger sense of I'm okay, even
Speaker 1: when like my, let' let's talk about my dog passing away, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, I put, I mean, I love my Yes,
Speaker 1: it's terrible. It's second one in a year, and so
Speaker 1: listeners are like, yeah, we've heard about the damn dog
Speaker 1: like the third time, but it's it's relevant to me
Speaker 1: because it's a it's a way of looking at this.
Speaker 1: And I cried like a baby like fifty times, right,
Speaker 1: So there was no shortage of pain, there was no
Speaker 1: avoiding the experience. It's just that there were not a
Speaker 1: lot of stories about what that means. And some of
Speaker 1: what you were talking about in the beginning is this
Speaker 1: dropping into this experience of what's happening, And that's what
Speaker 1: this was. I'm in the experience of grief and sadness
Speaker 1: for the dog. But that's where I'm at and that's
Speaker 1: what I am. That's what I mean by the suffering
Speaker 1: that we layer on top of it is all the
Speaker 1: things I tell myself about what that means, and all
Speaker 1: those stories that we use when we you know, with
Speaker 1: the dog, it could be the second one in a year.
Speaker 1: Why me? Why did he get cancer? He was too young?
Speaker 1: All that serves as a way to pull us out
Speaker 1: of the present moment and the feeling, and then that
Speaker 1: stuff doesn't get to get processed and go through us.
Speaker 1: And so I think we're saying the same thing, We're
Speaker 1: just using slightly different words. And I like what you're
Speaker 1: saying because something I've been thinking about lately is the
Speaker 1: idea of emotional residue and how things can sort of
Speaker 1: hang on if you don't have, like we're talking about behaviors,
Speaker 1: if you don't have the thing that you do to
Speaker 1: reset yourself, you carry all that stuff around with you.
Speaker 1: So I'm really bad at sports analogies, but I try
Speaker 1: to use this tennis analogy where between gay as you
Speaker 1: reset during a match and when you're in that position,
Speaker 1: there are lots of different things that you could do right.
Speaker 1: You could project into the future about what's going to happen.
Speaker 1: You could ruminate on something that you just did that
Speaker 1: was wrong. You can do all of that, or you
Speaker 1: can take a really deep breath and you can reset
Speaker 1: and then move into the game. And they say that
Speaker 1: the highest performing athletes are the most efficient and productive
Speaker 1: at rest, particularly in these little chunks. So I think
Speaker 1: that behavioral piece is really important to maintaining what you're
Speaker 1: talking about. And I think the other thing that you
Speaker 1: said is so key, where it's like, can I feel
Speaker 1: all of what's happening in this moment in this moment,
Speaker 1: because then it's just gonna You're gonna be able to
Speaker 1: let it go. You're not creating all that stuff that
Speaker 1: you have to carry around with you. I actually don't
Speaker 1: pay attention to any sports in the world. I just
Speaker 1: generally don't care except for Cleveland Cavaliers basketball. And I
Speaker 1: think it's wired to my son because when he was young,
Speaker 1: we watched you know, the games together. I love it
Speaker 1: and I think Lebron James maybe the best player ever.
Speaker 1: Where am I going with this this idea of rest.
Speaker 1: There was an article that came out several days ago
Speaker 1: about how Lebron James has learned how to rest while
Speaker 1: he plays. He plays more minutes than anybody else than
Speaker 1: anyone and yet he's the most productive, the most effective,
Speaker 1: and he's learned to rest as he plays. It's just staggering.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's another level of genius there. But it's
Speaker 1: to your point. He's finding these small places to reset
Speaker 1: on the court. You know. You they say that they
Speaker 1: time people Miles Prower often he's in the top ten
Speaker 1: slowest players except for these intense bursts. And so that
Speaker 1: made me think of that, and that story was on
Speaker 1: my mind and then staying current, I agree with you.
Speaker 1: I think the first time I learned to do this
Speaker 1: was when my first marriage fell apart, the mother of
Speaker 1: my son, and I was just devastated. I was devastated
Speaker 1: for a lot of reasons, but part of the devastation
Speaker 1: was I think I brought every failed romantic relationship that
Speaker 1: I had had along with me into that moment. And
Speaker 1: so when some you know, when that happens, it's like,
Speaker 1: I'm not just sad about this thing, I'm sad about
Speaker 1: a thousand things. And that experience was the first time
Speaker 1: that I learned to just go into it and let
Speaker 1: the experience happen and be present. And I walked out
Speaker 1: of that feeling sort of clean, like okay, you know,
Speaker 1: or so with my this dog, right, I grieved the
Speaker 1: last dog enough that when this one went, that's what
Speaker 1: I was grieving. I wasn't grieving that dog in my
Speaker 1: cat when I was seven. And you know, like, and
Speaker 1: I think that's the benefit of feeling what's here in
Speaker 1: the moment, what comes to us, allowing it to be
Speaker 1: and go into it, like you said, is because then
Speaker 1: it clears up and you're not dragging it through the
Speaker 1: rest of your life with you. I think something else
Speaker 1: that I found is really helpful in regards to staying
Speaker 1: in the moment is like the revelation of habitual patterns
Speaker 1: that I've been living in for so long, and then
Speaker 1: it's like I can actually watch it happen like smack
Speaker 1: me in the face again and again, until I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 1: so I'm really here and seeing this, I'm not somewhere else,
Speaker 1: and I'm able to like engage with this thing that's
Speaker 1: been haunting me for fifteen years or whatever the case
Speaker 1: may be, which isn't always fun, but then you have
Speaker 1: an opportunity to actually do something different in that moment
Speaker 1: rather than the thing that you've always done. And so
Speaker 1: that's something that's been really interesting that I've been working
Speaker 1: with lately is Okay, if I'm in this space and
Speaker 1: I see this thing happening again, what am I going
Speaker 1: to do differently this time that I didn't do last time?
Speaker 1: And how is that going to change the interaction that
Speaker 1: I have with that person in our situation? Yeah, and
Speaker 1: if we have time, will circle back to mindfulness, because
Speaker 1: so much of what you're describing as a benefit of
Speaker 1: learning to be more mindful of you know, of doing that.
Speaker 1: But I want to change directions to a different myth.
Speaker 1: And this myth is that as humans, we should be happy.
Speaker 1: We should be content. That's our right, you know, pursuit
Speaker 1: of happiness is our fundamental thing. So that we see
Speaker 1: happiness as the normal human condition, particularly in our society.
Speaker 1: I don't think they did that a few hundred years ago.
Speaker 1: I think a few hundred years ago they've been like,
Speaker 1: it sucks, man, it just sucks. But today's culture is
Speaker 1: very different for a lot of people, Like right, there
Speaker 1: are still people who live on survival level conditions and
Speaker 1: that's a different story. So to take that out. But
Speaker 1: you say the reality is that that's not true. Humans
Speaker 1: do suffer, that's part of life. There isn't a normal
Speaker 1: human way to be and that's so important to me.
Speaker 1: I think that idea, and I think that one of
Speaker 1: the things that we've tried to do on the show
Speaker 1: is normalize the idea that, yes, you're gonna suffer. I
Speaker 1: don't even actually like the words suffer because I make
Speaker 1: a distinction. Yes, you're gonna have a lot of pain, Yes,
Speaker 1: crappy things are gonna happen. Yes, life is going to
Speaker 1: hand you your you know what, got to watch that
Speaker 1: explicit marker for iTunes Um. They're very serious about it,
Speaker 1: and so normalizing that the fact that your life isn't
Speaker 1: going well and that you're in pain and things are happening,
Speaker 1: it's not personal. It's not a failure on your part.
Speaker 1: Not sometimes it's you know, you had a lot to
Speaker 1: do with it, right, But I'm talking more garden variety
Speaker 1: the pain. People around us grow old, they get sick,
Speaker 1: they die. The things around us we love they die,
Speaker 1: our friends come and go, our lover betrays this. I mean,
Speaker 1: all this stuff happens. Not all the time, but it happens.
Speaker 1: And I love that you brought that up as a
Speaker 1: under Montal myth because I think one of the reasons
Speaker 1: that we do suffer. Part of the reason we suffer
Speaker 1: is because we think it shouldn't be happening, and the
Speaker 1: story we layer on it is I am a failure
Speaker 1: somehow because I'm feeling pain, and so I think at
Speaker 1: every turn it's just so helpful to remind people and
Speaker 1: ourselves that that's not true. Absolutely, And I think, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm not saying anything new if I were to add
Speaker 1: on that. In today's society, that's exacerbated by the devices
Speaker 1: that we carry around with us seven like Fomo is
Speaker 1: for real for a lot of people, um and comparing
Speaker 1: mind and all of that sort of stuff. The thing
Speaker 1: that I love most I think about coming to the
Speaker 1: idea that pain and suffering is a natural part of
Speaker 1: the human experience, is that we can actually allow that
Speaker 1: pain to transform us and to transform our experiences. And
Speaker 1: to be really honest, I don't know of a lot
Speaker 1: of other ways that are more effective to do it.
Speaker 1: You know, it would be great if the human narrative
Speaker 1: isn't walking along, things are kind of okay, a little
Speaker 1: bit dissatisfied. Oh, something really horrible happens. Everything is destroyed,
Speaker 1: And that's when I learned, you know, I I don't
Speaker 1: know why. That's the human story, but it's somehow is
Speaker 1: it is for sure? And in your book you reference
Speaker 1: um a term multiple times that we don't hear very often.
Speaker 1: We hear it's opposite. We hear post traumatic stress disorder
Speaker 1: all the time, and it's real, right, and people suffer
Speaker 1: mightily from it. The thing we don't talk about very
Speaker 1: often is post traumatic growth. This idea that are suffering
Speaker 1: our experiences can lead to growth. And I'm what I'm
Speaker 1: fascinated by is what causes the difference? Again, I want
Speaker 1: to take the extremes of like being in war out
Speaker 1: of it, but let's take something like a marriage fails. Right,
Speaker 1: Some people come out of that stronger better, They go
Speaker 1: into their next relationship and they're a better partner. They
Speaker 1: learned and they grew from it. Other people just become
Speaker 1: increasingly bitter and cynical. And I'm just fascinating, like, what
Speaker 1: is that difference that causes some people to do that
Speaker 1: and not? And I'll let you answer kind of some
Speaker 1: of what what those differences are. And then the question
Speaker 1: under that is why are some of us able to
Speaker 1: do those things and others can't do those It's just fascinating,
Speaker 1: so a couple of things. UM. One is from the
Speaker 1: research that I've done, people are more able to come
Speaker 1: out of those experiences having grown if they were able
Speaker 1: to let go of how things were before that happened.
Speaker 1: So if we try to hold on to what we
Speaker 1: had before, we're pretty much doomed because that thing is gone,
Speaker 1: and that creates a lot of longing, and it creates
Speaker 1: a lot of um, false sense of reality and all
Speaker 1: sorts of things. So I think that's one thing other
Speaker 1: things that I've seen in regards to research, you're more
Speaker 1: likely to experience post traumatic growth if you're able to
Speaker 1: make meaning from the experiences, which is within our capacity.
Speaker 1: We can make meaning from difficult experiences, which is why
Speaker 1: the reframing tool is such a powerful tool. UM. Being
Speaker 1: able to go back and look and say, you know,
Speaker 1: my marriage almost ended, I lost someone that I loved,
Speaker 1: or you know, I went through this other really difficult thing,
Speaker 1: and what came out of that? What did I What
Speaker 1: did I learn? Um? And not in a trite, contrived
Speaker 1: kind of way, but in every experience that we might
Speaker 1: categorize this quote unquote bad, we're also given the opportunity
Speaker 1: to get these gifts and so being able to make meaning,
Speaker 1: I think is another quality that increases the likelihood of
Speaker 1: post traumatic growth. And then also from the research, folks
Speaker 1: who have some sort of belief system of something larger
Speaker 1: than themselves, they are more likely to experience post traumatic growth.
Speaker 1: And I think it can be lots of different things.
Speaker 1: Something larger than ourselves can be our family, it can
Speaker 1: be being part of the human species, it can be
Speaker 1: a higher power, whatever the case may be. But all
Speaker 1: of those qualities make it more likely that someone will
Speaker 1: have that experience. And I think I don't know for
Speaker 1: me personally, this is just going back to my own story.
Speaker 1: I think that I had the experience that I had
Speaker 1: because there was a frame for it before it happened. So,
Speaker 1: you know, I am a huge fan of her tre
Speaker 1: Drawer and his book Falling Upward, and I had read
Speaker 1: his book a few years before I went through the
Speaker 1: devastating circumstances that I went through of you know, like
Speaker 1: I said, losing my grandma, who I had lived with
Speaker 1: for three and a half years. She was basically my
Speaker 1: roommate in college while I was a single mother, and
Speaker 1: then my marriage almost ending at the same time, while
Speaker 1: I was in a job that was really unsatisfying being
Speaker 1: diagnosed with depression and anxiety, all of those things, as
Speaker 1: they sort of crashed down on me, almost gave me
Speaker 1: no other choice but to figure something else out. So
Speaker 1: I had this frame of the following upward experience, which
Speaker 1: is basically just the idea that like you were going
Speaker 1: to get knocked on your you know what, I'll keep
Speaker 1: your non explicit tag in an explicit tag. They won't
Speaker 1: even air it in India at all, like literally, And
Speaker 1: there's a lot of people in India. I don't think
Speaker 1: very many of them are listening to the show, but
Speaker 1: if you are, but they might be, yes, if you
Speaker 1: are to India right now, that's right, there's some of you.
Speaker 1: I know. Yeah, so um, you know, having the frame
Speaker 1: beforehand like this can happen to you. And I remember
Speaker 1: the quote that I was hanging onto you so hard
Speaker 1: was when he said, no part of you will want
Speaker 1: to go through this experience. And I had that where
Speaker 1: I was like someone to make this stop. I want
Speaker 1: this to stop, and it wouldn't, and it couldn't. When
Speaker 1: you're dragged through an experience like that, all this stuff
Speaker 1: just starts falling off right and left, and the thing
Speaker 1: that's left is sometimes totally different than what you started
Speaker 1: with before any of that happened. But ironically it is
Speaker 1: the thing that got me to that place that we
Speaker 1: were talking about, that like still quiet place. And what
Speaker 1: I think is so interesting now is I can see
Speaker 1: the pattern of how my whole life was sort of
Speaker 1: giving me all of the skills and all of the
Speaker 1: qualities that I needed to move forward into that next stage.
Speaker 1: I don't know when will release this, but last week
Speaker 1: we released the first of a two part interview with
Speaker 1: Audio Shanty, who's a spiritual teacher, and he said something
Speaker 1: in there that's right on target with what you said.
Speaker 1: And he was like, anything that we can bring consciousness to,
Speaker 1: you can use the word awareness or whatever you want
Speaker 1: if it's very difficult, but we can remain conscious to it.
Speaker 1: And this is kind of like what you were saying.
Speaker 1: I have a frame to put this in right that
Speaker 1: allows it to be transformed. But the minute that we
Speaker 1: start going unconscious and we try and escape it, and
Speaker 1: there's so many different ways of escape right until there
Speaker 1: isn't um but that if we can do that, then
Speaker 1: that leads to it being transformative. It's like you're going
Speaker 1: through it you're miserable in the middle of it. And
Speaker 1: I remember this back to talking about that divorce. It
Speaker 1: was I had discovered Pemma Children's book When Things Fall Apart,
Speaker 1: which was a life changer for me, And the essence
Speaker 1: of that book was simply, if I just had to
Speaker 1: summarize it, it it was dropped the storyline. So stop telling
Speaker 1: yourself all the things about this and just be in
Speaker 1: the feeling let it happen. And so there was a
Speaker 1: level of consciousness that I brought to that that allowed
Speaker 1: me to go through that. And there was a there
Speaker 1: was a simultaneous like please anything, take this away from me, anything,
Speaker 1: and an hour later the sense like okay, like I'm
Speaker 1: working with this in a in a in a way.
Speaker 1: And I think the ability to deal with life's storms
Speaker 1: is just such a valuable thing to have a to
Speaker 1: deal with them gracefully and be to allow them to
Speaker 1: change us. And I think the other thing you mentioned
Speaker 1: the book and you just mentioned now is why does
Speaker 1: it have to be that way? As humans? Um? Is
Speaker 1: there a way that we could grow without suffering? I
Speaker 1: use suffering a different context. So that's why I keep
Speaker 1: sort of backing off that word. But how do you
Speaker 1: do that, what is what are the means? And you
Speaker 1: talk a little bit in the book about some possible
Speaker 1: ways to have that happen, So why don't you elaborate
Speaker 1: on what are some ways that we might be able
Speaker 1: to continue to grow and do it when we're doing well.
Speaker 1: First of all, I just want to say it's theoretical,
Speaker 1: because that wasn't the experience that I had. You know,
Speaker 1: I did sort of get dragged through all of those things.
Speaker 1: And what I see in my work with others is
Speaker 1: that people want to have a more authentic experience with
Speaker 1: the moment, Like we live in this culture that is
Speaker 1: just starved for that. And if you're able to create
Speaker 1: a safe container for people to explore that further, I
Speaker 1: think I have seen things happen for people. Um A
Speaker 1: really easy way that I talk about in the book
Speaker 1: is even something like gratitude, which you know, again could
Speaker 1: seem trite, and yet if in the moment we are
Speaker 1: able to actually perceive the reality of what is happening,
Speaker 1: it's hard to not be grateful. I think about so
Speaker 1: frequently that my body is made up of billions of atoms,
Speaker 1: hundreds of bodily systems, and they are all operating on
Speaker 1: the perfect level for me to be able to sit
Speaker 1: here right now and have this conversation. I think David
Speaker 1: steinel Ross does a really good job of waking people
Speaker 1: up to gratitude. You know. It's one of those things
Speaker 1: where it's like you've gotta be smacked upside the head
Speaker 1: sometimes and just understand that we are so incredibly lucky.
Speaker 1: My son is doing a senior speech or I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: he did a senior speech last week for his class,
Speaker 1: and he talked about the actual statistical probability of one
Speaker 1: person being born who they are, and it's like a
Speaker 1: crazy number. I can't remember what you said, but I
Speaker 1: want to say it like one and twenty three million,
Speaker 1: you know, just this really wild number. Yeah, so there's
Speaker 1: this like awe. I think is one of those things
Speaker 1: that can really just shake you up and awaken you
Speaker 1: to the real reality of being a human being alive
Speaker 1: in this moment. So I think that's a hopeful tool
Speaker 1: to try to grapple with. And then I think the
Speaker 1: other thing is there are some folks who have studied
Speaker 1: post traumatic growth, and there is the idea of secondary
Speaker 1: post traumatic growth where maybe I can just sort of
Speaker 1: watch you go through this super hard experience and through
Speaker 1: empathy and compassion, have a sense of new understanding. And
Speaker 1: I think I saw that even happen for people in
Speaker 1: my life. When I was going through that devastating time.
Speaker 1: There were people who were right there with me as
Speaker 1: much as they could possibly be present, and I think
Speaker 1: that changed them as well. I think one of the
Speaker 1: things that's effective about twelve step programs is you have
Speaker 1: that build in. You get sober, and you keep going
Speaker 1: back to these things and you see these people drag
Speaker 1: themselves in who are not and you go, oh my God, like, yes,
Speaker 1: all right, I will do more. What can I do
Speaker 1: to keep growing? Because that looks awful, you know, that
Speaker 1: just looks terrible. I think the other piece of that
Speaker 1: is that I bought into for a long long time
Speaker 1: the suffering artist idea that in order to create art
Speaker 1: you had to be in a great deal of pain.
Speaker 1: And that's what what drove it um And there's some
Speaker 1: truth to that, right. Pain will cause you to at
Speaker 1: least will cause me. The guitar gets in my hand
Speaker 1: a whole lot more, but in a different level. And
Speaker 1: I think looking at a lot of artists, there comes
Speaker 1: a point where you are creating and you are growing,
Speaker 1: and you're doing these things out of the joy of
Speaker 1: doing them. And also the I don't know what the
Speaker 1: right word is for this, but I think we said
Speaker 1: early on that humans are were we have a wired
Speaker 1: in us to move forward. Yeah, acting from that place,
Speaker 1: I would go back to the word authenticity. There is
Speaker 1: a place, an artistic and creative place that you can
Speaker 1: act from where it feels just like an expression of
Speaker 1: who you are, which is the most joyful thing, and
Speaker 1: it doesn't necessarily have to come from pain. I wanted
Speaker 1: to connect with the other part that you said about
Speaker 1: a A. When I was in school for a year
Speaker 1: for counseling, one of our assignments was to go to
Speaker 1: ten A meetings, and I loved them because of the
Speaker 1: exact thing that you're describing. People bring all their stuff
Speaker 1: and they just lay it out and say, here it is,
Speaker 1: take a look at it. You know, what do you think?
Speaker 1: And that doesn't happen very often in our world. And
Speaker 1: so when I had mentioned at the beginning this idea
Speaker 1: of how do we get people to maybe grow without
Speaker 1: all of this pain, I have seen that if you
Speaker 1: can create a container where people can really bring their
Speaker 1: stuff in in that way and they feel really safe
Speaker 1: to do that. It is transformative on this different level,
Speaker 1: and it comes from this idea of human connection. Right,
Speaker 1: So one of the things that I'm really interested in,
Speaker 1: and this was incidental for me. So I started doing
Speaker 1: this work and I thought, like, this is all about wellness,
Speaker 1: this is all about personal growth. So that's the angle
Speaker 1: that I took. And then I would go into these
Speaker 1: communities and I would work, and then I would hear
Speaker 1: these stories later of people are collaborating differently, people are
Speaker 1: treating each other differently, the teams are more effective, like
Speaker 1: all of these sorts of things. And so I came
Speaker 1: across this term psychological safety, which is the ability for
Speaker 1: all team members, and I'm using that. I think in
Speaker 1: this context we can say community members because they're studying
Speaker 1: this for teams in a workspace, but I think it's
Speaker 1: community members can be their whole selves, that there's trust
Speaker 1: between members, there's a quality, everyone gets an equal chance
Speaker 1: to participate, and that there is some level of authenticity
Speaker 1: and communication. When all of that is present, individuals have
Speaker 1: this experience that is very hard to describe, but I
Speaker 1: think a a does it. And what I'm hoping yeah,
Speaker 1: not always, but in its in its best in incarnations, yes,
Speaker 1: it does it beautifully. And what I am hoping is
Speaker 1: that the process that I have seen work in these
Speaker 1: communities can be worked through on an individual level, but
Speaker 1: also on a collaborative level using the book. That's what
Speaker 1: I want to create, that exp oriants of I can
Speaker 1: bring my whole self into this space, I can lay
Speaker 1: it down and that safety changes people in this almost
Speaker 1: like magical way. It's really wild. Yeah, Parker Palmer is
Speaker 1: kind of the maestro at that type of thinking and
Speaker 1: has done so much. There's there's two things that come
Speaker 1: to mind, and then we're gonna need to wrap up
Speaker 1: in a minute. But one is that idea of safety.
Speaker 1: And you know, I do some work with some people,
Speaker 1: communication work, and the reality is you can't have a
Speaker 1: good conversation with someone unless both people feel safe. And
Speaker 1: so if you're having a conversation that's emotional or stressful
Speaker 1: and it starts to get out of hand, it's like
Speaker 1: the only effective thing to do is stop, re establish safety,
Speaker 1: pick back up, because if you don't, the conversation is
Speaker 1: going to go nowhere. There is no chance of that
Speaker 1: being productive. If one or both people don't feel safe,
Speaker 1: and that's the problem in so many of our inner
Speaker 1: personal relationships. We don't feel safe, and so the conversations
Speaker 1: we have with each other are just you know, barbaric sometimes.
Speaker 1: And and the last pieces your idea about community. I
Speaker 1: started this show with the idea that this was all
Speaker 1: about personal development and that meant things like meditation and
Speaker 1: going within and finding peace and being okay with everything
Speaker 1: that's happening. And the surprise to me has been that, yes,
Speaker 1: that is certainly a huge part of the equation, but
Speaker 1: that it's the connection outside of us with other people
Speaker 1: that is equally powerful, healing and important. And I don't
Speaker 1: think I saw that, which is it's funny that I
Speaker 1: didn't see it because I lived it in a a.
Speaker 1: I knew that, but I didn't know it in my head.
Speaker 1: But I've definitely found that to be the case. And
Speaker 1: I'm also very interested in that idea of how can
Speaker 1: we build communities of people that support and help each
Speaker 1: other that isn't necessarily based around something only like alcoholism,
Speaker 1: right like it it's not people that have one specific
Speaker 1: need that need us. Yea, everybody needs us. Every single
Speaker 1: person needs it. And I see it in my work.
Speaker 1: Every day I go into a space and there isn't
Speaker 1: one person in that room who does not need to
Speaker 1: feel more connected with the people around them, who does
Speaker 1: not need to feel like they can be seen. And
Speaker 1: I think it's such an interesting conversation the combination of
Speaker 1: factors that create those environments, because it's possible to create them,
Speaker 1: and I see it all the time, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: how can we get more of this? Like how can
Speaker 1: we create these containers so that people can grow personally
Speaker 1: but also really feel that sense of transcendence. So one
Speaker 1: last thing I want to add about this, um we
Speaker 1: look at Maslow's hierarchy. I'm from the world of education,
Speaker 1: and Maslow's hierarchy is like those basic safety needs and
Speaker 1: then we're moving up and the last level is, uh
Speaker 1: self personalization or I'm sorry, self actualization. Yes, right, So
Speaker 1: that's the myth that we live in, is that self
Speaker 1: actualization is the top of that pyramid. And Maslow didn't
Speaker 1: even believe that crap, like when he died, self transcendence
Speaker 1: was at the top of the pyramid. And I think
Speaker 1: that's really the key is it doesn't matter what the
Speaker 1: larger thing is um being able to lose that sense
Speaker 1: of solitude creates a totally different experience of the world. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you, this has been fun. We could do it longer,
Speaker 1: but if they flashed a flashlight, I couldn't see it
Speaker 1: because the lights are so bright. But I know it's
Speaker 1: about time. So um. Thank you everybody for coming, and Brandy,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for talking with me. Absolutely thanks
Speaker 1: for having me. Bye bye, Thank you. Yea. If what
Speaker 1: you just heard was helpful to you, please consider making
Speaker 1: a donation to the One You Feed podcast. Head over
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Speaker 1: for supporting the show.