Speaker 1: There are just millions and millions of people who are
Speaker 1: actively healing themselves, whether it's through Eastern modalities, Western modalities,
Speaker 1: indigenous modalities, healing has become this massive, massive thing. Not
Speaker 1: only is that going to benefit your personal life, but
Speaker 1: it will ripple outward. 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: word 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 Diego Perez, a meditator in New York Times
Speaker 1: best selling author who is widely known on Instagram in
Speaker 1: various social media networks through his pen name Young pueblo.
Speaker 1: The name means young people, and it serves to remind
Speaker 1: him of his Ecuadorian roots, his experiences and activism, and
Speaker 1: that the collective of humanity is in the midst of
Speaker 1: important growth. On this episode, Diego and Eric discuss his
Speaker 1: work in general, as well as his most recent book, Lighter.
Speaker 1: I love this quote from the Buddha, The mind hard
Speaker 1: to control flighty a lighting where it wishes one does
Speaker 1: well to tame the disciplined mind brings happiness. Happiness can
Speaker 1: often feel like an elusive goal everyone seems to strive
Speaker 1: for and never quite achieves, because we seek it outside
Speaker 1: of ourselves rather than going inward, which is something mindfulness
Speaker 1: teaches us to do. And Jenny, yes, Eric, this idea
Speaker 1: of taming the mind is why you named your program
Speaker 1: The Well Trained Mind, right yep. And I'm excited to
Speaker 1: announce that it's open for enrollment now through October eight.
Speaker 1: In my live virtual six week Introduction to Mindfulness program,
Speaker 1: whether you're new to mindfulness and meditation, or you're looking
Speaker 1: to strengthen your existing mindfulness practice, I'll teach you the
Speaker 1: foundations of mindfulness so that you can live with more ease,
Speaker 1: create a nourishing and fulfilling spiritual practice, Discover how to
Speaker 1: be a friend to yourself, and strengthen your ability to
Speaker 1: live in a more grounded, connected, peaceful way. To learn
Speaker 1: more about the program, go to one you feed dot
Speaker 1: net slash mindfulness. That's one you feed dot net slash
Speaker 1: mindfulness before October eight. I hope to meet you there.
Speaker 1: Idea Yo, Welcome to the show. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for having me Eric. I'm excited to be talking to
Speaker 1: you today. Yeah, I'm really excited to have you on.
Speaker 1: You have been really writing very eloquently about personal growth
Speaker 1: and change for a while, and you've got a new
Speaker 1: book that's coming out which we're gonna definitely get into.
Speaker 1: But let's start like we always do with the parable.
Speaker 1: In the Parable, there's a grandparent who's talking with a
Speaker 1: grandchild and they say, in life, there are two wolves
Speaker 1: inside of us that are always a battle. One is
Speaker 1: a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery
Speaker 1: and love, and the other is a bad wolf, which
Speaker 1: represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the
Speaker 1: grandchild stops and they think about it for a second,
Speaker 1: and they look up at their grandparents. They say, well,
Speaker 1: which one wins, and the grandparents says the one you feed.
Speaker 1: So I'd like to start off by asking you what
Speaker 1: does that parable mean to you in your life and
Speaker 1: in the work that you do. That parable really directly
Speaker 1: or minds me a lot. It aligns well with the
Speaker 1: Buddhist teaching because greed and aversion, these are two really
Speaker 1: really strong tendencies in the human mind, and they swim
Speaker 1: at the core of you know, what we really have
Speaker 1: accumulated over time, and they're constantly motivating us. And oftentimes
Speaker 1: we think that greed and aversion are things that will
Speaker 1: produce safety, but what they actually produce our misery. And
Speaker 1: I think it took me a long time to see
Speaker 1: that that was really the root of my like inner struggle,
Speaker 1: was that I was leaning too far into greed, leaning
Speaker 1: too far into a version and hatred, and all I
Speaker 1: ended up with was tons and tons of tension in
Speaker 1: my mind. So now that I've really started focusing on
Speaker 1: just peeling back all those layers, and I've been meditating
Speaker 1: for about ten years now, it's shown me that if
Speaker 1: you do feed the wolf that's full of kindness and
Speaker 1: that's trying to do good in the world, that you'll
Speaker 1: live a much more fulfilled life. You used a word
Speaker 1: they're I really like. You refer to greed and aversion
Speaker 1: as tendencies, and I love that word. In your new
Speaker 1: book you write about, I think you call it human
Speaker 1: habit versus human nature. Let's talk a little bit about that,
Speaker 1: because one of the things I love about the Wolf
Speaker 1: Parable as it sort of says, Hey, we have the
Speaker 1: seeds of all this inside of us, right, and we
Speaker 1: get to choose what we want to work with. So
Speaker 1: talk to me about tendencies or habits versus nature. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think um. One thing that we don't realize that
Speaker 1: became clear over time to me was that every time
Speaker 1: that you react right, whatever action you take, it gets
Speaker 1: accumulated in the mind and over time these develop into
Speaker 1: really strong patterns. So if you're repeatedly reacting with greed,
Speaker 1: thank reed just continues blossoming in the mind and they
Speaker 1: do become sort of tendencies or directions that you more
Speaker 1: easily move into depending on the situation that are in.
Speaker 1: So I think it's something to realize that when you're
Speaker 1: feeling something, you know it may go away from the
Speaker 1: surface level of the mind at some point, but there's
Speaker 1: an imprint that was made, and especially in the way
Speaker 1: that you react to what you feel, those reactions just
Speaker 1: become really strong habit patterns over time. Yeah, you mentioned
Speaker 1: greed in aversion. In Buddhism, we tend to talk about
Speaker 1: those things. They're called different things in different traditions, the
Speaker 1: three poisons, the three afflictions. But there's greed, there's a version,
Speaker 1: and then there is ignorance or delusion. Tell me about
Speaker 1: what that last one means to you. You know, I
Speaker 1: feel like ignorance encompasses them all, and greed and a
Speaker 1: version are really the children of ignorance. This is like
Speaker 1: how immediately they'll manifest, but at the core it's really
Speaker 1: you know, what are we trying to eradicate? We're trying
Speaker 1: to eradicate all of ignorance if you're really taking the
Speaker 1: Buddhist teaching seriously. Yeah, I often think about it is
Speaker 1: like greed or version, right, there's different translations of these things,
Speaker 1: And then I think of ignorance. I often think about
Speaker 1: and when I'm sort of in my mind, the ignorance
Speaker 1: I have about how much greed and aversion caused me pain,
Speaker 1: Like that's my ignorance, Like you said earlier. We think
Speaker 1: they work to some degree, right, we think they keep
Speaker 1: us safe. Yeah, we use them as strategies, right, And
Speaker 1: to me, that's the fundamental ignorance. The ignorance is that
Speaker 1: that isn't really a very useful strategy, no, And it
Speaker 1: just leaves you in this loop of survival mode. And
Speaker 1: I see why greed and aversion have such a strong
Speaker 1: tendency in us, because they help us survive at the
Speaker 1: most basic level. But we don't live in times like
Speaker 1: that anymore. We live in a like growing civilization that's
Speaker 1: trying to become more and more humanistic. So we need
Speaker 1: to sort of switch from survival mode to a mode
Speaker 1: of doing our best to thrive and find fulfillment. And
Speaker 1: if you're going to do that, you need to not
Speaker 1: live from a place of greed or version, but you
Speaker 1: need to live from a place of compassion and self awareness.
Speaker 1: There's a bunch I'd love to dive into right there,
Speaker 1: But let's pause for a second and jump back out
Speaker 1: and maybe have you give us the thirty thousand foot
Speaker 1: version of your story? You know, who are you? Why
Speaker 1: are you writing about these things? Just give us kind
Speaker 1: of the very short version of it. Sure, sure. So.
Speaker 1: I was born in Wayake, and my family immigrated to
Speaker 1: the United States when I was about four years old,
Speaker 1: and we had a very difficult time while we were here.
Speaker 1: You know, we went through an immense amount of poverty.
Speaker 1: And I saw that the struggle my parents went through
Speaker 1: to just feed us, to pay rent to you know,
Speaker 1: just give us the absolute basics of life, like we're
Speaker 1: talking no luxuries. My dad worked in a supermarket, my
Speaker 1: mom worked cleaning houses, and we were stuck in a
Speaker 1: poverty trap. And I think over those experiences, Um, you know,
Speaker 1: my anxiety really grew, My fear really grew in. This
Speaker 1: sadness started growing, and that stayed with me throughout childhood,
Speaker 1: throughout my teenage years. And when I got to college,
Speaker 1: I was sort of so outside of my comfort zone
Speaker 1: that these tendencies of anxiety and of sadness really just
Speaker 1: like kind of blew up. They just gained more and
Speaker 1: more power and they snowballed. And what I ended up
Speaker 1: developing were just like really really unhealthy habits. You know,
Speaker 1: I was partying way too much, doing a bunch of
Speaker 1: different drugs, constantly running away from my emotions, had very
Speaker 1: shallow relationships, and it led into a year or two
Speaker 1: after college. I almost lost my life early because I
Speaker 1: ended up doing way too many drugs one night and
Speaker 1: felt like I was dying, you know, I was on
Speaker 1: the floor. I felt like my heart was going to explode.
Speaker 1: And I ended up speaking to a doctor afterwards, and
Speaker 1: she told me that it sounds like I had a
Speaker 1: mild heart attack and I was only I think it
Speaker 1: was only about twenty three at the time, and that
Speaker 1: was sort of the life changing moment that really woke
Speaker 1: me up. I really saw how much I had run
Speaker 1: away from my own truth and how that led me
Speaker 1: to this horrible place. So when I started realizing that,
Speaker 1: I realized, if I had lied to myself so much
Speaker 1: and that's what got me here, what I need to
Speaker 1: do is start telling myself the truth and being honest
Speaker 1: with myself. And then I slowly started coming out of
Speaker 1: that dark place. About a year later, I started meditating
Speaker 1: the past and I did my first silence and day course,
Speaker 1: and there I saw this like deeper level of healing,
Speaker 1: and I was shocked by it. I couldn't believe that
Speaker 1: I actually felt better, and I kept going to courses
Speaker 1: and I realized I was like, wait, this is real, like,
Speaker 1: I actually feel better, my mind doesn't feel as dense
Speaker 1: as before. And that's when the motivation to write came up.
Speaker 1: You know, I knew like I wasn't totally healed, that
Speaker 1: wasn't totally wise, like I was just beginning, but I
Speaker 1: was inspired by the fact that healing was even possible,
Speaker 1: And that's when the writing journey really began. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people early in their healing journeys
Speaker 1: are often the most inspirational. I'm a recovering heroin addict
Speaker 1: and alcoholic, and I remember early on in my recovery career,
Speaker 1: I was just lit up, you know, and and and
Speaker 1: I see it with people who come in. I mean,
Speaker 1: in the beginning, you're kind of like a baby deer,
Speaker 1: you know, you're sort of stumbling around. But it seems
Speaker 1: like when people hit around like this is arbitrary a
Speaker 1: little bit, but about a two year mark, all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, they are just all about it. And that
Speaker 1: energy is really contagious and really beautiful. Now there's something
Speaker 1: to be said for the mature facets of it too,
Speaker 1: right of continuing to heal over a long long period
Speaker 1: of time. Then it sounds like that's about kind of
Speaker 1: when you really sort of started writing and really had
Speaker 1: this moment of like, oh my God, like wow, I
Speaker 1: can change. I mean, it is so exhilarating and it
Speaker 1: feels like that. I remember thinking it felt so wonderful
Speaker 1: and real. But I was shocked that nobody told me
Speaker 1: that this was possible. Like I grew up in a
Speaker 1: way where like if you were physically hurt or if
Speaker 1: you had some mental ailment, you're just gonna have to
Speaker 1: live with it for the rest of your life. You know,
Speaker 1: there was no solution. So I grew up Roman Catholic
Speaker 1: and didn't know anything about meditation going into it. So
Speaker 1: this was just a whole new world. And you know,
Speaker 1: I even sort of wanted to during those first few
Speaker 1: courses after them, like I would test myself to make
Speaker 1: sure that I wasn't falling into delusion, like I wasn't
Speaker 1: like it wasn't like a new type of lying, and
Speaker 1: I was like, no, I actually, like I literally feel
Speaker 1: like I have more space in my mind, Like when
Speaker 1: when situations would happen, like I know how I used
Speaker 1: to immediately react, but now I could feel that I
Speaker 1: could see options where there weren't any options before. And
Speaker 1: I could intentionally choose, Oh, you know what, I'm going
Speaker 1: to say this as opposed to what I would have
Speaker 1: said before. Yeah, you know one of the themes that
Speaker 1: shows up in your writing over and over again. And
Speaker 1: I'll just this is just a line of yours, but
Speaker 1: it speaks to something you talk about a lot, which
Speaker 1: is the past is packed into your mind and heart.
Speaker 1: You also say, your initial reaction is usually your past
Speaker 1: trying to impose itself on your present. So talk to
Speaker 1: me about what you mean by that, and how can
Speaker 1: we start to work with that more skillfully. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: it's sort of similar to something I mentioned a little
Speaker 1: bit earlier, where when you feel something and you react
Speaker 1: to it, you know, you react to it with some
Speaker 1: action or another, it gets accumulated in the mind. So
Speaker 1: when you feel those really strong emotions as a child,
Speaker 1: they're imprinted into you and you feel them and you're
Speaker 1: subconscious and they accumulate. And let's let's say if your
Speaker 1: common tendency is to defend yourself with anger, then if
Speaker 1: you encounter a situation that reminds you of the past,
Speaker 1: then you're just immediately going to react with anger, and
Speaker 1: that tendency of anger just becomes stronger and stronger and
Speaker 1: stronger over time, and it will more and more quickly appear.
Speaker 1: And a lot of people react in different ways, you know,
Speaker 1: they react with sadness, that react with you know, whatever
Speaker 1: it is that their system has accumulated. And when you
Speaker 1: walk around in life, it's almost as if the past
Speaker 1: exists in the mind as a concrete layer that you're
Speaker 1: walking on top of, like that pass is loaded into
Speaker 1: your mind. And that's something that I found, you know,
Speaker 1: in myself and meditation courses, especially the longer courses of
Speaker 1: twenty thirty days, is that there is just such a
Speaker 1: hardened layer of who I was before, what I felt before,
Speaker 1: and when you're in there, you can actually, you know,
Speaker 1: really chip away at it and um it can start
Speaker 1: burning away and you come out and just you feel lighter.
Speaker 1: But often we also just don't realize that when we're
Speaker 1: perceiving the world, we're looking at it through the lens
Speaker 1: of our own pass, through the lens of our own
Speaker 1: emotional history, and that makes it quite difficult to be
Speaker 1: able to engage with something in a fresh way, in
Speaker 1: a way where you're not judging it, in a way
Speaker 1: where you're taking it in as selflessly as possible. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the spiritual path is often referred to in certain areas
Speaker 1: as a process of unlearning or a process of subtraction.
Speaker 1: And you say that one of the struggles that comes
Speaker 1: with being human is we find ourselves in a process
Speaker 1: of constant accumulation, and so kind of what you're saying
Speaker 1: here is we start to try and shed some of that.
Speaker 1: And it's so interesting to realize when you start to
Speaker 1: really recognize, like, wait a second, I am simply a
Speaker 1: collection of causes and conditions. And then if you really
Speaker 1: internalize that, you kind of then start to go, We'll
Speaker 1: wait a second, what then am I? What then is
Speaker 1: the real me? How do you think about that idea?
Speaker 1: Like is there a real Diego out there? And if so,
Speaker 1: how do you tell the real Diego from the condition diego?
Speaker 1: Because even the good parts of you have been conditioned.
Speaker 1: It's true. It's funny, like I think that that question.
Speaker 1: It's never really brought me a lot of solace, like
Speaker 1: who is the real me? I think? As opposed to
Speaker 1: being like who am I? I found it much more
Speaker 1: useful to focus on burning away the patterns that cause
Speaker 1: me misery, Like let me like undo this huge pattern
Speaker 1: of anxiety. Let me undo this huge pattern of fear
Speaker 1: and let me focus on meditating and not really try
Speaker 1: to figure out who I am, but actually just let
Speaker 1: myself be and flow. And that's something that I found
Speaker 1: has given me much more satisfaction and peace in life,
Speaker 1: is to imagine myself as a flowing river as opposed
Speaker 1: to something that's static, like this is who you are
Speaker 1: and this is who you'll always be. And it's like, no,
Speaker 1: it's nut. It's like when I observed the body and
Speaker 1: I'm meditating, everything is constantly changing. Like there's nothing that
Speaker 1: is standing still. You know, we're talking like everything. We're
Speaker 1: talking the physical, the mental, the atomic, and this is
Speaker 1: you know, backed by science as well, Like everything is
Speaker 1: constantly moving. And I think allowing myself to just embrace
Speaker 1: that truth of change and allow it to pervade my
Speaker 1: sense of identity has actually been really freeing and embracing
Speaker 1: change At that level. It doesn't mean that, oh, you're
Speaker 1: going to do whatever you want, because if you start
Speaker 1: doing things and start putting out a lot of negativity
Speaker 1: into the world, then yeah, you're gonna get a lot
Speaker 1: of negativity back, and you're gonna create a lot more
Speaker 1: tension in your mind. But it's more so the sense
Speaker 1: of embracing change and doing it in a wholesome way
Speaker 1: where you're treating yourself while and you're treating others well.
Speaker 1: I love that idea, that that question doesn't bring you
Speaker 1: much solace. That's a really good way of thinking about. Ultimately,
Speaker 1: it is sort of a philosophical question, right, But I
Speaker 1: think that the heart of it for me is sort
Speaker 1: of what you just said, is recognizing like, Okay, there
Speaker 1: is something that's continuing to change here, and yet at
Speaker 1: the same time, as you talked about, we have these
Speaker 1: deeply embedded tendencies. We have this past that is like
Speaker 1: a cement underneath us. Right, So everything is changing, and
Speaker 1: yet there are some things that are changeable, but they
Speaker 1: don't change quick like you know. It's interesting. I'm going
Speaker 1: to interview somebody in a couple of days. She's a
Speaker 1: Buddhist teacher that I've admired for a long time. Her
Speaker 1: named Susan Piver. She's written a bunch of books, but
Speaker 1: her latest book is on the indiogram. I'm not sure
Speaker 1: if you're familiar with what the indiogram is. They will
Speaker 1: say it's not a personality test, but it's kind of
Speaker 1: a personality test, right, And it's really interesting to me
Speaker 1: because I have a very mixed relationship to I find
Speaker 1: it helpful to understand myself in some ways, but I
Speaker 1: also then worry that I live into those things. And
Speaker 1: so you write about identity pretty well. You talk about
Speaker 1: being able to be flexible with identity. Yeah, and I,
Speaker 1: you know, I have a similar feeling to like, I
Speaker 1: have a lot of respect for astrology and different types
Speaker 1: of archetypes, but I don't try to live by them
Speaker 1: and I don't try to inform myself too much from
Speaker 1: them because they're I think, you know, just similar to
Speaker 1: what you said. I think it can become a thing
Speaker 1: where you give away your power to it and you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is just how I am. But actually, if you're
Speaker 1: more so embraced that you're changing being, you can more
Speaker 1: so focus on your evolution as opposed to just being
Speaker 1: like this is how I'm always going to be UM,
Speaker 1: which I think can be you know, an easy thing,
Speaker 1: that UM that a lot of people fall into. But
Speaker 1: I'm sure you know, like and I don't know much
Speaker 1: about you know, angiograms or or astrology, even I'm a
Speaker 1: novice in those areas, But my real motto is like,
Speaker 1: if this is helping you heal yourself, do it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I love that you write about that really well, about
Speaker 1: how the healing journey is, you know, different for everybody,
Speaker 1: and different modalities are really helpful. You know, back to
Speaker 1: that idea of identity, it's interesting to think about recognizing.
Speaker 1: I love your word tendency. It's actually one that I
Speaker 1: use myself when I'm working with coaching clients. You know,
Speaker 1: they'll say I always do X, or I'm like, well, no,
Speaker 1: you have a tendency. And it's good to know your
Speaker 1: tendencies so that you can work to correct them, you
Speaker 1: can work to heal them. And yet how do we
Speaker 1: move free of them? And and I think that ident
Speaker 1: it is one of those things that's like really learning
Speaker 1: to go, okay, this is helpful for me. You know,
Speaker 1: there's research on habits that say somebody who identifies as
Speaker 1: a non smoker is less likely to smoke. So there's
Speaker 1: an identification that's actually helpful. But then there's lots of
Speaker 1: other ways that identity gets us into trouble. And so
Speaker 1: do you just work with trying to keep a pretty
Speaker 1: loose relationship identity? Yeah, so I think there's two levels
Speaker 1: to think about it, and this is sort of like
Speaker 1: I try to put myself in between the two, Like
Speaker 1: one is the conventional sense of identity, like yes, my
Speaker 1: name is Diego. Yes, like you know, I released books
Speaker 1: and I'm an author and and right now I'm having
Speaker 1: a conversation with Eric. But I'm also at the same
Speaker 1: time not trying to be completely dominated by the conventional
Speaker 1: level of existence. I'm also trying to more so embrace
Speaker 1: ultimate level of existence, which is like what is Diego
Speaker 1: like just like a series of changing phenomenon that's happening
Speaker 1: at incredible speeds. I think having that looseness in my
Speaker 1: sense of identity actually helps me more easily moved through
Speaker 1: the conventional life. So when I go away to meditate
Speaker 1: and do the longer courses, you're really just digging deep
Speaker 1: into what is the ultimate truth? Is like am I
Speaker 1: fundamentally real? Like no way, like there's you know, like
Speaker 1: if I'm really going to be honest, like there's nothing
Speaker 1: really here. And that understanding that experience has helped just
Speaker 1: alleviate so much tension that I would cause myself about
Speaker 1: like oh, this is the way that I want to
Speaker 1: be seen, or this is the way I want people
Speaker 1: to speak to me, or this is you know, just
Speaker 1: all these different forms of attachments that just create a
Speaker 1: lot of friction in life. You talked about an ultimate
Speaker 1: level of existence where you don't really exist, and then
Speaker 1: we refer to it as the relative and the absolute.
Speaker 1: I think some people refer to it is, you know,
Speaker 1: conventional and ultimate. There's different ways of referring to the
Speaker 1: sort of two truths idea, say a little bit about
Speaker 1: you know, ultimately there's nothing here, because on one hand,
Speaker 1: as you said, absolutely there is, right, Diego and Eric
Speaker 1: are having a conversation, right, And I think this is
Speaker 1: where a lot of people when they start to hear this,
Speaker 1: oh there's not really any solid thing here, they rebel
Speaker 1: and they go but wait a second, I very clearly
Speaker 1: sense that I am, so talk a little bit more
Speaker 1: about how you work with those two truths. Yeah, I think,
Speaker 1: you know, the ego is like a vehicle that helps
Speaker 1: you maneuver the conventional reality. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: as I kept meditating, like I kept experiencing that you know,
Speaker 1: there isn't anything fundamentally here. And I remember reading one
Speaker 1: of the writings of Lady saida Burme's monk from the
Speaker 1: early nineteen hundreds, and he wrote about how if I
Speaker 1: were to say that I exist, I'm not lying, And
Speaker 1: if I were to say I don't exist, I'm not lying.
Speaker 1: So to think that there only has to be one
Speaker 1: truth is totally wrong. It's actually taking a much more
Speaker 1: expansive view and understanding that both of these things are
Speaker 1: true simultaneously, and it don't even contradicted each other. It
Speaker 1: just depends on what frame you're looking at it in. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I totally agree. I mean that's in Then what we're
Speaker 1: sort of taught is form is emptiness, Emptiness is form.
Speaker 1: It's both. And when you say that there's nothing here,
Speaker 1: I think what you were saying, and you please clarify
Speaker 1: and correct you're saying that there is no unchanging fundamental Diego.
Speaker 1: Diego is simply a collection of all these different things
Speaker 1: that have come together, a combination of circumstances and genes
Speaker 1: and proteins and atoms and experiences and all that has
Speaker 1: come together to make something that for some period of
Speaker 1: time will hold what looks like the form of Diego,
Speaker 1: but isn't a thing unto itself, right, So it's pointing
Speaker 1: to the truth that what this is is totally insubstantial
Speaker 1: and ephemeral. It's just a momentary combination of things that
Speaker 1: is just constantly changing fast. So like when you ask
Speaker 1: the question like who are you, it's like, well, I
Speaker 1: may have a sense of who I am right now
Speaker 1: at like I mean, give it a week and it's
Speaker 1: gonna be a whole another sense. And I don't think
Speaker 1: that's a destabilizing reality. I don't think it's like, uh,
Speaker 1: there's discomfort in that. It's more so like, yeah, right now,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm someone who really enjoys like history books,
Speaker 1: and next next week, I may really enjoy fiction. Like
Speaker 1: you know, that's okay. It's funny. I go through that
Speaker 1: every once in a while, Like I'll be like, I'm
Speaker 1: really into just wearing T shirts, Like I'm a person
Speaker 1: who just wears a T shirt. It's stupid. But then
Speaker 1: like three weeks later, I'm like, wait, I want to
Speaker 1: wear a button down shirt. I'm like, we wait, what
Speaker 1: about the T shirt? Guy? Yeah, it's just all it's silly.
Speaker 1: Why why would you even put yourself in a box.
Speaker 1: Because I think we like certainty and some sort of
Speaker 1: identity that we can cling to. You know, and it's
Speaker 1: been one of the greatest gifts of getting older and
Speaker 1: having you know, done a lot of years of spiritual work.
Speaker 1: Is that identity Just I see it and I am
Speaker 1: so much less attached to it. It's really freeing when
Speaker 1: you can get to that point. I want to talk
Speaker 1: about the idea of repetition. You talk about repetition a lot,
Speaker 1: and I think we've talked about the negative form of repetition, right,
Speaker 1: that these things that happened in our lives, the things
Speaker 1: that are negative, they add up, they accumulate, right, Talk
Speaker 1: to me about repetition in the positive sense. Oh yes,
Speaker 1: I mean repetition can be incredibly healing, especially if what
Speaker 1: you're trying to repeat is a wholesome action that's like
Speaker 1: bringing you fulfillment or like activating life inside of you.
Speaker 1: I've found that before I even started meditating, like what
Speaker 1: I was repeating over and over were a few things
Speaker 1: I wanted to stay active. So I remember I first
Speaker 1: started just like going on long walks. Then I started
Speaker 1: going to the gym, and I knew that I had
Speaker 1: to keep going. Like rain or shine, you know, I
Speaker 1: remember like waiting outside, like in the rain for the
Speaker 1: bus to come, you know, get me so I could
Speaker 1: go to the gym. And but repeating that created massive results.
Speaker 1: And I remember when I first started meditating at home
Speaker 1: and um, doing you know, two hours a day, one
Speaker 1: hour in the morning, when hour in the evening. At first,
Speaker 1: it was just incredibly hard, and over time, like after
Speaker 1: a month, after two months, I was like, wait, this
Speaker 1: is really making a big shift in my mindset. So
Speaker 1: that not only was I getting the positive benefits of
Speaker 1: meditation while I would go to silent ten day courses,
Speaker 1: but now I was actually bringing them at home and
Speaker 1: I was able to accelerate my evolution even further. But
Speaker 1: I think being able to repeat what you actually need
Speaker 1: well just to set up that positive, healthy habit that
Speaker 1: you need to build a new foundation for your life. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it points to also that like change largely
Speaker 1: isn't overnight and immediate, right, not that there aren't moments
Speaker 1: that we have insights that are truly like whoa, Okay,
Speaker 1: the change is really this little by little by little.
Speaker 1: You know, there's an African proverb by love, which is
Speaker 1: little by little a little becomes a lot, right, Like
Speaker 1: that's my core thing, and you really talk about that,
Speaker 1: I'm impressed by your determination, and I'd like to dig
Speaker 1: into that a little bit because you talk about, you know,
Speaker 1: you had this problem with alcohol and drugs and you
Speaker 1: woke up one day and you're like, that's it. I
Speaker 1: think you've got some phrase. I wish. I was just
Speaker 1: looking for it and I can't find it. But like, basically,
Speaker 1: gambling with my life in order to avoid my emotions
Speaker 1: is over. And by gambling with your life, you mean
Speaker 1: taking lots of drugs in order to avoid my emotions
Speaker 1: is over. And you were kind of done, and you
Speaker 1: talk about I decided I'm going to move my body.
Speaker 1: So I'm waiting in the rain, you know, for the bus.
Speaker 1: I'm meditating two hours a day at home. I mean
Speaker 1: that is a significant commitment, and a lot of people
Speaker 1: struggle with that sort of consistency and that sort of determination.
Speaker 1: What can you offer from your experience that might help
Speaker 1: people that are going, wait a minute, I don't have
Speaker 1: that kind of determination. Yeah, I think you know, I'm
Speaker 1: sort of condensing a ten year period into these small sentences.
Speaker 1: So it sounds like it all is happening faster than
Speaker 1: it really did, especially with the very beginning, Like it
Speaker 1: started off slow, like when I almost died accidentally, what
Speaker 1: I fully said no to were the really hard drugs.
Speaker 1: So like I was like, no more cocaine. Done, Like
Speaker 1: that's it with that, No more sort of like random
Speaker 1: assortment of pills that could like conscious you know, like
Speaker 1: that could just like contradict each other and totally make
Speaker 1: me blackout and just like but I was still I
Speaker 1: took a break right after that from smoking marijuana, but
Speaker 1: then I started smoking again, and I would drink alcohol occasionally,
Speaker 1: but there weren't any more like serious drugs that would,
Speaker 1: you know, like totally cancel out my life. And then
Speaker 1: after doing that for like three or four years, then
Speaker 1: I felt this motivation. I started realizing the way like
Speaker 1: alcohol and weed were kind of clashing with the depth
Speaker 1: of my meditation, and I was like, you know what,
Speaker 1: like let me just put them aside, Like I know
Speaker 1: what it's like to be high, I know what it's
Speaker 1: like to be drunk. Let me take this meditation experiment seriously.
Speaker 1: And then I was able to set them aside, and um,
Speaker 1: I haven't drank or smoke or taken any in toxic
Speaker 1: against I think for almost seven years now. Congratulations, Yeah,
Speaker 1: thank you, And that like helped so much, but it
Speaker 1: wasn't like like I was able to just like boom,
Speaker 1: like do this, you know, automatically. And it's the same
Speaker 1: thing with meditating. You know, you start off with a
Speaker 1: course here and there, and then you kind of pick
Speaker 1: up steam over time. But I would say, like to
Speaker 1: anyone who's listening, it's all about small victories. Like it's
Speaker 1: all about small, small threes, and to be able to
Speaker 1: appreciate them and to not worry so much about the
Speaker 1: back and forth because it's a long journey. But if
Speaker 1: you're able to do small amounts of what you weren't
Speaker 1: able to do before, and you're able to repeat those
Speaker 1: small amounts, then they're going to eventually accumulate into like
Speaker 1: a mountain of change. I am mostly in everyday meditator
Speaker 1: these days, and so it's easy to think, well, okay,
Speaker 1: that's determination, but that misses the I don't know twenty
Speaker 1: five years that I was on again, off again meditator,
Speaker 1: Like I couldn't exactly say could not. I did not,
Speaker 1: for whatever reason figure it out. You know, it was
Speaker 1: periods of market intensity than nothing, than periods of market
Speaker 1: intensity than nothing, And it has been all about small
Speaker 1: victories I think, yeah, And it was the same for
Speaker 1: me if with meditation. I knew meditating was good for me,
Speaker 1: but I just like did not have the mental muscle
Speaker 1: to help me do it at home, and there were
Speaker 1: times when I would try, you know, I just can't
Speaker 1: keep it going, and then there was a moment where
Speaker 1: it really clicked. And and that's something that we were
Speaker 1: talking about slightly before, where like they're these moments of
Speaker 1: inspiration where your mindset shifts so much and then you
Speaker 1: understand the direction that you need to move into. And
Speaker 1: the day after is when you start the hard work.
Speaker 1: Is when you start like building that positive habit, and
Speaker 1: then the next day you do it again. The next
Speaker 1: day you do it again, and eventually you know your
Speaker 1: life is totally different. But it takes time to really
Speaker 1: build up. Yeah, I think the important thing is to
Speaker 1: recognize also, as we're saying, just because you've tried something
Speaker 1: a bunch of times before doesn't mean that you're going
Speaker 1: to be unsuccessful this time. And in the coaching work
Speaker 1: I do, that's something a lot of people bring is
Speaker 1: by the time you're going to hire a coach to
Speaker 1: help you with your behavior, it's because you've been unsuccessful
Speaker 1: a lot, right, you wouldn't spend that kind of money
Speaker 1: if you've been successful. And so they come with this,
Speaker 1: I'm the kind of person who can't stick with anything,
Speaker 1: and that's just back to that tendency. Well, okay, we
Speaker 1: can look at your tendency in the past you have
Speaker 1: not stuck with things, and we can learn what we
Speaker 1: can from that, but we have to shake the idea
Speaker 1: that you're going to fail in the future, right, right,
Speaker 1: And it's true. It's like, you know, how was success
Speaker 1: created like through a long series of failures? Like I
Speaker 1: feel like, you know, even when I was developing my
Speaker 1: voice as a writer, you know, I wrote a bunch
Speaker 1: of ships, a bunch of stuff that I just didn't
Speaker 1: really like, that didn't really align with like what I
Speaker 1: wanted to do. So it just takes time to be
Speaker 1: able to really kind of figure out like how you
Speaker 1: want to move forward. Then it's okay to mess up
Speaker 1: a long way. I'd like to talk about low moods
Speaker 1: because there's a lot of different times scattered throughout your
Speaker 1: work that you reference. When you're in a low mood,
Speaker 1: don't do this, or when you're in a lomo, do
Speaker 1: do this. And someone who has low moods, and you know,
Speaker 1: I know a lot of our listeners do. I'd love
Speaker 1: to talk about some of the wisdom you've gotten from
Speaker 1: your own low moods. What are some of the things
Speaker 1: that we don't want to do when we're in a
Speaker 1: low mood, and what are some of the things that
Speaker 1: maybe would be helpful. Yeah, first off, I like to
Speaker 1: write about them because that's the reality of life, is
Speaker 1: that there are ups and downs. And a lot of
Speaker 1: people think that once you stop drinking and wants to
Speaker 1: stop smoking, I want to, you know, make this big change,
Speaker 1: then it's just going to be uphill from here. If
Speaker 1: I did a thirty day retreat, I'd always be happy afterwards, right, Yeah, Nope,
Speaker 1: it's still life after that. You know, it's still you
Speaker 1: can better handle the ups and downs, you can be
Speaker 1: more quantumous to the ups and downs, but you're still
Speaker 1: going to have some days where it's easier for you
Speaker 1: to feel joy and it's easier for you to be
Speaker 1: funny and to laugh and to have you know, just
Speaker 1: like have a great day, and then other days you're
Speaker 1: just gonna wake up heavy and obviously, like right, this
Speaker 1: universe has dominated by the law of cause and effect.
Speaker 1: But sometimes the cause is something simple as like, oh,
Speaker 1: I worked a lot the day before or so today
Speaker 1: I'm just feeling kind of tired, you know. And it's
Speaker 1: nothing big. It's not some crazy narrative like some massive
Speaker 1: thing or like someone did this to me. No, you're
Speaker 1: just tired, you know. So your mood is going to
Speaker 1: be dragged down a little bit. And then what do
Speaker 1: you do in those moments? Something you just said there
Speaker 1: I think is really interesting. I'd like to go a
Speaker 1: little bit deeper, which is, you know, when we're on
Speaker 1: a healing journey, we have low moods, we have emotions. Right,
Speaker 1: I have myself subscribed to two different views of what
Speaker 1: to do in those moments. There are some people who say,
Speaker 1: anytime you're having a negative emotion, there's something going on
Speaker 1: and you need to go find it right, right, it's
Speaker 1: coming from somewhere, it's something can do, right, you know.
Speaker 1: And then there's the other school that I've often subscribed to,
Speaker 1: which I call the emotional flu school, which is I'm
Speaker 1: just like, well, you know what, I've got the emotional
Speaker 1: flu today. I feel down. I'm going to take good
Speaker 1: care of myself. I'm not going to make a big
Speaker 1: fuss about this, And I find both those approaches useful,
Speaker 1: but I often don't know which should I be doing.
Speaker 1: Do you have any thoughts on that? Yeah? I think
Speaker 1: what I have found most successful is that the healing
Speaker 1: happens and how I deal with what I feel. So
Speaker 1: if I'm feeling in a particular way, like how am
Speaker 1: I responding to that? Am I going to react to
Speaker 1: it by taking this anxiety that's coming up and just
Speaker 1: throwing more anxiety onto it and turning into this burning
Speaker 1: fire of anxiety? Or am I just going to sit
Speaker 1: with the anxiety and let it burn itself away? I
Speaker 1: think um a lot of times when we want to
Speaker 1: heal ourselves, we think that the process might be rather
Speaker 1: imaginative or it's very intellectual, and it's like, oh, because
Speaker 1: my mom said this to me back then, that's why
Speaker 1: you know. And sometimes some of that may totally be true,
Speaker 1: But a lot of times it's like the past is
Speaker 1: very opaque and memory is very unreliable. So what I
Speaker 1: can rely on is the fact that I do feel
Speaker 1: this tension in this moment, but how am I going
Speaker 1: to respond to it? And you'll find that a lot
Speaker 1: of the healing of the past, and a lot of
Speaker 1: the alleviation of the past will happen in the present moment.
Speaker 1: So often times I'm not trying to necessarily give a
Speaker 1: narrative to what I'm feeling. Sometimes it may be very clear,
Speaker 1: like I feel like this because someone said this to me.
Speaker 1: But sometimes it's just like, Okay, I feel this way,
Speaker 1: but what are my tools? What am I gonna do?
Speaker 1: I'm going to make sure that I let my wife
Speaker 1: know that I don't feel like good today, so that
Speaker 1: you know, I don't unnecessarily start any arguments by accident.
Speaker 1: I'm also going to make sure that I am relaxing
Speaker 1: the way I am aware of myself, that I'm not
Speaker 1: doing any like harsh negative self talk or I'm not
Speaker 1: like trying to analyze myself really intensely while I'm already
Speaker 1: in a bad mood, and I'm just gonna, you know,
Speaker 1: walk a little more gently through the day. And I'm
Speaker 1: also trying to understand that like this feeling is not
Speaker 1: always going to be there. It's just another transient thing
Speaker 1: that's happened in this human phenomenon. But I really find
Speaker 1: that what's most valuable to healing itself is that capacity
Speaker 1: to feel as opposed to thinking, because thinking can be
Speaker 1: pretty marky. So you talk about how the past leaves
Speaker 1: these imprints, and a lot of them are subconscious. Is
Speaker 1: your belief that simply being attentive to the feelings that
Speaker 1: are coming up and relaxing into them and observing them
Speaker 1: is helping to burn away those subconscious imprints? Is that
Speaker 1: how that mechanism is working. I think at the very
Speaker 1: least it will help not create new ones. Well, yes, right,
Speaker 1: my life philosophy, which is like I'll just teach you
Speaker 1: how to not make life worse. It's hard to sell that,
Speaker 1: but boy, that's so valuable. I mean that's huge. That's
Speaker 1: that's a bit, you know. If you can teach people
Speaker 1: how to do that, I mean, you're golden. It's just
Speaker 1: not a good marketing campaign. So yeah, but I do
Speaker 1: find that like acceptance is just like critical. The tension
Speaker 1: maybe there, but are you going to make it work?
Speaker 1: Like are you going to make it worse by throwing
Speaker 1: more at tension onto it? And you know, I don't
Speaker 1: like to give a step by step like this is
Speaker 1: how you let go and this is how all letting
Speaker 1: go happens. Because different modalities have their different peculiarities. You know,
Speaker 1: they're all very different, you know, different meditation techniques, they
Speaker 1: work in different manners or different forms of therapies and whatnot.
Speaker 1: But I do find that in a lot of them,
Speaker 1: In a lot of these modalities, the key aspect is
Speaker 1: an acceptance is can you just accept? Can you just
Speaker 1: be with what's happening? And you'll find a lot of
Speaker 1: unraveling in that, Yeah, a lot of deconditioning. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think do you speak to an important point there, which
Speaker 1: is depending on the modality that you're working in, you know,
Speaker 1: obviously it's going to have its its point of view.
Speaker 1: And you know, me having probably a couple of decades
Speaker 1: on you, right, I've had a couple of decades to
Speaker 1: experiment with different modalities, and different ones have been helpful
Speaker 1: at different times. But broadly speaking, I tend to, at
Speaker 1: least this phase of my life kind of be where
Speaker 1: you are, which is okay. That's why I love the
Speaker 1: emotional flu metaphor. It just sort of says like, when
Speaker 1: I have the flu, I don't make a big deal
Speaker 1: out of it, right, I'm like, okay, am I taking
Speaker 1: care of myself when I resting, and I you know,
Speaker 1: don't make any decisions while you have the flu. You know,
Speaker 1: the world looks crappy, don't trust it, you know, just
Speaker 1: let it, just kind of relax into it. And so
Speaker 1: it's a metaphor that served me. So you've you mentioned
Speaker 1: a couple of things to do in the low mood moment, right,
Speaker 1: You mentioned, like, I love the one about telling your wife,
Speaker 1: you know, like that's so helpful. So you just say
Speaker 1: to the people around me, like, I'm really irritable today,
Speaker 1: no good reason, nothing, you're doing. It just can relieve
Speaker 1: so much suffering, you know, of my partner wondering what
Speaker 1: did I do something wrong? And I'm like, no, proactive,
Speaker 1: So so that's a good one. You also mentioned don't
Speaker 1: self analyze a lot, So talk a little bit more
Speaker 1: about not self analyzing when we're in a low mood. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it happens often when you're already in this
Speaker 1: low mood, all of your accomplishments seemed tiny. It seems
Speaker 1: like you haven't you haven't got anything done. You're actually,
Speaker 1: you know, not as far along as you thought you were.
Speaker 1: And this person hates you, and this other person probably
Speaker 1: hates you too, and it's just you know, you're just
Speaker 1: snowballing down this hill of negativity, so don't add yourself
Speaker 1: to that. You know, this isn't the time for you
Speaker 1: to like be like, you know, doing some deep internal
Speaker 1: assessment of like how far you've really come. You're better
Speaker 1: off doing something like that not too often, but when
Speaker 1: you do, like do it when your mind feels balanced,
Speaker 1: take that big step back and see, Okay, you know,
Speaker 1: where was I when I first began this journey and
Speaker 1: where am I now? Not where I was last week,
Speaker 1: because last week doesn't matter. What matters is like from
Speaker 1: the beginning to where I am now. I try to
Speaker 1: be really careful with my low moods because I can
Speaker 1: like look at what I've gone through in life and
Speaker 1: be like, oh, actually I totally suck. But it's just
Speaker 1: the low mode. Yeah. In certain schools of thought, there's
Speaker 1: an idea that thoughts cause emotions, right, I believe that's true.
Speaker 1: But I believe there's another direction, and it's that emotions
Speaker 1: cause thoughts that like, if I wake up for whatever
Speaker 1: reason and there's a heavy mood here, my thoughts get
Speaker 1: filtered through that, you know, and recognizing that, like you're saying, like,
Speaker 1: let me not do a lot of self assessment. Now,
Speaker 1: the nature of being in the low mood for me
Speaker 1: is I go what am I doing wrong? Oh? God?
Speaker 1: You know you've hosted five podcasts, How can you be
Speaker 1: in a mood like that? Like you said, setting that
Speaker 1: aside can be really helpful. You talk a lot also
Speaker 1: about relaxing. Say more about the role of relaxing in
Speaker 1: these moments. Yeah, I think we have this attachment to
Speaker 1: speed we have in our society. Everything is moving so
Speaker 1: incredibly fast, and it's to the point where it's just
Speaker 1: detrimental to our mental health, even down to the way
Speaker 1: the Internet works and social media works, and you know,
Speaker 1: the amount of information that we get through our cell phones.
Speaker 1: Like you have to realize that every time you consume information,
Speaker 1: you're burning energy. So if you already don't feel good,
Speaker 1: this is an opportunity for practice, Like practice your gentleness
Speaker 1: towards yourself and allow yourself to slow down, allow yourself
Speaker 1: to accomplish a little less that day. You know, we
Speaker 1: often feel like we're in this like race, when actually
Speaker 1: a lot of that is self imposed. You know, you
Speaker 1: can accomplish great things without having to work super super
Speaker 1: super hard every single day. Being able to give yourself
Speaker 1: good rest can actually be what you need to take
Speaker 1: a really big leap forward. We talked early or about greed,
Speaker 1: Greed and aversion. Greed is often talked about also as
Speaker 1: craving right gets translated sometimes into attachment. A superficial reading
Speaker 1: of Buddhism, or a reading that that isn't real well informed,
Speaker 1: can end up with the idea that wanting anything is wrong, right,
Speaker 1: Talk to me about your thoughts on that. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean so I I never really connected with the Buddhist
Speaker 1: teaching until I did my first papas of course. So like,
Speaker 1: obviously the buddh is a very popular guy, you know,
Speaker 1: like I've been hearing about him throughout my whole life
Speaker 1: and um, and whenever I would hear about the teaching,
Speaker 1: I wasn't really interested. But when I went to go
Speaker 1: do that first papasita, of course, what immediately stuck out
Speaker 1: to me was that they translated the root of suffering
Speaker 1: as craving, not as desire. And I was like, this
Speaker 1: makes way more sense, you know, because I remember that
Speaker 1: first course, I asked the teacher, you know, was the
Speaker 1: Buddha craving liberation? Because he was putting a lot of
Speaker 1: effort into's liberating himself. And he was like, no, there's
Speaker 1: a difference between having a goal and having a craving.
Speaker 1: I remember hearing that, and it just blew my mind
Speaker 1: that there's a subtlety there. You know that we're all householders,
Speaker 1: Like we're not monks. You know, we were out here
Speaker 1: living our lives, and it's fine for us to have goals,
Speaker 1: and you notice that it's something that is becoming if
Speaker 1: the goal is slipping into a craving when you don't
Speaker 1: get what you want and then you get so upset
Speaker 1: that you don't have what you want and your mind
Speaker 1: is just you know, rippling with tension, and you know
Speaker 1: you're really just totally out of balance. And if it's
Speaker 1: just a goal, it's something that you try to keep
Speaker 1: working towards your doing so in a balanced way, and
Speaker 1: when you don't get what you want, you're okay. But
Speaker 1: what you end up doing is you go back to
Speaker 1: the drawing board. You strategize again, and you figure out
Speaker 1: what can I do better to continue calmly taking steps
Speaker 1: forward to achieve whatever goal it is that I desire.
Speaker 1: I love what you're saying there. I love the use
Speaker 1: of the word subtle because as the path goes on,
Speaker 1: it gets more clear, right. And I've been able to
Speaker 1: notice in myself where I'm not sure what to call it.
Speaker 1: It's a goal, it's not a craving in that, like
Speaker 1: I'm not getting all bent out of shape, but I
Speaker 1: am thinking about it a lot, right, Like it's always
Speaker 1: kind of there, you know, And so for me it's
Speaker 1: even been well, okay, am I just strategizing in a
Speaker 1: useful way? Am I? Just you know, back to the
Speaker 1: drawing board. There's a subtlety in this that I find
Speaker 1: takes a lot of discernment. Yeah, And you'll notice that
Speaker 1: if you think it's a goal but it's actually a craving,
Speaker 1: what you'll notice is the tension. There's tension there, and
Speaker 1: it's you know, consuming your mind too much, or it's
Speaker 1: like stopping you from enjoying whatever beautiful moment is happening
Speaker 1: in front of you. Then there's too much tension around this,
Speaker 1: and it's actually a crazy raving. But to be able
Speaker 1: to work when you need to work and then rest
Speaker 1: when you need to rest, being able to set this
Speaker 1: to aside and being able to live them in a
Speaker 1: good way, then you know that you're living in a
Speaker 1: much more balanced way. In order to do that, I
Speaker 1: think there is a sense of enough. There's a sense
Speaker 1: of what is enough? What is enough? Work? What is enough? Money?
Speaker 1: What is enough? Like? What is enough? How do you
Speaker 1: think about enough for yourself? Right? You're in a world
Speaker 1: where I don't know how many social media followers you have,
Speaker 1: but it is a big number, right, But is it enough? Right?
Speaker 1: You're making some money from doing this work, but is
Speaker 1: it enough? How do you think about that? I try
Speaker 1: to be really careful with that because it's you know, craving,
Speaker 1: Like what we're talking about. Craving is a really powerful tendency.
Speaker 1: So it's easy to just like be like, oh, you know,
Speaker 1: how quickly can I get to like the next like
Speaker 1: hundred thousand followers or whatnot? And it's just like an
Speaker 1: empty black hole. It's you know, it's it's just there.
Speaker 1: There's never gonna be enough, Like it's an ever going
Speaker 1: to be like I finally got here. I'm here where
Speaker 1: I want to be. And also, if I'm thinking in
Speaker 1: that way, then I'm already externalizing my value as a
Speaker 1: human being. Like I'm already saying like that I have
Speaker 1: to accomplish this thing and then I'll be where I
Speaker 1: want to be. And this isn't like a conversation between
Speaker 1: me and other people. It's between me and me. And
Speaker 1: I'm losing, right, Like if I'm just like I need
Speaker 1: to get this to be happy, I've already lost. So
Speaker 1: that's That's something that I've been really careful with in
Speaker 1: my own mind, instead of being like what else can
Speaker 1: I get? Instead to be grateful for where I've gotten,
Speaker 1: for how far I've gotten, and to try my best
Speaker 1: to not so much care about oh is this piece
Speaker 1: like getting X number of likes? And now it's more
Speaker 1: so like is this piece actually meaningful to me? Does
Speaker 1: it make sense to me? Like? Is it something that
Speaker 1: when I was creating it it really felt right. It's
Speaker 1: a very slippery slope, and I think a lot of people,
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of creators out there just are
Speaker 1: internally struggling because they're putting too much value on the numbers. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it is pernicious. I'm thinking to a conversation I have
Speaker 1: with somebody recently about addiction, and they said, it's hard
Speaker 1: to get enough of something that almost works, and that
Speaker 1: is such a great getting the more social media followers
Speaker 1: almost works, right, it almost makes you feel better but
Speaker 1: doesn't but almost, But that almost is enough. We've recently
Speaker 1: been engaging with some people about podcast growth and they're
Speaker 1: often like, well, which episodes of Years are performing best?
Speaker 1: And I'm like, you know what, I don't know, because
Speaker 1: I've tried to divorce myself from not that I don't
Speaker 1: care what people want or like, because of course I do.
Speaker 1: But my process, it's similar to Years, has always been
Speaker 1: if I'm interested in talking to the person, then I
Speaker 1: think it's going to be an interest in good conversation.
Speaker 1: If I'm not and I'm doing it because I think
Speaker 1: that's what but want to hear about, that's not going
Speaker 1: to work out so well. You referenced The Doubt a
Speaker 1: Ching a couple of times, which is a favorite book
Speaker 1: of mine. But there's a line at the end of
Speaker 1: the eighth verse or poem or whatever you call them,
Speaker 1: it is you do your work and step back the
Speaker 1: only path to serenity. I recently on a similar note,
Speaker 1: like about a month and a half now almost two months,
Speaker 1: where I just like stopped checking the analytics on Instagram.
Speaker 1: It has made such a world of a difference because
Speaker 1: like I would check the analytics and immediately feel tension,
Speaker 1: Like even if it was good, even if it was
Speaker 1: like good, you know, it's just like, oh, like what more,
Speaker 1: you know, like how can I do things better? And
Speaker 1: now that I've like stopped checking it, life is a
Speaker 1: lot better. In what you were saying with the conversation
Speaker 1: you have with your friend reminds me of a conversation
Speaker 1: that I had with my wife where I think we
Speaker 1: were eating ice cream and I turned to her and
Speaker 1: I was like, maybe this is the one that will
Speaker 1: actually make me happy, you know, like this this yep,
Speaker 1: And she just starts laughing and she was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: because it's it's not you know, like this is a
Speaker 1: part of the Buddhist teaching that I think a lot
Speaker 1: of people don't like. But it's just super real. It's dissatisfaction,
Speaker 1: you know, is another way to translate suffering. But there's
Speaker 1: this like pervasive dissatisfaction that was constantly combating because you
Speaker 1: can have everything and it's still not enough. I agree.
Speaker 1: When I was a twenty four year old heroin Attic,
Speaker 1: suffering was the word that really applied. And I have
Speaker 1: had times in my life where I've been in deep
Speaker 1: mental suffering and there are people who are in deep
Speaker 1: mental suffering. For me, though, the work these days is
Speaker 1: as you say, it's around this sort of pervasive, very
Speaker 1: mild dissatisfaction. You know. It's noticing that and going okay,
Speaker 1: hold on, Like you said, everything I need to be
Speaker 1: happy is right here. It really is. You know, if
Speaker 1: you told me any number of years ago, Eric, here's
Speaker 1: where you will be at this age. I've been like,
Speaker 1: I will take it. I will take it, I will
Speaker 1: be I mean right, but of or you know, we
Speaker 1: still have to work with the mind all the time.
Speaker 1: Listening to talk is making me realize how whether it's
Speaker 1: suffering or whether it's dissatisfaction, both of them are pulling
Speaker 1: you out of the present moment, like they're immediately pulling
Speaker 1: you into planning, like how am I going to get
Speaker 1: the next thing? How can I reset up these conditions
Speaker 1: to be able to get this sensation one more time?
Speaker 1: And you're immediately just in this like imaginary world that
Speaker 1: induces even more dissatisfaction. Yeah, that is My primary mental
Speaker 1: direction is forward and planning. And it's not highly anxious,
Speaker 1: it's not freading, but it is still not here, you know,
Speaker 1: it is still not here. And so I think all
Speaker 1: of our work, right is how do we come back
Speaker 1: to this moment and how it be enough. In your
Speaker 1: latest book, Lighter, Let Go of the Past, Connect with
Speaker 1: the Present, expand the future, you say that the goal
Speaker 1: of this book for you was to be a bridge
Speaker 1: between the ideas of personal transformation and global transformation. Say
Speaker 1: a little bit more about that, Yeah, I mean, Lighter
Speaker 1: really tries to focus on the different thresholds that people
Speaker 1: go through when they're actively evolving, when they're actively trying
Speaker 1: to heal themselves. But I wanted to make sure that
Speaker 1: the end of the book tied that into how this
Speaker 1: healing generation that's emerging, because I really feel like there
Speaker 1: are just millions and millions of people who are actively
Speaker 1: healing themselves, whether it's through Eastern modalities, Western modalities, indigenous modalities.
Speaker 1: Healing has become this massive, massive thing. Not only is
Speaker 1: that going to benefit your personal life, but it will
Speaker 1: ripple outward and it will start making global transformation become
Speaker 1: more possible in a sustainable manner. And I write about
Speaker 1: this in the book, where you know, there have always
Speaker 1: been groups of people who try to change the world
Speaker 1: and make get into a better place. People who have
Speaker 1: had these amazing values. But something that happens repeatedly is
Speaker 1: that once people gain power, power has this way of
Speaker 1: functioning like a magnet where it will literally pull out
Speaker 1: the roughest parts of your ego. So, if you've never
Speaker 1: healed yourself, and if on the surface you seem like
Speaker 1: a pretty good person, once you get power, then the
Speaker 1: roughest parts of you are going to come out. They're
Speaker 1: going to be given a platform for you to play out,
Speaker 1: just like all of the trauma that you've experienced. And
Speaker 1: what happens often is that people who set out to
Speaker 1: change the world into a better place end up recreating
Speaker 1: the thing that they were originally fighting against. One example
Speaker 1: that comes to mind is like the French Revolution, and
Speaker 1: it's so funny, that was the exact one in my mind. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And you know, I just finished reading the biography of
Speaker 1: the Marketa Lafayette and it was beautiful getting a taste
Speaker 1: of the American Revolution and the French Revolution through the
Speaker 1: lens of his life. And when the Jacobins and when
Speaker 1: they started gaining power, and you know, they killed the
Speaker 1: king and then this thread terror began where so many
Speaker 1: thousands and thousands of people were killed, and you know,
Speaker 1: At first, it may have quote unquote seemed like there
Speaker 1: was some form of justice, but like, you know, this
Speaker 1: wasn't it really like justice. It was revenge. But then
Speaker 1: it was just like, oh, I don't like this person,
Speaker 1: so I'm going to add their name to the list,
Speaker 1: or I don't like that person, and it just was
Speaker 1: this horrible blood bath. But then when you look at
Speaker 1: these people who were in charge of this blood bath before,
Speaker 1: they seem like there are people with good values and
Speaker 1: they were trying to build this beautiful revolution. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean Robespierre. For a long time, you're like, this is
Speaker 1: an extraordinarily admirable man, extraordinary Yeah, and then it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: he just went this went wrong. You know, this definitely
Speaker 1: went wrong. What I'm hoping that is the big sort
Speaker 1: of shift in our century is that people are going
Speaker 1: to continue trying to change the world into a better place,
Speaker 1: because that's the direction of history. Right. We're trying to
Speaker 1: increase human dignity, we're trying to create the conditions for
Speaker 1: human flourishing, and we've made a long way. The world
Speaker 1: is definitely like I'd rather be born now than in
Speaker 1: eighteen forty or like sixteen twenty, like I'd rather be
Speaker 1: alive now pick any time really exactly. And though that
Speaker 1: this century has these really giant, daunting challenges, I think
Speaker 1: that our inner healing is going to streamlined the way
Speaker 1: that we try to actively build a more compassionate structure
Speaker 1: in our world. So when we build this structural compassion,
Speaker 1: I think our healing is going to be the foundation
Speaker 1: that it really rests on, because we haven't had that
Speaker 1: before in human history, where people who were more self aware,
Speaker 1: had more self love, or you know, less burdened by
Speaker 1: their past traumas, who were actively healing themselves. Like people
Speaker 1: who go into this deep work, they're far far less
Speaker 1: inclined to hurt other people. They're just not interested. They're like,
Speaker 1: I don't want to hurt you because that's gonna immediately
Speaker 1: hurt me, like it's going to cause so much tension
Speaker 1: in my own mind. So I really think the two
Speaker 1: are just really deeply into connected, and I'm excited that
Speaker 1: they're going to be happening simultaneously for the first time.
Speaker 1: The inner healing and the outer healing. Yeah, that's beautiful.
Speaker 1: I can't resist a plug here, which is I do
Speaker 1: this thing called teaching song and a poem each week
Speaker 1: that I give to supporters of the show, and a
Speaker 1: recent one was all about like I'd invested so much
Speaker 1: time in the French Revolution learning about it, I was like,
Speaker 1: I gotta make something out of this, So I made
Speaker 1: an episode out of here's what the French Revolution can
Speaker 1: tell us about teachings that we can apply in our
Speaker 1: own lives. Listeners, if you want access to that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff when you feed dot net slash joint you
Speaker 1: got another one minute, two minutes, sure, but if you
Speaker 1: promised me to send me a reading list about the
Speaker 1: French Revolution, because it seems like you've read more than
Speaker 1: I have. I primarily listen to a podcast. Are you
Speaker 1: familiar with the Revolutions podcast? Yes, but I haven't heard
Speaker 1: their series yet on the French Revolution. It's like forty hours.
Speaker 1: It's more than you really need to know. But once
Speaker 1: I started, I couldn't stop. I also read a novel,
Speaker 1: so I love fiction, but I read a novel by
Speaker 1: a woman named Hilary Mantell. She wrote wolf Hall about
Speaker 1: Thomas Cromwell and Louis the Eight, but she also wrote
Speaker 1: about Robespierre, de Mulan and Donton from the perspective of
Speaker 1: their family. So it's historical fiction, but it's kind of
Speaker 1: from their families. It's a fascinating books. So good, I
Speaker 1: think you'd love it all right, So this is my
Speaker 1: last question. You sort of alluded to it there, but
Speaker 1: you say that you think that humanity is maturing. I'd
Speaker 1: love to explore that a little bit. Some people vehemently
Speaker 1: disagree with that. I actually, I think am on your side.
Speaker 1: I think we actually are maturing as long as we're
Speaker 1: alive as a species long enough to continue it, which
Speaker 1: is a little worrisome with climate change. But talk to
Speaker 1: me about why you think we're maturing. I think a
Speaker 1: lot of that is due to this emerging healing generation.
Speaker 1: I think there are just a lot of people who
Speaker 1: are basically exhausted by suffering, exhausted by dissatisfaction. And not
Speaker 1: only are they individually exhausted by it, but they're also
Speaker 1: seeing that being miserable is going out of style. Like,
Speaker 1: you know, wellness has become this like really popular thing,
Speaker 1: and it's more acceptable to like go meditate, to go
Speaker 1: see a therapist, you know, if you need a psychiatrist,
Speaker 1: to go get a psychiatrist and get you know, whatever
Speaker 1: it is that you need that's going to help you
Speaker 1: take steps forward in your life, positive steps forward. And
Speaker 1: I think out of that, there's going to be more
Speaker 1: people who are not only going to change the way
Speaker 1: that they behave on the individual level, but it's going
Speaker 1: to affect their work. It's going to affect the institutions
Speaker 1: that they're part of, it's going to affect who they
Speaker 1: vote for. It's going to just affect the way that
Speaker 1: they see the world, and they're going to allow their
Speaker 1: compassion to become more expansive. Because I really believe that
Speaker 1: if your self love is real, it has to open
Speaker 1: the door to unconditional love to all beings because the
Speaker 1: two are just so deeply intertwined. That's one of the
Speaker 1: reasons why I read under the name Young Pueblo. Is like,
Speaker 1: when I started meditating, I realized I was like, WHOA,
Speaker 1: Not only am I am mature, but the world is immature.
Speaker 1: Like we have a lot of growing up to do,
Speaker 1: Like we can't do these basic things, like you know,
Speaker 1: the things that we were taught in kindergarten, like clean
Speaker 1: up after yourself, tell the truth, share with each other,
Speaker 1: don't hit each other, and just generally be kind to
Speaker 1: one another. These are fundamental, basic things that we should
Speaker 1: be able to do on the collective level, on the
Speaker 1: human level across the world. And I think that our
Speaker 1: individual healing is gonna spur us into just building sort
Speaker 1: of this compassionate structure or that I think is going
Speaker 1: to be possible, wonderful. I think that is a beautiful
Speaker 1: place to wrap it up. Diego, Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: I have really enjoyed this conversation. I've really enjoyed diving
Speaker 1: into your work over the last couple of weeks and
Speaker 1: getting to know you better. So thank you, Thank you
Speaker 1: so much, Eric, this conversation. It brings me so much joy.
Speaker 1: Thank you. If what you just heard was helpful to you,
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