Speaker 1: I think we do have more common than we have differences,
Speaker 1: and when we realize that there's significantly less conflict, Welcome
Speaker 1: to the one you feed Throughout time, great thinkers have
Speaker 1: recognized the importance of the thoughts we have, quotes like
Speaker 1: garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you think
Speaker 1: ring true. And yet for many of us, our thoughts
Speaker 1: don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self pity, jealousy,
Speaker 1: or fear. We see what we don't have instead of
Speaker 1: what we do. We think things that hold us back
Speaker 1: and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking.
Speaker 1: Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort
Speaker 1: to make a life worth living. This podcast is about
Speaker 1: how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction,
Speaker 1: how they feed their good wolf. Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 1: Our guest on this episode is Danielle Laporte, a speaker, poet, painter,
Speaker 1: and former business strategist and Washington d C Think tank executive.
Speaker 1: Danielle is also an invited member of Oprah Winfrey's Super
Speaker 1: Soul One. She is the author of many books, including
Speaker 1: her new one White Hot Truth Clarity for Keeping It
Speaker 1: Real on your spiritual path from one seeker to another.
Speaker 1: If you're getting value out of the show, please go
Speaker 1: to one you feed dot Net slash Support and make
Speaker 1: a donation. This will ensure that all five episodes that
Speaker 1: are in the archive will remain free and that the
Speaker 1: show is here for other people who need it. Some
Speaker 1: other ways that you can support is is if you're
Speaker 1: interested in the book that we're discussing on today's episode,
Speaker 1: go to one you feed dot net and find the
Speaker 1: episode that we're talking to out. There will be links
Speaker 1: to all of the author's books, and if you buy
Speaker 1: them through there, it's the same price to you, but
Speaker 1: we get a small amount. Also, you can go to
Speaker 1: one you feed dot Net slash Book and I have
Speaker 1: a reading list there. When you feed dot net slash
Speaker 1: shop and you can buy t shirts, mugs and other things.
Speaker 1: And finally, one you feed dot net slash Facebook, which
Speaker 1: is where our Facebook group is and you can interact
Speaker 1: with other listeners of the show and get support in
Speaker 1: feeding your Good Wolf. Thanks again for listening, and here's
Speaker 1: the interview with Danielle Report. Hi Danielle, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 1: Hi everybody. I'm very happy to have you on. As
Speaker 1: we were talking about before we got started, I recorded
Speaker 1: an interview with you. It was quite some time ago,
Speaker 1: and it it was the first time I ever tried to
Speaker 1: record an interview without Chris, my partner with me, and
Speaker 1: I blew it and so we've never been able to
Speaker 1: air it. So I'm very excited to have you back
Speaker 1: and get to have this conversation again. I didn't know
Speaker 1: it was the first time you tried to record it solo.
Speaker 1: Here we are. Yeah, I happened to be out of
Speaker 1: town and I've got it all down now. I've got
Speaker 1: to figured out, but I didn't then. So what you
Speaker 1: learn learn as you go. So um, your latest book
Speaker 1: is called White Hot Truth Clarity for Keeping it Real
Speaker 1: on your spiritual Path from one seeker to another. And
Speaker 1: we'll get into that book in just a minute, but
Speaker 1: let's start like we normally do, with a parable. There's
Speaker 1: a grandfather who's talking with his grandson. He says, in life,
Speaker 1: there are two wolves inside of us that are always
Speaker 1: at battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things
Speaker 1: like kindness and bravery and love, and the other is
Speaker 1: a bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred
Speaker 1: and fear. And the grandson stops and he thinks about
Speaker 1: it for a second, and he looks up at his
Speaker 1: grandfather and he says, well, grandfather, which one wins? And
Speaker 1: the grandfather says, the one you feed. So I'd like
Speaker 1: to start off by asking you what that parable means
Speaker 1: to you in your life and in the work that
Speaker 1: you do. That parable Always choose I think you know,
Speaker 1: the most important word in all of this is truth.
Speaker 1: But always choose generosity. I feed my capacity to be generous. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a line that's in your book, and it was
Speaker 1: in one of your previous books too. You've got this
Speaker 1: idea of in the latest book. You call it reframing
Speaker 1: your obligations into conscious choices. Can you talk about that
Speaker 1: because that is so important to me in my life. Well,
Speaker 1: I think you know, this is part of getting in
Speaker 1: the driver's seat of your life and really being an
Speaker 1: intentional creator and completely washing out any victim mentality out
Speaker 1: of your consciousness. You know, the worst extreme is that
Speaker 1: that kind of robotic, unconscious way of living. I have
Speaker 1: a really long list of obligations, all these things that
Speaker 1: we think we need to do, and in that approach,
Speaker 1: there's a lack of choice, there's a woo. So what
Speaker 1: was me there? There's a you know, life is happening
Speaker 1: to you and I don't think it happens that way
Speaker 1: at all. Or you can choose. You can choose that
Speaker 1: other that positive wealth doesn't happen to happen the way.
Speaker 1: So to push most people's thinking on this, the push
Speaker 1: back would be, well, what about feeding my kids? That's
Speaker 1: an obligation. What about taking care of my ailing aging
Speaker 1: parents that's an obligation. What about my mortgage? I gotta
Speaker 1: pay my mortgage. You actually don't have to do any
Speaker 1: of those things. You could choose to be unethical, you
Speaker 1: could choose to be careless, you could you choose to
Speaker 1: be lawless, but you're still making a conscious choice to
Speaker 1: be a good son or daughter and a loving parent
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, a responsible mortgage holder. So you know,
Speaker 1: when you frame everything as a choice, you're empowered. It's
Speaker 1: a completely different energetic approach to things. Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 1: I have that aim kind of conversation with myself and
Speaker 1: with other people, which is like, no, you don't have
Speaker 1: to do that thing that you just said you have
Speaker 1: to do. I mean you you don't. You could get
Speaker 1: on a bus tomorrow and hide in California and live
Speaker 1: on the streets if you wanted to, Like, you've got
Speaker 1: lots of options. And whenever I remember that, it is
Speaker 1: so helpful to me to get me out of that
Speaker 1: like you said, the woe is me, or I have
Speaker 1: to do this, I have to do that. It just
Speaker 1: it opens me up so much to realizing that I am,
Speaker 1: you know, the author of my own life to some degree.
Speaker 1: And I heard you somewhere recently, and I don't know
Speaker 1: where I heard it, but you were making this list
Speaker 1: of all the things in our lives. We choose. We
Speaker 1: choose what we eat for dinner, we choose what dishes
Speaker 1: we put in our cabinet, we choose what you know,
Speaker 1: what art goes on our walls or on our desk,
Speaker 1: and and that how we are making so many choices
Speaker 1: in life, and that being artistic and creative is really
Speaker 1: about making choices, and we can bring that artistic or
Speaker 1: creative spirit into everything that we do. You know, what
Speaker 1: I think is really key about what you said about
Speaker 1: the choices and the obligations is there's a lot of
Speaker 1: different choices that we can make. So when you move
Speaker 1: out of that the weight I mean even saying the
Speaker 1: word obligation. It's just such a heavy crap word. You know.
Speaker 1: When you move out of the weight of that and
Speaker 1: you're still feeling resentment, I mean, there's lots of stuff
Speaker 1: to resent. There's lots of stuff that is not fun
Speaker 1: to do in life that you're still choosing to do.
Speaker 1: You can start to make different choices under that commitment
Speaker 1: you're making. So it's like, yeah, I'm taking care of
Speaker 1: my aging parents and it's heavy duty. But you know,
Speaker 1: if I move more into the power of choice, and
Speaker 1: maybe I could get someone to take a shift for me.
Speaker 1: Maybe I could ask for some of my inheritance money
Speaker 1: now to cover the bills. Maybe you know what, maybe
Speaker 1: they don't need as much attention and care as I thought.
Speaker 1: And I'm just doing this at a guilt and I
Speaker 1: can lay off and I can have a vacation. So
Speaker 1: there's this loosening when you loosen up on the weight
Speaker 1: of obligation, and then your creativity starts to flow. It
Speaker 1: gets lighter, exactly. So I want to circle back. This
Speaker 1: leads us right into one of the topics I had,
Speaker 1: which was, you know, a theme early in the book
Speaker 1: and really through a lot of the book, you say
Speaker 1: that my spiritual path had become another to do list.
Speaker 1: So in this case, you know, we were just talking
Speaker 1: about obligations, and a lot of us turn the spiritual
Speaker 1: path into yet another obligation. Well, I think in this
Speaker 1: case it's more about it being another thing to achieve,
Speaker 1: So then it becomes an obligation. I'm going to be
Speaker 1: a better person, I'm going to be more giving, I'm
Speaker 1: going to be in better shape, I'm going to be
Speaker 1: more healthy, i'm going to be more evolved, I'm going
Speaker 1: to think more clearly. And with that achievement intention, then
Speaker 1: there's so many things you can put on your to
Speaker 1: do list. It's another workshop. It's having to meditate, it's
Speaker 1: having to pray, it's a new wellness regime. It's all
Speaker 1: sorts of two does. And I shudos are great if
Speaker 1: they're getting you somewhere that's more fulfilling, if you like,
Speaker 1: you're really feeling expanded, and ideally you know, your teats
Speaker 1: are awesome. They go from good to great if you're
Speaker 1: experiencing some joy on the whale to expanding. It's like
Speaker 1: there's many times there's many parts of my quote unquote
Speaker 1: spiritual practice that aren't easy and they require some discipline,
Speaker 1: and you know, I I meditate on a regular basis,
Speaker 1: and it's not always fun. Working my day around that.
Speaker 1: I have to get up earlier. I gotta make my
Speaker 1: kids lunch at night so I can have my fifteen
Speaker 1: minutes to my happen or whatever it is in the
Speaker 1: morning to sit and do my thing. I still struggle
Speaker 1: with feeling like I'm not up to my commitment as
Speaker 1: a planetary citizen if I didn't sit that morning and
Speaker 1: send some light to the world, or pray for you know,
Speaker 1: victims of the hurricane, or do whatever I think I
Speaker 1: need to do that day. Um, I don't feel like
Speaker 1: anybody's keeping score anymore. I'm free to choose the practice
Speaker 1: that works for me. And that's what's changed for me.
Speaker 1: It's like I am choosing joy inducing practices. The yoga
Speaker 1: that works for me. It's not the hardcore hot yoga.
Speaker 1: It's really chill stuff. The exercise that works for me.
Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be every day a week, just
Speaker 1: three days a week is cool. You know. The kind
Speaker 1: of meditation that works for me. It turns out I
Speaker 1: go out of my mind if I sit for a
Speaker 1: long periods of time and watch my in breath and
Speaker 1: watch my out breath and try to empty my mind.
Speaker 1: It's not how I'm wired. I choose something that fits
Speaker 1: my personality, that fills me up. It's a big difference,
Speaker 1: way more fulfilling to be devoted when the practice itself
Speaker 1: has some delight to it. Yeah, I agree completely. And
Speaker 1: in the book you're talking about the striking the balance
Speaker 1: between you say, sincere spiritual aspiration versus the compulsion to
Speaker 1: change ourselves. One of the central themes of this show
Speaker 1: that I'm asking all the time is that, like, how
Speaker 1: do we balance that idea of you know, I'd like
Speaker 1: to be a better person. I'd like to do this,
Speaker 1: I'd like to do that, you know, having some ambition
Speaker 1: and also being content right where you are with what
Speaker 1: you have. And I'm just interested in your thoughts on
Speaker 1: how you how you work through striking that balance. Well,
Speaker 1: I think you have to ask yourself the question why
Speaker 1: do you want to be a better person? It sounds like,
Speaker 1: you know, ironic and a bit but now, but like
Speaker 1: why is it to impress your God? Is it to
Speaker 1: make more money? Is it some guilt programming that you
Speaker 1: got from your parents or your church? Um? Is it
Speaker 1: part of being cool and your self help in your
Speaker 1: new age circle. Are you like to really just polishing
Speaker 1: your halo? I've always loved that phrase. Or do you
Speaker 1: feel better when you're a better person? Do you feel
Speaker 1: more expanded and more loving and sex here and more
Speaker 1: flexible and more intelligent and let more in touch with
Speaker 1: life and your version of God when you're doing your
Speaker 1: version of being a better person. So like two very
Speaker 1: different motivations. Yeah, I agree, And I think for me,
Speaker 1: all that stuff has gotten to a point where I
Speaker 1: do most of it simply as a way to feel better.
Speaker 1: It does make me feel better, I mean exercise. I
Speaker 1: say this on the show all time. I'm sure people
Speaker 1: are perhaps tired of hearing it, but it's not about
Speaker 1: how I look anymore. That's a side benefit. It's not
Speaker 1: so much that I'll die in twenty years versus fifteen.
Speaker 1: It's really like for my day to day mental health
Speaker 1: and meditation kind of falls into the same boat, and
Speaker 1: eating right falls into the same boat. They're all things
Speaker 1: that relieve suffering in my life, relieve suffering and creates
Speaker 1: Joe at the same time, Like it's there's a tipping point.
Speaker 1: It's a tipping point. I think if you do it
Speaker 1: for the right reasons. Right, here's a question I've got
Speaker 1: for you. Because a lot of us are driven to
Speaker 1: spiritual practice and things like meditation and yoga and eating
Speaker 1: well and all those different things because we are in pain.
Speaker 1: That's where a lot of this starts. And what I've
Speaker 1: seen with a lot of people is that once the
Speaker 1: pain goes away, so does the desire to do some
Speaker 1: of these things. How how have you worked with people
Speaker 1: through that, you know, once they kind of have moved
Speaker 1: from being in pain and not sort of settling back
Speaker 1: into okay, everything's okay. Now, Well, I think everybody does
Speaker 1: that to some degree. You're going to slip off track,
Speaker 1: and getting off track is part of deepening your devotion.
Speaker 1: It's like I didn't meditate this week. I don't feel
Speaker 1: as useful, I'm not thinking as clearly. Okay, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: at least get three days in this week or five
Speaker 1: days or whatever. So I have a lot more compassion
Speaker 1: for myself when I get off track. I think, you know,
Speaker 1: what you're talking about can be laziness, you know, it
Speaker 1: can like sometimes we just need to call ourselves on it.
Speaker 1: Like you know, my current question right now, I'm about
Speaker 1: to do big speaking big this weekend. Um to people
Speaker 1: who you know they self identify as like high achievers,
Speaker 1: and I really want to put it to them and say, like, really,
Speaker 1: come on, how devoted are we? Because personally, I'm really
Speaker 1: interested in going the distance. I think it's not enough
Speaker 1: to kind of be on the self help path or
Speaker 1: to kind of be kind like with the current state
Speaker 1: of the world and psychology for for most of us,
Speaker 1: I mean personally, as someone who considers themselves, Um, it's
Speaker 1: not enough for me to just be a good person.
Speaker 1: I have to be engaged. It's not enough for me
Speaker 1: to just donate a little bit of money here and there.
Speaker 1: I've got to bake philanthropy into my business model. It's
Speaker 1: not enough for me to just quietly meditate. I need
Speaker 1: to be vocal a about what I think is ideal,
Speaker 1: you know, an ideal society to live in, Like I
Speaker 1: gotta go to distance. So we take a few steps
Speaker 1: forward with our practice, we eat right, and then we
Speaker 1: go back to sleep. I think you know, commit comme in.
Speaker 1: I think that's like were where some tough love comes in,
Speaker 1: Like are you in or not? And let me tell you,
Speaker 1: devotion is not easy, but it's worth it. And it's
Speaker 1: just like you know, your relationship with spirit, it's not
Speaker 1: a cakewalk, and this is part of it. It's it's
Speaker 1: like your relationship with anything, any person. The rough parts
Speaker 1: requires commitment and seeing it through and being flexible. And
Speaker 1: I think this is part of the dogma, the bill
Speaker 1: of goods that we've been getting for a long time
Speaker 1: from the New Age, which is once you're on the
Speaker 1: path and you learn how to follow your intuition and
Speaker 1: you really really eyes that you're one with humanity, then
Speaker 1: there's this grace and there's this flow that comes into
Speaker 1: your life. Well, I can tell you I'm on the path.
Speaker 1: I'm very devoted to the path. I'm devoted to teaching
Speaker 1: by the path, and that has not been my experience.
Speaker 1: There is a there is a lot of grind. I
Speaker 1: still have extreme stuff, you know, well extreme is an
Speaker 1: extreme way of putting. But I still suffer very deeply.
Speaker 1: I still have intense struggles in my life. But I'm
Speaker 1: not going to get off the path because I have
Speaker 1: deeper love, I have deeper fulfillment. Easy, no worth it. Yes,
Speaker 1: And here's the rest of the interview with Daniel Apport.
Speaker 1: I think we are all looking for that silver bullet,
Speaker 1: and then suddenly life will just be easy, Like I'll
Speaker 1: find the right way to meditate, or I'll read the
Speaker 1: right book, or I'll follow this correct practice, or I'll
Speaker 1: find this new exercise, and suddenly life will always be easy.
Speaker 1: And that's just not the way it works. You used
Speaker 1: a word in their suffering, and in your book you
Speaker 1: talk about making a distinction between pain and suffering. This
Speaker 1: is a bit of an extreme statement, but it's really
Speaker 1: worth considering for like mental clarity. I think that often
Speaker 1: suffering as a choice. Um, you know, suffering is optional.
Speaker 1: Pain not always optional. So it's like a physical example,
Speaker 1: you break a bone, you feel pain, it's inevitable. The
Speaker 1: suffering is what comes after, Like you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: a drag that you can't walk, It's a drag that
Speaker 1: you have to take, the medicine whatever you're incapacity. You
Speaker 1: go through a breakup, the pain is the breakup itself, separation.
Speaker 1: The suffering is how long are you going to hold on?
Speaker 1: How bitter are you going to be? How long does
Speaker 1: it take you to get over it? Um, are you
Speaker 1: choosing to forgive or you're not choosing to forgive? I mean,
Speaker 1: I got lots to say about not choosing to forgive
Speaker 1: and why sometimes that's actually an enlightened approach. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I think suffering is something that you have control over,
Speaker 1: that a lot of us have control over. And I
Speaker 1: don't want to broad brush stroke this and say, you know,
Speaker 1: someone who's in Syria right now has no choice over
Speaker 1: their suffering. That's an extreme situation. And no, you know,
Speaker 1: self help, how to is gonna help you get through that? Necessarily.
Speaker 1: I agree with the pain is happens. Life delivers pain.
Speaker 1: It's just it's a it's a very effective pain delivery mechanism,
Speaker 1: I suppose you could say, but it is skign of
Speaker 1: what are the stories we tell ourselves? And a lot
Speaker 1: of times for me, I've started just thinking about it
Speaker 1: from a perspective of how do I just not make
Speaker 1: it worse? Like life has given me this thing? How
Speaker 1: can I just not pile on more pain? With everything
Speaker 1: I'm telling myself? You know, I tell the parable of
Speaker 1: the second arrow all the time, you know how the
Speaker 1: first arrow is kind of that life you get shot,
Speaker 1: the pain you get, and then the second arrow is
Speaker 1: everything we add on top of it. And it's it's
Speaker 1: so true and then you know, there comes the third arrow,
Speaker 1: which is I'm feeling bad about myself because I'm not
Speaker 1: able to not suffer over it, and and on and
Speaker 1: on it goes. Lightening up can help a lot. Yeah, yeah, not.
Speaker 1: Alan Watts says, there will always be suffering. The trick
Speaker 1: is to not suffer over the suffering, to stay out
Speaker 1: of that. Why me, It's just like, this is what's happening.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you don't even need to solve it. It doesn't
Speaker 1: need to be your karma. You don't even have to
Speaker 1: look at why you created it. Just do what you
Speaker 1: have to do to not make it worse and get
Speaker 1: through it. Yeah. Speaking of other great minds, you quote
Speaker 1: Martin Bouber in the book with I'm assuming I think
Speaker 1: that's how you say it. Um. Yeah, but I love
Speaker 1: this phrase and it says the world is not comprehensible,
Speaker 1: but it is embraceable. Yeah. Isn't that great? He's so lovely? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: what's that mean to you? You got to leave lots
Speaker 1: of room for mystery, you know, our human capacities, And
Speaker 1: I kind of I put that in quotes because you know,
Speaker 1: I think we're spiritual beings who have crammed ourselves into
Speaker 1: these little suitcases called bodies and made a lot of
Speaker 1: choices to forget our divinity in order to have these experiences.
Speaker 1: So are we capable of comprehending the greatness of life
Speaker 1: and how it all works? No? I think, you know,
Speaker 1: when you get to a certain point of comprehension, you
Speaker 1: don't need to You definitely do not need to be
Speaker 1: on this dimension anymore. But you can really be intentionally
Speaker 1: on this ride. Like you know, a lot of my
Speaker 1: friends and I this past week had been talking about
Speaker 1: all the suffering that's happening on the planet, and you know,
Speaker 1: we're really having practical conversations. I'm about to have some
Speaker 1: friends over for dinner in the next couple of weeks
Speaker 1: talk about earthquake preparedness. We're really feeling heartbroken over what's
Speaker 1: happening politically with immigration and children in the US, and like,
Speaker 1: what can we do? And can I produce more meditations
Speaker 1: that go up on my website? How would I raise
Speaker 1: my mind? And when I really go down that rabbit
Speaker 1: hole of where the world is at at least you
Speaker 1: know the dark side of it. You know, I worry
Speaker 1: about my grandchildren, I worry about my kid. I have
Speaker 1: a son, and is he going to be able to
Speaker 1: breathe clean air. I mean, there's so many different directions
Speaker 1: that could go. And in terms of like bad directions,
Speaker 1: here's what's getting my friends and I through right now.
Speaker 1: We just go We signed up for this, We chose
Speaker 1: to be born to incarnate at this time. I've got
Speaker 1: something to learn. And if I don't have much to learn,
Speaker 1: which I think you know is unlikely, at least I've
Speaker 1: got a lot to offer. And I'm here. I'm here
Speaker 1: now in this time of history, human history for a reason.
Speaker 1: So I'm going to embrace it. I'm gonna embrace it.
Speaker 1: And on the quote unquote spiritual path, which I think
Speaker 1: too often is about ascension, I'm going to embrace being human.
Speaker 1: I'm going to love food. I'm going to love all
Speaker 1: the sensual things that come with being human, from food
Speaker 1: to rock and roll to like, you know, great holidays
Speaker 1: and a man. And I'm going to do my esoteric
Speaker 1: work at the same time. I mean, I'm really interested
Speaker 1: in heaven on earth. You know. Well, I looked up
Speaker 1: that quote after I read it in your book, and
Speaker 1: it goes on to say it's embrace able by embracing
Speaker 1: the things that are in it. You know, by embracing
Speaker 1: the things in the world is how it becomes embraceable
Speaker 1: to us. And I just I loved that when I
Speaker 1: read it, and I think it gets to what you
Speaker 1: were just saying. It's about being here to to what's
Speaker 1: actually in the world. Trying to figure it out is
Speaker 1: nearly impossible, but we can certainly engage with it in
Speaker 1: a real and meaningful way. Well, you went deeper with
Speaker 1: it than I did. Thank you. One of your favorite
Speaker 1: quotes I've ever seen of years, and I won't get
Speaker 1: it right, but it's has something to say, something along
Speaker 1: the lines of line on the floor and listening to
Speaker 1: loud rock and roll maybe the only therapy you need
Speaker 1: and usually is. And you know, my recommendation is to
Speaker 1: listen to UM Jim Morrison's American Prayer. That was like
Speaker 1: the first time I just use music as they're like
Speaker 1: just like in the dark and he's in a studio
Speaker 1: totally wasted, just reciting his poetry UM shortly before he died,
Speaker 1: and then the remaining doors the band it took those
Speaker 1: tracks and put it to music. Anyway you gotta do it. Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: my partner Chris here is giving you the thumbs up
Speaker 1: sign for that one for sure, for sure. So yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I'm I am a strong believer that music is definitely
Speaker 1: healing in so many different ways. I would be lost
Speaker 1: without it. I think, yeah, me too, me too. You
Speaker 1: call something the sacred paradox, and you say transformation begins
Speaker 1: with the radical acceptance of what is, yes, and you
Speaker 1: know what that is some of Christian Marty's thinking and
Speaker 1: and mine. I'll give myself a little bit of credit
Speaker 1: for that, where you can't really see something until you
Speaker 1: fully accept it. And I think what a lot of
Speaker 1: us do to try and get out of pain, like
Speaker 1: completely understandable response to pay is we go into nile
Speaker 1: that it's not happening, like this job doesn't suck, this
Speaker 1: marriage isn't shitty, and we just keep trucking along. Or
Speaker 1: we go into solution mode of you know, we see
Speaker 1: that something stucking, like how are we going to get
Speaker 1: out of this? How can I come up with the money.
Speaker 1: I don't see a way through. We can't solve it.
Speaker 1: Just stop, just stop and accept that it's happening as
Speaker 1: awful as whatever it is is. And then usually with
Speaker 1: that presence and that absence of being frantic. Then you
Speaker 1: can take a really clear next step you can make
Speaker 1: you know the next right decision. As Oprah puts it,
Speaker 1: that's my favorite favorite of hers. Right now the next
Speaker 1: or the next best decision. And it's really hard to
Speaker 1: do because you have to suspend wanting to fix it
Speaker 1: and you have to just be in it, not knowing
Speaker 1: how you're going to get out of it, Like you know,
Speaker 1: this marriage is brutal. Pause and then you figure out
Speaker 1: what you're gonna do about it. Yeah, I love that
Speaker 1: that Oprah phrase. I've been in in twelve Step Recovery,
Speaker 1: and I think the phrase I heard was very early
Speaker 1: on was just do the next right thing, And that
Speaker 1: was so helpful in just like one foot in front
Speaker 1: of the other, what's the next right thing to do
Speaker 1: right now? And you keep doing enough of those and
Speaker 1: you end up with good things happening. Also in the book,
Speaker 1: you talk about painting over pain with premature positivity and
Speaker 1: short circuiting the healing process, which is what you were
Speaker 1: just talking about. And you've got a phrase that I love.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people have heard the phrase
Speaker 1: spiritual bypass, but you've got a got a great phrase
Speaker 1: where you talk about putting spiritual sweetener on it, well,
Speaker 1: spiritual bypassing. You know, I hope, I hope that this
Speaker 1: concept like really rises to the front of the self
Speaker 1: help space. I mean, this is really what the White
Speaker 1: Hot Shooth book is about. It's things like something negative
Speaker 1: happened to me, the shitty thing went down. But you
Speaker 1: know what, I'm so grateful that has happened, because I
Speaker 1: should be grateful. Shouldn't be grateful. That's a spiritual New
Speaker 1: Age enlightened thing to do. And I learned so much
Speaker 1: from this. Oh that may be true, but before we
Speaker 1: get there, it would be a really good idea if
Speaker 1: we felt maybe angry, if we felt disappointed, despair, um,
Speaker 1: piste off, you know, just all of those really human,
Speaker 1: justifiable things, because that's what's real. And when we skip
Speaker 1: over those real human emotions and then move straight to
Speaker 1: the you know, the more quote unquote spiritual approach, that
Speaker 1: stuff just festers. And what happens is, you know, the
Speaker 1: same person who piste you off a year ago, you know,
Speaker 1: a year after you've been repressing it. Then you have
Speaker 1: some fantastic passive, aggressive interaction with them, and they're just like,
Speaker 1: where is this coming from? And you realize you've actually
Speaker 1: secretly been holding your your grudge against them for quite
Speaker 1: a long time, or it comes out in other ways.
Speaker 1: I mean, what's repressed, we'll find a way to sneak out. Also,
Speaker 1: if we're not feeling our anger, it disables us from
Speaker 1: creating justice and creating change. It's like, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of reasons to be very angry about things that are
Speaker 1: happening in our political system, and that anger is clarifying.
Speaker 1: That anger, you know, helps you stand up straight and
Speaker 1: use your voice and create change. And there are many
Speaker 1: occasions where it's just not the time to say, well,
Speaker 1: you know, this is karma unfolding. We're all learning something
Speaker 1: that's that's bullshit passivity. H I agree with you that
Speaker 1: what we repress ends up showing up. And it's funny
Speaker 1: you were mentioning anger and passive aggressiveness, and I was
Speaker 1: just thinking about that earlier today. I was looking at
Speaker 1: a situation and in some of the other work that
Speaker 1: I do, and I was like, I'm being passive aggressive
Speaker 1: to that person because I've not said what I'm frustrated about.
Speaker 1: And it was I was all of a sudden like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, and that's not that's not a good that's
Speaker 1: not being a good leader. Anger is the one that
Speaker 1: I struggled with. I've gotten pretty good at being sad
Speaker 1: and allowing sadness to occur and and flow through me
Speaker 1: and not afraid of that. But I think anger is
Speaker 1: the one for me. How about you? Is there one
Speaker 1: that you still are more inclined to run from? That's
Speaker 1: a great question. I think mine is disappointment. And instead
Speaker 1: of just like being with the disappointment, like I got
Speaker 1: let down, I let myself down. That's that's where I'll
Speaker 1: spiritual bypassing on just be like, well, everybody's trying their
Speaker 1: best and I'm so capable. I can do it. I'll
Speaker 1: take care of it. And I shouldn't have asked for
Speaker 1: that much or I should have tried harder, and it's
Speaker 1: really not cool as a leader. I mean, just to
Speaker 1: like get deeper into this. For me, it's a personality thing.
Speaker 1: It's an angiogram thing, So like on the innogram, I'm
Speaker 1: for you don't even need to know how the anagram works.
Speaker 1: But what I'll tell you is that my weakness is
Speaker 1: that I'll just do it myself. It's actually not a strength.
Speaker 1: And so when I'm disappointed. That's the default I go into,
Speaker 1: I'll just do it myself, and that that's not it's
Speaker 1: not cool because then I get well, I get overworked,
Speaker 1: and it also doesn't allow people to rise to to
Speaker 1: improve rise to the occasion. Then this is part of
Speaker 1: the spiritual bypass. I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings
Speaker 1: as much of a take no ship kind of person
Speaker 1: that I am, and just like, well, you know, and
Speaker 1: I'm way better, way better in the last two years
Speaker 1: at it than I used to be. I used to
Speaker 1: let things just go completely, and now I'm just like,
Speaker 1: you know what, Sorry, you gotta redo it. Yep. Well,
Speaker 1: I'm in nine on the indiogram, so I think that's peacemaker.
Speaker 1: So I wrestled with the same same challenge and I
Speaker 1: get better at it when I'm really focused on it.
Speaker 1: And I guess this goes back to what I was
Speaker 1: saying earlier. I get I focus on it, I get better,
Speaker 1: and then I sort of slide back into my old
Speaker 1: habits again, and and then I, like I was saying today,
Speaker 1: I was realizing, like, Okay, I need to re engage
Speaker 1: with this as be more conscious about what I'm doing here.
Speaker 1: Because listen, you nines would rut, you would do anything
Speaker 1: other than express anger. You might, you might evolved at
Speaker 1: the point whe're like, it's I'm okay feeling it, but
Speaker 1: to actually confront somebody, it's really I feel your pain.
Speaker 1: I have a friend, one of my best friends, is
Speaker 1: in nine, and I'm just like, you know, sweetheart, you
Speaker 1: just tell me, tell me what you would tell him.
Speaker 1: She's like God, and she gets it. I'm like, okay, now,
Speaker 1: just give him ten percent of that and you will
Speaker 1: be making progress forward. Yet, Chris just said, should I
Speaker 1: send her a picture of the black eye I gave
Speaker 1: him last week? As if I got mad enough to
Speaker 1: hit him? No that I can't imagine what he could
Speaker 1: possibly ever do that would provoke me to to that.
Speaker 1: But yeah, and is a nine. As a peacemaker. I
Speaker 1: keep trying to remind myself that not saying what's going
Speaker 1: on and just stuffing it is not making peace. It
Speaker 1: seems like it, but in a deeper sense, it's just not.
Speaker 1: And and I've learned that often enough in life that
Speaker 1: you'd think i'd have it by now, but I keep
Speaker 1: learning it. Yeah. Well, I mean, we're all just it's
Speaker 1: all a big repeat, but you know one thing that
Speaker 1: might be helpful. Can I just give you some therapy
Speaker 1: for a second, please. It's more creative to speak it.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think you can totally identify, like you
Speaker 1: want to create your reality. You want to be an intentional,
Speaker 1: a deliberate creator. And if you can express your anger,
Speaker 1: you're you're you're making an awesome life. You're creating more precisely, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that is is great feedback a lot of
Speaker 1: what I wrestle with. And you had a line in
Speaker 1: your book about this, which was, you know, if your
Speaker 1: heart is just genuinely you're sort of that easy going
Speaker 1: and good natured um, that's great versus if you're repressing
Speaker 1: all that stuff or you're not saying all that stuff
Speaker 1: because if you're afraid or you don't want to cause conflict.
Speaker 1: And and I sometimes don't know that I can tell,
Speaker 1: right because I am fairly laid back about stuff, like
Speaker 1: I'm kind of like, okay, whatever, But I don't know
Speaker 1: how much of that is sort of the unconscious habit
Speaker 1: over all these years of being that way. And so
Speaker 1: I'm really trying to look more closely at like what's
Speaker 1: going on underneath the surface. My initial reaction is to say, Oh,
Speaker 1: everything's fine, but what's really happening underneath that? And and recognize.
Speaker 1: And I usually can tell, like I said, because I
Speaker 1: start to become slightly passive aggressive without really even knowing it.
Speaker 1: I just noticed that I'm irritated with the person, and
Speaker 1: then I'm like, why am I irritated with the person?
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, because that thing that they did that
Speaker 1: I didn't think mattered two weeks ago, you know, blah
Speaker 1: blah blah. So for me, my body always knows when
Speaker 1: I'm angry. I mean, there's lots of reasons I could
Speaker 1: get angry, but when I'm in that mode of like, okay,
Speaker 1: that's healthy. But if I feel that fire and I
Speaker 1: don't express it somehow, then I pay I pay for it. Yep. Well,
Speaker 1: it's that idea of how for most of us are
Speaker 1: best trait can also be our biggest weakness if we
Speaker 1: don't deal with it. Right. So, another idea that you
Speaker 1: had in the book, and I really liked it, was
Speaker 1: you said that the more you can expose yourself to
Speaker 1: conflicting dogmas, the better off you are. And that seems
Speaker 1: to be something that a lot of people in the
Speaker 1: world today are simply not willing to do um is
Speaker 1: to explore anyone else's perspective on things. So why does
Speaker 1: that help us? Because I think we do have more
Speaker 1: common than we have differences, and when we realize that,
Speaker 1: there's significantly less conflict, because that's how you become a
Speaker 1: more loving person. Being able to entertain other perspectives helps
Speaker 1: I mean, it helps you see what you're dealing. Was like,
Speaker 1: it's good to know who else is on the planet
Speaker 1: and to know, you know, the extent of there's a
Speaker 1: lot of density, and there's a lot of darkness, and
Speaker 1: there's a lot of hatred. It's good to know that.
Speaker 1: And also to know that the light and the love
Speaker 1: and the humanity that is living next door to you
Speaker 1: and teaching your kids um and and running your communities.
Speaker 1: So there's that, There's just like general awareness and just
Speaker 1: expand expanding your perspective. Expansion is always better than constriction.
Speaker 1: I think the healing is there in that dialogue. I've
Speaker 1: been talking a bit about thinking a lot about this
Speaker 1: of the last you know, the summer, basically the last
Speaker 1: couple of months. I don't know when this is going
Speaker 1: to air, but you know, with a lot of strife
Speaker 1: that's happening in terms of racism and immigration, and I
Speaker 1: mean mostly in the US, but we certainly have a
Speaker 1: problems in Canada as well. And I'm thinking about what
Speaker 1: would the effect be if I had some one on
Speaker 1: one conversations with people who identified as being racist, and
Speaker 1: what would happen if we had town hall meetings and
Speaker 1: really sought to understand each other. And I think we'd
Speaker 1: find out that a lot of people who um spew
Speaker 1: hatred are deeply wounded. Doesn't mean there shouldn't be justice,
Speaker 1: doesn't doesn't astify it at all, right, but it helps
Speaker 1: us understand because what I'm seeing is, you know, I'm
Speaker 1: not quite comfortable with the kind of protesting that's happening
Speaker 1: right now. Like I'm about to go to the Women's March,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to be comfortable marching and screaming. It's
Speaker 1: about who I am. So my way of protesting is, well,
Speaker 1: it's more peaceful. Yeah, I agree. I am very concerned
Speaker 1: about a lot of the politics that we see and
Speaker 1: what's happening. I'm almost equally as concerned by how we
Speaker 1: are treating each other. Um. You you reference Parker J.
Speaker 1: Palmer in your book, and he's got so many wise
Speaker 1: things to stay on this topic that that I just
Speaker 1: think he's he's got so many great ideas. Yeah, he's
Speaker 1: brilliant and he I mean, I mean talk about somebody
Speaker 1: who's face they're suffering. He's amazing. Yeah. Yeah, Well, Danielle,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for taking the time to come on.
Speaker 1: The book, as I said, was called hot Truth, and
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed reading it. I like reading all of
Speaker 1: your stuff, and I appreciate you being willing to come
Speaker 1: on yet another time. Eric. Thank you for being so
Speaker 1: thorough and for really I have to say, you know,
Speaker 1: I've done a lot of I've had a lot of
Speaker 1: conversations about this book, and you really got to subtle stuff.
Speaker 1: So this was like a total pleasure. I'm really grateful.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Thank you, take care to okay bye. If
Speaker 1: what you just heard was helpful to you, please consider
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