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#039_ Disrupting Depression · INSPIRE STORY

0:25
Speaker 1: Back with my good friend Gurusing for another edition of
0:27
Speaker 1: Guru Corner. Very excited to talk to you today.
0:31
Speaker 2: This is an inspiration that came about because a very
0:34
Speaker 2: close friend of ours introduced us and we started talking
0:38
Speaker 2: and we realized that we could talk a lot because
0:41
Speaker 2: we were having so much of an enthusiastic experience in
0:46
Speaker 2: discussing various things. And so I'm really honored that in
0:51
Speaker 2: all that you do, that we put together the time
0:55
Speaker 2: to do this periodically.
0:57
Speaker 1: The honor is all mine, I assure you.
1:00
Speaker 2: It's not all his, partly mine.
1:03
Speaker 1: This man is a gift to humanity and it's a
1:06
Speaker 1: pleasure and an honor to share your perspective on how
1:10
Speaker 1: to live a life with higher consciousness. And today we
1:13
Speaker 1: sat down, we hashed through it. We talked about what
1:17
Speaker 1: did we talk about?
1:18
Speaker 2: We talked about depression, sadness and grieving and obviously we
1:26
Speaker 2: didn't talk the whole topic because the topic is immense
1:29
Speaker 2: in today's world. But we did create some insight and
1:35
Speaker 2: we created some some skill sets that could be practiced.
1:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think you guys are going to dig it.
1:43
Speaker 1: So without further ado, please enjoy this latest edition of Corner.
1:49
Speaker 2: Of course, Yeah, all right, we ready to get.
1:54
Speaker 1: Blackboard pain you want to write on there? We may
1:59
Speaker 1: you can you may? I invite you to express yourself.
2:03
Speaker 2: Yeah, and is there a and would we catch it
2:05
Speaker 2: with camera.
2:07
Speaker 1: If it's right in that general area? Yeah, it's inside
2:10
Speaker 1: this yeah, kind of that zone.
2:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, it looks like, well it's a fish, it as
2:14
Speaker 2: a fish.
2:15
Speaker 1: Yeah cool. Yeah, feel free to editorialize.
2:19
Speaker 2: Yeah, actually I could, good because I can use the
2:24
Speaker 2: dorsal as a as an explanation of something. Okay, yeah cool.
2:31
Speaker 2: Were you ready to go? Yeah, we're rolling, we're rolling.
2:35
Speaker 1: Good to see you, my friend. No, no clap, no clap,
2:38
Speaker 1: no clap, No, we're just in it. We're in it, man,
2:42
Speaker 1: great to have you out here. You're looking as stylish
2:45
Speaker 1: as ever.
2:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course.
2:47
Speaker 1: And I love to see the smile on your face.
2:51
Speaker 1: So let's just open it up. And how are you doing?
2:54
Speaker 1: What's going on?
2:55
Speaker 2: Doing? Very well? You know. It's interesting you hear about
3:01
Speaker 2: all that's going on, you know, in your world, in
3:05
Speaker 2: the world, you know, and then you look down at
3:09
Speaker 2: your dog or your cat and they're just cool.
3:12
Speaker 3: Yeah, And so I look down and I go, oh,
3:17
Speaker 3: everything must be everything must be cool, because they're just
3:21
Speaker 3: going lunchtime, dinner time.
3:23
Speaker 2: You know, it's like, we're good.
3:25
Speaker 1: Could we live so simply?
3:28
Speaker 2: Yeah? Well, future would probably be that simple when we
3:34
Speaker 2: learn because we've you know, I love to make up words.
3:37
Speaker 2: We've we've complexified the world for the purpose of selling
3:43
Speaker 2: products into it, right, Yeah, And this is what causes
3:51
Speaker 2: a great deal of the malaise of the current moment, right,
3:54
Speaker 2: depression and grief and sadness and all of that, because
3:58
Speaker 2: people don't ness necessarily get what they consider their fair
4:03
Speaker 2: share of the deal.
4:04
Speaker 1: Well, we're constantly bombarded with messages intended to convince us
4:15
Speaker 1: that happiness lie in the next purchase, in the luxurious item,
4:20
Speaker 1: in the fancy vacation, in the new car, in the
4:23
Speaker 1: in the nice watch, all of these things. And when
4:27
Speaker 1: you intuit that from birth and you find yourself unable
4:33
Speaker 1: to access those items, it's no mystery why it makes
4:39
Speaker 1: people angry or upset.
4:42
Speaker 2: And when they start to believe that someone else may
4:46
Speaker 2: be taking their items away, then we start to become bigots.
4:54
Speaker 2: We start to have attitudes towards those who or may
5:00
Speaker 2: be willing to do things that we're not willing to do.
5:05
Speaker 2: And hence this whole process that we're going through right
5:09
Speaker 2: now with with migration. You know they call it immigration.
5:14
Speaker 2: It's not immigration, it's migration. It's been happening for millions
5:18
Speaker 2: of years. And it's when when you've eaten all the
5:22
Speaker 2: grass and one location, you move on to another, right,
5:27
Speaker 2: or when the forest burns down in your one location,
5:30
Speaker 2: you move on to another. And you know, it's interesting
5:34
Speaker 2: the idea of nation states, because the idea of nation
5:38
Speaker 2: states is speaking on this podcast, which is very you know,
5:43
Speaker 2: vegan and plant based territory is is a carnivorous world,
5:50
Speaker 2: and territorial protection is a carnivorous world.
5:53
Speaker 1: Explain that the.
5:55
Speaker 2: Only the only creatures on earth that that mark their
5:59
Speaker 2: territory or carnivores. Every other creature is a grazer and
6:05
Speaker 2: welcomes others to graze with. So the the herd mentality
6:10
Speaker 2: of the of the cloven hooves as opposed to the
6:14
Speaker 2: claw mentality of the padded hooves is an interesting phenomenon.
6:21
Speaker 2: And human beings, you know, went through a transition because
6:25
Speaker 2: of the ice ages from plant based, plant mainly based
6:29
Speaker 2: right to carnivore because they couldn't they couldn't find the
6:34
Speaker 2: foods that were they were capable of digesting, so they
6:38
Speaker 2: ate the creatures that ate the food that they couldn't digest.
6:42
Speaker 1: Well, I think it was an evolution from from primarily
6:48
Speaker 1: herbivorous to a not a hunter gatherer culture, but a
6:52
Speaker 1: gathering hunting culture. Right, Meat was still hard to come by,
6:57
Speaker 1: plants were perhaps easier, and then you know, and so
7:04
Speaker 1: the animal products were the luxury, right, the result of
7:08
Speaker 1: the persistent hunt.
7:09
Speaker 4: Interesting choice of words. Why the luxury luxury? Yeah, Well,
7:16
Speaker 4: to this day it's still considered a luxury. When you
7:19
Speaker 4: see the rise of the middle class in China and
7:23
Speaker 4: in India.
7:24
Speaker 1: With sections of those cultures coming into disposable income for
7:30
Speaker 1: the very first time, there's a sense of entitlement like, Okay,
7:34
Speaker 1: now we can eat these products that have been traditionally
7:37
Speaker 1: the purview of the well to do. And then you
7:40
Speaker 1: introduce all the fast food restaurants, and meat consumption is
7:43
Speaker 1: skyrocketing in those populations as a result.
7:48
Speaker 2: And it's all just a fantasy, because the biology tells
7:56
Speaker 2: us to do differently. And you know, herbivores have a
8:00
Speaker 2: digestive tract that is five times the height or length,
8:05
Speaker 2: and carnivores have a digestive tract that is one and
8:08
Speaker 2: a half times the height or length, and we obviously
8:12
Speaker 2: have the longer, the longest digestive tract because it's that
8:18
Speaker 2: incredible formation within the small intestine, which is they say
8:25
Speaker 2: that they'll be able to perhaps reproduce every organ on
8:28
Speaker 2: the body except for the small intestine because it's so
8:32
Speaker 2: complex that nothing can They can't figure it out and
8:37
Speaker 2: how to print at three D print or whatever they're
8:41
Speaker 2: going to do. The idea that we have this elongated
8:47
Speaker 2: system in order to break down plant based proteins and
8:50
Speaker 2: formulate the animal based proteins is a fact that we
8:57
Speaker 2: should pay attention to. But back to the idea of
9:01
Speaker 2: this constant which you were saying, this constant need to
9:06
Speaker 2: access the luxuries and the putting of the happiness and
9:11
Speaker 2: the fulfillment on the outside of us is coming to
9:16
Speaker 2: a screeching halt because as we have mined the planet
9:24
Speaker 2: and extracted so much from underneath, if you look at
9:29
Speaker 2: the planet as a living body, we're going down there
9:33
Speaker 2: and we're pulling out some of the planet's deepest organ
9:38
Speaker 2: and glandular systems processes. I mean, the oil is deep
9:45
Speaker 2: in the earth, really really deep in the earth, and
9:49
Speaker 2: there are some jewelers around the world that work with
9:53
Speaker 2: what they call ripe gold, and that's gold it has
9:56
Speaker 2: actually brought come to the surface and usually appears in
10:01
Speaker 2: river beds in the form of gold nuggets. And they
10:04
Speaker 2: say that the gold that is being mined and leeched
10:09
Speaker 2: through the chemicals that they leach the gold oor thrut
10:13
Speaker 2: in order to come out with something that is of value,
10:18
Speaker 2: that that gold energetically vibrationally is unfit for humans to
10:25
Speaker 2: wear because it's not ripe yet. It's like eating unripe fruit.
10:32
Speaker 2: If we were to take our entire view of what
10:37
Speaker 2: is happening on Earth and realize that we're just the
10:40
Speaker 2: fleas that are on the body of the Earth, then
10:45
Speaker 2: the same thing that's going on within our body, just
10:48
Speaker 2: like the same thing that goes on within the body
10:50
Speaker 2: of a flea, is going on inside of the host's body.
10:55
Speaker 2: So the planet Earth a living creature, you know, fully
10:59
Speaker 2: in vigorated. We're carving into it, we're sticking. It's like
11:04
Speaker 2: we're these gigantic mosquitoes with these long, long snouts, you know,
11:09
Speaker 2: sucking some of the deep fluids out of this creature
11:15
Speaker 2: and burning them on the surface.
11:17
Speaker 1: Yeah, well you can kind of understand the argument why
11:22
Speaker 1: we do that for oil, because it serves a purpose
11:25
Speaker 1: that fuels you know, the necessities of living this modern life.
11:31
Speaker 1: But when you think about things like diamonds and gold,
11:35
Speaker 1: it's preposterous. I mean, you realize how silly and infantile
11:39
Speaker 1: the human brain is that it sees this thing that
11:43
Speaker 1: shines a certain way and decides that this is to
11:46
Speaker 1: be coveted.
11:48
Speaker 2: It's like continuing, completely bizarre, I know. And to think
11:52
Speaker 2: that that has value and that we should be on
11:54
Speaker 2: a gold standard or a silver standard or what have you,
11:57
Speaker 2: is bizarre. But going back to your you can understand,
12:02
Speaker 2: you said, you can understand why we, you know, drill
12:05
Speaker 2: deeply into the earth, you know, to pull out. It's
12:08
Speaker 2: the same as a mosquito. The mosquito sticks that needle
12:11
Speaker 2: deeply into your vein to suck out something that it
12:16
Speaker 2: feels it rightfully deserves. I mean, it doesn't go to
12:19
Speaker 2: your body and say, okay, I'm going to do this.
12:21
Speaker 2: I know it's illegal, but I'm going to do it.
12:23
Speaker 2: No for its life. It knows that it's okay for
12:27
Speaker 2: our life. I'm just waiting for the earth to scratch,
12:30
Speaker 2: you know, because it's back us exactly.
12:33
Speaker 1: Well, it's starting to it's it's rearing its its hand,
12:37
Speaker 1: it's getting ready for it.
12:38
Speaker 2: I think the metaphor of its rearing its ugly head
12:41
Speaker 2: is not an appropriate metaphor at that point. It is
12:44
Speaker 2: getting ready. Look what's happening on Hawaii with the you know,
12:48
Speaker 2: with the gushing of the volcano, the hurricane that just
12:52
Speaker 2: went by. Some people said they couldn't believe it. There
12:55
Speaker 2: were floods coming down the street at the same time
12:58
Speaker 2: that there are buildings on fire from a volcano.
13:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's truly apocalyptic.
13:03
Speaker 2: Apocalyptic. It looks like what is that blade runner?
13:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, in Hawaii with with it occurring right in
13:09
Speaker 1: the midst of this like development, there's like homes all
13:13
Speaker 1: over the place and the earth just literally erupting, And
13:18
Speaker 1: it makes you realize that we really are, you know,
13:21
Speaker 1: a tiny mosquito, that we're utterly powerless, and we take
13:27
Speaker 1: for granted this planet that we live on, and we
13:32
Speaker 1: believe that it's in some sort of status quote, that
13:35
Speaker 1: it's static, that it will always be the way that
13:38
Speaker 1: it is. And it only takes a little ripple like
13:41
Speaker 1: that to remind us of how of how small we
13:44
Speaker 1: are and I think you know whether there was an
13:46
Speaker 1: evolutionary purpose served by it or not. We're unable to
13:50
Speaker 1: really appreciate time in a way that allows us to
13:58
Speaker 1: proceed with a little more humility, a little more light footed.
14:02
Speaker 1: And how we and how we kind of traverse this,
14:06
Speaker 1: this blue spinning orb that we're all in.
14:10
Speaker 2: You said a phrase that is commonly used this planet
14:14
Speaker 2: that is here to serve us, and then we reverse
14:17
Speaker 2: that phrase and say that we're here to also serve it.
14:22
Speaker 2: And in that bi directional act of service, we can
14:30
Speaker 2: live in harmony. But when we're taking more from the
14:34
Speaker 2: planet than we are returning to the planet, that's when
14:38
Speaker 2: we start to live outside of that orchestrated harmony that
14:43
Speaker 2: nature has found so common. This is what happens. Take
14:48
Speaker 2: it from the planet, take it to this body that
14:51
Speaker 2: we have here. When we're when we're pulling more out
14:55
Speaker 2: of the body, when we're depleting the body then and
15:00
Speaker 2: not investing into the body, that's when we get to
15:04
Speaker 2: this place of depression. Because think about the word depression.
15:08
Speaker 2: Depression in meteorology is when you have a low pressure
15:13
Speaker 2: area and a high pressure area, and so depression within
15:17
Speaker 2: our somatic being, within our physical being within our psycho
15:21
Speaker 2: emotional being is just that we have less pressure inside
15:26
Speaker 2: than is outside. And because of what we've just been
15:29
Speaker 2: describing thus far, it's a high pressure existence on this
15:33
Speaker 2: planet right now. And if we don't find the ways
15:38
Speaker 2: of exuding the same kind of impression, we will be depressed.
15:43
Speaker 2: So if we're not able to impress, we will become depressed.
15:48
Speaker 2: And some of this is genetic. You learn it through
15:53
Speaker 2: your cellular structure, or because genetics follows closely with the
15:58
Speaker 2: social structure families. We learn it by mimicking, you know,
16:04
Speaker 2: our family around us. Then we learn it from friends,
16:08
Speaker 2: then we learn it from all kinds of ways that
16:11
Speaker 2: we perhaps don't have the right to impress as much.
16:15
Speaker 2: And over years and years of this, it compounds to
16:19
Speaker 2: the point of where depression literally feels like what happened
16:23
Speaker 2: to me in Old Mexico, where I was, you know,
16:28
Speaker 2: for the sake of going through a rite of passage,
16:30
Speaker 2: I was buried alive. And the sensation of not being
16:34
Speaker 2: able to move is a phenomenon that is only known
16:40
Speaker 2: to those who have been buried under earthquake rubble, who
16:43
Speaker 2: have been you know, buried alive. But think of it
16:47
Speaker 2: as a psycho emotional sensation. Being deeply depressed is so
16:51
Speaker 2: common in today's world. We have soldiers coming back from wars,
16:56
Speaker 2: we have people not able to meet their needs, we
16:59
Speaker 2: have people out of work, we have homeless, we have
17:01
Speaker 2: all of these categories.
17:03
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think. I think depression is the number one
17:07
Speaker 1: cause of disability. I may be wrong about that, but
17:12
Speaker 1: if it's not number one, it's close to it. I
17:14
Speaker 1: don't know the statistics or the last numbers, but yeah,
17:18
Speaker 1: it is. It's debilitating people in an unprecedented way, in
17:25
Speaker 1: a way that we have never before seen in the
17:28
Speaker 1: history of humankind. So what is contributing to that? Well?
17:32
Speaker 1: Is it our fast paced modern society? Is it overpopulation?
17:37
Speaker 1: Is it the stress and anxiety that is part and
17:40
Speaker 1: parcel of how we live today? Is it? Is it
17:43
Speaker 1: this Madison Avenue fueled culture that also that always makes
17:46
Speaker 1: us feel less than that, that that compels us to
17:50
Speaker 1: measure against measure ourselves against our peers. Is it the
17:55
Speaker 1: fear that the nightly news instills on us that creates
17:59
Speaker 1: this zero sum game, making us think that if someone
18:02
Speaker 1: else gets this, that they're taking away from you. I
18:05
Speaker 1: would imagine it's all of these things and many more
18:08
Speaker 1: that are contributing to this state of desperation, this quality
18:13
Speaker 1: of mental illness that is moving us further and further
18:17
Speaker 1: away from our natural state of connection, communion, and divinity.
18:23
Speaker 2: Think of the word that you just use, desperation. Desperit
18:28
Speaker 2: right means without spirit, without inspiration, without that enthusiasm. And
18:35
Speaker 2: what I believe is that all of these things are
18:40
Speaker 2: contributing that you just mentioned, but none of them are
18:44
Speaker 2: the cause. The cause is that with this much contribution
18:50
Speaker 2: to the state of affairs that we have, the fast paced,
18:53
Speaker 2: the Wall Street that this the consumption, what have you,
18:57
Speaker 2: We're not being prepared to live in that world. You know.
19:01
Speaker 2: They say that if you took a doctor and an accountant,
19:05
Speaker 2: and an engineer and a school teacher from the eighteen
19:09
Speaker 2: hundreds and brought them into the twenty first century, the
19:12
Speaker 2: only one that would recognize their task is the school teacher.
19:16
Speaker 2: And so the world, through the engineers and the medical
19:21
Speaker 2: science and everything else that has come along to build
19:24
Speaker 2: the modern world of the twenty first century, has been
19:27
Speaker 2: going along at its pace, and that pace perhaps is accelerating,
19:32
Speaker 2: but education hasn't prepared anyone for the new way of living.
19:38
Speaker 2: Education is still stuck in the world of the three hours,
19:41
Speaker 2: which is obviously a misspelling of the words, but the
19:46
Speaker 2: idea that kids are dropping out of school and that
19:50
Speaker 2: there's people with dyslexia and people with what they call
19:56
Speaker 2: add ADHD. These are not disordered. These are new orders.
20:02
Speaker 2: As you can see from this art right here. This
20:05
Speaker 2: is somebody that has a new way of looking at things,
20:08
Speaker 2: and we're not addressing those people with our education. And consequently,
20:13
Speaker 2: people are coming out into the world completely unprepared for
20:17
Speaker 2: the world, and therefore the world has more pressure than
20:22
Speaker 2: they do, and therefore they become depressed.
20:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, a couple observations. First of all, I think
20:28
Speaker 1: that's beginning to change. We're seeing more and more people
20:34
Speaker 1: deciding not to go to college for one thing. And
20:36
Speaker 1: I think it was just last week that Google and
20:41
Speaker 1: at least one or two other of the huge tech
20:43
Speaker 1: companies came out and said we're no longer requiring a
20:47
Speaker 1: college diploma for applications for employment. I mean, that's a
20:52
Speaker 1: huge change when you think about that. They're basically decoupling
20:57
Speaker 1: that nexus that has always existed between higher education and
21:01
Speaker 1: upward mobility, which I think is fascinating. But you're absolutely correct.
21:07
Speaker 1: And I think the pace, the accelerated pace with which
21:11
Speaker 1: culture society is advancing, is changing, is evolving, is so
21:20
Speaker 1: outpacing our evolutionary ability to adapt. You know, we're still evolutionarily,
21:31
Speaker 1: you know, built into our gna and to our genetic
21:33
Speaker 1: code is a life that looks like whatever's going on
21:38
Speaker 1: in the you know, the indigenous tribes of Africa, and
21:42
Speaker 1: if you go to those places, you know, you always
21:45
Speaker 1: hear these stories. Oh, I went to I went to India,
21:47
Speaker 1: I went to Peru, I went wherever it is. And
21:50
Speaker 1: people who spend time with cultures that are relatively immunized
21:54
Speaker 1: from the way that we live, realize how much happier
21:57
Speaker 1: they are, how much more connected they are, how much
22:00
Speaker 1: more communal they are, and content they have, all of
22:05
Speaker 1: these things that we're trying so desperately to build into
22:09
Speaker 1: our own lives, but which continue to elude us because
22:12
Speaker 1: the very things that contribute to that which we seek
22:16
Speaker 1: we've decided are either optional or not important. Even after
22:23
Speaker 1: having that experience, we may have that epiphany, and yet
22:30
Speaker 1: after returning to our lives, we slowly sort of return
22:36
Speaker 1: to how we're always living, and we fail to make
22:39
Speaker 1: those changes that would allow us to experience life and
22:43
Speaker 1: the way these people are.
22:45
Speaker 2: One of the things that education doesn't educate is the
22:49
Speaker 2: emotional body. You know, we get some physical activity. When
22:54
Speaker 2: you said people are choosing not to go to college,
22:58
Speaker 2: I thought to myself, people are choosing not to go
23:01
Speaker 2: to football games, you know, because you know, the big
23:04
Speaker 2: deal about college is now is football stadiums that cost
23:08
Speaker 2: you know, one hundred million dollars, and it's all about
23:10
Speaker 2: the ranking of football. It's the ranking of basketball, it's
23:14
Speaker 2: March madness and all of these things, you know, and
23:17
Speaker 2: these higher educational facilities have been you know, co opted
23:23
Speaker 2: into this whole spectator sport adventure and have not really
23:30
Speaker 2: kept up with the times. Consequently, people that are really
23:33
Speaker 2: brilliant don't find any reason for themselves to be in
23:37
Speaker 2: that environment. But going back to that sense of not
23:41
Speaker 2: educating the emotional body, think about these depression has a
23:45
Speaker 2: value because when you're depressed, you can go into some
23:51
Speaker 2: pretty deep places, some pretty dark places. And when you
23:57
Speaker 2: go into those places with the sense of let me
24:00
Speaker 2: explore rather than you know, let me feel horrible, those
24:05
Speaker 2: deep places can can find character, can find parts of
24:10
Speaker 2: your being that are able to come forward that would
24:14
Speaker 2: never be noticed if you were just giddy and happy
24:18
Speaker 2: all the time. And the same thing with good grief, right, grieving, sadness, grief.
24:27
Speaker 2: You know, these are also valuable moments, but they're not
24:32
Speaker 2: moments that we should use. If we want to go
24:35
Speaker 2: back to the idea of a diet, we shouldn't use
24:39
Speaker 2: them as entrees. We should use them as you know,
24:42
Speaker 2: maybe spices or maybe you know, side dishes to the
24:46
Speaker 2: main the main course, the main course, you know, our
24:49
Speaker 2: focus on becoming enthusiastic, becoming inspired, becoming fulfilled. That's our
24:56
Speaker 2: main course, with side courses that are you know, either
25:00
Speaker 2: warning signs or augmenting components like salt, augments, the food.
25:08
Speaker 2: So depression and grief and sadness are all things that
25:15
Speaker 2: when they come upon us, we should go into fully
25:20
Speaker 2: but giving ourselves the space. I'm going to take a
25:22
Speaker 2: sick day because I'm feeling really sad, and let me
25:27
Speaker 2: go into this sadness, let me process this sadness, let
25:30
Speaker 2: me gain the messaging from this sadness, just as if
25:34
Speaker 2: I was to take a sick day because I've got
25:37
Speaker 2: the flu.
25:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, these emotional states are part of what it means
25:42
Speaker 1: to be human, but it was embraced except the fact
25:45
Speaker 1: that it's perfectly natural and fine to experience sadness, to
25:49
Speaker 1: experience grief, to experience intermittent bouts with depression.
25:54
Speaker 2: And I have to make a correction here. I don't
25:56
Speaker 2: ever do this, but Rich I'm just gonna make a correction.
25:59
Speaker 2: You say, what it takes to be human. I saw
26:02
Speaker 2: the dog, your dog be sad in a moment because
26:05
Speaker 2: he couldn't come.
26:06
Speaker 1: And come in here and hang out.
26:10
Speaker 2: Poor girl, Poor girl, he went.
26:13
Speaker 1: Maybe we'll bring her in for round two. But but yeah,
26:16
Speaker 1: I mean, we're It goes back to, you know, the
26:19
Speaker 1: messages that we receive about what's okay what's not okay
26:23
Speaker 1: in this collective experience that we're having, and we're kind
26:26
Speaker 1: of taught like you should love your life and be
26:29
Speaker 1: happy and be enthusiastic all the time, and if you
26:32
Speaker 1: experience a moment of depression, that you should actually compound
26:36
Speaker 1: that by being ashamed or feeling bad about yourself because
26:40
Speaker 1: you're experiencing something that you feel like you shouldn't be experiencing.
26:44
Speaker 1: And of course that's a cross purposes with with how
26:48
Speaker 1: we're kind of wired, right, But I think there is
26:51
Speaker 1: a difference between that sine wave of emotional experience that
26:57
Speaker 1: we all have versus chronic states of depression. And that's
27:00
Speaker 1: really kind of what I'm focused on, is this incredible
27:05
Speaker 1: increase in persistent chronic states of depression that people are
27:10
Speaker 1: experiencing and whether that and you were saying like that,
27:13
Speaker 1: you disagreed with me about what the cause of that is,
27:17
Speaker 1: But I want to go a little bit.
27:18
Speaker 2: I agree with you. They're all about, They're all that,
27:21
Speaker 2: they are the part of the equation, but that the
27:24
Speaker 2: cause was that were not prepared. Think about chronic What
27:30
Speaker 2: about chronic flu That you go through a winter and
27:39
Speaker 2: you you get it, you seem to be well, you
27:43
Speaker 2: go out and do something energetically, you get a relapse,
27:49
Speaker 2: You get it, you go through it, you seem to
27:52
Speaker 2: be well, you go out and do something energetically, you
27:56
Speaker 2: get a relapse. What's not happening. What is not happening
28:01
Speaker 2: is that there's not a full forced cure. So if
28:09
Speaker 2: I'm to go into my flu or if I'm to
28:12
Speaker 2: go into my depression, and I can fully experience the experience,
28:16
Speaker 2: as the Buddhist said, anything fully experienced, any of the
28:21
Speaker 2: emotions fully experienced, will ultimately become its base factor, which
28:26
Speaker 2: is joy. Because going in and I've been depressed, We've
28:32
Speaker 2: all been depressed. The difference between someone who has the
28:38
Speaker 2: awareness or the knowledge when that depression comes on is
28:44
Speaker 2: the same as when someone has the awareness or the
28:46
Speaker 2: knowledge you just passed the frog when the flu comes on.
28:54
Speaker 2: If you can go into and fully work with that
29:00
Speaker 2: lou germ and get it so that it's completely removed
29:05
Speaker 2: from the body after you've gone through the cycle, it's
29:08
Speaker 2: the same way with depression, with sadness, with other things,
29:11
Speaker 2: with grief, etc. Think about the grief of people dying.
29:16
Speaker 2: I've had three or four people just recently reach out
29:20
Speaker 2: to me because someone very, very dear to them has
29:25
Speaker 2: passed away. And that idea of shame that you need
29:32
Speaker 2: to grieve in private, or that you should wear dark
29:36
Speaker 2: glasses at a funeral so to hide the tears that
29:38
Speaker 2: are rolling down your face, all of this is exactly
29:42
Speaker 2: what you were saying. That crossed purposes. That shame for sadness,
29:50
Speaker 2: shame for depression, shame for grief is something that we
29:56
Speaker 2: need to remove through education. We need to to inform
30:01
Speaker 2: people that their grief is good, that their sadness is
30:05
Speaker 2: of value and that their depression has some message. And
30:10
Speaker 2: just like the flu, if you give yourself the opportunity
30:14
Speaker 2: to go through that cycle that you were just mentioning,
30:17
Speaker 2: then it won't become chronic depression. It will become deep depression,
30:23
Speaker 2: maybe even deeper than the cycles of chronic depression, but
30:27
Speaker 2: it will be fully experienced and then relieved from the
30:33
Speaker 2: psycho emotional body. Right.
30:34
Speaker 1: So, in other words, what you're saying is if somebody
30:38
Speaker 1: is experiencing a depressive state, that there is something built
30:43
Speaker 1: into that, like a teachable moment, something to be learned,
30:46
Speaker 1: if you fully embrace it, if you just allow yourself
30:50
Speaker 1: to get swallowed up in it. I suppose, for lack
30:53
Speaker 1: of a better word, to really feel it rather than
30:56
Speaker 1: resist it and try to kind of surf the wave
31:02
Speaker 1: and learn what is trying to be spoken to you
31:06
Speaker 1: through that. Whatever message is trying to be conveyed, is
31:10
Speaker 1: a trajectory out of it. But I'm imagining somebody who
31:15
Speaker 1: maybe is listening to this or watching this, who is
31:18
Speaker 1: thinking I've had chronic depression my whole life, or I'm
31:21
Speaker 1: a manic depressive, or I've been battling this since I
31:25
Speaker 1: was a child, constantly in pain. You know, I've tried
31:29
Speaker 1: to understand, I've done everything. I've tried to do everything,
31:32
Speaker 1: and it's just this is how I'm wired. I need
31:35
Speaker 1: to be medicated for this. And feeling defensive at what
31:41
Speaker 1: you're saying, like I could see it up being provocative
31:43
Speaker 1: for somebody who suffers.
31:45
Speaker 2: And so I would say that do not take my
31:50
Speaker 2: words as being absolute or even that they're my absolute perspective.
31:58
Speaker 2: There are so many contributing factors to sadness, grief, depression,
32:01
Speaker 2: and all of those emotions, and some of them are genetic,
32:07
Speaker 2: some of them are truly biological and chemical. To be
32:13
Speaker 2: able to take medication is important in today's world. We
32:20
Speaker 2: have evolved to have those kinds of substances that we
32:24
Speaker 2: can take to help balance out chemistries. But I would
32:29
Speaker 2: say to the audience to just take the medication is
32:35
Speaker 2: going to resolve symptom, but it's not necessarily going to
32:42
Speaker 2: disrupt source. And so what you want to do is,
32:47
Speaker 2: you know, you don't want to be overwhelmed by the symptom,
32:50
Speaker 2: so you take you continue to take your medication, but
32:54
Speaker 2: then you also add to it something that's going to
32:58
Speaker 2: disrupt the source code of that What you call wiring,
33:04
Speaker 2: and that is there are so many things available. I
33:09
Speaker 2: mean just the activities that you do, you know, the
33:11
Speaker 2: bike rides, the swims, the runs, the activities that I do,
33:15
Speaker 2: the yoga, the meditation, well you also do those too,
33:18
Speaker 2: and these are all things. The long walks on the beach,
33:21
Speaker 2: the conversations with loved ones, the other things that we
33:25
Speaker 2: can do to help to rewire that network. And if
33:31
Speaker 2: the network is you know, biological, if it's inherited from
33:35
Speaker 2: your parents, if it's inherited from through your bloodline, you're
33:39
Speaker 2: going to have to do more work. But in our
33:44
Speaker 2: in our tradition of yogis and mystics, what we understand
33:48
Speaker 2: is that we're a soul and body. And what you
33:52
Speaker 2: have is a body with a particular code, with a
33:57
Speaker 2: particular formula, and a body that I'm in, or the
34:01
Speaker 2: body that one of our listeners are in, viewers are in,
34:05
Speaker 2: maybe a body that is prone towards sadness, grief, depression.
34:14
Speaker 2: Their task in this life is to not only take
34:21
Speaker 2: what they need to take so they're not overwhelmed by it,
34:24
Speaker 2: but find a pathway to change it. Because anything that
34:29
Speaker 2: is biological, and that is the chemistry of our physical
34:32
Speaker 2: body is mutable, is changeable, is transformable. And so I mean,
34:39
Speaker 2: you know, and I know all of the people that
34:42
Speaker 2: have been working with diabetes and plant based diet have
34:47
Speaker 2: found miraculous changes. People would never believe ten years ago,
34:53
Speaker 2: twenty years ago that diabetes could be assisted by a
34:57
Speaker 2: change in diet.
34:59
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's a it's a it's a shift
35:01
Speaker 1: in our perceptive perception of agency over our lives. Like
35:04
Speaker 1: we never were taught that, by the way, agency agency. Yeah,
35:09
Speaker 1: the idea that we actually can exert some control in
35:12
Speaker 1: how we live our lives and what we eat, how
35:14
Speaker 1: we move, how we interact with other people is a
35:18
Speaker 1: new concept for a lot of people who have been
35:22
Speaker 1: taught from birth that we should divest ourselves of that
35:26
Speaker 1: agency and vest it in the hands of the professionals.
35:30
Speaker 1: So when we feel depressed and we go to the
35:32
Speaker 1: shrink and after one session they prescribe a medication, we say, well,
35:36
Speaker 1: that's the professional and that's what we should do. And
35:39
Speaker 1: I would agree with you that that medication has its
35:44
Speaker 1: place and its purpose. You know, these are miracles of
35:48
Speaker 1: Western culture that we've developed to treat these conditions. But
35:52
Speaker 1: I would say that systemically, our approach has gone too
35:56
Speaker 1: far in that we're so quick to medicate over medicate.
36:01
Speaker 1: We medicate first, and then the real work of unpacking
36:05
Speaker 1: what is contributing to this and how we can confront
36:09
Speaker 1: it and ultimately overcome or transcend it gets pushed to
36:13
Speaker 1: the side. So, just like we're treating chronic health conditions
36:19
Speaker 1: with drugs that deal with the symptoms but not the
36:22
Speaker 1: underlying causes, I would say that we default to that
36:26
Speaker 1: same approach with respect to mental illness and disease in
36:29
Speaker 1: so many ways. And I say this with the caveat
36:32
Speaker 1: that I'm not chronically depressed and I've never had to
36:35
Speaker 1: take an SRI. SSRI is what they're called a medication
36:40
Speaker 1: for any kind of mental disorder or depression. So I
36:43
Speaker 1: can't speak from experience, but just observationally to know that
36:49
Speaker 1: so many people, I mean, how many people do you
36:51
Speaker 1: know that are on one or more of these types
36:53
Speaker 1: of medications. I mean it's endemic that we need a
36:58
Speaker 1: new way of conforms because the incidents of depression is
37:02
Speaker 1: only on the rise, And as we know, like these
37:05
Speaker 1: medications seem to work or they work with some of
37:08
Speaker 1: the symptomology, but then they either stop working or you
37:11
Speaker 1: got to change the medication, that you've got to take
37:12
Speaker 1: a new medication for the side effects of the first one.
37:15
Speaker 1: And it's at ad infinitum. There was a there's a
37:20
Speaker 1: guy called I'm interested in whether you're familiar with this guy,
37:24
Speaker 1: Johann Harry, who wrote a book called Lost Connections. I'm
37:27
Speaker 1: trying to get them on the podcast. But this is
37:29
Speaker 1: an amazing book that really takes a really hard, deep
37:34
Speaker 1: look at this depression problem and what is contributing to it.
37:37
Speaker 1: And what's fascinating is that he is noticing the same
37:43
Speaker 1: things that somebody like Dan Butner has noticed in the
37:48
Speaker 1: Blue Zone cultures that live the longest and are the happiest.
37:51
Speaker 1: In other words, that the people who are most depressed
37:55
Speaker 1: are the least connected to their elders, to their extended family,
37:58
Speaker 1: to their friends. Because we live in this fractured culture,
38:03
Speaker 1: they lack purpose in their lives, something that the Okinawans
38:07
Speaker 1: call ekey guy, you know, that driving force that gets
38:10
Speaker 1: us up out of bed in the morning. There's a
38:13
Speaker 1: lack of of, you know, faith based communities, this idea
38:18
Speaker 1: that there's something beyond the self that is important that
38:21
Speaker 1: can be a guiding light in our lives, like all
38:24
Speaker 1: of these things we don't move our bodies. You were
38:26
Speaker 1: talking about the cycling and the swimming, like we're divorced
38:30
Speaker 1: from movement. All of these habitual behaviors that defined the
38:36
Speaker 1: human race for millennia are things that we feel like
38:39
Speaker 1: we've graduated from. And I am firmly of the opinion
38:44
Speaker 1: that that is actually contributing to not only our mental
38:48
Speaker 1: lack of well being, but our physical lack of wellbeing
38:51
Speaker 1: as well, and of course undermining our happiness.
38:54
Speaker 2: Beautiful, what I would like to say in communit unicating
39:00
Speaker 2: with your audience here the audience here, is that if
39:07
Speaker 2: you can have this sensation of a label bipolar, manic, depressed, borderline,
39:18
Speaker 2: all of these dyslexic, attention deficit, if you can realize
39:28
Speaker 2: that these labels and I'm using a word that you
39:32
Speaker 2: use a lot, that these labels don't define you, they
39:38
Speaker 2: describe you, That they are describing some behavior that people
39:44
Speaker 2: have a need to categorize, and so they've given a
39:49
Speaker 2: label to you. And if you allow that label to
39:55
Speaker 2: just be like a loose fitting jacket that you may
39:57
Speaker 2: not wear all day, that you're going to shed at
40:00
Speaker 2: some time, continue to take the medication that is being
40:07
Speaker 2: prescribed to you, but alternately, or alternatively, get involved in
40:15
Speaker 2: a program at a very small level, at a very
40:20
Speaker 2: reasonable rate, bicycling, walking, running, swimming, yoga, meditation, get in
40:30
Speaker 2: touch with somebody who knows how to do it and
40:33
Speaker 2: can show you how to do it better. One of
40:36
Speaker 2: the things that you will find over time, and I've
40:38
Speaker 2: found this to be true with literally through my life
40:41
Speaker 2: tens of thousands of people that I either wanted to
40:44
Speaker 2: give up this or not be that, or achieve this
40:46
Speaker 2: or whatever, just like you have. And that is that
40:49
Speaker 2: they realized later in a few months, all of a sudden,
40:53
Speaker 2: they find that the medication is not making them feel
40:58
Speaker 2: the way they want to feel, so they take life
41:00
Speaker 2: of it, and then all of a sudden they feel like, okay,
41:03
Speaker 2: less of it was good. And then a few months
41:06
Speaker 2: later they're still doing whatever else they're doing in their exercise, meditation, reading, communicating.
41:13
Speaker 2: I need less and eventually the medication will give you up.
41:18
Speaker 2: Because in very few parts of our life does the
41:25
Speaker 2: medical prescription become a lifetime sentence. You know, you have
41:34
Speaker 2: a cold, you take the medicine from the cold. You're
41:36
Speaker 2: over the cold, you stop taking the medicine. You have
41:39
Speaker 2: a broken bone, you get a cast on your bone,
41:42
Speaker 2: your bone heels, you take the cast off. There are
41:46
Speaker 2: a few things that you are to take medicines for
41:50
Speaker 2: the rest of your life, but even those we have
41:54
Speaker 2: to question, because if we change our lifestyle, if we
41:58
Speaker 2: change our outlook, all of a sudden, we'll start noticing. Hey,
42:04
Speaker 2: you know, in this moment, as I said before, I
42:07
Speaker 2: look down at my dog, and the dog's just frisky
42:10
Speaker 2: and happy as ever. In a moment that seems to
42:12
Speaker 2: be going badly on Earth, I realize, Okay, even within
42:16
Speaker 2: this moment, there is some joy that I can find.
42:20
Speaker 2: I wanted to I wanted to use your blackboard, and
42:24
Speaker 2: if the camera can catch go for it. If the
42:27
Speaker 2: camera can catch this, and moving the microphone so it
42:31
Speaker 2: still picks me up. Think of this as as the
42:35
Speaker 2: waves on the ocean.
42:38
Speaker 1: For those listening and not on YouTube, he's drawing on
42:41
Speaker 1: a blackboard right now. So for those who are just
42:44
Speaker 1: listening that and like draw diagram, go on YouTube your PowerPoint. Yeah,
42:51
Speaker 1: but do we have a towel? Can you grab like
42:53
Speaker 1: one of those towels.
42:55
Speaker 2: There?
42:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, just the towel. You don't need the hellel solvent
42:59
Speaker 1: or whatever.
43:00
Speaker 2: Thanks. So, so, the thing that causes the wave out
43:08
Speaker 2: in the ocean to be this wave that is breaking
43:12
Speaker 2: up at the beach is the fact that the water
43:18
Speaker 2: has become shallow, and out here the water is deep,
43:25
Speaker 2: and in here the water is shallow. And if we
43:30
Speaker 2: can take away the idea that shallow is a derogatory
43:37
Speaker 2: statement and just say maybe it's just maybe it's just
43:42
Speaker 2: a geometry, maybe it's just a way of working with
43:47
Speaker 2: the moment. When we're shallow, our moments break up. And
43:52
Speaker 2: if they're constantly breaking up, we're going to be depressed
43:56
Speaker 2: because we can't get a sense of everything. Confusion, depression, sadness, grief,
44:01
Speaker 2: you know, all of these things just start whirling around
44:04
Speaker 2: and we don't feel that fulfillment. So what you need
44:07
Speaker 2: to do is you need to go deep, and you're
44:10
Speaker 2: an to.
44:10
Speaker 1: The deep water.
44:12
Speaker 2: The deep water, you've got to put yourself through a
44:15
Speaker 2: pace that you do consistently, that I do consistently each
44:18
Speaker 2: in our own ways, that is causing us to go deeper.
44:24
Speaker 1: So for people that are listening, you drew this diagram
44:26
Speaker 1: up there of waves with the sort of bottom of
44:29
Speaker 1: the sea getting gradually and gradually less deep, So in
44:34
Speaker 1: the shallow waters where the waves are breaking, there's a
44:36
Speaker 1: lot of tumult. There's a lot of.
44:38
Speaker 2: Disruption, and if you're living in that tumult, and that's
44:44
Speaker 2: what depression is. Depression is sometimes a protection from living
44:48
Speaker 2: in that tumult and that constant you know, irregularity and confusion.
44:52
Speaker 2: And let me you just go kind of like into
44:54
Speaker 2: the numb state and you're depressed, and you can hold
44:57
Speaker 2: on to it for a long period of time as
44:59
Speaker 2: a protective mechanism. But if you did something like you
45:04
Speaker 2: went for a good run and you started breathing and
45:08
Speaker 2: got your blood MOI, went for a good bike ride,
45:11
Speaker 2: went for a good swim, went for a deep yoga stretch,
45:16
Speaker 2: went into anything that's physical, because I wouldn't think that
45:19
Speaker 2: in this state you're going to be jumping into meditation
45:22
Speaker 2: and being able to gain a lot from it. But
45:24
Speaker 2: anything that you can go into that's physical, do pilates,
45:28
Speaker 2: do a spin, do aerobics, do whatever, and you will
45:33
Speaker 2: find that eventually you're facing the same situation, but it's
45:38
Speaker 2: not appearing the same. And appearances are very deceiving.
45:43
Speaker 1: What do you mean, doesn't appear the same.
45:45
Speaker 2: Every moment has well, let me go back into scripture.
45:51
Speaker 2: Every moment has a cycle, and in the moment, in
45:56
Speaker 2: this cycle, you can experience any thing from the devotional
46:01
Speaker 2: attitudes to the commotional attitudes, to the deeper depression attitudes,
46:07
Speaker 2: to the determination attitudes. Right, the determination attitudes are those
46:11
Speaker 2: things like you know, determination, struggle, hard work, effort. The
46:17
Speaker 2: dark emotionals are the fears, the rages, the angers, the depressions,
46:21
Speaker 2: the sadnesses. The commotions are the you know, the chaos,
46:25
Speaker 2: the tumult, confusion and all of those. And the devotions
46:29
Speaker 2: are that love, joy, you know, those things that are
46:32
Speaker 2: so present around uh, you know, family and friends that
46:36
Speaker 2: are that are really dear to you. Every moment has
46:41
Speaker 2: that cycle spinning because you can have the same moment
46:45
Speaker 2: with a great friend that if you're all by yourself,
46:48
Speaker 2: it's a completely different perspective, it's a completely different observation.
46:54
Speaker 2: And so in each moment, as the as the mystics
46:58
Speaker 2: and the yogis from the from the disc and past
47:00
Speaker 2: would say that in each moment, it is dependent upon
47:04
Speaker 2: how deep you're experiencing it as to what you're going
47:08
Speaker 2: to be able to get out of it. So if
47:11
Speaker 2: we juxtapose that back to what we were talking at,
47:14
Speaker 2: what we've been talking about throughout if in the moment
47:18
Speaker 2: of depression where things just don't seem to be holding together,
47:23
Speaker 2: still taking your medication, still understanding that we're not belittling
47:28
Speaker 2: the idea, this is a reality. I am of the
47:31
Speaker 2: opinion if in today's world you're not depressed at times,
47:35
Speaker 2: you're not paying attention, you know, And so I honor
47:39
Speaker 2: the depressed, and I say, if you can do something
47:43
Speaker 2: that causes you to go deeper, that same moment that
47:47
Speaker 2: is very depressing will have a different story, it'll have
47:51
Speaker 2: a different message. And those are the ones that the
47:53
Speaker 2: Buddha talked about, those are the ones that Laotse talked about.
47:57
Speaker 2: Those are the ones at all, you know, Muhammed and
48:00
Speaker 2: Jesus talked about that are so clearly message moments. And
48:08
Speaker 2: I believe that people that are very depressed in today's
48:12
Speaker 2: world are people that have more connection to the solutions
48:17
Speaker 2: than the people that are frivolous and giddy and bouncing
48:21
Speaker 2: on the surface.
48:23
Speaker 1: Right. Well, certainly there's an argument that they're more sensitive because,
48:26
Speaker 1: like you said, if you're paying attention and you're not
48:28
Speaker 1: experiencing depression periodically, then you know you need to pay
48:32
Speaker 1: attention more. There's plenty to be depressed about, you go.
48:36
Speaker 1: You know, and somebody who is naturally a little more
48:40
Speaker 1: sensitive or even more empathetic than the average human being
48:44
Speaker 1: is probably more prone to a depressive state than somebody
48:47
Speaker 1: who immunizes themselves from that and just bounces along thinking
48:51
Speaker 1: everything's hunky dory all the time. And it goes I
48:53
Speaker 1: grant you that, and.
48:54
Speaker 2: It goes back to what you were saying, is how
48:56
Speaker 2: humans have trained themselves over the years, you know, to
48:59
Speaker 2: feel shame under certain depths. You know, the depth of depression.
49:04
Speaker 2: You feel shame because you're this the idea. What has
49:08
Speaker 2: what has cured more addicts than anything else, is the
49:14
Speaker 2: removal of the shame factor.
49:17
Speaker 1: Well shame, Yeah, Shame is definitely something that keeps addicts
49:22
Speaker 1: stuck in a in a destructive cycle for.
49:25
Speaker 2: Sure, and keeps depression to be stuck, keeps sadness to
49:30
Speaker 2: be stuck, keeps grief to be stuck. Well.
49:33
Speaker 1: The people that are honkey Dory, though too, I never
49:36
Speaker 1: trust those people because I don't think they're really honkey
49:38
Speaker 1: Dory anyway. They're they're wearing a mask's that's because honkey
49:43
Speaker 1: do is. Yeah, it's like, I don't know, maybe it is.
49:47
Speaker 1: It is. Yeah, they're they're masking something. And perhaps that's
49:52
Speaker 1: a result of shame, because it's so shameful to express
49:55
Speaker 1: your true emotional state that it's easier to wear a
49:58
Speaker 1: mask and and and just tell everybody that that everything
50:03
Speaker 1: is great.
50:03
Speaker 2: Oh, let's dive into that moment. What you just said.
50:07
Speaker 1: Julie calls them the super dupers because every time you
50:10
Speaker 1: ask you see them, and you ask them how they're doing,
50:12
Speaker 1: they give you a firm handshake and with a big
50:15
Speaker 1: smile and tell you that they're doing super duper.
50:17
Speaker 2: Super duper. You just said. The people that are, you know,
50:23
Speaker 2: riding on the surface all the time, and it's like
50:26
Speaker 2: it's always daylight, you know, it's always high noon. Our
50:31
Speaker 2: physical environments are creating that now because every time we
50:34
Speaker 2: look at a screen, whether it's a screen on a computer,
50:37
Speaker 2: a screen on our phone, or a screen on an iPad,
50:40
Speaker 2: we're looking at high noon. We're looking at the light
50:42
Speaker 2: of high noon. This this this heavy blue light that's
50:45
Speaker 2: coming off the screen, and what it's giving us is
50:48
Speaker 2: this sensation that you got to always be up, You
50:52
Speaker 2: got to always be on top of it, super duper
50:54
Speaker 2: what did you say, super duper Hunky Dory.
50:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, is probably better than honky honckey door is like
51:02
Speaker 1: pretty good super duper that that that implies it.
51:07
Speaker 2: I think Honky Dori is the fifties and super duper
51:10
Speaker 2: is twenty for a century. Yeah, And you can't always
51:16
Speaker 2: be up how you doing I'm doing Every once in
51:22
Speaker 2: a while take off the mask and just say, don't
51:27
Speaker 2: feel sorry for me, but I'm feeling horrible. You know.
51:32
Speaker 2: One of the things that we have to watch out
51:34
Speaker 2: for is when we develop an acute pattern, consistent pattern
51:42
Speaker 2: of not feeling well, we are actually if we're around
51:47
Speaker 2: people probably being fed by some sympathy. And sympathy is
51:54
Speaker 2: a bit like a candy bar because it can give
51:57
Speaker 2: you a bolst, a boost of energy in the moment,
52:01
Speaker 2: but it's not sustaining energy.
52:03
Speaker 1: Well, it can create a victim narrative that people and
52:07
Speaker 1: a dependency become dependent upon.
52:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, and so you should check your sympathy factor if
52:14
Speaker 2: you're in a fairly consistent sadness, depression, grief, et cetera.
52:21
Speaker 2: You should check to see if if you've gotten so
52:25
Speaker 2: accustomed to sympathy that you're rejecting it, but knowing that
52:30
Speaker 2: it's always there to be accepted. Also, these are things
52:35
Speaker 2: that need to be viewed within the individual life. But
52:39
Speaker 2: the fact is is they're diving into that depression, diving
52:44
Speaker 2: into that sadness and taking off the mask and admitting
52:47
Speaker 2: it and saying, you know, I'm not looking for anything
52:50
Speaker 2: from you, but I just got to say, you know,
52:52
Speaker 2: what's happening in the world today, or what's happening in
52:54
Speaker 2: my world today, or what just happened, you know, in
52:58
Speaker 2: my home or whatever. You know, you know, I'm not
53:01
Speaker 2: feeling good, or you could even say, if it's chronic,
53:06
Speaker 2: you know what, I haven't felt good for ten years
53:10
Speaker 2: and then all of a sudden and.
53:11
Speaker 1: Then's the cocktail party goes silent.
53:15
Speaker 2: But you know, to heck with the cocktail party, you know,
53:18
Speaker 2: let's be honest.
53:19
Speaker 1: This is the thing. I mean, I think it's terrifying
53:21
Speaker 1: for people if I admit that I'm not feeling good.
53:25
Speaker 1: You know, what are people going to think of me?
53:26
Speaker 1: And I think that goes right back into this discussion
53:30
Speaker 1: around shame and around vulnerability. You know, we're taught to
53:34
Speaker 1: comport ourselves in a certain way to navigate social circles
53:39
Speaker 1: in a manner that will allow us to maintain that
53:42
Speaker 1: that trajectory of upward mobility. And to act in contravention
53:48
Speaker 1: of that is to put at risk everything that you've
53:50
Speaker 1: staked your life upon, which provokes fear, and that sense
53:54
Speaker 1: of shame is the ultimate prophylactic against behaving in a
53:59
Speaker 1: way that act actually would contribute to greater health. I
54:03
Speaker 1: have a couple like little mantras around this. The first is,
54:07
Speaker 1: shame can't survive the light. I didn't make that. I
54:10
Speaker 1: didn't come up with that myself. I'm sure somebody else
54:13
Speaker 1: said that, But I love that because it's it's it's
54:17
Speaker 1: it's uh. You know, if we're if we're ashamed about something,
54:22
Speaker 1: the most terrifying thing would be to shed light on it,
54:26
Speaker 1: to expose that in a vulnerable way to another human being.
54:30
Speaker 1: The steaks can be very high for people. But ultimately
54:35
Speaker 1: placing that into into you know, a social setting in
54:43
Speaker 1: which it can be discussed in a mature way is
54:48
Speaker 1: the path to healing. But it requires us to be vulnerable,
54:53
Speaker 1: and we're not raised to be vulnerable. That contravenes, you know,
54:58
Speaker 1: what we've been led to believe makes us a man
55:02
Speaker 1: makes us masculine. But I think that vulnerability, that willingness
55:07
Speaker 1: to be vulnerable, is the ultimate courage. And when you
55:10
Speaker 1: can expose that which you're ashamed of from a place
55:14
Speaker 1: of wanting to heal it, asking for help, allowing yourself
55:18
Speaker 1: to be vulnerable requires a tremendous amount of courage, but
55:23
Speaker 1: it's very difficult for most people, for myself, for anybody.
55:27
Speaker 2: Courage is a word that's made up of two words,
55:30
Speaker 2: core and as, and core means heart. It's a Latin
55:35
Speaker 2: word meaning heart, and as means time, and courage means
55:41
Speaker 2: a time of the heart. And so getting people to
55:46
Speaker 2: be willing willingness is also a mechanism of the heart.
55:51
Speaker 2: Getting people to be willing and courageous is something and
55:57
Speaker 2: I always look at it the same way as drawing,
56:00
Speaker 2: and that is that our trajectory can't be let's fix
56:06
Speaker 2: it right now. Our trajectory has to be something more like,
56:10
Speaker 2: let's fix it this year. Let's give ourselves twelve months,
56:15
Speaker 2: Let's give ourselves eighteen months. Let's give ourselves enough time
56:20
Speaker 2: so that we're not looking for immediate gratification, and if
56:24
Speaker 2: we get setbacks, we don't notice them as much as
56:28
Speaker 2: if the setback means that we didn't succeed in this day.
56:32
Speaker 2: And so I look at these things like overcoming depression
56:38
Speaker 2: and when it comes on, you go dive into it
56:41
Speaker 2: and live in it until it's completed its storytelling, and
56:45
Speaker 2: then you come out of it. These are the kinds
56:48
Speaker 2: of things that we can work with. I would say
56:51
Speaker 2: to the audience that's listening or viewing that you know,
56:56
Speaker 2: we've got two people here talking with each other, and
57:00
Speaker 2: you know, we're sharing ideas of things that we have
57:03
Speaker 2: learned throughout our years of life and things that we
57:06
Speaker 2: have studied throughout our efforts. But every single moment is
57:13
Speaker 2: a teacher. And vulnerability, the word that you used a
57:18
Speaker 2: moment ago, is something that men aren't taught to be.
57:24
Speaker 2: And one of the things that is taking place in
57:29
Speaker 2: the masculine world is this real dominance of the bravado
57:36
Speaker 2: and the subordination of vulnerability. And so men that are
57:44
Speaker 2: listening to this podcast, as well as women, have to
57:47
Speaker 2: find groups that are safe arenas in which they can
57:51
Speaker 2: expose the things that are true. You know, twelve step
57:54
Speaker 2: programs are famous for that. Men's groups, women's groups are
57:58
Speaker 2: famous for that. Find reach out there and find some way,
58:03
Speaker 2: I just came back from We have a men's camp
58:06
Speaker 2: in Canada every August, and I just came back from
58:09
Speaker 2: teaching at that were we live together for a week
58:12
Speaker 2: at a like at a boy Scout camp, and you know,
58:15
Speaker 2: we all eat together. It's vegan, it's you know, it's
58:18
Speaker 2: very it's very high energy. But people come into that
58:24
Speaker 2: with a lot of baggage that they don't leave with
58:29
Speaker 2: because in those circles that are completely safe, which you
58:33
Speaker 2: can find, you know, throughout the world, you can find
58:36
Speaker 2: those kinds of circles that you can relate, you can
58:39
Speaker 2: take off your mask, you can become vulnerable in that moment.
58:43
Speaker 2: You can start practicing. You don't necessarily have to take
58:47
Speaker 2: it out on the big stage of your life and
58:49
Speaker 2: suddenly be vulnerable in the midst of everybody that you've
58:52
Speaker 2: been completely shielded from for a long time, but coming
58:56
Speaker 2: out in vulnerability and safe settings, learning what are the muscles,
59:01
Speaker 2: what's the coordination that it takes to be vulnerable in
59:04
Speaker 2: a moment, and then you can also practice it when
59:07
Speaker 2: you're on your own or with when you're with those
59:09
Speaker 2: close intimate relationships of yours and start being more vulnerable,
59:14
Speaker 2: start allowing people in when you're feeling sadness, when you're
59:18
Speaker 2: feeling grief, when you're feeling depression, so that you can
59:22
Speaker 2: have assistance in the exploration.
59:25
Speaker 1: That's that's how you heal, That's how you overcome all
59:29
Speaker 1: of the bag. You know, the bag is that we
59:31
Speaker 1: carry around. I mean, in addition to not being taught
59:34
Speaker 1: the value of vulnerability as men, we're also taught to
59:37
Speaker 1: be self sufficient. In other words, asking for help is
59:40
Speaker 1: a weakness, that's a vulnerability. That's unacceptable. And I could
59:44
Speaker 1: tell you that when I was struggling with alcohol and
59:47
Speaker 1: just could not stop drinking, I was adamant that I,
59:53
Speaker 1: on my own, would be able to find a solution
59:55
Speaker 1: to this problem. And I absolutely refuse to ask for
59:58
Speaker 1: help because I believe that I could handle it, and
1:00:02
Speaker 1: that the manly way forward was just to handle your shit,
1:00:05
Speaker 1: man like, sort it out. You don't need to dump
1:00:08
Speaker 1: it on somebody else and make it their problem. That's weakness.
1:00:13
Speaker 1: Strength is cleaning house on your own. And as long
1:00:18
Speaker 1: as I proceeded with that mentality, that hole that I
1:00:22
Speaker 1: was digging just got deeper and deeper and deeper, until
1:00:25
Speaker 1: the pain was so great that everybody who was saying,
1:00:28
Speaker 1: will you please ask for help? Will you please ask
1:00:30
Speaker 1: for help? I finally had no other choice but to
1:00:33
Speaker 1: do just that, and I can tell you that was
1:00:36
Speaker 1: incredibly painful because it cut across everything that I thought
1:00:42
Speaker 1: made me who I was, which was this self sufficient person.
1:00:45
Speaker 1: I had imagined that every success that I had had
1:00:48
Speaker 1: in my life was a result of my ability to
1:00:52
Speaker 1: buckle down and work hard and get it done. And
1:00:55
Speaker 1: I could not understand why that mentality couldn't solve this problem.
1:00:59
Speaker 1: But ultimately, I sit here across from you today because
1:01:05
Speaker 1: I like to say it was because of courage, but
1:01:07
Speaker 1: it wasn't. It was because I was so broken and
1:01:10
Speaker 1: I had no other avenue of recourse. But it was
1:01:13
Speaker 1: that act of asking for help, of surrender, of raising
1:01:17
Speaker 1: my hands and saying I can't do this anymore. I
1:01:19
Speaker 1: don't know how to solve this problem. Can you please
1:01:21
Speaker 1: help me? It's a vulnerable act and it took a
1:01:26
Speaker 1: lot of courage to do that, and it was terrifying,
1:01:30
Speaker 1: and I felt very ashamed, all of the emotions that
1:01:33
Speaker 1: we're discussing here today. But that was the first step
1:01:38
Speaker 1: in addressing this problem that ultimately was going to kill me,
1:01:44
Speaker 1: and in that experience, I was able to find a
1:01:47
Speaker 1: way to get sober, to stay sober. And that's why
1:01:50
Speaker 1: I feel so strongly about this that we need to
1:01:54
Speaker 1: re imagine what it means to be a man, what
1:01:58
Speaker 1: it means to be strong, and really embrace the fact
1:02:01
Speaker 1: that vulnerability is courage, that asking for help is not
1:02:06
Speaker 1: a weakness. And I say that because millions and millions
1:02:10
Speaker 1: of not just men, but people are suffering tremendously all
1:02:14
Speaker 1: over the world, and they're stuck in situations that could
1:02:18
Speaker 1: be redressed, people who are harboring conditions that could be healed,
1:02:26
Speaker 1: but they're not availing themselves of the solution because they're
1:02:31
Speaker 1: afraid to ask for help because that feels like weakness.
1:02:36
Speaker 2: And another thing that comes out of that distortion of
1:02:40
Speaker 2: not being able to have a balanced world, not being
1:02:45
Speaker 2: able to be vulnerable, not being able to look weak
1:02:49
Speaker 2: because you're asking for help, is a strong contributor to
1:02:55
Speaker 2: the dilemma that we have today in the world, which
1:02:58
Speaker 2: is that men are They're sexual predators, they're power predators.
1:03:05
Speaker 2: They take advantage of other people, whether they're sexually oriented
1:03:10
Speaker 2: or or territorially oriented. The world is a predatory place,
1:03:17
Speaker 2: and this is not going to bring about inner peace
1:03:20
Speaker 2: or world peace, or any kind of peace. It's not
1:03:23
Speaker 2: going to bring about anything. I loved hearing what you
1:03:26
Speaker 2: were saying is that, you know, it came out of
1:03:29
Speaker 2: being broken. But what came out of being broken was
1:03:33
Speaker 2: that there was no alternative but to be courageous, but
1:03:36
Speaker 2: to be vulnerable. And if we could get the listeners
1:03:40
Speaker 2: and the viewers to understand, as we're talking about sadness
1:03:45
Speaker 2: and grief and depression, that you know, these two are
1:03:50
Speaker 2: addicted behaviors, These two are familiarities. You know, a lot
1:03:56
Speaker 2: of the things that we're dealing with in this cycle
1:04:00
Speaker 2: of behavior is that we move towards the familiar, so
1:04:05
Speaker 2: that if you have been chronically depressed, if you have
1:04:07
Speaker 2: been chronically sad or aggrieving, it's a familiarity. And just
1:04:14
Speaker 2: like you were saying, you felt that if what was
1:04:17
Speaker 2: familiar to you, and I loved what you were saying,
1:04:19
Speaker 2: what was familiar to you was that I have to
1:04:22
Speaker 2: be strong and I have to do this by myself,
1:04:25
Speaker 2: otherwise my whole image shatters, and I can't live in
1:04:28
Speaker 2: a shattered image. These people that are listening and viewing
1:04:33
Speaker 2: this show have to understand that It's okay to let
1:04:39
Speaker 2: the image shatter, but to do it in a safe location.
1:04:46
Speaker 2: Don't just do it out there in the public view,
1:04:50
Speaker 2: because the public isn't ready to view it, the public
1:04:53
Speaker 2: isn't ready to respond to it, and it may only
1:04:56
Speaker 2: compound your shame, it may only compound your sense of inadequacy.
1:05:02
Speaker 2: So we would be we would be fortunate to recommend that,
1:05:08
Speaker 2: just like what you've been through, and I really respect
1:05:11
Speaker 2: your journey, that that the people that are listening that
1:05:15
Speaker 2: may be in a chronic state of depression, that these
1:05:19
Speaker 2: are not unlike alcoholism. They're not unlike you know, drug addiction.
1:05:25
Speaker 2: It's a habit, it's a pattern. It has an emotional component,
1:05:30
Speaker 2: it has a mental component, it has a physical component.
1:05:35
Speaker 2: People get very accustomed to being who they are, and
1:05:39
Speaker 2: if it's only medicine that is going to help them,
1:05:46
Speaker 2: one has to understand that medicine's main effort is to
1:05:52
Speaker 2: and it's and it's a compassionate effort. It's not I'm
1:05:55
Speaker 2: not I'm not ridiculing it in any way. Its main
1:05:58
Speaker 2: effort is to remove the symptom, because the symptom is
1:06:02
Speaker 2: so painful.
1:06:05
Speaker 1: But if the core problem is your identity, you have
1:06:08
Speaker 1: a larger mountain to climb. We become so habituated to
1:06:12
Speaker 1: our sense of who we are, to our identities. And
1:06:15
Speaker 1: if you are suffering, whether it's alcoholism or from some
1:06:18
Speaker 1: other kind of mental or emotional disease, and I say
1:06:25
Speaker 1: that like disease, a sense of a lack of ease
1:06:28
Speaker 1: in your life, then I would challenge you to call
1:06:31
Speaker 1: into question that sense of self that you're clinging to
1:06:35
Speaker 1: so strongly. Beautiful, how's that working out for you? And
1:06:39
Speaker 1: the fear that you have around letting go of that
1:06:43
Speaker 1: actually is the key that can unlock the door to
1:06:48
Speaker 1: rebuilding a new identity that will serve you in a
1:06:51
Speaker 1: much healthier way. And I respect the fact that that's terrifying,
1:06:55
Speaker 1: because I know what that's like to be in that place.
1:06:58
Speaker 1: But to understand the consciousness is larger than this narrative
1:07:03
Speaker 1: that you've sown around who you are, and that we
1:07:07
Speaker 1: all have the ability to grow and transcend whatever whatever
1:07:12
Speaker 1: is currently holding us back.
1:07:17
Speaker 2: That is complete.
1:07:21
Speaker 1: I think we did our first hour of Guru corner man.
1:07:24
Speaker 1: How do you feel?
1:07:25
Speaker 2: I feel great?
1:07:26
Speaker 4: Is it good?
1:07:27
Speaker 1: It's great? All right, man, Let's take a break and
1:07:29
Speaker 1: come back for round two.
1:07:31
Speaker 2: Alright, all right, my friends, that was such a great
1:07:34
Speaker 2: summary of the whole thing.
1:07:35
Speaker 1: Now I want you to read this painting. Just say,
1:07:40
Speaker 1: piece and.
1:07:40
Speaker 2: Plants, yes, Peace and plants.
1:07:43
Speaker 1: Cool,