Welcome! You are listening to The Mindful Minute, Meditations Created for Everyday Joy. I'm your host, Meryl Arnett, and my passion is making meditation accessible and enjoyable. This podcast is recorded from my live Monday Night meditation class, where we have a brief discussion followed by a guided meditation. If you would like to access these
meditation practices as standalone audio files for your daily practice, please subscribe to my newsletter at merylarnett.com. It's free and you'll receive a new mini meditation each week, along with behind-the-scenes content and bonus material for each podcast episode. All right, let's grab a cup of tea, a comfy seat, and settle in for today's practice. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of The Mindful Minute. Today is Part 2 in our two-part discussion on The Power of Awe.
Today, I'm chatting with Jake Eagle, who is co-author of the incredible book by the same name The Power of Awe. Last week, I chatted with Jake's co-author, Dr. Michael Amster, so be sure to go back and listen to that episode if you haven't. Jake was a License Mental Health Counselor for the past 27 years, and now practices as a meta-therapist, exploring what comes after therapy.
Although Jake recognizes the value of therapy, he also recognizes the limitations and has developed a method that accelerates and simplifies the process of personal growth. Today, Jake and I are going to further the discussion started last week around the emotion of Awe and the micro-mindfulness practice that he and Michael co-created in their book.
We talk about why this is such an important, impactful practice for our nervous system. We get it a little bit deeper into why this is so helpful in terms of addressing stress, anxiety, and burnout.
And Jake also introduces for us three levels of consciousness. The really interesting thing about this is he gives us some tools to think about connecting to the level of consciousness we're in and how to shift to the level we want to be in, whether we're in the middle of a conversation, or whether we're exploring it in a seated guided meditation. Jake guides any readable meditation at the end of today's conversation you guys, one that teaches us how to shift through levels of consciousness.
I really encourage you to stay and make time to do that practice. It's short, it's less than five minutes, and it's really good. You know, what I loved about having Michael last week and Jake this week to talk about this book is that you get to hear about the practice of awe from someone who loves to meditate and finds it easy.
And someone who tries to meditate and finds it difficult. And I love that where these two meet is in the practices that we're talking about today, it is in the practice of connecting to awe, not necessarily the big vast type of all that we think about when we're standing at the shoreline of the ocean, or we're looking at an incredible night sky.
I could be that, but it could also be the type of awe that we experience in any moment in this moment right now when you are listening to a podcast and maybe driving your car or doing dishes or whatever it is you do, while you listen. So if creating a meditation practice is a goal you have set for yourself this year, starting with this mini practice of awe is a great way to further your goal. So without any further ado, come on, join me for today's conversation.
Jake, thank you so much for chatting today. Well, I'm excited to be here and to meet you. Same same. I already had the privilege of chatting with your co author, Michael, which was a really fun conversation, and I'm really looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the subject of awe. And I thought maybe we could start maybe just give us a little bit of a background of who you are in the world to work that you do.
Just a listener's have a sense of you. Sure, I'd be happy to do that. I'm talking to you now from Hawaii, which is where my wife, Hannah and I live. We moved here seven years ago. Before that, we were in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where I was in private practice as a psychotherapist for 30 years. And when we moved here, my intention was to slow down and kind of semi-retire. And then I found that the transition was particularly difficult.
I found that letting go of my work life was kind of like letting go of my identity. And so I had a, I found it to be very challenging. And as a result, I started to develop some ways to help myself. And often when I develop something that I find helpful, I share it with other people. So I developed a course and it was called thrilled to be alive. And I taught that course. And one of the people in it was Michael Amster, who's my co author.
Michael and I've known each other for 15 years. We've become friends and we've worked together on various things. So Michael was in that course. And, and that led to us having a curiosity about how can we help people shift their state of consciousness more quickly. Both of us are longtime meditators. Michael is a very serious meditator and very good at it. I am a meditator who's not good at it and never particularly liked it.
So we came up with an idea and it had to do with these micro meditations because when I taught my course, I was asking people to meditate. Most people said, I don't have 10 minutes a day. I can't meditate. So I said, well, why if you just do it for 30 seconds or a minute and you just focus on something that you really appreciate. So people did that. And what was so interesting is the people who did that got results that were as good as the people who were doing 20 minute meditations a day.
So it surprised me and Michael as well. And so we developed this idea, what we called micro-dosing mindfulness. And the idea was that throughout the day you take some time to micro-dose on something and in hindsight, we didn't know this at the time. And something that elicits the emotion of awe. And we found it to be very fascinating how people gravitated toward this and how they seem to get a significant benefit out of something that was so easy to do.
So Michael did a pilot project with his pain patients. I did one with patients from my private practice. And again, we got really good results. And this time we did recourse surveys and post course surveys. And we really documented what happened. The results were so good that Michael went to UC Berkeley, which is one of the places where they've done the greatest amount of research on the emotion of awe. He shared the results with Dacker-Coutner, who's kind of the big granddaddy of awe research.
And he was just astounded. And he said, this is fantastic. I think you guys are capping into what I would call the future of mindfulness, which is how people can experience mindfulness while in the midst of busy, hectic lives. So we decided we would do a big study with UC Berkeley and the hospital that Michael worked at and then COVID hit.
So we ended up doing our study right at the height of COVID in June of 2020. And we had 200 healthcare professionals and 300 lay people, patients and family members. And the results were phenomenal. We saw decreases in depression, decreases in anxiety, decreases in loneliness and burnout, improvement in wellbeing, reduction in physical symptoms of pain and discomfort.
And anyway, that the results were so significant that it led to publishers asking us to write a book, which we never intended to do. Remember, I moved to Hawaii to 70%. So we ended up, we took a year, we wrote the book, he came out January of 2023. And since that time, we've been sharing this with people. We've also done another study. I won't go into a lot of detail, but we did another study at UC Davis this year for people struggling with long COVID.
And we've only got preliminary results on that. But once again, the results are very encouraging. And so we're excited to share this, get it out in the world.
And before you and I started taping you said, you know, that you were kind of reluctant because you're not someone who believes in kind of quick fixes or, you know, simple solutions. And I share that with you. I was actually embarrassed by the subtitle of our book, which is overcome burnout and anxiety, ease chronic pain, find clarity and purpose and less than one minute per day.
Gosh, that's sounds awfully unrealistic. However, it's been documented. We have documented that if people will spend a minute a day, and we, you and I could go into more detail, but that means practicing this three or four times a day for about 15 or 20 seconds. It will result in these significant shifts in people's attitudes, their physiology. And that has all sorts of ripple effects, such as in our relationships and so many other things in our lives.
You know, I want to circle back to the first thing you said was this course that you created thrilled to be alive. You mentioned it in the preface of the book. And you mentioned that you as an experiment were asking yourself, am I thrilled to be alive? You did this for several days or weeks. I can't quite remember.
And it immediately caught my attention because it is, I mean, in essence, asking you to pay attention every day, right, which is so interesting is I think it's so easy for us to say, how are you doing? Oh gosh, I'm tired. And maybe you don't notice that you said, gosh, I'm tired every day for four months. And if that's the case, we should pay attention to that, right? So I love that invitation. The simplicity of that in itself is a powerful opportunity for us.
Yeah, so when I started that, again, I was kind of having a hard time and yet objectively my life looked fantastic. I'm living in the Y, I'm with the woman of my dreams who've been together 30 years, we built a home that we love everything's great. And yet I'm not happy. So that's why I started asking the question, you know, am I thrilled to be alive? And it was a longer route to get to awe than simply doing the awe practice.
But they basically serve the same purpose. Now, if a person is living a life and they're not thrilled to be alive, the question isn't as productive. What it does is it raises, it raises the issue of why am I not thrilled to be alive.
So that can take us into many directions. Yeah, but when instead of asking the question, am I thrilled to be alive when we simply commit to look for awe three times a day, that's the most direct route that we've discovered to shift people's physiological state to shift their nervous system. And so why don't we talk listeners through how we connect to all let's talk about the practice that you offer in this book.
Yeah, so the practice is called the aug practice. We took the emotion aw a w e and we turned it into an acronym and the a stands for attention. So the first step in this method is to place your attention on something you appreciate value or find to be amazing and listeners can do this as I'm talking you just think about something you appreciate value or find to be amazing.
It may be something in your physical environment. It may be a memory. It may be that you have a dog or a cat sitting next to you and you put your hand on them and you're petting them and that is something you deeply appreciate. So it can be many sources of awe and inspiration.
The second letter is w and that stands for weight and waiting is something that we often don't do a lot in our culture, but the waiting is very brief this whole process that I'm talking about can be done in about 15 seconds. So the waiting is where you just simply stop and you give added attention to whatever it is you place your attention on and you just be with that 110% and then the last step is the exhalation that's what the e stands for exhale and expand.
And that's where you allow yourself to exhale a little bit longer than normal and I'll tell you why in a minute and as you do that whatever sensations are in your body will be amplified and that's because when we have a longer than normal exhalation we activate something called the vagus nerve and the vagus nerve moves our nervous system in the direction of relaxation.
But it's not total relaxation it's sort of energized relaxation and so if we're focused on something we appreciate value or find amazing and then we have this longer exhalation we're going to amplify this sensations in our body which are already positive.
That's the entire that's the entire method it can be done in one breath cycle which is usually about 10 or 12 seconds or you can allow it to be extended where you you do it through several breath cycles either way is fine generally the fewer the breath cycles the easier it is because your mind doesn't have a chance to wander.
Right so even people like myself who I'm a meditator but I'm not a great meditator because my mind is so busy with this practice I don't have the challenge of quieting my mind my mind can be very quiet for 12 or 15 seconds.
If I start to try and do it for 20 minutes it's more challenging and then you mentioned in the book that there are you know I prior to reading your book tended to think of all in terms of like very sort of vast experiences and what I realized in reading your book was a it doesn't have to be this like I went to the Grand Canyon or sitting on an island in Hawaii but I can't.
And then I ended Hawaii but I can be in the midst of any moment of my day and the other thing I realized which I'd love for you to talk a little bit about is that there are different types of all you talk about some sort of and I think interconnected on and conceptual which is the one I'm drawn to like that's the one I tend to look for.
I'd love to talk a little bit about the different ways that we might experience all yeah I'd like to talk about that too because it's the distinction that makes our work unique all the all research has been done previously that I'm aware of has invited people to access all by being around something that really moves and captivate you like you say the Grand Canyon or watching virtual reality through goggles that just kind of blows your mind.
What we've done is we've invited people to find awe in the ordinary so it can be as simple as waking up in the morning and opening your eyes and just finding awe in the light the quality of the light that you're looking at can be that simple if you're sleeping with your partner and your crazy about your partner you can turn over and look at him or her and they're still sleeping and you can find awe in.
In the fact that they are there with you next to you and what they mean to you if somebody's not with you it may be a memory you have of a person who has been in your life or maybe they're in your life but they're not present in the in this moment so it's there's so many sources of awe that are available and we miss them we we don't think to identify them we don't think to connect with them if they're subtle and yet they're incredibly profound.
And they do come in three categories we've identified so sensorial law which for most people is the easiest one it's where your senses are stimulated through sight sounds smell touch and that's the one that is the most common and people experience it most often in nature.
So just go out be in nature and wake up their senses and when their senses have been woken then we're asking them to pick one thing and really pay attention to it for 15 seconds that seems to be the most natural the second one is interconnected aw and that's aw as a result of connecting with another sentient being could be a person could be a pet.
And oftentimes it's in person where we're looking in their eyes or we're touching someone's hair or we're hugging our partner and with awe it's as simple as adding five seconds to the hug just five more seconds of really taking in this person and what it means to have this person in your life and that can wake up aw and then the last one is conceptual law I think you said that's the most natural.
And I think you said that's the one that you find the most interesting and that's where we thinking of ideas or concepts or constructs that just move us deeply they're so extraordinary. And sometimes these will come together you know the new telescope that's out there sending pictures.
So that is conceptual in that it's just phenomenal to see pictures of something that was you know millions of years ago and we're able to imagine it by looking at it now conceptually that's extraordinary but then the actual visual images are also extraordinary and that can stimulate sensorial law. You can have a blending of these things i love that that's really interesting.
You know the other thing that I am really interested in is that all is I believe the only emotional experience that can happen simultaneously while feeling stressed or sad or grieving even is this am I correct in that yeah exactly that's right I call it a matter. I call it a meta emotion meta means beyond so I can be depressed or sad or lonely but I can go beyond that emotion and also experience all so I can feel depressed and access all I can feel angry and access all.
I could even have all at my capacity to experience anger and express it in a healthy way. So just imagine you know we find ourselves angry at somebody we go to express that anger and we do it in a way that's really appropriate really constructive and helps us reconnect with that person and there's all in the fact that we have that capability that we can do that. We can have these emotions and feel them and move them in a healthy and constructive way. You may.
Three levels of consciousness as well in the book I wonder if we could talk a little bit about. How how and why consciousness comes into play in an experience of awe and how they overlap. Yeah it's kind of the backdrop if I were to paint a picture for you of this I would say that the most important thing to understand is that most of our problems and challenges exist at a certain level of consciousness and we my wife and I've been doing work with groups for about 25 years.
And we have identified these three levels of consciousness the level at which most of us live most of the time is called safety consciousness. And that's where we are very focused on getting things done taking care of business solving problems making sure our loved ones are safe making sure we're safe and it's a very necessary level to live in and it's worth getting good at it. It's worth learning to navigate safety consciousness well.
However, and by the way most therapy takes place at the level of safety consciousness typically a client comes in they say I have a problem they're disturbed by it they're in safety consciousness and the therapist engages with the client and they work at that level.
Okay. Now beyond safety is another level called hard consciousness and when we access that what's happening is we're we're we're opening our hearts we're opening our cells to the wonder and the beauty that surrounds us and this has been well documented in Buddhism there are gratitude practices and loving kindness practices and.
There's something called hard math which your listeners may be familiar with it's a very well researched and documented way of accessing hard consciousness by focusing on our heart and thinking positive thoughts and it shifts our physiology when we do that in very dramatic ways and it's very easy to do.
Then there's another level which is what isn't spoken about too much and we refer to it as spacious consciousness this is what many of the spiritual traditions are encouraging people to move towards paradoxically described toward right as if I have a goal to be able to be in a state of spaciousness and spaciousness is this vast openness it's a space of no words and no sense of time.
Just imagine yourself entering a state of timelessness with no agenda no words and see if you can detect what happens in your body as you just hear my voice talking about this spacious quality opening opening no boundaries sense of expansion and vastness and typically when we do that several things happen one is that our sense of self becomes smaller.
And our sense of connection becomes greater and this is a state that people have long sought to experience and we believe that all is a shortcut that gets us there in 10 15 seconds and the difference between spacious and hard consciousness is that when I'm trying to access hard consciousness I'm actively thinking.
I'm thinking about a person I love I'm thinking about how fortunate I am I'm thinking about the wonderful things in my life so my mind is active when I go to spacious consciousness I send myself on a trajectory and I stop thinking I just open myself up and thought stop. And there's a quiet expansiveness that I don't know if you can hear it in my voice but even when I talk about it yeah my physiology shifts my nervous system goes into a place of deep relaxation and calm.
Now I can't live there but I can go there numerous times throughout the day and one of my favorite things as a therapist and also in my personal life is that I use these states of consciousness proactively so for example if a client comes in and is disturbed about something instead of delving into the content which is what is very common I'll say appreciate what you're talking about definitely going to go into it but before.
We do I want to take a moment and I want to invite you to shift your state of consciousness so I want you and then I'll invite them either to go into hard consciousness or spacious consciousness and if they've never done it before I'll guide them in that process maybe it takes a minute no more.
Now invite them to come back and say so let's go ahead and talk about what it is that you wanted to discuss when you first came in their voice quality is different their breathing pattern is different their attitude is different the defensiveness that was there is decreased if not gone and now it's an entirely different conversation.
And for your listeners this is something that you can do in your personal life this isn't exclusive to therapy if you need to have a conversation let's say that you think is going to be a difficult conversation with your partner.
I would hopefully you both know about this but even if just one of you knows about it I would say take a minute 30 seconds to shift into a different state of consciousness before you have the conversation and it will change the tone of that conversation and if you both know how to do this. It's just a gift that you can be giving to yourselves in each other.
And I know at the end of our conversation today I'm going to ask you to guide us through meditation and practicing shifting consciousness but I think that you mentioned in the book perhaps it doesn't have to be a formal I'm going to go sit down my meditation cushion and close my eyes to shift consciousness we can simply connect to that in a moment is that am I correct in that.
Yeah I just did it right now you're talking as you can hear in the background my phone is ringing so you know a little self conscious I'm trying to get the phone I keep answering it hanging up on whoever's calling right. So I'm starting to feel myself a little anxious and then I think about my state of consciousness I'm in safety I'm trying to control things that's what we do in safety consciousness.
And then I shift to appreciating you and you're quite relaxed in terms of doing a podcast and you're very present and I can just tell that this isn't a problem right. And we can use it we can use it as part of our conversation so now I've shifted into a state of appreciation and my nervous system has come back to a place of calm and quiet.
So we can do this we can do this anytime we can do it quickly it's a matter of two things the first is awareness to identify what state of consciousness am I in right now. I have to have the wherewithal and the awareness to ask that question and then the second question is what state of consciousness what I like to be in what would be appropriate. For time to write like to be in hard consciousness but it may not be appropriate right.
So if I'm in a situation that's truly threatening it's probably not a good idea to shift into heart because I really do need to take care of myself and protect and do whatever is necessary. So those two questions what state of consciousness am I in. What state would I like to be in and is appropriate. So you know as you're talking I'm just reflecting on my day which is so funny so we're recording this on January 2nd.
And it is my first day quote unquote back to work after a really lovely two weeks off with the kids I've young kids and they're off there at school so I stop working so that we can be home. And I'm not young enough that usually my anticipation is like I'm going to be really ready for school to start back right two and a half weeks is a long time do not have school. But this year they're just to find like we just had fun.
I'm not ready for school to be back it was lovely it was lovely not having to get up in rush in the morning. I really interesting day because we had to get up we had to get our stuff loaded in the car we had to get out the door I taught some classes earlier today and as I was teaching I was like man I feel so divided.
I'm I really like what I do so I was happy to be back I was happy to see my clients and be in that space again I have my new calendar on the wall over here I'm really happy about that. Also like the break was lovely and I want to be there so I'm just reflecting a little bit on like maybe I was sort of dancing between states of consciousness perhaps today because definitely there was the like I had to show up had to get things done today right. And also like it was lovely right.
So yeah part of what I hear you describing is the attachment that we have we get attached to things being a certain way and then they're going to change and when change occurs we almost always go into safety consciousness. And I say defense mechanism to help deal with the unknown. But what I hear you doing in this situation is actually holding on to heart consciousness even though change is taking place. It sounds like a kind of a sweet dance.
It was a really interesting day I will say that I was like this is so interesting I'm I really felt sort of a little bit like a dance I'm moving back and forth between two feeling and I like your suggestion of really naming for myself or ourselves as anybody who's listening what state of consciousness in my in and what state of consciousness.
Do I want to be in is that the question you asked yes I want to be and I really like that invitation as we step into moments and I. I feel like one of the things I'm really paid attention to in my own work. Is that it isn't always the 20 minute meditation that's the most beneficial thing and I love that for myself I personally find that to be the luxury in my day and if you meditate I don't want you to stop so if you're listening to this i'm not telling you to stop.
However I find that there are also these little things exactly what you're offering that are so powerful in shifting moment to moment how we move through our day. Yeah I think what you're saying is really valuable which is that for people who have a meditation practice this is not a substitute. This is a compliment if you're already a strong meditator and then you add in the all method practice I think you just. Deep in and enriching the you know your contemplative practice.
If you're not a good meditator you're frustrated with this is a great. Entry into the world of contemplation and the emotion of all yeah and it's a way. One of my meditation teachers once invited me to notice how long I could carry that meditative feeling throughout my day. And the answer to that was that embarrassingly a short amount of time like being on the cushion by myself in a quiet space is one thing.
And then walking up these stairs into the kitchen with two kids and a partner and dinner needing to get on the table is another thing and so I think what you're offering us is.
This opportunity to carry that state throughout our day in a much easier way than imagining you're just going to stay meditative all day long right right and then you disappointed then you become self critical of course the whole thing yeah our book is being translated into several different languages and in Germany I think. I think it came out of a week ago they changed the title they called it mindfulness to go oh I love that oh is that good that that's clever yeah really good.
Listening to you reminded me of that yeah. I want to talk about one more thing quickly and then let's do a practice together. So I've noticed towards the end of the book you talk about existential anxiety which is a topic we talk about a lot on this podcast and I wonder if perhaps it feels more prevalent than ever as we deal with many crises on many fronts. And you bring all in as a practice to support us in existential anxiety I was wondering if maybe you could talk a little bit about that.
Yeah be happy to I'm curious that you say that this is something you explore you know on your podcast because it doesn't get enough attention in my opinion. There's this backdrop of being a human where we have anxiety related simply to the fact that we exist.
Nothing needs to happen there is simply anxiety as a result of being human and some of that comes from our awareness of the fact that we're mortal we're not going to be here forever and the people we love are not going to be here forever that creates anxiety. So what it has to do with the fact that everything is changing nothing is certain and so how do we live in a world without certainty and calm ourselves be relaxed be present.
Third primary cause of existential anxiety is that people are not present and when we're not present our physiology is that a very deep unconscious level goes on alert because we're at again at a very primitive level we're asking what am I missing what am I not paying attention to. And when we're extremely present that calms down so when we're on a meditation cushion oftentimes we don't have that kind of existential angst.
And largely there are not great solutions for existential anxiety because it's not necessarily something that can be solved. It can be accepted that's one step towards it and it also can be affected by shifting our level of consciousness so existential anxiety occurs primarily when we're in safety consciousness where we want to know what's going on and we want to control it. But at some level we know we can't.
So when we go into spacious consciousness and time and words drop away the concerns related to existential anxiety drop away.
If there's nothing other than you and I being here right now in this moment focused on this conversation and and that's all there is then the anxiety decreases dramatically it only arises when we start thinking about either what's next what do we have to deal with what if I make a mistake what if something goes wrong or if we get stuck thinking about what did I what mistake did I make or what should I have done differently right.
So when we're in the past or the future existential anxiety tends to rise and I is a way of bringing ourselves powerfully into the present moment. I love that so much and I I know we had an episode a while ago devoted to this a long time listeners you might remember this but there was an episode where we practice just ask or stating sort of reminding ourselves that there is nothing to fix in this moment.
Which is a tricky statement right because if you really take it for if I can be right here just the second that is probably a true statement but it's almost impossible to stop your brain from going but right and then listing all of the things.
And so pulling in this practice of paying attention waiting exhaling and expanding just that very quick little practice it feels almost like a synonym right almost like a exact same offering and it stops you from going but and doing the whole list after work.
Yeah exactly I mean my reaction is well I could do that for 10 seconds I mean I could I could postpone the but for 10 seconds right but if you ask me to postpone for 10 minutes or 20 minutes I don't think I can do that yeah exactly and again what we're trying to do in those 10 15 20 seconds is we're resetting our nervous system.
It's really important for listeners to understand that at the core that's what the emotion of all is doing it's resetting our nervous system to a particularly healthy place where healing and regeneration and renewal can occur at a physiological and psychological level.
Now you know we could live there all the time maybe that would be great that's not possible but what if we did that five times a day what if we did that once an hour if you think of your nervous system kind of like a spring and you wake up in the morning and it's loose and flexible and then as the day goes and challenges arise.
The spring your nervous system begins to get compressed more compressed more compressed tighter and tighter and by the end of the day there's all this rigidity and stiffness stiffness in our bodies stiffness in our minds stiffness in the way we relate with people reactivity judgmentalness defensiveness.
Well if every hour I do a 30 second practice and I release the tension in the spring I release the tension in my nervous system at the end of the day i'm not going to be where I would have been had I not done this practice.
I love that alright so yeah listeners we have our gentle marching orders once an hour let's try it and but for today Jake if you want mind I would love for you to share the meditation that you share in the book on shifting our levels of consciousness listeners I really want us to practice this as well yeah take it away. This is a relatively short meditation i'm guessing it's something like one to two minutes perfect and the idea is for you to experience the different levels of consciousness so.
To begin sit on a cushion or in a chair in a comfortable position with your spine or react if possible. And if it's comfortable cross your ankles and your hands can rest in your lap with the tip of your index fingers touching the tips of your thumbs. Breathe normally relaxing more with each breath as you continue breathing you can close your eyes take a moment to imagine a small light in the center of your head.
With each breath allow the light to grow larger and strong and as the light grows it fills your head expanding with each breath extending beyond your head at a certain point growing in every direction. Imagine that the light expands in front of you behind you to both sides as well as above and below you. This light represents an energy field that can extend several feet beyond your body in every direction. Allow yourself to be aware of this energy field.
This large sphere of light that surrounds you. This is a place to be present and rest for a few minutes. You can say in your own mind i disinvite any thoughts or intrusions from being in this space for the next few minutes. As you continue breathing place your attention at the base of your spine.
Notice the quality of the energy at the base of your spine and imagine that this is the home of safety consciousness in extremely valuable state of consciousness that is with us from the time we are born until the time we die. As you focus on safety consciousness if you're comfortable doing so begin breathing in the nose and out the mouth in the nose and out the mouth. And as you're doing so i'm going to express some of the things that you may feel when in safety consciousness.
Just continue breathing in those out the mouth and notice any sensations in your body. Okay, here we go. Some of the things that may arise in safety consciousness. Sometimes i feel driven to do things. Sometimes i feel at a loss. Sometimes i feel smart. Sometimes i feel like i don't know what to do. Sometimes i feel determined. Sometimes i feel like i need help. And sometimes i feel like helping others. Continue breathing in the nose out the mouth.
All these feelings arise within safety consciousness. Each one of these feelings is possible because you are alive. Safety consciousness is a state of being in which we experience our needs and vulnerabilities. And we make plans we take action we set boundaries to help us navigate life. Safety consciousness spurs us to find solutions that help us grow and feel more secure.
Take a moment to appreciate safety consciousness trusting your instincts, your skills, and insights to guide you providing a strong foundation upon which to build your life. Much that you have and value is the result of having managed your life well in safety consciousness. As you take a few moments to appreciate all that safety consciousness offers you, you may begin to feel the energy at the base of your spine start to rise.
Start to rise just notice the act of appreciation can help shift our state of being. If you feel the energy rising allow it to continue and if not imagine the energy rising encourage the energy in the base of your spine to flow up into your heart center. Continue breathing but now breathe in the nose and out the nose if that's comfortable for you. As you access hard consciousness take a few moments to appreciate the people in your life who you love and the people who love you.
Appreciate the pets that you may have in your life and the places that you love to visit. Appreciate the gifts you have and the qualities that you value about yourself. Appreciate the beauty rest in the beauty. Pause for a few moments notice the sensations in your body and the quality of being in heart consciousness. Notice how this may be different than the way you felt in safety consciousness. You may begin to notice the energy in your spine starting to rise again.
If so allow it to rise or imagine it flowing up your spine into your head the energy may even continue to rise through and beyond your head. As the energy rises you may become aware of spacious consciousness a state in which there are no words. This is a state of expanding awareness and timelessness. There is no need to track or describe just be in this expansive state for a few moments. Breathing, relaxing, expanding.
Boundless, spacious presence. Notice the overall sensation of being in this state. Notice if it is the familiar or unfamiliar. Experience this way of being that is effortless. Pause. And then when you feel ready to bring this meditation to a close allow the energy to slowly drift back down from your head to your heart. Pause for a moment to re-experience heart consciousness a state of deep appreciation. Be aware of any changes in your body as you do this.
And then when you're ready allow the energy to drift back down from your heart to the bottom of your spine to safety consciousness, the foundation upon which you live your life. Pause for a moment and notice any sensations in your body. And when you're ready, open your eyes and bring your attention back to the present moment. Jake, thank you so much. Such a good practice. Yeah, I just want to suggest to people as they start this new year that this can be very easy.
There's so many ideas about change and growth being difficult and requiring a lot of effort. This practice of accessing the emotion of law and this practice of shifting our level of consciousness, this does not have to be hard. It does not take a lot of time. It is remarkably accessible to all of us. Thank you here here to that. So listeners, you've known had two episodes devoted to the power of awe. I hope you get the book. I hope you read it.
And Jake, where can listeners find more about you or are you retired and you don't want anybody talking to you? Did you embrace retirement? No, I haven't. As a matter of fact, after Michael and I finished writing this and promoting it, I then got very enthusiastic about a course I created called transformative tales. It's a five month program that people do home study that's very old fashioned. You get six little booklets and you read a booklet.
And then you spend three weeks contemplating what you read. And every three days you get an audio recording in the mail in the email. Very short audio recording to deepen and reinforce what it is that you're learning and opening up to. And it was born somewhat out of the work we did on awe because I had this striking awareness that people simply need to slow down. Do less and develop some mastery at a few things that really make a difference in our lives.
So identified identified six things that I believe if we had mastery in these six areas, it would radically change the quality of our lives and our relationships. Now we have to do a whole other episode. Maybe we will do that. So if people if people want information about the power of awe, that's our website. It's the power of a calm. If people are interested in other things that I'm doing my wife and I have a website called live conscious live conscious.
And on that website, there's some information about the transformative tales course and some other things that we do. I will link both in the show notes one last question and I will let you go are the transformative tales is it like myths or is it stories about like what are the tales I'm just curious. Well, it's a it's a blend so they are very grounded pragmatic, real skills that we can all practice and they make a huge difference, but I tell them.
Through a story that began when I had a car accident at the age of 18 and you hear me hesitating I've never figured out how to say this. So I either died in the car accident or something died. It was so disorienting and so severe that I really don't know how to describe it. A lot of people jump to the conclusion that I that I died and I accessed a different world.
I don't know about that I don't I don't pretend to, but I do know that something shifted and cleared my mind in such a way that I became open to receive information that I don't know that I could have received it had I not had the accident. And it's that information in the states that I've been in that are how I learned these skills and how I and I tell that story basically that's that's what it's about. Well, I think we'll all go to your website to learn more than.
Jay, thank you for sharing some time with me today. This was an absolute pleasure. I really enjoyed connecting with you. Thank you. I really like starting my new year with you. So glad. Yeah, let's stay in touch. Let's. Okay. Thanks. Thanks for listening to the mindful minute. If you enjoyed today's episode, please consider sharing it with a friend or leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts.
This helps others to find the show and let's face it. We could definitely use more meditators in this world. The mindful minute is recorded on Muscogee land and produced with the support of Madeline Day production management and Brianna Nielsen virtual assistance to join my live classes, ask questions or learn more about my teacher trainings. Please visit MaralArnet.com. Thanks again for listening. I'll see you guys next week.