Embarking on Paths of Compassion and Self-Awareness

This is an album I made for wellness practitioners and practicers alike to defrag and decompress in this very busy, fast and quick world, and we hope you enjoy as we take you up, down and across the river. This is Running the River. Let me ask you a question, now that we've gotten through all the things we want to talk about. Is this like? What are you using to, if we're talking about? You know if the theme? Is you regulating the nervous system?

and dealing with all the pressures of modern society, let alone what we inherit epigenetically. What are your practices to um create a more uh conducive life to uh uh ease and I don't know, or may not that life has to be all ease, but just maybe uh more peaceful yeah, peaceful, that's a good word.

And my family yeah, solid solid regime yeah, and I'm gonna be the first to say it's like I'm not nailing it every morning. I'm, you know, I hope that you know in the telling of this, there is no, there is no part of it where it's like I do this every single morning without fail, like you know. The discipline side of it, where it's like I do this every single morning without fail, like you know, the discipline side of it, is a work in progress still.

Energy wobbles, yeah, up and down, up and down, the worth. The earth is wobbling on its axis. It's like we're all wobbling. I think the idea, I think most people who practice kind of know this, but I think it's the, you know, there's that kind of romantic um aspect to kind of the whole quote-unquote wellness world or whatever else that people see from the outside.

It's like, oh, it's like, when you're looking for this, some kind of utopic, um unrealistic, fantastical idea of um serenity or you know, and actually a lot of times it's there's a lot of discomfort, yeah, you know. And the tension and the release of it all it's like it's not just all about release. There has to be, yeah, sun and moon, day and night, you know, and yeah, that you know. I think, another definition of yoga it's just like the practice, you know it is, it is the journey.

It's like it's not, it's not this, it's more of a way than a discipline, so to speak. That life is, yeah, it's not, yeah, it's not this, it's more of a way than a discipline, so to speak. That life is it's not like, cool, once you do this and then you do this, then it's all right, it's like, and then this too shall pass and something else is going to happen.

The modality that I was introduced to, you know, yeah, a year or so ago, was just this idea like you're not trying to still the mind, you're not, you're actually just trying to keep the breath. Natural. You can move as much as you want, you can think about whatever you want to think about and, you know, just lack of expectation to get it right was actually really, really great little practice to have.

But this idea that, like you know, we see that in the West a bit with, say, you know, yoga, for example, it's like you know, there's a, there's a, there is a small tendency or, depending on how large, I'm, not part of the culture that much but that it becomes a competition Like how much can you stretch, how long can you hold it, how bad it's, like it's.

We industrialize everything, everything has to be a commodity in a competition in the west, and like and to take that competition out and be kind. You know I always, you know recall I probably said this in the last podcast. I said a lot. It's like asking a friend about how he deals with anxiety and like I'm like what do you do? I need some help. And she's like I just well, I just try to be kind to myself. And I'm just like what did you say? Yeah, he said. I said kind of like.

What's that word mean? Like like I was. It was almost like he spoke another language to me. Protocol that I would kind of yeah, I've been raised with. I'm not saying that my parents weren't kind, I'm saying just this idea of oh well, first of all be kind, oh, that's all right because that's okay, but then fuck I can't do this, why can't I do?

He was doing a valedictorian speech for the graduation class and I don't know if those are the same. A valedictorian is probably somebody who's part of the graduation class. Anyways, he was doing a graduation speech as the guest speaker and he was like you can always tell who the smartest and not so smartest people in the room are. The meanest people are always the less intelligent and the nicest people are the most. And he said whether this is true or not, this isn't you know.

Obviously it's a metaphor for those listening, but it's like. It's like we are wired with fight or flight and negative bias to see others that are different to us, who don't, who are not, birds of a feather to us, as a mystery, different and potential danger, whether that is sex, gender, orientation, ethnicity, color.

Uh, we are wired by a lot biology, biologically, to a certain degree, to go, oh, that's different, is this a threat or you know, or an advantage, you know, whether we kind of like it or not, let alone all the social norms that then get built upon those things. He goes, and to be kind is to have enough. He's in enough of the last of our nervous system.

You know the prefrontal cortex, you know the youngest part of our nervous system and to analyzing and to go, oh, but that person, just because they're a different color than me, doesn't mean they're a threat.

Because that person likes that sexual orientation or because of that political persuasion or faith persuasion, that doesn't mean they're different to me and they see the world maybe differently to how I see it or have a different perspective or a different preference, but they are not a threat to me and they are no different to me in a lot of different ways. To have that cognitive practice, to be mindful enough and not a reptile, enough shows intelligence.

So the meanest are actually the less intelligent, the most driven by primordial fears, and I guess what I'm making, a statement, is much as just like when you said kindness, most driven by primordial fears, and there was this always. You know, I guess, what I'm making, a statement as much as, just like when you said kindness, I'm really struck that it it utilizes our most advanced inner biological technology. Yeah, you know, it does.

Takes a lot to to love, to be kind it does when the world's driven by fear, a lot of it. To be kind it does when the world's driven by fear a lot of it and we're fed fear To bypass that. Enough to have enough regulation, fucking regulation, I mean. That's the main reason why I do it. Regulating is key.

My biggest regrets, nine times out of ten, of the fact that I wasn't regulated enough, usually around the people I love the most or the people I was so wanted to be understood by you know how to regulate the fear in me. It's interesting, dan.

There I was like I'm like man, I'm like my intuition's pretty spot on, my gut is pretty spot on and somehow I think she said it we both got to it's like it's actually not the intuition of the gut, it's the filter that has to go through to get to a thought form and an action. Yeah, and the filter that my thoughts go through are survival and negative bias, so I'll get a fucking smell on something like something's not right.

And then the filters it has to go through, which are going to be mixed with my trauma and my predispositions and everything else that I've inherited, either psychologically, physically, epigenetically, culturally. Psychologically, physically, epigenetically, culturally. It has to go through all that, all those biases, to then pop out.

The other side is and this is what I think about that, or this is how I'm going to respond to it yeah, and I just find that really interesting that you know, yeah, you can have a great intuition, but if it's, if it's been translated through an app that has trauma bias- of some sort it's going to come back as defensive.

Sometimes, you know, like it's how we choose to filter and what the input and the data points that are coming in are just data points and it's like. It's like almost that kind of that Zen things. It's just stuff happening, it's just life. There's no meaning to any of it. And then we're us meaning making machines, we process it in this hardware and what pops out the other side can be anything from make America great again to uh, I choose not to eat any living animals to.

You know, I do not understand that. That race or that religion and how we program, how we choose to regulate. That I find interesting. You know, by no means to anybody listening do I think I have any of the answers. I'm just profoundly struck by the filters in which we choose to take this data in. Yes, and then the narratives that we build them into, that create our realities.

Yeah, so I'm creating, and the more conscious I am of my labeling style um, habit, habit, passion, it is not not passion, pretty suspicious, yeah, thank you. Predispositions on it. Yeah, the more I am afraid of being at the mercy of that or like a victim of that. Yeah, filtering, you know, the more, the more I'm conscious of how I'm filtering and and all. It only requires a consciousness, it doesn't require anything, it doesn't require me to like even labor or effort.

What I want my new filter to be, at that point, the just, even the recognition of

what is already there is incredibly liberating, you know.

They may not work for you, but the you know, yeah, framing, you know how we choose to frame. Yeah, it's just like it is the end all and be all, and again, that's what I was. I found myself again. Is that, and that's, I think, why we do the practice. Yeah, so that maybe in a glimpse, in a fucking mere little glimpse, you're like, oh, I just made that up. Yeah, exactly, I just made that.

Like I had enough distance from the canvas, yeah, to observe myself, you know, to be the observer for five seconds. I think that's what the practice like allows, and usually for me, probably, because how much I practice when you know is, I get glimpses mm-hmm and I'll sit there and watch this person yeah, who's myself and and what they're saying. Yeah, hanging up the clothes, and I should.

So I interested in just instantly start making more cortisol. Yeah, I, all of a sudden I'm finding a chemical reaction in my body that literally I'll come down from, like I'll have to, like I have to take a walk, yeah, and wait until I'm sober, yeah, from this chemical infiltration. That's just from a thought yeah, from your own thought.

And I think once you start looking at life a little bit that way, that's when things can almost feel a little bit unsettling at times because you're like, oh, this is a collection of narratives, yeah, yeah, oh shit, yeah, I think it's kind of what happened to jim carrey a little bit, like he kind of had this great point of view perspective on himself and everything else and it's like what's canadian mean? Yeah, you know what's jim mean.

I mean, really, it's a frame, it's an idea, it's a good agreement. Yeah, is that who I am? Like he can really start going. Yeah, he's great right out there. A little bit as far as yeah, all the things are yeah I like. I like that it allows just a little bit of spacing between me and that narrative to see maybe there's an author and do I choose to actually want to go on that?