Brothers from Another Mother

Thanks. Alright, as I start off uh all these podcasts, uh I always say why go ji cacasa, why good ji ki fate, even if my guest doesn't know what I'm saying and it's uh code language. But uh today I'm honored uh to have along with us uh good friend of mine from New York, Gary Glee. That's the right way of pronouncing your last name as people know it right, Gary.

Not really, but you know what that leads into a really interesting story Okay, well well first what what is what it sh what it should it be? Gly, G-L-I. gli. well why didn't you use a Y? Okay. All right. interesting. That's interesting. I should have. Okay, so why so okay, so that's a good place to start. Uh what's your interesting story? Well, you know, as you know, I've been involved in the martial arts my entire life.

um early on uh when I fought in tournaments, as you know, it's really important that you keep your psych up. And so the first tournament I was in, and it's a Chinese tournament, they really had trouble pronouncing my name. They said, in the red corner, Gary gook, gook, gook. And it really destroyed my sight. So a few days later, I was in the gym with my training partner and I said, Hey, I changed my name. said to what?

I said, Gly. I took the three letters in the middle of my last name and I decided that's what I'll call myself. He said, I love it. And so the very first tournament after that, they said in the red corner, Gary Glee. I said, geez. So, so the next time I signed for a fight, I told the promoter, my name is Gly, not Glee. He said, Gly, not Glee. I said, yes. And uh well, when you know what the next bike, they said in the blue corner, Gary Gill. I said, man, this is just three letters.

so many years later, I was on Good Morning America and I had told a friend of mine the story and he took me down to the studios. It was very early in the morning. And I believe it was Jane Hansen at the time that ran that show. And she said, this morning in the studio, have two guests, Dwayne Hyatt and Gary Glee. And I looked at the doors where this friend of mine was standing and he just fell down laughing, you So it's been a long history of not being able to get this name correct.

So no worries. gonna be I'm gonna be doing the same thing. I know whenever that stuff like this happens, I I I I just so I'll probably end up calling you Gary Glee, no matter what you say to me. It's already you've already got me g a little crazy about it. So it's Gary Gly. And thank thanks. I I actually didn't know that. And and and No, and actually I've always even you're even in my contact list on your I think you're probably your born uh last name.

So I wasn't even I wasn't totally tuned into the you know, you having kind of a stage name as they say. So oh wow. So you know um by the way how did how did you get on Good Morning America? What was that about Well, I also had a lengthy career as a professional musician. And I did some acting in between. So the manager of the band, was a, this is prior to all these dating services that we have now, I mean, this is probably early 1990s. There was a book out called The Bachelor Book.

And women would subscribe to it and every month they would feature different bachelors. and a way to contact them, et cetera. uh I had no interest in doing that, but I did want to get on the Good Morning America show. So um the woman who owned the bachelor book wanted our band to give her a very special deal. And I said, there's no way I'm going to give her 50 % off, but we'll give them a break of about 15 % if she uses me on the show. And so that's how it went.

So I thought it would be good exposure for me. Um, which it was for a while. Uh, locally I had some fame, you know, people would stop me and say, Hey, weren't you the guy on, you know, good morning America? And, and I also was on the Ricky Lake show. This is early 1990s, 91, 92. So, um, yeah, just the. she was uh what was the name of that movie she was in? I forgot. It was in Baltimore, Greece, was it? Was it Yeah, she was yeah, Ricky Lake, she was she was she was in a movie.

I forgot the name of it, but it was a big movie. Yeah, I remember it well, but I can't remember the name either. So I guess it wasn't that uh impactful. uh yeah, I remember she was in that. But she had a show running for quite a long time. And early on, they would reshow a lot of the broadcasts. So I must have been on 15 times the first month because they kept showing it. to I'm gonna have to do a Google search on this, right?

You know, my my uh my claim to fame about the time that we met in New York years ago was I I actually got on the what what's what's her name? Martha Stewart Show. Oh, okay. So that was my little claim to fame. That was that was a very that was after after she was convicted of whatever she was convicted of.

After she was convicted. So I found my I found myself on the Martha Stewart show and they um I don't know how exactly that happened, but they wanted me to show something, some kind of meditation on the yeah, yeah, on the Martha Stewart show. Uh but I didn't know that they were gonna have um These different people from different schools of yoga doing what they I guess thought was exotic yoga thing.

So I'd be teaching this meditation and above me is somebody like floating over the top of my head doing acro, acro yoga. And I was very hard for I remember it was like hard for me to concentrate and teach this meditation because I thought at any second this person would like drop and fall on my head. you And um yeah that was that was that was an interesting you with Ricky Lake and me with Martha Stewart. Okay, so we we have some background there.

Well, I'll give you some cred because at least you were doing something to do with meditation. Here I was uh posing as this bachelor looking for a date, but uh I just thought it would be good career move because I did do a few movies that were interesting back in the day and uh it was a fun thing to do.

I really had a knack for playing characters and uh you know, if my life had worked out a little differently, I might have... uh done acting full time, but you know, playing music, you sometimes finish gigs at two, three in the morning and you know, early calls for casting calls are at six. I had to make a choice as to which one of those things I wanted to put my attention into. So uh I did acting sporadically, but it was something I enjoyed a lot. I forget w what instrument did you play?

I forgot. I know you told me. Yeah, I play guitar. Just like like lead guitar, like like rock and roll. Well, yeah, I played rock and roll, most of the bands that I toured with and worked with were uh R &B acts. And you play both rhythm and lead, depending. um And it was a big part of my life. I I was on the road a lot for once, then for almost 12 years.

Yeah. um both of us went on to do different things a little later in life, but uh you know, sometimes people forget we kinda had like a very different life when we were younger and did different kinds of things that kind of are part of the fabric of our life. And uh I know I know in my case uh sometimes I d I think people don't pay attention to it or don't care, but I I basically am who I am today as a result of doing all these like crazy things when I was younger, right? Absolutely, absolutely.

I mean, I'll even say this, Harinam, which is interesting. I always knew deep down that the truth of anything I was doing, whether it was music or martial arts, was really about raising my own consciousness and awareness as to who my authentic self really was. And so that thread never died, even though I did various things, whether it was playing some small movie parts, playing music, teaching classes and seminars. That was really the subtext to everything.

And now what I'm just doing boldly, you know, it's now all of my writing and teaching and is all basically about finding the authentic self and recognizing that that is the inner purpose that we all share, regardless of our outer purpose, right? You know, playing music, someone could be a janitor, I think. I think it was in the movie, uh it was a Dan Millman book, uh trying to think of the name, but uh Nick Nolte played the part of a uh mechanic.

at one point in the book, this young guy seeks him out and he's coaching him on life. And the guy, you know, at one point turns on him and says, you're just a mechanic or whatever. And Nick Nolte turns to him and says, no. I'm in the service business. And I thought that was very interesting because when you're truly in the service of other people, uh helping them to find their higher self, that's the greatest thing we can offer.

And it doesn't matter what we do externally, whether we're a janitor or a teacher, you know, if the subtext is that. I think you can relate to this 'cause I I think we have um this in common.

I think it's one reason we kind of hit it off when we met each other is that, you know, even though we're we're kind of doing similar things at this stage of our lives, I think both of us have done like a lot of different things, have seen a lot of different things, have been a little out of the box, very uh extroverted social people and

one way that I've always been as an adult, and it was actually validated my by my uh own spiritual teacher who was very much like this, and I could see that people really didn't get it, the people around me, but I got it because I was already that way. Is that the one thing that I really saw from my own spiritual teacher was that like myself, uh he was actually interested in everything and everybody.

So he he he may not have known everything about everything, but he knew a little about everything. And he was interested in everybody, which meant that it didn't matter who he crossed pairs with, he'd have something in common that that he could very easily win people over because he could talk about what not what he wanted to talk about, he could talk about what they wanted to talk about. And I have kind of found my wheelhouse doing that too and and I've always felt you're kind of very similar.

We've done a lot of different things, but it's it's really helped us in uh in in the long run. even even now later I I'm you know seventy four now. I don't know how that happened. That kind of rushed on me quickly. I think life's been very slow, but the last couple of years seemed a little quicker. But I I'm seventy four now. And just two years ago I took up the electric bass. And yeah, yeah, I've always wanted to do that, and now I got a little more time on my hands.

And it's just interesting learning that at this time in my life. and it's as you know, you're a musician. It's uh I think that and learning languages are are just very good for keeping your brain uh flexible and fluid. So it's been actually helpful to me. Not not easy. I it's it's making me to go in a little different directions. But but it's kinda you know, it's kinda fun. I I mean I can't believe at seventy four I can kinda hang in there and play the girl for me Benemis.

So, you know, that I I I'm just tickled by just the idea that I I can do it. And well, you know, I don't wanna get too far off here 'cause you know, we could talk and do talk about everything, but I happen to have you on this show right now and I I kinda trust you're gonna be a regular here because uh frankly, um, you know, I know zillions of people, but I mean to be honest, you're you are and you have been one of the most interesting people that I know.

And so you know, that that's that counts a lot in my book. And so you're kind of guy we could talk about anything at any time. So and y and you you've kind of pushed the envelope like I have and and finding yourself uh also of of help to other people because of who you are. I don't think I we talked much about this show that I'm actually doing, maybe a little bit, but I you know I this this actually started when I was back in New York, by the way. Uh I may not even have shared it with you.

This was when like podcasting was just beginning. And actually, this this go off. I'm going off. Uh, this was a little bit of an outtake of the Martha Stewart show. Because on the Martha Stewart show, I met the niece of Martha Stewart. She knew some she knew somebody who was in the podcasting uh business back when it just was starting out, kind of a very irreverent Kind of feminist kind of person. and not not the niece, but this person in the podcast.

And uh and then she landed up taking uh Martha Stewart's niece took me in to meet this podcast. So the podcast was kind of fascinated with where I was coming from, invited me to do a podcast with her, okay, and gave me the choice of naming it what I wanted to name it. And I said, well, let's call it the warrior saint, because that's kind of like the prototype of somebody who who walks the spiritual path that I do, which is called the Khalsa, which was developed 300 years ago.

And the prototypical Khalsa is the prototypical uh warrior saint. And so uh it was really interesting getting uh interviewed by somebody so irreverent. Always challenging me. But I liked it. I wasn't intimidated. She she could always challenge me, but I always knew that in the end I'd come up up top, you know, it didn't bother me. I liked the challenge. And she was always questioning anything I had to say, but it was just fun. But that ended and that kind of rested in peace.

But then with all this new technology that we've been talking about. I thought, hey, you I got some time in my hands. You know, I'm gonna revive the Warrior Saint. I'm gonna do it myself, but it's not gonna just be like a an audio podcast with I'm gonna make a video podcast out of this. And um I'm I'm I'm not gonna push, I'm just gonna have conversations with really interesting people. Let the conversation have a life of its own.

And as you know from this conversation, no no This conversation's not planned. We don't know what we're gonna talk about. We're just hanging out. But I'm trying to bring in people who are visionary people, trusting the conversation will go where the conversation wants it to go, not where I want it to go, but ultimately with the hope that it finds its footing somehow and it kind of gets back to uh what the title of the podcast is, which is Warrior Saint.

And so You know, you came to mind because uh even though you're not specifically doing what I'm doing, I sense I've always sensed that we're doing very similar things, that we have a similar worldview. And so you're kind of like to me, like a brother in arms in in this way.

I just got back from two months uh tour, teaching tour in South America. And and at this stage of my life, everything that I'm teaching is in the context of the paradigm of encouraging people to live as a warrior saint and actually giving them specific direction on how to do that. That that's actually the best life, th is living like a warrior saint, uh both in your experience and how you conduct yourself and how you see yourself. And it's just a very integrated package.

And then I came back from that and now I'm kind of uh a little bored and not knowing what to do with myself. So good, I'm gonna talk with guys like Gary and and see what they're up to because I think this is kind of the future of things. And one of the things that's really kind of come to my attention is kind of actually um Present this in what's going on in the world today.

And I really see, even though it's from 300 years ago and it originated in India with the great Gudagobind Singh, the tenth master of the S of the Sikh faith, um to somebody who doesn't know anything about it, I often like to describe this as basically a way to live a life that's very stoic. It's like it's almost like Greek stoicism with devotion.

And I'm at the point that you know I've taught yoga and meditation for 50 years, but at this stage of my life, this is kind of the intro to where I'm really wanting to hear more about what you're doing and what you've done. Is that uh, and you know me well, so you wouldn't be surprised, is that, and maybe we'll even collaborate on that, on all of this together physically, you know, is that um at this stage of my life, I don't teach yoga meditation.

If the person is not practicing some form of martial arts, and I don't and I can teach martial arts as well now, but I don't teach martial arts unless somebody's willing to meditate and pray. So it's to me, I can't it's not one or the other, it's both. It's that that you're you're a warrior and you're a saint and it has to be seamlessly integrated water and water. And I think this is really where the future is. I think there's gonna be a lot of interest in this too.

I think it's the right time, the right place, and I I'm excited. I almost feel like I'm reborn here. It just got really jolt of energy, how much and how much interest there is in this. So blah blah blah blah. It gives a little background. So, you know, I invited you on today. I didn't have like an agenda, but of course, the title of this is Warrior Saint.

I know that you've done a lot about it, and I'd uh I'd be really thrilled if you could share with our audience uh you know, your whole whatever you want to share about it, 'cause I know that that you like me are are very dedicated to uh passing on that worldview. Yeah, you know, it's incredibly interesting that you just made the comment you did that you won't teach yoga unless someone's willing to do martial arts and you won't teach martial arts unless they're willing to pray.

And ah I just had a conversation last week and I was making a distinction with someone who is, you know, been studying yoga and practicing yoga for years. And I made the distinction that the martial arts offer something that yoga can't. And he said, what's that? And I said, objectivity, which is incredibly important. And here's what I mean by that. Many people could take a yoga class. Now look, it's baked in.

If you take a yoga class and you are of the mindset that you're going to surrender to what the asanas are saying to us, and we're going to conform to that, against our own proclivities, tendencies, and compulsions, then we're doing really profound yoga. But there's nothing to hold our feet to the fire.

So if someone were to go into a yoga class and the yoga teacher were to say, hey, turn your foot out about 45 degrees more, if you're not compliant, you can easily say, no, that doesn't speak to me. Intuitively, I like keeping my foot here. Hence, you're not really surrendering and letting the asana speak to you, but you could justify that in your own head. In martial arts, you don't have that luxury.

If you're doing jujitsu, for example, which I've studied and taught for probably 30 years now, and you're stuck on the bottom with someone that's holding you down on top, and you're having trouble getting out, and the instructor comes by and says, turn your foot out a little bit. and point your knee in this direction, well, you can take that subjective view that, no, that doesn't feel right to me, but I'll guarantee you, you'll never get out from the bottom.

This is a game of physics, and by placing your feet in a particular position, turning your knees, really paying attention to the same structure that's available to us in yoga, except you have someone who's non-compliant on top of you, you're gonna need to subscribe. to the posturing. And so you don't have the luxury of looking at it subjectively. If you get out, then you objectively fulfilled what the martial art was teaching you. If you don't, then you didn't learn anything.

And that's the beautiful thing is that, but you know, Hari Nam, m I also see in the martial art field, because look, uh we're living in an era now where everybody can put out, uh you know, content. uh through social media and a lot of people do and not all of it is bona fide. I see a lot of stuff that that really wouldn't stand up because a lot of times you'll see demonstrations where the what they call the uki the person that's helping you do the demonstration is very compliant.

Now there's a place for that but things are very different when that person in front of you is not compliant. How do you now improvise? What knowledge have you inculcated that enables you to make decisions predicated on where the weight is, what your surroundings are, so many other confounding variables. And so martial arts does offer something that's very unique as opposed to yoga.

And yoga does offer the other elements, as you say, of breathwork and prayer uh that I also think is important if... What we're looking to do is find authentic nature, which is our God self. That's really what this is all about for me. That's what I meant when I said before, whether I was playing music or teaching, it was always about coming to the deeper understanding that I am an aspect of God. am inseparable.

And that... trumps any kind of strategy, clever strategies that we try to learn and implement to find our deeper sense of peace. They always fall short. There is no way of finding peace unless you at least move towards the truth of your inseparability from God and what that means. uh So it's very interesting that you brought that up because I do think martial arts offers us uh a reality check. You know, we have to...

So you've been you've been uh practicing and teaching for decades, as you were saying. So you're integrating your practice and teachings of martial arts into all these aspects of your life is has it been f that from the beginning or has that been something organic over the years that has just increased and increased, or was it that way right from the beginning? That's a very interesting question. I would say it was a little bit of both.

But if I'm being honest, the first thing that drew me to the martial arts was I wanted to be a badass. I wanted to, you know, uh raise the status of my ego, like any young man would or teenager. um And so organically over the years, your ego will fall by the wayside because of the objectivity of the training. You know, if you get knocked out, or you get knocked down or you tap out, there's no way to justify that later. You can try, but you sound kind of silly.

ah You lost, you have to accept that. What I would say was a little bit different is, you know, um the book Outliers was a very interesting read for me uh because it points to things that you wouldn't normally connect that kind of get you to where you are. So when you say, it that way from the beginning for me? Not exactly, but very early on, before I ventured down to Chinatown to study at the Southern Praying Mantis School, uh this was the mid-70s.

And right around the time that I was getting ready to do that, there was this, uh you know, nighttime show, I'm sure you'll remember it, with David Carradine called Kung Fu. Yeah, and so... I was exposed to that spiritual element right from the beginning. was very intrigued by some of the uh scenes from the Shaolin Temple and how they brought the spirituality into the art itself.

So even though, yes, I wanted to be able to defend myself and have some street cred, I was still enamored by that kind of spiritual element. So it was a little bit of both for me right from the beginning. kind of... You know, I was intrigued by that and I recognized that when you subscribe to that kind of spirituality of being one with the universe, universal power, God, infinite intelligence, whatever you call it, you're going to be the best you can be.

Trying to do it on your own, you will never measure up because that's not what the greater part of us is. You know, this mask we wear in this uniform, this body is very temporary. part of the world, it's not part of the kingdom. uh so early on, I kind of was very connected to that. And just one other thing, to be honest, I always had a deep prayer practice from the time I was a child.

Now, albeit, I prayed to uh a man in the sky, sort of, an anthropomorphized God, uh where that's changed a little bit for me. I don't... see God in an anthropomorphized way. It's a bit more abstract. We can talk about that in a moment. But in spite of that, I felt that I was being heard in my prayers. And my prayers were always for someone else, never for myself. I never prayed for anything for me.

I prayed that my parents would stay alive, that my brother would be healthy, that, you know, my prayers, even when I blew out candles on a birthday cake. my wishes were always a bit more altruistic. It was never about me wanting something for myself. So the martial arts and that kind of spirituality blended in my early years. And so it remained the subtext of my journey until today.

What do you what do you think about Uh especially among younger people today, that there seems to be interest in martial arts in what is taking the form mostly of mixed martial arts, for instance. And there doesn't seem to be, I mean, from my view, at least w the commercial side of it, what I'm seeing on the television screen, uh it seems to be almost taking the worst of what's there.

And it's not actually i I mean, to its credit, it teaches people how to defend themselves, which they should be able to, and to discipline themselves. But um the people who are the best known people in this form of martial arts don't come off as being particularly inspiring.

In fact, they look like actually they're they're they're taking something that could be used uh as very elevating and they're using it in a very demeaning uh to my view demeaning way and dehumanizing way and not an elevating way and as somebody who's spent their life teaching it, what what's your opinion of what's going on in in Yeah. Well, I couldn't possibly agree with you more. uh It's painful to see that. In fact, I was a huge fan of MMA early on. I tend not to watch it.

There's a lot about it I don't like, but everything is a double-edged sword. And I'll tell you what I do think it did accomplish. You know, again, I studied in Chinatown early on. uh spent uh countless hours in the Chinese theaters watching Chinese movies. um And, you know, there's a lot of uh hype to that too. Stuff that really wouldn't work.

And I think, and you know, you have a lot of paper tigers, masters that claimed things that were really off the charts, know, things that were not really feasible. but nobody proved them wrong, you know, because everybody was compliant, right? They played along. MMA kind of exposed that, you you step in there and if your stuff works, it works. And if it doesn't, it doesn't. And a lot of classical martial artists stepped in there and got their come up ends.

They came to realize, wow, this stuff is not all it's purported to be. So in that way, it served us well. It became a proving ground. But as Eckhart Tolle says, the... The ego will hijack even our loftiest spiritual intentions. And the ego certainly, collectively, has hijacked the MMA world. And it's very distasteful. ah There's no real conversation about the spiritual elements of it. And I think that got lost. ah And so that's a sad thing.

But like I said, it is a double-edged sword, and it did provide something of value. ah Now people can really question, does this stuff work? Because you're being told it works and people train for years under the guise that what they were doing worked. And sometimes, unfortunately, in street altercations, they found out it didn't. uh Now with MMA, we kind of question the art we're attracted to and will this really work?

And what it also did was for those people who do teach a traditional martial art, they may be cleaned up their stuff a little bit and, you know, less hype and more actual technique that can prove to work. So again, a double-edged sword, but I couldn't agree with you more about how distasteful it is. I'm turned off by it, frankly. You know, I think it's a big ego game and sad to see that. You know, it's interesting you're bringing up this whole issue of what works and what doesn't work.

And both of us uh I think after decades have had a lot of opportunity to kind of look back and consider what we've seen and what we we've experienced. And uh you know, i it's interesting to me being somebody who was brought up In what I consider to be a warrior saint tradition, where most of the people around me, even if they talk about a warrior saint tradition, it's a name only.

And so even on like the spiritual path and the spiritual community I was raised in, um, there always has been seen like a premium put on practicing. yoga and meditation and the warrior side of it has been talked about philosophically but really has not been implemented in reality by the vast majority of the people but I think it's had um a a serious consequence and that is that looking at yoga meditation in a in a very positive light what it does I think accomplish is that um

It does if if people sincerely practice yoga meditation, they it's it's to m from my personal experience and my observation, it's indisputable that it gives people at its best an experience of their own soul and of God, and it's it's it's healthy in many, many ways. And the experience that it gives a person is very divine. So I have I practice it myself, I still do. I have nothing negative to say about it because uh it's it's been a transformational experience for me.

Also, if a person doesn't have it already, uh and they're attracted to the Personal experience they get from it. ah It gives them the opportunity to learn self-discipline, have a daily spiritual practice of something. And it really is an imp, as you know, is an important part of personal development, almost essential part of uh personal development. I don't know any evolved person who is not self-disciplined.

And and so it really does give people the opportunity, especially if they've never had it before, to learn how to discipline themselves because the the the the candy, the you know, the dessert, it makes it worth it. And so they do something regularly and they get in the habit. So I think those are the the real benefits to it. on the other hand, uh people who've I've seen, and I was this way when I was younger.

Who put all their eggs in that basket, I think are gonna come up short, especially on the path that I walk, because the path that I walk is a warrior saint path, which means that actually, because you you know, you yourself were talking about God and spiritual life and whatever, but to me, the goal of all these paths, whether it's explicitly said or not. Is giving people the opportunity to liberate in this lifetime. And there's different ways of getting there.

So just generically, there's different ways of liberating. And each path has its own kind of doorway to do that. Now, in the path of a warrior saint in a culsa path, uh, and many people may not agree with me, but but the pathway to get there, that the most direct experience of of transcendence is the absence of fear. Okay? I this is just I'm talking very concrete, non-philosophical terms, is that it's a big challenge because for all kinds of reasons, fear is what holds people back.

And so if you can learn to live without fear and basically leaving that vacuum for love and wisdom, that's that's your daughter way to liberation. And there's no evidence that I've seen, and I know that people would argue with me this, but I think I have a credible opinion because I have practiced and taught yoga and meditation for my whole adult life. Uh I've also been a lawyer, so I always tend to say the about the evidence.

I've seen no evidence that doing yoga and meditation will alleve people of fear. That that that it's just I I maybe it's maybe it is. I haven't seen it. But the martial arts part of it does give people an opportunity to confront and basically eventually conquest a fear. And I do not feel, I haven't seen any evidence that practicing yoga will do that by itself. So I think you have to bring that in.

The other and that and the other piece of this very simple paradigm of living as a warrior saint is that there it's basically this presentation that this way of liberation of a warrior saint. Is a combination of what I would call spiritual technology, which basically are the tools of experience that are totally integrated into what I would call character development.

And so just doing yoga, just praying, just meditating are going to do certain things, but they don't necessarily lead a person to character development. So in other words, somebody could be practicing yoga. There's n I don't see any connection between practicing yoga and being a generous person, an honest person, a truthful person, ah a fearless person. I would admit that, acknowledge that practicing yoga can make you very self disciplined, which is a part of character.

But it doesn't make you committed, it doesn't, you know, there there's a lot of it doesn't give you integrity by and by itself. And so I think these things have to be introduced into an integrated spiritual practice, uh, character development, and and martial arts actually into this particular path. Because um, you know, ultim ultimately we can't expect to experience liberation in this lifetime if we actually are afraid to die. That's yeah.

And and the gurus in my tradition, going back hundreds of years, talked about this experience of liberation of actually dying while you're yet alive. And so the only way possible of experiencing dying while yet alive is dropping your attachment to living. And not being disinterested, but basically not being attached. But you can't be unattached as long as you have that fear.

And so I I really s getting back to the beginning of conversation, uh I think it was just genius for our gurus three hundred years ago to actually make part of the requirement of living on this path. to not only meditate but also learn and master martial arts. Yes. Yeah, I agree. You know, I want to say a couple of things. A moment ago, I mentioned that movie with Nick Nolte. I couldn't think of the name. It's a book and a movie called The Peaceful Warrior.

So here we're looking at this concept of a warrior again. And uh before I began working on the book I'm writing now, I was writing a book called The Ten Practices of a Spiritual Warrior, which now has become a chapter in the new book. And um here's what I would say, I agree with you wholeheartedly.

And if we look at different traditions, perhaps your tradition, how I came up, we look at Buddhism, we look at mystical Christianity, whatever we look at, you're gonna find that there are certain practices uh that are necessary. to inculcate the spiritual knowledge that we are immortal beings. That's how we really rise above the fear of death. What dies is the body, which is attached to the ego, but the soul is an aspect of God that is immortal.

uh And in order for that to happen, you need more than a handful of practices. Now, of course we can conflate or we could subdivide, so... Some practices may be 23. I say 10 practices. I conflated a few. But I assure you, if you read the 10 practices I lay out and you looked at someone else who had maybe 15, you'll see that some of them I conflated. If you subdivided them, they would be 15 or 20 or more. The point being that you need several practices because they all serve different needs.

And so if you look at, first of all, the study of the spiritual archetype, what is that? Which is a commonality of all spiritual paths. Again, that we're all one. I mean, I don't think there's any bona fide spiritual path that will make the case for separation. It's all about oneness. So that's the archetype. But then you have prayer, you have meditation.

You have contemplation, which not a lot of people speak about, but witnessing your own thought construct and evaluating it based on the four pillars of higher intelligence, which are discernment, congruency, empathy, and creativity. It's like looking through the double amers on a gun to make sure that you're aligned properly. And then there's breath work. We can go through several more.

You know, if you're not adhering to some kind of diet to the best of your ability and your microbiome is out and your body is producing hormones like cortisol, you're not going to be able to be uh at rest during meditation. know, so all of these things, we have to learn how to work with the body. So you have conscious eating, conscious breath work. And at the end of it all, the most important one. is virtuous interaction.

Because if we're not kind, it doesn't matter what else we know or what else we do. If we truly not living with integrity, compassion, uh know, virtue, uh then it's all meaningless. And so I agree with you to say that, yeah, meditation alone and yoga will not get us there.

The martial arts is a virtuous interaction uh because It takes a great deal of uh personal integrity and openness to put yourself out against, you know, in let's say a training session with another martial artist and to lose, to come up on the short end of the stick and to still be okay with that. That's a real dying of the ego. You know, when you talk about dying while you're still alive, you know, you're letting go of that ego. You recognize it's not important.

It's okay to not come up uh on top today. And maybe tomorrow you will and maybe you won't. It's the path. It's not measured by uh any kind of identity to winning or losing. So I do agree with you in that it takes a lot more to inculcate spiritual knowledge than just two or three practices. It could take, I don't want to put a number on it, like I say, but we could look at uh you know, practices perhaps or more.

But more or less, we do have to have a considerable amount of practice under our belt to really move past fear. And I would say also, very importantly, guilt. uh I like to say that when we come over the border into manifestation, there's three of these, you know, challenging emotions on the other end.

We often talk about fear, but not enough about guilt. uh I think that guilt is a very primordial emotion whereby we feel as though we have torn out, because we're having this experience as separate beings, Hari, Nam and Gary, that we've torn ourselves away from the fabric of inseparability. Of course, that can never be the case. We can no more tear ourselves away from that and water can be extracted. separated from an ice cube. They're one and the same.

But we're under the illusion and we're deluded into thinking we are. And so we suffer this guilt that we tore ourselves away from the creator. And now he's going to enact some kind of punishment on us. And so what do we do? We punish ourselves. uh We figure we'll usurp that power, punish ourselves and spare ourselves, you know, the greater retribution from God. Of course, this is all just nonsense. None of that happens, but we live under that illusion.

so fear, guilt, and doubt are very closely related to one another. uh so, as you say, studying a martial art will do much to liberate us from those feelings. You know, it certainly assuages some of our doubts, because if you stay with it long enough, you will become successful at a technique that you weren't before. But again, it takes surrender, surrender to the art itself, to the teachers that come before you.

You don't have the luxury of being subjective and picking and choosing what you think you would like to take from that. It's a full surrender. uh so, yeah, I agree. This warrior path is really something. I mean, at the end of the day, uh we're fighting against the, not only our own, personal ego, but the collective ego. That we all are inundated every day with information and narratives that are untrue. But it's the collective ego. And sometimes we question, hey, is it me?

why don't I subscribe to that? A lot of people would, perhaps you say what you said about MMA, they may not get it. They may be such a fan that they're gonna defend it to the hilt instead of taking away from it the truth that you brought to bear, because it's undeniable.

I hope you enjoyed the conversation and uh you know from time to time I'll be checking in with you and calling you back and uh see what's going on in your life and what what your thoughts on are about what's going on in the world. That's okay with you. It's always a pleasure speaking with you and I really did enjoy it.