Secret Sangha - Growth With Dr. Diana Hill

his talk explores the deeper nature of growth through personal reflection and psychological insight. You’ll be invited to consider how challenge, uncertainty, and acceptance shape meaningful transformation over time. The session gently guides you to reflect on your own experiences of growth, including moments of being lost and learning to trust the process. It offers a compassionate perspective on becoming more authentic, flexible, and connected in your life.

Transcript

So good to have you new people here. We usually have a short talk on the topic, And then we do a meditation together, And then at the end we have a little discussion. And every week we pick a word, We've been picking a word for a long time, We've had all sorts of words, Words like fear, And words like clarity, And openness. And the word this week, Actually I picked it, I had my son pick it. He's in a play, And he's this like 13 year old with a solo in the play, And at the end of the culmination of all this work, I said, What word would you describe this experience as being? And he said, Growth. I was like, Aww. He's like, How is it that you're growing, Like what is it that, How do you know that you're growing? And he said, I feel more comfortable in my own skin. And in the scenes, You can think about this for your own growth, In the scene that I'm in, I kind of know what to prioritize, What to emphasize now. Think about your own growth, Something you're growing at in your relationship, Like in the scene that you're in, You know what to prioritize, Right? And then he also said, I know when to follow the script, And when to improvise. That's growth. And then finally, He said, I know when I'm not supposed to be the star. Like when I'm like, You know, I'm sort of like an extra on the stage, I don't make the biggest moves, Because I don't want to pull away from the person that's the star. So those are all, I mean, That's growth for a 13 year old, But I looked up, Usually when we do these words, I look up the Chinese symbol for the word, Because they're always so beautiful. And this one is the symbol of growth, Where you have the ground, And then you have this shoot sticking up. And then it's kind of moving through these layers, Like you can see the layers of emergence, It's poking through this little growth at the end, But it was so beautiful. And then I did this deep dive into like, What does psychology have to say about growth, And like sort of the original developmental models of psychology, Like Eric Erickson's model where it has the eight stages, And he talks about things in those seven and eight are kind of the interesting ones where you move into generativity, Or stagnation. Like in like your 40s and 50s is when that starts to happen, Like, Am I stuck or am I actually creating? And then a little bit later on, Do you move into integrity or despair? And that sort of growth of that model, But then there's other models like Keegan's model, Which is a little bit newer one, And he studied folks in the Harvard Adult Development Study that's been going on forever. So he's a developmental psychologist from Harvard that studied that group of people that they've been studying for a long time. And in his model, He talks about sort of this growth happening, You know, You start with as a kid, You have this impulsive mind, Then you start to have a instrumental mind that's kind of a rule follower. So like my son who's 13, He's already moving out of the rule following stage. He's growing into like, Sometimes you need to improvise in life. You need to not follow the rules, But you need to also know when to follow the rules, Right? And then you move into this socialized mind where you grow into thinking about what everyone else thinks. And am I fitting in? And you learn how. . . And it's kind of important to know that too, Like how do I fit in the social mind? And then, According to Keegan, Most of us stop at number four, Which is the self-authoring mind. We start to become the author of our own lives, And we can think about that even in our own meditation. When we do a meditation, Sometimes we can get stuck into the self-authoring mind, Which is a good thing to have a sense of empowerment and self-authoring aspect of ourselves. But this fifth stage is the growth that we work on in here, Which is self-transformation. Moving beyond yourself, Moving into a place that's more interconnected, Like my son was talking about in terms of his, You know, Knowing when to not be the star, And then knowing that it's more about the play itself than you. So those are the, You know, Psychological perspectives of growth. But I tried to think about, Like, You know, Everything that we kind of have been working on in here, The outside of the circle, Is when we are growing in something and we're experiencing growth, Are we becoming more authentic, Becoming more of who we are? Are we becoming more in harmony, Being able to be in harmony with others, But also see the harmony that we have with nature or in harmony with our body? That can be part of growth. Are we becoming more flexible and are we becoming more focused? Both of those. So this was my own model. So part of my own growth is making my own models. Do you like it? Okay. So this is my model made up last night when I was going to bed. And then I was thinking, Okay, So how do we do that? Like, What is it that gets us to this place of being more authentic and focused and in harmony and more flexible? And yesterday gave me this life example of that. So I've been talking about how I live on this little lane that we all share this piece of land up in the foothills. Our house in particular, When it was built, Was built six feet into the setback of the people behind us. And the people behind us said, You got found out, We want it down. So we've had to tear down our whole house. So for the past year, We've been dealing with this tear down of this house and we're coming to the end of it. But the culminating thing of this whole experience is the water tank. And the water tank is to collect all of the rainwater from your roof into a giant tank that we had to order from Germany. And everything is based on the sign off of this water tank. So I get to my house yesterday. All of us depend on our water tank arriving from Germany, Because we all get signed off together. All seven houses. We're one being. And I get to my house and I'm going to go look at how my office is doing. And the water tank arrived. The water tank is the size of a Hummer. It is the size of this circle, Well, Maybe this inner circle. And the water tank has to be buried underground in my front yard. And so I get to my house and I see the water tank and I'm like, I thought I had grown. I thought this was growth. But if you think about this for yourself, When growth happens actually in that moment when you're cracked, When you're cracked open, When things that you didn't want to happen, Happen to you, Right? And it's this combination of being challenged by life that actually causes us to grow, Whether it's physical challenge or psychological challenge or relational challenge, Right? And then what do you do to get to the authenticity, The focus, The being in harmony and being flexible? And so the first thing that you usually do when that happens is you get lost. And that is a very good thing. I'm reading Rebecca Solnit's book right now about, It's called like instructions for getting lost or life's instructions for getting lost. And she writes, That thing totally unknown is usually what you need to find. So if you're lost, The nature of being lost means that you are going to be present because when you're lost, You are awake. You're like, I don't know where I am. And if you find yourself lost, Then that's probably the edge of growing. And then we move into radical acceptance, Which is not an easy one, But it's real. It's okay. The tank is here. Your kid went to college and they got the worst roommate on the planet. The tank is here. Your mom had a stroke and now you need to find her a place to live. The tank just arrived, Right? Your health took, You got a result back that you didn't want to get. Here's the tank, Right? So the tank is here. What are you going to do? How are you going to radically accept? And if you're willing to radically accept, What will you be able to do from that radical acceptance? I have a group of therapists that I work with and I had them answer this line. When I radically accept blank, I can blank, Okay? When I radically accept things are going slower than I want, I can slow down. When I radically accept imperfection, It frees me to create. When I radically accept that I don't have to have it all figured out first, It frees me to begin. When I radically accept how deeply I feel, I can show myself kindness. Sorry, I can't speak or text anymore because I'm in the car. That was the last one in the Zoom call. So when you radically accept, Like whatever it is that you are cracked open, You're lost, Think about this for yourself, Something you're growing in right now. Then you can go into the, I don't know, And the Shel Silverstein poems, Which are so good. Fall up and grow down. He has two poems. And then finally you stretch and you grow and you connect and you lose yourself a little bit. And that leads us to this place of self-transformation, The place of self-transformation. So it's a turning upside down. It's a cracking open. And usually you don't know that you're growing either spiritually, Psychologically, Or physically while it's happening. But then you have those moments where you realize it. You're like, Oh, Like the tank is in my yard. This is growth. This is growth, Whatever your water tank is. I wanted to read a little bit from two places, One from Kate Johnson, My favorite books where she walks through the Kalyanamitas, The Sutta for Spiritual Friends, And she does it chapter by chapter, One chapter on each. Chapters like give what's hard to give and do what's hard to do and don't abandon. And this one is about not looking down. So, One of the things about these models, Which tend to be, No offense to old white men in psychology, But they tend to be ladder-based, Hierarchical, And like you go from A to Z and then you've made it. You'll notice my model has no ladder and no, It's circular because we're moving in and out of all of these things and that growth is not someplace that you get to. So Kate writes from the Kalyanamita, From the Sutta on how to be a spiritual friend, The last step of that Sutta is don't look down. Monks, A friend endowed with this quality is worth associating with. When you're down and out, They won't look down on you. The idea behind bodhicitta, Often translated as basic goodness, Is that all human beings come into this world with the seed of enlightenment in their hearts. Our lifelong path of practicing being human is to nurture that seed into blossoming. In the practice of radical friendship, Our path is to water and nurture these seeds in each other. We are all in various stages of waking up to our own true nature and healing from whatever obscures it. And some of these stages are not especially cute. They can be a lot like school photos from third grade when we're still figuring out our hair color and clothes and made of some regrettable choices on picture day. But the teachings on bodhicitta remind us that no matter how messy or ill-fitting our life choices are at any given moment, At our core, Every one of us is fundamentally wise and loving no matter what. That part of us can never be taken away. Our longtime friends will stay. We'll say we are always beautiful to them. So one aspect of growth is just really becoming more of who you are, Your bodhicitta, Your beautiful, True nature. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Wise Effort Podcast. Wise Effort is about you taking your energy and putting it in the places that matter most to you. And when you do so, You'll get to savor the good of your life along the way. I would like to thank my team, My partner in all things, Including the producer of this podcast, Craig, Ashley Hyatt, The podcast manager, And thank you to Bangold at Bell and Branch for our music. This podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only, And it's not meant to be a substitute for mental health.