Life is an opportunity to transform your relationship with yourself.
And as you do,
It will automatically and effortlessly transform your relationship with everything else.
Stop trying to fix your relationship with this,
That,
And the other.
Heal the relationship with yourself,
And that will touch all your other relationships.
Stop trying to fix other relationships as a way of hiding from the relationship you have with yourself.
It's like,
How do I get this other person to love me because I'm doing such a bad job at it myself?
How's that going?
Here we are,
Another episode,
Holding space so love can be seen.
Wonderful to have you along on this journey,
Hanging out with me as I do what I love to do,
Which is exploring the profound difference between what I imagine to be happening and what is really happening.
And the more I come to see what is really happening,
The more I am amazed with the depth of love,
Compassion,
And freedom that is all around.
So on this program,
What we do is,
Hold space,
So love can be seen,
Showing up without much of an agenda,
Even though I've got a little bit of an idea of what I want to talk about,
But I'm just here sharing what I see,
Which is very much like singing a song.
This is an exercise of poetry.
And if you resonate,
Find some value,
Fantastic.
If not,
No worries.
I'm going to share some insight about this topic,
Making meaningful change now.
I might say some other things,
And then we can do some Q&A,
And we will end with a short five-minute guided meditation.
And if this is your first time,
It might be informative to understand that we're not in a hurry here.
We're just hanging out.
We're going to enjoy some pauses along the way,
And just really allow ourselves to be here.
Right?
Isn't that nice to just take a break and just be here?
So often during the day,
We can be scrambling around trying to complete this task or another,
Or scrolling through our phones trying to find some sort of distraction.
Give me information.
Give me information.
Give me information.
Entertain me.
There might be a little bit of that here this evening or this morning,
Wherever you're at,
But really it's just an invitation to relax and rest and recognize something really beautiful.
I like to start with just a minute or two of silence.
This just allows me to fully be present because maybe like you,
Before I jumped on here,
I was clicking around between 17 different open tabs on my computer,
Trying to get stuff done before I came on here.
So my mind's still a little bit racy,
And I'd like to just take those moments.
Be quiet.
No demand to say anything,
And just embrace the stillness.
And so I invite you to do that with me.
And then from that stillness and silence,
I'll start talking and we'll see what comes out.
Lots of beautiful people joining us,
By the way.
I'm just going to say that real quick.
Some names I haven't seen for a while.
Scott,
Nice to see you,
Brother.
Okay,
Silent time.
Here we go.
Just a minute or two.
There's something really magical about the human experience,
And that's something that we call awareness.
The awareness to see more and more clearly what really is.
And as we see more clearly what really,
Really is,
There's a wellness that begins to emerge.
A direction.
A focus.
Maybe even a sense of being grounded.
And you know,
This is so profoundly true for my experience,
That in all the times of chaos,
In all of the emotional upheaval,
The conflict,
The drama,
It's always been awareness that has rescued me.
To see what's really going on.
Oh,
I don't need to be freaking out about this.
In all of those times,
In all of those difficulties,
It's so obvious to me that the reason they were so chaotic was because of a lack of awareness.
I was too preoccupied with what I thought I wanted in the future.
I was too afraid of losing what I was holding on to,
That I wasn't open to truly see here and now.
And it was only after I exhausted myself fighting,
Trying to hold on,
Throwing my tantrum,
That I collapsed and was finally open to see something new.
And in seeing something new,
I realized I was wrestling ghosts,
Trying to hold on to something not even really there.
And beyond all the noise,
What it really came down to is I was just scared.
And it's fascinating all the ways we try to avoid that depth of self-honesty,
Right?
Because so often we say,
No,
It's about this,
And it's about this,
And it's about this,
And it's about this,
It's about that person,
And that person.
Nah,
Nah,
Nah,
Nah,
Nah,
Nah.
But really the disturbance that I'm experiencing,
The agitation,
The stress,
The anxiety,
Is because I'm scared.
It can seem so easy to blame the disturbance on someone else or something else as the cause of my fear.
But really what it is,
That fear,
It's almost like an avoidance of coming to terms with the truth of things.
Because you know what?
The truth of things can be kind of scary,
Right?
Like maybe you're in this fantasy of,
Oh,
I can hold on to this person.
They're going to be with me forever.
They're not going anywhere.
And then life happens.
Wait a minute.
That's not as certain as I once thought it was.
Oh,
No.
I don't want to see that.
Coming to terms with the truth of things at first can be really scary.
But also there's this beautiful discovery where you ultimately realize that what you really crave is the truth of things.
You start to recognize maybe in that dynamic of relationship,
I don't actually want to hold on to this person.
I don't want them to be my prisoner.
I want them to be them.
Oh,
I can relax now.
Because when you're trying to hold on to someone,
Which is ultimately impossible,
It's pretty difficult.
Because as soon as it looks like you got them,
You're afraid they might get away again.
So you got to spend all your time keeping them in your pretty little cage.
And you can't enjoy yourself.
This is really off topic.
But this is what happens on this show.
We just kind of go wherever the flow goes.
But I think this might tie in nicely with the theme somehow.
Isn't that amazing though?
We can make life so difficult trying to do something that's impossible to do,
Thinking that we can do it.
Because we're afraid of letting go into the unknown.
We're afraid of coming to terms with what is real and true.
I get it.
There's zero judgment in that because I get it.
Welcome to being a human being.
But then through a deeper awareness,
I recognize,
Oh,
I actually love the unknown.
It's because of the unknown that makes this such an adventure in being alive.
Could you imagine if everything was just known?
There would be no life to that.
None.
Life can't exist in such a space where everything is known.
The quality of the unknown is such an integral part of the experience.
Much like this show,
Right?
I come into this space.
Sure,
I got an idea of what to talk about.
But I'm more interested in what life wants to talk about.
I'm more interested in where the flow goes.
Could you imagine like if I had an outline?
It's like I got to talk about this and I got to talk about this.
We got to get through this as if the end was the prize.
No,
No,
My friends.
Right now is the prize,
Right?
We are in the mystery in this moment.
Who knows what's coming next?
That's so much more fun for me.
The reason I put that title out,
Make Meaningful Change Now,
Is because earlier today I got off a Zoom call and I had this conversation with someone where we were,
You know,
Talking about being healthy and taking care of ourselves.
And I was sharing somewhat comically that in my human experience,
When I look back at all of the resolutions that I've made,
All of my plans to change,
I can't think of one that actually worked when it came to planning for change.
The change that I do see that actually worked was the change that I made now.
Because there was this awareness that said,
This is important.
And if it's important,
It's important now.
If I delay,
Then I'm saying it's not important.
Right?
So if I'm not willing to change now,
I really don't want to change.
I think I should change.
And so I put it off until the last minute.
And I think this is interesting to enter the arena of trying to change where half of you wants to and the other half does not.
And so you have to fight against yourself to do something that you say you want to do,
To do something that you say is good for you,
Or are you just trying to do the good thing?
And so in such a situation,
And I've watched myself play with this,
Where there was the idea of change,
But then there was also the experience of,
Man,
It really doesn't seem like I can right now.
Maybe I will in a month.
And I would say,
No,
No,
No,
No,
No.
We're not playing that game.
If it's not important now,
Then it's not important.
I'm not going to pretend like it's important in the future.
What I'm going to do is just keep letting myself do this because clearly I want to and I'm going to pay more attention.
And so I keep doing the thing that part of me knows isn't good for me,
But I'm going to bring some awareness to it.
I'm going to watch how I do something that makes me feel shitty and then ask,
How's that going?
And see over and over and over again,
Wow,
I really don't want to do this.
Wow,
This really isn't helping.
Wow,
This really isn't contributing energy to my experience.
Wow,
This isn't really filling me up with love that I can share with the world.
In fact,
It's the opposite.
I don't want to do this anymore.
And you see there's a sincerity that sees it's important now and it's very possible that you say,
Okay,
It's time now and you go for it and you perceivably fail.
That doesn't mean it's not important.
It means that there's a pattern of conditioning that we get to play with and transform the pattern.
And that pattern might have a lot of energy,
But what you also recognize is you are not the pattern.
Do you ever notice this?
You know what a great example of this is?
Sugar.
Most people think in their sugar addiction,
And again,
I'm just picking sugar because it's easy.
I'm not calling anyone out.
Most people think that when they want sugar,
They want sugar.
Like it's them.
No,
It's not.
There is an addiction happening in your biological system that is asking for it because it thinks it needs it.
Just like any addiction,
There's a dependency that's created in the body which creates a craving when that something leaves the body and that craving is intense and it sends signals to the brain that says,
Hey,
I need that.
Are you saying that?
Or is that what's just happening given the experience?
And it's interesting to watch that.
It's interesting to watch these patterns in our lives that are ultimately destructive,
Ultimately not what we really want,
And then to give in to them thinking that it's what we really want.
It's just interesting.
And it can be so intense that you can watch yourself have that experience and feel totally powerless.
And you know what?
There is power in being able to see that.
There is power in recognizing experientially how powerless it seems.
It's almost like an opening up within what you are that asks life for support in a way that says,
Oh my goodness,
I see that this isn't good for me.
I see that this isn't how I want to treat what I am.
This isn't how I want to care for what I am.
But in this moment,
I feel powerless.
And then there's an energy of love and forgiveness that says to yourself and says to your body,
I'm so sorry.
I think there's something really healing in that to communicate with yourself in such a way,
Rather than saying,
Fuck you,
Body.
Fuck you,
Self,
For not doing what I want you to do.
No,
It's I'm sorry.
We've had a bit of a tough journey.
We got super confused.
We developed all sorts of patterns trying to escape our emotional experiences.
And we got kind of stuck.
Maybe we don't have to be stuck anymore.
For me,
This speaks to real meaningful change.
And it's not just meaningful change in the way that you change your actions,
Even in the way that you change what you put in your body,
But meaningful change in how you relate to yourself.
Because as far as I'm concerned,
The transformation of how you relate with yourself gives rise to all other transformation you will experience.
That is a beautiful opportunity.
I mean,
Can we just be honest?
Can we just be honest that all of these things that remain unchanged,
The things that we say we want to change,
Are they not just a reflection of some flavor of self-violence?
Let's be honest.
Are they not some expression of self-punishment because you think you're not enough?
Is it not some reflection of self-hatred that says,
I need to escape reality because I can't deal with myself.
That's not a nice way to see yourself.
But hey,
I get it.
I get it.
If all of those things that we do that we don't like to do are a reflection of self-violence,
Then how about rather than trying to change all those things if it's too much,
How about we just relax the self-violence a little bit?
How about we start there and bring some compassion to the equation,
A compassion that understands exactly why you are where you are?
Because quite frankly,
If you look at the totality of your experience,
Everything that you've been through,
All of the misunderstandings,
All of the confusion,
All of the adorably innocent insanity,
It makes perfect sense why you are where you are.
Perfect sense.
Perfect sense.
There's no I should or I shouldn't.
It's like,
Wow,
What a ride.
And now,
Especially since you're here listening to this,
There's clearly some love awareness that's ready for that to transform or else you wouldn't be here.
And so maybe it's just time for that,
Right?
Maybe it's time and maybe that time is now.
Maybe that time is now to look at yourself and say,
I'm sorry.
I love you.
I'm sorry for treating you in a way that I don't really want to treat you,
But I'm scared and I'm confused.
Sometimes I don't know who else to blame than you because you know what?
Oh goodness.
Sometimes I feel like these should be longer than an hour.
We're going to have to do another one of these on the nature of innocence.
So you can see the depth of your own innocence because in contrast,
You can see the difficulty we're having as human beings,
Especially with all this self-violence is because you perceive yourself as guilty in some way.
And if you unravel all that guilt,
If you really look at it with a deeply sincere awareness that guilt melts away and you say,
Oh my goodness,
I'm sorry.
How silly to blame you.
Let's just start over.
I'm so sorry.
Let's start over.
And you know,
You might start over even right now this very second.
And then when we get done here,
You go back to judging yourself.
Will you do me a favor?
Will you see how funny that is?
It shows you kind of the intensity of conditioning.
It's like,
Wow,
That's been a record that's playing for quite some time.
Of course,
It goes right back to it.
It's okay,
Right?
It's like we can sit here and explore how it's unnecessary for any self-judgment,
Right?
And we can see that or you can at least see it more.
And then you leave this space and you start judging again.
Now,
You have a choice here.
Do you want to judge your judgment which just compounds the judgment or see that there's judgment and recognize how hilarious that is?
Like,
Wow,
I just saw that there was nothing to judge and now I'm judging.
Oh my goodness.
I'm so insane.
That's adorable.
There's nothing to judge,
Even the judgment.
Of course,
They're judgment.
We're scared little insecure creatures,
Super confused.
And that doesn't even need to be judged.
How quickly does that spiral when you judge the judgment,
When you worry about the worry?
No,
Just see that it's happening,
Awareness,
Right?
Because when you're judging,
There's no awareness.
So when you judge the judgment,
There's no awareness.
So if judgment happens,
Let the judgment happen and then just see it.
See how it's not true.
It's not I shouldn't have judged.
It's I judged and it's not true.
That's amazing.
And so often I think part of the hang-up too with making meaningful change is we think the prize is in the future.
And my God,
How true is this as it relates to health where everyone's fantasizing about looking like a photoshopped image.
If only I could look like this.
If only I could look like that completely devoid of any sincerity that says I would just like to take care of myself.
I would just like to treat myself kindly.
I would like to put things in my body that feel really good and support me in enjoying this life,
Right?
Because in our misunderstanding,
In our confusion,
We think the prize is in the future,
Even as it relates to health.
Not realizing that the prize is right now,
That you have the awareness and the opportunity to express love in how you treat yourself.
The present moment gift of taking care of yourself is a great act of self-love.
There's not self-love in the future.
You can just let that idea go.
That once I look like this or look like that,
Then I'll love myself.
Good luck.
Because then when you get there,
You'll still find something wrong with yourself.
Because that's the record that's playing.
I'm not whole yet.
My goodness.
Life is an opportunity to transform your relationship with yourself.
And as you do,
It will automatically and effortlessly transform your relationship with everything else.
And that's for another episode,
But it's profoundly true.
Stop trying to fix your relationship with this,
That,
And the other.
Heal the relationship with yourself.
And that will touch all your other relationships.
Stop trying to fix other relationships as a way of hiding from the relationship you have with yourself.
It's like,
How do I get this other person to love me because I'm doing such a bad job at it myself?
How's that going?
It's not good.
I know from personal experience,
It doesn't work.
But thank God I had that experience so that I could see through it and see that it doesn't work.
So hooray.
Hooray for the failure because the failure is the teacher.
I'm such a fan of failure.
Fail.
Fail.
Fail.
Fail willingly.
You know what?
This is the other amazing thing.
Failure and success go together.
You cannot have success without the experience of failure.
You cannot.
You cannot.
They go together.
The only way you really fail is you don't allow yourself to fail.
Because if you don't allow yourself to fail,
You can never experience the success.
That's failure.
To not fail.
So many people are afraid of failure,
They don't even try.
They don't risk it,
Which means they don't learn.
Often,
So often,
People ask me,
How did you come to see these things?
Through failure and paying attention.
Which is also like saying a radical willingness to just be human.
What a beautiful opportunity to be alive.
My goodness.
Holding space for love to be seen.
This is great.
This is great.
We can just show up here together.
Hold space for the authenticity of being human.
No judgment,
No expectation.
And then ask ourselves,
What's really going on?
What's really going on here?
Not what do I think,
Not what do I hope,
Not what do I want.
What's really going on?
And as you see what's really going on,
Love emerges.
Thus is the fabric of existence.
All held together by love.
All right.
What kind of questions you guys have?
I wasn't paying attention to the comments.
So if you wrote a question,
I don't think I'm going to scroll back through.
And unless I see one that just pops up.
So yeah,
You can write your question now.
I see one here from Kristen.
I love myself,
But I'm smoking and drinking vine.
I assume wine,
Which maybe you're drinking vine now.
I know it's not good for me,
But it's good for what?
I don't know.
I know that story,
Smoking and drinking.
I'm familiar with that role.
And you know what I do in that time?
Just keep doing it and pay attention.
Be present with it.
Be aware that you're doing it.
And also explore the kind of life you actually want to be living.
You know,
It's interesting too.
Sometimes we're just so stuck in this loop that life could never be amazing.
Life can never be vibrant.
Life could never be beautiful.
And often we punish ourselves because we think that's our fault.
Like there's something wrong with us.
And a lot of the substances we run to are just a way of punishing ourselves.
In combination with trying to avoid those emotional experiences.
But you know,
Numbing those things and running away from them,
As much as it helps you avoid those emotional experiences,
It also amplifies those experiences while it suppresses them.
And so not only is it not getting better,
It's getting worse.
And so we really need to look at that.
We really do.
If you want to be alive.
And if you don't want to be alive,
Then you really need to look at it.
Because life is really beautiful.
Even if you don't have everything that you think you want.
And my goodness,
That's a whole nother video.
But let's remove the judgment that says I should or I shouldn't be.
Because this is just what's happening now.
And see if we can introduce some compassion.
And then be also open to the possibility that maybe life can be beautiful again.
And you know what else?
Let me say this.
Especially for those who are struggling with being addicted to things like this.
Because I so know that.
I know that space and I know that energy.
And let's look at alcohol for an example.
And again,
This isn't what anyone should or shouldn't do.
This is my experience.
If I drink alcohol,
I'll feel shitty.
If I feel shitty,
I'll want to drink more alcohol.
And then I'll drink more alcohol and feel shitty.
And then in feeling shitty,
I'll eat shitty food that makes me feel shitty.
And then in feeling shitty from alcohol and shitty food,
I'll make shitty choices.
And on and on and on it goes,
Digging a hole.
And if,
At least for me,
In seeing that pattern.
And seeing that it's that which is stealing life from me.
It's stealing my life.
My gift,
My opportunity of being alive.
And sharing my heart with the world.
Because I can't share when that's going on.
I can't do what I love to do when that's going on.
And to really see that,
There's this awareness.
And again,
You could just be hearing me and it sounds like information.
But maybe some people hear me and inside of them is a holy shit moment.
To recognize that this pattern is stealing the gift you've been given.
And if you really see it,
There's something that stands up inside of you and says no more.
Because so often we feel shitty and we don't even know why we feel shitty.
We feel confused.
We feel foggy.
We feel unenergized.
And we think that's just the way it is.
And then one day you find out,
No,
You've just been poisoning yourself.
And not realizing you've been poisoning yourself.
It puts the power back in your hands.
Yeah,
It might be a little bit difficult.
But it's going to be a lot easier now.
Because you understand the root of the situation.
You understand in a compassionate way that you don't want to do that anymore.
And so you honor yourself.
You honor your life.
Here's a good one.
Is there a good meditation we can do to reset ourselves to that place of self-love?
Yeah,
I've probably got 40 of them.
If you don't know where they are,
Then get in touch with me.
I'll try and point you in the right direction.
And again,
There's a thousand different things you can do.
You can meditate.
You can whatever spiritual practice.
But the question is,
What energy are you bringing to it?
Are you bringing a willingness of heart?
Are you bringing openness?
Are you sitting down in a meditation posture trying to control yourself so that you don't express your humanness?
Are you engaging these things to connect with reality or to hide from reality?
My goodness.
And again,
Welcome to the club.
This is what we do as humans.
And as much as it might seem like it sucks,
It is an opportunity.
It is an opportunity for love to expand,
Which is what you want.
Is it not?
Something in you says,
I would like to experience more love,
Please.
Where do you think that's going to be experienced?
It's going to be experienced in exploring the ways that you don't allow love for what you are.
Where you don't allow love for life.
Where you don't allow love for others.
It's going to be in exploring where you have judgment and seeing through that judgment and realizing it's worthy of your love.
That's how love expands.
It doesn't expand by more and more people loving you.
Yeah,
I've got loads of meditations.
Meditations,
Talks,
All sorts of stuff.
Just like this.
Because this is what I spend my time doing.
Making meditations,
Doing talks.
Not sure if this is a question,
But some things just seem too much.
Too debilitating for you to bear.
So that you feel you run out of time from accepting or coming out of the rain where true beauty of life reveals itself.
I've come across a couple of things that were life-transforming and there was an air about rising like a phoenix from the ashes,
But I don't seem to be able to overcome this current obstacle.
That is beautifully human.
And in those times in the past where you rose through was another time where it seemed like you might not.
How many times in our lives have we experienced this?
And maybe not you,
But for me,
For sure.
How many times have I been curled up on the ground saying life,
Please help me.
Thinking that I might not make it.
Convinced I might not make it.
And yet here I am.
It blows my mind that I'm even here with you right now.
And I hope you hear me when I say that and see that I'm human just like you.
That good Lord.
But you know,
It is these times,
These depths that we travel to that are so scary,
That are so unknown,
That strip away all of our bullshit and opens us to see something more real,
More authentic,
Which is only pointing us to what it is we actually crave.
But yes,
We cling to this bullshit so much because we're scared to let it go.
I get that.
And I'm sorry that it hurts so much.
But part of why it hurts,
And again,
This is me just talking to myself,
Part of why it hurts so much is because I hold on so damn tightly.
It is not the letting go that hurts.
That's hard.
It's the resistance leading up to letting go that hurts.
That's hard.
Letting go is the greatest sense of freedom and relief.
To surrender that which is not yours to control.
To release that which is not yours to imprison.
To let the whole world be free so that you can finally be free.
And yes,
It's not always pretty.
It's not.
But it's not about being that because it's beautiful.
When you look at both sides,
It's beautiful.
If you're stuck in one end of the spectrum,
It can look really shitty.
But that one end is connected to a whole other side waiting to be seen,
Waiting to bloom.
Susan asks,
How to overcome the multitude of small things that weigh us down?
Practicalities,
Adulting stuff,
Death by paper cut stuff.
You know,
Susan,
It just makes sense that you would say death by paper cut stuff.
You know,
I don't think I've ever met you in person.
But for years now,
Years,
I've seen you and your personality on Facebook.
And it just makes sense that you would say something as hilarious as death by paper cut stuff.
How do you overcome the multitude of things?
You genuinely see how hilarious they are.
Especially those multitude of things,
Like practicalities and adulting stuff.
Because there really is a great humor in how seriously we take this shit.
Isn't that hilarious?
I mean,
Because we can get so stuck in the idea that,
Oh my god,
This is so serious.
And then in that seriousness,
It starts being a reflection of our own sense of inadequacy.
And it just builds a story that says,
It means this about me,
It means that about me.
And it doesn't mean any of that shit.
It doesn't mean anything.
And if it doesn't mean anything,
Then you get to see it however you see it.
If you want to see it as serious,
Go ahead.
If you want to see it as playful,
Go ahead.
But again,
It comes back to using it as an exercise.
When those small things seem to weigh you down,
When you get disturbed,
Let that be the moment of invitation that says,
Okay,
There's what I think is happening.
And then there's what's really happening.
Discern the difference.
Discern the difference between what you think is happening and what is really happening.
This short meditation is simply an opportunity to extend love and kindness toward what you are.
We're going to begin by taking three deep breaths and allow ourselves to become more present and more relaxed.
Just breathe.
Even if we don't understand why,
Let's just quietly in our hearts say,
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you for this breath.
Thank you for this heartbeat.
Thank you for this landscape called life and how it all allows me to be here right now.
It might have been a tough journey.
It might have been a tough day.
But however,
It has gone.
Maybe we can just be here right now and recognize that we made it.
Isn't that kind of interesting?
Sometimes we think we might not make it,
But we make it.
And you know what makes it a whole lot easier is being a little bit kinder to yourself because we can recognize that all the self-judgment,
All the criticism,
That's not helping at all.
So let's just let that go for a moment.
Let's just breathe into the release of all that noise that thinks you're not enough.
All that noise that thinks you're not in the right spot.
All that noise that thinks you should have this,
Should have that.
We're just going to be here right now and say,
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Let's just breathe.
Maybe there's a very soft voice within you that can say to yourself,
I love you.
And I'm sorry if I wasn't kind to you.
I just got scared.
But right now we can start over.
Thanks for meditating with me today.
