Episode 13
Stop Suffering: The One Habit You MUST Unlearn to Find Peace | Jennifer Newkom
The central theme of our discussion revolves around the profound impact of mindfulness on mental wellness, as exemplified by our esteemed guest, Jennifer Newcomb. With over two decades of experience, Jennifer elucidates how mindfulness emerged as a transformative practice during her own struggles with chronic pain, ultimately leading to healing and clarity. We explore the intricate relationship between thought patterns and emotional suffering, emphasizing the necessity of shifting our perceptions to foster greater well-being. Through her insights, we gain invaluable tools for navigating life's challenges, including techniques for grounding and emotional regulation. This episode serves as a clarion call to embrace mindfulness not merely as a practice but as a vital component of our everyday existence, fostering a deeper connection with ourselves and the world around us.
The Busy Free Mind Podcast invites listeners to explore the intricate relationship between mindfulness, mental wellness, and emotional healing through a profound conversation with Jennifer Newcomb. Drawing upon her extensive experience in mindfulness practice, which commenced over 20 years ago during a tumultuous period in her life, Newcomb elucidates the therapeutic potential of mindfulness meditation, also known as insight meditation. This practice not only provides solace and clarity but also serves as a vital tool for confronting the adversities of life. The conversation begins with an inquiry into the roots of suffering, positing that the mind is often the origin of our distress. Newcomb encourages listeners to reconsider their mental patterns, suggesting that instead of unlearning thoughts, individuals should strive to cultivate a healthier relationship with their thoughts—acknowledging that many arise from unconscious fears and past conditioning.
The dialogue delves deeper into the nuances of attachment, as articulated within Buddhist psychology. Newcomb distinguishes between the conventional understanding of attachment in Western psychology and its broader implications in Buddhist thought, where clinging to desires and the false sense of permanence leads to suffering. She reiterates the Buddha's teachings that life is inherently imperfect, impermanent, and not personal. This perspective invites individuals to embrace a more compassionate approach to existence, recognizing that suffering is a shared human experience. Newcomb emphasizes the necessity of acceptance and mindfulness in transforming one's relationship with pain, proposing that rather than resisting discomfort, individuals can find liberation through acknowledgment and understanding.
Practical applications of mindfulness are a focal point of the episode, with Newcomb sharing techniques to ground oneself during overwhelming moments. She advocates for a three-part method that involves grounding in the body, labeling present emotions, and engaging the senses to foster awareness. This grounded approach not only aids in alleviating panic but also cultivates a deeper understanding of one’s emotional and physical states. The episode concludes with a profound exploration of how mindfulness and compassion can coexist, enhancing our capacity for joy while allowing us to experience the full spectrum of human emotion. Newcomb's insights serve as a reminder that by living consciously and attentively, we can navigate life's complexities with grace and resilience.
Takeaways:
- Mindfulness serves as a potent tool for cultivating clarity and emotional resilience, enabling individuals to navigate life's challenges with greater ease.
- Our thoughts predominantly emerge from unconscious conditioning, presenting patterns that influence our perceptions and decision-making processes.
- Attachment, in the context of Buddhist psychology, manifests as a desire for permanence and control, which can lead to profound suffering when expectations are unmet.
- Practicing mindfulness facilitates a profound awareness of the body and stored emotions, allowing for a transformative relationship with pain and trauma.
- The integration of mindfulness and heartfulness fosters a holistic approach to healing, emphasizing both awareness and compassionate engagement with one's experiences.
- Understanding that suffering is often rooted in the mind empowers individuals to question their thoughts and perceptions, leading to greater emotional freedom.
Transcript
Hello, everyone.
Speaker A:This is Shobana.
Speaker A:Welcome back to the Busy Free Mind Podcast.
Speaker A:I hope you are all doing well today.
Speaker A:As always, we dive into mental wellness from every angle.
Speaker A:Today, I'm really happy to welcome our guest, Jennifer Newcomb.
Speaker A:Jennifer began practicing mindfulness more than 20 years ago during a difficult time in her life, and it became a powerful source of healing and clarity for her.
Speaker A:She went on to complete her teacher training with Tara Bright and Jack Cornfield, and she also has a long background as an educator.
Speaker A:I'm so excited for you to hear her insights today.
Speaker A:Let's begin.
Speaker A:Hello, Jennifer.
Speaker A:How are you?
Speaker B:Hi there, Shabna.
Speaker B:Good morning.
Speaker A:Good morning.
Speaker A:Jennifer, we are so glad you are here.
Speaker A:And please tell us, how did you come into this field?
Speaker B:Well, like you.
Speaker B:Like you shared.
Speaker B:I've had a history of chronic pain and illness about 20 years or so, and I found that the teachings of mindfulness meditation, otherwise known as insight meditation, were very healing, very soothing and comforting, and gave me a lot of clarity and a lot of wisdom to face, you know, what I.
Speaker B:What I need to face on a daily basis.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So my first question is, Jennifer, if suffering starts in the mind, what is the first thought people need to unlearn?
Speaker B:That's a great opening question.
Speaker B:And if I.
Speaker B:If I may, I think it's not so much about unlearning anything as really shifting our relationship with the thinking mind, having an acceptance that this mind thinks, you know, it's doing what it does and knowing that the bulk of our thoughts come from our unconscious mind, which.
Speaker B:Which means then that our thoughts, a lot of them, are based on fears and worries and our past conditioning.
Speaker B:So if we could step back and kind of clearly see the mind, we can see that there's patterns and there's habits of the mind and what we call our top 10 tunes, meaning we tend to think a lot of the same things over again.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:And when we see this, we could start to make some wiser decisions.
Speaker B:We could feel a little bit more in charge of the mind rather than feeling a victim of our mind.
Speaker B:A wonderful quote from the Dalai Lama is, the root cause of our pain and suffering lies in our ignorant and undisciplined mind.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:And so we can start to inquire, then each time we have a thought, especially a distressing one, is this true?
Speaker B:Is this thought true?
Speaker B:And if it is, what else is true?
Speaker B:Because oftentimes there's other possibilities that could be just as true, even though we're kind of clinging to one particular thought.
Speaker B:And so in this way, we can choose, have a little bit more choice as to what goes on in our mind.
Speaker B:And this greater wisdom gives us some greater well being.
Speaker B:Wonderful.
Speaker A:So how do we teach that to our mind that this is not something we don't have to get into the.
Speaker B:Fight or flight mode by labeling, you know, a lot of times just to stop and say, okay, this is a thought, you know, labeling it as such, okay, thinking is happening here.
Speaker B:And then like I said, just asking that key question of is this thought true?
Speaker B:Doing that inquiry work of is this true?
Speaker B:And a lot of times it's not, you know, and that's a huge relief right there.
Speaker B:And if it is true, okay, great.
Speaker B:Now I could take some appropriate action, but doing so with a little bit of distance, a little of space between me and my thought.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So that I'm not so overwhelmed by it.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So, Jennifer, can you explain what attachment really means and why most of us don't realize we are trapped in it?
Speaker B:Sure.
Speaker B:Well, first of all, attachment, as I'm going to use it here, it's different than Western psychology's attachment theory.
Speaker B:You may have heard of, like avoidant attachment or secure attachment.
Speaker B:In Buddhist psychology, it's used a little bit differently.
Speaker B:And a word that's used a lot here is clinging.
Speaker B:Clinging.
Speaker B:And so we tend to want things to be a certain way and to not be other ways, right.
Speaker B:We kind of have an underlying expectation or desire for our life to be perfect.
Speaker B:And when it's not, when it doesn't match what we want for ourselves, then we suffer.
Speaker B:The other way in which we attach is by thinking that things will never change, having an assumption that things are kind of permanent in a way.
Speaker B:And so when things do shift or change or pass away altogether again, there's suffering, there's that huge sense of loss.
Speaker B:And then lastly, we attach to ourselves.
Speaker B:We have this sense of what we call the ego, right?
Speaker B:And we live in very much this me, myself and I kind of world where we take everything pretty personally.
Speaker B:And that level of attachment as well causes suffering.
Speaker B:So the Buddha taught the opposite of all of these.
Speaker B:He said that life is not perfect, not permanent and not personal.
Speaker B:And when we really can start to understand that not only with our mind, but to really internalize that with our heart, it brings a lot of comfort, a lot of ease.
Speaker B:And you asked about feeling trapped, you know, feeling trapped in attachment.
Speaker B:And what happens is we develop this ego, this kind of fixed nugget of self at a very young age, 2, 3 years old.
Speaker B:It's pretty much set in place and so from that point forward, really it's all we know.
Speaker B:And you know, sometimes we don't know to question something.
Speaker B:You know, as they say, you don't know what you don't know.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And so we don't know to question it because we've been trapped in it since we were tiny.
Speaker A:So what is one habit people think is normal but actually creates emotional suffering every day?
Speaker B:This is another wonderful question.
Speaker B:And there's definitely more than one good solid answer here.
Speaker B:But the way that I'm going to answer this, first I need to set up some kind of analogy or metaphor.
Speaker B:So if we could imagine our life as a movie playing out in a movie theater.
Speaker B:And this isn't hard to do because we're the main character as we like to be, and the drama of life is unfolding there.
Speaker B:The issue is we spend our whole life in the movie, right?
Speaker B:We think that this is normal to actually be in the movie, and that's fine.
Speaker B:But we don't realize that we have the ability, the capacity to step out of the screen and, and to sit in a front row seat in the theater and to observe life unfolding.
Speaker B:And really this is at the heart of what it means to be aware, this observing quality of the witness, where we're not, and we're not disassociated or disengaged here.
Speaker B:That's not what I'm talking about.
Speaker B:But we're not caught up or swept away in the drama, right?
Speaker B:My teacher, Tara Brock, she calls it being in the trance.
Speaker B:And so mindfulness then is the practice of remembering over and over again to step out of the trance, to see our life unfolding in a more thoughtful way.
Speaker A:Beautiful.
Speaker A:If someone feels overwhelmed, what is the quickest mindfulness technique you would teach them in 30 seconds?
Speaker B:This is a great one.
Speaker B:And there's more than one, I like to call them nervous system hacks.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:There's more than one great nervous system hack, but I think in 30 seconds I would do this three part of ground label and then orient.
Speaker B:So I'll teach it really quickly here then.
Speaker B:So grounding means coming into your body, feeling the weight and the size and shape of your body right here, feeling the weight of gravity pulling you down, keeping you nice and secure and held.
Speaker B:And if it's comforting for you, feeling the breath.
Speaker B:And then once you've grounded in the body, labeling what's happened, what's happening right now.
Speaker B:So we do this with any strong emotion.
Speaker B:So anxiety is present, our overwhelm is present.
Speaker B:I've used this honestly for panic attacks, it works very well.
Speaker B:Panic is present, helps us to see it clearly.
Speaker B:And then the last is orient into your senses.
Speaker B:This is taught even by therapists, this three, three, three technique.
Speaker B:Name three things you see, right?
Speaker B:Name it out loud.
Speaker B:It might seem a little silly, but Car, tree, sidewalk.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:And then three things that you hear.
Speaker B:Oh, I hear the rumble of a motor.
Speaker B:I hear a bird.
Speaker B:I hear a child.
Speaker B:And then three things that you feel in your body, even if you need to reach out and touch, oh, I feel the steering wheel, or I feel my, you know, lay my hands on my thighs.
Speaker B:I feel my pants.
Speaker B:Three things like that.
Speaker B:So we're grounding in the body, labeling the emotion that's taking place and then coming into our senses.
Speaker A:Jennifer, do you think it is possible for working professionals or kids who are having so much energy in their body, possible to go into that grounding state and feel what is happening inside?
Speaker A:How do we get to that state that we can practice mindfulness at the panic or overwhelmed moment?
Speaker B:Oh, it does take some practice.
Speaker B:Certainly it takes some being informed.
Speaker B:We're not going to do this strategy naturally, but I think it's definitely possible for anyone of any age.
Speaker B:I used to be a special education teacher and kind of wish I had all my toolkit then that I have now because there were a lot of students I worked with, students with autism, students with ADD who could have really benefited from this.
Speaker B:And I think that children want to naturally be.
Speaker B:Be in their body.
Speaker B:You know, I think we all want to naturally have that congruence between our mind and our body.
Speaker B:And it's not difficult then to teach even a young child to feel the body, starting maybe with the outside, where you're actually maybe tapping the body or, you know, stroking the arms, massaging the feet, and then slowly, with practice, learning to feel inside.
Speaker B:You know, what's happening in your belly?
Speaker B:Do you feel a rumble?
Speaker B:You know, what's happening in your hands?
Speaker B:What does it feel like to maybe make fists and then to relax those fists so we can start to teach some body awareness over time, and then.
Speaker B:And then it becomes more second nature.
Speaker B:When push comes to shove and we're in it and we're in a state of overwhelm, it becomes more second nature then to come back to the body.
Speaker A:True.
Speaker A:When we talk about more mindfulness meditation and its benefits, I feel like, why it is not something that we can learn, learn even from school.
Speaker A:It's just my wish that it should be included in one of the subject in the future.
Speaker B:I totally agree.
Speaker B:And Ever since COVID my husband is an elementary school teacher still, so I hear a lot of what's going on in the schools.
Speaker B:And since COVID I think especially we've seen an increase in mental health therapists in the school settings, which is wonderful.
Speaker B:And they bring some of these strategies in with them in a very secular way.
Speaker B:But, yeah, I agree with you.
Speaker B:I don't think you could have too much of this at a young age.
Speaker A:Yeah, true.
Speaker A:So, Jennifer, why do people misunderstanding misunderstand letting go, and what does it truly mean in Buddhist psychology?
Speaker B:This is a great question.
Speaker B:And you know, I've taught whole classes just with that single theme of letting go.
Speaker B:And when I was first starting out, that's what I entitled the class, letting Go.
Speaker B:And then I realized when I really got into it that that phrase has become kind of cliche and that it's kind of a, kind of a turn off for some people.
Speaker B:And I, I think rightfully so, because when you really think about that, I really feel it in the body.
Speaker B:That phrase letting go, or, you know, telling someone, oh, just, just let go.
Speaker B:It implies releasing, dropping.
Speaker B:It feels very sudden, very all or nothing.
Speaker B:And first of all, this isn't possible.
Speaker B:You know, like if you tell someone, forgive and forget, well, you can't forget, right?
Speaker B:And in this.
Speaker B:And in the same way, you can't really fully let go of something that's hit you kind of hard.
Speaker B:And the nervous, the nervous system doesn't feel safe with that instruction.
Speaker B:And so what I realized is that language really does matter.
Speaker B:If we start to use words instead, like allow or accept or soften into this experience, lean into this experience, then a person's nervous system can feel a lot safer with that language.
Speaker B:And I think this is also much more respectful of people going through very challenging situations.
Speaker B:If someone's just lost a loved one and they're in the throes of grief, it sure wouldn't be very respectful or kind to tell that person, oh, just let go, right?
Speaker B:Let it go.
Speaker B:And so what's more in line here with Buddhist psychology then, is to give this invitation of allowing, of being present for all of life.
Speaker B:We may not like it, right?
Speaker B:We may not like it as it's unfolding, but we can be fully present for it as it's unfolding.
Speaker B:One thing we do in mindfulness meditation is we have a practice called metta, or loving kindness.
Speaker B:And we can bring this sense of allowing into our metta phrases where we wish well for ourselves and others.
Speaker B:We might say, for instance, may I accept my life as it is, may I soften into life.
Speaker B:May I allow this life to be here.
Speaker B:And again, this is not some kind of apathy or inaction.
Speaker B:It's reality.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:It's acceptance of reality.
Speaker A:True.
Speaker A:Awesome.
Speaker A:So how can mindfulness help us heal pain, recover from trauma, and feel more joy in everyday life?
Speaker B:Mindfulness can help with so many things we know now.
Speaker B:And this is a great three part question, so if it's okay, I'll break it down here.
Speaker B:So your first question here was how can mindfulness help us with pain?
Speaker B:And I'm going to keep a broad definition here.
Speaker B:I'm going to look at pain as something that could be physical, emotional or mental, or, you know, combination thereof.
Speaker B:And we can use our principle that we just talked about of allowing and acceptance because this can help us solve often around pain.
Speaker B:We can make space for the pain that we're going through.
Speaker B:And this works really well.
Speaker B:It may seem, you know, counterintuitive or counterproductive to greet pain in this way.
Speaker B:But we have this saying, that which we resist persists.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:That which we resist persists.
Speaker B:And it's a very human tendency to want to contract around pain and to resist it.
Speaker B:And again, whether that be physical, mental or emotional, but this tightening around our pain makes it worse.
Speaker B:Another saying that we have is that pain is mandatory in life, but suffering is optional.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:And what we mean by this is pain's gonna happen, right?
Speaker B:Life will have its painful moments, even long painful stretches, but when we fight against that pain, we're adding a layer.
Speaker B:And that added layer is our suffering.
Speaker B:So when we give pain permission to be there, we shift our relationship to that pain.
Speaker B:And that really makes all the difference.
Speaker B:It gives that pain permission to do its thing.
Speaker B:And if it wants to soften and release, then it can.
Speaker A:True.
Speaker B:Okay, so the second part here is a big topic.
Speaker B:I know you've had people on your podcast who are speaking primarily to this.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's complex.
Speaker B:But one thing that we can say, we know now that talk therapy most of the time isn't enough.
Speaker B:We need to have body based, or what we call somatic processing and integration of trauma.
Speaker B:And I don't just mean big T trauma as we think of it with assault or military service.
Speaker B:We all have trauma.
Speaker B:Trauma is any kind of energy that gets stored in our body and our fascia when that experience, for whatever reason, was not able to be processed at the time.
Speaker B:We have so many great sayings.
Speaker B:So another saying is we store our issues in our tissues.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:And it's a Good one.
Speaker B:And I don't think anyone could deny that.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:So mindfulness then is despite its name, right?
Speaker B:People think mindfulness is all head based stuff, but despite its name, mindfulness means embodied presence.
Speaker B:It's a body based practice.
Speaker B:And so we're constantly coming back to our body, what is present for me right now, what am I feeling inside?
Speaker B:And when we do this, we could start to very gently start to contact some of the trauma that is stored.
Speaker B:And over time, with support of course, as needed, we can begin to release and integrate then some of this stored energy.
Speaker A:Can we define that as a negative emotion that's stored in the body?
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:And I would even take it a step further and say that it's an energy, an energy stored in the body.
Speaker B:And what happens is we go through something and at the time that that something occurs, even if it's seemingly small, doesn't have to be something huge, but at the time that it occurs, it comes at us too fast or too much, or maybe we don't have the tools and the skills to process it at the time, or maybe we're going through a stressful life period where we've got a lot of other stuff coming at us.
Speaker B:And so that energy then isn't able to pass through.
Speaker B:And I don't mean energy in a woo woo way, you know, that we know that our bodies are energy and the experience then literally gets stored, gets imprinted in the cells of the body, in the tissues of the body.
Speaker B:And, and, and this is why, you know, maybe years later something will happen and it'll stir something up.
Speaker B:Not just mentally, but you'll get that knot in the gut or your pounding heart or whatever it might be because it's triggering that emotion or energy that's kind of dormant or latent and wanting to, wanting to unfold and release.
Speaker B:If you talk to doctors, you know, so often they, they will tell patients and patients get frustrate, you know, oh, it's, it's your stress that caused this or your, your emotional state.
Speaker B:And it seems insulting to be told that we walk away feeling like, you know, oh, was I just told I was crazy?
Speaker B:But, but, but really it is that mind body connection is so strong.
Speaker A:Exactly.
Speaker A:In my previous podcast, whenever we talk about it, we always talk about stress and how it affects the physical health.
Speaker A:And I very recently added diet and wellness also in my podcast because anyhow, mental wellness or I mean, mental stress is going to affect physical health.
Speaker A:So we need to understand that side of portion also, right?
Speaker B:Most definitely.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:I appreciate that.
Speaker B:You come at it, Shamna, from a lot of different angles because it's all important.
Speaker A:Thank you so much, Jennifer.
Speaker A:Can mindfulness and compassion help us live with less pain and more peace?
Speaker A:Is that possible?
Speaker B:Sure.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:Yes, it is possible.
Speaker B:And, and so now we direct our conversation a little bit more into the realm of what we call heartfulness.
Speaker B:So compassion is one of the four heart opening practices in Buddhism.
Speaker B:And we think of mindfulness and heartfulness as being two sides of a coin, or some say two wings of a dove, which is a beautiful analogy.
Speaker B:So it's not just enough to be aware.
Speaker B:If we go through life just having an awareness of every little thing, it could actually be pretty overwhelming that it's, that's a lot to be aware of.
Speaker B:So what's crucial is that we meet what we're aware of with a sense of care and a sense of kindness.
Speaker B:Because then we have, we have a strategy, right?
Speaker B:Not only are we now, not only are we mindful, but now we have a strategy for what to do with what's coming at us.
Speaker B:And Kristin Neff, if you're interested in self compassion, she's.
Speaker B:I kind of consider her one of the gurus of self compassion.
Speaker B:And she offers a beautiful three step approach which she calls a self compassion break.
Speaker B:And it's so simple and yet it's so powerful.
Speaker B:And I use it personally all the time.
Speaker B:You can do it in 30 seconds or you can really savor it and do it in, you know, 20 minutes.
Speaker B:But step one, you tell yourself, this is a moment of suffering.
Speaker B:You're going through a hard time and you name it.
Speaker B:This is a moment of suffering.
Speaker B:Step two, you tell yourself, oh, everybody suffers.
Speaker B:This is what's called shared humanity, right?
Speaker B:Or common humanity.
Speaker B:Everybody suffers.
Speaker B:And then the third step.
Speaker B:May I be kind to myself.
Speaker B:So again, this is a moment of suffering.
Speaker B:Everybody suffers.
Speaker B:May I be kind to myself.
Speaker B:And in that, embedded in that last part, there is then asking yourself, what do I need right now?
Speaker B:What do I need to ease my pain?
Speaker B:To allow for greater peace?
Speaker B:What kind of action might I take?
Speaker B:There's a lot, a lot there in that last part.
Speaker A:So compassion here is compassionate towards yourself, right?
Speaker A:I thought compassion towards others and towards the situation.
Speaker B:In mindfulness meditation, we actually practice offering compassion in different directions.
Speaker B:So we can offer self compassion.
Speaker B:We're directing the compassion toward ourself during a time of difficulty.
Speaker B:We can offer compassion like you're saying to another person or people because we see that they're going through hardship and we feel their pain.
Speaker B:And then like you mentioned there also, we can offer compassion to a situation, right?
Speaker B:To something that's unfolded globally or locally that we, that we think could benefit from this, from this warmth.
Speaker B:And it's, it's a little different from prayer.
Speaker B:Although I tell people that if they're prayerful, then, then great, this, this can be incorporated into their prayer practice.
Speaker B:But the way it's taught traditionally is, like I said, a heart opening practice where, where we're doing this to, to open our heart and to build our capacity to, to give and receive goodness.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:So how does paying attention with kindness help us heal and experience more?
Speaker B:When we pay attention with kindness, there's a, you know, it's a huge paradigm shift.
Speaker B:Typically our mind is full of judgments and criticisms.
Speaker B:That's.
Speaker B:That's normal, right?
Speaker B:That's what the mind does.
Speaker B:And we could be quite hard on others and quite on our, hard on ourselves in this way.
Speaker B:But with kindness practice, we're practicing over time bringing in this friendliness toward life.
Speaker B:And this affects not only our mental outlook, but our heart and our bodies.
Speaker B:It's this softening of the armor, we like to say.
Speaker B:And this is very healing.
Speaker B:This opens us up to greater joy.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:When our heart is open, we start to notice a little bit more.
Speaker B:Not just the bad stuff in life, but we start to notice when things are going well.
Speaker B:We start to notice, oh, that was, that was kind of easy.
Speaker B:Or, oh, there was joy there, or even in the moment.
Speaker B:Right, right now I'm feeling comfort, right now I'm feeling connection.
Speaker B:And so then we can purposefully savor this goodness.
Speaker B:We can take in and really feel this felt sense of when things are, are joyous.
Speaker B:And we know that our brain is malleable.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:It's plastic like this, they like to say.
Speaker B:And so now what we do is we use our mindful awareness as a tool where we can cultivate a happier brain on purpose.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Right, right.
Speaker A:So what happens when we use both mindfulness and heartfulness to support our healing and happiness?
Speaker B:So this is kind of the, you know, the grand finale, I think, right, this, this combination then, of living with both mindful awareness and an open heart.
Speaker B:The mindfulness and the heartfulness, it's a powerful combination.
Speaker B:And really looking back historically, this is the stuff of saints and sages.
Speaker B:Yeah, but, but of course, you know, for most of us, it's a daily practice, right?
Speaker B:It's a daily commitment.
Speaker B:We're committing to living as our best self, as our highest self.
Speaker B:And when we come from that place, we don't really need to seek anymore healing or seek happiness because we come to an understanding and experience of our highest self, or what you might call consciousness.
Speaker B:We come into this knowing that that aspect or that true nature is inherently whole.
Speaker B:It's naturally content.
Speaker B:It's both aware and it's both open hearted.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So this is my personal question.
Speaker A:So when we, when we are trying to bring happiness and joy during the tough situation, aren't we suppressing our other emotions?
Speaker B:Oh, that's a great question.
Speaker B:And it's good to answer this because we hear nowadays of what we call spiritual bypassing where we use our spiritual practice and, and I, as I teach mindfulness, it's secular, but it definitely, you know, it has the spiritual kind of edge to it always when, when we use our spiritual practice to bypass or to circumvent something that's difficult, that's not the intention of, of a spiritual practice.
Speaker B:We want to be full in this human body and in this human life.
Speaker B:And can we then experience joy and sorrow at the same time?
Speaker B:A lot of times we feel that it's black and white.
Speaker B:If something's going, if we're going through a difficulty, like let's say we're very angry or we're moving through the grief process, we feel like we should only be angry, we should only be grieving.
Speaker B:But that's not how life works.
Speaker B:Humanity's much more complex.
Speaker B:So can we give ourselves permission to have the grief and the joy, to have the anger and the contentment, to notice that it's all there?
Speaker B:It's like a whole soup inside when we start to pay attention?
Speaker A:Yeah, right.
Speaker A:No, why I asked that question is people now in the medical field are saying that, I mean, in the meditation side, they are saying that if you have unprocessed emotions, it's going to settle in your body and it will tighten your body at some point of time.
Speaker A:So when we try to manage these situations and try to bring joy, we are suppressing those other emotions which is again going to get, build up in our body and tighten our body.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So that's why I asked that question.
Speaker B:And this is where, this is where practicing what we call interoception, you're feeling into the body and over time, with practice, you're becoming more and more aware of what's unfolding inside.
Speaker B:So that if there is trauma that's stored, you're feeling those holding patterns in the body.
Speaker B:You're feeling where things are tight or dense or heavy, or sometimes there are places in the body that are simply without feeling They've just numbed out.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And at the same time, where in the body does it feel okay?
Speaker B:Maybe it's just the tip of your nose.
Speaker B:Maybe it's just a finger that feels okay, it feels safe, it feels comfortable enough.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Maybe it even feels kind of lovely.
Speaker B:And can then you be there with these parts that are traumatized and holding and then these parts that are comfortable or maybe even open and airy and spacious?
Speaker B:And again, can it both be there at the same time?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Beautiful.
Speaker A:My final question, Jennifer, if you could teach the world only one lesson from Buddhist psychology or Yoga nidra, which is you are specialized in, what would it be and why?
Speaker B:So this one, you know, it's so hard to narrow down.
Speaker B:There's so, oh, gosh, so many beautiful, beautiful takeaways.
Speaker B:So many.
Speaker B:But I would say if I were to offer the world one lesson, it would be to live awake.
Speaker B:And what I mean by that is to slow down, to pay attention, to remember that you have a body.
Speaker B:You're not just ahead.
Speaker B:I like to think of it as a lollipop.
Speaker B:You're not a lollipop.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:What's going on?
Speaker B:What's going on in your body?
Speaker B:You've got thoughts, you've got emotions and you've got sensations, and that's it.
Speaker B:Those three things are the whole of human experience.
Speaker B:And so pay attention.
Speaker B:And what insights then can you gain about who you are and how you operate based on all that's unfolding for you inside?
Speaker B:And how can you bring this greater awareness into your daily living?
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:If we all did this, if we all lived awake, if we all moved through life in this aware way, boy, wouldn't it be a very different world.
Speaker A:Very true.
Speaker A:That sums up my last question.
Speaker A:A big thank you, Jennifer, for joining us and sharing your thoughts on mindfulness.
Speaker A:It was an experience.
Speaker A:Your soothing voice and your beautiful explanation.
Speaker A:I really love this episode.
Speaker A:Thank you so much.
Speaker B:Thank you for having me.
Speaker B:It was a pleasure.
Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker A:To our viewers, I hope today's episode helps you feel calmer and more connected to yourself.
Speaker A:Don't forget to subscribe for more episodes like this.
Speaker A:Take care and until next time.
Speaker A:Bye bye.
