Speaker 1: Welcome to Destiny. Now here's your host, Cliff Dunning.
Speaker 2: Hey, what are you up to? What's going on? How
Speaker 2: are you feeling? Come on, let's talk. Hey, this is Cliff,
Speaker 2: your host of Destiny. This week we are looking at
Speaker 2: what you consider doing with less, not being so anxious
Speaker 2: to be Like the Joneses, the new car, the new clothing,
Speaker 2: the new watch, even the new house. Some people go
Speaker 2: nuts and want to do exactly what everybody else is doing,
Speaker 2: but doing it so that they have objects. It's interesting
Speaker 2: because today we are looking at a way to exist
Speaker 2: that I think probably was emulated or if not emulated,
Speaker 2: carried over in a very similar way to the period
Speaker 2: that we considered the Golden Age. And if you look
Speaker 2: at the yogas we're talking about, Sechya yoga, treta yoga,
Speaker 2: what they call the Garden of Eden. And what I'm
Speaker 2: trying to say here is that what it looks like
Speaker 2: is that those periods were concentrated more on high spiritual evolution,
Speaker 2: superior health. I think it was baboo dev misery of
Speaker 2: believe that people live to be many thousands of years old,
Speaker 2: and then after that I think that would be Tritah
Speaker 2: would be five to eight hundred years old, and of
Speaker 2: course today we lived it will be roughly one hundred.
Speaker 2: If you're lucky, you get to be one hundred. Most
Speaker 2: people in the industrial nations living to their eighties. And
Speaker 2: then that's about it. And how funny that? Why is
Speaker 2: that so funny? Why is it so strange? Well, it's
Speaker 2: because we don't take care of ourself rich foods, we
Speaker 2: don't exercise. We fill our bias with drugs and pharmacological
Speaker 2: products because we don't feel well, rather than getting out
Speaker 2: in nature. So in many ways we've lost our connection
Speaker 2: with nature. And you know who I'm talking about. I
Speaker 2: can raise my hand on that too. This winter, we
Speaker 2: should have got out more. I should have, you know,
Speaker 2: even though it's raining, even though it's cold, it should
Speaker 2: have bundled up and connected with nature. Well, we've lost that.
Speaker 2: We've lost that ability, and I think it's wonderful. The
Speaker 2: other picture we get of these golden ages of mankind
Speaker 2: is the is the lack of interest in items. You know.
Speaker 2: I think what we've understood is that people live very simply.
Speaker 2: They live with nature. One of the things I thought
Speaker 2: was quite amazing is that intention manifestation was almost automatic
Speaker 2: so what you when you thought of something that you
Speaker 2: wanted it and appeared. And if you're living a very
Speaker 2: simplified existence, you're not, you know. And this is the
Speaker 2: golden age when there was no computers or internet, that
Speaker 2: you manifested food, or you manifested conveniences or not sure
Speaker 2: what that is. We're not sure if people lived in
Speaker 2: homes or caves or whatever. But when we look at
Speaker 2: the Pupavoo, the Great Book of the of the Maya,
Speaker 2: we know that there was a lot of abilities that
Speaker 2: people had that we consider extreme psychic abilities, like by location.
Speaker 2: You could be one place but think about being another
Speaker 2: location on Earth and be there in another form. You
Speaker 2: could tap into premonition, you could or psychically aware of
Speaker 2: the environment you were in. You probably knew exactly when
Speaker 2: you're speaking to somebody, You probably knew exactly what they
Speaker 2: were thinking, and if they were friendly or not. I mean,
Speaker 2: it's you know, your demi gods, you really are demi gods.
Speaker 2: And that was a period of time when it was
Speaker 2: the most harmonious lifestyle and the most harmonious way to
Speaker 2: live on the planet Earth. So today our program is
Speaker 2: on lessening, letting go of relationships that don't serve us,
Speaker 2: material needs that don't serve us, and finding what I
Speaker 2: think and you'll you can hear it today. What I
Speaker 2: think is the next phase in evolution. We're moving out
Speaker 2: of the Dark Age Cali Yoga, which is a you know,
Speaker 2: hard period. There's a lot of wars, people are not happy,
Speaker 2: and material wealth is the way to go into Duwarpura,
Speaker 2: which is more beneficial, more enlightened. We're beginning to use meditation.
Speaker 2: We're hearing more and more guests on Earth Ancients talking
Speaker 2: about energy used in temples people bathed, and energy for health,
Speaker 2: for fertility, and this is the next phase. So this
Speaker 2: is something to consider. So today's program is the empty
Speaker 2: path finding fulfillment through the radical art of lessening. And
Speaker 2: my guest is Billy when hey, Spring is just around
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Speaker 1: And join us. We've got a good one for you today.
Speaker 2: We're all thinking about how to make a buck, how
Speaker 2: to live with as many items as possible. Of course,
Speaker 2: we're following the new president and Elon muh who's one
Speaker 2: of the wealthiest people in the world, and wondering how
Speaker 2: we can get there. But I don't think our guest
Speaker 2: today is going to tell us about why that's a problem.
Speaker 2: And let me tell you a little bit about the
Speaker 2: program today. The book we're featuring is The Empty Path,
Speaker 2: Finding fulfillment through the Radical Art of Lessening. We'll learn
Speaker 2: a little more about that in our interview today. My
Speaker 2: guest today is Billy Wynn. He is the author of
Speaker 2: The Empty Path. He's a student of Buddhism mindfulness for
Speaker 2: over thirty years and he received certification under a fantastic
Speaker 2: guy who lives around here. I'm in northern California, Jack
Speaker 2: Cornfield and Tara Branch, who are excellent, excellent teachers and
Speaker 2: whyse stages. So we're going to learn a little bit
Speaker 2: more about this information and why it's not necessarily great
Speaker 2: to be a person who is seeking well health and
Speaker 2: and rewards all the time. So hey, Billy, welcome to Destiny.
Speaker 2: Great to have you on the program.
Speaker 3: Thanks for having me pleasure to be with you.
Speaker 2: All Right, why did you write this book? Billy? You're
Speaker 2: living in the United States, where the Western culture we're
Speaker 2: all about collecting information, collecting wealth, doing better than the Joneses.
Speaker 2: You know, we got to have the new car, the
Speaker 2: new watch, the new uh sports sports item? Why why uh?
Speaker 2: Why Lessening?
Speaker 3: Yeah, thanks for asking that question. It gets really to
Speaker 3: the to the heart of the book. And first, so
Speaker 3: first of all, and it gives me a good opportunity
Speaker 3: to say that there's nothing inherently wrong and at least,
Speaker 3: you know, kind of what I'm presenting and the teachings
Speaker 3: that I'm offering with you know, being wealthy or having
Speaker 3: ambition or accomplishments, et cetera. It's really about how we
Speaker 3: relate to those life experiences that I'm trying to get to.
Speaker 3: And so Lessening is really about distilling our life experience,
Speaker 3: creating some space for us to experience most directly the
Speaker 3: ups and downs and the ins and outs, and the
Speaker 3: accruals and the losses that life brings to us, and
Speaker 3: just kind of relaxing our grip, if you will, from
Speaker 3: the outcome of those different life events. And actually what
Speaker 3: I have found and what I talk about to some
Speaker 3: degree in the book, there's a pretty significant autobiographical component
Speaker 3: is that that mindset can actually help us succeed in
Speaker 3: a lot of the you know, endeavors and goals that
Speaker 3: we have in our life, including potentially financial success. But
Speaker 3: it's really a shift in mindset about how we're approaching
Speaker 3: these things that can give us a little bit more ease, equanimity, piece, creativity, energy,
Speaker 3: et cetera. That can you know, perhaps paradoxically, actually help
Speaker 3: us accomplish some of those things that we are otherwise pursuing.
Speaker 2: Did you study other cultures and determine that they either
Speaker 2: were living longer, had more peace and tranquility and more
Speaker 2: happiness versus the Western lifestyle.
Speaker 3: There's some evidence of that, you know, I mean, I
Speaker 3: think that there well, I'd say the evidence around that
Speaker 3: is kind of mixed, and I think that you know,
Speaker 3: there are blue zones and there's been some really I
Speaker 3: don't talk about that my book, but there are some
Speaker 3: research around different types of cultures that can promote longevity,
Speaker 3: and to the degree that evidence is valid, there is
Speaker 3: some someponent components of it that a slower lifestyle and
Speaker 3: more you know, ambulatory lifestyle, for example, can contribute to longevity,
Speaker 3: but really it's about how we experience life, and you know,
Speaker 3: are we happier, are we more at ease? And there
Speaker 3: is some some clinical validation of the benefits of meditation,
Speaker 3: for example, in reducing cortisol, stress hormones, and improving cognition
Speaker 3: and those kinds of measurable things. But more what I'm
Speaker 3: getting after is what do our days feel like? You know,
Speaker 3: are they Are they joyful entities or are they stressful
Speaker 3: and angry? We could all relate to some of a
Speaker 3: little of all of that, but you know, we tend
Speaker 3: to to want a little bit more of the former.
Speaker 3: So that's what the book tries to help us do.
Speaker 2: Let's drill down into this a little bit. If we're lessening,
Speaker 2: we're reducing the stress because we don't have to worry
Speaker 2: about so many different items or I don't know, bank
Speaker 2: accounts or whatever. Is is your thinking that having less
Speaker 2: material wealth not necessarily I'm not going to use the
Speaker 2: word wealth because that's not what I mean. Material items,
Speaker 2: things that we have to worry about. Is that lessening
Speaker 2: the fatigue, the the stress, the problems associated with overwhelm
Speaker 2: is that what the go is.
Speaker 3: Maybe, And so the result of this path, so to speak,
Speaker 3: if one takes up the book, it tries to work
Speaker 3: with it a little bit, you know, may not lead
Speaker 3: to having less things. It may not lead to having
Speaker 3: less friends. It might, and for many people I think
Speaker 3: that it does, but that's not necessarily the prescription. What
Speaker 3: we're lessening is our attachment to and anxiety about, and
Speaker 3: preoccupation with the outcome of our endeavors, of our relationships,
Speaker 3: of our business pursuits, you know, and so forth. And
Speaker 3: the tool for getting to that, the reason it's called
Speaker 3: the empty path, is to really closely examine each of
Speaker 3: these different facets of our life for what they really are.
Speaker 3: And we begin to see that what we see them as,
Speaker 3: which is sort of separate, something to be pursued, something
Speaker 3: that we need in order to make us happy, is
Speaker 3: not actually what they are. And that, you know, when
Speaker 3: we have a settled mind state, we can see things
Speaker 3: a little more clearly as not not actually so distinct
Speaker 3: from us, and we can get into all that if
Speaker 3: you'd like. But and that that, you know, again, doesn't
Speaker 3: mean that we don't have the meal, or get the job,
Speaker 3: or buy the car, but the process and the experience
Speaker 3: of doing that can be less and less stressful and
Speaker 3: a little a little easier and happier. That's the lessening.
Speaker 3: It's not so much, you know, less things, although again
Speaker 3: it may result in that. It's more about lessening our
Speaker 3: you know, our our amped up pursuit of all these
Speaker 3: things and the belief that getting them is what's going
Speaker 3: to make us happy.
Speaker 2: I mean, if we have less to worry about, obviously
Speaker 2: we're not going to have the same stress and fatigue
Speaker 2: and chronic problems and cruting health problems that Western culture
Speaker 2: is dealing with right now. I mean, they annually do
Speaker 2: serve of the health of Americans, and we are at
Speaker 2: the bottom of the of the ring in terms of mental, physical,
Speaker 2: and very likely spiritual health. So I can understand what
Speaker 2: you're trying to get across. I would love to hear
Speaker 2: if you can an example or a case study where
Speaker 2: you say John Doe was in the corporate world and
Speaker 2: he did this and that and this and that, and
Speaker 2: you know, took a path similar to what you're suggesting,
Speaker 2: and this was the result. Because I think our listeners
Speaker 2: are curious and I see it from a spiritual point
Speaker 2: of view, what you're trying to say is that less
Speaker 2: is more and also less allows for other areas to open.
Speaker 2: But if we could, if you could give it, for instance,
Speaker 2: I think it would really help.
Speaker 3: Sure I can. I can give it for instance from
Speaker 3: my own life that is in the book. That's what
Speaker 3: I know best, So I could speak for myself. So
Speaker 3: and there's a couple of different, you know, examples of this,
Speaker 3: but I think maybe the maybe the best one that
Speaker 3: that it really speaks to what you're asking for is
Speaker 3: in my my primary career has been in health policy consulting.
Speaker 3: And when I first started, I had a job on
Speaker 3: Capitol Hill and I went into consulting and lobbying. This
Speaker 3: was over fifteen years ago, and uh, you know, I
Speaker 3: was I was the embodiment of American you know, Western
Speaker 3: hustle and bustle and ambition and uh greed you know,
Speaker 3: to some degree, and so and it it it bore fruit.
Speaker 3: You know. I was doing well. We moved to Denver.
Speaker 3: I was flying back and forth. I was basically commuting
Speaker 3: to Washington, d C. And I was just perpetually stressful.
Speaker 3: I was drinking a lot. I was missing out on
Speaker 3: the early childhood experiences of my kids and so, and
Speaker 3: partly due to the you know, I'm grateful because the really,
Speaker 3: to some degree, the necessity of not living in Washington
Speaker 3: and wanting to stay in Denver, Colorado. I started to
Speaker 3: change the way that I approached my work so that
Speaker 3: it wasn't so contingent on me personally, it wasn't so
Speaker 3: focused on lobbying. I hired people and empowered them to
Speaker 3: take on some of their responsibility, knowing that I would
Speaker 3: be sacrificing some income, some profit in the near term,
Speaker 3: but in the long term, now fifteen years later, it
Speaker 3: has allowed me to write a book and become a
Speaker 3: certified meditation teacher. And we lived in France a couple
Speaker 3: of years ago, my family and I for a year.
Speaker 3: So all these beautiful life experiences that you know, the
Speaker 3: one point zero version of me in my professional track
Speaker 3: could never have been able to do. And as I
Speaker 3: say in the book, my income has has been constant throughout.
Speaker 3: So I think there is some you know, that's not
Speaker 3: a guarantee, you know that anybody who does this kind
Speaker 3: of practice is going to have that same result, But
Speaker 3: I have shown that it can work, and I do
Speaker 3: think some of it has to do with when I'm
Speaker 3: working with clients, when I'm managing my team, I am
Speaker 3: I'm not gonna say I never get frustrated. Like I say,
Speaker 3: I never you know, make a mistake, of course, but
Speaker 3: I am a bit easier. I'm more patient, I'm more creative,
Speaker 3: I think, in coming up with solutions in the professional context,
Speaker 3: because I'm not you know, clinging so tightly to that
Speaker 3: next dollar and that next client, that next next outcome,
Speaker 3: or you know, correcting that employee's mistake and that sort
Speaker 3: of thing. So it is that that that shift in
Speaker 3: mindset which comes out of just you know, whether literally
Speaker 3: or metaphorically, just kind of taking a step back, you know,
Speaker 3: from from what's happening in this case, in our professional career.
Speaker 3: And uh, you know, it's it has it has worked
Speaker 3: for me. Again, there's all kinds of factors right for that,
Speaker 3: but but one clear threat for me has been this
Speaker 3: uh lessening of my preoccupation with the you know, the
Speaker 3: immediate reward of the profession and thinking more longer term,
Speaker 3: thinking about myself as a whole person, thinking about my
Speaker 3: family and you know, the rest of my life.
Speaker 2: I like that, and thank you for sharing that. I
Speaker 2: really appreciate that. Those who are listening, How would you
Speaker 2: suggest a start? What is what are the key tools
Speaker 2: that we integrate so that we began lessening.
Speaker 3: Sure, So there's two big tracks that are in the book,
Speaker 3: and so I'll briefly describe it. The first one is
Speaker 3: mindfulness practices, and so that can mean meditation. That's not
Speaker 3: everybody's cup of tea. But I do offer a couple
Speaker 3: of different meditation techniques in the book. There are some
Speaker 3: other techniques that can promote mindfulness in our daily life
Speaker 3: that don't necessarily require kind of formal seated meditation, and
Speaker 3: so I explore those as well. But the crux of
Speaker 3: it is to attune more to what's happening in the
Speaker 3: reality of our lives in the present moment, and trying
Speaker 3: to resist the impulse we have to rush into judging
Speaker 3: that experience as positive or negative, something we want more of,
Speaker 3: something less of, right that the person we really want
Speaker 3: to call the person we want to avoid that very
Speaker 3: natural and very persistent instinct. We have to judge things
Speaker 3: with mindfulness. We're trying to ease that throttle and let
Speaker 3: our experience present itself to us so that we can
Speaker 3: see it clearly before we rush decide whether we like
Speaker 3: it or not, and you know, want to dispose of
Speaker 3: it or not. So that practice of experiencing our day
Speaker 3: to day moments that way more mindfully is a major
Speaker 3: major component of the lessening path. It creates that bit
Speaker 3: of space between us and what's coming up for us,
Speaker 3: a little bit of space between us and our career pursuits,
Speaker 3: our relationships or you know, hobbies, what have you. That
Speaker 3: starts to ease that attachment that we very naturally have
Speaker 3: to those things and the outcomes that we expect from
Speaker 3: those things. But that's one, and we can definitely go
Speaker 3: into that in more detail. But one of them is
Speaker 3: mindfulness practices. The other is inquiring into this thing called emptiness. Right,
Speaker 3: the book is called The Empty Path, and so part
Speaker 3: of my motivation for writing it was I am a Buddhist.
Speaker 3: I have studied a lot about Buddhism, and in lots
Speaker 3: and lots of Buddhist books that I've read, this core teaching.
Speaker 3: Some might argue the core teaching of Buddhism is really
Speaker 3: glossed over or ignored all together. And I think part
Speaker 3: of it is a translation issue. The term emptiness doesn't
Speaker 3: sound so great, you know, A lot of people think
Speaker 3: of emptiness like you know, nihilism or meaninglessness or I
Speaker 3: have to give up all my things or all that
Speaker 3: kind of stuff. And part of that, again is a
Speaker 3: translation issue. But really what it means is that what
Speaker 3: I spoke to a little bit earlier, which is the
Speaker 3: appearance of things right here, you know, as separate from us,
Speaker 3: as kind of having their own kind of identity that
Speaker 3: is coherent through time, a certain permanence to them. You know.
Speaker 3: In this case, a book is actually just sort of
Speaker 3: the surface layer of what it actually is. And if
Speaker 3: we really kind of settle ourselves and contemplate things more
Speaker 3: closely and carefully, we can see that the different things
Speaker 3: that make them what they are are are innumerable. Right.
Speaker 3: So there's there's paper, there's production process, there's ink, there's
Speaker 3: the thoughts, there's the words, there's the editor, there's the agent.
Speaker 3: There's all these different factors that go into making this
Speaker 3: what it is, But not any single one of those
Speaker 3: is what makes it a book. So that's one element
Speaker 3: of emptiness. Is in Buddhism, we call it no self,
Speaker 3: but that it gets a little wonky for people pretty fast.
Speaker 3: But I think it's better to think of the fact
Speaker 3: that it's clear to everyone that what's sitting here is
Speaker 3: the result of you know, dozens and dozens, if not thousands,
Speaker 3: of different factors and steps and components, and that not
Speaker 3: one of them can you point to and say, well,
Speaker 3: that's the bookness, right, that's the bookness. So actually, really
Speaker 3: it's kind of an idea that we've put together. So
Speaker 3: that's one insight into the nature of things that, again,
Speaker 3: if we cultivate it can help us release our sort
Speaker 3: of reflex attachment to what we think this is and
Speaker 3: see it from a bit of a fresher, more creative way.
Speaker 3: We're going to take a.
Speaker 2: Short commercial break to allow our sponsors to identify themselves,
Speaker 2: and we will return shortly with my guest today, Billy
Speaker 2: when discussing his new book, The Empty Path. Will be
Speaker 2: right back. My guest today is Billy Wynn, who's written
Speaker 2: a new book called The Empty Path, Finding Fulfillment through
Speaker 2: the Radical Art of Lessening. I want to get into
Speaker 2: emptiness here in a second, because you spend a good
Speaker 2: deal of time discussing that. Let's get back to my mindfulness.
Speaker 2: We have had people talk about mindfulness on our program
Speaker 2: here in the context that you're presenting you're asking, and
Speaker 2: please correct me if I if I go over the
Speaker 2: cliff on this a little bit. But you're you're saying
Speaker 2: that being aware, being mindful, being present is a key
Speaker 2: to understanding your I was going to say your empty
Speaker 2: path or you're lessening. So this is really a key.
Speaker 2: Can you expand on.
Speaker 3: That a little bit? Sure? Sure, so I'd say that
Speaker 3: the you know, tik not Hans says, we have an
Speaker 3: appointment with our life. It's the present moment. You know,
Speaker 3: don't miss your appointment with life. And so one one
Speaker 3: thing that actually becomes a parent and with with mindfuls
Speaker 3: practice is just how unmindful we are the vast majority
Speaker 3: of the time. And that's that's okay, that's the human
Speaker 3: experience we're we are like I use the analogy like
Speaker 3: a pinball and a pinball machine just bounce seeing. You know,
Speaker 3: we want the pleasant chimes and the dings and the
Speaker 3: rewards and the bells and we don't want to slip
Speaker 3: down into the bottom and have to start the play
Speaker 3: over again or you know, so uh, we we most
Speaker 3: often live our lives pursuing things we think will make
Speaker 3: us happy, and you know, avoiding things that we think
Speaker 3: will will make us said, or you know, unhappy, and uh,
Speaker 3: it's it's it's just a constant hustle. And what the
Speaker 3: heart of what the book's book says is that as
Speaker 3: so long as we think it's these things outside of us,
Speaker 3: external to us, these factors around us, that in fact
Speaker 3: we have very little power to control. If we think
Speaker 3: those are the things that are going to make us happy,
Speaker 3: then that's a self fulfilling prophecy that we're going to
Speaker 3: be unsatisfied, because actually the you know, the fulfillment is inherent,
Speaker 3: you know, with each of us and all in all things.
Speaker 3: As I try to explain in the book, so mindfulness
Speaker 3: practice helps us slow down that reactive state of pursuing
Speaker 3: the happy things and avoiding the unhappy things and the
Speaker 3: pleasant things and the unpleasant things, which is takes a
Speaker 3: lot a good bit of practice because it's pretty much,
Speaker 3: you know, how we're trained to behave by our society
Speaker 3: from day one. So setting aside some time for dedicated
Speaker 3: mindfulness practice and meditation is a very helpful technique. But
Speaker 3: I do offer some ways to do it kind of
Speaker 3: in real time, you know, in a conversation or when
Speaker 3: we're working or what have. You can help put a
Speaker 3: little break into that reactive cycle of I like this,
Speaker 3: I don't like this, and help us see things in
Speaker 3: a fresher, newer way, which is really how they are.
Speaker 3: Things are always presenting themselves a new They're always changing,
Speaker 3: you know, our relationships, our tasked, our mind is always
Speaker 3: changing and evolving. So you know, we think it's the
Speaker 3: same that it was a year ago, but it's really
Speaker 3: not so. So this mindfulness practice is a way to
Speaker 3: pause and see things fresh, which is closer to how
Speaker 3: they actually are. Then all the preconceived ideas and judgments
Speaker 3: and you know, expectations that we tend to apply to
Speaker 3: things again as we're you know, snapping these judgments of
Speaker 3: pleasant or unpositive and positive or negative. So and we
Speaker 3: could you know, like I start with mindfulness of the breath,
Speaker 3: which is a very common and pervasive technique. And the
Speaker 3: beautiful thing about that is that you know, you can
Speaker 3: cultivate it and dedicated meditation, but it's always available stop light,
Speaker 3: you know, on a phone call, in a podcast, you know,
Speaker 3: we can we can kind of find a quick recentering
Speaker 3: tool with our breath. So that's one reason it's so popular.
Speaker 2: Yeah, excellent, Thank you for that, you know, you bring
Speaker 2: up in your book and this is curious for me,
Speaker 2: and I'd love to hear the explanation for it, lessening
Speaker 2: our relationships. And when you brought that up, I was like,
Speaker 2: you got something here, because I think that not only
Speaker 2: do we spend too much energy on certain relationships that
Speaker 2: aren't benefiting this, but also even with our loved ones,
Speaker 2: we can go out of our way to be perhaps
Speaker 2: diverted from the true nature of that connection. So talk
Speaker 2: a little bit about that. That's a great it's a
Speaker 2: great path.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Thank you. Yeah. And I think, I mean,
Speaker 3: our relationships are really especially with the people that we love,
Speaker 3: our own family and so forth, is where the rubber
Speaker 3: really meets the road. And I think we can all
Speaker 3: relate to. You know, this is the person that actually
Speaker 3: cared the most about in the world. Why am I
Speaker 3: frustrated with them? Why am I raising my voice at them?
Speaker 3: Like what is going on here? And it's it's because
Speaker 3: we're so closely attached, you know. And so what I
Speaker 3: try to talk about in the book, and I use
Speaker 3: one analogy I really like to use. I'm sealing from
Speaker 3: the minister who married my wife, and I he talked
Speaker 3: about this is not just about marriage, but this was
Speaker 3: of course in the context of marriage. The marriage not
Speaker 3: is kind of the typical metaphor for marriage. And he
Speaker 3: explained to you, if you think about it, that's a
Speaker 3: very stagnant, constricting, you know, way to think about our
Speaker 3: relationship and you can't move that. People can't ship, they
Speaker 3: can't move, they can't grow. And he said, maybe it's
Speaker 3: better to think of a marriage like this, and so
Speaker 3: that way there's freedom to you know, kind of flow
Speaker 3: and grow and change as we all do over time,
Speaker 3: and to allow the other person to continue to evolve
Speaker 3: and to be who they are rather than say no, no,
Speaker 3: you're going to be this way. I need you to
Speaker 3: be this way. That's that's what love is, right, So
Speaker 3: that starts to you know, explain this different way of
Speaker 3: thinking about relationships. And I just spend quite a bit
Speaker 3: of time on it. You and I talk about codependency,
Speaker 3: and I don't mean that in a really clinically, you know,
Speaker 3: really negative way. I actually try to present it as
Speaker 3: the way that most of our relationships are in the
Speaker 3: sense that we think that our happiness and our emotional
Speaker 3: state is to some degree dependent on how another person.
Speaker 3: Perhaps our partner is treating us right and vice versa. Oh,
Speaker 3: it's my responsibility to help make my partner happy, and
Speaker 3: you know they need this from me, so I need
Speaker 3: to do that, and that to me is a is
Speaker 3: a mild form of codependence. Whereas if we recognize that
Speaker 3: actually we are responsible for our own mind state, they
Speaker 3: are responsible for their own mind state, then then we're
Speaker 3: talking about freedom in a relationship where we're honoring each
Speaker 3: other to be the people that we actually are and
Speaker 3: want to be, which is closer to love, I suggest
Speaker 3: than you know, our our traditional mindset about it.
Speaker 2: I like that for personal relationship, especially with your spouse
Speaker 2: or your your girlfriend or boyfriend or your partner, how
Speaker 2: do we lessen the business relationships and the friends that
Speaker 2: may not service very well without hurting the other person?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, so I think that the key is to
Speaker 3: uh recognize right that they're again, you know, their their
Speaker 3: their their success, their well being, their emotional state is
Speaker 3: not our responsibility. Now there's a little bit of a
Speaker 3: parenthesis here of like, you know, it's our employee or
Speaker 3: it's our child, or you know, there are some cases
Speaker 3: where we actually do have some you know, responsibility that
Speaker 3: we accept for that person for their professional growth or
Speaker 3: or what have you. But in terms of the you know,
Speaker 3: kind of emotional components, I think that this is where
Speaker 3: boundaries are very important, you know. I mean we uh
Speaker 3: in a in a professional relationship, it's beneficial to be cordial,
Speaker 3: to be patient, to be kind to you know, to
Speaker 3: have some concern for that other person's well being and
Speaker 3: so forth, but also to say, you know, at a
Speaker 3: certain point, how they feel about their job, how they
Speaker 3: feel about their life, how you know, how ambitious they
Speaker 3: are or not ambitious they are. You know, is their responsibility,
Speaker 3: right and so and I think that that the result
Speaker 3: of that is more ease and patience in the relationship. Right.
Speaker 3: The expectation that that person be something that we want
Speaker 3: them to be is what can create a lot of
Speaker 3: that tension and animosity, I think in our relationships, professional
Speaker 3: or otherwise. So again, it's the lessening our relationships has
Speaker 3: a lot to do with drawing emotional boundaries between ourselves
Speaker 3: and others. And those boundaries look a little bit different
Speaker 3: based on what the context is. But at the end
Speaker 3: of the day, it's really allowing someone to be who
Speaker 3: they are and to accept responsibility for how they are
Speaker 3: in that relationship, you know, and vice versa with us
Speaker 3: taking responsibility for ourselves.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're talking about something that's always been a challenge
Speaker 2: for me when I was in the corporate world, which
Speaker 2: is you meet somebody who's on your team who just
Speaker 2: came on board, and you look at them and automatically
Speaker 2: you give them a title in terms of that's the
Speaker 2: brown haired, blue eyed dude with the funky clothes, and
Speaker 2: I'm going to treat him with a certain respect and
Speaker 2: of oh, you know, but I also don't have a
Speaker 2: lot of time, and I can't. You know, we we
Speaker 2: throw so much these new relationships that I think that
Speaker 2: we can it can be a problem.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, And I offer some techniques for that.
Speaker 3: First of all, of course, we all could relate to that,
Speaker 3: right and and and I mean, to some degree or another,
Speaker 3: we all have expectations of other people. And and you know,
Speaker 3: you know, it's interesting because again it's sort of a
Speaker 3: self fulfilling prophecy. I mean, nobody can magically fit into
Speaker 3: this expectation we've kind of imagined for them, and it's
Speaker 3: never the actual reality of that person. It's always much
Speaker 3: more complicated and nuance but uh uh oh, in the
Speaker 3: in the in the now, I just kind of forgot
Speaker 3: my tramp on. I'm sorry.
Speaker 2: We're talking about the h We're talking about the office
Speaker 2: people that we interact with.
Speaker 3: And oh, yes, thank you. Sorry sorry. Some techniques for
Speaker 3: uh dealing with that exact type of situation. So one
Speaker 3: is too pretend that you've never met the person before,
Speaker 3: you know so, and this is actually helpful in our
Speaker 3: in our close intimate relationships as well, even though it's harder,
Speaker 3: but to you know, it's like, Okay, I have a
Speaker 3: meeting with with Bob, you know tomorrow. I'm going to
Speaker 3: go into that call and I and I you know,
Speaker 3: I have been working with Bob for a year. I
Speaker 3: think Bob is you know, lazy, or I think Bob
Speaker 3: is or I think Bob is a high performer, or
Speaker 3: you know, I think Bob is you know uh uh
Speaker 3: this is you know, his calls to whatever. But if
Speaker 3: I go into that next conversation the next day and
Speaker 3: do my messages set all of that a crude, you know,
Speaker 3: judgment aside, I'm probably going to have a more constructive
Speaker 3: and productive conversation with Bob the next day, right because
Speaker 3: I'm not I'm not bringing in the baggage of the relationship. Now,
Speaker 3: what Bob does is up to Bob, right, But for me,
Speaker 3: I can adopt this mindset of a like, we're going
Speaker 3: to start on a clean slate, and you know, we'll
Speaker 3: have an agenda or whatever it is we've got to
Speaker 3: talk about. But in terms of my expectation of how
Speaker 3: Bob is going to act, I can set that aside.
Speaker 3: So that that's one There's a couple of different techniques
Speaker 3: I put in the book, but that's one for trying
Speaker 3: to kind of refresh these relationships that can get pretty
Speaker 3: entrenched pretty fast.
Speaker 2: We should also mention that throughout the book you have
Speaker 2: spread what you call reflections, which I think are a
Speaker 2: great tool to kind of reinforce the material. Talk a
Speaker 2: little bit about how the reflections work on the reinforcement
Speaker 2: of the material.
Speaker 3: Sure, I appreciate that, and I some of my friends
Speaker 3: and family have gotten advanced copies of the book and
Speaker 3: you have, and I've gotten started to get some some feedback.
Speaker 3: And one thing that's been pretty consistent is like, this
Speaker 3: is not the kind of book you pick up and bust.
Speaker 3: It's not like a Grisham.
Speaker 2: Actually have I think your reflections even have some journaling
Speaker 2: in them, which is, you know, really sit down and
Speaker 2: contemplate what you're dealing with.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so that I do encourage people, you know, usually
Speaker 3: about twice per chapter to just you know, take a pause.
Speaker 3: There's maybe a half page of guidance on what you
Speaker 3: might do, but really it's a place to say, this
Speaker 3: is a good place to stop and just take a moment,
Speaker 3: whether it's the way that I recommend or your own
Speaker 3: way to just just be with and process what you
Speaker 3: just read. And sometimes there's a new meditation technique, or
Speaker 3: sometimes there's a new you know, a little morsel of
Speaker 3: Buddhist wisdom, or maybe there's a fairly heavy, you know,
Speaker 3: experience I've shared for my life that maybe it connects
Speaker 3: with something you know, in that person's life that we
Speaker 3: really need to honor. Again, it's part of the path
Speaker 3: of lessening. It's to you know, let that settle a
Speaker 3: bit before we just rush on to say, well, what's
Speaker 3: the next thing. You know, I told myself I was
Speaker 3: going to, you know, finish this chapter tonight. Well you
Speaker 3: don't have to finish the chapter tonight. You can you
Speaker 3: can give it the space that it needs to really
Speaker 3: kind of sink in and mean something for you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I like that. Excellent you have and I want
Speaker 2: you to describe this a little bit. You talk about
Speaker 2: the importance of forgiving but also being forgiven, and I
Speaker 2: have had an issue with that in situations where I
Speaker 2: had a family member who I just got extremely angry
Speaker 2: at and I didn't want to talk to them, and
Speaker 2: I actually avoided them for almost a couple of years
Speaker 2: and it didn't serve me, and so I forgave them
Speaker 2: personally and face Bason, and I forgave myself for being
Speaker 2: that way. But talk about the importance and the energy
Speaker 2: around forgiving and being forgiven actually acknowledging.
Speaker 3: That, Yeah, thank you very much so and for me.
Speaker 3: And there's a reason that comes kind of later in
Speaker 3: the book, because for being forgiveness is really at the
Speaker 3: heart of every section of our emotional lives, you know,
Speaker 3: which really is our life. So I give it a
Speaker 3: full chapter's worth of consideration. And part of that stems
Speaker 3: from for me a bit, you know, of all the
Speaker 3: things that cause us suffering, I think that regret and uh,
Speaker 3: you know, a feeling of unrepaired harm in our lives,
Speaker 3: whether something we've caused or something someone calls to us
Speaker 3: is is likely our biggest source of suffering. Maybe that
Speaker 3: I think that's been the case for me. And so
Speaker 3: what I what I talk about, you know, is that
Speaker 3: for one thing, forgiveness is is kind of a natural
Speaker 3: way of being. It involves a recognition of what happened,
Speaker 3: It involves an investigation of you know, kind of the
Speaker 3: details of the relationship and all those things really matter.
Speaker 3: But it also takes this fresh look of saying, you know,
Speaker 3: how I relate to this experience, how I relate to
Speaker 3: that person, or how I relate to myself having done
Speaker 3: this thing in the past that I might regret, is
Speaker 3: really up to me, right, and it's it's it points
Speaker 3: us to what empowers me to enter into the next
Speaker 3: moment a little more freer, a little more kinder, right,
Speaker 3: with a little more love and patience in the way
Speaker 3: that I really want to be in the world. And
Speaker 3: the answer to that is usually forgiveness. That doesn't mean
Speaker 3: that we just snap our fingers right and say, oh,
Speaker 3: you know, this person who did these terrible things, I
Speaker 3: now forgive them and it's all over. You really really
Speaker 3: have to go through this mindful process of examining all
Speaker 3: the things that happened. And you know, I have a
Speaker 3: similar experience with someone very close to be in my life,
Speaker 3: and part of that process for me was writing a
Speaker 3: letter to that person, which I think I'd probably mentioned
Speaker 3: in the book is a pretty typical practice in these
Speaker 3: kinds of scenarios to really really go deep onto what
Speaker 3: happened from my perspective and the horror that it caused
Speaker 3: from my perspective. Now, I did not send that letter
Speaker 3: to that person, and part of it was because I
Speaker 3: realized that I was still attached to how they would respond, right,
Speaker 3: and that's not the point of forgiveness. Right forgiveness, at
Speaker 3: least as I presented and offer it for people to investigate,
Speaker 3: is it's not about whether or not the person deserves
Speaker 3: it or we think, you know, it's not about how
Speaker 3: the person's going to react when we forgive them, or
Speaker 3: if it's going to change their life or they're going
Speaker 3: to set a new path or any of that. That that
Speaker 3: is all a version of attachment and to some degree,
Speaker 3: control of that other person. It's really about us deciding
Speaker 3: in our heart that we are now at peace with
Speaker 3: what happened. And you know, whether you know that it
Speaker 3: was not our responsibility. It was their responsibility. What is
Speaker 3: our responsibility is where do we go from here? Right?
Speaker 3: And that's not that other person's responsibility. And that's really
Speaker 3: the way that it ought to be, is that we
Speaker 3: don't seed them that responsibility. So it's coming back to
Speaker 3: center and trying to look at what happened with a
Speaker 3: with a calm and patient heart to look at uh uh,
Speaker 3: you know, not glossing over any of the of the
Speaker 3: hard realities of what may have transpired, but then taking
Speaker 3: a look again to say, you know, where do we
Speaker 3: go from here, and what's what's serving the best, what's
Speaker 3: serving this relationship best? And it does get into I
Speaker 3: do offer again the practice of there's both the mindfulness
Speaker 3: techniques but also trying to examine the different facets of
Speaker 3: the situation for their emptiness that they might reveal if
Speaker 3: we really take a careful look at them, and that
Speaker 3: can also help us relax that attachment to you know,
Speaker 3: whatever it was that transpired.
Speaker 2: We're going to take a short commercial break to allow
Speaker 2: our sponsors to identify themselves, and we will return shortly
Speaker 2: with my guest today, Billy Whinn discussing his newest book,
Speaker 2: The Empty Path, will return to you shortly. H My
Speaker 2: guest today is Billy Wynn. He has written a new
Speaker 2: book called The Empty Path, Finding Fulfillment through the Radical
Speaker 2: Art of Lessening. And we're getting a sense of what
Speaker 2: the quality is of life when you don't have to
Speaker 2: worry and collect items for reward as an adult. This
Speaker 2: is this is pretty in depth stuff, Billy. I'll tell you,
Speaker 2: I would just I'm listening to. But we get into
Speaker 2: the Hindu system of you gas and these earlier civilizations
Speaker 2: that actually appear to will practiced a life that you're describing,
Speaker 2: this lessening, This not being so concerned about objective wealth
Speaker 2: and satisfaction through collecting items. It was more about how
Speaker 2: we interacted with other people, our relationships, and how we
Speaker 2: carried ourself. And this just feels very much like the
Speaker 2: Trita and Satya yoga period of earlier early man. You know,
Speaker 2: it's like, this is so fascinating about this book, my friend,
Speaker 2: is It's like you are bringing back to us this
Speaker 2: earlier phase of humanity that just seems to be so
Speaker 2: much more in touch with Earth but also individually in touch,
Speaker 2: you know, and walking this path you know, almost christ
Speaker 2: like beings, you know, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: Well I appreciate you saying that. I mean, Saint John
Speaker 3: of the Cross said to become that which we are not,
Speaker 3: we have to go by the way that we know not.
Speaker 3: And so in other words, this is about the resolution
Speaker 3: of our suffering, you know. So, and to really approach that,
Speaker 3: we have to try a different path, you know, the
Speaker 3: prototypical mode of life, and not really just for the West,
Speaker 3: although West is maybe it's kind of easy. Well, us
Speaker 3: living in it, it's certainly easy for us to relate
Speaker 3: to and see, but really, you know, the experience of
Speaker 3: humankind is this this rushing around in circles to try
Speaker 3: to find happiness outside of us, and it's just inevitably
Speaker 3: inherently unsatisfying. And one point I want to make clear,
Speaker 3: and I do appreciate that kind of analogy and archetype
Speaker 3: to the to the ancient you know, Vedic people in India,
Speaker 3: but it's available to us right now. You know, That's
Speaker 3: one thing I'm trying to make clear, and definitely right
Speaker 3: right just here and now, in the nittigree of the
Speaker 3: stressful job and the family and the ups and downs
Speaker 3: and the hardship, you know, you know, none of those
Speaker 3: things needs to block us from the peace and the
Speaker 3: beauty and the love that is always right here all along.
Speaker 3: It's just a question of not whether or not we
Speaker 3: really can pay attention to it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, thank you for that. I appreciate it. You
Speaker 2: bring up a topic that is really a problem in
Speaker 2: our culture, and this is the and you actually call it,
Speaker 2: the culture of competition. And this is very, very damaging.
Speaker 2: As a kid, we're always showing, you know, beat the
Speaker 2: other guy, no matter what the cost, that kind of attitude.
Speaker 2: How does competition influence this and how do we begin
Speaker 2: moving away from having that kind of a mindset.
Speaker 3: Sure, so, well it's interesting. Son's fourteen, and I see this,
Speaker 3: and yeah, all my best efforts to the contract. He's
Speaker 3: as competitive as as anybody. You know, that's just that's
Speaker 3: just the way it is. So but I see it,
Speaker 3: and we all you know, it's not to separate or judge,
Speaker 3: you know, others from myself. Well, we all experience this,
Speaker 3: you know, in big and small ways. But it is
Speaker 3: interesting to see through his eyes. You know, he's on
Speaker 3: a team and the team has the red jersey and
Speaker 3: all the kids on the other team have a blue jersey,
Speaker 3: and it's like, you know, I mean hate is a
Speaker 3: strong word, but they're the enemy, you know, right, I
Speaker 3: mean they're the enemy. Yeah, it comes just short of
Speaker 3: hoping they get hurt or something. But it's almost like that, right,
Speaker 3: And so clearly that's not a healthy you know, it's
Speaker 3: a natural and common mindset, but I think it's easy
Speaker 3: to say it's not a reasonably healthy one. So how
Speaker 3: do we begin to relax that, you know dynamic. Well, yeah,
Speaker 3: we can pause and take a look a little more carefully,
Speaker 3: rather than sort of jumping into our role, you know,
Speaker 3: as the opponent or the competitor and having this mindset
Speaker 3: of you know, zero sum, you know, game of scarcity
Speaker 3: and if that person gets that, that I'm not going
Speaker 3: to get that, and you know, that sort of mentality
Speaker 3: to say that, first of all, we are already uh,
Speaker 3: you know, fulfilled and satisfied and sufficient and enough from
Speaker 3: the very beginning. You know, we don't we don't need
Speaker 3: different things. You know, we are whole and complete human beings.
Speaker 3: It's how we're made, whether you believe that from the
Speaker 3: spiritual perspective, we're just just accepting that that is who
Speaker 3: and what we are to you know. We so the
Speaker 3: idea that we are competing for scarce. You know, victories
Speaker 3: is an illusion and it's what we buy into. We
Speaker 3: sometimes you think it's fun, but it can easily go
Speaker 3: too far. And another aspect of this that that comes
Speaker 3: up is is othering. I talked about other ing in
Speaker 3: the book. Right, so again this whole I've got the
Speaker 3: red jersey on, you've got the blue jersey on. Well,
Speaker 3: you are separate from me, and all I'm going to
Speaker 3: see you as is this kind of caricature of a
Speaker 3: human being. Right, all you are is my enity. It's
Speaker 3: kind of reminds me of a I love the scene
Speaker 3: in that movie There Will be Blood where the oil
Speaker 3: guy his son comes to him and his son has
Speaker 3: decided this is near the end, decides to go into
Speaker 3: the oil business, and he's Daniel da Lewis. He's like,
Speaker 3: that makes you a competitor, right like, and that's all
Speaker 3: from then on he's no longer his son. He's a competitor.
Speaker 3: So it's a beautiful, I think, illustration of how how
Speaker 3: how powerful and dangerous that mindset can be.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, good analogy. How do we cultivate the practice
Speaker 2: of emptiness on a daily basis? I'd love to have
Speaker 2: some examples because I'm trying to get my mind around this.
Speaker 3: Uh you know, yes, I hear you. And it's not easy,
Speaker 3: you know, unfortunately, because we're so trained to live in
Speaker 3: the other mode.
Speaker 2: Well, it's it's how we exist. It's how we're educated
Speaker 2: and how we are raised. It's you know, get the
Speaker 2: get a buck, get a buck. Even when you're retired,
Speaker 2: it's like, you know, invest correctly, Oh you didn't, You
Speaker 2: better get some more money. You know, you got to
Speaker 2: go back to work.
Speaker 3: Watch the ticker every day, and yeah, even the golf
Speaker 3: game becomes really competitive and stressful. And so yeah, I hear,
Speaker 3: I hear all that. So a couple of a couple
Speaker 3: of things, you know, One is that I do recommend
Speaker 3: sometime of dedicated meditative practice. It can be five minutes,
Speaker 3: it could be you know, we we tell ourselves we
Speaker 3: don't have enough time for that, but we're wrong. We do.
Speaker 3: We've got five minutes, We've got ten minutes. And what
Speaker 3: helped me was that early on I started, even just
Speaker 3: in five ten minutes, I started to notice that I
Speaker 3: was more relaxed. You know, it started to feel good
Speaker 3: even for bro brief minutes, you know, during a five
Speaker 3: or ten minute meditation practice, and when I was just
Speaker 3: getting started, and that was enough to say, Okay, there's
Speaker 3: there's something to this. This is this actually can work,
Speaker 3: even though the time I was my mind still racing
Speaker 3: around and I'm not sure I'm doing it right and
Speaker 3: my back's a little sore and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2: Were you doing a Buddhist practice? Uh, Billy.
Speaker 3: I started with mindfulness of meditation, which which is kind
Speaker 3: of secularized in the US, but it does does sort of,
Speaker 3: you know, descend from Buddhist practices. Curious, Okay, yeah, sure,
Speaker 3: kind of in the insight with the the tradition that
Speaker 3: I know, certified to teach in the Insight and meditation tradition,
Speaker 3: which is again very closely linked Buddhism, but it's been
Speaker 3: secularized for broader audiences, in which I think is a
Speaker 3: great thing. I mean, you know, you do not need
Speaker 3: to be a Buddhist, and you do not need to
Speaker 3: abandon whatever spiritual path you're on to apply mindfulness practices
Speaker 3: to your life, you know, in a very productive way.
Speaker 3: So so I started with that, and you know, you
Speaker 3: if you give it a little bit of time, you
Speaker 3: will see a little bit of calm. You know. Again,
Speaker 3: the key to success that I that I always point
Speaker 3: to is to put down our judgments and expectations upon meditation.
Speaker 3: Should be like before we start, right, forget about the
Speaker 3: cover of the magazine you saw off the grocery store shelf,
Speaker 3: like forget about the sunset, and you know, the kind
Speaker 3: of nervonic way that people think you're supposed to be.
Speaker 3: That's not how it is. The practice of mindfulness is
Speaker 3: simply finding a place for quiet, to start to focus
Speaker 3: on our breath and for our mind to wander off
Speaker 3: over and over again, and to gently bring it back.
Speaker 3: That's really the crux of the practice. And so people
Speaker 3: think they're not cut out for it when their mind
Speaker 3: starts to wander, and it's actually that's just what it is.
Speaker 3: That's the practice of noticing that. So that's one thing.
Speaker 3: Another very key, and this is also accessible throughout the day,
Speaker 3: is sort of sematic awareness or embodymit practice. So in
Speaker 3: this I think it's in the second chapter where I
Speaker 3: talk about this, but a more formal way to do
Speaker 3: this is like a body scan, got five ten minutes
Speaker 3: to go, you know, start I start at the feet,
Speaker 3: some people start at the head and just kind of
Speaker 3: go through and just tune into each portion of your
Speaker 3: body and see how it feels. There is one way
Speaker 3: to reacquaint ourselves with our body. Especially we tend to
Speaker 3: be very cerebral, right neck up is how we live
Speaker 3: a lot of our lives, and we think that our
Speaker 3: thoughts and our problem solving and all that kind of
Speaker 3: stuff is actually the reality. Well, you know, ninety percent
Speaker 3: of us is from the neck down. That's also walking
Speaker 3: through life with us, and it can just be a
Speaker 3: helpful reminder to kind of come down out of that
Speaker 3: thought cycle and reattune to the presence of what's actually
Speaker 3: happening in our lives, which our body is more directly
Speaker 3: connected to. There's two examples I could go up.
Speaker 2: Okay, other excellent the books called The Empty Path Finding
Speaker 2: Fulfillment through the Radical Art of Lessening. I guess today's
Speaker 2: been Billy. When who did you write this book for? Billy?
Speaker 2: Who is the reader? What's the audience you're looking to attract?
Speaker 3: Well, I think if you are looking to find a
Speaker 3: little bit more ease and satisfaction and fulfillment in your life.
Speaker 3: So you know, and my publicist did tell me to
Speaker 3: say this, but pretty much everyone that My hope is
Speaker 3: that there could be some teachings in here that will
Speaker 3: benefit you. Now, you know, the most natural reader, may
Speaker 3: you know, maybe they've tried meditation a few times at least.
Speaker 3: Maybe they've you know, heard a few things about Buddhism
Speaker 3: and they think it's interesting. You know, maybe they you know,
Speaker 3: have been on a you know, done done yoga. It's
Speaker 3: something like this. It just cots to these different things
Speaker 3: that are sort of a step toward this end of
Speaker 3: the spectrum of the path that I'm presenting. But you know,
Speaker 3: it's really designed for for anyone at any stage of life.
Speaker 3: My daughter is eighteen and first year in college, and
Speaker 3: I think that she and some of our friends could
Speaker 3: benefit from it. She'll read it.
Speaker 2: Did she get a copy of the book.
Speaker 3: I've given it to her this weekend. I'm gonna see
Speaker 3: her in New York. So yeah, she asked for it.
Speaker 3: I'm not forcing her to read it. But you know,
Speaker 3: so I think really anything, even retirement, you know, if
Speaker 3: you're thinking about well and obvious, a lot of people
Speaker 3: experience a sense of loss and and unfulfillment and retired
Speaker 3: it and so saying, well, what's already here, what can
Speaker 3: I be grateful for what's what's you know, what's kind
Speaker 3: of naturally fulfilling about where I am right now, and
Speaker 3: reattuning to that can be very helpful. So I offer
Speaker 3: it for for all, and you know, I hope it
Speaker 3: connects with people.
Speaker 2: You know, It's funny. I have been meditating for deal
Speaker 2: over thirty years. I got into transigental meditation when it
Speaker 2: was the thing, and it's a mantra based meditation, and
Speaker 2: there's certain mantra based meditations that are out there. But
Speaker 2: I think you're suggesting pretty much whatever works, as long
Speaker 2: as you can quiet the brain quite the mind. I
Speaker 2: didn't check do you recommend one or two noted meditative
Speaker 2: practices or I didn't see any guidelines for that, but
Speaker 2: maybe they're in your book somewhere.
Speaker 3: Sure, so there is some reasonably detailed instruction on meditation
Speaker 3: practice going into the mindfulness of breath practice that's offered
Speaker 3: in the first chapter each of the And I'm glad
Speaker 3: you raised this because there's there's ten chapters and each
Speaker 3: one offers a guided meditation. There's recordings of those on
Speaker 3: my website at Billy Winn dot com and in the
Speaker 3: book that people can you know, because sometimes you don't
Speaker 3: want to read while you're meditating. You want to hear
Speaker 3: something maybe, And and I guess what I want to
Speaker 3: make sure I say is that I don't think anybody
Speaker 3: is going to do all ten of those all the time, right,
Speaker 3: So it's it's it's a bit you can I invite
Speaker 3: people to try them and see what starts to resonate
Speaker 3: with them, and you know that might be the thing
Speaker 3: that they might not be mindpulos to the breadth, that
Speaker 3: might not be mindpulos to the body, might be the
Speaker 3: meta loving kindness meditation, which is another instruction in one
Speaker 3: of the chapters. So, uh, you know, at the end
Speaker 3: of the day, what's going to work is what feels
Speaker 3: right and is integrated into somebody's life most naturally. And
Speaker 3: so this is really, as I call it, part of
Speaker 3: the path of lessening is to decide what in these
Speaker 3: pages actually connects with and works for you, and that
Speaker 3: that can be the thing that you take with you.
Speaker 2: Okay, you guys heard it. Billy win w y n
Speaker 2: N dot com and Billy is going to provide you
Speaker 2: with guided meditations. And that's a great, great, great lead
Speaker 2: to get the book because obviously you read the book,
Speaker 2: you follow it up with the medication meditation. If you
Speaker 2: haven't meditated before, Billy is going to guide you, which
Speaker 2: is really a big plus because a lot of people
Speaker 2: don't know how to meditate or they can't sit still
Speaker 2: long enough to meditate. And I have friends that are
Speaker 2: like that too, So fantastic, Billy. Much success on this book.
Speaker 2: And for those of you listening, you can get a
Speaker 2: copy on Amazon. How else can people learn about you?
Speaker 2: Give us your other resources?
Speaker 3: Sure, there's Billywinn dot com. The book's also available on
Speaker 3: bookshop dot org. You know, some people don't like Amazon,
Speaker 3: and really, you know, most online platforms are going to
Speaker 3: It comes out on March eighteenth, and the best place
Speaker 3: to learn about it is to go to my website,
Speaker 3: Billy Wynn dot com. I am having events in Denver
Speaker 3: and Boulder in my hometown area of Norfolk, Virginia in
Speaker 3: the coming weeks where I'll be talking about the book
Speaker 3: and signing it for folks who are there. All that
Speaker 3: information is on my website and the guided meditations and
Speaker 3: other stuff. So yeah, and folks to visit.
Speaker 2: Thanks for joining me. Hey, much success on this book.
Speaker 2: Really a little great in depth look at peace of
Speaker 2: the mind, body, and spirit. Fantastic congratulations.
Speaker 3: Thanks for having me. I really really appreciate it's great
Speaker 3: chatting with you.
Speaker 2: There was something very refreshing about his explanation for that
Speaker 2: state of mind to be more present, to be more
Speaker 2: aware of those around you and your environment. I mean,
Speaker 2: I was, I was thinking about these earlier periods of time.
Speaker 2: We don't really know, we have no there's no way
Speaker 2: to write about people's personalities before the Greeks, before the Sumerians.
Speaker 2: But in that earlier epoch that we were always talking about,
Speaker 2: But you got to wonder, how did people think, How
Speaker 2: did people exist? Objects weren't that big a deal apparently,
Speaker 2: you know, And so reflection was big, you know. And
Speaker 2: I would think that forgiveness was a part of their
Speaker 2: life as well, in that Satia and treats to period
Speaker 2: the Golden Age. But you didn't make those kind of mistakes.
Speaker 2: It was just you were. I would think that you
Speaker 2: were much more in harmony as a human being and
Speaker 2: those around you and as well as nature. So if
Speaker 2: we're rebooting and heading back into this Golden Age, you know,
Speaker 2: many thousands of years from now, this book could be
Speaker 2: a representative of that coming age and the techniques he
Speaker 2: offers and the reflections in different chapters are really great
Speaker 2: for getting in touch, you know. And what a great
Speaker 2: gift that he's giving you by providing guided meditations. If
Speaker 2: you're not one for meditating, he's providing guided meditations. That's
Speaker 2: unheard of most of the time. You have to go
Speaker 2: to audible or a special pay site and pay twenty
Speaker 2: bucks for the honor for the privilege of listening to
Speaker 2: a guided meditation. And I have to say, and I
Speaker 2: haven't really brought this up enough, guided meditations are the
Speaker 2: best way to get involved, to get started with meditating.
Speaker 2: So as you close your eyes, and if you're like
Speaker 2: a lot of people, your mind starts wandering and running interference.
Speaker 2: Someone walking you through or guiding you through a meditation
Speaker 2: is the best way to start. Then you're guided into
Speaker 2: going to those deeper, lower levels and you automatically train
Speaker 2: your brain to relax, to sink, to expand. So that's
Speaker 2: a real nice gift that Billy offered. Again, Billy win
Speaker 2: w y n N dot com. And that's where all
Speaker 2: these guide of meditations are. Hey, we do a few
Speaker 2: tours every year. We try to do three usually it's Egypt, Turkey, Mexico.
Speaker 2: But in twenty twenty five we're going to be in
Speaker 2: Easter Island in a week. We'll be there from the
Speaker 2: fourteenth of March to the twenty sixth, and then we're
Speaker 2: going to be in Turkey June twenty second through July second,
Speaker 2: and then to cap it all off, will be in
Speaker 2: Guatemala for Day of the Day, which is the end
Speaker 2: of October of this year. We might do that, or
Speaker 2: we might do that. We haven't confirmed the dates, but
Speaker 2: we might do the second week of November as well,
Speaker 2: or excuse me, the first week of November. Whatever we do,
Speaker 2: let me just tell you our tours are fabulous. They
Speaker 2: are cost effective, typically half the price of other listed
Speaker 2: contemporary tours, complete coverage, all your food, all your beverages,
Speaker 2: all your travel, all your passes, and these wonderful guys
Speaker 2: that we recruit to you know, choice the way, and
Speaker 2: these are likely most of the time these are archaeologists,
Speaker 2: filled researchers. Sometimes it's an author or two, and then
Speaker 2: our guide, our hosts. So we got Turkey coming up,
Speaker 2: consider it, We're about half full. This is a wonderful tour.
Speaker 2: We all meet an instant Istanbul June twenty second, and
Speaker 2: we'll be seeing Darren Kuru, the underground city Cappadocia, some amazing,
Speaker 2: amazing museums. I was very surprised at the museums, pleasantly
Speaker 2: surprised at how sophisticated they were in Istanbul. Throughout the Turkey,
Speaker 2: they were all wonderful. We're going to be going to
Speaker 2: go Beckley Teppe, the oldest temple in the world, or
Speaker 2: to driving up to Carahan Teppe. We're gonna go to
Speaker 2: Spice Market and some bizaars. It is a fabulous elimitad
Speaker 2: tour and we'd love to have you with it. For
Speaker 2: more information and all the details, go to earth ancients
Speaker 2: dot com, Forward slash Tours. Let me know if you're interested,
Speaker 2: and if you have any questions whatsoever and you want
Speaker 2: more information, send me an email. Send it to earth
Speaker 2: Ancients the number four of the letter you at gmail
Speaker 2: dot com and we'll get right back to you earthcents
Speaker 2: dot com, Forward slash Tours come on and join us.
Speaker 2: All right, that's it for this program. I want to
Speaker 2: think My guest today Billy Winn discussing his new book
Speaker 2: The Empty Path. As always, the team of Gail tour
Speaker 2: Mark Foster, and everyone who makes this thing happen. You
Speaker 2: guys rock all right, Take care of you well, and
Speaker 2: we will talk to you next time.