Finding an Authentic Core of Calm Strength – Talk with Dr. Rick Hanson

I offer these every week along with a guided meditation just click the uh subscribe link below to be notified through YouTube when I post the latest recording or if you'd like to join us live which would be great uh just go into the description section below and follow the link along to be able to sign up for free I was just laughing at myself um it's good to laugh on I think anyway um a friend of mine Daniel Ellenberg who's been a guest teacher here fairly often uh was quoting um the one of the co-founders of esselin Institute in California Dick Price I think who said we teach what we need to learn and we are often Our Own Worst student so I'm trying to learn myself how how to maintain a a an unshakable core of calm strength and resilient well-being as much as possible while being authentically open to the ups and downs of traffic and weather and politics and you know the the ACH in my back uh how to actually do that so I thought you know I would I would try to speak to that here how do we establish deep calm when things happen whatever they might be you know a strange noise in your home or uh a terrible loss or you know bad news from your doctor setbacks in your country concern for others around the world or close at home whatever it might be It's Perfectly Normal to be shocked initially and Frozen that's an Adaptive response and with that might well be feelings of anxiety or helpless outrage uh panic deep deep sorrow on behalf of others this all normal so the question then becomes what do we do with that how do we move from that and how do we move from that in a way that is genuine and authentic that doesn't uh shame ourselves for being shocked uh and doesn't push ourselves too fast faster than we're ready how do we move from that should we always be calm I want to say very not calmly no sometimes it's appropriate to run into the house grab your kids and get out before you know the fire sweeps the whole building it's sometimes completely appropriate to be um full of positive emotion while being enthusiastic and jumping up and down and you know having a good old time one of my favorite uh images I've seen is this image of a bunch of I believe you know Southeast Asian certainly buddist monks uh in a roller coaster in like whatever some big amusement park just having a great time you know like laughing and freaked out as the thing goes down I mean the full range sh is is our Birthright the question is what's adaptive and what also is beneficial and what's enjoyable and then you get to decide what fits that best for you uh even though Tranquility certainly uh tends to be very valued in all the contemplative Traditions at least some of the time and in Buddhism Tranquility is considered to be one of the seven factors of Awakening um some of the other factors of Awakening in Buddhism are energy as well as Bliss so you know there's plenty of room for more than C that said I want to draw here on the evolutionary neurobiology uh beautifully described by the great um Robert sapolsky in his book whose title gives away my main point why zebras don't get ulcers in the wild what's normal as time let's say flows this way is for animals to be mainly hanging out in a sense of largely inner calm because when we're in a state of relatively calm calm well-being um we don't consume that many resources bodily resources and we don't expose ourselves to impulsive actions that lead to various risks it's our resting state it's our home basee you know relatively calm homeostatic equilibrium of basic well well-being so imagine a herd of zebras out there on the plains of Africa they're hanging out and in that relatively calm State they are vigilant for threat they're looking around they are looking for opportunity you know where's the green grass you know maybe they're nudging somebody else out of the way to get their own maybe they're you know are drawn to some other fellow zebra in particular they're they're having their life in a relatively Baseline kind of way then boom a pride of lions attacks boom normally and what's supposed to happen in that setting given the nature of zebras is to flee they don't fight they don't freeze which adaptive is fleeing so their heart starts pounding stress hormones flood their bodies they run rapidly and then as Robert sapolsky says basically episodes of stress in the wild end quickly one way or another and then the zebras return to their baseline or at least most of them that's Mother Nature's basic blueprint that's the template for how to live in general so that it's normal and adaptive sometimes to burst in stressful ways but what's good for us and good for long term health and good for coping is to recover as rapidly as one can to an authentic Baseline the problem is that stress for most modern people does not end quickly it's fairly chronic maybe it's not for most of us and unfortunately not this way for or many um it's not running for your life chased by a zebra although there are people in the world today as we well know around the world and at home in our various countries um who are effectively running for their lives or the equivalent or in equally desperate conditions I mean that that really is true and on the other hand even when you're not running for your life we're exposed to a constant bombardment of interruptions demands and threatening news so it's hard in the face of those challenges to recover to some kind of Baseline condition of calm coping calm coping is not numb it's not apathetic it's not stupid around the edges of your calm coping could be intensity um I've visited Haiti a country I care a lot about a couple of times and I would say that in each time especially the first time I was in a state of cold rage I was so infuriated at the Injustice and suffering I saw there that I was flooded with rage but it was a cold cleare eyed calm rage it was a productive rage it was an effective rage so maybe that's around your edges um but in the core of your being you're not overwhelmed you're not invaded by um upsetting feelings you you don't lose your footing going back to what I said you know in the informal get together before we started you find your footing that's what we're aiming for here that's that's that's a name so then the question becomes how to establish that sense of of a kind of a underlying unshakable core of calm Clarity and coping and well-being and resilience how do we establish that when the world sometimes seems like it's just coming apart how do we actually do that authentically not as a spiritual bypass not as suppressing not as turning away from Injustice but actually how do we help ourselves so that we can deal with conditions um for the Long Haul in the whole marathon of a life that's what I'd like to explore with you here so calm in the of the sort that I'm describing and again thinking about conditions in the Buddhist time 2 200 years ago very harsh for most people famine Injustice incredible wealth disparity extreme patriarchy slavery was routine Wars no modern medicine no pain control um child birth was often fatal I mean even in that setting quite authentically the Buddha is saying to us calm is one's thought calm one's speech and calm one's deed who truly knowing is Holy freed perfectly tranquil and wise notice the construction here it's based on truly knowing that one establishes that underlying ground of inner peace which can contain sorrow anxiety um hurt and anger so what is that knowing what is that knowing I want to draw your attention to a few key things right now one is the knowing that all things are impermanent this is a central teaching of the Buddha impermanence is permanent but other than a few and I think you know the speed of light may be a constant and the area of a circle is pi r squ blah blah that said we notice that certainly our experiences are continually changing and most conditions around us are changing as well now they may not change as quickly as we want but we can be aware as the Buddha put it of the rise and fall of everything that which is subject to arising is eventually subject to passing away and this is not about some kind of look on the bright side or after every storm there is a sunrise no it's just knowing in the present that whatever you're feeling is changing and that knowing including deep forms of it that come sometimes with over you know meditative training over time more and more you hold your experiences lightly yes you know certain consequences are permanent invasions occur people die elections occur people people die things happen those those conditions certainly are enduring and our experience of them can have a certain does inherently have a certain dynamism to it a certain changing and the feeling of this not just the knowing conceptually but the feeling of the immediacy of the ongoing changing of the present has been identified by the Buddha and certainly many other wise people including aari for example quite recently the feeling feeling of the immediacy of the changing of the present moment brings us to holding the present moment more lightly and less personally and thus more peacefully and competently or capably we become more capable of dealing with the present moment paradoxically as we feel ever more deeply its changing this this is a matter of deepening in practice and for me I'll say initially I thought so what sorry Buddha that seems really dumb who cares right clouds change who cares why does that matter but actually um you know I've come to trust the Buddha as a teacher more and more the longer I am a student of his uh and his you know successors um the more we have this felt sense of the immediacy of changing us truly uh the wiser we become so that's one of the things that is for us to truly know things change experiences change things change and um Empires rise Empires fall second thing to know is your own good heart and I'd like to draw your attention to the so-called Meta suta Meta being kindness loving kindness this is a fundamental teaching in Buddhism we find similar teachings um in other Traditions uh and certainly u in secular humanism we find similar moral te teachings that um pragmatically it's in our in one's own best interest in ways that are appropriate to conditions to lean more into love than to hate to lean more into compassion than cruelty to lean more into a kind of open-handedness than into a clenched fist yes sometimes we need maybe to clench the fist you know maybe sometimes we need to yell at somebody to get out of our way right we may need sometimes with a lot of passion to put someone out of filling the blank you know our home our bed our office the halls of power but we don't have to let hatred invade the heart this is a deep deep deep teaching and some of the knowing here is to know that this is true we can disagree with people profoundly vehemently clearly and we can do so even selfishly by not letting hatred and contempt invade our heart we may experience passing moments of hatred or deep anger moral outrage disdain contempt you know may pass through awareness but it need not invade the mind and remain as the Buddha advised we can know that this is true we can know that it is possible to uh vigorously stand up for what we believe in in while not taking on board the burden of hating or disdaining other people also we can know that we can bring the teaching here in the metas sua to the being among all beings who wears your own name tag who's you right can you wish yourself to be happy and secure can you wish for yourself to be happy at heart not leaving yourself out omitting none in other words not omitting you can you do that right can you not despise yourself right can you cultivate kindness toward yourself this is another knowing that we are allowed to take care of ourselves we are encouraged certainly in the Buddhist tradition and in other Traditions to put our own oxygen mask on so that we can then help others and um at any time but also during challenging times it is more important than ever to establish That Base that fundamental stance of being for yourself being on your own side that is the necessary that is the foundation of moving out of being frozen and shocked it's normal to be shocked it's normal to be appalled stunned flabbergast Hood jaw-dropping my jaws Hit the Floor a lot recently among a lot of other people um that's normal but what comes next and a key to coming next is exactly what the Buddha is saying here in the metas sua that including oneself that we can get on our own side and then on the basis of that move forward another thing that I believe is in the knowing so I'm want to go back to the knowing here and then I'll move on to questions and comments from people um to repeat the quotation calm is one's thought calm one's speech and calm one's own deed calm one's deed who truly knowing is Holy freed perfectly tranquil and wise so what are what are what is that knowing which frees us and opens us to that place inside potentially surrounded by agitation but that core inside that is perfectly tranquil and wise what is that knowing so I've spoken about some of those knowings already uh I think I'll finish on this one in the uh Buddhist tradition and we find parallels in other contemplative Traditions it is said that there are three fundamental pillars of practice in the in a key language of early Buddhism poly these are known as Sila samati and Pa Sila essentially is virtue morality often expressed as restraint including in the five precepts in Buddhism of not killing not stealing not being intoxicated not abusing sexuality and uh not engaging in false speech CA okay second Sama mental training training yourself developing inner strengths releasing afflictive factors purifying the Mind gradually over time potentially training in meditation even deep states of absorption training and then pa pa rather is wisdom Insight some of which I've SP spoken to here I want to highlight Soma or in general terms training it some of the knowing that enables us to deal with the world is knowing that we need to manage our own reactions and we need to gradually cultivate positive forces embedded in our own body positive factors and inclinations habits tendencies motivations in our own body that are good for us and others we develop these we cultivate them so for example we can deliberately cultivate increased sense of patience the capacity to tolerate conditions and weight we can also potentially cultivate greater courage greater confidence to not be intimidated by powerful forces that want us to shut up and sit down and just go along for the ride that too could be cultivated you decide what you would like to cultivate um I deliberately dropped into the chat two links um one to a talk I gave back in I believe late November about the good that is also true we can cultivate a sense of perspective that even as we see actual harms and toxic SPC IAL we can recognize that truly much larger and vaster than either of these are the efforts of countless people around the world uh perhaps you among them to make our societies better even amidst you know actual harms and toxic spectacle and um also more broadly even of just the goodness in everyday life and really really broadly you know the universe and potentially the unconditioned ground of all altogether so I put that in it's worth looking at including the graphic triangle that goes with that the other is an extraordinary essay I saw today from Heather Cox Richardson I'm not going to argue about what she had to say about the birth of Abraham Lincoln his times and lessons historically from those times for us today um you know she speaks to in that essay the importance of developing understanding of what is actually happening in its context nextt so these are that's an example of something you might choose to develop you might choose to develop you know greater clarity about how you will protect you and yours as best you can from the rapid changes we are observing certainly in America and in many places around the world action binds anxiety you know you can cultivate in yourself a good plan you can cultivate in yourself the motivation to fill in the blank you know G gather more information talk to friends um you can cultivate in yourself reaching out to others uh I live in an area that's vulnerable to fires here in Northern California recently we got a notice of a neighborhood meeting uh to you know talk about Mutual protection and preparation and any evacuation plan I mean we can do all these things what are you trying to cultivate these days you know um myself you know kind of where I'm at and so on is um while being quite politically engaged through the global compassion Coalition and some other initiatives um you know I'm trying to cultivate the capacity to rest increasingly in a sense of you know connectedness with everything uh with a loving heart Moment by moment okay what are you cultivating what are you working on I'm also cultivating on you know not being so prone to exasperation under certain conditions what are you cultivating so we can know that we can cultivate these things um one of my favorite quotations to finish here from the dapada is think not lightly of good saying it will not come to me drop by drop is the water pot filled likewise the wi one Gathering it little by little fills oneself with good One Moment In A Time one breath at a time one day at a time one synapse at a time we truly can grow the good inside we truly can strengthen our sombody our personal development our personal training and uh a deep and the more challenging the times the more important it is to focus on where you do have power which is in the inner most Temple of your own being no one can stop you from leaning into what is beneficial for you that you're already experiencing or you could call upon and activate in your mind like a sense of gratitude or a sense of your own good heart no one is stopping you from being able to learn and grow and heal every day are you using that power because no one else can do it for you and then last on this truly last one of the most important things to develop given our vulnerability to Red Zone spikes of stress that then become The New Normal you know chronic stress it's extremely important biologic i al to find a few breaths a day ideally a few minutes a day in very deep states of calm like we did or at least I was attempting to guide you into during the meditation that's really important I think of it as deep green you know if you think that the Baseline condition for zebras is let's call it pale green with brief episodes of red zone stress followed by recovery back into pale green it's also important particularly if you're exposed to a lot of chronic stress as a lot of us are we're rushing about we're pressured we're upset we're worried we're mad we're concerned for others we're just spun around whatever it could be it's especially important to train in deep calm as best you can take three breaths in a row in which the exhalations are twice as as long as the inhalations that'll sow your heart rate deliberately find a place of Refuge in your home in which you know you're safe comfortable maybe curled up in your bed with a pillow in front of you and then help yourself recognize again and again and again that you're basically all right right then and there and let that sense sink into you calm have a sense of others who love you or others who you love that's calming come home to deep calm at least once a day that literally does retrain the nervous system and uh changes the stress chemistry in the body gradually over [Music] time for reals deep calm okay so let me take a look at maybe some yes buts no worries I have my S buts uh coming through I see some nice suggestions about how to rest in deep calm return to deep calm uh I'm just taking a look at questions or comments I'm scrolling up from the bottom I really appreciate also Dr s Paul's comment at 13 past one poet said little drops of water make a mighty ocean little grains of sand make a mighty Castle much as the BD the Buddhist said in the dapot quote uh think not lightly of good drop by drop as the water pot filled so these cultivations somat training training the Mind developing greater trait calm um is a matter that it develops over time due to the law of little things and you can have confidence that if you do this repeatedly you know a breath here a minute there 5 minutes in a row perhaps over the course of a day it can really have a big impact on you all right uh Ali raises a very important Point 13 minutes past the hour cultivation points to having a strong agency while the Buddha pointed to no self question mark this can get technical and complicated I'm going to avoid that um the Buddha encouraged agency uh and there are many quotations that we are the fundamental source of our own um development over time and uh we need to do our own work and others cannot do it for us so right there is an emphasis on intention and agency uh noting of course that wise intention is included in the eight-fold path uh it's perfectly appropriate to have executive functions that make plans that recognize distinctions that have values that you know will you know value feeding children more than not feeding children that's perfectly appropriate none of that though requires a presumed um unified always the same independent from everything quote unquote self inside and the Buddha critiqued that view and modern psychology and brain science also critiques that view uh there can be a sense of self there can be that's fairly Dynamic uh that's perfectly normal what's most helpful is to appreciate that you are a person there are persons a body mind process associated with a particular body that is occurring over time there are absolutely are persons and and as one of the key capabilities of persons is developing a sense of agency and wise intentions so question being a person of faith I isue I turn away from hatred I don't really know what spiritual bypassing is and I don't know if I may be doing it sometimes could you give some examples and non-examples so I can more clearly understand what it is and what it is not beautiful the term spiritual bypass came from John well bless his memory and the basic idea is that at least as he originally described it sometimes people can use their meditation skills and their you know spiritual uh mumbo jumbo and stock phrases and cliches and platitudes to avoid dealing with stuff I have I know people who respond to others who are upset upset with some kind of spiritual platitude that does not actually help the person who's upset and basically just serves the function of swerving away from and not empathizing with and developing real compassion for the upset of another person I know people who also use their spiritual techniques maybe their meditative techniques to turn away from psychological material inside themselves that is weighing them down and is causing suffering and is leaking out in their relationships with consequences for others these are examples of spiritual bypassing um now sometimes we're aware of something problematic and we be with it which is for me one of the three great ways to practice being with what's there reducing what's harmful or painful and growing what's beneficial Andor enjoyable letting be letting go and letting in right so let's say we be with it we're we're upset about something or we're with someone else who's you know upset about something or a worldly condition we be with it for some time that feels appropriate and then we may deliberately bring to bear some of our spiritual wisdom I'm using the word spiritual broadly we may remember that this experience we're having is impermanent it will change um even if it has an annoying persistence uh we may uh you know open our awareness to a really really big picture A sense perhaps of the infinite Divine the question becomes why why are we doing that and what are the results it may be that we're doing that as a bypass that's not wise or we may be doing that because it is wise and it brings a bigger perspective and it helps us disentangle from maybe another person or some Cascade of reactions inside oursel this is what there this is for each of us to determine what actually is our purpose and what actually is our results um I would say for myself that I was a you know a major league spiritual bypasser or you can even say psychological bypasser I used my mind tricks to avoid feeling things and gradually I learned that wasn't working the mind is like a septic tank not a flush toilet the stuff sticks around it doesn't leech out it's there uh the brain is designed to hold on to pain basically and I needed to not bypass said it I needed to go into it and to Resource myself to be able to do that and I think sometimes we need to bypass stuff you know we need to change the channel and it's okay again that's the question why are you doing it and what are the results and you know are you being wise about it uh I like a lot of other people I would say myself uh you know four or five years ago uh you know again to be clear someone asked me um with without using their name so I won't use their name how do we remain calm and practice equinity when we're witnessing so many injustices and illegal acts against our US Constitution occurring in the current political climate Okay so to be clear there's a there are a wide range of political views my fundamental politics myself are to tell the truth and play fair let's start there and maybe we can find Common Ground there even if uh we have you know different priorities and values and points of emphasis so people can be upset about many different things understandably in this case you know uh from the perspective that I just quoted here which I'm not going to argue about and please do not argue about it in the chat okay more broadly I got another uh query also Anonymous about what to do when you just feel really Frozen in your life you're stuck and you you want a better life you want to find love you want to make your way forward in life but you're kind of frozen so like I think I've tried to say to me you see for yourself I think it's perfectly appropriate especially in the early stages of response to have all kinds of feelings to be outraged to be angry to yell at the television I've done all that um you know to just be so Furious I described my cold rage wonder you know not wondering U but being uh in the streets of Haiti um and that's we're not trying to suppress that the question then becomes how do we recover as the zebras do from those normal spikes back into something that's more of a Baseline and sustainable uh and you know good for us and good for others how do we actually do that so I've tried to outline that and to me there's a real useful distinction um between what you see is you know what what are the facts and then what are the values so I I should have actually said my politics personally have your own boils down to tell the truth play fair and try to have compassion you know and then a lot follows from there so for me uh it's really helpful to see clearly and to be informed you know understanding calms us down even if it's understanding the bad news but at least I understand it second suggestion is to know what your values are what what's your why why do you think it's bad why do you think this would be good you know own the own your values clarify values know what your values are you know what do you value and have confidence in your values as you develop them that's calming and then third with compassion for yourself and hopefully others make a plan know what you're going to do sputtering in helpless outrage and doom scrolling is really bad for us doesn't it's worse than feudal because besides being feudal and not helpful it's harmful to your own being remember the matuta do not omit yourself in your circle of caring and with regard to making a plan and this also goes to the person who texted me privately about feeling kind of stuck and Frozen it's understandable unless you're so depressed that you cannot get out of bed there's always something you can do if only to reach out to someone to ask them to come over and help you clean your stove or you know make a nice breakfast take action take those first steps you know maybe your action is to send a dollar a week to some nonprofit or political group that you support take that action maybe your action is to um you know tidy up your own home even if you're not yet ready to meet new people take that action it sounds silly but there's there are thousands of research papers on the power of taking simple basic immediate actions that are very doable you know instead of making the problem enormous and get and getting caught up in ruminating and looping about what a bad person you are because you're so helpless and you know it's hopeless because you're helpless and you're helpless because it's hopeless boom do something take action you know make a plan and take action that's really really key as basic and boring as that may sound okay well I wish you well um if there's for me you know one takeaway from all this it's to practice your form of coming home at least once a day to deep calm for you you know kind of a resting in your body calming peaceful knowing your own good heart and wishing others well the Buddha taught it other grade teachers taught it modern science teaches it it really works okay so thank you for coming thank you for your kind attention uh we're coming to an end of our kind of formal evening uh in a few minutes my friends will uh uh open up those small breakout rooms three to five or so people uh for those who'd like to remain uh for the rest of you um this will be recorded you can access the recording on Saturdays and uh I hope to see you again um the more of us who are practicing and resting in the green zone even as we deal with the world that's flashing red um the better the world will be so take good care and I'll see you next week bye-bye