Hello Friends,
In this episode of The Becoming Mindful Podcast, Maria and Jackie wrap up our dive into Mindfulness as a Catalyst for Change. We discuss why mindfulness gives us hope for positive change in the world. We talk about how mindfulness can be the foundation of everything we do – every action we take. Listen to get inspired and motivated to practice mindfulness and share the practice with all who want it.
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Assignment For This Month
Take a moment to find some hope and feel its warmth.
Show Notes & Links
- Previous episode in the mini-series: S2E05-Mindfulness To Catalyze Change Pt 2 – Seeking Wisdom: Real Change by Sharon Salzberg
Transcript
S2 E06
Maria: Hello and welcome to the Becoming Mindful Podcast. Today, we are wrapping up our three-episode series about mindfulness catalyzing change. I am Maria.
Jackie: And I’m Jackie, and we are becoming mindful.
Maria: welcome, welcome. Let’s start with a little exercise again.
Jackie: Yeah, let’s do that. Let’s take a moment to come into this moment. So find a comfortable seat wherever you are. If you can and you want to, you can close your eyes or you can just take a soft gaze. And take a moment to let yourself settle into your seat. Start to bring your awareness into your breath, and just feel your natural breath. Just notice it. No judgment, no change. Just where’s it at today. Now we will work on some three-part breath. So we’re going to, on your inhale, breathe deeply into your belly, expand all the way around 360 degrees. Then feel your breath in your ribs, and then your chest. And at the top you can hold for a moment and then exhale. Chest, ribs, belly. And we’ll do that a few more times.
So inhale into your belly and feel your ribs expand. And feel your breath in your chest. And exhale, reverse it. Again, inhale belly, ribs, chest, exhale, chest, ribs, belly. Keep going like this. As you do on your inhale, feel your spine extend and your crown reach toward the sky. And as you exhale, maintain that length, but settle into your seat a little more. Invite those feelings of expansion and steadiness. Let’s take one more round together. And when you finish that last round, we’ll take one big inhale together. Let’s inhale deeply. Take a full big inhale, and as you get to the top, hold for one min for one moment. And then as you exhale, try to exhale as long as you can. Take a long releasing exhale, and when you reach the bottom of your exhale, release the technique and come to a natural breath. And we’ll sit here for just a moment. Once again, bring your awareness to your natural breath and feel how, maybe it’s a little different now. There’s a little more room, a little more openness. Notice if there were any changes. In your mind, maybe a little more clarity, groundedness, and when you’re ready, you can open your eyes if they were closed. Thank you for doing that. Practice with me. You can. It’s such a simple practice. You can. Come to it at any time, so keep that one in your pocket.
Yeah.
Maria: Wonderful. Thank you for leading us through this. It’s always nice. I love it at the beginning of our sessions.
Jackie: Yeah. Nice to center. All right. Let’s talk mindfulness for change.
Maria: Yes. So last, month, we’ve given the exercise, if possible, to do some of the exercises in the book by Sharon Salzberg or we’ve also linked some resources online, meditations that she leads.yeah, let’s talk about those.
Jackie: Yeah, I love her approach to her practices. They’re so beautiful.
Maria: Yeah. And I liked, again, it leads you through this, Kind of timeline that the book follows, right?
how you go from the difficult emotions and within yourself and the loving kindness for yourself and then you expand that to everyone and then the equanimity at the end.
So that’s this expanding. Really love that. Also from like more of a past view to a future view kind of thing, right?
It’s like you kinda come from the, okay, so this is the worries, this is the things I’m,that’s happening or happened. And then going to the,how can I connect, what’s possible in the future?
Jackie: Yeah, that’s a great way to put it. The book really outlined it in such a great way where, we have to start close to ourselves and expand outward, like a ripple. lot of times when we want to fix the world and things, we start at the big picture and it’s so overwhelming, because,you’re just one person, but we always have to start with ourselves. they say you can’t love anyone more than you love yourself or be vulnerable with someone as much as you are with yourself. yeah, Sharon really helps that be very tangible. And approachable.
Maria: Yeah, and I definitely love the expansion effect on that as well. where you start with the little thing, the inside,essentially healing yourself and then allowing yourself to see the possibilities and the change that you can make within yourselfand your immediate vicinity.
And then, how that can ripple outwards. and also the, again, like we’ve always talked the community aspect that, a lot of times we think about, okay, what can we do? What can one person do? And we have all these other things in our lives that, we need to take care of or need to worry about or things that are happening in the world, but.this constant reminder that, we are a people, that means you’re not doing this alone. And
also being able to ask for help and being able to, do things with others together. maybe you have all of these beautiful ideas, and you know that you can’t do all of them by yourself because there is only so much time in the day.
And that’s,the equalizing factor. Everyone has only so much time,on this earth and realizing that yes, we need each other, we need each other.
Jackie: Yeah.
Maria: And that’s absolutely fantastic and okay and beautiful and like being able to lean into that.
Jackie: yeah.in my practice, the more I heal myself, the more I turn outward and want to serve and look for places where I can be of service. Because we are social andwhen we’re thriving, that’s what we want. We want to reach out a lot of these practices,gives you this permission almost to begin with yourself. because the kind of action you’re gonna go out and take is gonna be reflected. By, where you are at, so we need to first take care of ourselves,put your oxygen mask on first,and then go out into the world. there’s a saying that I really like and I don’t know. If it’s even quoted to anyone, but I’ll put it in the notes if I find it.
But the best thing that you can do for me is to work on yourself. And the best thing I can do for you is to work on myself. And I love that because when we do take care of ourselves and we heal ourselves, then we show up ready to help, to serve. We have the capacity for compassion and community and outwardness, andA lot of people need a lot of healing,
it’s hard.
Maria: Yeah. Unfortunately that’s what it is. Yeah. We need a lot of healing but I think even there the community aspect comes in too, and this is something that is really important, is that for yourself, the skill of receiving,
like it’s easy to give and to serve, and to, do good things for others, but to receive.
When you need it, like you were talking about the oxygen mask putting it on for you first. But if you are the child that can’t reach, then you have to
be okay with having others help you.
Jackie: Right,Yeah, I like that you said this skill of receiving. That’s awesome because it is, it’s something you have to know how to do. we learned so much about, being independent and taking care of ourselves and things. And our world is set up in that way that we’re all in our own little silos.
we literally need to learn how to receive and take help and, cooperate and collaborate. And it’s hard to do.
Maria: Yeah. Yeah, I always thought it was interesting how there’s so much overlap with how people parent it as well with these kind of things.when I was getting into, the Montessori method and how one of her things is, don’t help a child unless. They ask for it. Where when I first thought okay, that’s interesting.
you’d think oh, that, that would bring them to maybe be more, self-dependent and not, have that community aspect. But realistically it actually helps them ask because then they have to learn how to ask.
Jackie: Yeah.
Maria: ‘ ’cause you don’t just do it.
we were talking about agency
in the book. Sharon is talking about agency. That is a really big thing. If you felt you had no agency, most likely in your adult life, you will not ask for help.
Jackie: Absolutely. Yeah,
Maria: Or you would just be following anything that is told to you. It could be either way. Right,
Jackie: That’s something that gets lost a lot in childhood and that’s why I love things like the Montessori method and the fact that those are becoming. More popular, you’re seeing them more around, you’re seeing Montessori schools, you’re seeing different approaches like that, different ways to interact with children, and approach, the parenting and rearing of children. That gives me a lot of hope for the future and for future generations even now we see adolescents,trying to heal. I mean, at least on the internet, like I’m seeing, like there’s a whole new emotional intelligence kind of wave, it gives me a lot of hope. I feel really good about the future and these possibilities of more healed humans, people who are healing sooner,
Yeah, I see that too. And just this whole shift to seeing children as full human beings, full people that are not like, oh, I’ll mold you into something. You’re not there yet. You can’t do, yes, there’s things that children can’t do that are not safe for children, but realistically, at some point they should also have some sort of agency.
Maria: They should have a voice within the group of what they would like and what they, their ideas are,
Jackie: Mm-hmm.
Maria: I of course sometimes they’re crazy ideas, but sometimes it’s okay, maybe there’s something to it,
Jackie: right.I think it was 2016 when Marianne Williamson ran for president.she might’ve been the last election too. But I really liked her voice in the debates and things. because one of the things that she brought up, was that we should have a Department of children to advocate for children and to, give them a voice as a full human being in our country.
Maria: AndI hadn’t really thought about it before that, I didn’t have kids And. Like what you’re saying, kids are, whole humans with autonomy that they should have autonomy, that just are also dependent. But,the idea of them being their own person with their own agency, it’s disappointing that was a new idea for me Yeah, I’m, I notice it every now and then too. Still, that what we were taught comes in where the children are, they’re not full people. They have to listen andthey don’t have agency
and I notice it sometimes when I talk to my daughter, which, I’m trying to practice this quite a bit.
That, that’s my goal. But, then there’s moments where she’s oh, you’re bossing me around. And I’m like, okay.
I’m like,
I guess I am. like some, some things obviously if they’re not safe or and if they’re for your own good. Then, but like taking away that agency of, also negotiating and we’re like really thinking about how important is this now in this moment, right?
Like that I’m like telling my kid to do or not to do. How important
is this? Is it really not safe or is it just my inconvenience? Right.
Jackie: Yeah. Yeah. I find myself asking that all the time when my kid’s pushing back on me and it’s like, who’s really saying this?
Maria:
Jackie: but that made me think of.agency being balanced with discernment and understanding,where that line is and when you need to step in and when you can let things go. And discernment is its own skill that I’ve definitely had to learn as a parent.
And like you were saying, I really need to step in here or is it my habits, my training, my comfort? so often it’s like, yeah, I guess my kid’s right. I didn’t need to do that thing, or we don’t need to do this right now. But I think a lot of criticism around this kind of parenting and approach is that they just assume you just stop parenting and it’s just this feral child.
Maria: Yeah, like it being more like permissive instead of actually, yeah, and I think that’s a very good distinction. Again, the discernment, right?
Jackie: Yeah.
Maria: We are both people with agency, the parent and the child. And you can’t forget that. So if the balance shifts to one of them, you either have this authoritarian parenting or you have this permissive parenting and both are not good.
If you are too permissive, your child’s agency. Um.they will take over, they will be demanding and they will send you around on your little lns to, to serve them. Um,
it will happen. This, there’s no doubt about it. So yeah, I think that, the important part is to remember that we are both people with agency, and with boundaries, right?
Not
only the child. But also the parent. being able to, allowing the child to have their own boundaries,
don’t come into my room right now because I want to be alone. For example, the
Jackie: Right.
Maria: and the same way too, like,right now, I can’t help you because I’m in the middle of a task and.
sorry, I’ll get you back to you later. which is a, it’s a struggling because this is something kids need to learn, just
as us, and
Jackie: if you think about that, we don’t even know this really well yet, how is a child gonna know? Right, but looking at the big picture and the world as a whole, there’s so many more resources for, like us as parents, so many books orthere’s so many resources online of like psychologists just giving advice or papers to read that gives me so much hope for the future that we could have a more mindful world.we do, I think. I think we do. It is, it’s happening.
Maria: think so as well.
Yeah, I think this is one of the good and the bad of social media. if you look at the exposure to these very mindful ideas, to these resources, to communities, online communities of people that, are actually working towards a better world or a more mindful world, and that are, Practicing these things and helping people heal and, all of us together, it’s, it, there is a lot out there and it’s just growing.
Jackie: Yeah. Yeah.
Maria: Yeah. I mean it’s it interesting Sometimes you get maybe discouraged if you look at too much news.
Jackie: Right.
Maria: I’ve had that where I’ve really had to consciously mindfully consume news because it’s very easy to drag you down.
and. There’s a reason for that, that’s sensational.
although I think that the opposite could be true too, that you can also really pull people in with positive, news as well.
butJust being aware of that dynamic and limiting the exposure to maybe a specific time. And then after that, you do something nice or you read something nice or you purposely go into the spaces even online, that are positive and uplifting and where people are trying to really, make a difference and practice mindfulness and, connect with other people and. Heal. And, I’ve noticed,that,since ever since we started this mindfulness journey, there’s more and more I’m discovering and maybe this is like the feedback loop of the internet.what you search for but that’s just the universe itself, right?
What you put your focus on,
Jackie: Yeah.
Maria: you can call it confirmation bias or synchronicity or whatever you want to call it, but what you put your focus on, you’re gonna get more of.
and that definitely,counts for the internet. And, yeah, just seeing these beautiful communities, So much is done.just thinking about like little grassroots groups doing like community aid, jumping in, and or communities online that, connect for healing and so much. Yeah.
Jackie: I love that, those suggestions on how to find that more positive lens because it’s not about, not. Being informed, but we come back to discernment, is looking at what those resources are that are giving you the information, andlooking at how you’re getting information.
is this piece of information telling me how to feel or telling me what to think? Or is it giving me. Information that I can process, that I can discern for myself, becausethere’s an advantage, especially in media now, and you see it all over social media of you should be outraged at this, or You should be angry at this person.
Or you should, whatever it is. When in reality, the information behind what they’re saying is important to know, butmaybe there’s a different way to. Interpret it or to feel about it or to take action on it. Um, and if we each do that for ourselves, that’s the most important thing.
We need bottom up action instead of top down action. where media sources are telling us this is what you should be doing and being outraged about, they have different motives than than you do personally. So it’s really important to find your autonomy in. The information, so be informed, but then, process it yourself,
Maria: Yeah, and I think that’s also a really big one, What I’m hearing too, in what you’re saying is ask yourself the question, why is someone telling you the thing that they’re telling you? what is their motive? is it a motive of helping the world, helping you, or is it, just seeding fear or
is it a distraction or what’s really behind it?
And yes, there is lots of things that we need to be aware of and that we need to work against, but there’s also, I think this point where it easily can lead it to fear that stops you in your tracks. I just recently had this where I took a whole week of just meditating on that and using actually Sharon’s, meditations to help me with that because yes, like you get into these spirals of just being afraid or worried and it just, it doesn’t do anything.
It doesn’t help anything.
Jackie: it all begins again with ourselves and healing ourselves and knowing ourselves. And I’ve noticed the more that I self-reflect and the more I know who I am and know what my values are, know what my character is, when I do receive information, I can distinctly see, the difference between. How does this stack up against my values versus, okay, but what perspective are they trying to, impart on this information? You can really start to discern, okay, but how does this align with what I value and what I really care about? And process that information with kind of a cleansing filter.
we’re caught up in the inertia of fear or hate or, anything, we stop thinking for ourselves and we lose that autonomy. And all those good things, I think compassion and love and caring and service and everything,that’s all begins with autonomy. And if we lose that. We lose all those other great things,
Maria: that’s the thing that,if you’re thinking about bottom up,
that’s like the thing, right? Everyone has value,
Jackie: Yeah.
Maria: right? Nobody’s more valuable than the other person, and therefore you are not less valuable than the other person. So yes, your voice counts, but it’s on the other hand, their voice counts as well. And seeing that and not only knowing like your own values and what you’re standing for, drawing your own boundaries, But also allowing that for the other person, like we said, with children, but that goes with any other person as well. where we don’t get to say how they are supposed to feel,We don’t get to say, that,I. What they’re supposed to do, what they’re supposed to feel. we go, don’t get to dictate that,
Jackie: Yeah,
Maria: and just they don’t get to dictate us. But,
Jackie: they’re great little mirrors
Maria: yes.
Jackie: show you all these things. They illuminate it all.
Maria: yes, and that’s like the whole thing we’re talking about with community and, connection and, anything, in interaction is always both ways.
they’re always gonna reflect back to you what you put in the same way, like now, if you’re really good at mindfulness and you’re practicing that, then you’re gonna be able to notice that and maybe not send back what they send out.
If it’s something. That is not helpful. Right?
Jackie: Yeah. Yeah.
Maria: Yeah. I’m just particularly thinking about, hate and people being hateful to others .I always have to think about like,every person was someone’s baby no matter who, right? Like, and. they have value either even, so they might have ideas and thoughts that, and actions that maybe, yes, we have to protect the society from them.
And have to stop them from doing what they’re doing.
But that doesn’t mean that we have to condemn the person so there’s a separation, like making a distinction between the action and the person’s value.
so yeah, we can treat everyone with kindness even if they’re doing things that are harmful.
So we can just, we need to stop them.
From doing more harm for sure and maybe, somehow help them understand how they’re harming others.
Jackie: you say that everyone is someone’s baby. The way I think about it is way we behave is learned. We learn everything. And if you learned to be hateful, if you learn to be, fearful, you can unlearn those things. And I know this because I look at myself over, the last 20 years and I’ve unlearned a lot of those things, you know, dismantling that and,getting back to yourself can be a very hard process depending on where you’re at, but mindfulness is a tool to. Get back to that and to unlearn those things that aren’t serving you and aren’t serving your community. and when you look at people and you see them being hateful or you wanna judge them or whatever, coming back to that idea that they were someone’s baby, or, they learned this, they can unlearn it.
it’s not who they are.there’sa good core in there.
Maria: yes. Yeah. it’s also a reflection on your worldview, right? Like my values are that I do believe everyone has a good core, and I do believe in the good in people, and I do believe that there’s ways to change things for the better, and
everyone can change. And so this is what I’m then putting out as well, and this is
how I wanna treat people.
and, saying that these are learned behaviors doesn’t mean it’s excusable and it doesn’t mean that there doesn’t have to be some sort of reconciliation or some sort of way to fix it, right? Fix the harm,
Jackie: right. you are responsible
for your behavior.
Maria: You’re still responsible. You’re
responsible for your behavior, but it doesn’t mean that you are therefore not worth anything anymore or that you’re not
deserved to be treated, like a human being.
Jackie: right. E. Exactly.
Maria: and Yes, people can change. I know we’ve talked about this when we are talking about more of the brain, science part of,how the brain reacts to mindfulness and so on.
And,the neuroplasticity that no matter how old you are, your brain can always change and we’ve, come across that in so many different spots. when we’re talking with Sebastian about,leaning into fear and changing your paths of thinking, right?
And like reacting to fear and things like that. So I absolutely believe in that. I don’t really only have to believe in it. There’s lots of studies that show that
our brain is capable of that unless you have, some sort of, disorder that prevents that. Or if you are, have a brain injury or something.
Of course that’s different, but
Jackie: yeah.the crux of what we’re doing here, and what Sharon Salzberg was talking about in her book is you and I are aligned on this idea that people are good at their core, and that becomes apparent as you start to practice mindfulness you realize that, that’s like a universal truth, that it’s there when you start to slow down and pause and start to get to know yourself and heal your stuff, and that’s why mindfulness can change the world. Because if we all shift this perspective to see all people as people and all, all beings as sentient beings, as, and the trees, as trees, like just appreciating
Maria: Even the world, like even inanimate objects is valuable and important to this ecosystem, to our life.the air, the water, the rocks, everything. it is all important for our. Life and we are all interconnected, right?
Jackie: And that respect is emergent from mindfulness. not just from mindfulness, but that’s a tool to access that understanding, that truth that
Maria: We’re an equal part of this ecosystem and everything else is an equal part of that ecosystem.Come, comes back to systems thinking, right?
Jackie: Yeah, we’re systems thinkers, aren’t we? Yeah. but it is. it’s reciprocal and, it’s just a natural destination for someone who’s practicing mindfulness is to come to these ideas, to these truths is true.
Maria: I think so as well. It’s an underlying truth.and if you wanna circle back to, how that translates into change and action for change.I think that knowing this interconnectedness and how every little thing in the ecosystem is important and is, interconnected and impactful also gives us the opportunity to see that every little thing can make an impact.
it doesn’t have to be this giant action, that we feel like how do we even get there?and there’s two things to that. What, first of all, the little thing can kick off the next thing and
then the next thing and then the next thing, right? So you have the steps. You take one step at a time to go somewhere.
and that’s hard because especially when you’re like, have this desire to change the world and heal the world, then it’s okay. No, there comes patience, right? this is also a thing that you learn with mindfulness. It’s like having the patience.
To be like, okay, yeah, I’ll meditate every day I do a little thing.
Maybe I’ll talk to my neighbor, maybe
I’ll hold a potluck for regenerative gardening or something in the neighborhood, and maybe I’ll get some more neighbors on board with permaculture.
Jackie: And that’s humility too, right? the humility to know that I’m not gonna find world peace, but I can find peace in my neighborhood or in my house, or in my own mind. that’s a win.
Maria: Yeah. even your own mind,
yeah, just your daily meditation, how that totally changes your life. And we see that, you have. done this, even more than me. But even with what I’ve experienced now with our mindfulness practice, it makes a difference now if I’m comparing myself to now and then, like it’s just from a mindset perspective and for me,
Jackie: Yeah.
Maria: I experience the world and situations.
It’s so different. So
Jackie: Right.
Maria: it’s I don’t know. It’s
like clearer stuff is clearer. Like it’s just
Jackie: Uhhuh.
Maria: makes more sense. You just notice things more. you feel like before it was like you’re just walking around in this fog or something. I don’t know. It’s just really weird
Jackie: Yeah. I love that. I’ve tried to explain it to people too. in here, in my head, it’s all different. Like my perspective is clearer and more more peaceful. There’s less chaos, there’s less noise.
Maria:
and I know that kind of goes into this,like new age spirituality manifesting stuff where I’m,sometimes hesitant or like I have resistance there because I know there’s a lot of commercialization and, stuff there that does not align with my values.But there is also a truth to that because when you change how you view the world, the world changes because we experience the world through our senses, filtered through our brain, like our brain,translates everything that comes in from the outside, from all your senses and
your body, and the way your body and your mind interprets that.
It makes a difference,
Jackie:
Maria: It makes
a total difference of how the outside is
Jackie: Yeah.
Maria: even. So it didn’t necessarily change,
but because you changed, it did change, if
that makes any sense.
Jackie: Yeah. Yeah. So I keep going on my mindfulness journey and just keep getting more hope because yeah, there’s so many reasons to be hopeful,
Maria: Yes,
Jackie: it’s such an incredible tool.
Maria: yes. And just in general, I think it lets you appreciate life no matter what happens. if we talked about the radical acceptance, just also being able to see things that are beautiful
Jackie: that’s what I was gonna say. Yeah.
Beauty. The beauty of the world.
Maria: It’s like the purpose of being here to fully experience the here.
Jackie: Yeah, it’s a gift to yourself and a gift to everyone around you and a gift to the world
to practice mindfulness, and it’s so understated. I think people look at it, they’re like, oh, whatever. That’s doesn’t look like this monumental thing because the practice isn’t, it’s so simple, but it’s also very hard and very impactful,
Maria: Agreed.
Jackie: I will sit with that. That feels good. Yeah. That’s nice.
Yeah.
Maria: it. Just very calm.
Jackie: All right. thank you all for coming with us on this journey and,thank you for listening. please subscribe if you’re not subscribed, that helps us out and, follow us on social. We would love to hear from you. Any questions or comments or ahas you have on your journey, let us know.we are at Becoming Mindful podcast on the socials.and yeah, we’ll see you on the next episode and until then be well.
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