In this fourth installment of the ongoing live series with Wendy Nash inquiring into meditation practice on and off the cushion, we planed to, and did look quite a bit at “…Christmas, family, tense conversations, New Year, alcohol, partying – and how they relate to meditation and ethics.”
Amongst other topics we also look at right (or wise, skillful or whole) effort, whole speech, whole livelihood and some who are calling off holidays around this time of year altogether.
Join these Q & A’s when they happen live:
- via downloading the free Wisdom app in your app store or via: https://wisdom.audio where I’m @integratingpresence
- watch on my YouTube channel
*There’s naturally an ongoing open call for meditation (related) questions for the (roughly) monthly “Meditation Q & A” either by the various social media means listed; integratingpresence[at]protonmail.com or Wisdom App to type/ask live.*
Background
Regular, current and past visitors to Integrating Presence may recall the monthly series “Ask Us Anything” I did with Denny K Miu from August 2020 until January 2022 — partially including and continuing on with Lydia Grace as co-host for awhile until March 2022.
For a few months thereafter I did various Insight Timer live events exploring potential new directions and/or a continuation of the Ask Us Anything format while weaving in other related teachings to these events.
Then, after chats with meditation coach Wendy Nash, it became clear to start a new collaboration similar to “Ask Us Anything” simply and clearly called “Meditation Q & A” especially due to the original intent of the Ask Us Anything’s being “discussions about meditation and related topics.”
Past chats with Wendy:
Audio: Towards Mastering Holiday “Celebrations” | 12/21/2022 “Meditation Q & A With Wendy Nash” #04
Or listen via Insight Timer (app or website)
We didn’t get to gratitude but here’s some links to the science behind its benefits (via the show above https://www.corbettreport.com/solutionswatch-givingthanks/):
Gratitude is positively related to increased subjective well-being
Robert Emmons: Benefits of Gratitude
Thanks! How the new science of gratitude can make you happier by Robert Emmons
2015 study: benefits of gratitude for heart failure patients
2016 study: relationship between gratitude intervention and reduced blood pressure
2017 study: relationship between gratitude and hemoglobin A1c
Is Gratitude Good for Your Health?
Stuff To Blow Your Mind podcast – From the Vault: Thankful: The Science of Gratitude
The raw unedited YouTube transcription of this podcast:
presence.com and today I have again once again the lovely Wendy Nash has
kindlycut the crap.com Wendy how’s it going good good calling from Queensland from
guppy guppy country and I think we were going to talk about Christmas and all
sorts of like uh scary things about navigating complicated stuff and and I thought it
was very interesting so guppy guppy this is the the sort of nation that I’m
calling from and the reason it’s actually duplicated so the the country
the nation next door is waka waka so it’s no accident that it’s repeat repeated because it actually means no in
the original language so it’s no no as in no you may not cross this boundary
unless you have I have welcoming it welcomed you to my country so it’s a bit
like you know you knock on the door of someone’s office and then you go can I come in or you knock on the front door
you don’t just barge your way in and I thought Christmas is kind of one of those times where people think you can
just barge your way in an alcohol of course fuels that whole thing so I thought it was just it was an
interesting way of thinking about it this morning just before coming on air well right on and yes and of course it’s
wild to see that it is you know summertime there and we’ve got this people are freaking out here because I
think there’s gonna it’s gonna be super super cold they even deployed the National Guard or something I heard in
Missouri here uh like 30 below Fahrenheit they’re calling for whatever but the one thing that I like to point
out is that I kind of make Point poke fun at it because it’s just like fear
fear fear fear fear of the natural environment you know really amped up now I’m not saying you know don’t be
prepared don’t take precautions of course right but just notice know that
the fear can be just as debilitating as weather in the psychological part of it
um also I think I’ve mentioned this in the past this is the the map oh it’s it’s really big here uh kind of a map of
oh and there’s so much um reflection so it’s hard to see but
what it is it’s a um it’s the United States and it shows where all the the
peoples the native peoples used to live before they were put on
um you know off off their their regular land and I met the artist of this and
it’s a it’s an amazing piece and it shows famous Native people on there too so I’m really happy to have that um but
okay so what I did is I put in the chat in insight timer live
and tea lady gnats here by the way hey hey T lady now we’ve got hey nice to see
you again and you’ll be pleased to know that I have my people who both do and of course I might
be talking about that when we get into the alcohol section so um I put in here uh we plan to look at
Christmas family tense conversations New Year’s alcohol partying and how they
relate to meditation and ethics so yes Wendy’s set it up a little bit and that’s what we had written for today so
where do we want to start with that Wendy ah you know so ah gosh where to start so
just first of a heads up I’ve had a bit of an issue with my internet so if I go invisible like my if I start going still
then I do apologize in advance I’ll turn off my video at that point just I’ve just been having a lot of dropouts
lately ah um so well I was really struck by the Pyramid of
I think it’s an Abu Dharma so you’ve got um
the lower level which is ethics or virtue comprising wise whole speech I I really
like the whole the term whole speech so you’ve got right speech or but that right it suggests that there is a wrong
and I think there are some other translations where I’ve heard whole speech and I like that because it’s not
only about what are we saying but how are we hearing it’s really the
whole concept of communicating and conversation so I thought that was a
really the ethical Foundation of how do we connect with other people in our
words and rap and so one one is whole speech one is
a whole uh actions which I think is really about Behavior like what are we
doing and then the other one is whole livelihood which is basically how we’re
spending our days you know what are we doing with our time um yeah how wise are we or how
yeah prudent and thoughtful are we in those three so I thought there was a really good foundation to think well if
you do those with kindness and care and Prudence restraint
and warmth then really the next Foundation of mind
which is you would know this effort uh sort of whole effort which is about
you know just bum on cushion doing it regularly and uh
that’s a huge part of it yeah I I love these in the the whole I have I actually
haven’t heard that before I I like using wise and skillful with these two like a
wise uh livelihood you know Wise action skillful action things like this but the
effort is really um important too and I just want to touch on that right away because this is
how I remember this is we kind of we can let go of um
unwholesome States or whole states right we can then prevent them from arising
again we can cult we can um conjure up or cultivate create new whole
um you know skillful wise actions and then we can maintain those as well so it’s
like a four-pronged effort and yes this can be used on and off the cushion as
well I think that’s enough for now we can we
can address that yeah the action I I think the my favorite thing and I
think we touched on it last time after week after the call last time yeah so was this thing about meditation Hall you
know somebody had at their front door before they walked out the door meditation Hall and and I think that’s
really a useful way to think about interactions family interactions like if you want to find out how enlightened you
are go home if you’re a family of origin and you’ll find out yep you’re just as crap
as you always were which I the other thing I thought was really interesting about that was
it shows you the nature of context you know we talk about interdependence and
context and how is the self not solid and fixed in so here we’re you know
having a lovely time where we’re polite we’re thoughtful we’re kind we’re generous spirited that’s the sort of
state of how we come together because we’re both Dharma practitioners we both have been doing it a while we’ve thought
about it go straight back to family and we’re suddenly five years old and all that
stuff just comes back and it’s like yeah you’re not actually fixed and solid
because here you are in this grown-up body but your reactions are just like
straight back there as if somehow all these decades have never happened
and so that really clarifies how we are not solid or fixed or stable at all how
it’s so Dynamic anyway you were gonna say yes and at the same time it seems at
least in my experience I can catch it a lot quicker right it still happens but I see it a lot sooner there’s sometimes
too when there’s a little bit more gaps where oh well I don’t have to say this right now I don’t have to be on
autopilot right I can like hold my tongue a little more right uh and so you
know so a lot of times it doesn’t make it easier it still feels painful because I want to say something but it you know
it’s a lot of times if I can catch that it does help a little bit but no you’re right it’s still there right it is still
there uh and so this brings me to the point of well I want to jump into examples too of things we can use here
right of how what if what has happened and how we’ve reacted maybe how we’ve
are responded how maybe we’ve wanted to do better or maybe we’ve actually done something decent where it’s it’s helped
us and other people um so um I think I’ll just throw it back to
Wendy there and this is so much to say but uh yeah that’s enough for now for me
so so just a couple of things one is I haven’t got my uh because of my internet
solo I haven’t got any of the chat functions open so on any of the channels
so just um just you’ll have to keep an eye out for that
timer anyway and we’d love and and I’d love to hear
people’s questions so um if you have a question um really this is a great opportunity to
to talk about it so yeah by the way so yes always questions
whenever yep yep um and I don’t think we have answers but we might have responses I don’t think
any of us have got an answer I’ve got the answer to everything I promise you I will cure all your pills if only it were
true um so I think I think what would be what I
learned is that it’s when it comes to conversations
like I used to as you say just blurt out and I realized I realize now that there
are most issues in conversations happen with the first word of a question I was
that narrow I got that narrow down so so was
um for instance uh
if you’ve got a pro so say you’ve so you’re sitting at the table you’ve got your Uncle Dave we’ll call him I just
made that person up but apparently Josh has got a real one we haven’t got the real name here but he’s got somebody quite opinionated
um then you know coming forth about
unpleasant really really opposing political ideas
yeah and so when I when I moved from Sydney up to
here earlier on this year our van broke down halfway along we’d had our hair van
the axle broke and so we were grounded in this town for a few of three or four
days and it was the week of the federal election so um I I just sort of asked in the
beginning you know who do you think will win and because because the polling’s
really bad and I started this really interesting way of asking questions
so you know there’s a lot of contention at the moment with Trump and and all the
Insurrection and all that sort of stuff and if you sit on the other side of the fence from that and you’re going well
he’s crazy then then um you know it’s it’s about going
towards that gingerly but equally I had conversations recently with somebody who
was like the government’s really wrong um Biden’s terrible and and you could
equally have a Democrat voter be equally Biden’s really got the answer and Obama
or whoever it is you know you know if it were Bernie Sanders or you know you you can really really matter who it is
so what I learned were some some really interesting techniques in this process
the first one is get yourself out of the way so just become super curious about
the other person so don’t don’t this isn’t a statement about you this is
about becoming super curious about them and I guess I I you know I trained as a
psychotherapist at a work as a psychotherapist I I do work as a coach I’m used to doing this and it does take
practice but don’t get caught is is what I would say and there’s there’s a couple of
things that you could do and I found this really helpful basic basic
technique so this is super basic technique you’ve got your Uncle Dave at the table and he says and I don’t know
which side of the fence political fence you sit on but I’m going to make it up uh Donald Trump he you know the election
was stolen from him so I just that’s the kind of standard line I hear
and uh so instead of rebutting with your opinion of what has
happened because then all you’re going to do is spiral down into a Vortex of
horrible Christmas dinner it’s just not worth it
and you can’t avoid it because you’re sitting next to him actually so you can’t avoid it
so the question is ah so tell me more tell me more about
about about your your ideas about this tell me more about the about how that
was stolen and that just starts to fill out the
space a little bit and you can get a little bit more Nuance about the perspective
and then from there the next question it’s really really good and it’s super good to to hone the craft of listening
and that is to really pay attention to what does the person care about
they might say oh um
it was I don’t know the election was in you know because the election was rigged
and it wasn’t right and all this sort of stuff and and it’s really going right so
Integrity is really important I hear you care a lot about integrity and the
correct procedure takes place and that things are done in an ethical manner now
I personally I’m I’m sort of a progressive left kind of person and I
just go well you know this to me it seems like Fox News is making it up and Trump is making it up and that’s what I
think um and we’ll find out at some stage but that’s that’s my understanding so I’m
just coming clean and upfront that’s me I’m not saying anything about Josh so Josh I don’t know where you sit on the
political Spectrum well it got oh it was good well short answer politics is an
emotional con game so none of the above usually but no I can respond to this
it’s really good advice and Tech techniques Wendy I will say that some people when they get alcohol it doesn’t
really matter so much how as long as we don’t screw up totally they’re just
gonna go on with what they want anyway right so there’s this classic saying that you don’t talk politics and
religion and polite company right but of course it always comes up and this this
technique of getting ourselves out of the way I think not only when it can be charged in general but this can actually
be something very beneficial because if I want to connect with anyone what does
everybody love to do they love to talk about what they’re interested in especially a lot of people like what
they do so I can connect really easily and fairly deeply
um with someone that as long as they’re not completely belligerent it’s by just
paying it being interested genuinely genuinely interested in what they’re
doing and people it would be surprised even if we think we’re not interested in something they a lot of people have a
really depth of about the things they’re interested in right now when it comes to politics it’s a little bit different
because may I venture to say that people are usually parroting opinions given to
them right there’s not a lot of original thought and politics we’ve seen kind of the same tactics over and over but it’s
good because it’s a good test to do this right and and I love this thing about you know what do they actually care
about here and that brings out the best in people right if you instead of them just saying you know repeating an
opinion or whatever or being really emotionally involved in something we can really tune in and listen like when you
said and bring forth the goodness that is there you know that they might not even recognize in themselves so it’s
it’s it is a beautiful thing um yeah yeah the um so so let’s keep this in mind and then
what I wanted to mention here is this we know that um kind of people in our
family are Gatherings we’re going to have right there seems to be ideas people have let’s just say about me
right there’s these projections that are there oh Josh he’s like this he’s this kind of guy he always does this right
and this is how I know him and this is you know what I expect from him and um
so I this really got to me way more when I um didn’t have a meditation practice
when I started meditating I could actually see yes that’s a lot uh there’s a lot of
um truth in that in in the way that the other people the other person comes around right and so but I’m because I
know this thing I don’t get upset about it as much anymore usually right I can just know this is kind of lingering in
the background but at the same time know that it’s impossible for things to stay the same all the time right because
there are things that have changed you know certain events in my life has changed certain events in their lives
have changed you know they look visibly different than they did 20 years ago I looked visibly different so that’s
helpful to run the background even if it’s in repeat and then I can be more patient but this new technique I’ve uh
heard about and maybe I’m going to try this out when this when someone comes at me with this and just kind of is looking
for to trigger me to to prove their idea about me and how I am like maybe Josh is
a a-hole or you know okay so I’m going to do everything I can to prove that and
then when it comes down the table I can just say instead of me fighting it I say okay yes I’m an a-hole you’re right
so instead of me arguing or trying to prove otherwise there’s no more fuel left if I just jump in there and say
yeah I agree with you you’re totally right and even you know yeah so I I’m
interested to try that one out yeah yeah so when I was doing my Psychotherapy training the psychotherapist uh teacher
she said you know they a client says you know oh you’re so aggressive or
self-righteous or whatever it is um opinionated you can say yeah yeah and
her thing was well there’s something inside of you that is clearly giving
that impression like there is something inside of you that that is being met that is being seen might only be three
percent but still there’s three percent there so to kind of just uh yeah just be really
clear um yeah I can be an a-hole
yeah for sure there are times in my life where wow I’m just going ah that wasn’t
one of my best moves actually yeah I regret that stuff what about you when a time for you
whatever you want tell me about sometimes you regret ah you know I wonder what that would be
like yeah that’s um yeah so I’m looking forward to trying that
yes okay so um now we’ve kind of covered like
um right well right speech right action um now we can touch on right livelihood
I feel um but the um the right speech or I’m sorry a whole speech this is the the
term Wendy uses and I love that because now I have to be mindfully conscious you know instead of just defaulting back
into the groove of this same old translation of this right so this whole speech one thing I wanted to point out
though too that there’s some people who actually kind of need to speak up right like me I’m probably a little bit more
outspoken so I need to kind of dial it back more restraint can help me some people are kind of really shelled up
right they they would love to say something you know but but they they fear all kinds of things maybe you know
of not being accepted of you know being out of place
um all these different types of things I would definitely you know kind of look at our personality styles of do I need
to speak up more often speak truth more often or do I need to dial it back and be more you know um well that of course
it’s uh we speak true we speak truth or we be honest um we speak kindly
we speak at the right time right it’s got to be the right time to say something
um also ideally it creates Concord instead of division it brings people
together and so it divides them right uh and it might be missing one
um but I’m uh but yeah those are kind of the the ideal guidelines for speech I would say
yep honest did you say honest well yeah truth speaking truthfully that’s the most important to me as well yeah
yeah I think it is some people feel extremely self-conscious about
um my previous partner he was very what time we were walking along and I
suddenly it was like I had entered his way of seeing the world and all of a
sudden I felt completely all eyes were on me it was a very interesting experience so we weren’t in a
conversation or anything we’re just walking along in the street and I thought ah this is his this is
what it’s like for him oh my goodness this must be so intimidating and so
intense and it would be so hard to feel that you had the space
that you you felt safe to come forward because it was just so intensely watched
it was awful I just felt wow you know he’s very very shy man and um he still
is shy um but yeah I think that if you’re
sitting next to someone who is timid and self-conscious in the way they speech
then be as somebody who tends to speak a lot become really curious about them
you know you know what’s you know what’s been happening lately and and just again really focus on what
do they care about and and open out that conversation that way and questions not
to ask are ones that start with do or is or would you say
so their ones to not ask or why so skip those ones but instead to ask with once
with where how what and it’s it’s hard because we get caught
in habits of questions but it’s that first word which counts that’s so
amazing we talked about that on previous shows too yeah the what is really good the the where and you said how as well
yeah so how can I ask how you discovered this with uh your past partner
yeah so sometimes I get that thing where I I think I think the more I meditate
the clearer I am and that includes not being in my world
but being more I don’t know psychically connected to another person and I don’t mean psychic
as in I’m you know woo-woo but psychic as in um
just somehow I don’t exist I see the other world the other person within
their own world I just find that sometimes more and more it is and it’s it’s wild how much
information is being conveyed non-verbally through micro Expressions on the face through body language
through extended silences you know um gestures and just kind of feelings
right feeling someone we notice that sometimes they can well words are usually involved but if there’s a really
intense emotion they linger on and on even afterwards are not spoken
or even beforehand um so yeah I definitely know what you mean uh with that as far as some respects one other
thing I’ve noticed maybe about folks that a little bit shy and self-conscious is
um knowing especially if they’re introverted knowing if I’m starting to drain them with energy right because
some they usually recharge in silence in being alone so
um it’s knowing kind of when to pull back and not overdo it with folks that are more introverted as well
um yeah speaking with a soft voice so if you’re sitting next to someone who’s very shy
drop the pitch speak more slowly more measured space
out the words so it’s just very technical um drop the pitch so no no and just keep
it much more economical I would say and um
and and more thoughtful so don’t don’t rush to speak keep it keep the questions
sort of ponder the questions as you go
and and that creates space for the other person to feel like they’re actually got
the space you go Josh that’s beautiful I was just going to flip the coin now and say uh I think you’ve mentioned too like
you were in a family where you had to kind of was this you had to kind of like put put yourself forth and I have to put
myself forth and kind of um not necessarily dominate but jump in there if I really want to say something you
know to get a word in edgewise sometimes so now this is another this is the kind of the opposite Dynamic right where I
might be jockeying a little bit too much for position to say certain things uh and so that’s a whole nother Dynamic
right yeah and is it worth it right is this
conversation worth it out of that and like oh my gosh what’s
the point of expending all this energy to do that it’s just it’s exhausting yeah yeah
you know and and often what I’ll do is I’ll go and
somewhere where I’m kind of on my own and sometimes somebody will come and join and sit next to me
not always I have been told off in my family for sitting on my own and not being part of
the party I had actually somebody I invited somebody who didn’t have family in Australia and I asked if he wanted to
come along to my family Christmas this is 20 years ago and then afterwards he said don’t ever
ask anybody to come to your family Christmas they are horrible people I was like oh okay all right well you really
feel yeah yeah he was very vocal he was very vocal
kind of person but it was interesting to kind of think oh okay all right it’s not just me
has it the hour has already gone by this is amazing I just looked up and it’s like we just started um I guess we ought
to start wrapping up then huh I guess let’s huh oh I’m sorry we started at 7
30. okay great good this is one time that I I feel great to be embarrassed about losing uh
good thank you okay so now what about drinking okay so a lot of the strategies
we have right they work very well and and but then when alcohol is involved
people I mean it goes without saying a lot of times people don’t act like they usually act right and it’s kind of like
this thing well they’ve been drinking so they kind of get away with a lot of
things right or maybe they shouldn’t but I mean like how do you just deal with people that that drinks yeah so I
haven’t drank since 2013 I might have mentioned this before it’s not really that interesting when I started meditating it just I all sprayed the
background but it just turned into one drink and I was hungover for like two
days it was ridiculous so I was like what is the point so I just stopped you know
um now I will say early on I was invited to some um some like cocktail parties holiday cocktail parties and it was a
little awkward with not having much time under my belt uh and I was called out saying oh why don’t you have a drink in
your hand right you know and then I’ve also been told before this was early on too uh what are you trying to make me
look bad why aren’t you drinking but for now I know that my friends and family they know who I am so they can’t get
away with saying like that doesn’t phase me if anybody were to say that no big deal but I will say early on it will it
it could help to have like a mocktail or cranberry juice or something until you kind of get used to not drinking if you
don’t drink I’m not saying there’s necessarily anything wrong in and of itself of you know having adult beverages you know I’m not because it’s
it’s gonna happen anyway people are going to be around but so that’s this kind of the ground level for this I want to get Wendy’s take on this
um so I found that there are uh non-alcoholic wines so de-alcoholized
wines so you could take that to um a party or a thing if you don’t want
to drink that’s if you don’t want to drink so I don’t have any questions about people drinking I drink for a for
a good big while after starting meditation and sometimes I still drink so uh the other day and it’s really
important to do that sometimes so the other day I was at a friend’s place
and um I knew that her her mother-in-law had just died like the night before it was a
gathering and so I just got some champagne and a
glass and I just had you know like I’m not an alcoholic so for me to have a tiny bit of alcohol isn’t a problem
um and I just said you know to your mother-in-law you know to do the fact that the son was there and uh the
husband and so I said oh you know to your mother and and it was really a
sweet sweet he I bet I bumped into him the other day and he was so touched by
that gesture it’s not always
bad to drink alcohol not all contacts by any stretch
um so so if you people do get Itchy and Scratchy about
um because it it triggers their sense of shame that they are drinking and that’s
what gets The gnarkiness Happening um I so yeah I I what I often do is I say
and you can’t do this on Christmas day but you can depending on if you’re
staying overnight at your family or uh whatever but you might say if you go to
church on boxing day I don’t know what people do on boxing day but if you can say oh look I’ve start my Meditation
Retreat tomorrow and I’ve got to leave early in the morning
so that’s one thing to do often I will say if it’s a Saturday night or a Friday
night I say I’ve got some really I’ve got to do all my tax or I’ve got some paperwork I really need to attend to in
the morning and I really need to think pla you know or some strategic business planning or something I just come up
with something that that gives it kind of permission ah you know whatever and
sometimes what I’ll often do now is I’ll just go I love the first sip can I have
a sip of your glass of wine I love the first sip I’m not actually interested in the restaurant but the first step can I
have a glass of your wine I would love that I just I I really like it so that
helps it to de-stigmatize the alcohol consumption so I like that
and if you haven’t got like in in my family they’re all they’re very weird the fact that that I don’t drink because
they all my my family members drink heavily Australians drink a lot we have
a very big wine drinkers and our red wines are usually 14 alcohol and the
white wines are 13 like they’re really really heavy drinking
um so you can always cut them so you know a half sparkling half wine we can do that with red as much as white
but uh what I think is is good to do is
if you have if you have a glass of wine one glass or two glasses simply notice
how long it takes until you feel like how many days it takes before you stop
being oh woe is me my life is terrible I’m a failure or that grisly gray
feeling that just simply you know this is meditation simply observe notice what
are you going to say Josh you mean after you’ve drink drank that because it’s been so so long since I have but not if
I remember back you mean so like how many glasses does it take to trigger
that type of um response is that that’s what you’re saying notice that the amount yeah not only that but you might
have one glass of wine and say okay well that’s my bitten you know you kind of
drink lots of water and extra it or or whatever and then and then the next day
Boxing Day in the 27th 28th it takes about four days for that alcohol to get
out of your system four days amazing I was so shocked
um that really surprised me and as it happens do you know the conversation this is a website which is academics
writing uh lately um articles for the lay population but
in their area of expertise and as it happens if there was one today and it was drinking alcohol this Christmas and
New Year these medicines really don’t mix so depression medication
anxiety medication there are a few ones uh pain medication some of the pain
medications um also what heart medications
schizophrenia medications sleep medications
um and yeah so there are specific craft because I thought this was very
interesting some medications shouldn’t have with the most sort of craft beer or home brew ones so it was just a very
interesting thing that is another one of the excuses you could say if you didn’t want to drink was to say I’m on some
antidepressants well Wendy I’m gonna have to stop you right here and I I love the kind of
strategies but for me I can’t sit here and tell people to make stuff up right
now you can be you can’t there you can push it really far I mean I’m saying you
can push it really far like if Wendy says you want to do a strategic planning the next day I mean that’s totally
legitimate as long as you sit down and do that at least for a few moments right you’re not being dishonest about it
right and yes so I I would just there’s also grapefruit juice I think there’s
some medications you’re not supposed to drink grapefruit juice which was either like wow what’s in grapefruit juice but
you know this is a the four days really struck me because you know back when I was working for a company it was a
company culture to just go out and drink all the time and I would wake up and I would be like not hungover so that can
be really dangerous after drinking all night right get up no big deal like it didn’t seem like it took that long
because I would just you know maybe drink um not too long thereafter right but
then when I finally started waking up a little bit and realizing you know and meditating it did seem like it it took
at least two days to get it out of the system just one it’s pretty wild now I guess what I’m talking about here is
behavior from folks right there there’s it’s great that some folks can drink one
or two glasses of wine you know a craft beer and then that’s you know that’s it that’s all they kind of need and they
can be social but then you have the folks who they don’t even really get started until the third or the fourth
one right and actually some folks can become quite jolly and outgoing and
pleasant you know and really Lively and fun to be around but that’s can be more
of a rarity you know there’s some people when they drink a lot they like the it’s guys right they like to fight
some people like kind of argue or make jokes about people and not necessarily
you know and it’s sometimes it’s in good fun and it’s okay and but then we get some people that are belligerent right
so I’m talking about mainly the the challenging problem cases as well so I I
love Wendy’s advice for actually being practical with those people who are responsible drinking right it’s a lot of
good advice to to take in and how to deal with things when you know you want to kind of um stay more on the balance
when everybody else around is maybe pushing it a little bit further so these are great tips and advice now what
happens when we get into uh folks that are um let’s say drawing attention to
themselves through through maybe a little bit of excessive amount of alcohol
so just one thing I want to go back is like oh yeah I suppose it is kind of deceptive speech so before I was talking
about deceptive speech I’m like you could say you were on you know antidepressants or something like that it’s gray area or you could say you know
I’ve tried them before and it’s probably not a good idea or maybe you know maybe someone has tried them in the past or
maybe you’re thinking about going on them and you don’t want to just screw things up so there’s a lot of things you
can say that are more accurate instead of just a bold face I’m not saying it’s important yeah
what what I what I often say now is I just find I become a really horrible
person the next day and my life is too short to be horrible to people so that’s
what I usually say I feel like people really respect that Honesty they’re like wow that’s refreshing to hear you know
I’m glad you really put it out there like that you know I mean they might not say that but yeah I’d be I’m kind of
surprised at how people connect with just kind of really straightforward
honesty sometimes you know because it’s such a rarity it takes uh it takes people off guard a little bit but in a
good way um yeah I mean there are family families where it is complicated to be honest and
straightforward like you have to you know lying is one of those funny things
you know it’s you don’t want to lie no one wants to lie and what is a lie and what’s deception
and what’s a mission and all the rest it’s a gray area but I think at its core
the speech must be kind so if if what you say is going to
trigger a bad reaction in someone then then cat caging your reply around that
is perhaps prudent and if later they say but you lied you can go well actually I
just thought your reaction was I wasn’t sure your reaction so you can be honest later like that I I don’t let me let me
just respond really quickly what I’ve a lot of times just being um courageous enough to sometimes to say
I don’t know or I don’t really know how to respond to that right now maybe I can get back to you
um this kind of thing or you know I I really want to say something here but because I don’t really know how to say
it in the best way so maybe you know maybe I better not answer this right now it’s kind of being straightforward
honest about not really knowing uh how to to sing things or whatever you know
that’s that’s one technique I guess as well and also this pushes us too to become creative in in ways of our
honesty because a lot of times it does take a lot of energy and effort to come up with something that’s a little more
honest right so a lot of times it is easier to just to just to say a little white lie and no I do agree with Wendy
because what kind of harm are you creating you know it’s really difficult for me to know if I tell a little white
lie if that’s actually going to be better in the long term you know because I don’t know a lot of times uh so maybe
sometimes it will be and sometimes I do get in a lot of trouble and cause harm from being uh honest in the wrong way so
yeah it’s a very uh good consideration to to to look into this deeply and it’s
part of our practice too especially to ourselves honesty it lies to ourselves
is another huge area but anyway so please continue with the the problem drinking thing I think we were on so you
know if you’ve got a problem drinking I mean the five precepts I was just sort of thinking about that you know we’re talking about ethics and meditation
and if you if you’re if you have problem drinking
well basically who do you want to be in 10 years time what are the impacts of of
drinking without care so in this conversation so far we’ve been talking about how to drink with
care how to speak with care if you’ve got drinking problems
well kind of look in the mirror I think and
it is difficult so one of the things I wanted to talk about in in this that
what alcohol does is it makes a person more self-centered
and I guess more self-preserving
so lying about to yourself and others about
your drinking is part of the side effect of alcohol
so um I think that’s really interesting that alcohol and increases your
narcissism I think I think that’s a bit I know somebody who did her PhD 20 years ago in
this 30 years ago um yeah and I that’s really struck me
because when I think about people who are like so we we just bought this house and the guy who had the house before was
a carpenter and he did his own works in the house
and he did so many bad crappy jobs and
he he did this really cute little children’s uh cubby house a Wendy house
I would call it and it looked great for the photos for the
sale of the house but at the back there were whole sections that weren’t painted there was
no ridge cap on the top so that all the water would come in which meant that if
a child was using it they would get wet if it suddenly rained and it often does
up here and it was also very elevated off the ground so the ladder that he had created
was an adult ladder and so there were all these kind of and it
turned out all the stuff that he had done he’d done in the past year pretty much all of it for the sale of the house
to increase the value of the house and it was he’s done all sorts of crazy
stuff uh like he built a concrete slab downstairs and then it pulls because
it’s not done well and so he just drilled some holes so it just goes straight into the dirt which means that
you create problems with the foundations now he was a very heavy drinker and I
think he probably neglected his wife and children’s needs for that and I and he’s
like you know he was a good guy you know he was a good bloke as you’d say in Australia he’s a good bloke you know I
have a couple of beers with him that’s where he did his office he had like this really nice bar in the
um patio downstairs and yeah overlooking you know it has bonfire and all this
sort of stuff he’s a good bloke and he like I continue he was cheating
and lying in terms of the house and the presentation in order to maximize the
return on the sale price and I thought I wonder what he’s like
with his wife and kids so if you have an alcohol if you’re using alcohol
to an uncomfortable level ask if what harm is going on to the
people around you because money if you’re married the money that you are spending on
alcohol you could spend that on doing something lovely for your partner
your kids you know that’s not unharmful
spending money so when I when I when I gave up drinking 20 almost 20 years ago
um I sort of went oh I wonder if I’m an alcoholic and then I heard this like
justifications come through my mind and I was like Ah that’s a whole series of justifications either I am or I’m not
but I’ve just stopped drinking now and see what happens it was really interesting and I was it
was just and then I never really drank after that because I was like yeah
to the point of intoxication right yeah yeah I think I think it’s really hard to
drink alcohol and not have some level of intoxication I’m sure it is and that’s why even kombucha you know I drink it a
few times a year because I’m so re-sensitized I will get a little buzz from it even though you can sell that
without having to show a card because it’s such Trace Amounts of alcohol but because I’ve become resensitized I will
kind of feel it yeah so this is a really important point in uh you know the the five precepts or whatever it’s uh to to
refrain from intoxicants it’s not necessarily that they’re bad in and of themselves it’s that the other precepts
are more likely to be broken win what is intoxicated or takes intoxicating substances to the point of
endocation and so yeah this is the thing because I know in my own experience if I remember back well the addiction thing
is interesting because it while it can also be um amount it can also be frequency right if I’m doing like one or
two beers every day you know for you months and years and years and then I can’t just refrain from like one or two
days from having that one or two beers well then that can can be considered kind of an addiction as well it doesn’t
necessarily have to be like a large amounts you know that can be another thing if you have to binge drink it
could possibly be an issue then too but what I noticed about myself too yes I felt more egotistical like my ego really
boosted I was like they call it liquid courage right I felt more full of myself you know more uh say are more easy in my
skin I guess in inhibitions we’re just kind of thrown out the window right I were it was taking more chances and
they’d become more effortless than they normally would right and then the kind of regretted things later or maybe not
as much because I was drunk and then I you know and then I would just drink more if it was too painful so a lot of
times is it also being comes from a place of pain like I’m in pain and I
don’t want to feel that pain so I’m just going to drink more until I don’t feel pain it’s going to numb out
and for me I could actually feel my body more when I drank like I had more body awareness temporarily you know off
so yeah those are just some of the Dynamics that come into play in ethics didn’t really seem that important it was
more about okay well I would get mine right um you know I this kind of oh I deserve
this it doesn’t really matter if I screw up a little bit everybody does that these these kind of justifications like
our behavior is you know we justify things that we normally wouldn’t if we have this kind of more firm foundation
in ethics and not to be approved either because these ethics are actually there for our long-term well-being and
happiness I am so much better off in such more pleasant to be around and just
experience more um happiness day to day just from those five precepts but I I couldn’t see them
at the time right they just looked like two kind of uh prude thing you know why bother that you know that when I heard
about straight edge this movement straight edge when I was uh young I was like that’s not a thing nobody can do
that well I didn’t know about all the culture around it but I just the the no drinking or drugs that’s not impossible
hardly anybody can do that no way you know that’s the mindset I was in that that was so impossible that that can’t
even be done I mean of course I was really young and naive right and wanted to justify my own behavior but yeah and
so it it is really um an interesting situation with intoxicants
hey I haven’t seen any chat have we got anything on the chat
no no unless we have something in um Twitter or YouTube but uh the comment
was from T lady now we’ve got 32 meditators here it says so thank you for joining and I haven’t I don’t have um
YouTube dialed up and it looks like there’s 21 people listening on uh wisdom app and we’ve got what about seven
minutes or so left yeah um
I will just say too though that I I have the luxury of not doing a lot around the holidays right so my mom and other folks
they do a lot of the kind of cooking and preparation so that’s where it’s a
different Dynamic too because I don’t have to do all that so they’re they’re an extra level of stress and I will say
that I do excuse myself from time to time to meditate or at least take brief moments of silences too and it was
really interesting during Thanksgiving where my Sacred Space where I meditate in the room there the new family dog had just crapped all
over it right I mean literally if you’re a pet owner it’s not that big a deal but for me that doesn’t have a pet and this
is my Sacred Space right that I sit right there my meditation practice one of the most important things dog doesn’t
care it’s all over it so you know uh it’s really interesting to see how the
mind reacts to that too you know so what were some other things that I
talked about so one was our car we’ve done that we’ve done speech what are some other things that we were going to
talk about we did uh what we did the right effort right or in the livelihood so livelihood it’s really interesting to
find out what people do in their life right like what they do for a living and some of the the obvious things are maybe
you don’t want to be um if you really into spirituality maybe you don’t want to sell drugs for a living say there
might be a little bit more risk there are you might not want to you know kill Slaughter animals this life you know so
those are the classic things that are given uh but yeah livelihood is uh it’s really important you know um looking
back at some of the things I did for a living years ago and how they um were conducive or not conducive to our
long-term happiness and well-being in that of others yes yeah and it’s really hard it’s really
hard so say you know I I had a colleague and he went to work for a huge petroleum
company and the benefits he had were I
get free this free that free this free that free this free that and it just boosted in his had a young family you go
right so this is not is so more nuanced than that or you could say big tobacco
or you work for one of the fast food companies in their marketing department
you know getting or you work for uh one of those uh serial companies like um
uh that make very sweet sugary cereals and trying to push
casinos yes yeah it’s complicated you know we live in a
materialistic world I’m reading a really fantastic book at the moment by Johann Hari do you know this one stolen Focus
it’s fantastic and it just talks about how
um tech companies are stealing our focus at a collective level yes
they admit this and it’s the economy of attention like they pay big money to get
our eyeballs and our attention oh yeah right so if you work for one of those
big companies it’s a high status company I’m going to say Google or Facebook one of those looks amazing on your CV you
know you’re like wow I’m a brilliant coder I’m on 100 gazillion million dollars a year
and I work for one of those big companies and my job is to make people’s
lives awful and it’s got a status thing like it’s really interesting to kind of go okay so write livelihood
okay so it’s big Tech it’s no different to Big Oil no different to big farmers
sometimes no different big food yeah or less also yeah totally and uh you know I
I wanted to kind of say this at the beginning and um yeah these are really good points about like right livelihood
right like how much of this is for the benefit of my long-term happiness in that of others right like what kind of
harm is being done here what are my Alternatives can I just leave this right so these are all good questions but I
wanted to throw this in here because I I um talked to some friends before the show about this what if the whole thing
we just called off the holidays right uh which which I have a couple friends a couple and kids they’ve done this
they’ve pretty much made it clear to their friends and family that we don’t want to celebrate this traditional
holiday here we’re going to do something different right and it’s not because we don’t like it or I don’t want to speak
for them but for the most part they’ve been it’s been fairly supportive and I’m not wrecking
recommending this for everybody but I wonder about if there are alternatives
to this whole thing and how to go about them but I don’t think we’re going to have too much time to go into that so
Wendy would you want to wrap up with the the right livelihood do you want to address this topic and then what else
would you like to say as we wrap this up so I do want to actually this is a contemporary issue in Australia so it’s
summertime for us so we have our summer holidays with Christmas and New Year right up to the end of January where we
have Australia Day that’s our kind of Australia day is it the um 26th of January so that’s kind of our
summer holidays that’s you have it in July we have it this time of the year and because of the bushfires and the
weather actually they’re starting to say we need to not have our main holidays
for the year at Christmas time which is what everybody has done for the last 230 years we need to move it to March so as
a nation we need to move all our summer holidays to another time because
everybody goes to these camping places and holidays destinations in the summer holidays but it causes complete you know
terrible situation with the weather because we you know as you know a couple of years ago we had terrible fires you
know so it was just an interesting thing to think you know changing it actually who
knows in Australia we might be doing that as a country how are people taking it usually are they open and receptive
to it or are people like no that’ll never happen or I don’t want that to happen it’s a slow conversation but I thought
it was an interesting one the fires a couple of years ago were were traumatic
you know huge shoes I mean somebody somebody said are they bigger than the Californian
fires it’s like Australia is the size of the whole of the Mainland USA and the
whole country of Australia was on fire I was like is it because in California yeah I think so
you don’t forget about Australia’s yes yeah it’s a huge huge huge country
so but then let’s wrap it up there sure we’ll do that and uh we’ll just have to
wait to announce the next one we won’t do that here because I’ve got some big Life Changes coming up which will be
announced as they uh you know I guess on the next one or whenever if you if you don’t know already so all right Wendy
well thanks for joining and uh yeah looking forward to the next one and may you all
um learn the things you need to learn and master the things you need to master
around um the holidays uh if you’re if you’re doing the holidays this year so and also
you know if you make a bloody mess of things and it’s all a complete disaster welcome to the human race
it’s all just like you know that’s what it is it’s practice because you up
all the time and you just gotta keep practicing to try and get it right so give you catch yourself some slack is
what I’m saying absolutely makes it that yep whether you have one
minute of meditation practice or you know 50 years anything is still possible
good bad otherwise or whatever yep all right see you all later thank you
for joining thanks Josh thanks bye now
Integrating Presence 
60 thoughts on “Towards Mastering Holiday “Celebrations” | 12/21/2022 “Meditation Q & A With Wendy Nash” #04”