Duncan Trussell Family Hour - Ethan Nichtern

Episode Date: August 11, 2017

Is it possible to be enlightened and live in the world? Buddhist teacher and Shastri, Ethan Nichtern (Dharma Of The Princess Bride) joins the DTFH and we talk about meditation, the Shambhala tradition, and balancing relationships with a spiritual life. This episode brought to you by Casper.com JOIN US AT PATREON

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That's me slurping back a nice cold glass of powdered alpha brain, one of Onnit's amazing supplements. Alpha brain is a new tropic that definitely makes me feel a little bit like I've taken Adderall. That of course is my own anecdotal experience. Onnit no way backs up that claim. But I'm telling you pals, as someone who enjoys the good stuff, if you know what I mean, I really like alpha brain because Adderall makes me feel if I do it too much like my

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I've been taking alpha brain long before I was sponsored by Onnit and if you're looking for a nice caffeine replacement, alpha brain is the way to go. Onnit.com forward slash DTFH, you'll get 10% off your order. Friends, if you are in New York City on August 15th, I hope you'll come by the bell house for a recording of the DTFH. This is a DTFH first. It's the first time that I've ever interviewed extra dimensional beings. It's also the first time that I've ever had a medium and channeler on the podcast.

All selling world renowned clairvoyant is going to be the guest for this live DTFH. Emile Amos of the Holy Sons is going to be playing some music and Robert Ryan is going to be leading us in an oom. I hope you will come down. That is August 15th. You can get tickets at dunkintrustle.com. See you on Tuesday. Lots of you have been sending me emails asking what's the best way for you to have a fun

and safe time during the upcoming solar eclipse. To be honest, I'm not a cosmologist. I'm not up to date on all the best eclipse safety mechanisms or maneuvers that you can do to make sure that you come out of the eclipse in one piece. And so I have with us here today in the studio Lord Zaron Falth of the 14th Luciferian Legion, the Archons of the Sun, the very one who brought the child of the sea queen into the heart of the sun and stabbed the obsidian dagger through his heart ensuring that we would have sunlight for 20,000 years.

He is the one who crushed the sea serpent Nurnanan. He is the one who will never return to grob and he is here with us today with some eclipse tips. So get out your notebooks and get ready to learn how to have a safe and fun eclipse holiday. The number one way for you to ensure that you will be safe during this eclipse is to paint a circle of goat's blood in the sand and lay upon it, arms outstretched, completely naked. When the eclipse happens, in tone this prayer, O brave father of the seven lights of time,

hear my prayer, I offer unto thee my eternal servitude. Let me serve you in the minds of Karg, accept the offering of my heart and the heart of my children and let me serve you in the minds of Karg. Those ancient minds filled with bone, let me serve you in the minds of Karg. Let me flay my flesh from my bones so that I can experience true purity by being a skeleton slave of the great Legion Master. In your name I pray. Short.

Dorfann. Diasolo. Methesdor. Binog. Shuang. Upon intoning this during the eclipse, the great blood cherry will descend and carry you to the minds of Karg. You will find refuge in the minds of Karg.

You will not experience the tribulations of the coming days of blood. Enjoy the eclipse and if you're going to barbecue, make sure you have a barbecue thermometer because sometimes if you undercook chicken, you can get quite ill and make sure you don't look directly into the eclipse but where eclipse goggles. Have a great eclipse friends, I'll see you in the minds of Karg. Ooh, do we have a great podcast for you today. One of the light, Buddhist teacher and author Ethan Nickturn is with us today. We're going to jump right into it but first, some quick business.

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That's patreon.com forward slash DTFH. We also have a shop with t-shirts and posters that's located at DuncanTrestle.com. All right, let's do this podcast friends. Today's guest is a Buddhist teacher with an official title Shastri. That means he's a senior teacher in the Shambhala Buddhist tradition and during this podcast one of my favorite things to happen during a podcast happened, which is I began to realize that I was sitting across from dare I say an awakened being. This is a really cool podcast with an amazing person who's written a fantastic book on Buddhism

called The Road Home, a Contemporary Exploration of the Buddhist Path and he also has coming out in the next month or so another great book on Buddhism called The Dharma of the Princess Bride. You can find out all you need to find out about Ethan by going to Ethannicturn.com. If you live in NYC, you can go to the Shambhala Center and take classes with him. So now everybody please open those third eyes, pull out your astro water guns, fill them up with distilled love energy and spray that into the net of Indra so that at this moment Ethan and his brand new baby get a shower of pure radiant love.

Welcome to the Dunkin' Trussell Family Hour podcast Ethannicturn. Thanks for having me. Especially you just had a baby man. This is serious stuff going on in your life. Yeah. Yeah. Well, actually the baby was due today, the day we were recording but was born three weeks early so we're three weeks into parenting.

A preemie. Preemie, yeah. She was six pounds, 13 ounces so not too small. I'm a preemie. Yeah? Yeah. I was a preemie. Obviously I'm not anymore.

You look pretty well sized. Preemies, wait, what is the mystical thing people say about preemies? I don't know. Something like they've got, like there's some mystical attribute applied to them. You know, like when you're desperately trying to look for something to feel confident about. Right. You know, fuck. You can just make something up.

What's good about preemies? I was a preemie. Oh yeah, preemies are like angels that came here too soon or something like that. They're really thoughtful about rare meat or something. That's it. Preemies really are good at cooking raw meats. Yeah, sashimi, great for preemies. Preemies are like, they make the best sushi chefs for sure.

No kidding. So congratulations. Thanks so much. Have you put any like raw meats around your daughter yet? No, she's really just straight up milk, straight up my wife's milk. That's it. One trick pony. That counts as raw.

Yeah, it's raw. Yeah. It's not vegan. No, I guess it's not. That's a weird thing to think about. I don't know what the actual, maybe vegan includes, you can only have products of your own species. I don't know what the definition of vegan is actually.

Is your wife vegan? No, we're not. But we try to eat healthy and minimal meats. Every once in a while I eat fish and chicken, but not a lot of red meat. So the milk has fish and chicken in it. Good point. Yeah. What's the name for that in Buddhism, where everything is connected to everything else?

I think it's interdependence is the English translation. Yeah. What's the, what's it called? Is it just called interdependence or it's? Or interconnection? Yeah, interconnection, interdependence. So yeah, so the milk coming from your wife somewhat is a form of a chicken that was slaughtered. Yeah.

So you have like, Thich Nhat Hanh goes back into, you know, the sunlight and, you know, the trees and all of these things that are connected. So he goes pretty deep. My first book was about interdependence from a sort of urban standpoint, one city. So I kind of tried to go deep into like, you know, having a coffee mug that says don't mess with Texas, but it was made in China. Right. Yeah.

Or I don't know if you just saw the thing that popped up. I guess people were protesting Nike and one of the protesters was wearing Nike. I mean, it does get interesting, doesn't it? I mean, this is something that where no matter what you, what you try to do, you seemingly can't escape from violence in the world because at some point, just your very existence is dependent on some level of suffering and there's no way to escape it, right? Yeah. The way I would say it is you can't escape from participation, you know, so, so one

way of looking at interdependence from a Buddhist standpoint is that everything is connected like the chicken that is in the mother's milk, even if it's a human mother, if he eats chicken. But another way of looking at it is that your mind is always interconnected with what it's perceiving, you know, so that one way of looking at interdependence is you can't escape participation in what you're perceiving. In other words, if you're perceiving something, you are part of it. There's no way to remove yourself from that, which is perceived. So if you, if there's suffering in the world and you're perceiving it, you are participating

in that suffering. I'm not, that's not saying causing it. That's not saying it's anybody or your fault, but that there's a interdependence of perception, perceiver and perceived. That is so heavy, man. And I like, I'll tell a joke, lighten it up. I don't want to lighten it up. Yeah, it is heavy.

It's deep, you know, for sure. Yeah, it's deep, but it's also complex. Like the, the idea is this is in fact in Buddhism, one place where I get really like a little confused. It's so the idea is I look at something that's suffering. I don't know, go to the zoo, go to the zoo, just go to the zoo and see a gorilla and or even better sea world, go to sea world. And that thing that you're seeing duck doing leaps out of the water is suffering to some

degree. It's stuck in a fucking aquarium. It's supposed to swim deep into the ocean and go far and hunt with its family. That's a slave. You're looking at a sentient slave thing. And so by watching it, you're participating by observing it, you become part of it. You're intertangled in it just by watching it. Is that what you're saying?

Yeah, you're, you're part of the, of the situation that's bringing it about. I mean, obviously sea world wouldn't exist without an audience. So walking down the street, I see a person who is, and, you know, homeless or is it, you know, crazy or something? Yeah, how am I participating in that? Well, you live in the same world and the same society that creates different situations where a person becomes homeless, you know, and there's probably certain predominant influences about how certain people become homeless, you know, race, class, mental

health and well-being. So now when we say we're participating again, I think the reason interdependence gets really heavy for people almost paralytically. So is I think because we grew up with a more Western religious modes of guilt, we assume that participation or connection means it's my fault. Yes, that's right. Whereas this just means this is part of the world that you're inhabiting, that you're interacting with.

And by actually perceiving it, it means it's, it's, it's part of you. You're connected to it. How does this differ from Christianity or from theistic religions? Is there, like in Christianity, is this idea of participation still there too? Or is this, doesn't Buddhism kind of move away from other world religions in the sense that that idea of interdependency goes on, goes further, right? To point to something that's really quite scary to a lot of people, which is you really don't have an innate self.

Right, right. You know, I grew up half my family Christian, half of my family Jewish. I don't know enough about the causal metaphysics of Christianity, but I do know that, you know, Buddhism being a non-theistic tradition. I wouldn't call it a religion because I, if it was a religion, it would be to my mind, one of the few that's non-theistic, but I don't think you have to view it as a religion, but that notion of the absence of a creator or a sort of overarching conscious being that's acts in some creative role or some salvation role.

The absence of that is something that distinguishes Buddhism. So it's almost like interdependence. It's a much more scientific look at the universe because it's sort of saying what caused interdependence, you know, as both Chögyum Chungpa and Inigo Montoya like to say, your guess is as good as mine. You know, it's just, this is the way the universe works. Is it, is it true? I mean, I don't know what it's anything that they say the Buddhist Buddha

said is true because who the hell knows someone wrote it down after the fact, probably pretty far after the fact. But is it true, he would say when people asked him about the afterlife for the concept of the soul sticking around, he'd say, it doesn't matter. What's the point of bothering over that? There's, yeah, there's been different, you know, in terms of reincarnation or soul or the perpetuation of, you know, I like to think of iterations of consciousness. It's not clear whether reincarnation was the Buddha's view or it was actually

just the view of the society that he was working in teaching the nature of mind within because it was part of the early Hindu and Vedic way of looking at the universe, this notion of being born again and again into samsara and eventually trying to find some liberation from the cycle of painful rebirths. I mean, it's a really interesting narrative for a time on earth when life was probably really hard in the Iron Age. And so that notion of like, how do we get out of this cycle of rebirth? Now, did he create that narrative or did he just work within a culture that had

like a pop culture that had that narrative? It's not really that clear. Some Buddhists believe in reincarnation a lot, like in the Tibetan system, which Shambhala descends from a lot of Zen practitioners, you know, or teachers don't talk about it at all. I think it's helpful to think about the causality of identity and consciousness. But like, who were you in your last life? Who was I?

I mean, that just feels like, I don't know, I'd rather watch Netflix and think about that. Can you imagine? I mean, it would be useful, though, because it's like, I can already use shit to happen in this life to brush off being an asshole, right? I could, you know what I mean? I could be like, ah, you just don't know what I went through, man. In 2013, you have no idea. You know, I had cancer, you know, it's a bad year for me.

I can blame it on that. Or I could, you know what I mean? I could think like, ah, man, when I was a kid, this, you know, shit went bad at this point or whatever and blame it on that. So if we had memory of our past lives, you could be like, listen, man. I'm sorry I did that. But in the fucking 1800s, I got burned at the stake by fucking assholes. So I'm, you know, so it would really become so complex, wouldn't it?

Yeah. And so I do think one reason it's helpful, you know, I talked about this in the road home when I was talking about karma, because I take a much more and I think my tradition takes a much more psychological approach to karma. Chogyam Trungpa used to talk about noticing your habitual patterns. Sorry about that, man. Go ahead. If you can pick up for that shrill, glass breaking, poodle bark.

And poodle karma, poodle karma. Yeah. So Chogyam Trungpa, the founder of the Shambhala tradition, who is my father's teacher, talked about karma as noticing and working with your habitual patterns. So like, let's say, I don't know if you struggle with any kind of insecurities. It's so what's interesting about me is I don't like what I've never suffered. I've never felt any negative anything. Everything I do is quite healthy.

I've never had a negative pattern at all at all. It's weird. It's different. So how do you deal with people like me who have, do you just look down upon us with pity or do you kind of like? Yeah, that's my pattern. I look down on you guys. Are we like your zoo?

Just go to the zoo and see the Ethan peoples. Yes, I have clearly have negative patterns. And in fact, I'd say I'm mostly just a bundle of negative patterns with a few in there that I think are okay. Yeah. Yeah. So I think like when you start practicing meditation or studying how the mind works, I think you really start to feel like a lot of our shit is really deep seated.

Yes. Like it's like, wow, that's like, and that's why a lot of people give up on meditation is they thought it was going to be this transcendent voyage to an oasis. Right. And it's more like, oh my God, this is like a junkyard of self negativity. Yes. And maybe I should just go do SoulCycle instead, you know, which SoulCycle, by the way, I often joke is the most literal translation of the word samsara that you

can you, I've taken you've been to a SoulCycle. I have been, I've friends have done it. I mean, it's just an intensive bicycle workout. But I think it's about getting into your body. And I think that's really wonderful. I have a yoga practice. I love getting into my body, but I think a lot of people choose that sometimes because the mind scares us, right?

And the mind scares us just because it's, we haven't really looked at it very much and it feels very deep. It feels intense and getting this back to the reincarnation discussion. I just think there's another way of looking at reincarnation is like maybe my insecurities or my, you know, self criticisms. Maybe this has been going on longer than just like since I was a kid. And so the idea that I'm going to get out of it after a 10 minute meditation, right, like maybe this is going to be a longer journey.

And I have to be kinder to myself and take it slower to work with my mind and open my heart, you know, God damn it, man. So that's how I find reincarnation useful. And that gives you compassion for other people too. Because when you're around someone who's stuck in a pattern and you think, you know, they might have been going through this for yeah, a thousand lifetimes. Oh, yeah.

So to think you're going to, like in any way, help them get out of it with a couple of chats on the phone is not realistic, right? Exactly, exactly. And, you know, so just to not this soul cycle too much is a joke about the samsara thing, but it is literally a literal translation of the word samsara. Oh, I got it now. Oh my God, that's so trippy, dude. It's so trippy.

That's got to be intentional, right? Right. But if you go to a bicycling class or a yoga class or anything and you're like, I'm interested in making friends with myself and learning how my mind works, then it can be incredibly helpful. If we're doing those things to just avoid ourselves, it's probably just going to perpetuate the cycle further. Right.

That's so fucking nuts, man. I can't believe that's what soul cycle means. It is samsara. It's samsara, yeah. Yeah. And this is, you know, it seems so deep. You know, you start it's kind of like pulling up a carpet in the house and then you're like, whoa,

looks like the floor has got some water damage there, man. Going to have to pull up the floor and then underneath the floor. It's like, my God, the planks holding up the floor rotting. And then you start pulling up those planks. Holy shit. Somebody buried a dead body down here. And then underneath the dead body is like more and more. It never ends, you know, and then you begin to wonder to yourself,

is there any part of me that isn't a habitual mechanism that is just causing suffering to me and the people around me? Yeah. So that feels pretty heavy. But it does. But what do you think? Well, what my tradition would say is the part of you that knows that you're suffering is a very undamaged part of you.

That that awareness and that openness that can see clearly like, oh, I just did that thing I always do again, or can see that in other people. That's really the working basis, you know, in different Buddhist traditions. I mean, in many different traditions, it has a word. But in classical Buddhism, it's called bodhicitta, awakened heart, awakened mind, that that just natural, unconstructed ability to be aware and see your own habitual patterns, see your own schmutz to use the Yiddish, you know. Schmutz.

And to actually not view it as a fundamental flaw, but something to be worked with because you do discover a lot about yourself. And it gets very, you know, I think when you meditate, you notice a lot of your self-deceptions and it could create a lot of. Or it could amplify a lot of self-hatred to meditate. And I think it actually does that for a lot of people, and that's why most people are not meditating. You know, we've reached this point, I think, where people are like,

whenever I tell people, you know, I grew up Buddhist, and I teach Buddhism and meditation and write about it. There, we've clearly reached the point where that's a cool thing. Like, compared to my mother who grew up in small town Arkansas and fled to art school, you know, I just imagine her telling her parents Stuttgart, Arkansas in 1973, you know, I'm studying with this crazy wisdom Tibetan Buddhist master. Yeah, she's in a cult.

Right, whereas now when I'm like, oh, yeah, meditation, they're like, oh, that is so great that you do that, that is so great. And then the next thing is usually like, I wish I could do that. Yes, I wish, well, because you and your dad have this like really interesting composure, I guess, the way to put it, that comes from the practice that you've both obviously been doing for some time. It's discernible, you know, it's a... Whereas like, I'm like a fucking shotgun, man,

I've got like just pellets flying everywhere. You guys have this like really even keel and this very precise way of analyzing what's going down. And there's a grace to it, a skillfulness, I guess, is what they call it in Buddhism too. So when people are around that, yeah, in the same way when I'm around, when I'm at the beach and somebody walks by with like a six pack, I'm like, fuck, wish I worked out.

You know what I mean? So it is a thing we desire, you know, we do want that. I would want this equanimity. I would like this. I'd also like to see you when it isn't there. I wonder how often you guys are losing your shit. Well, I mean, and that's totally, you know, especially with everything going on in the spiritual teacher arena these days,

I really wanted to write about and, you know, have a more personal approach to like, what is a person who does these practices? How do they handle relationships? Yes, relationships. Yeah. So, I mean, and it's chaotic, you know? And, you know, thank you so much for complimenting me, complimenting my dad, who's way cooler than I am.

I disagree 100%. He's goofier. But he hangs out with very cool people. Listen, it's not a cool competition. The Nickturns are fucking awesome though, OK? No, thank you. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, there's just, I grew up in New York City, you know,

child of divorce, you know, and there's like, and growing up in the Shambhala community, like when Chogim Chonpa died, very chaotic, very human, sometimes very brilliant and compassionate, sometimes a very dysfunctional situations. He was an alcoholic, wasn't he? I, you know, I'm probably not qualified to answer that question. He drank and he did definitely die without taking care of his body. I can say that much. He's not my teacher.

I mean, he held a kind of more unconventional, crazy wisdom style of being in the world. He didn't sleep very much, is my understanding. He was just with his students all the time and he drank a lot. And, yeah, I mean, I don't feel the need to defend or attack him. But, yeah, he definitely died because he didn't take care of his body and something going on with his liver was part of that. Yeah, sure.

That's, I mean, alcohol is a brutal poison, man, but it doesn't discount the teacher, whatever he's doing or whatever it is. I don't know why people get caught up in that crazy idea that for someone to be a dispenser of wisdom, they have to also simultaneously be in some peak health. I just don't think it works like that, especially in that lineage, right? Right. Who, because the lineage, what, is it Marpa? Is it Marpa or is it?

Yeah, so that's one of the lineages that comes through Shambhala in the Tibetan tradition is the Kagi lineage. And one of the founders of that lineage was Marpa, who was, you know, this is 10th or 11th century Tibet. But a couple of things that are important about Marpa, he had serious anger management issues supposedly. So he had kind of transformed his anger into the wisdom side of anger, which Tantric Buddhism says that every destructive emotion has a wisdom side too.

The other thing that's interesting about Marpa is he was a Buddhist scholar, but he also was a total householder. He had a farm. So he was one of the early examples of a lineage of supposedly enlightened masters who were completely part of their family and social world. And that's what Shambhala is all about is like not actually necessarily becoming a monk or none or a yogi in a cave, but actually like how do you do it and hang out in a city and how do you have relationships and how do you raise kids

or how do you not raise kids? How do you deal with your poodle? You know, right? So I love that. And, you know, that notion of the householder kind of translates into our modern lineage as the ideal of the warrior, which is someone who's brave enough to be in the world in a compassionate way, and which also means in an imperfect way because we're human, you know?

And so that's really that sort of perspective on really being transparent about one's own process with relationships was really why I wanted to write the new book that I wrote. And it's great, man. It's great. And that's coming from someone who's not God, forgive me for saying this. Not a big fan of the prince's bride. Well, it's not it's not really about the princess bride.

It is. I mean, for I'm sure since we're of the similar generation, a lot of people who are listening either love or hate the princess. Most people love it. I just sounded like the biggest asshole I'm playing. No, it's fine. I know some people who don't love it, actually, but the point of using the princess bride, which for the geeks, there are plenty of princess bride references,

but was to sort of frame like a path through some kind of spiritual practice in this postmodern 20th, late 20th, early 21st century world, realizing that we have a culture and our fairy tale culture, our pop culture and sort of an era of culture where we don't believe in a lot of these tropes or memes of like true love very easily. So the princess bride really functioned as sort of like, here's a person who's loved a story for 30 years. It seems to me that it seemed like, yeah, the princess bride was there and

you were using it in this really smart way. But like what you were saying, the pulse that was running through that book was so much bigger and so smart. Man, it was really, really, really good. You're when you came up before I start recording, I was like, you got a ghostwriter because like the writing is that's an insulting thing to ask someone. Like I was like hanging out with you for like six minutes. I'm like, there's no way you wrote this incredible book.

So forgive me for that. Man, it's just I was so impressed with the, just the writing is so fluid and easy to like apprehend, to comprehend rather. And it was great. It's just a great book, man. It's someone who suffers from miserable, miserable relationship problems throughout my entire life, man. I, they're just, they're so complex, so unwieldy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so trying, so tiresome that I understand why a person would want to shave their head and venture off into a cave somewhere and stare into fire until they collapse in a heap rather than have to deal with just the everyday inevitable difficulties of interacting with human beings. It's brutal. It is brutal. Yeah.

And I think we can either pretend that's not the case or be, um, you know, kind of, uh, I don't know, um, non-transparent about the whole thing. We can just pretend that there's, if you've mastered some kind of spirituality that you're automatically beloved by everyone, the people close to you never have any issues with you. You never have issues with them. So really, I think the book for me had this quality of like trying to bust myths on both sides.

And, you know, so one of the big themes of the book is that there's no such thing as a relationship expert that I'm not saying that people can't get help from a relationship therapist that I think I have some friends who are relationship therapists and they do a great job of guiding people through processes of communication and reconciliation or separation. Right. Um, but the term relationship expert is actually an oxymoron because relationship going back to interdependence is at least two people and

expert is one person. So literally the term's an oxymoron. And I think when it comes to expertise in relationship or total fulfillment in relationship, we have these myths. One set of myths comes from these Eastern spirituality that like, if somebody has performed certain yogic rituals or meditated or done enough practice or ceremony, suddenly they have a really easy time with all, all their friends love them, you know, their family relationships.

That's the last part of the book, you know, um, Princess bride came out the year that Chogun Trangpa died. My father considers a second father and my grandfather and his wife committed double suicide together. So right. So this theme of like family relationships. Um, and people think like if you, the Dalai Lama must be amazing at relationships. Yeah, sure.

Which he's an amazing person, but I don't think he's amazing at romantic relationships. He's a monk, right? Yeah. So, and then on the Western side, you have this sort of myth or set of myths, which I really think is like our rom-com culture, which has just created this objectification of like happiness. Yes.

Find the soulmate. Oh, that, you know what? When you find the fucking soulmate, that's when the ukulele starts playing, right? The ukulele plays the credits role, paradise. This is the thing, man. This is like, they need to start a fucking rom-com at the end of a rom-com. And yeah, that's one of the, that's, that's what I say in one of the middle

chapters. Sorry, sorry to, sorry to snatch from your book. No, that's fine. You probably said it yourself. No, actually, no, I guarantee that that was in front of the author. I just stole your idea. Well, that's a problem, man. From reading this stuff, it just sinks into my head and pops out.

But that's another thing about interdependence is like a lot of our good ideas are just kind of floating in the ether. I wrote your book. You wrote, yeah. Dharma of the Princess Bride by Duncan Dressel. Can we change the title? And this podcast is called the Ethan Nicktern Family Hour. So, so we're good.

But this, this, and now I do work all reading it from your book. This, this is a brilliant idea because it's like, let's face it, man. This bullshit that has been given to us about the way a healthy relationship works or looks. Like, for example, uh, I have friends who are like, you know, my grandparents have never gotten in a fight in their, in their lives. Right. They, and I'm like, well, which probably means they've never

talked into each other. No, it means your grandparents are fucking liars is what it means. That's all, that's all. It means your grandparents lie to you. They've gotten in fights you out of your mind. They've, how do you not? Right. What are your grandparents fucking replicants or some shit?

What are they, plug them in at night? No, they fight. So it's like, but these illusions get seeded into our minds. And they're perfection. They're myths about some kind of perfection. Terrible myths, right? Terrible myths. And, and they destroy, they probably do destroy relationships because when

you're in the reality of the relationship, the sweatiness of the thing, the confusion of the thing, the non resolution of certain things, it's, this is, let me ask you something as a person who is, as a person who is not a relationship, but it's just written a brilliant book on relationships. Don't you think it's easier to be alone? So you're, you're talking to a guy who got married a little over a year ago and has a three week old baby girl. So I think it's easy.

I think we're never alone on the interdependent friendship standpoint, right? So romantic relationship is not the only kind of relationship that aids any kind of spiritual path. So the whole first part of the book is about close friendships. And I found it, we all need alone time to actually be able to work with our own mind, just know who we are and pursue our own creative goals, our own meaning in life. I've found it easier not to be alone, but it or more helpful not to be alone. But I get what you're saying.

I know I felt that way before that just like lead me alone go. It's really, I mean, I think it's a very personal choice, depending on how we want to arrange our life in relationships. And, you know, that's one of the things I take on in the book is that like I grew up with Buddhist parents, their teacher probably was not a conventional example of a nuclear family person, right? My parents, great people, they were not a good example of a nuclear family. Right.

So that idea of actually pushing or developing to the point where I could have a good family life, you know, a partner and maybe children was always kind of a myth or idealized in my mind a little bit because I came from non examples of that growing up in New York. So most of the people I knew were children of divorce too, et cetera. So, but working with the idealizing of something sometimes creates even further obstacles to actually making it so. And so, you know, that's why I love in The Princess Bride, you know, the notion of Buttercup, which is such a ridiculous name for an idealized object of romantic affection.

And so, but we are all kind of on some level, like if you think it's easier being alone usually because you're like the real people I've met, do not make good friends or good partners or and we are all looking if we could find a Buttercup or Studmuffin or, you know, whatever, whatever the non gendered name you can think of is, we would, we would probably choose that, you know. And so I do talk about my own quest, looking for Buttercups and trying to be a good Buddhist person. And I do think my wife is kind of my Buttercup, you know, but, but it's very, it's very

human, you know, and does she ever hold the book against you? Like when something goes down, is she ever like, well, she's only, she only read the, you know, it's just coming out this year. So she hasn't like received a lot of friends feedback, maybe, but she, no, I mean, does she ever like take things that you teach? Yeah. And when you're not living up to them, like raise your eyebrow and say, look at this, what's going on here?

Where's the person who is good at equanimity and understands about accepting other people? Do you ever get in that kind of fight? Not with her. She's really skillful at how and when to give feedback, but there's definitely in my life. And I joke about this, that a lot of times people will use, well, that's not very Buddhist of you. Yes. But a lot of times people try to pull that shit on you when they're trying to manipulate

you and you won't let them. Yes. Why won't you let me manipulate you? That's not very Buddhist of you. So, you know, she's, she's good at telling me when something's not working for her with, without making it about, because you can always, if somebody's, I mean, I have a title as a lineage holder in the Shambhala tradition. So you can always put somebody on a pedestal just to give them a hard time.

What's the title? Shastri, which means a senior teacher. So it's a, that's a Sanskrit word. So you could say anytime that, that person disappoints you, you could just say, well, that's, you know, of course you're not a real whatever, you know, but being a real Buddhist teacher just means you're a real person and you're trying to become, especially in my tradition, more and more authentic in being who you are. But I've got to say, man, that word Shastri, I see why they call you that, because the

way you're doing this, just with me right now, clearly is like, there's a rhythm to it, there's a precision or something. It's like, it's not a, it's not, it doesn't feel like it feels off the cuff, but it feels practiced or something in a good way, you know, I get why they call you a Shastri, because there, you are, you are, you're teaching me right now. It's really, it's really cool. How do they, was there like an initiation? Did you have to go through some kind of like ritual to get this title or?

So my teacher, who's the head of the Shambhala community, really great guy who is a Chogyam Trungpa's oldest son named Sakyang Mipam. He empowered me as a senior teacher in 2010. So I was 32 when that happened. So that's a little weird to be living in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and be a senior Buddhist teacher at age 32. And I mean, it's good. I had, you know, people like my father, who's been a Buddhist teacher, musician,

composer, living in the world for a long time. So it's, it's interesting because, uh, you know, most of my close friends and family and, um, even students just, I think the reason people like hanging out with me or working with me is that I'm not trying to sit on any pedestal or any higher seat. But, um, you definitely get, I mean, everybody gets subtle projections. You know, I'm sure whenever you're getting feedback from an audience, there's a lot of subtle projections, but it's interesting to have this sort of title of some kind of, I don't know, mastery of an Eastern tradition, you know, and be a

Western, you know, white male person with all kinds of other privilege. And it's, it's an odd, um, balance to, to try to strike. And definitely people think you're supposed to be a certain way. And again, the warrior tradition of Shambhala is basically saying you're supposed to be an awake person in the world, you know, and this world's nuts right now. Yes. Yes, it is, man. So we have to allow for a little, um, chaos and a little bit of, um, humanity in, in who

we try to be as, uh, who I try to be as a teacher and a practitioner. So I try to, you know, that's one of the big things in the book in terms of working with any kind of psychological or spiritual truth is I, I think transparency is very important, not exhibitionism, you know, but, you know, in Western psychology, for example, there's often, I mean, this is changing and evolving, but there's often this notion of total non-disclosure of like, do not share anything about yourself or your own process. And there is a good method there because you let the person you're trying to work

with or heal really let them have the space and have it be about them without distracting from that. Right. But I also think there's a history in Western psychology of non-disclosure because you don't want the patient or the student or the client to realize that you're a flawed person as well, and you're afraid they would stop paying you for your services. Yes.

And, but I think, I think that's a harmful protection because I think a lot of times when we try to just be like, I'm going to be a mirror for you and I'm not even here and I'm just going to reflect back to you what's going on with you. We end up coming across like a brick wall, you know, and, and I think for me, the, the Buddhist teachers, the other teachers, you know, like Sharon Salzburg, who's a very close teacher and friend and mentor of mine, who really are able to express some kind of mastery, they actually tell you who they are. They are open about how the process works for them or what they're struggling with

or what they know to be clear because I think that's what this path is really about is it's like, as I say in the book, tell me how to be in the world or show me how to be in the world by telling me how you are in the world, you know, and then I'll find my way. So getting back to your question, is it all easier alone? Not for me, but maybe for you. Right. People have all kinds of different, you know, and the most famous teacher in my

tradition is a, is a nun, family children. So there's all kinds of different paths possible here. Right. Yeah. And when I, in the book, I never got the feeling that you were advising that this is the way to be in a relationship or anything like that. It's just, it's, it's such a, it's just a lot to bite off, you know, having to, but then on the other hand, I think God, you know, something about it, you know, when

our relationship grows and evolves and matures and becomes more peaceful, is beautiful to see, you know, because you do get through things with people. You do like, it's, you do like grow together and help each other. And there's something incredible about that. You know, so you might miss that if you were dedicated to a life of isolation or something like that. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, I think, you know, it's interesting. I've thought about this a lot because, for example, in the Tibetan tradition, practitioners sometimes would like go away for 12 year retreats. And these are practitioners who had also taken a vow to be of benefit to all beings. Right. So that always created a kind of friction in my mind. Like, so you're going to go into isolation for 12 years to benefit all

beings and I could never figure out how that worked. I think, again, the reincarnation thing is like important there. Like, I think those folks who did that, who said, I'm going to spend the rest of my life in retreat for the benefit of all beings, they're looking at like future consciousness, future lifetimes, future worlds that they are going to be able to be more present with. It's like these guys or these ladies would go on a like a, you know, 12 year retreat with the same intentionality that I might go on a week long retreat,

you know, but I also feel like I need to live in the world. And that's really part of my practice. And that's the notion of the Shambhala warrior is the notion of actually using your imperfect presence in society to help bring about enlightened society, which does not mean perfect society. It just means awake, compassionate society, like some humans, some authentically human society. And so, you know, I think that people really struggle with because of the

romcom myth and because of the myth of some kind of spiritual mastery, people really struggle with personal relationships because it's, it's, it's chaos. Wait, are you guys like doctors pretending to be patients in some kind of lunatic asylum or something? Like, is that the idea? You're, you're like, whoa, that's wild, man. You guys are like, that's really funny. You're so like ideas.

Yeah, that's one analogy. The other analogy is it could just be like, you know, like some of the people who've been the most helpful in learning how to parent, because there's so many things three weeks in that you have like, what the hell is a diaper genie, Duncan? You probably don't even know. Are you kidding? Do you know about a diaper genie? The diaper genie is granted every single wish that I've ever had.

I have a diaper. You rub the diaper and the spirit comes out and like it grants your wishes. Right? Yeah. Yeah. So maybe we're just, you know, people who are a little further along the process. Like we've have a one year old kid and you have a three week old kid and we have a few more tricks up our sleeves.

You have some tricks and let me say this, man, because, you know, people aren't here in the room with us and people, I don't know how many times people out there run into like actual chastries. That's what you are. Yeah, that's, I don't know how many times people actually run into that. So I've got to report in on it, man. And I'll tell you, like you're, I'm trying to think of a way to put this. It's the same with your dad.

It's the same with Rom Doss, the same with Sharon Salzburg, same with Jack cornfield. You're human or something. Or so I like that, but there's something else in there. It's like you've done, you like, it's hard to explain it, but the, the, and I don't know how much of it translates in the way that you're talking, but what you're saying about this concept of being in the world, this concept of teaching through being part of the world, it's something that's just clicking in my head now. It's like, Oh, I get it.

So you guys are like, you aren't really, you're, you are us, but you're different than us because people like me, we haven't done this, I mean, most people don't even know what a cog you lineage is. Yeah. Most people have no idea who Chokim Trump is. Most people don't know what Shambhala is or know even what Buddhism is. A lot of people don't. And if they do know what Buddhism is, their understanding of Buddhism is based

on something they've seen in some movies, maybe, maybe they saw some kind of like part of a documentary about it. They certainly don't know what the four noble truths are. They don't know what interdependency is. They don't know. And so when you, when you're around someone who has absorbed it to the point that you're teaching it and have been given a title, whose identity has become a meshed in it, then you, you realize, whoa, this is, this has in

some way or another, and this is a dramatic word. It's destroyed you in the sense of like, maybe what you would have been if you didn't run into Buddhism, I don't know that what that would be possessed you. Is that another way to put it? It's altered you. You seem altered in a good way, but in a profound way. You know what I'm saying? And this idea that you guys are altering yourself through a lifetime of effort and

focus and digestion of these ideas to the point of being sort of like metaphysically configured by it. And then you're infiltrating society to be part of society intentionally to bring peace into the world. That is psychedelic. Yeah, I mean, so let's go back to you when you said it's destroyed you. Cause I mean, so there's, there's two ways to talk about, and I'm by any definition, I am very much still in process.

Okay, sure. Like, yes, I agree. I'm like, a lot of folks seem to be having issues that I feel like maybe a little bit more like, Oh, I can, I can hold that in mind. I can work with that. I can see that, but I get caught sometimes too. I am, I am not, I am not fully awakened, but is that possible? I think so.

I mean, but I need one who is fully awakened, you know, so this is like, there's in Buddhism is like a really intensely analytic and there's one definition of enlightenment that there's 10 different stages and that the first stage happens when you're able to, when you are meditating, when you're in a state of meditative awareness, you are completely without sense of self fixation, you're completely compassionate, open. And then when you arise from the meditative seat, you are sort of back into slightly neurotic, slightly self absorbed, you know, much lighter than,

you know, some of the people we know. But you're still, that's, that's the last stages is to sort of even out the meditative experience with the experience in every other aspect of life. Oh, you mean, so it's kind of like the meditation. Begins to merge in all other point and these 10 steps are the different ways that it kind of spreads into your life. But that work is also about dealing with relationships, right? So because relationships are where we get hung up, we get triggered, we get caught,

we get blindsided, we, we, uh, you know, a parent can make you feel like you haven't felt in 10 years and you're like, why am I regressing? Yes, yes, sure, sure. So, you know, I do think when you say this self, you know, is destroyed. That is one way of, I think a lot of this is linguistic and it depends on what narrative you choose, right? So one way of looking at enlightenment is it's the total loss of this self fixated solid identity, which is called the ego, which I have problems

with that translation just because there's so many different, like the Freudian definition of ego is very different from the Eastern definition of ego. Okay. You mean like the, the, the ego and Sue, you're talking about something complete. You think they're, they're, when they talk about the destruction of the ego, what do they mean? Um, when the Eastern, yeah, yeah.

I mean, so the ego, the, the term in like Sanskrit or Pali, the ancient Buddhist, uh, languages is Atman or Ata and it, it means something more like soul, like the peach pit, like the solid part of you. Yeah. Okay. So the thing that's always confusing when like yoga teachers or meditation teachers or Buddhists use the language of, of destroying the ego is actually that's not what the Buddha did.

He said, Oh, there, that Atman, that soul part of you, that solid thing that you think is me and needs to be defended. I've looked for it very carefully and it doesn't exist. So it's actually not about destroying something. It's about realizing that you were misperceiving something. Wow. Okay. So that's why destroying ego is not actually a Buddhist concept,

but it sounds like a, I'm a semantic. It is semantic, but it's, you know, it's semantic. Sometimes don't matter at all. And sometimes they, they totally shape our view. They destroyed Santa Claus for me, man. Yeah. You know, just by telling me there's no Santa Claus. Yeah.

That destroyed, I'll never forget it. When it happened, I'll never forget. I was kind of suspicious. And then it was like, fuck. Yeah. Really? Yeah. This whole thing, the presents, really?

The presents, the cookies, really? Why would you do this to us? Yeah. You know, this is a real thing. And in the same way what you're talking about, it's so in a weird way, you guys are like, you guys are like the kids who figured out that there is no Santa Claus. Yeah.

But the, the, the notion in the Shambhala teachings, the Shambhala teachings often take a much more positive approach because rather than talking about non-self or non-soul, the ideal of this way of being in the world in the Shambhala teachings is this word that's often translated as authentic presence. Like what would it be like to be authentic? Which is the same thing. It's not defending a solid fluid self.

It's just being who you are. Like if you like the Princess Bride, if you like Radiohead and Tribe Called Quest, you know, these are my dharma. Has to include a Tribe Called Quest and Radiohead. Okay. It's not going to include Tibetan music, you know. Right. And so what is the authentic way of not fixating on, but being who you are in

the world in a more fluid way? You know, I love stand up comedy, for example. I think actually stand up comedy is a lot of it's quite meditative because people are reporting, the ones who are best at it are reporting on the experience of having a mind and observation, sometimes neurotic observations. But like, so what is it like to teach Buddhism in an era of stand up comedy? I don't think that happened at the time of the Buddha. Right, right.

So this is the other way of saying non self is your, the, the sense of fixation is destroyed, but that's the negation way of saying it. The positive way of saying it is that arrives you at a place where you are just completely who you are, you know, and for me, my path, you know, growing up in Western society, I remember in college when I was getting really into meditation and Buddhism started when I was a kid, but really started in high school and then college, you know, there was such a pressure and, you know, to some ways I still feel this pressure and I imagine kids growing up now

really feel this pressure is like to get your profile right, you know, and to find the way to be in the world that like could just niche yourself. So like, you have all the right references and at a certain point, you're just like, what if you just drop that and liked what you liked and believe, you know, and tried to help yourself and help others? The thing though is a lot of times you end up liking the same stuff. Okay, that's like you like that stuff, you know. So what if it was a little less complicated?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's that's super cool. It's very cool. It's like, yeah, I can feel you. You should kind of tune me in. I forget maybe the difference is I forget this shit, you know, maybe people like us just forget it and you remember it more or something. But I want to ask you, was there some point, was there some point as you were meditating and going through this process where you started experiencing

a shift, like what you're talking about and you thought for a moment, maybe I don't want this to happen to me. Yeah, yeah. Well, there's two aspects to the path. There's one, you know, the meditation seat, the actual formal practices, which my friend who's a Buddhist teacher and psychotherapist, Miles Neal, he talks about your meditation seat as the flight simulator for the rest of your life. And I like that way of looking at it.

Um, so in the meditation seat, there's definitely, especially when I go on longer retreats or do some of the longer practices, there are moments of boredom, moments of irritation, moments of just like, Oh God, please perform something right to make this be something other than me being alone with my mind. Right, you know, and, um, that sort of process of working with one's boredom, one's self-aggression, I think is something that retreats are really, even if it starts with a day or a weekend, um, you know, I would really recommend that people do at some point, if they're interested in meditation, do more

than just like a 10 minute session or three minute, uh, you know, or, or more than just downloading headspace. I mean, you can do that too. It's downloading headspace. Headspace is a meditation app that a lot of people use. Oh God, I thought you had some cool term for meditation in short periods. It's not my term. Okay.

Um, I hope it's legal for me to say, I don't know if it's trademarked, but, um, I prefer heart space to headspace, but, um, but, uh, to really go on a retreat and see like, wow, I am going to have to work with all the ways that I just avoid being present, you know, and, and it does, there is a confrontation for sure, but I would say, what was that like for you? When did that happen? Uh, you know, it definitely happened in college. Um, I had already started meditating, but I, this is interesting coming back to,

uh, um, uh, this, I had been, um, my, had my first serious, uh, romantic relationship, my freshman year of college. You know, I was kind of a late bloomer. She was awesome. She was from LA. She actually, this is one of my three different personal princess bride connections. She actually went to high school with the whole savage family.

Oh, wow. Fred Savage. Yes, of course. And, um, uh, she broke up, broke up with me and, um, I mean, I wasn't like, I had no idea how to be in a relationship, so she should have broken up with me. She was awesome, but, uh, what do you mean? What were you doing wrong? I was 18 and I was like listening to my high school friends, boys about how

they were in relation to, you know, it's just like, how do you, like, and nobody's telling you just like, open your heart and be present and say you like the person, you know, like, it's just, it's just all, it's a mess. It's a mess and it's a mess because it's inauthentic, you know, and nobody can just be like, I like you, right? Do you want to like go to this party with me? All right.

Period. It's just games. Yeah. It's all games. Games inside games inside games. Yeah. So after freshman year, she, um, she dumped me and, uh, then I remember going back to college sophomore year, not wanting to be there and just reading

a lot of books on Buddhism, meditating, sitting in my room, sometimes listening to a tribe called quest. There was one Oasis song I was really obsessed with for like a month. I remember, do you remember Oasis? Sure. Are you kidding? Don't, don't kick me off the podcast because I mentioned Oasis. No, no, I totally, it's okay.

Um, and just, and that process of just like, I'm going to sit with myself in this uncomfortable space. Yes. It was actually very healing. And that was before I did, I had done some weekend meditation retreats, but then right after college, I did my, I went and lived at a meditation center in Vermont, Karmachilling, which I still teach at and practice at. And, um, that was the best eight months of, that was better than anything

that happened to me in college, other than some friendships, uh, living there and doing a month long meditation retreat. So it is irritating. It is difficult. You do have to confront your holding on to an identity, but it's also very much like you come to this place where you're just like, Oh, I'm basically good. That's the premise of the Shambhala G-Chains, basic goodness. Like, and then you have to keep reminding yourself that that's why

enlightenment's not easy. You have lots of enlightenment moments. It's just stringing together those moments. That's what the path is about. And that's why I'm on the path. I haven't finished the path as I'm still working to string together the moments where I remember my own basic goodness and, and remember your, your basic goodness.

That is so cool, man. That is so cool. Yeah. I get those moments sometimes. That's like, wow, this is, this universe is amazing. Oh my God. I can't believe, and sometimes those moments happen in the midst of absolute chaos.

You know, that's my favorite one when it pops in, even though shit's going completely haywire somewhere in there. Like, whoa, it doesn't matter. This is still incredible. Yeah. Now those moments happen for me every three years. So if I could string them together, it'd be great, but I'm going to end up with like six of them, but you know, like that, how many of those do you have?

How often do you have those moments? Uh, it's not every moment, but it's a lot more than once every three years. I'm having one right now. It's really great to talk to you. Oh, it's great to talk. I'm having one because I'm around a teacher. And this is the other thing that happens when you're around a teacher that I think people don't, um, maybe aren't aware of, you know, cause like the term is so

like when you think of a teacher, well, you think of like school. You think of high school. It's a weird, it's a weird term for Western. It's the wrong term. Yeah. Cause you guys are more like harmonizers or something. Yeah. There's a, so there's a term, uh, the wrong term in my tradition is the

word guru, cause guru specifically in my tradition means that the teacher who gives you certain tantric empowerment. So like sake and mi pam che is my guru and that's a particular relationship. It's one of the most misused terms from Eastern philosophy, like guru in our culture just means you're good at something. Right. Um, there's a term Kalyana Mitra in Sanskrit. Kalyana means something like noble or spiritual or exalted.

And Mitra literally means friend. So we sometimes translate this in my tradition as mentor. Oh, okay. My mentor, but lit the literal translation is something close to noble friend or spiritual friend. So it's somebody you look up to, somebody who you look to for guidance. All right. Um, guru is it, is it kind of different type of teacher relationship.

Um, so what were you saying? It gives you something? Uh, certain empowerments, what do you mean empowerments? So, uh, there's certain ceremonies where you're empowered to do certain visualization practices in Tantra or, you know, do certain, um, visualization practices. Have you not heard about visualization meditation? Well, I, I guess so, but I didn't, I, I've never heard this concept of like

being empowered to do it. Like, I don't know what, I don't know what you mean by that. Like given permission, you mean? Well, there's in, in most of the lineages that descend from Tibetan Buddhism, there's a real sense of like a curriculum and a path. And so that there would be certain practices that you do to just settle in, you know, and sort of develop the ground. You know, it's the same, you don't teach calculus in kindergarten.

Right. It's kind of the same notion of, okay, gotcha. There's a, there's a progression. There's a curriculum. So the guru represents the person who's, who gives you certain transmissions that often come later on along the path in my tradition. So, can I, I'm sorry to reduce it to like an embarrassing place, but is it like belts

in martial arts or something? Is this a form of like, okay, you're ready for your purple belt now? Yeah. I mean, that, that it's a, it's a reduction. I appreciate, you know, I wish we had belts. We actually have pins in Shambhala for certain roles and things like certain that you put on your lapel that are kind of cheat. I kind of wish we had purple belts again.

Actually, I did karate. I think I only got to a yellow belt, which I reminded my dad, I reminded my dad right after Izzy was born, that he used to take me to karate class for like three months and he totally forgot that. And he felt so bad that he forgot taking me to karate class. I was like, I didn't mean to make you feel bad. He's like, are you sure that happened? I was like, yeah, dad, you took me to karate class.

It's like 1984. Don't worry about it. Cool dad. But the, the, the, so I guess what I'm saying is that someone, the, the, this guru is sort of adept at recognizing when you're ready to move on to the next thing. Yeah. And so that's what you would call being empowered to do these visualizations. Yeah.

And there's certain ceremonies and vows that one takes. So there's more vows beyond the classic Buddhist vow. So in the, in a classic Buddhist, Tibetan Buddhist framework, you would have the first vow that a person would take is the refuge vow, which is where you're kind of committing to a refuge in the Buddha. I take refuge in the dorm. I take refuge in the song. Is that it?

Which are called the three jewels, which is sort of creates this supportive educational environment for awakening, right? So you're sort of saying that's, that's when a person formally would identify as I'm a Buddhist practitioner as if they've taken that vow in the Tibetan system. Then the next vow, which enters you into a series of teachings that's all about working with others and working with the interdependence and the relational interdependence of self and others called the Bodhisattva vow, great beastie boys song too.

Sure. And the Bodhisattva vow is that enters you into the second body of teachings, which in the Tibetan system is called Mahayana, greater vehicle. The third vow is called Samaya and Samaya means something like word of honor. And that enters you into the Vajrayana, which is synonymous with mostly synonymous with the word Tantra. And that's where you actually take a personal commitment with a guru, which is sort of like getting married, you know, yeah, to a teacher, to a master.

And which is a very interesting relationship because it's not as close as a close friendship or partnership. How often do you talk to your guru? I have, um, I see him more or less like two or three times a year, sometimes in very big environments. So, you know, it's more, he's very interested. He checks in, but it's not like I don't, like I might talk to my mentor like once a month or something like that.

And with him, it's more like two times a year. So, you know, it kind of depends. There's different nervous talking in not as much as I used to. Um, but he definitely has, uh, um, sucking me from, she definitely has a very strong grounded presence. So, um, and he can be very quiet sometimes. And then he can, and then he can also give a lecture that's like two hours long. Um, he can go back and forth between those two states.

So he's, he's intimidating. He's really, um, he takes care, really immaculate care of his body. He's in his, um, early fifties. He looks like he's like 30, um, very kind, very gentle. And I think people have this relationship to the spiritual teacher as being the one who's like, you know, telling you what to do or like yelling at you or like, when are you going to get your shit together and wake up? And he's not, he's like, oh, yeah, that sounds good.

I would suggest this. And it's, it's much sort of, um, quieter and gentler with moments of real articulation and, and force. So does he call, ever call you up? He does not ever call me up directly. Um, which I think is a good thing for me. God, I know that I mean, that's, he has a few of his close assistants, he does call up directly.

And I think, you know, that's a kind of guru I want, man. That's great. Like nobody wants a guru is calling them every day. It's annoying. Some people need that. And I think karmically either you work out the situation that you need. And, and he's more kind of a larger guide for me, you know? Um, so yeah, it's been great.

It, you know, it is, I will say it is great to commit your life to something. Yeah. I think that's, that's part of what I've noticed is there's like, sort of in my world, my understanding of what I like to call in the book, the kale belt world, like these cities that we inhabit, like LA or New York, where meditation and kale salad have become popular. Yes. So you have the Bible belt and the kale belt.

But it's sort of, you know, there's, I've lived in the kale belt for almost 20 years. It's everywhere I go is in the kale belt. Every once in a while I go into the Bible belt. Bible belts usually a bigger belt. Yeah. Yeah. But you need to eat more kale in the Bible.

But I've noticed that people are either like very hipster, very non-committal. Yes. Or they're totally fundamentalist and totally trying to preach to everybody. You like, you know, and I just, because most of the people I've taught and studied with and practiced with and been friends with are more on the hipster end of the spectrum of just sort of like, whatever, man, like. My friend Chris Ryan calls it passive hipster Buddhism. Yes.

Yes. But it's nice to actually commit to a path. You know, it's nice to a community. It is scary, but you still get to. Don't want to drink Kool-Aid, man. Don't want to get sucked in. Don't want to get tricked. Yeah.

Don't want to, don't want to get hoodwinked. Right. No, I, I hear it. Guru? A guru? Yeah. No, man. Not going to do it.

Well, in Chambala, we build up to that point. You don't start with a guru. Anybody, anybody who says like the first time they meet a teacher, they're my guru. It's like, give it a little time. Like see, go on a few retreats with this person, do the practice. Take out with them a couple of times. Yeah, it's like the person who goes to Vegas for the weekend and just ends up getting hitched, you know? No, I know.

I mean, I can remember when I first got to talk to Ram Dass through Skype. And of course, embarrassingly, I'm like, are you my guru? And he got that big smile, he gets, he's like, okay, fine, I'm your guru. Now what? Right. Now what do we, now what? Yeah. You know, ultimately, it's like, well, the word, it's a word.

What are you doing? You know, but I think that you're right. Committing to something, taking that leap is ballsy. Yeah. And it's crazy these days to do that. Because we always, all of us are living in this, what's it called? We're agnostic. Yeah.

We live in this world of like, seems great. I mean, you seem awesome. Yeah. I really think it's possible to commit to something and maintain your intelligence, but and maintain your own dignity. That's, that's what I've been trying to sort of demonstrate and manifest in my own life, like you don't have to just be a leaf on the wind. Right.

I really think for a lot of times, I mean, if you haven't committed to something because you haven't found your thing, great, don't commit to something before you're ready to, but I do feel like people I meet who are just kind of like leaf on the wind. A lot of times where those people, we tend to be unhappier because there's like, what gets you up in the morning? You know, what are you living your life for? What are you practicing?

That's what I mean by committing. I don't mean like, what are you preaching? Just what are you practicing? And is there a clear commitment to that? So, you know, That is awesome. Yeah. Shostry is here, friends.

How cool, man. This is, I, we're in eight minutes. My God. It's like 15 seconds. I can't believe time went by this quickly. Yeah. And we're just starting this conversation. I hope you'll come back.

I would come back anytime. Anytime my two ladies let me. I'm spellbound. You're awesome. You and your dad, the Nickturns are cool, man. I'm going to have to come out to that Shambhala place. Where is it? Well, in New York, it's in Chelsea, West 22nd Street.

Too far away. Oh, come on. I'm not going to drive out there. We used to have to cross mountains. Now we just make you get on a train. Oh, I'm not going. Now, I don't know. I'm just going to be sad for the rest of my life.

I'm not going to fucking Chelsea. That is the quote. Can we, can we like put that on the Shambhala Center website? Thank you so much for being on the show. Thank you so much, John. And you have this wonderful book coming out. Could you tell people where they can find it? I know it's not coming out from, um,

month. Yeah, it's, it's called the Dharma, the Princess Bride, what the coolest fairy tale of our time can teach us about Buddhism and relationships. It's coming out September 12th from FSG books. And I think you can get it anywhere books are sold. And obviously I still love independent bookstores. So, um, they're one of my favorite places to hang out.

But you know, if you need, if you need to go to Amazon, go, you go to Amazon, you know, it's a wonderful book. Friends, if you're going to get a book about Buddhism, grab this one. It's fantastic. As you can see, we're with a very authentic being here. And you're a great writer too, as well as a great teacher. Thank you so much, man. I really appreciate it.

Thanks so much. Thanks for listening, everybody. That was Ethan Nickturn. If you enjoyed this DTFH, make sure you to subscribe to us. You could subscribe to us on Patreon by going to patreon.com forward slash D T F H. I will see you very soon with an interview with Chris Ryan, a live DTFH. And don't forget if you're in NYC, come out on the 15th for a live DTFH with

Paul Selig. Thank you so much for listening, everybody. I will see you soon. Hare Krishna. It's Macy's friends and family get an extra 30% off. Great gifts for her just in time for Mother's Day when you use your coupon or Macy's card and take 15% off Beauty Essentials or shop specials she'll love while supplies last plus star rewards.

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