Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 513: If You’ve Ever Doubted Whether Meditation Works, Listen to This Story | Ali Smith, Atman Smith, and Andres Gonzalez

Episode Date: October 24, 2022

You may remember hearing a massively viral story from a few years ago about a school in Baltimore that gave students meditation, instead of detention. Ali Smith, Atman Smith, and Andres Gonzalez founded the Holistic Life Foundation and are the authors of Let Your Light Shine, which recounts the story of their work helping traumatized children in one of America’s most underserved cities, and how mindfulness tools can help children and communities not only survive, but thrive. In this episode we talk about: The story behind their meditation-instead-of-detention initiativeTheir experience asking principals to give them the most challenging studentsWhat it’s like working in one of the most violent cities in the worldThe results from teaching students yoga and meditationHow we can apply the lessons they’ve learned to meditation and lifeContent Warning: Explicit language. For a clean version of this episode, please listen on the Ten Percent Happier app or at tenpercent.comFull Shownotes: https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/ali-smith-atman-smith-andres-gonzalez-513See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hey, everybody, remember a few years ago when there was that news story that went massively viral about a school in Baltimore where instead of giving the kids detention, they gave them meditation, whether you remember it or not, it was an incredible story. And not only was it true, but the story behind the story is even more incredible. The group behind that meditation instead of detention initiative has been doing all kinds of heroic work in the city of Baltimore for years.

In essence, they've been going into some of the most troubled schools in some of the most underserved neighborhoods in one of the most violent cities in the country and asking the principals to give them the most challenging students. Then they teach those kids yoga and meditation, and the results have been extraordinary and validated by study after study. Today, the people behind this work are here to tell their story and to talk about how you can apply the lessons they've learned in their work to your meditation and your life. I have three guests today, Ali, Smith, and

Ottman Smith are brothers who grew up in Baltimore. Together, they co-founded the Holistic Life Foundation with their college friend, Andres Gonzalez, who you're going to hear me address as Andy in the interview. The three of them have just put out a book. It's called Let Your Light Shine. And in this interview, they're going to tell you a story that will, I suspect, obliterate any doubts you might have about whether meditation actually works. Just a few notes before we dive in.

First, there's some swearing in this episode. These guys are friends. We're pretty casual together. So yeah, there's some swearing in this episode. These guys are friends. We're pretty casual together, so yeah, there's some swearing. If you're listening with children and you don't want those words, we've created a bleeped a version of the podcast over at 10% dot com or on the 10% happier app. So go there for the cleaned up version. Second note, as you'll hear, the guys introduced two key characters at the top of their yarn here,

and I'm just going to call out these two characters for the sake of clarity. They are Ottman and Ali's father, Smith, who they sometimes refer to as Smitty, and their godfather and spiritual mentor, whose name is Uncle Will. Okay, so Smitty and Uncle Will keep those names in your mind and buckle up because we're about to get started with Ali Smith, Ottman Smith and Andy Gonzalez right after this. Before we jump into today's show, many of us want to live healthier lives, but keep bumping our heads up against the same obstacles over and over again. But what if there was a different way to relate to this gap between what you want to do and what you actually do?

What if you could find intrinsic motivation for habit change that will make you happier instead of sending you into a shame spiral? Learn how to form healthy habits without kicking your own ass unnecessarily by taking our healthy habits course over on the 10% happier app. It's taught by the Stanford psychologist Kelly McGonical and the great meditation teacher Alexis Santos. To access the course, just download the 10% happier app wherever you get your apps or by visiting 10% calm. All one word spelled out. Okay, on with the show.

Hey y'all, it's your girl Kiki Palmer. I'm an actress, singer, and entrepreneur. I'm a new podcast, baby, this is Kiki Palmer. I'm asking friends, family, and experts the questions that are in my head. Like, it's only fans only bad, where the memes come from. And where's Tom from MySpace? Listen to Baby, this is Kiki Palmer on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcast.

What's up? Ali Smith, Audemond Smith, Andre Skinsalis, welcome to the show and in Ali's case welcome back to the show. I'll be Smith, Audemond Smith, Andres Gonzalez. Welcome to the show and in Alley's case, welcome back to the show. It's good to be back. Thanks for having us, man. Yeah, thanks for having us, man.

We appreciate everything that you do for us and having us on here. I appreciate you letting me bring out my Nandie with me this time. Yeah, well, it was a fight. You didn't want them to come, just to say. So, it's like, nah. I'll let you work that out with them. Well, what I was going to say is congratulations on your new book.

That's huge. I know what it takes to write a book. I can only imagine what it takes when there are this many cooks in the kitchen. So congratulations. Appreciate that. I mean, it was a long time coming. A lot of people have been asked about a book for a long time, but things just worked out. Yeah.

And we've been working together for the past 20 years, so, and with results, so we knew that it wouldn't be too difficult to do this book together, and it really wasn't. I carried the two gentlemen like I always do in life. I knew it was coming. I knew it was coming. He's like Ezra, he's just described. We tell him what to to say and he just writes it all down. So like he did all the heavy lifting. Like we gave him all the stores. We were like the inspiration. And he was just the workhorse.

Yeah. If you go heavy lifting holding a pencil and or typing, then yeah, I love the trash shelkins. Does like you don't turn it on me. We're good. It's so early. Yeah. You never know what's going to happen.

Yeah. Well, Ali had dinner at my house a couple of months ago and he saw that I live with an insult comic whose name is Alexander Harris, my son, and it's just constantly making fun of me. When I wake up in the morning and see him for the first time, he usually looks at me and says, good morning, dummy. He's quick to lighten you up all the time. Oh, he's so quick with it. Yeah, he lights me up on the regular day.

He thinks that's his job. So he's excellent at his job. Anyway, enough about me. For people who are unfamiliar with the amazing work that the three of you and your team do, I think it maybe makes sense to start with your origin story. I'll jump all whoever wants to take it. I'll let the three of you tell it in whatever order.

Go ahead, Sean. Yeah, you always lead, huh? Yeah, I'll start off. And I think our origin story is a lot of what the book is about. I mean, it talks about like where our parents came from, where our Godfather came from. Like it was funny, like for us, like the people who raised us and introduced to contemplative practices were ex-panthers, black men, historians, philosophers,

and like two of the toughest and wisest, and funniest people that we know and most caring. I remember we didn't really realize how white the yoga world was, until we went to the Garrison Institute, and we went up there for a conference, like damn, the yoga world is really, like we had no clue, it was like, because we learned from two black men,

like we were teaching around black people. So it was just like, that was our introduction into the practice. Our neighborhood was North and Pulaski and Baltimore. And a lot of people don't navigate, getting out of West Baltimore successfully. I think in our home we had our dad who was like a combination of, I don't know, it was just pretty like,

Yinn and Yang with him. Like he taught us to meditate, but we also taught us all about mental toughness. Like he would make me and my brother go up to the track and run and do workouts in the middle of the summer and 100 degree heat until We revolted one day and we're like look we'll work out with you But we are not doing this at 12 o'clock in Baltimore where it's a hundred degrees and 200% humidity like we can't do this anymore But you mean he also gave us the yoga background and the meditation background and then our mom like she was there

She wasn't into the practice, but she was like, she made us be vegan. Like we didn't even salt sugar in the house growing up but she made us be vegan growing up. We caught health from it for our friends. Like we couldn't even have a regular snowball. Like we had to take the snowball back in the house and get apple juice to orange.

You poured on it, walk back outside and get joked by our friends. It's like that was a part of it. But I mean, she was also the one that would take us the long way to school so that like we would see the big houses on the way to school. And we lived in West Baltimore into a private school. So like to make us drop ass like this is what you guys are achieving for. Her and my dad would always get an argument because she would force us on these vacations. We couldn't really afford, but she wanted to expose us to different things. Like I tribe in our

neighborhood. It's a big part of the reason that we do we do like our family wasn't just inside our home. Our family was our entire neighborhood. And then just seeing that structure kind of fall to pieces after crack hit in Baltimore. And a lot of other places, I think that was a part of it. The shape behavior shaping institutions. We were part of it.

Like we went to a Quaker School, a private school. That was a part of it because, you know, we got to meet people from all over the world, all types of demographics and the people in our neighborhood, all with the public school. And looked like them lived in the same neighborhood as them I mean they didn't have as many resources or as many educational enrichment opportunities church we grew up in Divine like church of absolute oneness based on yoga philosophy was a big part of it I think a lot of those things that embarrassed us we tried to hide from people like reflecting back on it as adults You're like shit. this is a blessing.

Like, like, how do we have all this stuff as kids? We ran away from it, but then as we looked at what was going on in the world, we're like, well, that's exactly what we need. I mean, the book is filled with all these practices and philosophies and life lessons that made us decide that we wanted to go and change the world. So we're hoping like the stories in the book and our origin inspires many people as possible to go out and do the same thing, change themselves and go and change the world. So we're hoping like the stories in the book and our origin inspires many people as possible, want to go out and do the same thing, change themselves and go and change the world. Yeah, and just I guess the build off of what Ali was talking about, we met Andy in college.

This is part of the origin story. We met him at a meditation center. We all were big meditators in college and it was like a meditation community, contemplative community at college. I'm just BS in you. we did not meet at a meditation. We met at the bar scene. Honestly, we're, I was wondering why Andy was shaking his head. I was like, this time, I thought maybe you were telling the truth.

No, no, no, no, no, no. Okay, you were doing keg stands and that's where you met. Exactly. Basically, yeah. But the crazy thing is, it's like we were the first people in the party, last person's last people to leave, but near the end of the party, we started is, is like, we were the first people in the party last person's last people to leave. But near the end of the party, we started like philosophizing like,

yo, you know, why are we here? What's the purpose of life? And the partying went from that to a book club, because you know, we started looking for the answers for like why we're here. What's the purpose of life? So, you know, we went to like a lot of the obscure libraries at University of Maryland College Park, Go Terps, and we started researching on like, creational theories, philosophy, science, astronomy, astrology, all that stuff, looking for

the answers of what else is out here. And the thing about that was the more we read, the more questions came up, and they would always talk about, you know, the answers are within, the answers are within, but they never really told you how to go within to find those answers. And around that time, we started hanging out with our teacher,

me and Ali's Godfather, my dad's best friend. Well, he was always preaching yoga and meditation to us, but I don't think we were ready at the time. But when we were thirsting for knowledge in regards to, you know, what else is out here? He was sitting right there, like that we're big star wars has. We were like, he was like Yoda in a Dega boss system waiting for his student, Luke. We went there and he basically was telling us about yoga and meditation.

And we had a manual by Yogi Bajan on his altar. And I picked the book up and it was a lot of meditations that taught you a lot of esoteric or the esoteric benefits of these meditations. And we were blowing away, we were like, yo, meditation can teach you how to do this. And basically become a superhero. And you know, we're being in the superhero suit. And he was like, yeah, you know, a lot of people

get caught up on the citizen, they call them in the yoga, philosophy, or background. And he a lot of people get caught up on the citizen they call him in the yoga, philosophy, or background. And he was like, people get caught up on that. But it's really, you know, about uniting or being at one or the that union with the universal energy, God, or whatever you want to call him. And he was like, if y'all interested, you know, I have two requests, one, to be a teacher and two to show up at my house at 430 in the next morning. And honestly, we were at his house watching basketball and drinking a couple

beers. So he probably didn't think we were going to show up at 430 in the morning, the next morning. But we showed up knocked on the door, like 425. And he took us to a park where they had long needle ponds and a reservoir and we started our journey there and we were like, yo, like the answers are within is this meditation and yoga and it started our journey. First of all, Andy, let me ask you this. I introduced you as Andres, which do you prefer for me to address you as going forward? Because I've always called you Andy.

Yeah, Andy's cool. It doesn't really matter to me. It's whatever people feel most comfortable with. So, but let me, let me bring you in to recap the story. Ali and Atman grew up raised by, and this is their turn, not mine. Hippies in the hood. And then they go to college. They meet you as their drinking buddy and fellow search, searcher, seeker. And then you get out of college and you

don't know what to do next. And that, if memory serves is when you kind of stumbled upon this, I would say game changing, world changing idea. Can you pick up the story from there? Yeah, you know, it was crazy because I was going to mention how like when we were doing on that study and that I was talking about, you know, and we're going into these libraries and we're researching all this stuff about the ancient history and creation theories, you're at a stage in your life, I believe, where you're really philosophizing more and you're asking yourself, why am I here? What is the purpose of life?

What's the meaning of all this? And what am I going to do, right? I think when we were doing a lot of that research, we we really noticed that you know a lot of people were struggling and that there is a lot of trauma in the world and there's a lot of atrocities they were going down and no one was doing anything about it and in the book we address this too where we even talk about how not only is that going on in the present moment but it's been going on for ages centuries you know what I mean that people just aren't treated fairly and certain people are, but certain people aren't.

And usually people of color are not. And we knew we wanna do something about it. We really didn't know, I think at that time, exactly what we were gonna do. I remember the day I graduated, I got my haircut, I have really long hair now. I know the listeners can't see it, but I cut it all off. And I go to Abman's house and he sees me

and I have my hair cut up. And then he's like, what'd you do? And I'm like, well, man, I was a business major at that time. Like, I'm gonna get a job. I bought all these suits and I'm supposed to, this is the American dream, right? You go to college and you get a job and you keep moving on. And he's like, oh no.

And it was so wild. He picks up his phone. He calls his dad. He calls Smithy up and he's like, hey man, God, I've told you about Andy. You know, he's been grinding with me and Ali. For a while, we've been studying and doing all this stuff and talking about doing this whatever was we were doing because we Still didn't really have a name for it or meaning about what we were doing He's like he just cut his hair and said he's gonna get a job Can you talk to him and he hands me the phone?

This is the first time I ever talked to Smitty ever in my entire life. And I'm like, hey, hello, and he's like, hey Andy, he's like, yeah, so my boy's telling me that, you know, you're all working on this project and I got a deal for you basically. He's like, if you keep sticking to this and you don't get a job, you keep doing this, then you can come live at my crib here in small wood. And I was gonna be moving in with Adley,

you know, and pay rent or nothing like that, and you can basically follow your dream, follow your mission. And what else does I say? Shit, oh yeah, dream come true. Kyle, let's do it. I ain't got work and I can do what I want to do with my two best friends, my two brothers. I'm like, jackpot, you know what I mean?

I know he was moving in a small wood at the time. It's not the nicest of neighborhoods. But it was amazing. You know, that was, I think, what really for me was like, wow, this is going down. So then we moved to small wood and that's when things started popping off. We were, like I said, we were in our practice, and we were heavy into our practice then. We were, we always joke like we were hermits,

but it just happened to be three of us in the same cave, but the cave was just the row homes. And so we were in different parts of the cave. And we were just getting it in, doing all the practices that Uncle Will was telling us about always being a scientist, like he just always preached to us about, about don't take his word for it,

do the practice yourself, see what happens to you, and then you'll have that wisdom, you have that real knowledge. So at that point, we're just grinding and grinding, and doing the work on ourselves, and that's when that transformation, I think really, really happened. That's when you start, and you're a practitioner, that's when you start seeing the world through different eyes, you start hearing the world through different ears, you start seeing yourself and everything and

everyone and just life starts changing. So we're living in this neighborhood. Isn't one of the best neighborhoods in America, you know, I mean, it's and we're blitzing still and our friends can't understand it. They're looking at us like, why y'all happy all the time? You ain't got no job, you ain't got no money. You're living in the hood as violence all around. You look at this neighborhood's trash all over and we're like, well, well, look at you. You got money. You got a job.

You got the nice shoes, nice clothes, nice car, nice house, you got everything, and you're miserable. So I think that was one of those moments where we kind of knew, hey, well, we're all into something. And then we got an opportunity with some kids to do an after school program. And they wanted to be football coaches

and said, we were like, hey, can we teach them yoga? And that's when stuff really, really started skyrocketing to where we are now, because we had the opportunity to start sharing the practices that we were doing ourselves with others. And that same transformation that happened within us, we could start happening with the kids. And it was beautiful to see that transformation occur. As I understand it, and I may get some of these details wrong, so you guys are correct me. But you started working with the kids at the same elementary school

that you, Ali and I, Mon, attended. So we've started with an elementary school that our mom worked at, Windsor Hills Elementary School. Carmen Holmes is the principal at the time and she just, she needed some male influences in the school. So we started there. And then we took those kids because we bonded with them to the Drew at Hawaii, MCA.

And we were there for probably like six or seven years, maybe two more years, I guess six, seven, three more years with that group. And then we got a bunch of kids from our neighborhood, like right in our neighborhood, like the kids that were just like terrorized in our neighbors, we took all them in. And then as they got older, we went to the school that our mom went to, school that all of our friends went to because our parents sent us the private school. It was maybe like a 20-minute drive, 15-minute drive in the morning with traffic from where we lived, but it was definitely like serving

our homeschool, because like I said, our mom graduated from that school, all of our friends that we grew up with, our neighborhood graduated from that school, all of our first group of students went to that school, and our second group of students from our neighborhood also went to that school, it was like kind of like going home

to serve our home neighborhood. Is it true that you essentially asked at one point for the most difficult students? I mean, we were gluttonous for punishment at that point, damn. And the funny thing was, I remember we went and we went and met with the principal. And we passed the principal list of the kids that we were working with. And the principal busts out laughing. You guys, you guys are working with the principal. And we passed the principal list of the kids that we were working with. And the principal busts out laughing. You guys are working with these kids,

and it was one particular family. We're not gonna put their business out there like that. But like, it was one particular family. It was like five or six of them. And she was like, you guys pick all these kids up after school. You trust to take them to the Drew and Hill YMCA and not while that place out.

Like y'all do that. And we're like, yeah, those are our kids. And we're like, you can have whatever you want here. I'll give you space, I'll give you students. We're like, well, give us all your worst students. Like, that's what we wanted to help. That's what we thought we could make the biggest impact with.

And she helped us to that for probably almost a decade that we were at this school. She would all the kids all the time. She would have kids that kicked out of other programs that stuff was going on with. She's like, hey, I got a program for you. She walked to the door smiling, kid in her arm, be like, I got one for y'all.

And she would just usher them on in and then the wildness would start. So just to put a fine point on this, you are in Baltimore in one of the most underserved neighborhoods and you're specifically asking for the most difficult and challenging children. You then start teaching these kids yoga and some meditation. Were you greeted by the children or anybody else with some degree of skepticism?

See, we kind of tricked them, Dan. We didn't tell them anything about yoga and meditation when we first started. We went up to them and we were like, yo, how would y'all like to hang out with us? We'll let y'all play basketball, take y'all swimming, help y'all with your homework. And they were like, yeah, definitely. We would love that. And we let them have some fun plan basketball. We took them swimming. They dried off. And then we were like, All right, let me just in the dance studio. And I guess they thought we were gonna have a dance off of something, because they came up there and they were all happy and all that stuff.

And then they looked around and looked real puzzled and they saw a whole bunch of yoga mats rolled out. And I think that we were such a positive influence on them and we were there for them that they just were down with whatever we wanted to bring to them. So they sat down on the yoga mats and they were receptive. And we kept it fun.

You know, our teacher said, if your students aren't laughing, then you ain't doing shit basically. So we kept it entertaining and engaging and we challenged them. We pushed them in the practices. We told them the practicality of it. The public could help them out. How it could boost their energy before they go to school or tied into sports and tell them about like how the sun rise can help them out, how it could boost their energy before they go to school or tie them to sports and tell them about like how the sun rise can help them not hurt themselves because it's a full body

warm up, telling about like the breathing practices that we teach how it could expand your lung capacity and help you run longer. And after we like did the physical practices which kind of got that restlessness out of their body, did the breathing practice, pushing out only expanded their lung capacity, it slowed their mind down, it enabled them to actually get still, get into the meditation and tap into that inner peace. And a lot of the times, kids are from such chaotic homes that those little stints of inner peace,

they would actually fall asleep. And it would be some of the most peaceful time that they would have in their entire day. So after like they felt the practice they were sold and yeah we had to trick them into it originally but once they actually felt the benefits of the practice because like Andy said we used to tell them we can tell you how what the benefits are but just do the experiment be a scientist and see what it does for you. They had all the faith in us. They did the experiment, and they felt the benefits of the practice.

And we have kids that we started out with 20 years ago that are still practicing yoga. If they're not working for us, you know, that's a beautiful thing about our organization. We employ a lot of the kids that came through our programs. They still have a practice in their lives. So that's how important of a factor it is in their human experience. And I think it's very humble and makes it sound easy. It was hard then. Like, you know what I mean?

Like, we got cussed out by kids. We got cussed out by parents. Like, you know what I mean? Like, it was a lot going on. We were breaking up fights every day. And like, we thought our program was going to get canceled. Like, there was a lot going on. But the cool thing was, like like slowly, slowly chipping away

and getting these kids to like, I don't think we had a word for it at the time, but these kids were highly traumatized. Like all that executive function, that shit was out the window. Like these kids had no acts. Like their brains were in survival mode. So it was like, there was,

there was all these things going on. We were like, I'm gonna begin with, I mean, you some bad ass kids. Like why these kids so bad? But then it was like getting to know them more and like figuring out what things going on. We were like, I'm going to begin with, I'm going to use some bad ass kids. Like, why are these kids so bad? But then it was like getting to know them more and like figuring out what was going on. And it was like, we would see what's going on their homes and what's going on their community,

what's going on around them. Who like damn, like I don't think I can live with this and function even half as well as they're doing. But then it was like, I was talking about the physical practice making their body a safe space. Like once that happened, then we could start to move to their mind. The breath work would slow them down and they could get into the meditations.

And I think the biggest thing was the connection, that love, like we loved all of our kids. Like it was, it was, there was no doubt about it. You can walk in the room and you can feel the love between us and them. Like it was one of those things. I remember the one of the first times we bought one of our major funders in there.

First thing we were surprised about was the fact that the gym went from like 50 footballs and dodge balls and all this stuff and having to keep your head on a swivel to them trying to do yoga. On the mats, they're kind of running around to them doing the breathing, start to slide on a little more. Then when they're meditating, you can hear a pin drop in that gym. They were impressed by that, but I think the thing they were most impressed about was that there was the three of us at that point and maybe like 90 kids and we knew

every single kid's name like they would come up to us and knew who they were and it was going on their lives and she was like that bond that you all have with them is amazing and it was something that like Andy was the nut ball that would tell everybody he loved them you know I mean like he would the parents would come by like I love you I love you I love you they'd be like who is this dude telling me they love me? Like, what is wrong with him? But we all embodied love. Like, we treated each other with love. We treated ourselves with love. We treated the kids with love. Remember one time, Opland got cussed out by some kids dad and like, keeps all together, treats the dad with love, treats the kid with love because he could have

easily gone over the edge and whipped his dudes ass, but it was like, no, I'm not going to do that in front of my kids. I'm not gonna put that energy out there. So it was just like, they constantly saw us being love and it kinda helped them to connect to themselves and love themselves. Cause I think that's one of the biggest things that's going on in Baltimore right now is like, people don't have respect for human life

cause they don't respect their own lives. They don't love themselves. So I'm not gonna care about going over and shooting somebody or doing something violent to somebody. If I don't even care about myself, I think we were through us loving them and through them seeing us love each other and ourselves. They were starting to love themselves. And from there, it could start to ripple out. And we saw the kids started to really, really, really change who they were and how they functioned in the world and how they treated each other and themselves.

I mean, it's hard to talk about love without sounding corny. And yet this, I think, is a clear cut case of love being the active ingredient of this whole thing. I remember when you said love being corny, like there was one school year, me and Andy were living together, Oppen lived like four houses down on the corner and the kids were all congregate on our porch. And they were terrorized our neighbor, like the lady lived next door to us, like they broke her banister,

they would mess up her car. And one day, one of the kids like broke one of the mirrors on her car, and the neighbor cussed the three of us out. And the kid that did it, like, I'm a rock tour into them. I was like, the next day all the kids came around, he wasn't there. And I remember I'm talking to him, I was like, where's Tayyat? Like, what He wasn't there. And I remember I talked to him. I was like, where's Tayyat?

Like, what is it? He's like, you got mad at him, didn't it? I was like, man, got mad at him. Like, I love Tayyat. Like, you had nothing wrong with him. I love that dude. And all the kids were like, ew, you can't say you love him. And I was like, what?

I was like, I love all of you. I was like, ew, you can't just run around saying it. I mean, you just can't be saying you love people. And he's the kids that are dropping every single F-bomb, M-R-F-R-B's, like any curse word you could possibly imagine they're throwing that and they're telling us love is a corny thing. And then now, Ramon Brown,

kid that was in that group, the ringleader of that group, is one of those kids. He's still with us. Like he's father, two sets of twins that are like under five, but you know, like the thing with him, like he was one of those kids that said that and now this dude will not hang up the phone with us I'll say and I love you and if he didn't if he hangs up the phone

He'll call us back. You're like, you off. I forgot to tell you I love you big bro, and then hang up the phone like so it's just like That has like it was corn. I mean to them it was corn It's a lot of people at this corny, but we were always taught that like love was strength love was powerful and love is the most powerful For us in the universe like that's what love was taught to us as. I mean, because we had like, like our dad and our godfather's two big tough dudes, but they would say I love you to the people that mattered. Like they would show love to everybody.

So it's just, I think seeing it embodied by the two of them didn't make it seem like something we could corny to us as we were like kind of navigating through life and trying to figure things out. You know, I'm still reflecting a little on something you said earlier, Dan. We've been doing this for 20 years, over 20 years now, and got an interviewed countless amount of times. The way you worded that statement like, so let me get this right.

Y'all chose the worst city, the worst neighborhood, and they were like, let's get the worst kids. When you first said it, I'm like, man, we were some dumbasses when we were younger. Like, what in the world were we thinking, you know, but honestly, I think it, a large part of that was, we were pretty wild ourselves. Like, we're not mjokes about the meditation class and the party thing, like, we were the party animal dudes.

As a child, I got arrested three times before I even turned 18. I was off of the hook, right? So I think a lot of what we saw, whether it was experiences, we had ourselves or our peers, friends we had, we kind of saw a lot of that stuff. So that's who we wanted to help, you know what I mean? And we didn't do that just in Baltimore. Anytime we go anywhere around the nation, around the world, and we're setting up something, we're like, oh yeah, we're going to do this with the teachers, and we'll do this assembly. But do me a favor. And can you get all, you're like, problem kids, it was high flyers, you know what I mean?

I'm doing air quotes like listeners can hear when I say problem kids. You know what I mean? And they will, and we'll sit down with them wherever we go. And I think it's because we experience a lot of that ourselves and we can put ourselves in their shoes. And then when we went through the practice and that transformation occurred with us. It's like I can hear our teachers' words that we would be quite remiss if we didn't share this stuff with everybody.

And in particular, those kids have really, really needed it and who had gone through a lot of stuff. And I think that's why for us, it kind of was so easy, because we've been through it, and we knew that, hey, these practices work, and they can really make a difference in their lives.

Coming up much more with Ali Atman and Andy from the Holistic Life Foundation, right after this. Raising kids can be one of the greatest rewards of a parent's life. But come on, someday, parenting is unbearable. I love my kid, but is a new parenting podcast from Wondry that shares a refreshingly honest

and insightful take on parenting. Hosted by myself, Megan Galey, Chris Garcia, and Kurt Brown-Oller, we will be your resident, not-so-expert-experts. Each week we'll share a parenting story that'll have you laughing, nodding, and thinking. Oh yeah, I have absolutely been there. We'll talk about what went right and wrong.

What would we do differently? And the next time you step on yet another stray Lego in the middle of the night, you'll feel less alone. So if you like to laugh with us as we talk about the hardest job in the world, listen to, I love my kid, but wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen ad-free on the Amazon Music or Wondering app. Well, you say the practices work.

I'm going to pretend to be skeptical now because I'm not going to, I know what the answer is, but I can imagine some listeners saying, okay, well, you've told us some really moving stories, but does this program actually work? There's a lot of different ways you can look at it. We've told you a bunch of anecdotal stories, but even if you look at the numbers, the numbers don't lie. Like our Mind for Moment program, which was the program, like if you saw the turning detention and meditation viral stuff that was going online, that's our Mind for Moment

program. It's a program where you get a room in a school. We have one of our staff members who's really well trained in there. And when a kid gets in crisis, they either get referred or they self-refer to the room. They come to the room, they work with our staff and we do some active listening and mirroring. Like, we don't counsel the kids because we're not counselors. Like, that's not what we do. But the kids feel empowered by that and they start to kind of ease up a little bit. They feel that connection, do some breath works, meditation, some mindfulness practices, send them back to class in 15 to 20 minutes and then you they go about their day

And there's also recording at the beginning and the end of the day where the kids practice together with the staff And that's our that's pretty much what our mindfulness program is But the thing with that program is suspension numbers drop drastically and every single school that that program works in at the Robert W Coleman elementary school the school we were talking about earlier that our mom graduated from that's in our home neighborhood They're having been a suspension there in like eight years. Fort Worthings and elementary middle, the year before we got there, there were around 171 suspensions after the first year that number was in the 50s after the second year, that number was under 10.

You know what I mean? And it's, and the people equated to what's going on. I remember we had to get some information for a grant from the principal at Robert Cole. I remember walking into our office, her and the assistant principal are there. And I'm like, hey, we need suspension numbers for this grant that we're putting in. So they passed me a piece of paper

and I see all these zeros on it. I'm like, what is that from? Like, what's going on here? She's like, Ali, you don't know what that's from? I was like, I don't know, what are you all fudging the numbers? Like, there can't be zero suspensions here. And she's like, they just bust our laugh

and they're like, no, Ali. Like, it's what you and I, that in Andy are doing at this school, like, your program, like kids that were about to suspend, we send to you, they resend to themselves and they're ready to go about their day, like that mindful moment program, if you look at it, like at the beginning of the year,

the referral rates, the room are off the charts, like, there's kids in there all the time, but then the kids learn what their stressors look like, they learn what center is and when they're drifting away from it, they learn how to pull themselves back. And then they start to learn like, oh, I can, they start to use the practice in the moment, don't need to go to the room. So by the end of the year, the referral numbers to the room are very, very low.

So suspension numbers go down. Kids learn to use the practice in real time. We've had schools where kids actually teach the other kids to do breathing practices. And they got their highest ACT scores in school history after doing this. So it's helping out academically, it's helping out socially, it's helping out behaviorally, it's helping out across the board. So I mean, like, you can listen to our cool, like we do have some dope stories after 20 years of work, but like the numbers don't lie either.

And you've been studied, as I understand it, your programs have been studied by academics. So there, there are some numbers that go beyond suspension rates. Oh, definitely. We had Johns Hopkins and Penn State that the first randomized controlled study on the effectiveness of yoga at mindfulness on urban youth and they found that their lung capacity increase. They're able to deal with more stressful situations. And it's honestly one of the studies that if anybody wants to get yoga into schools, they will reference that study and show the benefits and how it can impact a school and a child's life. And like perceived stress and goes down and they just can deal with a lot more just because they're able to respond to things instead of react

with different practices that we teach. It's an incredible story and that's why I'm such a huge fan and supporter of your work. Let's pivot though to what you've learned in terms of practices that can be applied in any life to help us do life better, no matter where we live and no matter what our age is. What kind of practices are you teaching in the book that any of us could do? I know one practice that helps me a lot is the practice of Janani Yoga.

It's not a well known for me Yoga. I think when people think of yoga, they think about the bending and the stretching and the osminous, that's all they, that's almost people get to when they get to the yoga practice. But our teacher, Uncle Will was always about like, he would always say to us, you will not get through this course without learning. And then he would throw these other more subtle forms of yoga at us.

Like, I was talking about his practice and with him, but I think for maybe like the pet, the last 15 years we learned from him, we didn't get on a mat at all. Like, we were pretty much sitting around this kitchen table talking about the yoga of how you live your life and how you practice those other 22 hours that you're out in your day if you're on your mat for two hours a day. And Janana Yoga was one of the ones

that really gets out there. Because it's all about the yoga of knowledge and your thoughts. I think one of the first parts that helped me with Janana Yoga was realizing that I'm an asshole in some ways. You know what I mean? Like there's certain ways that I'm an asshole and like everybody is, but I think you have to, and I think it makes you aware of it. Because you're watching your thoughts, you're watching how you're treating yourself, you're watching in the inner dialogue. And I think it's all about

like being aware of that. And then like you become aware of what, what those thoughts are. And then the second part is like reflection and like looking at where those thoughts are coming from, like where those actions are coming from. And the third part is turning it into something positive. So like the energy you put out is the end in yoga philosophy. The energy you put out is the energy that comes back to you. And it's even stronger when it comes back. So it's like you can be putting out all that negativity through your thoughts, through your actions, through your words, through what's going on to other people, or to yourself, either way, that negativity is coming back to you.

But if you can watch your mind and see what's swirling up, like, okay, that's the thought about this. This is where it came from. And I'm not going to choose to let it be something negative. I'm going to switch it to something positive. So like if someone, if someone did something rude to me, then I'm going through my day, and I think about it all the time, and I'm thinking about how I'll be kicked this person's ass, I like to do something rude to them back, and all this negativity is going out there,

or I can catch that thought. Like when it first forms, or early on when it's forming, like, okay, boom, that's a thought about that person that did me dirty. What I'm going to do is I'm not going to let it go, and I'm not going to send all negativity out there. I'm going to actually take the time to switch to something positive about that person, put some positive energy out there and let it come back. It's not an easy form to practice. I'm not going to say I win all the time instantly with that practice, but just the knowledge of it and having an option.

I think is what our teacher was always trying to give us is trying to give us options with the way that we lived our life. A little more knowledge, a little more wisdom and a way to be more positive in the world like with the energy you're putting out there and the way you treat yourself and the way you treat other people. So Janana Yoga, it's like the yoga of your thoughts everybody's thinking all the time you don't have to be able to twitch yourself up like a pretzel you don't have to be able to take a deep breath. He just have to be aware of your thoughts watch them reflect on where they're coming from and then turn them into something positive and it's a it's a it makes a drastic change with the way you treat yourself and the way you treat the other people around you.

I know the detailed instructions are in the book, but just to recap, it sounds like Janana Yoga can be practiced free range, whatever you're doing. It's just the practice of turning your gaze inward and looking what kinds of thoughts you're having and then making the active decision to change the channel. Exactly, perfect way of putting that. Can that be turned into some sort of denial or this power of positive thinking bullshit that I think has been quite harmful to a lot of people.

Now, you heard me first off say that I can be an asshole. You don't mean like I'm not saying I'm above or beyond those thoughts, but the thoughts don't own me. You don't I mean, I think it's one of those things where like you see the thought, but also the the part in between is you're reflecting on seeing and where that thoughts coming from because thoughts come from a certain place. Like it comes from a certain emotion, a certain interaction that you've had. So it's about reflecting on that too, but then instead of letting that thought dominate the way that you live your day or your energy, switch it to something a little more positive. But it's about the awareness of it, to the awareness of the thought, the awareness of its root, and then making the choice to switch to something positive.

Not just being like, oh, that person's an asshole, I'm just going to send him some love. Like, okay, why do I why why are the thoughts of that person Being this way coming up and then looking at the real root of it And why you feel that way and then make a choice to switch it because that spiritual bypassing stuff doesn't work It doesn't solve anything like you really have to know where this stuff's coming from in the root of it to really make a change So it's it doesn't preclude taking effective firm action It doesn't make you into a poluca or overly passive It's just about counter programming against our evolutionarily hardwired

Negativity bias. Do we like polluca's the you Dan come on man? I mean maybe Andy Good, it's just remember you started it. You started it. Any other practices? Yeah, I'll jump in. Another practice, just like Oli was saying, for the past 15 years, a lot of the practices

that our teacher, Uncle Will, used to teach us was more subtle with us sitting around his island and his kitchen. And this was one of his favorites. It was Bok Tio Yoga or the Yoga Devotion and then one of the concepts of Bakti Yoga is that word respect and if you break that word down, respect, re means again and like spectacle means to look and what he means by that is when somebody's coming up to you and you may get caught up in seeing that person as an asshole,

but you know if they are rubbing you the wrong way, you originally see them and see them being an asshole, then you kind of look again, look a little deeper and you look and see their light. You look past their physical appearance and looking to their light that that light that's inside them is the same light that's inside you So it's really about respecting the differences that you have with people and looking deeper and seeing that unity within you both And that will kind of make you rise above a lot of the BS that could pull you down And that's like one of the times he taught us that was right before down. And that's like one of the times he told us that was right before Congressman Ryan and James Gimian from my full magazine came to visit our program and that her parents was all in my face cursing me out because his son lost his cell phone and thought one of our staff stole it.

And I was really about to get angry with him and the street was about to come out at me. And then I looked around at the kids. I saw the light in the kids. Then I looked at the gentleman who was cursing me out. And it was hard to see that light, but I looked hard. And I saw that light and that allowed me to slow down and respond to that situation and use my words instead of my fists. So it's a practice and like one of the things that he says,

like a lot of people do yoga on the yoga mat for an hour to a day But then there's 23 hours left in the day. You can't be an asshole So it's all about taking that practice or whatever you can off the mat and into your life And this is one of those practices that you can take off the mat and into your life and help you slow down because a lot of people are stressed out. There's a lot of trauma that's out here in the world. So everything isn't going to be peaches and cramps. So this practice kind of helps you navigate and not give in to your lower emotions. And even if you're dealing with those people that are trying to push your buttons, you're able to respond in a higher fashion and not have them control you, but you can control the

situation. I like that a lot in the tracks with just control you, but you can control the situation. I like that a lot and it tracks with just something that I've noticed in my own practice 13 years in, which is that I increasingly can see that even people that I vehemently disagree with their actions or their words that if I were in the exact same position under the same conditions of life history and present moment conditions, it is highly likely I would do the exact same thing. And that is very humbling. It's a little bit different. It's a little bit more cognitive than seeing their inner light, but it kind of lands you on the same place of dropping your superiority. them are saying, but I'm gonna see their like, because they need it more than everybody. They need more love and everybody. It's so angry.

I'ma send them a lot of love. So he would like sit there and watch things that would like intentionally try to trigger him like with some of their policies and stuff. And he would just sit there and like, I'm sending them love. I'm sending them light. I'ma practice this. And I think that one of the beauties of this practice is that it's like neural plasticity in action.

You know what I mean? It's like rewiring of your brain because a lot of us are kind of trained to just hold on to these thoughts. We allow people to rent space in our mind. But the beautiful thing about this practice is you don't have to physically be around the people if they pop up into your mind. And like Ali said,

you can either let that thought take you to a really dark place and you're putting out that funky energy, or you can catch that thought construct. And the idea of Bach Tioge is you see their physical appearance. And once again, that may cause little friction in you, but look again at the picture in your mind and see their light there and just focus on sending them love. And you'll notice, notice like even in relationships, I know Ali always talks about the story where he was in a relationship with a young lady

and they had so much friction in their relationship. And our uncle was like, man, when y'all aren't together, what do you think about? And you know, he was saying like, yeah, man, I just think about how messed up she was and how angry I am with her. And he was like, yeah, well, I'm gonna give you a recipe

for success. I want you whenever she pops up into your mind, cast a thought construct and see her light, hold her light inside of your light and send her love. And Ali did the experiment for a while. And the relationship definitely got a lot better. They were the friction fizzled off. And it's one of those practices that once again,

your listeners out there don't take our word for it, do the experiment. And if you have anybody that's frictional in your life, do that when they pop up into your mind that whether they pissed you off yesterday, a last week, a month ago, a year ago, a decade ago, but if it still pops up in your mind, it doesn't do you any good to have them

reaching space in your mind in a negative manner, catch that thought construct, and see their light and send them love. And see how that makes you feel. They say that it helps you evict people from writting space in your mind, or in other words, a release. That lady broke up with Ali anyway, right? Of course. Damn, Dan, but yes, actually, yes, actually, but it wasn't, it wasn't

then it was this is maybe like this is maybe like six years later. It happened. But, you know, I bobbed and we've, I look, I sent her love and light for like six years and it lasted. Like it worked. And she still loves Ali. That's not good. It's what's the thing. Yeah. Come on. Yeah. Who doesn't love Ali? I'm saying,, I like coming to talk to you man. I knew that I was going to say one of the ones that I said and he did. I'm glad you did bark to y'all. I would like to introduce one of the concepts that we have in the book that I think has had such a huge impact on all of our lives and a lot of the kids we work with. But I think that some of the listeners can certainly benefit from. And it's just your breath. But not even doing the breathing practices.

We have a rack of breathing practices and going over the proper way of breathing and all that stuff. It's so crucial and important. So definitely check the book out and take note of that stuff. But I want to focus more on just your awareness of your breath. I think that as you become aware of your breath, it's going to assist you so much in life because then you're going to be able to pull yourself away from those situations and instances where you're going

off center or you're going off balance. We talk about these kids we work with in these underserved communities and the trauma that they face, but I know that there's not a listener out here that doesn't have problems with sleep or their stress or their anxious, they have worry, they have doubt, they're depressed, they're going through something. And it doesn't really matter where you're from or what color your skin is, or what your culture is,

or what you've been through, because I am positive that if any of the listeners took an ACES test and really learned about some of their adverse child experiences that they went through that are still impacting them to this day and they probably don't even know about it, right? And they're constantly dealing with it. Whatever it is, that stuff that's internal or this external bombardment that we're overwhelmed with all the time.

And when you learn to be aware of your breath, when you catch yourself, when you're shifting into that sympathetic state, right? When you're in that stress mode, when you're getting fight or flight, when something's boiling your skin and your clenching your fist, or your jaw, when that's happening, as you become more aware of that,

it's easier for you to use another breathing technique to still yourself and bring yourself back to the present. When our teacher always talked about that, how the past causes anger. Someone said something to you. They did something to you. And it's like, Oppen was saying, they're renting space in your mind. Still, the future causes anxiety.

What's to come? What's going to happen? What am I going to do with myself? But the present is the only time that exists and it's the only real time like right now I remember Uncle Week said that it was so cool Like right now is the only time exists and and that now is already the past Because now is the new now and that's the only time existing and when you're aware of your breath If you're like you're able to take control of your life again.

And even though none of us are perfect, I still get angry, I still get frustrated, I still get sad, I get upset, all that stuff happens. It's part of the human experience. But when now when that's happening to me, I'm able to catch it, because I can pay attention to my breath and I see how my body changes,

our physical bodies give us signals. They're letting us know, hey, I'm not feeling right right now. And when you can be aware of your breath, then you can start to control it. It allows you to take control of your life. And I think that meant I remember when Uncle Will first, when he first started doing the practices is after college. And he was like, I'm going to teach you how to breathe. And I'm looking, I'm like, well, I've got to breathe my whole life.

What do you mean you don't teach me how to breathe? Like, but for real, he taught us teacher to breathe. And I'm looking at him like, motherfucker, I'm a breathing my whole life. What do you mean you want to teach me how to breathe? Like, but for real, he taught us how to breathe. Like all this higher education and no one taught us the right way to breathe. And then once you start breathing the right way, then you start noticing when stuff's bothering you, you're not breathing the right way anymore. You start panting like an animal. You're in the state, this fight, flight, fear, freeze, all that type of stuff. So when you can control your breath and we have plenty of techniques in the state, this fight, flight, fear, freeze, all that type of stuff.

So when you can control your breath and we have plenty of techniques in the book that will help you out with this, I've really think it a lot of listeners to transform themselves and take control of their lives. And honestly, I think they'll be able to realize some of the stuff that's happened in the past and how they haven't gotten over yet and how they're currently, every day, still working on it and the reason they haven't got over yet because they haven't passed that test, you know, that the universe is going to keep throwing that same shit at you over and over and over again until you figure it out. And the moment you figure

it out, then it's going to be like, okay, I might throw it at you one more time just to make sure. Oh, you got this? Okay. And then another test presents itself. Coming up much more with Ali, Ottmanman and Andy from the Holistic Life Foundation right after this. I know that there are instructions in the book. Can you just say a little bit to listeners now about how to breathe better? Yeah, I mean, first and foremost, if you breathe in and out your mouth,

you breathe in wrong. So you should always breathe in and out your nose. That's the one thing we always say to people, in and out your in through your nose, out through your nose. Not in through your nose, out through your mouth, in through your nose, out through your nose. Your nose filter, heater, humidifier. So you're getting the benefits of that.

And then I would also stress using more diaphragmic breathing. So a lot of people, when they breathe, they use the top portion of their lungs, so they're doing clovicular breathing, so like just puffing their chest up, but they're only using a small percentage of their lung capacity. So they want to really make sure they're manipulating their diaphragm and breathe low. Like if you're a singer or someone who plays an instrument, they understand this type of concept. So in and out your nose, make sure you're really focusing on filling your belly almost.

You don't fill in your belly actually because your belly doesn't get filled with air, but it's what it looks like that you're filling your belly down there and you're filling your lower lungs. And then I would say, try to make the breath audible. I know it sounds a little weird, but there's a yoga breathing technique. It's called ujai. We call it the stress breath where when you use that audibility, that audibility of your breath, when you vibrate,

when you, you can hear the breath like that, that stimulating your vagus nerve, and that's giving you that mind body connection. It's getting your body more connected where you're not gonna be so reactive to everything that's going on, but now you're connected with what's going on,

and it's gonna be to slow yourself down and it's going to bring you into that present moment. So those are three main things I would say to people. Nice long one, in and out your nose, use your belly, make it audible, and then just make a nice long and slow, long and slow. Still yourself. And with the Ujjai breathing, which anybody who's done yoga will be familiar with, I think you're recommending there may be periods

during the day when we specifically want to do that, audible breathing, distress breath, as you call it, as opposed to breathing all the time in that way. I mean, I honestly would recommend trying to do it all the time if you could. I mean, it's a technique, right? So you can sit down and do it seven to 10 times, right?

But if you're walking, our teacher you story say yoga isn't something you do It's something you are Right, so it's all the time ideally if you could walk around and be meditating all day long or in a in a close-to-meditative state You're badass. I would say go ahead and do that all the time You know what I mean? So if you can if you're sitting in line and you're sitting there You don't have to be sitting down in your yoga mat to make your breath audible, you can be doing it while you're driving. It starts becoming just a natural part of the way you're breathing. And if you start, you can continue to remind yourself, hey, I'm breathing

like this in and out my nose, big, long, deep breaths, belly out and make it audible, then you can get those benefits all the time. Thank you for that. Another practice that I know you talk about in the book and this you say is a huge issue with with the populations you're working with is self-love. Yeah, I mean, we kind of teach that through teaching our version of the love and kindness practice. Olli alluded to this earlier when you're asking people in communities with their hopeless to care about keeping their streets clean or not resolving conflicts with their fists or gun. They don't really have a value on life because they don't really care or have that

love for themselves. Besides working with kids from these underserved communities, we work with adults. I mean we started in these underserved communities, we work with adults. I mean, we started in the underserved communities, but now we work everywhere. Adults, college students, people in corporations, and there are a lot of people that we teach that have never loved themselves or take the time to have that interfoundation full of self-love. And once people tap in to that love of self, it allows them to kind of love and care for others without feeling resentful or being empty or feeling used because you know you do tap into that certain level of love of self where it ignites something inside of you and it allows you to

love others at a totally different level without burning yourself out. This is a hobby horse. I'm riding now with increasing frequency because it's kind of the core thesis of this book that I've been writing for the last million years, which is that self-love, which sounds super corny and super selfish, is actually one great way to unlock your ability to love everybody. Yeah, I think one thing we noticed then was that like when people we teach to meditate, and I'm not even talking about kids because we can't really get into this form meditation with kids. It's more of a spiritual form or a yoga form meditation. But in yoga philosophy, you're, I mean, and that's that's how we raise where yogis that's how we raised that's how we brought up

That's that's what our teacher was is what our dad was a church we went to so it's like that's where our base is coming from But your body is just the vessel that you experience the world through like it's how you experience the world It's how you learn lessons, but you're actually a spiritual being like you are the light of the universe like a book It's called let your light shine for a reason. It's like the light of the universe that's within you. That's what we want to let shine. I think it's working on getting people to connect to that and feeling what it is. I spend a lot of time in meditation and I still don't have the words to describe what I feel when I go into my light and I actually experience it.

It's one of those things that like people throw the words bliss and all these other things around but that doesn't really explain it. Like you don't I think you have to experience it. People to get there and once you get there and you see what you really are, I mean people say words like I'm this shit, I'm nip-ton, I'm the present, like all these things like that you're connected to the universe. And when people connect to that, they come out and they feel different. Like it's like, okay, so this is something different. This is not anything outside of myself that I have to be looking for. This is not anything I have to compare myself

to anyone else with. And you don't mean like, you're not, you're not constantly comparing yourself or seeing what you have versus what someone else has. You're not constantly judging yourself. You become more aware of who you are and in your philosophy, you're a soul, you're a light of the universe. That's what you truly are. But people get caught up in identifying with that

negative self-talk, their physical world. And I'm not saying to ignore your physical world or anything. Because that's a part of you too. Your ego, as we call it, is a part of you too. But it's just knowing where you're coming from. Our teacher would always say, start your day in the light and end your day in the light. You start your day in the light because you would say, like, you get your base there with your true self and you go function in the world that way. Because we say it was easier to move from the inside out and like, you get your base in the light and then you function in the world. And when you get back home, you're dealing with all the things that are going around

you. You burn all that stuff off in the light and you can go and have more peace, we'll sleep. But I think a lot of people struggle loving themselves because they don't know who they really are Like they're looking at their physical ego self and there's a lot of judgment that goes with that They're looking at their thoughts and there's a lot of thoughts There's a lot of negative self-talk on people identify what their thoughts But I think if you can get beyond those two things then you can truly start to love yourself And then that love can reverberate outward. I teach you would always say you like we were talking about back to yoga and seeing the light

and then but he would always say you had to see light in yourself before you can see it in anybody else. You're not going to see it outside of yourself. You're not going to love truly love anybody outside of yourself before you can love yourself. So it's about making that interconnection first and then shining out from there. What is a simple practice that you would recommend for people to even start to get a glimpse of what you're calling the interlite? The first stage of meditation in yoga is a stage called Pratya Hara, which means withdrawal of the senses. So, you know, you got to kind of wrangle your senses and pull them inwards.

So it starts by, in your meditation practice, seeing your light, feeling the light, and then kind of going inward. And like, we use the mantra Om. You can use whatever mantra you want that's gonna take you deeper but pulling your senses inward towards your light and then you start to feel it and see it and experience it and then you can tap into it at any point during your day it doesn't have to be when you're sitting on your meditation cushion or sitting in a chair it's like you have it like once you know how to get there you can get

there at any place any time I remember when I started getting deep into my meditation practice we had an entertainment company like Andy and he You know how to get there? You can get there at any place, anytime. I remember when I started getting deep into my meditation practice, we had an entertainment company. Like Andy, Andy Grapes asked off. Like we opened for like Wu Tang and like all these other famous people. And I remember everyone would meet at my house before the shows.

They were doing the studio, like the studio was the Outspullies. They mixed down the CD. We pre-game hang at my house. And I would go upstairs to second floor and I would leave my door open with all the ruckus and all the noise. And I would prove to myself that I could be in my light when door open with all the ruckus and all the noise, and I would prove to myself that I could be in my light

when it didn't have to be four in the morning, total silence, it could be 10 people in my house, practicing their set, screaming and yelling, whatever was going on, and I could still get there. So it's like once you know how to get there, no one can ever take that from you. You can always get there no matter when you want to, it's just making a choice to want to go that way

and not be going outward. So for people who want to try this at home, the recap is mantra meditation would be the beginning practice that you would recommend the mantra that you use, which is not unusual is home. And the signlet repetition of this can take our focus away from external stimuli into something internal. And that you say is one root towards seeing the interlite that you describe. Yeah, and seeing and also visualizing it there, like visualizing at your heart center and yoga, they say that your heart center there is a dwelling place of the self. So like you're going to see a light at your heart center and not with your eyes, but with your mind's eye, or your imagination, you're gonna imagine it being there.

You're gonna do that own repetition in your head, and you're gonna try to feel the energy it's giving off. Cause it gives off energy if you pay attention to it. Like the vibration changes instantly once you put your consciousness there. And I know an easy way to be, if you don't have a vivid imagination. One thing that you could do,

everyone has cell phones these days. If it's hard for you to actually see that light and you have your eyes closed and you're trying to see, you can't see it. Cut on your flashlight on your cell phone and look at that for a couple seconds, then close your eyes and like Ollie said, in your mind's eye, see that at your heart center

and hold that there and see that as long as you can. And if you can't see it anymore, pick your cell phone up again, turn on the flashlight. Look at that light again, close your eyes and hold that image of that light there and just keep doing that. And like Ily said, the vibration that that light gives off that unity within all things is that own vibration.

And that speaks to me, Ily and Andy, and a lot of other people out there, because that's the tradition that we were raised in as far as going into that meditation. But if that doesn't speak to you, whatever speaks to you, tucking your toolbox, whatever doesn't, you can just leave it on the outside. And if it's just seeing the light, that's enough.

But like Ali said, to take it a little deeper, see that light and feel that light. That practice you just described to the flashlight, I believe in the Buddhist traditions called Cassina practice. My wife has actually been getting into that quite a bit, but I do appreciate having you guys on because we haven't talked to that many guests about yogic or Hindu style meditation. So I think this is, it's really good for our listeners to hear this. We don't have a ton of time left. I have two things I just want to hit on and then

open it up for anything I might have missed. But I know in the book, you have some kind of advice, gentle warnings as well for white or affluent people who might want to work with children of color, children who've endured trauma. Briefly, what would you say to people who might look like me, who want to work with children in much more difficult circumstances? I think one important thing is don't be Philip Drummond. Like you're not going to save everybody. Like you're not going to save Willis and Arnold.

Like that's not what it's about. A lot of people have that savior complex when they go in the neighborhoods that they see as less affluent than them or might be struggling more than them. Like you're not going to save anybody. Like we've never saved anybody. We've worked with probably over 100,000 kids. We haven't saved zero kids.

What we do is we empower kids to save themselves. Like that's what it is. So like drop to save your complex, drop to Philip Drummond, woo, webster's parents, man and George, like that's not what you are, that's not what you're trying to do. You're going in there and you're empowering people

to help themselves. Like if you go in there and that's your base, like you'll succeed. Like it's definitely a lot stronger place to come from. I didn't see the different strokes reference coming, but I'm glad we got it in there. I think that's the first for this show. I mean, when, I mean, my kids still watch different strokes. If you go back and watch it, that show is, it's a gem. Like they talk about such point issues and like, will listen on or hilarious.

And yet you think the father kind of has the wrong frame on this endeavor. If going back and saving people, yeah, like I think that's what people see themselves as. They're going to save like the cute little black kids. You know what I mean? It's like, you know what I mean? Lift somebody up. Like I think true change comes from empowerment, not from them needing you for anything. Or like we teach in a way that our students don't need us.

Like we don't want our students to need us. Like we would love it if we'd go somewhere and show somebody something and we would never have to see them again because they've taken it on. We've empowered them with the practice and they know how to use it. Not only do you know how to use it, but they know how to show it to other people.

Like that's real teaching, that's real upliftment and not just like, hey come live in my penthouse and Manhattan and like drop water balloons on the neighbors and like all that stuff. Having all the goal fish named Abraham. I can keep going with the different strokes. Just let me know.

Just let me know how far you want to go with it. I didn't realize your knowledge was so deep. I'm impressed. But you know, just what I am really impressed by though, and you mentioned this earlier, but I want to put a fine point on it. The children you worked with early on are now teaching this curriculum to other children as grownups. And that is the proof or part of the proof in the pudding, which leads me to my to my last question or my second last question, which is what is your vision for the future question or my second-ass question, which is what is your vision for the future of HLF, the Holistic Life Foundation?

I know you work with tens of thousands of kids in Baltimore. You've also, Ali, you were telling me about this and over dinner recently, and I believe it's in the book as well. You've been working with some Native American children. Where do you see this going? I mean, I'll start off, guys. Like you mentioned, we have a satellite program in the aquasized in the territory

at a Mohawk reservation, which straddles the upstate New York and Canadian border. And Ily and Andy and I were doing work up there for maybe four years before we got the satellite program started, and we wanted to make it more sustainable. And one thing that we always say is that the best solutions are homegrown solutions so instead of us going up there we train people from the community people on the Mohawk reservation to be able to deliver our style of programs to the people in their

community but put their own cultural spin on it and the success that they're having is like, through the roof, the demand for the programs are going through the roof, the impact that they're having for their community is through the roof also. And I think one of the most beautiful things is that, you know, we set down with the chiefs up there before we got the green lights through the program.

And, you know, they told us that this is an answer to their prayers. There's a saying that the Mohawk people are going to bring something to the whole Eroquoid nation that is gonna help them out and help them get out of this suffering and trauma. And the chief said that what it is is these practices and this holistic life foundation, aquasisany,

is that answer to their prayers. And I think what we wanna do is we want to be able to duplicate what we did up there in every other city that we can. And all over the world, honestly, because not only does it help alleviate and heal trauma, now all communities are traumatized. And scientifically, it helps heal that trauma, but it also creates jobs for folks. That's one thing that we're doing here in Baltimore. We did an aquasizing, it's creating jobs for a lot of people that wouldn't have jobs other places and helping improve things on a level that no one ever really thought was possible. And once again, it's all about

empowering communities to help heal themselves. And you know, that's all about empowering communities to help heal themselves. And you know, that's one of the things that I see that is in the future of what we're going to do. Just to close this out, if you could just please plug the book, HLF, how people can support you beyond buying the book, learn more about what you do, just lay it all on us, please. Yeah, and they can always donate it at our website, hlefink.org. So you can throw some funds that way if you'd like to reach out to us if you want us to start doing some work in your neighborhood, in your city, in your schools, your community, we're more than happy to sit down and talk in the discuss ways that we can strategize and start bringing some of this programming to you, to your location.

Also, Ali and I might have an organization, it's a wonderful organization called the Involution Group. They have this new spiritual strategic plan that's coming out. We're just going to take a little, it's like a deeper dive than what we do with Holistic Life Foundation. So I would definitely check that out as well and support them with that initiative. And the book, of course, called Let Your Light Shine, Telefrande, Telefrande. We're trying to be on that New York bestseller, Timesless.

By a few, they're great for Christmas gifts. They're great for birthday presents. Yeah, yeah, but please just reach out to us. We're here. This is what our mission in life is, and we're going to keep doing this forever. So we're here to help anybody if they want to start doing programs similar to ours. It doesn't necessarily be ours. We can help support you in that way as well. Well, congratulations again on the book. And thank you for coming on the show. And more importantly, thank you for everything you're doing. It's extraordinary.

Thank you, Dan, for always helping and supporting us, man. We appreciate you and love you. Yeah, man, we love you so much, man. Thank you so much, bro. I just kind of like you. I don't know about the love thing, Dan. Yeah. Yeah, work a little more.

You have to work a little more, Dan more to get the love out of Ali. He loves me. I know he loves me. I'm confident in his love, but I love you right back. I just really grateful for everything you're doing. And I mean that in the realist and corneast way. Thanks again to my friends, Ali Smith, Ottman Smith and Andy Gonzalez. Thank you as well to everybody who works so incredibly hard on this show.

10% happier is produced by Gabrielle Zuckerman, DJ Cashmere, Justin Davy and Lauren Smith. Our senior producer is Marissa Schneidermann. Kimi Regler is our managing producer and our executive producer is Jen Poient, scoring and mixing by Peter Bonavventure of Ultraviolet audio. We'll see you all on Wednesday for a brand new episode. Hey, hey, prime members. You can listen to 10% happier early and ad-free on Amazon Music.

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