The Dr. Hyman Show - How To Live In Flow-Motion

Episode Date: June 19, 2020

Many of us live in a constant state of low-grade dissatisfaction that we don’t need or deserve. Yet there are tools waiting within all of us that can connect us to our purpose—and show us how to share our unique gifts with the world. In his conversations with Reverend Michael Beckwith and Dr. Andrea Pennington, Dr. Hyman explores how we can connect to our highest selves through simple practices, even in the face of relentlessly hostile messages from society. Reverend Michael Beckwith is the Founder and Spiritual Director of the Agape International Spiritual Center, a trans-denominational community headquartered in Los Angeles, comprised of thousands of local members and global live streamers. In 2012, Rev. Michael Beckwith addressed the UN General Assembly during its annual World Interfaith Harmony Week. As co-founder and president of the Association for Global New Thought, he hosts conferences featuring harbingers of world peace including His Holiness the Dalai Lama, and had the distinguished honor of presenting Nelson Mandela with the Gandhi King Award. Dr. Beckwith is a sought after meditation teacher, conference speaker, and seminar leader on the Life Visioning Process™. Dr. Pennington is an integrative physician, acupuncturist, meditation teacher, and #1 international bestselling author. She received her Doctor of Medicine from Washington University School of Medicine, trained at Georgetown University Hospital, and received certification in Age Management Medicine with the Cenegenics Medical Institute. Her extensive study of medical nutrition, positive psychology, and neuroscience-inspired biohacking led her to create a holistic media platform, In8Vitality, to teach people how to blend ancient wisdom and modern science for enhanced vitality and life mastery. In Andrea’s latest book, The Real Self Love Handbook, she explores her personal journey from depression to real self-love and how The Cornerstone Process, a 5-step self-discovery framework, is setting people free from the drama of past trauma. Tune into Dr. Hyman’s full conversation with Reverend Michael Beckwith at https://DrMarkHyman.lnk.to/RevMichaelBeckwith Tune into Dr. Hyman’s full conversation with Dr. Andrea Pennington at https://DrMarkHyman.lnk.to/DrAndreaPennington

Coming up on this mini episode of The Doctor's Pharmacy. If you can devote to whatever the practice that feels good to you, and you do it a little bit every day, then you start to change the trajectory of your life. Hi, I'm Kea Perot at one of the producers of The Doctor's Pharmacy podcast. Many of us have questioned our reason for being here in this life. In doing so, we are seeking our purpose. We're looking for our deepest understanding of our place in the universe. Yet, many of us are also living in a reactionary state where we simply respond to life's circumstances.

In his conversations with Reverend Michael Beckwith and Dr. Andrea Pennington, Dr. Hyman explores how we can connect to our purpose and offer our unique gifts to the world. Let's turn to Dr. Hyman's interview with Reverend Michael Beckwith. There are different stages of spiritual growth. The first stage is the victim stage. And here we think something is doing something to us. The next stage... We're at the effect of our life, right? As opposed to the cause of our life. Absolutely. I said, then we grow and we realize that there are laws in the universe. Just as there's buoyancy, you know, if you surrender to buoyancy, you'll float.

If you flail against it, you'll sink. So in the second stage, that's where visualization is. You learn to apply these laws of mind to make a difference in your life. The third stage is the stage that something operates through you. Something bigger is actually coming through you. The zone. You're in the zone. Peak experience.

There's something, it's beyond your thinking. Flow state. Flow state. I call it flow motion. Flow motion. And then there's the being state where you're at one with. So in the first stage, we ask disempowering questions. What's wrong?

Who's to blame? We want to know the scapegoat. Who's to blame for this? Why me? And these questions, if we live in them chronically, the law will answer them for you. The world's happening to you as opposed to, yeah. Somebody's doing something to me. It's somebody's fault. You don't grow at that level. So you have to have a much more dynamically, aerodynamically asked question. And so those are empowering questions. What's real?

What good is here that I presently cannot see? What's trying to emerge in my life? What gift do I have to give? What's my destiny? What's the vision locked within me that's trying to escape? So if individuals begin to ask an empowering question and become alert, become available, they'll start to hear different answers.

I've never really heard stated that way before, which is that when you focus on the big self, everything gets taken care of for the little self. Yes. So you don't have to worry about that. No. And matter of fact, if you worry, it the little self. Yes. So you don't have to worry about that. No. And matter of fact, if you worry, it repels it. Yeah.

Worry repels. Dr. Hyman also spoke to Dr. Andrea Pennington about many of these same topics. She shared her personal story of experiencing a state of flow and how she helps clients cultivate self-love for better health. I was at that time doing television and running a medical center. And it was my COO, a very dear friend of mine, Nadal, who came to me and was like, I can see that something's not right. I was heading towards burnout again. And he was like, are you singing? Are you writing music? And I'm like, what are you talking about? He's like, I just kind of

noticed that when you're doing your music thing, your mood's a lot better. And it was again, this kind of outsider who was pointing to me like, why are you not doing the things that bring you joy and happiness and fulfillment? And so it was kind of a long way to get to this realization that the arts and the things that come naturally to us are meant to be expressed. And from a Chinese medical perspective, we know that these energies that normally flow through our bodies and even our environments, they need to flow. Otherwise, that's when we get off balance and we create dis-ease. This is the pivotal moment for me. I happen to be in the south of France. This was at a time when all of the TV shows that I was doing in America hadn't

yet made it to Europe. So nobody knew who I was. I was able to go there anonymously and I wanted to just be the artistic version of me. And I ended up in this nightclub in Saint-Tropez and this guy was like, oh, okay, so you're a jazz singer. You know, we're going to get you up in the booth. And there I am. I'm like singing and I'm like sharing my love. And I felt like everyone was like receiving me for the real me, even though they had no idea who I was. I wasn't famous.

But I got back to my hotel in Cannes and I was like, what just happened? I just experienced that flow state, that bliss state where I felt complete acceptance from myself and from everyone around me. I felt like that bliss of love. It was fascinating. You know, I noticed in some of the pictures of you online that you have a Buddha tattooed on your arm. I do. Which is kind of cool. And a lot of the things you're saying are actually making me think of the Buddhist framework. You know, I studied Buddhism in college and it was the sort of self, the little self versus the big self. Yes. And most of us identify with the little self, which is the ego. It's our body. It's our life circumstances. It's the Dr. Andrea Pennington, the media personality, the famous doctor, the whatever it is.

And how that takes us away from our bigger self. So we know that when a baby is born, they're typically born expecting and accepting unconditional love and affection. Because that's the kind of womb experience we've just come from but over the process of our early childhood development we developed this ego this identity that is a construct I mean it's literally a construct based on the programming and the experiences that we have it's not the real self so you know in this early childhood period where we're developing this ego personality, it's all based on survival. It's all about, you know, how do we

fit into our surroundings and how do we ensure that we are accepted and liked within our tribe, whether that's our family tribe or at school. And over time, many of us do identify with that ego or with whatever roles that we're playing. So being able to see that this ego personality that we create is trying to ensure our survival, but sometimes the practices and behaviors that we adopt and the belief systems that we adopt end up causing us illness and dis-ease. So I, as you mentioned in the intro, I've been teaching meditation for 15 years now. Meditation is the number one thing that I recommend, whether a person's dealing with stress or cancer or trying to find their true self, having that regular practice of getting to that point of stillness where you can perhaps have that flash where you touch that bliss and you recognize, whoa, there's something more to me. We're also doing a lot with narrative therapy. So one of the things I learned very early on in my positive psychology days was about the benefit

of just writing and journaling. Right. You get to be the author of your life instead of being the victim of your life. Exactly. Dr. Beckwith also spoke to this power of practice. He shares how we can deepen our spiritual practice and heal through stillness, surrender, and a sense of trust that we have enough. I always encourage a spiritual practice. Something that you're doing deliberately, intentionally on a daily basis, even if it's for a few minutes a day.

So you develop a different behavior. You develop a different pattern in life. Many people are doing hit and miss and reacting to circumstances. But if you can devote to whatever the practice that feels good to you and you do it a little bit every day, then you start to change the trajectory of your life. The chemicals change in your body, the thoughts change. You start to see life differently.

You have a different perception, even if it's for a small period of time every day. And then as that perception slowly changes, then your life experience changes. As the example, if you pour a little bit of water in muddy water every single day, eventually, there's clarity with the water. So if you do something every day, just a little bit, then you become more and more clear. That's true.

So you mentioned something I think is something that affects all of us. We live and are bombarded by hostile messages all the time. How do we navigate that onslaught? How do we sort of build a way of dealing with that for us? So I teach that when all that's coming at you, that's actually a prayer request from our society in that you to breathe, become still and kind of look and see what's missing there. And you add that, you add that in your prayer so that you're not at the effect of it. That news that's coming at you is actually making you go deeper in your spiritual practice.

So with every bad news you get, it's taking you deeper into a contact with the presence rather than being overwhelmed by it. And that's kind of how we approach it. So we say we move from the headlines to heartlines. Hear the headlines. It takes us to our heart. What is the world asking for? I just recall this research that was done a number of years ago where, and it was really well done, scientifically controlled study, where they had groups of people praying for other people at a distance. Someone's in a hospital or someone's sick. And they were able to measure the response of the people who were sick, even though they didn't know anybody was praying for them. And it had profound effects on their outcomes and the results in

terms of their hospital stay and their medication use, all these really hard metrics. It was true. Because right now, most people live in a paradigm of lack and separation and scarcity, which doesn't exist in the universe. That's a lie. There's more than enough of everything for everybody. So I think if people came from an awareness that there is enough and we have enough and that everything that we need for the healing of our past ills as human beings already exist, then the golden age emerges. We don't have to, you know, live the way we've been living. There's enough of everything. That's beautiful. Yeah.

It is often our mindset and daily practices that are our strongest guiding forces. Consider what daily practice you can establish to connect to your authentic purpose. It starts with small, consistent steps that ultimately create a better world for all of us. Thank you for tuning into this mini episode of The Doctor's Pharmacy. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider sharing it with a friend or leaving us a comment.

Be well. Hi, everyone. I hope you enjoyed this week's episode. Thank you. the understanding that it does not constitute medical or other professional advice or services. If you're looking for help in your journey, seek out a qualified medical practitioner. If you're looking for a functional medicine practitioner, you can visit ifm.org and search their find a practitioner database. It's important that you have someone in your corner who's trained, who's a licensed healthcare practitioner, and can help you make changes, especially when it comes to your health.