The Rich Roll Podcast - Guru Singh On Intuition Over Impulse

Episode Date: October 14, 2021

Last week we dipped our toes into sacred waters both spiritual and metaphysical. This week we are diving off the deep end. In other words, welcome to another incarnation of Guru Multiverse, the latest in my ongoing series of communions with Guru Singh, my treasured friend and favorite sparring partner when it comes to matters heart and soul. Aside from being a modern-day Gandalf, Guru Singh is a master of the Kundalini arts, a celebrated spiritual teacher, a third-generation Sikh yogi, an author, accomplished musician, father, grandfather, and an overall gift to humanity who has been teaching and studying Kundalini yoga for the past 40-plus years who now holds virtual court at kundaliniuniversity.com. The Guru joins me in the studio to offer a dissertation on divining and discerning the delicate and detailed differences that differentiate: instinct, impulse, intuition, and intelligence—the four “I’s” if you will. This is a conversation about perspective, accountability, the willingness to solicit and receive feedback, and why growth depends upon the ability to truly understand and appreciate the nuances that distinguish these “I” words. To read more click here. You can also watch listen to our exchange on YouTube. And as always, the podcast streams wild and free on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Make sure to stick around until the end. As has become his custom, Guru Singh closes things out with a song. This might be one of my favorite Vulcan mind-melds to date. So let us not waste another moment. Peace + Plants, Rich

Impulse doesn't control the show, but impulse gets to contribute to the show. And instinct doesn't control the show, but instinct also contributes. And so then all of a sudden you have impulse contributing, instinct contributing, body intelligence contributing, and larger pictures contributing. Then, as this sounds like a complexity, but it can happen ultimately very rapidly, then you can base a decision on all of this input. And then intuition is a little bit like a pilot's license. You know, there's a lot of ground skill that you have to go through reading and trying things before you actually end up up in an airplane.

And so intuition is very, very real, but the skill set needs to be developed. And oftentimes, you said people mistakenly equate instinct for intuition. I think that a lot of people on a spiritual path will be mistaken in the opposite direction. They'll think that they're intuitively feeling something and all they're actually feeling is just a really strong emotion, you know, and so they're disguising what would be impulse by holding an emotional impulse at bay long enough so it feels like it's qualified to make the decision. The Rich Roll Podcast.

The Rich Roll Podcast. What is up, all you beautiful earth-dwelling creatures and creators? Welcome to another incarnation of Guru Multiverse, where we wade into the sacred waters, the waters that are both metaphysical and, of course, practical. A master of the kundalini arts, Guru Singh, my compatriot in this exploration, is a good friend. He's a celebrated spiritual teacher. He's a third-generation Sikh yogi, an author, an accomplished musician, a father, a grandfather,

and essentially man about town and gift to humanity. Now holding virtual court at kundalinuniversity.com. This might be one of my very favorite Vulcan mind melts to date with Guru Singh, and it is coming in hot, but first. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life. And in the many years since, I've in turn helped many suffering addicts and their loved ones find treatment.

And with that, I know all too well just how confusing and how overwhelming and how challenging it can be to find the right place and the right level of care. Especially because, unfortunately, not all treatment resources adhere to ethical practices. It's a real problem. A problem I'm now happy and proud to share has been solved by the people at recovery.com who created an online support portal designed to guide, to support, and empower you to find the ideal level of care tailored to your personal needs. They've partnered with the best global behavioral health providers to cover the full spectrum of behavioral health disorders, including substance use disorders, depression, anxiety, eating disorders,

gambling addictions, and more. Navigating their site is simple. Search by insurance coverage, location, treatment type, you name it. Plus, you can read reviews from former patients to help you decide. Whether you're a busy exec, a parent of a struggling teen, or battling addiction yourself, I feel you. I empathize

with you. I really do. And they have treatment options for you. Life in recovery is wonderful, and recovery.com is your partner in starting that journey. When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe

everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life. And in the many years since, I've in turn helped many suffering addicts and their loved ones find treatment. And with that, I know all too well just how confusing and how overwhelming and how challenging it can be to find the right place and the right level of care, especially because, unfortunately, not all treatment resources adhere to ethical practices. It's a real problem, a problem I'm now happy and proud to share has been solved by the people at recovery.com who created an online support portal

designed to guide, to support, and empower you to find the ideal level of care tailored to your personal needs. They've partnered with the best global behavioral health providers to cover the full spectrum of behavioral health disorders, including substance use disorders,

depression, anxiety, eating disorders, depression, anxiety, eating disorders, gambling addictions, and more. Navigating their site is simple. Search by insurance coverage, location, treatment type, you name it. Plus, you can read reviews from former patients to help you decide. Whether you're a busy exec, a parent of a struggling teen, or battling addiction yourself, I feel you. I empathize with you. I really do. And they have treatment options for you. Life and recovery is wonderful. And recovery.com is your partner in starting that journey. When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best

treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. Okay, okie dokie. So, the guru resides in the house of the RRP today for a dissertation on divining and discerning the delicate and detailed differences that differentiate instinct, impulse, intuition, and intelligence, the four I's. So, this is really about perspective. It's about accountability, the willingness to solicit and more importantly, receive feedback. It's about why growth depends upon this ability to truly understand and appreciate the nuances that distinguish these quote unquote I words. Make sure to stick around to the end. Once again, Guru Singh takes us out with a song, a beautiful one at that. And with all that being said, allow us not to waste another moment.

This is me and Guru Singh. We're back again. Guru Corner is like a thing. I know. It's happening. You know, with the beauty of your new studio and your dedication to doing these shows with people in person has opened up me to the idea that, well, I'm gonna have to be down here every few months. If for no other reason, then we're gonna pop in and do an hour. I know you're Mr. Internet now and virtual and all of that.

And that's fantastic with Kundalini University, but there is something about the analog experience. I know. I just have a really hard time doing what I do in a Zoom format. I can do it, but is it the same? It really isn't. It isn't the same.

And one of the things that I've always treasured about our communication is we watch each other, you know, we're, we're across a desk or across the table looking at each other. And you and I are a bit of an expert in body languaging and, and we start to form our conversations, not just in the spoken word, but also in the, you know, the physical expression and the facial expression. You don't get that in the two-dimensional Zoom world. Yeah. It's much more difficult. It's much more difficult. Yeah. And I think that is true. I mean, when I sit down with you, I have an idea of things I want to talk about, but other than that, there's no preparation, which makes this a lot easier because some of the guests, like I have to put in hours and hours and

hours of prep time to be here. Well, I will interject as an interruption. It is because this is not an interview. This is equal partners in a conversation. And that to me is the greatest value that I get from our time together is that we're not, there's not a person who's an expert and a person who is an interviewer. There is two people who are exploring the world. I hope so. I think that's right. But if I start to stutter or look like I can't think of anything to say, then I'm giving you the visual cue to step in and save me. I do.

Keep it going. I gotta go to point guard then. Right. And run the game. What I wanna talk about today, what I wanna focus on is the difference between instinct and impulse. When are we following our intuition?

When can we trust our intuition? When are we basing our actions on instinct and when are we acting impulsively? And I think there's different layers to this. On some level, we kind of understand the difference between these two things, but it quickly becomes very subtle and difficult to parse when you're making a decision,

am I doing this impulsively? Have I thought this through? What is my intuition telling me? And can I trust my intuition? How reliable is my intuition? For me, I would use a metaphor. Think of a movie set and you've got a director and you've got a director and you've got a script.

What's going to be formed between the director's ideas, the actor's skills, and the script is going to be a combination of talents and impulses and intuitions and instincts. And sometimes the whole thing ends up in the shitter. And they go, cut. Okay, that didn't work out. I thought, I was thinking it was going to end up. And what do they do when they have a mistake? They do a new take.

And the way in which we can, like anything, learn to trust our intuition is by learning how to forgive ourselves for making really horrendous mistakes. and we can practice you know with little insights and little intuitive or instinctual behaviors or impulsive behaviors and we can start noting how how did we how did we do when we followed that kind of a trigger knee-jerk response. And how was it if I, instead of just going with an impulse, I just stepped back for a moment, looked at the whole picture, tried to take as much in as possible, and then arrived at a conclusion that I would then bank on, still maybe make a mistake, conclusion that I would then bank on, still maybe make a mistake, but work with it. So I believe there's tremendous value in impulse. The where, why, and when is going to be significant. I believe there is tremendous value

in holding impulse. And again, the where, why, and when is going to be important. I believe there's a significant difference between instinct and intuition. And we can dive deeper into that. But I think there's a place for both. What is that difference? Like, is instinct more in attunement with impulsivity? Yes. Well, to a degree. Instinct is more of a hereditary circumstance. Instinct comes out of your DNA, out of your physiology.

It's learned behavior, you know, the capacity for your body to know. For example, when you're on a long distance bike ride, run, swim, there will be instincts that are coming up that aren't based on just impulse. They're based on patterns that you have remembered over many, many years, many, many years. And they may be in some ways patterns that you've inherited from your mom and dad and your grandparents and generations. That's what instincts are. And instincts are stored in the body chemistry. The idea that you have this body intelligence

is part of what the instinctual network is able to employ. Intuition, on the other hand, is less of physiology and more of a subtlety base you start to build your intuitive skills through as i've said in other ones of our interviews through the use of the parasympathetic nervous system, the nervous system that takes a step back, the nervous system that takes in more of the information, the data field that is present in the moment, and then starts to allow the correlations or what's rapidly called correlations between the different data points. When you're in that state of the parasympathetic

theta brain, the dream time brain, all of a sudden, and you've learned how to get yourself into that state, you can start forming intuitive determinations or decisions that are not based on impulse, but they may take impulse into account. Hmm. And so impulse doesn't control the show, but impulse gets to contribute to the show. And instinct doesn't control the show, but instinct also contributes. And so then all of a sudden you have impulse contributing, instinct contributing, body intelligence contributing, and larger pictures contributing. Then, as this sounds like a complexity, but it can happen ultimately very rapidly, then you can base a decision on all of this input. Instinct to me is like a really successful business leader, a really successful CEO

that listens to all of the input and then comes to a conclusion that is collective, or what is called in my world, the elevated paradox. You know, you've got the, all of the issues that are competing for space, and then you've got the paradoxical issue that just sort of arises from that tension and pressure. The four I's. Yeah, the four I's.

Instinct, impulse, intuition, and intelligence. Beautiful. Right? Yeah. They overlap a little bit with each other. I mean, the way that I've always thought about this is instinct, yes, this is something that's bred into our DNA as animals that have evolved over millennia.

Impulse is a reflection of our emotional bodies and the experiences and traumas and stresses that we've had over the course of our lifetimes. We have buttons that have been installed that when they get pushed, we act impulsively. There's not a lot of neural activity in terms of like intelligence that comes into play. We react without thinking about it.

It's only in the wake of that action or engaging in that impulse that we then have to pick up the pieces or figure out how we went wrong here. Impulses are- Or enjoy for- Yeah, I mean, I tend to associate it with a negative connotation, but obviously we have impulses for a reason. And back to that sympathetic nervous system,

like an instinct or an impulse can be a way of keeping you safe or avoiding danger or reacting to a certain stimulus that is basically creating a boundary, any of these things, right? Yeah, just think about the impulse as sometimes the first move,

almost like first responders. And that instinct might be in getting the injured to a facility. Intelligence is in the analysis of what's going on. And then in the midst of surgery, some intuition comes in when obstacles are met. So there's a place for all of that. You said that it combines those graphics where they have the circles, intersecting circles. Venn diagram, yeah. And what is that? What ising circles. Venn diagram, yeah. And what is that?

What is it? The Venn diagram. Yes, and that sweet spot where they all are shared common space. Overlap, mm-hmm. Yeah. There you go. Yeah. But intuition, the way that you characterize it

is a little bit of fairy dust, a little bit of the unknown that comes into play. A little bit of fairy dust. I think the problem and one of the reasons why I wanted to talk about this with you today is that we can confuse instinct or impulse with intuition. And my sense is that there are a lot of people who are living their lives in a manner

that we described in the last episode that we did, where we're not so connected to ourselves. We're living our lives reactively. We're going to our job and waking up and just trying to get by and we're inoculating ourselves with media, et cetera. And there's not a lot of internal reflection and there's a dissonance between the higher self

and kind of the operating system that's carrying this human machine through life. And I think short of really engaging in that internal work of self-understanding, this exploration that I'd like to think that I'm on and that I know that you're on of trying to understand ourselves and trying to reconcile those past traumas and make sense of them and become more self-actualized

and whole that we begin to develop a sense of the difference between intuition and instinct in that we begin to be able to trust our intuition. Like one of the things that I learned early in sobriety is that I couldn't trust my intuition because my intuition had led me astray. It had been kidnapped or co-opted by substances and thought patterns and behaviors

that had taken me to some dark places. Like I would think, you know, my instinct was, oh, do that, or I'm conflating these terms, but my intuition was I should do this. And then I'd end up in some terrible situation, right? So in early sobriety, I didn't feel like I could trust my intuition was I should do this and then I'd end up in some terrible situation, right? So in early sobriety, I didn't feel like I could trust my intuition. And I was told that it would probably be a good idea

to not trust my intuition until I had kind of done enough of this work to the point where I could dip my toe back into that, test it, oh, that worked out. Maybe I can trust it a little bit more, trust worked out. Maybe I can trust it a little bit more, trust it a little bit more, trust it a little bit more to the point where now I feel very confident in trusting my intuition.

But that was not something that happened overnight. Yeah. I think intuition, you've just framed it beautifully. What your communication just there brought into me was intuition is a little bit like a pilot's license. You know, there's a lot of ground skill that you have to go through reading and, and, you know, trying things before you actually end up up in an airplane. And so intuition is very, very real, but it needs, the skill set needs to be developed.

And oftentimes you said people mistakenly equate emotion or impulse or or instinct for intuition. I think that a lot of people on a spiritual path will be mistaken in the opposite direction. They'll think that they're intuitively feeling something and all they're actually feeling is just a really strong emotion. And so they're disguising what would be impulse by holding an emotional impulse at bay long enough so it feels like it's qualified to make the decision. And so, and it's a little bit like, you know, a person

that's just taught themselves how to golf or tennis, play tennis. And, you know, and then they find a teacher and the teacher has to undo everything that they've been doing. And, you know, and then they find a teacher and the teacher has to undo everything that they've been doing. And so they get worse at playing golf until they get better. Right. And I believe that it's the same way with, with using the four eyes that you can use them successfully. But if you're, but if you're learning how to train the intuition, to train your instincts to come in when you need that instinctual behavior, to train the impulse to be able to come in when you need it. I mean, driving a car, you better have some good instincts and some good impulses

because things can fly at you, right and left, and you need to be able to respond and sometimes really react. And then there's times when you can follow the intelligent pathway into the intuitive realm and it's successful. But I certainly wouldn't drive my car on intuition. No. You'd look like an idiot on the road. I feel like this process requires an objective outside counselor, like whether that's a mentor or a spiritual guide

or a teacher or a sponsor, somebody who can reflect back to you the truth of the decisions that you're trying to make. I mean, a perfect example would be somebody who's in a string of bad relationships and is all ready to commit to this new guy. I know he's abusive, but like, I think this is gonna be different.

My intuition is telling me that this is the one. It's like, no, that's not a well-honed intuition. That is programming built in by dint of a terrible relationship with your father who modeled bad behavior and has crossed the wires in your brain to put you in this position where you're attracted to that unhealthy behavior.

Wow. Until we untangle that knot and really look at why you keep ending up in these types of relationships, you're gonna continue to do it. And you're gonna delude yourself that you're acting on your intuition. When in truth, you're acting impulsively based upon trauma and emotional circumstances that were beyond your control

at a very early age. That is profound. And you said it when you first entered sobriety, I didn't trust my intuition. That's appropriate. There's an appropriate time if a person is sort of fixated and addicted to bad relation because of the programming that scrambled, I'm just reusing your words, that scrambled the internal relational wiring from a bad father or a bad uncle or a bad this or a bad that, and then that is the time to not trust your intuition. That is the time to try to trust and get more in touch with your intelligence patterns and maybe even your instinctual patterns, but have your instinctual patterns

pass through your intelligence before you act on- Now I'm getting confused. Too many I's. Too many I's. But really what you're looking at is sometimes you have to be that witness. Sometimes you have to be that guide or that sponsor. But you're a very unreliable narrator of your own life. Correct. That's the problem.

And you can't see that when you're in it. Right. But there are times that you can then learn by your mistakes. And in that not seeing it when you're in it, learning by your mistakes requires the giving forward, which is forgiving. The giving forward in order to learn from the lesson and give yourself forward into the new opportunities

rather than be cringed by the lesson, crushed by the lesson, and forced to never learn another lesson in that category and just be single for your whole life, right? Or whatever else is, you know, the circumstance. Being able to give yourself forward, to forward give yourself, to forgive yourself and allow yourself to learn,

to make the mistake, like I said, on the movie set, cut, cut your loss. But in that context, you have a director who is the objective outside observer who says, cut, this is not working. You're way off track here. Your intuition is leading you astray. I think we all need some version of that person

as a mirror, as a non-interested party who can reflect back the truth of the decisions that you're trying to make. That's interesting that you wanna do that. Tell me more about why you think that's a good idea. That is the value of a lot of things. That's a value of having a sponsor in sobriety. That's the value of having a therapist in life.

That's the value of having a teacher, a counselor. That's the value of having that witness. And in today's world, the idea of a guru, and by the way, I'm not selling myself here because my name is Guru Singh, it's not my position or title, but the idea of the guru, right? That The teacher, the wise one, the one who's been through it before. And however you assimilate that, whether it's a sponsor, a witness, a friend, I call it an accountability buddy. You know, I have an accountability buddy.

I have an accountability buddy in my wife. I have accountability buddies in my children. And if I can't pass my behavior through their eyes and through their senses, then I'm looking at it as inappropriate or as I shouldn't go down that pathway. So filling ourselves with sponsors, with people who are wiser than we are is really a value added. Yeah, I think it's crucial. I mean, there's a couple pieces to this

that I think are important for those that are listening or watching who haven't had the experience of being in therapy or are not part of a spiritual community or a 12 step community. I think we all have people within our communities or in our circles that are wiser than us in various categories.

So perhaps a way to look at it is as a board of advisors. Like when I have a relationship problem, I know this person who's been in a healthy relationship for 30 years. Like that's the person I'm going to call to run this problem by. Or when I have a fitness or a running question, there's a different type of person that I'm going to call. Not every guru needs to be able to check all those categories. And I think just being in the habit and developing the humility of running your decisions by these types of people is a really great practice. Even if it just affirms the decision

you were already gonna make, it's still a healthy habit. And more often than not, you're gonna come up against some resistance. Well, maybe you didn't think about this or me. And they're gonna tell you that maybe you're not making the right decision, which is uncomfortable. And maybe you're gonna make that decision anyway,

but maybe you'll reflect back on that, which gets to the second piece that I wanted to talk about, which is developing the capacity to receive the feedback. I think that's the real mover here. It's one thing to have these advisors or gurus in your life, but if you can't receive what they're telling you or advising you of,

then you're not getting off first base, right? So the capacity to receive the feedback is a function of humility. Like, can you set aside your ego or what it is that you are so attached to doing? And can you hear the objective outside perspective on why maybe that might not be the best thing for you? And I think that dynamic works best or optimally

when the person who's delivering the feedback is able to do it in a nonjudgmental way, right? Like how can you keep this on an even keel? The feedback deliverer just says plainly, did you think about this? Maybe you should think about this. That's interesting that you wanna do that. And then receive it, oh, rather than get defensive,

which is an impulse that I think we all have to develop the capacity to take it in, to process it and say, thank you for that. Let me think about that. It doesn't commit you to a it in, to process it and say, thank you for that. Let me think about that. It doesn't commit you to a certain path, but to me, that's the process. And that's the way that I try to make most of the bigger decisions that I have to make.

And it's dramatically improved my life. You've housed this really beautifully. you've housed this really beautifully. What I understand in that, the way you've described this, is that if you're feeling a lot of discomfort in the reception of the advice, then you can pretty much be guaranteed that you are too impulsive. Yeah. And you could take that as, oh, that's an interesting piece of information that I'm feeling that resistance and I'm feeling defensive. That should tell you something.

And if you're wise, you will take that signal and process it and say, okay, I'm uncomfortable because my impulse has already got me moving in this direction of this choice that I'm making. And now I've asked somebody to give me their advice on the choice that I'm already committed to. My impulse is already engaged. And if that is what is occurring often, then you have to realize that you need to put more energy into the other three eyes,

the intelligence, the instinct, and the intuition. And you need to draw back a little bit on the impulse because it's causing you to be uncomfortable under the influence of the advice or the suggestions that are coming from the witness, be it a sponsor, a therapist, however it is. What I learned from a lot is the three brains, the head brain, the heart brain, and the gut brain, or m-braining as medical science, multi-braining calls it. The brain in your heart has to work to serve, but has to surrender to receive.

So if you sort of take that model and apply it to how are you going to receive the advice? How are you going to receive the advice of a sponsor, a therapist, a witness of some form? You're going to have to surrender. And surrender doesn't mean giving up. Surrender just simply means become inactive for a moment. It doesn't mean that the momentum is lost. It doesn't mean that anything is lost. It doesn't mean that the idea is lost, but it means stop engaging. It's like a car. If you put in the clutch, the engine is still there. All the horsepower is still there. The wheels are still there. The drive column is still, everything is still there, but it's disengaged for

a moment. And maybe in that disengagement, you will say, well, I should turn the car to the hard right because the way I was going is not going to have a benevolent outcome because I've talked to my witnesses, I've talked to my people, and they're all advising me against this. Or you may say, I'm good to go. I'm going to go against all advice, but I'm going to take full responsibility. And all of these sort of and all of these sort of mimicked sequences, mock sequences, need to be studied. How many of the decisions that you made against advice over the last X amount of time, you talked about we can do less in a year but more in a decade. How many of the decisions that we've acted upon against advice have turned out?

Is it greater than 50% or less than 50%? And start coming up with some conclusions based on real data. Another way to parse this or look at it, again, I always go back to the addiction recovery kind of lens on these things. It's beautiful. One of the things that I learned is evaluating these decisions or these impulses

or these intuitions through a calculus of what hole am I trying to fill? So if I have this notion that pops into my head, I am feeling very hungry, I'm protein starved, I must go to McDonald's. McDonald's is the solution to my problem. That is my instinct, That is my gut.

It's telling me that's how I'm gonna solve this hunger that I have. Well, let's deconstruct that a little bit. Are you truly protein deficient? What's driving this hunger? And what is the emotional discomfort that you're feeling right now that your unconscious mind is telling you

will be resolved by putting a gigantic amount of calories into your gut as quickly as possible that will essentially sedate you. It's an addictive response to an emotional discomfort that's driving that decision. Thus, it is less intuition and it is more impulse, an impulse driven by an unconscious emotional need. Well, you said the word sedation

because the unconscious emotional need will remain once that food is digested and wears off. Well, you will be sedated for a moment. You will be sedated so that you won't experience the need. And then your emotional dis-ease will return. Exactly. And what is a more appropriate view in that moment is to go, okay, my impulse is this. And by asking yourself, what hole am I trying to fill? It's got many layers, doesn't it? And there's many different

aspects to the hole that is being filled here. And maybe if we just withheld some of the consumption and spent a little more time in the evaluation, we might realize something that could be reapplied over and over and over again successfully that ultimately ends up changing the fact that that even comes up. that that even comes up, that we may never have to ultimately face that same challenge, that same emotional need, that same hole that needs to be filled. Yeah, if you're constantly reaching out to fill the hole and doing it impulsively without any kind of higher

cognizance of what's going on, you're just gonna perpetuate that behavior. But if you take a moment and say, I'll go to McDonald's in 20 minutes, but I'm gonna sit with this emotional discomfort and try to figure out why I'm feeling the way that I'm feeling right now, more often than not, that will lead to some epiphany.

Oh, I just had a fight with my spouse 20 minutes ago. That's why I feel uneasy right now. And I'm reaching out for this thing that I know will fix me at least in the short term. I think the ego comes into play as well. Like if somebody comes to me and they say, I wanna run a marathon, like I've been on the couch and I don't like how I feel, Like this is what I'm gonna do.

Like help me figure out how to get there. And I've told this, some version of this story before. So forgive me if you've heard it, but my question to that person, my first question to that person is always why? Like what is the problem that you think this is going to solve? I just wanna do it.

I've never done anything. Maybe that's great. Or maybe you're emotionally out of balance and you're gonna take on a very difficult goal only to discover that it wasn't the right goal for you because you're not integrated enough to trust what you think is an intuition, but it's really just an impulse being driven

by some discomfort that you're experiencing. Sedation periods are very telling. Running a marathon, for example, requires a lot of preparation, requires a lot of effort, and then there's a recovery time. And so one of the things that about the sedation of anything, whether it's a positive or a negative, is that what you were saying before, after the fact, the hole remains unless

the hole itself has been discovered as to what's causing the hole. And what you said a moment ago about going back in time, you know, let's take 20 minutes, you know, not go out and grab the whole. And what you said a moment ago about going back in time, you know, let's take 20 minutes, you know, not go out and grab the burger and let's go back in time and see, okay, what's led to this sensation. If you do that often enough, one will find through that discipline that the sensations are in themselves very complex. And a lot of the feelings that we feel aren't our feelings. A lot of the feelings that we, because we consume through every, every orifice in our body, not just, you know, not just putting it into our mouth. We consume through our eyes and our ears and our nose and everything. And a lot of times what is creating the hole

is the fact that we are being targeted by so many people in the marketing world, in the sales world, in the industrial world, in the financial world, in the political world, et cetera, et cetera. All of these worlds that are competing for our attention on steroids now with the internet, for our attention on steroids now with the internet, that there is actually no hole. There is actually a sensation that there is a hole. But if I actually get down to it, I'm good. And I don't have a hole.

But if I had sedated the idea that I had a hole, I could never have been awake enough to recognize the fact that I don't have a hole and that I am being inundated by those things that can only sell me a fix the hole solution if I believe that I have a hole. Right, the idea that you are in lack and I have the solution for that lack in the form of product X, Y, or Z,

or even healthy pursuit A, B, or C. Because all of those things can be inoculants that are driven by a sense that you are not complete exactly the way that you are. I love that word, inoculants. I'm gonna steal that, man. I'm just gonna use it. I didn't invent it, so go for it.

I know you didn't invent it, but you really use it with me. The bottom line with me is that it even applies to the world that I live in, right? The world of spiritual teaching and of healthy living and of all those things. Sometimes if a person can just go down inside themselves, learn a technique to go down inside themselves

and evaluate themselves, they'll find out that in fact, they're okay the way they are. It's just all of this other paraphernalia. And so it might be more of a reductionary practice rather than an additive practice. Let's add this to my life. Let's add this to my life. Or maybe it's let me subtract this from my life. Let me subtract this from my life. And if I do that, not to a place of renunciation, but to a place of at least I can see and be more clear, that becomes a place where I can feel I don't have a hole.

I am whole. I am complete. It's hard though, man. It's so much more fun to add stuff. Subtracting stuff is painful. Of course, more meaningful ultimately, but the extent to which this game is rigged against us. It is rigged.

I mean, the lengths that we will go, myself included, to avoid just having to sit quietly with ourselves is insane. Well, I remember you and I once having a conversation around the weighted blanket and all- I still sleep with it every night. And all the relationship is with that weighted blanket. And all- I still sleep with it every night. And all the relationship is with that weighted blanket is to literally force you to not move,

to sequester the impulse while you're unconscious and it holds you in place. You know, the weighted blanket is very much like in biblical terms, the swaddling clothes and in native indigenous terms, the papoose, whereby the child was held and contained and really found that the flailing of the arms and legs or the movement at nighttime of the arms and legs or the movement at nighttime was what was causing the sensation of I need to move more because that movement didn't give me everything I need.

And so I love it because that weighted blanket changed your world. And that weighted blanket is a forced stillness. I'm just a baby that needs to be swaddled. I love it. Yeah, it's this calming impact on your, your sympathetic nervous system. It's a feeling that it creates this feeling of safety,

right, like you're okay, you can relax, you can let your guard down. You don't need to be in fight or flight. All is well with the world. You are complete. Go to sleep now. We were talking impulse, intuition, instinct, and intelligence.

You know, impulse is a little bit like the old biblical terminology where such and such begets such and such more, right? Using the word begets, right? such more, right? Using the word begets, right? And impulse or movement or knee-jerk reaction can tend to inflate the circumstance and not always, but when it does, inflate the circumstance and then you have to move and become even more impulsive and then you have to move and become even more impulsive and so that's when i'm just saying that sometimes like with a weighted blanket if you subtract an impulsive move rather than enact an impulsive move

and just give yourself a little bit of time to open the brain's aperture. We're on camera right now. Opening up the aperture of that camera is going to feed more light into it. It's going to give more information into it. When we can open up the aperture of our own mind and bring in more information,

maybe that additional information is the circumstances which can avoid what are often called the unintended consequence. Yeah, that goes back to being receptive to that type of feedback. When I reflect back on the history of the decisions that I've made before getting sober and then throughout my sobriety, it's very revealing. Like I realize only in retrospect that most of the decisions that I made when I was drinking and using were purely impulsive, driven by the idea that I had a hole

or just a sense of overall discomfort with myself that must be quelled. And I found substance as a means of accomplishing that. It worked until it stopped working. But in tandem with that was a drive to just be a pleasure seeker, to never be in that discomfort, to never look at it, to never try to deconstruct it or understand it

or work through it, just make it go away as quickly as possible for as long as possible. Then you get sober, you have this explosion of emotions that are very confusing and disorienting. And with that, I developed the reflex to run my decisions by other people, peers within that community, sponsor, et cetera. And more often than not, irrespective of the feedback,

I would still make the impulsive decision. So I had to do that for a period of time and did exactly what you said, which is tallying inventory of how that worked out. My sponsor would say, okay, you're gonna do what you're gonna do. Here's what I, you know, I'm not attached to whatever you do, but here's what I think.

Make the wrong decision, suffer the circumstances of that, reflect upon it, do it again, do it again, do it again, do it again, until my actions started to align with the feedback that I was getting. And I started to notice that my impulses were becoming more intuitive and the decisions that I was exploring were more consistently aligned with the feedback that I was exploring were more consistently aligned

with the feedback that I was getting instead of getting feedback that made me defensive because this person was telling me I shouldn't do the thing that I wanna do or kind of already had decided that I was going to do. The feedback was saying, yeah, I think that's a good decision or go for that. Then I reached a sort of Rubicon with the whole thing

where I wanted to explore myself as an athlete. It's like, I think I wanna do this ultra man race. I mean, for an addict or an alcoholic to be like, I've never done an Ironman, but I'm gonna go do this double Ironman. Any sponsor's gonna tell you like, that's probably not a good idea. Or I think maybe you're out of alignment

or perhaps you should reflect on that a little bit more. But that was a situation in which I felt confident and comfortable in my intuition, even though it didn't match up with the feedback that I was getting because I'd done 10 plus years of work to get to that point. And I didn't have any guilt in making the decision to pursue that, even though it wasn't in alignment

with the feedback that I was getting. How'd that work out? But the point, it changed my life and it was great. And I, you know, so, but the important piece in that whole thing is all the work that went into getting to that place where I could then go my own way and feel confident and comfortable

that my intuition was guiding me rather than handicapping me. Oh, man. I love that experience that you just took me through because let's apply it to the world of, of having advisors, having a guru, having a teacher, having a therapist, having a this, having a that. It can't be a forever kind of event as a only source of your wellbeing. There has to come a place where you are self-reliant. And it doesn't mean that you throw away the advisors and just go it on your own.

But it means that you are able to create a segue between the advice and what you believe is your own budding intuition, that you are starting to become wiser, more intelligent, less impulsive. And if you can build that trust over time by going it your way, making a mistake, forgiving yourself, picking yourself back up, acknowledging that you could use a little more advice before you go out and do it your own way again. And then when you do finally get to that place where you can begin to trust your own intuitive, your own inner sense, that's what gives you the strength. And that is what the idea of a teacher, a guru, a therapist, a sponsor, a witness, anything is all about. People in the world of therapy,

people in the world of spirituality, people in the world of any number of things will sometimes get locked into a, you know, a one perspective is what I always go to. I always go to this person. I always go to this person. This person knows best for me. And like you said previously, you would go to somebody different for marriage counseling than you might for running counseling as to what's the best way to go forward. And that's the same kind of trap

that we can get addicted to our advisor. Well, also there's an identity that gets baked into that as well. This is who I am. I'm the person who follows this person, or I'm an adoptee of certain, you know, this of philosophy X or spiritual vein Y. Or I am, or I can only make my decisions

if my therapist slash my sponsor slash my this, agree with me. And that provides, if we can use the metaphor, a muscular atrophy in that self-reliance. The student must leave the nest at some point. Exactly. And so in these worlds of advisory and in these worlds of building the intuitive muscle

and building in reducing the impulsive nature and balancing it out with the other three eyes, this world has to become a world ultimately of self-reliance that is still willing to be a student, still willing to receive that incredible, hey, I think about that if I were you, I know you've been doing this for a lot of time, but I'm just looking from a different angle

and I'm not seeing it. A great litmus test for trying to understand whether you're being driven by impulse or intuition is the 24 hour rule. If you have a decision to make, if you need to send somebody an email that's perhaps incendiary, sit on it for 24 hours and see if you feel the same way

the following day or 48 hours or 72 hours. Let's put that as. Rules and regs. Right, if 48 hours later, you realize like, yeah, I probably shouldn't send that email to that guy, even though I felt so strongly about it the day before, then you can be assured that that was an impulsive response to some stimuli versus 48 hours later, you're like, I still think this is a good idea.

Can I wait another day? Well, I kind of, maybe I can, maybe I can't. If you can, like the longer you can push it off and still feel confident that that's in your best interest, then you're tipping more into the intuition area. You just hit the magic number, which is actually physiologically and neurologically 72 hours.

Perspective changes every 72 hours. Obviously you have multiple perspectives going on all at once. So it's not like every 72 hours you're a different framework. But you're working with a particular perspective when you want to send that email. This is what you want to achieve with the email. This is what you want to say in the email.

This is why you want to say it, because this is what this person did from a perspective. why you want to say it, because this is what this person did from a perspective. 72 hours, three days, if you can wait, because you said 48 hours, and then you said, can you wait another day? 24 plus 48, 72 hours in three days, that's a magic number. And that's not like philosophy, that's like actual physiology. Physiology. What I experience, I'm sure this is very common, like I'll get an email that will throw me off kilter

and I'm so uncomfortable, I feel like I have to respond to it immediately. Or you're not real. I just can't move forward with anything else in my life until I deal with this thing. Yes,'re not real. I just can't move forward with anything in my life until I deal with this thing. Yes, yes, yes. Every fiber of my being is like respond now, respond now, respond now.

And that's feeling like really fierce intuition. And the higher version of myself is like, step away from the computer, you know? And it takes everything to do that. the computer, you know, and it takes everything to do that. Yeah. Yeah. I love this because this is when we mistake impulse for intuition. You know, there is the, you can't let anyone get away with that trigger. If I wait 72 hours, I'm a weakling because I've let somebody walk on me. Actually, you've let someone trigger the actual thing that's going to walk on you, which is the result of your impulse. That's what's going to ultimately walk on you. However, if waiting 72 hours

and your perspective is still locked in, then most likely what you're experiencing is your intuition. Go for it. But I would reckon to say that if you kept a tabulation of how many times you waited 72 hours and the result was effective, and how many times you didn't wait 72 hours or even 24 hours, and the effect was inappropriate, that you would find out that it's way more weighted towards the step away from the computer.

Yeah. I mean, a hundred percent of the time, 72 hours later, you're like, yeah, I don't need this. I'm so glad I didn't send that. Or I don't feel like I need to do anything. Why should I give that person so much power? And also intuition has this ability of seeing beyond time. And if I wait 72 hours on a reaction to make it more of a response,

have an ability to respond, becoming more responsible, then what I oftentimes experience is what caused that person to send me that email in the first place. And that it wasn't even me. That in that 72 hours, I will have learned a lot more about the circumstance. And sometimes within that 72 hours, they'll come back to me and say, you know, I really want you to disregard what I said the other day, because I was feeling this because of this, this, this, and this, and it really had nothing to do with you,

but you were the tallest tree in the forest. And so my wind hit you. And those are the rewards that are so incredible when you do wait and step away from the reaction. How different would the world look if Twitter had a 72 hour delay on every tweet? That you post it and it doesn't post and you can withdraw it.

And within that 72 hours, you can withdraw it. You can withdraw it. I mean, obviously like it's supposed to be a real time news platform as much as anything else. It's not functional. That would never happen. But I feel like if it was an option, like if you could install... Oh, cool. You know, a preference where every time I tweet or respond, maybe just when you're responding

to other people's tweets... Can wait 72. Yeah. Maybe we alleviate a lot of the pain that we're causing each other on's tweets. Can wait 72. Yeah, maybe we alleviate a lot of the pain that we're causing each other on these platforms. Yeah, a lot of the mudslinging, stone throwing. Because that is the ultimate impulse provocateur. You read something, I have to tell that person they're wrong or some emotional overwhelm occurs

where I must be heard on this thing now. Just to, as an example, I established a, I don't respond, I don't react, because on social media, no matter how high your intentions are, somebody will find issue with something that you're doing. Who do you think you're talking to? I get this like all day long.

Yeah. And so I appreciate that. And so I just created an inner attitude that I am not going to bite the bait. Somebody once told me I'm a Pisces, right? Pisces is the two fish. And some wise Vedic astrologer once told me that the Pisces will die by the bait and the hook.

And so I took that to heart and determined that I wasn't gonna bite the bait. I was gonna wait and see if that was really food or if that was a hook that was trying to entangle me. And that one decision that I made and the fact that I'm able to discipline myself and follow that decision has made a big difference in my life on social media. I'm not there yet. Oh yeah, you are. No, no, no. I mean, I-

You have far more bait hanging out there. But I mean, I- Then you bite. I battle with the tension between being a broadcaster on these platforms and being somebody who wants to be engaged in the communities that are coalescing being a broadcaster on these platforms and being somebody who wants to be engaged in the communities that are coalescing around this work that I'm doing.

And I wanna be present and I wanna make myself available to constructive criticism and feedback, but there's also a dopamine inducing, addictive piece to this where it's like, I have to see these comments and then I'm exposed to all kinds of negativity. And then I find it very difficult to emerge

out of the haze of all of that. Like, I don't know that it's doing anything positive and perhaps all would be better if I just took a step back and used it simply like you do to broadcast and find other ways of cultivating community or being engaged with the people who are interested in what I'm doing here outside the four walls of these platforms that have become toxic

for so many reasons. Well, I would say that there is a moment in the race in which every cell in your body is screaming at you to quit and kind of like hitting the wall. If in responding to negativity, you have the same discipline that you do, that has made you a successful runner, bicyclist, swimmer. With everything else that goes on,

you're a vegan triathlete, that if you could use the same deflectors, like Aikido, that has no offensive move, but uses the energy that's being thrown at you to reverse onto itself, if you develop that skill set, then you would be a person in demand even more so than you are. Because the old saying, the tallest tree catches the most wind. And you are, in the industry, you are a tall tree. In my industry, I am a tall tree and we both catch both nourishment through the roots

and we catch wind at the top. What I do is I develop a skill set that allows me, particularly during these times of scandal and pandemic and all of these things where people are throwing a lot more stuff at those of us that are putting ourselves out there than ever before. But I find that if I look at the opposition like an Aikido master would, that that's just energy. That isn't actually opposing me. That's going to energize me. Then I have to figure out, okay, that's a philosophy. What's the practicality? How can I actually achieve that? And therefore I would, the 24 hour rule, maybe not in social media, you have a 72 hour rule because you may be way behind the curve then, but at least have a 24-hour rule. And if nothing else, have a 12-hour rule on certain things, but also have ways in which you can become less personal

because there has to be an opportunity within your own nervous system to be able to take the criticism, which is obviously not personal because nobody except a few people know you so they can't say they can't say who you are or what you've done and make it less personal and it ultimately becomes more of a teaching mechanism because that's what you're doing all the time i mean you don't have the kind of following that you have what you're doing all the time. I mean, you don't have the kind of following that you have because you're an authority.

You have the following because you love authorities and you gather authorities together and people know that if you want to know something about anything, go to the Rich Roll podcast and look through it and you will find because he's got an admiration. And maybe I don't want to use the word authority. He's got admiration for wisdom. He's got admiration for people who are very intuitive, who are very intelligent. And then you present those things. And for some of those things, you get deep negative

feedback. And in that way, you apply the art of Aikido, which simply means no offensive moves. It's the Tao of no offensive moves. And you understand that you presented something, and you understand that you presented something, somebody had a bad experience with it, but that wasn't about you. Of the one or 2,000 people that had a bad experience with it, there were 50, 70, 100,000 who had a really good experience from it.

And so the ratio is still super positive. I'll try to bear that in mind. You got to because you're doing such incredible work. Such a people pleaser though. I have so many insecurities around this that I fall prey to, you know, seeking validation in the wrong places because I still delude myself into that belief that there is a hole that must be filled

and chasing the fulfillment of that hole in all the wrong places. And I'm just calling myself out as a human being that when I'm not spiritually fit, I can find myself doing that. And it always leads to a not so good place. Well, let us both call ourselves out in this moment, just so that the audience that is watching or listening can understand that happens to all of us. This last year, I've had to learn a lot of new tools to deal with depression. I've had to learn a lot of new tools to deal with depression.

I've had to learn a lot of new tools to deal with pushback, really negative pushback. And so I think it helps everybody listening and watching to know that you're never beyond the need for help. You're never beyond the need for advice. And you're never beyond the need to try some new tools and learn some new skills so that you can then accommodate the opportunities that are in front of you. Because as they often say, you know, all the negative is, is just the positive with its ass in forward. And it all begins with a commitment to hone that intuition.

And to do that, we need teachers, we need advisors, we need humility, we need curiosity, we need wisdom, we need gurus and a good place to begin that journey. And we need humility, we need curiosity, we need wisdom, we need gurus and a good place to begin that journey. And we need forgiveness. Just might be forgiveness, compassion, gratitude, and we can go on forever. Yeah. But if you're interested in beginning that process,

perhaps a good place to start would be the Kundalini University. All of a sudden. How's that for a plug? All of a sudden, man. I'm gonna stick the landing. You just. All of a sudden. How's that for a plug? All of a sudden, man. I'm gonna stick the landing. You just talk about a good partnership here. Yeah, we do teach, we teach emotional wellbeing.

We teach mental wellbeing. We teach physical wellbeing through the science of, the ancient science of Kundalini yoga and meditation, and also through other things too, the spiritual world, the emotional world, the mental world, the physical world, kundalinuniversity.com. And it's not the only school. I'm not even going to say to anybody out there that it's the best school, but it's my school, so it's the school. I'm not even going to say to anybody out there that it's the best school, but it's my school.

So it's the school that I'm going to promote, but I'm not going to try to promote it by putting anything else down. It has an opportunity. And if you look us up, you'll see that there's so many ways in which you can engage us, whether it's the simple freedom of a daily reminder or the larger investment of a 16 week, 200 hour course. I love the daily emails. Sometimes I'm like, another one of these? I don't have time to read this.

I know, people have told me that and it doesn't hurt my feelings whatsoever. But just the fact that it's there. I know another one of these, I don't have time to write it. I'm in a bad mood, delete. Like I just can't do it today. I love it, you're so honest. The next day, there it is.

You got it. Just, it's always showing up no matter what. Isn't that the beauty? The beauty of the digital age is really more important than the negativity of the digital age because it is so consistent. Yeah.

It doesn't have an emotional letdown. No. It always shows up. Relentless. Relentlessly. Well, always a treat and a pleasure to talk to you, my friend, thank you for gracing us with your presence. We'll do it again sometime soon.

And until then. Peace. Plants. Gratitude. And take us out with a song. Yeah, I'd love to. Cool. I'd love to.

Look at Jason, he's all fired up to be a music tech. Yeah. Guitar tech. It's so good. Oh, you know, some great friends of mine every Kundalini class ends with this some great friends of mine the incredible string band

way back in the 1960s wrote a round a song in the round and the refrain to it was may the long time sun Shine down upon you

All everlasting love and joy surround you And the pure light The pure light within you The pure light within you. Guide your way on. Guide your way on. Guide your way on. Love you. related to everything discussed today, visit the episode page at richroll.com, where you can find the entire podcast archive, as well as podcast merch, my books, Finding Ultra, Voicing Change

in the Plant Power Way, as well as the Plant Power Meal Planner at meals.richroll.com. If you'd like to support the podcast, the easiest and most impactful thing you can do is to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, and on YouTube and leave a review and or comment. Supporting the sponsors who support the show is also important and appreciated. And sharing the show or your favorite episode with friends or on social media is, of course, awesome and very helpful. And finally, for podcast updates, special offers on books, the meal planner, and other subjects, please subscribe to our newsletter, which you can find on the footer of any page at richroll.com. Today's show was produced and engineered by Jason Camiolo with additional audio engineering by Cale Curtis. The video edition of the podcast was created by Blake Curtis Thank you, Georgia Whaley, for copywriting and website management.

And of course, our theme music was created by Tyler Pyatt, Trapper Pyatt, and Harry Mathis. Appreciate the love, love the support. See you back here soon. Peace. Plants. Namaste. Thank you.