So today we're talking about no self.
I don't know if that's on the schedule, but that's what we're
talking. So, yeah.
So no self in the digital age, right?
So no self is a foundational aspect of Buddhism, right?
It's, it says that there that the self is not this fixed
entity, but it's a construct of our minds, It's an illusion.
And that that kind of connects to the idea that we're all
actually, we're living in this way that's very individuated.
But the concept of new self is meant to remind us that we're
actually far more connected and far more interdependent upon
each other then especially our current.
Our modern culture would have us believe that there's no
permanent in or independent self.
Nothing arises independently. Everything arises dependently
upon other things. Everything is contingent upon a
web of causes and conditions or interdependent factors.
This way of thinking liberates one from a a sense of self,
which is considered the root cause of suffering in Buddhism,
right? This idea of the self often
leads to thoughts about, you know, leads to different types
of attachment, leads to the constant isolation back and
forth between craving and aversion, craving for oneself,
being averse to something for oneself.
But if you abolish the idea of the independent self, then the
idea is that you will that the attachment to self, the
attachment to mind, the attachment to liberation will
start to fall to limitations, will start to fall away.
The absence of a person, a permanent self, frees you from
suffering and clinging. No self also brings into focus
the idea of interconnectedness with others, as I've said, and
that that will ultimately be one of the main factors in helping
one cultivate compassion, empathy, and a sense of
responsibility to others. And then also a sense of
dependence on others, like we have talked about many times in
Arisana, like the idea of a group of people depending upon
each other, supporting each other, but being connected to
each other and not being stuck in the idea of individual, the
kind of blowing up the idea of individuation.
There's a story about the Buddha and the businessman.
Where the Buddha is, is in the public space and the businessman
comes through and is just really not receptive to what the Buddha
is saying, kind of talks to him nasty, and he spits on him.
And then over a few years, he starts to learn more about the
Buddha's teachings, not from the Buddha, but from other places.
And he at some point comes upon the Buddha and he apologized and
said, I'm really sorry that I treated you that way.
I'm really sorry that I cursed at you that way and talked to
you the way that I did. And the Buddha's response is I
don't accept your apology and yells like what Buddha is not
accepting the apology, not being not being understanding for
another. But the idea was that he says
that the person who did those things to me is not even here
now. And the person who he treated
badly is also not here now because there's no permanent
sense of self, right? You are a different person now,
and I am a different person. I am not even the person that
has been wronged. And so this illustrates the idea
that the self is not fixed, but there's every evolving thing.
And that the person who actually treated the Buddha abusively
clearly is no longer the same person who's standing in front
of him because he's he's repented for havoc.
How the actor So the question for today is how does the self?
The question that I wanted to explore more is how does the
self play out or this the sense of no self that we as people who
are thinking about Buddhist concepts of Buddhist ideas, how
do we play that out in a culture that is so obsessed with the
self, right, that puts the self so close to the front in the
digital age. In our current culture, we've
merged a lot of our ideas about in our concepts of the self with
our digital lives. And in those digital spaces,
the, the idea of oneself and one's ego is exaggerated in ways
that really, you know, we've never really had the capacity
technologically to exaggerate our concept of self in the same
way that we do now. The ego thrives in these spaces.
There are many, many opportunities in, in our
technological culture to to enlarge the ego.
Ego, essentially our digital lives are based upon the
manipulation of the self with many, many, many different
goals, one of which is to continue to foster the idea of
building the self and building the ego and building the
personality through consumption. All right.
And then in this context, we are constantly augmenting ourselves
and building ourselves through the prism of comparison, through
the prism of envy, through the through the prism of anger,
division, pride, selfishness, ego, vanity.
This has become a very, very important part of our media, of
our culture, of our politics, of our economy, of our consumption
patterns. And so we culturally construct
our identities through digital sources a lot at the top, which
was something that wasn't really even possible to do or maybe 100
years ago or maybe less than that.
So that's the question that I want to discuss is how do you,
how do we find ways to combat that constant desire, that
constant encouragement, that constant drum beat of building
1's own self through, through digital means and focusing on
the self in the ways that the that the Buddha and Buddhism is
encouraging us to completely abandoned, right?
If you're interacting with a lot of digital, you know, formats
and platforms that we use on a daily basis, you're constantly
being encouraged to do that. So how do you stop yourself from
doing that while you are also still connected to the rest of
the world, right? Being in the world, not
necessarily being of the I was going to say that there are a
couple of things we can think about, but I also want to hear
what you all have to say about this.
There are tactics you use that might help with this issue.
For instance, the one that I'm sure you're all thinking about
already, mindfulness, that might help be more aware of the way
that we're engaging in these things, how we allow them to
affect us, how we allow them to affect how we think about
ourselves and about other people and our connectedness to those
other people. There's also meta meditation,
which we've done in here before, which is about cultivating
compassion. It's about thinking about
compassion, chanting about compassion, then emanating that
out into the world through yourself, sometimes silently,
sometimes with words. Obviously there are things like
digital detoxes, meta meditation retreats, like some of the ones
that we talked about in here before that where you can detach
and have some time to, to think and to reconnect with yourself
outside of these, these things that are constantly exaggerating
the concept of self. And so those, those are all
things that we've talked about before and things that are
pretty obvious. But I'm also interested in
hearing what you all think about this.
Like how do you how do you engage with the world in all the
ways that we sometimes are encouraged to, but sometimes
have to without slipping constantly into, or maybe you
slip into those modes of self that we've talked about.
I'm sure we all do. How do you come back from it?
How do you conceptualize it when you're in it?
And and what's what is maybe a long term strategy for all of us
think about. These days, so I'll.
Turn the floor over to you, yeah.
Yeah, I see. Like all kinds of digital zombie
to, you know, out there just kinds of like flickering lights
always there in their phone, not really front of whoever they are
actually they're in front of. And you know, I see that and I'm
like, wow, you know, you see kittens a lot, you know, just
kind of checked out or check in and checked out or what
surroundings. And but then I discovered Zoom
and I go to a meeting almost every day.
You know, I meditate with people.
From around the world. You know, and then I have also
access to meditations, to mantras, to just information.
So I see the flip sign of the technology, you know, so I guess
just everything has a flip side, you know, like nothing's
perfect. And I, I figured that the ego
that gets inflated on social media and everything, I mean, I
just stay away from it, that it's, it's a part of people's
lives. It's, you know, people go there
for information as well and communicate, but I think that
the only way is just if you're suffering enough that your ego
is suffering so much that maybe you'll turn to something else
that's alternative to what you were fixated on that you thought
could bring you happiness. You know what, it's just they
all clash of the egos and beside, you know, a lot of
times, not always like a lot of times, I guess if you with maybe
anything, if you suffer enough and meet you.
I'm actually such a look for alternative means.
Hopefully not always, but that's otherwise you can get lost, you
know, in this digital identity. Well, I lose touch with certain
things, you know, That's all you got.
Yeah. And, and, you know, like he
said, there are ways to avoid it.
There are ways to say, well, I'm not going to I'm not going to
interact with Facebook or social media or I'm not going to, you
know, do certain things that bring me constantly into contact
with these ideas. And that's great.
And that's true. But then there's also the fact
that you, you know, the, the culture that you live in, right?
The people that you interact with, the people you work with,
the some, in some cases, the digital formats that you have to
be, you have to be on in order to, in order to work.
In some cases, you can avoid them.
And something that I've been thinking about a lot recently is
that, you know, we have a epidemic of anxiety in our
culture, right? I mean, everybody's experiencing
anxiety and it's a thing that we have kind of come to conclude
that this is just a human condition.
And yes, anxiety is a part of the human condition.
And there are many, many different things that can happen
to a human body and the human mind that might cause anxiety.
But there are also some cases where we are, you know, we're,
we're actively doing things that create anxiety and then question
where it comes from, right? What would happen if we didn't,
if we didn't have these digital formats?
So if we didn't live with some of the technologies that we've
accepted, would we still feel some of these anxieties?
Or is it possible that the anxiety that we feel is our
physical form, our bodies telling us something's wrong,
right? Is anxiety just simply a part of
the human condition, or is it that?
Is it something that our physical form expresses when we
are constantly living according to a clock?
We're constantly living in a way that is dictated by the
technologies that we're using, which are not shaped to, you
know, complement human happiness, but are shaped to
kind of be efficient or to be convenient or to create a type
of connectivity that might encourage consumption.
You know, are the technologies that we're lewd we're using
making us happier or are they actually creating the anxiety
that we might not feel if we were to get away from those,
those technologies? And part of the reason why I'm
saying this is because when I've gone on some of the 10 day
retreats, I've gone in there. The first time I went in there,
I went in and a lot of people I know who has done this have gone
in thinking my mind is so fast. It's so crazy what it's going to
be like when I'm in there. I'm going to, it's not going to
work. It's I don't want to do that.
I don't want to be in some quiet space with my mind going crazy.
But what I've noticed is that when you go into those spaces,
your mind isn't going crazy in the same way.
Yes, your mind is always active, but this kind of frenetic pacing
is kind of pushed along by the things that we've invited into
our lives. And when they're not there,
there's a certain type of calm that is possible, right?
Everyone's different, but I just wonder how much of the anxiety
is being created. You know, chicken or the egg?
Which one is coming first? By the technologies.
Yeah, I was just gonna say. I didn't answer the vote.
Right, Mike up already. In terms of obviously
biologically you have anxiety and for devolutionary reasons,
but I think that I think we'll talk about this.
The these programs are these algorithm they're specifically
you like made to take advantage of the of your anxiety like
you're missing out or you know. So I definitely think and not to
mention all the the comparisons and which is directly.
Draw the art you get. Especially on social media,
yeah, I think it's purposely making people anxious, which
then feeds back into the entire usage of it because it's
something it's stimulating still.
I don't know. But yeah, I don't know.
I think answers both. I think it's definitely, I think
technology into media and IT especially these things that are
particularly enticing like for me.
That's the problem. With these is that they're like
I'm. I, I am afraid impulses.
Sometimes about certain, like small.
Things and so social. Media is like easy eaten is for
me to fall into if I don't have like strict guidelines.
And so those are the those are that's why it's hard for me, I
think, and why it's hard for a lot of people to speak.
It's just so easy to fall into and get taken away with, and
that's what they're. Trying to get you take.
The constant stimulation makes it harder to sit in silence.
With yourself with that, Yeah. So James, I have a quick
question me, sorry to bounce it back to you.
I have a bunch of thoughts, but I have a question.
When you return from the retreats, I know Danielle's
done. Anybody else when you return
from their retreats with some of this knowledge and I'm sure some
of it took some longer time to unpack and even watch some of
their your change back return to some of the pattern like
patterns. So like you said, some of it is
unavoidable, some of it. Did you did you take?
Some things out of it, some tools that that you know, Hey, I
I can do less of this. Just a thought that I decided to
ask you about that. Yeah, I mean, the first thing
that I took out of it, I said a little bit about it already, but
was just that I recognize that part of the reason why I get my
my own anxiety is just because of the constant stimulation.
And that the less of that that I have, the less I feel that
right. So one of the things I did the
first time I the first time I did the retreat back in my 2017,
I just said I'm not going to I I won't watch TV.
That is, that was that was produced after 1970.
And when I because when I watch modern television, which is
great, right? There's a lot of great stuff on
television. I'm not.
Saying no one should watch
television. But when I watch modern
television, I feel more anxious, like I can feel, I feel my body
and my mind just so, just so much more tentative.
And what I've decided is that this, I mean, obviously I
haven't done any research on this, but that it has a lot to
do with the fact that modern, more modern television is made
with constant cliffhangers, right?
So they're, they're constantly producing in you this emotion of
anticipation of what happens Nets, right, like multiple times
within an hour. And, and they're also are they,
they're crafted in a way that is meant to keep you in suspense,
right? And obviously suspense has
existed since television has existed, but there but it's
ramped up, right? And I've I've noticed this after
I came out of the retreat. This is one thing I noticed that
there are also very few scenes or very few times that the
camera sits in one place for more than two to five seconds,
right? You're constantly getting a new
seat, which feels to me like it. It's like working at McDonald's,
right? When I was a kid, I, I worked at
McDonald's when I was 16 years old.
And I remember my first week working at McDonald's, I was the
miserable every night when I went home, the the stimulation
was so high because I was constantly making food and
sending it through the drive through and listening to someone
in my ear while I'm trying to make something in cash register.
And I remember waking up in the middle of night and thinking I
was at McDonald's. I, I woke up in the middle of
night. I was awake and in my eyes I
could see my bedroom, but I thought it was McDonald's and I
would be moving around my, my room, moving things around,
moving toy. Like I had some toys leftover.
I was 60, but I was moving things around and I thought they
were cheeseburgers. I know this sounds ridiculous,
but that that imprint of the stimulation of being at that job
for 8 hours, 32 hours a week created that kind of frenetic
feeling inside of me. This nervous condition that was
making me think my bedroom was McDonald's at night.
And I feel like that same on a lesser level.
That same feeling comes from watching these shows that are
crafted to buy constantly keep your attention even as if they
they do. So I stopped watching those
shows. I still do sometimes, but I'll
generally I'll just watch stuff from the 50s and 60s because
they're slower paced. They're not doing it.
They haven't learned to do that yet.
And when I did that, I I feel a difference in my mental
chemistry, something that happened for me.
With that was music when in my younger years of construction
labor, I drank everyday listen to loud rock'n'roll on the way
home. And then one day I had to really
my anxiety was ramped up and I'm driving with a beer in my hand
and I turned the music off and it was the most beautiful thing
that ever happened. You know, I go, huh.
OK, you know, yeah, it's, it's incredible when you know, when
we. Yeah.
And and when in 2017 when I went, I the the house, it was
this big mansion up in Wisconsin and Outback there was just a lot
of trails to walk for the meditators.
And I came back home and I said, you know, I should be walking an
inch or every day. And ever since then, I've gone
to watch the sunset almost every day that I'm available to do it.
I I leave my house and I go walk and watch the sunset.
And it's just this really, really great addition to my
life. It's just, it is added so much
dimension, just 20 to 30 minutes.
Usually it's about an hour walking around in this loop and
watching the sunset. And yeah, I mean, I think those
are the sorts of things that we often think about as we're
driving to and from and we see the sun is setting and it's
really beautiful. Like, oh, that's such a
beautiful sunset. But then we get back to what
we're doing. We pass these things by.
But they can actually be a really great addition to your
life. They don't cost a lot, if
anything at all. And they often don't cost a
whole lot of time. And but yeah, I am I perfect
yet? No, not at all.
But I didn't learn that that stillness that we often are
afraid of is really the most comfortable place if you, if you
can force yourself into it. So, so there's certainly answers
to this question that you're posing to us.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, but there are many other
answers. I don't, I don't know.
Those are those are great answers.
I think they're really good answers.
I'm I'm Danielle First, thank you Douglas for the sound bath.
That was that was really lovely. Second, I hope I'm not going to
be the stereotype of the teacher who's a bad student because I I
you have actually opened a lot of doors that we could walk
through for in in your Dharma talk.
And I'm going to exit the technology one, but walk through
the the no self one because I find that really useful.
And I think it's because I've been, I, I've had like a, a
little, I maybe it was a little bit of an epiphany.
I don't know, we'll see. It might not stick.
But a thought about the self because I think, and what I
heard from a lot of what you're talking about, what everybody's
talking about is kind of this idea of awareness and what are
you aware of? And, and it kind of combined
with our talk from last year on last week on pragmatism and
treating all of these kind of observations as sort of
hypotheses and determining what is true for us based on the
world that that we live in. And I was thinking about that
because like my sense of self, I practice this a lot.
And although the Buddhist concept of the self is really
difficult, really the idea is like to let go of all of the
packaging that you've built up around yourself and to could
just kind of like some, but what is here?
Like what, what can I find some solid footing about?
And so I practice that a lot. And, and I think the concept of
the self is so tricky because we don't even realize that we're,
we've repackaged into a new story.
So we, we practice and we're like, Oh, I see all the stories
that I'm telling about myself and like, let me step back from
that. And then instantly we repackage
that into a new story that then we take on.
So I think the idea of just being aware and, and I agree
that technology can exacerbate that, right?
Like we are constantly called to prove who you are in social
media, right? Like, what are you posting and
what are you saying? And it's a it's like an external
display of that story that you're telling of yourself.
So I do think that it can, it can, it can deepen that in some
slightly problematic ways because that also then there's a
sort of permanent record of who you said you were and then you
get stuck into that story and and then it's harder to get out
of, right. But one of the things that I
have realized recently is like the story that I have told about
myself is not helpful in a lot of ways.
I mean, we've talked about this a lot with the three poisons of
the craving, aversion and delusion.
And I focused a lot on delusion because I know that I am a very
powerful storyteller to myself. Like I tell myself stories and
then I believe that they're true and forget that it's a story.
And one of the stories that I have told myself over my life is
that like, I'm an intrinsically motivated person.
I just like to solve problems. I, I like to be active.
I like to, you know, like fix things or whatever.
And I realized that that's not exactly true, that it's, it's
something that I am performing kind of in the world, right?
Like this idea of being somebody who fixes things and who solves
problems. And, and it's, it's carried me
like a lot throughout my career. Like I just keep building on
that kind of a story to like, I, I've gotten into a pretty high
level of leadership at my university and it's made me
realize that like, I don't need this shit.
Obviously, why, why am I doing this?
And I look back at like the, it's, it was the story that I
was telling myself about. Like what makes me valuable is
that I can provide service to something I can fix, sync
something I can be helpful to someone.
And it's gotten me to this position now where I'm like, I
feel like, does it doesn't feel good?
It doesn't feel like I'm in a good kind of grounded, sort of
equanimous place. And so then I thought, OK, I
need a change. And that scared the shit out of
me. Like my whole career, years and
years, decades, I've built up this career, I have this long CV
and now I'm like, I think this might not be right for me.
And then and then I'm like, but, but it but then what?
Then what? Well, where do I?
So I've been unraveling a little bit.
You've probably heard this over the last, you know, months
perhaps. But this is kind of where I am
this, this idea of this sense of self.
I think that I actually think that having a story about the
self is helpful because it keeps you feeling unravelled.
I mean, ravelled. It keeps you feeling ravelled.
It prevents you from feeling unraveled, but it also then
encourages us to tie ourselves up in an into knots that we
can't get out of. So like with all things in
Buddhism, the idea of like recognizing that you're telling
a story about yourself and see where it's starting to chase the
story that you're wrapped up in when it's starting to bind and
allowing yourself to open up about that.
And then from my personal experience, being brave enough
to say like, OK, I, this is the trajectory I thought I wanted.
This was the life I thought I wanted to build.
And maybe I'm wrong. So, so I don't know where that
was, but thank you for helping to, to bring this topic right
now because, yeah, I'm unraveling.
I mean, I think it's such an interesting thing.
I mean, I, I've, I'm sure we all have, like I've had situations
like that. I mean, I grew up in situations
where I, my identity was partially formed by being there
for my family. And, and you know, I'm still the
one, all right, I'm still the one in the family who is there
for everyone. But I've also just come to
realize recently, like, I don't, I don't, that doesn't have to be
who I am. I don't have to be the one that
is run. You know, that doesn't mean that
I'll never not be there for my family, But there are ways in
which I, because of this concept of myself that has been built
through external forces and internal forces, I make
decisions that are not always the best decision for me because
I'm trying to fulfill that role not only in my mind but also in
the mind of the other person. And then I find myself in the
middle of something like, why am I here?
Why? Why did I leave my home and come
here when I would have rather do that?
Yeah. And so like dismantling that and
allowing yourself to feel that it's OK to not live up to some
ancient construction of who you are and then to rebuild it in
some particular way. And is is really is
revolutionary. Sorry, Michael, you were going
to set us up a lot of visuals. Blogs Tito awesome topic.
I think talking about anxiety in today's age is.
Very what? I needed.
It's been irrelevant forever, but especially today.
And I liked that. First topic you brought up as
far as like tactics, how do we engage with anxiety in a way
that it's kind of unavoidable? Like you said, right?
We live in an We live in an anxiety moving.
World. Some of which is manufactured, I
say very intentionally and some of it's just part of the human
condition. Anxiety exists, right?
I like that mindfulness was the first one.
You brought up my experience with being trying to be mindful
of emotion, whether they're pleasant, unpleasant, neutral,
whatever is kind of tying into what you were talking about
about like you get rid of this story.
It's an immediately attached to another word.
And oftentimes what I've experienced, especially with
dealing with something like anxiety, is that we're often fed
contradictory message. It's in our society as well,
which is to say that you're not allowed to be deatrice.
If you're anxious, you're broke, you're something wrong with
none. Yeah, not.
You're completely ignoring the fact that there's a lot of other
things that you didn't do that, you know, you said, bro, because
I had to explore. So what I was going to say is
often, especially early in my meditation, in my practice, and
you know, a it got to a feeling of oh, I'm aware of this
emotion. Great.
I did the thing. It didn't really register
though. Oh, I'm aware of anxiety.
Therefore I broke. It and that that was.
Also just creating another anxiety sort of a thing, you
know, So I guess like my thought was rather than like being
mindful of your emotions in a sense of like almost like a
check as as an emotion come back, stop it.
You examine, you don't want to do anything, you know, whatever.
I found it helpful to try to be more like a conversation with
your emotions and be curious about it because anxiety by
itself I think is a bad thing. Anxiety.
Can keep you a lot. Right.
I mean, it's a very useful emotion.
It's just all the time to. Is like use that inflated it so
being in conversation. With your emotions, like
anxiety, things like that, I think you.
People would be helpful but just remembering that so.
You're remembering that this is being manufactured as I'm
scrolling through. Facebook like whatever I'm
seeing. All the politics of crazy
nonsense and it's stressing me out.
Remember in the like I can put this thumb down and like.
I did do something else, you know, and I don't have to grab
the but. Being curious about the
adversary. Where's it coming?
What? What purpose might this be?
Survey. Can it you got?
The Shoals of feet, you know, things like that.
I think it's all cool. I'll, I'll, I'll let we only
have a few more minutes, so I'll let everyone else speak without
trying to respond there. I'm happy, Danielle, you're just
at one of those forks. We have many in our lives, and
you get to choose. How to?
Brushen it up your cat, you'll do it.
Sounds like the no self is a reminder that our self is really
delicate and being barbed. Barbed with media can't damage
it and through an awareness we get to choose what we allow,
what path we take, what damage you can see happening and turn
off the TB or FBN social media because we're precious and it
does take practice and awareness and my role since I have always
avoided. I like face to face bit so I
never got into social media but I've come from a huge pen and my
I have one sister-in-law who is always a Brack because she sees
what Elises and nephews are keep doing.
She's so worried and I had to tape her aside, say I.
Don't know how to tell you this but.
It's kind of like it's not real and she just stole you Calm, but
I can't fix her. But I know that my children put
up photos, put up photos of their rosy life.
But I've seen the ballpark, so I added their Facebook pages.
That's true. And I'm OK with that because
it's not my biggest Sir, but as a reminder to be aware of our
attention, take care of ourselves in That takes practice
because there's dangers everywhere, but we get to choose
what influences us. Even the people at my work that
are loud boisterous blazer on, I can't avoid them, but I don't
have to take down their so I come here as it all adds up to
the equanimity. The only other thing I would I
would say is probably the most liberating teaching of Buddhism
for me is also one of the things marked as like one of the
greatest sources of suffering, which is in Romans.
The cheeseburger that I have in front of me is not going to last
forever and as it proud and without fat kid that makes me
very sad. But.
When I'm scrolling through Facebook and I'm feeling really
anxious or like, you know, feeling like a panic attack or
something like that that's not going to last forever.
I and I know that someone who suffers from panic.
Attacks from time to time. You know when you're in the
grips of something like really strong anxiety?
And it's kind of running. Upgrade.
It's really easy to feel like you're literally dying or like
this is going to last forever. I'm never going to get out of
this, right? Just kind of being able to check
in and be like, Nope, all things are impermanent.
It's not going to last forever. I don't know what's coming next.
Might not be fun, but like this whatever this is.
Is not the last. And that can be applied not only
to like, the internal experience of the emotion itself, but it
can be applied, I mean, on a massive scale, like this society
will not last forever. This style of consumerism will
not last forever. This economy will not like, you
know, these things all pass. And I just kind of wonder, in
1400 years, who's going to care? You know what I mean?
Like, how much of this will really matter?
Yeah. I mean, there are some people
who say like, oh, you know, you should always, you should be
thinking constantly about the fact that you're going to die.
And that sounds really morbid, but the fact that you're going
to die is like recognizing the fact that you're going to die is
like your, your recognition of impermanence, right?
If you're, if you're able to continuously think about that
impermanence, then the, the likelihood that small and even
some larger problems will consume you is lower because
you're, you understand it's going to pass.
You understand that one day you're going to be lying on your
deathbed. And a lot of the things that
have seemed so important will be really trivial.
And you don't have to wait till you get there in order to
actually observe that fact and to feel it and maybe live inside
of it. And yeah, so that that is like
ultimately, like at the core of the idea of impermanence, Micah,
you wouldn't say something. Yeah.
I guess you you should touch on this topic a little bit, but.
I feel like and this has less to do with the.
Self I feel like and more more to do with the anxiety aspect
and how we use circle media and whatnot, but but what I'm
realizing is like a huge part of my dysfunction or like.
Struggle to use social media or. All these different things, like
in a healthy way comes from things from my childhoods.
And like in terms of it's, it's kind of what you were talking
about, my beliefs about yourself.
But even deeper than that. Like I fool you guys, like I
struggle a lot with like loneliness.
And what I'm learning is that it comes down to me not feeling
safe with myself and like in the world in general a lot of times.
And so I guess the reason I bring that up is because I think
that a tactic would be like exploring at whether it's in
therapy or. Whatever.
And that's not just kind of in. School to become a therapist,
but but I do believe by for me, for myself, I think that's a
big. Part of like.
When I feel the safest is when I had the healthiest relationship
with these things, and it's like, easier to engage with them
without being lost in them. So yeah, King, that's an.
Important piece of an asshole. Yeah, all right.
So but when we end, we like to say.
Many of our. Practice extends.
To all the living greens.