Real stories, told by real people.
We've got a new one, and today we're joined by Jake, from the UK. And he's got a story to tell.
Jake talks about growing up in a household that was likened to a BATTLE FIELD. The crying, thumps, and pain of his young mother being beaten by his step father, daily and for years. His feeling of being helpless, hopeless, and all of the anger, and rage, he talks about how that affected him growing up. All of the abuse as a child. And how he, despite all of it, was able to find PEACE. In his own right, walking as one of the GIANTS AMONGST US.
For Jake, meditation was a powerful part of the process for finding peace. He also talks about the importance of being able to let go, and his process with freeing himself from that endless, negative loop of suffering and trauma. And how someone struggling with the same can find and discover peace for themselves. There was a lot unpacked today.
'Til next time
and very soon,
PEACE!!
_____
Connect with Jake :
Tik Tok : https://www.tiktok.com/@discoveringpeaceone
Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/discoveringpeaceone/
_____
Connect With Giants Amongst Us :
Website : https://giantsamongstus.org/
Show Updates & Extras : buymeacoffee.com/Giantsamongstus
To Share Your Story : giantsamongstus@tutanota.com
YouTube : https://youtube.com/@giantsamongstus?si=LQqRyvae3UozibHy
Reddit : https://www.reddit.com/r/Giants_Amongst_Us/
_____
Background music by : @bnoizemusic
00:00:00
Now, tips a little story I got to tell.
00:00:03
This is Giants Amongst Us.
00:00:13
Welcome to the show where you're always going to hear real stories told by real people.
00:00:27
Today we'll be joined by Jake, coming from the UK.
00:00:32
And he's got a story to tell.
00:00:34
The conversation that we had had a lot of different tones with various colors.
00:00:40
And it went on for over an hour.
00:00:43
And for me personally, I enjoyed every bit of it.
00:00:47
What I'm going to do is I'm going to add some timestamps in the description box.
00:00:53
And I think that's what I'm going to start doing from here on out.
00:00:57
Jake talks about growing up in a household that was likened to a battlefield.
00:01:02
To hear the crying, the thumps, and the pain of his young mother being beaten by a stepfather.
00:01:10
Daily, for years.
00:01:12
How that affected him.
00:01:14
His feeling of being helpless, hopeless, in the anger and rage that became a part of him because of it.
00:01:21
But fortunately, for Jake, after years of the trauma, of the abuse, the hurt, and the pain.
00:01:29
And his efforts of trying to numb it all through violence and with other unhealthy habits.
00:01:35
There was an awakening.
00:01:37
It was in the woods with friends and on LSD where his moment of clarity came to be.
00:01:45
Jake explains how that was the start of him discovering and finding his peace.
00:01:54
Ladies and gentlemen, this is Jake in his story.
00:02:00
Ladies and gentlemen, today we are joined by Jake and he's got a story to tell.
00:02:08
I want to thank you very much for putting some time aside today to share your peace with us.
00:02:14
Thank you for joining us.
00:02:16
Thanks for having me on.
00:02:18
It's a great honor.
00:02:20
So how's it going and where are you from originally?
00:02:24
So I'm from the UK, from a small place called Chesterfield.
00:02:28
Okay.
00:02:30
We're in the midst of coming up to summer now so we're looking better.
00:02:35
Things are gonna get better.
00:02:37
So are the clouds cracking a little bit in the sun and shining?
00:02:40
Yeah, yeah.
00:02:41
Beginning to shine?
00:02:42
Finally.
00:02:44
The long way, I know what you mean.
00:02:47
I feel your pain, bro.
00:02:50
So let's talk a little bit of you, you don't mind sharing with us some of your upbringing and how it was for you growing up?
00:02:59
Yeah, so I grew up with basically an abusive, very abusive stepdad.
00:03:07
Never knowing my real father.
00:03:09
I would dare to say is actually a psychopath that's undiagnosed, to be honest, because of the lack of emotional, that's the right word.
00:03:22
The lack of empathy or the lack of understanding of the impacts these things have on people definitely plays a big part in my development anyway, in understanding my own mind.
00:03:37
You said something interesting when we were offline and you came into this world and your mother was very young when she had you, wasn't she?
00:03:49
Yeah, she was only 15 when she had me.
00:03:51
She was still a baby in a sense.
00:03:53
Yeah, yeah, so how can...
00:03:56
So in a sense she's still growing up and she's trying to grow someone, grow another child, you know what I mean?
00:04:02
Now how old was your biological father?
00:04:04
Was he the same age?
00:04:06
Yeah, I know nothing about him.
00:04:09
Oh, you know nothing about him?
00:04:11
I know nothing, yeah, it's a complete mystery.
00:04:14
Wow.
00:04:16
Yeah, yeah, so that was another thing to overcome.
00:04:20
I remember in school there was a few...
00:04:24
When I was about 14, 15, I do remember there was some girls at that time and they were pregnant and man, it was something that I wouldn't say it was common,
00:04:35
but it wasn't strange to see that and I mean that's like babies bringing babies into the world.
00:04:42
So were you living with your grandparents or...?
00:04:45
Yeah, so my mom was still living with my grandparents when I was born and then about two weeks after, I think something around those lines,
00:04:54
that's when she'd moved out with her new partner who is actually the dad to my brother and sister as well.
00:05:02
Yeah, and then we pretty much moved in with him when I was about two weeks old, so he was there pretty much from the beginning.
00:05:09
You mind talking a little bit about how that was for you growing up?
00:05:15
Yeah, so every day was just a day of battle essentially because he was almost like...
00:05:23
I don't know if bipolar is the right word, but he could switch very quick, so the thing is as a kid as well,
00:05:31
you're always left on the edge, it's like you develop this sense of hyper-vigilance because you've got to be very aware,
00:05:38
is he gonna snap, you don't know when he's gonna snap, so as a kid you start to develop this sense of sense in the room
00:05:45
and I think that's where true empathy comes from, it comes from pain because we have to understand how to read a room in order to know how we can respond
00:05:54
because we don't know what the situation's gonna be.
00:05:56
It's like a survival tactic in a way.
00:05:58
Yeah, it's a survival instinct because you've got to know what to do.
00:06:05
And as well, it's a lack of understanding because he thought that what he was doing was not gonna have an impact on me,
00:06:16
even hearing it, even just hearing it, you know exactly what's going on, no matter how old you are, when there's screaming going off
00:06:25
and you can hear the actual physical hits getting hit, you know what I'm saying, you know exactly what's happening, kids aren't stupid, man.
00:06:33
Now you're talking about the physical abuse with your mother's partner and her, so he was beating on her, was that?
00:06:43
Yeah, he was beating her, like daily, daily, and they stayed together for 12 years.
00:06:51
Wow.
00:06:52
So this went on for 12 years, yeah.
00:06:55
So about 12, 11 years, a big part of my life to be honest, just growing up in that scenario.
00:07:02
Were there drugs involved or he just had issues?
00:07:09
I mean, I was probably too young at the time to probably understand if there was drugs involved, but as I got older, I did find out he was taking things like,
00:07:19
I don't know if you know what tramadol is, but I don't know if it's like some kind of opioid or something like that, it's a strong pain killer,
00:07:27
that's something that he uses quite a lot and I don't know if, like I said, I never really spoke to him about that kind of stuff.
00:07:36
But I think to be honest, from the story I heard, he grew up in a similar scenario and he must have just assumed that that was the way he did things.
00:07:47
I believe that there's two types of people, you either grow up in that scenario and you copy what you've learned, or you grow up learning that that's exactly what you shouldn't do.
00:07:56
Yeah.
00:07:57
Yeah.
00:07:58
Depending on the way you look at it.
00:08:00
And for some people it's not easy, they just think that's the way it is.
00:08:04
And this, to me as well, this is a big part of the healing, which is understanding that even though these people have done these things,
00:08:13
they're an outcome of what they've been through, what have they been through that's made them that way.
00:08:18
And when you find out that story, you find out well they're that way because of this person.
00:08:22
So you can just keep following the chain all the way along.
00:08:25
And there's never really anyone to blame at the end.
00:08:29
Yeah.
00:08:30
Do you know what I'm saying?
00:08:31
Yeah.
00:08:32
It's an outcome of their mind, it's the outcome of the events that they went through in life, it's an outcome of the things they learn, the beliefs that they have.
00:08:39
If they didn't think it was right, they wouldn't do it.
00:08:41
Right, exactly.
00:08:42
And this carried on pretty much all through your young childhood.
00:08:46
So this, I know for a fact, affected your school life and childhood.
00:08:53
I mean, like you were saying offline, you had to grow real fast.
00:08:57
Yeah.
00:08:58
Well, I remember I was a quiet kid.
00:09:02
I did a take on part of his, because not everything he taught me, not everything was bad because when he was good, he was good.
00:09:10
This is what was confusing because when he wants to be a good daddy, could it could be there and it could be a good dad.
00:09:16
But then in then 10 seconds later, you hate him and you despise him because of what he's doing.
00:09:22
And he played these mind games and you go into school, it was like, it was bizarre because none of these kids, you couldn't.
00:09:30
I couldn't imagine that anyone else was living like this.
00:09:32
I just knew even at that age, there was no way there was going through stuff like this.
00:09:38
I knew that I would just leave him to a days where I'd leave.
00:09:42
There were one event in particular, we were just about to leave for school.
00:09:46
My mum was working nights and he literally he rang my mum on the phone and he said, you can get ready when you come in.
00:09:54
You're gone. You're gone.
00:09:56
And I knew and I was going to school.
00:09:58
So I knew what was going to go off before I even left school and I was sat thinking all day, oh God, what am I going to go on to?
00:10:04
Just as we were about to leave school, the teacher coming, one of the office staff coming and said, oh, your mum's rang.
00:10:11
You're going to have to walk home on your own today.
00:10:13
Well, me and my brother, you're going to have to walk home on your own today.
00:10:16
There's been some it come up that they can't get up to pick you up.
00:10:19
And I knew instantly, I knew instantly, they obviously what I'd heard that morning.
00:10:24
Do you know what I mean?
00:10:25
So I knew what I was going back to.
00:10:27
And then I got back.
00:10:28
But this displays the kind of mind games you'd play because when I got back, you'd be like, oh, look,
00:10:33
your mum don't want you.
00:10:35
She's leaving.
00:10:36
She ate your kids.
00:10:37
She don't want you.
00:10:38
You know what I'm saying?
00:10:39
He was like using her as a weapon against us and using others, a weapon against her.
00:10:44
And he was claiming that she was the one that wants to leave and that she was the one that didn't want us.
00:10:49
But I'd heard that morning that it was him that was initiating it before she'd even got back.
00:10:55
Now you mentioned that he would beat your mother every day.
00:10:59
Was he also putting his hands on you and your siblings?
00:11:03
Not as much, not as much.
00:11:05
But when he did punish, he'd punish you.
00:11:07
So I think I was about, there was very heavy smokers as well.
00:11:11
So in the house, I think when I was about, yeah, yeah, in the house, when I was about eight, that's when I first started smoking.
00:11:20
And there was, there was a lot of cigarettes in the house.
00:11:23
And I used to have about 10 a day, about eight year old.
00:11:25
And believe it or not.
00:11:26
So that was easy access for you.
00:11:28
It was easy access.
00:11:29
And I didn't understand at the time why I was doing it, but it was relieving stress because there was, I didn't know where, I didn't know where to put it.
00:11:36
What, what, where do you put all this anger?
00:11:39
There's a child, you know what I'm saying?
00:11:40
There's nowhere to, I can't go down there and do anything because then it's going to be me on the receiving end.
00:11:45
There's a grown man.
00:11:46
How can, how can like an eight year old child do anything?
00:11:51
You can't.
00:11:52
So I started getting violent at school.
00:11:56
I was getting into fights all the time and it was purely just to let go, let go of the anger that I had built.
00:12:02
Yeah.
00:12:03
So yeah, I got into a lot of fights.
00:12:06
And there was no other family like outside of say your, your, your mother's parents or anybody that would try to come in and, and.
00:12:16
Oh, yeah, yeah.
00:12:17
I don't know, a mediator or in a sense they would see what's going on here.
00:12:20
Things don't look, things don't look too good.
00:12:22
The situation was that twisted this is what I'm saying.
00:12:24
He was very clever.
00:12:25
So that's why I learned a lot about mental, mental warfare.
00:12:31
Yeah.
00:12:32
Yeah.
00:12:33
Literally he drove that's more, that's more dangerous than physical, I think to be honest, because he dragged it down and down and down and down to the point that should protect him, should lie to a family to protect him, even though he'd do all these things to her.
00:12:49
And I had to sit there and sort of be like, well, what, what can I do if you're not even going to defend yourself?
00:12:55
How can I defend you?
00:12:57
Like you're lying to your family.
00:12:59
Like I want, I want you out of this situation, but you keep defending him and going back to that same scenario.
00:13:03
Yeah.
00:13:04
So it was very confusing for me as a kid.
00:13:06
I couldn't understand why would you, why would you stay there?
00:13:10
But now as I've got older, I understand now it was the mental abuse that played the biggest part over time.
00:13:17
And even, even to this day, years and years later, still affects her, still affects her today.
00:13:23
And it's going to like, he used to get to the point where she'd, it should be on death's door.
00:13:29
It's stomper, strangler to the point of, she told me some of the stories as well, like one time it strangled her to the point where she was just about to pass out from, from, you know, the lack of oxygen.
00:13:45
I don't know if she'd have died or what. And he, he was, he knew just by the look of her eyes.
00:13:49
And just as she got to that point, you let go.
00:13:51
Oh, wow. That's, yeah, that, that's that. Those are those torture tactics that you read about in that.
00:13:58
Yeah. So this is what, this is what could, this is what could happen to you.
00:14:02
Yeah.
00:14:03
So I think to be honest, it was probably a mix of being scared to leave and what would happen to those kids.
00:14:09
Like, you know what I mean? Like, and if you're living in that daily, your mind set's not going to be right, is it?
00:14:13
No, no.
00:14:14
You're not going to make the best decisions. You're not going to, you're not going to do what's best for your kids.
00:14:18
You're not, you're just going to do what he thinks right. And that's very clouded when you're going through that.
00:14:24
Throughout all of those, those beatings, was it, was it you hearing it or you would actually see, see him doing it as well?
00:14:34
So he used to do it in front of me up until like, I got to an age where I started talking, I think, because then I could start, I'd say things.
00:14:45
And I think he thought that a lot of people think that all the kids, they won't remember, they won't remember this and they won't remember that.
00:14:51
Yes.
00:14:52
But in those kind of events, that will stick with a child because these are like the foundational years, the, the building up on those first five years of your life, the building your character for who you're going to be forever.
00:15:03
Like they're the foundational blocks. That's where you, even though you're not speaking, you're learning how to communicate, you're learning how to interact with people in the world.
00:15:11
You're learning how to, you know, I'm saying the very impactful years. And this is what I was growing up.
00:15:17
Yeah.
00:15:18
And even from a young age, I knew that this just wasn't right. It never felt that this was normal. It never, it never ever felt like that.
00:15:27
So.
00:15:29
That reminds me of a, there was, there was an old saying, and this is coming from, I can't really remember the source, but it's having to do with, give me the first five years of a child.
00:15:42
And I pretty much would, will have molded this person, you know, years later.
00:15:48
Yeah.
00:15:49
And that's like you said, we really have a, like, even me, I thought that for the longest and I know a lot of people probably have thought that the same thing just like you.
00:15:58
You, you, you can do things, even from the, the words that you're saying, whatever it is your actions and you, they don't, they don't understand you.
00:16:07
They don't, they, they're not picking it up. But like you said, I mean, you, you were talking about you had memories from when you were months old.
00:16:14
Yeah.
00:16:15
That, that all. So the start for a while, it was like my mind, this is how powerful his mind is.
00:16:22
The mind blocks out these painful events and these painful memories in order to protect itself.
00:16:29
But when it does that, it makes it part of your unconscious mind.
00:16:32
So it makes it these things that run in the background, even though you might not think that you're dealing with that anymore, you are dealing with it every single day and it will impact every decision you make, every thought you make, every, you know, I'm saying if, if there's
00:16:48
In a subconscious level, it's there with you.
00:16:50
In a subconscious level, it's there and it wasn't until I was open enough and ready in order to sit with myself and say, right, well, what is going on?
00:17:02
And when, and when I did that, and I took the time to understand myself, that's when the flashback started happening.
00:17:09
And then the earliest one was like eight months. And I weren't sure if I was just imagining it. It was like some kind of subconscious fear being projected in a, in a thought of anxiety.
00:17:21
I'm not sure. But then I remember my mum being strangled right in front of me. And I was, I remember, it's not very verbal, but I remember the context of how I felt.
00:17:31
And it was, I was very, I was helpless and watching how helpless my mum was. And you just laid there, all you can do is watch. So it's like you're being forced to be, to be watching this thing.
00:17:41
Do you know what I'm saying? You're, you're forced to watch this event.
00:17:44
Oh, wow.
00:17:45
And those things stick with you.
00:17:47
And you said you were, you were about eight months old when you,
00:17:51
Yeah, when this, when this happened, yeah. And I did check with my mum the day after I told her about this flashback I had.
00:17:58
And she said, I can't believe you'd remembered that.
00:18:02
So it happened the way that I explained it to her as well.
00:18:07
Wow. And these, these started to come about once you started, you said to make time and was this through, this was through meditation or you were, you were doing things to kind of work on, work on yourself internally.
00:18:20
Yes.
00:18:22
So I was very, very aware that there's a kid.
00:18:28
Then I got to my teen years. And then I started spiraling. I started like, this was before I understood much of this stuff and how it would affect you.
00:18:36
I started getting involved in the wrong crowds. I started getting involved.
00:18:40
Drugs, even from a young age.
00:18:45
I was fighting, I was like, I know what fights, I was just letting all this aggression just start to flow out of me.
00:18:52
It was never towards women though. That was one thing that I would, I would just not stand for.
00:18:57
And I was also the bully of bullies.
00:19:00
That's what I used to be like if I was, if I was to see that kind of scenario outside even my house.
00:19:06
So like, let's say I didn't even have to be friends with a person, but if I could see that someone was picking on someone else,
00:19:13
they'd be the, I'd then fight that person.
00:19:16
Yeah.
00:19:17
I'd stick up for people I didn't even know, but just because I couldn't stand to see what was going off.
00:19:22
You were disgusted by that.
00:19:24
Yeah, I was disgusted by it and I would do some, I'd do violent things to them to like, well, this is what you're doing. So you're going to get it back.
00:19:32
Yeah.
00:19:33
That's like, it's not fun when the rabbit has the gun.
00:19:36
Yeah. Yeah. And that's sort of what I used to be like.
00:19:41
I like the, I like the karma dealer.
00:19:44
Yeah.
00:19:48
But that was that pretty much.
00:19:50
What karma got me in the end karma got me in the end.
00:19:53
And it always does, doesn't it? You can't get away from it.
00:19:57
No, you can't get away from it.
00:19:59
I would, I don't know, is it safe to say it was free range while you were, while you were in school, there wasn't really too much supervision or you didn't have to worry about,
00:20:10
I would say you come home and, and if you had, whether it's bad grades or fights or anything like that.
00:20:16
And I noticed like, hey, Jake isn't doing too good in school, but I don't know if you're your mother or your mother's partner were involved in that.
00:20:25
None of that stuff mattered to me because there was, to me, there were much more bigger things that were happening in the world.
00:20:32
Like, do you know what I'm saying?
00:20:34
For me, I grew up to learn how to survive through hard situations.
00:20:39
And to me, these school exams didn't see, I couldn't see how that was even remotely important compared to what I was having to deal with when I got home.
00:20:48
How can I, how can I sit and concentrate in a class when all I can think about is what am I going to go home to, what I seen last night, what I heard last night, what, you know, I mean, none of that stuff could even come close to even being important,
00:21:02
compared to just getting through the day.
00:21:05
I never paid much attention to stuff like that. And it went until I got towards the end.
00:21:10
I sort of thought maybe I need to try a little bit.
00:21:13
And I come out with some all right grades, nothing, nothing spectacular, but a lot more than what they predicted to get, I was predicted to get.
00:21:22
How were your brother and sister coping with it? Were they going through their own struggles?
00:21:28
So, yeah, so they almost seem to like, not really, we didn't really speak about it too much in a weird way, not until we got older.
00:21:40
It wasn't until I moved out, then it all hit me.
00:21:44
So the pivotal moment was when I was about 16.
00:21:48
I met my partner, who I'm with now, where I think we've been together nine years now.
00:21:54
And when I met her, yeah, yeah, when I met her, we were complete opposites.
00:21:59
So obviously I was a bit more of a bad boy involved in fights, drugs, and she was the good girl, good grades, good friends, good family,
00:22:11
never really been around anything kind of like this.
00:22:14
But for some reason, we were just like a magnetic force. They say opposite attracts.
00:22:19
And she was beneficial. She was, she like, in a way, she saved me because when I first went to her house and met her parents,
00:22:30
I couldn't believe how they lived.
00:22:32
Complete opposite, right?
00:22:34
I couldn't believe that this, yeah, I couldn't, that's what started it all for me because I was like, people grew up like this.
00:22:42
Like, this is what some people grew up like, like this is crazy.
00:22:46
And I couldn't believe the silence, the silence was so loud.
00:22:50
When you used to just a noisy household and you used to all these, I could hear every tiny little bang.
00:22:57
That's how quiet it was. That's why it felt like to me anyway. I was like, wow.
00:23:01
This is strange.
00:23:03
I'm especially coming from where it sounds like it was a battlefield every day.
00:23:07
Yeah. Yeah, it was just a warground, well, a warfare.
00:23:13
And then that's, that's when the depression really come full force.
00:23:18
That's when it crept up like a tree just crept open. It hit me like a train because all these years have just, because obviously I developed such like mental blocks.
00:23:29
If that's the right word, I'd develop these mental coping mechanisms.
00:23:33
I developed like, you know, I'm saying develop these blocks, these walls that could protect me from all this pain and hurt that I went through.
00:23:41
I built these walls up around it in order to not feel it anymore.
00:23:45
But that's quite dangerous because when that wall broke down, that's when I just, especially with men,
00:23:53
even if someone spoke to me a little bit funny, it didn't take much.
00:23:59
If I could feel someone was disrespecting me and it didn't take much, I'm like, well, what gives you the right?
00:24:05
And that anger would just slip out.
00:24:07
Or you'd snap. But then, yeah, I'd snap very quick. It didn't take much.
00:24:11
I didn't, I'd never, I'd never argue. I never seen doing people bicker before it gets to a fight.
00:24:17
There were none of that for me. It was just straight to fight mode.
00:24:21
So when, when I'm, when I stopped directing it outwardly and I started to settle down, that's when it all started to just pile on top.
00:24:32
And I had, I realized the mountain that I had to get, that's what I had to deal with.
00:24:37
So that, that's, that was pretty much all of the undoubt with trauma.
00:24:43
Yeah.
00:24:44
And it finally just, yeah, it come over, it just washed over.
00:24:49
And it was intense, very, very intense.
00:24:53
And you said you were about 16, 17 when that happened?
00:24:56
Yeah. So it didn't really fully come on until I'd say I was about 18, 18, 19.
00:25:04
That's when it really piled on. And I deteriorated really quick.
00:25:08
It was in the space of a year. I'd come from seeming like the happiest guy to just suicidal every single day, every single day.
00:25:18
It was just every thought was just the only way out of this is, is the way out.
00:25:24
I couldn't, I couldn't see for, I couldn't see for the life of me. I would even get out of that.
00:25:30
Went to doctors. It was, and especially when I went to the doctors and they told me I'd got depression.
00:25:36
I was like, wow, it went until they really said it, it hit.
00:25:41
And they put me on meds. They made me worse. And there was a point I was like, cause, cause I was raised to be strong, if that made sense.
00:25:53
I was seeing these tablets as almost like this is weak. I'm having to depend on this, on these tablets in order to make me feel alright when I'm not.
00:26:03
And all these tablets are doing is just, it's just blocking me again.
00:26:06
That's what's put me in this predicament in the first place. They just blocked the pain. They didn't fix the pain.
00:26:11
It's not getting to the root or the source of what's causing it.
00:26:15
Yeah. And I've always been one of those people that I have got to figure out how it works.
00:26:21
I've got to understand it. No matter how long it takes, I will figure it out.
00:26:25
Even if it seems impossible, there's got to be a way.
00:26:29
And I'm glad I was like that because it's made me, it's gave me the understanding that I have now.
00:26:35
Because in order to know extreme pleasure, well, in order to know extreme joy, you've got to know what extreme pain is.
00:26:44
I think you've got to have felt both equally. The amount of joy you can feel is equal to the amount of pain that you've felt.
00:26:51
So the pain was that immense that when I did finally actually come out on that other side, my joy for life was just immense as well.
00:27:02
Because then I appreciated just every tiny little part, every little aspect of life just waking up in the morning.
00:27:09
That's a gift in itself.
00:27:11
True.
00:27:12
Some people go to sleep and they don't wake up this morning.
00:27:16
That's a fact.
00:27:17
I mean, it's crazy.
00:27:18
Now, I'm just curious in your situation when it was having to do with you, because you said you did speak with therapists, you did speak with a few therapists.
00:27:30
I wonder, were they quick to put you on the meds or at first were they trying to kind of work some things out with you and to help you find the tools or the resources to work through your trauma?
00:27:44
You know, the very first time I met him, that's when I got put on meds straight away. Straight away, straight on meds.
00:27:51
Oh, right out the gate.
00:27:53
Right out the gate.
00:27:54
And no real support. There was like, at the time as well, there was like, oh, you can go to these, and at the time as well, I thought there's no way this stuff's going to work.
00:28:03
That's what I used to think as well.
00:28:05
I was like, how's talking to someone about these, like, I've got to face these problems in order to, that's the way I've seen it.
00:28:13
I thought I had to deal with everything on my own.
00:28:16
That's just the way I grew up. I had to deal with all that pain on me. And so I'm not going to rely on anyone else other than myself to fix this problem.
00:28:24
That's the way I saw it. I've seen it.
00:28:26
When you, you know, you, that was pretty much how you are. Like, I'm going to do this on my own. I'm going to figure it out now.
00:28:32
I'm already taking it, taking it upon yourself to look for whether it was books or things online or any kind of information and sources you can find to help you out with that.
00:28:47
Yeah.
00:28:48
So there was, there was a defining moment that started that tradition for me.
00:28:54
And it was for a while I was just using, I was using cannabis instead of the meds because the cannabis opened me up in order to see myself a bit clearer because it gave it let me get out of my own head for a bit.
00:29:07
And I could look at myself objectively.
00:29:10
If that makes sense when you're so used to being wrapped up in your own head and your own thoughts, the cannabis actually gave me space to, to look at myself a little bit in a different way and I could understand and see the processes happening.
00:29:23
And then as soon as, as soon as it wore off, I was backing it again.
00:29:27
So I wasn't really.
00:29:29
And then I was one, I'd smoked cannabis and stuff, but I could have never imagined that I would have took LSD.
00:29:37
But at the time I was suicidal anyway, because the way I seen it was, I even take these meds and don't figure it out.
00:29:43
Well, I even kill myself because, because I can't cope or I just get through it.
00:29:52
Right. Yeah.
00:29:53
That was the only option.
00:29:54
I even, I even figured this out or I kill myself.
00:29:57
What is not, I wanted to kill myself anyway a lot of the time.
00:30:00
So it were a win, win really.
00:30:02
I was like, well, I made, yeah, you pretty much felt like I have nothing to lose.
00:30:05
Yeah, nothing to lose.
00:30:06
So what's this going to do?
00:30:08
Well, how can this, how can this possibly make anything any worse?
00:30:11
So I don't know if you know much about trips and stuff, but they say sets and setting in place and people that you with is very important.
00:30:21
Right. Yeah. The atmosphere, the environment has a lot to do with it.
00:30:25
Well, the first time I did it, well, the only time I did it actually, I only did it once.
00:30:29
That's all it took.
00:30:30
It took one year.
00:30:31
Now we're talking, we're talking shrooms, right?
00:30:33
No, you said LSD.
00:30:34
LSD, yeah.
00:30:35
Okay.
00:30:36
And we was in these woods about 40 minutes away from home and I was lying to my partner at the time because she was very anti-drug as well.
00:30:45
So I wasn't going to tell her I was doing it because she was already concerned about me anyway.
00:30:48
Did you tell her I'm going to go on a retreat?
00:30:51
Yeah, yeah.
00:30:52
Well, I didn't even tell her.
00:30:53
I just said me and the boys were going camping, just a few drinks, few smokes.
00:30:57
Like we're just going to chill.
00:30:59
But my intention was to go and take LSD and we was quite away away and I took this, I took this tab and I had no idea what to expect.
00:31:09
They all warned me as well.
00:31:10
They said, don't take the full thing because it's your first time.
00:31:13
You don't, I says, are you kidding?
00:31:14
He says, if I'm going to do it, I'm going to do it. That's just the way I was.
00:31:19
I had no cares.
00:31:20
I had no cares.
00:31:21
I was borderline.
00:31:22
I was laying there.
00:31:23
Yeah, I was.
00:31:24
I was all in.
00:31:25
Just jump right in.
00:31:26
So I just took it and started off well.
00:31:29
Started off all right until it got weird.
00:31:32
And then my friend said to me, he says, he just looked at me and he says, something don't feel right.
00:31:38
And that's all it took.
00:31:39
That's all it took.
00:31:41
And then it started getting spooky.
00:31:44
So I was, and we were sat together and I noticed that the music just kept looping over and over again.
00:31:50
There was just one part of the song that just kept playing over and over again.
00:31:53
I thought, am I the only one hearing this?
00:31:55
Like, this is weird.
00:31:57
And you start to forget.
00:31:58
I kept trying to remind myself, oh, I've took this drug and that's why I'm feeling this way.
00:32:02
But over time, you forget, you start to just believe that that's your new way of living.
00:32:07
That's your new reality that you're living in.
00:32:09
That's how powerful it is.
00:32:12
And then I locked myself.
00:32:14
I went, I thought, right, I'm going to have to get in the tent.
00:32:16
I'm going to have to give myself a minute because it started getting spooky.
00:32:19
So I'd lock, I'd zip the tent up, fell into the air bed, like just dropped down into the air bed.
00:32:24
But then I got stuck in what they call loops.
00:32:28
So on psychedelics, you can get caught in what's called loops.
00:32:31
So it's the same moment happening over and over again.
00:32:34
And you're living through it as if it's happening over and over and over again.
00:32:38
And I kept, I got stuck zipping this tent up and falling into the air bed, zipping the tent up, falling into the air bed.
00:32:44
And this happened about 40 times.
00:32:47
And I could, I could not stop this one event from happening.
00:32:51
And then it took a real dark turn because then I could start hearing voices like floating around the tent scene.
00:32:57
Right, let's kill him now. Let's kill him now.
00:32:59
Like, I get ready when I get him in a minute.
00:33:01
And I was like, whoa, now this is getting real.
00:33:04
Because then I thought I was in a place where I could die right now.
00:33:07
My mind had, because my mind was obviously so warped anyway, and it was so twisted from the darkness that it believed, I believed fully that I was about to die in that moment.
00:33:18
Now you said you were hearing the voices or this was in your mind plane?
00:33:23
Well, this is obviously my mind.
00:33:25
Yeah, obviously at the time, but it felt.
00:33:28
But it was audible itself.
00:33:29
Yeah, at the time I thought that's what was actually happening, not that the fact that I was on a trip.
00:33:34
And I am right, right. And the voices were just floating around tent about going to kill him now, going to kill him now.
00:33:39
And I thought it was all my friends plotting to kill me.
00:33:42
So I thought all my, all my friends were plotting on killing on me.
00:33:45
I'm in the middle of these woods.
00:33:47
My Mrs does not know I'm even here.
00:33:50
She does.
00:33:51
And I was like, I'm in a bad situation right now.
00:33:54
I'm far away from civilization.
00:33:56
I'm in a bad spot.
00:33:59
And then the next second I turn around and my friends just there in the tent with me.
00:34:04
And I didn't even hear him get in and bear in mind what I was just going, I just screamed just screamed, which made him scream because he was tripping as well.
00:34:12
Oh, it was wild.
00:34:13
It was not good.
00:34:15
But so yeah, and, and then it just started taking a real turn.
00:34:21
I think all the pain that was hidden and suppressed in me was able that night to come out.
00:34:29
It was like, it was like an experience which was tailored to fit the pain that I felt.
00:34:37
If that makes sense.
00:34:40
I think that's what happens with trips.
00:34:42
It makes a visual out of the feelings which, which aren't visual.
00:34:47
It gives you like a scene which can express that way that you feel inside.
00:34:53
And that's why I think a lot of people that do trips, I actually find that it's very therapeutic because it's bringing these unconscious feelings to light, but just in a way that you don't understand.
00:35:03
And that's why even, even now, like that was years ago that that happened to me.
00:35:08
And even now I still have little mini realizations about it.
00:35:11
I was like, oh, that's what it was.
00:35:13
That cloud was representing, it was representing the darkness that was, and even like so until even years later today, that trip still has immense impact on me.
00:35:22
It's terrifying as it were.
00:35:24
But by the end of it, I think I went into like full on psychosis because my, my, my misses ended up getting there eventually.
00:35:32
Realized how much I actually appreciated her.
00:35:36
And then by the end of the night, I'd completely forgot who I were.
00:35:40
I didn't know who I was.
00:35:42
I thought my head just exploded by the end of the night.
00:35:44
I didn't know who I was.
00:35:46
I didn't know who my partner, I didn't know who she was.
00:35:48
I didn't know the room I was in.
00:35:50
I had that my toe, my identity was completely white.
00:35:54
And that was my mind's way of coping with the immense amount of stress that it was under.
00:35:59
It had to just sort of just white clean.
00:36:04
And that's what it felt like.
00:36:05
And from that day, that's when the recovery started.
00:36:10
Wow, that was, that was your, that was your moment.
00:36:14
That was the moment.
00:36:15
Yeah.
00:36:16
It was like a reset.
00:36:17
And I understood that night how much pain the mind can go through and the power of the mind.
00:36:21
That's powerful.
00:36:22
Yeah.
00:36:23
It was a visual representation of the pain that I'd felt for all these years.
00:36:28
And it's, it still took a few years after I'm, I mean, I'm still healing now.
00:36:31
I think we're always healing.
00:36:33
Right.
00:36:34
But that was a very pivots.
00:36:36
Everything that you went through, not to cut you off, but everything that you went through,
00:36:41
there's no way you can not even, it's going to take as long as the trauma lasted and you had to endure that even two years,
00:36:51
three years, like you said, it's going to be an ongoing process.
00:36:54
But the point is that you're taking the necessary steps to continue with that healing.
00:37:00
Yeah.
00:37:01
And it was, it was that night that really opened my mind up to the possibility of what, what the mind's capable of.
00:37:07
Because before then I was quite closed minded.
00:37:10
And from that day I was like, there's so much more, there's so much more to the life, to life and the mind.
00:37:16
And it showed me that as well, that suffering is really just your mind.
00:37:23
It's the, it's a playback of loops of thoughts.
00:37:26
That's what the loops represented to me.
00:37:28
Then the negative, what they represent.
00:37:31
That's what I'm saying.
00:37:32
They represent things that can't quite be conveyed into words, but what it was showing me that you can get stuck in negative thought loops.
00:37:40
And if you don't get off the loop, you're going to keep spiraling and spiraling and the quicker the wheels going to go.
00:37:46
And the thoughts are going to get more and more intense and they're going to get darker and darker.
00:37:50
And you're going to believe in more and more, it's going to keep spinning and spinning.
00:37:53
That's what it felt like.
00:37:54
And that's what it showed me that if you don't get off this train of thoughts, that you will spiral and go with them.
00:38:03
Wow. Yeah, that's powerful right there.
00:38:06
The loop is representing how a lot of us are.
00:38:11
We're prisoners of our own mind.
00:38:16
You know, and it could be a lot of times, it's going to be for the worse and not everybody.
00:38:23
But I mean, the people that are dealing with trauma, especially like you're replaying these things, whether it's not forgiving, whether it's not just coming to terms with it or whatever it is, but you're stuck on that.
00:38:37
Like you said, that loop and it's constantly playing in your mind and it's eating you up inside and there can never be any progress or growth or healing or recovery.
00:38:47
If that is the, if that's your program replaying over and over again.
00:38:53
And if you're not willing to say, I am sick, I am sick and tired.
00:38:58
That's what point I had to get to.
00:38:59
I had to get to the point of nearly killing myself to sit there and go, I can't do this.
00:39:04
I just can't do it.
00:39:05
There's got to be a way out of it.
00:39:07
There's just, there's no way that I can't do my mind is just going to keep running like this.
00:39:11
If it's going to keep going like this, what is the point?
00:39:13
And that's what I think a lot of people feel and a lot of people think that there's no way out.
00:39:19
But if the mind can be programmed to feel those negative thought loops, then surely we can program the mind to think positively.
00:39:26
That's the way I've seen it.
00:39:27
That's the way I understood it.
00:39:29
So if it can get itself into a negative thought loop, why not at least try to get into a positive thought loop?
00:39:34
Let's, let's try.
00:39:35
Let's try filling the mind with some kind of information that's beneficial to it rather than ruminating over these things that I can't do.
00:39:42
These things that I can't change.
00:39:44
I can't change them.
00:39:45
I can't, I can't go back and say, I don't want that to happen anymore.
00:39:49
No, it's happened.
00:39:50
That's what I've, that's what's imprinted in my mind.
00:39:53
So I've, I can either learn from it or get tortured by it.
00:39:56
Yeah.
00:39:57
Which it, so it was up to, do you know what I'm saying?
00:39:59
I could even take it and learn, take, take away what I learned from it.
00:40:03
And that is putting that kind of pain on people is just not right.
00:40:08
It's not right.
00:40:09
That's some heavy stuff right there.
00:40:11
Right after, well, not right after, but after that trip, did you, I know you said that was a turning point.
00:40:18
Did you start making, you started to look towards now, how can I continue with this and, and.
00:40:25
Yeah.
00:40:26
So the most powerful thing was the point where I forgot who I was, right?
00:40:31
Because in that moment that my, yeah, I had no identity.
00:40:35
I don't know if it actually was, but from what I've read, it's very close and, but it all come to an end.
00:40:42
It all come to an end in a second.
00:40:44
That's what I've seen.
00:40:45
All this pain and all this suffering can come to an end in an instant.
00:40:49
And in that instant that the pain come to an end, what happened is I lost my identity.
00:40:54
And that stuck with me for a while because I was like, even though I could even though my identity was gone, I was still there.
00:41:01
And in that moment when the identity gone, that's when peace arise.
00:41:06
It was like, it like it just like it all just got washed away.
00:41:11
As simple as it is as simple as that.
00:41:14
It just like went and it could, it could, it could all be let go of.
00:41:18
And then I really started to think, well, what is identity?
00:41:21
What really is identity?
00:41:23
It's the, it's the thoughts and feelings which we identify ourselves with.
00:41:28
So when we say things like, I got really heavy into philosophy and religion, not, not in a sense if I wanted to believe in a God, but I needed to understand like, I started to see the correlation between Buddhism and Hinduism and then Christianity in them.
00:41:46
I started seeing that now they're all actually talking about the same thing.
00:41:50
Exactly.
00:41:51
The only different cultures are saying it in a different way.
00:41:54
Yeah.
00:41:55
Yeah.
00:41:56
And it's just different.
00:41:57
Exactly.
00:41:58
They've got different languages on depending on where they are.
00:42:00
Like some are using names and some are using symbols and yeah.
00:42:04
Yep.
00:42:05
And in Eastern to the Eastern traditions, they don't have a word for what we call ego.
00:42:09
That's a Western term.
00:42:11
So they don't, they don't refer to an ego.
00:42:16
But it was in the West.
00:42:17
We all talk about, oh, the ego is the collection of the thoughts and feelings which we believe a self to be.
00:42:22
Yeah. Over in the East, they don't believe that even exists.
00:42:27
And then you get things like Buddhism and Advaita Vedanta.
00:42:31
And what they're saying is that there is no individual, the individual which believe a self to be is a collection of thoughts and feelings, which we then believe our self to be.
00:42:42
And when we believe ourselves to be those thoughts and feelings and we convince ourselves that that's what we are, we're going to feel in line with what those thoughts and feelings say.
00:42:51
So if you, if you've got thoughts that's, if you've got thoughts that say, oh, I'm depressed, I'm anxious, I'm this, I'm not worthy, I'm, I'm horrible, I'm this and that.
00:43:02
And you believe it, then you're going to start feeling that like you are.
00:43:05
It's, it's quite simple when I, when I really looked at it eventually.
00:43:10
And then you create, you pretty much create that reality.
00:43:13
Yeah.
00:43:14
That's, that is, that is you creating your own reality.
00:43:17
Everyone, everyone sees like everyone sees a different world.
00:43:23
I don't believe that there's a good teaching that says there's one consciousness, but there's seven billion worlds.
00:43:32
Yeah.
00:43:33
And by that is this however many people there is on the earth.
00:43:38
And by that is how many different worlds there are, because we've all got our own interpretations, our own experiences, our own events that we went through that shape what we call the world and our views on the world.
00:43:50
So not everyone's world is the same.
00:43:53
Exactly.
00:43:54
So you, you are quite literally creating that world with the thoughts and beliefs that you have about that world.
00:44:00
And if you go out there and you're inner inner feelings are telling you that it's horrible is depressing. It's, it's sad.
00:44:08
It's, it's, then that's all you're going to see in the world.
00:44:12
The world is a reflection of you in a mind.
00:44:15
What you see in the world is a reflection of what you feel inside.
00:44:19
And that's one thing I've learned experientially.
00:44:21
When I was in that depressed state, all I seen was doom and gloom.
00:44:26
Meditation started that over time started to observe my thoughts and feelings rather than become them.
00:44:32
I started to actually become an observer of them.
00:44:35
I realized that if I can observe my thoughts, then surely they're not essential to me because they come in they go.
00:44:42
All thoughts come and go.
00:44:44
So they're not essential to you.
00:44:46
They're not the absolute truth really.
00:44:48
They don't define you because one day you can have a thought that's depression, but the next day you can have a thought that's happy.
00:44:53
So which one's real?
00:44:54
Do you know what I mean? Each one's telling a different story and that, that story is depending on how you feel.
00:45:01
So that, that one thought can dictate your emotions, even though it comes and goes.
00:45:06
But the one that knows the thoughts does not come and go.
00:45:11
It's aware of both thoughts.
00:45:13
So one, so it's still the same me, but this day I'm having a depressed thought.
00:45:18
So I'm depressed.
00:45:19
And then the day after I'm having a happy thoughts, I'm happy.
00:45:21
And I realized that the observer is continuous between each thought.
00:45:27
So who I really am is not dependent on thoughts and feelings.
00:45:31
That reminds me of it.
00:45:32
There was a saying and maybe I know I'm going to say it wrong, but it's something to do.
00:45:38
This has to do with thoughts and it's pretty much saying that your thoughts, they're passersby, but it's up to you whether or not you want to invite them in and have tea with them.
00:45:48
Like you said, they come and go.
00:45:51
Yeah.
00:45:52
So true.
00:45:54
So true.
00:45:55
And it's not, it's not to deny thoughts.
00:45:57
Like some thoughts and I asked you, do you know what I mean?
00:46:00
Like if it's there and you want to engage with it, enjoy the ride.
00:46:04
But if it's a thought and you can, once you get, once you get used to observing your thoughts and you start to identify when the old triggers come up, you start to identify when the, when the cycle comes up.
00:46:15
So sometimes I might notice that even though I'm happy, I still might notice a depressed thought.
00:46:21
But does that, but now that depressed thought does not take me down.
00:46:26
I don't have to get on that.
00:46:27
I can just see it as, oh, here's another thought passing up based on my experiences that I've been through.
00:46:34
So this is going to be part of my subconscious, but it's okay because now I understand that that's not ultimately what I am.
00:46:41
And I don't have to ride that.
00:46:42
I can let that pass.
00:46:44
It doesn't have to affect me anymore.
00:46:46
And you become, you develop like the way I see it is like you build a, you build a stable sense of self in, in what, what's true.
00:46:58
And then you start to identify what, what's false, what comes, what goes, cause anything that comes and go, anything that comes and goes can't ultimately be real, ultimately real because it comes in, it goes.
00:47:10
I mean, it's not, it's not permanent. If we had a permanent thought, then that would be real thought, but there's no thought that's permanent.
00:47:17
We have 10 thoughts a day.
00:47:19
How can we say that any of them are ultimately real?
00:47:21
So meditation, meditation was a big thing for you then.
00:47:24
Were you doing that?
00:47:25
Did you, did you make it a point to practice that daily when you, when you got into meditation?
00:47:31
Well, to begin with, yeah, to begin with, I started getting into like the philosophy and research, not even so much practice.
00:47:39
I was just doing research about the way they understood things. Yeah.
00:47:42
I was like researching the understandings that they was trying to, why, why are they prescribing meditation?
00:47:49
Like imagine prescribing it is like, it's like a medicine.
00:47:54
Like, I was like, why are they prescribing medicine? And this does, this doctor's prescribing me pills.
00:48:00
So let me look at what that prescription meditation actually has an effect on.
00:48:05
And what I learned is that meditation is actually the key to a long term sustainable happiness.
00:48:13
Whereas the pills was dependent on me taking them every day, not really fulfilling me, not really making me happy,
00:48:21
not really making me face my problems, just blocking my problems.
00:48:24
And I thought, well, I know which one I'd rather try.
00:48:27
And probably had a few side effects to go along with.
00:48:32
Yeah. And even meditation has side effects. It affects every aspect of your life.
00:48:37
Once you really get it and you really understand what it's about.
00:48:41
A lot of people see meditation as, I used to be the same way.
00:48:47
I was like, how could that possibly help me get out of this feeling that I'm in?
00:48:52
Like that's what I used to think about meditation.
00:48:54
And now, like after doing it for a long time, now it's like, there's nothing else I'd rather,
00:49:01
there's no other method I'd rather use.
00:49:03
How did you start off with, did you start off real slow, like five minutes, ten minutes,
00:49:09
and then you slowly built up?
00:49:11
How did your practice evolve?
00:49:13
I didn't really even have a frequent practice, to be honest.
00:49:16
I just went really deep when I did do it.
00:49:19
So I'd listen to, you know, you can get like guided meditations on YouTube and stuff.
00:49:25
Yeah, yeah, Spotify. I've got to listen to those also.
00:49:29
And just find something that works for you.
00:49:32
For me, I was always into the deep aspects of things.
00:49:35
So just like, I like to understand the deep elements of Buddhism.
00:49:41
What are the core teachings?
00:49:43
What meditations are there about the core teachings of what Buddhism represents?
00:49:48
So I used to get into that kind of stuff.
00:49:51
I've meditated on Zen Buddhism,
00:49:56
and I've been a big divider Christian.
00:49:59
There's loads of different types.
00:50:02
Mindfulness, even like where you're just,
00:50:05
you're being mindful of when you're walking,
00:50:08
of whatever it is that you're doing, whether it be eating, walking, sitting,
00:50:13
you know, because a lot of times whatever it is we're doing, we're doing that one thing,
00:50:18
but our mind is on so many other things.
00:50:21
You're not even focused on or in that moment.
00:50:24
That kind of thing, it is show that that can be helpful.
00:50:28
Yeah, that's very deep what you've just said,
00:50:30
because that's one thing that comes with meditation over time.
00:50:33
So to begin with, people see it as something that you do.
00:50:36
But over time, meditation becomes what you are, not what you do.
00:50:40
So like meditation starts to seep, it starts to seep into your everyday life.
00:50:45
Like you were just saying, I could be washing the pots, but in a state of meditation,
00:50:49
I could be cooking dinner in a state of meditation,
00:50:52
working in a state of meditation.
00:50:54
I could be having stressful thoughts in a state of meditation,
00:50:58
and it's that grounding in what meditation represents.
00:51:02
Meditation represents, like what's the whole point of mindfulness?
00:51:06
It's to be aware of what's going on.
00:51:08
And are we not always aware?
00:51:11
You have to be otherwise you wouldn't know anything.
00:51:13
Yes.
00:51:14
We are always that presence of awareness,
00:51:18
is always there, but the things that it's aware of change.
00:51:22
What do you think is a big hindrance or something that really keeps people from being more mindful?
00:51:31
But I know one, we have a lot of distractions.
00:51:37
There's so many distractions these days.
00:51:39
Yeah, a lot, a lot.
00:51:41
One of the main hindrances people think that, oh, if I'm meditating,
00:51:46
I shouldn't have any thoughts.
00:51:48
And if they think that if they've got thoughts going through the head,
00:51:51
they're not meditating properly.
00:51:53
Meditation does not mean having no thoughts.
00:51:56
Meditation simply means to be aware of what is going on.
00:52:02
And so it's just to be aware of your thoughts, not involved in the thoughts.
00:52:06
Just if you're meditating and you've got thoughts, that's actually a good sign,
00:52:09
because you're providing an open space for these thoughts to appear.
00:52:14
And a lot of people say when they start meditating, they start getting anxious,
00:52:17
or they start getting these intense emotions.
00:52:19
That's a good sign, because actually what you're doing is you're allowing the space for these to arise.
00:52:24
These have clearly been buried in you for a while,
00:52:27
and you've never given them the space to come up.
00:52:30
But when you're sitting and meditating and you give them the space,
00:52:33
then all of a sudden that these deep feelings and deep thoughts start coming up,
00:52:37
in order for you to process it, because you're allowing it the space.
00:52:41
Whereas before, you'd probably just deny it with another thought.
00:52:44
Yeah, that's true.
00:52:46
Was that meditation like the main component for you
00:52:51
with starting to deal and sort out with a lot of the trauma that you've had to deal with?
00:52:57
Yeah, so there was another very intense moment, and it does sound...
00:53:04
It's going to sound wacky, to be honest.
00:53:07
Oh, the wacky of the band.
00:53:08
Woo-woo. It might sound woo-woo to some people, but as a kid, I didn't mention it before,
00:53:15
but I was very... I don't know if it was some kind of wave my mind coping,
00:53:19
or I was blessed with this in order to get through what I went through.
00:53:23
But I used to see spirit a lot when I was a child,
00:53:25
and it could have just been... as a kid, you don't think about it that way.
00:53:29
I used to see people and talk to people, I used to talk to relatives that were past.
00:53:35
And this was now about three or four, I like talking to my great-none-a.
00:53:40
I didn't know who she was, I thought she was just actually in my room at the time.
00:53:43
I thought I was just talking to this lady, and then my mum comes up the stage and says,
00:53:47
Oh, you're talking to her? I'm talking to my non-a.
00:53:49
Oh, wow.
00:53:50
I'm talking to my non-a, she's sat there, she's like, there's no one there.
00:53:53
Well, well, there is.
00:53:55
And we went to my non-a's actually after that, and it was her mum that had passed before...
00:54:01
she passed giving birth to her, so I'd never even met her in my life when I was sat talking to her.
00:54:07
Wow.
00:54:08
But that stopped when I got to about ten-year-old.
00:54:10
It all just sort of stopped and it never happened again, so...
00:54:14
But then after that trip, and I really started getting into meditation and understanding that there is a way out of this.
00:54:20
There is a way out of the suffering mind.
00:54:23
I got really into it, I got really...
00:54:25
Buddhism was one of the main ones I was invested in,
00:54:29
because they're very clear-cut, they're very straight to the point.
00:54:33
So, you've probably heard of enlightenment, right?
00:54:36
Oh, yeah.
00:54:37
So, I've become obsessed with that.
00:54:40
That was something new for my mind to focus on.
00:54:42
I used to be very... I'm quite obsessive when I find something that I want to figure out, I will obsess over it.
00:54:48
I will get into it.
00:54:50
I could be the same way.
00:54:51
Yeah, I've got to figure this out.
00:54:53
I know they say that it can't be figured out, but there's got to be a way.
00:54:56
I'm going to figure it out.
00:54:57
Exactly, yeah.
00:54:58
Yeah, so I got really deep into it.
00:55:00
I was reading everything, I was practicing everything.
00:55:02
And even if I can't figure it out, I'm going to figure out that I can't figure it out.
00:55:06
Yeah, and that's very true.
00:55:09
So, I've become obsessed with it.
00:55:11
And I remember one night, I was just sat in the garden, and I was like,
00:55:16
you know what?
00:55:17
I give up.
00:55:18
I give up with this enlightenment.
00:55:20
I'm not going to...
00:55:22
Enlightenment's going to have to happen to me.
00:55:24
I can't chase it, and in that very moment of giving it up, I promise you not.
00:55:30
In that moment that I said to myself, I give up trying to get it,
00:55:33
my whole body started radiating with ecstasy.
00:55:37
I could feel every cell in my body start to come alive.
00:55:41
And I was looking at things, and I was not seeing an objective world.
00:55:46
I was seeing self.
00:55:48
Everything was self.
00:55:49
Everything was a reflection of me.
00:55:51
I was looking up at the stars, and I was looking at me.
00:55:54
I looked at a bush, and that was me, the self.
00:55:57
And this...
00:55:58
I was overcome by this...
00:56:00
Just this radiance.
00:56:02
I felt like I'd died.
00:56:03
I felt like I'd completely vanished, similar to the LSD trip at the end.
00:56:08
But this time, it was added with an element of pure peace, pure happiness,
00:56:13
and pure contentment, and a love that I could never describe.
00:56:17
And I was completely absorbed in this...
00:56:21
What I can only describe is God presence.
00:56:23
I'm not saying God in...
00:56:25
I'm not saying God is a man, or God is a figure, but God is consciousness.
00:56:30
Like energy, this...
00:56:31
Yeah, right.
00:56:32
Yeah, it's like God is a...
00:56:34
Like you're saying, like an energy.
00:56:36
It's a consciousness, if we want to be more accurate, or awareness.
00:56:41
Awareness itself is God.
00:56:43
That's what allows anything to be present.
00:56:45
It's the presence.
00:56:47
It's finer than fine.
00:56:49
When you had this experience, was this...
00:56:53
Had there already been a time where you developed your meditation,
00:56:59
and was this like some years afterwards, or when did this happen exactly?
00:57:03
It was about a year after.
00:57:06
So when I really started to take it seriously and try to understand it,
00:57:10
and I really wanted to actually fix my mind, if that makes sense,
00:57:14
to be done with the suffering, because I knew there was a way out.
00:57:17
And then, like I said, I got obsessed with it.
00:57:20
But it wasn't until I gave up.
00:57:22
And what I learned from that is that giving up, letting go of the pain is the joy.
00:57:28
We can let go.
00:57:30
And that's what I learned, that's what that taught me, that in the process of letting go,
00:57:34
is actually the process of becoming free.
00:57:37
And that's what that experience represented.
00:57:40
The freedom is in letting go.
00:57:42
So I let go.
00:57:44
I had this amazing experience, it was beautiful.
00:57:47
Euphoric, huh?
00:57:49
Oh, it was beautiful.
00:57:50
There's nothing in my life, there's nothing that can compare to that.
00:57:54
It's really just a staple point, and it's a constant reminder.
00:57:58
I can never forget it, it's a constant reminder of what happiness is and what it is.
00:58:02
What were you doing?
00:58:03
Was it just something that came out of the blue?
00:58:06
It came out of nowhere.
00:58:08
It came out of nowhere.
00:58:10
I wasn't even practicing, it was just because I'd let go.
00:58:13
Because like I was saying, I was obsessed with enlightenment,
00:58:16
but I was getting frustrated that I couldn't, I'm not getting it.
00:58:19
I'm not getting it.
00:58:21
What these guys are talking about, what these guys are talking about, it's not happening.
00:58:25
And then in the process of letting it go, because it didn't happen, it happened.
00:58:30
Which was powerful, it was like, honestly it was amazing.
00:58:35
And that was a very defining moment.
00:58:37
And it also was bizarre, so I was just in this spaceless, timeless place.
00:58:43
There was no space, no time, only the self, consciousness, God, which all of us are.
00:58:50
Not just me, all of us are that.
00:58:52
We're all an aspect of it.
00:58:55
And I was given a choice, I can spend, I can stay in eternity.
00:59:00
Because I'd already had my first child by then.
00:59:02
And it was, I can stay in eternity, or I can come back, knowing what I know now and live life fully.
00:59:09
And not only live life fully, I can bring this understanding that I now have.
00:59:14
This love and this joy and this happiness, which is within all of us.
00:59:18
I can come back and share that with the world.
00:59:22
Now knowing that.
00:59:23
And that's what it felt like.
00:59:24
I don't know if there was a near-death experience there or what.
00:59:26
I don't know if I had a stroke or something.
00:59:28
I don't know, but it was just strange that I was given the choice as well that I can leave.
00:59:32
Yes.
00:59:33
And stay, well, not leave, but I can just stay in this eternal life, or I can come back and live life.
00:59:38
Because I know that that's what's there after.
00:59:40
I know that's what's there at all times.
00:59:43
So I decided, well, I'm going to come back.
00:59:45
And in that split second I come back, I just completely materialized again, essentially.
00:59:50
Like, just come back to my senses.
00:59:52
And I felt I was just back in the world.
00:59:54
And everything, just a blade of grass, I could see the truth was in a blade of grass.
00:59:59
The truth was in everything.
01:00:01
It's what everything's made of.
01:00:02
And then I was just in tears.
01:00:04
I was crying for hours after.
01:00:05
Because I'd never felt happiness like that, if that makes sense.
01:00:09
Bear in mind, what I'd gone through.
01:00:11
I'd never knew that that was possible.
01:00:14
I didn't know that that kind of happiness and love and peace was attainable.
01:00:18
And what I realized is that after all these years, it was always within me.
01:00:22
Yes.
01:00:23
It was always right there.
01:00:24
Yeah, it was always right there.
01:00:26
Man, how old were you when this happened?
01:00:29
About 22.
01:00:31
Oh, wow.
01:00:33
I'd grown up fast as well.
01:00:35
I'd skipped some years.
01:00:37
Yeah, yeah.
01:00:38
I mean, it sounds like you didn't even really have a childhood.
01:00:42
No, I didn't.
01:00:43
What did they say?
01:00:44
It's not the year it was made.
01:00:46
It's the miles on the clock.
01:00:48
That's right.
01:00:50
I'd got some miles on the clock mentally by then.
01:00:54
Well, mental experience by then.
01:00:57
I'd done most stuff.
01:00:59
Adults had gone through by the time I was 16.
01:01:01
I'd done it.
01:01:02
I'd done most of it.
01:01:03
I knew that none of these things could even satisfy me.
01:01:06
Happiness.
01:01:07
And this experience right here, this was without appeal.
01:01:11
This was all a natural.
01:01:13
Just happened spontaneously.
01:01:15
Euphoric, yeah, spontaneous experience.
01:01:18
Holistic, if that's the right word.
01:01:21
Yeah.
01:01:22
Very natural.
01:01:25
And even to this day, you can still, it seems, and it sounds like you can still go back to that moment.
01:01:31
Like it's still, you can relive it almost.
01:01:34
Yeah, because now I know that that's where I permanently am.
01:01:38
I live in that place.
01:01:40
I might not always see it.
01:01:42
So like I was saying, what that represented is that it's not that there's any
01:01:47
thing better after or it's not like, like, a lot of people think, oh,
01:01:52
if I kill myself, it'll be better.
01:01:54
No, because that what you're looking for doesn't, you don't need to die in order to realise that.
01:02:00
You don't need to die in order to realise the happiness, happiness and peace is right here right now.
01:02:05
It's found in your being.
01:02:07
It's found in your awareness.
01:02:10
Because let me, let, let, I'll do it.
01:02:13
I'll do it. I'll do it in a little example that people can go along with it as well if they want to own.
01:02:18
Yeah, please.
01:02:19
What a thought experiment for you to try if you want.
01:02:22
So what I want you to do is close your eyes and imagine empty space.
01:02:30
Yeah.
01:02:31
Yeah, I'm with you.
01:02:33
Now, now imagine this aware.
01:02:36
Now imagine this space is an aware space.
01:02:39
So anything that's in the space, it's, it's an aware space.
01:02:42
It's just an empty aware space.
01:02:45
Yeah.
01:02:46
Yeah.
01:02:47
Then remove space.
01:02:51
Mm-hmm.
01:02:52
Now, how do you feel?
01:02:55
How do you feel now?
01:02:58
There's peace and there's happiness and there's everything you ever look for just right there.
01:03:04
You just have to bring your mind to an end.
01:03:06
Yeah.
01:03:08
It's that simple.
01:03:09
That simple.
01:03:11
And that's the thing about it, even with meditation, mindfulness, these kind of things, if we can put a few minutes aside for this, but then it's just the fact like it's the doing part of it.
01:03:26
I mean, we can spend time doing this.
01:03:30
We can spend all day doing that.
01:03:33
A lot of it can be just, just to kind of kill the boredom.
01:03:38
But something like this, just a few minutes, take a few minutes out the day to do that.
01:03:43
And then like you said, you, you develop it, whether it's a daily practice, but you build off of that.
01:03:50
Yeah.
01:03:51
And these are, these are, these are things that can help someone who's dealing with trauma and they're dealing with their own issues.
01:03:58
Yeah.
01:03:59
And I think it's not a matter of, so a lot of people think that you've got to put the hours in the meditation to reap the benefits of it.
01:04:07
Well, yeah, in a way, right?
01:04:09
The, the practice of meditation is an aid, it's a tool, because the real, the real, the real peace and the real happiness and the real joy comes, not through practice, but through recognition.
01:04:23
So it's not to, it's not unto intellectually remember these practices, but it's when it's when that the practices have been recognized fundamentally in your mind is the nature of how you are.
01:04:34
So like I was just saying, that little practice of awareness and aware space, if you, if you recognize that, wait, I'm actually, I'm aware all the time.
01:04:44
Anything I do, I'm aware, whether I'm thinking or I'm feeling, whether there's a negative thought or a negative emotion, I'm still aware of them.
01:04:52
So awareness is the constant factor and recognizing that awareness is actually your natural state of being.
01:04:59
And what does that, and what does awareness come with, it comes with the qualities of peace and happiness. So therefore we are peace and happiness.
01:05:06
It's a recognition more than it is a practice. That's when it's, that's when you'll start to live from that place, not just visit it.
01:05:15
It becomes your home.
01:05:16
Yes.
01:05:17
Yes.
01:05:18
And that's why, that's why in, like in Buddhism, they go, oh, it's home.
01:05:25
Aha, that's where it comes from.
01:05:29
Yeah, it's home.
01:05:30
It's not just a noise to be saying it, but it actually means something. There's a reason for it.
01:05:34
And it's, yeah, and it's taking you back there.
01:05:37
And it's, it's a rounding yourself.
01:05:39
Yeah.
01:05:40
And it's a powerful, a very powerful practice, which I'd recommend for anyone that's struggling with trauma. And this is the way I deal dealt with it.
01:05:49
I've got either backlog or trauma to deal with.
01:05:52
So when, so when, when a painful thought or a painful emotion, because not everyone's going to be able to just separate themselves from it straight away, you're still going to get some people are still going to get lost in it for some time.
01:06:02
It might not happen straight away.
01:06:04
But the important thing is when, when you start to notice, when you notice that the thoughts and the emotions come up and the triggers come up before you get lost in it, just, just take a second to remember.
01:06:15
This is a thought. This is a feeling I'm aware of this thought and feeling ground yourself every time that this happens, because what you're going to do is you're going to break down the normal structures of your mind and the normal patterns that usually happen because your mind's a pattern into it.
01:06:29
It comes in waves and patterns and this thought will lead to this thought typically and we go down this.
01:06:34
But if we stop it in its tracks, right, the moment that it pops up and then we replace that with peace, we're, we replace that with a, you know, an aware sense of being and aware of the thought and the feelings that come up.
01:06:44
And the sense of being an awareness of these thoughts were actually breaking down the structures of the, the old habits and the old thought routines.
01:06:54
And over time, they'll just stop popping up as much.
01:06:57
You know what I'm saying? You'll break them down to the point that they don't really happen anymore because you're not, you're not, the mind's not going to keep doing what you're not allowing it to do.
01:07:04
Yes.
01:07:05
And if you're shutting it down every time that it pops up, it's not going to try as hard to keep popping up, it's going to think, but it's going to realize that, oh, well, this is pointless no more because it's no longer having a purpose.
01:07:16
But while ever you're giving it life and you're giving it the power to overcome you, it's going to keep doing it.
01:07:22
Yeah, that's a constant battle.
01:07:24
Now, this is something that you've, you, that has really helped you, hasn't it?
01:07:28
Yeah, it's, it's drastically improved my mental wellbeing, not just mental wellbeing, just fulfillment.
01:07:36
You know, when I come to peace, when I really come to peace and I really found that, that anchor and that place that I knew that I could rely on and I knew where to go for my happiness and my peace.
01:07:48
That's when I could forgive everyone, that's when I could forgive even the person that put me through all of this because I recognize that he's just acting on his own pain.
01:07:58
In order to deal pain to people, you've had to have, you've had to have gone through pain yourself.
01:08:02
You just, you don't just do it for no reason.
01:08:05
If you, you can only deal as much pain as you've been through.
01:08:08
So for him to do this on a constant level, he's got to have been dealing with his own pain as well.
01:08:14
And he went through a similar thing. So he's got his demons. Do you know what I'm saying? Like we've all got these things going on and we don't really, we don't always realize that what we do hurts a little bit.
01:08:22
And it's some, some people never get around to sorting it out.
01:08:25
Yeah. The only person you should be concerned with helping heal is yourself because once you heal yourself, then you can help everyone else.
01:08:33
You can't help anyone else if you've not helped yourself first.
01:08:36
Yeah, so true.
01:08:37
It doesn't work because what the advice you're giving is not coming from a place of, do you know what I mean? You're not even embodying it yourself.
01:08:44
So how can that message even convey?
01:08:46
True.
01:08:47
You know what I'm saying?
01:08:48
Yeah, exactly.
01:08:50
So first help yourself in order to help others. That's the only way you can do it.
01:08:54
Yeah, you've got to, you have to have your own, your own household sorted out first.
01:08:59
Yeah, 100%.
01:09:00
Do you, do you still keep in good contact with your, your mother and I don't know if she's still involved with?
01:09:08
No, they, no, they split up when I was about 11 or 12.
01:09:12
But they were still, it was still ongoing.
01:09:14
It didn't, it didn't necessarily stop when they split up because it was all, it was like, there wasn't actually together.
01:09:20
We weren't living in the same house anymore, but there was still events happening and there were still things going off.
01:09:25
But yeah, my mum's found a good partner now. It took her some years, but she's found someone good now.
01:09:32
And he's very connected as well. He's, he's very much into this kind of stuff as well.
01:09:37
He understands a lot about dealing with trauma and pain.
01:09:41
And now my mum's finally got someone that will treat her the way she needs to.
01:09:45
And she's even, like I say, we never finished, we never done healing.
01:09:49
She's in, she's, she's in her 40s now and she's still healing herself.
01:09:54
But she said, she did say to me that I've taught her a lot about healing because she, she didn't understand a lot of how that affected me as a kid.
01:10:03
Because she remember she was on the end of receiving that.
01:10:06
Do you know what I mean? Like, you're not going to be thinking about the way it's impacting the kids when you're just trying to survive yourself.
01:10:14
Yeah. I mean, and she was still a kid.
01:10:16
It was a big shock. It was a big shock for her. Yeah.
01:10:20
So she's still like,
01:10:21
Oh, that's some and that goes to show like the power of when you, when you, when you come to grips with looking inward and, and, and working out your own demons and how it can spill over and in effect and touch somebody else.
01:10:36
Like you say, for when your mother, she, she sees the example in you and, yeah, I mean, that's, that's powerful in itself and not just your mother, but I'm sure like the people around you.
01:10:48
I mean, I know you, you mentioned this was offline that you plan in the future to, to put a class together or you had something in mind.
01:10:58
Yeah. So it's, it's for a while I've tried to, I really tried to figure out how can I best best help people, how can I best give people this message.
01:11:10
And it's, it's been hard. It's hard cause like I say, even though, even though I've found that piece and that happens, there's still elements of my development that that's what's it called like self esteem, like being confident in the world,
01:11:23
going out there and just doing things like that. Not all those things still come. Yeah. Not all of those things come natural to me still. Yeah. I'm still like, I'm doing this now. This is like the start.
01:11:34
I've been on a couple of podcasts, not many, but I feel like I'm only just starting to get out there and really spread, spread my message and my story and why I'm looking to start meditation classes and not just meditation classes, but maybe just even talks cause
01:11:52
because like I was saying, it's not just about the meditation, it's the understanding, it's recognition. It's like, you've got, if you understand, you know, you could, if you can understand your mind and what its functions are, it's a lot easier to work with it, if that makes sense.
01:12:07
Yeah, no, exactly. 100%. If you want, if you understand the cycles and you understand the way that the mind moves, you understand its complexity, but ultimately you understand that your thoughts and your feelings and all these things, these are things that you are witnessing.
01:12:23
They're not you. You can become them if you become obsessed with them. But if you learn that you can step back from them and witness them, then you can start to understand how they work.
01:12:34
Because while you're involved in them, you can't, you can't look at them objectively because you're too involved.
01:12:40
But if you understand how they work and you understand that the functions of the mind and the processes, then you can actually start to understand the way it moves and then you start to feel the benefits of that new place that you're sitting in.
01:12:54
Yeah, I know for a fact, just from hearing your story and your words and all of your insight and your philosophy on things and whichever route you do choose to go, that a lot of people are going to find it useful and helpful.
01:13:10
I'm sure that there's going to be a lot of people that you can, you can touch in a positive way when it comes to that.
01:13:15
Yeah, I appreciate it.
01:13:17
I appreciate it. However you, yeah, whatever avenue you choose to pursue when it comes to that. That's it. And also I'm going to, you have a Facebook page, so I will leave the link to that.
01:13:30
Yeah, I do make, sorry, I make like, so sometimes I have meditations and I write poetry after. A lot of the stuff I write is sort of poetic.
01:13:41
Okay. Because I find poetry best describes these states sometimes. It's, it's because it's like, it's beyond words eventually.
01:13:50
Even all these, even all these words I'm saying, they can't directly point you to it.
01:13:55
Well, the, yeah, it's hard to color it the way that.
01:13:58
Yeah, it's got to be something that you've got to see for yourself. It's not about believing what I'm saying. It's about taking what I'm saying.
01:14:04
Experiencing it yourself.
01:14:07
Yeah, apply it to your life, apply it in your own experience and see that it's possible. Then what I'm saying will make more sense.
01:14:15
That's true. You've got, you've got to feel it on your own skin or you've got to go through it. You had in mind with, with meditation courses, would it be like an online thing that you had in mind?
01:14:26
I mean, I know you're still trying to sort out everything, but did you have any ideas or?
01:14:31
I was thinking of starting online first, maybe just starting online class. And I want to make it affordable for everyone.
01:14:39
Because, you know, at the same time, I think that you obviously we need, if to do these things full time and you want to help people full time, you need to make a little bit of something.
01:14:49
Right. Yeah, just to keep the lights on.
01:14:51
Yeah. Yeah, that's it. And if it goes well and it spreads well, then I'm so I need more time to do that.
01:14:59
I do write a lot of stuff. I'm debating a book, to be honest.
01:15:03
I think you have a book there. I mean, of course, it's the writing part of it. But as far as everything that I mean, we can't cover it all to you.
01:15:12
But you you took us on a ride. You really took us on a ride.
01:15:15
Yeah, there's a lot of elements to it. There's a lot of things I've not said, but I've tried to just talk about the main things.
01:15:22
I really appreciate the, like I told you before, just somebody wanting to share their their their heart, a piece of them and to be vulnerable.
01:15:31
I mean, that takes courage. That takes guts. And there's a lot of people that can gravitate to it.
01:15:37
There's a lot of people that that I'm sure it's going to resonate with a lot of people are dealing with family trauma with childhood trauma.
01:15:45
And they are still dealing with it 50 years later, 60 years later, they haven't found that key to unlock and kind of help them get the healing, the recovering and the support that they need.
01:15:58
And you it seems like you're on you're on the right path.
01:16:01
Yeah. Yeah. And the thing as well, what's so sad to see is, imagine, I couldn't imagine going through my whole life.
01:16:09
I've never, I've never realized the very the simplicity of it all.
01:16:16
I think a lot of people overcomplicate the thing that they overcomplicate. Yeah, they think that it's a massive process in order to deal with these things.
01:16:24
It's not it's very simple. Sit with yourself.
01:16:29
I'm not saying don't like because because I didn't take meds. I'm not saying don't take meds. Everyone's different.
01:16:35
It's necessary sometimes it is necessary. It's necessary to have a therapist whatever works.
01:16:40
The main thing is is do what you need to do in order to help yourself.
01:16:45
And then at the same time, just just sit with yourself and just see what what am I really.
01:16:51
And remember that what the trip taught me who am I.
01:16:55
That's a very important question.
01:16:57
Because we all talk about this I that we are I am I am this I am that I am this I am that.
01:17:04
What does I am mean? What does it refer to before it is something.
01:17:09
So before we say I am happy what or I am sad what does I am referred to.
01:17:14
Yeah, and a lot of times we're we're taking on the identity of what somebody else is giving us.
01:17:21
It's not even necessarily who like you said is it we haven't even took the time to get to know ourselves and to be alone with ourselves to know ourselves.
01:17:32
We're always going we're going by what somebody our neighbors said our partners saying and and these are all these things we're taking on and we're putting on our shoulders and that doesn't necessarily mean it's who you truly are.
01:17:47
Yep. And that's the biggest thing I want people to understand this is first understand who you are understand what your nature is understand what that I represent.
01:17:57
And once you understood that that people those things that you've been longing for all your life that feeling that you're long for as a kid that when you was a kid that nostalgic feel why why was I so happy as a kid why was I so why did I have no troubles
01:18:13
because you had no identity yet.
01:18:15
Yeah, you didn't have you didn't have these mental beliefs and structures that I am this person I have this particular story and in this story I did a bad thing so that means I represent a bad person.
01:18:26
And I want to carry this round with me. No, it's a thought and it's a belief it's not it's not happening now.
01:18:32
Yeah.
01:18:33
Do you know what I mean it doesn't represent who you are right now.
01:18:35
You can change every day.
01:18:37
If you went with your thoughts and he's constantly changing but we always say I am we all have that name is one of my favorite teachers said Rupert Spirey says I am is the is the street name for God.
01:18:50
Huh. I like that.
01:18:56
It's the common word for God.
01:18:58
And you and you hear it every day with everybody.
01:19:02
Yep. And we say and we say it every day we all say it but no one knows what it means.
01:19:07
No one really no one really looks.
01:19:11
I always find that strange when I learned that like we wait we all do call ourselves I we all say I but we all claim to have.
01:19:18
But if I'm talking to you I call you Richard and you talk to me I call you call me Jake but when we refer to ourself we don't say Jake we don't say we don't say I am Jake would just say I am.
01:19:29
Yeah.
01:19:31
We all say it and it's so simple and that's what all the great religions say that's what all the spiritual texts are saying that's what they're all look at what Jesus says I am the way I am the way the truth not life.
01:19:45
And it's not saying that I am I am Jesus Christ the way it's just what is saying that I am is the truth.
01:19:53
Yes.
01:19:54
It's just what is this is you know I mean it's in it's in all these great traditions and all these all these it's in all of it.
01:20:01
It's just representing the same thing.
01:20:03
The realization right coming to a realization of the true essence of yeah who you are.
01:20:09
Yeah.
01:20:10
And once you recognize the essence of who you are you recognize the essence of the universe.
01:20:14
Because even if you look at it even even if I sound spiritual like that sort of stuff even if we take it in a science context.
01:20:23
Scientists say that the Big Bang was the start of everything so the Big Bang we're all a process of the Big Bang then.
01:20:30
Yeah.
01:20:31
We're not individual parts we're all we are still actually the process of the Big Bang we all that we all we all are that same event.
01:20:38
Yeah.
01:20:39
Even in that sense science is saying we're all the same thing so whatever the universe is is what I am and whatever I am the universe is.
01:20:46
Yeah that's some profound stuff.
01:20:48
It's hidden everywhere.
01:20:50
It's not even hidden it's in plain it's in plain sight.
01:20:53
And it really it goes back to how you brought up the point of where it would really benefit all of us all of us if we take time out of our day and just sit with ourselves.
01:21:07
Yeah.
01:21:08
The other thing is a lot of us and that's how we can we can find ourselves being distracted by so many things because there's a lot of people and maybe for good reason because like like you for instance you had a lot of trauma and and they're afraid to be with themselves
01:21:24
and their thoughts because they're just tormented by it.
01:21:27
Yeah.
01:21:28
We're always running from something.
01:21:30
You pick up the phone OK what are they doing on here or you turn on the TV or you throw some music on whatever it is just get some noise and some distraction going on because you're tormented by and that and that comes down to the point of a lot of those things have
01:21:46
not been resolved.
01:21:47
Yeah.
01:21:48
And it's and the way I went about it was very much like right.
01:21:52
Let's take all this on.
01:21:54
Let's go.
01:21:55
Let's let's just face all of this and it hasn't got to be that way.
01:21:58
All it's got to be is pay just pay a loving just give these elements of yourself just a loving aware.
01:22:06
Be aware of them lovingly embrace them like because when you do that you actually allow them to be healed.
01:22:12
That is healing when you allow the negative thoughts and things to be there and you give them that loving space.
01:22:20
Remember that space I was telling you about.
01:22:22
Yeah.
01:22:23
All these things arise in that loving space and that actually gives them time that that allows them to be free.
01:22:30
That actually lets them go.
01:22:32
While you run from it you're keeping it there you're suppressing it.
01:22:35
But if you give them that space to to arise and be processed then then you can actually be free from it.
01:22:43
There's some mindfulness talks where they say you when you're doing that when you're being mindful it's like you're coming from a place of non you're being non judgmental about anything whether it's your thoughts whatever it is.
01:22:57
There's no right or there's no wrong they just are.
01:23:00
Yeah.
01:23:01
Yeah.
01:23:02
And in the one of the practices that I love the most is called this practice what I'm talking about is actually a form of it's called self inquiry.
01:23:10
Okay.
01:23:11
Self inquiry.
01:23:12
And what and what they what they often refer to you've heard of dualism haven't you like yin yin up down.
01:23:18
Well the self is actually non dual.
01:23:21
It's neither up it's neither up nor down it's either it's the it's actually the thing that all of it arises in.
01:23:27
It is.
01:23:28
The self is the essence for the dualism to arise because all of it arises within you.
01:23:34
So you are the you are the background in which all these things can arise.
01:23:39
So the self is non dual.
01:23:41
This was a lot to unpack.
01:23:43
I like I like that this talk right here with you Jake.
01:23:48
It had a lot of a lot of colors.
01:23:50
There was a lot of good insight.
01:23:52
It was enlightening.
01:23:53
It was inspiring.
01:23:54
There was a lot a lot of good information a lot a lot of good information.
01:23:58
I really enjoyed it.
01:23:59
This is something right up my alley too because I really am into philosophy.
01:24:02
I'm into spirituality.
01:24:04
I mean I'm not to say I'm the holiest of people but I really I love the ideas I love.
01:24:09
I was really excited and interested to hear what you had to say and then that was just pretty much it sounds like the tip of the iceberg.
01:24:17
Yeah, I mean, yeah, yeah, maybe that's why we connected then you already said a whole lot and you gave some good tips about being being mindful being in the moment.
01:24:29
Meditation how good and helpful that was for you and dealing with your trauma and even the point of taking time out of the day to spend with yourself get to know yourself.
01:24:41
Was there any anything else that that you would want to leave something with for all the listeners.
01:24:47
Yeah, if I was if I was to try and sum it up.
01:24:52
And that's what I do with my writings I try to sum up all of this stuff in just a few words.
01:24:59
And one of them is happiness is prior to experience happiness is not dependent upon experience.
01:25:06
The direct path to happiness is to know your nature who or what is aware of your life.
01:25:12
I am the either I am before I am something prior to experience of mind in the world.
01:25:18
That is beautiful.
01:25:22
That's a lot of what my content is at the minute.
01:25:24
I'm just putting out a little short videos with some of some of my writings and I like to go out in nature and shoot footage as well.
01:25:32
I like to get some nice videos and pictures and stuff and I'm sort of just combining the two at the moment.
01:25:38
Okay, so it's actually the photos and pictures that you took.
01:25:42
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and you follow them and that with your writing.
01:25:45
Yeah, that's what I'm doing just getting my own videos and then combining them with my own writing and then just putting them out there.
01:25:51
It's just somewhat small to begin with and then that creative expression.
01:25:55
Yeah, I feel like I need it out.
01:25:56
That's what it feels like.
01:25:58
It just seeps out of me sometimes and I need to put it somewhere.
01:26:02
I mean, and it probably feels good right once you once you're releasing a let it go.
01:26:06
It's like, oh, that's my that's my baby.
01:26:08
That's like, yeah, well, it's weird because when I write, so I'll meditate and then write.
01:26:14
But sometimes when I write, I don't feel like I'm actually writing.
01:26:18
And then the next day I look at it.
01:26:20
It doesn't feel like I wrote it, but something was wrote through me.
01:26:23
It was flowing through you.
01:26:25
You were you were the you were the vessel.
01:26:27
Yeah, I was the vessel in which that writing was written.
01:26:30
That's what it feels like sometimes.
01:26:32
I've heard people where they've got they've gone through similar things, even authors where they say a lot of times when they get in their place where they're in that writing state and they're like, I just put the.
01:26:43
I put my hand to the to the pad and and the words just start coming out.
01:26:48
Yeah, that's I think that's when you're that's that place that they're coming from and that place that they're writing from is the same place that people go to in meditation.
01:26:56
It's the same place that people go when they're doing something that they're a mastering because when you're a master of something, then you don't try to do anymore.
01:27:04
It just happens because you just in the flow with it.
01:27:07
You know, I mean, exactly.
01:27:09
It's like a master is forced.
01:27:11
Yeah, yeah. When when you're in the flow, you're allowing it to happen as it should and you're not trying to intervene or interfere with it and then it can it can come out as it should.
01:27:20
Now, do you you mind you mind sharing your Facebook page?
01:27:23
So if anybody wants to check out more of your writings and what you're doing, they can.
01:27:27
Yeah, yeah, it's called Discovering Peace.
01:27:30
I'm on Facebook and I'm on Instagram and I've started a TikTok as well.
01:27:35
Okay, you're exploring all avenues.
01:27:38
Yeah, because I find TikToks where as much as I don't really like using TikTok because I find that it's just so addictive that I don't really go on it too much.
01:27:47
I just go on there to put my stuff on.
01:27:49
Yeah, you hit it and then you get out.
01:27:52
Yeah, that's what I do.
01:27:54
I get on there, put my make my content, put it on and then I leave.
01:27:58
Yeah, no, you're smart. You're smart.
01:28:00
I could imagine.
01:28:01
I don't have a TikTok, but I know even my Instagram, my deactivated, but it and that was that was the reason for that.
01:28:07
That was the reason for it because I could find my, you know, one after the other and then you're just the scrolling scrolling.
01:28:15
They know what they're doing.
01:28:16
They did that for a reason.
01:28:18
Yeah, like that's why the TikTok style is now in Instagram and it's now on Facebook as well.
01:28:24
But as much as as much as like that, as much as I don't like that style of concept, like I do because it's good at getting stuff out there.
01:28:33
The algorithm is really good.
01:28:35
But it's not good to be sat on it all the time.
01:28:38
Like you can get real.
01:28:39
That's another example of a loop that we get stuck in.
01:28:41
That's just another form of the loop because you're not even watching the videos anymore.
01:28:45
You just swiping.
01:28:47
Yeah, I see people like that.
01:28:49
If I'm waiting for the bus, if I'm coming home from work or whatever it is, even outside and or if I'm on the bus, I'm on the train riding and then there's someone sitting next to me or or beside me.
01:29:01
However, the cases, but you can see them looking at the phone and sometimes I'm just curious.
01:29:05
I look over to see what they're doing.
01:29:07
And they're just they're not even looking at the screen, but they're just flicking it with their thumb.
01:29:12
Like they're looking around and they're looking out the window.
01:29:15
What are you and it's just out of habit now.
01:29:18
Yeah.
01:29:19
And it's just another distraction.
01:29:21
Like we're saying it's another way of distracting us.
01:29:23
I don't think we even mean to know we're surrounded by this technology, but it doesn't help.
01:29:28
Like it that's another part of the suppression.
01:29:31
I think that's why as well the the mental health crisis is huge at the moment because we've got all this technology and all it does is distract us even more.
01:29:40
Yes, what we was already avoiding.
01:29:42
Yes.
01:29:43
Now that that's like the key is really to I mean, it can also be a good a good tool like you say, for instance, or whoever is if someone's interested in philosophy or you want to learn how to how to build a spaceship.
01:29:56
I don't know you can find it on YouTube and you can figure these out and watch videos, but then at the same time, there's that trap that you can find yourself and you can get caught up just filling your mind with junk and nothing but it.
01:30:10
What I did with them with Instagram and Facebook and stuff is I unfollowed like loads of groups and loads of and I made sure that if I was going to spend time on these platforms that they're going to be based around things that are important to me or they're going to remind me of
01:30:25
these things that so like I'll follow pages that specifically talk about things that I'm into and the things that reinforce.
01:30:33
Yes.
01:30:34
What is I already do so that way that yes, it's not healthy to be spending, I don't know, two hour on Facebook, but at least if I'm on Facebook, it's it's content that's reminding me of this thing that I'm already.
01:30:45
Right.
01:30:46
Yeah, you're being mindful of what you're doing.
01:30:49
Yeah, yeah, yeah, mindful even while on Facebook and stuff.
01:30:52
That's key.
01:30:53
That's key.
01:30:54
Yeah, be mindful of the stuff you consume because it will consume you otherwise.
01:30:58
Yeah, exactly.
01:30:59
Everything and that we're tied up to that screen all day long.
01:31:03
Like if we're not on the phone, then then we're putting on the TV and if we're not watching the TV is like so.
01:31:09
Even if we can give ourselves a break, like going back to what you were saying, if you can spend a few minutes with yourself, I mean, we have 24 hours out the day that that's not really asking much and even who knows, you know, not even who knows, but a lot of.
01:31:23
Good can come from that.
01:31:25
Yeah.
01:31:26
Well, I was thinking of putting together a technique which is called the one minute piece technique because I was trying to find like how can I relate?
01:31:35
How can I relate this practice with today's technology if that makes sense and we're in a time where everything's fast paced and everything's so like if you say it's one all sit for 30 minutes of meditation.
01:31:47
That's just like no chance.
01:31:48
I can't even sit and watch a video for that's all kind of watching video for 10 for 10 minutes.
01:31:52
Never mind.
01:31:53
Sit with doing nothing for 30 minutes.
01:31:55
So I thought, right, well, the short content seems to work really well.
01:31:58
So how can I produce a short meditation and I like combined a few different styles of meditation together.
01:32:05
And I call it the one minute, the one minute meditation.
01:32:09
I like that.
01:32:10
That has a good way.
01:32:12
You will think it's a lot more appealing than saying 10 minute, 15 minute here because it doesn't need to be that long.
01:32:19
It's just a matter of going straight to the heart of the matter and then going about your day from that place.
01:32:26
You put yourself in that place and you're giving yourself the best chance really.
01:32:30
Right.
01:32:31
You're starting off on the right foot.
01:32:33
Yeah.
01:32:34
And then you realize like, wow, this is something I actually enjoy.
01:32:37
Now you give someone that door to get in with just one minute and then they might come to the realization.
01:32:44
I actually like this.
01:32:46
A minute.
01:32:48
Yeah.
01:32:49
When I first started five minutes used to feel like, wow, I used to feel like forever.
01:32:54
Yeah.
01:32:55
And then now I get to the point where I might listen to just like a piece of writing, like a particular piece of writing and it's using a meditative sense.
01:33:04
And it might be like 30 minutes long.
01:33:07
And then because I get because I get that absorbed in the space though, that even when the recordings finished, I don't even notice that it's finished.
01:33:15
And I'm like, and you know what I mean?
01:33:18
I've been listening to it and it came back down.
01:33:20
And I look at it.
01:33:21
Yeah.
01:33:22
And I look back at my phone.
01:33:23
I'm like, wow, another hours past.
01:33:25
I've been sat there for a whole hour.
01:33:27
Did not even, did not even realize because that place that is this where else would you want to be them peace and happiness.
01:33:34
And it all it takes.
01:33:35
Yeah.
01:33:36
I mean, if it's right there, then there's no need to do anything else sometimes.
01:33:39
And it's nice to spend time just.
01:33:42
Yeah, I mean, yeah, strong stuff.
01:33:45
Man, Jake, I really, really enjoyed this talk.
01:33:49
It was a lot, a lot of information, a lot of goods, a lot of nuggets of wisdom that came out of this.
01:33:55
And I really enjoyed it.
01:33:56
Yeah, yeah.
01:33:57
So you said that.
01:33:58
Well, I appreciate you having me on.
01:34:00
Yeah.
01:34:01
Yeah, of course.
01:34:02
Of course.
01:34:03
I appreciate what you're doing for the community.
01:34:05
Thank you.
01:34:06
Thank you.
01:34:07
That means a lot pains.
01:34:08
Definitely relative.
01:34:09
For me, I went, I went through these particular experiences and that was traumatic to me.
01:34:13
It doesn't mean that if my, if your experience isn't as bad, like if it isn't as extreme as that, it doesn't mean it wasn't as painful.
01:34:21
Everyone's pains equal, essentially, because it's what you make out of it.
01:34:24
But essentially, it's the same ways out as well.
01:34:27
Like for everyone.
01:34:29
Okay.
01:34:30
Yeah.
01:34:31
So people can get in contact with you and then if ever, if ever anything comes of a meditation class or a group session and things like that, they also can, can link up with you.
01:34:44
And I know that's going to be helpful.
01:34:47
That's going to be resourceful for, for people that, that are interested in that.
01:34:52
I appreciate it.
01:34:53
I appreciate the show.
01:34:55
All right, Jake.
01:34:56
Thank you so much for being, being on the show and sharing your words.
01:34:59
I really do appreciate it.
01:35:01
Thank you.
01:35:02
Thank you for having me.
01:35:04
My hats off to you, bro.
01:35:07
Because even through the trauma, the suffering and all of that abuse, you still found peace.
01:35:16
You found forgiveness in a way to let it go.
01:35:20
That's something that I think a lot of us to this day find challenging.
01:35:27
How to let go of that extra baggage we've kept and carried on from the past.
01:35:33
The abusive relationships, addictions, broken confidence and all of the failures.
01:35:45
Jake meditation was a powerful part of the process for him finding peace, the importance of disconnecting from all of that outside noise, the outside chatter and then reconnecting back to himself.
01:36:01
That I am our true essence.
01:36:05
If you will, I really enjoyed his perspective.
01:36:09
Jake, you are a giant amongst us.
01:36:14
This is one thing that I do appreciate about the show and about doing the show.
01:36:20
It's the fact that after the conversation has been recorded, I get to hear it back and reflect and I'm learning.
01:36:28
I'm constantly learning with every go at it.
01:36:31
To get in touch with Jake, you can find him on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok.
01:36:37
His handle is discovering peace.
01:36:41
I'm going to leave a link to all of that in the description box.
01:36:45
He has poetry on display, more of his thoughts.
01:36:49
And like he said, he's looking to put together something nice for those interested in meditation.
01:36:55
Shoot him a line and say, hey, if you enjoyed the story and to connect and build with him, I'm sure he'd appreciate it.
01:37:02
Speaking of connect.
01:37:05
If you'd like to share your story or even the story of someone in your life that has impacted you in a positive way,
01:37:13
you can always reach out to me via email.
01:37:16
I'd be happy to connect.
01:37:18
Thank you to everyone who's been involved in the show up until now.
01:37:24
Mindy, Kyle, Aaron, Fry and today with Jake.
01:37:30
We've got more to come and I'm looking forward to what's next.
01:37:34
In a quick shout out geographically to every continent, every country, city,
01:37:42
Providence that's been tuned in.
01:37:46
I'm seeing Mexico, get on the family.
01:37:51
The Philippines, Canada and all across the US.
01:37:56
Germany, Vigetz, Japan, Malaysia,
01:38:02
the UK, Australia, Belgium and even parts of the Middle East.
01:38:08
We're hitting every corner.
01:38:10
Shoot me a direct line and tell me where you're listening from and on what platform it is.
01:38:17
Let's spread the word and help it grow organically.
01:38:22
Till next time.
01:38:24
And very soon.
01:38:27
Peace.