After waking up I fall straight asleep again

I recently read the excellent book by neuroscience professor Matthew Walkers: Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams.

In it, he asks the following question:

“First, after waking up in the morning, could you fall back asleep at ten or eleven am? If the answer is ‘yes’, you are likely not getting sufficient sleep quantity and/or quality.

“Second, can you function optimally without caffeine before noon? If the answer is “no,” then you are most likely self-medicating your state of chronic sleep deprivation.”

I think many of us at different stages have been able to answer yes to the first and no to the second.

Walker explains that humans need more than seven hours of sleep each night to maintain cognitive performance.

After ten days of just seven hours of sleep, he says that the brain is as dysfunctional as it would be after going without sleep for twenty-four hours.

And if you’ve ever stayed up for 24 hours, you’ll know how loopy you start going.

Reading this made me rethink my own sleep schedule – in the past I often prided myself on being to have only six hours.

But Walker says that studies show that those of us getting just five to six hours each night are 200 to 300 percent more likely to suffer from calcification of coronary arteries over the next five years, which plays a significant role in heart disease.

So what can we do?

One key piece of advice Walker offers is to give yourself enough “sleep opportunity” each night. That means getting to bed at a reasonable time, ideally before 10pm.

If you stay up till 11 or later, you enter a new circadian cycle which makes you feel awake for hours more. Night owls will know this all too well.

The other thing you can do? Meditate regularly! Studies show that regular meditators have enhanced sleep, including enhanced REM sleep which helps emotional regulation.

Ready to learn to meditate properly? Learn about Meditation Sydney

What's the goal of meditation? There is no goal

Through our upbringing we’re conditioned to always be trying to achieve a particular outcome or goal.

From school to work to sport and hobbies, there’s usually a defined marker of success.

But in meditation there is no goal – we’re not trying to achieve a state of peace or tranquility beyond thought.

That might be an outcome of meditating but it’s not the process.

We don’t try to clear our mind of thoughts or have a deep experience.

Instead, we hold an intension lightly. We intend to think our mantra whenever we remember to.

But we’re almost guaranteed to forget it!

In fact, it’s designed to be forgotten.

Its job is to relax us and take us away from regular thinking so that our mind is able to unwind thoughts and stresses it has been holding onto.

Sometimes, as a by product of this, it’s able to fall silent – but the price of these deeper meditations is the shallower ones.

If we have a goal at all, it is to sit down to meditate every day.

Once we’ve closed our eyes, it’s time to drop all expectations and  our habitual outcome orientation.

What next? Learn Vedic Meditation in Bondi Junction.

When is a good time to start meditating? Right here is a good place to start

Happy new year! I hope you are enjoying the feeling of new beginnings that a new year brings.

This week I read the below passage from American Tibetan Buddhist nun Pema Chödrön, which is a great way to think about your meditation practice – whether you’ve been regular or not meditated for months.

Start where you are. This is very important. Meditation practice is not about later, when you get it all together and you’re this person you really respect. You may be the most violent person in the world—that’s a fine place to start. That’s a very rich place to start—juicy, smelly. You might be the most depressed person in the world, the most addicted person in the world, the most jealous person in the world. You might think that there are no others on the planet who hate themselves as much as you do. All of that is a good place to start. Just where you are—that’s the place to start.

From The Pocket Pema Chödrön.

Learn to meditate properly

If you're ready to take your meditation practice to the next level, strike while the iron is hot and join my next learn to meditate course.

Vedic Meditation Bondi Junction

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The Vedic Conversation: Can meditation help solve the Social Dilemma?

In this episode of The Vedic Conversation, we’re joined by ex-Facebooker, Digital Wellbeing Consultant and Vedic Meditator Giancarlo Pitocco where we talk about the 2020 Netflix documentary The Social Dilemma and ask whether meditation can help solve the Social Dilemma. 

You can listen below or reader a full transcript of the conversation further down.

Anthony Thompson (00:05):

Hello, and welcome to the Vedic conversation. In this second series, we've made some changes and are inviting guests to share their thoughts about a variety of topics. In this episode, we're talking with Giancarlo Pitocco, who's worked for Facebook, Instagram, Apple, and the world's largest ad agencies. Giancarlo is fighting back against the mental health, productivity and creativity crisis caused by the attention economy and it's habit, forming technology. He founded Purposeful, a wellbeing practice teaching educators, companies, communities, and individuals to renegotiate their relationships with the attention economy. I'm Anthony Thompson, a Vedic meditation teacher based in London. And I'm joined by my Vedic colleagues, Derrick Yanford in New York and Rory Kinsella in Sydney. Sit back and let's dive into this fascinating conversation about how meditation helps solve the social dilemma. So, Giancarlo, I'd like to kick off by just asking you during lockdown. Many of us have increased the amount of time we've spent on digital platforms. And for some people, this has been work-related and for others, it's been a way of finding comfort and solace. In either case there's been an overabundance of comfort, convenience, and stimulation. So apart from having to get new glasses, what is the price we'll be paying for this increased screen time?

Giancarlo Pitocco (01:51):

Well said, well said it's true. We are spending more time on these devices and so many people have written to me or talk to me about this. They're concerned in particular parents but people, you know, work in corporate jobs where they were already on their computers a lot. Now, in addition to work, they're on their computers just to stay connected to family and friends. They're worried that it's unhealthy. And they're always interested for a take on this sort of thing, thinking that I'm going to tell them ways to cut down on their usage and to avoid it, but here's the deal. As I always like to say, even pre pandemic, I teach people how to use technology in service of their needs, their values and their aspirations. And those are things that all can change over time. I teach ways that you can be responsive and adaptive to your circumstances, using technology to come in to support you in those areas of your needs, your values, your aspirations.

Giancarlo Pitocco (02:53):

And I think we could all agree that those things have shifted in the past year during the of 2020. We've had to learn how to adapt that. And I say, thank goodness that we have, I have the power of technology to connect us over distances while we're in quarantine while we're social distancing. I don't know what I do without the connection I have to everyone. In fact, this year I feel more connected to people than I did. Last year in terms of my long distance friendships and family members. We look after each other more and it's because of technology that we're able to do this. So I first and foremost want to say technology, isn't the enemy, but it is important to know how it's been designed to influence our behavior, have that in our minds while also holding in mind.

Giancarlo Pitocco (03:45):

Well, what is the meaningful use of this technology in my life? We need to be careful about what we invite in instead of just getting every cool whizzbang new technology. That seems good. We should ask ourselves, well, how is it actually going to help me live the life I want to live and live it better rather than replacing time spent on things that might be more meaningful to us. So that's what I have to say about that in terms of our mental and emotional health and the role of technology during this time, but there is the physical aspect of it, right. I know that I get zoom fatigue and I do try to find balance between how much time I spend just on the phone voice chat with people versus video chat. Because I find that having my eyes locked at a screen all day, like we're doing right now, makes me feel more tired at the end of the day.

Giancarlo Pitocco (04:40):

Then if I have my headphones in and I'm just talking to someone while I take a walk around the neighborhood I feel better after a day full of those kinds of calls than face to face calls, but we to go one more layer deeper on that. And then I'll, I'll pause. It is important to maintain a balance of social nutrition in your life. A term that I use based on the work of Sherry Turkle from MIT, who wrote a wonderful book called reclaiming conversation, and what she writes about makes me think of social interaction as a form of psychological nutrition. And we need to find balance between the junk food of social interaction, which is what we get when we're scrolling around on social media platforms and just mindlessly watching content clicking on memes, likes comments, those sorts of things versus face to face interaction, even when virtual is much more nutritious for our sense of wellbeing, because most of the machinery up here in our brains is evolved to process a rich spectrum of things that happen when you're face to face with someone it's not just about the exchange of language like you would have through texting or Facebook.

Giancarlo Pitocco (05:56):

It goes further than that. Our brains are spending more energy processing gestures, facial expressions, even pheromones, physical touch, all those kinds of things that you get when you're in person with someone that you really can't replace through text messages or even phone calls, strip away so much of that. There's a hierarchy to these kinds of interactions. And so my point is, even during this pandemic, we do need to find balance between the kinds of interactions we're having. If I do all voice all day, I'm not getting as much nourishment as if I had a little bit of video chat like we're doing right now, mixed in there as well. So response to a short question,

Anthony Thompson (06:39):

That's a great, great, great answer. So you're suggesting that we kind of mix it up, that we kind of make a ticket Tutti, Frutti approach of a little bit of everything

Giancarlo Pitocco (06:49):

I would say, experiment and see what works for you. One of my favorite workshops to run on this topic helps people build a balanced diet of social interactions and thinking about how they want to weight the amount of face to face time they have with people in a socially distance setting versus time just by themselves and solitude, whether that's meditation or taking a walk free from the thoughts of others or phone calls or email or texting or social media. And we even use a, a social or we use a food pyramid style framework to show what is the rough balance you want to have? And then what actually works for you because you know, your needs might be different than mine. There isn't a wholesale recommendation around how much of these things you should have experiment and see what feels good. That's kind of, kind of a good philosophy for life in general, to be adaptive, to changing circumstances.

Anthony Thompson (07:50):

I agree, but one of the issues we have is that the, the the mechanisms that we used, the platforms we use are so addictive. And, you know, we, we, we, we know certainly as has been discussed shown recently and the, the social dilemma, the, the new film that got released last month on Netflix, but the way the big companies are operating now is that our attention is a commodity. And you know, how easy is it? I mean, I absolutely agree with what you're saying about experiment, try things out, put things aside, try other things, but, you know, we've got this, this thing that keeps drawing us in, it's like a siren pulling us into the rocks. You know, how do we, how do we actually turn that around?

Giancarlo Pitocco (08:37):

Yes, yes. So I worked inside of Facebook for three years and I saw this firsthand. And ultimately why I left was because I was so well for a lot of reasons, but chief, among them being disappointed in seeing our leadership not take, or really anyone in the company feel any kind of sense of responsibility for the impact the platform was having on the course of human events, I was there for the 2016 election. I watched Mark Zuckerberg, just flippantly dismiss the accusations that Facebook played any role in disinformation spreading during that 2016 election period really didn't want to take responsibility for it. I was there during the Cambridge Analytica scandal, and again, watched leadership, whether it was Mark or Sheryl Sandberg stand up in front of the company or get on the news at night and be interviewed and deflect responsibility left and right.

Giancarlo Pitocco (09:35):

And it was, it was grotesque to watch. And ultimately I spoke to him about it and directly got no good response to that. That's a whole story in and of itself and, and left to teach people about these things because you're absolutely right, whatever Facebook says, whatever the, the people who lead it say fundamentally their business model is to build an algorithm that displays content to you that is so engrossing so charming to your mind, that it becomes impossible to stop scrolling the same way that junk food is engineered to not fatigue your taste buds while being as potent as possible. And if you don't know about that, there's some great stories you can read in the press from food scientists, talking about how they get that perfect balance. That's the same thing Facebook does, but instead of it being food and our appetite, it's digital content and our attention that's being manipulated here.

Giancarlo Pitocco (10:33):

So we do need to be mindful that once you understand the threat, once you watch things like the social dilemma you, you become aware of the ways in which you are a pawn in a game that's being played. You, our inventory Facebook's products that they are selling. Let let's, let's lay this out for those that haven't seen the social dilemma or any of the other films that have been made about this Facebook's business model is to harvest as much of our time and attention as possible. We give it away for free because their algorithms are so good at showing us stuff that keep us scrolling. Instead of getting fatigued with looking at stuff and put down our phone or whatever it might be.

Giancarlo Pitocco (11:19):

They're so good at this. They've hired,

Giancarlo Pitocco (11:20):

Did the attention of over 3 billion people who are active users across all their platforms, because Facebook owns Instagram and WhatsApp and a number of other platforms as well, 3 billion people, almost half the world's population. They take that attention our time, and then they're selling it to corporations who want to sell products to us, or to politicians who want to influence us with political ads and propaganda. And that's the whole business model. Facebook makes more money if they can harvest more of our time and attention and then sell it to advertisers to show that's the whole thing. And I worked on a division at Facebook that was focused on understanding how all of this was changing human behavior, how it was changing the way we think, the way we feel, the way we behave, the way we communicate, the way we work, what I saw, frankly, scared me into taking action and examining is this true?

Giancarlo Pitocco (12:16):

Do I see this in my own life? And I went through the process of removing as much of technology, including Facebook and Instagram from my life as was possible while also working at those companies which was an interesting challenge all in of itself. But what I learned in that period, I did an experiment for two months. I had dialed back, my tech use as much as possible. That meant getting rid of my TV and everything, putting a little thing on my phone that said, what are you really seeking? And every time I looked at my phone, I had to ask myself that question. Was this a reflexive reach for more stimulation? Or did I have a purposeful intent for reaching for that phone? And when we make that shift in that relationship and realize, Oh my gosh technology was kind of having me like a train dog.

Giancarlo Pitocco (13:00):

Every time I heard the bell, I was panting for more food. Then you can take control of it. And that's what happened. And in two months of this experiment with technology, my life was transformed. I felt better. I was using my time better. I was reading more books than ever. I picked up my hobbies. I have is deepening my relationship with family and friends. The thing that I thought I didn't have time for anymore. And just generally it was getting great feedback from coworkers and friends on, Hey, what's going on with you? Like you are on fire right now in the best way possible. So it's a, it's something that if you're not aware of it and you ignore it, you can't do anything about it. I have Facebook in my life. I have Instagram. I don't use them a lot, but I did transform my relationship with them by knowing what are the ways in which they try to manipulate me, which is what I teach about. And then to is there a reason to have these things in my life? Is there enough value? And ultimately I got to a place where I could balance those things out.

Rory Kinsella (13:58):

Yeah. I've been very similar in that, in that regard with my use of Facebook and Instagram, like I still use them and, you know, as people with our own small businesses, we kind of have to be out there. That's where our customers are. But, but being mindful as in, I'm going to take it off my phone and have it on my computer because there's just that habitual thing of getting sucked in. And I've, I've found the social dilemma, I guess, cause I kind of knew a lot about it. I was like, yeah, does everyone not know this? And maybe they don't. But then I, I did like the kind of practical stuff they said at the end, you know, as you were saying that turn off your notifications, which is such a simple one because you can be doing whatever you want to be doing for half an hour. And then it's like zinging, here's something that's going to be interesting to you. So, you know, that was really important. So I love what you're saying about how, I guess we have all our own, our own responsibility in managing our own use, but then there's this other kind of aspect of, do we get government to regulate them? How do we change that? And I guess it's, we all have responsibility for our own part of it and should maybe start there. But what do you think the likelihood of getting regulation around these behemoths is?

Giancarlo Pitocco (15:20):

I'm incredibly excited to see that a report just came out this week from Congress here in the U S a committee that spent about a year now investigating some of the major tech companies here in the U S and the report has found that they're actively participating in anti competitive behavior and the report hints at breaking them up. Now the execution of that will prove out whether or not that's going to be a meaningful activity, but I hope they follow through in a meaningful way to break up some of the power they hold that heartens me. And I know they've been calling Mark Zuckerberg and others to Congress to testify about these sorts of things. We'll see what happens with that. I don't want to wait for the government to do this for me. We have the power. So there's two sides of it, right?

Giancarlo Pitocco (16:16):

Like we can wait for the government to try and catch up to technology. I don't know anyone who believes the government moves fast enough in any nation on this planet to keep up with the evolution of technology and how fast, the great minds that are trying to solve these problems, build these businesses, move. They move fast, way faster than governments ever can. So government will always be playing catch up and we watch these companies out smart them left and right with new policies, new laws that go into effect, they found find ways around it. Why do you think there are all those popups on websites now that ask you to accept all cookies? That's getting around GDPR regulations that were instituted. They find ways around this, they're doing all the same stuff that GDPR was supposed to protect us against. All they did was put popups on all these websites and then keep doing the same old stuff they were doing before for the most part.

Giancarlo Pitocco (17:05):

So where we see that I'm not super confident we're ever going to get to a place where government can completely protect us. It starts treading into the territory of protecting free speech. And what can you say and do and we're already treading into that territory in dangerous ways. So we could sit there and watch these documentaries and feel helpless about it, which I find a lot of people do. Like whether it's, you know, Screenagers, which is about growing up in a, a tech centric environment where parents can, you know, should know about that. Or if it's these latest ones that have come out like the social dilemma, a lot of people write to me saying they feel helpless about it. When they watch these things, I want to empower people to know here's what you can do about this. You have the power control, what your attention goes to, but you have to also have in mind what kind of life you want to live.

Giancarlo Pitocco (17:54):

Your life has created based on the accumulation of how you spend each moment. And if you're not consciously offering those moments and being present throughout the course of your life and these moments, when you look back on your life, you might not like what you see. This is one of the big shifts I try to help people make. When I first meet them to come to one of my sessions, or we do some coaching or something, it's recognizing that your attention is the one power nature has given you for creating your life. What you choose to pay attention to becomes your life. It's like the needle or the stylist on a record player where you place it determines what music gets played. And if you're allowing the buzzes, the dings, the notifications, the email, the push notifications, all that stuff to lead you through your day.

Giancarlo Pitocco (18:40):

Or if you're a busy executive with a calendar full of invitations of meetings back to back all day, you don't even know what they are, but you're just going to them kind of, you know, mindlessly letting your computer tell you where your next meeting is and what to pay attention to you are no longer the author of your own life. And that's how all these people who seem to be living like impressive lives and impressive careers. Let's say, find themselves in their thirties, forties, fifties, waking up unhappy unfulfilled because they've allowed everyone else around them and their devices to lead them by their noses, lead their attention through life. I tell people you want to be the DJ. You want to determine where to place the needle on that record to determine the music that gets played over the course of your life.

Giancarlo Pitocco (19:26):

Pick it, choose it, get excited about what your life experiences were and what you're going to do next. But if you're not thinking about it and actively planning to offer it and design the experiences, then you're going to be helplessly let around by whatever is the most charming thing in front of you. And that could be a whole bunch of cat memes on Instagram, that after you spend 30 minutes cruising those hilarious memes, it's kind of like just bingeing on a bag of Doritos. You don't feel good and you're no better off for having done it. And you certainly can't sustain yourself off of that kind of junk food. Thank you.

Derrick Yanford (20:01):

One of the most powerful and inspiring things you've already just said in this conversation is how your personal relationships have changed for the better to the point where people were noticing and recognizing. And I feel like when we're talking about these notifications and that we have control over it, well then Facebook or any other social media platform is just like a relationship, except for, you're probably more able to set boundaries that that platform is going to pay attention to then crossing. And I actually listened to a podcast that you were on, where you had said you had stopped the feed from everybody on Facebook, and then you just started to reintroduce certain people. You want it to fall. And then you had a news feed that was filled with inspirational people or people who you really wanted to pay attention to. And I think what we haven't really uncovered enough of is that yeah, either we can interact with those platforms, with the default mode that is given to us, or we can take a little time and do a little digging and set boundaries or whatever and treat it like a relationship.

Derrick Yanford (21:13):

What kind of relationship do I want to have with it? Especially if it's going to lead to me, having deeper, more fulfilling relationships with actual beings in my community, you know, and especially for a person like you, who's worked for those platforms that you found that out. And, and you're having, I would imagine a better experience having, you know, doing what you did. That's inspiring to me. I don't feel hopeless. I mean, I can understand why you would, but it's like, yeah, I can turn those notifications. I can delete it if I want to. So I love the hope that you are giving to people to say, you can take some control here. Don't don't feel like there's nothing you can't do. So thank you for that.

Giancarlo Pitocco (21:59):

Oh, beautiful. I love hearing all of that and thank you for the kind words as well, but I love hearing you feel in control. That's what we want. And honestly when I speak to fellow meditators, I find that they often are in control of these things in a way that non-meditators aren't, which is always very interesting to me because we get comfortable with solitude. And I don't know about where you are, but in the communities I belong to solitude often has a negative connotation. It gets lumped in with loneliness, and it's important to create a distinction between what solitude is and what loneliness is. There's an epidemic of loneliness in this country. No doubt, but solitude is different. Solitude is being free from the thoughts of others. It's spending time with yourself, which is what the practice of meditation is, but it's not the only way to experience solitude and to be comfortable with yourself and your own thoughts without stimulation.

Giancarlo Pitocco (22:58):

And the point you were making about you went in and changed the settings on your newsfeed, on Facebook, which people don't know you can do. They think the algorithm determines everything, but Facebook actually gives you the ability to control what shows up in your feed. And so, you know, taking this idea of solitude so far as to even remove the voices that distract you online experience, what, what Facebook is without the feed is a fascinating thing because all of a sudden Facebook becomes what it originally was, which was a social utility that allowed you to map your network of contacts and then seek out what you wanted from them, whether it was connection with them or to look up their birthday or whatever it might've been back when it was just a fun little diversion for college kids. But we do have this power and it's one of the things I love to teach.

Giancarlo Pitocco (23:49):

I often teach 10 techniques that allow you to take control of your relationship with Facebook. It's one of my most popular talks and workshops that I host, and you can get a taste of it at purposeful.nyc/numeral 10 ways, 10 ways, purposeful.nyc/ten ways. And I I've published the list of things you can do right now. It's changes to the settings on your phone, different prompts you can place in your environment. And other things you can do, other habits and things that you can embrace as little experiments to see what happens when you start taking control of the way technology shows up in your life in small ways. And that's all you need to do to get started and create some momentum towards really what could potentially be a total transformation in your relationship with technology, which is definitely what I saw when I started taming.

Giancarlo Pitocco (24:41):

Some of the distractive forces in Facebook and Instagram so much so that, you know, I thought I was going to end up deleting these platforms from my life completely. But once I realized I could take control of them and make them a force of good in my life by altering how it actually functions in my life without changing any of my habits, just settings in an app, it was incredible. And so, yeah, I mean, my Facebook feed looks dramatically different than it would have. If I hadn't done this, it's full of inspiring quotes and thinkers and certain members from my social circles and family who use the platforms intentionally. I actually follow more accounts that are related to like inspiring quotes and meditation and great thinkers and philosophy than I do individual people. Because if I want to know about someone's life, I'd rather call them or get on FaceTime or set up a time to take a walk socially distance somewhere safely.

Giancarlo Pitocco (25:38):

Then look at pictures of their newborn on Facebook. I see that if I do see that in my feed, well, I don't want to sit there and comment on Facebook. I want to get on the phone and call them and talk to them or, you know, plan a time to go see them. I don't want this. I don't want it all digital that's no, thanks. So, but that's me. And, and so, you know, other people might prefer it that way. Other people that might be the only way they can do it. So finding what works for you, finding what feels good, deleting your feed. If that's a thing you want to do it's, it's fun to try and see, see how it shows up. The other part of that, that I'm curious though, too, is making the shift actually deciding, okay, I've had enough of that.

Giancarlo Pitocco (26:22):

I want it different. Can you maybe talk about the role your meditation practice had in leading you to that decision and making, you know, cause I think the other thing that some of us are afraid of, even if it's not good for us is change. You've gotten so used to something, it provides value. We don't want to, you know, fear of missing out all of that kind of stuff. So maybe if you could talk a little bit about how meditation maybe helped you go, okay, I get that, but now time to exit. Yeah. So I mean, meditation is such a perfectly beautiful contrast to using our devices. When I was last in India I got to hear a Swami who lives in a cave, isolated from civilization, come in and speak to the group I was with, including Anthony who was there. And he, he pointed at us and said, those phones that you're carrying, they are vibrating with the energy of the universe.

Giancarlo Pitocco (27:24):

And you wonder why you can't find peace. We are staring into these things that are truly vibrating with all this, this energy, a lot of it negative. Right? if I think about my meditation practice, I start my day with it. It's the first thing I do after I get up in the morning. And that's in contrast to what I used to do, which was use my phone as my alarm clock. And so before my head is even off the pillow, I'm reaching for my phone and looking at the screen. What happens when you do that? Well, all the stresses of the day come pouring into your consciousness, right? You're, you're faced with here's my agenda for the day. Here's the stressful email from my clients. Here's a news update about some nasty dramatic thing that has happened in the political world and all that, ah, okay.

Giancarlo Pitocco (28:08):

Filled with stress chemistry, right? That triggers that fight or flight response at the base level of our brain. And it sends stress chemistry through my body. So I haven't even begun my day yet. And I've already got my own body working against me, where as with meditation, I'm doing the opposite of that. I'm, I'm enjoying some solitude. I'm getting quiet, I'm conditioning my brain to know what it's like to enjoy being without the constant stimulation. It's like a, it's true that we get your brain starts to crave stimulation that is provided by television, video games, cell phones all the stuff we do on those devices, meditation has trained me to enjoy being without that constant stimulation where I can sit in a waiting room or in line somewhere for 10 minutes without the urge to reach for my phone, I can just like be, I can just observe.

Giancarlo Pitocco (29:05):

I can just be present in the moment in a way that I used to constantly have to be doing something. Oh man, I'm so bored here. Like give me my phone. Let me see if someone tweeted something interesting or posted something interesting on Facebook. Oh, let me devour the news. And every idol moment that I have, by the way, all of that is information that isn't really relevant to me living my life. And so many of us spend all day consuming the news when really like maybe a 30 minute news session once a week gives you everything you need to know in order to be an informed voter or whatever it is that you need information for. That comes from the news. So meditation taught me and retrained my mind through a daily twice a day practice of 20 minute meditations, reconditioned my mind to enjoy being still and not being still an accepting boredom, but finding delight in simpler things that, you know, you could say that sounds boring, but in the moment it's freaking delightful.

Giancarlo Pitocco (30:08):

And I, so I've just moved from New York city to Los Angeles. And, you know, I just find myself staring off at like the plants that are here. I'm not used to having plants. It's like so amazing, like the greenery everywhere and the way the wind blows through the trees. And it's like, I'm delighted. And I didn't even need Twitter or Facebook or Apple TV to make me feel that. So that's one of the big shifts that meditation has created in me that has helped me break that dependence on these devices to entertain me, stimulate me all day long.

Anthony Thompson (30:44):

Beautiful. I think that was such an encouraging way to speak to Vedic meditators who are perhaps thinking, well, how am I going to, how am I going to find that, that kind of moment when I can take, you know, have the courage to turn things off or reset? My, my devices, the big, biggest fear is that of course we, as meditates than many of us, but in the big scheme of things, we're actually a very small group of people, but we have a responsibility and of course we do have an effect on all the people around us. Did you notice when you were working in Facebook and some of the other big corporations that there were other meditators people, either using Vedic meditation or other meditation practices, did you come across people like that?

Giancarlo Pitocco (31:32):

There were I never found another Vedic meditator inside of Facebook. Not that they aren't there but I never came across them. And I even hosted a Vedic meditation session where Tom Knowles came in and spoke and you know, filled a whole big room at Facebook and had people dialed in from all across the world to tune into him being there. But you know, none of the people that I came across while organizing that said, Oh yeah, and I'm, you know, doing Vedic meditation, there are other meditators there. I didn't find anyone who was super regular in their practice. I didn't find anyone who saw it as anything beyond just a way to distress. And, and I think, you know, that can be a very limiting view on what benefits you get from it. And as Tom knows, likes to say, every technique of meditation is designed to give you exactly the results that says it will give you, but I, what I have appreciated about our practices, that it has so much, so many more benefits than just the stressing, although that is the one that people most commonly recognize is this ability to be stable, even in uncertain or turbulent situations.

Giancarlo Pitocco (32:44):

But you know, I really was hoping we'd get a lot more Vedic meditators in, at Facebook as a result of Tom being there.

Anthony Thompson (32:52):

I think, you know, stress is sometimes the gateway into Vedic meditation is that it's the first thing that people get attracted to. But just going back to your earlier points about how we can actually change the situation when you were talking about governments, governments examining this and trying to pack perhaps put in place some, some laws to change the way these companies work. And we also, as the consumers have perhaps an obligation that we can take responsibility ourselves, but I'm just wondering also, you know, given your personal experience and the central dilemma, but also this week, there was a letter published by Ashok Chand, whiny, who is a Facebook employee and he's resigned and his letter was published. And he sort of also brings up the points that you've raised of being frankly disgusted by, by the, the, the organization, the management's approach to this.

Anthony Thompson (33:49):

Do you think that actually the change is going to come from the people who work within that instead of government coming in from outside from us, you know, us as the consumers, we can only do a certain amount, but it's actually the people who work in the organization. If enough of them, if there's a critical mass who understand that, what they're doing, actually, isn't helpful that it's seriously counterproductive to the development of, of the human mind. And so the fulfillment of human beings that we are being manipulated and tweaked, maybe that could be the place where we as meditators, are we going to target? Do we have a mission to target Facebook employees and say, Hey guys, we know, you know, I suspect you're probably a little bit disconcerted at the moment. Why don't you try this? And why don't we start a movement from within there's. So often the change coming from within is so much more powerful than the pressure coming from without

Rory Kinsella (34:54):

Go and get your own tilt back

Giancarlo Pitocco (35:05):

[Inaudible] Oh my God. Yeah.

Giancarlo Pitocco (35:09):

There's, there's a lot to unpack there. I want to focus on what would be most beneficial for folks to hear. Have you ever,

Giancarlo Pitocco (35:21):

Have you,

Giancarlo Pitocco (35:21):

Have you ever known a group of people? Oh, go ahead. I was just listening. Have you ever known a group of people who maybe follow a certain politician with almost a religious fervor where no matter what evidence is brought forth that says this person is actually like a con man or con woman who is just lying all the time and is, is actually destroying the thing that you most care about. Have you ever known a group of people that when faced with that evidence would choose to believe that the person that they believe in is just the only source of truth? Have you ever known, have you ever seen a situation like that in the world? Maybe that's happening like right now, where no matter what happens, if the person they believe in says those are all lies, they believe it and want to believe it. And can't wait to see, have you ever heard of anything like that?

Giancarlo Pitocco (36:23):

I have seen it. I've seen it in multiple places.

Giancarlo Pitocco (36:29):

The one that's in the news. I guarantee if you turn on the news right now, you will see some evidence of it reported in, on television or print or whatever the heck you read. You'll see it. I've seen all of that before. And it wasn't in the political field. It was inside the halls of Facebook and the same religious fervor and the response of, well, we'll see what Mark and Cheryl have to say about this news that we influenced the election, or we'll see about this controversy or this awful thing that people are saying we did. And watch them masterfully put forth a, a narrative that paints us in the best light possible, us being Facebook and, you know, shoots down all the naysayers outside. It is. I mean, it's truly an art form and they have it down in a way where, I mean, I know one other person who in this world who is also masterful at that and watching them work is very impressive, very impressive, and very scary.

Giancarlo Pitocco (37:32):

What do we do about that? Should we target Facebook employees to become a Vedic meditators? Absolutely. We should. Absolutely. We should. We should be targeting anyone. Who's in a position to help influence the major movements that are happening in this world at a government or cultural level, the leaders, the people that have the power to create some change, because they're actually pooling the leavers, turning the dials. If we can reach them, we absolutely should. In all fields, not even just Facebook, although in social media and technology, I mean, it goes much further than that, but yes, we should be targeting them. We need more meditators inside of these kinds of companies. We need more meditators inside of Silicon Valley and to go a step beyond that, not just meditators, but people who are willing to go through the process of correcting mistaken intellect and choosing to be a witness of themselves, experiencing propaganda and all forces of cultural indoctrination that color our view of the world.

Giancarlo Pitocco (38:39):

It's not enough just to meditate. Meditation is great. And you know, some people have these amazing breakthroughs where they're able to Cognose insights that come from the ancient Vedas that help you see more clearly what's actually happening in the world and what people's different biases and influences our persuasions are. We need that too. We need people willing to unlearn all the, the cultural indoctrination that has made them blind to what their own role is in this world, through their jobs. I mean, I saw a lot of very, very happy, well fed a well paid comfortable people inside that company that didn't want bad news about the effect their work was having on the world, because it meant they that they might be earning all these comforts and this wealth and all this delicious food off of behavior. They might not be proud of when they look back on their lives. If we, I mean, if there's a way to wake people up to that, I don't know a better way than Vedic meditation and studying the knowledge behind it. Thousands of years old that helps us. It doesn't tell us how to think. It tells us how to see clearly it's an agnostic body of knowledge that helps you just have the clearest lens possible for what's happening. I love that if we get more people doing that, amen, J guru David.

Giancarlo Pitocco (40:03):

So that's

Giancarlo Pitocco (40:05):

Step after get your house in order. So, you know, start meditating break your addiction to all things, including devices and media stimulation, whatever form that comes in for you. And then once you've got that under control, how can you be a resource to others? How can you be that positive influence? You know an exemplar of what it is to live a more intentional, purposeful, balanced life. I mean, when I was inside of Facebook, there were two reactions I got at first, people were like, Oh my God, you are on fire. You are just performing better than ever at work. You, you are effortlessly delivering results in a way it's you seem totally unstressed. What do you have? We'll have some too. And then once I taught them what it was, the other reaction was, Oh, wait, you're saying that what we're building might not be good for us and we should tone it down.

Giancarlo Pitocco (40:58):

I remember the day that I led a session in a team meeting where I was like, here's how to tame your Facebook newsfeed and really sculpted into what you want it to be like we were talking about before Derek and the reaction from people was are you OK? Like they weren't willing to hear it. Obviously, like I didn't do my job and meeting them where they were. There was a gap that I didn't effectively bridge, but I did get, you know, once I went beyond the here's, how I am you know, now that I meditate and now that I've reduced the influence of technology my life, you think it looks so good once I tell you all of a sudden, it forced you to question your job or the company that you work for, or some of your own habits, and it was uncomfortable for people. And so instead they wanted to say, no, something's wrong with you. We don't want to buy that. There's anything wrong with us or the place that we worked for. So that was interesting.

Derrick Yanford (41:51):

You know, I heard you say something else along the lines of how the geniuses of the world need to take their, their eyes off the phone. And everybody, everybody needs to start using their mind to help us reach the solutions that humanity is facing unlike they have ever in before. And what that triggered for me was like, I was like, well, what's my genius. You know? And are there people who, if maybe they were given another opportunity to go, Hey, look, the phone is great. We know you can connect with people. Like you said, the universe is vibrating in your hand. However, what if you looked up from that work, how could you bring your genius out into the world? And so I'm like, I want to inspire people to bring their genius into the world. And that might mean, or probably will mean you got to put your phone down to do it though.

Giancarlo Pitocco (42:51):

That's right. That's right. I mean, I hope to be a teacher of Vedic meditation someday. And I get a little bit of practice in teaching about it. When people ask me about my practice and why I am a Vedic meditator, and the benefit that I tend to espouse the most is the fact that meditation has tuned me into my intuition in a way that I never was before. And what does that mean? That means that I'm tapped into that innate creative intelligence where all the creative energies flow throughout flow from when you think about great artists and geniuses in this world, those are the folks that were most tapped into that creative intelligence or that intuition as we most commonly refer to it as, and to have regular sustained access to that is so delightful and so transformational. And it makes you fearless. It makes you appear fearless to others because of the decisions that you make to reshape your life in, in ways that are more authentic to who you are and what you actually want, versus what your culture has told you is the best way to live.

Giancarlo Pitocco (44:04):

And that is one of the greatest benefits there is. And for some of that meat, that means unleashing the innate genius. We have to solve the problems that are facing humanity. Right now. We need more of those geniuses putting their phones down and rising up to tackle the challenges like we, you know, here in the U S we've had over a hundred days of people protesting in favor of racial justice. That's incredible. These people have put down their dang, gotten out on the streets and that's amazing. And that's another force that's happening. That's trying to create positive evolution in our culture. And you know, that can be spun a number of different ways, depending on your political biases. But these are people that are fundamentally standing up and saying, enough is enough. I want to be treated equally. And, and others that aren't being treated equally, who are also standing up with them saying, we need to make change.

Giancarlo Pitocco (44:58):

I love this. And that's beautiful. And so some, it doesn't mean we're all going to go out and become, you know famous artists or genius scientists or incredible leaders of institutions like a form of genius as being an incredibly skilled teacher of meditation, right? Like if you have the power to make a technique, relatable enough to a person that they adopted as their daily practice and then get to reap the benefits of it. Oh my gosh. I mean, is there a greater gift you can give? Because if we, I mean, I fundamentally believe at least here in the U S a lot of our problems STEM from the fact that we have a really poor education system, and we have people who are heavily influenced by the media that we're surrounded by. And if we could get them seeing more clearly and more steady in their own beliefs and intuition that they would be immune to a lot of what they see on Facebook and the news that is influencing them in ways that makes them unhappy at the end of the day, and leading a, an empty meaningless life.

Giancarlo Pitocco (46:06):

I know that sounds really harsh, but, you know, ask people that have had those moments where, you know, midlife crisis is a thing, right? And that's coming to terms with the fact that you've lived by society's rules for so long. You've chased all these ideals that they try to teach you lead to a good life. And if you haven't done the inner work, if you haven't created some inner stability and connection to, well, what makes a meaningful, satisfying life for me, then you're going to hit that midlife crisis and wake up, you know, leading a life that doesn't fit you. I want to lead a life that fits me. I don't know how we got on this topic. And I think it's done

Rory Kinsella (46:44):

The bike connecting with that creative source. We, we find fulfillment there, you know, when we find the inspiration and all those other things, and that makes us less needy and less looking for that satisfaction from the outside world, which could be any, you know, manner of things. You know, I used to be a heavy drinker. So it was alcohol for me. We're talking about social media here. That's looking for that kind of dopamine hit in the outside world. So rather than it being necessarily a case of getting the clarity and then saying, no, it's this natural quality of, I am satisfied on the inside. So I naturally look less at my phone and I naturally want that kind of nasty stimulation of news, or I want that bad news because it connects my bad feelings inside. We have less of that. So I always like to stress to people that it's this natural process where they won't have to go, Oh, no, I'm eating bad food.

Rory Kinsella (47:40):

I'm gonna have to change that. It's like, you will naturally change that by, by connecting. And that's, I think it's important to always stress how simple this is. Like, it's not like with thinking through all these aspects, it just happens naturally by removing these external influences saying, I'm closing my eyes. I'm not taking in any more information. Like you said, it's the opposite of the newsfeed. It's like zing, you know, taking that off. And then everything else is, is a natural byproduct of that. And it becomes this playful experience rather than going right. And now I have to go through and remove all these bad things. They just fall away because you need them less, which I think is always important to show people. And then the other kind of technology thing that I love to bring up with students, that intro talks who are like, I haven't got time for this. I'm like, do you have an iPhone? Do you have the screen time? Let me see how many hours you spent on it.

Giancarlo Pitocco (48:41):

Yes. Oh, that's, that's my favorite. I don't have time for this. What you are. What you aren't changing. You are choosing someone said that once. And I, I never forgot it. I don't remember where it came from, but what you aren't changing, you are choosing. So people that come to me and say, ah, you know, my kids are addicted to their phones and what do I do about it? I'm, you know, stressed out and busy. I don't have time to deal with this. Well, is it important to you? Is it more important than what's occupying all your time, raising good kids, raising kids in a way that, that feels true and authentic based on your values and morals. What's more important than that. I mean, actually like, show me your calendar, show me what, what is so important that it takes you away from that.

Giancarlo Pitocco (49:28):

And it's usually work, right? Like we, we point to work as our excuse to get out of a lot of things that would be better for us. Okay. Well, if you want to choose your career and maximizing your earning potential over the course of your lifetime, well, you have to make peace with the sacrifices you're making and the sacrifices might mean not tending to your children as carefully as you'd like to as a parent, is it worth it to you for that to make another 50,000, a hundred thousand dollars a year on your salary? Because you're more competitive because you rise up through the ranks faster, you take on more responsibility at work. The more responsibility you take on that occupies your time so much so that you can't tend to the things that are important to you personally, while you're choosing that and make peace with it now, and don't be upset when your kids behave in ways that aren't the way you wanted to raise them.

Giancarlo Pitocco (50:16):

I say that somewhat sarcastically, right? Because obviously we want to be good parents. But maybe some people have different priorities and, and if can make peace with the fact that there's a trade off there. Great. And this is true on all levels. I pick parents because that's who most often brings that complaint. To me, they're usually executives at companies trying to raise kids. But you know, letting other people dictate their agenda, I go into companies and I teach them how to reclaim their agendas, both so that they can have a personal life, but also, so they can do their best work. Instead of being monopolized by meetings that half the time they tell me, they don't even know why they're in these meetings and don't contribute much. Anyway, this is another form of allowing others to influence the course of our lives and not being authors, not having agency over the life. We're creating how we spend our time is a reflection of our reverence for life. So gotta get right with that.

Anthony Thompson (51:26):

What a fascinating examination of our relationship with technology, this conversation turned out to be experts like Giancarlo agreed that the first step to acting with purpose rather than compulsion, is to take stock of just how much time our tech takes from us without our consent begin tracking what you're doing with your screen time and take a critical look at where that time goes. Did you choose to spend three hours scrolling through your feed or did it just happen? If this conversation has raised some thoughts or comments, we'd love to hear them. And have you joined the conversation, please send them through to us@storiesatthevedicconversation.com. We'll post them on social media with a hashtag the Vedic conversation. If you've enjoyed this episode, please share it with your followers and don't forget to subscribe to our channel. See you next time.

Laser eye surgery: Overcoming my fears

Me wearing glasses with my nephew Patrick in 2013

A white stick, a friendly guide dog and permanent blindness – these are the outcomes suggested by friends in the lead up to my laser eye surgery.

Either that or a laser-etched cyclops eye in the middle of my forehead. Against these fears are the words spoken by most people who have actually had the surgery: "Best thing I ever did."

To best understand my squeamishness around my eyes, take a failed attempt at getting contact lenses. When the nice lady got within an inch of my face, I bucked and flipped around in the chair like a fish out of water. After she spent ten minutes coaxing and trying to get near my eyes, I had to apologise for wasting her time and slink away with my tail between my legs telling myself glasses weren't that bad after all.

"Make sure you don't sneeze!" they said. "The laser will slice your head off!" Thanks, friends.

Did I really want to risk blindness or a third eye hole just so as not to have to wear glasses? Or was it like the risk of shark attack where you had overwhelmingly higher chances of being run over by a bus than anything going wrong?

5.35am

I'm awake early. I couldn't keep my eyes closed and every time I think of the word 'eye' terrible visions of medieval eye torture come to me. I sit nervously and wait for my friend Frankie to arrive. She has been assigned to be my seeing-eye dog for the day and can't resist making blindness jokes too.

11.35am

I'm walking the short distance from where I'm staying to the Laser Sight clinic for my initial appointment. At this point my eyes could still be deemed unsuitable and the more cowardly part of me is hoping that they are. I don't need my guide dog for this part and am considering getting lost so as to miss the appointment.

11.45am

I'm greeted by the friendly staff in what looks like any regular suburban doctor's surgery – magazines on the table, patients sitting around quite normally showing none of the terror I'm feeling. It's only my professional sense of decorum holding me in a kind of straitjacket while the madman inside me wants to run for the hills. I register mild surprise that the room isn't splattered with blood and bits of eye.

11.47am

I fill out some forms and am given an iPad and headphones to watch a film detailing what the procedure will involve and the risks. It makes it perfectly clear that this is "elective" surgery and that if anything goes wrong I'll only have myself to blame. I watch on hiding behind my fingers and take notes to distract myself from the horror.

A nice American optometrist called Michael takes me through a bunch of tests. At one point he has to put eye drops in and I start to freak out, but on the bookcase there is a kids TV character called a Womble (popular in the UK and NZ) and I think about them Wombling around picking up litter on Wimbledon Common to distract myself. Michael tells me I've got slight astigmatism in my right eye but "plenty of cornea" – more than enough to slice a bit of it and fold it back into place.

Why can't people have it?

If you have too much astigmatism in either eye you can't have it. If your cornea is too thin there won't be enough of it to make the flap.

What's the worst thing I can do and can I ruin it?

If you struggle and move around on the operating table the worst that you can do is make the process take a bit longer. If you squint or move your head, the doctor will have to correct you to get the equipment in place but once the suction device is in place and the laser is on, nothing can go wrong.

In the gown pre-surgery

Eye surgery: The main event

3.10pm

I walk back to the clinic, seeing everything – cars, trees, pretty girls walking past – as if for the last time. "Eyes, we've had a good innings," I tell myself.

"We've seen plenty of beautiful things in our time."

"But we don't have to do this," say the eyes. "It's ELECTIVE," they shriek. "You can pull out now – a lot of people say that you look great in your glasses, intellectual, someone with a touch of class. You're going to look like one of those squinting people who look fine in their glasses but when they're off everyone wishes they left them on."

3.15pm

In the surgery, the staff are so normal about the whole thing that it's calming me a little. I've been promised Valium and am hoping for the maximum dosage. They give me one 5mg tablet and I ask for double. To make my case I explain that the dentist gives me three, just for a filling. On my dentist file it says I am a "gagger". I writhe around in the chair choking on his fingers and biting down on all the equipment so he can't do his job.

3.20pm

I'm taken to sit in another waiting area by a nice lady called Helen whose job is to reassure everyone that they're about to undergo a routine surgical procedure and not have their eyes gouged out with a hot poker. She gives me a surgical hat, gown and booties and passes me some stress balls to fondle should I start to freak out.

I ask how my fear levels compare with most people's and she says I'm kind of normal. Some people you can barely get the drops in their eyes and some are mute and don't show their nerves but also show that they're not really listening. I watch as two patients go in and come out again 15 minutes apart. They look a bit dazed but they're walking under their own steam and don't seem to be stumbling around clutching eyeballs on their stalks and trying to put them back in.

3.45pm

Helen has numbed my eyes with drops and has now painted some green sterilising fluid around my eyes. She talks me through what's going to happen. Then the manager Yvonne who is acting as one of the assistants comes to ask me my name and date of birth, presumably to check whether I'm coherent enough to go through with it after my double dose of Valium. I pass the test and in we go.

3.47pm

Crunch time: there's no going back. Even though I'm still tempted to do a runner, my shame doesn't allow me to break 16 years of no one bottling it. I lie on the bed with Dr Hamish above me behind a set of machines. He applies tape around my eyes and keeps telling me not to squint as he makes sure my eyelids won't be able to shut during the procedure. They do one eye at a time and while they attach a clamp to my right to stop it moving – an unpleasant but not painful action – they cover the other one. Now everything becomes a bit spacey and I'm told to concentrate on a green light coming from a contraption above. A series of sheets of red light then pass over my eyes. Hamish tells me to keep my eyes open and look up, which is difficult as they both tear up. I resist the urge to flip out.

When they are ready, they apply a suction bit of equipment over the eye which I assume to be the laser.

"Stay still for 30 seconds," says Hamish and by now I'm more worried about prolonging it that anything else so readily oblige.

The burning smell

The machine kicks in and lights move over my eye. There is a burning smell like singed hair and I try to keep breathing normally even though I know that it's my eye being frazzled, like a piece of bacon frying in a pan.

For a moment everything goes black but then the green lights reappear and I refocus on them. The laser is pulled away and there is an unnerving few moments when through the blur I am aware of Dr Hamish lifting a flap of my eye and putting it back in place.

This for me was the scariest part but also the part that seemed most delicate so I summoned my reserves of courage and tried to pretend it was perfectly normal for a man to take a flap of my cornea, replace it over the eye and then delicately dab it back down, deftly pressing down at even points around the edges like he's finishing the crust of a pastry.

But the pastry is my eye and I squeeze the stress balls to stop myself freaking out. More eyes drops are applied and then it’s time for the other. By this point, I am either drained of nervous energy or zonked from the Valium but the second eye goes much the same only without the terror.

4pm

All done and I walk out of theatre surprised that I'm able to comply when they ask me to stand up. We go into the other room and Michael checks out my eyes to see they're all in the right place. He puts in some eye drops, attaches some plastic patches so I can't rub my eyes and dislodge the flaps and then I'm free to go. My guide dog has arrived to collect me and we walk back to where we're staying, me looking like Stevie Wonder with oversized sunglasses over my patches and women with prams making way for us on the pavement. The world is blurry and I need to be guided mostly because my eyes don't want to stay open but soon we're back home.

Doing an impression of The English Patient

The aftermath

4.15pm

My eyes are sore now and watering a lot. I tell myself they're not tears and just my eyes making sure nothing is in my eye long enough to infest it. I eat half a muffin, take two paracetamol and a sleeping tablet and hope I'll sleep. I've been told to relax and keep my eyes closed and try to sleep. The next four hours are not a pleasant experience. My eyes feel sore and scratchy and fill with tears so much I'm blinking them out every few minutes. I try to relax and fall asleep but the sensations are too strange and I wonder when I can have another painkiller.

The form says 8pm so I struggle through picking up snatches of sleep until my own snoring wakes me up. My cheeks and bandages are wet with tears but I'm not supposed to take the eye guards off or touch round my eyes.

8pm

My guide dog Frankie has fetched takeaway and feeds me spoonfuls in bed like I'm The English Patient. With food in, I gratefully take the other painkillers and sleeping pill and in an hour or so am asleep.

12am

I wake again and my eyes feel uncomfortable but I don't want to wake Frankie or try to do my own eyedrops so I take the final sleeping pill and fall asleep.

5.35am

I'm awake. I can't see clearly but the discomfort has gone so I get up and use the toilet. The bandaged man in the mirror is still disturbing and the blurring is off-putting but it feels there is gunk in my eyes getting in the way.

7am

Frankie cleans off the gunk and applies the first of the four different eye drops that need to go in four times a day. After they are in, I can see a lot better. Outside is too bright if I'm not wearing sunglasses but already I can read signs on the other side of the street that I would have needed my glasses for before. There is a bit of cloudiness that I'm told will pass but initial signs are good. I ceremonially put my glasses and prescription sunnies back in their cases and bid them farewell.

8.30am

We head back to the clinic and bump into a fellow patient who seems to have had a similar experience to me with the discomfort when she got home. She's also feeling much better now and closes with, "Why didn't I do this years ago?"

We see Hamish and Yvonne again to check the corneas have held correctly and I'm given an eye test. "Can you read this line?" says Yvonne. "How about the one below?" I get all but one right and am told that my eyesight is not only as good as before but better.

My vision was a bit cloudy for a few days but has been great ever since. Would 100% recommend it!

Sayonara, my trusty Ray-Bans

Meditation: Inspiration is a result of the process – not a prerequisite

In my early 30s my big ambition was to write a novel.

I’d discovered the joys of reading quite late – around 15 – but ended up studying English Literature at uni and doing a Masters in Shakespeare.

After seven years as a journalist writing mostly short news items, my strangled inner novelist was ready to burst out.

I took creative writing classes @writers_studio in Bronte and embarked on a four year journey to write a novel.

It was hard work, much harder than I'd thought. The story arcs, the characterisation, the endless re-writes. But the hardest part was regularly putting pen to paper.

If I waited for inspiration to strike, it would have taken forever. To produce a novel takes a lot more consistency. It meant writing even when I didn’t feel like it.

So I made a daily habit out of it. I’d get up at 4.30am and write for an hour before having to be at work for 7am.

The above quote hung over my desk to keep me on track.

I didn’t feel like it most days and I often wrote crap, but that’s part of the process. Hemingway once said to F Scott Fitzgerald: I write one page of masterpiece to ninety-one pages of shit. I try to put the shit in the wastebasket.

I scrapped my first idea but eventually completed a first draft of my second idea – many drafts of shit before I’d have had something publishable.

But by then I’d discovered meditation and realised I’d rather channel my extra-curricular energies into teaching.

I’d learned a valuable lesson about habits. As a meditation dabbler, I’d do it only when I felt like it.

But so much changed when I turned it into a daily habit. They don’t all feel great and I definitely don’t feel like doing them all, but they all make a difference – and it’s so much easier when it’s non negotiable.

My colleague Light Watkins calls it "feeding the baby" – something you’ll make time for no matter what mood you’re in.

Inspiration is a result of the process – not a prerequisite.

How meditation gives you more access to present moment awareness

When I was a music journalist I'd regularly get to interview big-name musicians, many of whom were heroes of mine.

I'd get nervous beforehand and plan out all my questions meticulously to make sure I sounded knowledgable and didn’t run out of things to ask.

During the interviews I'd often be so busy figuring out what I was going to say next that I'd totally miss what they said.

I’d realise they’d stopped talking and look up from my notes in a panic before launching into a completely unrelated question.

It would only be when I listened back to the recording later that I'd realise they'd offered me a really juicy opening that had gone right over my head.

Maybe it was a hint about a huge rift in the band or some other big headline-grabbing scandal I could have probed into if I'd been paying attention.

Years later when I’d been meditating for a few months I noticed I wasn’t in my head nearly as much as I used to be. It became so much easier to stay in the room and respond to what was going on rather than clinging to a plan.

Photo circa 2007.

How the stress release process works in meditation

It’s often in the third session of my Vedic Meditation course that the penny drops for people about how meditation works

They’ve had two previous sessions and five meditation experiences by this point and are ready for what we call the “bubble diagram”.

This is where I get up and do my best (barefoot) school teacher impression at the whiteboard.

I love the simple picture it paints of consciousness being like an ocean.

Thoughts begin in the peaceful depths and bubble up through consciousness until we experience them at the wavy surface.

We experience them one after the next as an endless procession of often repetitive thoughts.

When we introduce the mantra, this lets the mind dive downwards away from the chaos at the surface towards the more peaceful depths.

The mantra, thought silently and effortlessly, has a charm to it which occupies and settles the mind.

As the mind relaxes, so does the body, allowing it release stresses it's been holding onto.

When the stresses unwind, they trigger thoughts which take us back up to the surface.

When we realise we’re back thinking, we pick up the mantra again and dive back under with as little fuss as possible.

Usually during this section there’s a lot of ‘ahhhhh’s as people realise that thinking during meditation isn’t just an unwelcome by-product, it’s an intrinsic part of the stress release process.

Interested in meditation Bondi Junction?

How meditation and Rounding can lead to higher states of consciousness

On retreat in Mexico with my friend and colleague Nick

Since learning to meditate, I've made huge incremental change in my behaviours and attitudes, but day to day it can be hard to see any changes.

It's been when I've been on meditation retreats that I've made some of my more obvious step changes.

On retreat, we practice a Vedic technique called Rounding, which is a way of super changing the benefits of meditation.

A Round is a one-hour sequence that includes about 20 minutes gentle yoga, five minutes of breathing exercises, 20 minutes regular meditation and about ten minutes lying down in shavasana.

The yoga and breathing open us up to go deeper in meditation and the lying down allows us to integrate the experience.

I run half-day sessions where we do two or three rounds but to get the most out of it, you go away for a weekend or longer. If you build up to it, you can do up to 14 rounds in a day.

This clears out a lot of the built up stress in our systems and can work through deeper stresses than you’d be able to reach in regular daily practice.

Because this can be such a powerful practice, we only do it in controlled conditions – away from demands and with an experienced teacher who isn’t Rounding themselves.

I've had some of the clearest insights about my life and had the perspective to make significant changes from these experiences.

By the end of my first five day retreat, I decided to completely change my approach to dating.

I'd been taking a scattergun approach, dating as many people as I could – seeing what I could get, having fun and playing a numbers game. No one stood a chance as there were always more dates being lined up.

I changed this to only go out with people I thought there was a long term potential with and took things slower with coffee dates instead of getting smashed.

After a seven day retreat in Mexico a couple of years ago, I had the clarity to give up drinking.

It's something I may well have come around to without the retreat, but it was the retreat that gave me the perspective, the lift into a higher than usual state of consciousness that enabled me to make the change.

Having a high state of consciousness or being enlightened isn't a binary thing – it's not that you've either got it or you haven't.

It's more like a percentage. How enlightened are you today? For me at the end of a retreat I might be an 85% – nothing can ruffle me, I'm full of insight and wisdom.

If I've had a terrible night's sleep, I’m sick or when I used to be hungover – maybe I’d be more like a 5%.

With meditation and with advanced techniques like Rounding we have a tool to change where we are on the conscious spectrum, which is a truly special gift that most people never have access to.

Vedic Meditation course costs

When I learned Vedic Meditation, I remember being shocked by the cost.

I'd been to an intro talk for a similar technique where they said it was $1500. I looked around and most teachers including Tim who I learned with were $1000 or more.

Looking back on this cost, I now see what a great investment it was. An investment in me, for a skill I'll have for life that gives me benefit every single day.

I have guitars and cameras that cost more than this that I hardly ever touch!

But when I started teaching, I wanted to make it more available to more people, without devaluing it. It sounds like a self-serving thing that a salesman might say but we tend to value things more highly when they cost us more, so the price actually works for you in getting you to stick to it.

That's why it's so much harder to make a habit of something you read in a book or a guided meditation from an app.

I wanted to make it more available to more people so instead of a flat rate, I operate a sliding scale based on income, starting at $500 and going up to what most other teachers charge.

I don't ask you to prove what you earn, it's an honour system. And it's not to penalise those who earn more, the top rates are what others charge as their standard rate, but makes it available to more people. This was something that was important to me.

I encourage people to pay in instalments over four months to spread the cost out, like you would a gym membership or a personal trainer.

Click here for more upcoming Vedic Meditation courses and costs.

Meditation and anger management

In the past, I always had a really short temper when it came to jobsworth people. You know the type, people in petty positions of authority at places like the phone company or the airline check-in desk.

One time I was coming back from Melbourne on a certain airline after a boozy weekend and the flight got cancelled at the last minute with a very weak explanation. The airline has this thing where the cost of a return ticket is, say, $150, but the return portion is only $20.

Then the replacement Virgin flight costs $300 on the day and you realise you’ve been conned and should have bought the Virgin flight in the first place, for $200. I see red and unleash on the poor people who are on the front lines implementing these kinds of corporate policies.

Then a few months after learning to meditate I found myself in a similar situation. I was planning on picking up a hire car after work to go away for the weekend. I phoned at lunch to check on something and they said I had to bring a physical credit card to pick it up and that I specifically couldn't use Apple Pay. I knew this would mean I'd have to go all the way home at lunch and come back taking 90 mins out of my day.

I felt the surge of anger and prepared to unleash a volley of abuse.

But then I noticed the anger disappeared. Instead of my usual response, I found myself instead trying to see what the positive outcome of this would be. It was a sunny day and I'd just bought a new motorbike. If you'd asked me that morning what I’d most like to do that day I would have said ride my new bike. Here I was with a chance to do just that and not be at work.

Instead of my former response, I found myself politely ending the call. Instead of seething all the way back to pick up my credit card, I found I was able to enjoy the ride. Instead of awkwardly picking up the car after abusing them on the phone, I found myself sharing a joke with them about the card policy.

These are the kinds of events I tell my students to watch out for to track their progress. We don’t live under laboratory testing conditions when we learn to meditate so it can sometimes be hard to see what progress you’re making. It’s times like this when you overturn a long-held behaviour that you can really see your progress in action.

The time I attempted a three-hour marathon

In 2016 I ran my second marathon and set my sights on doing it in three hours – no mean feat.

While you can finish a half marathon without too much training, when it comes to a marathon, there's no getting away from serious training. And if you want to do it in three hours you need serious serious training. Most running plans recommend anywhere from 3 to 5 runs a week. Only 5% of finishers get under three hours.

Starting from a good running base, I trained hard for six months – on the beach before work, sprints at lunch, 30km+ runs after work till 9pm winding around the most convoluted route home to make up the distance. Over the Harbour Bridge, around Kirribilli, back over the bridge, City2Surf route, along the beaches to Bronte and back.

I chose Gold Coast as it's the flattest course in Australia and flew up the day before. To avoid hitting the wall and running out of energy, I stuffed so many carbs down my throat I felt sick most of the day. Big bowls of pasta, bananas, Powerades and a whole loaf of white bread with jam.

It's around 7am when we set off and I'm feeling good for the first few kms, sticking to my pace of 4.15m/km.

One hour in and I'm still going well, trying to pay attention to how I'm feeling in the moment and not think about the later part of the race. If I think too much about what time I might finish in, I start feeling tense and getting tired.

At 4.15m/km, I'm running at 80% of the fastest I can run if I'm only doing 1km. This is constantly being reasonably out of breath. If my breathing becomes too easy, I know I've dropped behind the pace without even looking at my watch.

At about 20kms, just under the halfway mark, things start to go wrong. A pain I've had before that begins in my hip and goes down my leg to the outside of my knee flares up.

I try my old trick of not entertaining negative thoughts. I find in races where I do succumb to negative thinking about injuries, things always fall apart. After a few minutes of this, I look at my watch and see I've done the last kilometre in 4m30. That would be 15 seconds I'd need to make up somewhere. I try jumping back up to a faster pace but my right side isn't having it.

The tightness and discomfort are turning into undeniable pain.

I push on like this for two more kilometres with the leg seizing up more and more – a 4m35 km followed by a 4m45. At this point, I see my friend who has come out to support me. It's all I can do to acknowledge her and indicate that I'm not doing well. Around the next corner, out of sight of my friend, I admit to myself I can't go on like this.

The dream of a three-hour marathon is crumbling. At this point, I'm already a few minutes behind schedule, but more importantly, I can barely keep moving.

I'd built the time up to such an extent that the thought of running a slow marathon, even slower than my previous one, seems pointless. These were the thoughts going through my head as I slow up and start hobbling down the side of the road.

People in the crowd read the name on my bib and call out support, which is encouraging, but my leg feels terrible. I stop completely and stretch. Three or four different stretches don't seem to help and I walk on. Runners flood past me. The 3h05 pacer, then a few minutes later the 3h10. All the other runners look fine – why is this happening to me? I trained so much.

My main problem at this point, I realised in retrospect, is that I'm running the wrong storyline. The story I'm so attached to is running a three-hour marathon.

Judged against that storyline, I'm failing. I'm walking the course with no chance of getting near my target. I'm seriously considering giving up – why go on if I can't get my goal? I'm not even going to beat my previous time.

But then I remember how many people have sponsored me. I'm running not just for personal glory, I'm raising money for charity.

This detail completely changes my perspective. I'm now no longer running/hobbling for myself, but for the people who believed in me and the cause I picked. Gone are all thoughts of quitting – now it's a question of getting across the line.

I have a new mountain to climb! Not the one I set out for, but a challenging summit nonetheless. Can I finish the second half of this marathon injured?

I find my leg is feeling well enough to jog slowly. The 3h15 and 3h20 pacers pass me now. I'm jogging at around 6m/km, almost two minutes slower than my original pace. I remember I have some paracetamol and take a couple.

I carry on like this for about an hour, 10kms. I'm still running in a very jagged way, all lopsided but not in pain. The 3h30 pacer passes me and I realise that even after all the walking and slow jogging I've only just fallen behind my previous time.

There's 10km to go and I decide to take a stab at getting a half-decent time. I try and up the pace and get to about 5m30/km. I'm not overtaking anyone but there are no longer people overtaking me, which gives me a boost. The 3h35 pacer goes past but I keep on. The 3h40 group never caught me. I crossed the line in 3h38m, only seven minutes behind my previous time. I also raised over $1000.

The turning point was where I changed the script. When I was running to finish and overcome my injury, and doing it for the greater goal of raising money, the race had meaning again.

If we tell ourselves the right stories, we can make the most of any situations.

Sharpen the saw

A man walking in the woods came across a woodcutter straining to saw down a tree.

He could see how much work the woodcutter was putting in and knowing a thing or two about woodcutting himself suggested the man take a break.

“You look shattered! How long have you been doing that? You should stop for a few minutes and sharpen your saw.”

The woodcutter glared at him.

"I've been sawing for five hours and have to get this finished. I don't have time to take a break!"

As gently as he could, the man suggested:

“If you sharpen the saw, you'd be able to cut the tree down much faster.”

The woodcutter exploded.

“I don’t have time to sharpen the saw. Don’t you see I’m too busy!”

I love this story that Stephen R Covey shares in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Many of us work ourselves to our absolute limits trying to get work done, but don't realise how ineffective we're being.

If you take a break and meditate for 20 minutes, you won't be 20 minutes behind, rather you'll be in a much better state to see how the work should best be done.

In life you rarely get points for how much work you've put in. It's all about the results you produce. The more rested version of you with greater access to your full mental capabilities will produce far better results than the frazzled version of you that gritted their teeth and pushed on through.

How to improve your sleep through meditation

For many of my Vedic Meditation students, sleep is one of the first things that improves when they start to meditate. Like Cooper in the quote above, my sleep wasn't terrible or anything but I I'd often wake up really early and not be able to get back to sleep. It would be 4am, I'd wake up and before I knew it my mind would be racing trying to solve whatever the main issue from the day had been.

This would go on for half an hour or so until I realised what I was doing and tried to get back to sleep. But we all know what happens when you try to fall asleep. Since I started meditating I've found that I still wake up early and the main issue of the day still comes to mind, but rather than going to town with it, I can let go of it and fall back asleep.

The reason meditation makes this possible is that it neutralises all the stress and anxiety connected with these thoughts when you meditate during the day. With the stress removed from the issues, you don't forget about them, but they no longer have control over your attention. You're free to deal with them appropriately during waking hours. At night you're free to head back to the land of nod.

How to practise gratitude

North Bondi

A lot of things you hear around meditation and spirituality can sound cheesy and easy to dismiss.

Take gratitude. You hear about it so often – Oprah or Deepak extolling its benefits or you see it emblazoned on a T-shirt or mug.

Its blandness and ubiquity turn off your critical faculties quicker than a tepid Starbucks in an airport departure lounge.

You’ll be familiar with the basic premise.

Be grateful for the good things in your life and you’ll be happier

So far, so blah. It’s ripe to be filed under “things that sound fine that I’m not going to act on”.

But the key here is not to let things of value pass you by just because they’re obvious.

We’ve been programmed by evolution to favour the novel and that important information will come from the new or unfamiliar.

So when we come across a dusty old concept like gratitude, we tend to hurry past looking for the next shiny new thing.

But if we’re able practise what Zen calls Beginner’s Mind, we can see things with fresh eyes again, free from our usual preconceptions.

We can start with the scientific evidence that it actually works.

In one study, two psychologists asked one group to write a few sentences each week about things they were grateful for. A second group wrote about things they hadn’t liked, and the third wrote about anything at all. After 10 weeks, the gratitude group were more optimistic and felt better about their lives. (Harvard Health)

A few sentences a week – surely you could give that the benefit of the doubt even if you weren’t 100% convinced?

How to practise gratitude

Write it down

Probably the most effective way to practise being grateful is to write things down. By taking the idea out of your head, it makes it more tangible. You also create a record you can refer back to at a later date to remind you of all the good fortune you’ve had over time. You can either keep a formal journal, digital or paper, or instead jot things down in the notes app of your phone whenever you remember to.

Make a mental note

If writing is not your style, you can instead take a moment to quietly make a mental record at a certain point of your day or week. If you stack it on top of another habit, it becomes easier to remember. For example, you can spend the first few moments of your morning shower reviewing the previous day or maybe the quiet time at the end of a meditation session before you open your eyes.

The beauty of this is that you don't need to post it on Instagram for it to work. You can quietly acknowledge things to yourself without having to bore the rest of the world with it.

Meditation is one of the best ways to cultivate an attitude for gratitude. Find out more about how to learn Vedic Meditation.

Want to make quitting alcohol easier with meditation? Try this: How to quit drinking.

Three simple things about meditation

When I teach meditation classes in Bondi Junction, in the first session I go through three simple concepts that often surprise people.

They seem to go against a lot of what we've picked up about meditation from popular culture, but once you get your head around them, they make meditation so much more enjoyable.

1. Thoughts are good
 

We grow up with the idea that thoughts in meditation are bad but that's not true! Thoughts in meditation mean you're releasing stress. Think of it like having too many applications open on your computer. You need to revisit each one to close it down. Afterwards you'll have a lot more mental capacity.

2. Effort is bad

When things aren't going as we hoped, it's tempting to put more effort in to try to fix them. Failing maths at school? Revise more. Falling behind on a project at work? Stay back late. But as meditation is the art of relaxing, it's about seeing if you can give up the need to succeed. Success comes in meditation when we give up the need for it.

3. You're not in control (and that's OK)

Like on a rollercoaster, if you're trying to control the ride, you're not going to have a very good time. Rather than trying to hold on tight, just sit back and enjoy the ride, whatever ups and downs it takes you on. In the game of relaxation, it doesn't pay to be in control.

Want to learn more? Come to a meditation class in Bondi Junction.

Not in Sydney? Why not check out our partner site in Germany: Meditation Teachers Berlin.

Meditation: A spam filter for your mental inbox

Imagine if your email inbox didn’t have a spam filter.

In addition to the usual mountain of legitimate things you have to wade through, you also had to make your way through all the dross.

The alluring emails from Nigerian princes offering riches in exchange for your bank details, the fake pharmaceuticals, the phishing messages from your bank and energy companies.

It would slow you down and make you unproductive right? As soon as you heard of a spam filter, you’d install it straight away.

Meditation is like a spam filter for the mind.

Instead of allowing all the mental chaff to accumulate and take up space and capacity, meditation processes it all out.

It’s the processing that people often mistake for being bad at meditation. When we process all the crap that comes in, we find ourselves thinking during meditation.

Becoming good at meditation isn’t about stopping yourself thinking, it’s about being OK as the mental processing takes place.

It’s not about not receiving spam in the first place, it’s knowing how to filter it out.

Don't chase the perfect meditation

I love this quote from James Clear's Atomic Habits.

It really sums up one of the key messages I try to get over in my meditation classes in Sydney.

You get the benefits of meditation by simply doing it, not by achieving any particular state during it.

Many of us have a certain expectation of what meditation should be like – and it's easy to hold yourself back from doing it if you're worried about not having the "perfect" meditation.

But as any productivity guru will tell you: done is better than perfect.

You don't need to be transported to some Zen-like level of consciousness every time you close your eyes.

And I can guarantee you won't be.

You'll reach that state sometimes, but the skill of becoming a meditator is in accepting that sometimes you'll get these experiences and sometimes you won't.

If you've accumulated a large amount of stress over the years that your body needs to offload, then you might not get there very often.

But that's not why we meditate. We don't meditate to get good at meditation, we meditate to get good at life.

And by putting the time aside each day to do our practice, we systematically de-excite our nervous systems and neutralise the acidic stress chemistry that modern fills us with.

Meditation is about mastering the process, not the outcomes. The outcomes will take care of themselves.

And they'll likely be in the form of benefits you notice outside of meditation – more calm, more focus, more energy – rather than within the meditation itself.

Meditation to cut down or quit drinking

Over the last year and a half since I gave up drinking I've heard from so many people about how they want to cut down or quit drinking themselves but don't know where to start.

For me, meditation has been such a strong driver of making it possible that for the last six months I've been putting together an online guided meditation course to give people the skills they need to use meditation themselves to help them cut down.

If you have any friends you think would benefit from this, please share it with them. And if you'd like to see how your practice can help you cut down drinking, give it a try. The course uses a generic mantra, but you can substitute this with the mantra I gave you.

How does meditation help cut down on alcohol?

Stress

Dealing with stress and unwinding at the end of the day or week is one of the biggest reasons people drink – and meditation is a simple swap you can do for this. It's way more effective at stress release and will give you more energy rather than making you tired.

Impulse control

It only takes one weak moment to break a stint of not drinking but meditation actually strengthens the part of your brain responsible for decision making and impulse control (the cortex), which means you'll find it a lot easier to resist temptations.

Peer pressure

Other people trying to get you to drink is another big hurdle to get over in cutting down. Meditation is great at making you more comfortable in your skin and more sure of your boundaries. It gives you the confidence to stick to what you believe in and not cave to pressure from others.

How does the course work?

To make this course more accessible, I've made it online and at a very affordable cost (AUD$49). Once you sign up, you get 31 guided 15-minute meditations that will teach you a simple and effective way to relax, all with the convenience of doing it on your own terms. It's the perfect companion to a month off alcohol and can set you up for taking longer off.

Find out more on the below link or reply to this email if you have any questions.

Rory

Learn more: How to quit drinking

The two-minute rule

If fitting in 20 minutes of meditation seems daunting, here's a life hack that might help. In James Clear's book Atomic Habits, he talks about what he calls the "two-minute rule", which is designed to make any new habit or activity seem manageable. 

"The principle is that any activity can be distilled into a habit that is doable in two minutes," he says. "Want to read more? Don't commit to reading one book every week - instead make a habit of reading two pages a night. Want to run a marathon? Commit to simply putting your running gear on every day after work."

So instead of writing off your meditation on any day as unworkable, just commit to going and sitting somewhere for a couple of minutes in silence.

By doing that, you'll get a nice brief break from your day and you won't be putting any pressure on by committing to a full 20 minute session. 

As Clear puts it: "Once you’ve pulled on your running shoes, you’ll probably head out for a run. Once you’ve read two pages, you’ll likely continue. The rule recognises that simply getting started is the first and most important step toward doing something."

Once you've closed your eyes you'll probably find you've got time to meditate after all. 

I've been trying out the principle with yoga. Rather than committing to a 60 or 90 minute yoga class everyday, instead I'm aiming for only ten minutes, at home in the morning. Already, after only a few weeks of doing a minute or so each on certain poses I struggle with, I've been able to hold a headstand for 30 seconds and get myself up into (an approximation of) a wheel, getting slightly better each day. 

If you break things down into small (atomic!) chunks they're much more manageable.

Interested in learning more? Come to one of my meditation classes in Bondi.