The Unknown

38:20

38:20

The Unknown

Type

talks

Activity

Meditation

Suitable for

Everyone

From almost two decades of contemplation and self-reflection, I have learned that the answers to all our suffering is in the Unknown...in the space...in the gap.. we are not born to suffer. We are here to free ourselves from suffering.

Emotional Health Family Dynamics Body Image Anxiety Yoga Meditation Self Acceptance Awareness Self Compassion Surrender Journaling Body Image Issues Vipassana Meditation Inner Resistance

Meet your Teacher

Grand Blanc, MI 48439, USA

Meet your Teacher

Grand Blanc, MI 48439, USA

Transcript

The unknown. What is the unknown? For two decades, Well. For pretty much my entire life. I have suffered. Emotional turmoil, A little bit background here. I grew up in a dysfunctional family. Many of us do. Until the age of seven. Everything was great. But I remember. Around that age. Two things happened. One. I was informed. By my siblings that I was different. I was fat. And I was stupid. Two things I heard. I'm the youngest of three. The other thing that happened is. . . I was into comic books. And my dad. Give me a book. On the Life of Buddha. That was like the early times when I was just about learning how to read. Comic books were. Interesting and that is one comic book that I kept going back to. I have no idea why, At the time. But 51 years later. Actually not even 51, I would say. 41 years later, A kind of. Understood. That there was a reason why that happened at the time. Of course, Going through my teenage years and young adult life. That feeling of unworthiness, Feeling of not belonging, Feeling of something different, Something wrong with me, Kind of became the tagline or pretty much the. Work that I had to do for the rest of my life, For at least four decades, Four decades. My young teenage years, I was pretty lonely because of course I was fat and I was stupid. So I didn't really felt like I belong. There was a feeling of unworthiness, Not enough. People laughing at me. You know, Whenever I used to play sports and stuff, So that kind of. . . I bottled a lot of those things up because I was, I couldn't really talk to anybody about it. And I shoved my face into food for comfort because food is something that never turned me away. And that is when my my disordered eating habits began. Food became kind of my numbing mechanism to not feel the pain of food. Down and out. In my young adult life, I spent my entire, I guess in my 20s and 30s. Chasing that number on the scale just to feel enough, Just to feel that I belonged. There was a lot of rage, A lot of anger. And when I was 33, I did lose a lot of weight. I did lose a hundred pounds. And that felt good because I've never been that small in my body. I never knew that I was that small. So that felt good. And I also became. Highly competitive, And also became a perfectionist. Obsessed. Like OCD. Literally on the spectrum of OCD. Where everything had to be a certain way. Counting calories and I was exercising, Overexercising sometimes. And not peeling enough. Unhealthy obsession rather just to feel validated just because I had lost all this weight I was able to fit into smaller clothes I was getting all this attention that I never got for almost three decades. So that was kind of intoxicating. To get that kind of attention. But I was still not happy. I just wasn't happy. And I didn't know what that felt like. I just knew it in my gut that. I have. A great body. I am an athlete. I look great, I'm getting all these compliments, But I'm still not happy. Why am I so angry all the time? It's like a ticking bomb. Anybody would say something, I would just immediately retaliate. It's like a protective mechanism going on, Which I was not sure why it was happening. There was so much anxiety, So much rage. Sometimes I even remember getting panic attacks. And I just was miserable in my body, Even though I had lost all this weight. And I was looking great on the outside, But inside I was just claustrophobic and I was dying. During this time, I suddenly recalled Playfully, I remember my dad telling me I was supposed to be a boy. This was, I don't remember what age I was at the time. Maybe I was like 10, 11. So my oldest one is my oldest sibling is a brother and then I have a sister. So pretty much family is complete right there. But then I came along. And I was supposed to be a boy. So I always, First of all, I already had feelings of unworthiness, Not enough, Don't belong. And now I feel like I never really was supposed to be here. So there was this feeling of loneliness, Isolation. I all of a sudden remembered during my teenage years how lonely I was. I was such a sad child. They were just dealing with me. Apparently I was never wanted. And then I'm already fat and I'm stupid. So pretty much I'm just a fly on the wall that nobody cares about. So I kind of started remembering those things in my 30s when I was really struggling. So this was back in 2010. When I was training for a half marathon. So I was so athletic and I was so strong and I was able to accomplish all this, You know, Physical activity. So I thought, Why not try for a marathon, A half a marathon? And as I was training, I recognized that my knees were starting to bruise and I was not sure why. I just ignored them because the high that I was getting from being able to run long distance was too high. Good to pass. I wanted that high all the time. But then one day I remember I broke off, Broke out in hives. My whole body had wells all over it. I got terrified and then I thought, You know what, Maybe some kind of allergen I picked up. Outside. So I thought I'll try running on the treadmill and see what happens. So I went in an air-conditioned room, Started running on a treadmill, And then again, My body broke out in hives. I didn't understand what was going on. Of course, Now I know that I was not training properly. I didn't have the proper protocol for training how to build miles. I was just going all out from the get go. But I believe nothing happens. There are no coincidences. Everything happens for a reason. So this is during the time when I was kind of feeling all this anxiety. Somebody said, You know what, Why don't you try yoga for just a seed, Just a word came out of somebody's mouth. Why don't you try yoga? I said okay, So I went to a yoga class, My first class. The whole class was, Of course, Fine, But the Shavasana part at the end was something that I have never experienced. It was so peaceful. I didn't know what it all meant. I just thought it was just stretching, Doing yoga. I had no idea what yoga literally was at the time. But I continued. Once a week I would go to a class and I felt great after that. Shavasana was awesome. So that was enough for me to keep coming back. But before this time, Before yoga seed was planted in my head, A voice kind of I heard in my head for my anxiety, The deep anxiety I was experiencing at the same time. This all happened around 2010. It said meditate. I have no idea where that voice came from. And my gut told me to follow it. So I did. And I started meditating. It was the hardest thing I ever did. I sat and I sat every day, One minute, Two minutes, Sometimes a few seconds, Just all over the place because just the mind would not shut up. But I persisted. It was just their voice telling me, Sit, Just sit. I tried meditation beats, I tried music, I tried guided meditation, I tried mantras, I tried everything but just something told me sit in silence. So I sat in silence. And it was hard, But I continued with the practice. And then yoga, Of course, Happened. So while I was training for marathon, I was meditating, I was doing some yoga, But I actually happened to go to a local pharmacy, A community pharmacy, Like an organic store, And I was chatting up this lady at the desk and she planted this third seed in my head. Why don't you become a yoga teacher? And I'm thinking in my head, I'm not even close to being flexible. When you think of yoga, You think of people standing on their heads, Or doing arm balances, Or doing all those deep back bends. I'm like, OK. My body is not going to do that. I felt like a. . . Like a liar. I'm like, That's not for me. But she said, Just go to this place and just see. So I said, OK. I followed that. I talked to my husband immediately. He backed it up. He said, Yes, Let's go and visit the place. So I did. This place was about two hours away from my home. I mean, There were other yoga studios that were offering yoga teacher training in my town, But she told me to go there. So I went there. The moment I entered the space, The energy the owner, Her energy, Her aura. I had never experienced or seen anything like that in my entire life. There was, It was a no brainer. I was, I was, Yes, I'm doing it. I'm doing it. I signed up. And that's when began, This was 2014. When I did my teacher training. Between 2010, 2014, I was meditating and I was doing my own yoga practice once a week. There was going to and all that stuff. I started my teacher training in 2014. And this place that I was going to, There was a reason I was supposed to go there because they also offered Ayurveda. Ayurveda is the sister science of yoga. They go hand in hand. And they had the whole practitioner course going on and the owner. Was herself an Ayurvedic practitioner. And when I understood Ayurveda, I figured, Well. . . For my body type, Running was not healthy. It was not good for my joints. Okay that was a hard pill to swallow but thankfully with yoga practice and meditation i was able to surrender to that in that moment And then Ayurvedic knowledge actually really fascinated me, Learning about my own body, My mind. And how I can use lifestyle medicine and nature therapy for just keeping my body in balance. So that was really an eye-opening experience for me. Luckily, They were also offering a counseling course. So I decided, You know what, After I became a yoga teacher, I thought I will do the counseling. So back to back, I immediately finished the counseling course. And I learned how to use. Mindfulness practices like yoga movement, Meditation, Crystals. I got into crystals. I got into mantras. I got into I waited and I could see my anxiety kind of going down, But I was still not happy. Something was missing. In my gut, I just knew. I've done all these things. But why am I not still happy? What is next? This was in 2017. I just knew in my gut I had to go into silence. I had to go into silence. Absolute silence. And Vipassana meditation came along. I have no idea why I did it. Finances were not available at the time, But. . . This tradition of Vipassana, They do not function on God. Profit. It's a non-profit, Donation-based practice where anybody can go, You donate whatever you can, And you sit in silence. It was the perfect timing. Just what I needed. My kids were young, They needed me, But I had to do this. I just knew in my gut I had to do this, So I did. I went to a Vipassana meditation center about three hours from my home. No phones, No writing, No reading, No talking. No exercise, No yoga, Nothing. All I had to do was 10 hours of meditation every single day for 10 days. And between those meditation times, Sit with myself. That was beyond i thought yoga was the hardest thing i ever did meditation was the hardest ever thing this was beyond hardest thing i've ever done sitting with myself A lot of things came up. There was times I wanted to just run away. Bail. But I knew in my gut, No. I have to do this. I have to go through this discomfort. The last day when they said, OK, Now you can break your silence and everybody can. You know, It was time to go home. My words wouldn't come out of my mouth. I had to run away to my room and I bawled my eyes out. I had no idea what was going on. There was a lot of energetic release happening at the time. Everybody was chit-chatting in the hallway and I just didn't want to be part of it. I just wanted to be alone and I wanted to just release the stuff that was coming out. Something shifted inside of me. I had no idea. I have no idea till date what shifted. It was like. . . A door opened up. A door just opened up. Freedom like some kind of like I was out of a jail something like shifted in me like I was out of a jail. And now I can think back and I can see nine years later. I was miserable inside of my own body and that was the freedom I experienced. That door just opened wide open and I just felt so free inside. I was still not there. Something shifted inside of me. Yoga and meditation were still part of my life. But I knew this was one thing. This was the moment I needed to start. Self-reflection. I got back home during the same time, Yin yoga is something I started practicing. Yin yoga is the art of sitting still in poses and feeling the inner resistance in the body and learning to be still with that and breathe through that. That practice with the Vipassana practice that I was experiencing there was such a commonality there's so much similarity between the two. Vipassana meditation is you sit with yourself. And you see what comes up. And you watch. And you observe. And you notice the resistance, The inner turmoil, Everything that you're feeling, The emotional stuff that comes up. Same thing within yoga. You sit in a pose. You become still. You notice the inner resistance that's rising. And you learn to relax into that. Just observe it. Observe it. These two practices profoundly opened up the path. For me to see what is this inner resistance about? This is where I started journaling. This was the moment when I started journaling. And i started journaling and i started journaling and there was so much revelation so many things started to come up i had moments of extreme outbursts, Crying, Yelling. Just catharsis, Just so much came out of me from my meditation. This is around the same time my meditation practice went from two minutes to 15 minutes to 20 minutes. I also jumped into Iyengar Yoga. Which is a very, Very difficult physical practice where you have to hold poses in absolute alignment, Proper alignment, For a long time. And again, During that practice, I could feel that inner resistance coming up, Like the teacher is not letting us come out of the pose and I'm dying over here. And I jumped right into home practice also to kind of further just observe the inner resistance so basically the inner resistance became the theme line for everything i was doing yin yoga, Meditation, Ayangar yoga, The inner resistance that's the key word That's the keyword. Here's an example. In Ayurveda yoga, Inversions are a big part of the practice. And I used to go to classes with my teachers and they would put people up in handstands, Kick up in handstands, Kick up in handstands. And I spent years kicking, Kicking, Kicking, Kicking. Everybody would go up and I would just sit there just kicking, Just would not go up. And that became my goal to be able to accomplish that pose. So I started practicing regularly at home, Just kicking and kicking and kicking and kicking and kicking. And I became so obsessed with it. And every time I would keep trying and trying that I would get aggressive, Angry. And every time I would go to the post to try it, I would feel the fears come up, Aversion, Not wanting to do it, But I'm going to do it. This is when. I found. The book on Surrender by Michael Singer. I read the whole book, Same time. And even at the same time, I was so obsessed with BKS Anger Yoga teacher training, I mean, Teacher programs, His teacher, I mean, His practice, BKS Anger Yoga practice. Then I started listening to his podcasts, All his interviews, Not podcasts, All his interviews. And I was reading Michael Singer at the same time. These two things happened together. That's not a coincidence. There was something that I recognized in both, One thing. BKS Anger said, Try a pose. Try three, Four times. If it happens, Happens. If it doesn't happen, Move on with grace. Because this is not the only pose in the library. There are many other poses. And then show up the next day with a fresh state of mind, Not from yesterday's experience, But in the moment. And approach the pose with the body. Fresh Certifies. Michael Singer talked about surrender. Just let life come through. Don't fight it. Don't resist it. I put the two together. And I tried to kick up. And I went up in handstand. What the message was. If you stop fighting life. Life happens in the perfect. Magical way it is supposed to. For us. The only thing that gets in the way and we struggle so much. Because we are trying to fight life as it comes. That was a pivotal moment. In everything that I experienced and of course I was still journaling at the time and this is when I remembered why that book came to me at the age of seven, The Life of Buddha. Buddha means the enlightened one. He was just a normal person like you and me. Just a normal person. He was a prince. He had nothing to be worried about. He had no suffering. What is the suffering? He has all the money. He was a prince. But he was not happy. And then he saw people around him not happy. He wanted to know the root of the suffering. And he meditated. And the all. Can be the Buddha. We all can be the enlightened one. How? Serve with our sauce. Understand the root for suffering. So this is the background. Now, 2026. At age 51. I know exactly. The root of my suffering. Now I know. It's all in the mind. We carry the past with us. Beliefs, Patterns of behaviors. Things that we pick up in our society, From our culture, From dogmatic beliefs that have been passed down from generations and generations. And we believe that like it's the word of the Bible. We don't even sit with it for a moment to understand and try to figure out what try to uncover the validity of what we are. Using as a compass, As a roadmap. None of us do that. We all are living such a robotic life, Such a zombie-style life. We are moving through life like a zombie. Asleep. So what does waking up mean? Asking the big questions. Be curious. I was curious, I was desperate. And yes, I could have chosen. I could have done alcohol. I could have done drugs. New There has to be another way. I just knew it in my gut. And we all know that. We just tend to because we all want the fast fix. Unfortunately. There is no fast way. To permanent. If you want long-term, Long-lasting, Sustainable, Permanent freedom. It takes time. It takes work. It takes accountability. It takes sitting with ourselves and getting uncomfortable. Doing self-reflection, Questioning our thoughts, Questioning our beliefs, Questioning our daily behaviors. Why we keep repeating the same cycles of behavior all the time, Questioning that. Where is it coming from? Where is it coming from? That is exactly the work I did. Every time I would yell at my kids. Every time I would go to the gym and push myself. I had to question why. Because I was hurting. I was not happy. I was running like an, I don't know, I was a spinning instructor at the time too, And I was spinning away like I was, People would come and compliment me, Oh my God, It's hard to keep up with you, All that good stuff. I was so fast in my step classes that everybody would come and compliment me. You look great. You lost so much weight. You're so strong. You're so fast. And temporarily that gave me a little bit of a, Oh. People see me. But then I was not happy. Because that was temporary, That lasted only. . . For that moment, I would go home, I was on a hike, And then. . . Back to base ground. Feeling of unworthiness would kick in until I would go back to the gym the next morning and I would push myself again. And I got depreciation again, People saw me, And then I would come home, Feel high for a moment, Go crash again. This is exactly what happens with drugs. When you're on drugs, When you're high on drugs or you are intoxicated by alcohol, It is a temporary moment of elation, Feel great. You don't feel your pain, But the moment that wears off, Everything is right there in front of your face. So there was no difference. I was using exercise and food. To not feel the pain. And people who do drugs and alcohol. But this is exactly what my process was, But every time I would go kind of go high and then go low and then go high and then go low, I wanted. Just a permanent change. Solution to my problem. It was not like I'm I was still not happy and I was trying to question that. I'm like, Why am I not still happy when I'm getting all this and why do I hit that low and it feels miserable again and then I have to go back up? And then I keep going up and down like a roller coaster. And I didn't want to feel that way. This is where I started journaling, And journaling is what helped me a lot. Break those patterns of behavior. To understand the root of the problem was that of course in my case like I already shared feeling of unworthiness. So whenever I had the high, I was getting all this appreciation. I was getting all this recognition. And I'm like, Oh, People see me. I belong. And then when I'm home by myself, In my own room, Doing my same routine, Kitchen cleaning and whatever else I was doing, Raising my kids, I had that low. It's that constant. That I needed, I needed the constant feedback that you are perfect, You are great, Look at you, You look so great, Blah, Blah, Blah. And when I was not getting that, That is when I was hitting my low. So these feelings of unworthiness were so deeply ingrained that that literally was the root of my suffering. And I'm sure most of us have that feeling, Feelings of unworthiness. Not enough. Imposter syndrome. Self-doubt. And we find our ways to fix the outside, But the work is actually on the inside. So now what did I experience is that now at the age of 51, I do not need external validations to feel enough because I know I'm enough. I've always been enough. How do I know that? Well, I peel the layers. I peel the layers of the onions, The layers that are full of beliefs and dogmatism and cultural dogmas. Race and gender and things that society, Separation, Everything, Sitting in nature really helped me to figure that out. Watching animals. Just watching the animals, How they are living in harmony with each other. And nobody's fighting each other. And we are all the same. We all need. One thing, Two things actually. Unconditional love. Unconditional acceptance. That is what every human being wants. We all have been to experiences. But that does not have to be. The story of our lives. Instead of using my experience as a victim mode, Like, Oh, This happened to me. My dad did this to me. That is another story for another time about my own dysfunctional family. Or I didn't go to school. I had to start working at 18 holding grudge against my parents for not sending me to school or not letting me finish my degrees and get a good job or career. I had to literally find a job to support myself. At the age of 18, Which I will share in the future episodes. This constant. Instead of using my victim play card, Blaming everybody else for my suffering, I started to look. Again, This did not happen organically. It did not happen like a switch. It had to happen organically. First, I had to do self-reflection. First of all, It's awareness. Awareness is the most important thing. So you start becoming aware of your suffering, That you're not happy. And you're not happy with the choices you have made. Whatever you're choosing to numb yourself or feel validated in the world. Whatever your mode of choices. For me it was over-exercising, Becoming a perfectionist and calorie counting. Obsession with my physical appearance because that was the reason why it all started in the first place when I was told that you're fat and you are stupid. So degrees, Getting degrees, Getting qualifications and also losing weight. So in what ways are you numbing your pain. So awareness is the first key. You have to be aware. And you have to take accountability for what you're doing. That is when the self-reflection begins. It is hard. It is not going to be easy. It's painful. It is very hard, But this is the path. You can go to a therapist, But let's be honest, Nobody's 100%. I am not. That's why I never went to therapy. I did self-reflection. The thing about self-reflection is. . . You can really open yourself up and the journal is never going to talk back. It is just looking in the mirror and really seeing yourself. For who you are on the inside. Not on the outside, But on the inside. That is what journaling is. Is coming in terms, Coming face to face with the way you think, The way you behave, The choices you're making, All those things. That is what journaling does. So everything is on paper. And then you start to see clarity because all that junk that you've been holding inside of you is actually out of your body and onto a piece of paper. So now you are feeling a little bit more clear and free on the inside. And then you begin. The process of releasing stuff, The stored energy of God knows how many decades. And it can come out as rage. It can come out as anger. It might come out as yelling and screaming. It might come out as shaking. It might come out as crying. It can come out in many different ways. And you don't hold any judgment towards the way it comes. You don't hold anything. And you let it all out. So awareness is the first step. Becoming aware of actually recognizing and taking accountability that yes, I have been making bad choices and it's not serving me. I need to find out why I do what I do. And you have to start digging deep. And when you continue to dig deep, You continue to dig deep, You dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, You kind of free yourself and you come to a place. Of just emptiness. But that place is not empty. That is the truth. You see everything a bit clearer. View, Clear eyes, Everything is crystal clear. And you find nothing but truth. So much compassion for yourself. So much love for yourself. Unconditional self-acceptance. Unconditional self-love. When that begins to happen, You see around you, You look at other people, And you feel compassion for everybody else because everybody's going through it. And then. As you begin to recognize these patterns of behaviors and these choices that you're making, You continue to move on with your life and you are well aware of how you are moving through life. You're aware of your thoughts, You're aware of your choices, You're aware of your behaviors. I'm not saying it's going to be 100% perfect. You will fall back into old habits of behavior, Patterns of behavior. But then the best part is you will live a life of awareness. You move forward in life, Not like a zombie. You are living. Aware. Awake. Moving forward. And you can see clearly why you suffer. And instead of whenever you make a mistake, Instead of beating yourself up and repeating those cycles of behavior, You give yourself grace, You give yourself forgiveness. You pick yourself up again, And you show up again, And you show up again. And it can take for some people a few years. It can take some people a few decades. And it can take some people a lifetime. But this is the path from the unknown to the unknown. From the space. And the space between. Everything. Everything originates from that space. Everything originates from the unknown. And when you become acquainted with the unknown, You see everything clearly and you recognize the root of your suffering. Is everything that's on the surface. When you go back to the unknown, You recognize. You don't have to suffer anymore.