So hi I'm Tom Evans and welcome to another Zone Show.
Now this Zone Show is a little bit unusual.
You may be able to detect some sound effects in the background.
So there's two unusual things about this.
The first is I'm doing it live.
We're in lovely Bushy Park in West London and I'm with another Insight Timer Meditation Guide,
Huw Burn.
Welcome Huw.
Lovely to be with you Tom.
But isn't it strange that we're here?
Because it's only a week ago that we connected.
I saw your face on the app.
I was drawn by your energy.
I pressed the button,
Started listening to all of your meditations,
Went to your website,
Said it would be great to connect,
Come on the podcast sometime.
And you said,
Well actually I'm in London this week.
So I said well why don't we just meet up and here we are.
Now isn't that strange?
It is,
It is,
It is.
And these things happen don't they?
And they happen.
And you know I just think when they do I just want to take advantage of it.
I think you're the same with that.
And yeah,
And this is a part of the world although I live and work and teach mainly in the US and have done for many years now.
This is a part of the world where I grew up.
I grew up just a few miles from where we're sitting right now in Richmond Park and this was my local park growing up as a kid.
So it feels,
That feels right as well.
Absolutely.
We're joined by lots of ducks and swans and the odd airline going into Heathrow.
So just for people that don't know you then,
Tell us about your journey into this wonderful world of buying problems.
What got you into it all those years ago?
You know I was,
It was about 30 years ago.
I was very much an activist at the time.
I was engaged in work around the Central America issue during the Reagan administration.
I was an organizer.
I did that for over a dozen years.
And I was at a time in my life when I was very,
You know,
Very caught up in the energy of activism and doing things and getting things done.
And I was away staying with my partner's family for a few days and I just started reading a book.
It was Alan Watts,
The Way of Zen.
Just happened to read it.
Kind of was interested in it.
It wasn't the kind of thing.
It wasn't really about activism or engagement so much,
But about more the inner life.
But I got into it and I just had an experience there.
It was one of these experiences where I was like I was in this very tight place and it was a simple question.
Do I go this way or do I go that way?
And then suddenly things fell away.
You know,
I just kind of fell into a much more freer state of mind which I stayed in for,
You know,
Really for a number of months afterwards.
You know,
Just living in a sense of ease rather than being in a tight contracted place.
And what was interesting to me about that experience was it was just an experience but it kind of opened a door for me.
And I walked through that door and I haven't really looked back.
I mean the journey has been zigging and zagging and,
You know,
Going this way and that for a while until I found my real path.
But it was a door that opened and then I started reading more,
I started meditating more.
And then maybe a few years after I did a longer retreat and that was a kind of another deep dive into these practices.
And really I've just continued from there.
You know,
It's been a journey in that direction.
But like one of those things,
Why did it happen then?
No idea.
But it was a door opened,
I walked through it and then the rest is kind of history for me.
And what was the history then around,
Because you were a meditator,
You were an activist and a meditator,
How did you transition into being a meditation guide and teacher?
Because we all find ourselves in this position in an unexpected way.
I certainly didn't plan it,
It just sort of happened.
What was your journey?
My journey was the first ten years or so it was really practice.
I did a lot of meditation on my own,
Went on a number of long silent retreats in the US in,
You know,
Insight Meditation in Barry,
Massachusetts and other places.
And did some retreats in India,
Did a lot more reading,
Got kind of avidly reading books around meditation and spirituality.
And I practiced and studied mainly with one teacher,
Christopher Titmuss in the 90s and went on retreats with him in the US and in India.
And he suggested that I maybe start thinking about teaching,
You know.
And I tell you the story was an interesting one.
I'd been working as an activist and an organizer.
It was coming to the end of the 1990s and I decided I wanted to make a change and I consciously wanted to move into more sharing these teachings and these practices.
So it was coming to the end of 1999 and I decided I wanted to leave my job,
You know,
As an advocate and as an organizer.
I said,
Where do I want to be on December 31st,
1999 as we move into the 2000s?
And I said,
I want to be under the Bodhi Tree in India where the Buddha had his awakening.
So I worked it out to go there in late December of 1999 and sat under the Tree of Enlightenment where the Buddha had his awakening experience on the 31st of December,
1999.
The Dalai Lama was supposed to be there but didn't end up showing because of security issues.
And then I just stayed there for a few weeks,
Did three weeks of meditation retreat and from then on I moved into that,
Kind of more into that kind of formal role of teaching.
But as for all of us or almost all of us,
It's a journey.
You know,
I did continue to do some consulting work to pay the bills and it's only been,
Must have taken me a decade or so before I kind of was doing this full time as my livelihood,
As my vocation to be able to pay the mortgage,
Pay the car,
Etc.
,
Etc.
But that was my journey and now this is what I do.
I do,
I teach,
I share these teachings,
These practices in workplaces,
In the community.
I do retreats,
You know,
Internationally.
I do work in the Middle East with aid workers.
So a variety of different ways of sharing these teachings and practices.
So it's interesting,
So your practice and your passion then,
You've ended up in a position where you can actually make a living out of it,
Which is quite encouraging for anyone that's listening that might be thinking of doing the same.
Yeah,
I mean I think more people are thinking about it and more people are being trained to be mindfulness teachers and there's,
As you and I both know,
There's an extraordinary explosion in the interest in mindfulness over the last few years and so things,
Opportunities are opening up.
But like in the yoga world,
You know,
I think right now there's much more yoga teachers than there are,
You know,
Than there are full time people making a living as yoga teachers.
You know,
There's more people who are trained to do it than are actually making a living.
So I wouldn't hold it out that there's going to be thousands and thousands of people being able to earn a regular salary doing this.
I think each of us has to find our own way.
For me,
It's been kind of making a portfolio of things of different kinds of offerings,
Workshops,
Classes,
Retreats,
Individual sessions with people,
Like a lot of different things and there's so many different ways people can incorporate this into their work,
Into their livelihood,
Into their lives.
And obviously if you've got an iPhone or an Android phone,
Then you've also got all these meditation teachers in your pocket these days,
Haven't you?
Because is there either insight time or found you like they found me?
They did.
I just got an email I think in 2016 in maybe spring from Maddie,
You know,
Would you be interested in putting some of your meditations up on Insight Timer?
And I kind of didn't do anything for a few months because I was busy with other things.
And then I uploaded a few of them and then found,
You know,
There was a lot of interest and they've got,
Oh,
This is interesting.
You know,
It kind of opened up possibilities.
And then over the last year or two,
I put up a lot more meditations,
Had a lot of good feedback and encouraged me to do more.
And it's been a wonderful experience for me as I know it has been for you as well.
Just of the kind of has opened up connections,
Not least of which we're sitting on a bench in Bushy Park,
West London,
Having this conversation,
You know,
That's going to go out to folks on Insight Timer.
Well,
I guess we'll throw the gauntlet down and if anyone listens to one of our meditations and just has the inkling to reach out that we're people and humans and you can find us on the internet.
You've got a website with a form that I found you through and you responded within 24 hours and I respond within 24 hours too.
So you're listening to this.
Just reach out.
You never know what these connections are going to be.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Now I noticed that in your work on activism then,
I was kind of curious where the connections between activism and your book,
Which is all about changing or breaking habits were and how one relates to the other.
You know,
In some ways,
You know,
The connection isn't a kind of specific one of like,
Oh,
Bringing habits to activism.
I mean,
That's not what I'm writing about.
I'm writing and exploring in my book the relationship between mindfulness and habits of how habits are essentially behaviours,
As well as thought patterns that become automatic through repetition.
So we repeat behaviours and some of them are healthy,
Putting on a seatbelt when we get in a car.
Or meditating every morning.
Meditating every morning.
Some of them are unhealthy,
You know,
When we do something to get some comfort,
But it's not in our interest in the long term.
It could be eating in unhealthy ways.
It could be smoking.
It could be judging ourselves unkindly or getting angry.
All of these habits,
The key of bringing mindfulness to habits,
The key of mindfulness is that it brings what is unconscious into awareness.
And once we brought what's unconscious into awareness,
Then we can make change.
If we don't bring it into awareness,
We're just going to keep repeating.
Wash,
Rinse,
Repeat.
We'll do it over and over again because there's not the awareness there to make the change.
But if we can make that pause,
As Viktor Frankl says,
Between the stimulus and the response is a space.
In that space is our ability to choose.
If we can make that space between feeling that urge to do the habitual thing and actually doing it,
Then we can choose not to do it or to do something else that's more healthy.
Now where it comes in in activism,
I think,
Is that as in any area of our life,
Whether it's in our family or in our workplace or in our community,
When we bring,
When we're engaged in activism,
We're bringing our habits of life into that work.
So one of the things,
I was an activist and an organizer for over 20 years.
And as I look back on those years,
The work I was doing,
I would do again.
I think it was worthwhile work.
It was about human rights.
It was about social justice.
It was about caring for the world.
But the energy that I brought to that work was a kind of energy of us and them,
Right and wrong,
Good and bad.
We're the good guys.
You're the bad guys.
It was also about winning and losing.
You've got to win.
You know,
Got to get this bill passed.
We've got to win this election,
You know.
And if we didn't,
Then there would be some kind of unhappiness or some disappointment about that.
And what mindfulness brings is the possibility of engaging in a very different kind of way to that work,
Where we certainly want to see things happening,
But it's not in a controlling way.
We're doing it because it's the right thing to do.
And the outcome will be as it will be.
It won't always be what we want to see happen.
But if we're doing it with the right intentions and the right heart,
Then it'll be the right thing to do.
And to bring that energy into activism brings the potential for,
In some ways,
Changing the way we do politics,
The way we engage in each other in that larger social world,
In the national political world,
In the global world.
We can engage with the work we do differently.
Like I mentioned,
I do the work with the humanitarian aid workers in the Middle East.
If you're an aid worker and you're stressed out,
You're anxious,
You're caught up in,
You know,
How am I going to do this?
It's too much.
It's all of this suffering.
I can't take it.
You're not going to be helpful to people.
You're not going to be able to do it for very long.
You're going to get burned out very quickly.
But if you have the tools of mindfulness,
Of self-compassion,
Of loving-kindness,
Of these other skills of equanimity that you can practice and incorporate into your daily life,
Into your working life,
Then you can engage with a different kind of energy.
You can be,
You know,
You're not so concerned with your own fears.
You're not so in that fight-or-flight place.
You're in a much more fluid place.
You know,
The term that I like a lot is dancing with life.
Dancing with life.
You know,
We're in a kind of fluid relationship with life,
Rather than in that kind of tight,
Controlling relationship.
A bit like these ducks in front of us,
Dancing with their lives.
They really are.
They really are.
We couldn't have picked a better spot,
Really,
To have this lovely,
Wonderful conversation.
I know.
And it's just beautiful ones with the ducks with the pointy white faces,
Which I hadn't seen before.
I think we'll take a picture,
Put it on the podcast,
And we'll get a bird twitcher to let us know and enlighten us of all we've got.
So why is things,
Because you're writing a new book now,
Aren't you?
What's that going to be about?
It's actually going to be another kind of expression of the book that I wrote,
The Here and Now Habit,
Was about mindfulness and habit change.
And this one is really about skills and practices.
It's about how we can use mindfulness,
Bring mindfulness to letting go of unhealthy,
Unhelpful habits,
And how we can cultivate healthy habits,
As you said before.
The habit of meditation,
Which I see as a bedrock habit.
It really,
For me in my life,
It's a bedrock.
I meditate for an hour at the beginning of the day,
Typically,
To really ground my day.
And if I don't do that,
Or if I don't do a regular daily meditation,
I find I'm much more apt to get caught up in getting stressed out,
Getting worried,
Getting caught up in the busyness of life.
So cultivating mindfulness and meditation is a core event.
And it's cultivating healthy habits.
Like if you're a person that judges yourself in a harsh,
Critical way,
Oh,
I'm no good,
I'm always screwing up,
Etc.
What I'm doing is I'm wanting to bring in antidotes.
So bring in,
If you're judgmental,
If you're harsh to yourself,
The antidote really is self-compassion.
So cultivating self-compassion.
If you're apt to be caught up in anger or fear,
Cultivating joy,
Bringing that,
The habit of being joyful,
The habit of being grateful,
The habit of being compassionate to yourself and others.
So looking at habits from a standpoint of letting go of the ones that are unhealthy and cultivating and developing ones that are supportive of living a happy,
Free and healthy and peaceful life.
So it's kind of,
In some ways,
An application of some of the themes that I covered in my first book,
Mindfulness and Habit Change.
Well,
It sounds like we need to get you back on the Zone Show for when that book comes out.
So good luck writing that.
Thank you.
And what would you say for somebody that hasn't got that hour every day?
You're in that luxurious place because you spent a long time developing your practice.
Yeah.
What have you?
How have you dived into this world?
You've only got like five minutes,
For example.
I mean,
It's wonderful.
If you go on the Insight Timer app and you go to,
You know,
Check out five-minute meditations.
I've got a five-minute meditation on there.
I think that's the one I listened to.
I probably did.
Yeah,
That's it.
Yeah.
I mean.
.
.
I gave you five minutes.
You gave me five minutes.
Yeah.
I mean,
It's great.
I mean,
Just at five minutes.
They've even got one-minute meditations on there.
I mean,
If any time,
If you can just come back as we're talking now.
We're going to have a short formal meditation on this,
But just in for this 30 seconds,
Just breathe in and let your attention come inward.
Just taking a pause in the midst of our lives.
It's such a gift to ourselves and we can do it any time.
Did you notice how the ducks seemed quiet and down then as well?
They realised they had two Insight time-on-minute meditations sitting on a bench right next to them.
And even the ducks chilled out too,
Which is just phenomenal.
Yeah.
Such a choice.
So is it time for the whole world to become more mindful?
I think we're.
.
.
I don't mean in a cultish way.
Yeah.
I do see.
.
.
I see a movement very much in this direction.
In some ways,
There's,
You know,
It feels as though things are getting worse.
If you looked at it in those terms,
You could see like,
You know,
The wars and the violence and all that's happening in terms of the environment,
Our planet.
And yet there's very,
Very much this counter-energy.
You see it in the US with the Trump administration and the counter movement,
The students coming out opposing,
You know,
The free availability of guns,
Who anyone who wants to walk into a store to buy a gun and do anything they want with it.
The students coming out with this really strong moral voice,
Women coming out and saying,
No,
We've got to change.
This can't go on.
So many others concerned.
And I feel that for the future of our species and our world,
We collectively do have to make a change.
And whether you call it mindfulness,
It's about a change in our awareness,
A change in our consciousness.
And I do see that happening.
I don't want to presume or predict,
You know,
How it's going to happen or when it's going to happen.
But I certainly feel that energy that we can't go on living in the old way,
That we have to move to a different level,
A different way of being in the world and a different way of caring for the world and for each other and for ourselves.
And so I think that the need brings out the responses,
Not in an automatic way,
Not right away necessarily,
But it brings about,
It points to the kind of change that we need.
And I do feel it's happening.
I think what's happening with Insight Timer is a beautiful example of that kind of expansion of the interest and the linking of people together all around the world,
Practitioners,
Teachers,
You know,
People who are wanting to wake up,
Wanting to live more consciously.
And I'm just,
I love being part of this community as I know you do as well.
We think we go back a hundred years,
We've just come out of the First World War.
And a few years after that,
We're about to go into a Second World War.
So there is,
But obviously there was what,
Three billion people then,
There's now nine billion people.
So it is a world that's got more people on it,
But then that's also got more potential for people to be awakened and mindful and respectful and thoughtful.
So in that context,
Are we a lot further on than we were a hundred years ago?
You know,
I find it difficult,
You know,
Cause when I think about where we are,
You know,
The mind tends to go into a very linear place,
A linear way of thinking.
You can look at,
You know,
Steven Pinker's books about,
You know,
Violence and how things are so much better today than they were,
You know,
200 years ago or 500 years ago in terms of your likelihood of living to a ripe old age and not getting killed by a neighboring tribe or whatever.
And in that sense,
It's right.
But I think we're talking about something,
You know,
Certainly,
You know,
The vast improvements being made in technology and in medicine and all of that.
And that's wonderful.
But I think what we're talking about is an inner shift.
It's really about a,
It's a shift in consciousness.
That's the key,
I think,
To change.
We need the changes in technology.
We need the changes in institutions and in laws.
All of that needs to happen.
But the most important change I feel is a change in the heart.
I love Leonard Cohen.
I'm a huge fan of his,
Of,
You know,
The late great singer-songwriter poet.
You know,
He says that the heart has got to open in a fundamental way in one of his songs,
Democracy.
And I think that's true.
The heart has got to open in a fundamental way,
Each of us,
Individually and collectively,
Kind of changing the way we see ourselves,
Changing the way we see our relationship with others,
How we relate,
And living from the heart more consciously,
More wisely,
More compassionately.
And so I just feel privileged to be part of this,
You know,
We could call it a movement,
Or this kind of this energetic shift,
I think,
That's going on,
That I think we're very much part of.
And so many of us,
I think,
Are those who are listening are very much part of too.
So let's just outline the shift.
So meditation is a good way to initiate the shift,
So it gives you that point of reflection,
Stillness,
And you don't run into the day like a bully in a china shop.
Right.
But let's imagine that meditation is the key.
Could you just give more detail of what you mean about this inner shift?
What does that really mean?
I think it means a shift in our own consciousness.
It's a shift about living with more intentionality.
Like what do I care about most deeply?
How do I want to be?
How do I want to be in the world?
How do I want to be in my family?
What are the qualities of heart that I want to bring?
And then having clarity about our intentions,
About how we want to show up in our lives,
What really matters most to us.
Then in a really moment to moment,
Hour to hour,
In kind of engagement to engagement way,
How am I showing up right now sitting on this park bench on this typical late April London day around this beautiful pond with the ducks and the geese?
How am I showing up for this conversation?
How are you showing up for this conversation?
How are we,
You know,
What are the qualities of heart and engagement?
Am I here or am I halfway somewhere else,
You know?
And we can look at this in every engagement,
Every interaction in our lives.
Am I here?
Where is my attention?
And what is the quality of,
What is the attitude that I'm bringing to this?
What's my intention?
What is my intention here?
What is the way I'm showing up here?
And what am I,
You know,
What is my attitude to this moment?
Am I showing up kindly,
With acceptance,
With curiosity,
With interest,
Or am I somehow not quite here,
Somewhere else on autopilot,
In the future,
In the past?
And not as a judgment of that,
But just the mindfulness offers us the opportunity to see where we are somewhere else and say,
Okay,
I see that now.
Can I just come back and be here?
Can I show up for what this moment is asking of me?
This experience is asking of me.
Now,
Can I share something with you?
I don't think I've ever shared in all the hundreds of podcasts I've ever done.
People have always said,
You're quite a good interviewer.
And,
You know,
Some other people said,
It must take you ages to research these interviews and that sort of stuff.
And I've got to share with you,
I never ever have more than the first question planned.
I kind of know where we're going at the end of the interview.
I'll ask you what your website is and stuff like that.
And I'm going to share something that people are listening to.
You want to be a podcast interviewer,
Do not be thinking about your next question.
Absolutely listen to what the guest is saying.
And the first,
The next question will come naturally.
And it sounds like you're having a conversation as if you're on the same part bench.
Sometimes you're over Skype or Zoom or something like that.
And that's exactly what happens.
So,
What your words there probably be then to ask was,
Where is your curiosity going to take you next?
My curiosity over the next year or two will be around taking in information in lots of different ways,
From books,
From conversations,
From engagement in the world.
Kind of slowing down as much as I can to take in and reflect on where I am,
Where we are collectively.
And I don't mean just politically,
But including that.
And really see what I have to say,
What I have to share that can be of value and the different ways that can be of value.
Obviously writing a book is one way of kind of coalescing and synthesizing a way of seeing something.
In this case I'm talking about mindfulness and habit change,
But it could be something else.
And the other ways that I can be of help to myself and to others,
You know,
Insight time and meditations,
Talks,
Workshops,
Classes,
Retreats,
All of those different ways of kind of expressing.
What I care about most I think is waking up and living with freedom.
And I'm interested in that not as an individual,
Purely individual journey,
But a journey that I'm on with all beings,
You know,
A journey of all beings and how I can be of service both to myself and to others.
And that's kind of what I see as my,
You know,
Maybe if I'm here for a reason or a purpose,
That would be how I would see it.
Just to wake up and help others to live more consciously,
More compassionately,
More wisely,
More freely.
Well,
That's what a lovely thought that is,
Or set of thoughts.
So if people are more curious about you,
Finding out about you,
Getting you to show up in their world or listening to your meditations or reading your books,
Where's the best place you feel to find you?
My website is www.
Hugh-burne.
Com.
You can also find me through IMCW,
Insight,
Insight W,
Insight Meditation Community of Washington.
You may be familiar with that organization.
Tara Brach is the founder.
And the Mindfulness Training Institute is a group that I've co-founded,
Mindfulness Training Institute.
And you just Google those and that's mindfulnesstraining.
Org.
You can find out more information there as well.
And obviously on Insight Timer,
Which is just Insight Timer and my name,
Hugh Burne.
And you can find my page on there.
Fantastic.
We'll put all those links down at the bottom of the podcast.
So it's been a real joy and pleasure to speak to you.
I'm hoping this is the first of many,
Many conversations.
I certainly want to get you back on the show to talk about the new book and best of luck writing that.
And you very kindly said that you'd share a short meditation with us.
Now if you're driving right now,
Pull over.
It's not a good idea to meditate while you're driving.
Get yourself comfortable and over to you,
Hugh.
So just sense yourself wherever you are right now.
Sitting down or lying down or walking.
Just let your attention come into your body.
Feel sensations of contact with whatever you're sitting on or your feet with the floor.
The sounds around you.
Sounds in the background here of the ducks in Bushy Park,
West London.
If you like,
You can let your eyes gently close if you're in a place that you can do that.
Let your awareness come inward.
Drop down out of thinking.
Just bring your awareness for a moment to your breathing.
You might take a nice full deep in-breath or two.
Relaxing,
Releasing,
Letting go on the out-breath.
Just feel yourself here.
Feel the contact of your body with the earth.
Your skin with the air around you.
The space around you.
Just meet whatever is present for you right now with an attitude of acceptance and of kindness.
The poet Dorothy Hunt says,
Peace is this moment without judgement.
This moment in the heart space where everything that is is welcome.
Just take a full breath,
Relaxing on the out-breath.
Just appreciate yourself for taking this short time to come home to yourself.
To be present for yourself,
For your life.
And when you're ready you can open your eyes.
Come back to your day,
What you were doing before this meditation began.
I've been Tom Evans and thanks for listening to The Zone Show.
And for loads of books and resources to help you get in The Zone,
Come over to my website www.
Tomevans.
Co.
That's it for now.
