[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome everyone to this really lovely interview with Earl Bernie who just came so present, so focused, so open to the interview.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was interesting because we don't know each other and [SPEAKER_00]: We didn't do any kind of pre-interview preparation, just a couple of emails back and forth.

[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, we start off on a very delicate note, like two things came up right away.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I just really admire how Earl handled that, how he was able to just be with what is the question that is and not shy away from it.

[SPEAKER_00]: to just be thoughtful and respond and not judge me or himself or how the conversation was unfolding.

[SPEAKER_00]: And just this ability to stay present even when things get a little bit uncomfortable or awkward.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I know I'm probably teasing you to say, wow, what are they going to talk about?

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm really not trying to do that.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm trying to say that I think this interview in and of itself was just such a lovely example of living yoga off the mat.

[SPEAKER_00]: We hear that all the time.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's such a catchphrase like, oh, [SPEAKER_00]: Take your yoga off the mat.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's not about all the postures.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's about how you live your life.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then we turn around and we do something really mean or nasty or inconsiderate.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I just felt like the whole interview was an example of just staying together in a present way, letting whatever comes up emerge, and being okay with whatever comes up.

[SPEAKER_00]: digesting it, moving on, going to the next moment of life.

[SPEAKER_00]: I had that feeling that, oh, he's doing it right now.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is it.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I hope you like this interview.

[SPEAKER_00]: For me, the pace, the subtlety of it, the presence and awareness that Earl showed us today was really, really lovely.

[SPEAKER_00]: All right, let's go meet Earl.

[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the Yoga Therapy Hour season nine.

[SPEAKER_00]: When I had this idea about a year ago that we could take an entire year for all of you to come on the podcast and tell your stories, I had no idea how overwhelming the response would be and how amazing it would be to get to know so many of you are faithful listeners.

[SPEAKER_00]: I've gotten to know friends and see faces and connect with hearts.

[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, so many people that I didn't even know were out there.

[SPEAKER_00]: People just like you and I.

I'm so grateful.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the response has been so large that I can't take any more stories for the rest of the year.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's many weeks where I have two podcasts every Thursday scheduled for recording to try to respond to this wonderful thing of having so many people willing to share.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're no longer needing anyone to sign up for telling your story.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you really feel strongly, I could put you on a waiting list in case someone cancels.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I want to thank all the people who came forward to make this year on the Yoga Therapy Hour.

[SPEAKER_00]: So successful.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm so grateful to you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Alright, let's go meet our guest for today and hear another story.

[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome, Earl.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's so nice to meet you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks, Aaron.

[SPEAKER_00]: Earl, where are you joining us from?

[SPEAKER_00]: Just so our listeners can imagine me near Minneapolis, Minnesota and you are.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I mean, Brooklyn, I've been in New York for five years and soon to head back to the desert in Arizona.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, uh, wait.

[SPEAKER_02]: I used to live away south east, tiny, on the outside of Bowie.

[SPEAKER_02]: We started a retreat center.

[SPEAKER_00]: Wow, all right.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I want to hear more about that too, but let's fold off on that till the end when we tell you how they can be in touch with you and what you're doing these days.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, Earl, you and I don't know each other, and we're just meeting, and I always say, if the guest is willing, I just like to keep it really fresh.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like, we're having a cup of coffee together.

[SPEAKER_00]: We've just sat down at a cafe, we're meeting for the first time.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, that's kind of where we are.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, what are you, tell us about your first yoga class?

[SPEAKER_00]: I think you said I was in, [SPEAKER_02]: My first yoga class, that's a funny story.

[SPEAKER_02]: My very first yoga class was probably right around then.

[SPEAKER_02]: Gosh, I mean, to be honest, I wasn't prison.

[SPEAKER_02]: I was in New Zealand.

[SPEAKER_02]: Somebody pulled out a Yingar book, the light on yoga.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we were just talking in the library?

[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know where he got her from.

[SPEAKER_02]: I maybe the library was terrible.

[SPEAKER_02]: But yeah, he just got the book and we were going through some poses.

[SPEAKER_02]: That was really the very first time.

[SPEAKER_00]: Wow.

[SPEAKER_02]: And here we are.

[SPEAKER_00]: Did you?

[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, such an interesting way to start.

[SPEAKER_00]: So were you immediately hooked?

[SPEAKER_00]: Was it like, this is kind of esoteric?

[SPEAKER_00]: What is it?

[SPEAKER_00]: Like, do you remember?

[SPEAKER_00]: It's quite a long time ago.

[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, yeah, it was very new.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it was coinciding with the start of me.

[SPEAKER_02]: I'd always kind of been interested in philosophy.

[SPEAKER_02]: not interested in religion, but interested in what's the meaning of the world?

[SPEAKER_02]: Why are we here?

[SPEAKER_02]: What's the solid about?

[SPEAKER_02]: Which, you know, some ways kind of led me to where I was at at that time.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I had never seen a yoga mat.

[SPEAKER_02]: There wasn't a yoga studio in every corner.

[SPEAKER_02]: Right.

[SPEAKER_02]: It wasn't a thing.

[SPEAKER_02]: So I was very into sports.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, at that time, lifting a lot of weights.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it right away felt like a new challenge.

[SPEAKER_02]: It felt complimentary to being in the weight room.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it just felt kind of goofy and we're doing headstands.

[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if I'd say I fell in love right away, but I definitely did not fall in love, but I didn't think, oh, this is stupid.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that's an obstacle for some people today.

[SPEAKER_02]: Sometimes I think people think yoga can be weird.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: If it's new to them or outside of their life experience.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: But you must have saw something in those early days because I read that five years later, you were actually in India, I practicing every day in my store.

[SPEAKER_00]: So that's some seed month planted for you to then, you know, find my sore.

[SPEAKER_02]: When I started a jumped in pretty quick, I have been to my sore.

[SPEAKER_02]: Mainly I studied, I was living in Arizona and my teacher been to my sore, I don't know, fifteen times, sixteen times.

[SPEAKER_02]: So I started to struggle with her a lot and I jumped in to, you know, five and a half days a week, hour and a half practice for [SPEAKER_02]: seven eight years maybe more tend to like really consistently for a long time.

[SPEAKER_00]: But like primary series.

[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.

[SPEAKER_00]: That is intense.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_02]: I kind of joke like we ended up dating.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it was my partner at the time and that was the best way for me because she was going to be at the yoga studio at six a.m.

[SPEAKER_02]: every morning and sure cell I had to be there with her.

[SPEAKER_02]: So great.

[SPEAKER_02]: She was an amazing teacher, amazing woman.

[SPEAKER_02]: And she was diabetic teacher as well.

[SPEAKER_02]: And you really lived the teachings and we didn't live them very purely.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it's great.

[SPEAKER_02]: I got to learn from a teacher that was walking their talk.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I want to say, I mean, I know people don't want to hear this, but back in the late nineties, nobody was upset that a teacher would date a student, you know, like you think are way different now.

[SPEAKER_00]: But back then, I remember nobody was complaining about that.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was a very, very common thing.

[SPEAKER_00]: Do you agree with that?

[SPEAKER_02]: I was part of a yoga community and later even more kind of an extreme community.

[SPEAKER_02]: And of course, that's who we hang out with.

[SPEAKER_02]: That's who we're influenced by.

[SPEAKER_02]: Of course, we're going to date people in our scene and in our community and our social circles.

[SPEAKER_02]: So recognizing the huge potential for abuse and all of the abuse that has happened.

[SPEAKER_02]: But kind of separating those two things, normal people having very healthy relationships and teachers abusing even consciously.

[SPEAKER_02]: Through lack of awareness, I think a lot of times.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I think back then, we hadn't heard of all, I mean, I'm sure people on the inside of each organization had seen in herd of potential abuses that were happening.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I don't think we had it out there in the magazines on TV and on social media, like it really was kind of compartmentalized is what I experienced back then.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: All right.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, where do you want to go from here?

[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like we started off on a woo!

[SPEAKER_00]: We've got to get to the joy, the peace, the love, all of that.

[SPEAKER_00]: But you tell me, where do you want to go from here in this interview?

[SPEAKER_00]: And what do you want to talk about?

[SPEAKER_02]: First of, I think, we've been talking about yoga.

[SPEAKER_02]: And for me, my paradigm about yoga is not yoga on a yoga mat.

[SPEAKER_02]: When I think of yoga, I must think of meditation.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then I believe that's how the word was originally used.

[SPEAKER_02]: If we go back two thousand years and read the literature of the times, it really meant meditation.

[SPEAKER_02]: So when I think of yoga, it's not just the physical lesson, it's the meditation, it's a lifestyle, it's the morality, it's what I do day to day, it's not compartmentalized.

[SPEAKER_02]: But this one of the things I'm really into now is to really erase the lines between, well, now I'm practicing yoga, now I'm practicing meditation, now I'm studying this text.

[SPEAKER_02]: And now I'm not practicing.

[SPEAKER_02]: And to see yoga is a much more moment to moment thing that I do that I'm trying to live my life through the eyes of what does it mean to me to be a yoga.

[SPEAKER_02]: which I think, again, might have a weird connotation for people, you know, someone that's dropped out of society or someone, you know, originally back in the day of a meditator, in the Himalayas or something, but it's very powerful feeling of how I want to walk through the world, you know, with love and wisdom and compassion.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that to me is, you know, kind of how I relate to you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.

[SPEAKER_00]: I was just studying when my teachers this morning and they were basically saying the chapter one of Patangeli's yoga sutras for the more advanced practitioner that's already kind of mastered chitta prasadana, mastered kind of a pleasant mind, someone who has good speech, patterns meaning they speak at the right time, the right place in the right way, people who have [SPEAKER_00]: been able to master their senses and not be so attached or averse to the external world.

[SPEAKER_00]: So all of that to me speaks to what you're saying that that's a lived experience moment by moment.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it really may or may not have anything to do with your down dog.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's funny.

[SPEAKER_02]: I'm right now teaching chapter two.

[SPEAKER_00]: And are you?

[SPEAKER_02]: The Coral of the, you know, the implication of chapter one for the smart students.

[SPEAKER_02]: And well, here we are in chapter two.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, we just started chapter two again, and I just laughed this morning because I'm like, yeah, this is probably the chapter I need to be at.

[SPEAKER_00]: Most of us, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: So, you tell me, what do you see in chapter two?

[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it starts off with Kriya Yoga.

[SPEAKER_00]: What does that have to do with living our yoga?

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I think chapter two would get a couple different ideas on systems of yoga, the Kriya Yoga, and then the Ustanga Yoga, what the text I think is probably most known for.

[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe eight limbs.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, learn the eight limbs.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like eight aspects of yoga.

[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's getting a chapter one is much more mental.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's much more the chapter on meditation.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I always think of, you know, fruit.

[SPEAKER_02]: Let's skip texts.

[SPEAKER_02]: Let's go to the Gita when I think it's Krishna says, oh, Arjuna, the mind is as hard to control as the wind or maybe Arjuna says that to Krishna, can't remember.

[SPEAKER_02]: The mind is as hard to control as the wind.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that's very true.

[SPEAKER_02]: I think that we try to find our happiness and think of that as such a mental process.

[SPEAKER_02]: If I could just be happy and we kind of think of the mental process of being happy.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think what's cool about the second chapter is now removing into the physical practices of yoga or how we act in the world.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then we can have two ways of approaching our happiness.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's not just a mental game, but is there a connection between my mind and my body?

[SPEAKER_02]: And then if so, there's a whole new physical approach that I can use to planning happiness, which I think people can relate to, you know, in a different way.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like, I feel like I can control, you know, raise my arm.

[SPEAKER_02]: I can do that.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, absolutely do that.

[SPEAKER_00]: Very tangible.

[SPEAKER_00]: Can you inhale and lift your arm for the same number of counts of your breath and your arm moving up?

[SPEAKER_00]: Focus the mind.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, you know, to say we'll just be happy or to control your mind, it can be frustrating.

[SPEAKER_02]: But then if we can use our body to control our mind, then that gives us another avenue to think is tangible and real and perhaps more accessible for some or most people.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, we start to get into that in chapter two a little bit.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think it's important to point out that for most people going from the gross fiscal body to the more subtle, the breath, to the more subtle the mind, that that is a pretty great way, as Patanjali talks about, to bring ourselves to this chitta prasadanam and this pleasant mind and clear mind most importantly.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I have seen a lot of people, especially through yoga therapy, that their body no longer has access to do the postures.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I always like to say that doesn't mean they can't do yoga, and they can't get there.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're just going to come in through a different doorway through praningama, through meditation.

[SPEAKER_00]: What do you think of that?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's where my mind went.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like we can hopefully all breathe.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think it's not even maybe that extreme of, you know, can most people even just do some simple movement and the help benefits from that.

[SPEAKER_02]: But I think the whole yoga journey kind of become a little bit physically extreme of, I can't tell you how many people are here.

[SPEAKER_02]: I can't do that.

[SPEAKER_02]: I can't do yoga.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's too hard.

[SPEAKER_02]: this conception of or a vision of people doing very extreme poses as that being yoga.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think as people have been doing those extreme poses for decades, you know, I've got a lot of friends that are getting hip replacements now and chronic shoulder injuries.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think everyone's going to kind of chill out a little bit.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so that's uh, you can go to a list of these folks for flexible and maybe that isn't actually the goal and to look at more [SPEAKER_02]: ways that we engage in yoga practice that can span a lifetime, and that is going to look different at different phases in our life.

[SPEAKER_02]: But yeah, at some points in our life, it might just look like...

How do you know?

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, even at I'm almost fifty-five, and my body just does not want to be pushed into a lot of hard posture anymore, and actually I can get injured quite easily, [SPEAKER_00]: if I don't do it very mindfully and keep it simple.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so many of my students like secretly admit to me like, I can't really do the postures anymore.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I said, yeah, we can.

[SPEAKER_00]: We just have to tame it down a little bit if we need to and just do it really slowly with breath.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, in some even ask, can I just skip that?

[SPEAKER_00]: Cause yoga, postures don't work for me.

[SPEAKER_00]: Pilates works better.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I said, sure, if that's what you want to do, that's fine.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't feel we need to be that rigid.

[SPEAKER_00]: Do you have an opinion on that?

[SPEAKER_02]: Anyone doing that?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I agree.

[SPEAKER_02]: I grew up in a very dogmatic, stonga, was a set series.

[SPEAKER_02]: And you know, and it was great for me at that time.

[SPEAKER_02]: And now, when I think of yoga, like, what's the most important yoga pose that I could do?

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, it might just be like, you know, like a job.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you're hand on your own shoulder padding, it's saying it can be okay, you're all right.

[SPEAKER_02]: Hard to say, you reached out to someone that needed it.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's more important to me than down dog, to be honest, like how am I doing it walking through the world with integrity?

[SPEAKER_02]: How am I doing it entering into difficult conversations with love?

[SPEAKER_02]: That's what the poses are aimed at.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so I'd rather evaluate myself on, you know, am I trying to work out and weed out the little lies that I continue to say or, you know, trying to, you know, [SPEAKER_02]: I'm good at not lying, but I'm not always good at the whole truth.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, like, so how am I doing?

[SPEAKER_00]: I just had this discussion this morning.

[SPEAKER_00]: We had an electrician over here this morning, and I was like, well, just tell him this.

[SPEAKER_00]: My husband said that that's emitting some facts.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm like, yeah, you're right.

[SPEAKER_00]: It is.

[SPEAKER_00]: like the wait till he asks you you don't need to give it all up in a text and I said if he asks you of course he should he said honey I'd rather just write it out you know get it all out there like okay fine [SPEAKER_00]: You caught me, Earl.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, one of the questions you had told me in a written exchange, you said a well-known teacher once said, how will you know when you have accomplished something in yoga?

[SPEAKER_00]: Do you have any thoughts or reflections on that?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that is the answer was very beautiful.

[SPEAKER_02]: It was when I can walk through the room with elegance and grace, like that being the yoga pose that I want to attain.

[SPEAKER_00]: What does Ella Dickinson grace mean to you?

[SPEAKER_00]: I think words matter.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like when you say that, I'm picturing like a beautiful Yogiini in her adorned golden jewelry and sorry and being graceful.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think there's something more than that that you mean by that.

[SPEAKER_02]: I would love it if it was that too.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's like the inside and the outside.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think we can't have that outside of it's not on the inside first.

[SPEAKER_02]: Otherwise it's kind of fake.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like if I'm not living my life with integrity, I teach a lot and teaching is the best for realizing the disconnect between what we say and what we do.

[SPEAKER_02]: Often when I'm teaching, I'm like, I should listen to myself.

[SPEAKER_02]: And to what I should really, if I did what I told what I taught, my life would be awesome.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, so many of us teachers laugh.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like we say, we hear our own voices.

[SPEAKER_00]: And again, my husband hears me teaching it calls me out.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like we hear our own voices say this stuff.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we really do mean it.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we are aspiring to be that.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we're sharing the teachings as they were taught to us.

[SPEAKER_00]: But it doesn't mean that we do it every day or we're good at it, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: I think that kind of has been a learning curve for me to have that humility and that honesty and to catch myself teaching as the ultimate in hypocrisy.

[SPEAKER_02]: To catch those moments of hypocrisy and [SPEAKER_02]: but then to try to be processed focused instead of end focused and try to be that who I think it's a lie for me what I'm into right now is establishing my core values.

[SPEAKER_02]: Who do I want to be in my life?

[SPEAKER_02]: What are my core values?

[SPEAKER_02]: And then that yoga of the moment to moment of living it, moment to moment.

[SPEAKER_02]: So then if I am true to that, then hopefully I will be walking through the room with that elegance [SPEAKER_02]: If my inside was true to those core values, then I think the outside would reflect that.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I love the first word of the yoga sutras at home.

[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, now, home that idea of like now yoga, like now let's do yoga.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like there's always an opportunity to be doing yoga now.

[SPEAKER_02]: Now, now I go, okay, I didn't do my practice yesterday.

[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, I didn't kind of mean to that person.

[SPEAKER_02]: I kind of lied to the electrician yesterday.

[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't try, he wouldn't let me.

[SPEAKER_02]: Get go about.

[SPEAKER_02]: I can do something.

[SPEAKER_02]: What again again?

[SPEAKER_02]: I have another opportunity to be who I want to be in touch.

[SPEAKER_02]: Try again, you know?

[SPEAKER_02]: It's okay.

[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.

[SPEAKER_00]: And to be gentle with ourselves.

[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I'm laughing at myself that I kind of have to, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: That when we catch ourselves not to be too harsh.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like, okay, we want to correct that.

[SPEAKER_00]: We don't want to be like that, but at the same time, we're not, you know, fledgulating and beating ourselves up over it.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're like, okay, I see that.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'll do better.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think so.

[SPEAKER_00]: Our students at Maryland University of Integrative Health, we had a whole lecture on ethics the other day with Michelle Bowles, and she brought this idea of cognitive dissonance to the surface.

[SPEAKER_00]: And first of all, a lot of people didn't know what that meant, that there was some value internal that was not matching up with their behavior, their thoughts, their actions.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that there might be some friction there or uncomfortableness there because the inside wasn't matching the outside.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I think a big part of our yoga practice is to notice that cognitive dissonance.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because we can just ignore it and those little weird feelings we have inside.

[SPEAKER_00]: We can go have a drink or we can go [SPEAKER_00]: Our workout, there's a lot of ways to avoid it, but to feel those uncomfortable sensations of, oh, I'm not actually living the values that I set for myself.

[SPEAKER_00]: So how do we do that?

[SPEAKER_00]: How do we notice it?

[SPEAKER_00]: Because isn't that the first step?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think that's a great question that we've, you know, tasked ourselves.

[SPEAKER_02]: I got a couple ideas for me.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, one is just being less busy, like trying to steal our life back from technology.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_02]: So meditation is, for me, one aspect of that so I can sit and try to have a little moment of that freedom from busyness in the morning.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then often that, yeah, things will bubble up that allow hopefully for that reflection or realization of cognitive, of what you described.

[SPEAKER_02]: One of the things that I've done for a long, long time, one of my teachers are suggested that we do goes back to those core values [SPEAKER_02]: you know, got created a big, long list of what those are.

[SPEAKER_02]: It took some ideas from Buddhist scriptures and different ideas of vulnerability and it's like stop six times a day.

[SPEAKER_02]: and check.

[SPEAKER_02]: You call it a six times book.

[SPEAKER_02]: And you could use like the Yama's and Yama's from the yoga suture like don't do these things try to do these things ten commandments or whatever anybody wanted as their core values or what I wanted and then like okay I don't lie okay you know speak truthfully okay well I kind of wanted to you know not tell everything the electrician didn't do that so great it's calling me out or [SPEAKER_02]: get it done better there, but it's exhaling of it.

[SPEAKER_02]: There's a positive of like, but I didn't, you know, I didn't do it.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then like a to-do of like, okay, I don't know, something that's training our mind and the direction that we want to go.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's one of the things that I found really helpful is how do I carry that through with me in the day?

[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so I have that book.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's like a journal, it's like a meditation.

[SPEAKER_02]: I put it on top of my coffee machine.

[SPEAKER_02]: So if I went coffee in the morning, I have to first get my journal and look at what I've established is my core values and then okay, not harming how am I doing?

[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, well, I'm really trying to hard to be vegetarian last night, not so good.

[SPEAKER_02]: didn't make the choice I wanted to make in the restaurant.

[SPEAKER_02]: What did I do good?

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I've been, I don't know, it could be like in the desert, you know, if you left out water, lots of insight, you'd wake up in the morning that'd be cesspool of death.

[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, did the water out some beings would drown in it?

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, like just like that.

[SPEAKER_02]: So identify my core values and kind of track it through the day.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then the last thing that I thought has been really helpful for me is retreat.

[SPEAKER_02]: And to really try to every year, how's some time where I do some more isolated retreat?

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think two of the things you said, I mean, all three really resonate with me, but two of them specifically, which I feel are so hard, are to create the space and time to slow down, whether that's on a daily basis or a retreat, to have the space to even do the self-reflection or to not feel so rushed off to your next activity, like there's got to be space.

[SPEAKER_00]: for us to become regulated in our nervous system, to settle the mind, and then have some coffee reflection time.

[SPEAKER_00]: And what I'm saying, like, I think the way we pack our lives so well, it is almost impossible for us to do this deeper work of self-reflection in Yamaha, Niyama.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think it's easier to stay busy for a lot of people.

[SPEAKER_02]: I think we're dealing with an incredibly, incredibly addictive.

[SPEAKER_02]: thing that we carry around in our hand all day that choose up our time and our attention and creates like kind of eliminates boundaries of work, work is now potential of twenty four seven.

[SPEAKER_02]: When I think he goes back to the, I think about this a lot, it goes back to my core values of, well, what do I want in my life?

[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, well, I do want to have a meditation practice in the morning for thirty minutes.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I do want to do a little bit of spiritual reading or I want to do yoga or whatever it is.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so, okay, I've got to, you know, I wake up and I have my shower, you know, and then I'm gonna make some breakfast, you know, wake up at eight, and then I'll breakfast state thirty, and then, you know, I've got some time here on meditate, and then I gotta go to work.

[SPEAKER_02]: But then what happened here was I've opened my computer and, you know, I'll just read some news, and it's okay, because I can meditate at twelve.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm just eating them, like, ah, I'll do it tonight.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I've got some time after work, I'll do it tonight.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then someone's like, let's go up.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so what we're doing is we're fitting our meditation practice into our life.

[SPEAKER_02]: And what really was a turning point for me was doing it the other way around of, okay, my things that are important is my meditation yoga study, whatever.

[SPEAKER_02]: So my life has to fit into that.

[SPEAKER_02]: Because I'm meditating for me to lay thirty, there's nothing else that can go there.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so can I fit my life into my practice?

[SPEAKER_02]: And it's a little bit artificial because my practice is my work and my responsibilities with family and, you know, it's not quite that clean, but that mindset was very helpful for me to live the values that I had established for myself.

[SPEAKER_02]: When these became not negotiable, instead of these, [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's like bookmarks in our day that we come home to and prioritizing the bookmarks, the time where we just get to be for a few minutes versus if we let our day take over there, there will not be slots open for that.

[SPEAKER_00]: It just doesn't work that way.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it sounds easy.

[SPEAKER_02]: It sounds like you said it's incredibly difficult.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know about you if you have children living with you at the Diamond Mountain University.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have children, and I have total control over my schedule.

[SPEAKER_00]: I have a supportive spouse, and I still have trouble doing it.

[SPEAKER_00]: I can't even imagine the needs of a larger family, like how you could put up those boundaries.

[SPEAKER_00]: It would be really challenging.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and then we have to look at, you know, how can we engage in those things as our practice?

[SPEAKER_02]: I huge practice for me has been, I was taught to me as a meditation called harvesting joy.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it's just simple like walking down the street and then just stop.

[SPEAKER_02]: And like, is there something in my direct vicinity through one of the senses that I can recognize and enjoy?

[SPEAKER_02]: Can I hear children laughing or birds or the music?

[SPEAKER_02]: Can I smell something pleasant to smell of the coffee in my house this morning or, you know, just have a look around?

[SPEAKER_02]: And so just journey through the senses and is there something right now in my direct experience that's enjoyable?

[SPEAKER_02]: And when I was taught that, I was one of the times that I actually did the practice well, you know, most times I hear something cool, I blow it off and forget about it.

[SPEAKER_02]: But that I really did for my eighteen months every day, really tried to do it.

[SPEAKER_02]: And every single time I stopped, [SPEAKER_02]: there was something and it was such a cool experience to understand like we have such a you know our brain is wired to notice the negative we are hard and so we need to retrain the mind to be glass half full of fists [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think, you know, all that we know from Buddhism, from yoga, neuroscience is starting to actually show scientific results about things like you're talking about rewiring the neural pathways for positive as opposed to [SPEAKER_00]: There's a risk.

[SPEAKER_00]: I might not survive.

[SPEAKER_00]: I have to think about the negative.

[SPEAKER_00]: And in some ways, I feel like we are at such a precious time as humans when we can have this scientific knowledge matching up with the spiritual knowledge.

[SPEAKER_00]: We know it's true.

[SPEAKER_00]: We actually have access to these teachings amazingly, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: Like, it's a precious moment in time for each of us.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's cool to see it all coming together.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I also know that one of your big values that you've been wanting to live by is love.

[SPEAKER_00]: So tell me more about that value.

[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, putting me on the spot.

[SPEAKER_00]: My question to you is, what is one piece of advice you would give our listeners about your life?

[SPEAKER_00]: And you wrote, well, I don't tend to give advice much, but I guess if you pressed me and despite it sounding kind of tried, I would say everything is really all about love.

[SPEAKER_02]: That's nice.

[SPEAKER_00]: I stand by the producer.

[SPEAKER_02]: Again, words matter, what does love even mean to you?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, when I think about what I had written, I think it comes from, I did a three year retreat, I did a three year meditation retreat.

[SPEAKER_02]: There was times in that retreat when that internal, incessant monologue in the mind stops, in states of meditation, or even outside of formal sitting meditation practice.

[SPEAKER_02]: There were times that there was moments in that quietness and that stillness and that clarity that were just the mind is very bright and very vivid and very awake.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it felt like the cloud had, you know, the metaphor of the clouds and blocking the sun and the clouds moving the sun as they're shining it.

[SPEAKER_02]: It just made sense to me in the sense of [SPEAKER_02]: There's a state of love that is constant, that's not object-dependent.

[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't need a thing to love.

[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't need a thing to have as an object of that love, it was it.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's like a sponge soaked in water.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I believe them, we have that capacity.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, we could explain that with yoga physiology of prana in this energy channel.

[SPEAKER_02]: But to me, it was just like the experience of it was very profound, just that realization there.

[SPEAKER_02]: My love doesn't need to depend on what other people show me or do or give or think of me or anything.

[SPEAKER_02]: It doesn't depend on anything.

[SPEAKER_02]: Listen to interesting moments of fear also of like, I know I can't sustain that level right now.

[SPEAKER_02]: I know I'm going to come out of this state of meditation.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's going to fade.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I know that it could always be like that.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so it's going to be moments like that that really keep me inspired in my practice as I know where I want to go.

[SPEAKER_02]: I believe in there's these states that anybody can have, can access.

[SPEAKER_02]: So when I think of love, it's like that, it's more like a, I can have a very special love for my partner, wow, or the cat, or whatever, for my coffee, in addition to that, like really the capacity to be in a state of love that's not dependent on anything.

[SPEAKER_02]: That's kind of what I mean.

[SPEAKER_00]: I can see that state is beyond words to articulate that experience, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: It's too subtle, but what I'm getting from you, if I were to try to paraphrase it back and you can refine this is like there's a state of kind of unconditional positive regard of benevolence for all beings and all that is an openness or receptivity to connect if [SPEAKER_00]: It happens just feeling okay with things as they are in no resistance.

[SPEAKER_00]: Does any of that resonate?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it does.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that that love can be called into action in many different ways.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, it's not standing by in the face of injustice.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's that love is going to be called interaction in a way that might look more forceful or more powerful.

[SPEAKER_02]: The basis behind the intention of the action comes from a place like you said of connection or of concern or compassion.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_02]: It felt like that also very powerful.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like I'm not a dorm ad.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's not like that.

[SPEAKER_02]: So yeah, all of them.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, Earl, we just have a few minutes left and I want to know more about the Diamond Mountain University and what it is that you're doing, which I guess is in Arizona, yes.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, Diamond Mountain is a retreat center.

[SPEAKER_02]: I helped start in two thousand and four people from all over the world came and we did a seven year program, an advanced program in Tibetan Buddhism mostly, Yelgan.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then a group of people went into a three-year retreat.

[SPEAKER_02]: Diamond Mountain now exists as a retreat center for people who do personal retreat or group retreat.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's a beautiful center in the middle of the desert.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's very remote.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's very quiet.

[SPEAKER_02]: And the cabins are off-grid.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's a fantastic place for a personal retreat.

[SPEAKER_02]: I'm still involved in that organization and some other, you know, the main organization I teach for now is called the Yoga Studies Institute.

[SPEAKER_02]: an online platform and we develop yoga programs and meditation programs and philosophy programs.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then we distribute those programs around the world.

[SPEAKER_02]: So I do that.

[SPEAKER_02]: I teach locally in New York at a place called The Three Jewels, which is a yoga meditation studio.

[SPEAKER_02]: I have a really great group of teachers and a ton of classes online and really amazing.

[SPEAKER_02]: They have a two hundred hour meditation teacher training.

[SPEAKER_02]: They have a two hundred hour yoga teacher training.

[SPEAKER_02]: They leave retreats, beautiful community.

[SPEAKER_02]: So those are my two organizations I teach with now.

[SPEAKER_02]: So weekly classes, mostly I teach meditation and a lot of that is really focused on how to train the mind in single point of concentration and the techniques that we can do to it.

[SPEAKER_02]: to do there's a path which shouldn't be a mystery.

[SPEAKER_02]: We can follow the path.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'm amazed with the kind of the blueprint from Buddhism, as well as even Potangilisioga Sutra and some of the other texts about here's kind of the steps to get there.

[SPEAKER_00]: It really is a beautiful map for us.

[SPEAKER_00]: but it requires a teacher who's been working with that map who also has a teacher.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's not that easy to find someone who's really curious about helping others figure out how to get their minds to feel better more of the time.

[SPEAKER_02]: I think there's a lot of great yoga teachers and I think they will see the next way for [SPEAKER_02]: is we'll be meditation teachers and people will be reading some digital detox.

[SPEAKER_02]: There's a profound roadmap for how to train the mind and meditation.

[SPEAKER_02]: It was really helpful for me because I just sat down and meditated and I didn't have instructions and I developed all sorts of bad habits that I got worse.

[SPEAKER_02]: It took years to break out of those bad habits and to learn nine stage path.

[SPEAKER_02]: Each stage has its own problems and its own solutions and its own techniques that we can do them.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, thank you, Earl, for sharing so much of your heart with us today.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I know that you're off to teach this morning.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I want to wish you well in your teaching this morning and just want to say thank you for being here with us.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that was great.

[SPEAKER_02]: I really appreciate it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, thank you so much for being with us today, Earl.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was lovely to meet you and get to know a little bit more about who you are and how you work with your own self through your yoga practice, specifically more of a meditative, based yoga.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I wanted to show people the websites that kind of correspond with where you can find Earl Bernie.

[SPEAKER_00]: One of them is the yoga studies institute, which is www.yogastudiesinstitute.org.

[SPEAKER_00]: Beautiful website, transform your world, not just your body.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then another place that Earl works that I'd like to point out is the three jewels organization in New York City, which is www.threejoules.org.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's not your average yoga studio.

[SPEAKER_00]: So if you want to learn more and hear more about Earl Bernie, we'd love to have you check those resources out.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I think Earl has given us so much to think about today with respect to the Yamas, our social disciplines, the NAMAS, our personal way that we take care of ourselves.

[SPEAKER_00]: As the foundation, you know, in those eight limbs of Ashtanga yoga, it's take care of others, take care of yourself.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now, do your internal work.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now do some postures.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now do some breath work.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now see if you can draw your senses inward and start to have that one pointed focus of concentration.

[SPEAKER_00]: Then can you go deeper into the different layers of absorption and maybe eventually kind of let go of this sense of eye me mind so that you can feel a little bit more love or oneness or peace [SPEAKER_00]: all the different layers of samadhi, samadhi, to feel balanced within yourself.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I love that our discussion today really focused on these kind of foundational steps of finding out what our values are and then kind of observing ourselves tenderly as we follow through with what we value or also find ourselves maybe [SPEAKER_00]: not doing exactly what we said we value.

[SPEAKER_00]: And always knowing that we can change things around, too.

[SPEAKER_00]: We can say, OK, well, apparently I have not been able to live this value.

[SPEAKER_00]: So what support systems can I put in place?

[SPEAKER_00]: What else could I do to help me live the values that I talk about?

[SPEAKER_00]: So thank you so much, Earl, for helping us to reflect on this this morning.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's a great start to the week, and I wish all of you listening, so much goodness, so much benevolence, kindness, compassion, and sweetness as you go into your week.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you to our guests this week, and thank you to all of you who are listeners of the Yoga Therapy Hour.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not sure if you know, but I've had a life change in the last year.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm now the chair of Yoga Therapy and Ayurveda at Maryland University of Integrative Health.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are having some changes there.

[SPEAKER_00]: In the fall of twenty twenty five, we expect that a full merger will have happened with Notre Dame of Maryland University and we will become a graduate school at Notre Dame of Maryland University.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to be called the School of Integrative Health.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you're interested in a master's degree in yoga therapy, we'd love to talk to you, or if you're interested in a post-master's certificate, meaning you have a master's in some other area, but you would like to now come and study therapeutic yoga.

[SPEAKER_00]: We would also love to have a chance to show you our program.

[SPEAKER_00]: We also have certificate programs in Ayurveda.

[SPEAKER_00]: So if you're interested, just come to www.theoptimalstate.com and find me, or you can look us up at Notre Dame of Maryland University.

[SPEAKER_00]: Until the merger happens, we'll still be over at www.muah.edu.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for listening.

[SPEAKER_00]: We look forward to seeing you next week.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for listening to the yoga therapy hour.

[SPEAKER_00]: We wish you a wonderful week.

[SPEAKER_00]: We hope that somehow in a small way we've contributed to your well-being so that you can go out and share that well-being with others.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's what life is all about, bringing in the goodness through you and then shining it out to the world.

[SPEAKER_00]: We need you more than ever.

[SPEAKER_00]: So let's all get out there.

[SPEAKER_00]: Do good, be good, and have a great week.