Yeah, and when you went to become a monk, what was that process like? Can you take us through that? And then also, once you were ordained, what's a daily life like as a monk?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So the process of ordaining was going to this meditation center called Dhammasuka that was also a monastery.

And Bhante provided temporary ordination.

So basically, you'd be given a Pali name, which is the language of the Buddha.

It's kind of like Sanskrit.

You'd be given a Pali name, shave your head, put on a pair of robes, and you take what are called precepts, which are like uh, essentially vows, but it's more of like principles of the training.

And if you can take us through that thought process, but also were there times where you, as you got into it, you had second thoughts, if so or not?

So what's

incredible is that this theory, this basically modern theory of cognitive neuroscience about how the brain works relates and maps on so well to some of the ancient biology.

uh, understandings of how the, of how the mind works, the subjective standpoint.

Uh, and one of these in, in Buddhism, uh, is famously called dependent origination.

And this is really the core of, uh, the historical Buddha, uh, Gautama's teaching about how the mind works and how to free ourself from stress and suffering.

And at a very basic level, um, We can think of these different layers of prediction that the brain is creating that take us out of the present moment.

The way I label this in the book is I talked about at the bottom we have sensory inputs.

What did you learn from them?

So how do we make it work in this Western world with your four words?

Yeah, the four R's, recognize, release, relish, and remain are a summary of Bonte's practice.

He actually had six R's, but I simplified it and run it by kind of the main teacher there now just to make sure.

But I think it's easier to remember four.

and these uh i'll run us through the micro level because this actually operates on both the micro and macro level on micro level we're going from unfit to fit states and on a macro level we're going from unfit to fit traits so that's in the book i i give kind of an ex i go into more detail than i can in the time we have here but essentially if you think about at any given moment your mind is either satisfied in the present or if you're like most of us, there's some kind of dissatisfaction.

It's thinking about something, it's worrying about something.

So the first step is to recognize that your mind has taken you out of the present.

And our relationship shifted drastically as a result of me keeping a picture right here and sending goodwill and smiling and loving him, sending the loving thoughts.

Can you say a little bit more about what you mean by that? Are you meaning to have more consistency with peace of mind, opening the heart, learning new tools like mental training tools? Can you say a little bit more about what you mean by wanting to deepen your practice and then how monastic life actually ended up deepening your practice?

It's a good question because my understanding of the practice evolved through my monastic training.

How I came to meditation was viewing it, I think, the way a lot of maybe Westerners or at least Americans view it, where there's a sense that you can have your daily practice and there's incredible benefits that come from sitting for even a few minutes.

And even in a busy life, a lot of people make time for even 30 minute or one hour daily sittings.

But there's so many of other activities throughout our day, it's harder to get into deep states of altered states of consciousness that can lead to more profound changes, lasting changes, and shifts in consciousness.

And so a lot of what I'd read about was people going on these 10-day silent retreats where it's easier to put aside all distractions, essentially meditate all day, alternating between sitting and walking and maintain a continuous flow of mindfulness, which builds a momentum and can lead eventually to deep insights and shifts in consciousness.

So I saw being a monk as an extension of that initially as a chance not just to attend a retreat, but essentially be on retreat all the time, or at least At the time, I still had some other responsibilities, but I could set aside large chunks of time where I was just practicing.

But I'm just curious, like how much of a hybrid of metta practice and say other classical forms of meditation, like mindful breathing, body scan, et cetera, did you practice?

For anybody that isn't aware of you and, and your work, can you just give us like a, an overview of the journey you've been on, say the past, uh, maybe the past decade, if you don't mind?

Yeah, absolutely.

Wow, it's, it's hard to think back over a decade, but I guess, uh, you know, I started out with a pretty standard, um, journey in some ways for kind of a, um...

I was on kind of a Western track towards finance and wanting to be successful in a material way of making money.

And, um, so that was kind of my thoughts from high school and in through college.

Um, I studied at Yale University, and I was, um, pretty convinced I was gonna go into finance, which is what my dad had, uh, uh, worked in and also my brother.

And it was kind of the world that I grew up in and was also, um, maybe subconsciously, um, believing that that was the, the way to be happy, was to make a lot of money and, um, get the house and the, the car and the, um, all the things that kind of the American dream sells in some ways.

Is this, is this what we're saying here?