Stop Playing It Safe with Adam Schomer – Spiritual But Not Ridiculous Ep. 5

Yeah, eventually we realize we are whole and perfect and that we could have just sat back and accepted ourselves in a beautiful way, right? But sometimes it takes some work to get to that ability to do that.

Yeah, it's like, uh, it's like to truly relax, you have to work hard, right? Is that part of it?

Is that a quote?

I don't know, I just made it up.

It's like, uh, like a sport. Sometimes you have to practice the skills so that when you're out in the field, you It's effortless, even though there's a ton of effort, but the skills come automatically.

Yeah.

So freedom is inherent, but sometimes because of what we're born into, we need practices to help us remember what's natural.

Yeah, I think that's right.

What's going on? Make it seem natural to translate. Well, let me ask you this then.

Yeah. All right, let me ask you this then. Let me ask— no, but let me ask you this though. What was I gonna ask?

Um, universe, beep filter.

Universe, and a coffee. You ready?

Absolutely. Who's listening out there?

Welcome to Spiritual But Not Ridiculous, a podcast that explores the world of spirituality from a grounded and clear-eyed perspective. I'm your host, Jaya Dev, a yoga teacher, Vedic astrologer, attorney, and technologist. Adam Shomer is a documentary film and TV director, writer, and producer, and the president of I2I Productions. Recently, he produced and released the incredibly successful Heal documentary, A number one iTunes bestseller and a Netflix hit. Adam has also directed and created The Road to Dharma, a 10-episode television series that has a powerful online companion course called Living a Life of Freedom. He is currently spearheading a global online summit for the Netflix hit and iTunes bestseller Fantastic Fungi. In addition to this, he is currently developing 3 docuseries and 2 features that are meaningful, inspiring, and like all his projects, Bring wisdom through entertainment. Adam is also a dear friend and personal inspiration to me. He's a great example of how spirituality and the spiritual path can be lighthearted and fun and authentic. In this episode, we explore the role of fear and forgiveness on the spiritual path, utopian communities and the importance of community, and giving people tools for living through the kind of elevated entertainment that Adam produces. We also talk about the power of following your heart, how to build resilience, and much more. Here is my conversation with Adam. All right, so I'm here with Adam Schomer, and Adam is an old friend of mine from India. Yeah, he's a Producer.

True.

Writer.

Yeah.

Director.

Yeah. Yogi. Yeah.

And a body surfer. Professional body surfer.

Professional. Yeah, there's a big circuit.

So yeah, so I appreciate you being on the podcast.

Absolutely.

You're one of my favorite people, longtime fan.

Thank you.

Yeah, so you're known for, among other things, The Highest Pass, a documentary about an Indian yoga teacher. Right?

You could say that. I think it's really about facing death and fear.

Right, right. Yeah, it's about a bunch of people on motorcycles going over the highest pass in the world. True. Was that Ladakh?

It is up through Ladakh. Yeah, yeah, Ladakh, northern India.

Yeah, yeah, beautiful, beautiful documentary. Highly recommend it. Thank you. Uh, early in your career, so very impressive.

First film.

Yeah, first film.

Hard— probably hardest ever, but first film.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's, it's impressive on many levels, but even just The fact that you got it is impressive, you know.

Meaning that we got the footage?

You got the footage, yeah.

And didn't die.

And didn't die.

That was what I was more impressed with. Like, it's like first-time producer, first-time director, and first-time motorcycle rider. Which was the hardest?

Right.

The motorcycling was the hardest because that's where you die. Right. So, and you, you fell, right, on that one?

No, that was later. That was later.

I'm sure I fell a couple times. Like, not hard falls, just, uh, like early in the trip there's a drop of the bike, like I went to pick up someone's sunglasses or something and forgot my bike was on.

You know, we can talk about that more, I guess.

Rookie mistake. Riding a motorcycle is dangerous when you don't know how to do it, right?

Yeah, right, right. Because at that point you've been riding for how long?

2 and a half weeks.

2 and a half weeks.

Yeah, before going on probably a very treacherous ride.

Yeah, yeah. Okay, highest pass. And then you've also done like the One Little Pill, right?

Uh-huh. Yep.

Heal, which I think everyone probably knows. Documentary about how the body can heal itself, right?

Yeah, empowering people to— through our emotions, through our thoughts. Yes, yes, the body heals on its own, that we also have more, more of a part to play in our healing than just taking orders from the doctor. It's not pissing on Western medicine. It's saying let's integrate, you know, kind of like integrative medicine, saying let's look at it holistically and say, hey, our emotions have something to do with it, our thoughts. Our visualization, our purpose in life. So we cover a lot of things in that film, and it's helped a lot of people. Very proud of that one.

Yeah, that's a beautiful film.

Thanks.

Yeah, and then you have your own production company, is that right?

Eye to Eye Productions.

Eye to Eye. Yeah, and so what's the focus there?

Uh, the focus of the production company?

Yeah.

Great question. Um, you know, the tagline is uniting entertainment and wisdom, right? So I came from a comedy background. I came from story in a narrative sense versus nonfiction. So I always wanted it to be entertaining, but I really felt that we needed the wisdom in our entertainment in order for it to like land home and actually change people, you know, rather than just be entertainment or drugs.

Yeah. Yeah.

You know, eye candy, if you will.

Right, right. I love that. Yeah. And it's important too, though, to make sure that the spiritual information or wisdom has an entertaining element to it too, right?

Yeah, it has stories so you can relate, right? One thing to hear like a You know, a dharma talk. But it's another thing to watch people go through something and have story and then weave in that wisdom and say, I can empathize with that character, and thus I can empathize with that wisdom maybe landing in my life.

Yeah.

I think it's— this is how we view story, you know, in the, in the past.

Yeah.

Before now, right? Before advertising, right, per se. No offense to your advertisers on this podcast. Advertising is fine, but yeah, um, But yeah, I mean, we should— we can use story for helping each other out.

Yeah, storytelling is so important. I mean, I've heard there was a quote somewhere, I forget who said it, but, you know, the universe is not made of atoms but of stories.

Oh, that's cool. Who said that? We don't know?

I don't know, I forget.

It's a good story.

Yeah, that's right. But yeah, so you and I met in India, I think maybe 4 years ago, because you were at the first summit at Satva, right?

I don't know if I was. I don't think so.

Okay, maybe later then.

Yeah, maybe later.

A couple years back, 3 years back maybe.

Yeah, I don't really know.

It doesn't matter.

I know we reunited in San Francisco, right?

Right. Yeah, yeah, we went to, uh, your showing of your, your new show. Yeah, right. Well, it's not new now, but, uh, Road to Dharma. Road to Dharma. Yeah.

And then didn't we go to— when you were working at that place, what, Airbnb or something?

Oh yeah, I met you for lunch at Airbnb.

Yeah, yeah, that's right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. You're— yeah. So you have Road to Dharma, which is a series.

Series. So Highest Path was the first film. And then Road to Dharma was like, hey, let's— I want to do this again, but I want to do, you know, I want to focus more on the other riders rather than just my own journey and the guru, Anand. And really, with a series, have more time, you know, to go into the wisdom, to go into the characters, you know, 10 episodes. Now you're talking, what, half-hour episodes? That's 5 hours to really dive deep into things. Whereas in a feature, you have a certain pacing, like I talked about that narrative pacing, entertainment value you got to keep to. So I really want to do it as a series. A lot of people said, no, you're good at feature length, stick to what you're good at. I'm like, no, this has to be a series. And so I did. And thus, you know, an independent series was born, and, and even a course to go along with it and a lot of other cool things.

Right.

But, uh, in essence, you know, riding through the motor— on motorcycles through the Himalayas to sacred sites, and, uh, again, experiencing fear and death while looking for something that I think is dear to everybody, which is Freedom.

Yeah, that's it. Yeah, yeah. And those 2 things are connected, right? Freedom and fear are basically 2 sides of a coin.

They can be.

Yeah.

Um, how do you think so?

Well, I think, you know, it's, it's only by transcending your fear or moving into it with intention that you can become truly free, right? That's going to be part of my practice anyways.

Yeah, I think so. Yeah, I would agree. Of course, right?

Um, What's your relationship to fear these days?

Yeah.

Let's start there.

Relationship to it is good. It's a really good question. My relationship to fear is that it can be a beacon of growth. So when you see it come up, it's not like, hey, I'm not good enough. Why am I still afraid? No, it's like, oh cool, I'm pushing the limit a bit. That's good. I'm afraid. I'm pushing myself to be courageous again. So that's good. I must be out of my comfort zone. This is all good. So my relationship to fear is that. And then sometimes my relationship to fear is, um, still then reacting to it and then having to afterwards go back and go, wait, oh, I see, I was afraid and that reaction came for that. So my relationship sometimes is 30 minutes later.

Mm-hmm.

And then recognizing what drove my actions and going, oh, that was fear of loss. Or that was one thing recently, like just feeling like the loss of something, um, and watching the brain Project into the future and like, I'll plan this, maybe I'll do this, this. And then I was like, no, no, no, no, no, no, you're just feeling loss right now, or the fear of loss of something. It's really more, you know, let me feel that for a while.

Yeah. Do you have an example of, of a loss that you want to talk about?

Uh, let's say like even relationships, something's ending, right? And okay, maybe I'll say this to this person in the future, tomorrow, or this, or reconcile a different way. And it's like, no, actually just feel what's happening. It's changing. The relationship is changing. That part's done. And there comes fear with it of like, oh, I'm not going to have this or this and this part of it anymore. That's where I think the fear is.

And the fear is partly sort of a fear of having to feel that feeling, maybe. Is that part of it?

I think inherently we have a fear of having to feel that and the fear of like maybe the addictive quality of not having the things you want all the time. And then where am I going to get those things that I have? You know? And you go, whoa, whoa, whoa. Before I take that fear and start planning, which I think a lot of us do. Yeah, get the input of fear from society and then go plan to avoid it. Yeah, why not just feel like, oh, things are changing? That's all that's happening. Yeah, delta, right?

Life is changing.

Life is changing. That's what happens. Yeah, you know, and go, oh, that meaning things are always dying and things are always rebirthed. Like, that is actually life.

Right.

Versus avoiding that part and going, oh, let me for once feel that thing called loss.

Right.

And not have to run from it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's beautiful. Part of what you're talking about too is, is getting comfortable with just feeling intense emotions, right? So is that part of it?

I think so. For me, meditation has been like the key to be able to do that.

Yeah.

It's made me a human that can feel something versus run away from feelings.

Yeah. Yeah. I feel like learning to feel your feelings is such a huge part of the spiritual path.

Yeah.

I mean, I've spent entire, you know, meditation sessions just crying on the mat, you know, or on the meditation cushion.

This is beautiful.

Yeah.

This is like, I mean, what's important to me on the spiritual path, because this, I know your listeners are spiritual or looking at spirituality, right?

Right.

Is that if it doesn't apply to the human being and our experience here on earth, then like, what good is it?

Yeah.

Anything, even a belief system. If it doesn't translate into how we live— I was talking to someone the other day that was like, I believe I'm an alien. I came from this planet. You're this type of alien. This person's this type of alien. And I'm like, okay, you know, and then I just said, what's that do for you?

Right.

You know, what's that actually— well, makes me feel like I can actually love myself because these qualities of that alien are what I am, and I no longer have to think that's weird because I'm part of something. I'm like, oh, that's beautiful then.

Yeah, it's like a form of self-acceptance.

Self-acceptance. And if it means like you, you feel you're an alien, or you feel you're a Christian, or you feel whatever, if that helps you feel more self-love and thus be more available to others, all right, cool.

Yeah, I mean, it reminds me of, uh, I mean, in a sense what you're talking about is just different kinds of archetypes, right? And I feel like in the yoga tradition we have the same model basically, right? We've got the different Deities, the gods and goddesses.

Yeah.

And you might identify with one, and that helps you to accept yourself more or whatever. And if that's aliens, hey, you know.

I think it's a good way of saying it with the deities. Exactly. It helps remind you of parts of yourself. And I don't have to believe the story that this person cut that one's head off and the tusk came and did that.

Right.

That's a parable to help me understand something. I don't have to believe it happened.

Yeah. It didn't have to happen.

Right. Didn't have to happen.

Right. Yeah. And these are all just stories. Like I was saying, the universe is made of stories, right?

You did say that.

Well, we're done.

The whole podcast is done.

We figured it out. There we go. It's a wrap.

What'd it take, 7 minutes? The shortest podcast ever. I covered my, you know, a couple movies. We're good.

Yeah, yeah. Well, this is for the side series I have called Spiritual But Not That Long.

That's awesome.

Well, um, so this podcast is in large part about exploring the entire world of spirituality, you know, not just yoga per se, let's say, but, but everything is open to everything and, and exploring in a way that's like grounded and sort of clear-eyed, you know, and accessible, you know. And so with that, with that approach, you know, I like to hear how people have come to different practices or spirituality. So do you want to talk a little bit about your journey with spirituality?

Sure.

Your story a little bit?

I'll do the quicker version and then we can dive into little areas that I think are more important. But my first real jump into meditation was in college. I was 18. Is that right? Yeah, 18. And, um, someone had a meditation tape. It was really body relaxation and then just being with the breath. It was awesome. I think we smoked some weed and did it, and I thought it was great. But as soon as someone said, I have this tape, I was like, yes. So I was primed. I was ready.

You were primed.

I don't know why I was so ready. Partly probably because, you know, science-minded kid, but I did some mushrooms in later years of high school, and maybe that helped open up. But even before that, Deepak Chopra's book Ageless Body, Timeless Mind for was merging quantum physics and spirituality, and that worked for me as a science-minded kid. And before that, I had read Gandhi's autobiography. I believe actually in seventh grade I picked it up and just started reading it early, early, and was just like I can't you know at night I remember like late into the night just kept going and going and going. And then I remember I you know I had neighbors that were Indian. I grew up with the smells and a lady that had overcame cancer without chemo and just. You look at these little things that might have been leading up and priming me at a young age, but I think I was also just intuitively, or inherently would be a better word, interested.

Yeah.

So when it was there, I just grabbed it. And then from college, kept exploring, you know, different books on meditation, retreat here and there, like one in Australia. And it stayed with me into my 20s. Actually, I retired. I played pro soccer, kind of like semi-pro soccer, and I retired around age 23. And went to Thailand for a month and just was in silence in Thailand. Yeah. Took a silent retreat and was at a monastery.

Yeah. Wow.

The silent retreat was 10 days, but I was at the monastery for about a month.

Was that vipassana or some other?

It was for the most part. It wouldn't be a strict vipassana per se. It was at the Wat Buddha Dharma Center in Surat Thani, the south, south of Thailand.

Yeah.

Really sweet. You know, you pay $20, right? And it's food, lodging, and teachings. You're like, these people are You know, just giving it right at these moments. Just like, make it available.

Yeah, it's like an act of service for them.

Yeah, absolutely. It was really amazing.

So you went deep there. That was a good experience for you. Amazing experience.

Amazing, amazing experience. And I remember fighting it the first few days, like, I should— I'm young, I should be out climbing rocks in the movie with DiCaprio, you know, whatever that was called, or something. And then finally I settled in. I'm like, this is where I'm at. I'm doing this. I'm silent, and I just really loved it.

Yeah.

I was like, oh, this is, this is good. So again, I think I, you know, something in me is primed for this work for whatever reason. And I stuck with it with my— through my 20s. It was always part of my life, even when I did improv comedy. I remember at Second City, I trained at Second City for a couple years in Detroit. They asked me, level 3, literally level 3, we're talking about levels, the third level of the class, they go, hey, um, why are you guys doing this? Why are you studying comedy? People are like, I want to be on SNL, I want to be in this. I said, it's the yoga of comedy. And people are like, what, hippie? What's going on?

Like, no, they said that, yoga of comedy.

That's what I said.

That's what you said. Okay.

I'm like, this is the yoga of comedy. So it's still in my life. This is around age 27. I was really— it was like, oh, this comedy is about being in the moment. It is about being adaptable. You have an idea for a scene, but somebody else throws something in. You have to drop your idea. Your idea dies, and then you move into the next idea and have to Right. And I said, this is not only a fun thing to do, but it's an art that really teaches me how to live in the yogic sense.

Yeah, you have to be so present to be a good improv person, right?

Yeah, yeah. So yeah, I don't want to practice things that aren't— that are taking me away from that, right? Which is part of why I stopped acting, because I found like in acting you are willfully going into the kind of the samskaras of a character and playing those out. And I'm like, why am I memorizing other people's subconscious beliefs every day? And Acting them out. I'm still working on mine, right? You know, right. So part of that, after a while, I was like, I don't really want to do that anymore. And that's when that was actually my third time going to India, where I decided to drop acting and really focus on writing and producing. And that's where that first film came from.

Yeah, yeah. First documentary, The Highest Pass. Yeah, beautiful. Yeah, you know, and you're in good company. I mean, not to jump ahead too far, I think we'll probably come back to this at the end, but. You know, having part of your experience start with mushrooms, psychedelics, you know, you've got Ram Dass, Pete Holmes, you know, everybody. It seems like a lot of people, they go into the spiritual path because of a psychedelic experience. You know, I think that's interesting. And we'll come back to that probably at the end.

Or maybe I went into psychedelics because I was already looking for spirituality.

Right. It's a little bit of both. Yeah, it opens you up, but you, you're already, you were already kind of open to it.

I think, I think it's both. It's like that helps like unlock a little something To get you out of the fixed patterns. And we were doing it very recreationally, not so therapeutic, you know, but I know it had an effect.

Right. Well, it's still— yeah, it still gives you that taste of like the transcendent experience, right?

I think so.

And then you want more of that.

I think so.

Yeah. Yeah, that was my experience too. Yeah.

And then, I mean, I quickly realized in college like, oh, meditation compared with— I would meditate. I was in a frat for a little while. A little while.

Yeah. Not long.

I would meditate for half hour and then I would go into the next room where they were just smoking weed for half hour and I felt the different level of vibration. And apologies to anyone that's really into weed, but it doesn't compare with the vibration that you get from meditating. Like, it doesn't.

Right.

And I said, okay, that's very clear to me now. Like, as a longer lifetime practice, meditation is key. And I pretty much had stopped smoking weed at that point anyway.

So, right. Yeah. More sustainable, the meditation. Yeah.

Yeah.

And actually, it reminds me again of Pete Holmes, where he says, you know, when he— before he got into meditation and all that, he thought that like Buddhists, you know, especially in the mountains in Tibet or whatever, were just relaxing like on vacation. You know, he didn't know until he got into it that they were like flying through space or whatever, right?

Pete Holmes, the actor?

Yeah, yeah, he's really into like Ram Dass and all that.

I think I saw him at a Krishna Das concert too.

Oh, really?

I was like, that's the guy from the couch thing.

His book, Comedy Sex God is phenomenal. Ah, all right. Highly recommend it.

Comedy Sex God?

I've read it twice.

Wow.

Yeah, okay, so that's— so you, you were from a young age open to this stuff?

Open to it.

Yeah, and then what, uh, how did you end up in India for the first time?

Acting coach here, uh, that I was with, she was taking people to India, and I didn't think I would go, and then it just kind of hit me one day. I was like, oh, my whole life has been India, you know, some of my best friends and the smells and everything I grew up with. Oh my God, I gotta go. So I went, and that's where I was introduced to Anand. My guru, if you want to call him my guru. Somehow it was a group trip. It was like 15 people, which was weird for me to go anywhere with 15 people.

Really?

Yeah, like, but I loved it. We just, we had a blast and all the Dharma talks were always around somebody's like problem. Oh yeah, I love that. Like using an issue to kind of to go back to like the Road to Dharma or any of these shows, to use somebody's issue, someone's story to bring out the wisdom to me was so much cooler than just a straight talk.

Right.

So we would do a lot of that, like, Adam, why are you so angry? Right? And I was like, because everyone keeps saying the chai is the best chai they've ever had. Like, how can it be always the best chai? Yesterday was the best chai, and now today's the best chai. I'm like, you're all lying. Let's stop lying. Yeah, and Alan's just laughing like, oh, here we go. Like, we're gonna talk about this.

Yeah.

Uh, A, spiritual bypassness of saying this is the best thing, and B, like, your anger at that. Like, just let them Let them have that.

Let them have their experience.

Yeah, even if they're kidding themselves, you don't need to go around changing them.

That kind of dishonesty, so to speak, is harmless, right? It's the best chai ever, who cares? Correct.

This is the best sunset ever. It's kind of like life was— this was pre-Instagram. We were Instagramming to each other in life. This is the best chai ever, I swear. And oh my God, that's bullshit. That's a filter on that.

Well, so much of that is about having that experience in that place. It's so much more than just the chai, right?

Yes, that's true. Yeah, but it wasn't the best.

It wasn't the best chai. Adam, Adam is the chai expert.

I am there. I'm still holding on to that. It wasn't. It wasn't.

Right.

It probably was.

Where is the best chai?

The one I'm having right now is the best chai ever. Dirty chai, and it's fantastic.

Yeah, you know, I had I had a similar experience. I mean, my first time in India, I felt like I had come home.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, as soon as I stepped into the streets, I was in Chennai, and there was like a festival happening on a Monday night, and I was like, this is— the energy here and everything, the smells and the people.

Yeah.

There's no place like it, you know?

That's where you landed was Chennai?

Yeah.

Wow, interesting place. Why there?

I wanted to go to Pondicherry. I wanted to check out Auroville.

Yeah.

Do you know Auroville?

Uh-huh.

Yeah, and so yeah, that was kind of the entry point. I flew from Naples, Italy to Chennai, India.

That's great.

Yeah, it was my Eat, Pray trip.

Was it?

I mean, sort of.

Not really.

It sounds like it. You know, in hindsight. Yeah, and I went to Pondicherry and then Auroville. Yeah, I went to the geodesic dome, the meditation thing. Yeah, powerful. I had at that point the deepest meditation I've had in that dome.

Really?

It's like a spaceship, you know, that thing.

I know, I've never been in there and I've seen it, but it really is—

It's so powerful. They have a It's so— there's 2 levels. The first level is literally like a spaceship carved out of like marble, you know. There's like consoles and like pink lights and stuff. I don't know. And you go up this winding stairway into the top level and it's an empty room and there's an open, like a circular opening in the ceiling with light shining down into this giant like crystal orb. So like the light kind of goes out into the room and you just sit in meditation. There's, you know, it's silent. And yeah, I mean, at that point I hadn't even had a Great meditation practice, but I just dropped right in, you know.

Interesting.

Yeah. So I recommend it. I mean, yeah, Auroville is interesting.

What do you— yeah. What do you make of it now? Like, looking back, is it still like— did that place really have that for you? The community? What do you think was really eliciting this?

I think it was— I think it was the structure and the community, the history, the tradition. I'm a huge fan of Aurobindo, you know, the founder. And I really appreciate and respect their attempt to create like a utopian society over there. I don't know if that can work, but it seems like they're making it work to some extent. And, you know, there was a weird— like, I was picking up on a weird energy from the people a little bit in some cases, but there was a lot of anger from a lot of the Western people who were there. On their faces anyways, they looked—

That must be strange to see coming from a New Yorker.

Right. Well, yeah, it was nice. I was like, oh, I feel like I'm at home.

Yeah, this is perfect. We go meditate, we're fine. We come out here, we're pissed again.

But yeah, Auroville, I recommend going at least once. Yeah, it was great.

I'm fascinated by communities. That's a whole other topic, but just, just people pushing the, the edge of like what it means to live in community is really interesting to me.

Yeah, me too, me too. And this desire to try to find, create like a, some kind of idealized, like almost utopian community, you know. I find that interesting. Yeah, yeah. And, um, Yeah, I think it can go so wrong. We've seen this many times with like Wild Wild Country or whatever, you know. But I think it's not a reason to give up on the spiritual path, for example.

That's for sure. Because I was gonna say, like, um, our current society has gone way, way wrong.

Totally.

So what's— what do you mean? Like, we should be trying other ones.

We should be trying.

Yeah, like, this has gone off the rails a little bit. Like, no offense to all of us, right?

Right.

But this is a little off the rails, you know, like, we can't be an extractive society for too much longer.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, it's— there's a lot of challenges, you know. So going back to the sort of theme of my— the whole podcast, you know, it's, it's, it's trying to find that vein of gold, you know, within maybe a lot of dense rock, you know, and that's kind of, that's kind of the intent, the goal, the focus. And so I've been, you know, focused on thinking about a lot of the challenges that we face as a humanity, you know, right now, especially, obviously, there's Like climate change is affecting us, and there's inequality and poverty and all these things. And so I personally think that spirituality can be, you know, instrumental in addressing a lot of that, you know, on a mass scale. And so, um, what I'm interested in exploring a little bit too is, um, you know, 2 things. How do you get spiritual practices to more people? So we can talk about that.

Sure.

And, um, you know, how do you avoid a lot of the pitfalls that seem to be like part of the path, you know, like spiritual ego, Or, you know, these, these, you know, maybe following like a perverted guru or, you know, all these different things that happen to people, you know, like, I'm curious, maybe we'll start there. Like, what do you have any thoughts about how to, you know, stay kind of like focused or, you know, to avoid these, these pitfalls like spiritual bypassing and all that stuff?

Sure. Forgiveness, number one, because it'll happen to us all.

So absolutely humanity. I mean, acknowledging people's humanity is so huge.

So huge. Because We will go up and down. I think we've known it in this. And if we can't forgive ourselves and for what we've— our path, you know, our failures, then we have no chance of then taking the next step into like the man we really are or the woman we really are. So I think—

Yeah, forgiving yourself but also other people. Is that—

Yeah, number— I mean, for sure yourself for your own transgressions and your own like, oh wait, you know, like otherwise you develop a spiritual ego to protect the fact that you failed and not want to own it.

Right.

That's what I think goes on. Oh, I have an identity already as this, this newly created spiritual me that now is afraid of losing that new identity that I think was stronger than the last one I had. And you gotta go, well, no, you still need to own up to things you're doing incorrectly or people you've wronged or whatever. Relationships where I wasn't as honest as I should be and could be. And so you call yourself spiritual, it's like, I am human too. Yes, I could have been more honest. Right. Yes, I agree with you. I've made mistakes.

Right.

So I think taking responsibility is a big way to— and forgiving oneself and just being honest about where you've messed up is a good way to avoid the spiritual ego, if you will.

Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, yeah. But forgiveness is not easy, right? I mean, especially forgiving other people. My experience has been it's— yeah, it's a very complex kind of intense emotion. It can be.

Yeah, I guess I like Michael Beckwith talks a lot about just releasing resentment first rather than forgiving the person.

It's a multi-step process.

Yeah, it's easier to let go of your resentment of them than it is to quote-unquote forgive them because letting go of the resentment has nothing to do with the actual act of what they did right or wrong and forgiving it, but I don't want to hold on the resentment part anymore. Yeah, I don't want to hold the anger part anymore. Let's start there. Yeah, I remember just just five months ago just saying I don't want to be angry anymore, and boom! Then the tears came. Okay, the healing started. The forgiveness started for another someone I had been in relationship with. I just had to say I don't want to be angry anymore, which is I don't want to hold the resentment anymore. Yeah, why did I want to hold it before? I don't know. Probably because it helped me feel better about my position.

Right.

I don't know. You know, it's nice to resent someone that I don't have to. Take on again the responsibility which we were just talking about.

There's a vulnerability too, I think. Like, if you're not— if you're forgiving somebody, you're opening yourself up in a very tender way, right, to that person, to being hurt or disappointed. You're having to acknowledge like the messiness of human relationships. Yeah, it's a lot. It can be a lot.

Yeah, it's not— yeah, it's a good practice, right? It's a good way to avoid these other pitfalls. Right, right. Forgiveness of self. The— I mean, the other ones you talked about, perverted guru, so to speak, or— I think the good way to watch out for that is just trust your intuition. Don't, um, if you feel something's off, like, honor that, you know?

Uh, yeah, but how do you know? Like, sometimes it can be hard to know. So, so a big part of the spiritual process, as I'm sure you've experienced, is Sort of releasing conditioning or releasing your own issues, right? And so how do you determine if something is your intuition, like legitimately your intuition, or like you're triggered and you think that's your intuition?

Yeah, practice, I guess. And then forgiveness for yourself again. If, oh, I think this is my intuition, you make a step and you see after, like, was it or was it just a trigger? But you gotta start playing. Just like I have a compost outside And a garden, like, I'm stepping into it from the beginning saying this is a learning process, not necessarily to make vegetables that are economically sound.

Right.

Let me just learn. So when I— the first mistake I made, which is bought a compost that was totally wrong for the city, I had to just laugh how, like, that was a $150 mistake right off the bat, you know. So maybe that's a good beginning.

Um, yes, part of what you're getting to is like this American tendency, I feel, To want to do everything the best and like to be an expert right away. And I think this is a lot of the things that get us into trouble on the spiritual path, right? Is like wanting to be like, oh, I got to be, you know, a good yogi or a good whatever. And then that prevents you from acknowledging maybe, you know, that you made a mistake or that, you know, you're not— that you're not perfect. Yeah.

Or like, you know, in this— I don't know. I mean, people talk about experiences on the spiritual path and maybe people want that experience someone else has had or that Kundalini awakening someone had. Level 3, right?

Level 4, 5.

Whatever the fuck that means. Um, and I've made a very concerted effort to not need to have my journey be like someone else's.

Yes.

So I think that could be very helpful for people. Like, you don't have to have the Kundalini awakening to say you're spiritual. In fact, you don't even have to practice any of this to be spiritual, right? You're a kind human that helps another, you're being spiritual. If spirituality is enacted in what you're doing as a human, meaning like if you're being kind and joyful and Serving others. And that's an act— to me, that's an act of spirituality.

Absolutely. So let's not get so hung up on trying to have like a Kundalini awakening or whatever.

Who cares, right?

Who cares?

Why is that the thing, right? A lot of people that have had that are nuts. Yeah, I mean, you know, not nuts meaning like still haven't found the wisdom, right? You can have— you can go on the highest pass on a motorcycle and throw it all away and not practice any of it. It doesn't— just because I went over the highest road in the world on a motorcycle and just because I plug my own movies through conversation, right, doesn't—

right, very Well done.

Well done, right? Doesn't mean I'm a pompous promoter, right? Um, or a self-proclaimed genius, which at times I am, right?

So you have moments.

Correct. Your listeners that are following me know that I'm a genius. I don't have to say it. Um, but you see, I lost my train of thought.

No, but you're talking about like— part of what you're talking about is this thing that, um, Chogyam Trungpa says, which is, uh, a lot of people on the spiritual path They like to collect experiences almost like you're collecting statues in India, you know, like, oh, I have all these, I have this collection now, I have this library, you know, and that means that I'm level whatever, you know, or yeah. And it's like all this attachment to some kind of identity, the spiritual identity.

Yeah, because I mean, you've been at, um, Sattva, right? And you, or you, and you've seen people have probably Kundalini awakenings and their body thriving and moving and crazy things. Just because your experience isn't like that Like, who's to say that's the right way? Like, yours might be a slower birthing thing so that you're maybe more grounded in it. And who knows? Because that's what you're meant to kind of be.

Well, that's what I've noticed too, is that everybody, everybody has their own very unique expression of like Kundalini rising or, you know, whatever that energy is. You know, it might come out in one person as their body moving or, you know, whatever it is, but yours might be more subtle or— but more deep. You know, you never know. You don't know what another person's experience is. Who knows?

Yeah, you don't know. And why better or worse?

Yeah.

So that's a way, you know, to avoid some of the spiritual ego and some of the trap of even following a guru. If you're striving in that American way to get somewhere, you might not listen to your intuition because of this drive to get to this utopia or place of spirituality. You think that things no longer— suffering is there. No, it's all still there.

Right.

We still feel the feelings like it's not going away. The Buddha, you know, I say this a lot, he wasn't saying emptiness, like empty. The Buddhists aren't really saying like sensation's the problem, even though if you got rid of sensation, it would cut off some of the suffering. Yeah, it's not the issue. I have a lot of discussions with like the hardcore Vipassana. I'm like, it's not the problem.

Yeah.

It's— there's other places in the wheel where you can cut off the suffering, meaning your attachment to it, so you can be with it all. Like you I'm an inclusive person. Like, let me feel the feelings of life. Let me smell the smells. Let me feel my body. It's got to be expansive, not empty. So empty, empty of, empty of separation is how the Buddha— that's what the Buddha was really saying. Okay.

Thank you for clarifying that.

What the Buddha was really— not empty, empty of separation. Yeah. Says Thích Nhất Hạnh, not me. Thích Nhất Hạnh said that.

Right, right. Yeah. But what you're talking about though is I think this misconception that being spiritual is being enlightened and a being of light, but actually it's about being more human and being more in the body and messy, and it's everything, right?

I think so.

Yeah, it's not just—

Inclusive.

Yeah, it's inclusive. It's the whole experience.

Yeah, it has to include. So it can include that, and it doesn't— you don't have to be too attached to that part.

Right.

I'm going through a tough time.

Right.

You're allowed to go through a tough time as a spiritual person. You're allowed to have what, you know what I mean? You're allowed to like have months of quote unquote not a good practice or whatever, you know, like, or not meditating for 2 months. You're allowed to do this, right? Right. Yeah. And observe it and not just be too attached to like what you thought you were or were supposed to be. You're allowed to.

Right.

Right.

Because there's no hurry to be somewhere else. Right.

I don't think so.

Yeah.

I mean, talk to me, you know, tomorrow, on Monday, on the real Monday.

The real Monday.

When all the emails are flying in. It feels that way.

Yeah.

God, it feels that way in this society.

Yeah.

It really does.

Yeah. Because we're already— I mean, from a spiritual standpoint, we're already sort of perfect right now in this moment, right?

Yeah, I think I'd say so.

Yeah.

I mean, you look great.

Oh, thanks. So do you. Okay, so if we're already perfect, or, you know, we're already spiritually sort of like whole, let's say that. You know, why practice? I don't know. Yeah, because it's fun?

No, I mean, I think on some level there's a— like, I was called as a kid to want to read Gandhi's book or to meditate. Like, I think we all seek more liberation. Yeah, we seek to unravel a little bit more, right?

So you could say that life has like the seed of Evolution inside of it. Is that one way to put it?

Absolutely. Well said. So it's not so much like I know why or to get something. It's just this is living, is this, this is life evolving. If you want to call it evolving, has to do with kind of open up. You study a lot, right? Like you love going to grad school.

Yeah.

All the time.

Yeah. I've been to grad school twice.

Yes, twice. That's amazing. Um, so it's like, why? Because you want to learn stuff. You just have a natural—

I love learning.

You love learning.

Yeah.

It's probably why you're doing this podcast.

Absolutely.

You love learning. I love the idea of freedom. A lot of my films tend to be around freedom. Why is that? I don't know. Just, you know, maybe past lives, who the heck knows? But I know we all want freedom. I mean, look at the political society and how it's grown for 2,000 years, how we've edged closer toward freedom.

Right. True freedom.

True freedom. True freedom on an inner sense, but also Political freedom, if you want to call it that. Um, and why is it that we do that? I think inherently that's how we want to be and how we want to express. So, uh, yeah, eventually we realize we're— we are whole and perfect, and that we could have just sat back and accepted ourselves in a beautiful way.

Right.

But sometimes it takes some work to get to that ability to do that.

Yeah, it's like, uh, it's like to truly relax, you have to work hard, right? Is that part of it?

Is that a quote?

I don't know, I just made it up.

It's like, uh, like a sport. Sometimes you have to practice the skills so that when you're out in the field, it's effortless, even though there's a ton of effort, but the skills come automatically. Yeah, so freedom is inherent, um, but sometimes because of what we're born into, we need practices to help us remember what's natural.

Yeah, I think that's right.

What's going on?

I think Ananda says something about, you know, true effortlessness comes out of effort. Something like that.

Doesn't that piss you off?

Like what? Yeah.

I'm out of here. You're the problem. How many times have I been upset at my guru? Oh my God.

Yeah, it's definitely a dance.

It's great. It's great. He just sits back and like, I'll meditate for 2 hours just on a trigger. And then, like you know, see him later in the afternoon. He's the same the whole time. He doesn't care if you're triggered him.

Yeah.

I don't care.

Yeah, I'm still in a trigger right now.

No problem.

No problem.

It could take ten years. Right. Welcome back.

Right, right. Yeah. Yeah. And I think but but another reason to practice maybe is you're reducing your own suffering, hopefully. Yes, yes. Over time, and then maybe as a result reducing the suffering of people around you.

It's a beautiful intention.

Yeah.

I think so.

Yeah.

What could be better than that?

Yeah. Okay. I think we solved it. Yeah.

Again, why take an hour to do what we could do in 35 minutes?

So yeah, I mean, but do you think— I mean, I'll ask you this though. Do you think the spiritual path is hard or easy, or is that a false dichotomy?

Um, I think it's hard to, um, not be on a spiritual path in this world.

It's harder. Yeah.

Meaning, like, living these— in this society time without spirituality, to me, would seem like incredibly hard.

Yeah.

Without those skills. So let's just call spirituality like skills and tools that help us maneuver, um, this dance of like being in the physical body.

Yeah.

Yeah, I guess that's a new definition I just made of spirituality.

Love it.

All right, we'll go with that if that's the Case, like how do you not use have spirituality in this life? Like it makes it really hard. I mean, how is that person over there dealing with disappointment if they don't have a practice? They're probably not.

Right. They're avoiding feeling it probably. Numbing or something.

Drinking. Who knows? Acting out with someone else.

Right.

A relationship that they actually want. Boom boom boom.

Projecting. Yeah.

Crum.

It's a mess.

Crush. Boom.

Right.

So I think life is really hard without tools, and it's a shame that. We haven't had a lot of the tools baked into society, but that's why I think what you're talking about in spirituality is growing in leaps and bounds because people want tools for living.

Yeah. Yeah, I think that's right.

Yeah.

So Peter Russell has this concept, this, the wisdom revolution. He thinks that we're entering into almost like a new revolutionary period of human development. We had the industrial revolution, we had the information age. He thinks there's a wisdom revolution coming that's as transformational for humanity as those two were. And I like that idea. You know, I think it's coming and it's very early maybe, and it's not evenly distributed, so to speak. And so I'm curious, maybe we can talk about this then. How do we get spiritual practices to more people? You know, how do you reach more people?

Yeah, that was your earlier question. I mean, for me, I use story. Yeah, that's like my method for whatever reason. Like that, it's like, oh cool. I can make movies, documentaries— documentaries specifically because this isn't fiction.

Yeah.

These are real humans going through life. I think it's a great way to blend in teaching spirituality, uh, to show others that it's possible. So possibility— and how do you show possibility? Through film. That's a medium that everyone loves right now— film, series, documentary. I mean, Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, right? Buddha meaning the possibility of enlightenment or the possibility of freedom. So showing the Buddha, you know, showing that it's possible through other characters in a show. Dharma, oh, having the teachings in there. Sangha, oh, okay, that— the other way I think would be having people around you, Sangha, people that share this stuff.

Yeah.

So if we want to share it or if we want to accelerate it, so to speak, you know, for me, like I said, film and such, But I think these— taking myself out of the equation, I think the actual bigger, bigger thing would be community. Because we have access to the internet, we have the teachings, they're pretty accessible for people now, the apps and this. But community— we need people around us that are speaking the same language, that are supporting our practice, that can hold space for us when we're dicks.

And, and to reinforce that honesty you were talking about earlier, right? Yeah, keep you honest.

Yeah, keep you honest, let you be honest, you know. I mean, you can just be honest anyway, but—

Yeah, this is, this is a big part of what I love about your work is that you're reaching so many people through this medium. So it's powerful.

Through film and such. Yeah, yeah, I think it is powerful. I mean, Heal is a very good example of a lot of people that respond and say, I got sick and I watched your movie and I saw possibility with my diagnosis. I didn't have to go into the prognosis they gave me. I saw a possibility for some other outcome with my illness and another way to go about it.

Yeah.

And that's all sometimes people need is possibility. And then seeing maybe there's a Facebook group and there's other people going through it.

Sure.

Okay, cool. Um, or Road to Dharma, like they're, they're opened up to like, oh, there's other people being courageous and seeking freedom amidst craziness of India, putting their life on the line because this is important to them. Oh, I'm not alone. Oh, that's cool. That's helpful.

Yeah.

It's really helpful when you know you're not alone with like these crazy thoughts, so to speak, or this crazy desire to want something different in our life.

Yeah. I think, yeah. Do you hear from a lot of people that have seen those films? You know, what do they say?

Tons. Yeah, with the Road to Dharma, it's cool because the course that's along with it, like, people dive deep. Yeah, of course, it's probably even the wrong word. It's kind of like this immersive experience because there's meditations and chapters and the episodes, right? Um, people that really do that, they make changes in their life. They get inspired. Like, this is, you know, they were ready. It's kind of like me when I was Going to college and someone said, here's a meditation tape. Like, they're like, ugh. I was like, yeah, people that do that, they were ready for it anyway. I don't take credit that like, oh, our thing opened them up. They were totally ready. And then you put something in front of them that's speaking their language, they go, sweet, you just— that's what I've been feeling.

Yeah.

And oh, now I know it's okay, I guess, to leap.

Yeah, yeah. Your films are like, uh, the first time you go skydiving, the film is like the guy who's hugging you as you're falling. That's great.

Tandem.

Tandem.

Yeah. The tandem guide to spirituality. Yeah, you don't feel like, yeah, like, oh, they've done it before, they didn't die. Right, right.

Or go crazy or something.

Yeah, and they'll take me with them. All right, cool. And then the next time, like, I'll go alone. Now I want to move to Vancouver. Someone like, I watched it and I moved to Vancouver.

Oh, really?

Like, okay. Yeah, I guess that's what you needed.

What was in Vancouver?

For them, they just needed to get somewhere that was more west, I think. Out of the mindset they were in and to go west. You know, to maybe a more liberal mindset or whatever it meant to them. Yeah, I forget.

And Vancouver's pretty spiritual too.

I think so.

It feels like community there. I think—

I would think so.

Yeah.

And the mountains and it's nature-based.

Yeah.

So yeah. And then with Heal, you— we hear a lot when it comes to illness and people having possibility. And I do a meditation on Heal Instagram every Wednesday. And so some people write in too that like, I watched the movie, I do Adam's meditations because they're on IGTV, I went and got these books. And so We've created a little more resources where people can have a little bit of community and a little bit of grounding and be on a path. But that— I have to say, the illness path is a tough one.

Yeah.

And one thing we're probably lacking more than anything in that area is like a general practitioner, a point person to kind of handhold you on your path. The medical guru that would walk with you. In spirituality, we have a lot of gurus and teachers that'll walk with you along the path. Not so much in the health. There's a lot of modalities that people are great at, but who's the point person in the middle that says, let me help you find the right ones and take you along? That's a missing piece in healthcare.

Yeah, I feel like healthcare and education are 2 places where we could use a lot more integration, a lot more spiritual influence. I see it happening with certain people I know, like nurses, a few doctors, some educators. But yeah, I hope that that will continue to grow.

I think so. I hope so.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Beautiful. I mean, uh, yeah, I think right now I feel like we gotta find more ways to reach people.

Yeah.

And, you know, and, and yeah, like you're saying, to make these practices like more digestible, more accessible, like ba— you know, bite-size baby steps, you know, it's not, doesn't have to be flying to India or, you know, doing a vipassana or whatever. You can, you know, you can just tune into Instagram or whatever.

Right.

I mean, that stuff's great too.

Yeah. But you don't have to.

Exactly. You don't have to.

Yeah. Seeing something, um, Yeah, I think more accessible through the films. And then, God, like, just having people around you. So how do you do that? Like, how do you make sure that there's other people around? I guess you, if you're someone listening that has a practice, don't be afraid to maybe open your door.

Yeah.

Uh, and say, you guys want to meditate together? Or do something for free? Or, I don't know, be out of the closet with it.

Mm-hmm.

I meditate. Yeah, you know, I know guys that had a Kundalini experience 25 years ago and didn't tell their family. Wow. Would go in the basement and meditate. New Yorkers, right? Yeah, these were New Yorkers, like Brooklyn guys that were like, I had this Kundalini experience 25 years ago. I've been meditating in my basement. You know, you're like, it's totally normal. Like, it's fine. But like, for that family, it wasn't. So be, be open with it. Tell people about it. Like, you're not gonna get scorned.

Right. And the courage, I mean, there is, maybe it sounds a little funny, but there's courage in coming out that way, especially, you know, if you're from Brooklyn or whatever. And then I think that inspires people. I think people will see that and they'll think, oh, then I can do that, or it's not strange or whatever.

It's not strange. Don't even make a big deal of it. Yeah, I meditate, of course.

Yeah, of course.

Of course.

Doesn't everybody?

I inquire about myself. I'm interested in freedom. Who wouldn't? And I have a job and a family, right? It's part of life. This is what we do, right? Make it— normalize it in some way. Yeah, I think that would help.

I mean, I've had that experience. I felt like at some point I had to sort of almost come out and say, hey, you know, I'm spiritual. Yeah, you know, and it's kind of funny. Yeah, I mean, not to— I don't mean to, you know, to minimize the coming out process for, you know, for homosexuals or other people, you know, trans and all that. I mean, that's obviously a whole other level, but But still, I think there's like a stigma, and that's part of the motivation of this podcast is like overcoming that stigma.

Right. It's not ridiculous, right?

Right. It's not ridiculous.

It's not. Yeah.

Yeah.

There's the stigma of it's ridiculous, right? Because some of it is.

Because you're going to be— you're going to lose touch. You're going to become escapist. You're going to be like, you know, woo-woo or whatever.

You know, there is a fear of that. Like, if you do— like, even if you do a psychedelic or if you go off to India, that you won't be able to, when you come back, have a life. I think it's a genuine fear.

Right.

Right. That I'll lose grounding.

Right.

Maybe you should.

Maybe you should.

Yeah.

I mean, it's interesting because I feel like there you're touching on a little bit of a tension that is tricky because I feel like part of the process of overcoming our sort of capitalist industrial kind of lifestyle that's, you know, destroying the planet is for more people to say like, well, wait, maybe I'm going to check out of society. You know, I think that could be a positive too. So there's a little bit of a tension there maybe.

Yes, within us.

Within us.

I think so.

Yeah.

And I mean, my experience of spirituality has made me more grounded.

Yeah. And hopefully it should, unless you're not practicing properly.

Yeah. But I understand people's fears too, because there's so much ridiculous, right? People that go have an experience and come back and think they're enlightened. And like you said, the spiritual ego is abound and you don't want to be one of those. Or I didn't want to be a yoga teacher.

Right.

You know, that was a fun story because I'm training there with Anand one-on-one for 6, 7 weeks and just meditating with him by the river every morning. And we're talking and I'm recording it and writing it down. And then one day he says, hey, will you teach my, my yoga class? I'm supposed to teach some people today. I'm like, Anand, I don't want to be a yoga teacher. I mean, it's too cliché. I mean, LA, I'm, you know, I do acting and writing and I'm a yoga— I don't want to be a yoga teacher.

All the ego.

I just don't want to be that, right? He's like, "I'm not asking you to be a yoga teacher. I'm just saying, will you teach my class?" And then you know that's the cool thing about like he's very simple like that. Like you're getting in your head, man.

Right.

I just said, "Will you do this for me? Like a favor." Yeah.

That's when having a teacher can help. They can kind of, you know, call you out on things and simplify things for you. Simplify. Yeah. Like I remember reminds me of one time I was there. We were all doing this river run. He likes to do this. Thing we run in the river up in the Himalayas. It's pretty— it can be pretty hairy. I mean, it's, you know, you're running on these slippery rocks and it's like, it's, it's a mountain. Um, and so the first time I was going, you know, we were all getting ready and, and I was asking him all these questions, you know, is it dangerous? Am I gonna fall? Have people gotten hurt? You know, and he was like, just go on the run, you know.

No, I know I have a little experience with that because when we just went to the beach, you're like, all right, should I bring a towel? Do I need my glasses? Should I bring my phone?

I'm like, what?

For me, it was a little weird because I go to the beach every day and I have my, my, my thing, right? You're sitting— you inquire.

I inquire. And, you know, I'm a little bit in my head sometimes, you know.

Join the club, right? Uh, so he called me out on that and he's like, just sub my class. I'm like, okay, you know. And, um, and then I subbed the class. He's like, how was it? I'm like, oh, I really liked it. Okay, teach my next one.

Okay.

All right, I really like it. Yeah, I thought, I thought you might. You know, why don't you teach? You know, and then, and so then, so then I taught yoga.

Yeah, that's another huge benefit of having a teacher that can really see you, is they can see the potential in you that you can't see, right?

Yes.

And that was my experience, especially with him.

Oh yeah?

Yeah.

What was he seeing in you?

You know, I showed up.

Was he seeing—

what was he seeing? What could he have seen in me?

Oh my God, but tell me something. What was he—

wait, what was it? Um, you know, I showed up I think I've talked about this before, but I showed up like, um, expecting to do one job, which was work on the technology and the website and all these things. And then there was a kind of a change of plans, and I was going to be teaching in the trainings, you know. And, uh, great, great opportunity. But, you know, at the time I was thinking, I don't know if I'm ready for that, you know. I mean, at that point I had done a bunch of trainings and everything, but, uh, and I've been teaching for years, but still, you know. And, uh, you know, but I saw that he knew on some level that I could, and so that gave me the confidence. And then I found out that I could I could, you know, I think.

Yeah, yeah, I think so too. I think we, we create all these like RYT this and that. Once I have this, then I can— especially again, you love grad school and you're used to getting this before you go do that, right?

Right, right.

And another friend of mine is feeling the same. People won't take you seriously until you have XYZ. And I'm like, I don't know, why don't you just go do the thing before you have to be legitimized in front of the quote-unquote peers, right? And that brings me back to the whole like coming out of the closet thing, which, uh, friends of mine that are very successful filmmakers, doc filmmakers, would say to me, um, they're like, I, I admire like you're just so free with that, you make this kind of content, right? I'm like, what kind of content? Like, you know, spiritual stuff. I'm like, I just make what I like to make.

Yeah.

And I go where I'm kind of drawn in the project, and I don't think twice about the fact that it's spiritual, as if I'm in some kind of subset of it where it's taboo. And they, being Academy-nominated people, couldn't come out to their friends that they wanted— that they made spiritual films or wanted to or were spiritual. I'm like, Really? I didn't realize there was that stigma in Hollywood that somehow you're not as legit. You know, like, will CNN still hire me to do— right, to do their work also if I also did a spiritual film? I'm like, you really worry about that? I was blown away. I'm like, you're nominated for an Academy Award. Like, that's a pretty nice calling card.

Yeah, that's, that's a level of power too.

Yeah, like some level you think that having done a spiritual film takes that away suddenly. That's the weird fear of like, oh, I'll become ridiculous.

Right, right. And I feel like you're touching on maybe like the most important thing in a way.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

What is this?

Yeah, only 45 minutes later. No, I do feel like there's a way in which not just in Hollywood but in like business and industry, everything, people have a thing they want to do or they want to be more authentic and more true to themselves, but they don't because Of a fear of being judged or they're gonna lose an opportunity. And I feel like if everyone would just do the thing that they want to do, like just forget about the repercussions, forget about what people think, the whole world would change, you know?

Yeah, because there's probably more people that want to do that than—

Totally.

We think everyone else is, uh, something else.

Yeah.

It's everyone's hiding behind the curtains.

Yeah, everyone's playing it safe and we gotta stop playing it safe.

Yeah.

That's how I feel.

Be open with the projects you want to do, right? Yeah, I did a spiritual film. So what?

Yeah, it's great.

Every film is spiritual, technically. That's the thing, like, kind of bring the ridiculous out of it, right? What do you mean spiritual? You mean because it had meaning and it inspired people, right? And it wasn't so driven on the same old archetypes of the prince gets the princess. Yeah, I know Hollywood likes to like repeat itself and do what works so that it can churn out money. I get— sure, okay, it's gonna do that, but you can go over here and do ones that are different, right? And oh, but will I lose this thing, right? Hopefully you will, to be honest, right?

Maybe we'll have fewer sequels. Yeah, remakes. Yeah, if we could do some spiritual—

yeah, everyone just jump out like you said. Like, if everyone showed their cards, right? Like, wait a second, we all want to make some cool stuff, right?

I think it would change the world.

It would change the world. Yeah, it was— yeah, maybe there's that fear of, um, If we all go start making good things, then these— then everyone else is going to laugh and then keep making the other stuff and crush it in the economy and bury us, right? This weird fear of like, um, being outside the— everyone will laugh at you.

Everyone will laugh at you.

And, um, the whole world won't change, right?

Right. Like, you'll be the only one and then you'll— yeah, totally right. I felt that way. We've all felt that way probably at some point.

Yeah, yeah.

And what about the GDP? You know, what's gonna happen to that?

I don't know, man.

I'm not sure.

You mean the gross— the GHP? GHP, gross happiness product, might go up.

Yeah.

So that's what, you know, that's the longest answer to like, what can we do?

Yeah, I love it.

To spread and help each other is like to be more open about it. Be open, whatever profession you're in, like talk about it, integrate it.

Right. Wear your mala beads to the office, you know.

Do it.

Yeah.

Or if you don't want to be so ridiculous, if that's ridiculous, at least why not let people know like what you're going through in life or that you are maybe meditating or you're trying to become a better person or that you'd like to— how can we make this business actually more sustainable? Or like just even like within our business, how do we treat our employees better? Like, could we have a conscious year? I kind of want my company to be more nice. I don't know, you know, whatever it is. Yeah, it's okay to have those thoughts. Yeah, that, you know what, I don't know if profit is the most important thing anymore, right?

Which is blasphemy in a lot of circles.

It's blasphemy, right, to say what if we didn't put that first and said maybe we should pay people more or just look at a different way of doing it?

Yeah, yeah. This reminds me of lately I've been reading a lot of this author Devdutt Pattanaik, who's an Indian scholar and businessman. And he has all these books that are beautiful about the Indian approach to business. And it's like he has this model where you treat every business interaction like a yagya, you know, like a fire ceremony.

Yeah.

And, um, so you're imagining that you're sort of like making an offering into the fire, which is your business, whatever you're offering into the business world. And then as a result, you're getting back, you know, some kind of compensation, you know. And it's this more, you know, he kind of breaks down the way that the entire world is structured around this sort of European approach to business. And if we had more of an Indian approach to business, maybe what you're talking about, you know, elevating human values, you know, putting other things above profit, you know, would be more popular.

So he's saying make, like, make your business an offering, so to speak?

Kind of, yeah. Or your approach to your, like, what you're doing in your business is like an offering, and you're making an offering to somebody. And then the person on the other side of that transaction has the same approach. And so then it becomes more like An elevated, like, sort of spiritual type of Baba, you know?

Sweet.

Yeah. So anyways, I've been reading a lot lately. That's on my mind.

You like to learn.

I like to learn.

Yeah. And what's my— yeah, what's my offering in this podcast? What am I offering people?

Yeah, you're offering your wisdom.

I hope so. The experience, maybe possibility, maybe a little bit of inspiration.

Yeah, like, if you can do it, like, anybody can do it.

That's what I would say. If this kid from Detroit, Michigan, right, Midwestern kid, can Absolutely. Absolutely. I didn't study film. Yeah, I was a science-based kid, you know. I didn't have a plan for life. I just kept making a few decisions, and I continued to do so that, like, aligned with, like, my heart. I didn't want to get a job after college, and it's not because I had money. It's just I couldn't do it. Like, I couldn't go to the JP Morgans and blah blah blah. I was just like, uh, and I followed my heart, and it helped. It helped me, like, just have a strength and a Trust. Yeah, that, um, there's other ways to make a life.

Yeah.

And my, my nephew kind of summed it up because he just went to college and he's a very like emotionally like intellectual or emotionally mature kid for his age, I think. Because I'm like, I didn't really talk like that when I was your age, you know. I was still drinking and doing shit.

Well, that's the new generation.

I think it is. They've grown up with more yoga and stuff in their vernacular and uncles and stuff that go to India, right? I didn't have the uncle that went to India. But he said, like, I've had these very 3 different uncles, me and my brother. He's like, you, you make movies in LA and go to India and all this. My, your other— my other brother does like mortgages and very successful and has a family in Michigan. My other brother just kind of does what he wants and like, not really at all thinking about career or this. It's just more kind of a service where he needs to be. It's just a Totally different form of life most people wouldn't understand. He's like, I have really— it showed me a lot of different models of living that is not the way America puts it, right? You can live life a lot of ways. I'm like, that's really cool to have that growing up. Yeah. And to know that like, yeah, just you'll do what's your way.

Yeah. Well, it's great to hear too. It sounds like what you're saying is if you just follow your heart, things will work out.

I don't know if I said that.

That's gonna be the quote on the COVID Things don't always work out.

If you follow your heart—

What does it mean to work out anyway?

That's what I mean. Yeah, people are like, but it didn't work out, you said it would.

Well, you didn't die so far.

We're all gonna die. So, Chad, I don't know what you're implying, that I'm gonna be immortal because I followed my heart. Meaning that, um, the benefit of even like following your heart just starts to help you inhabit a A being of faith, a being of trust, and a being of more in flow with the mystery of things rather than I'm gonna like, you know, do what's expected or what I'm afraid of, so to speak. Um, so to me, working out isn't the end goal. To be working out is like that, oh, I built a muscle of being able to kind of keep stepping in.

Yeah, I love that.

Doesn't mean like my bank account's full, right? You know what I mean? Like, or that I've achieved some success or not, because 4 years ago I was totally broke, right? And so what would you say, it didn't work out for me, right? No, because at that moment I'm like, you love yourself regardless of like your knee is broken, you have nothing in your bank account, you just broke up with someone, you have no place to live. And I'm like, this is where you practice, dude. This is where you just totally love yourself and are happy for no reason.

Yeah.

This is where you do it, you know?

Yeah.

It's quote unquote not working out. That to me is more like what you get from Follow your heart.

Yes.

You get that.

Yes. You build a muscle.

You build a muscle.

Yeah. It's kind of like you start to have the experience that Krishna is teaching Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita, which is that no experience is too big for your soul to handle.

That's wonderful.

Yeah.

So I'm, I'm in, in with those guys?

Yeah, you're, you're right there on that same level with Krishna.

Would you say I was in with earlier? Didn't you put me in with some dudes?

I forget.

That was great. It felt really nice.

Yeah, no, that's that's that's beautiful.

Alan Watts was it?

Alan Watts.

Huxley.

No, Huxley. One of those guys. Ram Dass.

Ram Dass. Yeah, you put me with Ram Dass. Right.

Psychedelic experience. Pete Holmes.

Pete Holmes.

Yeah. I mean, I love this. It reminds me of this quote too of you know Terence McKenna, right?

I do.

Yeah. He said that if you jump into the abyss, yeah, you'll land on a feather bed.

Sweet. What's that mean?

I don't know. I just like the way it sounds.

He didn't. He also said that mushrooms are aliens.

Yes, he was very much into that.

I love that. When I read that, I read one of his books early on, I thought that was so cool because intelligence travels in the spores through space and that like you ingest these mushrooms and like you have communication. So what's to say like alien intelligence couldn't speak through a food, right? And chemical interaction.

That's—

I love that.

Yeah. Well, then it's all, you know, that raises the question of like, what is an alien, right? Like we're all just life forms in the universe.

What is an alien? Next podcast.

There you go, teeing it up. Well, let me— so I ask all my guests this question. If somebody who didn't practice yoga came to you and they asked you, what is yoga? What would your answer be?

I would say, why do you want to know? And we'll start from there. And then like, okay, look at their desire, look at their, like, what's driving them. And I'd be like, oh, that's yoga.

Yeah, you're—

whatever's driving you, that's the yoga. Like, that's it, man.

Like, you're—

momokṣutva, Anand talks about momokṣutva, is the innate desire in all of us to have— to want freedom. So to me, yoga is like that, that innate desire in all of us to want freedom, but it happening. Yeah, that expressing itself.

Yeah, we talked about that earlier, the seed of sort of evolution planted in consciousness.

Yeah, so someone asked that. That from now on, that's what I'm gonna say. Why? Why are you asking?

That's good. Yeah, turn it around a little bit.

You can use that.

Okay, I'll use it. Can I use that?

Yeah. Did I ask you enough questions? I feel so selfish. No, I feel so selfish having not asked more of you and had it be more of a back and forth. It's an interview, man. Is it an interview? It's my podcast.

Yeah.

All right, all right. It's cool. It's cool.

We're okay. We're okay.

I'll have you on mine once I start.

Okay. Sounds good. What are you going to call it?

Uh, The Philosophy of Living.

Ah, I like it. Yeah, I like it.

Yeah, how to put spirituality into actual living practice.

Beautiful. Yeah, well, actually, on that point, do you want to talk about what's going on with you right now? You know, what's your vision? What are you working on? Anything you want to plug?

Anything? Do I want to plug? I mean, the only thing— the thing I love to plug is The Road to Dharma because I really love that, that show and that immersive edutainment. So roadtodharma.com, you can watch 3 episodes for free. You can do 3 meditations for free. So I love plugging that because I think it's awesome. I think it's okay to think it's awesome too. It's really cool. It's cool.

Yeah, I've seen it. It's wonderful.

It's cool.

It's really good.

Yeah. Like, it's just you don't get to take these trips.

Yeah.

Most people.

So to take it with us, especially now with COVID and everything, I mean, it's nice to be able to travel like in, in that sense.

In that sense. Yeah. High Himalayas to, to these sacred sites. What am I doing? I feel like the things I'm doing are taking a little step so they're not so on-the-nose conscious, and they're in the underbelly. So some of the themes I'm looking at is freedom and escapism. Both these, these are like the themes.

Yeah.

And finding— I have a few projects I can't talk about, but that are interesting ways of expressing those themes that again are entertaining or educational. that make bigger statements that to me are more actually, uh, more accessible to the masses, which probably answers the other question too, which is like kind of hiding the Trojan horse of the wisdom, right, in something that looks like— in a general sense, one of my projects is about aliens, right? So I can't go into how it, how it works on these levels because it's a really different take on it all, but we're making a sizzle for that right now and, um, for that series.

Exciting. Yeah, great. Yeah. And I think you can probably say one thing you're working on is a community kind of project, right? Like creating community.

Yes. The application.

Yeah.

Yeah, we're working on that. And then I mean, I can talk about Fantastic Fungi depending on when this comes out, but I'm helping the Fantastic Fungi people do a global summit for the— so that's fungiglobalsummit.com. So everything from health to psychedelics to mental health to food. But yeah, the app soon we'll talk about, the other series soon we'll talk about. These things— I mean, Rhododendron actually took a long time to come to its fruit, you know, like 7 years or so to actually be done. So sometimes these more audacious projects, you got to be patient and just, yeah, wait for the signs, wait for the season.

Well, it's a good reminder that things take as long as they take, right?

That's true. Who said that? Uh, Terence McKenna said that once when he was tripping balls.

The mushrooms told me that things take as long as they take. Yeah, um, that's beautiful. You have a lot of exciting stuff coming. Uh, this will be— this podcast will be out in a week or two, so yeah, plenty of time for people to check out the Fantastic Fungi. Um, and I think that brings us full circle to fungi. So meaning we started talking about earlier your experience with mushrooms.

That's why I said yes to that project, to be honest, to help them do this summit, was because mushrooms were part of me as a child. Felt like a child, right?

Yeah.

So when it comes back years later and I have these other skills, like I go serve the mushrooms a little, and that movement 25 years later— yeah, 25 years later, it's kind of like acceptable right now, this idea. Same thing, I did a film with the Native Americans, Lakota people, called Women of the White Buffalo.

Mm-hmm.

That project was brought to me as a producer to help, and I was super busy at the time, but I I couldn't say no to that, that project and that theme because I was brought up with a very strong love of Native Americans. My dad had instilled that in me. And also one of the guys, the fathers involved, was a famous musician that helped me out with some songs on my first film. It's like, of course I'll step in. So sometimes, you know, you just— no matter what, like, for anyone out there, like, if something feels right, even though you're too busy, you just say yes. Like, you just have to step in and you go— Absolutely. Yeah, let me help with this thing. Be the fun guy. Be the Lakota Indian project. You just you got to do it, and somehow we make time.

Yeah, yeah. If it's exciting and aligned, just do it, right? Yeah, beautiful.

Okay, good.

Yeah, it's been you know as always it's great talking to you. I love well I loved having you on the podcast because you're a great example of somebody who's spiritual but not ridiculous. You're you're putting it out there. You're you're setting an example. You know, and the things you're working on are really affecting people.

So thank you.

So thank you so much.

My pleasure to be here. I love that you're doing this podcast because spirituality is not ridiculous.

It's not. It's the best.

I think you nailed it. It's not ridiculous. It's not. It's ridiculous to not have it right in your life. Right. Life would be ridiculous without these tools. Absolutely. That's what's going— that's what's up, dude. We figured it out.

We figured it out again.

Again, life's ridiculous. Without spirituality.

Yeah, it's true. It's true. And I think you have to experience it first, so it can be a little bit of a, like, a hurdle, right?

True.

You just, you know, it seems like a strange thing. You gotta, you know, try it.

Yeah, meditate.

Just check it out.

Check it out.

Yeah, great. Well, I'll put all the, uh, things we mentioned in the show notes and links to your, you know, website and Instagram and all that stuff.

Yeah.

All right, well, Adam, it's been so great. Thank you so much. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Chad.