Nothing Interviews...SHIV SENGUPTA

[Music] Everyone, uh, this is Nothing Interviews. Um, we have presenting Shiv Shifts and Gupta. Uh, since Gupta experienced a powerful awakening in his twenties after suffering from years of debilitating depression, what followed was an unexpected four-month period of inner silence and psychological freedom, which, to his disappointment, eventually ebbed. After spending several frustrating years attempting to recreate his experience, he realized that awakening wasn't the solution in itself but a glimpse into an effective way of approaching the problem of our existence. In 2018, Shiv began sharing his reflections on a Facebook page called Advisaholics Anonymous. Now it's a book available. Uh, welcome Shiv. Thanks for having me, Emerson. Oh, thank you, thank you. The first question that I have is, um, we're going to go straight to it. Um, is spiritual seeking a form of addiction? I definitely think it can be, can become. Um, you know, there's a very fine line between being curious about the world and seeking something. And if you think about the simple act of seeking, you know, like let's say you're looking for your car keys, Emerson, you've lost your car keys, you're seeking your car keys. You have a very one-pointed focus when you start scanning your environment. You're not looking at this environment from this, you know, zoomed-out view. You're honing in with this very mad, very narrow tunnel vision and looking for just keys. You're not noticing the dog, you're not noticing the couch. You're looking for this thing, objects as in the shape of your keys. That's what seeking is. You have an idea in your mind of what you want to find, and then you go through your life looking for that exact thing. You know, call it enlightenment, call it salvation, call it liberation, whatever have you. But what if the idea of what you're looking for itself is flawed? Then what you're doing is you basically completely bypass the natural human curiosity for life, which is really what spirituality, the way I define it—and we can get into that a little bit later—is about. And if you look at children and the way they approach the world, especially young children, and I have two kids, I have a seven-year-old and a three-year-old, and they’re my spiritual teachers, Emerson, right? I mean, I look at them for cues on how to orient my own consciousness because I look at the way they approach a tree or, you know, we're walking along, we're late for school, but my seven-year-old just stops and stares at a rock on the path. I'm like, come on, we gotta go, you know, we're getting late for school. But being late for school is not in her real house. There's this rock on the road, and the shape of it has just completely absorbed my attention. I need to stop, and I need to pick it up, and I need to spend time with this rock. I mean, how many adults actually function in that way? Not many, right? So that kind of curiosity is actually the opposite of seeking. And so what the spiritual search becomes is about trying to find this thing, and that becomes an addictive thing because the more you can't find it, the more you need to find it, right? It becomes a sort of desperation. And so yes, in that sense, seeking is an addiction. However, what starts that seeking off, that impulse in the seeker, no matter how it starts off, typically is triggered by some form of disillusionment early on in life or even later in life. It could be a form of trauma or something that suddenly reveals to you that whatever this construct is around me, something's wrong with it. Maybe your parents got divorced like mine did, or maybe, you know, you lost your job or your wife divorced you, or, you know, financial ruin, whatever it is that suddenly shatters the illusion of what your life was about makes you feel like there's something deeper that is worth investigating, right? And that impulse is very important. That impulse is what makes human beings progress as beings, right? We don't just accept reality the way it's presented. We want to delve deeper, and that's a very important impulse. However, what spiritual culture does, and this is how ideally, you know, spirituality from spiritual culture—and when I say spiritual culture, I mean the teachings, the books, the retreats, all that—is it gives us that idea of what to look for and then sends us off in that direction. And we very soon start to assume that we're going deeper, but we're just inhabiting a whole different realm of superficiality. We've given up material consumerism for spiritual consumerism, and we just become spiritual consumers. And so the kind of writers that I deal with—sorry, readers that find my work appealing—are typically people who are not new to seeking or the spirit or spirituality. They've been doing it for 10 years, 20 years, some people like 40, 50 years ever. I have people who were like Rajneesh, Osho, Sunny Asides from back in the day when you first started up reading my stuff, and I'm like, whoa, that was before I was even born, you know what I mean? And they're just like, you know, we spent so many years just going around in these circles thinking we're progressing and getting deeper, but at a certain point it hits them that, wow, you've just lived a really shallow existence. So like any other addiction, seeking can definitely become an addiction, and when it does, the very object that we're seeking becomes the substance of abuse. Totally. Thank you so much. I can totally relate to that. It's, uh, it's fascinating. Um, can I ask you, um, to give a brief history of the character of Shiv in spiritual seeking addiction into recovery? Oh, so you're asking for the story of my life? You see, I'm not even going to refer to myself—take your time, take your time, Shiv. Yeah, I don't even refer to myself as the character of Shiv. I don't need to separate myself. I'm Shiv. I have no problem being Shiv. I get it. I get it's a name that was given to me, but uncomfortable being Shiv in this life. I don't need to, you know, consider to bifurcate myself as an awareness of Shiv and a Shiv. I am completely integrated as Shiv. And so I'll tell you my story since you asked. Um, and it's not a fantastical story. It's a fairly traditional one. I grew up in a home which was, you know, parents who loved me but there was a lot of friction between them, and so it was a toxic environment, caused a lot of, uh, you know, negative trauma within my system, which I dealt with by being a very rebellious teenager, an adolescent, and then that slowly translated into being a very depressive young adult. And I suffered from depression for a number of years. I'd say, you know, better part of a decade, and it had gotten to a very acute state in which I was, you know, having thoughts of suicide, suicidal ideation on a near daily basis. And at a certain point it was just like, this is too much work, just waking up in the morning and just seeing myself through my day, this meaningless, pointless day, just too much work. It's so easy to end it. It doesn't even have to be a painful way. You can be painless. People will get over my absence in their life eventually. Um, and so I was in that state of mind when I happened to be—and you're from Toronto, you know, the Center Island, right? Toronto Center Island, you have to take a ferry to get to it. It's this little island, a lot of amusement, there's like an amusement park and like a beach and all of that. And my dad and sister just dragged me out of the house because I'd be lying in bed all day. Uh, they're like, just come out with us, just get out of the house for a bit. And we were on Center Island. They went off to do their own thing, and I just walked out on this pier and went into Lake Ontario. I sat down. I hadn't intended to sit down for more than a few minutes, but I was so exhausted I just couldn't get back up. So I just sat there. I just looked at the lake. It was, it was 30-something degrees Celsius, so that's like close to 100 degrees Fahrenheit, baking hot day, and I just sat there. And for four hours I watched a sailboat cross the horizon slowly and th—

and psychological freedom which to his disappointment eventually ebbed after spending several frustrating years attempting to recreate his experience he realized that awakening wasn't the solution in itself but a glimpse into an effective way of approaching the problem of our

existence in 2018 shiv began sharing his reflections on a facebook page called advisaholics anonymous now it's a book available uh welcome shiv thanks for having me emerson oh thank you thank you the first question that i have is um

we're going to go straight to it um is spiritual seeking a form of addiction i definitely think it can be can become um you know there's there's a very fine line between being curious about the world and seeking something and if you think

about the the simple act of seeking you know like let's say you're looking for your car keys emerson you've lost your car keys you're seeking your car keys you have a very one-pointed focus when you start scanning your environment

you're not looking at this environment from this you know zoomed out view you're honing in with this very mad very narrow tunnel vision and looking for just keys you're not noticing the dog you're not noticing the couch you're looking for this thing objects as

in the shape of your keys that's what seeking is you have an idea in your mind of what you want to find and then you go through your life looking for that exact thing you know call it enlightenment call it

salvation call it liberation whatever have you but what if the idea of what you're looking for itself is flaw then what you're doing is you basically completely bypass the natural human curiosity for life which is really what spirituality the way i define it and we

can get into that a little bit later is about and if you look at children and the way they approach the world especially young children and i have two kids i have a seven-year-old and a three-year-old and i they're my

spiritual teachers emerson right i mean i look at them for cues on how to orient my own consciousness because i look at the way they approach a tree or you know we're walking along we're late for school but my

seven-year-old just stops and stares at a rock on the path i'm like come on we gotta go you know we're getting late for school but being late for school is not in her real house it's there's this rock on the road and

the shape of it has just completely absorbed my attention i need to stop and i need to pick it up and i need to spend time with this rock i mean how many adults actually function in that way

not many right so that that kind of curiosity is actually the opposite of seeking and so what the spiritual search becomes is about trying to find this thing and that becomes an addictive thing because the more you can't find it the

more you need to find it right it becomes a sort of desperation and and so yes in that sense seeking is an addiction however what starts that seeking off that impulse in the seeker uh no matter how it

starts off typically is triggered by some form of disillusionment early on in life or or even later in life it could be a form of trauma or something um that that suddenly reveals to you that whatever this construct is around me something's

wrong with it maybe your parents got divorced like mine did or maybe you know you lost your job or your wife divorced you or you know financial room whatever it is that suddenly shatters the illusion of what your life was about

makes you feel like there's something deeper that is worth investigating right and that impulse is very important that impulse is what makes human beings progress as as beings right it's we don't just accept reality the way it's presented we want to delve

deeper and that's a very important impulse however what spiritual culture does and this is how ideally you know spirituality from spiritual culture and when i say spiritual culture i mean the teachings the books the retreats all that is it gives us that idea of what to look

for and then sends us off in that direction and we very soon start to assume that we're going deeper but we're just inhabiting a whole different realm of superficiality we've given up material consumerism for spiritual consumerism and we just become

spiritual consumers and so the kind of um writers that i deal with sorry readers that find my work appealing are typically people who are not new to seeking or the spirit or spirituality they've been doing it for 10 years 20

years some people like 40 50 years ever i have i have people who were like rajneesh osho sunny asides from back in the day when you first started up reading my stuff and i'm like whoa that was before i was even bored you know

what i mean um and they're they're just like you know we spent so many years just going around in these circles thinking we're progressing and getting deeper but at a certain point it hits them that wow you've just lived a really shallow

existence so like any other addiction seeking can definitely become an addiction and when it does uh the very object that we're seeking becomes the substance of abuse totally thank you so much i can totally relate to that it's uh

it's fascinating um can i ask you um um to give up a brief history of the character of shiv in spiritual seeking addiction into recovery oh so you're asking for the story of my life you see i'm not even going to refer to

myself take your time take your time shiv yeah i i don't even refer to myself as the character of [ __ ] i don't need to separate myself i'm [ __ ] i have no problem being [ __ ] i get it i

get it's a name that was given to me but uncomfortable being [ __ ] in this life i don't need to you know consider to bifurcate myself as an awareness of [ __ ] and a [ __ ] i am completely integrated

as [ __ ] and so i'll tell you my story since you asked um and it's it's not a fantastical story it's a it's a fairly traditional one it grew up in home which was a you know parents who loved me but

there was a lot of friction between them and so it was toxic environment caused a lot of uh you know negative trauma within my system which i dealt with by being a very rebellious teenager an adolescent and then that slowly translated into

being a very depressive young adult and i suffered from depression for a number of years i'd say you know better part of a decade and it had gotten to a very uh acute state in which i was you know having

thoughts of suicide suicidal ideation on a near daily basis and at a certain point it was just like this is too much work just just waking up in the morning and just seeing myself through my day this meaningless pointless day

just too much work it's so easy to end it it doesn't even have to be a painful way you can painless people will get over my absence in their life eventually um and so i was in that state

of mind when i happened to be and you're from toronto you know the center island right toronto center island you have to take a ferry to get to it it's this little island a lot of amusement there's like an amusement park and like

a beach and all of that and and my dad and sister just dragged me out of the house because i'd be lying in bed all day uh they're like just come out with us just get out of the house for a bit

and we were on center island they went off to do their own thing and i just walked out on this pier and went into lake ontario i sat down i hadn't intended to sit down for more than a few minutes but i was so

exhausted i just couldn't get back up so i just sat there i just looked at the lake it was it was 30 something degrees celsius so that's like close 100 degrees fahrenheit baking hot day and i just sat there

and for four hours i watched a sailboat cross the horizon slowly and there literally i was so spent i didn't have the energy to even think i just watched that sample like it was the last thing i was ever going to do in

my life you know i just sat and watched it and four hours later my dad comes and finds me he's like what are you doing sitting here being like i completely turned charcoal black in that time they take me home passed out for 18

hours and i woke up and i remember the first thing i remember hearing this bird singing or twittering like the sparrow so loud i thought it was sitting right next to my ear but it wasn't it was well outside the window but everything

was loud like sensations loud and i sat up and i felt like this pristine emptiness in my mind normally i would wake up and the first thought would be oh what a [ __ ] life i have like this anxiety it was just it was a

cycle i was used to for years and years like and suddenly i wake up and i'm just looking around and things are great and things are vibrant and i and this basically what i refer to as an awakening

was a state that was in for about four months it's complete silence in my brain i couldn't think up a thought um i didn't have much motivation to do things i was very blissful just sitting on my balcony

looking at the out of the city or you know i felt like this effusive emotion for things around me and i was like wow this is great it's like i got like the old [ __ ] is dead

completely gone and this is like what world have i entered into same world but everything is transformed and i didn't even think this as a thought it just was a feeling that arose um and and i thought like this is it you

know this is the end of it all my problems are gone suffering is finished and the story this must be what they call enlightenment or whatever right and then slowly after about four months i'd wake up in the morning

and i'd feel that that that intensity sort of dilute a little bit and then my little thinking mind would come back in and i'd be like oh okay just gotta focus a little bit more get a bit more like

i just need to wake up i need a cup of coffee i'll be back there right and it would work i just give myself a shot of caffeine i'd be back there but then it died you did more and more

and more until i just literally felt it slipping away like you feel you know something's slipping out of your hands and you're trying to hold on to it uh at that point i wasn't that heavily into spirituality i hadn't read that many

special books i was more into philosophers like nietzsche and plato and these guys right so i was always the kind of guy who thought deeply about life but i hadn't gone into the eastern spirituality angle as much but

after that i became obsessed by this one experience i had and i wanted to figure out how do i make this permanent that's what got me hooked on advice of atlanta because all these guys seem to be talking about

was exactly what had happened to me and i was trying to get back right under shanty eckhart tolle the saga rama all these guys these were these look like the dudes i was like i need to figure out what

they did i became obsessed with it that's all that occupied my attention for the next you know i can't even remember like maybe 10 years i'd say better part of 10 years but what i eventually found and i you know i do all that i'd read a

you know book like nissan god does i am that and in while i was reading i'd be in the state of arousal and awareness which would be very close to what i remember experiencing in my awakening be like oh okay that see the book is

doing that it's getting through to me it's happening it's happening but then it will be gone right after i close the book or it will last for maybe a few minutes and boom right or meditate and have this really

amazing meditation two hours of like blankness of mine staring at a wall i come out of that and be like all peaceful and blissful like yeah yeah that's all i need to do just more of that more of that more than

but you realize that all this is is you're just [ __ ] with yourself man this is all self management self management constant self management changing this tweaking that fixing this constantly it's obsessive it's a form of addiction and eventually

at a certain point i realized well what am i doing to myself i've just life is passing me by things are happening and i'm just like on this one track and really the whole point of this was to be able

to connect more deeply with life and here i am completely disconnected from it because i'm trying to get this thing and this is what i meant about seeking actually deadens the natural human curiosity we have of connecting with

life right so at that point that's when i realized that whole culture even if it was created around people who had had these experiences and perhaps formed some sort of sort of connection with life the culture that had built around it had

the opposite effect you know it it sort of took people out of their natural connection natural ability to connect to life and made it into like this agenda this abstract agenda right and so that experience of nothingness that had

felt in my awakening when you make it into a goal actually hollows you out as a human being and not in a good way it hollows you out by making you completely superficial and this is what i found when i look at

people who are products of that culture even though they're all new aging and into this and love and bless and all of that when you really get down to it they're extremely hollow individuals i'm not saying everybody but a large

majority of them because they're consumers like any other consumer ouch um i was there what you what you just said shiv about you know that that um initial or one of those glimpses i had the same experience for about three months all my brothers

were trying to bug me because i was just completely placed i think i was like hugging people at one point and um just seeing everything and this is this is kind of like um um yeah true through some some suffering

some major suffering and of course when i got that first kind of like your first hit of a drug you know after that high comes off you're like i want to get back that high i want to get back that high

and then you buy into this spiritual um spirituality and then you buy all the retreats all the thing and and then i didn't even know it but but at the end of it at the end of that i

was not only an addicted with spirituality or or seeking but i was also a dealer i was also selling this you know what i'm saying like be like me and then and then there's this just fraudulent that i thought you know i'm

like this is just a bit i'm a big fraud and even when i said that even when i started kind of like just completely ruining my my spiritual whatever uh teaching by by drinking and going out and this stuff because i

really just wanted to be out of that character i just felt that it was just a big like what did i get into um was there a moment in in your in your spiritual seeking that you were like what did i get into did you get

sucked into it completely well yeah like i said you know at a certain point when you're that focused on something obsessive you're sort of going with a blinkered vision you're not really looking at all the angles you just focus

this is one thing i'm obsessed about it i need to get it and then you're on that track and everything seems to support you being on that track right every every spiritual teacher everyone's saying hey yeah the track is the right

track to be on go on and keep going so you don't question it in the beginning but yeah at a certain point i wouldn't say it clicked like that but it started dawning on me and one of the

i've written an article about it one of the moments where it sort of sort of hit me pretty hard was in 2012 i was invited to speak at the science and non-duality conference right you've probably heard of it as a

fairly well-known conference i don't want to say i don't have anything per se against that conference when i talk about people think i'm criticizing that conference and honestly as far as conferences go that's not a bad one you know in terms of a

conference um you know it's a trade show like anything else but i had this other image about it right because i had this whole image of what spiritual culture is about and so i thought i was going to this

gonna you know i was going to this conference i was going to meet all these spiritual teachers whose books i had read i was super excited about oh man i'm going to meet this guy this this guy's going to be here she's

going to be here whatever it'd be great um and so we flew down to california my wife and i in iran and my first day there i had a speaking engagement on the third day all right it was a conference over i think three

or four days like the whole weekend long weekend um and so the first day i'm there i started getting this really weird vibe from the moment i walked in like this whole thing felt very like cliquey and orchestrated and

fake and you know i've worked in the corporate world my whole life and i've always had an issue with that whole you know fakery that goes on there you know but at least it's it's obviously fake everybody knows they're

all the relationships are transactional we're all using each other we're all trying to make a buck but this spiritual world was supposed to be pure these are supposed to be human beings not using other people not trying to get

a leg up not trying to or you know gain power those are the sort of rose tinted glasses i went into this with and then i looked at this whole thing i'm like holy [ __ ] these people are

doing the exact same thing you see in any other industry trade show you know people trying to schmooze people trying to you know get good with a guy who's who's well recognized influential and then the people who are

influential wearing that you know whole persona off yeah i am the [ __ ] top dog of this whole scene here come lick my feet like you you were saying someone want to kiss your feet then people standing there

waiting for their feet to be kissed and there's a line there man for the for there's a feet kissing like and i'm looking at this whole thing i'm like this is not at all what i imagined this conference would be like

um and again nothing against the conference that was my fault that was my disillusionment and so that's when i realized that okay well this is not what i want to participate in and this was a very shattering thing for

me because it sort of all those fantasies you build up in your mind that hope and all of that gets crushed in one shot right um and i almost didn't make it to my speaking engagement on the third day because i

i said i want to be a part of this but you know my wife and daughter talked me into to speaking because they're like you know well you made a commitment they put your name down on the roster you don't

show up this with the audience members just sitting there waiting for the speaker that's not cool i said yeah i agree with that so i did go i did speak the audience loved it but then i left soon after i'm not lingering

here this is not my scene that was i think for me the the nail in the coffin when i actually got to be there and see it all play out what pissed me off after that about the whole spiritual

culture scene is that how are those other teachers sitting there willingly participating in this playing this game knowing that their clients are vulnerable seekers they're the most vulnerable of the lot your clients aren't like rich consumers just coming in there with

lots of money to spend here you go take some money tell me some beautiful words no a lot of them are coming in desperate they're in desperate situations in their lives those are not the kind of people you

want to exploit go ahead and exploit your warren buffets but don't exploit exploit this guy who's just given up his home in his car and moved to the city you live in just to be close to you i mean that's [ __ ]

up [ __ ] you know what i mean like where's the humanity man and that's when i started to realize that this whole spiritual culture extracts the humanity out of people under the guise of giving them that experience of

pure enlightenment whatever it is it extracts the basic human decency you have to emerson no matter what happens i'm not going to try and [ __ ] you over in order to better myself in life it's just not that kind of guy man

and i'm not going to do that to other people so how do you make a business or a lifestyle out of doing that to people that's really stark and i noticed that this whole spiritual culture is about that it

is about normalizing that to the point where it doesn't feel that dark anymore because everybody's doing it anyways right we're all doing it we're all exploiting it's an explanative culture so whatever okay i'll just be another kind of sport

and that's this apathy that sets it and then everyone's trying to do it that's really destructive i find so so that for me was that sort of realization that then you know i couldn't articulate it in this way back then back then i just

felt these frustrations i didn't know what those frustrations were really about uh and then it took me a few years to put those pieces together in my mind and that's when i started writing on this page i totally get that shiv um when i was

into it um what i wanted to do was to give it for free for people i wanted to give it for free but of course you know when you have it for free people look up to you they put you

in a pedestal they think you're a saint and then there's this this pressure now because it's getting bigger to to maintain it so to maintain this free stuff you end up you know doing some retreats and stuff and even if you don't get paid you get

people to do this and um you know based from my mentors and and spiritual teachers that have followed that this is a good thing this is something that can really help a person and i think of what the one of the

breaking point for me was i'm like if this is happening how come i'm still having some trauma i'm still how come i still want to party how come i still you know i would be teaching meditation and and knowing that

my my my students would wake up at five o'clock because my classes at six o'clock i'll be like you know what i'm gonna go out party at one o'clock i don't think my students will see me there you know i'll see them in the morning

and i just beginning to see the uh the hypocrisy of it and and felt really bad you know for people that were paying money for for this liberation or something and um and it's an empty promise because here i am i'm supposed to be teaching it

and i'm not feeling liberated this was and and here i was having that i had a shift or an awakening and then another awakening so this is my second awakening but i can't seem to hold on to it

the character was going back and forth um and so basically i said [ __ ] it you know and just completely demolished the character the persona you know instead of kind of like having this persona of like a

saintly person that was vegan that that that you know dressed in beige and had a mala bead drank kombucha tea non-stop i even drank a tea called enlightenment spirit of it it has guarana so it was it was

getting me kind of like because i would be partying at night and i would be drinking it so that would seem kind of like really vibrant in the day but really it was my hangover drink because i was having a difficulty just

such difficulty there's more to that story and uh but how did you how did you integrate it you know what i'm saying after that experience um you know me i just dropped out of the world kind of thing

how did you integrate it after that that science and non-duality conference experience well see yeah the integration didn't happen all at once it's in that kind of integration is a non-stop process i don't think anybody ever gets integrated

as a final state right that's just you can just sell that as another kind of enlightenment okay i'm not gonna enlighten you i'm gonna integrate you right that kind of integration of it's an ongoing process it's still happening

right it's still happening for me and i'm still happy for you it's still happening for everybody what what was the game-changer for me is when i realized that if i'm truly a truth seeker and not seeker in the sense of seeking

but truth seekers and i care about truth right if i'm truly a truth seeker then i have to be an honest human being it's a no-brainer if you're seeking truth you have to display truth you have to exhibit truth

in your life how much ever you're capable of doing but you have to be as honest as you possibly can in order because if you're a dishonest human being or you're being hypocritical that is going to be the very barrier

between you and the truth right you would expect that truth is about honesty speaking the truth being the truth acting truthfully all of that and i said all right well the first thing i need to do is be truthful with

myself let's start there if i'm gonna ever hope of you know finding or contacting the truth or seeing the truth of reality i need to first be truthful with myself i said all right so let's be truthful with myself what's going on here

and i realized that all i was doing was trying to escape i was so terrified about going back to that state of suffering that i had been before my last 10 years since my awakening had all been about

escape escape escape escape escape constantly non-stop i said all right well why am i trying to escape either i still have trauma in which case my best strategy is faced with that thing instead of pretending it's not there

or if i'm not traumatized anymore then i've got nothing to worry about but what am i trying to escape from and i found well i do have trauma and the more honest i am with myself the more trauma i realize

i have we all do every single human being and how can anybody be a teacher of truth and not admit to their own fallibility as human beings and this is what i found with most spiritual teachers very few are able to own up to the fact

that they're just normal [ __ ] up human beings like you and i are men how many spiritual teachers are there presenting a persona of perfection this this steel like casing of absolute pure enlightenment where nothing phases them

equanimous calm peaceful blissful these are all very violent words if you really think about it because they all put down our humanity they're all trying to project an image that none of us are and in the process subliminally telling us that the way we

are is not good enough and we need to be aspiring towards that and so the only strategy we then have is to lie to ourselves in order to get there to deny all that and so all of what

spirituality is about in culture is a form of bypassing that's all i see very little of it actually has to do with anything concrete or substantial so for me it was really that it was that integration process if you want to call

it that was really about getting real with myself and that took acknowledging two things right one there are many beautiful aspects to me as a human being right there are these talents i have there's a compassion i have

this is a willingness to be there for other people many many wonderful things there are many ugly things about me as a human being there are many many ugly things and sure i could wish the ugly away and

sure i could wish that only i only had the good stuff but that's never going to happen there's always going to be beauty to me there's always going to be ugliness and they both serve a purpose you know

they both juxtapose each other and they both actually help in the process of evolution i need to accept the goodness and the darkness within me and if i can do that then i can begin to accept it in society then i can begin to

accept it and emerson or another person i need or somebody who has different political views for me or a racist or anything another person who shows me they're ugly it will help me understand why they are ugly because i've taken the

time to understand why i am ugly but that's not the kind of spirituality you hear about it's not it's the spirituality of beauty only it's just one sided spirituality that denies the darkness within us and if you look

out at around in society what's been happening in north america for the last 10 years in europe all this political divisiveness all this polarization it's all about both sides refusing to accept the ugliness in the other side and the ugliness in themselves

both sides wanting to see themselves as pure as driven snow and righteous and the other side as be evil and wrong or whatever neither taking the time and having the humility to consider that hey we're all [ __ ] up

man we're all [ __ ] up no one's got the answers here let's try and understand each other's point of view that's what spirituality is about for me not this [ __ ] low self [ __ ] like yeah okay those

kind of experiences happen but spirituality is about looking at life the way it exists looking at the problems and the conflicts that exist trying to get to the root of what's happening here and engaging with it in some way

some substantial way you're not gonna fix any of it you're gonna die with a lot of problems unsolved you're not gonna have all the answers when you die but at least you gave it a [ __ ] shot

thank you for saying that that's that that's uh wonderfully said um yeah for for me you know what when when i was oh sorry just a second okay i have this emergency alert on my phone i mean when [ __ ] gets too heated the

emergency alarm goes off no no i i've always you know after that you know when i was when i was teaching you know you're putting a pedestal and everybody has this glazed look on on their eyes and you and and you have

mentors because you can't do this alone so my mentors are telling me that you know there's great responsibility for the power that you have and then you can't really show your dark side and this kind of stuff and you have

to you know control yourself emerson or or whatever they're telling me and then after that you know because you know i i just really wanted to dj and and and party and um you know i i was going through a

divorce um i um of 10 years relationship and then um i was worried about my mom dying because my mom has cancer so here i was falling apart you know and and and trying to date trying to mend that you know brokenness

and um i was not allowed to do that because i had to i had to smile and and and and you know project is perfection and because everybody's coming to you know to this meditation the trainings and everything and um i

end up and then became kind of like almost like the poster boy for selfless service that kind of thing because i gave everything for free and um when when when i realized now is that you know this this this character this

persona has the capacity of extreme kindness extreme kindness you know like you know like i'm even surprised sometimes of the kindness and the generosity and the compassion but also extreme you know um the opposite side could be an [ __ ]

could be a douchebag could be could be just the most insensitive person it's just this extreme see that i'm saying like oh wow and and or or or has the capacity to self-destruct and sabotage everything yeah and it's so

important to that realization is so important because you know when we look at you know history and all these horrible things that people have done to each other we look at fascism or you know the nazis or paul pot or

all these regimes of pure cruelty it's like almost impossible to relate to how human beings sort of behave like that right i mean i i find it hard to even you know cause harm to a small animal forget like mass genocide right i

mean it's out of the wheelhouse of our thinking how is are we could a human being be capable but the fact is we could be capable given the right circumstances the right triggers we could be capable and it's so

important to understand the darkness within us and develop some sort of understanding compassion for it because when you're aware of it then you know what it's what it's leading you into it's when people are completely unaware you know when you look back at like

your 1930s nazi germany and the kind of things people did were all germans evil of course not but most supported the najib party and they and they a lot of people carried out a lot of very cruel uh behavior but it's not necessarily

because they were cruel human beings by nature that circumstance triggered and brought out that was the need of the moment to bring out all that cruelty and it just flowed out because nobody was aware that this would exist within their system

and now we you know 20 years later or 50 years later people look back in hindsight like how how did we ever do that i've had conversation with so many japanese people living in japan you know i lived there for a better part

of a decade and to this day you know younger generations look back and they're like we have no idea how we did that how we ever occupied that headspace as a nation because they're some of the kindest most

compassionate people of men and so you know that self-awareness is about not just developing kindness but also developing an understanding for all of it and that's what makes you an effective human being thank you when i'm thinking about you

know like i'm about into guru talk about you know i hope it's not it doesn't come across as guru bashing but there was a point in in my spiritual career that that there was almost gonna like you know like people were

going to see it they're like you are going to end up you know um you know you have a lot of followers and all this kind of stuff and i got really scared of that i'm like doesn't mean that i'm going to

be celibate and then people are going to look with these glazed eyes and and i'm so happy that i kind of like [ __ ] it up before it got really really bad you know kind of like um

um i don't want to talk about those girls but you know what i'm talking about so what do you think happens to these gurus that ends up in all of these scandals you know i mean you touched upon it earlier

emerson when you said your realization was that you still had trauma and if you really try and trace it back you may find that the reason you got into becoming this guru type of person was in order to alleviate your trauma it

helped made you feel better right and so really this whole guru disciple this whole spiritual culture we have is all traumatized individuals playing out their trauma with each other that's any codependent relationship it could be a husband and wife

could be a schoolteacher and student any codependent relationship is about two people trying to resolve their trauma by using each other taking on this oppressor victim whatever all these different roles we play they can be more benign and benevolent

or they can be very exploitative and tyrannical doesn't matter but it's all about resolving trauma and what that means is that your guru is just as traumatized as you are and when this clicks in for followers they're going to be like why am i

following that guy he hasn't dealt with this trauma either so the only way that relationship can ever make sense is that both of them are transparent about their trauma the guru and the disciple both admit to the trauma they feel

because there is a space for people to work with each other in society you know you and i are talking about this i'm learning something from you you're learning something for me as a pro in this process of this interview

right and so there's room for us to learn things from each other but not in these hierarchical roles where one is the teacher and one is the learner and one is not traumatized and has completely you know perfected themselves

one is the traumatized person and here's the power hierarchy that's all [ __ ] if we're if this is going to be about truth let's all be truthful here we're all traumatized teacher and seeker alike and we can help each other we can talk

about it from we can share we can all have insights people find my page insightful but it's not because any of them believe that i've resolved all my trauma from day one i've said i'm a [ __ ] up

like there's so many things i haven't figured out about life that i'm still figuring out i was talking with my dad earlier this morning because you know sometimes i need to just call up my dad and talk to him

and he'll be he'll talk me through whatever you know i'm working on in my own brain with my own life if i i can pick up and i need to call dad once in a while what kind of guru

would i be you know calling daddy but that's it and i have no problem telling people i call my dad or everyone or my mom or or a friend or talk to my wife if i'm you know struggling to figure

something out because i'm a normal human being and you know i may have certain insights that help other people but sometimes i lack those insights in my own life and that's okay right so and so the beauty of human

relationship is we have this ability to be a little bit more objective about somebody else's life than we have to be about our own and that objectivity can sometimes help another person you know if you you have a problem with

you know you're suffering because your mom has cancer for example i'm not saying right now but you know as an example and you need someone to talk about because this whole situation has consumed you and we you know there's some back and

forth between us maybe you learn a couple of things but maybe i have a completely different problem that's work related and you talk to me and that gives me some you know pointers in my own life because we don't share

the same problems so definitely there's room for that sort of interaction and help but but like i said we need to first be truthful about the fact that we're all traumatized but when you build a culture around people

avoiding their trauma or pretending they're not traumatized and therefore in a position to help other people resolve their trauma you're not going to help anybody you're not going to solve anyone's trauma you're just going to traumatize people further

right i agree i agree but that there is a point when you know not actually a point when i started you know teaching i really did this close that i'm [ __ ] up i did tell people i'm [ __ ] up you know

and i come from a [ __ ] up place that's why i understand this [ __ ] up-ness but but there comes a point i guess in in in you know even if you repeat it over and over and over again i would always

tell this you know in the start of my teaching um it sounds so weird now when i say my teaching but but you know i'm talking about right so i would say that please don't put me in a pedestal

because i'm beginning to see glazed eyes looking at me and and it was almost like a fan club kind of like happening um like because you'll crucify me later and then i realized at one point that no matter what i do even if i disclose

to them everything even if i smoke cigarettes and i started drinking beers and i think i bought a pack of smokes and just kind of like i just really wanted out of it i was dealing with with a lot of stuff and i

i can't be in this position anymore and i was really [ __ ] up everything um even if i disclosed you know and i was honest with them before what's going on um because there's this perception of a teacher a spiritual teacher um

and and then you have mentors that tells you you know what stop drinking or stop doing this and you know get your life together so you have to be perfect in a way you know what i'm saying you have to have

this even if you're kind of like bleeding and everything covered up advantages to show up you know what i'm saying and you have a meditation class to teach um so the only way i think at that time that i did that i

wanted to do was like how do i destroy this completely how do i go to the extreme so that you know i'll just get booted out or i had to step down how do i [ __ ] this up and and i think a

lot of um a lot of um a lot of teachers and and gurus for example you were talking about osho you know um earlier um oh you didn't say that sorry uh but you know um how how does how does one

get out of the guru or the teacher from both teacher and a seeker position to get the [ __ ] out of it so first one has to be aware of what one is participating in right it's like

any relationship how do you get out of a bad marriage where you're doing this codependent thing or even with a parent where there's this codependency happening first you have to see how it's being destructive you have to viscerally feel because yeah

there's the suffering and all of it but often we don't understand why we're suffering and you know there are people who go repeat the same mistakes in relationships they choose the same kind of partner every time the kind that they always have this

sort of care dependent relationship sometimes you you need to work it out by doing that over and over again making the same mistakes over and over again and i think i said somewhere in one of my articles that

what makes us wise as human beings is not listening or reading the wisdom of other people but suffering by actually suffering through life suffering teaches you that's why we suffer so i don't see suffering as this thing to be done away with that's like

you know going to school and getting rid of the curriculum what do you want to do at school if you're there to learn something and there's a curriculum suffering is the human curriculum and each person has a little different

kind of curriculum custom design and tailored to them for their own mind because we make the choices that then cause us to suffer and obviously a lot of times events happen out of our control that cause us to

suffer but either way how we face up to those events and how we then deal with the aftermath the attitudes we develop the emotions we feel what it makes of us in the long run all of that is part of the learning

experience you don't want to bypass that because that sort of defeats the whole purpose of living life so at a certain point i think if a person life is designed to make us more self-aware and society is designed to make us less

self-aware okay these are this is two movements i see happen if you look at the natural world it's all about the evolution of human consciousness and society is more about the evolution of human society which doesn't really care

about individual consciousness it tries to subdue or control and make a human being more predictable in order for the machine of society to keep moving forward but at a certain point one begins to make the connection between suffering and what your level of

self-awareness and you realize they're linked to each other and they're the lessons literally being shown to you day after day that are waiting to be learned but we're not learning them because we're skipping over them or we're finding some way to avoid them right

so when that happens then you say okay i don't want to participate in this any longer it's like breaking any addiction right you realize first that you are abusing a substance until you make that connection no matter what anybody tells you you're

not really going to move into a rehabilitation move right actually thank you for saying that yeah that's that's what happened it's like you know what i don't you know i'm sick of this high i can't i can't control this high

anymore this is this is beyond my control now kind of thing no matter what i do no matter what you know um um trying to be a saint partying in between and everything in between you know i'm like maybe i should maybe i should just

go on maybe i should teach a 40-day meditation so that i would sober up and i will just gonna you know and nothing still happened and then after that i'm like you know what i need to go to a festival

i need to go to a rave you know because i was i always told people this i'm just a raver you know from the 90s that that uh that did a lot of ecstasy and did some dmt and um i've always said that you know

and and and in in all of that and his honesty it's almost gonna like um it almost felt like you know i like i like calling it i let the [ __ ] up-ness play out because there was a lot of fucked-upness

about it i'm like this is really [ __ ] up here here i was like an insecure kid you know what i'm saying and then here i'm being adored by so many people and then that is bandaging all of this

trauma of insecurity i'm like let me play that out let me let me let me be messy again let that messiness happen you know what i'm saying there's no choice anyway it just happened you know you know what i'm

talking about just kind of like kept on it just played out and then when when when when i think the uh there was just a collapse kind of like almost at this it's almost like that that um persona got just demolished

completely and i was like okay um and in this sobriety you know what i'm saying that we're talking about is there clear thinking now or whatever whatever you might want to call it well and you know that's that's exactly

the whole metaphor for my page and the book the book is actually at vitalik's anonymous the subtitle is sobering insights for spiritual addicts i actually don't have a copy handy but you know readers if they're interested can find it on

amazon but it's essentially that it's about first recognizing this whole spiritual addiction and then facing up to it it doesn't give any sort of techniques on how to get out of addiction this is not what it's about it's about making helping people make

that connection if they feel that something's a mess but they're not really connecting with that yet we're realizing that this whole spiritual thing this whole seeking is about an addiction that's a result of your trauma and you're finding a way

to soothe it and this is all this whole culture is a self-soothing culture it's all about making people feel better and nothing to do with finding the truth or any of this that's beautiful i i really like that

that almost kind of like you know um you know um paralleled the story that i have about this and and i haven't even read your book i should read it it is a journey it's kind of like you know having this spiritual

addiction on top of your trauma on top of your substance you know if you have substance or or um drug alcohol abuse you know it's just all combined into this messy messy addiction until you kind of like him

like oh wow that was a [ __ ] up journey i loved it and i hated it and if you know it doesn't even have to be an addiction like alcohol or drugs if you look at this this experience of

addiction is universal people spiritual people non-spiritual people all have people are addicted to work people are addicted to exercise people are addicted to certain diets people are addicted to self-image all these things this is all addictive behavior and what we see in society around us

the ambition people display to go and achieve our money or fame or enlightenment whatever have you all of those parts of seeking they're all different paths of seeking they're all about resolving that trauma so i don't want to single out spiritual

seekers as this specifically traumatized bunch using this tactic it's really humanity at large that's doing it what is consumerism about what is black friday about what is christmas shopping about it's all about self-soothing alleviating trauma and we do this we constantly put ourselves out

there chasing after this and that in order to to to create substance and value in our life because we feel deep down inside we have no substance we have no value it's the lack of the sense of intrinsic

value that keeps us constantly searching for extrinsic values but a child doesn't feel like that you know children grow up feeling a sense of deep intrinsic value until that's sort of sucked out of them by focusing their attention upfront

when i see my kids playing they play without any agenda they're playing in the snow my older daughter spent three hours yesterday in her school playground making the biggest snowball she could ever make in her life that was

that's all she was doing she's just packing on stuff why because that's it no agenda no points i really feel like making this junk snowball and the enjoyment that she got out of and i'm just watching go like wow this is this is

what human beings have been doing for millions of years on this planet as tribals and stuff we just walked around like hey this looks like something that's worth doing let's do it but now society has become all about

this this mindset that you have to create value in your life this look this idea that life is intrinsically meaningless devoid of value it's actually really magnalistic society even spirituality this kind of spirituality they've gone well all this is a

nihilistic kind of philosophy because it not the philosophy sorry the culture because it promotes a subliminal idea that you do not have enough value you are not of iran thus you must seek right so all seeking starts from that

point of lack this feeling of not enough and then trying to become enough and as long as you're trying to become enough you'll never become enough because you are enough right you can't fix a problem that doesn't truly exist

it's our trauma that distorts our vision of ourselves and then we're off seeking to try and resolve it beautiful thank you thank you so much um yeah for for for this experience you know what i'm saying it's gonna like

i've sobered up um maybe for two years i was in an island i told you about haida gwaii and i just let it all let it all play out you know what i'm saying i look sometimes i would stare at the

ocean for months you know and or sometimes i would just dj but it's almost kind of like when when when um the triggers were like spiritual words you know like meditation um meditation is great you know what i'm saying but i made it into

an enlightenment thing that if i meditate then i would get into this this state or something or even sanskrit words because i used to be a good sanskrit teacher you know and i would so i got rid of that it's almost like a purging

of all of that and then everything just dropped away and and and now it's like uh when grieving happens i cry really really loud when i'm watching a really stupid comedy show i laugh really really loud it's just

it's just enjoyment now because it's almost like that traumatized child finally kind of like went in it cycle completely you're like okay you know this this traumatized child was addicted was was was seriously [ __ ] up you know

what i'm saying seriously [ __ ] up but now i just laugh at that right now and it but it's not bypassing anymore because you know what there's no more to bypass i bypassed all of that before because

you're right you know spirituality is like an escape piston thing i'm like okay if i just need to go to this you know to this teacher training or if i become a teacher you know i will get there

um i thank you for your time i just wanted to i don't know if you wanted to add to that one thank you for this i think i think you really expressed it beautifully emerson um you know the only thing i would add

to that is you're you're absolutely right and the problem with most spiritual teachings is they create this very linear idea of what spirituality is whereas the spiritual process is really the circular one it's always moved back it's always

coming full circle and then another circle another full circle not progressing anywhere it's just as completions of cycles and processes totally you know and we keep coming back and you're here now and you you know you're able to engage with

life uh much more naturally and much more organically like you're saying when you agree degree but you know something else might start oh yeah yeah that just keeps happening that's right i do understand that it keeps happening then you're not waiting for the end

right that's right it's just whatever happens enjoying the life because you realize right it ends when you die that's right but that's that's as much as we can figure out we should have another conversation about this shiv i really enjoyed that i'm going to

pause this right now and uh thank you so much