Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Our guest this week is Joel Lessees. Joel founded the Education Training center in Buffalo, New York as a means of counseling people marginalized by trauma, addiction and psychological distress and its effects, including incarceration, homelessness and institutionalization. He is dedicated to reframing mental health distress as a potential spiritual marker. Joel has lived in Nepal and Israel. He's also a poet expressing the landscape of the mystical elements of our human being. He believes world religion, poetry, spirituality and meditation encompass the most vital aspects of our mind and life. His other passions include the intersection of poetry, spirituality, science and phenomenology. He has been voted Buffalo's best poet. He founded Western New York's Ground and Sky Poetry series and he created and hosted the podcast Unraveling Religion as our biography, Odyssey of Autumn's Breath is in progress and combines much of his life's poetry with prose. Joel Lessees, welcome to Next Steps Forward.
[00:00:54] Speaker B: I'm so excited to be here, Chris. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited about today's conversation.
[00:01:01] Speaker A: Now I am the same. And before we start, this episode is airing on your birthday. So I have to say a big shout out, happy birthday to you. So I hope you're having a great day and hopefully it's going to get better after this once you're done with me.
[00:01:10] Speaker B: Yeah, well, it's interesting, you know, we're going to talk a lot today, hopefully about mystical attunement and sort of synchronicities and an underlying intelligence that operates hidden from us and that this aligns on my birthday. It's just one of those events that is I take joy in.
[00:01:25] Speaker A: All lined up.
[00:01:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:01:27] Speaker A: So there are what are considered the big questions about religion. Let's get them out of the way before taking a deeper dive. Does God exist?
[00:01:35] Speaker B: So Chris, I love this question because in all my searchings I've done some extensive non academic investigations, explorations and studies into world's mysticisms. All traditions, all mysticisms are essentially the same. They express in different languages the same ideas and concepts. And so when we ask does God exist? I think we really have to ask like from our point of view, it's either a matter of faith or it's not, right? Like either we believe or we don't or maybe there's some gradation therein. But one of the things, Chris, that meditation has revealed to me is that we can direct directly experience, whether answer the answer to that question. We can directly experience does God exist? And so, you know, how can we understand whether God exists or not? The question becomes where, where do we find God, right? I mean, where would that be? Where do we begin to look? And so if God is hidden from us, where has God hid himself from us? And so I think it's kind of funny that looking inward, the inward search, right directly within the very core of our being resides the very thing that is the source of all creation. And by meditation instilling ourselves, we can really begin to understand the mechanisms of the larger, the larger elements at work here in the universe and our relation as a human being to that. So I really think that like meditation and the experience of God is a kind of negation that eliminates all that we think, feel and believe.
God is a realm of non being or emptiness. And that is a limitless field that is not commonly perceived by our human experience.
[00:03:34] Speaker A: Now the next question. Why are we here?
[00:03:39] Speaker B: Right? So if there is a creator and he created this, or she created this, or it created this, why? What are we doing here? And I can tell you it's interesting. My mother was Irish Catholic, but my father is Jewish. And so I was raised in a Jewish frame. And I've spent some time in Israel, as my bio expresses. And one of the things that they state in Jewish mysticism is that what is the purpose for creation? It's for God to find a dwelling place in the lower worlds, the earth being the lower worlds. So we're in a process of, of evolution and perfection of humankind to the point where eventually we will feel God's presence with us. But right now, God's presence is exiled. For whatever reasons, his purpose in creating this.
Human beings were to toil and to struggle to work to build something which its ultimate goal is the perfection of humankind, God dwelling with us. And just a point on that, Chris, is one of the things that is taught is that why would God have us struggle? So it's the bread of shame. So if you are just given something with no investment, no effort, no. No work, no no sweat and toil in it, it's not really yours. But if you are vested in developing that and sacrificing for that, for building for that and caring for that, then you really feel it is a part, a part of yours. Yeah.
[00:05:12] Speaker A: A couple of big questions seem to go together. Why does evil exist? How should we live? And why should we bother being moral?
[00:05:21] Speaker B: Yeah. So these are great questions. And I love this. And this is in all the world's traditions and all the world's mysticisms. These are the questions that are addressed. And I just want to say I had to take an unbeaten path to come to these places of researching, understanding and investigating these questions. These aren't normally what we find in ordinary conversation, but they're most vital to our experience as people. And so why does evil exist? Or why is really what is evil? When we ask why does evil exist? What is evil? It really seems to me that there are gradations of self interest over self, selflessness or agenda, one's own wanting for oneself over service to community. And so we're all in a balance of that because we have the body. There's a certain element of selfishness. We have to tend to our human experience. So there's this interplay of selflessness versus selfishness. Now, evil, the straight out evil which does exist in the world, they're probably beyond the scope of what we want to talk about today, reasons for it. But I would say that one of the most important teachings in Kabbalah and Jewish mysticism is the shelf life. The energy of evil does not have the shelf life of love or service or righteousness. So that evil may exist and affect the world, but it doesn't last. Its energies dissipate in a way where when we express love and selflessness and service, those energies go someplace that lasts forever.
[00:06:59] Speaker A: And one question I hear now and then that always seems to have an air of desperation or resignation to it. Is there any point to it at all?
[00:07:07] Speaker B: Yeah, I love this question because, you know, it ties into faith, it ties into hope, and what are we doing here? And in Zen Buddhism, there is the. The three great attributes of enlightenment or impetuses of enlightenment are great, great faith, great doubt and great zeal. Great faith, great doubt, great zeal. The great doubt is what you're expressing. What? Why is there any point to this? And so I think if we understand that there is an unseen field that we are existing in an unseen ocean that we are existing in whose very essence is love and lovingness. But it is hidden from our experience.
Then we begin to understand that there's purpose, there's mission, there's reason, and things like sacrifice, devotion, duty, care, vision, hope, all these things matter. And so absolutely, if you haven't found it and you don't know why you're here, look more deeply into yourself. I guarantee you you will find it. The answers are within yourself.
[00:08:14] Speaker A: Yeah, and one more here. Do we live on after death?
[00:08:19] Speaker B: So, yeah, in all the traditions, all the traditions, including Kabbalah, the Christian Gnostics, the Sufis of Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, the Native American and indigenous traditions, even Western medical literature, all affirm the multiplicity of lives, past lives and future incarnations. And I think that when you begin to invest, investigate oneself deeply through meditation, you touch the timeless element, the eternal element in you that, as the Bhagavad Gita says, we change clothes like we change clothes, we change bodies in a larger scope of time.
[00:09:02] Speaker A: Zen Buddhism is so integral to who you are that I want to make sure that we bring it into the conversation very early today. How did you come to Buddhism or did Buddhism come to you?
[00:09:12] Speaker B: Well, you know, when I was considering this question, Chris, I love it because it's twofold. I think that I definitely, without question, there's no doubt in me as I'm talking to you, looking at you right in the face, that I have past life affinities, past life connection with Zen Buddhism. And I tend to incarnate around the Dharma. What we call the Dharma, or dharma means truth. And it's the teaching, the wheel of Dharma is the wheel of the teaching of truth. And so the Buddha incarnated to teach the wheel of truth. But there were several Buddhas before and there will be several Buddhas after to do the same thing. And so that past life affinity is one connection to Zen Buddhism, but another, the more practical incarnation of my connection to Zen is really, I went to Israel after college to do a 10 month social services program. And so, you know, I was doing a deep investigation. We'll talk about it. I was questioning very deeply what is the matter with me. I'd had some experiences in early childhood and adolescence which created a profound suffering. And I had to ask this question. They were lost in my memory, they were repressed. So I didn't have connection with the memory. And so I knew inside myself, but in my mind I didn't have access. And so I was asking myself with deep scrutiny, what is the matter with me? And so, and I was reading world's mysticisms and traditions and this question, what is the matter with. With me, we will talk about is a koan, a Zen koan, which is an illogical question that cannot be solved by logic. It breaks apart discursive logic to open you to the sheer presence of the moment. And so someone sent me a copy of the Snow Leopard, which is a book by Peter Matheson, who it won the National Book Club Award. But that blew all the doors and windows out of my mind. Yeah, it was an amazing book and a great experience.
[00:10:59] Speaker A: So, yeah, he just mentioned Kan. At the crux of your own personal journey, are there questions and answers to your own koan? You Know what is the matter with me? How did you choose that koan, and how does it help you?
[00:11:11] Speaker B: Well, in the same spirit that we are talking about right now, I do feel that that koan was assigned to me by the universe. It arose naturally or organically in me. But it's something that, because of the experiences that were scripted for me in this incarnation, I do feel that our lives are mapped out.
It was scripted for me in a way where I'd had these very difficult experiences in early childhood and adolescence that caused a disconnect from my organic experience. And I held on to tremendous suffering that was very difficult. And so to write the benium, the correction of myself, my healing journey began with this question, what is the matter with me? Which broke apart the discursive logic and brought me to a place of really directly touching the deepest aspects of myself.
[00:12:07] Speaker A: You also take inspiration from the koan. True human being no rank. What does it mean? Or what does it mean to you?
[00:12:15] Speaker B: Yeah. So true human being no rank is a Chinese koan from many centuries ago. And I think it touches on. The way I would offer it in contemporary language, is that we, as a human being, you and I, all human beings, are an interface between spirit, the limitlessness, the soul, ruach, or spirit, and the physical, the limitations that are confined in appetite and discernment and the limitations of the body. So we interface in that way, the limitlessness of what we are versus this container that we're in.
When we rest in our minds, we see rank, we see hierarchies, we see divisions. But when we rest in our deep self, there's truly no rank, that there's truly no division, that all is a unified field. I think true human being no Rank for me is the reminder of myself, what I choose or desire to express in this human form, in this incarnation as my deepest self.
[00:13:25] Speaker A: Yeah, my listeners and viewers, I know I'm from upstate New York, and I'm a devoted Syracuse Orange alum, and you're right down the road in Buffalo. Western New York and Buffalo in particular have experienced more than their share of heartache and agony in the past year because of three incidents. There was a racially motivated mass murder last May, which a teenage gunman killed 10 black people and wounded three others in a massive Dec. 23 blizzard, claiming at least 35 lives. How do events of that magnitude immediately affect and alter, for the long term the collective mental health of an entire community or region?
[00:13:59] Speaker B: Well, you know, it's a very difficult question, but it's a question that I think Every human being may be astonished by, in their own unique way, which is the resolve, the resilience of human beings both individually and collectively as a community.
And I really want to touch on this for, for a brief moment that I do feel that there are sort of like capacities of souls as we individuated.
Some souls have larger capacity to hold their suffering. Some souls have smaller capacity to hold their suffering. And so the smaller souls capacity to handle suffering, when their suffering comes to them, they can't restrain themselves. They act out in these shootings or in a myriad of different ways, which we see all too often, too commonly in our community.
And the capacity of a larger soul.
BJ Miller is someone who comes to mind. He's a doctor who does hospice in San Francisco. And he had an accident where he lost both his legs and an arm. And his capacity to hold suffering is enormous. And he went. After that event happened, he went to medical school and became a doctor and became a hospice doctor. And so when you look at the different capacities of souls, we can tie it. Even an evil event is the act of a small soul and its inability to hold the obstacles, difficulty and suffering that is allotted to it. It's the duty or obligation of community and larger souls to point the way, to support patients, love and validation. And so when we talk about the shooting at tops, I just want to say that one of the things that does come out of that is a deeper community, deeper sense of community, and a deeper sense of understanding about how these things can be prevented and a deeper understanding about sort of like the shortcomings of maybe the inequalities of our culture and our community.
[00:16:04] Speaker A: And I mentioned there were three events. The third involves Demar Hamlin. He's of course, the Buffalo Bills football player who collapsed after going to cardiac arrest. And a game at Cincinnati on January 2nd. What began as such a traumatic real time crisis for millions of people had a very different ending from those first two tragedies. Demar Hamlin is now recuperating at home. How should we frame the Demar Hamlin saga when we started to process that emotional roller coaster?
[00:16:28] Speaker B: Yeah, well, because we have talked about this and the undercurrents, the intelligence as it is is hidden from us. I think that on the surface, we see a football game, we see a hit, we see Demar go down, we see resuscitation, there's great concern, there's outcry, there's worry. The players, NFL players, are in tears. They don't know what to do in the moment. Like Moments after that happened, they all understood. They could see what was happening. So on the surface, there was great worry and concern and great uncertainty. But as you look at the larger picture of what happened out of that, the resolve of the medical team and the Bills in the NFL itself and the community at large to offer prayers for Demar and for the Bills.
You know, I almost feel that the universe or God utilized Damar in that event to coalesce in understanding that there is a spiritual element, that prayers are answered, that there's a. There's an element that is not commonly looked at or examined in our culture that is present that was reawakened by this event with the Marham.
[00:17:42] Speaker A: You mentioned the spiritual component to that. You know, is the, the episode with the mar. Hammond simply a medical story, or is it something more, a story of, you know, rebirth or hope?
[00:17:53] Speaker B: Yeah, I. I have to say that as I examine it, I was watching the game with my dad and I'm like, oh my God, that's cpr.
He's. He's in cardiac arrest. Like, he's not. And so there was great concern. And what has come out of that has been a much deeper understanding of the priority of life. We used to watch. I. I have done this Bills games. I've lived and died with the Bills, and I've really suffered. I've been a long standing suffering Bills fan. So with that being the priority, you can see when they lose, it's terrible. But when an event like this comes, you can see what it is in relation to life and death. And I think that that illustrated was a great teaching for many, many people.
[00:18:44] Speaker A: You know, when you and I spoke a week or so ago before the. The show today, you know, I had mentioned the article I saw in the Wall Street Journal about, titled Damar Hamlin, the person who taught a country how to. How to pray.
[00:18:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:55] Speaker A: And to your point, just the. The outpouring of emotion and prayers to him and his family was something, you know, you don't see that very often, especially given how divided the nation is right now. So that was something very special.
[00:19:09] Speaker B: So much so. And even Josh Allen, you know, it was interesting in the game after the Demar Hamlin, where they canceled the game and I think the Bills were playing. I don't remember who they were playing, but they ran a kickoff back. It was the first time in three years and three months. Demar's Hamlin's number was three. It happened twice and they won by three. And so, you know, I don't think that God or the universe shouts at us, but gives us little whispers that, oh, I am here.
[00:19:38] Speaker A: You know, that was a heck of a whisper.
[00:19:40] Speaker B: Yeah, it was.
[00:19:42] Speaker A: You know, and when there's so much suffering all around the globe, you know, in Ukraine, for instance, why did the image of one person lying unconscious on a football field bring people together with so much emotion and intensity?
[00:19:54] Speaker B: Well, I love this question, and I think it really has to do with sort of like, our shift in and focus and understanding. We were there to enjoy a Bills game, and the very element that we don't normally deal with was brought to bear in a way that we could not ignore it. And it was very interesting to see the broadcasters immediately understand very quickly that this was the game should be canceled and that this is a matter of life or death, and this player's health and prayers for him are the only thing that we can offer him right now. And that's what we must do. And so that whole thing was. I think we'll look back in time and see the Damar Hamlin incident is a very deep spiritual transformation for our country.
[00:20:42] Speaker A: Totally agree with that. You know, I think there was some higher power there using this, I'll say, you know, accident for a greater purpose, you know, And Demar Hamlin was so vulnerable in that moment, and I understand how that vulnerability can draw people together. But it seems like there are three types of people in the world. There's the person who, like the good Samaritan, will stop and help a stranger, the person who will ignore someone in need, and the person who would take advantage of someone when they're most vulnerable.
[00:21:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:21:10] Speaker A: Why is it in our spiritual DNA that separates one from the other? Or is it simply a matter of how we were raised?
[00:21:16] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't think it's. I think it's both, in part, how we were raised, but I think that as souls, we are we. We have attributes. Each soul has a unique attribute and a unique signature. And there are tendencies that are expressed in the incarnation that really help influence whether we. The culture also influences that. The way we raise influences that. But also, really, the final. The final decision maker is you. Is me. What? What? You know, I have this phrase that I often say, Chris. The world we create is the world we inhabit. And how do we create the world? Well, in Jewish mysticism, it talks about four garments of the soul. We clothe ourselves with four garments of our soul. What are those four garments? They are intention, action, thought, and speech. Those are the things that we have at our discretion to choose how we want to implement them, how we want to express them. And the world we create is the world we inhabit. So that when we choose lovingly, patience, validation, thoughtfulness, those things return to us, like in kind. Because remember, we are in an unseen field. And the Zen master Dogen says, karma does not deviate any more than a shadow or an echo from its source.
[00:22:41] Speaker A: We're often told that we have to look out for number one and you have to take care of yourself because nobody else will. What happens to us from a spiritual perspective when we're motivated by and we act out in self interest?
[00:22:53] Speaker B: Well, you know, this is foundational to Chris. This is foundational to why. Why did God create us in this way? People need people, and we are built to need community. We're built to need family. We're built to need friends. We're built to need each other. And so I can understand at times why people feel that they must place their own self interest over others. But that comes at a cost to the individual, and it also comes at a cost to the community.
But how we balance selflessness versus self interest is personally unique to each of us. But I think it's often done without this understanding that we are in this field of awareness that does come back to us. It returns to us what we put out to it. So when we sacrifice or go a little bit further than we would have normally, and that returns to us, like in kind, that in and of itself is the reward. So you're benefiting someone in the community by going a little bit extra and it returns to you, like in kind. So I just think that this whole system of the human experience, humankind, human beings, is built to teach us the very valuable lesson of selflessness, self sacrifice and service.
[00:24:09] Speaker A: We've been talking to Joel Lessees and we'll be right back after a short break.
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[00:26:58] Speaker A: We are back. I'm Chris Meek, host of Next Steps Forward, and my guest today is Joel Lessees, founder of the Education Training center in Buffalo, New York. Joel, we titled this episode of Next Steps Forward the Micro of the Macro, because that was something I've heard you say. What do you mean when you said that you are the micro of the macro?
[00:27:18] Speaker B: Well, so there are so many different ways we could deconstruct this, Chris. But I'll tell you, there was a Persian poet, Rumi Yuladin Rumi, who said, you're not the ocean in a drop, you're a drop in the ocean.
And so this relationship of the micro and macro, this relationship of the human experience, the finite, small, specific, person centered experience, has a deeper aspect when we cultivate meditation, when we cultivate contemplation, that you can realize that you are connected with all things, with all existence, in both a practical and spiritual way.
[00:28:06] Speaker A: The flowers of our success often grow from the seeds of difficulty and even despair.
Is that true in your life story? And if so, without sharing anything too difficult, would you explain how you turn your Difficulties into triumph.
[00:28:19] Speaker B: So I would say that certainly I'm at a place where what I once considered the greatest travesties of my existence, of the greatest sufferings of my existence, I can see are absolutely. I say this unequivocally and very directly. They were gifts. They were gifts. And I think that the human experience is that what we learn most deeply is what we're called to teach. And so the experiences that I had in early childhood and adolescence were calls for me to extract wisdom from lessons that I had learned and then offer those lessons to community. We each have a unique set of gifts. And so I think the great way that I did that, the best way to explain how I did that was to build a spiritual framework, my investigations into spirituality, to understand the larger mechanisms, and that I do have a mission and a purpose. It's my obligation, and it's incumbent upon me to find it, to seek it out. It's hidden for me. And so the clues to it are within me and what I love to do and what come naturally. And they're also found in things that I lose track of time doing, like writing poetry. But finding my life's meaning and mission and purpose and making meaning out of events is really how I turned my difficulties into triumph.
[00:29:43] Speaker A: And are those seeds of difficulty also why you felt called to help others through your profession as a counselor?
[00:29:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, as we've been talking about, my own profound suffering has been full and complete preparation for my life's mission. So it's a kind of training. You know, it's a. It's a kind of training that prepares me for what I meant to offer to my. To my world, to my community.
[00:30:06] Speaker A: Along with spirituality, psychology, religion. You place a high value on poetry. Why poetry?
[00:30:14] Speaker B: So right. Poetry.
Talking about my connection with Zen Buddhism, I also have a deep and ancient. I feel. It's felt in me, in my heart, that an ancient kind of like previous incarnations with poetry. But poetry is a unique form using language to connect and express what is real and true and genuine in our human experience. And so it eliminates the conventional norms of what's generally accepted to discuss in polite or ordinary conversation, and opening that train to what is real, true and genuine, we can really see what's going on in our life, and we can. And. And so what does that allow us to do? It allows us to address it, understand it, and make a path into extracting meaning and lessons from that. So poetry has been a great boon in my healing journey, and it's something that I offer through ground In Sky Poetry series to the Western New York community in Buffalo and Rochester.
[00:31:12] Speaker A: We discuss mental health and well being a lot on Next Steps Forward. How does faith influence our mental health and well being?
[00:31:19] Speaker B: Well, as we discussed in the beginning of the podcast, some people have it and some people don't.
It doesn't mean that it can't be grown or ignited in people. And I think it's almost incumbent upon us, Chris, when we see someone without hope through an action or word, just some way to try to ignite hope in the faith of what is good in people, that faith gives hope and vision to the future and it provides optimism and knowledge that maybe there's something more here that meets the eye, something unseen and spiritual. I think hope, faith and optimism are good for our mental health because they align us with resilience and finding our own way in the world to cope with and teach what we have learned in wisdom from our difficulties.
[00:32:06] Speaker A: And are there ways or times that spirituality and religion can be harmful to our mental health and well being?
[00:32:11] Speaker B: Well, I think we see it. Yeah, of course. I think we see it all the time. And I've thought a lot about this question because it's an important question. So in what ways can spirituality and religion be harmful?
I think that the world, in our human life require balance, right? And so you can look at the there's the spiritual and there's the physical. And when they're out of balance, when there's too much spiritual, we see mental health distress. When there's too much physical, we see no hope, no, no hope of optimism. It's just the physical world is all we see. So we want those two things in balance. And I think too much spirituality, we can't, we can't live practically in the world. And too much religion, we think we have answers that others do not.
But as we have discussed, we're all endowed with an inherent birthright from God through intuition and wisdom that have been given to each of us. And we each have unique gifts that are God given along with a mission and purpose. So it's up to us to seek our mission and purpose. But it's not always so easy. How do we do that?
When we share and make room for our differences with others who make space for family, friends and neighbors, we have a deep inner compass through our intuition, which is God. Given that when we don't honor it or don't know how to access it, we find ourselves in difficulty and kind of leads to a lack of faith or hopelessness. If we want to live respectfully in the world. We need to listen deeply to ourselves and live from a gentle guidance and respect and wisdom from that understanding.
[00:33:46] Speaker A: Given all that context, do you have a sense for the percentage of mental health professionals who include spirituality and religion in patients care plans?
[00:33:54] Speaker B: It's a good question. I don't, but I can tell you that I only hope that we recognize that meaning making and spirituality are the vital component of healing from trauma, difficulty and obstacle. So I only hope that it increases over the next coming time.
[00:34:10] Speaker A: You know, from an individual perspective, is there a best way or a right way to heal ourselves after we've experienced any emotional trauma?
[00:34:19] Speaker B: Yeah, I think so. I think that, you know, we first begin by understanding that something has happened that isn't good or right. We really have to investigate it through kind of an introspection. But telling our story to a trusted person, sharing why what happened was hurtful, and using therapy as a means of understanding and healing are the beginnings of a journey that, you know, we talk about healing, but I, I don't think that's the arrival point. I don't think that we stop at healing. I think to really flourish from difficult experiences. When we begin to teach what we've learned to our community, that's when we've really experientially made meaning from our trauma and suffering. And that's when we really understand that what was once harmful or hurtful to us becomes a gift to us. It's something that we can offer to others and affirms our, our shared human condition.
[00:35:14] Speaker A: Some emotional wounds go quite deep, you know, some perhaps to our very soul. How long should we expect the healing process to take?
[00:35:22] Speaker B: Well, it's a good question, it's a common question, but I would say never count or think that it should take X amount of time. Right? I mean, I always say this, and I don't know if you feel this way, Chris, but I think that there's clock time, there's chronological time, and then there's heart time, right? Like someone walks into the room and time stops. What is that? You know, so the heart naturally. Jack Kornfield, the Zen Buddhist meditator, teaches that the heart naturally presents itself for healing when it is ready. And so when that healing is ready, the heart, you'll know it in yourself and events and circumstances and people will kind of like organize himself in a way to facilitate that healing. But I don't think in terms of.
[00:36:04] Speaker A: Clock time, you believe that we each have an inherent resilience within ourselves.
How do we activate that resilience, especially when we may be in despair and feel like we just can't go on another day.
[00:36:17] Speaker B: Well, I think that this is probably one of the most important questions that you asked today because I think it's more common than we can even begin to conceive of. Beyond, beyond the normal conversations of how are you in bedrooms? Behind closed doors, people are wondering. And so I really think that this is why the spiritual element is so vital and important. Even if it's not, doesn't have to be about God or the universe. It just can be an inherent faith in our fellow human being that we are. There's something shared here that we don't fully understand that we can have faith in and goodness. That goodness triumphs over evil, that goodness triumphs over everything. I mean, goodness is what will reign. And so the best thing I think to do is to start with prayer or connecting yourself with whatever you consider to be a power greater than yourself. And I think that that's just a good beginning place, but that just starts the conversation in the journey. Yeah.
[00:37:19] Speaker A: How does suffering and trauma help us to discover our life's meaning and purpose?
[00:37:27] Speaker B: Well, let me put it this way. If we're walking from A to B, and when you're at A, you just look at B, you'll get there, but you won't have seen as much.
When you're starting a day and you have some obstacles, difficulties, you really have to struggle, fight and strive again. It's that buy in. It's the. This becomes a part of a journey that you own because you're vested in. You're scrapping, clawing, struggling, examining and fighting for what is good and right, that you know what is good and right. And so I think, you know, every human life is a test of our worth, of our value, of what we've been given by God. And by overcoming difficulty and making meaning out of it for our community, we offer something that transcends ourself and hopefully our life and gives. You know, there's a teaching in Judaism that what's the greatest thing that one can offer to the world? It's the crown of a good name because it lasts after you are gone. Your reputation is what you offer.
[00:38:29] Speaker A: Yeah, I love that. My grandfather used to say, a man's word is his worth. And it's the same concept. There a follow up to that. Is it possible that sometimes suffering and trauma have no meaning, that they're just suffering trauma or karma paying us back?
[00:38:46] Speaker B: Right. So I would definitely say that for an individual's perspective, if they feel that way, if they are hopeless, I would also say that the potential for growth and for deeper understanding is present in that. So, like, if someone's really struggling, like they're hopeless and they don't know what's going on, like, that's not our reality. Our reality is one that it's a blank slate in one one sense. But we are evolving and we are growing towards something. So there's a seed of faith in every human being. There's a seed of faith that is planted by God in every human being. And our job is to activate that. And when we don't feel that we believe that and we dig deeper, maybe that's the time where it just begins to sprout. So, no, I don't believe never has any meaning.
And I don't think that we're just paid back. I think that, you know, everything that the universe does for us is for good. It's just that it's not always seen or understood by us rationally.
[00:39:48] Speaker A: You also say every life has a mission, but many people are just trying to get from one day to the next. Determining our life's mission seems like a lot of work. Why should we bother to go through the work of having our life's mission revealed to us?
[00:40:01] Speaker B: It's. It's the same as A to B. It's the same as we can. We can go to our job, raise our family, do all our things, and we go birth to death and we go a straight line. We've seen A to B, but have we seen all that life has to offer? And so I really think that by examining what is my mission, what is my purpose, we begin to array a vast tool belt that really begins to activate how we might respond in caring and compassion to a multitude of circumstances that we may not have seen if we were just heading straight line A to B.
[00:40:42] Speaker A: You say that when we do things from the soul, there's an effort, effortlessness. The energy just comes. How do we know when we're doing something from the soul? Or maybe more importantly, how do we make sure something is coming from the soul?
[00:40:54] Speaker B: Yeah, well, the quote is actually a roomy quote, and I love it. It's, you know, that when it comes from the deep part of us, there is effortlessness. Or a better way of putting it is what do we lose track of time doing that when we do something that we are passionate about? What is the activity? When I write poetry, it's like meaning that person, time stops. And I. I don't. It could be. Or meditation can provide this, but these are the elements, these are the indicators for me that this is the part of my. My journey, my soul, my. My life's mission.
[00:41:29] Speaker A: And somewhat in that vein, is mental health distress a potential calling to something to be explored and go deeper?
[00:41:36] Speaker B: Well, there's a wonderful documentary, Chris, called Crazy Wise. And Crazy Wise is about indigenous views of mental health and psychosis in indigenous communities. As a marker for what? A leader, healer and teacher. A shaman. Most shamans go through an episodic experience of psychosis. And because they're given a narrative by their elder that they are sensitive and they have a gift and they're supported by their community, they have a vastly different outcome than we do with mental health distress and psychosis in the West.
Yeah, so I would definitely say that, you know, medication is necessary in our culture because it's what it offers. We medicate too often, too frequently, and we also don't allow what the distress could teach us to teach us sometimes. And that's a very difficult lesson, and it's scary because we are very vulnerable and we don't know. But I think that there are valuable lessons to that process that I myself have learned.
[00:42:43] Speaker A: Why are humility and service important components to each life or should be important components?
[00:42:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I speak from my heart and for me personally, that when I. My work is to pull myself back into a place of proper relationship to my Creator and my community and myself. And humility, the opposite of humility, is arrogance. So I think that I'm the center of everything. When I am humble, I understand my true relationship, that what I have been given in this life is a gift. It's not sustained by me. I don't fully understand it, but I know that there are things I can do within it. So my obligation becomes to find my mission and purpose and to do the things that I can do within it that I know to be good, to be constructive, to build towards a better future for people. And so that's true of humility and it's also true of service, because the nature of God in meditation, if one has ever come to a state of emptiness, you realize that God has no self, that there's no self, there's no localized, centralized God like God is everywhere. It's omnipresent. And so selflessness or service is an affirmation of God's existence. And that's why it feels so good to us.
[00:44:00] Speaker A: Are most religions in agreement when it comes to acting in self interest and that we're part of a large community?
You know, is that where we can find common ground whether we're Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, or practice something else.
[00:44:12] Speaker B: Yeah, well, you know, the division over human beings because of religion must. I just don't. It's such a travesty because we are all praying to the same thing. Not only are we praying to the same thing in different languages and in different ways, there's beauty in the differences that we express through Islam or Judaism or Christianity. These are all beautiful expressions that when we think we are self centered and have the truth and have the answer, my truth supersedes your truth. We can't see the other. But when we operate from a place of humility and of service, that I'm here to serve not just my creator, but my community in whatever forms they take, then we begin to understand the relationship between these things. We can learn from one another and we can grow with one another in a true humanity.
[00:45:08] Speaker A: What else do we have in common with all human beings?
[00:45:12] Speaker B: Well, I think we have the physical form, the human incarnation. But much more important than that is our inherent self.
We are a micro of the macro. We are a fraction of God within us. God broke itself off to create you. God broke itself off to create me. It gave fully of itself so that you could exist. It gave fully of itself so that I could exist. There's no more greater self sacrifice than that and there's no greater act of love. And so I just think that what we all share is this inherent nature, this inherent true nature, this inherent Buddha nature or Christ nature or, or in the image of Allah or God, whatever, however you want to phrase that. It's all the same thing. We're just using and arguing about language when really the experience is all shared.
[00:46:05] Speaker A: I mentioned your podcast in the introduction and we're coming down to the end of today's show. Tell us about Unraveling religion, how long you've been doing it, who are some of your guests, and how can we connect with it?
[00:46:16] Speaker B: Great. So you know, my spiritual explorations were born out of my suffering to build a spiritual framework of understanding about why I had suffered and what I could do about it. But that didn't end. That's a part of my mission. And part of my mission is manifested in this podcast of Unraveling Religion. And it started in 2007 in South Buffalo in a studio with my friend Richard Wicka, who is my podcasting mentor. He taught me how to do it. My show, Unraveling Religion, began on Think Twice Radio, which is a collection of shows, and it spun off into its own thing, but they're really mystical and practical discussions and their explorations of spirituality in relation to religion and psychology, always with questions. In Judaism, we say, better a good question than a bad answer. And so it delves deep into beyond specific religions or spiritual practices, what we have in common. And the talks are about our rich inner life, the inner life that we've discussed during this time and how it's shared. And it explores the relationship with ourselves, with one another in the world we share. And so some of the guests are I interviewed Dr. Aboulayish Izaladine Aboulayish, who is a Palestinian doctor trained in Israel, who wrote a book. His three daughters were murdered by an Israeli tank. And he was a liaison between two communities. And he was narrating on the news when this happened. And he cried out and it stopped the war. He subsequently wrote a book called I Shall Not Hate. And I titled that episode of my talk with him in Toronto, We Shall Not Hate is me taking on the teaching of what he's offering from his great travesty. I also interviewed Phil Borges from the documentary Crazy Wise. And I interviewed my spiritual mentor, Mage Reagan, Northeast Ohio's giant in the poetic community. You can just find it on Google. You can just Google Unraveling Religion.
[00:48:21] Speaker A: That's our next question. You read my mind. Joe Lessies, thank you so much for being with us today, Chris.
[00:48:27] Speaker B: It was my pleasure. I really enjoyed our talk. Thank you so much for this opportunity.
[00:48:31] Speaker A: No, it was our pleasure.
