5 Elements Of Life- How Ancient Wisdom Can Transform Modern Living- with Nicole Goott

Brian Smith  0:00  
Close your eyes and imagine

what are the things in life that causes the greatest pain, the things that bring us grief, or challenges, challenges designed to help us grow to ultimately become what we were always meant to be. We feel like we've been buried, but what if, like a seed we've been planted, and having been planted would grow to become a mighty tree. Now, open your eyes, open your eyes to this way of viewing life. Come with me as we explore your true, infinite, eternal nature. This is grief to growth. And I am your host, Brian Smith. Welcome back to all of our loyal listeners and a warm greeting to those joining us for the first time. I'm your host, Brian Smith and unblocking me to another transformative episode of grief to growth where we explore the intricacies of life, the universe and our place within it. Today we're honored to hold host our guest the call good. She's a distinguished author. She's a spiritual facilitator, and she's a consultant whose life's work is to illuminate the paths of those seeking deeper understanding and personal growth. She was born and raised in the vibrant city of Johannesburg, South Africa. Her journey took a pivotal turn when she moved to the US at the age of 24. She became disenchanted with her career financial services, and she sought deeper meaning and purpose leading her to immerse yourself in the rich worlds of theosophy, Indian philosophy and various healing arts including Reiki, biodynamic, cranial sacral therapy, Ayurveda and Thai Yoga bodywork. Her extensive travels to India and Thailand not only broaden their perspective, but also deepen their commitment to spirit, her spiritual practices and teaching. So for over a decade, she has been a passionate educator yoga, meditation and spiritual self discovery, Touching Lives Through her groups, or group classes, workshops and intensive sessions in both the United States and internationally. And she's got an upcoming book called Yoga and the five elements spiritual wisdom for everyday living, and encapsulates our philosophy offering readers modern interpretation of ancient wisdom through a practical framework that connects the physical body with the subtle energies that influence our lives. So today, what we're going to do is dive into Nicole's insights on the dynamic interplay of the five elements were found, the profound concept of subtle bodies, and our understanding these can lead to a life of balance, joy, and fulfillment. So you might wonder, how does this all relate to grief? Well, grief does, you know the name of the program is grief to growth. And so this is, I believe, the Colts way of looking at the world as a way that we can grow after we go through a tragic event. So with that, I want to welcome Nikki guts.

Nicole Goott  2:52  
Thank you, Brian. Thank you for that really beautiful introduction. I'm really

pleased and excited to be here.

Brian Smith  2:59  
Yeah, I'm glad to have you here as well. And we were talking before we get started, you know, your work of personal transformation and growth ties directly into into what I do with grief to growth, because by grief, the first part of our grief journey, we might just be in shock. And we're just trying to survive. But at some point, a lot of us kind of wake up to like, what's this life all about? Why am I here? How do I move forward? And that's where I see I think you can help our listeners. So I know you had a kind of a transformative experience after you moved to the US. So tell me how you got started in your life's work now?

Nicole Goott  3:37  
Sure, I'd love to share that. Probably it goes back a little before that.

Well, actually, I should say it goes way, way before that to a very early childhood memory, which I recount often because it was so vivid and really set the stage for sort of the path that I've taken in the sense of awakening to who I am. Now. I remember being three years old and sitting in

the sandbox or the sandpit at school I looking around and sort of wondering where I was, and wondering who all these people were while these other kids these other three year olds, and thinking to myself, you know, who am I and you know, I want to go home and not home to mom and dad, but you know, home I guess at the time, or as I reflect on it now home to myself inwardly, but also home to that, that non physical place that we're connected to as well when we're in physical form. And so those you know, that early question just grew as I got older, and you know, by the time I was in my mid teens I was interested in I was interested in spirituality and yoga and any Being involved with self help and self development. And, you know, it kind of grew from there. But I didn't really know what my course was what my plan was, you know, some of us, I think bloom or blossom later on, some of us have a very clear idea of what we want to do with our life, what we feel our goal or our passion is that wasn't the case for me. And, and what I will say is, before I moved, you know, to the United States, there was, you know, an earlier event for years prior to that I was involved actually in a serious car accident when I was 20. And, you know, I remember I remember the car accident from the work I did actually later in life with Somatic Experiencing practitioner, who helped me sort of unwind the trauma of that event, but in some ways that that was another propulsive force, I was already looking at the path of moving to another country, following an in a call. But you know, in some ways, the car accident also sort of propelled me on my journey forward, I became interested in how to heal the body and how to heal the mind. It was like sort of this, bam, this big wake up call. I once heard someone say, at a workshop, you know, sometimes the universe hits you over your head with a two by four. That was my two by four moment. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, moving to the US when I was 24, it was sort of this big step into the unknown. I was still in a financial services background, and all the healing and the self introspection. That was, that was something I was I was investigating still inwardly. And, you know, sort of, you could say on the side. Wasn't too later in my later 20s, that I really started to take the step outside of that. That plan and change, focus change direction. And that's when I began really teaching and, and doing healing work. And that's evolved, you know, we never stay the same. We're always changing and growing. And so that's developed over, you know, the past, you know, decade and a half. Yeah. I'll pause there. Yeah,

Brian Smith  7:36  
no, thank you for sharing that. I think it's really interesting. I think. I'm always fascinated, because we talked about that feeling of being three for me, I don't have really early memories of childhood, but I think it was around five, where it's like that feeling of like, I don't belong here. How did I How did I end up here? Like you said, Who are these people? So there are some of us, I think that can relate? I know, I can relate to that experience?

Nicole Goott  8:03  
Yeah, yeah, it's, and there's not a lot necessarily of examples often around us of, you know, having that early experience as a child of kind of a consciousness awakening, because, you know, the personality is still developing. And here we are having this experience as a, as a, you know, three, four or five year old, which is a very adult kind of way of thinking. So there's, you know, there's already a knowing and awakening that's, that's come online. What I call that today is self remembering. And self remembering is the process we go through. So I take a reincarnation or point of view of life. In other words, I think about the soul tribes migrating through multiple lifetimes, not just a single lifetime. And that self remembering is this process we go through lifetime through lifetime. You know, we sort of pick up in a way where we left off, but we remember what we learned in all those successive experiences, and we wake up to who we are. And then we, you know, we sort of, we expand that knowledge into the leading edge of our growth. So what's the what's the new the new frontier in this lifetime of what we're here to learn and integrate?

Brian Smith  9:26  
Yeah, I think that's a really interesting thing to explore. Because a lot of times what people will say, well, reincarnation doesn't make any sense to me, because if I were being recruited, I should be able to remember what I did my past lives. Otherwise, I'm always starting from scratch. But anybody that's been around small children realizes we don't start from scratch.

Nicole Goott  9:47  
Absolutely, absolutely. It is an interesting thing to think about because just as you say, you know, the natural thinking is, oh, well, I should just remember All my past lives. And and actually, if you've ever had a past life memory, it's not a walk in the park. It you know, it's not this necessarily glamorous life that we've lived as like, Cleopatra, you know, or, you know, Julius Caesar or, you know, some some emperor, you know, lifetimes have many different shades of experience. And, you know, we take on many different roles depending on what we're learning. And sometimes that can be painful. So there's almost a, the way I think about it is there's a, in the same way that the body we don't really remember pain. And I put that in air quotes as we don't walk around every day saying I remember exactly how it felt when I stubbed my toe when I was five, it would be it would be incredibly overwhelming to our sense sensory field to carry that every single moment. Right. So I think I think of it in a similar way with passage week.

Trying to remember all of that could be a tremendous amount of sensory overload. What we remember is the energy, because

so I think that the soul is energy. And when we come into physical form, we come into the physical body. And so there's this dialogue that happens between soul and body, soul and personality. So what we're bringing back is non physical experience, non physical memory. Not so much this idea that okay, I have to remember it like a book that I read yesterday. Yeah,

Brian Smith  11:38  
I think that's a really interesting point. And as you were saying that, it just reminded me this is we're going down a little bit of a rabbit hole here, but I want to explore this a little bit. Because there I've seen stories of people who can remember like, every moment of their lives, and we think that would be a great thing. And they say it's a curse, because you're like, it's like, it just happened yesterday. So if they had an argument with someone yesterday, for most of us, that memory fades, and we kind of remember the feeling, but it's not there. And they're like, for me, if I remember what my mother said to me when I was 15, I'm like, right back there again. So we have to be careful what we wish for. And I think coming into this life, we do crash in a way we wipe the slate again. So we're not carrying all that with us. But we do carry that, that tendency and those those lessons. And then it's really interesting that sometimes it seems like these little bumps along the way, kind of remind us, so when like when you were 20, and when you're 24 and in the car accident, so you know, I everybody's got some sort of triggering event in their life, some sort of trauma or something that propels them forward, it might be a car accident, it might be losing a loved one, it might be a divorce, it might be the loss of a job, it could be a lot of different things. But those those things, that's what they have in common, they kind of push those forward.

Nicole Goott  12:56  
I agree. I agree. And, you know, one of the things that is in what you said is, you know, I think of I think of the experience of physical reality and non physical reality, as kind of going through three years, sort of principal phases, and emergence, and a birth, a, living in a sustaining of that experience, and then a gradual dissolving of and retraction of that experience. And so, you know, you know, if we think of life as circular it is, in a way, but it's, it's not circular going around and around. Well, it is I'll share a parable in a moment, when when we're stuck, but more in the sense that it's a spiral that expands constantly because we're always moving in, in and out of processes of an emergence. So for example, starting a new job would be something new opening up, but stepping away from the previous job, or, you know, or home or something that you let go of, that's a dissolving, that's letting go of what was the form and allowing for something new to emerge. So, you know, I heard that a little bit in what you were talking about there. But I have a power parable to share. It goes something something like this, I'm sure it's been retold in many different ways. So this is how I remember hearing it. So a man wakes up in the morning, gets out of bed, crushes his teeth, puts on his clothes, gets dressed, walks downstairs, you know, goes out the door, walks down the street and falls in a hole. If this is familiar if you've heard this parable, not sure, okay. And next day, same thing, he wakes up, gets up, does his routine goes downstairs walks down the street falls In the hall, and this repeats over and over, and over and over, until one day, he wakes up and he walks down the street and he sees the hole. But he still falls in, continues a few times over, and then he wakes up, walks down the street sees the hole, and takes a different path. And so the parable is the story of change. And you know, how we're able to let go of habits and tendencies or habitual ways of being of seeing, seeing things, and being able to move, you know, move forward. And the reason I bring up this parable is this idea of, you know, when we, when we self, remember, we're also bringing through the experience of what's the word I would use, where we have a repeated pattern that we have to unwind, that allows us to take that next step in our growth. And sometimes it can be hard to see, because we're just caught up in our own wheel, our own cycle of repetition. But eventually, we get to see what that is. And then while we may not make that change right away, we're at least in the stage of recognizing, and then at some point, through whatever it is, that helps us move forward tools in a changes, you know, we take a different path. And, and I think that's another thing to think about with respect to self remembering is that we're not always stuck with the same, you know, a lot in life is not determined, or predetermined as not to be changed. We always have a choice, I think is where I was going with that.

Brian Smith  16:50  
Yeah, I think it's a great parable, because I think we can all relate to, you know, doing the same things over and over again, knowing that it's not the right thing, knowing it's not what you want to do. No, it's not the best thing for us. But there's that habit that forms. And then so but then it's recognizing, okay, now I have the choice, but we still do it. So that's the and then eventually, we That's why we need tools, though. Because we need those tools to break the habits, it's not just a matter of saying, Okay, I'm not going to do this anymore. So I think the parallel makes a lot of sense.

Nicole Goott  17:22  
So it ties into a way to think about, you know, I've been talking a lot about non physical reality. So we're in a physical body, but we have a non physical experience. And that's what I talk about as the subtle bodies. And these are the, the other layers of our being that we experience, while we're embodied while we're in physical form. But there, we just aren't necessarily turning our attention into, in that direction into that awareness that we have these more subtle layers of experience. So for example, if we think about where our emotions and our thoughts live, you know, then we could say that we have an able bodied experience and our thoughts and our feelings because they have, they can have a pressure and an expression through the body. But where they originate from is a more subtle level of being an excuse me, and similarly, our, our path in life, our, our dharma, our unique reason for being, what it is that our time unique function is in the universe. These are these subtle levels of being that we're constantly drawing down through into physical experience. And so the, you know, part of the parable is recognizing, you know, at the level of the the mental body, for example, what are our habitual thought tendencies, so we all get caught up in likes and dislikes, for example, and that keeps us in this polarity of thinking, Well, I like this, and I don't like that. And that's very binary. And when we can find the middle path, there's a lot of freedom and openness in that, you know, it allows for our lifeforce to really flow through.

Brian Smith  19:27  
So if you could explain the various bodies that we have, because I know that that can be confusing to people. It's like why I have had this body but what's, what's a mental body? What's the subtle body? Right?

Nicole Goott  19:40  
So beyond the physical body, some of your listeners may have heard of the term an aura, or the human energy field. So I'm talking about that sort of relationship we have to what's beyond our physical body. So we have I've kind of five basic layers there's more, but the five that I deal with are the ones that were most involved with. The first is your etheric body, which is the body of vitality, and health and well being. You know, you might think of prana, or lifeforce as part of that field, we then have an emotional body or an astral body. So that's the level at which we deal with our feelings, dreams. You know all of that inner, inner emotive experience, they have a mental body. So that's the level of not just mind, but really beliefs and values. And it's a level at which we create reality. And then we have a causal body. So causal, you can think of cause and effect. But it's also really the causal experience of your life purpose evolving through lifetimes, and in a particular lifetime. And then the one beyond that, the fifth that I deal with is the Buddhic body. And that's beyond time and space beyond the ego personality. And it's the level at which we all feel our connection to each other and everything, it's the level of interdependence. And it's actually, if we can access that place, it's probably one of the most restful, peaceful places that we can experience in terms of states of consciousness and inner being, because it is free of time and space. It is free of the, the the ego personality tendency to want to label and judge and be caught up in what I call the sensory mind, which is that place between the mental body that gets stuck in judgment, and that presses on the astral or emotional body that experiences emotions that either sort of propel us into the highs of extremes or the lows of lows.

Brian Smith  22:06  
Yeah. So how do we how do we start to access these these various levels of ourselves if again, if I can put it that way? Time for real quick break, make sure you have like and subscribe, liking the video will show it to more people on YouTube, and subscribe, you will make sure you get access to all my great content in the future. And now back to the video.

Nicole Goott  22:31  
So for me finding the framework of the of the subtle bodies was really life changing, because and I say this first before I answer your question specifically, because, you know, I had been sort of studying and looking at different ways of dealing with energy and self development. But none of it really kind of made sense. I couldn't really fit everything the pieces together. And it wasn't until this framework came together for me that things started to click, I really started to understand that I'm more than just my physical body, that I have these other levels of experience, but also that I'm not my emotions. Those don't define me that I'm not my thoughts, either. Those aren't the definition of who I am, that there's something deeper. So part of it is, I think, how this I think how this framework can help help others is to realize that you are multi dimensional. So I think that's the first thing I think that's important to understand, is the multi multi dimensionality of experience. I think the second thing is being able to know what level you're dealing with. So in other words, what body you're in, in a quotes. So if, if, if I'm having an experience, where is that coming from? And how do I how do I unwind the the pressure point or the trigger? So all emotions are, the way I think about them are messages that come from our soul. They're the communication between the soul and the personality. So if I know what that emotion is, and I can see the thread of where it's coming from, it's much easier to unwind the energy and the trigger in the first place. In particular emotions that can be very overwhelming in being able to stay present in an experience of being in a mindset, a mindset of witnessing or equanimity, not being swayed by the waves of feeling. And so similarly with, with thoughts being able to sit with and be with the experience of, okay, I can see my mind stream, but I don't have to be pulled into or engage with all of those levels of thinking. So, so. So one is understanding the multidimensionality. Two is understanding that there is this framework that we have this way of, or this lens, and it's just a view, it's just a perspective. Some people may not resonate with it, it just is one, one way of looking at energy and things. And then I think the third is, once we start to develop this awareness, we're awakening to what are called inner senses. So we're used to just our normal five sensory perceptions, what I can see with my eyes, what I can touch with my hands, what I can smell with my nose, but we actually have a whole sensory field inwardly. And once, once we're, once we start to kind of awaken to that a whole other field of information becomes available to us. And some people might think of this as intuition, right feeling into or knowing something that's not just thinking into something. So thinking into versus feeling into our kind of different sensory, inner sensory experiences. So it's like developing a different muscle. So when we close our eyes, let's say to meditate, we're actually tuning into those inner instruments of perception, we're opening up our inner visual field, to see things with our non physical eyes to feel things with a non physical touch sense, etc. So that would be another step is on developing that. And you you're doing it naturally, every time you sit to meditate, or when you are involved in a creative project. Those perceptions are there. It's it's really just like, taking a flashlight and turning your attention in that direction and saying, oh, okay, I'm aware of that now. And I think the next step is practices that are related to those different levels, some of which I talk about in my book. I've already mentioned one, which is meditation.

Brian Smith  27:29  
What are some of the other practices?

Nicole Goott  27:32  
So I use journaling a lot, I think that's a very easy and accessible tool. And it doesn't require a huge investment of time, or poaching, really, because, you know, with a piece of paper and a pen, you can just write down your own thoughts and what you're thinking and feeling and put it on the page. And it's not just a good exercise, I think for

it's a, it's a great exercise for emptying out the content of what's in there. But it's also another tool for reflecting, seeing your own experience reflected back to you from yourself. We so often, I think, tell ourselves a story about ourselves to other people. That we don't necessarily know that that's the story that we're telling, right. So part of journaling is a way of seeing the story we're telling ourselves, and that begins the process of okay, how can I unwind from the story? I don't have to be the story anymore.

Brian Smith  28:43  
Yeah, I think that's, that's, that's a great practice. And I like the meditation as well. And I think people you know, it's interesting, because I what I always say, there's like a couple of questions that everybody has that that these existential questions Who am I, why am I here? Where am I going? Where do they come from? And for most of us, in our, in our society, or Western society, I'll say, we've been we identified so much with our body. It's like, I this, this is me, what do you mean, who am I? This right here? This is me. And then we might move beyond that was like, Well, I'm on my thoughts are on my emotions. And so we we we start to find out as we start to explore this. No, not that. No, I'm not that. And then we're always left with, you know, who am I? So these frameworks, while they may not be literal, you know, it's not like, maybe there's not a literal, etheric body, whatever. But they're helpful for us to understand that we are multi dimensional, that we are more than this, and that we do have these other senses that we've kind of turned down in our society. And these are ways to help us to open them up. So I'm trying to make this practical for anybody who's listening and going, I don't even know what they're talking about or how this is going to help me. It Yes, that peeling away of an identifying with that spiritual aspects of herself, you talked about the Soul and the Personality. So maybe you could define that for people that may not be familiar with those terms. Sure.

Nicole Goott  30:13  
So the soul is our essence. And and, and it's our expression of being in energetic terms. So if we're not in a body, if we're you know, and actually, here's a way to think about it, when you go to sleep at night, when you close your eyes, right, we sort of make this assumption that we're going to wake up in the morning, we don't even think about it, we just, it just happens. But where does that consciousness go, you know, our thinking mind. So it's a thought experiment that that I invite listeners to make, which is, when you go to sleep tonight, or whenever you listen to this, think about what happens to you, the you that you think about your consciousness, and where does that go at night. And just see where that thought experiment takes you. But so that's one that's one practice that I'll leave listeners to do on their own. So the soul is energy, then what is its housing, what is its way of being in the world. And so it's a what's a vehicle, and the physical body is really just a vehicle for their consciousness for the soul. And there's a mediator between the body and the soul, and that's the ego, personality. So it's the, it's the veil, or the mask, or the many masks that we wear, when we present ourselves into the world. How we describe our characteristics, or how people describe us, oh, she's friendly, oh, he's, you know, he's easygoing, you know, those are, those are just, they're the labels of identity. But, you know, beyond that, there's a deeper essence. And that's the the soul the the non physical part of us. That is in this constant dialogue with the personality. And so another way to think about the soul is if the soul is energy, then the body is like your earth suit. Right, and your soul is the captain, and your ego personality is your chariot. And it's really, it's really taking the instructions from the soul, and implementing what the soul is directing. And when we can hear what the soul is directing us to do, or another way to say it, instead of soul is your highest self. That might resonate more for for some books, your highest self, when that level of wisdom and knowledge is flowing through the personalities is really just taking directions, taking orders. He's the he's, he's the general in the captain's army, right. But what can happen is that the ego personality wants to be in control. And that's when things get tricky. That's when the soul or the voice of the the highest self gets rolled out a little bit. And that's when we start to feel stuck. Not knowing what the next step is. Feeling like our choices are binary. feeling as though there's there's no possibilities, we get caught up in our blind spots in our shadows. Because there isn't this higher level of wisdom and illumination, it's able to penetrate what is sometimes a very thick wall. That's walling out at this level of being. So part of why I use the framework of the subtle bodies is that we can start to see that the way that ego personality gets triggered, is through the you know, the astral body, the mental body emotions might the sensory or sensory experience. And that when we can bring in that higher self, that higher illumination, that higher wisdom the sensory mind is no longer the way we are operating in the physical world, but we're operating with our higher our Higher Mind AI wisdom mind. So making that distinction between am I operating am I stuck with the person that ego personality? Am I just operating out of habit, habitual tendencies, or is there this just filament and satisfaction and joy, which is the higher level of being. So that's maybe another way of thinking about it is the soul. When we're when we're when we're more connected to our soul. We feel an increase in lifeforce. We feel satisfaction, we feel fulfillment, and we, we feel joy.

Brian Smith  35:22  
Yes, yes, I think that that's a wonderful way of putting it. Thank you for explaining that to people, to all of us. Because, again, it's that this identification and and I said thing that some of us felt that little nagging thing when we were kids like, this is not me. And I was going to smile. It's I'm thinking of a friend of mine who had a near death experience when she was like two years old. And she came back and she kept telling her parents, I am not Ingrid, you know, I don't I don't even I don't know, like, who I just I don't need a name. Because she she connected that thing that's beyond the personality. And people, people get very confused when we say this is not who I am. But some of us feel that it's like this, this doesn't. This was not really me, you know, and we have that connection. And then this, again, to talk about these awakening periods of time, there's a time where for some reason, we feel dissatisfied. We're like, this can't be all there is this this is this is not the reason why I was put here this is this doesn't make any sense. And then we reach out to that, hopefully reach out to the higher self and realize, you know, there's there's purpose here.

Nicole Goott  36:31  
Yeah, absolutely. And I think there's a shift, or at least I've started to notice that there's been more of a shift, and a pressure to move out of the usual ways of labeling identity, who, who you are, yeah, and I think, certainly younger, and younger generations are kind of coming into the world saying, I'm not interested in that way of being, I'm not interested in you labeling me, as you know, X, Y, and Z. There's, there's more to me than that. So, you know, even if we're even if we're just looking at it from sort of the these younger generations and the way they're doing it, I think that there's a mass consciousness, that's shifting towards realization that all of us, you know, it within a much more than the usual ways we want to, you know, we want to label ourselves. You know, every, every human being has three very fundamental unifying needs, the need to be seen, the need to be heard, and the need to be understood. And that's, you know, really deeply at the soul level, I mean, sure, we could say, you know, the personality we want to, and, you know, understand each other, but really fundamentally, we're connecting at a, at a soul to soul level. And that can be challenging, right? Because it's easy to look at the world and say, Oh, well, you know, there's, there's, there's a lot of good and then there's a lot of not so good, how do we how do we stay connected to that compassion in ourselves to see that and I think whenever we're in touch with moving beyond the, the personality, ego, and we can really see what's, you know, within that we're each a soul, all on a, on a journey of an experience to learn and grow. Can we see that we're all looking to have those three basic needs met. I think that invites a much larger sense of self, and a much greater awareness of the connections we share and being a little bit more tolerant and a little bit more compassionate and kind, I think,

Brian Smith  38:51  
yeah, as you were saying that, you know, talking about identification, I just was kind of laughing at like, what's going on right now? Just Just take gender, for example. You know, there are people saying I don't want to be labeled as this or that. And I think there's like 43 genders. Now I have some number much higher than we would known. And then people are like, no, no, no, there are two genders, you are male, or you are female. This is what I was taught in seventh grade biology. This is the way that it is. And but there are people who say, I don't want to be put in that box. Because that's not who I am, I think identify more that soul level. And I think that's just one example of how we're seeing this. And I, I agree with you and ever many people say that people that are coming in to the world now. Are older souls, if you want to use that term, that are more or more developed, I guess. And they're saying they're pushing back against the way that we've done things and I see young people. I have a daughter who's 27 and my wife and I just laugh about like, I'm like they're just living their best lives they traveling. They're like, we're going to have experiences when interested in working, you know, eight to five sitting at a desk, I want to be fulfilled and people my generation are like, there's not It's not about being fulfilled, it's about, you know, getting the job done. Right. Yeah.

Nicole Goott  40:11  
Yeah. And I think, you know, that's a really great point. I mean, for me, one of the ways I look at that is through the lens of COVID, because I think COVID was when he was global. And it was a big shift for so many people to re examine and re explore ways of being, and to your example of your daughter and her generation, and wanting to have experiences and fulfillment what you know, to what is satisfying, what is satisfying, what really is deeply meaningful inwardly. And it's not necessarily all the ways that social and family conditioned ideas, expect or demand that to be, there's a different, deeper way that we can experience that. And I think part of the world waking up to that, in in many different ways is the realization that life is so much more. And it really is fundamentally, that when we can experience or move through experiences from one to the other, where we have that sense of deep fulfillment and satisfaction, that joy arises. So you know, it's not something that we can manufacture or do a practice and say, Okay, now I'm in a state of joy. Joy comes from, you know, our natural state of being when we're allowing our lifeforce to flow through. And we're not governed by what we should or shouldn't do, or dealing with the pressures of external, what's externally projected onto us of what's expected, or what society expects or demands are even our own conditioning that may come up and say, well, I should do this because that's how I was brought up, you know, when we unwind those tendencies,

Brian Smith  42:08  
right, right. Well, we do we internalize those those things that society and our parents and teachers and everybody puts on us and we again, that's another thing that we miss identify with, we think that voice is ours. Excuse me, but then when does that make us happy? We've grown and realized maybe that's not me, maybe that's that's coming from me. That's why it's important to tease all these things apart. You're talking about and understand this framework and really get to understand ourselves as these multi dimensional multi dimensional beings.

Nicole Goott  42:37  
Yeah. And use you use the word happiness and happiness and joy are sometimes I think, interchangeably used and I make a distinction between them. I think of happiness as an emotion. And it comes and goes, it's fleeting, whereas joy is a state of being. And when when we when we do experience that free flowing lifeforce when lifeforce isn't stuck. And when we do experience, the satisfaction and the fulfillment, Joy is that natural byproduct and I think the distinction of not searching for happiness or not, what we're really looking for is the the satisfaction and the fulfillment that brings us to that inner peace and that joy, yes, happiness, happiness comes and goes, it's sort of like a roller coaster. And, and the mind wants to recreate experiences that give us that same high. So when we're seeking things that make us happy, what we're really seeking is the pleasure that we got from the edge. And so that what I was talking about earlier about the way the mind gets into binary thinking of likes and dislikes, what what is going to make me feel happy, right, the happy emotion versus what's, you know, what do I fear? And what do I want to run away from? So craving and aversion are often at interplay with each other, like a tennis match back and forth, back and forth? Right.

Brian Smith  44:16  
Oh, sorry. Go ahead. No, no, go ahead. I just

Nicole Goott  44:19  
gonna say being able to move out of that, that tennis match.

Brian Smith  44:24  
to the, to the middle. Right, right. Exactly. That back and forth between what do we want to avoid? And what do we want to what do we think we want to have? Yeah, your books title yoga, and the five elements, spiritual wisdom for everyday living? So we've talked about meditation, we've talked about journaling, but we haven't talked about yoga. So how does yoga tie into this

Nicole Goott  44:44  
question? So yoga, the way I think about it is, is that it is a it's a it's a path, and a philosophy and a way of being that allows us to opened up to these multi-dimensional parts of ourselves, and to bring everything into union inwardly and outwardly. So it's so I think of yoga is harmony, harmony, within and harmony outside. I think many people who are exposed to yoga today often think of it as the postural practice. And that's one component. Certainly how it's been popularized, but yoga is also an inner practice. And when we can see that there is this, this vehicle for coming into union with ourselves. And it's a funny thing to say, union with ourselves, what are we coming into union, particularly when I've been talking about making this distinction between the soul and the ego personality. And really, it's the unifying aspect is being able to transcend the tendency to allow the ego to be in control, and to not have this disconnect, or this constant battle of inner will, between personality, ego and the soul. And rather to bring the two into alignment and into harmony with each other. Such that there's just a flow of communication and energy, so that we experienced that fulfillment and satisfaction, and that joy. So that's how I think of yoga. And the inner practices that I talk about, certainly, in the book, involve, you know, meditation, where we touch on different states of consciousness, different states of awareness, that allow us to feel into what it means to to experience inner peace. So when we free our mind, well, that's a funny way to say it. And now that I think about it, you know, our thinking mind, our sensory mind is always on. Yes. And, you know, or some, sometimes the expression that's used is the monkey mind, that doesn't really go away, what goes away is our engagement with that sensory mind is our capacity to step back, what I call witnessing, and to be able to observe to observe that inner experience. So a practice is, for example, both sitting with yourself, and, and, and getting quiet and coming home to just being with you. Sitting with your breath, which is actually really hard to do. All beginning meditation starts with breathing, because it's fun, fundamental and foundational. Thank goodness breathing. I once heard John Kabat Zinn say this, thank goodness breathing is automated. Because if we had to actually have mindfulness of breathing, we'd all expire. Yes, yes, pretty quickly. So focusing on your breath, and being able to watch your breath, and to realize, okay, I'm actually observing my breathing, well, then who's doing the observing. So, you know, there are these gradual stages of developing this witnessing capacity that leads to states of non judgment, and equanimity. So an emotional calm and emotional neutrality. And, and those are practices that are really connected with yoga, because as we kind of go through the rungs on the ladder of moving out of our lower human tendencies and human instincts, and we are able to rise above and rise through that spiritual ladder, we're reaching for higher states of consciousness and for higher states of being. So yoga typically talks about, for example, withdrawing the censors, really what we're doing is we're withdrawing our engagement with our sensory experience. So, you know, whenever we turn on the TV, or we turn on the radio, we're engaging our sensory mind, because we're just taking in information. And then there's some sort of categorizing and labeling happening. And if we're not necessarily sitting in prison awareness, which, to be honest, we're watching Netflix, really, who is we're, we're, you know, just involved in the, you know, suspending belief for a moment of watching a movie. We're just absorbing sensory information, but through through through stepping back, we start to observe, oh, what is that? What do I what is the content? I want to take it and what are the choices I want to make about how I feel when I engage in that sensory experience?

Brian Smith  49:52  
Yeah, that's, that's great. I think it's a really important thing to say because, again, we think of yoga Just think of the exercises in the pasture people might say, what does that have to do with what we're talking about? But is that union? And we touched about ego. And we touched upon monkey mind. And I find a lot of people think, well, meditation is about like silence in my monkey mind, and you get rid of this monkey mind thing. And we think about ego and people like, Well, my ego is a bad thing. And I hear this a lot of spiritual, spiritual people, we've got to get rid of the ego, if we, if we get rid of the ego, we're going to be fine. What roles do are the ego and the monkey mind actually play in us in our human experience.

Nicole Goott  50:36  
So I'll start with ego first. You need your ego, it's actually it has a function. So the, the understanding that I think is needed is to realize that what we're doing is transcending the ego transcending its tendency to hold us in, its needs to be satisfied. of, well, this is what I like. And that's what I don't like, and you need to feed me. So another way I sometimes say it is, you can't kill your ego, and you shouldn't try. And that's, I think, one of the great spiritual traps, is thinking that you need to kill your ego, you can't. It is also quite a long and lengthy process that requires deep spiritual maturity, to reach the stage where you can transcend your ego. Because, and this is talked about in some spiritual texts, that when you transcend the ego, it's like a, it's like a diff, in the sense that you are able to shed all the bonds of identity that have held you together, have the ironmaking self, to let go that into to rest in easy, confident, easy awareness of who you are, as energy as essence, without the need to any longer be identified with this identity, which is your ego. And that is really difficult, because like you were saying before, so many of us identify with our identity, identity, and this body, and this job, and these clothes, and this house, what happens when you strip all of that away, and it can be really quite a spiritual crisis, and quite maddening when you start to pull that away. So I would caution anyone who's you know, thinking, Okay, well, I can just do this, I can just, you know, transcend my ego, no, it's not that simple. It is, it is a journey. And it requires, as I was saying, you know, deep spiritual maturity, and I think, a real understanding of, of what that means to transcend your ego. And then with respect to was with respect to the monkey mind. So our sensory mind is important, because you know, we are in physical body, we're in the physical world, we're on a physical plane, and we're having physical experiences. And we're learning through form through physical form. And those forms change. And that's the, that's the trick. That's the lesson is, can we move in and out of the experience of form and formlessness? That's where the causal body and the Buddhic body, that's where you start to make that crossover being able to move beyond really time and space? Can I allow an experience to come to its natural evolution, and let that dissolve, and allow myself to take the next step in my growth. So being open to as opposed to resisting what that growth is, and see what new experience comes. So the century mind has a role to play in that we really we need to process what we're experiencing, and translate that back to the soul so that that dialogue can happen. It's what we do in that translation process. That's where things get sticky. Yeah.

Brian Smith  54:33  
I'm glad to hear you say that because, again, there's this misunderstanding that people think well, I want to just transcend all this and live as a spirit. But we came here for a reason. We have we have a body for a reason we but the sensory experiences we're having for a reason. And we have an ego for a reason and ego again, I don't think it's really necessarily an entity to be killed anyway. It's just it's a It's a construct that we use to explain, Well, I have to protect my body, I, if I didn't have an ego, I wouldn't understand the difference between you and me, I would walk in front of a bus, the bus is like, it doesn't matter, the bus and I are one. You know, if I didn't have any, I wouldn't go to work every day because I wouldn't, I wouldn't care about my physical. So the ego is here, but I like it's here to serve us. It's not here to be the be all in the end all. And I think one of the challenges as humans, we set up for ourselves, because I view this is all virtual reality that we set up and we stepped into insight, let's play this game. And one of the challenges we set up was like, How do I live when I'm going through these changes in form, doesn't mean they're not real doesn't mean that it'll happen. They're not the ultimate reality. But I'm having this experience for a reason. So I'm not here to kill the ego. I'm not here to silence the monkey mind, the sensory mind. And that's a lot of things when people they meditate, they're like, I can't meditate, because I can't I just can't shut my mind off and the stuff we're trying to do.

Nicole Goott  56:05  
Right, exactly. You can't it's it's, it's what I was saying to before, just thinking it's disengaging from that. Right. Right. And to kind of borrow from what you were just saying about, you know, as if you were stepping into a virtual reality, just as you can step into it, you can step out of it. So you can take a step back from the the monkey mind jungle gym, and and observe what what's happening. That's the, that's the process of the disengaging is to see, to see the game that's being played, and then decide, do I want to do I want to hop in? Or do I want to hop out? Yeah, well,

Brian Smith  56:45  
I love the video game analogy, my daughter, and I love to play video games. In the end, there's so immersive these days, and then you get into it and you your, your heart starts racing, your palms are sweating, you're sitting on the couch, but you feel like you're running through a jungle. And you can while you're playing the game, you can realize, okay, this is just a game, I'm really sitting on the couch, but still enjoy the game. And that's what I think the challenges of being a human, it's like I can, I can, I can be immersed in all this, I can look around and see all of the terrible things that are going on. Now the beautiful things that are going on, and I can choose to engage with them on any level that I want to. So it I it still bothers me to see that the things that are going on the things that like to change. But I realize they're not the ultimate reality. So it doesn't affect me, as deeply as someone who's totally identified with this.

Nicole Goott  57:37  
It's interesting, you say that I'm going to be working on a lecture at the moment, related to how we see the world and what our what our choices are, do we you know, we can choose to see the world burning and on fire, or we can choose to see the world as full of possibilities. And, you know, we we always have a choice in what we're doing. And more importantly, is we all have a Dharma, a path. And when we're called to something, so we're all still sitting at home, what reading the news, digesting what's going on. And you still have your life to live, that doesn't go away. But then they're also choices and listening for a call listening to Am I being called to something other? Am I being called to something higher? Am I'm being called to step into something? And sometimes it's in the moment, you know, funnily enough, I was thinking about. I don't know why, I guess maybe to relate this this morning. Some years ago, when I was living in Boston, in Cambridge, I was coming home at night somewhere with my husband, and there were all these cars, you know, kind of going up and down the road. And I noticed that there were cars kind of swerving in really weird way. And I realized that there was a bunny in the middle of the road and a cast because when you live in the city, you often have domestic cats that sometimes I'll let out and they'll they like to catch bunnies. And there was this bunny in the road. And, you know, in that moment, it wasn't really even a choice. It was I'm getting out the car to help because that's what I felt called to in that moment. Obviously safely and with, you know, care, but it's a small, tiny example of how we can help we'll make a change in our life and in what's around us. And I think when we can step out of the feeling of overwhelm have a Oh my gosh, I'm looking at the world and there's so much that's on fire. What can I do as opposed? You know, I can, I'm just going to sit at home and worry and stress and point fingers at what everybody else should be doing. Instead, you know, to sit and be with yourself and just listen quietly and inwardly, what am I called to do in this moment, is it is it to write a letter to someone, you know, to reach out to, you know, a political representative in your area, or to go out and to campaign or whatever it is that we're called to. And that's, that's, that's the dialogue that we come back to, when we're not caught in the sensory mind and the ego personality. And we're instead listening to the soul, there's, there's a much higher wisdom that comes through and that can guide us and I think that's a really important message, maybe to, for people to hear is to be guided, to be guided from a higher level of being is a very different way of experiencing yourself in reality. And that may sound lofty, or, you know, far or unreal. But I'm sure if everyone were to close their eyes, and just think for a moment, on an experience, where you were guided deeply, but you didn't think about it necessarily as your soul or your higher self or something, there was just this guidance that came from within, and we can tap into that, and let that, you know, lead us more often than not,

Brian Smith  1:01:38  
yeah, as you said that it reminded me when I was a kid, I was raised as a as a fundamentalist Christian. So we were always taught that there was God. So you pray to God and God's the things you reach out to. And then later on in life, I learned that like Catholics pray to saints and, and then as it became more spiritual people said, we have guides and we've got ancestors and all that stuff. But were, these things were they have in common, they're all reaching outside of ourselves. And then as I became more and more immersed in, like, with the practice you're talking about, it's like, our highest guidance actually comes from within, it's actually our, it's our, it's that higher self, if you want to call it that our soul, we have the wisdom that we're looking for. And that even saying that coming from the background, it sounds it's gonna sound blasphemous was to some people. But we can we can turn within, and we have the answers within and so this this framework you're talking about, and we're we're coming to the end of our time, but you talk about a no inner and outer terrains, and this might be a great way to finish on that subject.

Nicole Goott  1:02:46  
So the inner terrain is, you know, this whole, excuse me, inner landscape, of ourselves of our, of our inner being, you know, in the outer terrain is how we meld the two. So we're always moving between physical and non physical reality. I remind listeners about the thought experiment, when you go to sleep tonight, your inner experience of where your consciousness goes your dreams, that's an inner experience, and then the outer experience of bringing that back into, you know, physical reality, and moving between the two. And, and while it's a movement between the two, and there are there is an inner and an outer, it is also a balance. And if we can hold them an equal balance, then you know, then we can find the greatest support and foundation for ourselves. Because there is, you know, when whenever we're following the middle way, that's, that's where we have the clearest path, the clearest light, you know, it's normal human tendency, normal for life to, you know, be swings, from the pendulum going from one end to the other, but finding that balance, so the, the inner terrain of all the beauty that's within exploring your own inner landscape, your own inner consciousness and inner states, and bringing that back into, you know, physical reality, and seeing things with new eyes, bringing things back in and feeling into those experiences. And being able to change your relationship to what you see outwardly, no longer as this thing that is separate from you, but rather as what is part of your universe, and how what you're thinking feeling as you project that outwardly creates your own reality. So maybe a thought to finish on is we all have the power to create our own reality.

Brian Smith  1:04:58  
Awesome, awesome. Nick. You remind people, the name of your book and my people where they can find out more about you.

Nicole Goott  1:05:04  
Sure, thanks. So the book is yoga and the five elements spiritual wisdom for everyday living. It's available through online retailers. If it's in your local bookstore, please support local. So Amazon bookshop.org bookshop.org is actually an interesting way to support local buying online, because you can choose your own local bookseller if people don't know that.

Brian Smith  1:05:29  
Oh, no, that's great. Yeah. Yep. So bookshop.org.

Nicole Goott  1:05:34  
And then my website is my name, my full name, my birth name, Nicole. Nicole girth.com. So two O's, two teas. And I am on social media very little. But you can find me on Instagram. I do have a sub stack where I write, it's called a seekers guide. My search for an ever awakening life. And I write about inner and outer experiences, some of what we've been talking about so people can find me on substack my name. And that's, you know, that's it really.

Brian Smith  1:06:05  
All right. Well, great. Thanks for being here today. Thanks for doing what you do and have a great afternoon. Have a great rest of your day.

Nicole Goott  1:06:12  
Thank you, Youtube, Brian. Great to be here.

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