Soulful Conversations with Ash Grunwald

John Butler: Part 1 - Life Is The Manual

February 19, 2019 Ash Grunwald and John Butler Season 1 Episode 1
Soulful Conversations with Ash Grunwald
John Butler: Part 1 - Life Is The Manual
Show Notes Transcript

I was very honoured to have my first guest be no other than John Butler! I can't think of a better guest for my first episode of Soulful Conversations with Ash Grunwald because John has always been very candid and honest.


I've known John for about 20 years but we have never really had the opportunity to sit down and have a deep conversation. So that's exactly what you hear from the get go in this episode!


Here's what we chatted about: 

  • John talks alot about owning your own shit
  • How John continues to practice and improve at guitar
  • How John uses running and a meditation practice to 'chase the crazy man away'
  • Men's health, anxiety and the effects of touring on family life
  • John's new album 'Home'
  • The power non religious prayer to manifest the things you want in life
  • What it means to be in a Man in your 40's and the journey to becoming an elder in life 


Links


John Butler Trio podcast (about their latest Album called Home)
https://johnbutlertrio.com/podcast/

Check out John's new album 'Home', and website here
https://johnbutlertrio.com/


Ash Grunwald Website/Show Dates
https://www.ashgrunwald.com/


Find more about Ash's current obsession here - Wim Hoff (The Ice Man)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1ial3Rc7Xg


Earth Bottles - use promo code ASHLOVESME
https://earthbottles.com.au/


Listen to Ash's latest album 'NOW' here
NOW by Ash Grunwald


This was such an uplifting soulful conversation! Hope you enjoy it and would love for you to reach out and start a conversation with me over on Instagram here.

Speaker 1:

Hello there. Good people have podcasts land. This is ash Grunewald. Yeah,

Speaker 2:

this is the first ever episode of my new podcast. Soulful conversation. Yeah. For those of you who don't know me, I'm a professional blues musician, singer, songwriter, guitarist, and I've spent the last 20 years traveling the world, listening to podcasts and talking to people and basically having soulful conversations wherever I go.

Speaker 1:

I was very honored to have my first guess, be none other than the dude, pretty much at the pinnacle of the Blues and Roots scene, Mr. John Butler. And I can't think of a better guest for my first episode of soulful conversations because John has always been very candid and honest and he's a good guy and he always has been enough known him for about 20 years. And uh, we've always had great interactions, but we've never really got a chance to sit down and speak so deeply. So what you're hearing in the podcast is that happening on a deep level, straight away, straight off the bat. And he talked a lot about owning your own shit and owning up to stuff. We covered meditation, the power of nonreligious prayer to sort of manifest the things that you want in life. That was absolutely amazing. And you know, it's really good to hear these things from someone who clearly has the score on the board. So when somebody has achieved so widely and done things to such a high level, I sit up and listen to what they have to say. He really puts that thing really

Speaker 2:

well. This is for the guitarists out there. Um, you know, I was asking him about practicing, um, cause he's continued to improve his considerable guitar skills. And he was talking about the aim of becoming a conduit for spirit for like Hendrix. So many men don't

Speaker 1:

share how they're feeling and don't show their vulnerability. Um, and basically he had some inspiring things to say about this phase in life about becoming an elder. And I found it to be a very uplifting, soulful conversation. Welcome to soulful conversations with Ash Grove.

Speaker 3:

Whoa.

Speaker 2:

In this podcast, we interview inspiring and amazing people, musicians, surfers and experts in mindset, creativity, health, wellbeing, and making the world.

Speaker 3:

I'm tired of beating around the bush. I want to go deep and have a soulful conversation.

Speaker 4:

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Speaker 1:

None other than John Butler. How are you going brother? I'm good man. How are you? Very good. Thank you so much for doing this. Well, the name of this podcast is going to be soulful conversations with Grunwald and hopefully that's what this is. I know that's what this is going to be, man. Any excuse has been, it's been a long time. So, yeah, this is nice that we get to chat in absolute as podcast makes it happen. All the better. I listened to your podcast in anyone listening to this go over and we'll put links in John's podcast for his album is fantastic and it's such a great insight into the, the making of, of uh, how an album is made. And it's very personal too. I mean, what, how was the experience of making the podcast? It was good. I mean, I, I'm at a point in my life where I find, uh, the guts of stuff more interesting than the mechanics. So, you know, it was interesting to talk about all, you know, the techniques and the sounds and all that stuff and that was really good. But I really feel that the emotional kind of backdrop and psychological and psychic backdrop that, that, that feels, uh, you know, the tools, uh, fuels the tools, um, more interesting. So, yeah. So, you know, I'm happy to talk about kind of deep personal shit because that's kind of where I'm at, I guess at the moment. And I feel like that's not, not just for myself, but I feel like that's where a lot of us are at at the moment. Yeah, definitely. That's, I mean it's so funny you say that that's, and it's perfect and as it should be because that's why I'm doing this. Yeah. This podcast, you know, for that exact same reason. And I, you know, in the introduction to the podcast I was saying I want to go in deep, you know, because everything else is boring. I think we probably feel like we've done that. It's like that's just details. Yeah. Yeah. It's sort of time to get to the heart of the matter a bit more now. So for you, this particular, and that's a good place to start. You move back to Margaret River before this album.

Speaker 5:

Yeah, I moved, I was living in Western Australia, but we moved out of the city, into the country and to a small town called Margaret River. It's actually not that small in comparison to other small towns like I've grown up in. But yeah, we moved back down to the country and that was great and was really, really good in it. Still is really, really good. And I took a year off off the road, which was great. Uh, and um, yeah, this is interesting and what can I came up, uh, you know, I guess to generally put, you know, put it when you stop stirring the pond, you know, sometimes all the debris comes to the surface. And it was really interesting cause I was during the pond quite a bit at it just at home I've stayed really busy, you know, doing all kinds of projects and I was doing lots of physical, manual labor, which I love. But somehow getting off the road that you like you like you mentioned before, the 20 years of just panning it, I want to tell the personal come up, all the projects on the land kind of came into it. I realized my vision for the land. It was amazing what kind of came up and you know, anxiety was one of the big ones that came up. But um, I'm getting too far ahead of myself. We moved to the country and it was great.

Speaker 1:

Really wanted you to talk about that because like, I don't think there's anything more important and more relevant to the people who are listening to this then inner states, because you're in a state, like how you feel, how we feel in our stomach while we're talking right now is very important. And I don't think outer circumstances, like say if you've got a good circumstance, you're very successful in whatever. One thing I've learnt in my life is that doesn't make any, oh, that doesn't make any difference, really comes down to how you feel when a particular day. How are you feeling? Yeah. So, and I don't think there's a level of success that deals with that or any, any achievement

Speaker 5:

if you think, yeah, if you feel like successful one, they feel the inner cup, you're sorely mistaken. Yeah. So how did you deal with that? Uh, well, you know, uh, it was a slow build and know what I mean by that is like, it's a 10. It was like a 10 year builds. And when I first realized I was getting anxiety was, uh, I was really, I always presents as me being really quite prickly in a bit of an asshole. I get rid of quite grumpy and hate people walking around with lattes in my bands and smiling. That's when I know I'm getting a little anxious on fucking look on the, and I'm like, that's not my height. I become a hater. I do. And I become a head on myself and everybody around me and that's, and that's including the people I love, which is really, you know, I get grumpy. Anyway. Um, then one time I was in that mood right before leaving on tour and my wife saw that happening and she turned on our favorite album dance too, which is duets by Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald. And she kind of grabbed me, she put her hand on my shoulder and Louis started singing and I just started crying. And that was the first time I was like, ah, I'm so fucking anxious about leaving again. Oh, this is what this is. Ah, this is the emotion underneath the surface. Prickly asshole. It's, this is the sorrow of leaving his family, my family. And that's when I first noticed it. And then I found it when I, every time I went away I'm like, Oh, here's this guy again. And every time I came back, ironically, you get it when you come back. Oh, I get it when I come back on a lot of people who live flying, fly out lifestyles too. Um, and yeah, over the 10 years I've really started noticing it more and more. When it came to a point were it was no longer acceptable for me to have this reaction to my lifestyle and circumstances. And especially for my wife. She was over the way that I was processing these emotions. Um, and I think, you know, it came to a point where she's like, dude, you gotta do fucking something about this. I'm over this, this whole thing. You get any fucking grumpy around in the house and like, I have to just fucking wire it until it passes again. You know, it's like, I'm done, I'm fucking done. And you know, that's a pretty hard thing to share with people. But at the same time, that was a really pivotal point for me because she's the most important thing in my world. And her and my family are like, that's the one thing I could lose my career. I could lose a lot of things, but I would hate to lose that. And so it was a really a motivational point in my time and going, cool. That is no longer a place to absorb that kind of energy that is no longer an avenue to express it. I need to kind of deal with it. And you know, how do I deal with it? I, I, you know, uh, I'll have to run like almost everyday cha, I call it chasing the crazy man away. Uh, so I chased the crazy man away every day and then maybe go for a run. I run, I run like I have a lot of energy as an individual. You could probably really relate to this, but you know, you know, essentially, you know, I know I'm turning 44 this year, but in all aspects I'm a young man's do, who evolved, you know, along with the human race. For the last million years to hunt most of the day and to be very physical. Um, and then we live a very sedentary lifestyle nowadays. And so if I don't run, I have a lot of energy in that doesn't tend to come up just me and I'm effervescent kind of means it turns on itself, it turns into Leighton Energy. So I got to get that out of me first and get the endorphins running and get kind of get all those positive hormones going on and then I meditate and those things kind of help. But um, it's been a long, it's been a long journey yet when you have cycles of your emotions and if it's like if your emotions are a reaction to something that is part of your everyday or your touring

Speaker 1:

cycle, then obviously that's not good. It's like your emotions are acting like they're in shock or pissed off about something that's a normal thing for you, then that's obviously not going to be a good thing. But you are, you seem to have, how you seem to have that level of awareness and being, had your ass kicked into that level of awareness to that helps you get onto it.

Speaker 5:

Yeah. It's kind of interesting. You know, I, I, I would consider myself pretty aware guy. But the, the anxiety thing in, in mental health in general, it creeps up on you in a different way. You know? It's not like you, you know, I'm gonna get, I'm gonna get rid of junk one night and the next time when you feel like crap, oh, that's because I try and you're you to smoke a spliff and all of a sudden I'm grumpy for the next few days. It's like anxiety has this way of like, just like permeate in your life and you don't realize you have it for a decade and you're like, oh fuck. Um, so it was interesting. I feel self aware but it to, it took a lot of, it took being off the road and creating almost like a, a scientific kind of laboratory esque kind of environment. Like the control group, the control group. Like, okay, you're not on the road, you're not leaving. Let's see what happens. And it took my wife and myself to kind of come to that realization

Speaker 1:

because the dangerous thing is for you. That's so good you said that because on the road there's plenty of content, um, for the anxiety to use. So like if you want to be anxious or like if anxiety wants to creep in, there's the right content, the right things for you to, there's always something you can get pissed off about it on the road or feel anxious about or whatever. So yeah, it can, that's why it can sneak in under cover, I think.

Speaker 5:

Yeah. Well, I mean there's that, you mean you had the shows? I find the road to be very controlled space and you know, I think for people who get anxious, we long for control. A lot of us come from traumatic backgrounds when we weren't in control. And so the road is kind of a controlled space. She always know what you're gonna do every day. And he also, a lot of times you're not aware around your family, so all of a sudden your life becomes very kind of like a, a mono, a mono vision, which is kind of easy to do with. I wake up, I'll wake up late on, got the breakfast by myself, I, you know, I exercise and then[inaudible] and then I played a Gig and everything's control is getting off the road or the regimen to life changes and it becomes a little more dynamic that things can be, that thing's at shy, I'll get more inches off the road sometimes then on the line because you just controlling the, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I, and all of a sudden, you know, nine o'clock every night, I don't have this real big mission and that pumps out. Oh, bitter gentlemen energy and like have him, it's like you get off the road and you take the main objective away, uh, of, oh, what has been the main objective, which is putting on a show and ego to, you know, even more important things like family and relationships. Those things are quite complex. The a quite complex, you know, and being a father and watching your kid grow up and you know, my boy, you know, he's between nine in[inaudible] now. You know, it's been really confronting for me cause I went to a lot of trauma at that age. And so I look at him and I feel as my trauma a lot of times. So that's that complex. And then trying to follow him, help him become a man and all those things. It's, it's, it's really quite interesting being on the roads. You know, it's pretty simple, you know what I mean? You wake up this time, Bobby called that time, eat at this time, gigs on this time, bus call at 2:00 AM two it all again, very controlled, very regimented, getting off the road. It's like, whoa, okay Elvis, you know, I can't explain it. Yeah, you come from a very controlled environment to a very dynamic and essentially more enriching environment. But it's complex, especially if you spent a long time being a regimented soldier on the road, you know? And now I guess we're at that age too where when you come into your forties that whatever you've been doing, you'd be doing it for 20 years. So it's probably one of those first points of checking. I mean, seems like it used to manifest as a midlife crisis. Now it's, it doesn't have to be a midlife crisis, but it's definitely a midlife check in because if you've been an adult longer than you were ever a kid, so I guess the groove in the record as warm, pretty deep and you can see it, you can see the patterns and you can see the results of your actions for the first tongues with with a clear perspective. No, you get the 40 you can look back and go, Oh wow, okay. That happened kind of quickly. I can see what I've been doing less 20 years. Here I am. Look at your body. What state is it in? How am I going right now? I'm going good or I'm not going good. And then you look ahead, you can see your parents if they're still with you and you can see the next 40 years and they come pretty quick. And how do I want to go, you know, and, and, and who have I become and who do I want to be and what has been the result of my, uh, action today. And so, yeah, there's quite a bit of perspective that you get, you know, that you don't, you can't, you cannot get until you about in your forties early, you're late thirties. And so it's a beautiful, beautiful opportunity and it's a luxurious opportunity to just to make it to the sage, you know, it new when you look back at the human race only a few hundred years ago. But um, but it does come with responsibility to a certain degree comes with like this opportunity to kind of take it to the next level or to remain the same and pay, you know, pay some of the prices for that. Cool. Only keep on party and I'm going to keep on thinking it's the whole world's fault and not my own. I'm going to keep on being a kid and not a man and you know, do that for 40 years and see what kind of man you are you're going to. Or it was like, cool, how can I take this shit to the next level? Do I want to like live thinking? I don't have anxiety and thinking it's the world's fault in Haiti and other lots as a fair and reasonable thing. You might be thinking, um, uh, or in Darwin I to keep on self-medicating, do I want to keep on rolling my family through the drama, my melodramatic dramas and all this stuff? Do I want something different? Do I want to be, you know, so it's an amazing time. It's, I'm not surprised that people, they call it a midlife crisis or something because it's a reckoning. It's a real reckoning of yourself. You get perspective for the first time. It's a real mirror in front of your face. If you're lucky enough to not be fighting for your life and some worn torn country, it really, you get a chance to really observe yourself. And um, and if you are in a situation where you have a family, it gets even more deeply fractal because you have these children and um, and they're the evolution evolution of you and they're the genetic mirror of you. And she can get pretty real pretty quick. But it's a, an amazing time. It's an amazing time to almost step up into, ah, into a new way of being and also being, becoming an elder in some way, you know, and letting go of the boy, you know, in the, in the world, so intoxicated and so infatuated with youth in or to becoming an elder. It's like, it's almost like, oh no one wants to become an elder. Cause it means old and uncool. Actually. It's really uncool not to respect your elders. It's pretty and cool not to have elders that we're looking at a society that doesn't, right. Elders in look at what Western society is becoming, you know, um, so to, to embrace me and coming to elder to be embraced going, I am now a man. I'm actually now a man and I'm going to newer raise these boys and these daughters to become men and women. That's my role. I need to let go of some of this old immature stuff of wanting to be, you know, appboy forever and become a man. It's, it's, it's, it's amazing time. It's amazing time to be alive, but it, it does come with a certain amount of self reflection and like, okay, it's going to be a bit of a spring clean and some of it's not going to be easy to let go of and some of it is totally necessary to get to the next level. Yeah. Well that was just so well said. A nice one. It's funny like I will go on one more time when you mentioned midlife crisis because I feel like for men at this age, we feel it. The antidote to our crisis is becoming leaders in real men for, I'll speak for men at the moment. For our, say our sons, and you look at most of them, it must've been become 40 45 they have either kids or about to become teenagers, are teenagers, teenagers. You know, some teenage boys are some of the most lost individuals and society around that time. They're looking for something to believe in the looking for something to prove themselves. A Lou looking for guidance. The men in the forties are some of the most lost people in society as well. They're looking for something to redefine themselves. They're looking for something that's deeper than just what there was, what was the career? And you look at this two things, they'd look a ying and a Yang to each other. It's like the young man is searching for the, for the elder to lead them through the rites of passage. And the elder is looking for

Speaker 1:

a young man to be,

Speaker 5:

to lead through rites of passage. And they both become the rites of passage for each other. And so I find that really interesting. At the moment they go, oh cool, maybe my boy is, you know, is the antidote to what I'm looking for. And I'm the antidote to it. He's looking,

Speaker 1:

hmm, it's, it's a time to, and you know, we, we are both pretty idealistic people. Um, but it's a time to be more idealistic in a way, but maybe more based on the self, but like it's the time to put in that work that the self work and there's something about what you just said then that really put that into perspective because I've been going through I think probably similar things to yourself in, in different ways and just putting in a lot of self work and it's just like, it is the period to step up and to step your game up and be a leader and somebody that you can look up to. And that does involve actually been a little bit more virtuous. It does, you know, and that can be whatever is important to you, but you've got to put in a bit more work at that stage. I mean for me, the way I feel about it is it's the time and it feels right. It feels really good to do that. It's not like something I've done kicking and screaming. I'm turning things around. Hey, I wanted to ask you about meditation because I do really think that's one pillar of health and spiritual wellbeing. Um, so how did that come into your life and, and what do you do? I,

Speaker 5:

my mom met it, hasn't been meditating for most of my life and, um, I think the first time I started meditating with went to a self realization fellowship center in California. What is that? That's run by, it was started by a Indian yogi named Paramahansa Yogananda and um, so it was kind of, it's Kinda like on Meditation Church. And so I remember going to Sunday school there when mum meditated some routes and I was introduced to it there. Uh, then we moved to Australia in 1986. And, uh, I think it was when I was in my teens, I started doing transcendental meditation and, uh, on and off for years doing that and then kind of re ignited that maybe about a seven or eight years ago, again, doing TM, I still remembered my mantra, which was amazing. Um, and um, to me, meditation is like ohns kind of stuff, you know. I feel like a lot of these things are byproduct may be moments of peace, moments of euphoria, moments of maybe spiritual enlightenment, you know, you know, in inverted commas. But mainly it's, it's, it's mental hygiene. It's, uh, you just, you just, it's a practice. It's going to be done. He said, are we going to be done? You know, it's like you brush your teeth, you eat food, you take a shit, you sleep. Like those things you have to do, otherwise you die or you miserable. Uh, and he also should meditate and exercise. He's just like, I don't run for ABS. I run for like chasing the crazy guy where as I said before, I run from mental hygiene, I meditate for the same reason, to defrag and let my nervous system like just chill out. Um, there are other benefits other than just keeping my anxiety down and it'd been a nicer person. And, uh, yeah. Yeah, there's moments, there's moments where I feel a complete one with nature and the universe and you know, there's this little little bubbles that pop with like moments of, of, uh, you know, deeper kind of realizations. And wonder, but they're fleeting. You know, the main reason why I do it is to just in the same reason why wipe my butt, I do it cause I have to unleash, you know, why they let you, they, you know, like, uh, and I might take the romance out of it a bit, but like I've kind of come to that point in time. I still find it very romantic to don't get, get me wrong. I'm always going to be idealist and a romantic, but I do it now cause I have to, not because I want to be a certain kind of person, you know? Um, I do it because I know like I'm a better person with it.

Speaker 1:

And, and just boiling that down to a boring, like daily practice. How do you, how often do you do it?

Speaker 5:

Oh, I, I tried to run first know any of them anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes at the moment. Um, we used to run longer, but at the moment I'm still trying to get to that point without trying to prove anything to my ego. So I just, between 15 and 30 minutes seen how I feel. Uh, then I, then I meditate for 20 minutes, um, on, on good days, I'll do it twice a day. Yeah. And I remember one thing that a teacher wants told me was if you don't have 20 minutes, twice a day, you're too busy. You're too busy. Like if you can't put aside 20 minutes twice a day, Youtube, like I struggled with my, my second one, but if, yeah, if you're too busy to do 20 minutes once a day, you know, you need to re look at the schedule a little bit.

Speaker 1:

You would know that Chinese saying or whatever that, that wine, if you're, um, you should meditate for 20 minutes a day, but if you really busy do it for an hour. Yeah. Right. Yeah. What have you feel too busy? Meditate for an hour. Yeah. I mean, it just really makes all the difference. I'm probably a little bit slack with that one, but my God, just over the last couple of months I got into the old, uh, Wim Hoff breathing. Oh yeah. Have you got into that? No, I've, you know, I've watched a couple of things and I was the head of the friends and you know, that's the same kind of thing. Is it good? It, it just gets me to that place. I feel like it blasts me to that place very quickly with a whole body sensation that can't be ignored. Wow. So like I do like somebody sent me a youtube and it's just got like one round is five minutes. Okay. So you just, it's like basically if anybody's wondering, it's all over the Internet, but essentially to just in a nutshell, taking 40 deep breaths and then, uh, as deep as you can, not pushing the excel too much and then having one exhale and holding your breath out, like emptying and holding your breath for two minutes, holding your breath for two minutes, which is easy. You could do that right now coming from the surfer here. Well, you're surprised the first time you do it. Um, so that after the 40 breasts, then you hold a team of 40 breaths, then you hold an outbreath. It's like you're not even holding your breath and then you know, after a while you say you do two rounds of that. You'd basically the practices three rounds of that and on the third one, my God, man, you're just, you just go to a different place. I do for sure. Wow. I think it stimulates a bit of your pineal gland and the Vegas nerve, and I'm not really sure on all of the details, but on the last round to go that next little bit, you chuck in still on the outbreath, you check in a few, these almost sounds made up, but you check in a few pushups to you do like say pushups to your maximum of whatever it is and you feel like absolutely like superman, like you, you're doing way more than you think you can do in a rapid rate, like the flash or something. And meanwhile you'd potentially seeing all sorts of purple and that's what has happened for me at times. That's what keeps me like really quite intuit and I'm into it. But that's like, that's 15 minutes in. And then after that I feel very much more inclined to want to meditate. And I just actually lay there and after that and just go, wow. And, and just work on my breath. She's had a cracker instead. You find after that like your mental state and thinking and Cognitive d does it just, does it trickle down into other aspects of your life? Do you find that the rest of the day? Absolutely. And I haven't seen, that's the thing that I haven't seen all over the Internet. I mean, I think people say that that's the go and you're doing it for health. But I've been staggered to which, uh, the degree to which it's kept me on that really even Keel, not identifying so much with the content of my thoughts, aware of my thoughts, aware that they are thoughts. Yes. They're not you. Just thoughts. Yeah. Yeah. And then I can just do little periods in the day. If I'm walking down the street, I might look like a Weirdo or on the plane. I do it a lot and I'm like sometimes I know people are thinking I'm a Weirdo, but I don't, I just don't care. I just, I just sneak a few in, some, a good breather from um, Yoga and um, some surfing, breathing and also from singing. So, and you would be to, you can, you can get probably more in then people who were just starting out more oxygen so you can sort of sneak into that state without looking too bizarre. But the abdominal breathing, but it's just, cause I like the idea with meditation. Um, I've always liked the idea of putting it into my everyday life. I've always thought that was more important, but I'm sure it's just as important. But that's as important as a practice that you do at the start or the end of your day to be doing a minute many times a day to keep reminding you. Because I've heard, I remember ecot totally talking about that now. I was thinking that is really true. Like he was saying, people could reach some transcendental kind of state and then get up and have a fight with their wife as soon as they get off there. And if it's, if it's that, then it's sort of a not as good as it could be. Like I think both it would be optimal, but I think whatever transfers into your day and changes how you live your life as we check in throughout the day a little bit. You know, I had a friend, uh, is the end of things already and I think her doctors, psychologists, um, counts as suggested this chicken, she had set something on a digital watch or been given a digital watch, these reminders up for reminders a day and all you had to do is just contact with your breath for that time and[inaudible] went on. You're like, okay, cool. I got to do 30 or 40 breaths somewhere in the staff room or wherever she was working. And it just drops her rate of anxiety down. And yeah, I think, I think you're right. I think integrating it throughout the day and like everything else is integrated. You know, we eat, we work when we walk, we talk, we do all these things that are integrated throughout our days. Why shouldn't idea of, you know, whatever you want to call it being present or in the moment or a meditation, be part of that. Not these kind of book ended moments but more like sprinkled throughout the day. That makes a lot of sense to me. And I think that it sounds like the ultimate is you still do the book end because that teaches your brain about the place it needs to go. But then throughout the day you just keep flicking back there. It's a little maintenance. Yeah. And the other one to remember I saw on the Internet, have you ever looked at old mates? That Guru? No, he, he's, he's really cool, but he had some really, he has got heaps of cool ones. One one he talks about the body and he's like, this is the most sophisticated gadget. You know, he's like the gadget. He said a lot of people have iPhones and apparently you only use 5% of what an iPhone can do. Well, and he's like, if you used 1% of what this gadget can do, I'm pointing at myself here. People who are listening, you know, you would be able to do amazing things, but we just, we have this gadget which is us but what we call us, but we don't have the instruction manual. And he says a whole lot of cool things. But um, but one really good thing is like he says, when you wake up in the morning, you should be so thankful that you have alive. Millions of people died that night. You didn't, you know, you'll hear. And you should be first and foremost before you thankful. Having gratitude for the things that are good. That's one level. But having gratitude to just be here is an amazing leveling thing. And you can do that throughout your day too. That's another way of centering yourself, I think.

Speaker 5:

Yeah, especially in this day and age have been very aware of our negative bias, you know, through through our evolutionary process of, you know, thinking that tiger was in the common may mouse or you know, some other thing was some other prey was going to get us back in the primordial kind of the history of our evolution. We do have a negative bias. So to kind of change that in this day and age a little bit and credit positive bias is a really important thing. And that, and that takes training that does that. That really does take training. Yeah. Yeah. Sat Guru. He's such a legend. I mean really we have a, you know, I'm always perplexed by the over fascination of our devices. You know, I'm talking about our funds and our bits and our gadgets. I'm always telling the kids and the biggest computer on the planet, you know, and Oh and the most powerful technology we have is, you know, in our heads, but it's also in our hearts, it's in us. Like, you know, we invented those gadgets that were so infatuated with, like we invented them. And that's just like what we were able to make, you know, like within ourselves. That is where the biggest technology lies. Like if you want the next technological advance really, you know, he uh, we can have a AI and all this and we can go to Mars and fucking do the same thing. We always did mind the shit out of it, but like where is the next advance? It's really a spiritual kind of awake name, you know? And yeah, there was no manual life is the manual trials and tribulations, trial and error. That's the manual you learn from your mistakes, you learn from your successes. You, you know, you get you into your ego and it comes and bites you in the ass and leaves you, you know, paralyzed and you get stand back up and go, cool. Got To watch that ego thing this time and you get back in the game. That is, you know, that's how we learn. It's, yeah, it's a, there's like an infinite well of technology and knowledge within us. So, you know, we're onto it anyway. I should be calling you sat butler. No, no. I'm just fascinated by how much, I don't know. There's this, there's so much, there's so much that I don't understand and I'm, I'm, I'm, and I'm, and all of it in, in, in wonder of it. I'm in the wonder of it, you know, you hear some of the old people speak about their old people, you know, and talking about indigenous stories and stuff and it's like, wow, this is a whole world out there. I do not understand people who can shape shift and all kinds of stuff. And I'm like, so yeah, I, I'm, I'm, I'm constantly fascinated by this mind and heart of ours. We only use what under 10% of our brain, you know, like, yeah. Shit. God knows. I mean, interstellar travel, we talking about that. We're talking about going to the light speeds. I don't think, I think there's a lot using the wrong technology, you

Speaker 2:

know? Yeah. Anyway, I'm getting a bit too far out there, but I totally know what you go with that and I totally get it to be continued in you. That is it. Here enter the very first project, soulful conversations and thank you so much to John Butler for that first little bit. We were going ultra cosmic there at the end and um, the second half you're here next week and it goes to some mind boggling levels and some really, really interesting interesting stuff. I just edited it, edited, I just edited it and it is sounding amazing. Thank you so much for being with me on the start of this journey and I'm just so excited about it. And um, don't forget, if you want to get some goodies on earth bottles on the website there and get it in the good books, getting some coffee cups and bottles and helping to reduce the use of single use plastic type in the Promo Code. Ash loves me for a little 10% discount. And if you've enjoyed this podcast, please share it on whatever platform you're listening on and do a little screenshot maybe, and chuck something up on socials. I heard Jim Kwik saying that the other day. He's a legend. And, um, I think that's a really good idea. You know, make a little comment about what you found to be the best takeaway thing from what John said, and post it on socials and tag us. That would be absolutely amazing. I would be eternally grateful for that. Otherwise, just send me a direct message on Instagram or whatever platform you're feeling. Just lay it down. And, um, this next track that you're hearing is the worst crimes are legal from my now album, but otherwise, see you next time.

Speaker 3:

Thank you so much.[inaudible].