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Hey everyone, welcome back to the Sneaky Powerful Podcast.
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My name is Ali Capurro and I'm so glad you're here.
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It's been so long since I've published a podcast and this particular one was actually recorded quite a while ago.
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To be able to publish more podcasts, hopefully, I made a choice to skip the editing process.
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So this is Sneaky Powerful Raw.
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No intro music, unless I figure that out later, or polished content, just meaningful conversations.
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So today I'm really excited to share the conversation with Dr.
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Joshua Silve.
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Joshua is someone who makes me feel more hopeful about the world.
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He's a faculty member with SEI, and he has a book coming out in November.
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Joshua is also a creative, deeply thoughtful human who's using his intellect and light to support trauma healing in ways that reach far and wide.
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I'm really happy to share this conversation and staying true to the raw nature of this episode, we jump right in with laughter, my favorite.
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So let's get into it.
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That's great.
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It is great.
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But yeah, so we were going to talk about free will a little bit.
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So I had kind of told myself that I would do a little more research on free will because I thought, do I not know?
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What do I know about free will?
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But as free will would have it, I didn't do or not.
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I don't know.
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I didn't do any research.
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So I'm like, well, what do you think about free will?
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Right, right.
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You didn't do any research.
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And what does that say about you?
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Why weren't you able to muster more discipline to complete this task that you had set out for yourself?
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Yeah.
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And, you know, do we hold you accountable for that?
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You know, do we say, you know, this is a moral failing of some kind?
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Yes.
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Or do we acknowledge or...
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Or do we acknowledge that according to the laws of nature, everything arises out of prior causes and conditions.
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And so to presume that you could have chosen otherwise is perhaps illusory.
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And I think of all of this as, you know, super interesting and potentially super relevant to this work that we do, but it still is considered by most to be a kind of intellectual sideline.
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And I'm not surprised to hear you say and to hear others say, I don't really know much about this.
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It's not exactly something we're encouraged to reflect on or consider.
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For me, it wasn't until I don't know, maybe 10 years ago or something, all of a sudden I realized that I had just never really considered this thing.
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Like, do we have conscious voluntary will over our lives?
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And I was surprised to realize that it had just really never come across the screen of my awareness, you know, that I hadn't considered it.
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And then, you know, really became fascinated with it, devoured a ton of literature And it has since come to really influence the way that I think about things.
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But I don't get to talk about it as often as I'd like, you know, because when you're teaching the SE professional training, the somatic experiencing professional training, which is where you and I have first crossed paths, you know, it's...
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It's potentially not what people are paying to hear about.
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Exactly.
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I try to inhibit those impulses I have to sort of explore this with people.
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Okay.
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I am curious.
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Can we use like a really simplified example of maybe something you've encountered where free will has, where you've noticed it, nothing dramatic, but so for our listeners to kind of get a understanding of what you mean when you're talking about free will without the philosophical textbooks that you've read through.
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Yeah.
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Well, for sure.
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You know, I mean, it's, it's, Everywhere.
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It's in everything.
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It touches, you know, really anything that means anything to us, I think, because we're tending to walk around day to day, all day, every day,
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with
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this sense of authorship over our actions.
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Right.
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And I am wondering, even as you say that, there's a little bit of possessiveness, like, absolutely, I author my own life.
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Exactly.
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Exactly.
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There tends to be a little bit of a reaction.
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for many of us when we really deeply consider the possibility that my choices, so to speak, are in a way, as we were saying in the beginning, choiceless.
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That what I elect to say and do is arising out of prior causes and conditions and is likely reducible to my genetic inheritance combined with the environments that have shaped the expression of those genetics.
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So I have this sense of like, and of course, we can't touch on this without considering how many of us might understand ourselves to not be something of the body you know, that there's a, there's an immaterial soul that inhabits, you know, the body.
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I
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like the idea of separating out.
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Yeah.
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Those.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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Early on.
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Right.
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You know, so sometimes, sometimes there's kind of a sense of like, well, sure, you know, there's my genetics and my environment and that does provide some kind of influence, but then there's the real me that's somewhere in there and maybe is made up of spirit matter.
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Right.
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But the thing that we might say is that even if that's true, even if we are a soul, did we choose our soul?
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Did we...
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Dang that question.
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That's a big one.
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That is shaking me to my core.
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I thought I knew that one.
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Did we come into the world and somehow there's some stuff that is us that stands apart from these different layers of experience.
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And we looked and said, well, there's my soul and I don't really like it.
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And so I'm going to make a different choice.
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I mean, wherever you look, the notion that there's some me that is somehow standing apart and saying, yay or nay is is a little is a little hard to get behind uh and so you know of course we could talk about all the like neuroscience and philosophy and all that stuff um but that's that's the basic picture and you know i i just really think it's uh it's relevant to any project of of healing you know that that we really start to question how much authorship do we actually have over the choices that we make?
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I
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don't think this is exactly what you mean.
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Maybe, maybe it touches on it, but when I, as I have been at least thinking about it, even if I didn't do much research about free will, I was thinking that if I, if I really felt like I had a free will and even though I said I got defensive or angry up in arms about me, I, Not being the author of my own life.
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There's also an awareness that I would have chose things.
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I would have done things a lot differently if I had a little more free will.
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Yes, 100%
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yes.
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Of course.
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There's so many times, I think, in this life for many of us that we find ourselves saying or doing things that we had expressly forbidden ourselves to say or do.
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Okay.
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Now I'm feeling the relief.
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I'm actually like, yes.
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Right.
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Yeah.
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Right.
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So what a lot of us tend to want to do is...
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Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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And about the things of which we are ashamed, that was something else.
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That was my conditioning.
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That was, you know, my mom wasn't nice to me.
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I
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was like, it's the thing, like when my kid's good.
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Oh, that's my kid.
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And then when they're not, they have their own free will.
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I have nothing to do
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with that.
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That's the other parent's influence.
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That's
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right.
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That's right.
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That's their dad's side.
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Right.
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Actually, in a serious way often, which is funny.
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No, for sure.
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For sure.
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I mean, that's part of what can be challenging about children is that they are going to manifest some of the same attributes that drive you nuts about their other donor, so to
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speak.
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Button pushers.
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They know how.
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Yeah, that's right.
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It's also like when you said genetics, oh man, yeah, I was thinking about just ancestors in general and that whole, I know that's a big topic, but there's a little bit of anger thinking about the influence that perhaps my ancestors have on my lack of free will.
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Like to be real, like a little bit of like, you motherfuckers, like you should have done this generations ago.
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Why am I doing it now?
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Right, right.
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Yeah.
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Right, right.
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I'm going to sit with that more.
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Right.
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Being the inheritor of generations of unprocessed, unworked through intergenerational trauma is part of that inheritance that conditions us.
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our lives, you know, so the, uh, and, and it could not be otherwise.
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I don't think, you know, that those are, those are prior causes and conditions that will constrain what's possible for us.
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Right.
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I
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was talking to my kid last night.
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Uh, she was, I mentioned, um, that I was watching, I've been watching this documentary.
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Gosh, hopefully this isn't going to be, um, controversial.
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I've been watching this documentary about Donald Trump and really curious about his life, his upbringing, kind of what made him who he is.
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And hopefully without stepping in it, what my daughter said was like, well, he must have had really his parents must have been, you know, not good.
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Really kind of coming down on the side of like nurture, you know, rather than like, you know, a sort of nature nurture thing.
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And, you know, hopefully I can say this without being controversial, you know, it's all in, you know, what he says, how he presents himself, you know, that like he is in this to win, and understands winning as the amassing of resources.
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And so we started to have this really interesting conversation, you know, where I said, well, I guess, kiddo, I can't say, you know, how much of this is owing to, you know, his parentage, you know, because maybe genetics also play a role.
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And she was like, I just can't believe that.
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I mean, he once was just a little baby and that little baby, you know, couldn't have just been there, you know, with this kind of, you know, these tendencies, right?
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But then we started to kind of, you know, unpack it a little bit.
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Sorry, hopefully this is going to be relevant to our point.
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Started to unpack it a little bit.
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And I was like, well, you know, if it's true that there is some genetic aspect to this, you know, maybe that has been playing out, you know, through the generations.
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And so, you know, there was some...
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some selection for certain characteristics.
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And the thing we know about human ancestors is that they were, in our deep time, ancestors hunter-gatherer groups, the archeological and anthropological evidence suggests that they were fiercely egalitarian, which is to say everybody was equal and they were fierce about protecting that state of affairs.
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So they would expel people if they tried to usurp the autonomy of other people.
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Right.
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And in those environments, obviously, the genetics that would be selected for would be ability to cooperate, respect for other people, putting the needs of the group ahead of your own.
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Those kind of characteristics would be celebrated by these groups.
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And those people would be probably winning more partners and sending their DNA down through the generations.
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if people were exiled when they showed tendencies towards selfish or even sociopathic behavior, then their genetics would have died out as they were off in the woods by themselves, unable to find mates.
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So, but then I was, I guess it became a little, it's probably hard being my child because everything becomes some, you know, neuroscientific uh you know lesson or whatever but i was like but then let's think about you know the world that we live in today in a capitalist economy what gets selected for i.e what wins you more resources and potentially access to to mates and you know the ability to send your genetics down through the generations is selfishness yeah is uh you know sociopathy And so in that sense, it could be that we're now finding ourselves in an environment that is not shaped towards our basic biology and in which the genetic signature of selfishness is what is getting reinforced and selected for.
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So In that sense, we're kind of seeing this interesting shift, I think, in our world, where a lot of us are scratching our heads, just being like, what happened?
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What's going on with the human species?
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And it could not have to do with people being bad actors who could choose otherwise if they so desired, but actually people According to the dictates of prior causes and conditions like their genetics and like the environments that have, that have shaped their actions.
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It, it brought my, it brought me to a real serious level.
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Cause it felt like, Oh, that to me speaks to so much of the sadness that I'm maybe, even if I talk, speak anecdotally, like in my practice or in my patients or clients and just this, this, the selfishness that doesn't create happiness maybe creates winning, but not yeah.
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Happiness.
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And actually, first of all, your daughter, that's so insightful, even though she has to be your daughter and you're the neuroscience and I'm sure it's not terribly hard, but yeah, that's so cool that she picks up on that and has awareness of that.
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I love hearing that.
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But it reminds me of in 2016, I don't know if you'll remember this, but when Peter spoke, Peter Levine spoke in Portland.
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I remember it was the first time I met you.
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I didn't really meet you, but the first time I talked to you, because he was doing like a little, maybe a two-day workshop at the Hilton, something downtown in Portland.
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Oh, yeah, for Pussy or something like that.
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Yeah, it must have been.
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I honestly can't remember.
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But...
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And it was election year, and he had photos of Donald Trump and sort of was, without being too controversial, going into...
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I remember specifically him talking about the way his mouth, how he held his mouth and this sort of attachment reaching.
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Do you remember that at all?
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Vaguely.
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Yeah, but I just remember being fascinated.
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Well, because he can read body language or...
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I don't know if read's the right word, but yeah.
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Anyway, it's really an interesting thing to think about.
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And I like thinking about him as a little infant or a little baby because that brings so much compassion to my heart.
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Right.
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No matter what is happening politically.
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Right.
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Isn't it nice to be able to access that, that sense of compassion?
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And for whatever it's worth, if I'm still allowed to bring this back around to free will, one of the things that I love about about integrating this understanding is that it does allow me to have a lot more compassion
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because
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I'm no longer moving through the world, judging people and saying that person is just a bad person who they must want to do this.
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Like when they cut me off on the freeway, they must want, They must have been in the lane and said to themselves, I could just stay in this lane and not almost kill that other driver and his children.
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But
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I just want to get over, and I don't care.
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I don't care.
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They can suffer.
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And did all of that as this deliberative action that they were utterly and completely in control over.
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That kind of stuff makes me mad.
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And I get real, real mad when things like that happen.
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Again, compassion for the kiddos.
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They have to hear me cursing and whatever, having some big reaction to whatever.
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But if I can remember that that individual no more chose...
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to do that thing, then I chose to yell some expletive at them that they're never gonna hear.
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And we're all moving through this world, acting according to things that we didn't choose.
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And so I can start to let go of that sense of like, oh, this is a bad person.
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And they're, they're essentially like me, but they're just choosing to do bad stuff.
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Right.
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Right.
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Right.
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They're not like me.
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You know, they have not enjoyed the luck that I have enjoyed to arrive at this moment in my life with the, with this amount of free attention and interest in certain kinds of, you know, ethical behaviors.
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You know, it's like, like I was thinking, um, As I was driving around today thinking about, I wonder what we're gonna talk about, I was reflecting on this.
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I, as a person, have moved through this world sitting with spiritual teachers, sitting with therapy teachers.
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I've been to all kinds of workshops and retreats and all this.
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And some number of those teachers, when I would get close enough to them, I would realize like, ooh, this person is a little, hmm.
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you know, like there's a little bit of like, you know, some kind of malignant narcissism going on here and I would get burned and, and be really resentful.
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And, and now I'm a teacher and I realized like, I've been moving through the world kind of with this, like, like I'm not like them, you know, this like sense of superiority that I'm like, yeah, I'm not making those choices.
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Like I'm not, you know, exploiting people and seeing people as pawns on a chessboard to aggrandize myself or create more resources for me.
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And I've been really kind of getting off on that.
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And all of a sudden, the whole house of cards just came down.
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And I was like, I'm just lucky.
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I'm just lucky for whatever reason.
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I did not come into the world with the genetics or environmental cues that created in me that particular set of ethical predispositions.
00:23:10.017 --> 00:23:25.233
I have the ones that I have and I'm incredibly grateful because I think that I'm probably at the end of the day, living a better life, feeling freer inside myself, like sleeping, you know, whatever, sleeping better, however, you know, whatever metaphor we want to use.
00:23:26.055 --> 00:23:35.986
And, and I'm really glad about that, but I should not, I should not sit there thinking that like, there's something superior about me.
00:23:36.258 --> 00:23:43.548
Like, this is just, you know, this is just dumb, dumb luck in a sense that I didn't choose and I didn't earn.
00:23:43.567 --> 00:23:44.890
I didn't earn it.
00:23:44.950 --> 00:23:47.113
You know, it's just what happened.
00:23:47.733 --> 00:23:59.590
So anyways, I do think it's useful to be able to hold some of these perspectives because it softens us, I think, in a way that's probably really important.
00:24:01.173 --> 00:24:01.353
I...
00:24:02.082 --> 00:24:03.463
I value that a lot.
00:24:03.584 --> 00:24:15.858
It's taken me back to when I think I was a senior in high school and I was in psychology, a psychology class, and we were talking about serial killers.
00:24:15.878 --> 00:24:25.310
And I had, this is how I wrangled in my very first serious boyfriend.
00:24:25.330 --> 00:24:25.351
I
00:24:29.615 --> 00:24:30.998
love this story already.
00:24:31.874 --> 00:24:36.145
It's totally true, which is so funny.
00:24:36.165 --> 00:25:00.627
But anyway, so we were talking about specifically Jeffrey Dahmer and the class was, and I think I raised my hand and said something like, kind of understanding the, I don't know, thin line between me and Jeffrey Dahmer, which was probably frightening to many of my class, my peers, but there was one guy who got it.
00:25:01.368 --> 00:25:02.710
Yeah.
00:25:02.869 --> 00:25:04.491
That's
00:25:04.511 --> 00:25:04.612
right.
00:25:04.791 --> 00:25:05.432
Exactly.
00:25:05.551 --> 00:25:06.692
He's like, that's my girl.
00:25:07.054 --> 00:25:39.105
But yeah, basically like, haven't you ever felt crazy before was what I said, my 17 year old self said, and that was prior to me having panic attacks and really going on this journey of understanding, I don't, not mental health, mental unhealth, but I've been watching not a documentary, but a made up, a fictional show, but called, I think it's Mindhunters, but it's about like the beginning of the FBI.
00:25:39.226 --> 00:25:46.693
I think the serial killer sort of unit of the FBI, I think, hopefully I'm saying that correctly.
00:25:47.054 --> 00:25:47.134
Yeah.
00:25:47.809 --> 00:25:49.571
Can you hear the dirt bikes in the background?
00:25:50.133 --> 00:25:51.976
I think, okay, good.
00:25:52.296 --> 00:25:52.936
I heard something.
00:25:53.017 --> 00:25:54.199
I wasn't sure.
00:25:55.800 --> 00:26:00.708
And I'm really holding compassion that they are not choosing to do
00:26:00.748 --> 00:26:01.449
that, right?
00:26:04.053 --> 00:26:04.692
That's right.
00:26:04.752 --> 00:26:09.420
Their attraction to that is not something that they selected.
00:26:09.961 --> 00:26:11.182
No, it's genetic.
00:26:12.183 --> 00:26:22.608
Anyway, so, but yeah, thinking about and watching these films, fake interviews, but I'm assuming they're based on some sort of reality or hopefully, I don't know, maybe I'll research it more.
00:26:23.570 --> 00:26:24.192
Probably not.
00:26:29.458 --> 00:26:42.074
Where they are talking about, but I guess where I'm trying to go with this is just the idea like, I don't think they would have chosen that if they could have, is my feeling and my guess.
00:26:43.936 --> 00:27:00.682
And What an awful life and it's hard, but to muster some compassion toward that scenario.
00:27:00.721 --> 00:27:02.904
But that is a way bigger can of worms.
00:27:03.305 --> 00:27:04.226
That's what I'm talking about.
00:27:04.846 --> 00:27:04.926
Well,
00:27:04.967 --> 00:27:05.488
for sure.
00:27:05.667 --> 00:27:13.278
I mean, but we can even look there, like your ability to hold compassion for that situation.
00:27:13.473 --> 00:27:15.296
is itself choiceless.
00:27:15.977 --> 00:27:16.156
Right.
00:27:16.817 --> 00:27:17.038
Right.
00:27:17.077 --> 00:27:27.872
Like there's other people in this world, maybe the family members of Jeffrey Dahmer's victims who will never be able to, for a moment, feel compassion for him.
00:27:28.613 --> 00:27:33.999
Even someone I might be watching the show with might have an absolutely different experience.
00:27:34.058 --> 00:27:34.680
And you're right.
00:27:34.700 --> 00:27:36.082
It does not feel like a choice.
00:27:36.102 --> 00:27:40.666
I don't know why I'm made this way, but I have been since I was very little.
00:27:40.727 --> 00:27:42.469
And I remember that specifically.
00:27:42.829 --> 00:27:42.910
Yeah.
00:27:43.105 --> 00:27:59.606
Yeah, I think a capacity for empathy might be one of those things that is shaped by genetic factors and then whether our environment prepares us for that.
00:27:59.727 --> 00:28:07.896
Like if we're not shown empathy, we may have a deficiency in our capacity to empathize with others.
00:28:08.698 --> 00:28:08.798
Right.
00:28:10.049 --> 00:28:10.490
Yeah.
00:28:10.691 --> 00:28:16.618
It's pretty, it's pretty fascinating, which is why I love my work, my line of work.
00:28:18.181 --> 00:28:18.461
Okay.
00:28:18.481 --> 00:28:23.489
So I know I'm being careful of time and we have about 12 minutes and I want to make sure.
00:28:23.509 --> 00:28:24.971
So I want to make sure to
00:28:25.131 --> 00:28:28.394
kind of just, just, you know, I have till 515.
00:28:28.655 --> 00:28:28.955
So are
00:28:28.996 --> 00:28:29.297
you sure?
00:28:29.336 --> 00:28:30.238
Yeah.
00:28:30.753 --> 00:28:31.115
Okay.
00:28:31.895 --> 00:28:33.699
I like my me questioning your life.
00:28:33.719 --> 00:28:34.640
Are you sure?
00:28:35.080 --> 00:28:36.261
Yeah, no positive.
00:28:36.282 --> 00:28:36.363
Yeah.
00:28:36.383 --> 00:28:36.682
Okay, cool.
00:28:36.883 --> 00:28:37.644
Okay, good.
00:28:37.744 --> 00:28:41.911
Cause I think this one might be a little bit longer and I'm sure free will will come into it.
00:28:41.951 --> 00:28:42.833
I'm not sure how though.
00:28:43.313 --> 00:28:47.640
Actually, let me first say, so sometimes this happens where something will come into the field.
00:28:47.680 --> 00:28:57.674
Like, so, so, you know, you knew you had this interview and I'll start to like, like, like I dreamt about our interview or our interaction last night.
00:28:58.276 --> 00:29:03.301
And I, I, dreamt that we were talking about the Feldenkrais method.
00:29:03.823 --> 00:29:05.744
So I'm like, Oh, should I bring that up?
00:29:07.047 --> 00:29:09.509
I don't know, but I'm just going to hold that over here.
00:29:09.750 --> 00:29:11.090
Cause that was my dream.
00:29:14.154 --> 00:29:27.209
But what I really want to talk about is I want to have this really, I feel lucky to have this moment to engage in this, what I emailed you about a couple, a year, maybe a year ago.
00:29:28.321 --> 00:29:30.163
about this spiritual experience.
00:29:30.345 --> 00:29:38.915
I was lucky enough to participate in a demo and you were the practicer, the faculty therapist.
00:29:39.655 --> 00:29:42.640
And I'm comfortable talking about this part of it for sure.
00:29:42.800 --> 00:29:49.048
And it was a very impactful demo session.
00:29:49.088 --> 00:30:05.134
And there was a point toward the end where I looked at you, but I It was so surreal, psychedelic almost, where I could see, first of all, I felt really safe.
00:30:05.173 --> 00:30:06.736
And I want to kind of emphasize that.
00:30:06.756 --> 00:30:14.884
I felt really physically safe, emotionally safe in the setting we were in, being there.
00:30:14.903 --> 00:30:16.905
It was just a really safe experience.
00:30:17.306 --> 00:30:27.528
And I looked at you and it was like I'm trying to describe something like Psychedelic is really difficult, as I'm sure you know.
00:30:27.568 --> 00:30:34.895
But it was as if through your eyes, I could see you for sure.
00:30:34.976 --> 00:30:36.156
It wasn't like you went away.
00:30:36.196 --> 00:30:51.932
But it was also as if I could see, maybe it was more in my mental channel, but a kaleidoscope of, so it was like a tunnel of, like, honestly, it was like lifetimes in universes.
00:30:52.973 --> 00:30:53.054
Yeah.
00:30:54.241 --> 00:31:04.011
And the only reason I know that is because of the way that trying to put myself back there a little bit.
00:31:05.333 --> 00:31:16.284
But I guess what I want to really ask about is just the spiritual piece of this trauma healing, healing in general.
00:31:16.324 --> 00:31:17.846
You can throw free will in there.
00:31:20.188 --> 00:31:22.150
But it was for sure a spiritual moment.
00:31:22.529 --> 00:31:25.074
of connected to healing trauma.
00:31:26.736 --> 00:31:34.667
And I, and I think is that you might have Intel, but I think that's what Peter Levine's new book is going to cover.
00:31:34.708 --> 00:31:38.554
Maybe spirituality and trauma.
00:31:38.574 --> 00:31:43.661
Is it, do you mean the memoir or something else?
00:31:43.781 --> 00:31:43.862
I
00:31:44.241 --> 00:31:46.865
think the memoir that's out and I think it's April.
00:31:47.186 --> 00:31:48.888
I think I saw you can pre-order it.
00:31:49.630 --> 00:31:49.931
Okay.
00:31:50.351 --> 00:31:50.551
Yeah.
00:31:50.571 --> 00:31:51.153
Not that we have to
00:31:51.192 --> 00:31:52.034
talk about that at all, but.
00:31:52.289 --> 00:31:52.671
Anyway.
00:31:53.432 --> 00:31:53.653
Yeah.
00:31:53.772 --> 00:31:54.575
I don't have Intel.
00:31:54.615 --> 00:31:56.258
I haven't, uh, I haven't read it.
00:31:56.298 --> 00:32:21.528
Um, and I think it's the story of his life and he, uh, you know, he's had some experiences that I think he's going to be sharing about, you know, in that book that are, uh, that involve altered states of consciousness, like the one that you're describing here.
00:32:21.568 --> 00:32:22.611
And
00:32:23.172 --> 00:32:28.500
it's funny how we have those experiences and we apply this term psychedelic to them.
00:32:28.520 --> 00:32:29.482
And
00:32:29.522 --> 00:32:34.270
that might confuse people because they're going to be thinking, oh, psychedelic substances.
00:32:34.731 --> 00:32:35.653
Right, right.
00:32:36.034 --> 00:32:46.349
But experiences of what we might call expanded states of consciousness or non-normative states of consciousness, those are available to us in lots of different contexts.
00:32:47.131 --> 00:32:53.580
People on meditation retreat will have things like this begin to unfold.
00:32:53.721 --> 00:33:03.576
People experiencing hypnosis will start to have their perceptual faculties shifted.
00:33:05.665 --> 00:33:13.919
all kinds of different contexts where folks will have experiences that kind of open them up in different ways.
00:33:15.019 --> 00:33:38.163
And what you're describing sounds like one of those where somehow in that moment, your system was able to access another layer, if you will, an awareness that were maybe not normally able to access.
00:33:39.567 --> 00:33:50.704
Because imagine if you had access to that all the time, if every moment of every day you were walking around, seeing the tunnel, feeling the lifetimes.
00:33:50.724 --> 00:33:52.807
It would be very distracting.
00:33:52.888 --> 00:33:54.371
How are you going to get by?
00:33:54.811 --> 00:33:55.452
Yeah, right?
00:33:55.833 --> 00:33:59.098
Take care of the kids and hate the dirt bike guys.
00:33:59.338 --> 00:34:00.079
Exactly.
00:34:00.181 --> 00:34:00.842
Yeah, no.
00:34:01.122 --> 00:34:04.406
It would be like the mundane would be, I would not do it.
00:34:04.426 --> 00:34:05.509
It would be like brush my teeth.
00:34:05.788 --> 00:34:06.770
No, why?
00:34:09.655 --> 00:34:10.356
Look at this.
00:34:11.177 --> 00:34:11.818
That's right.
00:34:12.159 --> 00:34:12.719
That's right.
00:34:13.340 --> 00:34:23.737
So, you know, I do think that the universe has in a way conspired to open those doorways to us only at times.
00:34:25.539 --> 00:34:29.885
And, you know, it's a little bit unpredictable what provokes those doors.
00:34:30.081 --> 00:34:30.862
those openings.
00:34:31.603 --> 00:34:55.233
I mean, with the psychedelic drugs, it's not, you know, because now, you know, since those, those medicines got synthesized, you know, in the, you know, in the last decade, you know, now, you know, you can just put some, you know, molecule in your body and you're going to have, you know, recourse to, to that more expansive awareness.
00:34:55.293 --> 00:35:08.025
But other people, you know, will describe this interesting thing where, Some folks might meditate for decades and never have one of those experiences.
00:35:09.106 --> 00:35:14.690
Some people sit down on the cushion and a couple hours later have one of those experiences.
00:35:15.532 --> 00:35:18.054
And again, yeah, you were saying this might touch on it.
00:35:18.514 --> 00:35:32.974
Again, this might be a reflection of genes and environment, that some people come into the world with a psyche that is more prepared to access expanded states.
00:35:34.775 --> 00:35:58.030
Or in the family that I grew up in, it was encouraged to look up at the clouds and dream and that the people were open to when I would start to spontaneously talk about God or something.
00:36:00.161 --> 00:36:02.706
And other families, you know, maybe not so much.
00:36:02.846 --> 00:36:04.427
Maybe that wouldn't be reinforced.
00:36:04.548 --> 00:36:09.396
And so I would end up, you know, with more or less of a sense of access to that.
00:36:09.456 --> 00:36:13.481
So, you know, for you, that was there then.
00:36:13.501 --> 00:36:16.847
I'm imagining that you've probably had some other kinds of
00:36:16.867 --> 00:36:18.690
experiences like that in your life.
00:36:27.585 --> 00:36:32.918
Sorry for sort of an abrupt end, but I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Dr.
00:36:32.978 --> 00:36:33.980
Joshua Silvey.
00:36:34.000 --> 00:36:39.853
And thanks for listening to today's episode of Sneaky Powerful.
00:00:02.017 --> 00:00:05.440
Hey everyone, welcome back to the Sneaky Powerful Podcast.
00:00:05.961 --> 00:00:09.005
My name is Ali Capurro and I'm so glad you're here.
00:00:09.044 --> 00:00:17.033
It's been so long since I've published a podcast and this particular one was actually recorded quite a while ago.
00:00:17.073 --> 00:00:27.062
To be able to publish more podcasts, hopefully, I made a choice to skip the editing process.
00:00:27.182 --> 00:00:29.786
So this is Sneaky Powerful Raw.
00:00:30.882 --> 00:00:37.393
No intro music, unless I figure that out later, or polished content, just meaningful conversations.
00:00:39.536 --> 00:00:43.543
So today I'm really excited to share the conversation with Dr.
00:00:43.624 --> 00:00:44.685
Joshua Silve.
00:00:46.228 --> 00:00:49.914
Joshua is someone who makes me feel more hopeful about the world.
00:00:51.076 --> 00:00:55.865
He's a faculty member with SEI, and he has a book coming out in November.
00:00:57.121 --> 00:01:06.959
Joshua is also a creative, deeply thoughtful human who's using his intellect and light to support trauma healing in ways that reach far and wide.
00:01:08.962 --> 00:01:19.641
I'm really happy to share this conversation and staying true to the raw nature of this episode, we jump right in with laughter, my favorite.
00:01:20.882 --> 00:01:22.045
So let's get into it.
00:01:26.242 --> 00:01:27.022
That's great.
00:01:27.343 --> 00:01:27.843
It is great.
00:01:29.287 --> 00:01:31.530
But yeah, so we were going to talk about free will a little bit.
00:01:31.670 --> 00:01:37.679
So I had kind of told myself that I would do a little more research on free will because I thought, do I not know?
00:01:37.698 --> 00:01:39.421
What do I know about free will?
00:01:40.061 --> 00:01:43.787
But as free will would have it, I didn't do or not.
00:01:43.927 --> 00:01:44.549
I don't know.
00:01:44.569 --> 00:01:46.231
I didn't do any research.
00:01:47.293 --> 00:01:50.378
So I'm like, well, what do you think about free will?
00:01:51.170 --> 00:01:52.451
Right, right.
00:01:53.013 --> 00:01:54.295
You didn't do any research.
00:01:54.394 --> 00:01:57.599
And what does that say about you?
00:01:57.640 --> 00:02:05.272
Why weren't you able to muster more discipline to complete this task that you had set out for yourself?
00:02:05.731 --> 00:02:06.013
Yeah.
00:02:06.293 --> 00:02:09.397
And, you know, do we hold you accountable for that?
00:02:09.478 --> 00:02:16.769
You know, do we say, you know, this is a moral failing of some kind?
00:02:17.110 --> 00:02:17.510
Yes.
00:02:17.591 --> 00:02:19.533
Or do we acknowledge or...
00:02:20.258 --> 00:02:32.092
Or do we acknowledge that according to the laws of nature, everything arises out of prior causes and conditions.
00:02:33.574 --> 00:02:43.825
And so to presume that you could have chosen otherwise is perhaps illusory.
00:02:44.706 --> 00:03:02.645
And I think of all of this as, you know, super interesting and potentially super relevant to this work that we do, but it still is considered by most to be a kind of intellectual sideline.
00:03:02.664 --> 00:03:09.174
And I'm not surprised to hear you say and to hear others say, I don't really know much about this.
00:03:09.213 --> 00:03:14.480
It's not exactly something we're encouraged to reflect on or consider.
00:03:14.521 --> 00:03:25.322
For me, it wasn't until I don't know, maybe 10 years ago or something, all of a sudden I realized that I had just never really considered this thing.
00:03:25.382 --> 00:03:32.770
Like, do we have conscious voluntary will over our lives?
00:03:32.810 --> 00:03:43.161
And I was surprised to realize that it had just really never come across the screen of my awareness, you know, that I hadn't considered it.
00:03:43.260 --> 00:03:54.235
And then, you know, really became fascinated with it, devoured a ton of literature And it has since come to really influence the way that I think about things.
00:03:55.337 --> 00:04:09.020
But I don't get to talk about it as often as I'd like, you know, because when you're teaching the SE professional training, the somatic experiencing professional training, which is where you and I have first crossed paths, you know, it's...
00:04:11.042 --> 00:04:15.170
It's potentially not what people are paying to hear about.
00:04:15.211 --> 00:04:22.387
Exactly.
00:04:22.406 --> 00:04:30.324
I try to inhibit those impulses I have to sort of explore this with people.
00:04:31.074 --> 00:04:31.514
Okay.
00:04:31.855 --> 00:04:32.815
I am curious.
00:04:33.495 --> 00:04:55.158
Can we use like a really simplified example of maybe something you've encountered where free will has, where you've noticed it, nothing dramatic, but so for our listeners to kind of get a understanding of what you mean when you're talking about free will without the philosophical textbooks that you've read through.
00:04:55.177 --> 00:04:56.199
Yeah.
00:04:56.459 --> 00:04:57.120
Well, for sure.
00:04:57.139 --> 00:04:59.603
You know, I mean, it's, it's, Everywhere.
00:04:59.843 --> 00:05:00.704
It's in everything.
00:05:00.764 --> 00:05:11.579
It touches, you know, really anything that means anything to us, I think, because we're tending to walk around day to day, all day, every day,
00:05:11.598 --> 00:05:12.579
with
00:05:12.639 --> 00:05:15.584
this sense of authorship over our actions.
00:05:16.706 --> 00:05:16.925
Right.
00:05:16.966 --> 00:05:23.875
And I am wondering, even as you say that, there's a little bit of possessiveness, like, absolutely, I author my own life.
00:05:24.115 --> 00:05:25.076
Exactly.
00:05:25.117 --> 00:05:25.898
Exactly.
00:05:25.958 --> 00:05:28.380
There tends to be a little bit of a reaction.
00:05:29.089 --> 00:05:43.833
for many of us when we really deeply consider the possibility that my choices, so to speak, are in a way, as we were saying in the beginning, choiceless.
00:05:44.855 --> 00:06:10.497
That what I elect to say and do is arising out of prior causes and conditions and is likely reducible to my genetic inheritance combined with the environments that have shaped the expression of those genetics.
00:06:11.819 --> 00:06:36.577
So I have this sense of like, and of course, we can't touch on this without considering how many of us might understand ourselves to not be something of the body you know, that there's a, there's an immaterial soul that inhabits, you know, the body.
00:06:36.598 --> 00:06:36.617
I
00:06:37.098 --> 00:06:38.379
like the idea of separating out.
00:06:38.420 --> 00:06:38.680
Yeah.
00:06:38.901 --> 00:06:39.100
Those.
00:06:39.321 --> 00:06:39.641
Yeah.
00:06:40.002 --> 00:06:40.201
Yeah.
00:06:40.262 --> 00:06:40.702
Early on.
00:06:40.723 --> 00:06:40.963
Right.
00:06:41.324 --> 00:06:58.004
You know, so sometimes, sometimes there's kind of a sense of like, well, sure, you know, there's my genetics and my environment and that does provide some kind of influence, but then there's the real me that's somewhere in there and maybe is made up of spirit matter.
00:06:58.024 --> 00:06:59.326
Right.
00:06:59.458 --> 00:07:09.790
But the thing that we might say is that even if that's true, even if we are a soul, did we choose our soul?
00:07:09.829 --> 00:07:12.052
Did we...
00:07:13.213 --> 00:07:14.396
Dang that question.
00:07:14.456 --> 00:07:15.637
That's a big one.
00:07:15.677 --> 00:07:18.581
That is shaking me to my core.
00:07:19.961 --> 00:07:20.843
I thought I knew that one.
00:07:21.504 --> 00:07:31.677
Did we come into the world and somehow there's some stuff that is us that stands apart from these different layers of experience.
00:07:31.737 --> 00:07:37.084
And we looked and said, well, there's my soul and I don't really like it.
00:07:37.105 --> 00:07:41.149
And so I'm going to make a different choice.
00:07:41.831 --> 00:08:27.096
I mean, wherever you look, the notion that there's some me that is somehow standing apart and saying, yay or nay is is a little is a little hard to get behind uh and so you know of course we could talk about all the like neuroscience and philosophy and all that stuff um but that's that's the basic picture and you know i i just really think it's uh it's relevant to any project of of healing you know that that we really start to question how much authorship do we actually have over the choices that we make?
00:08:27.115 --> 00:08:27.136
I
00:08:29.738 --> 00:08:31.461
don't think this is exactly what you mean.
00:08:31.540 --> 00:08:54.634
Maybe, maybe it touches on it, but when I, as I have been at least thinking about it, even if I didn't do much research about free will, I was thinking that if I, if I really felt like I had a free will and even though I said I got defensive or angry up in arms about me, I, Not being the author of my own life.
00:08:54.934 --> 00:09:00.888
There's also an awareness that I would have chose things.
00:09:00.908 --> 00:09:08.686
I would have done things a lot differently if I had a little more free will.
00:09:08.706 --> 00:09:10.850
Yes, 100%
00:09:11.393 --> 00:09:11.692
yes.
00:09:12.385 --> 00:09:13.047
Of course.
00:09:13.067 --> 00:09:25.667
There's so many times, I think, in this life for many of us that we find ourselves saying or doing things that we had expressly forbidden ourselves to say or do.
00:09:25.706 --> 00:09:28.692
Okay.
00:09:29.253 --> 00:09:30.414
Now I'm feeling the relief.
00:09:30.455 --> 00:09:31.697
I'm actually like, yes.
00:09:32.597 --> 00:09:32.817
Right.
00:09:33.239 --> 00:09:33.580
Yeah.
00:09:34.321 --> 00:09:34.520
Right.
00:09:34.600 --> 00:09:39.929
So what a lot of us tend to want to do is...
00:09:40.769 --> 00:09:44.652
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:09:48.033 --> 00:09:52.717
And about the things of which we are ashamed, that was something else.
00:09:52.937 --> 00:09:54.298
That was my conditioning.
00:09:54.339 --> 00:09:58.062
That was, you know, my mom wasn't nice to me.
00:09:58.403 --> 00:09:58.643
I
00:10:01.966 --> 00:10:04.788
was like, it's the thing, like when my kid's good.
00:10:04.869 --> 00:10:06.370
Oh, that's my kid.
00:10:06.389 --> 00:10:09.452
And then when they're not, they have their own free will.
00:10:09.653 --> 00:10:13.976
I have nothing to do
00:10:13.996 --> 00:10:14.177
with that.
00:10:14.197 --> 00:10:15.918
That's the other parent's influence.
00:10:16.038 --> 00:10:16.339
That's
00:10:16.359 --> 00:10:16.458
right.
00:10:16.519 --> 00:10:18.000
That's right.
00:10:18.000 --> 00:10:19.402
That's their dad's side.
00:10:20.322 --> 00:10:20.423
Right.
00:10:20.722 --> 00:10:23.966
Actually, in a serious way often, which is funny.
00:10:24.687 --> 00:10:25.328
No, for sure.
00:10:25.349 --> 00:10:26.110
For sure.
00:10:26.129 --> 00:10:43.269
I mean, that's part of what can be challenging about children is that they are going to manifest some of the same attributes that drive you nuts about their other donor, so to
00:10:43.350 --> 00:10:43.490
speak.
00:10:43.850 --> 00:10:44.591
Button pushers.
00:10:44.692 --> 00:10:45.413
They know how.
00:10:45.552 --> 00:10:46.333
Yeah, that's right.
00:10:46.498 --> 00:11:07.274
It's also like when you said genetics, oh man, yeah, I was thinking about just ancestors in general and that whole, I know that's a big topic, but there's a little bit of anger thinking about the influence that perhaps my ancestors have on my lack of free will.
00:11:07.970 --> 00:11:14.499
Like to be real, like a little bit of like, you motherfuckers, like you should have done this generations ago.
00:11:14.558 --> 00:11:16.120
Why am I doing it now?
00:11:16.140 --> 00:11:17.243
Right, right.
00:11:18.384 --> 00:11:18.865
Yeah.
00:11:19.966 --> 00:11:20.527
Right, right.
00:11:20.547 --> 00:11:21.729
I'm going to sit with that more.
00:11:21.769 --> 00:11:22.830
Right.
00:11:22.870 --> 00:11:36.990
Being the inheritor of generations of unprocessed, unworked through intergenerational trauma is part of that inheritance that conditions us.
00:11:38.241 --> 00:11:44.148
our lives, you know, so the, uh, and, and it could not be otherwise.
00:11:44.168 --> 00:11:52.456
I don't think, you know, that those are, those are prior causes and conditions that will constrain what's possible for us.
00:11:52.856 --> 00:11:53.216
Right.
00:11:53.236 --> 00:11:53.256
I
00:11:54.798 --> 00:11:56.080
was talking to my kid last night.
00:11:56.120 --> 00:12:02.886
Uh, she was, I mentioned, um, that I was watching, I've been watching this documentary.
00:12:02.927 --> 00:12:06.770
Gosh, hopefully this isn't going to be, um, controversial.
00:12:07.490 --> 00:12:17.881
I've been watching this documentary about Donald Trump and really curious about his life, his upbringing, kind of what made him who he is.
00:12:17.922 --> 00:12:38.035
And hopefully without stepping in it, what my daughter said was like, well, he must have had really his parents must have been, you know, not good.
00:12:40.740 --> 00:12:46.107
Really kind of coming down on the side of like nurture, you know, rather than like, you know, a sort of nature nurture thing.
00:12:47.389 --> 00:13:08.063
And, you know, hopefully I can say this without being controversial, you know, it's all in, you know, what he says, how he presents himself, you know, that like he is in this to win, and understands winning as the amassing of resources.
00:13:09.666 --> 00:13:24.063
And so we started to have this really interesting conversation, you know, where I said, well, I guess, kiddo, I can't say, you know, how much of this is owing to, you know, his parentage, you know, because maybe genetics also play a role.
00:13:24.104 --> 00:13:26.366
And she was like, I just can't believe that.
00:13:26.447 --> 00:13:37.981
I mean, he once was just a little baby and that little baby, you know, couldn't have just been there, you know, with this kind of, you know, these tendencies, right?
00:13:38.977 --> 00:13:41.942
But then we started to kind of, you know, unpack it a little bit.
00:13:41.961 --> 00:13:44.184
Sorry, hopefully this is going to be relevant to our point.
00:13:45.466 --> 00:13:46.548
Started to unpack it a little bit.
00:13:46.587 --> 00:14:03.369
And I was like, well, you know, if it's true that there is some genetic aspect to this, you know, maybe that has been playing out, you know, through the generations.
00:14:04.210 --> 00:14:06.753
And so, you know, there was some...
00:14:07.745 --> 00:14:12.038
some selection for certain characteristics.
00:14:12.840 --> 00:14:34.413
And the thing we know about human ancestors is that they were, in our deep time, ancestors hunter-gatherer groups, the archeological and anthropological evidence suggests that they were fiercely egalitarian, which is to say everybody was equal and they were fierce about protecting that state of affairs.
00:14:34.692 --> 00:14:41.224
So they would expel people if they tried to usurp the autonomy of other people.
00:14:41.644 --> 00:14:42.686
Right.
00:14:42.946 --> 00:14:55.822
And in those environments, obviously, the genetics that would be selected for would be ability to cooperate, respect for other people, putting the needs of the group ahead of your own.
00:14:55.842 --> 00:14:59.327
Those kind of characteristics would be celebrated by these groups.
00:15:00.009 --> 00:15:09.341
And those people would be probably winning more partners and sending their DNA down through the generations.
00:15:10.274 --> 00:15:25.577
if people were exiled when they showed tendencies towards selfish or even sociopathic behavior, then their genetics would have died out as they were off in the woods by themselves, unable to find mates.
00:15:27.441 --> 00:16:23.333
So, but then I was, I guess it became a little, it's probably hard being my child because everything becomes some, you know, neuroscientific uh you know lesson or whatever but i was like but then let's think about you know the world that we live in today in a capitalist economy what gets selected for i.e what wins you more resources and potentially access to to mates and you know the ability to send your genetics down through the generations is selfishness yeah is uh you know sociopathy And so in that sense, it could be that we're now finding ourselves in an environment that is not shaped towards our basic biology and in which the genetic signature of selfishness is what is getting reinforced and selected for.
00:16:23.374 --> 00:16:33.748
So In that sense, we're kind of seeing this interesting shift, I think, in our world, where a lot of us are scratching our heads, just being like, what happened?
00:16:33.788 --> 00:16:37.094
What's going on with the human species?
00:16:37.114 --> 00:16:57.936
And it could not have to do with people being bad actors who could choose otherwise if they so desired, but actually people According to the dictates of prior causes and conditions like their genetics and like the environments that have, that have shaped their actions.
00:17:00.298 --> 00:17:05.505
It, it brought my, it brought me to a real serious level.
00:17:05.565 --> 00:17:26.847
Cause it felt like, Oh, that to me speaks to so much of the sadness that I'm maybe, even if I talk, speak anecdotally, like in my practice or in my patients or clients and just this, this, the selfishness that doesn't create happiness maybe creates winning, but not yeah.
00:17:27.028 --> 00:17:27.429
Happiness.
00:17:27.469 --> 00:17:44.213
And actually, first of all, your daughter, that's so insightful, even though she has to be your daughter and you're the neuroscience and I'm sure it's not terribly hard, but yeah, that's so cool that she picks up on that and has awareness of that.
00:17:44.233 --> 00:17:45.155
I love hearing that.
00:17:46.116 --> 00:17:55.090
But it reminds me of in 2016, I don't know if you'll remember this, but when Peter spoke, Peter Levine spoke in Portland.
00:17:55.111 --> 00:17:58.036
I remember it was the first time I met you.
00:17:58.056 --> 00:18:09.856
I didn't really meet you, but the first time I talked to you, because he was doing like a little, maybe a two-day workshop at the Hilton, something downtown in Portland.
00:18:09.876 --> 00:18:11.941
Oh, yeah, for Pussy or something like that.
00:18:11.961 --> 00:18:13.103
Yeah, it must have been.
00:18:13.143 --> 00:18:15.207
I honestly can't remember.
00:18:15.768 --> 00:18:16.048
But...
00:18:18.018 --> 00:18:28.972
And it was election year, and he had photos of Donald Trump and sort of was, without being too controversial, going into...
00:18:29.012 --> 00:18:36.683
I remember specifically him talking about the way his mouth, how he held his mouth and this sort of attachment reaching.
00:18:36.723 --> 00:18:39.768
Do you remember that at all?
00:18:40.088 --> 00:18:40.469
Vaguely.
00:18:40.689 --> 00:18:43.613
Yeah, but I just remember being fascinated.
00:18:43.673 --> 00:18:46.657
Well, because he can read body language or...
00:18:47.233 --> 00:18:48.895
I don't know if read's the right word, but yeah.
00:18:49.557 --> 00:18:53.102
Anyway, it's really an interesting thing to think about.
00:18:53.382 --> 00:18:58.910
And I like thinking about him as a little infant or a little baby because that brings so much compassion to my heart.
00:18:59.611 --> 00:18:59.951
Right.
00:18:59.971 --> 00:19:02.855
No matter what is happening politically.
00:19:03.095 --> 00:19:03.194
Right.
00:19:03.776 --> 00:19:07.820
Isn't it nice to be able to access that, that sense of compassion?
00:19:08.823 --> 00:19:23.686
And for whatever it's worth, if I'm still allowed to bring this back around to free will, one of the things that I love about about integrating this understanding is that it does allow me to have a lot more compassion
00:19:24.248 --> 00:19:25.009
because
00:19:25.048 --> 00:19:35.210
I'm no longer moving through the world, judging people and saying that person is just a bad person who they must want to do this.
00:19:35.411 --> 00:19:48.567
Like when they cut me off on the freeway, they must want, They must have been in the lane and said to themselves, I could just stay in this lane and not almost kill that other driver and his children.
00:19:48.606 --> 00:19:49.708
But
00:19:49.868 --> 00:19:52.090
I just want to get over, and I don't care.
00:19:52.131 --> 00:19:53.112
I don't care.
00:19:53.152 --> 00:19:55.134
They can suffer.
00:19:55.153 --> 00:20:05.624
And did all of that as this deliberative action that they were utterly and completely in control over.
00:20:07.329 --> 00:20:10.494
That kind of stuff makes me mad.
00:20:11.477 --> 00:20:16.124
And I get real, real mad when things like that happen.
00:20:16.424 --> 00:20:20.230
Again, compassion for the kiddos.
00:20:20.431 --> 00:20:26.160
They have to hear me cursing and whatever, having some big reaction to whatever.
00:20:27.942 --> 00:20:34.272
But if I can remember that that individual no more chose...
00:20:35.298 --> 00:20:44.086
to do that thing, then I chose to yell some expletive at them that they're never gonna hear.
00:20:44.126 --> 00:20:55.078
And we're all moving through this world, acting according to things that we didn't choose.
00:20:55.880 --> 00:21:01.345
And so I can start to let go of that sense of like, oh, this is a bad person.
00:21:01.986 --> 00:21:08.174
And they're, they're essentially like me, but they're just choosing to do bad stuff.
00:21:08.515 --> 00:21:08.755
Right.
00:21:09.016 --> 00:21:09.256
Right.
00:21:09.876 --> 00:21:10.076
Right.
00:21:10.217 --> 00:21:11.318
They're not like me.
00:21:11.960 --> 00:21:27.741
You know, they have not enjoyed the luck that I have enjoyed to arrive at this moment in my life with the, with this amount of free attention and interest in certain kinds of, you know, ethical behaviors.
00:21:28.482 --> 00:21:37.583
You know, it's like, like I was thinking, um, As I was driving around today thinking about, I wonder what we're gonna talk about, I was reflecting on this.
00:21:38.523 --> 00:21:46.395
I, as a person, have moved through this world sitting with spiritual teachers, sitting with therapy teachers.
00:21:46.436 --> 00:21:50.782
I've been to all kinds of workshops and retreats and all this.
00:21:51.944 --> 00:22:00.478
And some number of those teachers, when I would get close enough to them, I would realize like, ooh, this person is a little, hmm.
00:22:00.865 --> 00:22:09.635
you know, like there's a little bit of like, you know, some kind of malignant narcissism going on here and I would get burned and, and be really resentful.
00:22:09.675 --> 00:22:26.675
And, and now I'm a teacher and I realized like, I've been moving through the world kind of with this, like, like I'm not like them, you know, this like sense of superiority that I'm like, yeah, I'm not making those choices.
00:22:26.816 --> 00:22:42.355
Like I'm not, you know, exploiting people and seeing people as pawns on a chessboard to aggrandize myself or create more resources for me.
00:22:42.976 --> 00:22:46.621
And I've been really kind of getting off on that.
00:22:46.901 --> 00:22:49.644
And all of a sudden, the whole house of cards just came down.
00:22:49.684 --> 00:22:51.932
And I was like, I'm just lucky.
00:22:51.951 --> 00:22:55.218
I'm just lucky for whatever reason.
00:22:55.238 --> 00:23:09.496
I did not come into the world with the genetics or environmental cues that created in me that particular set of ethical predispositions.
00:23:10.017 --> 00:23:25.233
I have the ones that I have and I'm incredibly grateful because I think that I'm probably at the end of the day, living a better life, feeling freer inside myself, like sleeping, you know, whatever, sleeping better, however, you know, whatever metaphor we want to use.
00:23:26.055 --> 00:23:35.986
And, and I'm really glad about that, but I should not, I should not sit there thinking that like, there's something superior about me.
00:23:36.258 --> 00:23:43.548
Like, this is just, you know, this is just dumb, dumb luck in a sense that I didn't choose and I didn't earn.
00:23:43.567 --> 00:23:44.890
I didn't earn it.
00:23:44.950 --> 00:23:47.113
You know, it's just what happened.
00:23:47.733 --> 00:23:59.590
So anyways, I do think it's useful to be able to hold some of these perspectives because it softens us, I think, in a way that's probably really important.
00:24:01.173 --> 00:24:01.353
I...
00:24:02.082 --> 00:24:03.463
I value that a lot.
00:24:03.584 --> 00:24:15.858
It's taken me back to when I think I was a senior in high school and I was in psychology, a psychology class, and we were talking about serial killers.
00:24:15.878 --> 00:24:25.310
And I had, this is how I wrangled in my very first serious boyfriend.
00:24:25.330 --> 00:24:25.351
I
00:24:29.615 --> 00:24:30.998
love this story already.
00:24:31.874 --> 00:24:36.145
It's totally true, which is so funny.
00:24:36.165 --> 00:25:00.627
But anyway, so we were talking about specifically Jeffrey Dahmer and the class was, and I think I raised my hand and said something like, kind of understanding the, I don't know, thin line between me and Jeffrey Dahmer, which was probably frightening to many of my class, my peers, but there was one guy who got it.
00:25:01.368 --> 00:25:02.710
Yeah.
00:25:02.869 --> 00:25:04.491
That's
00:25:04.511 --> 00:25:04.612
right.
00:25:04.791 --> 00:25:05.432
Exactly.
00:25:05.551 --> 00:25:06.692
He's like, that's my girl.
00:25:07.054 --> 00:25:39.105
But yeah, basically like, haven't you ever felt crazy before was what I said, my 17 year old self said, and that was prior to me having panic attacks and really going on this journey of understanding, I don't, not mental health, mental unhealth, but I've been watching not a documentary, but a made up, a fictional show, but called, I think it's Mindhunters, but it's about like the beginning of the FBI.
00:25:39.226 --> 00:25:46.693
I think the serial killer sort of unit of the FBI, I think, hopefully I'm saying that correctly.
00:25:47.054 --> 00:25:47.134
Yeah.
00:25:47.809 --> 00:25:49.571
Can you hear the dirt bikes in the background?
00:25:50.133 --> 00:25:51.976
I think, okay, good.
00:25:52.296 --> 00:25:52.936
I heard something.
00:25:53.017 --> 00:25:54.199
I wasn't sure.
00:25:55.800 --> 00:26:00.708
And I'm really holding compassion that they are not choosing to do
00:26:00.748 --> 00:26:01.449
that, right?
00:26:04.053 --> 00:26:04.692
That's right.
00:26:04.752 --> 00:26:09.420
Their attraction to that is not something that they selected.
00:26:09.961 --> 00:26:11.182
No, it's genetic.
00:26:12.183 --> 00:26:22.608
Anyway, so, but yeah, thinking about and watching these films, fake interviews, but I'm assuming they're based on some sort of reality or hopefully, I don't know, maybe I'll research it more.
00:26:23.570 --> 00:26:24.192
Probably not.
00:26:29.458 --> 00:26:42.074
Where they are talking about, but I guess where I'm trying to go with this is just the idea like, I don't think they would have chosen that if they could have, is my feeling and my guess.
00:26:43.936 --> 00:27:00.682
And What an awful life and it's hard, but to muster some compassion toward that scenario.
00:27:00.721 --> 00:27:02.904
But that is a way bigger can of worms.
00:27:03.305 --> 00:27:04.226
That's what I'm talking about.
00:27:04.846 --> 00:27:04.926
Well,
00:27:04.967 --> 00:27:05.488
for sure.
00:27:05.667 --> 00:27:13.278
I mean, but we can even look there, like your ability to hold compassion for that situation.
00:27:13.473 --> 00:27:15.296
is itself choiceless.
00:27:15.977 --> 00:27:16.156
Right.
00:27:16.817 --> 00:27:17.038
Right.
00:27:17.077 --> 00:27:27.872
Like there's other people in this world, maybe the family members of Jeffrey Dahmer's victims who will never be able to, for a moment, feel compassion for him.
00:27:28.613 --> 00:27:33.999
Even someone I might be watching the show with might have an absolutely different experience.
00:27:34.058 --> 00:27:34.680
And you're right.
00:27:34.700 --> 00:27:36.082
It does not feel like a choice.
00:27:36.102 --> 00:27:40.666
I don't know why I'm made this way, but I have been since I was very little.
00:27:40.727 --> 00:27:42.469
And I remember that specifically.
00:27:42.829 --> 00:27:42.910
Yeah.
00:27:43.105 --> 00:27:59.606
Yeah, I think a capacity for empathy might be one of those things that is shaped by genetic factors and then whether our environment prepares us for that.
00:27:59.727 --> 00:28:07.896
Like if we're not shown empathy, we may have a deficiency in our capacity to empathize with others.
00:28:08.698 --> 00:28:08.798
Right.
00:28:10.049 --> 00:28:10.490
Yeah.
00:28:10.691 --> 00:28:16.618
It's pretty, it's pretty fascinating, which is why I love my work, my line of work.
00:28:18.181 --> 00:28:18.461
Okay.
00:28:18.481 --> 00:28:23.489
So I know I'm being careful of time and we have about 12 minutes and I want to make sure.
00:28:23.509 --> 00:28:24.971
So I want to make sure to
00:28:25.131 --> 00:28:28.394
kind of just, just, you know, I have till 515.
00:28:28.655 --> 00:28:28.955
So are
00:28:28.996 --> 00:28:29.297
you sure?
00:28:29.336 --> 00:28:30.238
Yeah.
00:28:30.753 --> 00:28:31.115
Okay.
00:28:31.895 --> 00:28:33.699
I like my me questioning your life.
00:28:33.719 --> 00:28:34.640
Are you sure?
00:28:35.080 --> 00:28:36.261
Yeah, no positive.
00:28:36.282 --> 00:28:36.363
Yeah.
00:28:36.383 --> 00:28:36.682
Okay, cool.
00:28:36.883 --> 00:28:37.644
Okay, good.
00:28:37.744 --> 00:28:41.911
Cause I think this one might be a little bit longer and I'm sure free will will come into it.
00:28:41.951 --> 00:28:42.833
I'm not sure how though.
00:28:43.313 --> 00:28:47.640
Actually, let me first say, so sometimes this happens where something will come into the field.
00:28:47.680 --> 00:28:57.674
Like, so, so, you know, you knew you had this interview and I'll start to like, like, like I dreamt about our interview or our interaction last night.
00:28:58.276 --> 00:29:03.301
And I, I, dreamt that we were talking about the Feldenkrais method.
00:29:03.823 --> 00:29:05.744
So I'm like, Oh, should I bring that up?
00:29:07.047 --> 00:29:09.509
I don't know, but I'm just going to hold that over here.
00:29:09.750 --> 00:29:11.090
Cause that was my dream.
00:29:14.154 --> 00:29:27.209
But what I really want to talk about is I want to have this really, I feel lucky to have this moment to engage in this, what I emailed you about a couple, a year, maybe a year ago.
00:29:28.321 --> 00:29:30.163
about this spiritual experience.
00:29:30.345 --> 00:29:38.915
I was lucky enough to participate in a demo and you were the practicer, the faculty therapist.
00:29:39.655 --> 00:29:42.640
And I'm comfortable talking about this part of it for sure.
00:29:42.800 --> 00:29:49.048
And it was a very impactful demo session.
00:29:49.088 --> 00:30:05.134
And there was a point toward the end where I looked at you, but I It was so surreal, psychedelic almost, where I could see, first of all, I felt really safe.
00:30:05.173 --> 00:30:06.736
And I want to kind of emphasize that.
00:30:06.756 --> 00:30:14.884
I felt really physically safe, emotionally safe in the setting we were in, being there.
00:30:14.903 --> 00:30:16.905
It was just a really safe experience.
00:30:17.306 --> 00:30:27.528
And I looked at you and it was like I'm trying to describe something like Psychedelic is really difficult, as I'm sure you know.
00:30:27.568 --> 00:30:34.895
But it was as if through your eyes, I could see you for sure.
00:30:34.976 --> 00:30:36.156
It wasn't like you went away.
00:30:36.196 --> 00:30:51.932
But it was also as if I could see, maybe it was more in my mental channel, but a kaleidoscope of, so it was like a tunnel of, like, honestly, it was like lifetimes in universes.
00:30:52.973 --> 00:30:53.054
Yeah.
00:30:54.241 --> 00:31:04.011
And the only reason I know that is because of the way that trying to put myself back there a little bit.
00:31:05.333 --> 00:31:16.284
But I guess what I want to really ask about is just the spiritual piece of this trauma healing, healing in general.
00:31:16.324 --> 00:31:17.846
You can throw free will in there.
00:31:20.188 --> 00:31:22.150
But it was for sure a spiritual moment.
00:31:22.529 --> 00:31:25.074
of connected to healing trauma.
00:31:26.736 --> 00:31:34.667
And I, and I think is that you might have Intel, but I think that's what Peter Levine's new book is going to cover.
00:31:34.708 --> 00:31:38.554
Maybe spirituality and trauma.
00:31:38.574 --> 00:31:43.661
Is it, do you mean the memoir or something else?
00:31:43.781 --> 00:31:43.862
I
00:31:44.241 --> 00:31:46.865
think the memoir that's out and I think it's April.
00:31:47.186 --> 00:31:48.888
I think I saw you can pre-order it.
00:31:49.630 --> 00:31:49.931
Okay.
00:31:50.351 --> 00:31:50.551
Yeah.
00:31:50.571 --> 00:31:51.153
Not that we have to
00:31:51.192 --> 00:31:52.034
talk about that at all, but.
00:31:52.289 --> 00:31:52.671
Anyway.
00:31:53.432 --> 00:31:53.653
Yeah.
00:31:53.772 --> 00:31:54.575
I don't have Intel.
00:31:54.615 --> 00:31:56.258
I haven't, uh, I haven't read it.
00:31:56.298 --> 00:32:21.528
Um, and I think it's the story of his life and he, uh, you know, he's had some experiences that I think he's going to be sharing about, you know, in that book that are, uh, that involve altered states of consciousness, like the one that you're describing here.
00:32:21.568 --> 00:32:22.611
And
00:32:23.172 --> 00:32:28.500
it's funny how we have those experiences and we apply this term psychedelic to them.
00:32:28.520 --> 00:32:29.482
And
00:32:29.522 --> 00:32:34.270
that might confuse people because they're going to be thinking, oh, psychedelic substances.
00:32:34.731 --> 00:32:35.653
Right, right.
00:32:36.034 --> 00:32:46.349
But experiences of what we might call expanded states of consciousness or non-normative states of consciousness, those are available to us in lots of different contexts.
00:32:47.131 --> 00:32:53.580
People on meditation retreat will have things like this begin to unfold.
00:32:53.721 --> 00:33:03.576
People experiencing hypnosis will start to have their perceptual faculties shifted.
00:33:05.665 --> 00:33:13.919
all kinds of different contexts where folks will have experiences that kind of open them up in different ways.
00:33:15.019 --> 00:33:38.163
And what you're describing sounds like one of those where somehow in that moment, your system was able to access another layer, if you will, an awareness that were maybe not normally able to access.
00:33:39.567 --> 00:33:50.704
Because imagine if you had access to that all the time, if every moment of every day you were walking around, seeing the tunnel, feeling the lifetimes.
00:33:50.724 --> 00:33:52.807
It would be very distracting.
00:33:52.888 --> 00:33:54.371
How are you going to get by?
00:33:54.811 --> 00:33:55.452
Yeah, right?
00:33:55.833 --> 00:33:59.098
Take care of the kids and hate the dirt bike guys.
00:33:59.338 --> 00:34:00.079
Exactly.
00:34:00.181 --> 00:34:00.842
Yeah, no.
00:34:01.122 --> 00:34:04.406
It would be like the mundane would be, I would not do it.
00:34:04.426 --> 00:34:05.509
It would be like brush my teeth.
00:34:05.788 --> 00:34:06.770
No, why?
00:34:09.655 --> 00:34:10.356
Look at this.
00:34:11.177 --> 00:34:11.818
That's right.
00:34:12.159 --> 00:34:12.719
That's right.
00:34:13.340 --> 00:34:23.737
So, you know, I do think that the universe has in a way conspired to open those doorways to us only at times.
00:34:25.539 --> 00:34:29.885
And, you know, it's a little bit unpredictable what provokes those doors.
00:34:30.081 --> 00:34:30.862
those openings.
00:34:31.603 --> 00:34:55.233
I mean, with the psychedelic drugs, it's not, you know, because now, you know, since those, those medicines got synthesized, you know, in the, you know, in the last decade, you know, now, you know, you can just put some, you know, molecule in your body and you're going to have, you know, recourse to, to that more expansive awareness.
00:34:55.293 --> 00:35:08.025
But other people, you know, will describe this interesting thing where, Some folks might meditate for decades and never have one of those experiences.
00:35:09.106 --> 00:35:14.690
Some people sit down on the cushion and a couple hours later have one of those experiences.
00:35:15.532 --> 00:35:18.054
And again, yeah, you were saying this might touch on it.
00:35:18.514 --> 00:35:32.974
Again, this might be a reflection of genes and environment, that some people come into the world with a psyche that is more prepared to access expanded states.
00:35:34.775 --> 00:35:58.030
Or in the family that I grew up in, it was encouraged to look up at the clouds and dream and that the people were open to when I would start to spontaneously talk about God or something.
00:36:00.161 --> 00:36:02.706
And other families, you know, maybe not so much.
00:36:02.846 --> 00:36:04.427
Maybe that wouldn't be reinforced.
00:36:04.548 --> 00:36:09.396
And so I would end up, you know, with more or less of a sense of access to that.
00:36:09.456 --> 00:36:13.481
So, you know, for you, that was there then.
00:36:13.501 --> 00:36:16.847
I'm imagining that you've probably had some other kinds of
00:36:16.867 --> 00:36:18.690
experiences like that in your life.
00:36:27.585 --> 00:36:32.918
Sorry for sort of an abrupt end, but I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Dr.
00:36:32.978 --> 00:36:33.980
Joshua Silvey.
00:36:34.000 --> 00:36:39.853
And thanks for listening to today's episode of Sneaky Powerful.
