Episode Notes

To be adaptable is to change with the environment. When we stay rigid and don't allow ourselves to change, we eventually experience a crisis. In this episode, we take a look at how to open ourselves up to change, how to sense changes in our environment, and how to adapt to change.

Key topics include:

How to develop a flexible mindset to handle unexpected changes
Practical tools for navigating transitions and uncertainty
The importance of resilience and emotional intelligence during times of change
Steps for thriving in new environments and embracing opportunities

0:00-05:17 Introduction To Change 05:17-07:52 Supporting People To Change 07:52-10:39 The Role of Identity In Change 10:39-16:54 Perception and Belief Systems 16:54-42:31 Environmental Radar 42:31-46:48 The Importance of Adaptation 46:48-50:28 Survival of the Fittest 50:28-55:18 Domestication of Humans 55:18-01:01:06 Adult Development and Wisdom 01:01:06-01:08:20 The Process of Reinvention 01:08:20-01:14:02 Pattern Interrupts for Adaptation 01:14:02-01:20:30 The Cycle of Creativity and Adaptation

is a global, leadership-strategy consulting company. 3Peak creates the roadmap that aligns behaviours, relationships and Functional Human-Systems™ to achieve your business strategy.

Co-Founder holds a Ph.D. in Neuroscience, and did extensive research in Consciousness, Trauma and Physical, Emotional & Mental Health in various Institutes and Research Centers around Europe.

Co-Founder is one of the most sought after therapists in the world, mastering diverse modalities and opening wellness centers in Istanbul, Santiago, New York and Berlin. Her approaches bridges transpersonal psychology, meditation, bioenergetics, family- and business-constellations and more.

Co-Founder has extensive experience advising Fortune 50 and FTSE 100 C-Suite Executives in leadership, strategy, team dynamics, and organizational change. Before coaching, Mino worked in finance, management consulting, and mergers and acquisitions (M&A).

Transcript

Mino Vlachos: Hello and welcome to the three peak master leadership experience. My name is Mino Vlachos and I'm joined by doctor Mazen Harb and Krisana Locke. We are the co founders of 3Peak coaching and solutions where master leaders build healthy systems. Our company provides coaching and workshops to executive leaders and leadership and well being workshops to employees. Today's topic is all about adapting to change, how we can be in tune with our environment, and how we can shift ourselves to match what's happening outside of ourselves. Before we do that, we're going to do a little bit of housekeeping. On the topic of adaptation, we have decided to shift our podcast cadence from every week to bi weekly. We realize that some folks are not able to digest all the information on a weekly cadence and for us, we're having fun and busy running our business, so we're happy to adjust to every other week. So please expect the podcast on a bi weekly basis. And with that, we're going to switch to our topic, adapting to change. And so I'm going to begin by sharing a story about myself and then we're going to get into the topic of adaptation. So I used to work at a consulting company where we took a lot of really cool online tests about leadership personality. And one of the tests that we took was about how we make decisions and take feedback. And we were doing a training. So I was in a conference room with about 30 of my colleagues in the company that we had hired. This is one of the best tests on the planet and they make really good stuff. And they came in and they administered the tests and we were going through the training and we were all going through our packets with all our results together. And we get to the last page, and the last page was about how one adapts to feedback. And I was looking at my page and it was as if I had a clock on my page. Like I saw a circle. And then there was like the hands of the clock, like the, like as if it was at 12:00 and I was really confused because everyone else was like, oh, here's my score, there's my score. And so I asked out loud to the facilitator, hey, I'm really confused. It looks like I have a clock on mine. And so he took a look at it and he was like, that's a one, which is the lowest score possible, which means that you are completely and utterly unreceptive to feedback. And yeah, it was funny. I was with all my colleagues and I was like, God damn. So everyone was joking and laughing. But it's something that stuck with me. And it was kind of a bit of a wake up because up until that point, I felt like I had always been asking for feedback. But what the score was showing me is that I wasn't actually doing anything with that feedback or really letting it settle in. And so since that day, I've really introspected on the role of feedback and how I can really digest it and really implement it in the world. And so that is what I would start with. Our topic is how people change and how they change in accordance with their environment. So there's two components to the discussion today. And so we're going to start with how people change or if they don't change. And so we're going to use myself as a little bit of a case study when I got that one out of 100 on my openness to feedback score. And so I love to start the conversation by asking Krisana, when you're working with someone, what are some of the indicators that that individual might be open to change and what are some of the indicators that they might be resistant to change?

Krisana Locke: One of the indicators that they're open to change is they're not stuck. They're not feeling stuck, they're flexible. They have more of a yes to life and being willing, willing to take on new opportunities. People who are indicators that they're not good at change is they. They have maybe maladaptive mechanisms in happening. So they will be the reverse, stark, difficult to. To move on, unwillingness to accept the situation around them, and also quite a negative mindset on life. So these are the indicators also.

Dr. Mazen Harb: Having.

Krisana Locke: Very set patterns, very set routines in life and not wanting to comfort zone is very important for them. So there's some indicators of willingness and panic and fear. Fear and panic. There's some indicators. So it's at first working with this because it means going into something that's new and into the unknown.

Dr. Mazen Harb: Thank you.

Mino Vlachos: And so, Mazen, I'll ask a version of the same question. I know you work with a lot of people of all backgrounds, including CEO's, executives. And of course as advisors, we can go and give a ton of advice and tell people what to do. And sometimes they implement it and sometimes you think they've done it and then you show up a year later and they haven't done anything and they're still struggling with the same issues. From your observations, what supports people to change and what are the things that hold them back from change supports people to change.

Dr. Mazen Harb: change doesn't come to us naturally. We have one of the main reason, because it's connected to one of our most primitive and basic fears. It's really the fear of the unknown and the fear of death. And in that sense, when change happens, we have to readapt and change our belief systems. But our belief system is connected to a certain identity, how we perceive ourselves. So it's very understandable that we fear change because through that fear, we feel like our identity will change, because our belief system needs to shift. So hence we have this deep rooted fear of change. So we really, all our life we strive to have predictability and certainty, and we really want something that's constant. And the only thing that's not constant is change. So the moment we start to adapt fully to change, this is where life starts to be. We ride life, we live life in a way more smoother way. And that's the issue. What I saw in myself and in everyone I work with, when we resist change, this is where the road is very, very, very bumpy. Because change are indicators that something needs to evolve. But a certain belief system need to die in order to have another belief system, in order to move forward in a project. Otherwise the software between brackets will be outdated and then, but we not, nobody taught us that. So it's something that we have to fully take back responsibility to and then venture in, start relating with change, understanding change and understanding change is a necessity and it's what keep us updated to our environment, ourselves and our evolution. Thank you.

Mino Vlachos: And I'm going to now again, use a little bit myself as a personal example. And then we're going to open up to some of the research we've done on this topic that we publish in our book as part of three peak coaching and solutions. So at that time, one of the things that I was doing was I was actually asking for constant feedback. And what was interesting about that score of one. And that's why people around me couldn't understand it, so they actually thought the test was broken because they're like, but this guy has more feedback than anyone else I've ever met in my life. What I was doing at the time, which I didn't realize until much later, was because I had such a low opinion of myself and so little self confidence, I was constantly asking people for feedback and externalizing my self confidence to the outside world. So I was checking with other people constantly. Am I okay? Am I okay? Am I okay? So, Azen, give me feedback. Krisana, give me feedback. Joe, give me feedback. And then as long as people are saying, everything is good, everything is good. I was like, okay, like, I'm all right. But I wasn't actually looking for feedback. I was just essentially checking with people, am I safe? Am I safe? Am I safe? And if they did have something that was constructive feedback, I couldn't handle it. I couldn't tolerate it because it was more of, I'm unsafe. It wasn't about like, oh, cool, good point. Maybe I should shift something. I would potentially change things, but only out of fear. Fear to get back to feeling safe and then check with that person, am I safe? Am I safe? Am I safe? So that externalization of my self confidence was, for me, a very negative thing. And so this is why I cannot paint a broad brush and say, everyone should always be asking for feedback. Actually, in my case, what supported me was to stop asking for feedback and to stop externalizing my self confidence to other people. It was to stop this thing and then be in the little bit of this freak out of the unknown and then build up within myself my confidence, my self value system. And then I could go back out into the world. And then when I asked for feedback, I was able to take it again. And for the first time, I actually took it constructively. I didn't personalize it. And so with this topic, there are, we did research and we found there are three things that kind of block people from individual change, which is a big part of adaptation. If something shifts in our environment and we can't shift with it, it's going to be hard to adapt. And so the three things that we're going to go into each one individually is we've already touched on them in a. In pieces already, but having identity structures, so identifying with things. The second is having a kind of mental projection, how things should be the belief system. And then the third is kind of being in a more of a shutdown, so not being in tune with the environment because we're feeling shut down. So we're going to start with the first one, which is forming identities. So I'm going to ask Mazen to start with you. Can you tell us a little bit about identity? What is identity? How do we form identities and what is the value of them? And then are there hindrances when we form identities?

Dr. Mazen Harb: I would say all the phase from childhood, teenagerhood, and then toward early adulthood is we're really trying to find an identity. We want to crystallize our identity so we can feel safe in that constant evolution that's been happening to us since we were kids, we come as kids and you see, you can see it in kids how they adapt to change, because they really alive. And actually, this is how nature is. So they adapt to change not because they want, because that's how the way it is, because their identity is not yet formed fully. So they start, they're moving teenagerhood, they start to search for the identity and then. But they're growing. That means there's constant change. At certain point, even the brain actually is constant evolution, constant development. And then it reaches its peak around 25 years old of age. And it's not after that it doesn't continue, but this is the peak of where, like, constantly change is happening in the development way. And then from there on, there's, of course, neuroplasticity. We can do whatever we need, we can learn whatever we need, we can evolve. But to a certain degree, in our mid twenties, the identity starts to be formed and then we start to really create. It will bring us a stability. It's a bit of. Not necessarily it's very helpful for stability, but that stability and that reality, that identity can become a hindrance, because we really needed that for us to. To have a grip, to focus on our lives and to move forward. But then later on, if we really crystallize our entity so much, and we believe we are only that, it will make us learn less, evolve less and really incapable in dealing with change. So that's. And just the biggest illusion about identities is when we are adults. Look, there is childhood, there's puberty, teenagerhood, post teenagerhood. And then we say adults, we really believe adult, it's one thing. And actually we evolving until really old age. And the best way to see it, also in plants, right? The plant started a seed, a small plant becomes a big plant becomes a tree. So we're always growing up. But how we're doing it is different as a human. As kids, we grew up with the body, with the brain, with the functions. But when we become adult, we have a certain body and then lots of people look on the outside. Ah, that's it. We're adults. We don't. We don't grow up more, actually. No, we're always evolving. We're always changing the body. Not to that fast degree pace as when we're kids. But there's every single day, every single day we change. Something changes. Just one last thing on the body level. Every single cell actually replace itself. So there's every single cell replace itself, every single tissue replace itself, every single organ replace itself. So when you go and then come back after a few months, probably that organ or that. That tissue you had. Now it's a different one. So this is how the way it is, actually constant change.

Mino Vlachos: And I'll add that I think identities, of course, are beautiful because playing with an identity can open up a new vista. For instance, when I recently joined a gym, the people in the gym kept calling me an athlete, which was very jarring because I've never, since I was a teenager, when I played american football, I haven't thought of myself as an athlete. And to have that kind of identity or label kind of return, and it really shook something in me, and it was like it shook a belief system that I started to crystallize around. And I was like, well, can I play with being an athlete? Like, what would that be like, to play with that identity, to have that, to maybe hold it for a little bit? For instance, another one that I've struggled with a lot of my life is the identity of being an artist. I was always like, I'm the corporate guy. You know, I'm the finance guy, I'm the math guy. And then people would be like, no, I think you're an artist. And I'd be like, I don't know what you're talking about. I'm not an artist. I'm not creative. And then learning how to almost go beyond that, to be like, can I play with this identity and try it out and see what it feels like to fit into this for a little bit of time and go in and out, in and out, and just play with different things? On the flip side, as Mahazine was sharing, when we get really hung up on our identity, we can become very emotional. And actually, a lot of people who would like to manipulate us can use our identities to evoke emotion and then evoke us into action. So I think a lot about the sports teams. We have an identity of being a sports fan, be it football, whatever, and then our team loses, and we go crazy and we burn the cars and flip things and fight and kill people because of a sports team. It's a game, it's entertainment, and we're willing to die for it. To me, that is the kind of shadow of identity. And most wars, religions, nationalism, it's about taking identity to this place where we allow ourselves or someone else to put something in us, where our emotions go a little bit haywire and we act out on that. So this is when identity, I think, can have more of that shadow. Krisana, I know, again, you've worked with thousands of people, you do incredible work. If someone were to come to you and kind of have these strong identities, how would you work with someone like that? What would support them?

Krisana Locke: First of all, I have to see how much they identified with what they come for, if it's for support, to unravel something, for an issue. So first of all, I have to look how much are identified? Are they aware of this identification? And then what would support them to come out of this identification? Because it's basically the way I work is it's got to do with the mind, creates identification. So anything that is passing in the mind, any belief system, any thoughts that are created in that come out of belief systems, create an identification. So I work with their cognitive, but I also support them to get more rooted into their body and to come out of belief systems and thoughts and to be more in the flux with the body and the flow. So, but it can't be overnight. It just has to be where a person is and starting to establish if they're aware of their thinking, their thought patterns, their, their beliefs that they have around themselves. So for me, identification at the root of it, is being identified through the mind and being identified through a personality you have created. And my sharing in my work is also to support the person to come out of identification, to come out of personality and come into the individuality, the uniqueness of them. So when you were just sharing, you were talking me now, I was thinking, I was feeling to myself, really for me is to be myself, my authentic self. And I'm discovering that all the time, but I have a sense of something authentic in me. And it's, I don't try to be a certain identity. It's about relaxing in oneself, connecting with oneself. Beyond the layers of personality and belief systems. Mind is good to use for processes, for understanding. But when to switch off the mind and the constant thoughts and the constant beliefs that are streaming in, that this is what I am, this is how I function in my life and really coming back into finding the space inside the being that is authentic. So my approach when I'm working with people is supporting people to discover that, and then they can share that in life, in their work, in their personal life, in relationships. It's to do with awareness, and it's to do with also creativity that opens and to respond and instead of reacting, so steps, so it's a whole steps, and also supporting people where they are to gradually get them to find the seeds of insight for themselves. You don't get it overnight. It's aha. It's peeling the onion and supporting peeling the onion to. To reveal your uniqueness and your being, your essential nature.

Mino Vlachos: So I know for myself there are many tools out there, but one of them that really supported me in this was meditation. And I'm even now reflecting on, I think there's one meditation in the Book of Secrets, which is about observing your own life as if it was a movie while you're living it and almost hovering above, like a bird's eye view. And really. So one, I think, is you can look as if it's on a screen. One is a bird's eye view. So I really like the bird's eye view. So I'm going and cleaning the dishes and I'm watching myself from above. And something about that has really supported me. Can you tell me, Krisana, how does meditation support this process of working with identity?

Krisana Locke: So meditation is a state through meditation is a state of consciousness. Meditation methods, techniques is a way to support you to start to disidentify, to come out of the mind and to also to be not. So, okay. Some people are really identified with the body. Yeah, some people are really identified with their minds. So either way, it's to. To start to witness, to become aware of your body, of your thoughts, of your beliefs, and. And start to watch this. So there's a slowly, slowly you can get a distance. You start to disidentify with the mind. And so you have distance to see it as constant thoughts, beliefs that's been passed on by religion, by family, thoughts that are around that you believe, that are yours. And then to. To have a distance. So there's slowly, slowly a gap comes. So you. Something happens where there's space that gets revealed, where you find something bigger than the mind and the body. And we do need to be in the body to have an anchor to be able to do this. So meditation methods helps us to build a routine, to start to witness. And the basis of all methods of meditation is awareness, witnessing and having a non judgmental attitude about your thoughts, about your body. So the basis is witnessing an awareness. So it's cultivating this cultivating awareness in your life, in your actions, and in life.

Mino Vlachos: Thank you. So, Mazen, I'm going to turn to you. One of the many things that you are as a neuroscientist, if I'm going to put a label on it, an identity on it. And the way I perceive this field a little bit is that as humans, we're always collecting information with our senses and processing it. But we each have a very subjective reality in how we process that information. I once heard a consciousness researcher say that we all have controlled hallucinations because we're all essentially taking things in making sense of it in our own individual way. And out of that sometimes we can develop this sense of this is how things should be. So I love if you could tell us a little bit about the process by which we take in input from our environment, how we filter it. And then what happens when we have a should in life.

Dr. Mazen Harb: So here we're speaking about identities, but also perception. And again, bring imagine when each one's perception is different. Why? Because our senses that we perceive, the physical senses and then other senses other than the five, there's more than five senses in the body. The balance, temperature, way more others. And it's really specific to our nervous system on one hand. But then when we receive stimulus stimuli and when we. The way how we perceive it is also based on the collection of memory or respond and responses. So how what happens to us when we perceive something? When we receive something is the way we perceive it is based on our lived experience. So our memory and our emotion. And we know very well that each one's emotion is really different to one another. So it's a mix of imagine like the different emotions and the different lived experience and the memory connected to it. Then we have one stimuli. So if both the three of us look at one thing, it's impossible to come up with the same full understanding. And even with the same full expression. Expression of it. There's this nice test about perception done in coaching. I was one in a once in a while helping someone. And this person really she brought this a picture of a family on a small scooter, motorbike scooter, with wife behind, with the kid in front and another kid behind. And then it is. And it asks the group each one, right? What do you feel? What do you see, what do you think? And then what do you feel? And then when you see a picture like this, normally we say it's obvious. Gonna always say the same thing. What if I tell you very few said the same thing? And then between different between, what do I see? Many people saw whatever they want to see. Probably they connected to that. It's dangerous. It's not what do they think and what do they feel? So it's really interesting actually. It's an exercise as everyone to who try it with friends. Bring something, see an event and allow yourself to first write down what do you see, what do you feel and then what do you think? About it. And really repeat it and see if it's 100% the same thing. When you start to see it's not a hundred percent the same thing. It's very little, very less, less than that. You start to understand that we are biological creatures. So we have different. We perceive. We receive the information. We receive and perceive it in our own way. Based on our living experience. And then we make out of it whatever we need. Based on our personality. And personality and identity is based on our belief system. What's good and what's bad, what's wrong, what's moral. So the example of being on a scooter with a family. So it's very the perception is very influenced if we have a morality about that. And it depends also which country we come. It depends on really the upbringing. Do you ever do it yourself? So, yeah. So it's really a multitude and multifaceted universe. Upon universes of perception, realities. We can never see the reality as it is. All of us in the same time. The only way to see reality as it is. Is if all of us are deep in a meditative state. Where we are watching with full awareness, with zero judgment. So we keep our personality behind. And then we see it as it is. Yes, we can unite as it is. Awareness can unite us. But then there is no identification about the emotion. There is no identification about thought. There's no obligation about sensation. So in meditation does not mean to cutting out of those. No, I'm aware that my emotional reaction, what I feel is that I'm aware of my mental thought. And what I'm thinking is that about what happened. And I'm aware about the sensation that makes me be like that. Or I want to react that way. But then when we do not react and watch reality as it is. That's another exercise with other folks. Sit somewhere. And then after a meditation, just see reality as it is. See where you're identifying with it. And see when you do not end. When you witness an awareness without judgment. And then express, what do you see?

Mino Vlachos: I really like to quickly, how did. I really would like to talk about the scooter for a moment, just selfishly within me, there's two things that come up. When I have that american lens. I'm like, oh, my God. That's terrible. It's dangerous. And then I put on my greek lens, and I'm like, nice. We're going to the beach. So it's like even within me. There's two identities. That can filter a totally opposite experience. So let me ask you a little bit about the should mazen. Because many of us, we walk around with, this is the way things should be. And I would like to hear a little bit from you. Like we just told us about perception and how everything is different. Like, what goes on when I have a should in life. And how does that block me from really potentially perceiving things as they really are?

Dr. Mazen Harb: Look, all our pressure in life, frustration, disappointment, self disappointment, is based on the should that we impose on ourselves. That should. We didn't come to life with that should. There is no kid. No animal came with the should. But the kids. We indoctrinate kids very early on for the good and for the bad. Doesn't matter here. It's not about being moral about it, just really explaining the fact we are very alive. The energy is flowing over our body. There's. There is no should or shouldn't. And then slowly, we start to really listen to adults, and they start to tell us through their lens, regardless their religion, where they are, they should and shouldn't when it comes to this, when it comes to that, when it comes to what to eat, when it comes whatever. Consuming this food, consuming this alcohol, or, like, when it comes to sexuality. So those are the basic ones. So imagine for everything we start as kids, we start to look around to see what is correct and what is not. Why? For the simple reason we want to belong. And this is why, actually, we didn't speak about it, actually. Mainly why we need identity and personalities at certain point is we really want to fit in where we are. We want to really belong. But the thing that's really craving to fit and belong and to be one with the family or one with the culture or one with the religion, we have this. This outside should. And then we really learn through it. It's said to be impulse should. And this is where we start to really push ourselves to be something we're not. So we lose connection with who we are. What do we need? Our basic needs through connecting to this body. Again, meditation and awareness helps us to understand where does the should begins and where does it end and where our inner freedom begins and then where our inner freedom ends. So should is a crucial part in defining how much inner harmony, inner acceptance, self love we have or we haven't.

Mino Vlachos: Yeah. For me, there's like, if we cast this, like, mental model, and I'll give a bit of an absurd example, but if I one day wake up in arbitrary, say it doesn't rain on Mondays, it doesn't rain on Mondays. It doesn't rain on Mondays. That's my belief system. And I get really hooked into that. And then I never check the weather on Mondays. I never bring an umbrella. And then, guess what? I'm gonna get it wet at some point, because I've decided to create a universe inside my mind, a little palace that I think is correct, but it doesn't actually exist outside of me. And so there's something about being able to stay receptive and open to the outside environment and not going into my mind palace and say, this is an artificially constructed reality of how I think the world should be around me. And so, Krisana, we're all. Every one of us has senses. And I'll even go to say, because of that, we're all sensual people. And sometimes we can go into a bit of this shutdown, trying to kind of stop us from sensing and feeling. I want to start first with sensing, what are senses, and how do we sense? How do we open to this liveliness that's within us? And then I'll ask you a follow up about shutdown. But let's just start with senses and sensualness.

Krisana Locke: So the senses, as Mazen said, we have five senses or more, you know, taste, sight, sound, touch. So these are senses that are part of the body, and we also have body sensations. So there's the felt sensation of the body. So this is like stimuli that responds from our nervous system to indicate, is everything okay? We're responding through the senses of the body. When we are born. We are born as a freewheeling life energy. Yeah, we're full of life energy. And what happens is, in the process of growing up, we create a conditioning around to fit in, as Mazen had said, like belief systems. And what happens is all this feeling, liveliness that we come with starts to having to be shut down to be good or to fit in. So we start to create a personality, a Persona, and we lose connection with this aliveness, this sensuality, because sensuality, senses, as you were saying, at the base of it is sex energy. And sex energy is part of the basic biological level of being born. Everyone so far has been born through the sex act. Or, you know, now, I don't know where we're going in the future, but that spark. So we are from biological sex energy. So on its base, basic level, it creates life. And then this comes in our body, and we have a life energy. It can go in the simplest form in sex, but it's also a life energy where we can move it into creativity. So it's energy. It's life energy. So when we start to shut down and start to repress our life energy, what we're doing is we're compromising how we feel and how we want to express ourselves, because it's better to be good, it's better to fit in, it's better to do the right thing. So we bypass our own aliveness. So this creates a repressed shutdown state in emotions. And you can also see it in the body language of people and a compromise. So then when we do this, the only way to then to express oneself is through mental concepts, through the mind, because they've lost contact with the sensuality and the aliveness of the body. So to come back into your senses, to come back into your liveness, to come back into this sense of feeling alive and well being is you have to come back to the body and you have to come back into this to allow this natural expression. You will always see it. The impulses of a child who's really alive, you know, running around really full of life. If a teacher or someone says, stop, you shouldn't do that. That is a lot of impulses on the muscular of the body, of being so open, there's having to start to contain that. Why? So it becomes a very deep unconscious mechanism, defense mechanism, to hold back our life energy. And thus, when we grow up, thus when we're in intimacy, relationships or at work, we're shut down or we can't really be ourselves, because we've formed a lot of armoring, emotional armoring that is defined in the body and in the way our thoughts are. So a lot of what we share and what we also bringing into people in the business environment is getting much more in touch with the connection with their bodies, connection to their senses, their thoughts, their breath. Mindfulness approaches and also a space of coming into meditation to support coming out of identifications with the mind. So that's very important to come back to feeling alive and feeling grounded and being able to live your life in a joyful manner, to share that with people.

Mino Vlachos: And there's tremendous joy and pleasure in our senses. That's why I think the word, I wanted to purposely use the word like sensual, because when you have a really nice breeze on a nice sunny day, it feels really good on the skin. If we hear a really nice piece of music or birds chirping, this feels really good to the ears. If we see an amazing meal in front of us, it feeds the eyes, of course, taste. There's everything the senses can really bring us. So much pleasure and joy and of course, if we cut off from that, we cut off from a lot of that pleasure in life. And the other thing I wanted to add, based on what you're sharing, is that as humans, one of the remarkable things we do is we bond with our tools, we can form a connection with technology. So if you're driving a car, you've probably had the experience of feeling like it's an extension of yourself, because we're actually able to sense through not only ourselves, but start to sense through the object. And what research has shown is that CEO's of companies start to have that same sensation. About two years into running a company, they intuitively start to feel the organization as if it's an extension of themselves. So instinctively they can start to feel if something is wrong in marketing, something is off in HR, they can almost feel it like it's an extension of their body. It takes a little bit of time to develop that, but research has shown that we do develop that sense, but we have to be open to our senses to do that. So one of the things that's difficult for leaders is the way I've heard it described, which resonate with me, is that leaders at the top have all the power but none of the information. And employees at the bottom have all the information but none of the power. Over simplistic, but I mean, to actually change things in the organization, I don't think it's necessarily entirely true, but we'll stick with that dichotomy for a second. So CEO can change everything and anything, but they have no information. There's so many people, they don't know what's really going on. So they're struggling to get feedback, they're struggling to have the loops. So one way is to do it mechanistically, which is we find reporting mechanisms, we find ways to increase, again the feedback loops, verbal feedback, so that we can check in on each other. And another way is for the CEO themselves to increase their level of sensing, to open themselves up to the world around them so they can feel what's going on. And so these are some of the things that can block us from adapting to change, which is, as we mentioned, having a very strong identity structure, having a very strong concept of this is how things should be and living inside my own mind palace, and I'm shut down and cut off from feeling. So now we're going to switch a little bit to talk about adaptation. So first I'm going to ask Mazen just very basically what is adaptation?

Dr. Mazen Harb: I really catch it from where you ended literally. The tools for adaptation is our nervous system and the senses. So when we cut out of through our feelings and emotions. So when we cut out our feelings and emotions, we are not updated what's happening in our environment, outside and then inside of us. So we're not following and receiving the signs that they're needed in order to change. And then this is what happens. A crisis is nothing more than many alerts outside and inside to change, to evolve, to adapt. That is really rejected by us for multiple reasons because we're really not most of the time connected to the body, afraid of our feelings and emotions, and then in the head, overthinking, over trying, overthinking, so we lose connection to the outside and the inside. Hence crisis. Actually I always use that word. People, most of the time when they hear, they don't like it. Crisis is the best opportunity they can ever have. I know it's a rough statement to say, but if crisis doesn't exist, you will perish. Think about it, why this statement is so bold or so scary. That prize is the best thing that ever happened. To understand it. Know something, if a crisis doesn't happen, there will be death happening within, within the cells, within. And this is seen when we have disease or when we have cancers and when everything. We have so many signs to correct our life, lifestyle, way of being, way of working, way of mental health, physical health, emotional health. And then when we don't, we start to become ill. The immune system reflected immediately. This is on the inside. And then when we don't in a company, the system, things starts to happen and then things start to change. And then you, like you say, crisis is happening here. Crisis happened in that, in the company, here and there. And then we start to control it and try to solve it. But actually whenever question ourselves and this is nothing more than our ability to change. So this is adaptation. Adaptation is the one and the main key for survival, for evolution. Evolution happened through adaptation. And if we do not allow adaptation to be, we really start to have all those ailment diseases and then constant crisis after crisis. But that's the truth. Adaptation means how to be able to change not once, not twice. Constantly. Yes, that's scary, but constantly. So, you know, you've been changing all your life and you're like finally now I'm in a place where I feel good, healthy, happy. And then you try really to keep it. But then you go from you, you go from adaptation to maladaptation. How long you can keep it, you can keep it only for a certain amount of time, but the growth of everything around you and within you need to continue. And we don't know how it will continue. So the moment where we start to control it, to stay, this is why crisis happened, because we compressed change, we compressed adaptation, and then at certain point, we cannot compress longer. Remember, nature is very powerful. Look what nature is capable of. And then also it's reflected in our economical market and reflected in between countries. So we cannot hold something back or down and pressure it, as if stopping a volcano from expressing itself bits by bits, bits by bits. And then you try to compress it and then it will explode. But that's a good thing. Once it explodes, there's a different rhythm, the lava starts to go in a more smoother way.

Mino Vlachos: So, Mazen, I know we've talked about in the past, Darwin and survival of the fittest. So can you clear up once and for all what is survival of the fittest? And how does it apply to this conversation?

Dr. Mazen Harb: So Darwin was a brilliant biologist, evolutionary biologist, who used his sense of observation. He really watched, observed, observed, observed, looked, look without judgment, really watching, watching, watching. And then actually it's really interesting because the statement, it's the most misunderstood statement and it's really been taken here and there, each to their own needs and wants. So then we start to see someone who's very, like, very muscularly and whatever, say, that's the fittest. Actually, the fittest is the one who's capable of the most amount of adaptation, the one who's able to adapt to any circumstances. So I don't know what's the fittest. I don't know what's the fittest based on a century when a century we have lots of famine. The fittest is the one who have more fat, the heaviest when it. So this is an example. So it's beyond morality. So we have, for example, we have fat for a reason. Evolution, we have fat is to deal with really big amount of famine or big amount where between food, see? So, and then, then also that can turn like, okay, cool, I have fat. So. But actually, no, now we have food everywhere. So when we start to put on more fat and more fat, we won't adapt because we're gonna be struggling because the environment is not a famine anymore. So this is a very, very simple example. But the power of adaptation, that's what he meant. And every species was capable to do that, is here now. And every species that didn't disappeared. It's like more of like the, I call it. No, it's a joke, like the arrogant. The arrogant race or the arrogant species. Imagine a flock of birds and they're like, we're the best. We look amazing, all the colors. And then change is happening, and they refuse to change. Then they will disappear. And really, lots of even humans, humans, a humanoid, have disappeared. But again, they disappeared for the only reason their DNA and their biological structure could not follow up on the change of the environment and the evolution of the species. Then the Homo sapiens sapiens, who we are now at the end, succeeded. So we are now Homo sapiens sapiens, because this is the way how we were able to evolve to a certain degree, that we could adapt. We are the best in adaptation. That's why all the other humanoid disappeared. They could not adapt to all those changes. It does not mean that we fittest, strongest, fastest. I don't think. I feel if you run against neanderthal and then a homo sapiens sapien, I think probably they will succeed in, you know, running and killing because their job was really only to hunt. But when the homo sapiens sapiens came, it came with this neocortex. So it was more clever to find traps and tricks and probably to go after the other species or the other humanoid. This. They came and bargained with them, or and then find a deal to trick them. You know, commerce starts to happen again. That was became the fittest from really, the physical body, how to hunt. Then the fittest became, you know what? I can connect. I have a neocortex. I have a capability of thinking and then reflecting and observing that they don't have. So I go bargain, and they won't notice that. Yeah, that's my really best way tool of evolution that I'm using now.

Mino Vlachos: And what's interesting, if we look at the last, probably 10,000 years in human development, is how much we have domesticated ourselves and built societies where our entire world becomes inside the home, more or less. In America, it's even more extreme. I think it's. I think I've heard it called, like, the three door life, because you go from your house door to the car door to the work door and then back again, and that's it. You're in a house, a car, and work back and forth. And maybe you go to, like, target or a Walmart or something at some point, but you're never outside. You're never really in touch with what's happening beyond you. And what you're saying, Mazen, is when we look at humans, there's something about killing off competition for food in nature, what humans have done is they've killed off the thing that kills off that thing that kills off the thing they want to eat. Like, it's such a controlled system. Like, I want to plant food. So I'll, of course, have the pesticides for the insects, but then I'll go beyond that. Like, there's such a high degree of control and changing the environment around us that we've forgotten that the environment itself is dynamic and outside of our control. Sometimes what I find interesting about the climate change that we're witnessing right now is how much these warning bells are going off. For instance, trees have been found to be migrating up mountain chains. So trees, they operate in bands in zones depending on climate, because they like certain temperatures, certain amount of sunlight. So let's say you were a tree that was in the middle of the mountain. Those. Those trees are starting to basically have seeds that are taking root and flourishing up the mountain. And the ones lower down the mountain are dying off. So entire bands of trees are starting to migrate up mountain peaks, and the ones at the very top are going extinct. So we're seeing that this is beyond animals. Even trees are starting to migrate because of the changes in the environment. And yet, because folks have this kind of three door life, we're completely unaware that things are different. And I remember as a child, when I was in Greece, for instance, in the summers, it never rained. Never, like, not even a cloud in the sky. And now there's like, every couple weeks in the summer, there's a thunderstorm. Even my father, who grew up on the island, same thing, he never witnessed rain in the summer. So we're seeing a change in our environment. People who are outside, people who farm, people who work with nature, they know it's changing. They know it's shifting. They know that bird patterns are changing, migration patterns are changing. So none of this is surprising if you're in touch with the environment. But if you sit inside your apartment or house all day and then get in your car or the metro, and then you're just in your work place of work, it might be pretty shocking a few decades from now when things start to get even more volatile. The other thing I was thinking about is corporate culture. How because the corporation is so big and so stable, that when you get into that lifestyle, that becomes your world, that becomes everything, that becomes a nexus of stability in your life. But these companies are so big and so stable, which is a beautiful thing in a way. I'm like, wow. Like, it's kind of amazing what we've done that. We forget that things are changing on the outside versus if you're in a startup life like we are, we feel we have to be in the environment, we have to be in tune with what's going on around us. And we shift and change like every other week. So we're constantly forced to adapt what we're doing. Because we have a much smaller boat when the wave comes, we have to be able to steer around it. When they're in a giant cruise ship or a tanker, it doesn't really matter. You can actually go right through the waves. You don't even feel it that much. And so there's a really. That's beautiful in some ways, and in others, I'd say, if you get so sucked in. And this is a game where I put the responsibility on the individual. This isn't me complaining about corporations, the individual. If you get so sucked up, sucked into. This is my home life, this is my work life, and this is all that exists in the world. And you don't take a moment to peer outside this veil, then you're going to be quite surprised by what the rest of the world and the cosmos is up to. Because the world is operating outside of our control and we cannot control everything. And so with this, I'm going to turn a little bit to mazen. You already opened up the topic, but it's one that I very much enjoy, which is the concept of adult development. And so all the research we have shows that adults continue to change and they continue to evolve through the entire course of their life. You put it perfectly. We can track it with kids because there's a physical change. But with adults, there tends to continue to be mental and emotional changes. And so this one is for Krisana. My question is, what are some of the. As you worked with people and you noticed the kind of maturity curve, people get wiser, they get older. How have you noticed in your work supporting people that folks change over time and continue to develop as adults?

Krisana Locke: Well, everyone grows up and gets old. That's a biological part of the body. But to grow up and evolve in a mature way is a whole different aspect of self development. So there's a body development that happens over time, or a body we have these we have today. We know how to prolong our health and the benefits of having a healthy life. But the development of one's maturity, one's wisdom is, again, I'm going to say, through awareness and through insight and self inquiry. This starts to open when you start to tap into into discover, really, who am I? Am I happy? Why am I doing these things to really inquire about? Am I just going through life senselessly? Am I just, am I also just seeking safety and security? It's biologically built in because humans do seek safety and familiarity, but that's wired into the hard drive or the brain, the nervous system, because for millions and millions of years it was survival. So it's all the time, you know, always detecting and responding to a potential threat. So there's an inbuilt like, ah, to have safety and familiarity. So when you do have safety and familiarity for too long, you have set patterns. So then you talk about the corporate world, safety, familiarity, the three doors, they become patterns. So it can become a hindrance. So this will become a hindrance to your inner growth because you will grow comfortably old, mature old in the body, probably with better wellness interventions, organic foods, knowing your sleep patterns, drinking well, but it will not, I guarantee it will not open up your inner wisdom, your innate wisdom that you have to tap into inside. And that's by self inquiring and going in and discovering yourself beyond your personality. So it's not like I sit and I meditate and I do a mantra for ten minutes a day and I say meditate. It's to understand the basis of your personality that you have set up and then to look, but there's something deeper. So really the wisdom that can grow is through tapping into your intuition, to your instincts, getting your body more alive, and then to also come out of your comfort zone and discover and be curious. And this will open up the evolution of wisdom growing and also being around people who have had wise experiences in their life that have made them wise. Any experience you have physically, emotionally, an experience in life, you will have an outcome where you know something better, you understand something, and you become wiser. So just reading or reading on some information about a topic where a lot of people say, these days, I've done my research, but they're just scanning through on their phone. They call this research and they get some information, but they haven't had an experience where they learn from themselves. What did I gain out of it? What wisdom do I get out of it? So people who have had deep experiences of discovering life, being curious of life, can also support wisdom happening for oneself. But find your own wisdom. Tap into it.

Mino Vlachos: He just reminded me of a friend I had growing up where anytime I was like, oh man, I went and watched the coolest movie ever. He was like, oh, I read the Wikipedia summary. I was like, oh, I went and did this coolest thing ever. Oh, I read the Wikipedia summary, and every time it was the same thing. And yeah, it was a fascinating way of living, because I cannot, I cannot. To me, I don't think it's the same. To read five bullet points about a sunset, to read about it and then to be there and actually watch the sunset and feel it and take it in, it's two very different sensations. So, Mazen, I want to turn to something that's very related, but a little bit of a shift. With our company, three p coaching and solutions, we've created a really beautiful method called the functional human systems method. And a subset of that is something that, between us, we call the core fundamentals. We've basically mapped out whether it's from an individual person to a project, to a company, an empire, the cosmos. We've mapped out through really beautiful research the kind of order of the chain or sequence of events, the strategies we can employ in life. And one of those is the kind of chain of events that can lead to reinvention, which I would probably posit is a little bit more of that adaptation. So tell me a little bit, and you can pick whether it's a person, an empire. If I'm kind of a bit in this, like, maintenance mode, maintenance mode, maintenance. Bone. And the environment shifts, and I actually can notice that it's shifting. What does it look like to go through a process of reinvention?

Dr. Mazen Harb: Interesting, because actually, in my notes now, some, I don't know. Ten minutes ago, I put an example, because I had a session this morning with someone, head of marketing and communications, and then I was working with her and really to support her, to be more creative and bring her artistic side to creative ideas she's building. It was really to help her understand how she disconnect from the body. So from the sensations, how when she disconnects from the body, she start overthinking. And then when she start overthinking, she start trying. And I told her, look, imagine yourself. You're in a tank of water, and then in the tank of water, you have enough elements or information or factors, you're gonna start using them. But if you cut the pipe, that brings you more water and more information, you're gonna be just using and trying to be creative based on only what you have. So based on thinking. And here I'm gonna differentiate two things. Thinking is not thoughts. Thoughts is not thinking. So thoughts are received. That's why we say in meditation and witnessing, witness the thoughts you're gonna say your thoughts, yes, but it's just your brain, like, really receives thought and you start to see them. Either you start thinking about them or you don't. So this is more really to bridge it to our method, actually. And then when I was working with her, I was really only thinking our method, and I told her, look, the best way to allow yourself to be more creative is that you have really to really connect to your body to start to feel. And then when you start to feel, you are more open. So when you're more open, you are more receptive. And when you're more receptive, you allow more thoughts to happen to come. You allow more outside of that tank of water, so more new thoughts start to arrive. And then this is what we call, we allow, when we call it reflection, but not in a thinking way, just reflection happen when we allow thoughts to come through, and then once we start to have new thoughts, and this is, that's creativity, we go there and do them. But so creativity should come, always should come the best. Like, there's two kind of creativity that creativity that comes from. I am open, I'm receptive. I receive thought, I receive an idea, I receive something creative, and I go and do it. This is very healthy. But when I start sitting there and I start thinking, I have to think, I have to think about the thought, I have to be creative. I have to find a solution. We cut out from our body. We don't have any more information about environment, neither the inner nor the outer. And then actually, we are only in our head, and we're only using the data that exists in our brain. So the only thing to do is to try all possible probability of our thinking patterns that we already have, but nothing from the outside. So that's why most folks who are amazing, pioneer at the beginning, if they don't go back and then refill through feeling, through reflection, they, this is where you have the biggest amount of burnout. And that form of creativity, it's called survival. Creativity. Creativity coming from a survival need. The other one, when we're receptive, more open, more connected to our inner and outer, and more on reflection, allowing new thoughts, new ideas to come. This is a long term form of creativity that's very fulfilling. The other one out of survival, you might find solution, but those creative ideas that you found solution with are short term lived. You might gain lots of money and lots of fame, but you're gonna notice it's very short lived because you cannot apply it again. It's only got applied once, twice, but it has a short life. So here, actually, I drew two things. One day we will show it more, or we send. We will show the diagrams. But here I drew attention to two diagonal quadrants. One is action, and then in action, I mean, trying, and then, which is beautiful. It's like all pioneer companies and us, when we're pioneering something, we really have to go through that quadrant. We go and try something new that nobody tried it before. The opposite of it is the quadrant of reflection. It's a more of the creative thinking, the creative mind. So the part of the mind of the brain that's creative. So we not necessarily in action, we're in receptivity, so we do not do there and do anything about it. We just. First, you have lots of scientists are there, you have lots of philosophers, you have lots of those geniuses, actually are there. Again, all. We all have those different aspects. We all have a small, also genius in us. But if we find ourselves stuck and we're not able to get new information, be more creative and super exhausted and burning out, that mean probably we're constantly in action, and we're not going to receptivity, we're not going to reflection, we're not going to maintenance, we're not going to be open to look outside, whereas what there is and only looking inside and acting and trying based on what's inside, that worked once or twice, and we want to see all the probability that can work again.

Mino Vlachos: Fascinating. Just a little analogy came up is if I only have, like, two or three crayons or markers, I only have a few colors. Why would I stay with the same box? If I can have a different box that has the 120 colors? But in order to have 120 colors, I need to be receptive to receiving something new. And so today we've talked about a wide ranging kind of conversation about adapting to change. We've talked about an individual and how an individual can shift themselves and can kind of get unstuck from some of the things that block them. And we talked a little bit about how to extend out into the environment, to sense and from there, get an understanding of what's happening, and then adapt. It is this process of adaptation that supports us to continue the species, essentially, if I put it very bluntly, because we're in tune with the rate of change. So with that, I would like to slowly start to bring this to a close. And so I'm going to ask each one of us for our final thoughts, final pieces of wisdom on this topic. So, Krisana, are there things that you'd like to leave us with as it pertains to this topic.

Krisana Locke: Yes, I would like to leave listeners or viewers if they're wondering, am I able to adapt? Is to start to see if you have set patterns in your life. You know, that you have a lot of patterns in your daily life that you built up that have made you too secure. Or for the person who has gone to work the same day on the same path, like catching the same train, going down the same street, turn right somewhere, is to have some pattern interrupts because opportunities will not come. Take another street to catch a train. So it's really all shifting some patterns. If you wear, if people still wear a watch, if you wear it continually on the left hand side, switch it over, wear it on the right. So we create some. Some pattern interrupts in our life, so opportunities open up, so we get a different worldview. So it's creating small steps of pattern interrupts to create something new. So you'll be surprised, you will have new opportunities. So things like that to come out of being when you feel you're stuck. That's what I can share.

Dr. Mazen Harb: Beautiful.

Mino Vlachos: Mazen your thoughts.

Dr. Mazen Harb: I'm gonna. My thought is just really to draw the. How do you, how do we call it the cycle of every creative thought project, or even our day, or even an empire, a nation, a company. Everything starts from a place where it's more of the zero space, where all potential is. And then it goes and then to a receptive space. It receives an idea. There is no action. And then when it receives the idea, we go, and then start. We go to the quadrant of feeling. We start to feel about it. Imagination. This is the quadrant of imagination we need to feel. We start feeling it. And then once we feel it, we go, okay, let me go try it. We go and try it. And this is the place of pioneering. We go try new things. Then after we try it, and then we see, okay, we go back and then to more receptive fate and start reflecting. What have we tried? So we bring the creative thinking, the creative mind to reflect. What. What I tried, did it work? Did it not work? And when it works, we go back to action. But in this time, not in a trying phase, we go to the more thinking, critical thinking brain and we start building. And then from there, from building, we go back sometimes to reflect about it. And if it's all good, we go build again. All I'm trying to say now, I showed a bit the cycle. Imagine every time we're stuck, we're only stuck on one of those quadrants. When we're artists and visionary, we are stuck in feeling and imagination. We have so many thoughts, we have so many projects, but we have a deep fear of going and trying them. So instead of really living by the identity, I'm a visionary, I'm an artist. I'm like, but go and try it. Know very well, if you identify as a visionary without doing, you're really stuck in identity, and you really will be unhappy, actually. And you won't make things, you won't manifest things, you won't go and try it. And then for the folks who go there and do the challenge, go from feeling imagination, they go and try it. It's amazing to try, but they're pioneers. They're needed in every project, in any endeavor. But the only thing is, the more we are there, the more we're using only our body. So it's become impulsive, or our impulsivity are in that quadrant. We sit there and then we're trying and trying. The problem is it's very exhausting for the body to use the body to just constantly be impulsive. And then this is where we see lots of burnout happen there, lots of overthinking, lots of disconnection from the body. So the folks who are there, we asked them, we invite them to go back to the second 3rd quadrant coming, which is go to reflection, take a break, sit. Try to sit without doing anything. You did an amazing job. Allow reflection to be, don't even do reflection. Allow yourself to be open to just relax, take a walk, take a breath in, and then only then, you can be inspired. And funnily enough, this is where inspiration happened. And once you're inspired, you see again. Either you go try it, or you go try to feel something new. Or if you feel good with it, you go and start building it. But when you go start building it, you're activating the critical thinking brain. And when you activate the critical thinking brain, it's amazing. You build empires. You're only looking within and you're building based on the data you have. The only problem when you're stuck there, you become very limited because you're not receiving any information from outside. So this is where become very conservative. We call it the conservative quadrant, or even the AI quadrant. On another day, we speak about it, but this is only based on information. And then when we feel ourselves stuck there, the question is to go back to reflection, to go back to see, to check the outside world, and then come back again to your company, to your project, to your family to your day, and then continue maintaining it and building it. Nature is built on cycles upon cycles upon cycles, and everything we initiate goes into this exact life cycle. So we can have multiple projects, each on a different life cycle, and then we can be stuck in different places with different projects. So adaptation is the only key to allow the wheel of creativity, the wheel of evolution, to continue. In creativity, in nature, nothing is stuck. Nothing is still, nothing is stable. Everything in a constant flow energy from its atomic structure to its more physical structure. It's a constant movement of atoms, neutrons, and electrons. So allow to be on the wheel of movement, and that is adaptation.

Mino Vlachos: For those listening, I think Mazen just dropped some multi million dollar keys to life advice. So if you didn't grab it at once, I would recommend relistening to that part a few times, because there's a lot of wisdom and a lot of research that we put into that method. So thank you, Mazen, for sharing that. From my end, there's two things I want to share. It's actually funny you brought something up at the end, which is the exact thing I wanted to talk about is how we conceptualize ourselves. If we see ourselves as a fixed entity. I'm done. I'm just like, whatever, a solid thing. Then we ignore that. In actuality, the way we probably can conceive ourselves is more like an atom. There is the nucleus, the core of who we are, the essence, the authentic self, which is both somehow, I think, more expansive and smaller than we might realize. I don't know how to put it. In a conceptual way, we are infinite. And the things that we conceive as who we are are probably not true. So the essence of who I am, my soul, is one thing. And then there's the electrons that kind of spin around and fly around me. And these are the things that identify with, whether it be a belief system, identities, what keeps me safe. And that's ever changing, ever flowing. So we're in this dynamic state. Things about us are always in a change of flux. So when we talk about adaptation, for me, I always think that's our birthright. Humans are pretty damn good at adaptation, or we have been up until the last few thousand years when we've probably decided to go more on the safety and control thing. But if you look at the last 300,000 years, we are great at adapting. It's our birthright. So the way we conceive ourselves in allowing those electrons to come and go while maintaining that window of space, that is the authentic soul. I don't know what to call it, the authentic self. And that to me is the authentic self. You find it not through thinking, but you find it through awareness, through meditation. That is where I find my authentic self. And everything else is an electron that some days I'm a little bit more attached to. So they're closer to me and some days are a little bit further out. I feel inspired to talk about a tv show that I've been rewatching. It's like a kid's show. It's called the last Airbender, and it's about the Avatar in this fictional world, can basically master all the elements and they're supposed to bring balance to the world. And the show came out like almost 20 years ago, so spoiler alert. But in the last episode of the last season, the Avatar, who's this little boy, twelve year old, I think, like named Aang. He's in confront the Fire Lord, who the Fire nation for a hundred years has been dominating and pillaging and conquering. And the Avatar is trying to need to confront the fire Lord, but he doesn't want to kill him because in the way he grew up with the air nomads, the monks said that you can't take life. And so he has this big conflict, this big dilemma, because he says, I grew up, that I can never take life, but I need to end this, this situation somehow. So he's able to call upon his past lives for advice, and he calls on the past lives, and every single one of them in some way says that you need to do this. But the last one, which was a fellow airbender, said the monks are striving for spiritual enlightenment and so they can detach from things, and some of them do accomplish this. But the avatar, their role is to be here in time and space and to bring balance to the physical world. So the avatar cannot reach spiritual enlightenment. And actually you have to detach from your desire to become spiritually enlightened because it is something that you want that's holding you back from doing your job. So it's actually a selfish desire to become a spiritually enlightened being when really all you need to be doing is bring balance to the world. That's your role. Ultimately, in the show, the avatar was able to find a way of solving the situation without killing the guy, so he stayed true to his authentic self. But I thought it was a very interesting moment where the advice from the past self was, you have to let go even of your desire for spiritual enlightenment because it's selfish. That's not your job. So that's one thing I wanted to pass along, is that everything we think that makes us us is probably not true. It's a bit of an illusion. So to see beyond the veil of illusion about what makes us us. And then the second thing is we operate in human systems. We operate within a family system. At work, we have a work system. But to look beyond human systems, because that's not our whole world. There is a whole world that exists outside of human systems. The literal world, with nature and the cosmos and everything beyond. If we just get stuck of like life is just the human system, we're not in tune with the environment. So some people think. I think they are adapting because they're really aware of the interpersonal dynamics in their life. Oh, something shifted at work. So I can shift with it. So I'm adaptable. I'm like, yes. And what about outside of work, outside of humanity as a whole? Are you tuned into the environment, the nature? What about the cosmos? And so that's where I leave it for today. To look beyond ourselves, the small self. There's so much more out there. And so with that, I'd like to thank you for listening, and we'll see you in two weeks.