033: Love — How Do You Find It Within You? - "Everyday MINDFULness" Show

When is the first time you can remember experiencing love? Do you view heaven as a religious place or as a spiritual utopia? Host, Mike Domitrz, and CAST members Rick Clemons and Dr. Jenn Gunsaullus unpack the concepts of self-love and unconditional love to uncover what it takes to come from a mindful place of love – within us.

The quote that inspired this episode is “‘The kingdom of heaven is within you.’ So we should ask the question to ourselves what this means.” from Breakfast with Buddha, by Roland Merullo.

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Key Takeaways:

[1:09] Mike reads a quote from Breakfast with Buddha and asks CAST members what it means to them.

[7:24] The process of melding self-love and unconditional love together.

[14:45] How do we recognize the ‘red flags’ to determine we lack self-love?

[20:49] Quieting the brain to come from a place of love and purity.

[28:08] Books Rick and Dr. Jenn find insightful.

Transcription (5,285 More Words)

Introduction:	Welcome to the Everyday Mindfulness Show the off cuff exploration of every day aha moments of life experiences. Join a cast of over 70 uniquely brilliant individuals. Each week, Mike Domitrz and an eclectic mix of cast members and a special guest will engage in mindful and lively conversations about everything from meditation to spirituality to personal passions to successes and failures to relationships to the stuff that makes up the moments of our daily lives. Let’s get started with your host, author, speaker, provocateur and a bit of a goof ball, Mike Domitrz
Mike:	Yes, hi. I’m your host Mike Domitrz and thrilled to be here with our cast from the Everyday Mindfulness Show. This week’s cast includes Rick Clemons and Dr. Jenn. Of course you can check out our brilliant cast and get all the special freebies that many of them have contributed at everydaymindfulnessshow.com. That’s everydaymindfulnessshow.com.
	In this episode we’re discussing love and how do you find it within you? The quote that, I’m reading this, inspired by the book Breakfast with Buddha by Roland Merullo. You might have heard me quote the book in a few other episodes also. This quote is, “The kingdom of heaven is within you.” We should consider asking ourselves that question and consider what it means. Dr. Jenn, what does that quote mean to you?
Dr. Jenn:	I don’t personally use words like heaven but having been raised as a Catholic but I don’t identify with that anymore. I identify more as a spiritual atheist. However the idea of the kingdom of heaven within a suggested idea that we are all interconnected, that we all have innate goodness in us and that we don’t have to go seeking outside ourselves for that. The place to start is within us and that it’s already there.
Mike:	I love that you brought up the ‘kingdom of heaven’ phrase because in the book he also brings up that concept of … He really looks at it from all spirituality. It’s interesting that the word ‘heaven’ is in there and he’s quoting in that part. That part is actually a part that he used. The author asks we should question that, we should think about that. He’s following a Buddhist across the country in the book [crosstalk 00:02:31]. It’s an interesting perspective so you used an interesting word there, which was you’re a’ spiritual atheist’. Is that the correct terminology?
Dr. Jenn:	Yeah.
Mike:	Just for anybody listening, what does that mean?
Dr. Jenn:	Well, it’s a term I made up when I was trying to … I shifted from identifying as a Catholic and then just sort of identifying as religious-some in grad school and then just realizing, “No, I actually think I am an atheist.” I have a lot of spiritual beliefs in me. Interconnectedness of all humans and that the whole is more than the some of the parts and then mindfulness and meditation and all of those things are resonating with me.
	In some ways, my understanding of it, at least the aspects of Buddhism that most resonate with me is a spiritual atheism, at least compare to how we have is the mainstream religious beliefs in the United States, compared to their view of a god and religion. Spiritual atheism there’s no … I don’t believe there’s anybody looking down on us making decisions but I do believe that there’s an inter-connectedness of all of us as humans.
Mike:	I always find that intriguing because many people come from a place of spirituality versus religion or a combination thereof. I have this concept that we are all connected that there’s universal energy or there’s energy of the universe. It’s interesting because people get into arguments about this and it seems to be … It’s just who’s calling what or what’s the paradigm shift they’re having.
	I know people who say, “I don’t believe in religion but I believe there is a force connecting us all together.” I’ll say, “Okay, some people call that God. You call it the energy of the universe.” I’m not saying you personally, Dr. Jen. I’m saying others. It’s interesting because when people read that quote, “The kingdom of heaven is within us,” it is interesting how people can view that. Do you view heaven as a religious place or do you view heaven as this utopia spirituality that could be within anyone? Rick what do you think?
Rick:	I concur with Jenn and I love that book too. I remember the first time I read that because I come from a somewhat fundamental Christian upbringing myself, which I’m now not practicing because I am a kind of a spiritual guy. I believe there’s lots of different things that connect us all as humans, that there’s a greater power of some sort out there. I don’t believe I just showed up here but I know I don’t know what’s there. I’m open to exploring whatever shows up. For me this whole thing about heaven is within you is, ‘whatever works for you.’
	Whatever that heaven means to you and allowing that to be the thing that emanates from within you and not necessarily letting it emanate from somebody else’s belief system, which I know puts us in some interesting spaces this time as humans. Everybody is like, “Okay but you got to be like me.” What if we don’t have to be like you? What if we don’t have to do some of these things we think we have to do and we just allow that this beautiful space of heaven within being whatever that is that lights you up, which to me is, “My heaven to me is my beautiful soul being that creates my own heaven.” That’s how I look at it.
Mike:	I love the word that you used, your own ‘soul being’. When you use that phrase, ‘soul being’ is that your purist self, where the world’s not influencing, where you’re just truly yourself at a place of good? What does that mean to you?
Rick:	My soul being is that place that is truly my essence of me allowing me to honestly be myself. I step into that … I try to step into it as much as I can. I know that as a human one of the things that shows up for me is allowing the judgments or the expectations of others to take me out of that when I can hold other’s expectations or society’s how we’re supposed to show up in the world and go, “Okay, well that works for me. This works for me.” Back to Dr. Jen, [inaudible 00:06:37] works but it fits here in my spirituality when I bring all that together, my soul being is the essence of what I allow myself to say, “This is who I am. I know this is true for me and I allow myself to embrace that all of this is what makes me me. It’s that genuine uniqueness of me that is my soul lessons.”
Mike:	It’s beautiful. For anyone listening right now, a great question to ask ourselves is if you were to write it down, how would you describe your soul being? I love that you’re giving us that Rick. It’s a great, almost a tool that people can think about to try to help themselves, have some exploration. They could be beautiful and really think what is that at it’s purest place? The question of today’s show, the whole theme of today’s show is love and finding it within us. If we don’t know who ‘us’ it’s been really hard to figure that out about the whole love concept.
Dr. Jenn	It goes both ways because we don’t know who we are. Then it’s hard to find love within and vice versa. Maybe they go hand in hand of the continual process of pulling back the layers of who do I want to be? Who am I in integrity with my values? Who do I want to be in this world, how do I want to be of service? How do I want to express compassion to my self and compassion to others? Digging up those layers while then we are also pulling back what is love? What gets in the way of self love and what’s that even feel like to really drop into a space of unconditional self love? I’m an atheist so both of those they go hand in hand.
Rick:	Absolutely. When you can hold those hands together of self love and unconditional love and I have a lot because of the work I do, working with a lot of people or have done and do some to some degree still, people coming out of the closet to be who they are in their sexuality. This self love is the greatest lesson. I’m also learning what unconditional love is because we so badly as humans … I’m going to put it in the bigger scope first.
	I believe we so badly as humans all desire, not need. I don’t believe it’s a need but I think we all desire to feel and experience unconditional love. When I take it down to the microcosm of the LGBTQ community, that magnifies so much because we are told you can’t be loved because of who you, what you are da da da da. It starts within. We have to start unconditionally loving ourselves in order to begin to experience what self love is so that we can also go from self love and unconditional love simultaneously whether anybody else wants to give that to us or not. What I found in my journey was the more I began to really embrace my own self love I also learned what unconditional love was because I was giving it to myself.
Dr. Jenn:	I am curious Rick when you say that. I feel like what would be a difficult obstacle to overcome a lot of folks is even starting point to know that they are deserving and worthy of love in the first place. I’m just curious like how do you help folks embrace that even initially?
Rick:	Well, the first place we start is so what does love mean to you? Get that clear. It’s like let’s not get to the upper stuff yet. Let’s ask, “What does love mean to you? Where aren’t you experiencing that?” Not just in your coming out process. “Where in life do you not feel love and when you don’t feel love what does that look like?” How does that feel because you got to get clear on what not being loved feels like and what you believe love does feel like. Then we can start to spring board. Okay so if you now know what love doesn’t feel like, it’s like the question of, “What don’t you want?”
	We can all say what we don’t want but the hard question is what do you want? What does love really look like for you and when I ask that question to clients a lot of times it’s really, really hard for them to answer the question. They know what love doesn’t feel like but to say what would love feel like for you if you didn’t have anybody judging it, if you didn’t have to worry about what anybody else thought and you get to choose what love feels like for you, what would it look like?
	Once I can talk them and walk them through that experience, which isn’t like, “Okay we do this in one particular session,” it can take two or three times of really diving in at this. Then we can start to go so let’s talk about, if that’s what love feels like ... Of course as they’re answering I’m starting to like give them some really nuggets towards, “So what would it be like if you were able to give that kind of love to yourself without saying [inaudible 00:11:40] have self love,” then I keep nudging them towards, “Okay if that’s self love then let’s take it to another level.
	What do you think the term unconditional love.” That’s usually one that screws people up. It’s like, “Oh it’s not possible,” or, “I think it’s this.” It’s all a nudging and a stepping, a nudging and a stepping with the ultimate goal as … You can [inaudible 00:12:03] on the person, “My ultimate goal would be I really want you to experience self love so you can experience unconditional love so that in this journey of coming out, you don‘t have that hinge on your experience of being who you are. If you don’t get any of that from anybody else, you’re okay.”
Mike:	I love the spring board because I do this in my work. On stage people say, “I don’t know how to talk to my partner about what we want to do in bed. I don’t know that they even know what they want to do in bed.” The first question I’ll say is, “I guarantee you a question and most people can’t answer, ‘what do they not want to do in bed?'” It’s amazing how many people are, “I know that.” Well then start there. Start there. What do they not want to do?
	You might get surprised by that answer. They might say, “I don’t want to do this one thing that you’ve been doing for 20 years.” By asking the question, it opens the doorway of, “All right, these are all the things that you don’t want to do. What other things you do want to start with?” What’s just a beginning part? What would you like to try? What would you like to start with? What you just described there Rick is the same thing with love.
	What are the things that don’t feel right and what would just be a starting what it would feel? The keyword there is what if you just had a little bit, just to him a little. What would a little bit feel like? For some people, the idea of jumping to what does love feel like, it seems so grandiose they can’t relate. What would a little love feel like? What would that do?
Rick:	One of the things that helps them is taking them back to a place where they can remember what love was. I believe no matter what experience you’ve been through and I’ve worked with some clients who’ve through some pretty horrific things but when was that very first time you can remember experiencing love like you saw a puppy in the window or you were on the play ground and that buddy or friend of yours came up to you and just really smiled on you and said, “I’m so glad we’re friends.” That first time you remember hearing your parents actually say, “I love you.”
	It’s let’s go way back to the very first time you knew what love was. Let’s just experience that a little bit. I’m not asking to grab on to this and hold on to this and let’s make this big grandiose thing and let’s play our own version of The Bachelorette. Let’s take it one little step at a time here because it does become consuming. So many that I have worked with have that injury already of you can’t be loved because you’re LGBTQ it takes a lot of small baby steps to get to that place where you can start to really feel the love within.
Dr. Jenn:	I found myself recently instead of using the word love I’ve just been using the word open hearted a lot more. Adjust it for somebody to understand the difference because I’ve been really throwing myself into compassion. Last fall I took an eight week cultivating compassion class, I just took a little refresher course last night also. With the current political climate, many of us were finding that necessary. I found that the open hearted terminology, just when I talk with folks, I talk about, “What is it to move through the world from a place of love<” Which blows most of our minds.
	The I play with the idea what is it to be open hearted? Even just to get folks to tap into what that feels like. Ricky mentioned something about the first time you saw like a puppy in the wind or something like that. That’s actually like pets or animals are something that I use because that’s often easy for folks to feel really open hearted, like literally that expansive warm feeling in their heart. I say, “Imagine a pet that you love or imagine if you have kids something they did that you felt really proud about.”
	Folks can access that little opening, warmth heart feeling and then I go, “Versus imagine somebody kicking that pet, kicking that dog that matters so much to you.” Often people feel that restriction like they close in in their heart. You feel that tightness or you feel that anger and so that difference of open hearted flowing versus closed. Just for folks to be able to get that, that semantic that that [inaudible 00:16:19] difference between those and then just start to build and get the nuances of that and then where do you actually start to be able to cultivate choice around that in their interactions with others as you move through the world and how you view yourself.
Mike:	I love Dr. Jen how you brought up what does it feel when you don’t see the right thing? For those listening right now, how do we help and ourselves, others recognize when self love is not present? What’s the warning sign? What’s the cliche‘ ‘red flag’? What are things we can look for in our life that says, “Hey, I need to take a breath here because I’m not in a place of self love. I am not in a place of loving unconditionally. What are signs that either you Rick or Dr. Jenn say, “Hey, here’s what I help people with. Look for this.”
Rick:	Well, I think obvious ones are anger, frustration, just lack of energy. Those are like three right off the top that I can go with any client to. Others are going to be like true apathy, you don’t have any desire for anything. When I can pick up on those things or … Here’s another one. Lot’s of energy. Sometimes if they are demonstrating lots of energy, the thing I will say is, “Okay, you got lots of energy today so you are either hyped up on Red Bull,” or, “What are you running from that you don’t want to like about yourself right now?”
	It’s so interesting when somebody hears that. They are like, “Damn, how did he know what’s going on with me?” It’s so interesting that we as humans have these so interesting huge swings of what we do to avoid some of the stuff.
Mike:	One, I love that you used anger because for a lot of people, they might think, “Well, I don’t get angry.” I’d say, “All right, what if it wasn’t anger? What irritability?” I know about me when I’m snapping and it might not be obnoxiously cruel or mean or anything but I just hear that snap in my attitude and my voice or being short. For a lot of people what’s interesting is a lot of people know not to do that with their parents. They know not to do that with their kids so who’s left?
	Their partner. Their partner gets the blunt of that energy that is so negative, that is not coming from a place of self love though. That’s not someone who you want to be not sharing love with obviously. A good test is, are you being short with the person that you can most share with in the world, the one that you feel safest with because that’s what you’re most likely to it with? Are you being irritable with them? Do you catch that? That to me is often the red flat of, “Oops, something is going on here. I’m being short for no reason of anything they said. It’s something that’s going on with me.”
Dr. Jenn:	I was jotting notes during this. What you guys shared is exactly the type of stuff because I went to anger right away and went to that, like how are we distracting ourselves. If you’re noticing that you’re numbing yourself or running or hiding more, having more wine at night time or zoning out on Facebook or Instagram more or video games or whatever it is, you’re disconnecting. You’re numbing, you’re running, you’re distracting and/or if you’re lashing out.
	All of these things that we do when we’re not being mindful and not aware of the ups and downs of our emotions and when we’re stuck on heads too much and detached from our bodies. I’d say all of those things are things that we do when we are on automatic pilot or when we are stressed or we are just so caught up in our heads and not being grounded in the moment and checking in with the everyday joys and every day appreciations and that are available in every moment.
	It’s absolutely a mindfulness type thing to check in with ourselves. I think whether you’re sitting down to meditate and doing formal mindfulness practices or not, at least every day some sort of reflection back on your day of looking at, “Okay, was I kind to myself? Was the little voice going off in my head and beating myself up or making me wrong? Where did I feel like I was running, numbing, distracting or lashing out.” Not in a way to beat yourself up for but just in a way of reflecting on your day in like, “Where did I feel off today? What do I think I could have done differently? If I may not seen situation tomorrow, what might I try that’s different, that’s kinder to myself and maybe more compassionate to others?”
Mike:	Dr. Jen, you bring up the numbing, which Renee Brown talks a lot about also in this idea that when we are on the internet, we don’t even recognize we’re numbing. It’s such an addictive response that we don’t recognize. I catch myself more and more like asking the question why am I going on right now? A good piece of the time that answer is boredom, which means I’m numbing. Whenever the answer is boredom you’re numbing. For any activity you choose just about that is not bringing some for of fulfillment or maybe allowing you to be mindful in a moment.
	Social media is not being mindful in the moment. That’s not what it’s about. That’s for sure. That’s always a good test of why am I going online? Why am I having this extra drink tonight? Why am I, whatever it is for the person who’s …? You gave the example you’re having more wine at the end of the night. Why am I making this choice? What’s going on there? Sometimes it’s that we don’t know how to quiet the brain. If we can’t quiet the brain, we can’t take time to love ourselves.
	That’s a struggle for me. It’s just quieting the brain enough to allow myself to really have that self love and that compassion for a busy day, a busy life. Stress and be compassionate enough to yourself to say, “It’s okay to do nothing. You don’t need to go online to do something. It’s okay to do nothing.” That’s part of loving yourself. I don’t know if I’m right or wrong there. What do the two of you think?
Rick:	I think you’re spot on Mike. As you were saying that, one of the first things that runs through my head was it’s interesting to me that we can quiet our brain for somebody else but we can’t do it for ourselves. We will quiet ourselves down and focus on somebody else in our life because, “Ooh, they need me to be here present for them,” but the moment we turn that back and ourselves, “Okay, now I got to get busy again.” It’s insane that we do that. In fact I was working with a client yesterday who has literally been in the workforce 28 years, has never had a break. Basically went from job to job literally, not like jumping from to job but as one career move would end he’d go right to the next and right to the next and …
	He suddenly finds himself without a job and trying to make the next move. His partner said to him, “Why don’t you just enjoy this time?” He doesn’t know how to do that. He doesn’t have to go back to work right away. He could actually not work for the next two years and be completely okay. More than okay. What we worked through yesterday was what is it going to take for you to really embrace and love yourself enough to just be in this moment and let that be the thing that guides you to your next move and it came down to him.
	It was so ironic. As we’re sitting with Mike, “I think we’re going to talk about this tomorrow on the podcast, this whole self love thing,” because he had to open up to that possibility of really loving himself enough to let himself embrace, I don’t have to be doing anything right now. It’s really okay for me to love myself, to let myself do nothing.
Mike:	I personally went through that in the summer of 16, of 2016. I was sitting in on my mastermind. For those now listening, mastermind is a group that counsels each other, advises each other in their businesses and they were all speakers. It’s a small group. It’s five people or so. We’re talking about, “Hey, I just want to focus on my unique-ability,” and one of my mastermind members who’s also a cast member Laurie, Laurie Guest had said, “Mike why don’t you just take a vacation from everything except speaking?” [inaudible 00:24:30] like, “I can’t do that.”
	She was like, “Wait a second. You speak 110 days a year. Most people that fly all over the world trying to pull your schedule doing to do what you do would not be doing anything other than that and recovering and resting from that. You’re trying to do this and this and this and what if you just said, ‘It’s okay that I do all this, and I don’t have to do the other nine things.'” What occurred, and it first it was, “Let’s try that for two weeks.” Then the goal was six months but let’s just get away with two weeks.
	Then three months, then six months. You know what, six months came around. We’re like, “Why would I stop doing this? I’m actually getting more done, we’re able to be in our truly correct space that I should be in and without the chaos of what’s next.” That’s a great example Rick that you gave of it doesn’t have to be what’s next. It’s how about just be present now because if you are, you are going to give so much of yourself to the world at a higher level and a more intense level because you’re not distracted. You’re not overwhelmed and you’re in a place of love and purity.
Dr. Jenn:	What comes to mind for me is the term restlessness. I was reading a Pema Chodron’s book last fall, I think it’s ‘The places that scare you.’ I hadn’t thought of that term before and how much that comes into play. When we’re used to being productive or just … How we’re trained as a society that our mind is always going and sort of our fragmented thoughts and the quick pace with technology, that’s really cultivated a restlessness in a lot of us. So when we pause or try to slow down or when people just try to meditate for five or ten minutes or when you try to work less or you try to shut down your brain at night time and then find yourself on social media.
	I can get to underlying restlessness in our body. That’s been something I’ve been playing with since last fall is noticing what does that actually feel like physiologically in my body and what it is to sit with that and stay with the discomfort because it is a discomfort to sit with that restlessness and just become intimate with that restlessness and allow that space, and just shine that bright light on it? To me just giving that that space and acknowledging it and being with that discomfort helps move me through it a lot more quickly.
Rick:	Dr. Jenn, here’s something else I was thinking as you were talking because there is this restlessness peace but then there’s also this struggle that I think people have and I think it relates to the restlessness of allowing yourself to be at peace that people struggle with too which is part of restlessness. It’s like, “Okay, I want to be just focused, I want to be present.” It’s like [inaudible 00:27:21] that we have to train, it’s the same thing. “Now, I’m going to do this,” but this restlessness shows up because you’re so used to going, going, going.
	You also have the opposite extreme of, “Okay, now I want to be at peace but I can’t be at peace,” so these two things again, here we are holding hands at what is self loving is to slow down the restlessness and to be at peace so the two opposites are again, holding hands yet it brings up that energy of how can I do this because I haven’t allowed myself to love myself enough to know that being at peace and being present is really a condition of self love and self care.
Dr. Jenn:	Absolutely. Yeah.
Mike:	What a perfect way to bring us around here to the discussion. Wrapping up here, what’s a book both of you have found was insightful or of great use when really looking that love and how to find it from within us or that you have found that really helps others?
Rick:	One that, I don’t know why it just came to mind, it doesn’t focus necessarily on it but Oprah’s book I think it’s ‘These things I know for sure’, there’s so many examples she gives in there of how she found ways to be loving of herself so that she could be loving to others. It’s such an easy read. It’s not every page is going to be about love but there’s lots of little tid bits in there.
Dr. Jenn:	I’d say, I mentioned Pema Chodron already and I’d say her book ‘When things fall apart’ because that’s just like talk about a paradigm shift about in general how we are trained to move through the world and even think about love and it’s just like pulling the rug out from under your leg. “Oh, shit.” It’s a wake up call and it’s rough but she’s so loving in her writing and so down to earth and honest. It’s fantastic.
Mike:	Awesome. For everyone listening, you can always go back to the website, everydaymindfulnessshow.com and this will be in the shown notes. You can find the book, the author, there’ll be a link there. Thank you both Rick and Dr. Jennifer joining me today.
Dr. Jenn:	Absolutely. This was a pleasure.
Rick:	Yeah, thanks Mike. Appreciate it.
Mike:	Absolutely. For everyone listening out there, remember you can find out about Dr. Jen and Rick Clemons on our website. You can learn about all of our cast, our billion cast members at everydaymindfulnessshow.com. Until next time may you enjoy every day mindfulness in your life.
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Mentioned in This Episode:

Breakfast with Buddha, by Roland Merullo

The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times, by Pema Chödrön

What I Know For Sure, by Oprah Winfrey

When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times, by Pema Chödrön

Rick Clemons is the Author of Frankly My Dear I’m Gay, Host of The Coming Out Lounge podcast, certified life coach, TEDx Speaker, world record holder, and a guy who’s helped 1,000s of people in over 50 countries across the globe come out of the closets of their lives to escape their bullshit, explore their fears, and elevate their f*cking self-expression.

Rickclemons.com

Facebook.com/rickclemonsofficial

Twitter.com/RickClemons

Dr. Jenn, sociologist, and sexologist, is a frequent speaker about sexual empowerment, healthy relationships, erotic play, and mindful sex. She has presented two TEDx Talks, is a writer on sex and relationships, and a recurring intimacy expert on the morning news. Dr. Jenn has over 1.3 million hits on her In the Den with Dr. Jenn YouTube video series and is an expert in the new documentary on masturbation, called Sticky: A (Self) Love Story.