Episode Transcript
<p><!--block-->Alara Sage (00:02.095)<br>Hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of the Ecstatic Woman podcast where we activate and inspire women in their power, in their authenticity, and in their bliss. I'm your host, Alara Sage. And my beloved ecstatics, you know, we've talked here before about our monkey mind, about overthinking. Today we're going to go deeper into this topic. It's going to be a really delicious conversation.<br><br>We're going really cover what is the wandering mind and how we can use it for our benefit. We have a special guest today, which I'm really excited for, Hossein Kurosmer. Kind of said that right. Thank you.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (00:46.744)<br>You said it right, Alara. It's a real pleasure to be here. Yeah, it's so wonderful to be here speaking to your audience. Thank you for having<br><br>Alara Sage (00:53.871)<br>Thank you. And Hossain is an author and physician scientist who spent over two decades in cancer research and drug development. And thanks to his background, he recognized extraordinary ramifications of a recent scientific discovery. And from this discovery, he wrote his book, Breakthrough, Master Your Default Mode, and Thrive. So he's been helping readers and helping people to master this modality<br><br>live their life happier and more fulfilling. So let's dive right into this delicious topic because I want to hear from you. What is the wandering mind? Like what what is it? What's the purpose of this part of ourself?<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (01:38.025)<br>Yeah. Let me take a step back and describe the title of the book is Breakthrough, both in terms of a scientific breakthrough, which I'll talk about this default mode network, but also the act of breaking through. And so what is it that you're breaking through and what is the breakthrough? It is an understanding of this wandering mind.<br><br>So this wandering mind of ours until now hasn't had a name and now it has a name. It is called officially the default mode network and it is the part of your mind that turns on when your brain wanders away from the present. And we're all a little bit different. Our brains work differently. For some of us, our mind wanders back into the past. We relive old memories from childhood or from yesterday. Maybe gives us some emotional pain, some trauma. Other<br><br>Well, their minds wander to the future and they're stuck worried with anxiety about the future. And so we're all a little bit different, but this wandering mind has its hand in some pretty bad mental knots, as I call them. I don't call them diseases or syndromes, but by understanding this default mode network, you can break through to a more peaceful place, a spiritual place, a happy place. And that's really what the book's all about.<br><br>Alara Sage (02:58.501)<br>really love how you say that everybody's different because that's absolutely true and that some people will spend more time in their past or some people will spend more time in their future. And I feel like that can even shift, right? Sometimes maybe we get into this mode where we're in our past more or into this mode where we're into our future more. And as we talk about on the show a lot, the present, the here now is really where we want to be. It's where our joy, our fulfillment,<br><br>really lives so tell us what is the point of the default mode.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (03:34.641)<br>Yes.<br><br>So first of all, the purpose of your wandering mind, it's not there to bother you or annoy you, although it may seem that way. The purpose of the default mode network, your wandering mind, it is trying to go back into the past or think about the future to help you. What it's trying to do is it's trying to process old memories and help you succeed, help you be happy. But what happens a lot of times is this wandering mind becomes<br><br>active and and no longer serves its purpose and ends up giving us unintentionally some pain. So this book is first of all about self understanding, self growth, the first step in the process, really understanding how your brain works, why it's doing the things that it does, and then giving you really specific tools on how to silence this default mode network and how to heal it so that it works for you and not against you. We all have it. I have it.<br><br>wandering mind. A couple of years ago, it trapped me in anxiety, in stress, in pain, addiction. But over, it took me about six months, but I was able to heal this wandering mind. And now when my mind wanders, more often than not, it leads to a good decision or a solution to a problem. I'm now in a much happier place because I understand how my brain works and I set the intention of how I want that relationship with that wandering mind.<br><br>Alara Sage (05:05.285)<br>Hmm, I definitely want to get into that, but I want to go back to something you said about processing because this is really huge and understanding healing and self evolution, right? Because oftentimes we don't process trauma and we don't even process fully experiences. You know, we're constantly just moving on to the next experience when we haven't given our mind and our nervous system the time and the spaciousness<br><br>process that experience. And to me, what happens a lot with this wandering mind is that the unresolved energy needs to be seen. And so maybe we're up against something in our life that has a similar vibratory frequency to that trauma or something about that experience. And so our mind triggers back to that and wants us to process that, wants us to see that, or it's automatically projecting<br><br>that trauma, that pain into the future, right? Trying to protect us from it happening again. Is that true to how you see<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (06:11.426)<br>That's You got it. There's one thing you said that really resonates. You said, that pain wants to be seen. That is the critical word. Because it turns out,<br><br>There is another part of the brain, it has a fancy term, it's called the central executive network. It's your observing mind. That is actually the part of your brain that's on when you're seeing, when you're observing, when you're present. And it is actually the key to quieting down the monkey mind, to resolving a lot of these issues, the old pain you've experienced. For a lot of us, and I was this way too, old traumas, old memories, we bury them, they try to come to the<br><br>Instead of seeing that pain, we medicate the pain. We try to ignore the pain, distract the pain rather than simply experiencing the pain. Maybe because that part of our brain, observing mind isn't strong enough, or maybe we need some help, someone to help us process and observe. this is, you really just nailed the point of the book, which is a lot of us are trapped in this wandering mind. The key to breaking through it is to strengthen<br><br>observing mind and there are a lot of tools and practices you can use to strengthen that. But like a muscle it's something you do have to strengthen with practice, regular practice. You can't just wake up one day and expect to awaken, you have to work towards that. So we can talk about it.<br><br>Alara Sage (07:44.239)<br>Which I love how you say, I saw some of that in some of your other talks about you're really saying you have to practice. And it's so important because sometimes we just want this quick fix. it is any kind of mastery of anything that we want to learn, we have to practice it. We have to learn it keep practicing it until we achieve it, until we understand it, until we... It really becomes organic, doesn't it? It becomes something that we start to default to.<br><br>rather than not default to. And so I really love how you bring that and you keep saying that because it's really important to make people aware of that. You know, with meditation, for instance, people, I remember I did, I just thought I was going to sit down and like Zen out. Right. And I sat down and instead I had the monkey mind and it was like, hello, you're here. I'm so happy. Like, let me tell you everything that I've been wanting to tell you. And I found myself totally overthinking rather than<br><br>calming my mind and it took regular consistent practice to learn how to release that and be in this very still, you know, in stillness and stillness of thought. Not to say the wandering mind never happens, but your ability to work with your wandering mind, which you're referring to is much more mastered and, you know,<br><br>So you talk about the central executive and I really love that and you're also calling it the observer. Tell us a little bit about that part of our brain and what is its function.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (09:11.83)<br>Mm<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (09:19.016)<br>That's right. So the central executive network, the observing mind, that's the part of your mind that's on when you're doing mindfulness. You just mentioned when you're in that state and you're sitting down and your monkey mind is racing, let's say all the thoughts are there. But guess what? There is something observing that<br><br>That is your central executive. That is your observing mind. So I like to this what you just talked about. The analogy I like to have is let's say there's a lake after a really bad storm. The lake is muddy. You can't see through it. You look at the lake. It's muddy and it's frustrating. Right. But you wait and the mud slowly settles down very slowly. The clarity appears in that lake. And the same is true for your mind. You may observe your mind and observe a state of distraction.<br><br>But you keep at it, you keep going. And as your observing mind grows, just as a muscle grows, you start to very, very slowly see more clarity and more peace. And you start to see the baseline nature of your mind in that observing mind, which is peaceful, which is blissful. And it's that same part of your mind in children and infants, let's say, you know, I've got a three year old and he is present. He doesn't have a default mode network yet. It'll be for<br><br>soon but he's present he's curious he's playful that's those are the qualities of that observing mind and for me it took me six months to really be in that state that flow state that it's called being in the zone<br><br>So what you're doing with mindfulness, with prayer, with spiritual practice, you're tapping into that central executive network. When you pray, for example, you come to the present moment with full honesty, with full acceptance of the present moment as it is, which is the same thing you do in mindfulness. And in both of those, that is your observing mind that you're tapping into. like anything with practice, you strengthen it. And when you strengthen it,<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (11:20.001)<br>it takes you to a pretty good place, I have to say.<br><br>Alara Sage (11:24.367)<br>I saying this is so wonderful because you're really taking, you know, what we've been talking about in spirituality for a very long time and you're equating it to actually parts of the brain, which is really magnificent because we need this. We need this coherence between science and spirituality. And so I just want to really celebrate you for really bringing this through in a way that really helps bridge these gaps that we really need bridged.<br><br>and bring it in so that people can connect to the fact that this is actually like a part of your brain, you know, and that there's nothing wrong with you. If you have a monkey mind, if you have a wandering mind, you're not broken, you know, you're not bad, you're not wrong. It's actually a part of your mind. And as we've been talking, you can shift that and utilize it to your benefit. When we talk about the observer, you know, again, when I meditate, most of the time when I'm meditating,<br><br>I just go into stillness. However, there are still times when I'm particularly working through another layer of belief structures in my life. And when I go to sit down into stillness, those thoughts are coming up. And just as you said, as we observe, just observing the thoughts, right? The thoughts are existing. You're not trying to stop the thoughts. You're not getting frustrated with yourself. You're not trying to change your state of being.<br><br>You're just in the level of acceptance that, my mind is currently active. Let's just observe the thoughts. And it's so beautiful because whatever I'm currently working on in my energetic field and in my conscious creation is exactly what those thoughts are expressing. They're showing perhaps a trauma or a belief structure or a pattern that I was in and how that belief<br><br>created a pattern over and over again and certain individuals that were a part of the co -creation of that belief structure and through observing it you watch this train of thoughts come through and then as you said it starts to soften and all the silt begins to sink down and you kind of sink back down into this clarity. I just got a total bliss hit just now. Whoa of just<br><br>Alara Sage (13:40.001)<br>I am presence, right? So after those trains of thoughts go, because you're holding the energy of acceptance, which is to me one of the key points, you're not self judging or self criticizing, then you're giving it the spaciousness and the frequency of acceptance, which ultimately is love, which allows the settling and the clarity to be revealed.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (13:48.612)<br>That's<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (14:01.78)<br>Beautifully said, beautifully said. mean, don't we have such a miraculous brain that can automatically process things for us? And so what I, you know, more recently, I've really have gratitude for this wandering mind because look, life, life is hard, right? There are unexpected things that happen all the time. We can't always live in peace and harmony. But guess what? When a traumatic event happens, our wandering mind will automatically revisit it, automatically process it,<br><br>decide which memories to keep, decide how we're going to change our future behavior. So what I'd like to do now is when my mind starts to wander, have gratitude for it. Observe it, watch it go and say thank you wandering mind. It just went earlier today, went off to Friday, made me remember that there's something meeting coming up and I wrote some emails. It helped me get ready for the future. So rather than being angry at it when you're trying to be mindful, peaceful, and it shows up, observe it. What is it trying to<br><br>And as long as you have that honesty and acceptance, go with it, observe it, see where it takes you. It may be leading you somewhere, but eventually it will take you back to that place of peace. you said it really well.<br><br>Alara Sage (15:16.729)<br>Yes, I love that. I love the gratitude because all of a sudden that opens up the energy, doesn't it? Without gratitude, we can't really see the wisdom. We're just narrow, we're narrowed down with horse blinders, right? And the wisdom is there. What our mind, what our body, what our higher self is trying to show us is there, but because we're judging it, we can't see the wisdom. So I love how you bring in gratitude. And yes, that will absolutely open up the information field so you can actually receive.<br><br>from this beautiful intelligence that we have. really enjoying this conversation. I want to get into specific tips, but before we do that, I really want to connect and ask you, have you connected the nervous system, particularly the vagus nerve, with this part of the brain? Because to me, that's where we store so much of our trauma. And when I'm working in my body and my mind, again,<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (15:59.813)<br>Yes.<br><br>Alara Sage (16:09.241)<br>Working those energies through different areas of my body, but absolutely through my nervous<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (16:14.776)<br>Absolutely, yes.<br><br>So let me tell you a little bit about this book. So I break down what I call 11 mental knots. I don't call them syndromes or disorders. Those terms make it seem like these are unfixable problems. But knots like knots in a rope you can untie and heal essentially. The very first knot in the book is stress. And this is where the vagus nerve comes in. So stress it's number one. A lot of times we have issues past trauma rather than dealing with it. It comes.<br><br>It manifests as stress. And what's happening in stress is the body, the mind is releasing hormones into the blood, adrenaline, cortisol, which get your heart rate going, which actually shuttle energy away from your immune system, make you more susceptible to illness. So this stress response can unfortunately worsen diseases. It can lead to heart disease and cancer. And so how do you reverse stress? Well, you tap into the vagus nerve, what you just said,<br><br>Basically by releasing what's called GABA in the brain by releasing that GABA you can activate that vagal response It's called the parasympathetic pathway and prevent stress from happening. So not one learning how to prevent your stress from escalating is Very important and will allow you to untie and heal the other knots. how what is okay? No, you mentioned earlier. We want quick fixes, right? What's it's Friday night and what's the fastest way to get<br><br>the flowing in the mind, it's a glass of wine. Right? A glass of wine gets the GABA flowing. Boom. Relaxation. Unfortunately, that alcohol, it's damaging your liver. It's damaging your cells. Not the healthiest way to release GABA, but the much healthier ways. Breathing exercises, mindfulness, prayer. And we're all a little different. I'm very auditory. So for me, focusing on sounds around me.<br><br>Alara Sage (18:04.857)<br>Yes.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (18:14.081)<br>taking a walk in nature, really listening, gets the gaba flowing. So the key is to spend 20 to 30 minutes relaxing, but doing it mindfully. So mindful relaxation, 20 minutes of it, whatever works best for you will get that vagus nerve going and prevent your stress basically. So that's the first knot. Yeah.<br><br>Alara Sage (18:36.581)<br>Well now I'm super intrigued about all the other nuts.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (18:38.433)<br>Well, another knot, well the second knot is emotional pain. That's also big in many people's lives. It was big in my life. I had a lot of it growing up, even ancestral emotional pain and really getting at the root cause and healing it at the root. And so there are tools you can use there, including working with a therapist, cognitive behavioral therapy.<br><br>breaking the link between that memory and that emotion, many different ways of doing that, including mindfulness, different forms of mindfulness. But ultimately, the most powerful tool is the power of forgiveness, where you can completely eradicate all old emotional pain. And that default mode network, that wandering mind puts up a fight, does not want you to forgive. But when you learn to tame that wandering mind, it makes it a lot easier to forgive, to heal and<br><br>on.<br><br>Alara Sage (19:36.173)<br>and it's important to understand you know with forgiveness I think people automatically assume that it's somehow saying you know you're validating what was done to you right if it was coming from another person or even to yourself you're validating the actions when forgiveness from my perspective and from a spiritual perspective it's really releasing the karmic tie between you and that experience it really lets go of as you said the emotional trauma it releases it from your body<br><br>releases it from your space and you're no longer actually tied to that experience because until we forgive we are we're energetically tied to that experience. I love how you bring in forgiveness. So the 11 knots are they all the the knots that the default mode is kind of referring to is that what those knots<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (20:26.817)<br>These are knots that's right. These are knots where the default mode network has its hand in and can keep you in a state of suffering that when you learn to recognize this default mode network, silence it and heal it, you can recover and heal from these knots. Yeah, exactly.<br><br>Alara Sage (20:47.001)<br>Yeah, that's really powerful. Can you name off just name off what the other ones<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (20:50.203)<br>Sure. So number three is addictive craving. That's my term for addiction. It's a little softer term. Addictive craving. Loneliness is number four. Negativity, that sort of judgmental negativity is one. Anxiety and anger is one. Dissatisfaction is one. Dishonesty and denial. Inaction, which is sort of procrastination or inaction.<br><br>And then poor lifestyle, which is sort of sleep, diet and exercise. I put that towards the end of the book. And the very last one is resistance to change where you need that. And each of each of these has a remedy basically for it. But as you loosen that default mode network, it becomes easier and easier. And once you get a taste, the process gains momentum on its own. And yeah, so it's.<br><br>There are spiritual tools in there. There are medical, clinical tools in there, very practical tools. I try to put everything in one place. Even some controversial tools like plant medicines are in there, not yet approved. They silence the default mode network so that it's all in one place.<br><br>Alara Sage (22:00.849)<br>I love that so much. And I just really love the work you're doing. I really feel like probably everybody can probably relate to all of those. You know, I mean, I definitely could, as you said, them I've had all of those in my life at some time. I've shifted the vast majority of them through the process of the observer. So let's talk about that a little bit more. How do you help people or how would you recommend that start there that people<br><br>learn to utilize their observer<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (22:33.208)<br>Yes. So and by the way, I wrote this especially for people who are a bit skeptical of this whole process, maybe doctors, scientists, lawyers who don't want anything spiritual going on, especially for them. So it turns out.<br><br>Yeah, one of the best ways to get that observing mind going is to set your intention, which we did before this call. Setting that intention, when you set that intention, you actually enter that observer because you come into the present with honesty, with acceptance. You sort of acknowledge your state. OK, I'm unhappy. I'm miserable. I have an intention to go down this road. That act turns on that observing mind, actually just that alone.<br><br>And so just doing that every day, five, 10 minutes every single morning, remind yourself of your intention, not just your goal of what you want to accomplish, but your intention of how you want to live, how you want to live pursuing that goal. That will start the process. Just that. So if you can start that, you're on your way. And then it's really coming to understand what is it that silences that wandering mind and turns on that observing mind? We're all a little bit different, but what I recommend in the<br><br>is spend five or ten minutes first observe your state whatever it is if you look inside and there's the monkey mind that's fine observe that spend ten minutes doing any of the tools in the book ranging from focus exercise there are prayers in the book there's dozens of things you can try and at the end of those ten minutes look again inside<br><br>And is there any difference? If there's no difference, then that exercise is probably not for you. But if you find yourself a little bit calmer, a little bit more at ease, that's a clue that maybe this activity can strengthen that observing mind. So do that repeatedly, 15, 20 minutes, a couple of times a day and keep at it. So for me, it was mindfulness. was insight meditation. Very powerful Vipassana.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (24:42.944)<br>but for others have done it and they got nothing out of it. So we're all a little bit different, but figure out what works best for you.<br><br>Alara Sage (24:51.331)<br>Yeah, again, it's so important and I really love that you honor everybody's individuality and what really works for them because it's really important that each person really find that rhythm. Otherwise, we're kind of trying to stick that square peg into a round hole and feeling bad that it's not working. Why is this particular modality or tool not working for me? There must be something wrong with me. Whereas again, it's kind of like if you have a spectrum of tools that you can pull from,<br><br>and find the ones that really work for you. And you can always invite yourself to try new ones that maybe are a little bit harder for you. Maybe if meditation or that inward meditation is challenging for you, you can have those other tools in your toolbox that are quick and easy for you. And simultaneously, challenge yourself into one that isn't quick and easy for you so that we're always expanding that space for ourselves.<br><br>It reminds me a lot of what I teach as the four keys to embodiment. The first one is presence. You know, is that awareness of presence? The second one is breathing, right? The using our breath to really be in the present moment. The third one is our voice, which you had kind of alluded to with sound and we can use prayer or we can use affirmations or we can just simply state our intention over and over again. I do this thing in my kitchen where I just, have an island. And the last several houses I've moved around a lot.<br><br>The last several houses I've lived in have this island I think it's just kind of how my higher self is always creating this island so I can do this and I just walk around the island and I just say affirmation after affirmation after affirmation allowing my consciousness to stream through how that affirmation wants to shift or mold and just as you said if you start and at the beginning you kind of observe where you are and you bring in one of these practices and then you observe where you're afterwards, you know<br><br>usually pretty radically shifted your vibration. So I'm always using that. And I do that for several minutes, walking around, really stating these affirmations, following that stream of consciousness. And it just totally lights up my energetic field really powerfully. And some people really like to hear sound as well. But I find our own personal voice is so important and powerful. I want to bring<br><br>Alara Sage (27:12.515)<br>something you said before about intention, because I love that, because I'm a big proponent of intention, having clear intention. And I love how you say not just your goals as intention, but really like how you want to live, right? How you want to create your life. And I think that goes along with values, right? Having those values, those key core values that you really want to bring into your life that maybe right now you're not quite meeting the mark.<br><br>and really connecting to those every day. That is a really beautiful practice, particularly to start your day off in, right? So you've kind of established those. And as you said, that puts you into the observer. And now you're moving directly within that energy.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (27:48.969)<br>Yes.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (27:57.636)<br>Yes. So what happens when you don't set the intention? What happens is then you fall into where the default mode network wants to take you. life, when you're living in that default mode network, when you're literally living life in that monkey mind, it tends to be a very reactive, judgmental place where you're bouncing back and forth almost unconsciously between wanting this, disliking this,<br><br>and just sort of up and down with that. It tends, the default mode network tends to take you, tends to, take you down a road of isolation and loneliness because what it's trying to do, it's trying to make you succeed and it has you believing that to succeed you've got to be better than others, you've got to be richer, you've got to be smarter than others and life becomes very competitive and it takes you down this lonely road.<br><br>So when you're setting that intention, you're sort of challenging that default way of living and consciously saying, look, I want to live with compassion. I want to live with empathy, gratitude. Those are qualities maybe the default mode does not want you to have because it's quite selfish. And in many ways, it is your ego. But I think by challenging this default mode network,<br><br>we find a way to true happiness. And it turns out what really makes us happy is compassion, is gratitude, is empathy. That's actually who we are. And that's why we feel so fulfilled when we help somebody else and feel that gratitude gives us fulfillment, as opposed to making a lot of money doesn't really bring that fulfillment and leaves us wanting more traps us in addiction. So setting that intention is very important.<br><br>So just want to reiterate.<br><br>Alara Sage (29:50.169)<br>Yeah, no, I think it's really important to understand what happens when we don't set an intention. That was really, really powerful. And I also find, you know, like for instance, our ego, you know, we have our personality and we have our ego and it still is, you know, permeable. And so as we practice these acts of observing and compassion and gratitude, you know, they start to become more organic where we start to just naturally desire to feel that compassion or we naturally desire<br><br>to collaborate or lift each other up rather than compete. I love how you brought up competition, because that used to be a really big one for me. Unbeknownst to me, I was like a really hardcore competitor. And I didn't even know it. But I was just constantly evaluating me and everybody else. And I had to be somehow one up, even though I know what does that even mean, right? And so through my own personal practice of really learning how to utilize the observer,<br><br>That's just gone. Like I want other people to just be the most extraordinary version of themselves because we're all very unique and different and there really is no competition. And when we work together, of course we succeed together. But my point being is that, you know, the stillness, the I am ness, that the truth of who we are in my experience begins to permeate more and more that default mode. Is that what your experience has been as<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (31:18.969)<br>You got it. And I was just like you, very competitive. And what I found, you know, I was sitting on a beach, I remember two years ago, and I should have been very happy. I had a lot of accomplishments and family, et cetera, et cetera. I looked inside and there was just deep misery. I'm like, what is going on? Why am I so unhappy? And that actually started on that day. I set this intention of I must experience this higher self, whatever it takes. I don't know what it is.<br><br>And it was a six month journey for me. But what I've discovered is there are two things I need personally to be happy and fulfilled One is to be present here in this moment. And the second is to have an intention to help somebody an intention Those when I have those two things I am as happy as I possibly can be Versus in the past I've you know, I graduated I was like valedictorian and and all these accomplishments and that really didn't bring<br><br>fulfillment. I wish I had learned this 20 years ago, better late than never.<br><br>Alara Sage (32:26.863)<br>When you said that, I literally felt the vibration of that. It was really beautiful. It was very authentic from your heart. And as you mentioned, yeah, it's where we get our most fulfillment, right? Is helping other people. We're just naturally servers in that context. We want to assist. We want to support. We want to co -create. You know, we are, we are community. So I love how you say that. And I definitely invite the audience to,<br><br>contemplate that it seems so simple, you know, we're always talking about the present moment and the importance of it. I talk about it a lot and it's just so good coming from, you know, a physician, scientist and somebody who studied more of the brain and just continue to, we all need to repeat this over and over and over again until humans realize that that's where everything that we desire truly exists.<br><br>and you bring in another aspect which is really from the heart and from love, which is quite beautiful.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (33:29.061)<br>Yeah, yeah. I mean, we're living in an exciting time. have to say you mentioned it earlier. Science and medicine now sit finally sitting at the table with spirituality, with psychotherapy, mental health, finally all sitting at the table. And now I'm seeing clinical studies showing that people who meditate, their brains are different. Their default mode network is silenced. They have increased what's called cortical thickness and a reduced rate of some diseases.<br><br>Studies showing that practicing forgiveness and compassion actually improves your physical health. When I was in medical school, they didn't teach any of this. This is all brand new science. it's amazing to see all of it.<br><br>Alara Sage (34:11.781)<br>Wow, that's incredible. Yeah, my partner will often turn to me and go, what are you thinking? And I'm literally like, I'm actually not. Like I'm literally in stillness. He doesn't meditate. So to him, it's kind of like, he knows me now, but initially he was like, no, but really, what are you thinking? Like I thought I was hiding something from him. Like, no, literally I'm just sitting here being, yeah, so beautiful. And I, you know, for me and my own personal experience,<br><br>It's just been able to really, as we kind of alluded to earlier, handle stress. I've been through extremely stressful circumstance. Well, what would have been labeled as stressful? What other what I would have experienced as stressful in many years ago. And my partner and I were having fun. We were enjoying ourselves. We were laughing. We were like really in the present moment experiencing it without stress, which is just a massive shift in our reality. Like imagine humans living.<br><br>with even a lot less stress, dare we say no stress.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (35:11.691)<br>Yeah. Stress is subjective. It's all created in the mind. You know, we have,<br><br>We have a thought every two to four seconds. It's very, very normal. There's nothing wrong with that. And for many people, those thoughts can trigger stress out of nowhere. Just remembering something that happened earlier in childhood. And it's a painful way to live. But again, you can heal it. And it starts with that intention. we're now, know, in the old days, we didn't talk about this. People just suffered in silence. But now we're talking about it and we have the tools to prevent that suffering. And that's critically important. What you're doing<br><br>is critically important.<br><br>Alara Sage (35:50.105)<br>Same with you. mean, I really celebrate you. As you said, you wrote the book for perhaps people who don't believe so much. And like, I'm so grateful for you writing that book and having the background that you do and merging, bridging these two important truths. Is there anything else you want to say to the audience on this topic?<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (36:12.524)<br>Well, would say those the knots may seem permanent, may seem there's just that's how life is. But they're all you can heal from from each of those. Even judgmental negativity is one that I, my relatives.<br><br>They have it, know, and that's just who they are. But guess what? With intention, you can overcome that and find a happier place. Even in old age, you can, you the brain is plastic. Plastic, not like the material plastic, but there's plasticity. The brain can learn and change and adapt at any age. And it starts with that intention.<br><br>Don't underestimate the power of intention. Set it and find those tools and the people to help you get to where you want to go.<br><br>Alara Sage (37:02.575)<br>I love how you bring up age because I feel like we often believe that after a certain age, whatever it just is, our bodies just this. And I don't believe that. I believe that our body responds to our beliefs, our body responds to our mind. And so I love how you say that no matter your age and the the you the word not like when you say not, I can see the not and some knots, you know, you can untie very easily. And some of those buggers like, you know, you are there.<br><br>working the knot, loosening it right before you can even begin to like untie it and move it. And so I just want to use that analogy for the listeners that, some knots are going to, you know, perhaps because it was more traumatic of an experience or it was a repetitive, like, you know, Chinese water torture that repeated many, many times that knot became very, very tight where other knots will be much looser.<br><br>And just because the knot is tight doesn't mean that, like Hosein says so wonderfully, that that's just the way that it is and that's who you are and you just got to live with yourself. It just means that you're going to have to spend perhaps a little bit more time and a little bit stronger of intention, clear intention, hold that intention for a little bit longer to loosen that knot and ultimately untie<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (38:21.18)<br>That's right. That's right. And what you're doing when you loosen that knot, you're allowing the mind and body to heal itself. Our mind, incredible, miraculous self -healing machine. You just got to give it the right tools to allow it to heal, just like a muscle knot. If you have a muscle knot in your neck, what you do is loosen it and that allows the body to heal the knot. You're allowing the body to do its work.<br><br>Alara Sage (38:47.333)<br>Really beautiful. Yeah, you loosen it the energy flow the blood flow everything starts flowing again and now it's returning back to its original state. So wonderful to have you here. How would you like readers? Where can they find your book? How can they connect to you or not readers listeners?<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (39:04.582)<br>Sure. Yeah. So I have a website. It's your default mode dot com. Just one word. Your default mode. And yeah the book you can start reading it for free there on the website. There is the audio book. I just released that. If you're more of an audio listener and two other books that I wrote in the past are also on there if you want to take a look. And all of the social media handles are at the bottom of the page. So Instagram and Facebook. It's all it's all there as well.<br><br>Alara Sage (39:33.861)<br>Fantastic. Seriously, this has been such a delicious conversation to the listeners. took us several times to get together. We kept both having to reschedule, but I'm glad we stuck it out because this has been just truly, truly delightful. Thank you so much for being on the show with us.<br><br>Hosein Kouros-Mehr (39:50.469)<br>Thank you for your insights, Alara, appreciate it. And yeah, best wishes for you and your guests.<br><br>Alara Sage (39:57.381)<br>To the listeners, get the book. Make sure you have a copy of that. You learn these knots. share that book. If you have people who aren't spiritually inclined and could benefit from more of a scientific background, share. This is one of those books, like I said, that bridges these. And we need this. So share the book. Share Hussain's work as much as you can, please. This is very, very important work.<br><br>and definitely share this episode as well. As always, I love you all so very much. I'm so deeply grateful that you're a part of this podcast. wouldn't exist without you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. And until next time,<br><br><br></p>
