Pause: The Power of Stillness, Compassion, and Choice

0:01 This program is designed to provide general information with regards to the subject matters covered. This information is given with the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors, or station are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial, legal counseling, professional service, or any advice. You should seek the services of competent professionals before applying or trying any suggested ideas. At the end of the day, it's not about what you have or even what you've accomplished. It's about what you've done with those accomplishments. It's about who you've lifted up, who you've made better. It's about what you've given back.

0:44 Denzel Washington, welcome to Inspire Vision. Our sole purpose is to elevate the lives of others and to inspire you to do the same. The Lado welcome to the show. Thank you so much. I'm looking forward to this, you know. It's I've been fascinated by the people that have reached out, that we've been able to connect with. From all over the world. And where are you at right now? I am in Serbia, well little country in the Balkans where a lot of things happen, and it's lovely to connect with you. Right, that's wonderful. So at this point in time, you own an academy that teaches people how to help other people from a transformational standpoint. What brought you to this point? What is there a story behind what you're doing now that you can share with the audience.

1:41 Well, you know, like I'm like, do we have only forty five minutes just for this? Keep it fairly short? Yes, So you know, like there are many faces. Then we present ourselves and then there can be this professional line of how I got here, and it can be like a career building and the exact steps, and then there's a personal. Story, and I'd appreciate the personal story. Yes, yes, So I'm back in Serbia. It's actually I never lived in the country called Serbia. I left Yugoslavia when I graduated from university. I studied Chinese language and literature, and I went to China and kind of like the journey unfolds there. It's not that I had a job.

2:32 I went with minimal funds. I don't know if I had. Sometimes the number comes that I had one hundred and fifty dollars, sometimes three hundred dollars, but definitely not a lot of money, and a lot of people came to help, and there were some people that needed help themselves as well, and I met those carred people and got scarred as well. It was about drug addiction and feeling lost and so on, and even myself, you know, there was a lot of socializing going through alcohol and everything. So I really, like Pinocchio, ended up in a place of now, forget everything that my father taught me and just go and release the anger about the war. So there was worrying Ugoslavia at that time, and I earned weigh basically, so I had a bit of chaos, chaotic six years of feeling lost in that anger and different path that really took me away from my dream life. And when I turned I was spenty three at that time, and then when I was about to turn twenty nine, I thought something is wrong.

3:52 I actually I had these big dreams of who I was going to give when I'm thirty, you know, and I thought, I'm going to be a millionaire. I'm going to go and think of my retirement. And there it was. I was didjaying part time. I was working in a consulting company also freelancing. Beautiful job. That's actually what set the tone for my coaching. We were doing team building with different multinational companies, but that was sporadic outdoor education as well, and that very all hit me that something was I was not really following my dream and that my actions were completely different from my the way how I perceived life would go. And just around the time, there was also bumping off Belgrade and that hit me really really hard. It was daily thinking like will my family survived if I was it was just Internet was just happening, and would be people on Yahoo Messenger at the time, and then they would say, oh, you got to go, got to go to shelter, the bomb being here, the planes are coming, and then that those moments of silence of not knowing what was going to happen. So the amount of stress and this still coming going into what was my reality?

5:22 What was I. Experiencing a lot of successful people around me, a lot of talks about building China, hopes for future, while on the other side, at the same time, I'm hearing these survival mode reflection from people that I really cared about. And then I thought how I was wasting life knowing that I had all of those things present and a lot of opportunities. I thought I have to change something, and the change that happened was really about me starting to practice taichi and internal martial arts. So my life completely fleep from one reality, from long nights, alcohol drugs, sleeping at four or five am and waking up at ten and being hangover. And now, so we are talking about nineteen ninety nine. Sometime October, I'm going early in the morning at six o'clock, I'm going to the park to practice taichi, and I see people drunk lying on the side of the street, and I'm just looking at them and thinking I could have been that person.

6:47 So when you practice taichi, it always is curious to me, you know, when we think about taichi and we see the videos people in the parks and they're moving along and so forth. But there's a whole philosophy that I think a lot of peopleeople miss. When you were studying taichi, were you studying the philosophy? Also, you can't study one without the other? Oh, okay, no, Slowly, it's all connected. It's not a physical movement, and it's really cultivation of mind, body, and the spirit tags along with it, at least in the way the methodology to China teaches it. I had a chance to connect. I mean, I just went to a park and I'm like, I'm looking for a teacher. How does one find the teacher? Right?

7:34 So that was the first thing. And I was looking and looking and then saw a woman who was leading a group of hundred people and she was a referee for competitive taichi. So she actually introduced me into competitive taichi and after eight months I was competing. I want some medals as well. And it was a lot about the structure and the physical. When I asked her, for example, why are we practicing and she said, well, we are practicing so that our mind and body can be aligned fully. And she said, and if you can manage to be aligned with your mind and your body for ten seconds, that means that you're a master.

8:22 You know when you say that, something comes to my mind from just a previous podcast that I did the other day, and we were talking about people as they age and they kind of get to that point where they start to feel the victim of aging, and yet as you talk about the mind and the body becoming one, and we had talked about how important it is to just accept who you are at any given moment in time, and if you can do that, it makes such a difference in your mindset, in your attitude and so forth. Could you elaborate a little bit on that when you talk about the mind and the body becoming one.

9:05 Well, to be honest, it really didn't speak to me in the way how I was taught through manal internal martial arts. Because I explored later Chigung and seeing me and Barbados the Chinese practices. It was only that I understood what they were talking about. And we are talking now about maybe fifteen years after my practice tarted. Yes, that I came to mindfulness and a lot of things then settled and I understood what they were actually talking about what is the final goal? But the methodology was not really there, and that's what they were saying. It takes ten years to become monster if you're lucky, I mean, it takes a lifetime, you know.

9:55 But so. What it means that mind and body are together is that so there's this capacity for the mind to gain awareness of the inner experience, physical experience. So I can be aware right now, well, you know, like I have a bit of tightness about my left eyebrow, eyebrow or like I just misspelled eyebrow and I said eyebrow. So there's a bit of shame comes in. And then I'm noticing, oh, you know, like my shoulders are a little bit tight, so and I can relax, and my practice is enabling me to have a real time experience what's happening in my body. So my mind can be aware of that, and then our body can be aware of our mind as well. Right, sometimes I can feel agitation. So I mentioned a couple of things tightness in my shoulders, but also mentioned a bit of shame, the mistake, right, And so that is the interpretation of the mind and that direction between the mind and the body when we find stillness and grounding in that, when we find an element of trust, that that attention provides a lot of nourishment for our mind and the body in a way we

11:27 can actually have capacity to hold the pain with same awareness and not be taken over by it. And that's I mean when we say aging, right, where there's pain, this body starts giving up. And so that's one element. Another one is our motorics are not the same as well, right, Like I'm a little bit clumsy, and it's like I have now taken care of my parents as well here, So it's really having insight about that. But so we don't connect mind and a body to prevent things from happening. We don't magically forget that we are aging. But there is some grounding and confidence that goes comes from acceptance, and it's like, oh, this is what aging brings.

12:19 So we talk about aging, let's talk about other things and how mindfulness helps. Because as you know, I'm sure with people you've worked with, there's a lot of people that have experienced some type of trauma in their lives, some very serious, others their perception of trauma. Someone else would look at it and go, no's no way, But it doesn't matter because their perception is some type of trauma, some type of suffering that they're experiencing. How does how does the mindset and that awareness move into that so that as those things come up, you're able to, as you say, be aware of them, but not let them control your emotions or your mind to the point where you are now a victim of that versus you're really in control. Something comes up, Okay, I get it, and you move it to the side or wherever it goes, but you're able to continue on consciously with that mindset of being one with yourself.

13:23 Well, one thing is maybe I can share that it's not really being in control, because that would go against mindulements. It's actually we are learning how to control and still be grounded. So being grounded doesn't mean being in control. It's a little bit like when the wind is blowing and the tree is there and it's shaken by the wind. The tree is not controlling the wind, it's just keeping its roots right there, right, and that there's a lot of benefit from the tree actually being shaken by the by the weed, the roots get stronger, and maybe there's polinization and you know, the seats kind of lego and so on. So I think our perception that we can control anything and in life is actually the problem. This is where people have expectations I'm going to be able to be in control. It's like, no, we're not in control, but we can be able to just like you know, like water or the tree, to kind of like swing with it and not completely lose ourselves.

14:38 Well, yes, and I probably shouldn't used that word. I think it means something different to me than it does to you. But maybe a better description is conscious awareness. How we can be consciously aware of ourselves, of our mindset and all that, so that we are literally moving in a very positive direction and not being the victim of any of those subconscious thoughts, emotions, and so forth that get triggered all the time. Of course, that's the practice, it's really the practice to understand first the mind is going to go through the doubt, you know, like why should I be like I'd rather escape and not really going too feeling or feeling pain or being aware of all of that because it brings this comfort and victim is just one of the ways of protecting our system. You know, there are different subhat attaching strategies, right being full in control is one, being you know, like perfection is another one. And these are defense systems that we have developed in childhood for whatever reason.

15:56 So now this conscious awareness can help us to in a way detached from automatic response to life pressures. See that these urges come up, it's like, oh, there's victim wants to step up and save me, and then making a conscious choice and saying, well there's another way I can choose another way, not a victim victim. My child created the victim as a way of escaping from whatever was happening in my family, in my education, because kids are shamed or not. I mean, at least generations, our generations, you know, like and I would assume that you're rather closer than than this that generation are closer to the that generation. Now, I don't know if this is making any sense. Maybe Victor Franco said, between stimulus and response, there is a space between. That space is lies of freedom to choose our response. And that's what this conscious awareness is. It's not only about holding something, you know, like if you're holding a hot coal, you're going to throw it. You're not going to burn your hand. If it's burning too much, you're going to stop. But to make that choice consciously, it's like, oh, I'm dropping the call versus reactivity or the victim mentality comes in. It's

17:32 a lot of that here where I am and I have it as well. It took me a life change just to be able to monitor when the victim comes in, you know, and the victim was like, oh, here I am is the war that happened and without you know, any support here and ah, look at the kind of like people that I met and now the mess that I'm in, and on the top of everything, I'm gay as well, and like nobody likes me, and many many reasons for that victim to really be present, and then it's like, wow, this is hard. And then the practice brings a compassionate element. At least that's one element that not many people mention. The compassion is really big part of it. When we can warm up to our experience, be soft and gentle rather than critical. Because if I critical, I'm critical of my victim or cut it off, It's going to be removed for a little bit, but then it's going to come so strong when I least expect it.

18:49 Well, let's talk about compassion, because I think people people look at compassion and understand it differently. It's been fascinating to me as I've moved over to Thailand and the different culture that I'm experiencing here and recognizing that words mean entirely different things to different people and different cultures. So when you talk about compassion, and particularly compassion for others, but compassion for ourselves, elaborate on. That a bit. There may be I will just give brief sentences and then I'll give you a space to ask maybe a question. Again, I can just go off on the tangent here, so there may be true wisdoms. Well, I'll share three short sentences.

19:35 One meditation without compassion only strengthens the ego. Compassion without self compassion only strengthens the ego. It's not compassion. And compassion might be perceived as something soft and weak, but it has two sides, and compassion without strong boundaries is also really not compassion. It is not sustainable. What is your definition of compassion? You've said, well, it's not what it is, but what's your definition? So my definition would be it's a It's a state of presence when we are able to perceive the world in such with and breath in a way that many elements can give us the sign of what is really going on at any given moment, and compassionate presence with self compassion is really about the capacity to hold ourselves with understanding or what is going on in the internal world and compassion. Then it speels over into compassion, which is really about this deep understanding of what others are going through or they're theres are and what their difficulties are.

21:03 And then being compelled to act based. On that well, and you know it fascinates me. I love theology, and you know what comes to my mind is that one main thing that said in the New Testament love God and love others as yourself. And you know, I'm just not quoting specifically, but as you talk about compassion, what what came to my mind as you were talking about it is the fact that true compassion is really true love for ourselves and for others as we really experience that. And you mentioned meditation, and you know brought that in as far as without compassion, meditation is no good. But I want to talk about that too, because as we start talking about developing compassion, developing all of these aspects of mindset and so forth, I think one of the most important things that has come to my mind is again, be still. And that's not easy. But how do you what are your thoughts about the importance of being still and what difference does that make in one's life when they can learn how to be still.

22:21 Well, first, the moment we become still, our mind is going to be agitated. So that's completely against everything the mind feels comfortable with. Some people, not many would find themselves in this sense of oh, this is it. I've been longing for this. But many, many practitioners are going to actually find a lot of pain, physical, mental, emotional, just from being still. When we are still, we can notice, right, So when we distruct ourselves with all of these things outside of us, it means that we don't have the capacity to be still and hold what is present. And so compassionate presence means that were somewhere in our practice discovered how to develop relationship with pain. In putism, it's a suffering, right, okay, So it's basically that we cannot avoid sufferings, pain or difficulties, whichever world is right for anyone.

23:35 They're present. We are going to get sleepy when we can't sleep, We will be hungry when we can't eat. These are some simple ones, right like that is also difficulty in life, and then the scale can go up. And as you mentioned trauma before and so on. So our relational presence when these situations come up, when when suffering or difficulties are present, this is the training of compassion. So one voice can be in a critic, Oh, you fool, why did you allow yourself to get into such a mess?

24:17 Or like you should have eaten before you left home, or like today I went to bank, commap to ATM and the car. He took my card and I didn't have the phone, and you know, can you imagine being a critic how I wanted to go at me? It's like, how could you lead a house without the phone? Call the service to give you the card back? But then I said, and I was like, wow, this is a difficult moment. And then a guy was passing by. I said, hey, do you have time? I need help? Can you call? And he called and the moment he called, the card came out and thank you. You know, it was a very nice moment of connection. And he was so full of reassurance. He's like real sorting out, you know.

25:03 Yeah, And you talk about suffering, and I look at you know, I've studied Buddhism a lot, and I find it's fascinating how now he taught that there's you know, four different levels of suffering. Of course the last two you're not suffering. But also then he talks about the eful path of how you overcome this, and I find it fascinating as I look at that and then look at Hinduism. I haven't been able to quite find the same philosophical aspects to that. I'm sure it's there, but I haven't been able to find it. You get into Christianity, and of course everyone kind of a temperts it one way, well, you know, he's paid for my sins and so forth, that they still suffer, whereas if they were to look at it as though, you know, I've suffered for everything, so just take my hand, and as you're suffering, take my hand and I'll help you through it. So I think that it's interesting that we can either become the victim and then we've used that word a lot today.

26:05 We can become the victim of. Suffering, or we can recognize that, you know what, that's part of life. What am I going to learn and what can I be grateful for that is going to affect me in a positive way or others in the future. It's true, you know, like it's different, different cultures, different philosophies, they do have essentially very similar messages. I mean, you know, Christianity and Hinduism and Buddhism. Perhaps it's like the terrain is different, so like you're in Thailand. I live in Thailand for a year. You know, like it's right now, it's beautiful weather. Probably it's like wet and humid, then humid and hot, and I suffer the lot. Nobody could understand why it was so difficult for me to live in Thailand when everything is so beautiful, right, So this environment where those teachings have been created is really important. Also, the cultures are very collective in the East and in the West it is very individualistic culture, right. So there's one person taking suffering for everyone and kind of like just release that and there's something for the psyche. I guess it is important for that message to be accepted.

27:33 But ultimately all of them are saying there is suffering and there's a lot of hard stuff happening in the world. There's these demons in Hinduism. It's all these demons that come and we constantly need to fight against demons taking over. Buddha came at the time of Hinduism, right, and he came from a palace, from riches and realizing that all that money doesn't do anything, right, So so it's any but he went to famous teachers who already had a lot of students. He went to kings directly. Those were his students at the very beginning. He didn't need to explain to them how if he was saying to them like, just stay the road and let's go and back. It was the practice. It was necessary practice for them because they had everything. Yeah, So within that there was something important on how they could understand suffering. In the West, it's Jesus who was carpenter and then went and you know, suffered in his own way and stood up to the to the bullies.

28:46 You know. Instead, it's not like it's it's love. It's not what you're talking about, and so on. So they have different message messages I think based on the context. And we were trying to pretend as if it's to take it into the modern life, as if it's the whole truth. The one thing I like about the Buddhism, it's like the same when you meet Buddha on your path, kill him. There's no Buddha. I mean, there's no glorifying. I mean it took I don't know, two hundred and fifty years I think before they started writing first teachings of Buddha to make records right, So how much was diluted by that time because he was like, no teachings exactly.

29:35 Yeah, and now there's at least what five different sects of Buddhism. Actually, yes, that gets to be fascinating too. But I think, you know, getting back to what we were talking about, as far as suffering goes regardless of what your culture is and what your poliefs are and so forth, my sense is that yes, we all saw. The important thing is how do you approach that from a inner, mindful, conscious way so that rather than becoming a victim of that, you recognize that that's just life and you move forward in a positive way. Because as you do that, suddenly the suffering kind of minimizes what your thoughts.

30:24 Well, you know, like I approach these practices a lot from the secular perspective. There's a lot of psychology behind that and research and why it's working and all of that. So what is important to know is that we have illusion that we will not suffer. We have and I found myself quite a few times in that space like oh wow, look I just came to the place where ed life is great, I have everything, and then a bit of time passes and it's like, oh my god, I lost everything. Is like, what do I do? Now, so we forget, we forget that in the moments when we are feeling good about ourselves that there's no permanence. Right, So there's something about accepting impermanence of life and everything that is happening and not being taken by it into a dark side, so not being cynical about it, not being you know, realistic or passimi stick. So these are some again like let me not notice beauties of life, so I'll just kind of like see the dark side.

31:42 So there's always been stuff happening that's not right, but our capacity to be present when when good, when pleasant things are happening, and knowing that that too shall pass, and just reminding but then savoring, nourishing, experiencing joy, right, and then when difficult moments come, also remind ourselves this social paths and know that even at that time we can still find the moment. So this is the teaching, and I think it's really hard teaching, especially when there's collective suffering and we see a lot of people suffering around us to find that momental things like oh, it's just this sunshine on my face, or like, there it is.

32:31 I managed to connect with the guy by hating and he helped me. He doesn't know anything about me or I got my card back. Like I'm having my cat on my lap right now, and God knows what's going to happen, but I'll just stay here. And this is our The teaching is that we do have capacity to experience joy no matter what. Yes, And you know what's interesting to me. We talk about being still, we talk about we haven't but we can talk about solitude versus loneliness. And so many people experience quote loneliness, and I think kind of try to stay away from that, and yet that sense of solitude makes such a difference. I just got back from Pouquet for a week in Thailand. You know which you're aware of.

33:26 It's on the beach. And in fact, the picture that I had behind me right now I took while I was on a cruise. And what I found was, I you know, as I we did a cruise, is I just laying in the pool and so forth. It was fascinating to me that as we were getting ready to go to the airport, and you've been in Thailand, you know how horrible the traffic is it and it drives me crazy. And we got in the cab. We started going. There was a lot of traffic and I stopped for a minute and I thought, I'm not getting frustrated. I'm literally just feeling peace. I'm not getting frustrated. Why And then I realized because I spent a week and it wasn't all just relaxing, but I literally spent a week in nature, in the water, in the pool, just relaxing for you know, a long time. And somehow that solitude, that being still made a huge difference in my attitude, at least for that day.

34:35 What are your thoughts about that? Why? Why is solitude so important? And recognizing that solitude isn't loneliness, is that it's a conscious choice to be still with oneself and with the universe. Well, yes, I mean the power of nature right, the mentioned connecting with water and moving within the name nature. Nature has that capacity to heal our nervous system if we just are present with it and we connect with the nature. So that's that's what really nature does really well. And when we go into that solitude, we can also say there's so much do you say, like it's now the word poisonous errows come in. But when we are in the in the city. When we are connected with all these modern life pressures, the gadgets and everything, there's constant board bombardment of the information, and the mind gets really agitated. And when mind gets agitated, the body gets agitated.

35:48 So it's basically you mentioned stillness. So when the mind is agitated but our body is still, that's really hard, it's harmful. Right, But if we move the body and our mind is calm, that is fantastic. And it doesn't have to be either know gen or big practice and exercise. Doing that in nature and allowing ourselves to experience self. Right, who am I? How am I experiencing this moment? Tons of research has been done or what benefits that does to the brain? And your whole nervous system was reset so that when on the first kind of like entry point that something is triggering or something is giving high pressure, your nervous system was not reactive.

36:40 Yes, And so how do you help clients learn how to develop that solitude and stillness? I mean, particularly in a busy world where they may have kids, they certainly have work, they've got neighbors, they've got all the stuff going on, they've got social media. And on and on. What do you do to teach someone how to develop solitude in their lives. Well, you know, I'm a coach and we are very careful not to mix coaching and teaching. I'm also a teacher, mindful, self compassion teacher, so I tend to do the work separately.

37:20 So in coaching, being with a client that one hour when we meet is actually a solitude in presence. It's all about that person. It's almost like let me go into the deep dieve of really seeing what is in there that is to celebrate and what is bringing pain. So for busy executives, you know, it's just such a precious moment and not everyone is ready for that. A lot of people see coaching is let's move towards the goals and we achieve goals. Right, the context of me bringing mindfulness based coaching is so let's just stay with that a little bit and just notice what message is that providing. And when we go into the body as well to hear what is the need behind the physical response of whatever difficulty is coming up, such clear simple message is coming. It's like, oh I need rest or, I need to be acknowledged, or I need to celebrate, I need warmth. I need love right, and then we can move into coaching stuff and saying is like, okay, that need that is coming up now that this difficulty or difficult unpleasant emotion or difficult sensation in your body showed what are you going to do about that? And in that way they learn how to sit with what

38:54 is what is happening. And also find find a way in which they can experience solitude in some way, whether it's to close the door and just be quiet, or whatever that happens to be, do the meditation, whatever that happens to be. So as we knew the close now you know, we've talked about a lot of things. But is there is there some specific message that comes to mind that you'd like to share with the audience. Is kind of a short message. I think this is a message pause, don't be afraid of silence with you know, be a bombarded with messages with quick fix. Here is the wisdom to do this?

39:39 Do this? How about allowed to sit in silence and not do anything? All right? That's great? So how do people find you? And is your main focus? You're not are you coaching people or are you strictly teaching coaches? How to coach people. I do both. I'm a coach and there's at times my clients would want to learn how to coach, but mostly I teach mindful self compassion and mindfulness practices. And then from that people are really interested how to be certified in bringing both skills mindfulness and coaching. I do that through BMC Academy.

40:24 So how do people find you if they're looking for help? Yes, so you can reach me through the website, my personal website where I kind of like play with some insights poetry blogs and so only there's a calendar there, so it's the leader to codey with the C in the end dot com contact and also through my website BMC academy dot com or it's Beijing Mindfulness Academy dot com name of the website. Both will work and I love to meet with people in person. Is just to immediately schedule the time with me whenever the time slot is open, and I would love to have a conversation chemistrycall.

41:14 We called. Yeah, So give me your personal website again slowly so that people can understand what it is. So it's my name or name Www. Dalidavic. It's C at the end. Now age dot com. Okay, excellent, excellent, Well, thank you so much, Toda. This has been fantastic. I'm really I didn't even know that you're in Thailand. I lived in Puquet for a year. There you go. Yeah, I decided I wouldn't want to live there. It is way too busy. Absolutely, I understand that's why I left as well.

41:56 Yeah, but anyway, thanks so much. Your insights have been wonderful in folks, I hope you've enjoyed it. I hope you'll join us again soon. And if you're looking for some help, reach out to her personal website. I think that would be a great value. So anyway, there's a doctor Doug saying no mistay. Thank you,