Making Peace with Your Thoughts l Sam Manachenko l S2E084

Welcome, everybody. Welcome back to A Call for Love.

And if you are a new listener, then A Call for Love is

a place where we inspire you to choose love, peace,

and joy over fear, stress, and anxiety

to embrace the growth that is available to you and create a

life rooted in compassion and connection. And

today, I have a very special guest. We are going to

dive into waking up to making peace with your

thoughts. And my guest, Sam Manachenko, is a

lifelong learner curious about the true meaning

of unconditional love. And in 2012, she

walked into her home and a little voice whispered to her,

sell all your possessions and get out of your lease.

She followed those directions, and for 7 years, she traveled,

studying yoga wisdom, meditation, and breath work

all around the world. She lived in yoga

ashrams and eventually was led to her first teacher and

living example of the practice. And his name is

Dharma Mitra, a beautiful guru who

is still alive today. And she has studied with

not only Dharma, but Byron Katie and Eckhart Tolle.

She has a wealth of information and the

purest, most gentle, and beautiful heart as she

shares how we can make peace, how to make

peace with ourselves, and unraveling the story,

the story of illusions of pain and suffering into

the peace and light that is always available to us.

So welcome, Sam. Welcome to A Call for

Love. Thank you, Linda. We have a mutual friend,

and our friend is Monica from Be Yoga and Wellness in Burlington, and

she was on the podcast as well. We talked about yoga.

But today, we're gonna talk about something really special to all of our

hearts, and it's called making peace with your thoughts, which was

is actually the part 2 that you'll be offering at b

yoga. But I feel like there's so much you have to share

and offer in this area because I'm a

meditation guide, and I love meditation. And I always say it's

about befriending ourselves, and befriending ourselves

means, for me, making peace with our thoughts.

And so I'd like you to share what does that mean to

you, making peace with your thoughts. Yeah.

It's a great question, and the

answer has been evolving. If you asked me what

that meant 10 years ago, I would have given you a different answer.

And, really, I'm noticing on the practice, everything is

moving from the external getting closer, closer, closer, closer.

So my first idea of making peace was,

okay, I have to act a certain way in the external world to

not ruffle any feathers, to, you know, get along with others. I thought it

was all about our actions and, you know, how we

interact with so called others in form. And as you

go deeper in the practice, you realize, oh,

actually, how we're interacting is determined by our vibration.

And, you know, according to our vibration, we're attracting

beings, situations that are aligned with that vibration

to help show us the cause of that vibration, which is

our thoughts. What are we thinking?

And for many years, I would have you know, I was raised

Catholic, and I would feel

guilt or shame if I had a thought that was unkind.

And I thought I must annihilate this thought, or it's bad, or

it's wrong that I have these thoughts. And all that does in yoga, we

talk about, being free of resistance than aversion. That actually

just has more resistance than aversion towards yourself. So on the surface,

you might be pretending to be peaceful and kind to others, but

inside, there's this war.

And so, really, making peace with the

thoughts is going away from this idea that some are

good and some are bad, which is conditioning,

to the perspective of God

or love or consciousness, whatever you call it, which is

unconditioned and which loves

everything that arises in it. So really know

noticing every thought that arises, it's consciousness

that makes it possible. It's all arising. Everything is arising in the palm

of God's hand. And just as the sun shines evenly on

everything, instead of being moved when

an emotion comes up and think, I'm bad, I'm wrong, and going to

battle. Can I be like the sun and see the emotion

and be curious about it and not afraid to feel

it? Or sorry. The thought. We're talking about the thought. So notice the

thought, be curious about it, and and

brave enough to actually explore it inside

before I act it out on the outside.

So it's really more and more I've realized everything.

Yeah. Every time I think someone's to blame, I

know I'm I'm confused. I know my ego is tricking

me and that there's there's no one to blame, but learning

more and more to to be

neutral in my observations of what's arising in the field so

that they can simply pass instead of

going to battle with them, which makes them stronger and, you

know, gives them ammo. Yeah. I do love that

because I think we are conditioned to judge.

You know? And I always I have this phrase, isn't this

interesting? And when I invite that phrase into

a thought, in this case, I can kinda hold space for

it to see what's really going on

there. And, also, I think it takes, as

you are such an advocate for it and me too, self

compassion. Oh, absolutely. If I feel ashamed

about something and I don't tell others,

if I'm try to closet it or, you know, if I don't have peace with

it and I try to mask it, and I look at how I actually treat

others in that moment, there's a disconnect.

And I'm treating them like we're different. Sometimes we think,

oh, it's okay if they feel shame, and I'll go help them. I'll be the

fixer, but I should never feel shame. So then there's, like, this

hierarchy where we're acting like we're better than others. And then

or on the opposite, sometimes we think we're worse than others. Oh,

imagining no one else feels this shame. When we talk about self

compassion, how we isolate and forgetting about common

humanity. But if I make peace with this

thought of shame, if I just see it, I'm like, oh, wow. Look.

There's a thought of shame, and I can talk about

it. Suddenly I'm not violent anymore. I'm not violent

towards myself, and I'm not violent to someone else. So

it's actually I used to think that if you do everything

perfectly and you get it right, then you'll be connected to others

and and you'll feel safe. And I realized that it's actually by being

imperfect and vulnerable that you feel the

connection and feel that safety that's inside of us. And there's

that there's there's nothing to run from. We don't have to run from these thoughts.

They're natural. They're safe to explore, and they're not

our identity. We're we're the we're that which can perceive

them. Well, I have a question for you because

I have a lot of beautiful relationships in my life, but sometimes

in some relationships, we may feel unsafe.

Mhmm. What would you advise one does in

those circumstances? Well, if

you feel unsafe, I would listen to my body

and, you know, remove yourself from the situation

and continue to do my own work.

So I I wouldn't, you know, remove if I

remove myself from the situation and then say, oh, it was because of them, they

were bad. They you know? And just then I'm keeping that war and that

separation. But if I remove myself, it's totally fine to

remove yourself from a situation and then start to notice,

You know? What was I thinking and believing when I was with that

human? And you become aware of it. So I do I

study with Byron Katie a lot, and I do her work every day.

And she says a worksheet a day, it was

He's the doctor. Yeah. Yeah. It was something and then

it's about sanity. But the she

talks about how the ego is a frightened child looking for

love. And so often we're trying to annihilate our ego and get

rid of it, which creates anxiety in ourselves because it

feels like we are at war with part of ourselves.

So she talks about loving the ego,

actually listening to it. So if you feel unsafe, your body's telling you, I

feel unsafe, well, a loving mother would listen to that. Okay, honey. Come

over here. I'm gonna hold you. But then look deeper. Is there a

thought either that attracted you to that

dynamic? So sometimes people have very

strong beliefs. I don't deserve to be treated with

love, or, you know, no one will ever love me or people don't

respect me or whatever these beliefs are. And so they end up

attracting characters that do this. Remove yourself when you

notice it, and then you can start to do some work on that

thought. How do I live my life

when I believe I don't no one treats me with

respect? You know? And and really look, how do I treat

myself? I feel like I'm less than others. I feel

desperate or or clingy or needy. I try to

change others. I don't believe that I could find someone

else, though maybe I feel stuck in situations. It'll be different

answers for everyone, but there's there's it's all the same

stressful thoughts. We're all repeating. And if you

really sit still in meditation and notice what

web, what life does that belief create, it's really

fascinating. And how do I treat others when I believe no

one respects me? I'm watching others and

waiting for them to disappoint me. So I don't notice

when they do respect me. I don't notice other

things. And, you know, what does it cost

you? Presence, connection to your

intuition, many things. Well, it's very

interesting because, you know, I am mid to

late fifties now. And, you

know, there's been a lot of people that come in and out of

one's life. And in my younger years,

I would get so panicky over those more challenging

relationships. But now I'm like, oh, okay.

There's another teacher here in this moment teaching me about

myself, not teaching me about them, but Yeah. Teaching me

about myself. And I said, this is an opportunity

for myself to do the work. And so

I I don't look at it as so daunting or

scary anymore, but I do go slowly,

and I have many, many practices. But I think of it

as an invitation to grow and to grow

in self awareness through self compassion, and I

just really find it very interesting. I would love to hear

what Dharmamitra you have really

embraced him, and many people may not even

know him. He is larger than life. Correct?

And so just a really I'd love for you

to share about him, your path, and maybe his

teachings that have, as well as Byron Katie, that

really drew you into deeper self awareness.

Yeah. So, Dharma, Dharma is 85 years

young. He's still teaching in New York, and

he's so playful and joyful.

You know, in the Bhagavad Gita, it says the yoga sees sameness everywhere.

That's one of the main things Dharma teaches us is to see sameness

everywhere. Right? To have the same love, the same amount

of divine love is in every in the heart of every single being.

And to really work on recognizing that love in all the beings. So

we're seeing that part, we're connecting to that part, instead of, you

know, the little web of thoughts, the shadow outside, the limiting beliefs.

When we when we focus on that and other people, we strengthen

that. But when we're with someone else and we're focusing on what's

behind that, our presence can help them

connect to their presence. We're seeing who they really are. So

Dharma treats all the students equally with

incredible kindness and respect. He's very humble.

Dharma says I don't know a lot, which is amazing. Had so many teachers

before Dharma that, you know, asked a question, and they'd make up an

answer, and you can ask, and he says, I don't know, which

I love, like, you know, and sometimes he says, oh, maybe this

person will know. He's he's he's very humble

and curious and open, and he teaches about

joy. So at first, I felt like, oh, okay. This is a rigid,

harsh path. Dharma does have incredible discipline. He's very

reverent to the practice. And then, you know, after a class, he could

turn on some crazy techno music and start dancing and shaking.

There was one class in particular where he did that, and then he turned off

the music and said, joy is very important.

And that's really what drew me to him because I had very serious

teachers before then. I had one who told me, you know, Sam, life

isn't meant to be joyful. And I it's,

I'm sure not every moment, but I do believe our essence actually when we're

awake is joy and light and love.

So, yeah, he's really

changed my relationship with everything I

really taught me how to treat everything as sacred. You know, Dharma will

sometimes pick up a little table and be like, this is my beloved. You

know, everything has is made of the same

source. And, you know, he encourages

us to eat a diet that is

compassionate, to do our best to make choices that are compassionate.

And a lot a huge part of studying with Dharma is to

reflect on compassion every day on, you know, how can

we treat everything with more love, including

our thoughts, our emotions, whatever arises. It's just it's just

passing. Just passing. It's not us.

No. It's not us. And I love how you say, you know, he

invites that presence to everything. Presence to love.

So so this is what I'm thinking that you

are sharing here that whatever making

peace with our thoughts is holding it in

a loving space to see the beauty in it, the

beauty in the lesson. And sometimes lessons aren't easy, but they

can have the essence of beauty. Is that what I'm hearing?

Oh, I think everything's beautiful. I think when we're in our right mind,

everything is beautiful. Katie talks about this too.

But to have have the courage to actually look at our

thoughts. Often, there's so much shame. Oh, how could I have a thought

like that? So we don't even have the courage to bring the light to it.

And when you really bring the light and look at it, it's

nothing there. There's nothing dangerous there. It's just

vibration. It has no meaning. It can't last.

Right? Anything in form is subject to time. Anything

subject to time is not us. And so to

really know that we are the the timeless

witness that's observing this beautiful evolution,

and knowing that there was a point in time where this part

of creation, we really wanted this creation. Dharma

says, you know, every being experiences the same amount

of suffering on their path to awakening.

But once you're awakened, that's not the end. You continue to

exist forever, but you get to delight in your

creation. So everything gets better and better and better, but what lies

ahead of us is amazing. We can't even imagine

it, you know. And to to have that

faith and to realize that no what no matter what you're going through right now

well, there's 2 ways. Whatever you're going through right now, there's a

perfect reason for it according to the conditions that you're going

through it. And if you get really, really

still in the present moment, really

still, nothing's happening.

I once was lying in bed, and I'm like, the now how small is the

now? I'm like, it's smaller than the sound.

Like, so small. The present moment is

so small that you can't there's there's only one there. There's not

another being to observe it or judge it or analyze it. It's just

there. So suffering in order to

suffer, we need a window of time so we can make comparisons.

And then also in order to play in creation, there's a gift

of time that we can pretend that we are these separate bodies

and enjoy the gift of being able to create.

But through life, we start to notice if we're if we're not afraid

to look at our thoughts, and we can see, oh, that's a thought I think

a lot, and look what world that creates.

And what's another thought that I could maybe focus on?

So it's just like going to the gym, but instead of a muscly gym, it's

strengthening our power of attention to focus on what we

really want. Yeah. That's that's

very beautiful because I do feel and I guess this

is really Eckhart Tolle's

thought. This moment is the only moment

there is. If we can live in that finite space,

then we can live in the truest essence of who we are.

And I believe we are love at our deepest core.

It's just like Michelangelo. I chipped away the marble until I found the

angel within. And so I think if we can really come

into that really finite space and connect with

that love within, then, like, everything softens.

Yeah. And Eckhart often says when he says that,

I don't mind what happens. That's what enables him to be in the

present moment, which really is karma yoga.

Dharma says this too. Right? Dharma often talks about be

established in the eternal present moment, in the eternal now.

So you know the content, whatever we're seeing through our senses

of perception is the past. Even you you know, we're

looking at each other, but there's beyond just the delay of

Zoom. My eyes, for this equipment to go out and

see that and then put that image back into my brain and to

analyze it, I'm seeing you in the past. It's impossible for me to

perceive you in the present through this technology we have of our

senses of perception. And so knowing that that whatever you're seeing,

Dharma says this a lot, whatever you're seeing right now, this is the result of

your past imagining. Don't worry. If you like

if there's something you don't like, now imagine different. What

you're focusing on in this moment is is what's gonna

help the next moments unfold. So you don't

have to suffer for your past and replay it.

And and that's the thing is because, the past gets

skewed, it gets manipulated and

transforms, and then it can become,

a source of suffering. But if we can have the beginner's

mind, right, and start really fresh, then it

can it can really transform into a new experience.

Yeah. Yeah. If we spend too much time, it's like mind candy.

It just and ring that.

He will sometimes, Dharmel will say very aggressively, the past is

over. Let it go. Right?

I also Eckhart recommends an amazing book, 3 Magic

Words, and there's a beautiful part in there that talks

about remorse, and that it's not helpful for anybody.

That part one of the main teachings of Jesus was that we need

suffer only the errors are sin is just belief and lack of

love. Only once in just the laws of cause and

effect. So if we, you know, create some

error, it's already in the effect. That's it.

But you don't have to replay it and keep punishing yourself. That

doesn't do anyone any good. It actually tethers your

vibration to that. So your heart

is is not as open around others. Yeah. That's that's

beautiful. A reminder. And, you know, when you said 3 magic words,

doctor Wayne Dyer has something that an excerpt

that he took from that 3 magic words, and I listened to it

often. And it's a really, it's a beautiful

resource to look into. So thank you for mentioning that. What

is it? Do you know specifically, or is it a long Well, it

well, it is it is a a paragraph, but it's, doctor

Wayne Dyer says, you know, the last words that you put into your

mind at night is what you marinate in. And so he takes,

an excerpt because it's a chance for us to

plant the seed of who we really are, you

know, and and the essence of kindness for

ourselves and all beings. And so I took

his, and then I recorded it in my own voice.

And then I closed my eyes, and I play it

just off my phone voice recorder. And then I just listened to

it. And, it's a really beautiful way to

drift off into sleep.

Beautiful. Yeah. Every chapter of that book has a meditation.

They're really nice. Yeah. Beautiful. I know that you

have been to Sivananda Ashram in

Bahamas. I went there too with a with a good friend.

So tell me about that. What was your experience? Were you working or,

just Yeah. I did. My first teacher training I did was

in India, and then I stayed a little longer and went to the Sivananda

Ashram in Nayar Dham, and I loved

the experience there. So then I went as a guest to the,

Ashram in Valmoran, and then I did the karma yoga program

for 4 seasons in the Bahamas, which is an

amazing way to get immersed in yoga. So

I went there. I thought I just I'm like, I just wanna cut vegetables

in silence and meditate all day, and no one talked to me. And I

ended up the job I got, I was the hostess to the guest speakers.

So I had a cell phone, and I was on call, and I was

pick people up in the airport, and I met amazing people. You

know, I got to Krishna Das comes every year. I got to know him and

Nina and Deepak Chopra was there. Sally Kempton was one

teacher I loved before I was there, and then she came. So it was really

amazing to get to meet her and many other teachers.

I just I was expecting, oh, I'll be there and be silent. And

I was busy. But one of the best teachings of

theirs, you know, we had to do our sadhana every day. We had to wake

up with the bell at 5:30 and go to satsang,

do the meditation, the chanting, our asana practice.

And often, I'd be doing my asana practice, and then my cell phone would ring.

A guest would want something, and I would get, oh, or I'm trying to

do my practice annoyed. And then I realized one moment, finally,

oh, when they call you in the pose and you're walking to see them,

walk in the same energy of the pose as you go to them. So

you're actually learning how to integrate this practice so it's not separate. This

is my practice, and this is my life. Really, can

you move that way while you're really busy? While, you

know, they kind of they make sure you're you're at

right at your edge. So everyone, when they can see, okay, you're coping well, they

give you more tasks, and they give you a little more responsibility. So you're

always, you know, at your edge of doing, but

learning to do, it really is a the karma yoga is an immersion

in you know, karma yoga is the act of doing our

actions without expectations for the fruit

and attachment to the result. And they often would say,

you could try to live karma yoga your whole life, and you

might do, like, 2 selfless actions. And I noticed there often if I

was rushing, I'm like, why are you rushing? Oh, I want I don't want

my manager to be disappointed in me. So you could start to see even

that little expectation. I want that person to think this of me or I want

that. It was really interesting to get to

see all the little attachments we have.

And the past karma yoga Dharma

his karma yoga was his main practice too. He lived in his

guru's ashram, and he talks about, like,

it's really about how do you stay in the

moment and do every action because it needs to be done

without wanting anything from it. So then it's just simply

an expression of your heart.

That's so beautiful. I feel like every day for the rest

of this physical body that I have,

I want to practice the teachings of yoga. Everyone thinks

yoga or not everyone, but many people think yoga is the

asana. But, you know, it's it's off the mat. It's the

practice of living the that union,

that yoking of everything that you had mentioned.

I say sometimes I've done more yoga off the mat than I did on the

mat. And then I went on to your website, and I realized, that

you have that as one of your taglines in your

website. But it's very beautiful practice, and I do agree

that the universe or spirit or God,

puts those things on our path so

that we can practice what we need.

Yes. Absolutely. Now you took the risk

to sell everything and follow this journey, this

new path. But if somebody would

like to make those changes and make peace with their thoughts

and evolve into their higher self in a new

journey, what can they do

in this moment, like in the space, in the life they

are living?

Well, you don't have to go anywhere, and you

don't need any time to wake up. So that's really

good news. It's really easy to create a

story. Okay. To become enlightened, it's gonna take this many years, and I have to

do this action, this action, this action, this action. Waking up

is is actually independent of all those actions. You can't

do yourself into being.

It's really a surrender into presence.

And it's simply a shift from thinking, you know, while I'm doing

this, I'm moving these things around and thinking that I'm the one that's moving this

versus I'm the the consciousness behind that's

watching this hand go there and there and doesn't have

any stories. So if

you got really present right now, and took

one fully conscious breath, and really allowed yourself to

feel the breath in the body without making up

any story about it, without comparing it. As soon as you

compare, then you're in duality.

You're holding an image of the past on top of what's happening right now.

So each breath is if it's your very first breath ever.

And if you started to do that just, you know, once a day, if you

don't do anything, one conscious breath a day, and then

maybe 2 and 3, slowly spending more

time where you are focused on being and

less than doing. It will shift. And if

you have no desire to do that, it's okay. The

doing will actually eventually get to a point where it exhausts you,

and you realize this isn't working. I don't wanna do this path

anymore. And then it's it's already programmed

in what what you will need

to to slow down. But if you are feeling drawn to

right now, it's it's here right now. You can

slow down right now. Byron Katie has a really beautiful practice we

do at her schools. We do a morning walk. And you go and you

walk, but everything that your eyes rest upon,

you imagine you're seeing them for the very first time.

And then, you know, you can give them a name, like you were god

naming things for the first time, but only a first generation name. So

maybe dog, snow, basket. If

you catch yourself going big dog, beautiful

snow, ugly basket, then no, stop and come

back. So she's teaching us to strip away

those labels, the those judgments, those conditions to see things

purely. And eventually, you

know, often in this practice, I'll be going and I'll just everything will be

friend, friend, friend. Like, you really see that everything

is a friend. The the ground that holds your foot is a friend.

You know, it walks by you.

But that it just comes from practice.

Notice when you are labeling things and see if you can practice

peeling back the labels and just get to

a a word or a name that doesn't have so

much meaning to it, so much story. So

really what we're doing is unwinding, unraveling the

story. The story is the little cloud on top

of this infinite light of what we are.

And when we move it aside, we're like, oh, there's just

the light there. That's it.

That's so beautiful. It, makes me think

of I didn't have any grandparents

growing up because they had all passed. But there was

a lady, Louise Despirit, and I was a young girl.

And she would look at me, like, with stars in her eyes, and she

would say, oh, you're so beautiful,

and I which is a judgment. But what I thought was, no.

I'm not pretty. You know, I got this. I got that. But I

I realize now she was just looking at my soul,

and she was saying, you are so beautiful. You are such

an angel. And this is the parallel I

see, that she had that essence

to look at things, not the shape, not the

color, not the size, not the attributes of it,

but to really focus in to the vibration

of love within it. And I believe that's what

you're saying here. Mhmm.

And so if we in this moment, if we can

we don't have to travel far away. It's like Buddha

before he became Buddha, he he did

he his wife not say, you know, you found enlightenment. And he

says, well, I I didn't know I had I could find it right here.

I I thought I had to travel to look for it, but it's really right

here in this moment. So that if the listeners

know that this shift in perspective is

seeing everything from its purest essence of love,

then there can be that miracle to come into a

higher awareness and a sense of enlightenment? Is that what I hear you

saying? Yeah. We're all enlightened. We

just don't know it. Just and who doesn't know? Just the mind and the

senses. Dharma says this often. Any corrections I give you, he's like,

they're just for the mind and the senses. The real you is

there, full and pure. That's so

beautiful. I also sometimes I'll do a walk where

you know, if we think of and, like, I hear I'm holding up my iPad

case. It looks solid, but we know that this is made of

atoms, that this is actually made of light and

vibration and mostly empty space. And

sometimes I'll go for a walk and imagine that I can see, instead of seeing

the solid forms, that everything I'm passing is just light and vibration. I imagine

light and vibration in the form of the trees and the house and and the

body. So you feel like you're just in this field of

sameness. And then by this gift of our senses of perception, we

can pretend all these nice costumes.

But there's something behind everything

that's that's what we are, not the surface.

Absolutely not. I ask everybody towards the

end of the show, and I would love to hear yours,

the question. A call for love

is really about noticing how we are living.

You know, are we in the place of separation, fear, anxiety,

stress, the ego based

self, or is there a call for love,

a call to shift into that enlightenment that we

always are, as you had said? So what do you do when

you are feeling that you're slipping out of alignment

with who you truly are? Yeah.

So I suffer. If I before I I usually suffer

first unless I'm wiser and, you know, more awake in

that moment and catch it. But usually when I slip out, I don't

notice at first, and there's a little bit of suffering. And then

when I'm fortunate enough to recognize, I'm suffering.

Great. Then I I can

use my tools. I'll share, for example, I had a headache,

last week, and I noticed, you know, trying to sleep, I was trying to

push on one side of the head and trying to go child's pose. Well, how

can I make these sensations go away? And then I had the thought, oh, you're

at war with this. Don't be at war with this.

And then I was like, okay, stop calling it a headache.

It's fine. Sometimes it can be helpful for people to label things if they're not

so charged. But to me, a headache is a sentence. I have a

big story about what it means to have a headache. And so I let

go of that, and instead, I went right into the

sensations in my head and allowed myself to

experience them, pretending which actually they

were. There's only the present moment. These are the first imagine this is the

first time you're ever in a body. These are the first sensations you've ever

experienced. What is it like? And when I

went in with that curiosity and actually felt the

sensations in my head, there wasn't pain anymore.

Katie often says all pain is remembered or

anticipated. So when I have an idea, I

remember different sensations in my head that I thought

were so called better, that comparison

creates the suffering of these sensations or imagining in the

future that there'll be a sensation that I don't wanna have. All pain remembered

or anticipated. But when I got really still and went right into

the sensations, there there wasn't pain. There was sensation,

and it was expansive. So I I do the

same. I try to do the same with the emotions, with

the thoughts. I used to really try to run away from

sadness. And now when there's sadness, I'm like, oh, hey.

Hi, sadness. What does it feel like to be sad?

And, you know, I just let it do what

it needs to do, but not feeding it. Not saying this is because

x y z, but befriending it, actually

allowing allowing the experience.

Yeah. That's so beautiful. So you first notice it

by self feeling the the vibration of suffering.

Yeah. Usually, I suffer first. Yes. So and that's and I

think that's a really important point for listeners

to realize is that when they feel themselves

suffering, it's an opportunity knocking on the

door, hello, let's take a look here, instead

of, like, walking it off or or, you know,

people could shop, have a vice like drinking or smoking

or distraction. Instead, it's

like, would you say befriending it? Yes.

It's safe to feel it, to to love it, to befriend it.

But love, simply is attention in that

situation. Just paying attention to it. So many people have

the the thought, nobody listens to me. And

if you really get still, how often do you listen to your own

body, to your own sensations? Are you actually present?

So we can't Katie says this

too. I love she says adults can't be abandoned. Children's can

children can, but adults, if you feel abandoned,

you can change that. You're abandoning yourself. You're not listening to yourself or

present with yourself. That's beautiful. Yeah. Well,

thank you so much for being on A Call for Love, Sam.

Thank you, Linda. How can people find you, or is there

anything that you would like to share with the listeners of A Call

for Love? I know you're gonna be at b yoga and wellness in February.

I will put the links in the show notes. But is there anything else

you'd like to share? What else? Well, I

do every Monday, I do a class called love in action. It's just a

half hour session where we do a centering together and then

talk about a practice or something that we can use. People can send in

questions, struggles that they're going through. So if you want some

more connect like, if you want to be able to

communicate and chat and get some direct,

and I wouldn't wanna say advice. But if you, yeah, if you have questions, that's

a great way to do it. And, yeah,

through my website, my website is samtheogi.com. I'm sam the yogi

on Instagram. Beautiful. Well, thank you,

Sam. Thank you for being on a call for love, and

I look forward to meeting you in person because you are in

Toronto, Ontario, Canada at this moment instead of

traveling all over, so, which is in my local area. So I look

forward to meeting you in person. I do too. Thanks so

much, Linda. Thank you. And thank you to everyone

listening on A Call for Love from my heart to yours.

Namaste. Namaste.