David Ding: Regeneration
David Ding's podcast, documenting the revelations he had while awakeing to unity consciousness and holographic awareness.
For written summaries of each episode check out David's substack:
https://daviddingnz.substack.com
David Ding: Regeneration
The Nature of Presence
Caught in the whirlwind of work, I was once asked, "What do you want for Christmas?" This seemingly simple question unraveled a tapestry of thoughts on presence and cherishing the fleeting moments of our lives. Today's episode weaves a narrative exploring the art of truly living in the now. As I recount a personal journey, our conversation travels through the rich landscapes of solitude and companionship, where solitude paints a canvas for creativity and companionship dances to the rhythm of shared ideas. With a team of founders, we contemplate the audacious potential of human presence as a tangible asset, a frontier that could redefine the essence of innovation.
The heart beats to the rhythm of connection and collaboration, and in this episode, we examine the profound impact of truly embracing these moments. Solitude, often a sanctuary for the mind's expansion, is juxtaposed with the vibrant energy of engaging conversations that bubble in the company of others. Tackling the notion of mental bandwidth, we recognize the myriad personal responsibilities that can cloud our ability to immerse ourselves fully in life's symphony. Yet, when we address these issues head-on, we discover the sweet spot where creativity can flourish. The dynamic interplay of ideas when three people unite sparks a discussion on the very fabric of creation, from the inception of a thought to its manifestation within the bounds of reality.
Our narrative culminates in a celebration of community, music, and shared experiences that stitch the quilt of our society. We touch upon the complexities of modern life that may deter us from savoring the present and delve into the concept of innovation sovereignty. Here, we imagine a world where communities band together to overcome life's hurdles, reimagining the pathways to a better quality of life. This episode isn't just about stories; it's an invitation to join a collective mission, a 'tribe' that supports and empowers each other, shaping an environment where innovation thrives and life is cherished. As we near the holiday season, let this be a reminder to create moments with loved ones that echo with joy and connection long after they've passed.
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Thanks for listening!
Okay, so this one's about the nature of presence. So I was inspired to do this one today because of a question my mother asked me and that was what do you want for Christmas? And I remember at the time being so engrossed in what I was doing at work and so fixed and focused on Delivering something, you know, accomplishing a mission, that the question in and of itself, when I considered stopping what I was doing to then think about what it is I want for Christmas, the disruption in that, to invest myself into that even that question Felt like a real chore and a real Just, really disruptive To what I was doing. And that's not to say that I didn't want to contemplate it, but in that moment it was. I didn't have the bandwidth, and so there you have a moment whereby my mother's evoking something out of me to full consideration that requires an investment of my time, my energy, my presence, into introspection, and so it got me thinking about presence a lot, and I'm working with a phenomenal team of founders who are Looking at turning present, the presence of a human being, into a tokenized asset, a tokenized real-world asset, and we're looking at ways we can support them and potentially Help them to incubate their startup, and so it's timely that I've that.
Speaker 1:I share my perspective on presence, because I think it's fundamentally one of the most precious Commodities that there is, and, in fact, I'd even go as far as to say it's the only real thing that matters in life. It's the only thing that matters in life is being here now. So in that context you know on the assumption that what I'm saying is Is true for not just myself, but most of us what does that actually mean in terms of life? If our presence is the only thing that matters in that moment, why are we living our lives the way that we are right now? Because it's fundamentally flawed In context of our presence and the only thing that really matters being is to be here now, then surely the most precious thing to us as human beings are moments. So if a moment is the only thing that's truly precious To a human being In terms of their quality of life, then it's. You expand upon that and you say, well, it's a human being. You expand upon that and you say, well, it's moments that we cherish. So then you say, okay.
Speaker 1:So if moments that we cherish, if that is the key to living a fulfilling and meaningful life. What are the obstacles and barriers preventing me from Creating moments that I cherish? And so you see, this unfoldment of Fundamental understanding of what really matters in life to us as human beings, that the true essence of what quality of life actually means is that we're creating moments that we can cherish. And so when my mother asked me that question, what do you want for Christmas and I saw that as a disruption from what I was doing I had to say to myself Is what I'm doing now disrupting me from a moment I could cherish with my mother? It is what I'm doing, disrupting me from other potential moments that I could be cherishing.
Speaker 1:And so the unraveling began. So it's like, okay, let's create my life around this hypothesis that this is really the essence of life and what it means to be alive. And so you begin the grand unraveling and you say, well, what is a cherished moment? What is it about each moment that means that it is cherished, and what would have to be true in order for a moment to be cherished? So you then it just hits you in the face. It's like it's the people that I'm with. It's a shared experience with people with, I mean, the most diverse thing I've ever come across in my life is the variation in people, the differences, the uniqueness of a human being. So, as an isolated human being, when you're sitting with yourself and contemplating, it's wholly familiar, other than a thought which could arise which could be wholly unique. And so I cherish those moments with myself where I can let my mind soar without constraints, in the real world of entrepreneurship.
Speaker 1:My nature is that my mind is, it soars, it goes to the absolute apex of what's possible, and that's very, very useful when people are feel constrained where they're at now, and I can blow the glass ceiling off so that their conception of what's possible expands. However, life is about. Life is about the space in between the possible and the impossible, and you want bandwidth between those things, you want headroom. So for me, what I a moment that I cherish on my own, is to let my mind soar, to contemplate what's possible, understanding that I don't. My life doesn't have to be a reflection of what's possible. I want my life to be a fluid, the fluid result of the space in between the possible and the impossible. So life is the space in between. You have headroom between what's possible and what's impossible, and to me that's a graceful life, and so I want that solitude. I want that time to myself.
Speaker 1:That's a moment that I cherish, moments to myself, where I can allow my mind to soar without constraint, without having to make it possible in the real world. I want to go out and imagine what human AI symbiosis would look like, what fused consciousness might be, might look like, what spliced DNA might look like. Just because it's fun, just because it's fun, it's not because I'm because that's what I want to do. I just want to conceive of what's possible so that, because until you do that, you can't reconcile what's desirable within that. So, if that's possible, what is desirable within that?
Speaker 1:And in fact, more often than not, when I allow my mind to soar in that way, I become more and more aware of what I cherish about here and now and what's already in front of me in the life that I have now, and I realized that I don't want to fuse with AI, I don't want to splice my DNA with something else, because there are so many moments that I've yet to cherish about what I have now, where I am now and I'm potential to be unlocked inside the human body, that I have right now to explore with the people and the uniqueness of the people that are here and now. And so when you explore what's possible with what's here now, it's infinite, without having to go off into the realms of the infinite, and so okay. But so that's one component of my ideal life moments to myself alone where I can allow my mind to soar, those are cherished moments for me. So what has to be true in that regard?
Speaker 1:For me to have a moment to myself where I can allow my mind to soar, means I have to have no distractions around me, so I switch my phone off. Means I have to be in a place of solitude where there are no unexpected distractions, where it feels peaceful to me, where I can be wholly present with myself in that moment. But then, if you, there's a subtle component to this which is essential and this is a thread that runs through all cherished moments is that there has to be nothing else occupying bandwidth inside my mind If I want to allow my mind to soar. I can't be thinking about my bills, my health, my emotional state, the health of my family, the health of my friends, the wars going on in the world. All those things are trying to occupy bandwidth within my mind. So, as long as the subtle hum of those things is going on, when my intention is to wholly devote my presence to allowing my mind to soar, then I'm encumbered by other aspects of my life that are occupying bandwidth.
Speaker 1:So, in that scenario, what you can see is a blueprint for how to live life and how every human being can live their life, and this is why it's so fundamentally important to honour and respect the validity of every single human being's perspective, no matter how distorted it may be to someone else, because the nature of what's occupying space in your mind is indifferent to what the truth means. If you're worried about toxic algal bloom, if you're worried about cats destroying native birds, if you're worried about fungus on your toenail, if you're worried about the fact that you broke a nail, if you're worried about that, you got the wrong colour lipstick and it doesn't match your outfit, all that matters is what's occupying bandwidth and space in your mind, and this is where, as human beings, we compare ourselves to other people and we say oh well, you know the suffering that's going on in another country because of war. We invalidate our own. And it's not that it's suffering. I'm just talking about the obstacles and barriers to being wholly present, to cherish a moment. And so here we have a blueprint for life. It's about understanding what is occupying bandwidth in our mind Work, projects at work, our health, our mental state of being, medication, guilt, emotions, and so if we really want moments to cherish in our life, we have to devote ourselves to the unraveling of these things, to we free up the bandwidth in our mind in order to create the space to be here now, unencumbered with maximum bandwidth, to just be here and wholly present and to let go and that's a magical feeling being in that flow. We've all felt it when we're not really thinking because our mind's empty. It's like a blank canvas and it's like our nature arises and expresses itself through us onto that canvas. And so here you see a blueprint and a template for presence unfolding.
Speaker 1:So, okay, what are other moments that I cherish? So I know that I cherish moments by myself, allowing my mind to soar with maximum bandwidth available space in my mind. So what else? Well, being with another person that I, who I cherish. So spending quality time with another unique human being that I gravitate towards and where the conversation flows and our minds can soar together. I love that. I love that, especially in a setting, you know, like an outdoor bar, with a bit of hustle and bustle, vibrant people around us and nice hum, trying a drink that I've never tried before sun's shining. I cherish those moments, I cherish the conversation, I cherish the uniqueness of where that conversation goes and what's possible because of the collaboration. It always happens in an unexpected way, the nature of the back and forth and the bouncing of ideas in a collaborative way, where you're exploring the potential of what's possible together, or you're just actually just bouncing off each other in unexpected ways for no reason. It's almost like curiosity more than anything else, and being wholly present in those moments is a wonderful thing. And so, okay, that's another moment that I cherish. So then you apply the same thing. So how can I be fully present in that moment?
Speaker 1:Well, what's occupying bandwidth in my mind? Health, it comes back to the same fundamental things. I'm worried about my grandma, or whether there's bills to pay or it's the bandwidth is the same. The things encroaching into my space, creating obstacles and barriers preventing me from being present, are the focus in my life. They're the path, the aspects of my life that I want to devote myself to so that they become autonomous so that I can create headroom. See, I'm notice, I'm talking about bandwidth and headroom, and this is the key. Anything that's occupying bandwidth is limiting your headroom. The more headroom you have, the more things flow, the more of a state of grace that you're in. So if my health is occupying bandwidth, how can I create headroom so that that flows in my life and so it begins the great unfoldment? Why am I concerned about my health? I don't know.
Speaker 1:So, okay, you begin with a checkup, you do the checkup and you may free your mind straight away. Oh, I've got perfect health. Or it may be that you've got pain in your body, or it may be that your mobility is not great. It may be that you just don't feel good in your body. You know it may be comfortable with your physical appearance, which is totally okay. That could be an emotional issue, it could be a mental issue, it could be trauma related, but you see, it's not until we actually unravel the thing and we give that its own space and we create bandwidth for that thing. Sorry, we create headroom for that thing so that eventually it becomes autonomous and it doesn't occupy space in your mind. It becomes autonomous and it becomes unconscious and therefore it's not pulling us away from each moment, it's not nagging on us, at us to give it headroom, so we can cherish each moment more and more together.
Speaker 1:So imagine a. So. So I cherish moments by myself. I cherish moments with others where our minds can sort together. Where else do I cherish? I cherish moments when there are three of us and where we're kind of there are two opposites and there's someone who's kind of like a, like a transformer in between.
Speaker 1:And what I notice about when I'm in a space with three people in that dynamic is we can actually create stuff. So if you think about when I'm alone, my mind soars. What's possible? There's no creation in that, it's just imagination. If you imagine with two people, our minds are soaring together. You know, I imagine I imagine like DNA twisted together, just soaring and just going as far as we can. And then I imagine the revelations that we have along the way that were unexpected and that expand our awareness of what's possible. Maybe they reveal deeper desires that were unaware that we knew we had. It illuminates things.
Speaker 1:Then you bring three people in and specifically especially when there's a really superb dynamic where you've got and I call this trinity, where you have, which is binary and infinity, so a one and a zero, so everything, so off and on, or everything and nothing, and then the space in between are varying degrees of the same thing. Some people some of you are listening to this are used to like the diamond or the double diamond design design method where you're creating, you're talking about what's possible tempered by what's impossible, and then you're constraining possibilities until you land on what you actually want to create. It's kind of similar to that dynamic, so three people in the same space, wholly present with each other, but in that scenario you're into creative energy whereby by the end of that session, you could land on a concept that has a beginning and an end. And so you can see a theme here. The theme for me is for my life, I need the full gamut of creation and I want to be included and involved in all of those phases. I want to be on my own, allowing my mind to soar. I want to be with another mind who enables my mind to soar, and new and unique in different ways, and then I want three of us together to create a viable concept with a beginning and an end, where the zenith of what I believe is possible and the absolute, the reverse zenith of what's impossible. I don't know what you call that no-transcript. I create temperance for each one, but there's a concept occupying the space in between.
Speaker 1:The fact is, in what's possible and what's impossible, to create something in the here and now that will fluidly be able to be stood up now to create something now, now it could be something to create in the future. It depends on what your pipeline's like, and this is what it means to be in the flow. What can we do here and now, understanding what's possible and understanding what's impossible, so that we can perpetually and continually create and progress. So I cherish all of those moments. I love all that stuff. So what else do I cherish? Well, I cherish being in an environment where we're celebrating together and my favorite is the accomplishment of a shared mission, and that could take on any shape or form. It's chaotic in nature. You're just there, being with each other, reflecting on an accomplished mission.
Speaker 1:Now, each of us could have had a different role in that. It's not about that. We've ticked off a bunch of tasks and, oh yeah, I've completed this task and this is the next. I did 11 tasks today and that's great. Those are the things that are for ourselves, to make us feel as though those are the constraint the self-imposed constraints we put on ourselves, that make us feel good in ourselves. So that's part of it, but that's a self-responsible thing. I know that because I ticked these things off my list today. The self-imposed constraints I put on my own time and energy today means that they're not occupying space in my mind, means that we're aligned to the mission and we're going to accomplish the mission. Here's the I'm on track. It means that the part I'm playing and accomplishing a shared mission, I feel good about my contribution. You see, it's not about people going, oh you did so much work today. That's nonsense. That just doesn't work. That doesn't work. The self-imposed constraints are our responsibility as human beings. They're what make us feel good about ourselves and give us respect in ourselves and trust in ourselves. We trust ourselves that our self-imposed constraints are the standards we set for ourselves.
Speaker 1:So back to the scenario of a cherished moment, a shared mission that's been accomplished. We're all celebrating together because together we were able to achieve whatever it was. We did it, we did it, and so we share in the success together. My preference is we share in the spoils as well, and it's kind of like the old tribal mentality. If it's in a business sense, if the tribe goes hunting and they shoot a deer, then you feed everyone, because if everyone's fed, then the bandwidth and everyone's mind is free. You're not worried about whether the tribe's hungry, you're not worried about people surviving. You feed them with what you have so that you can continue to create moments that you can cherish. That's what the quality of our life is about, and you celebrate each other, you appreciate each other. You realise in those moments that you accomplished the mission because of the uniqueness of one another, not because of a list of tasks that were completed, and you weigh them up and say, oh, this one did more work than that one or whatever it may be.
Speaker 1:Lots of people's uniqueness is based upon the gravity they can create around a situation, the people they can pull into a room, the credibility of their reputation, the diversity of their networks, the mana of their word. When they speak someone, people listen, their mentorship, their shared experiences. It's all just this grand. It's kind of like a tapestry. We weave together All of that uniqueness, we encapsulate it and we utilise it to accomplish a shared mission. And because of the collaboration and because it's we create a space for each individual to show up wholly as an individual rather than as an accountant or as a web developer.
Speaker 1:You're a unique human being. You can bring your whole self to accomplishing a mission. Just because you're an accountant doesn't mean you can't pick up the phone and talk to someone about sales or it's about. When you have that freedom to be a human being and to bring the richness of who you are to the potential of that scenario, then those moments are wholly cherished. Once you accomplish the mission and for me, I like to go to the pub and I'm cheering each other, high-fiving pats on the back, sharing stories, war stories Can't believe we did that, oh you know contemplating what comes next and all the new challenges that come because of the success, because of what's made possible, because of what happened. So I cherish those moments and so, underpinning this, it's the same things. How can I go into that space and cherish that moment? I have to be able to remember it. If I'm not present, then I won't remember the moment, because my mind will have been based on the future, based on the health of my cat, based on that my garden's not growing properly based on whatever it is, whatever it is, but it's on us to devote the time, the energy and the effort into creating the headroom for everything so that it doesn't occupy space in our minds preventing us from being wholly present in each moment, so that we have memories that we can cherish, so we can remember being in the moment, and so you can see the theme here, the other moments that I cherish.
Speaker 1:I love music. Most of my friends are, all you know. We have a DJing background semi-professional DJing, if not professional DJing. You probably couldn't make a great living out of it, but most of us have DJed at massive festivals and kind of regularly DJed in the weekends and nightclubs and things like that. So what we love now is we love events around a birthday party where we come together, get together, we all jam, drink quite a lot, if I'm honest, have a barbecue, the kids are playing in the pool and these big mash-up events with music and sunshine and cider and the sun, and that's a whole other dynamic. That's even more chaos.
Speaker 1:You're celebrating each other. You're celebrating the life of another human being, reflecting on the past, telling stories, thinking about the future. It could be anything. You're open to the totally unexpected. And I find in those moments the really unexpected can happen. And when you're whole, you're present in those moments, those are moments that you know kind of come out and that will stick with you, that you kind of really never forget. And here we have the quality of our life. This is really what quality of life is the ability to be holy, present at the moment.
Speaker 1:So if you let's just base, make the assumption that we can all agree on that, yeah, that sounds awesome, yeah, it sounds amazing. Well, how is civilization, the way that it's structured now, an impediment to this? And it really is an impediment. It is an impediment Because there's, we don't have enough autonomy, we don't, we haven't decided as a civilization to say that this is our shared intent, this is our unified intent of purpose, this is how we, this is what we're going to devote innovation to. This is, you know, if you bring this into the context of innovation as an example, and you've got a tribe, let's say you've got a community, and let's call that your tribe. They're the people that you work with on the shared missions and and all the rest of it, on commercial ventures or some kind of business venture.
Speaker 1:Well then you look at each individual and you understand together what is the bandwidth, what's occupying space in their mind that's preventing them from being holy present. And for one person, that's the mortgage. For one person it's the health of their daughter. For one person it's, you know, the grandmother's going blind. For one person, it's chronic pain in their body. For another person, their dog's got a sore leg. For another person, broken nail.
Speaker 1:So we don't invalidate these things, we encapsulate, because what the things that are occupying space in your mind are indifferent to the degrees of perceived levels of suffering or whatever it may be. All that matters is what's occupying the space. And so when you can come together as a tribe and say, okay, these are all the things that are impeding the quality of your life, that are preventing cherished moments from being cherished, where you can actually share, you know, in this scenario you could accomplish a shared mission, but you are unable to cherish the moment because your mind was occupied thinking about the health of your grandmother. So you end up, you don't cherish the moment and therefore you don't. The quality of your life is impeded. So in that scenario, you actually become a tribe and you actually say, well, I'm really worried about my grandmother.
Speaker 1:So, in the context of innovation, we look at what's the challenge with your grandmother she's going blind. Why is she going blind? Been to the doctors, they don't know what's going on. Or there's a two year waiting list for an operation, whatever it may be. Now, the two year operation, it's an impediment to the quality of our lives, it's not working, it's not good enough, but we have to accept these things.
Speaker 1:So, in context of innovation, you always start small, you perfect a small thing and you proliferate the small thing. And you probably already know we're into big time, into decentralization and cooperative collaboration. So it's not about deferring your authority to the centralized thing. It's about the tribe coming together to say how can we, how can we accelerate this? How can we fund innovation to create something new? How can we find have we got scientists around us who are working on things like this in fields of AI and blindness, and you know? How can we amplify those things? How can we provide funding to accelerate this? How can we recalculate the risk and set a new standard for regulation that supersedes what exists right now that the government is stating, how can we come up with a way of doing a clinical trial that's even safer than the way it is now, but a thousand times faster. And how can we create a standard for measuring the vulnerability of our grandmother in terms of her having full disclosure on the risk and the perceived reward?
Speaker 1:You see, this is what sovereignty means. It means that if something's occupying bandwidth in your mind and affecting the quality of your life, you get to decide how much risk you take. Only you know how painful it is. Only you know what it would mean to be liberated from that. Only you know the impact on the quality of your life If the innovation were to be successful and if the full disclosure happens, if the safe space is created by your entire tribe who love you, they're not gonna. They will not put you at risk, at undue risk. However, they will honor your free will choice.
Speaker 1:I speak to many people who are I Don't like using the word disabled because I don't see them as disabled. I see them as profoundly gifted. But they have challenges in their life and the quality of their life is so impeded by Whether it's emotional or Physical or mental the, the amount of risk they are prepared to take to escape that situation. It's heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking Because the degree of suffering that they're experiencing on a day-to-day basis Is so intense that they're prepared to take the risk. It's worth it, you see.
Speaker 1:So sovereignty means that if you are prepared to take that risk, then it's about your tribe coming around you to say okay, we know that this is really important to you. You're prepared to put your life on the line. There's a 50-50 chance that you won't survive the operation. As an example, how can we move that? How can we come together really quickly to accelerate it, that to move that 50% to 25? And if we can get it 25, can we move it to 10? You see, this is what mission-led innovation means. We accomplish shared mission together. It's like we love you too much. 50, 50, 50 is not good enough. How can we innovate to get that to 1% chance of failure? Or maybe we get to 10? You see, so that this is, this is how we redesign and reform civilization. We, we, we restructure it so that the driving force and the power behind everything that we do is driven by our love for each other.
Speaker 1:You see, because the reason things occupying space in your mind, the reason you're worried about the health of your tribe or of your grandmother, or the deterioration of people is because of love, because they're at risk. You, because you're concerned about their quality of life. You're, you're concerned that they're suffering. This is occupying the space in your mind. If you can't pay the bills, it's because of love, because the people that need a roof over their head and food in their bellies are at risk. It's love. The reason you're concerned about your sister. He's considering an operation with a 50 50% of that. It won't work.
Speaker 1:It's because of love, because of the moments yet to be cherished that would be lost. And the grief is Because of the unrealized potential moments we could have had, cherishing. We could have cherished with that person if we were able to be wholly present, together To create moments, together to cherish. You see, this is how we reform civilization, this is how we restructure it In a tribal way, but harnessing the potential of innovation, capturing the uniqueness of everybody around us, sharing with the rest of our tribe what's occupying Time and space in our minds, and coming together to encourage each other To accomplish the intimate, the incremental, to achieve the shared mission together. You know, if it's mobility for someone, you know we, we share the accomplishment of. They were able to walk 50 steps today. They only did 10 steps yesterday. That 100 steps, 100 steps. On the weekend they did a kilometer. They've done five kilometers. They're jogging now.
Speaker 1:You see, we lift each other up To accomplish a shared mission so that, in an autonomous way, we create the headroom around the challenges and the suffering that's occupying time and space in our minds, that liberates us to be wholly present with each other in each moment, so that we can cherish each other and create moments to cherish. And this, this is what makes living and, in the quality of our life, becomes the incentive to prolong it, to cherish life itself. We want to invest in creating headroom Around aspects of our life where there's no bandwidth and we help each other to create that headroom, so that we become autonomous and Deliberated and free to just be here now, in each moment, cherishing each other's presence. You see, this is the life that I want for myself. This is life I want for the people that I love, for my friends, for my family. I want this life for everyone. We can do it. We can do it, but it starts with the and unraveling within ourselves To begin considering what is the headroom.
Speaker 1:I need to create my own life, and Then we need to come together to share Our mission. This is my mission in my life. How can we collaborate together to create a shared mission for our tribe? We were working with each other to raise each other up to accomplish that shared mission, and we celebrate the accomplishment of everybody's mission together, so that we can be wholly present with each other, cherishing each moment. And that is the gift of presence that we can give to each other, we can give to ourselves, and and that will lead us to a life that we cherish. So my hope is that this Christmas for you, for your family, for your loved ones, that you have the bandwidth to be wholly present, to be here and now with your family, with your friends, with your loved ones, so that on the day of Christmas, you can create moments together that you'll cherish for even more. Okay, that's it for now. For the nature of presents, talk soon.
