054: Real Self-Improvement Doesn't Happen Because of This

The podcast episode discusses the challenge of making personal changes, focusing on how our bodies become accustomed to certain emotional and physical states over time. It explores how discomfort arises when attempting to shift to healthier or more positive states, despite the benefits they may bring. The speakers emphasize the importance of clarity and intention in pursuing change, suggesting that discomfort can be a natural part of growth when aligned with clear goals and intentions. 

Connect with Mike Chang:
- Instagram: @mikechangofficial
-Youtube: Mike Chang
- Website: www.flow60.com

Connect with Stephen Yeh:
-Instagram: @iamstephenyeh
-Twitter: @iamstephenyeh

Transcript

Mike: [00:00:00] You know, a big factor that stops us from being able to make change is that our body doesn't recognize what's good or bad. It's not like our mind. Our body doesn't judge and says, this thing is good for me and this thing is bad for me. The way that our body actually recognizes good and bad is through what it's familiar with feeling.

So in other words, if I'm used to feeling this certain sensation. The certain way in my body, then when I feel that, no matter what that is, it feels good for me. That can be feeling bloatedness,that can be feeling pressure, pain, tension, that could be feeling stressed, anger. It sounds strange, but it's the truth.

Whatever it is that I'm constantly and used to feeling. That feels [00:01:00] good for me. Now, I might not say that I like that feeling. But, whenever I feel that way, it feels comfortable. Now, vice versa. Whatever it is that I'm not used to feeling, my body's not used to feeling, that feels uncomfortable. So, today I want to talk about this because when a person is moving towards feeling more calmness, feeling more centered, More at ease.

We would think that path, like the more comfortable they feel, the more they want it. But actually the opposite is true. When a person's used to feeling stressed and agitated, you know, they're used to feeling, emotional. When they start to feel calm, feeling calm, feeling centered, feels really strange. It feels like something is off.

They can't put their finger on it because in reality nothing is off. But they feel so strange in their [00:02:00] body that. They will look in their environment and think what is wrong with this situation? What is wrong with what's happening? Maybe it's what I ate, maybe it's the air, maybe it's something else. And they would start to make things up.

Because we are so conditioned based on the way we feel, when a person is making these type of changes and they're changing the way they feel, they have to remember that we can't change our behavior. Mind. We can't change our actions, our behaviors, without changing the way we feel. And because we are used to feeling a certain way, change will feel weird.

Change will feel different. Change will feel uncomfortable. Uncomfortable may not be extreme pain, but it's uncomfortable because we're not familiar with it. So we can say change will literally feel strange and unfamiliar in your body. [00:03:00] But if you want to go through real change, we have to go through this, and we have to understand it.

If we don't understand this, then we may create doubt about the approach that we have. It may stop us from doing the consistent, Daily habits that's creating this change in feeling we may end up stopping it because we think something is wrong And I personally went through this before and took me a little over a year to recognize that nothing was actually wrong Besides just the fact I feel different than before and that's a good thing But at the time I didn't realize it and I thought it was bad And I kind of kept going back and forth until over a year and I recognized what was actually happening.

So, , have you experienced this before, Stephen? 

Stephen: Good question. I mean, it's funny because as you're talking about it, I, I'm not thinking of a personal one just yet, but I'm just imagining [00:04:00] whether it's in movies or somewhere where all the friends to this woman's like, Why don't you just leave that man?

He treats you so bad. He beats you and everything, but then she's like, I just love him. And, and so it just reminds me of when you're just so used to being in a certain state, you get so comfortable in there and that comfort. In some ways, even that situation, it brings her safety. And so if I, if I'm good example, if I'm thinking of my own life right now, and we had this discussion just last night as well, which is just around,, there is an aspect of me.

That would like to share more with other people. And then, but there's also another aspect of me where I feel just comfortable with where I'm at, , just, you know, I have a [00:05:00] pretty good life. Already. It's like. A part of the body is saying, why push myself to, to do those things where in general I'm already feeling pretty well right now.

And so there's a bit of a challenge and a struggle to want to make that leap and make that difference. 

Mike: I think one way to look at it is we would question, is this something that we actually need to do? Because let's say if you were to go ahead and push yourself, it feels uncomfortable. And then so therefore, if it feels uncomfortable, should you still do it?

And it's important because it's not really just about feeling uncomfortable. A person, we have goals, we have, you know, things that we want to accomplish. And if accomplishing it feels uncomfortable, But that's our goal. , we have clear reasoning on why, , increases our quality of life or moves our life in the right direction.

Then I say we feel uncomfortable. It's okay. It's part of the path. 

Stephen: Mmm. 

Mike: But if there's not a clear [00:06:00] understanding or a clear intention to accomplish this thing or to go that direction, Then why feel uncomfortable, like why push ourselves, you know, so I think there's, I think there needs to have that clarity, you know, and I think based on our conversation yesterday, I think you were saying like, I just don't want all of those things right now.

It's just not that doesn't feel like that time in my life and I think if that's the case, there's no point to, to try to make ourselves want it, , I think the first thing that needs to happen is we need to have a desire, desire for something. And then once we have desire, now, if I feel uncomfortable, but I want to accomplish meditating for one hour a day, but wow, it feels so uncomfortable after 10 minutes.

But because this is my clear intention and because I, I believe that if I was to meditate for one hour a day, it's going to just silence my mind and put me in this nice place. So that's my clear intention and goal. [00:07:00] So now I'm gonna go through the discomforts until I reach that, right? I think that's, having a clarity like that makes it worthwhile.

Without it, yeah, I don't think people should just make themselves uncomfortable just because. 

Stephen: So if we go back to, you were talking about there was a year where you struggled through this, would you want to share what happened there? 

Mike: Well, I remember learning about that all feelings, all emotions are inside of us.

And if we are present with them, they'll come up and they'll leave. They're only inside of us because we suppress it. So when I had that understanding, I said, okay, well, that's great. Then that means I'm just going to meditate every day, meditate every day. And I'm just going to connect to all this stuff inside and we'll let it go.

So then my meditation at the time was about 10 minutes a day, five to 10 minutes. It wasn't very long. So I started to do 10 minutes and then I increased it [00:08:00] and I was doing 15. And then every week or so I increased it by about five minutes. I remember when I got to an hour and I'm sitting there and an hour was, was tough, you know, but I can finally, I was, able to do it.

And I remember every day just feeling good, but different. So different that it felt like something was wrong and I'm thinking to myself, I'm trying to become more peaceful, but this doesn't feel like the peace that I would imagine, which I imagine feels good. I feel off. I feel like something is off. I don't know what it is, but I can feel it.

And this is real because I'm feeling it. So then I would look around and I'm like, well, what is it that I'm doing that could be creating this? And I saw that, , I extended my meditation by a lot and didn't make sense on why I would feel that way with that lot of a meditation. So then I [00:09:00] remember I would spend time reading books and studying and figuring this out, which caused me to decrease my meditation.

And suddenly I'm feeling better. So I said, okay, well, I feel normal again. But this normal isn't normal. I'm still seeing the characteristics of like a chattering mind and all these things, so this is not where I need to be, but Where I was, I don't know if that was right either. And then I remember realizing that, Oh, right, you do need to meditate.

You do need to do all that. So I said, okay. So I started doing it again and then I felt at ease, but uncomfortable. So then I stopped again. So I repeated this process multiple, multiple times until. One day, I remember reading somewhere that even when we reach a level of peace, it will feel uncomfortable at least in the beginning for a while because the body is used to feeling a certain way.[00:10:00] 

And if you introduce peace, you introduce love, and the body is not used to feeling that, it will feel uncomfortable and it will not be desirable. It's like somebody who's used to eating junk food and suddenly they eat healthy foods. They're body's like, what the heck is this, give me my, give me my real food.

But then if a person was to eat healthy food over and over and over, the body starts to adjust and it goes, wow, this feels good for my body. Okay, I'm starting to get familiar with this taste, get familiar with the way this healthy food sits on my stomach. That's another thing, the food that goes in sits in our stomach in a certain way.

So once I had that understanding, I said, okay. So then I went back in and I would meditate. I'll do my practice. The only difference is when it felt really weird, I didn't pull out. I didn't stop because I was prepared for it to feel strange, for it to feel weird. And eventually what happened was my body started getting used to that weird feeling of calmness and ease.[00:11:00] 

And I stopped having doubts and I stopped questioning. Because the doubts and the questioning itself creates more emotions, more stress. So eventually I stop questioning it, I just let it be. And that allowed me to go much, much deeper. And it was because I came to that realization. Our body is familiar with the way it feels and it doesn't want to change.

So if we want the body to change, we've got to be okay with feeling discomfort, feeling unfamiliar things, which feels uncomfortable. 

Stephen: I'm just imagining if we are to look at life like a game, , And it's like, what you are trying to do in that situation in meditating and increasing your meditation is like up leveling yourself.

And it feels like that you progress, but then you have that struggling feeling inside saying this is uncomfortable. It feels [00:12:00] like it's one of those challenges or one of those kind of, when you're playing video games, you have these adversities that you have to go through. In order to like stabilize yourself in that new level.

And it's funny because when you really take a look at the things that you improve upon, and we're talking about making shifts in our state or even in, in our environment, in some ways, we do have to, in some ways, overcome that challenge there before we can step into that new reality. And essentially that's a test for us to see if we can maintain and be in there because then it's almost like, okay, then life is saying, if you can actually stick through it and be in, then you actually deserve it.

Mike: Yeah, I can see that. I think people, know that change feels uncomfortable, but I think they're [00:13:00] looking at the perspective of. It's uncomfortable to do this thing, so I'm going to keep doing it until it feels comfortable. But the idea of, , when we go into deep meditations or when we get the body to kind of relax, it doesn't feel like so much of a thing that we're doing.

And I think sometimes people forget that they needed to go through the path of discomfort. I had a student a couple weeks ago talk about this. And, uh, she was saying that it felt uncomfortable and she stopped because she didn't know what was wrong. It just, she didn't know why she felt uncomfortable. And as we started diving into it, we came to the realization that it felt strange for her to feel relaxed.

It feels strange to not have drama. It's like when a person is having drama about this and this and this and in their mind they're just running through the dialogue. And suddenly to not do that, a lot of times people don't know what to do. They don't know what to do with themselves. They're usually dealing with drama, and now they're just sitting around, there's no [00:14:00] drama, there's nothing going on in their head.

And the idea of that, the experience of it is wonderful. But the idea of the fact that, that is happening, sometimes is scary. Somebody's like, oh, this is wrong, I'm wasting my time. They haven't went through the process. So I think it's important to recognize that when we become more peaceful, when our minds start to become more calm, the feeling is going to feel strange.

It's never going to feel tremendously painful. It's not going to feel that way because so much of it is already gone. But, There's still sometimes enough traces to make it feel uncomfortable, unfamiliar. I think if people just recognize that, they'll just keep going and just know that all we're doing here is getting the body to be used to a way of feeling.

And when our body's used to feeling this way, what we have to do is get the body to be used to feeling that way. It's actually really simple. It's really, it's very, very [00:15:00] logical. My body's used to feeling X, that feeling, that sensation. And I just want the body to feel a new sensation. So all I gotta do is introduce it to the body as often as I can.

And then now over time the body starts to get used to feeling the new way and it's unfamiliar with the old way. That's how we're able to use our feelings to actually drive and change habits, change things in our life. Because if we don't do it that way then we only depend on what we think in our head.

We can't even listen to the way the body feels. The feelings never lie, which means the way you feel is the way you feel. That doesn't mean that we will make decisions based on the way we feel. But it does mean that our feeling compass is accurate. This is the way I feel about the situation. Here's what I want to say about that.

Stephen: I'm just imagining as you're talking about that, where you're saying you just have to consistently Introduce the new feeling into the body. So I'm just [00:16:00] imagining, let's say you have a lot of like heaviness inside. Then what happens is you start doing a regular practice and then you start to clear out some of that heaviness.

And you feel a new sensation, but yet it's still kind of foreign. And you still have a lot of that heaviness just all around the body. And some ways wants to be like, Oh my God, what's going on? Because it's shifting, it's changing. It's feeling uncomfortable. And then so as you can introduce more of that new feeling, it starts to enlarge itself inside and until it can take over more and more and then you start to lock into that state more normally.

I have a memory now just popped up. Of a situation like this and it was the first time that it did a silent meditation retreat. It was in Thailand and [00:17:00] over there, there was a specific center where they call it a beginner's class or a beginner's course. But I guess, you can translate like fundamentals course because they want you to go deep enough.

It was 21 days. Silent meditation, and at this place, you don't talk to, yeah, so that's what I was thinking. I was like, what do you mean this is basic? But after a while, it's like, ah, they have for, for this particular lineage, they want 21 days to lock it in even more. And so, I remember I was younger, I went in with a lot of like ego, like, yeah, I'm going to fucking do this.

Come here, I'm going to get so zen and peaceful and this is going to be my time to just like chill and just have like a clear mind throughout. And the first couple days, like, I was in that state where I was [00:18:00] like, Ah, yes, this feels good. Yeah, just sitting there. And then, after some time, when that frame that I had started to get tired, then it became like, oh my god, I got another like 18, 19 days here.

How am I going to survive this? And then there'd be all these changes going on inside because there'd be moments where I'd feel so centered and so good, and then it would flip back. And there was this constant push, push and pull feeling, and it was a very, very fascinating experience. And it was also the time where I realized.

Oh, my problems don't lie just outside of my world, because I'm here in this serene environment where I don't have to take care of anything, like the food is taken care of, there's a place for me to sleep, all I gotta do is just do this meditation. [00:19:00] And I have all this chaos going on while there's a little stream of water, , being shown and birds flying around.

Why is there still so much chaos inside? And that was another lesson that I learned while there. How long were 

Mike: you guys meditating every day? That was a full 

Stephen: day. That was crazy. It was, it was essentially do it as much as you can. Because other than that, there's no talking to anybody. There's no reading.

There's no writing. There's no listening to anything. Nothing. Don't even look at anybody. And you just do it whenever you can. And then if no eye contact, and then if you're supposed to, if you need to chill, go and do your chill and then get back to practice. And it was intense because what happens is, , they ramp it up for you in the beginning, like, let's say first day it would be like, okay, you know, do 10 minutes, [00:20:00] sit 10 minutes, walk.

And then take a break for 10, 20 minutes and then repeat and try and do it like four or five hours a day and then it'll go up to six, seven, you'll start increasing from 10 to 15, 15 to 20. And then you'll continue to increase until you get to one hour sitting and one hour walking and then you take a small break and then you, you do another round of that.

So, but what was very intense was the last three or four days. Because they don't tell you this up front. They don't tell you. They just say, Hey, this is the finality. So, this is what you're going to do on this day. Hand me a piece of paper. That's kind of the instructions and essentially throughout the day it's pretty normal.

But, they want you to continue doing the practice throughout the entire night as well. So, that [00:21:00] day it's like, 

Mike: Here's Like stay up? Oh wow. Stay 

Stephen: up. So they hand you a piece of paper saying, okay, here's your challenge now. Go throughout the day and then at nighttime, here's a little bit of a new practice to do, but at the same time continue doing what you're doing for the whole night and then come back to me in the morning.

So that, my friend, was very challenging for me just because I love my sleep. Also I think that's one of the things that like triggers me the most is when I'm tired and lethargic. And so you're like trying to stay up and walking. And so first day was definitely a struggle. And then I get back in the morning saying, Oh my God, finished.

Get back. They say, congratulations. Here's your next assignment. Next assignment, stay up another 24 hours.

And so essentially I, 

Mike: when people show up, so they're not all starting at [00:22:00] the same time, right? Like they, they just start when on the day they show up or do they all show up at the same time? 

Stephen: Everybody shows up on different days. 

Mike: Ah, wow. That's kind of cool. Yeah, so then it's like, okay, this is your day one, so you do this thing.

Here's your day ten, so you do that thing. 

Stephen: Hmm. 

Mike: Well, right, I guess, , because people aren't communicating with each other, it doesn't matter if you're on this day and I'm on that day, because Yeah. I really like how you mentioned that you realized it, it was coming from within and not from outside because nobody's doing anything to you.

Stephen: Hmm. Especially on, during those nights, I mean, essentially ended up being, I remember calculating it was three and a half days up where you don't sleep. And you're just doing your best to meditate throughout that entire time. And I didn't understand it at the time, like, why were they doing this?

This is like, [00:23:00] torturous in some ways. But then over time, I actually went back to that place multiple times. And then what I discovered was Oh, these are actually the times where, at night time, where you're already exhausted, where you're already tired, to dig up even deeper stuff, and, and the game then would be while you're in that exhausted state, how well can you still be present and conscious?

Mike: Sounds like a good challenge. 

Stephen: Yeah. I think maybe on the second night I was starting to hallucinate, that just popped in my mind again. Because on the second night, there was like this window, because at night time we'll do it in our small room, just walking back and forth. Walking back and forth like, like two meters, back forth, back forth, or sitting meditation.

And there was a window, and I remember I started to look at that window, [00:24:00] and it felt like it was starting to turn into a portal or something, and I got freaked out. And then, I had to stop, because I was like, oh shit, something's gonna happen. And I had to go to my teacher and say, Hey, this is what's happening.

And he was like, okay, so we're going to reduce, your meditation from an hour, an hour to a 15, 15 for now.

And then I remember shortly after, maybe it was like half an hour or an hour later, the weirdest thing happened. I still don't know exactly what happened, but I was in sitting meditation and I had my lights on and I remember finishing that session and. I took one foot off to stretch it, and when I did that, the lights went off, and it went back on.

And then when I took my other leg off, again it happened, the lights went off, and the light went back on. And this was during the time where I was [00:25:00] already delirious thinking there's a portal happening. So I was like, what the fuck is going on here? Wow. 

Mike: Hard to, hard to say for that. 

Stephen: Would you 

Mike: say that, that over the course of the 21 days, did your body change in the way you feel normally?

Or would you say it was very similar to when you started? 

Stephen: You mean after, like before and after? Or what are you talking about? You know, 

Mike: we're talking about, we're talking about getting used to a certain feeling state. And did you feel like, like you, you were experiencing a different state of feeling by the end of this 21 day program?

Or did it feel very similar to when you started? 

Stephen: Good question. So, well, before, and I would say right after, there would be a huge difference. Huge [00:26:00] difference. Like I felt like I was able to perceive just so much more when I was in that state. But what I do remember specifically with this type of practice that I was doing, it started to wane over time as I went back into normal reality.

And it's also mainly because I wasn't keeping up with the practice, right? So over time, I could see just coming back to that state. And that's also why after, , I literally went to that place, I was on and off that one specifically, I think like a good six months at least. And then what I found was that every time I went back after a couple of months or so, it would drop significantly.

So I was like, Oh, There's not a big point in this then because I can't sustain it in normal everyday life. And then that's when I found another form of meditation that I felt that I was able to [00:27:00] keep it in my daily life as well. So 

Mike: and what form of meditation was that for you? 

Stephen: Well, before I get into that, I, I think the main difference is.

Because the style that I was being taught in the first one, I think it was mainly for monks. It was a regimen for monks. But I'm just imagining, like, that's in some ways their life. They don't really get out of it. So, it works really well for them. Right. The other one essentially was also in Thailand and he, he just did a different version of Vipassana.

So the first one that I went to, it was also Vipassana, but they were doing a certain technique where essentially you would note everything that, or as much as you can, that would pop up in your mind. So right now, whatever I'm imagining, I just note and say it. So for example, [00:28:00] it'd be like bird, bird, bird, repeat it three times.

And then you go back into meditation, bamboo, bamboo, bamboo, random bamboo, just popped in my mind. So I do that, right. But then it's hard. I mean, nearly impossible to integrate that into normal day life, because how are you going to actually function if you're constantly calling out. What's happening in your mind.

So that was not as effective in everyday life, but it did definitely get me into a deep state while I was there. The other technique that I ended up learning was from another monk in Thailand, and I spent a good amount of time there, which is essentially, it was really just, you would walk for 20, 30 steps, turn around, walk back for 20, 30 steps, and you can go back and forth.

And essentially, the practice is while you're doing this walking, just [00:29:00] observe and be mindful of your thoughts, what you're feeling, what your emotions are, what's coming up for you, what's the common story that keeps getting repeated over and over, and then I noticed that that particular practice I was able to take with me into everyday life much, much better.

Mike: Why do you feel that is? Is it because you were walking or is there something else? 

Stephen: I think it's walking. And then I think it's also just a, a different way of keeping track. Meaning the previous one, they would have you, whatever you have a feeling, come up. Sad, sad, sad, angry, angry, angry, and then happy, happy, happy.

You, you would like, almost like mentally take notes constantly, right? And so if you're in daily life, you can't take all these notes, and the walking method [00:30:00] was different in the first one. The walking method in the first one was It was like this technique where it's not normal walking. What you would do is, as you start to advance, it's like, as you take a step, you're taking a super mindful step where it's like, heel up, lifting, moving, heel down, Placing heal up and you're repeating that over and over again, right?

So something like that, you're also again, not able to really integrate into normal day life. You're not going to be walking around like that, 

Mike: right? Right. It just gives something for the mind to pay attention to. So this way I can stay focused. Stay focused in the present moment. 

Stephen: Yeah, 

Mike: that's very interesting.

Did you find that to be very helpful for you to be able to say things out loud? . 

Stephen: For the, if we're talking about the the noting aspect, [00:31:00] it was, I've, at least in my experience, I felt like it was very helpful for me to get into a very deep state while I was contained there. What I felt the most helpful with the other type of walking meditation was that there's no extra action steps that you take.

It's more so you're going to sharpen your awareness enough where you can just be aware of it and you don't have to take notes or any of that. And you can just see it as it comes. 

Mike: You know, I guess, uh, going all the way back to , beginning subject of, like, get used to feeling a new feeling, and I think this all works hand in hand, like these walking meditations or these 21 day vipassanas.

It's creating an opportunity, you know, a nice protected space for a person to get used to feeling differently. And I think, like you mentioned first day it feels really tough and the second day [00:32:00] it's, it feels a little better, but still tough. But overall, as somebody goes through this process, they're getting their body used to a new state of feeling.

And once that happens, it becomes easier to maintain it. And, then the result of that is also a increase in awareness. Being able to hear their thoughts and all of this stuff. But I think the main takeaway that I can see here is that going off to places like that, it creates an opportunity for a person to move forward and not back out.

I think if a person was to do it by themselves, they can stop anytime. There's no accountability, there's no structure, there's not other people that are going through it. And therefore a person may feel like I'm by myself, I don't know if I'm doing the right thing, versus I'm around many other individuals that are doing exactly the same thing that I'm doing and, I feel like I'm not alone at this and therefore when I have doubt, I can look and I can see other people are continuing and this would drive me to [00:33:00] continue.

I think, uh, just these group dynamics along with the way the program is structured, I think those play a really important role. I think it's just like when we do our programs online and we have groups come together. People are submitting the proof of practices and they're coming together to go and train online and all these things.

I think having that accountability and that structure makes it to where even if it feels weird, everybody else is doing it. So I'm just going to continue. And therefore, they're able to get their body adjusted to this new way of feeling. I think that along with, understanding that that's something to expect.

That's not about, , struggling and feeling, dealing with pain as you push forward. It's more like as you're letting go, dealing with the discomfort as you're moving towards feeling better, you're going to feel uncomfortable. Not because there's actual pain, but just because. The body's not familiar with the feeling.

Alright, so I think that's it for our chat today. For you guys [00:34:00] that like to dive in deeper on how to connect deeper within your body, how to get used to a new state of feeling, you want more information on stuff like that, you can go to flow60. com. There's programs to check out and see if there's one that could fit for you.

And we'd love to be able to support you on this journey. And see you guys on the next podcast.