In this episode, Yung Pueblo explores why inner peace takes practice and how to build it through small, intentional choices in everyday life. Drawing from his new book, Journey, and his experience on a 60-day silent meditation retreat, he shares how slowing down helps us become less reactive and more aware of our emotions. He discusses the exhaustion of constant information consumption, how to pursue goals without carrying so much tension, and why you don’t have to put your life on hold to begin cultivating a calmer mind.
Free Guide: Outsmart the Hidden Saboteurs of Self-Control. What’s been holding you back lately? In this free guide, Eric shares the six common saboteurs that quietly derail our best intentions—like autopilot behavior, self-doubt, and emotional escapism—and offers practical strategies to help you regain control and move forward. Download your free copy at oneyoufeed.net/ebook.
Key Takeaways:
- Why happiness and inner peace require mental training
- How everyday moments offer opportunities to pause and respond differently
- Recognizing when information consumption becomes overwhelming
- Slowing down to make thoughtful choices about your commitments
- Balancing meaningful goals with acceptance and letting go
- How mental flexibility helps loosen all-or-nothing thinking
Connect with Yung Pueblo Website | Instagram
Diego Perez is a meditator and #1 New York Times bestselling author who is widely known by his pen name, Yung Pueblo. He has sold over 1.5 million books worldwide that have been translated into over 25 languages. Online he has an audience of over 4 million people. His writing focuses on the power of self-healing, creating healthy relationships, and the wisdom that comes when we truly work on knowing ourselves. Diego’s new book is Journey: The Year That Changes Everything: 365 Daily Reflections to Build Self-Awareness and Inner Peace
If you enjoyed this episode with Yung Pueblo, check out these other episodes:
How to Feel Lighter with Yung Pueblo
Relationship Mistakes & How to Love Better with Yung Pueblo
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Episode Transcript:
Yung Pueblo 00:00:00 It’s okay that happiness takes mental training. I think we always want easy in our lives, but the reality is that the mental space is also something that’s similar to the gym. You have to strengthen it and that’s part of life. That’s okay.
Chris Forbes 00:00:22 Welcome to the one you feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes like garbage in, garbage out or you are what you think ring true. And yet for many of us, our thoughts don’t strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self-pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don’t have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it’s not just about thinking our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their good wolf.
Eric Zimmer 00:01:06 Every app on your phone is trying to make your life easier. Get your food faster. Your package is faster. Fewer steps between wanting something and having it. Diego Perez, who also writes under the name Yung Pueblo, says that that trains us to expect the same thing from our inner lives, that peace should arrive quickly and that something is wrong if it doesn’t. He came off a 60 day silent retreat this year with a plainer view of things. Happiness takes mental training. We want it to be easy, and it isn’t. But that’s okay. The mind is closer to a muscle than a switch, and most of the building happens during our ordinary days in the moments before we react. Diego’s new book is Journey: A Year of Daily reflections. I’m Eric Zimmer, and this is the one you feed. Hi, Diego. Welcome back.
Yung Pueblo 00:02:04 Thank you so much for having me again, Eric. I look forward to our conversation. So I’m excited to go deep with you.
Eric Zimmer 00:02:10 Yeah, I don’t know what number this is. It’s at least three.
Yung Pueblo 00:02:13 Perhaps.
Eric Zimmer 00:02:14 Four. Yeah, this this might be number four, but we’re talking.
Eric Zimmer 00:02:17 You’ve got a new book out and we’re going to be discussing it. It’s called Journey the Year That Changes Everything 365 Daily Reflections to build Self-awareness and Inner Peace. But before we get into it, we’ll start like we traditionally do, which is by me telling you this parable. In the parable, there’s a grandparent who’s talking with a grandchild, and they say, in life there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One’s a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love. And the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandchild stops and they think about it for a second. They look up at their grandparent and they say, well, which one wins? And the grandparent says, the one you feed. So I’d like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you and your work today.
Yung Pueblo 00:03:08 Yeah. Thank you Eric. I love coming back to this question over and over again, because there’s such a potency there. And honestly, this time it reflects directly back to how I started the year when I did my first silent 60 day retreat this year. And I’ve done a number of them where many ten days, 20 days, 30 days long, 45 day longs. But this was the first 60 day course. And in that one, I felt like I could very clearly see both of those wolves, and I could feel this sort of raw, river like inclination towards greed, hatred, delusion, self-centeredness. And what I spent the 60 days doing was literally feeding and energizing and cultivating the qualities of selflessness, of awareness, of non reaction, of compassion and what it really means to me today, in this moment, is that it’s okay that happiness takes mental training. I think we always want easy in our lives, but the reality is that the mental space is also something that’s similar to the gym. You have to strengthen it and that’s part of life. That’s okay.
Eric Zimmer 00:04:19 I want to get back to that point, because you say that in the book, and I was really struck by that, and I want to explore that idea more that, you know, we really do need to do mental training. I’d love to talk a little bit about your experience at the retreat. So quote unquote, Bad Wolf, these energies of greed or selfishness or self-centeredness, what did these show up as? Thoughts, feelings, sensations? And then imagine on a 60 day retreat, you’re doing a number of different practices, but what was a practice or two that you were doing while on retreat as you kind of sat there?
Yung Pueblo 00:04:53 Yeah, that’s a great question to to answer the first part, what it showed up as most consistently was the tension that comes when the mind clings. So I think those wolves appear when we become inflexible. And that’s a different way of looking at attachment. It’s like inflexibility. And I saw that repeatedly where that inflexibility would look like craving for whatever object is there, or hating a particular sensation on the body or whatnot. And very quickly, those cravings, those aversions, those different forms of tension would then wrap themselves around a story and would pick something like, oh, I fought with so-and-so years ago, and that’s still bothering me or whatever it is.
Yung Pueblo 00:05:38 And and it’s the, the almost fueling and continuation of that tension and the practices. What it looked like was the first 20 days were based on the building of concentration through the awareness of the natural breath. And, you know, starting from day one, your concentration can be very choppy. And then by the time you hit day 12, 14, 18, your concentration becomes quite focused, quite collected, and one pointed at times and very different from being aware of the breath for a minute versus like being aware of the breath for two hours. And we’re meditating 11 hours a day so many times that by 60 and the last 40 days, we’re taking that concentration that we built, that collectedness of mind, that calmness of mind, and we’re using that tranquility to then very calmly and objectively observe what’s happening in the body. So the last 40 days are a practice of vipassana that’s oriented towards feeling the body. And all of that makes that truth of impermanence very pristine, quite clear. That’s a gateway to to the wisdom that really clarifies how the universe is structured.
Eric Zimmer 00:06:53 Right. Because I haven’t done a 60 day retreat. But as you get that degree of focus and concentration and watching, it’s like everything slows down enough that you can actually really observe the way that you’re able to see it come up and be there. And then I’m able to see myself react to what’s there, and then I’m able to watch whatever that thing is, then pass away. Yep. And in real life, it’s hard to see because it happens like this day to day, right? It’s just a snap boom sensation. I don’t like it. I don’t like it. I react to it, I respond, and then I’m not even with a sensation anymore. So I don’t quite even know when it goes away because I’m not paying that close of attention, you know? And and that’s what in my much lesser but, but multi weeks of retreats have kind of allowed me to see some of the time.
Yung Pueblo 00:07:47 Yeah. I think that’s very similar to what I’m experiencing, where you spend that time with the breath. Because what it allows is this new quality for the mind to become like a microscope. And then that microscope can take a very close look at what’s happening, and it can feel how. Not only is all of this material, whether physical or mental, it’s highly impermanent, but it does slow it all down. And in a way, it’s interesting because we sometimes joke amongst the people who were at that retreat, like it felt like you were entering the no time time zone where you’re so pristinely aware of what’s arising in the present moment that the the relationship between ego and time becomes very clear, where like, it feels like time is a product of ego. And as the ego dissolves, time would just really speed up externally with speed up, but slow down from the close perspective. So it was funny to me how deeper in the retreat a day to me personally would feel like three hours, but I know that the day would actually be 11 hours. So yeah.
Eric Zimmer 00:09:00 So you have written a book. It’s 365 Short Reflections Daily practices. A lot of your following is on Instagram, although I suppose at this point you’ve sold a ton of books, so they’re probably readers also. But there’s a tension here, right? There’s a tension between 60 days of retreat and meditation and what most people are able to do.
Yung Pueblo 00:09:26 Absolutely.
Eric Zimmer 00:09:27 How do you help, you know, how would you help people who are like, look, I love what you’re talking about. I do want more inner peace. I do want more calm. And at least at this phase of my life, 60 days of meditation is not in the cards for me. How do you reconcile these two things, both the deep practice that you do yourself and then the brief practices that most of the people you’re talking to will need to do.
Yung Pueblo 00:09:50 Yeah, that’s a great question. And when I was structuring this book, I kept reflecting back onto what really started my personal journey. And that was a deep moment of rock bottom where I had abused my body so much with intoxicants, with drugs, with alcohol and all of that, because I was really afraid of feeling my emotions.
Yung Pueblo 00:10:15 And what made the rock bottom happen was that my body literally just couldn’t take it anymore, and I either had to stop or was going to have an early death. So that moment for me, it shook me awake and it kickstarted a year long journey before I started meditating, where I was asking myself, like, what am I missing? Like I’m missing a relationship with my emotions. I am totally disconnected from my body. and it felt like I was rebuilding myself from the ground up. And I wanted to use that energy of how much work got done between the summer of 2011 and the summer of 2012, when I did my first silent ten day retreat. So I was putting myself in that mindset of like, okay, a lot is possible in just regular everyday life, and I do bring in a lot of this wisdom that I’ve gained over, over time from meditating, and I’m trying to make it practical, palatable and accessible for people who don’t necessarily have time for a retreat or have never even meditated before.
Yung Pueblo 00:11:26 But they’re interested in starting to think in these ways so that they can then choose different actions. So to me, like self-awareness and inner peace, the key element is that you’re okay with not having them come quickly, that you’re okay with realizing that they’re built through actions, through intentional actions, and over time, those will become second nature. And the act of slowing down, of having gratitude, of stopping the impulse, doesn’t necessarily need to immediately come from meditating again. Meditating will make it easier, but these actions can come alive when you wake up in the morning.
Eric Zimmer 00:12:07 Right? And even with meditation, I mean, I’m a practitioner. I go through phases where I’m much more serious than other times, phases where I do less of it. And it’s a valuable tool for me, for sure. And there is still that. How do I take any of that? I don’t even know if I would call insight being the word. I mean, I guess that is the word, but to me it gives me more space, I guess.
Eric Zimmer 00:12:34 Really. Ultimately, it feels like it increases that space between stimulus and response. Yeah, and it gives me a calmness also. But my point being, I think a lot about, okay, what do we do the other 23 hours and 45 minutes if you’re meditating 15 minutes a day. And I love what you just said about how your first year there was a lot of reflection. Yeah. And I do think reflection is important. So let’s go back to what you said a minute ago, because I think it’s really important that mental training is necessary, meaning we don’t just get good emotional, mental health, concentration, clarity, all of that without doing some of the work to get it.
Yung Pueblo 00:13:17 Absolutely. Yeah. I think something that’s been hitting me a lot lately is how our phones are conditioning us so intensely and often without us even realizing. And what I keep going back to is that every app on your phone is providing a different service, but all of them have a very similar quality where they are trying to make your life easier.
Yung Pueblo 00:13:44 And it’s like, how can I get the food too fast? Or how can I get your items to you faster? How can I make sure that your external reality is as blissful as possible and as smooth and easy? And that dilutes us into thinking that all of life can be like that, and that our relationships can be like that, and that our inner peace should come as fast as possible, and even that it’s something externally driven, as opposed to it being an internal mindset that we have to cultivate. So I think that’s this book is breaking that down, because it comes from the yearning that I feel a lot of people have now of wanting things to slow down. And I feel like in 2020, 2021, a lot of people were talking about boundaries. And then in 2022, a lot of people are talking about the nervous system. And I think the next wave of what’s coming is like slowing down. Like everything is just moving so dang fast that we have to figure out how to slow down so that we’re not constantly swimming in information and slow down internally so that we can make different choices.
Eric Zimmer 00:15:07 So let’s talk about ways to do that. I was just thinking about this this morning. The very thought I had was I have too much coming into my brain. There’s too much information, and all of it is generally something that I want to put in my brain. I’m pretty good about cultivating what I allow in. I’ve developed that skill over the years, but I’m like, well, I’m reading this book and I’m reading this book for pleasure, and I’m watching this show on Netflix, and I’m reading this Zen book, which is different than the book I’m reading for my show, and I’m also then asking Google or AI about 30 to 40 questions a day. And what’s happening to me, and I don’t know how much of this, you know. Your memory works a little bit less well over time. Is that like, it just is all blending together? Yeah, we watched a show. It was a great show on Apple TV. It’s called silo, a really good show. I watched it and my friends are debating it on this group chat and they’re asking me, did you see the final episode? And I’m thinking, I don’t know, I and they’re like, well, what was the last thing you saw? And I’m like, I well, I don’t remember.
Eric Zimmer 00:16:13 I mean, at the time, at the time it was very important and moving. Yeah. But two weeks later I don’t have the foggiest idea. Yeah. And some of that is okay. Like, not everything has to be remembered. But I guess the long way of saying this is I’ve been feeling this way too. And some of it is just like going back to books versus reading online, but even that is still shoving information into the system.
Yung Pueblo 00:16:37 Totally. It’s it’s interesting. I wonder, I wonder if studies are being done about how fast we dump information now versus in the past, because we have to dump information so quickly for all the new information coming in. And it’s funny because I was avidly been watching silo, and it’s like just the most enjoyable show that I’ve seen in a while. And my wife and I, we, we love it, but it’s really challenging because everything you described, it’s like you were like, living my life too. Like there’s so much opportunity now that it is suffocating.
Yung Pueblo 00:17:12 It’s like. It’s like, I want to hear this podcast. I want to hear that podcast. I want to read this book. And I remember some of my happiest, calmest moments growing up were literally just like laying in my parent’s bed reading a book when I was like in sixth grade, and I would read one book at a time, you know, and there was only so much on TV. But now we have this, like plethora of access and it just all feels like it leads to even when you pick everything that you like. It just it leads to a almost a minor sense of burnout because it’s just overconsumption. And I think what that calls for is like deep intentionality about life. Like one simple thing that I’m working on right now is trying to move away from reading books on my phone, because I previously had used that as a solution. Okay, I’m not going to spend time on the apps. Let me instead read a book on my phone. But now I’m like, I’m losing something. Like I’m losing something from not being able to turn the page. And there’s a simplicity and only having one book on a trip or in your bag.
Eric Zimmer 00:18:24 I know it’s it’s strange because for my work, reading on my Kindle is the thing that makes sense, because what I’m doing is I’m reading, like your book, I’m going through it and I’m highlighting what I want, and then I can export that right into the app that I use to do this. So for work, it makes a lot of sense. And changing seems to me like, well, that would just be increasing a lot of friction that maybe I just, I don’t want. But it’s like if I’m reading, I’ve said this before, I’ve been reading this book. It’s called Appreciate Your Life by Tai Zun Mizuki Roshi. He was the one of the guiding Zen teachers Los Angeles Zen Center for a long, long time. He was my old teacher’s teacher, and I’ve been reading his book. It’s about 165 pages. And I just realized today, like I was working on another newsletter where I mentioned it and I was like, I have been mentioning this book for like three months now, but it’s because I’m just with it.
Eric Zimmer 00:19:19 And so for my own, like my own practice, I’m like, that’s what I need. Just keep looking at this same I mean, the idea in the book, the whole thing is more or less in the title appreciate your Life, but I find that way for me. And I’ve also been trying, like, if I’m reading fiction, can I? Can I get a book? But even with that, I think it’s it is challenging. What I’ve been thinking about is what can I do that isn’t information based. Like how can I spend time that’s not information based. Because all the things I like to do, I like to read, I like to watch a TV show, I like to listen to books on tape. What can I do that’s not information based. And one of them for me is the guitar. So I play guitar. Yeah, pretty regularly. I’ve been playing more, but I feel like I’m like, I need another habit or any other hobby or two that is like not about information coming into my brain. Yeah. Even if it’s like doing a puzzle, like I’m just sitting, just quiet, doing a puzzle.
Yung Pueblo 00:20:19 I know a life that is not always based on consumption. My new favorite thing that I’ve been doing is walking, and it seems so mundane and so unexciting to say, but it’s like it’s honestly like the most healing thing that I’ve been doing lately when there’s too much going on and I will challenge myself to sometimes I’ll walk alone and listen to a podcast. Other times I’ll walk alone and listen to nothing and just like, look at the horizon. And the times when I walk without any consumption are so generative and so calming that by the time I’m done, I am sort of like like as soon as I walk back into the house, I’m looking for a pen and paper to write down a new poem or something, because it just the whole system relaxes in the first half of the walk. By the time I’m turning around, walking back. Like creativity just starts bubbling up again. And I’m realizing how our civilization that is so founded on technology these days is was sort of pulling us away from being humans and into being more machine like and simple things like having conversations with friends, having meals with friends, going on long walks. It’s like I need to go back to the core of what it is to be a human being.
Eric Zimmer 00:21:45 Yeah, walking is one. I mean, I have that sort of like 10,000 step a day goal, even though I know that’s just a made up number. But for me, it’s a proxy for that meant I spent 100 minutes that day walking.
Yung Pueblo 00:21:57 Amazing.
Eric Zimmer 00:21:58 Yeah, that’s kind of how I was translated to me. I’m like, okay, that’s a little over an hour and a half. If I do that, that’s good. Right? Like, that feels right. And like you, sometimes I listen to music. Sometimes I listen to a podcast, sometimes I put on stand up comedy and sometimes I just listen to nothing.
Yung Pueblo 00:22:15 Just to mention another simple activity. It was this summer. My wife and I were picking blueberries, and in the middle of it, I start laughing because we both get into this mode of like, as soon as we’re there, we’re, like, picking blueberries. Like filling in our little things that are that are holding the blueberries.
Yung Pueblo 00:22:33 And it feels so human. It’s like, this is what we’re supposed to be doing. We’re supposed to be picking berries like we’re supposed to be just we’re having. And it’s so joyful. And so, like, the strangest exercise and even down to the postures that we have to put ourselves in, like we have to squat. Sometimes squatting then just feels so good. But yeah, all these little things that we forget that we’re hunter gatherers and we can’t lose sight. There’s nothing wrong with living in a civilized, interconnected, cooperative world. But we can’t forget what is the. What is real humanity?
Eric Zimmer 00:23:07 Yep, yep. Like you, I feel like a lot of people are yearning for this more and more. And it’ll be interesting to see what what emerges. I want to turn towards the book, though, for a little while, and the book breaks down into sections. You base them on the elements, tell me what the elements are and why you chose to do it that way.
Yung Pueblo 00:23:27 Yeah, I when I was putting the book together, one, I wanted to go back to my roots of shorter prose and poetry and things that are like in between the two.
Yung Pueblo 00:23:38 It’s like unclear if it’s a poem or not. And I like writing in that manner. Where let the reader decide. Let’s let’s let the reader decide if it brings value to them. And I knew that I wanted to wanted it to be a journey that’s based on building the habits of self-awareness and inner peace. But then I didn’t want it to be time oriented. I wanted it to be elemental. Because for all history, like you look at, all these different cultures and human beings have always been inspired by the elements. Like if you look at Buddhist cultures, if you look at Chinese culture, like there’s there’s a lot there about the four primary elements. So I broke down the first section as fire, where fire is the energy that you use to achieve your goals. I had this section on air which is about adaptability. A section on Earth which focuses on balance, and a section on water which focuses on nourishment, not just the nourishment with between you and yourself, but between you and the people that you are in community with, which could be your intimate relationship or your friends.
Yung Pueblo 00:24:43 And I think there’s something to learn from each of these elements, and we can look at them and examine, okay, what qualities can I embody that will help me on this journey of building self-awareness and inner peace?
Eric Zimmer 00:24:57 So what are the themes that is in the book? A lot of different places is letting go. If you’re going to talk about spiritual themes, it’s a biggie. It’s, you know, it’s it’s been on the charts a long time. It’s a big one. And yet that is one of those things that a lot of people say, you know, I’ve heard let go a thousand times, but I still don’t know what that means. Like, how do I do it? What is it?
Yung Pueblo 00:25:22 Yeah.
Eric Zimmer 00:25:22 Talk to me about how we let go, or things in your life that you’ve struggled to let go of and eventually found your way to.
Yung Pueblo 00:25:31 Yeah, and the context of journey letting go is deeply connected to slowing down. And that’s what I’m hoping people really walk away after the going on this year long journey that they’re walking away with, seeing the value of them personally slowing down.
Yung Pueblo 00:25:49 Not in the sense of decreasing your ambition. I’m talking about slowing down in the sense of focusing your energy. Like, what are you actually letting go of? You’re letting go of impulsiveness. You’re letting go of this like immediate lightning quick reaction. And so it’s not just like the stories that you’re holding of yourself. Like journey is really based on practicality. So the practical quality of like building self-awareness and inner peace, the most inner peace that you’re going to get is from noticing that a reaction is happening. That’s lightning quick and challenging yourself to slow down and then bringing in the energy of compassion so that you can choose something that’s more skillful than just repeating your past over and over again. And I think to me that’s like, that’s the main thing you’re going to walk away from, like, let letting go slow you down, bring in the energy of compassion and choose something more skillful.
Eric Zimmer 00:27:07 Before we dive back into the conversation, let me ask you something. What’s one thing that has been holding you back lately? You know that it’s there. You’ve tried to push past it, but somehow it keeps getting in the way. You’re not alone in this. And I’ve identified six major saboteurs of self-control things like autopilot behavior, self-doubt, emotional escapism that quietly derail our best intentions. But here’s the good news you can outsmart them. And I’ve put together a free guide to help you spot these hidden obstacles and give you simple, actionable strategies that you can use to regain control. Download the free guide. Now. At oneyoufeed.net/ebook and take the first step towards getting back on track.
It’s back to then part of it, building that space between the stimulus that occurs and the response. And it’s interesting because in certain areas I feel like I’m pretty good at this. If I’m in a conversation or something’s happening and and I have a reaction, I am able to hold my tongue and sit back and think about and reflect. And but as you were talking, I was like, but where else am I impulsive? And I was like, I think the impulsivity is picking up the device.
Eric Zimmer 00:28:23 Yeah, it’s the second. There’s a question in my head. Grab the phone or there’s a quiet moment. I’m not quite sure what to do. Grab my phone. I’ve noticed it in myself with checking email on my phone. I’m not really on social media much, but I will just habitually, you know? And when I say habitually, I mean often and without thinking. Yeah, yeah, you know, check my email and I’m like, wait a minute, I just did this nine times in the last 30 minutes and sometimes I’m more aware of it. But there are other times it just it feels so habituated to it.
Yung Pueblo 00:28:58 Yeah.
Eric Zimmer 00:28:58 As in and again, when I say habituated, what I do mean, I mean it in the sense that a behavior change scientist would mean it, that it happens automatically and without thought.
Yung Pueblo 00:29:07 Right, right. Just to bring in another example, like a personal example for me that I became really aware of last year and this year is that I have this tendency that is very related to how I grew up. Like as I grew up in such scarcity, and there wasn’t a lot of money in the home that we grew up in. And because of that, I’ve noticed that as an adult, my impulse is when new opportunities come my way. I’m very quick to take them on. And and I’ve noticed that this reaction is being driven by a fear of scarcity. And actually, when I spread myself too thin, I am not giving myself the space that I need to be creative and to do my primary work, which is to write. And it’s such a clear pattern of like, okay, what am I letting go of? I’m letting go of this one, this fear of scarcity and the actual what is it practically look like? It’s the impulse to say yes, way too quick. And there’s a mixture of people pleasing in there. There’s a mixture of like, you know, fear of being left out and whatnot. But now I’m like, okay, so the challenge is an opportunity comes. Let me slow down and let me see.
Yung Pueblo 00:30:23 Does this connect with my intuition? Is this connected with my values? Is this something that will take too much away from my nervous system and like really to feel depleting and just measure it out internally, give it time and then make a decision if it’s appropriate or not.
Eric Zimmer 00:30:40 Yeah, I relate with that. And I think a lot of people are that way. Oftentimes what gets me also in addition to that is not asking the follow on question or not thinking about like, I think of these things individually and you’re like, ask me, do I want to do X? And I’m like, well, yes, X sounds good. And even if I even if I do some of what you’re saying, but I need to look at, well, what else is already there that I’m saying. Yes. You know, because I’m like, oh yeah, that sounds amazing. Oh yeah. But wait a second. That’s going to be a train wreck of a three week period.
Yung Pueblo 00:31:14 Exactly, exactly when it all comes together, what does it look like? Because slowing down just means so many things. And, you know, going back to that example where it’s not about people think, oh, but life is so busy. How can I let myself slow down? It’s not about stepping out of life and developing something totally new. It’s about in the actual moment when you have to decide, giving yourself even another 30s another minute to really reflect and see. Okay, does this make sense? Is adding this to the table going to help, or is it going to actually just decrease my inner vitality? And I think having those moments of reflection can help you just refocus your energies. And I really find like the most successful people, the wisest people that I know, they narrow their lives down to very few goals and they hit them hard.
Eric Zimmer 00:32:08 Yeah. I think there’s also an element and this is really hard to do, but like, how can I be busy but not rushed? Like how does that happen? And I see in myself both situations. I can see a time where I’m where I’ve got a lot to do and I need to move through it, and it’s all done in a very clenched, tight way. And I also then will see myself at other times where there’s a lot to do and I’m moving through life. It’s not like I’m not doing stuff I am, but there’s an inner ease as I do it. If you looked at the schedule, the schedule is the same both days, but I’m very different.
Yung Pueblo 00:32:49 Yeah, I think we have a lot to learn from, like musicians that tour intensely because every time I’m around a musician, I’m like, how do you do it? Like, how do you how do you stay fresh? Or like stand up comedians who have, like, really grueling schedules? And I think what I figured out for myself personally is that if I am not well resourced, then I can sign up to a bunch of things, but it’s going to be really grueling, and I’m going to end up worse than when I started. And now I feel like I’ve learned, really by failure, that I have to take care of my sleep as much as possible. Like, not only do I have to have a basis of meditating two hours a day, but make sure that I’m making time to sleep really well.
Yung Pueblo 00:33:36 Make sure that I’m making time to like to work out every other day, making sure that I’m eating in a way that actually makes me feel stronger instead of just like. Because you always have to be careful in those moments when you’re really busy, it’s easy to then get stuck in a loop of like, oh, I’m going to feed myself what is feeding my craving instead of my strength? And yeah, being really mindful of making sure that I’m well resourced, it’s almost like a a leveling up of my self-care that has made it so that I can just like, move through the moments. And it’s still it’s not perfect. It’s always a changing system, but I rather try to flow through life and maintain goals that I that challenged me to grow, as opposed to like stumbling through and forcing everything to happen.
Eric Zimmer 00:34:22 Do you ever reflect and laugh upon like I used to put my body through the most unimaginable? Yeah. I mean no sleep, terrible diet, drugs, alcohol, I mean just terrible. And I seemed, at least for a while, to just carry on just fine. And now I’m like, God, I get one hour less sleep. And I’m like, I feel like I’ve become this very tender creature all of a sudden. Yeah. You know, maybe that’s because I beat myself up so much for for those years now. I don’t know, I just always, I always think about that. It makes me laugh.
Yung Pueblo 00:34:59 I always wonder about the same thing, too. It’s like, because if I’m taking care of myself so well, like I’m getting stronger. But I also feel like you throw something in there and the system’s like, no, no, no, we don’t want that at all. Like we want to keep it really, really clean.
Eric Zimmer 00:35:16 I know I think about sometimes like the road narrowing. It’s like coming from where I came from, basically sex, drugs and rock and roll. Yeah. And I’m like, what’s left? It gets narrow and narrow and that’s a negative framing on it. And I don’t mean to make it that way, because I actually feel like my life is more free in so many ways. But it is very interesting the way that the number of things I don’t do just seems to keep increasing.
Yung Pueblo 00:35:39 Yeah. And I think there’s there’s some value too, because it’s important to see the different perspectives where I think one thing that I’ve gained great realization from is I grew up in a really impoverished situation, and now I’m fortunate that my books sell, that I’m able to, like, have abundance in my life that I didn’t have before. And I’ve seen that external moment of like, the pieces falling into place. That’s not what’s driving happiness at all. What’s driving happiness is a mindset that is more so focused on the little things in life and being able to appreciate them, like being able to have access to clean water, like being able to have food, being able to like walk in the sunlight without danger. Those things can really drive joy. But that’s only possible because the mindset is able to welcome them, appreciate them, and see them as moments of joy. And I’ve had conversations with elite athletes who have everything right.They have so much money, so much access. And for some of them they realize like, okay, money can’t buy happiness and it definitely can’t buy peace. And and I’m like, yeah, that’s that’s the thing about peace is like you have to cultivate it. It’s another muscle that needs to be cultivated. Yeah.
Eric Zimmer 00:37:03 Yeah, it’s a very different one to cultivate. So another question I wanted to talk about. And look, if you write a 365 page entry in a book, some of them are going to contradict each other. And frankly, personal development and spirituality contradict each other a lot. There is the core idea that there’s a little of both in which is letting go being okay with exactly the way things are. But there’s also there’s a fair amount of designing your life to be a certain way, whether that be with the boundaries you set with other people, the boundaries you set with yourself, the time you set aside. And so there’s that tension there. How do you negotiate that tension in your own life? Because it’s one I feel all the time, right. Like, I know what a wisely designed life is, right? And too much of that becomes its own problem.
Yung Pueblo 00:37:56 Yeah. I think our relationship with contradiction is really interesting because immediately, like oftentimes we’ll find it confusing. I find contradiction really useful because it helps break down black and white thinking, where the answer is usually in the gray, and contradictions are if you look at them with a skillful eye, they’re pushing you towards a middle path. And if you find a lot of the most skillful wisdom teachers, there will be contradictions in their teachings. And you may think like, oh, it’s always this way, or it’s always that way, and well no, that the answer is that you’re not trying to grasp anything and you’re trying to move forward with balance. And that’s really what I’m trying to do too, with this book is like, of course, like there is extreme value in letting go, but you still have a life. You still have goals that you need to try to achieve. If you have a family, you want to make sure to have a good house for them.
Yung Pueblo 00:38:58 You want to make sure to be able to feed them and take care of them. And with that comes proper goal setting, proper active design of your life. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But what I try to tell people is be measured in how you go about it. Are you doing it with great stress, or are you doing it with compassion and with peace? Are you able to move forward towards your goals in a way where you just carry tension in your mind the whole time, or in the moments that you don’t succeed? Are you able to calmly acknowledge that and then go back to the drawing board and ask yourself, okay, how can I do this better? And there is great, great power in a calm mind. So I think of contradiction as a really useful tool. Like we have to like black and white thinking that’s the opposite of intelligence. So we have to allow our minds to be flexible.
Eric Zimmer 00:39:48 Yeah. I mean, I’ve got the whole chapter in my book about the middle way for that, that very reason. And sometimes the middle way is you split the difference. Right? But sometimes the middle way is the, you know, you just end up holding two completely different things and they stay different, you know? But that’s a middle way also. And I love that idea of saying that contradiction breaks down black and white thinking because it causes us to say, oh, it’s probably an and situation here. Right. And that tension is also really, I think, very, very useful.
Yung Pueblo 00:40:24 Yeah, I have found it really useful because I find that like one of the best ways that I could measure, if my mind is moving in a good direction, is if the mind grows in its agility, like, can I hear things that are opposite from my view without immediately losing my temper and actually being able to consider a different set of information? And similarly, I find the the narrowness of black and white thinking actually leads people often to immobility. They’re just not they’re not acting, and they don’t quite realize that it’s okay to not have things all figured out and it’s okay to, like, learn in the process.
Eric Zimmer 00:41:06 Yeah, and I really love the idea of the goal being flexibility. Yeah. Psychological flexibility. I think that that’s an incredibly useful skill given life seems to have a tendency to keep going. Lots of different directions that, you know, you have to be able to bend with it.
Yung Pueblo 00:41:26 Yeah. I think there’s a beauty in like, being able to hold a lot of different perspectives that come together to make something a little more refined. And yeah, like I remember my first questions to the teacher from the first ten day retreat that I set. And I remember one of the questions being like, if if it’s all about detachment and letting go, then was the Buddha craving enlightenment? And, and, you know, he was just like, no, it was like there’s a difference between a craving and a goal. And I’m like, oof! Like being introduced to subtlety in that way. Like, that was so helpful.
Eric Zimmer 00:42:06 Yeah, yeah, it is a core question. And in the book, you start the air chapter by saying that air is the element of freedom, intelligence and change. And then you go on and talk a little bit about intelligence. You say to have true intelligence, you need to have a strong base of humility so that you can see more than just your own point of view. Intelligence is your ability to take in new information in a non-biased manner and allow your perspective to adapt. Intelligence is mental agility and flexibility, and I love that idea of thinking of that as intelligence. If that’s intelligence, would you define wisdom differently?
Yung Pueblo 00:42:46 Ooh, that’s a good question. I’m actually working on a paper right now called What is Wisdom? And it feels so meaningful to me that I’ve been really letting it marinate for the right time to actually finish it. But the basic idea is that intelligence. I see it as adaptability, flexibility, but wisdom. I see it directly connected to your ability to let go of self and identity and labels and stories. There is this. The bundling together of the ego creates this constriction that doesn’t quite let you fully appreciate how deep the well of impermanence goes.Like the well of impermanence is so deep that it includes what is I, what is conceived of as I. And letting yourself take it to that level really, really opens up the full door to wisdom.
Eric Zimmer 00:43:42 In the Zen tradition, there’s the Heart Sutra and in its Prajnaparamita, which is kind of the ultimate wisdom, which is seeing that to not use too technical of Zen terms, seeing that all of these formations are empty. Yeah, that is considered the ultimate wisdom is when you see that, when you see that really you could say it a thousand different ways, but that nothing has an inherent existence on its own. It is all relation. That’s what everything is, its motion and its relation. And we are no different.
Yung Pueblo 00:44:18 I couldn’t agree more. And in a similar vein in the suttas, so the Theravada suttas, there’s a description of Nibbana as the stilling of all formations and formations, like for, for whoever’s listening, who may not have that Buddhist context is like it’s any conception, right? It’s like any conception of I, of this or that, of this story.
Yung Pueblo 00:44:41 And in reality, it’s exactly like what you said is like, this is all a conditioned moment that is coming together from so many variations of cause and effect that is like pushing together this momentary existence of all this mental and physical phenomena. But if you were able to like, fully, fully feel the truth of that, it’s just change. It’s it’s just changing conditions, like you said.
Eric Zimmer 00:45:07 Yeah. It’s a beautiful thing. I can’t remember whether we’ve talked about this or not. Have you ever read the book Seeing That Freeze by Rob Burbea?
Yung Pueblo 00:45:14 No, but it’s funny. I was just talking to my buddy who loves Rob Burbea.
Eric Zimmer 00:45:20 I think that book would, particularly with where you’re at with trying to define wisdom. It’s one of my favorite written spiritual books of all time, and that’s saying a lot because he really is going into ultimate emptiness. But the thing that I love about the book is that he keeps pointing you there as he leads you along the path. Right. Because a lot of the stuff about emptiness and non-self is just it’s way out there, right.
Eric Zimmer 00:45:51 I mean, particularly for people who aren’t really engaged with these ideas. I mean, my editor, Chris, is probably thinking there’s they’re talking gobbledygook, right? But the thing I love about the Rob Birbiglia book and its emptiness, impermanence, is that he never lets go of. That’s the truth of reality. So here’s lots of ways we can see it, little glimpses of it along the way. It’s a great book.
Yung Pueblo 00:46:12 I love that. I love that there’s something in the sutta that in a way points to that when when the Buddha is asking like, how do you properly meditate, asking his monks and, and he’s telling them like, ought to satisfy this, to be ardently, continuously aware of, of impermanence. And there are moments where he’s asking like, what is there? And it’s just change as change. Not like I am observing change. It’s just change that’s happening. The flip side of that is showing how all this material. Like, that’s why I love the word insubstantial. Like it’s it’s really insubstantial.
Yung Pueblo 00:46:52 Like, which one of these atoms is Diego? Well, by the time you point at it and look at it, all the electrons are popping in and out of existence. Like, good luck. Really getting a clear view of it.
Eric Zimmer 00:47:02 Yeah. Okay, I’m going to read another line or two from your book and bring us back down to earth for some of them who are not ready to go that far. And I really like this one, which is you cannot rush the best version of yourself. Say more.
Yung Pueblo 00:47:18 Yeah. I think for a lot of us, the mind has this nasty inclination that I think is something we need to like push back on where it thinks of the best moments as already having happened and the best version of herself. Like we have to think of our actions as the paint that we use to create the canvas of our life, right? Like, our actions are really designing everything around us, and there’s nothing wrong with letting that process take time. And oftentimes when people really take their evolution into their own hands, and they get really intentional about the actions that they put forward. Their best days and their best self is way in front of them. And I think that’s a much more joyful way to live, as opposed to thinking that, like, the past is always dominant where it really isn’t. That’s a choice.
Eric Zimmer 00:48:14 Before we wrap up, I want you to think about this. Have you ever ended the day feeling like your choices didn’t quite match the person you wanted to be? Maybe it was autopilot mode or self-doubt that made it harder to stick to your goals. And that’s exactly why I created The Six Saboteurs of Self-control. It’s a free guide to help you recognize the hidden patterns that hold you back and give you simple, effective strategies to break through them. If you’re ready to take back control and start making lasting changes. Download your copy now at oneyoufeed.net/ebook. Let’s make those shifts happen starting today. oneyoufeed.net/ebook.
Eric Zimmer 00:48:57 I’ve been listening to a song there, a local Columbus band. Although they’re incredible, to say they’re a Columbus band makes it sound like they’re some local thing.
Eric Zimmer 00:49:05 They’re amazing called watershed, but they’ve got a song called The Best Is Yet to Come, and I’ve been thinking about that as I prepare to move to Atlanta and, you know, and to be 56 and believe that the best is yet to come, I feel like it’s a good attitude to keep trying to to open up to.
Yung Pueblo 00:49:21 Dude, my buddies who are in their 50s, they’re living good lives like I’ve been. I’m really looking up to my friends who are in their 50s and like they are bringing this new youthfulness into it. And like, what I noticed about my friends in their 50s is that they make the things that they want. They actually make them happen. They’re like, they’re done with waiting. They’re like, we just started this conversation with, like, you were telling me about this bookshelf that you’re going to make happen. and my buddy the other day, like went to Japan and it’s like they’re just making it happen. And I’m like, dang, that’s that’s a good way to be 50.
Eric Zimmer 00:49:56 Yeah, yeah, I agree, I agree. Well, thank you so much Diego. From coming on. It’s always a pleasure to talk to you. We’ll have links in the show notes where people can get the book and find all the things on you. And. Thank you.
Yung Pueblo 00:50:08 Yeah. Thank you. Eric, this one was so nice. I’m glad we went to the deep end.
Eric Zimmer 00:50:12 Me too. Me too. Thank you so much for listening to the show. If you found this conversation helpful, inspiring, or thought provoking, I’d love for you to share it with a friend. Share it from one person to another is the lifeblood of what we do. We don’t have a big budget, and I’m certainly not a celebrity, but we have something even better. And that’s you just hit the share button on your podcast app, or send a quick text with the episode link to someone who might enjoy it. Your support means the world, and together we can spread wisdom one episode at a time. Thank you for being part of the one You Feed community.
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