{"id":19920,"date":"2023-01-25T13:06:07","date_gmt":"2023-01-25T20:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/?post_type=transcript&p=19920"},"modified":"2023-01-25T13:06:07","modified_gmt":"2023-01-25T20:06:07","slug":"already-free","status":"publish","type":"transcript","link":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/already-free\/","title":{"rendered":"Already Free"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"image_print\"Print Transcript<\/span><\/a><\/div>

Tami Simon:<\/b> Hello, friends. My name\u2019s Tami Simon, and I\u2019m the founder of Sounds True. And I want to welcome you to the Sounds True podcast, <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I also want to take a moment to introduce you to Sounds True\u2019s new membership community and digital platform. It\u2019s called Sounds True One. Sounds True One features original, premium, transformational docuseries, community events, classes to start your day and relax in the evening, special weekly live shows, including a video version of <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i> with an aftershow community question-and-answer session with featured guests. I hope you\u2019ll come join us, explore, come have fun with us, and connect with others. You can learn more at join.soundstrue.com.<\/span><\/p>\n

I also want to take a moment and introduce you to the Sounds True Foundation, our nonprofit that creates equitable access to transformational tools and teachings. You can learn more at SoundsTrueFoundation.org. And in advance, thank you for your support.<\/span><\/p>\n

You\u2019re listening to <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i>. Today is a rebroadcast of one of my favorite episodes. I hope you enjoy it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, my guest is someone whose work I deeply value\u2014Bruce Tift. Bruce Tift has been in private practice as a psychotherapist in Boulder, Colorado, since 1979. He has taught at Naropa University for 25 years and has given presentations in the United States, Mexico, and Japan. A practitioner of Vajrayana Buddhism for more than 35 years, he had the good fortune to be a student of Ch\u00f6gyam Trungpa Rinpoche.<\/span><\/p>\n

With Sounds True, Bruce has written a new book called\u00a0<\/span>Already Free: Buddhism Meets Psychotherapy on the Path of Liberation<\/span><\/i>,<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>where he examines how psychotherapy\u2019s developmental approach of understanding the way our childhood experiences shape our adult selves both challenges and supports the fruitional approach of Buddhism, which tells us that the freedom we seek is always available.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this episode of\u00a0<\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i>,<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>Bruce and I spoke about how the approaches of both Western psychotherapy and Buddhism contain blind spots, and how we might be able to address those blind spots. We talked about neurosis and neurotic behavior, and how\u2014in Bruce\u2019s experience\u2014neurosis always requires disembodiment. We talked about what Bruce calls \u201cunconditional practices,\u201d including the practice of unconditional kindness. Finally, we talked about the difference between problems and disturbances, and how Bruce experiences disturbance on a regular basis\u2014and how this is not a problem. Here\u2019s my conversation with Bruce Tift.<\/span><\/p>\n

Welcome, Bruce. It\u2019s always great to be with you and to have the chance to be with you in person here, in the Sounds True studio.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Thanks for inviting me. I enjoy our discussions. Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0My goal for our conversation today is to bring forward\u2014to highlight\u2014some of the themes in your new book,\u00a0<\/span>Already Free: Buddhism Meets Psychotherapy on the Path of Liberation<\/span><\/i>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>I want to do this because I think there are some ideas in the book that are really intriguing. So I want to see if we can bring those forward for our listeners.<\/span><\/p>\n

You begin the book by describing two different ways of viewing, if you will, our human experience. You call them \u201cthe developmental view,\u201d and you contrast this view\u2014the developmental view\u2014to \u201cthe fruitional view.\u201d So, to begin with, can you describe what these two different perspectives are?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, very basically, a developmental view is an \u201cover-time\u201d view. It\u2019s an acknowledging that, as humans, we have this amazing capacity to remember the past, to think about the future, to locate ourselves in what feels like a present. I think that gives us a lot of choices [and] a lot of potential that probably most animals who seem to be living more just in the present don\u2019t have.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the book, [it\u2019s] talking about that over-time view especially as it relates to psychotherapy. Western therapy is complex. It can\u2019t be reduced to a simplistic formula, but I think it\u2019s fair to say that at least the majority of therapists practicing in a traditional Western way work with the idea that experiences that we had as very young children tend to shape how we are engaging with our life now as adults.<\/span><\/p>\n

So there\u2019s a lot of interest\u2014a lot of very good work has been done\u2014to speculate, have theories about, and research how different types of experience when young seem to persist in the form of survival strategies or ways of organizing our experience. Some of these, of course, are very valuable and we want to continue to have access to [them]. But therapy tends to focus on the ways in which our experience when young is persisting now as adults in ways that are no longer accurate, are several decades out of date, or are not actually serving us or others.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, in Western therapy, there\u2019s a lot of interest in trying to understand\u2014to investigate\u2014 what [it was] like for us as young children. In Western therapy, there\u2019s a focus on our relationship with our parents. That\u2019s the main focus. But siblings, gender, life experiences, trauma\u2014that\u2019s very complex.<\/span><\/p>\n

I find that that\u2019s so pervasive that\u2014from what I can tell; I just hear from clients that I work with\u2014but from what I can tell, it\u2019s almost a given in a lot of types of Western therapy that there are unresolved issues from our past that some people call \u201cwounds\u201d or whatever, and that there\u2019s an idea that these unresolved patterns of behavior have to be resolved in order to be present.<\/span><\/p>\n

So a lot of times there\u2019s work in what\u2019s called a transferential relationship, where the therapist takes on the attitude of not disclosing much about themselves, not offering many theories, keeping things very open\u2014to invite the person they\u2019re working with to project these unresolved issues from their past as if the therapist were the parent. Once these deep, unconscious projections are out in the open, then they can be worked with.<\/span><\/p>\n

So that\u2019s a transferential model of working. That\u2019s not how I work, but it\u2019s a very common way of working in therapy.<\/span><\/p>\n

What I call a fruitional view comes from my Buddhist training and practice, and it refers to a type of organization in Buddhism called \u201cGround-Path-Fruition.\u201d \u201cGround\u201d is where we find ourselves to be\u2014our current reality. \u201cFruition\u201d is understood as where we would like to be, and \u201cpath\u201d is how we get from here to there.<\/span><\/p>\n

My training is in Vajrayana Buddhism\u2014Tibetan Buddhism\u2014and in that tradition, the ground and the fruition are seen as essentially the same. But the difference [is] that, in our ground experience, we\u2019re taking what we experience unconsciously as if it\u2019s the whole story\u2014as if it is what\u2019s true. A fruitional experience is basically the same experience, but in the environment of\u2014the context of\u2014awareness, so that the same feelings, thoughts, sensations, perceptions are arising perhaps, but there is a conscious participation in an open awareness that prevents us actually, experientially from taking any of this display as if it\u2019s the whole story\u2014taking it too seriously.<\/span><\/p>\n

And then the path, from that point of view, is not about how to get somewhere else because it\u2019s the same immediate experience. It\u2019s more about a variety of practices, views, studies, [and] techniques that invite more and more conscious participation in open awareness\u2014which, in this tradition, is said to always be present already. The view is that this experience of open nature is already is most fundamental, most basic, most intimate in all of our experiencing. But, for a lot of reasons\u2014which I don\u2019t completely understand\u2014we pretend to not be aware of what is actually present.<\/span><\/p>\n

So a fruitional point of view\u2014in this context\u2014is one in which we focus on coming into immediacy, embodiment, presence, acceptance, [and] surrender to whatever is arising in our immediate experience with no claim that we have to clear anything up from our history as a requirement for being fully present in our life\u2014that we can be present in anything that arises without exception and with kindness. Anybody can do that as a practice.<\/span><\/p>\n

But, of course, [this is] along a continuum. The more frequently we have moments of awareness, the more that view makes sense.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Now, in your work as a therapist, you work both with a developmental approach and a fruitional approach. However, I want to clarify one thing. When you were describing the developmental approach, you said that you\u00a0<\/span>didn\u2019t<\/span><\/i>\u00a0work with the transference style that many therapists do. So why not?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, I could probably examine my personal history to understand why I don\u2019t [and] haven\u2019t ever been attracted to that. [<\/span>Laughs.<\/span><\/i>] That would be accurate.<\/span><\/p>\n

But I would say the more useful understanding is that I prefer to work with people as if they are adults who are responsible for learning how to relate to their own experience\u2014whatever it is, including what\u2019s conscious or unconscious, resolved or not resolved\u2014with an almost a generic approach of being present and non-interpretative, embodied, and unconditionally kind to whatever we find there. My bias is that\u2014as long as we are looking to the other person, whether it\u2019s the therapist, our partners, [our spiritual teacher,] or whoever as if my capacity to be fully present and aware is somehow in the future or it\u2019s outside of myself\u2014I think that it actually can be counterproductive to a fruitional view, which is my basic ground to work from.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, in a lot of my work, I\u2019m relating to those I work with as if they are actually already awake and pretending not to be. So I find that it is more congruent with that view to relate to people as if they are fully responsible for how they relate to their own experience and not imply that there\u2019s something that has to be healed or resolved before that\u2019s possible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0So even though the book is set up as a meeting\u2014if you will\u2014between the developmental approach\u2014or we could say psychotherapy\u2014and the fruitional approach\u2014we could say Buddhism\u2014it sounds [like] you actually are saying that you have a preference or a bias towards the fruitional approach.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0And yet you incorporate the developmental approach. But tell me a little bit about that\u2014this bias. You called the book\u00a0<\/span>Already Free<\/span><\/i>,<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>so you gave it a fruitional title.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Right. Well, let\u2019s say we\u2019re in a relationship. I\u2019m married. My wife and I have been together 36 years. We\u2019ve been together almost 40 years. I would say that my bias is to [ground] my experience in the reality that I love her. And\u2014as you have talked about in the past\u2014my experience is that I get disturbed in my relationship pretty much every day. So I have found it very helpful to work with that disturbance so that I am not feeling so upset, so I can be more kind to my partner, so that things work better.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, on a relative level, I find it very helpful to work on the display of our experience. But my preference is to hold as the basic ground what is most true\u2014the fact that I love this person and I feel loved by her. Or why in the world would I still be in a relationship?<\/span><\/p>\n

So, in a similar way, I prefer to relate to the people I work with as if I feel that they are already wakeful in their basic nature and that there\u2019s always work to do on the relative level. That\u2019s never going to end. You can\u2019t solve one\u2019s life. Life isn\u2019t solvable. It\u2019s not a problem to fix. It\u2019s a process that we can participate in. Things are always improving. They\u2019re always falling apart.<\/span><\/p>\n

So my particular bias is that it\u2019s very helpful to work on the relative developmental level to clean up our act, to reduce our unnecessary suffering and not cause unnecessary harm to others. But I find that the experience of open awareness is what is most reliable in my life. That is addressed in the fruitional view, and it\u2019s basically not addressed at all, really, in Western therapy.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Now, a couple of times you\u2019ve used this interesting word in our conversation. You\u2019ve talked about the \u201cdisplay.\u201d Our experience\u2014life\u2014as a display. I notice every time you use that word\u2014\u201cdisplay\u201d\u2014I think a little bit, \u201cAre you not taking life as seriously as I am?\u201d Or, \u201cWhat\u2019s going on with this word? \u2018It\u2019s a display.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, I\u2019m not taking life as seriously as I used to. I don\u2019t know about you.<\/span><\/p>\n

[<\/span>Tami laughs.<\/span><\/i>]<\/span><\/p>\n

In the book, I use an example that makes sense to me: If we go to the movies, we\u2019re actually paying to get captured by that display. We all know it\u2019s a display, but our unconscious agreement and hope is that it\u2019ll be so fascinating that we\u2019ll get a little break from our life for a couple of hours and get entertained. But it requires that we get captured by that display as if it\u2019s reality.<\/span><\/p>\n

But, in getting captured, we have almost no choice. If it\u2019s a happy movie, we laugh. If it\u2019s a sad movie, we cry. If we took exactly the same movie and showed it out in a broad field, middle of the day, it\u2019s unlikely that we\u2019re going to get captured by that display. We\u2019re going to know it\u2019s a display because everything that\u2019s around it is so much more real and vivid to us. That open expanse within which the display is happening makes it clear that it is a display. Whereas when we have a more tunnel-vision approach to our experience\u2014meaning without an environment of awareness\u2014we take that display as if it\u2019s reality.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I happen to use \u201cdisplay\u201d as an invitation for somebody to just consider that what we tend to take as reality may not be so in the way that we assume it to be.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0OK. You\u2019ve shared now that you have a bias towards the fruitional approach. And yet, you value a developmental perspective as well. With your clients, you alternate\u2014and this is what you say in the book\u2014between these two approaches and\u2014here\u2019s the key thing\u2014\u201cwithout any hope of resolution.\u201d You alternate between these two approaches.<\/span><\/p>\n

So you don\u2019t have some kind of system or grand unified theory that puts it all together? You just alternate between these two different ways of working with experience?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Yes. To be a little abstract, the complimentarity principle in quantum physics asserts that reality is so complex and fundamentally ungraspable that the most complete descriptions of reality have to tolerate holding contradictory modes of investigation and descriptions. That\u2019s actually going to be the most complete\u2014never total\u2014but the most complete approximation of the non-divided nature of what we call reality.<\/span><\/p>\n

If we said, \u201cWell, there\u2019s night and there\u2019s day,\u201d hopefully we\u2019re not trying to integrate those into being the same thing. We accept that there\u2019s winter, there\u2019s summer; there\u2019s up and down; there\u2019s death, there\u2019s birth. The actual reality of our human experience is that the larger, non-divided\u2014maybe we can say whole, but whatever it is\u2014is made up of apparent contradictions.<\/span><\/p>\n

So if somebody is trying to integrate two opposing views, I think that reflects an idea\u2014maybe not examined\u2014that there\u2019s some problem with contradiction. I don\u2019t think there is. I think contradiction is the display of relative experience.<\/span><\/p>\n

Another more abstract way of saying that is that in my training [in] Vajrayana Buddhism\u2014which one of the things I\u2019ve always appreciated is the idea that most of us of course start with a complete identification with our thoughts, feelings, [and] everything, and then if we are fortunate in our spiritual path-work, we have more and more moments of hope and awareness, basic nature, whatever people call that. But, unlike some traditions, the point isn\u2019t to escape from the limitations of our relative experience and somehow go into a state of open, formless bliss. My understanding is that the point is that as we become confident in the fundamentally open, non-graspable nature of our experiencing, then the point is to return and participate even more deeply in the relative precisely because we\u2019re not taking it so seriously.<\/span><\/p>\n

So my current understanding is that what is most accurate\u2014and I think helpful\u2014is to practice at least holding what we call relative and absolute\u2014this display that all we take seriously and in more open awareness that has no bias, actually\u2014to hold both of those ways of experiencing simultaneously with no fantasy of resolution, because that\u2019s really going to be taking sides, which is going to maintain dualistic experience, actually, on a subtle level.<\/span><\/p>\n

Beyond that view, [I think] we actually explore the possibility that awareness is inseparable from our relative experience. It can\u2019t actually be divided in the ways I\u2019m talking about it, and even that there\u2019s a simultaneity of formless and form in which both of them are saturated with the other. No description actually is going to capture that. We can\u2019t take a position about it.<\/span><\/p>\n

So that\u2019s a view. But I find that it makes the most sense to me to understand and work in ways that invite that direct experience that you called that of our life [and] our self being unresolvable. I think the feeling\u2014the actual experience\u2014of nothing be resolvable is a closer approximation to open mind than a theory that seems to explain whatever we\u2019re interested in.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0What is so interesting to me, Bruce, is so many different Sounds True authors will give\u2014let\u2019s say, for a moment\u2014the fruitional view. They don\u2019t talk at all about the value of looking at things as a progression in time. They\u2019re only talking about the timeless. So it seems like these different teachers\u2014and then we\u2019ll publish another person who\u2019s very much looking at, \u201cWe have to go back and heal these traumas from our past,\u201d or whatever.<\/span><\/p>\n

So it\u2019s very rare to actually find someone who says both of these things are important and they can be seemingly contradictory, and that\u2019s not a problem. That\u2019s pretty rare, actually.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0I think it\u2019s not a culturally familiar view. It\u2019s one of the things that I\u2019m really appreciative of my teacher, Trungpa Rinpoche\u2014that he had apparently no problem with contradictory things that he would say or teachings that he would give. It was very difficult to ever feel like there was any certainty to stand on when you were listening to him.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Now, one of the things that I find so valuable about this perspective that you\u2019re offering is that it helps reveal blind spots\u2014if you will\u2014in either one of these approaches. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about what you think the main blind spots are in the psychotherapeutic or developmental view, and what the main blind spots are in the fruitional view.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0I think that in the Western psychotherapy view\u2014the developmental view\u2014because there\u2019s so much interest in historic origins of current ways we organize our experience, it\u2019s very easy to somewhat unconsciously take the attitude that there actually is a problem in the past that needs to be healed\u2014there are wounds that need to be healed\u2014before somebody can be fully present. I think\u2014again, unconsciously\u2014it\u2019s very easy then to take on a project of self-improvement where we don\u2019t realize that we\u2019re postponing recognizing that we always are fully present. We\u2019re always fully intimate with life and with each other. We\u2019re always fully engaged. There\u2019s no other possibility.<\/span><\/p>\n

But [I think] a lot of us have this unexamined idea that when I clear these things up in the future, then I\u2019ll show up. Then I\u2019ll accept myself. Then I\u2019ll bring my vulnerability to my partner. Whatever our thing is.<\/span><\/p>\n

So one of the problems with the over-time approach\u2014in our culture especially\u2014is that we postpone acceptance until there\u2019s a certain type of improvement. I think that\u2019s invited by that view\u2014that blind spot.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the fruitional point of view, it\u2019s sort of the flip side, where there\u2019s much more focus on acceptance, and improvement is seen as a story or a fundamental aggression toward reality. So I\u2019ve worked with many clients who are practitioners who, in my opinion, are somewhat unconsciously using immediacy as an avoidance of dealing with their actual, human, messy life.<\/span><\/p>\n

I can\u2019t tell you how many people over the years have come into therapy\u2014and they usually don\u2019t stay long, given my style\u2014basically reporting that they never have had a long-time job. They\u2019re there because their partner tells them that they\u2019re ready to leave them because they yell at them or they\u2019re drinking too much. You\u2019re familiar of course with the term \u201cspiritual bypassing,\u201d and that\u2019s a way of saying it\u2014that people can use immediacy\u2014because it\u2019s true that in the present moment, it\u2019s almost impossible to find any evidence of a problem. We can find disturbance in stuff, but no evidence of a problem. \u201cProblem\u201d basically means a refusal to be present.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s very pervasive in the spiritual path community that people will be drawn to a path of nonviolence\u2014let\u2019s say in Buddhism\u2014when they have issues of anger. \u201cOh, great. I\u2019ll go be calm and generous and kind and everything like that.\u201d They use these practices often as a way of not having a relationship with their own rage, their sadistic impulses, their basic aggressive energy\u2014which all humans have.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I think the blind spot in the fruitional view is that by focusing only on immediacy, we can ignore the patterns in our experience which are only revealed over time. But, in therapy especially, basically we\u2019re looking for out-of-date patterns of experiencing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0OK. I want to talk about neurosis. There\u2019s a couple of interesting quotes that I\u2019ve pulled from the book,\u00a0<\/span>Already Free<\/span><\/i>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>But, to begin with, how do you define neurosis?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0I usually don\u2019t, but I did in the book, I guess. I guess I would say that neurosis is a practice that has to be maintained with a lot of intelligence and creativity\u2014and discipline, even\u2014in which we are constantly looking for ways in which to ignore the truth of our experience and focus on ritualized dramas, apparent problems, [and] distractions as a way to pretend that we don\u2019t really have to feel and work with what we don\u2019t want to experience. Usually these patterns of ignoring and distraction could be understood as having their origin in young childhood. I think that\u2019s very accurate.<\/span><\/p>\n

But my view is not so much about how did they get formed [as young children]\u2014I\u2019m always curious\u2014but the real question for me is: how is it that we are maintaining these patterns of avoidance in the present moment when there\u2019s almost never any evidence that they are necessary and justified? So, in my work, I have the view that most of us actually actively are looking for evidence all the time that will justify our investment in these patterns of avoidance.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0So I\u2019m wondering if you can give me a concrete example that would make it\u2014just a common neurotic pattern that\u2019s an avoidance pattern.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0I don\u2019t like to pay bills. I get anxious because I\u2019m not independently wealthy. That\u2019s not\u00a0<\/span>why<\/span><\/i>\u00a0I get anxious\u2014that\u2019s my fantasy. [<\/span>Laughs.<\/span><\/i>]<\/span><\/p>\n

Anyway, I get anxious about paying bills and I can\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Are you giving us a personal example here?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0This is a personal one. OK. Good. That\u2019s great.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0This is a personal example. I figure that\u2019s\u2014I could talk about you, but it\u2019s more kind to talk about myself. [<\/span>Laughs.<\/span><\/i>]<\/span><\/p>\n

So I find that I have a tendency to put bills off to the side somewhere, either literally in a little pile or just out of my mind. I don\u2019t often deal with the bill-paying proactively, but a lot of times I\u2019ll suddenly realize, \u201cOh no. Did I pay that bill?\u201d I\u2019ll go look for it in the pile and say, \u201cOh, damn, I forgot it,\u201d or, \u201cOh good, I\u2019ve got another couple of days.\u201d So I generate a drama about paying bills.<\/span><\/p>\n

It obviously doesn\u2019t prevent me from feeling disturbed, but like a lot of procrastination strategies, it allows us to unconsciously pretend that my anxiety is about this issue\u2014of let\u2019s say paying bills\u2014rather than recognizing that I have anxiety every day of my life. If I had a very organized system and paid my bills ahead of time as I was able to, I\u2019d have to feel that anxiety every day. But if I can sort of condense it into a little short drama, then I can unconsciously ignore that reality of that part of my life.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0This brings me to one of the quotes from the book: \u201cNeurosis is always a substitute for experiential intensity.\u201d I wonder if you can unpack that for us.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Yes, that\u2019s just a paraphrase of a quote by Carl Jung which I like, which is that, \u201cNeurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suffering.\u201d That was his quote.<\/span><\/p>\n

I like that because it points to neurosis as the activity of intelligence, whereas\u2014I\u2019m not a Freudian, but I think that some of that view was that it was this sort of blind conflict between our libidinal, primitive sexual energy and our superego type of energies. A lot of people see neurosis as something that happens to them or they inherited from their history. I prefer to think of neurosis as a practice that has to be maintained continually. I think that our basic agenda in our avoidance strategies is to stay out of too much aliveness\u2014too much openness\u2014which can include suffering [as well,] as Jung said.<\/span><\/p>\n

But also, I think we organize our lives around avoiding too much sexual intensity, power, joy, open appreciation, uncertainty\u2014things like that. It\u2019s actually very, very intense to be fully present in our life.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Let\u2019s talk about this for a moment. Most people what they want is\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0To be open?<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Well, to have intense sexual experience and to feel incredibly alive and powerful and joyful. Now, you\u2019re saying that that\u2019s actually what we\u2019re avoiding through our neurosis.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Yes, and it doesn\u2019t mean that some aspect of us\u2014to use that language\u2014doesn\u2019t want that. It just means that there\u2019s another aspect of us that avoids that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Why would we avoid it?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, I think as biological beings\u2014also given our personal history\u2014most of us actually are going to put survival as a higher priority than quality of life. Most of us unconsciously are invested in our young survival strategies as if those are what\u2019s going to keep us alive and functional\u2014to protect us. From a Buddhist point of view, even that that is my identity. \u201cI\u2019m somebody is always looking for the love that he will never get.\u201d Something like that. That sort of drama.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I think it\u2019s true that we want aliveness and I think it\u2019s true that we want safety and security. But in a very primitive, unconscious way, I think most of us are probably going to go for safety and security if the aliveness gets to be too much.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Any way I can have both? Door Number Three?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Yes. You already have both. [<\/span>Laughs.<\/span><\/i>]<\/span><\/p>\n

So it\u2019s more consciously participating in that unresolvable simultaneity of contradictory energies. That is: the more we try to choose sides, therapy jargon, the more black and white organization there is from childhood\u2014the more we act as if it\u2019s one or the other.<\/span><\/p>\n

So if we work from that reality, I think that it\u2019s helpful to give ourselves permission at first to alternate back and forth rather than our unexamined fantasy that it\u2019s one or the other. So that might mean that I\u2019m going to allow myself to have moments of passion or of open mind or of rage or feeling very confident\u2014whatever it is\u2014and then I don\u2019t have to stay there.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think it\u2019s just as important to be open to being closed as it is to be open to being open. But [I think] a lot of therapy-spiritual path people have a prejudice that it\u2019s good to be open and it\u2019s bad to be closed. So they keep on trying to be open all the time, but that just guarantees that their need to be closed\u2014meaning protected, safe, secure\u2014will get expressed unconsciously and indirectly.<\/span><\/p>\n

But if we want to practice unconditional openness, if it\u2019s unconditional we have to be just as open to being closed as we\u2019re open to being open. Then I think it\u2019s more like breathing in and breathing out. It\u2019s appropriate, skillful, [and] accurate to alternate between these two energies knowing that they will never be resolved.<\/span><\/p>\n

Sometimes, I might want to be close. Sometimes, I\u2019m not going to want to be close. Sometimes, I\u2019m open to ecstatic experiences. Sometimes, I just want to watch TV. Maybe none of that\u2019s a problem.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0OK. We have another quote from the book about neurosis that I found quite important, actually: \u201cNeurosis requires disembodiment.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0If it makes sense that neurosis is fundamentally an avoidance strategy, where we\u2019re trying to get out of experiential intensity, [I believe] it\u2019s very difficult to ignore the truth of our experience if we\u2019re aware of what our embodied experience is. If my heart\u2019s beating fast and my stomach\u2019s tight, it\u2019s hard to pretend that I\u2019m calm and together.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I think that life is always disturbing us. It\u2019s not really, but that\u2019s how we think of it. Life is always affecting us in ways that don\u2019t fit our fantasies or preferences. We call it \u201cdisturbance.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

I think that the level that is hardest to ignore our disturbance on is the embodied sensation, physical level. If I\u2019m disturbed in my body, it\u2019s sort of hard to pretend\u2014again\u2014that I\u2019m an evolved person who\u2019s never affected by anything.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I think one of fundamental requirements of neurotic organization is a dissociation from our immediate, embodied vulnerabilities. So from that point of view, the antidotal process if we want to dissolve neurotic organization really\u2014I don\u2019t know if it\u2019s a requirement or not, but it certainly is very important, very central\u2014[is to] train ourselves to bring our attention back into our immediate, sensation-level, embodied vulnerabilities so we can discover [where the problem is]. Do I actually have to bail out of my body? Do I have to dissociate? Do I have to avoid the truth of my experience?<\/span><\/p>\n

As children, we do. There\u2019s no way in the world that we can tolerate the inner and outer overwhelming intensities of being a fragile little being in the world. But by the time we\u2019re adults, a lot of us actually have the capacity to stay embodied through very, very intense experience. But until we discipline ourselves to go into what we don\u2019t want to feel, we\u2019re probably going to take our young assumptions for granted\u2014as if they\u2019re still true.<\/span><\/p>\n

So it seems to me that for somebody to successfully ignore the truth of their experience, it\u2019s really almost necessary to disembody\u2014to get out of our immediate body vulnerabilities. To dissolve neurotic organization, I see that as a very central part of that work\u2014to re-embody.<\/span><\/p>\n

But, again, nobody wants to feel unsafe. Or we don\u2019t want to feel our rage and our panic and our grief and our fear. So this is all counter-instinctual work. [I think] a lot of Western therapy mistakes the practical need to feel safe [in order] to do certain types of work\u2014especially trauma work\u2014I think there\u2019s an unconscious extension of that in thinking that the point is that we\u2019re supposed to feel safe in relationships [and] we\u2019re supposed to feel safe in our life. Nobody feels safe in their life. How could anybody? Life isn\u2019t safe. Life isn\u2019t organized around our survival or our preferences.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I think it\u2019s very important to learn to discriminate between feeling unsafe, for example, and whether we actually\u00a0<\/span>are<\/span><\/i>\u00a0unsafe.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0OK. I want to help a listener at this point bring this into their own life. So if someone\u2019s listening and they\u2019re thinking, \u201cI wonder in what way am I neurotic?\u201d They could ask anybody that knows them and probably get a good answer.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Good idea.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0But what would be your suggestion, first of all, how they could choose to just work through this here with us\u2014to pick one of their\u2014out of a handful. How would they find, \u201cOh, yes, that\u2019s how I know. I\u2019m definitely neurotic in that respect.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, I think your question is a good one to start with. Which is: \u201cHow am I neurotic?\u201d instead of, \u201cAm I neurotic?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Yes. We\u2019re going to presume.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0We\u2019re going to presume that all of our experiencing is an inseparable entanglement of sanity and neurosis. So, \u201cHow am I sane [and] how am I neurotic?\u201d is the more useful question.<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a lot of ways to approach that. One, let\u2019s say\u2014because relationship is very important to many of us\u2014let\u2019s say that any experience that I have of complaint about my partner is almost certainly evidence of neurotic organization.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Well, everyone\u2019s going to have something on that front. Every single person. So that\u2019s a safe one. So everyone\u2019s going to have a complaint about their partner. I\u2019m going to bet my career on it. OK.<\/span><\/p>\n

[<\/span>Bruce laughs.<\/span><\/i>]<\/span><\/p>\n

Once they identify that, then what\u2019s the next step?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0So then they could consider the view that their actual complaint more precisely is probably that their partner is triggering feelings in them that they don\u2019t want to feel. If I\u2019m irritated with my partner, that probably means I\u2019m irritated [with] having to feel some vulnerability that I\u2019ve had all my life that my partner is triggering but not causing\u2014because I had this issue before I ever met them. If we split up, I\u2019ll still have this issue. They\u2019re not the cause.<\/span><\/p>\n

But codependent dynamics involve this mutual agreement that we\u2019ll each blame each other. Nobody will have effective boundaries, so nobody has to deal with their own vulnerabilities because the finger is always going over to one\u2019s partner.<\/span><\/p>\n

So anytime we have a complaint, we could start by asking, \u201cOh, what is it that I\u2019m having to feel right this moment that I don\u2019t want to feel?\u201d Then investigate that. My bias is to investigate it as raw sensation-level experience, no interpretation at all. Certainly no claim that it\u2019s about my partner\u2014because it\u2019s not, really\u2014and then see, first of all, is it killing me to feel my tight stomach, my heart hurts, my throat\u2019s constricted. Whatever.<\/span><\/p>\n

Is it damaging me? Is there any evidence about my worth as a person? I\u2019ve never found it. We\u2019re not going to find shame or guilt or abandonment as sensations. They\u2019re not. They\u2019re already dissociative interpretations of our immediate vulnerability, in my view.<\/span><\/p>\n

So our practice is to continually use our sense of complaint\u2014let\u2019s say\u2014as a signal to return to our immediate, embodied vulnerability and start to have a conscious, embodied, kind relationship with that aspect of our own experience\u2014because it\u2019s us. It\u2019s not something that\u2019s happening\u00a0<\/span>to<\/span><\/i>\u00a0us, and at some point we get the clarity, \u201cDoesn\u2019t it just make sense for me to be kind to my own difficult experience? Nobody else on the planet\u2019s lining up to be kind to my vulnerabilities. Maybe it\u2019s up to me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So basically we can use any repetitive, dissociative experience\u2014whether it\u2019s self-aggression as another very common thing that I would say is always a dissociative escape from some immediate, embodied vulnerability that\u2019s happening\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0OK, so let\u2019s slow down on that one. So that means that anytime that I\u2019m feeling terrible about myself\u2014\u201dOh my God, I can\u2019t believe I said that,\u201d or, \u201cI could have handled that better,\u201d or et cetera\u2014that I\u2019m leaving my body in some way?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0I would say almost certainly\u2014and substituting what\u2019s probably a historically learned explanation for my difficult feelings. Most kids have to learn to blame themself rather than blame their parents, because that\u2019s not very safe when you\u2019re young.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, first of all, your language was, \u201cWhen I\u2019m feeling like I\u2019ve done something wrong.\u201d But that\u2019s not a feeling. That\u2019s already an interpretation.<\/span><\/p>\n

So a lot of us unconsciously actually relate to our story about our disturbance as if it\u2019s our feelings. But they\u2019re actually stories. They\u2019re dissociative explanations for why I\u2019m feeling anxious or vulnerable or raw or expose or something very hard. It\u2019s hard to stay embodied with that\u2014that raw exposure sort of feeling.<\/span><\/p>\n

But I would say if somebody investigates with that sort of question\u2014\u201cWhat am I feeling right this second that I don\u2019t want to feel?\u201d\u2014[and staying] embodied with no interpretations, they\u2019re never going to find any evidence of my being unworthy or somehow worthy of shame or anything like that. It\u2019s just not there. There\u2019s just raw vulnerability.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Now, you speak at one point in the book about these unconditional practices that we can bring into our life. You could call them fruitional practices. One of them is this practice of unconditional kindness. I\u2019d love for you to say more about that, because I think it\u2019s something that\u2019s really challenging for a lot of people.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Yes, our culture isn\u2019t exactly mature. We have a lot of aggression in our culture and lot of it gets turned against ourselves and others.<\/span><\/p>\n

Sometimes, if I\u2019m working with a client and they happen to be a parent, I\u2019ll invite them to remember what it was like when they had their little infant\u2014maybe six months old or something\u2014and that infant was inconsolable. They were in pain, they were upset, and the parent tries everything they can. Nothing works.<\/span><\/p>\n

When I ask a parent, \u201cWell, what do you do then? What did you do?\u201d I have had a couple of parents say, \u201cWell, throw him in the room until they feel better,\u201d but 99 percent of the parents say, \u201cWell, I\u2019ll just keep holding my little baby. I\u2019m not going to abandon my baby, but it\u2019s tearing my heart apart to not be able to solve my baby\u2019s pain.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So, of course, that is analogous to how we might hold our own deep grief and rage and fear and panic and everything. We can actually hold exactly what is most disturbing to us in the sense of love, as if we\u2019re actually holding\u2014it\u2019s not an intellectual practice, it\u2019s a heart practice.<\/span><\/p>\n

And I find that for many of us in our culture, the more heart-based practice of unconditional kindness\u2014which means toward everything, without exception\u2014is actually much more powerful than just clarity practices. We have to have enough clarity to know what we\u2019re practicing with, but a lot of us take refuge in clarity as a way of staying out of the vulnerability of opening our heart to feelings that are really, really disturbing [and] are not resolvable, actually.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0I\u2019m curious to know, in your own life, how the practice of unconditional kindness has unfolded for you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, I think there was some shift in my 40s and another type of shift in my 50s. I used to be incredibly sarcastic\u2014and I know you won\u2019t believe this about me\u2014but [I was] very aggressive and everything. But I would say maybe in the last 15 to 20 years, I don\u2019t experience self-aggression at all.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Not at all? It doesn\u2019t come up at all?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0It doesn\u2019t come up at all. I think that has come out of some variety of factors, but I think an intention to practice kindness at some point in my life was very central to that\u2014that I really committed to returning to my immediate experience whatever it was\u2014and often I really, really did not want to feel that. I just found in my direct evidence that my state of mind was so much more positive or satisfying or workable when I stopped being aggressive to whatever was true\u2014and in fact actually even practiced being kind.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think being a parent\u2014which I am\u2014was very helpful with that in the same ways I was just talking about. Certainly being married has been very helpful for me. Being a therapist has been very helpful for me that way. And my Buddhist practice has been really helpful that way.<\/span><\/p>\n

I would say it\u2019s not even an issue. It doesn\u2019t come up anymore\u2014about self-aggression. So I don\u2019t have a current practice of being kind because that\u2019s sort of an antidotal practice.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Pretty cool, Bruce.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0It sounds good. You don\u2019t know if it\u2019s true or not! [<\/span>Laughs<\/span><\/i>.]<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0I trust you. You\u2019re a truthful guy.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, there are two other unconditional practices that you write about in the book: unconditional immediacy and unconditional embodiment. I wonder if you can give us the sort of pith instruction, if you will, on both of those.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, we\u2019ve touched on both of those I think. The fruitional view has a lot to do with immediacy. So the more we return to what is most true in this present moment\u2014whatever a moment is\u2014but in this present moment, understanding we\u2019re only living in the present moment\u2014this is the only moment in which we can find out is most true. There\u2019s always some unfolding happening on a relative level.<\/span><\/p>\n

But, in my experience, what we find to be most true in the present moment as we go deeper and deeper and deeper\u2014and more and more immediate in our experiencing\u2014is that we find less and less and less evidence of any problem, any division, any conflict, anything missing. As you and I have talked about, that\u2019s not the whole story, because as humans there\u2019s also the over-time recognition\u2014the patterns that will continue to manifest.<\/span><\/p>\n

But when we have a ground of immediacy, then we can work with these patterns without a sense that they are a problem. We actually increasingly just work with these patterns as practical issues to help improve the quality of our life and our capacity to be a benefit to other people\u2014but not because there\u2019s something wrong with me that I have to heal before I\u2019m OK.<\/span><\/p>\n

Embodiment we were just talking about. That, again, is an unconditional commitment to return\u2014because most of us are always dissociating\u2014to immediate, embodied experience [not just] when there\u2019s a problem, but just as an ongoing practice. [It\u2019s] almost like being aware of our breathing. It\u2019s not because there\u2019s a problem, but because that\u2019s more true than my stories about what\u2019s happening.<\/span><\/p>\n

I remember reading at some point about a Western student doing a retreat in Thailand. The teacher gave the instructions, \u201cIn the next 10 days, don\u2019t do anything that takes you out of your body.\u201d So I thought that was a great instruction for a retreat.<\/span><\/p>\n

We could actually commit to that practice not as an accomplishment\u2014but as a practice\u2014for the rest of our life. Why should we ever intentionally do anything that takes us out of our immediate experience if that\u2019s the only moment we\u2019re living in? That just seems to make sense to me.<\/span><\/p>\n

So all of these practices of immediate embodiment, immediacy, unconditional kindness\u2014to me\u2014are resonant with the open, ungraspable, unconditional, nonbiased nature of open awareness, which from a Vajrayana point of view is already our basic nature. So if we can take on practices that are most resonant with our basic nature, my hope is that it actually will\u2014through a process of resonance\u2014start to invite more and more conscious participation in this fundamental nature.<\/span><\/p>\n

I sometimes just use the analogy of two tuning forks tuned to the same frequency. If you hit one, the other\u2019s going to start vibrating without being hit. So if we can take on active practices that keep inviting this sense of unconditional awareness, embodiment, kindness\u2014in Buddhism, we talk about mind and body and relationship as sort of three things.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think that it\u2019s an invitation. It\u2019s not causal, but I think it\u2019s an invitation to have more and more frequent moments of investigating that really interesting question of, \u201cWhat is aware of all this? What\u2019s the nature of awareness? Is awareness disturbed when I\u2019m disturbed? Does awareness care if I\u2019m dying or if I\u2019m healthy? Does awareness care if I have abandonment issues?\u201d I\u2019d say no.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, again, we don\u2019t take refuge in that with the Vajrayana view. But we bring these two together so that all of our workings [and] our investigations of this crazy display of being humans can be worked with from this ground of open joy, workability, non-bias, and confidence\u2014things like that. It just makes working with our human issues so much more practical and non-problematic because we\u2019ve removed our identity drama at that point from it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0OK. I want to ask a question that maybe puts a little pressure on the system. Which is: you said the unconditional kindness\u2014the practice of unconditional kindness\u2014now comes naturally to you. You don\u2019t experience self-aggression.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I\u2019m curious to know: of the beautiful teachings that you\u2019re offering in this book,\u00a0<\/span>Already Free<\/span><\/i>,<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>where do you find trouble spots in your own life at this point? Do you find any trouble spots?<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, I discriminate between \u201cdisturbance\u201d and \u201cproblems.\u201d I would say\u2014again, I could be just bullshitting myself\u2014but I would say my report is that I don\u2019t experience problems. But I definitely experience disturbance every day of my life. Some of that disturbance is very obviously related to lifelong core vulnerabilities. But I personally don\u2019t have the agenda anymore\u2014like I did when I was younger\u2014that they need to be resolved or cleared up.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0So your distinction between disturbance and problems\u2014just help me be clear about that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0I would say a problem is probably a disturbance that we\u2019re refusing to have a fully conscious, embodied, kind relationship with to participate in fully. It\u2019s a problem because I\u2019m trying to avoid it. I\u2019m trying to get around it, make it go away.<\/span><\/p>\n

So my bias\u2014a lot of people don\u2019t like this\u2014is that almost all the time\u2014at least with neurotically organized people\u2014that what they call wounds are not problems. They reflect a refusal to stay present and embodied with really difficult feelings they don\u2019t want to feel. But the fact that they\u2019re refusing to stay present and participate as deeply as possible gives it the appearance of being a problem. Then I can have the project of trying to heal it before I have to show up in my life. So one of my many biases.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I would say that I honestly can\u2019t call to mind any experience in my recent memory of feeling there\u2019s a problem. But I certainly have disturbances all the time. I have a lot of limitations in my experience of relationship. I don\u2019t like to feel anxiety, and I can see myself\u2014as I said about that example earlier\u2014having an impulse to avoid certain engagements that would trigger anxiety. I feel irritation come up. Blah blah blah. All that stuff.<\/span><\/p>\n

To me, it\u2019s just part of being human. But [in] my experience, every once and a while they get a little traction. But almost always what happens is these very difficult feelings get triggered and almost immediately they are experience in an environment of awareness. So they don\u2019t go anywhere. They just have their life and they fade away and sometimes they\u2019re actually sort of funny. It\u2019s funny to see myself getting irritated at something. Other times, I sort of take it seriously for a little bit.<\/span><\/p>\n

But I don\u2019t have a personal agenda to clear up my neuroses. I don\u2019t see that it\u2019s a problem to avoid certain types of experience. I think there are practical benefits of clearing those things up, but I\u2019m not going to make my life into a therapy project.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Truth is, Bruce, I could talk to you for a really long time.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0[<\/span>Laughs.<\/span><\/i>] And I with you, Tami.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0But instead I\u2019m going to ask you a final question.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0OK.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0The book\u00a0<\/span>Already Free: Buddhism Meets Psychotherapy on the Path of Liberation<\/span><\/i>\u00a0came into existence because students, clients, and friends of yours encouraged you, cornered you. We didn\u2019t exactly<\/span>\u00a0flog<\/span><\/i>\u00a0you, but we were in that direction\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0You were actually very generous in encouraging me.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Now the book exists. It\u2019s published. I\u2019m curious to know if you have any hopes, if you will, for how this book might impact people.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Well, my basic hope is that it might be of benefit to some of the people who read it. My guess is that different aspects of the book may be helpful to different people. My most fundamental hope would be that something about the variety of views and examples and everything that\u2019s offered would strike somebody in a way that, again, could resonate with an actual glimpse or direct experience that, \u201cI don\u2019t need to continue calling myself a problematic person. I don\u2019t need to keep claiming that life is a problem. Maybe the fact that I have difficult experiences is not evidence of something wrong that has to be fixed.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So I guess my hope would be that something in the book might spark an interest\u2014a little view for a moment\u2014that it actually might make sense to be kind to oneself and others regardless of our failings, not wait until we feel happy to be kind, and that might reduce unnecessary suffering. [It] might help others be more kind to themselves and to the people that are important to them in their life.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think probably anybody writing this type of book is probably just finding their own way of passing on teachings they\u2019ve received. So I don\u2019t think there\u2019s anything radically new in the book except for maybe how some things are presented\u2014but I\u2019ve found that sometimes that different presentation of very basic ideas strikes me in a new way that\u2019s very helpful.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I think that would be my hope\u2014not that, \u201cOh, this is some new material,\u201d as much as maybe it\u2019s a different way of presenting it that might be more accessible to some people.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0I\u2019ve been speaking with Bruce Tift. He\u2019s the author of a new book\u2014as well as an audio teaching series\u2014called\u00a0<\/span>Already Free: Buddhism Meets Psychotherapy on the Path of Liberation<\/span><\/i>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/i>I do have to say I feel quite a bit more embodied, alive, a sense of immediacy, and I feel even more free, Bruce, at the end of our conversation than I did at the beginning. So thank you so much.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0All right! Good testimonial.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b>\u00a0Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bruce Tift:<\/b>\u00a0Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Tami Simon:<\/b> And if you\u2019d like to watch <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i> on video and participate in after-the-show Q&A conversations with featured presenters and have the chance to ask your questions, come join us on Sounds True One, a new membership community that features premium shows, live classes, and community events. Let\u2019s learn and grow together. Come join us at join.soundstrue.com. Sounds True: waking up the world.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"template":"","meta":{"_expiration-date-status":"","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[]},"class_list":["post-19920","transcript","type-transcript","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nAlready Free - Transcript | Sounds True<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Read the full transcript from this Sounds True conversation with Already Free. 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