{"id":9598,"date":"2021-12-07T08:54:22","date_gmt":"2021-12-07T15:54:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/?post_type=transcript&p=9598"},"modified":"2021-12-07T08:54:22","modified_gmt":"2021-12-07T15:54:22","slug":"tracking-wonder","status":"publish","type":"transcript","link":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/","title":{"rendered":"Tracking Wonder"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"image_print\"Print Transcript<\/span><\/a><\/div>

Tami Simon:<\/b> Welcome to <\/span>Insights at the Edge <\/span><\/i>produced by Sounds True. My name is Tami Simon, I\u2019m the founder of Sounds True, and I\u2019d love to take a moment to introduce you to the new Sounds True Foundation. The Sounds True Foundation is dedicated to creating a wiser and kinder world by making transformational education widely available. We want everyone to have access to transformational tools such as mindfulness, emotional awareness, and self-compassion regardless of financial, social or physical challenges. The Sounds True Foundation is a nonprofit dedicated to providing these transformational tools to communities in need, including at-risk youth, prisoners, veterans, and those in developing countries. If you\u2019d like to learn more or feel inspired to become a supporter, please visit soundstruefoundation.org.<\/span><\/p>\n

You\u2019re listening to <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i>. Today, my guest is Jeffrey Davis. Jeffrey researches and works with innovators, professionals, writers, scientists, and social psychologists, who offer him leading insights into the creative process. He\u2019s the founder of the Tracking Wonder Consultancy. With Sounds True, Jeffrey Davis has written a new book, it\u2019s called <\/span>Tracking Wonder: Reclaiming a Life of Meaning and Possibility in a World Obsessed with Productivity<\/span><\/i>. Before speaking with Jeffrey, I thought I knew what wonder was, but I think I only knew one dimension.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jeffrey shares with us six facets of wonder, and most importantly, how we can increase our wonder quotient, bring more wonder into our lives and our world, become more wonder-filled. Here\u2019s\u2014I\u2019m going to say it\u2014my wonderful conversation with Jeffrey Davis.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Jeffrey, the topic of wonder has become the focus of quite a bit of your teaching work, your writing. You\u2019re the founder of the Tracking Wonder Consultancy. As a way for our listeners to get to know you a little bit, how did the topic of wonder become so central to how you teach, what you write about, what you focus on?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Jeffrey Davis:<\/b> Yes, that\u2019s a great question. There\u2019s maybe an inspiration point and a series of inflection points. The inspiration point came while being in South India, studying with my teacher of yoga, TKV Desikachar. I was researching for another project that was exploring the creative process and yoga philosophy and practices. I was curious about this experience that I only had the word for the delight and surprise we sometimes feel when we\u2019re in the creative process. He led me to a book, little known book among some, called the Shiva Sutras. It\u2019s really all about a sort of innate creative force within us.<\/span><\/p>\n

There was a reference to <\/span>vismaya<\/span><\/i>, Sanskrit for wonder or a fascinating wonder, a joy-filled amazement that we experience when we\u2019re aware of, let\u2019s say, ultimate reality in this ordinary waking world. The commentaries just lit a whole-bodied yes through me. I realized that\u2019s what I wanted to devote much of the next several years to\u2014my studies and my pursuit. So, that was the moment of inspiration. I realize in retrospect, when I look back at so many critical points from my 20s and even earlier, I was like, oh, that\u2019s always what I was being attracted to, these experiences of wonder.<\/span><\/p>\n

But it was a few years later when the real inflection points came, because before that, for a few years, I was pursuing all different areas of wonder and wisdom traditions, very little science of wonder at the time. But I was scrambling to find any signs of wonder at the time. It was a few years later, after a series of hardships that my wife and I both endured. We were newly married. She had two miscarriages. In the same spring, I contracted Lyme disease, which is a tick-borne disease that can really devastate you neurologically and physiologically.<\/span><\/p>\n

I thought I got through it OK after the first round of antibiotics. It turned out I really didn\u2019t. Within just a couple of weeks after that, lightning struck our dream house, farmhouse, here in the Hudson Valley that we had just purchased. Literally sent a fire roaring through my study and studio. It kind of devastated our sense that, oh, we\u2019re going to build our dreams. Maybe we\u2019ll have a couple of wonderlings wandering around someday.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The next day, I came back to the house, which we would not be in for the next 15 plus months while it got gutted and renovated. I came back to my studio to size up some of the books I could salvage out of the 300 that were ultimately destroyed. I was noticing I was really shutting down. I was closing down. I wanted to cry, but I couldn\u2019t quite find the tears. I was feeling rage, but not sure what I was angry about. Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw this pulsing, this monarch that had flown through one of the holes that the firefighters had knocked in the wall. For just a moment, all of the armor within me sort of dissolved, all the closeness dissolved. I felt open again before this beautiful monarch that had flown in.<\/span><\/p>\n

I felt open again that, OK, I\u2019m not a big sign seeker, but I took it for what it was worth. It was like, OK, we\u2019re going to be OK for the next\u2014however long this ordeal lasts. That was enough to give me enough hope and sense of openness to make it through those challenges. Now here\u2019s where the series of inflection points really take shape for this project, to answer your question. Because then I thought oh, this is the real practice of tracking wonder. It\u2019s not just when everything\u2019s going really great for you and you\u2019re just playing along your good days. The real practice of tracking wonder is what happens in moments of adversity and consistent challenge and change.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, I got really curious about my own practices, my own living laboratory. I got really curious about testing out other ideas with our clients and our community. So, that was our living laboratory. I started gathering more the emerging science of wonder to explore this question. How do fulfilled innovators, how do people who really describe themselves as fulfilled and who are making significant contributions in different fields, ultimately thrive amidst constant challenge and change? That\u2019s what got me on to this current project that we\u2019re discussing today.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> So, for a listener who says, \u201cThe emerging science of wonder? I didn\u2019t know there was a science of wonder.\u201d What is that?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes. So, when I started this, I was looking into three areas of research: human flourishing, mindfulness, and innovation. So, human flourishing. Marty Seligman and another psychologist had really foremostly developed what we now call positive psychology, which is a very different orientation to psychology than the previous hundred-plus years, to look at how certain positive emotions might ultimately help us flourish. At the time, there was relatively little science on wonder, in part because it\u2019s so subtle. It is so subtle physiologically, and even neurologically, that psychologists were studying love, compassion.<\/span><\/p>\n

Dr. Keltner, whom we both know, was on the trail of awe. He and I had early conversations back in 2006 about his studies of awe, but little on wonder. So, some of the science of awe and wonder overlap, but what some of the science of wonder is demonstrating is quite remarkable. So, let me just define wonder maybe for our listeners. OK.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> That would be great, yes, especially because you said it\u2019s \u201csubtle physiologically.\u201d That brought up for me, how do I even know for sure, in any given moment, that this is wonder? So, a definition, but also a kind of litmus test in my own experience. This is wonder, Tami. Now you know what it is for sure.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> That\u2019s such a great question. I hope this conversation actually illuminates more of just what I want this book to give, which is a shared language of possibility, a shared language of the emotions of possibility, which are what I call the facets of wonder. So wonder, I define for entry-point level here, is a heightened state of awareness brought on by something unexpected that delights us, disorients us, or both. A heightened state of awareness like instant mindfulness brought on by something unexpected that delights us, disorients us, or both.<\/span><\/p>\n

Something, somebody you know, you think you know very well says something to you that\u2019s kind of surprising and makes your head sort of tilt and maybe it delights you. Maybe it helps you see that person in a new way. Maybe it challenges your notions of who that person is. That\u2019s a potential experience of wonder in the facet of connection. Or, a turkey shows up on the streets of Boulder, that\u2019s another potential moment of wonder as well, because it\u2019s delightful, potentially disorienting, right? What\u2019s remarkable physiologically, and out of some studies out of Arizona University, is that these moments of surprise can pause the fight-or-flight response.<\/span><\/p>\n

We know that positive emotions, such as love, will attract us. We\u2019re attracted toward the stimulus. Emotions like fear repel us. Experiences of wonder can hold us in pause, can pause us in the state of receptivity and maybe even possible appreciation. So, I\u2019ll pause there for a moment just to let you digest that.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK. Yes, what comes up for me is, I\u2019ll just share something from my own life for a moment, which is often I notice\u2014especially if I\u2019m working a lot and I\u2019m not really taking enough time for my inner life\u2014that the world can become kind of flat to me. Like one more morning, undoing the dishwasher one more time, doing this other\u2014very rote. I want to find out if I\u2019m using the word wonder correctly or not. There is this wondrous, I might use the word sacred or something, dimension that\u2019s always present all the time in all of these things that I\u2019m doing that feel kind of covered over with a gray film because I can\u2019t see it or find it, but underneath it\u2019s wondrous. Is that the right use of the word wonder?\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> It\u2019s the perfect use of the word wonder for so many reasons, even the way you just laid it out. There\u2019s nothing to, I would say, \u201cpathologize\u201d about the fact that often you go through the world in just the terms that you described. We\u2019re, in part, wired neurologically to slot the world into different categories so we can survive and not have to figure out everything like, oh, dish pan. Oh, that\u2019s a faucet. There\u2019s not this constant relearning every day. On the other hand, just exactly what you\u2019re describing, taking moments to pause and even be aware of one\u2019s surroundings. Then, it does feel as if a veil is lifted.<\/span><\/p>\n

Those are potential moments of wonder. So, I describe wonder as having this effect on us, and experiences of wonder, that sometimes they will disrupt or dissolve our biased perceptions, right? We have just these natural filters and for a moment, for a fleeting moment, these experiences of wonder can disrupt or dissolve those biased perceptions of ourselves, of one another, of our surroundings, of what we consider the world. We see again what is real and true, what is beautiful and possible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Sometimes just for a moment, as you\u2019re washing the dishes, suddenly you look around and you just recognize the ordinary beauty and the water flowing and the beauty of just taking care of the dishes. Perhaps you just had a meal with your partner and you\u2019re just honoring that whole sacred moment and for a moment, that is wondrous, and that is potentially expansive if you heat it.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> So, is it fair to say that any moment, including this moment, the moment that the listener is in right now, could be a moment of connecting with wonder? It\u2019s possible, any moment.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> I just got the goosebumps. I\u2019m going to say yes. Goosebumps are actually, sometimes, the physiological response to having a moment of wonder. I think the reason I got goosebumps is because you really identified something that is really beautiful about moments of wonder, is that they often happen in the space between us. There\u2019s a beautiful relational and social dimension to wonder, that they don\u2019t only happen watching the great sunsets, which is what we may think, and certainly they do happen there, but they can happen right here in the most beautiful, ordinary moments, even in conversation, maybe even particularly in real conversation.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Now there\u2019s a lot I want to talk to you about, Jeffrey. You\u2019ve created a whole, I would call it \u201ccartography\u201d of tracking wonder that\u2019s really interesting. I want to get into it. But first I just want to know, now that you\u2019ve been immersed in studying wonder, tracking wonder, talking to other people about wonder, has your life really become wonder-filled? How are you different now than you were 15 years ago before this became such a focus for you?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Thank you for that question, because I\u2019ve reflected quite a bit on it, particularly the past two or three years, to recognize there are certain days I\u2019m like, wow, the wonder ratio was really up. Of course, it was the now late Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, the psychologist whose work, for the listeners who don\u2019t know, gave us the language of flow. He said something in his follow-up study on creativity that has always stayed with me, \u201cYou are what you pay attention to.\u201d You are what you pay attention to.<\/span><\/p>\n

So to your question, the more I\u2019ve paid attention to wonder, the more I\u2019ve discussed wonder, the more refined have been my sensibilities to recognizing the numerous moments of wonder that arise in my life. So, yes, my wonder ratio really has amplified by virtue of that.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Now your book uses the title <\/span>Tracking Wonder<\/span><\/i>. Tell us a little bit about this metaphor of tracking, of tracking animal paw prints, but also scatology and all the other things we might track.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes, thank you for that. So actually, Hilary, my wife\u2014I have to credit her, in part, for that title, because she had actual experience in studying with some of the foremost animal trackers. Tracking animals, not to hunt them down, but tracking them to understand them better. Tracking them to better understand where they might dwell, what are their habits, where are the typical places where they pursue prey, perhaps, but not to pin them down and hunt them. We were taking a walk many, many years ago in the woods and I was explaining to her what I was really devoted to pursuing and she\u2019s like, \u201cOh, you\u2019re tracking wonder.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So, it stuck ever since then, but now I can clearly say, this is exactly what you and I are talking about. moments of wonder are subtle. They are a red fox of emotions because it\u2019s like, now you see them, now you don\u2019t. They\u2019re pervasive yet they\u2019re evasive. We do want to bring more of ourselves, more of our faculties than just our rational, analytical faculties to tracking wonder. We want to bring our imagination. We want to bring our intuition, our somatic intelligence, these other parts of us, to actually tracking these experiences.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> In the book, you write that if we want to know what tracking wonder means, we have to pay more attention to what you call the six facets of wonder and\u2014ready, here we go\u2014I was going to say \u201cI wonder,\u201d but you probably get a lot of puns and stuff like that. It\u2019s kind of endless once you start really bringing wonder into your vocabulary. But I wonder if you would introduce us briefly to the six facets, and then I have some questions about them.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> I would love to. So, I do think, too, for those listeners who\u2019ve had therapy, for instance, and maybe a therapist helped them define certain emotions they\u2019re experiencing, that actually helped them navigate their inner world. Just as in Buddhism, there\u2019s a lot of language about certain states of awareness to understand our inner world. What I want these six facets to do for listeners is actually give them this shared language where they\u2019re like, oh, that\u2019s what that is. So, here are the six facets, and they often function in pairs.<\/span><\/p>\n

The first pair is openness and curiosity. Openness is the wide-sky facet that really cracks us open to possibility, where we actually foster what I call an \u201cintelligent naivet\u00e9\u201d to pursue some new possibilities\u2014really important. Curiosity is a more playful, proactive facet of wonder that questions and challenges the status quo of things, questions the way things have always been done. That\u2019s why I call it the \u201crebel facet.\u201d I\u2019m confident Tami has a bit of that rebel facet. Those two facets are really important in terms of allowing us to approach challenges more creatively than reactively, more flexibly than rigidly.<\/span><\/p>\n

The second pair is bewilderment and hope. These are really important for our times. Bewilderment is the disorienting facet of wonder, when our sense of identity or even the ideas we\u2019re pursuing get really confused, which is why I call it the \u201cdeep woods\u201d facet. This is where we don\u2019t fight or flee from confusion, but actually learn to fertilize confusion. Hope is the rainbow facet. This is not wishful thinking. I have to admit this was a part of \u2026 My challenge is I really dove into the science of hope. I actually had some biases toward hope in equating it to wishful thinking, but so many people I was working with in our community were suffering from crises and adversity. So, I really dove into the science of hope to discover that it\u2019s very proactive. It does involve deliberate daydreaming and goal setting so that you can keep moving toward a better near future. The final pair. So, those two facets, by the way, bewilderment and hope, are essential for building resilience and fortitude without burning out.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The third pair is connection and admiration. I have to say these perhaps are also maybe the most important for our strange times in our culture, divisiveness and polarity, because these are the relational facets of wonder.<\/span><\/p>\n

Connection is what I call the \u201cflock\u201d facet. It speaks to our yearning to sync up with one another, our yearning to really connect with strangers and people we\u2019ve been become overly familiarized with and find the support and collaboration among them. Admiration is what I call the \u201cmirror\u201d facet. So, I define admiration as a surprising love for someone else\u2019s excellence and character or craft. So, I\u2019ll pause there, let you digest that.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK, very good. Yes. Obviously, there\u2019s a lot here. I think before I read <\/span>Tracking Wonder<\/span><\/i>, I associated wonder with openness and curiosity, like those two things that, if you said to me, \u201cWhat\u2019s a moment of wonder?\u201d To be honest with you, I did not associate wonder with the other four facets that you\u2019re identifying, so I\u2019m more interested in going into the other four facets, if that\u2019s OK. Just because I think it will be more surprise-filled and possibly disorienting and delightful for our listeners, consequently. OK. So, let\u2019s go into this notion of bewilderment.<\/span><\/p>\n

You talked about this idea that we could fertilize confusion and that somehow that would be useful for us. I was a little bit like, OK, first of all, I don\u2019t really like being confused. It\u2019s not something pleasant. I don\u2019t associate it with being wonder-filled, and I don\u2019t know what you mean by fertilizing it.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes. Thank you for that, great questions. I\u2019m glad we\u2019re delving into the less familiar facets of wonder. Bewilderment, maybe this is a helpful entry point for us, listeners. We go to children\u2019s literature, wondrous kid stuff because children are always in wonder. I think children are quite disoriented quite often. The children\u2019s literature often reflects it. Let\u2019s think of the archetypal film version of <\/span>The Wizard of Oz<\/span><\/i>. When Dorothy lands, she has her tornado moment, which is quite mythical, and lands in a whole other world of reality in Oz.<\/span><\/p>\n

She has that classic statement, \u201cToto, I don\u2019t think we\u2019re in Kansas anymore.\u201d Or, when Alice spirals down the rabbit hole and then the hookah-toking caterpillar says, \u201cWho are you?\u201d Alice is like, \u201cWell, I don\u2019t know. I\u2019ve been so many different people just since this morning.\u201d I think, \u201cOh, yes, many of us feel that way.\u201d So, bewilderment, many of the listeners, if they just think about the experiences maybe they\u2019ve had in the past year-and-a-half or two years, when their sense of what was real and true got turned on its head or when they thought who they were got disrupted.<\/span><\/p>\n

Those can be moments of bewilderment because wonder can decenter our sense of self. Wonder can decenter our sense of self so that, ultimately, we can re-center our sense of self. Now, you\u2019re right. Most of us want to flee from confusion. Most of us are profoundly uncomfortable with confusion and uncertainty. I know myself, I have a high tolerance for ambiguity and confusion, and I used to think it was a character flaw. Why can\u2019t you just get with the program and know everything and be certain about everything?<\/span><\/p>\n

But I recognized it\u2019s actually an advantage because I work with so many people and organizations advancing their work, dealing with mounds of uncertainty and confusion, that it\u2019s actually made me a good ally to help them navigate the confusion. So, fertilize. Actually, let me just review four things about bewilderment that might be helpful entry points for listeners. One, rather than flee from the confusion or fight the confusion\u2014when we fight the confusion, we just want to get a quick answer to something\u2014rather than that, start by feeling it.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is where we come back to that heightened state of awareness you were alluding to earlier. Actually feel the confusion. I have clients actually describe, sometimes even draw the confusion metaphorically, and they used language like floating. I feel like I\u2019m floating. There\u2019s no ground underneath me, or I\u2019m spinning. That\u2019s important just to acknowledge and bring that somatic intelligence to the experience. Then we can celebrate the confusion. I don\u2019t mean that glibly.<\/span><\/p>\n

I mean that it could be a moment that you\u2019re on to potential transformation, whether it\u2019s personal or professional or just with the ideas you\u2019re sitting with. Then, we fertilize the confusion. Well, even before we fertilize the confusion, we want to do some things to pause seeking quick answers. So if you\u2019re confused, kind of in two categories\u2014confused about who you\u2019re becoming. You just lost your job or you quit your job, which has been quite common lately. You\u2019re not sure who you\u2019re becoming.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rather than seek the quick answer, try to find activities to help you pause and live in the question of: Who am I becoming? That\u2019s challenging, but we can talk about how to do that. Fourth is what you are alluding to, which is fertilize the confusion. Could I give an example?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Please. Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> OK. I hold inner circles of about six to eight business owners, professionals, academics. They all have in common that they\u2019re wanting to advance certain ideas or kind of complex projects, but they need more visibility with those ideas. With that comes more vulnerability. Inevitably, Tami, one or more of them experiences their own tornado moments. Quite often, just as soon as they say, \u201cThis is what I\u2019m going to experience.\u201d There are these series of tornado moments.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, in one of my inner circles once, somebody just was\u2014I can\u2019t give away too many details\u2014but she\u2019d just like, \u201cOK, this is really where I\u2019m taking my work in the world.\u201d Within a matter of weeks, she realized that her partnership wasn\u2019t working, a long-term partnership wasn\u2019t working. She\u2019s going to have to make some decisions there. Realized that where she thought she was going with her business wasn\u2019t working, and became really physically ill. All of this kind of working together.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So, she came for a spotlight and she\u2019s like, \u201cI just really don\u2019t know where I need to go next.\u201d So, I gave her a couple of suggestions related to bewilderment. I said, \u201cDon\u2019t do anything too quickly for a while. You are sick right now.\u201d She was in the spotlight from the sick bed. And I said, \u201cOK, here\u2019s my prescription. For 10 days, visit your sick bed at least once a day for an hour.\u201d Do you remember when you were a child? When I was sick, sick day was great because it was just me and my imagination and my drawing pads and so forth.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, I said to her, \u201cTo fertilize your confusion here, you\u2019ve got this question about who are you becoming now and who are you in relationship? Where\u2019s your business going? Live those questions, bring out your color set of markers and sketch pads.\u201d She\u2019s like, \u201cRight. I actually have those. I haven\u2019t pulled those out in quite some time.\u201d I said, \u201cFor once a day, for an hour, I want you to explore these series of questions.\u201d Again, they\u2019re private questions for her. She did so for 10 days.<\/span><\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t know what to expect, but in those 10 days, every day she was drawing these elaborate mind maps that ultimately gave her insight, like deep, profound insight into where she was going in all three parts of her life, her personal identity, her relationship, and her business. Now again, I can\u2019t give away too many details for privacy, but I hope that gives you some sense of how it comes into play in practice.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Yes. I\u2019ll tell you the question that\u2019s coming up for me. I talk to people, friends, people I\u2019m just meeting and they\u2019ll share sometimes, \u201cI\u2019m going through a really big transition. It\u2019s like a \u2018dark night of the soul\u2019 kind of thing.\u201d You can tell they\u2019re going through some type of huge, to use the word you use, decentering. The center that used to be the center of their life is no longer the center of their life. They\u2019re painting it in spiritual terms that it\u2019s a dark night.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s clearly, in their own view as they talk about it, a time of suffering. They would not say, oh, I\u2019m in an experience of deep wonder about this transformation I\u2019m in the middle of. People don\u2019t say that. So, what it brings up for me is, what is the accurate emotional valence? Am I going to start to just switch off to like, oh, this is a wonder-filled time instead of a deeply disorienting, terrible time?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> I love that question. Thank you for this. You always ask such good questions. So, let\u2019s think of the sacred geometry of overlapping circles, what we call in secular terms, the Venn diagram. But it\u2019s really quite sacred. Overlapping circles, positive, negative. Positive emotions, negative emotions. Light, dark. Bewilderment is right in that space in between, and it deliberately looks like an oval opening of a cave, a birth canal. That\u2019s where wonder resides, that\u2019s where bewilderment resides, and that\u2019s potentially where transformation resides.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So, to answer your question in very concrete terms, bewilderment is neither positive nor negative. You\u2019re going to experience both and neither framing\u2014this is suffering, or this is OK and wondrous\u2014are accurate or real. If you really feel bewilderment, it feels like floating. It feels disorienting. It feels like you\u2019re going through the woods.<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s moments of excitement and there\u2019s moments of potential terror and deep fear. But the practice is, how do you keep navigating the deep woods? Or let\u2019s say the choppy ocean, to use a different metaphor. How do you navigate the choppy ocean when you have left behind the familiar shore of the life you had set up? You\u2019re moving toward another shore that you don\u2019t even know where it is or what it\u2019s going to be. So, how do you navigate that choppy ocean without sinking under?<\/span><\/p>\n

The metaphor of the dark night of the soul can be useful, but not if it\u2019s all framed in suffering, because that is where we will potentially be paralyzed and go under.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> So, if I hear you correctly, sometimes wonder can be a positive experience when we\u2019re feeling delight and sometimes it\u2019s not positive or negative, it\u2019s something else. It\u2019s just an opening of discovery. Is that correct?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> It is. I have to say, this is even\u2014and I\u2019d have to talk to people like Dacher [Keltner] about this, and the psychology, because he has studied quite in depth, the physiology of certain emotions. But let\u2019s think about this. When psychologists use positive and negative emotions, they\u2019re not actually ascribing a moral value like good and bad. It\u2019s actually positive in part because positive emotions attract us toward the stimulus. Negative emotions repel us. Many experiences of wonder hold us in that pause of receptivity, taking it in. This is where that increased sacred awareness comes into play. Can I be fully present and aware even in this seemingly dark moment? Does that make sense?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> It does. It does. Yes. Now, Jeffrey, you do a lot of work with people in business and you\u2019re bringing in wonder interventions at the workplace. How could this pair of bewilderment and hope come together at work to help people?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Great question again, because the new world of work is profoundly bewildering. What I hope for listeners who are in the workplace or leaders, executives, managers, as well as employees, that this gives them a new language and hope as well. So, part of the re-skilling necessary with wonder interventions is to help employees and leaders and managers become more comfortable with confusion, actually openly acknowledging when they\u2019re confused. This does not equate to incompetence. So, let me frame it this way, too. I know you\u2019ll appreciate this because I don\u2019t want to get too much into my admiration of Sounds True, but I will say what I have admired about Sounds True is doing things with integrity and challenging conventional business models.<\/span><\/p>\n

But I\u2019ll just put this in these terms and like the 20th century paradigm of how to \u201cmake it\u201d in the business world was, you needed to be the expert or the smartest person in the room or appear to be the smartest person in the room, the one who knew things and knew more than others. What I would suggest that can be advantageous is not to be incompetent, be fully competent in your field, but to increasingly know what you don\u2019t know, and to increasingly acknowledge what you\u2019re confused about. Can we, as a team, for instance, actually fertilize some of our confusion together and bring about some collaboration to really\u2014let\u2019s just open it up and get into what we really don\u2019t understand about employee benefits or how to engage employees.<\/span><\/p>\n

Because this is such a common language, we\u2019re often approaching it with conventional terms. Hope, so hope is very proactive and is immediately applicable in a company setting. I think 10-year, five-year and three-year planning is still useful, but not as useful necessarily as it used to be. What can be very helpful and hope-inducing even for employees is to set short-term goals, to set their sights on just where can I get to in the next three weeks or the next six weeks, and be very concrete with those goals. Then, the next thing is to surround yourself with other hopeful people\u2014other people on the team who share that three-week or that six-week goal.<\/span><\/p>\n

How do we collectively share that goal and support you and support us with that goal? That\u2019s really important. But the other wondrous part in the science of hope is actively daydreaming. This is where it gets a little counter in most company culture, to actually encourage employees, encourage leaders to actively deliberately daydream on the next possible future horizon, even if that\u2019s just six weeks or six months. So, I hope some of what I\u2019ve said has\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Yes, actively daydreaming needs set time aside to just see what comes up, like, different than brainstorming.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes, very much so. This, in part, comes from the science of Jerome Singer. Singer shifted his own colleagues\u2019 attitudes toward daydreaming IN psychology. Psychologists, not surprising, have their own set of biases. For a long time, they were biased toward praising the capacity to focus and concentrate for long periods of time. They saw daydreaming as kind of mind wandering, which can get us into negative patterns of ruminating. But Singer, he calls it constructive daydreaming. We\u2019ve called it at Tracking Wonder for quite some time, deliberate daydreaming. It is when you actively set aside time to daydream. This is what I do on a regular, almost daily basis.<\/span><\/p>\n

I go out to a spot where I actually see a horizon, a ridge of mountains, and I actively daydream about the next possible future horizon. We have clients do this, we have teams who do it. They don\u2019t necessarily go out to mountain horizon.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK, but I\u2019ve got to ask you a question, Jeffrey, because I spend time every day, now that I\u2019m working at home, lying on the couch, doing something. I don\u2019t know if I\u2019m actively daydreaming or if, perhaps, I\u2019m doing something else like lethargically relaxing. I don\u2019t know.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> It could be a fine line, right? If an employee at Sounds True was just lounging on the couch and said, \u201cWell, I\u2019m just deliberately daydreaming, Tami.\u201d Deliberate means intentional, so you go forward with a question. That you want to live, so to speak, that you want to daydream. You formulate the question that you\u2019re daydreaming, or you formulate the goal and how will I actively, how could I actively get there? How could we, as a team, actively get there?<\/span><\/p>\n

Whether it\u2019s a sketch pad or something else to actually document some of the tracking of the daydreaming helps it be deliberate and not get into passive rumination. This is some of the negative downer patterns I talk about in the book, where we could get into negative catastrophic daydreaming. Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Yes. All right. Very good. Well, let\u2019s briefly talk about the last two facets that you identify, connection and admiration. Now, the place where my attention really got piqued\u2014and you\u2019ll probably know where I\u2019m going here. Under admiration as a doorway to wonder, it\u2019s easy to think of the people that we just think are fabulous and how wonder-filled that is, but you actually say there can be a fine line between admiration and envy, and that we can use envy as a gateway to wonder. That\u2019s what I wanted to hear more about.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Absolutely. So, there is a benign, good type of envy and there\u2019s certainly a toxic envy. I think we know what the toxic envy is. We go onto Instagram, we think somebody\u2019s life is perfect or we see somebody\u2019s success or achievement, and we get envious, maybe jealous. We have a little schadenfreude, which is, if we see somebody fail, we\u2019re like, oh, good, they failed. That\u2019s schadenfreude. But there are some studies that actually show that a positive or benign envy can actually be very motivating for us, ourselves, to excel.<\/span><\/p>\n

I catch myself doing this quite often with some of my colleagues. I have some of my clients actively identify certain people in their fields who, perhaps, are leading certain conversations or advancing certain ideas in the same field that they want to. I said, follow them. Look at what they do, but then identify the that, that you want to be like. I\u2019ll give you a personal example that I think can clarify things for listeners, that I give him the book as well.<\/span><\/p>\n

One of my psychologist friends who I\u2019ve known since 2010, he has three daughters. I have two daughters. He is like Captain Fantastic and he\u2019s super buffed, which I\u2019m not. He is always showing posts of himself with his daughters. One of them is having airplane pilot lessons, somebody else is jumping off cliffs into water, all this bungee jumping. I thought, I want to be a father like that. Well, if I stopped there, I could really get into a toxic downward spiral of envy, like I\u2019m not good enough.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is my inner Piglet mind saying, \u201cI\u2019m not good enough. I\u2019m not a good enough father.\u201d That\u2019s not helpful. It\u2019s not productive. So, I identify that \u201cthat.\u201d I want to be a father like that. What is that? Oh, I want to build my two daughters\u2019 courage and strength and grit. So that\u2019s led to certain activities, not like my friend\u2019s, but it has led me to put my daughters in challenges that suit them and that suit me. That\u2019s the way, really, that watching him, it was envy turned into admiration, and helped me be better at what I do as a father, in my way, for my two daughters. That translates directly in the business world as well.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Now, just to ask a clarifying question here, do you think it\u2019s possible that when we find ourselves feeling something that you could say, I think that\u2019s toxic envy. I think so\u2014that we could just kind of step back a little bit and without too much heavy lifting, turn that into benign envy that we could work with, so that we can take our toxic envy and transform it?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Absolutely. Thank you for asking this question. So, Dr. Keltner and Jonathan Haidt also coined the phrase <\/span>tugendfreude<\/span><\/i>, it\u2019s the opposite of schadenfreude. So, when you see somebody doing well and really making it or excelling in a certain way, rather than feeling the toxic envy, you pause again. There\u2019s the pause of wonder, and you shift, and you actively express good thoughts toward them. Maybe even sending them a note of appreciation or admiration can be a step in the right direction.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yes, I do this often and I\u2019ve had my clients do it often as well. So yes, it\u2019s a beautiful example. You feel the toxic envy, you identify it, you pause. You\u2019re like, actually let me foster more positive emotions, appreciation for that person, congratulations for that person. What that does is not only, it\u2019s not just like bypassing negative feelings, it\u2019s actually potentially elevating you to say, OK, what has that person done well? How could that lift me up as well?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> All right. So, you mentioned that since you\u2019ve been in this wonder field, immersed in the science of wonder, that you\u2019ve increased your wonder ratio in general. And for the listener who\u2019s like, I want to increase my wonder ratio. I want to do it. Jeffrey, can you give, let\u2019s start with just three, three wonder-ratio-improvement techniques that our listeners can try.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> I love it. Yes. One is, try this: in the morning, pause a few minutes, maybe with your favorite beverage, and really check in and center yourself and ask yourself, what am I devoted to? What am I devoted to today? What that does is it can open you up, switches that default pattern of, I need to check my phone notifications and texts. I need to go through my to-do list. You\u2019ve just opened yourself up to potentially standing in wonder with something and it creates a beautiful new reframe for everything that you do during the day. That\u2019s the first thing.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> OK. Let\u2019s pause on that before we go on to the second or third, for a moment.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Please, yes. Go ahead.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> You know what I notice is that word devotion, devoted. What am I devoted to? That word just hits me in my heart immediately. I immediately almost start to cry. It\u2019s a really powerful word. Tell me your sense of that and why it\u2019s so powerful as a wonder gateway.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Thank you. So, I alluded earlier in our conversation that when I look back at all the different things to which I was attracted, I realized I have been on this path for a long time. In my early 20s, a mentor gave me a copy of Erich Fromm\u2019s, <\/span>The Art of Loving<\/span><\/i>. It was great a book from 1956, this existential psychologist, and he talks about loving as a practice and he says we often are focused on falling in love, but what about the practice of standing in love? So, that\u2019s always stayed with me.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s in the context of devotion that I\u2019ll get to, because one of the premises of Tracking Wonder, both as a company and a community, and in the book, is that it\u2019s one thing to fall in love with a fantasy of an idea, of a partnership of, oh, I\u2019ll write a book. It\u2019s another thing to stand in love and stand in wonder with a dream you\u2019re devoted to. We say that every big idea begets a series of challenges, so can you really stay devoted to that endeavor or to your calling, what you\u2019re called to? So, let me unpack devotion and why I choose it.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m so glad that it almost brought you to tears only because it resonates with me that way as well. The word originates in the Sanskrit <\/span>Vac<\/span><\/i>, V-A-C, Vac. It\u2019s one of the oldest Sanskrit syllables. It means, in some way, sacred utterance. Later, the force of Vac becomes the force of Sarasvati in some of the Hindu iconography. Vac gives rise in English to voice, vocal, vocabulary, vow, vocation, that to which we\u2019re called. So, when you check in with your devotion, you really are checking in with that deep calling, that depth to which you\u2019re called.<\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know. When I ask you, Tami, what you\u2019re devoted to, what comes up for you? What would you vocalize?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Yes. I\u2019m devoted and it\u2019s so meaningful to me, to my wife and my family, which are my two fur children. I\u2019m devoted to Sounds True, deeply, and to a set of values and bringing those values into every part of my life. I could say more about that, but it\u2019s a deep orientation of my soul.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes, and I feel that. You are so devoted to awakening yourself and others, and it translates in all those different areas. One of the people in my inner circle last year, she took this practice to her husband. They each now share their own personal devotions, their couple\u2019s devotion, their family devotion and her team\u2019s devotion as well.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> The link to wonder when doing that is because when we identify what we\u2019re devoted to, that\u2019s a doorway into\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Possibility. Devotion is wonder infused with desire and commitment.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Beautiful.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes. Yes. So, yes, that\u2019s one of the key practices. The second I would suggest is detect some of your default patterns and habits throughout the day. We all have them. When you are in your work mode, your to-do mode, and you start to notice how you\u2019re shutting down, my invitation to listeners to is to detect when you\u2019re starting to shut down, when you\u2019re getting hungry or tired. Instead of checking out on social media or your emails or your texts, step away from a screen, step outdoors for just a few minutes, look up at the sky, no matter what the weather. Just for a few minutes, disrupt your default afternoon patterns in one way. You may have to set a timer to remind yourself to bring you out of your default patterns.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The third is maybe something in the evening, to actually make it a practice to look back on your day and ask yourself, what were three highlights today? What were three small moments? They could be sensory moments. They could have been a moment of conversation, something someone said, and write those down. That\u2019s a wonder intervention that can be really powerful for framing your day.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> I want to ask you a question about your second wonder intervention about these default patterns. I\u2019m curious if somebody has the experience. I often have the experience. My default patterns are my default patterns because I find them kind of comforting. They resettle me. So, I lie on the couch with my iPhone, which is similar maybe to someone watching television or something like that. I don\u2019t want to go outside. I don\u2019t want more stimulation. I don\u2019t want more anything. I don\u2019t know if I even want more openness and wonder. I\u2019m just like, I need a couple hours just to sit here and be an internal\u2014I don\u2019t know exactly if I\u2019m a grump, but I just, I know I\u2019m closing down, but I need that time.<\/span><\/p>\n

What would you say to\u2014this is the story. What do you think about that? Am I narrowing the wonder in my life? Or, am I just kind of resetting myself and that\u2019s OK.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Good question. I\u2019m not sure yet. I would spend some more time with you unpacking that. Closed states are not bad states. When we\u2019re highly focused on something and we\u2019re eliminating distractions, that\u2019s a cognitively closed state we need. It\u2019s not potentially wondrous, but that\u2019s OK. Being in digital distraction is an open state, but it\u2019s not particularly wondrous. Actually, I\u2019m just touching on some of this new research that a lot of the increases in depression and anxiety are coming from an overstimulation of dopamine. Dopamine is the neurotransmitter of curiosity. It is what keeps us going. But when we\u2019re just like stimulating ourselves, it\u2019s like brain candy and then we feel like we\u2019ve got a sugar hangover.<\/span><\/p>\n

So if your, let me just say, for your instance, right? We all have variations. Let\u2019s say, if you just like unwinding, doing nothing and doing nothing well on the sofa and just looking through your iPhone for a little bit is fine. It resets you. There\u2019s nothing wrong with that, but if it\u2019s keeping you in a state of potential debilitating distraction or over-rumination, where you\u2019re stuck in a pattern of fret or regret, that\u2019s a good signal. A good signal to like, let me disrupt this. Let me detect the default. I feel what that feels like. Let me seek out something surprising, and then let me extend that moment.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> I\u2019m curious, Jeffrey, have you worked with people who say to you, \u201cI\u2019m depressed. I\u2019m depressed right now. I don\u2019t know if this Tracking Wonder stuff is going to work because I don\u2019t really have an appetite for wonder right now, because I\u2019m depressed.\u201d How would you work with someone who presented that emotional confession to you?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes. Yes. First of all, most people don\u2019t come to me with that probably because they have not been drawn to wonder. They usually don\u2019t come to me saying I\u2019m not attracted to wonder, but I understand what you\u2019re saying. Because I\u2019ve worked with plenty of people who are symptomatic of depression and not chronic depression, but sometimes acute depression. Certainly I experienced it. I experienced my version of languishing and mild depression over the past couple of years during the pandemic, as did many people for different reasons. So it does show up in that, even though that\u2019s not always what presents itself to answer your question.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, when it shows up, we work with it. We don\u2019t bypass what we\u2019re experiencing. We don\u2019t bypass whether it\u2019s showing up as depression or anxiety or confusion or fear or irritation. We don\u2019t bypass those emotional experiences, but we also know that we don\u2019t have to dwell in those emotions nor frame our whole reality around those emotions. So, if there\u2019s an entry point, which is what I\u2019m looking for in another person, if there\u2019s an entry point to experiment with an intervention, whether\u2014and I would usually start with, in that scenario, with openness and curiosity. I would actually start there before I went into, say, bewilderment.<\/span><\/p>\n

Are you open to experimenting and testing out something for just five days, seven days, and you track the intervention and see what works and then report back the results. If they\u2019re open to that, then we\u2019ve got an entry point. Then we\u2019ve got room to have a tracking party, so to speak. Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Tracking party, I like that. OK. Here\u2019s the last thing, Jeffrey, that I want to have you touch on. The subtitle of <\/span>Tracking Wonder<\/span><\/i> is <\/span>Reclaiming a Life of Meaning and Possibility in a World Obsessed with Productivity<\/span><\/i>. I\u2019d like to understand more how the current landscape of our time, where people are asked to work so many hours or they feel like they\u2019re now working all the time from home, et cetera, how that affects our wonder quotient, if you will.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes, I really appreciate this. I\u2019m really taking lots of deep dives here. We\u2019re gathering lots of data from our Wonder @Work assessment and survey. What\u2019s interesting, and just like looking at that multipoint survey, is that people describe satisfaction in a lot of areas of wonder in that survey. Where they have the lowest rankings\u2014say, sometimes on average, four out of 10\u2014are in the areas of depression and anxiety and in the ability to turn work off. They can\u2019t turn work off regularly. The third is, at the end of the day, they feel exhausted. All three are related.<\/span><\/p>\n

I frame our culture of toxic productivity in certain ways, and just looking at this culture we have inherited and some of us have perpetuated it regardless of our situation. This culture really values perfectionism, no errors, no mistakes versus playful experimentation. Even though ironically, we now know that a certain degree of playful experimentation can lead to a more productive and fulfilled and healthy workforce. Culture tends to value always being on. I can cite a number of examples from even just a few years ago.<\/span><\/p>\n

There was, I think an Uber driver who, she kept driving, even as she was delivering her baby, as she was having her baby. She was valorized like a really loyal\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Holy God.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes. Right. So, we see this, oh, yes, crush it and so forth. If anything, I hope the past two years has started to shift some of that narrative versus valuing, let\u2019s say, deliberate daydreaming, as we\u2019ve been exploring. Even though now we\u2019re learning that deliberate daydreaming can ultimately lead to better productivity, more fulfillment, healthier lives. Toxic productivity values human beings in terms of efficiency, units of labor instead of well-rounded, emotionally complex human beings. So, yes, we do live in a world obsessed with this type of over-productivity.<\/span><\/p>\n

What I really hope is that this book and this body of work is an antidote to that world. That, if anything, I guess maybe the closing is that what gives me hope, too, Tami, is that part of my research has led me into the domains of cultural anthropologists, psychologists, evolutionary biologists, who are giving us a very different narrative of our human history of what has helped us not just survive but ultimately thrive over the millennia. It turns out that it\u2019s not survival of the fittest, that we don\u2019t have to be cutthroat competitive and aggressive to make it in this world.<\/span><\/p>\n

They are painting a whole different picture of what has helped the species actually survive for millennia. They\u2019re actually more cooperative, generous, and yes, wondrous, which is the first of all of our emotions. Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Why do you say it\u2019s the first of all of our emotions? Why do you say that?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> Yes, and I\u2019m not the only one, actually. Martha Nussbaum, psychologist of emotions, also attested that. Ren\u00e9 Descartes, actually in 1649, in one of his first studies, the five key emotions, also described it as the first of all emotions for a couple of reasons. It gives rise psychologically to all of the other emotions. It is the emotion we\u2019re more than likely born with, which is why I say it\u2019s our birthright. Regardless of circumstances, we are born with a certain kind of wonder\u2014 it\u2019s not the wonder you and I now experience\u2014but a certain kind of wide-eyed wonder.<\/span><\/p>\n

It gives rise to love. It gives rise to compassion. Where it not for wonder, we likely, psychologists surmise, would not have these other emotions. Certain anthropologists, like Melvin Konner, look at even chimpanzee behavior as they stand in awe of and wonder toward a waterfall. We\u2019re looking at them to understand human behavior. It\u2019s possible that our ancestors, some five million years ago, had these early experiences that then gave rise to our ability ultimately to thrive over millennia. This is what gives me hope.<\/span><\/p>\n

We have so many challenges in this world, so many challenges that these experiences of wonder aren\u2019t going to be the antidote, but they are a possible counter-antidote to our typical solutions in this world of hyperproductivity.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Then one final question here, Jeffrey. You write in <\/span>Tracking Wonder<\/span><\/i> that it\u2019s possible to gift wonder to someone. How could our listeners here at the end of our conversation, take something away so that they could gift wonder to someone else?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> I love that. Think of somebody you care about who, perhaps, could use a little surprising delight in their life. What\u2019s one small gesture you could do for them? What\u2019s one small thing you could do to stoke their curiosity and surprise them in a way that helps them see that you see them? That could be just as simple as sending them a handwritten note in the mail.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Gorgeous. I\u2019ve been talking with Jeffrey Davis. He\u2019s the founder of the Tracking Wonder Consultancy. With Sounds True, he\u2019s written a new book. It\u2019s called <\/span>Tracking Wonder: Reclaiming a Life of Meaning and Possibility in a World Obsessed with Productivity<\/span><\/i>. Jeffrey, thank you so much. Great, great work you\u2019re doing. You\u2019re really giving us ways to notice and bring the wonder that\u2019s here, right here into our life and increase our wonder quotients. Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

JD:<\/b> It\u2019s been an honor and a pleasure. Thank you, Tami.<\/span><\/p>\n

TS:<\/b> Thank you for listening to <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i>. You can read a full transcript of today\u2019s interview at soundstrue.com\/podcast. If you\u2019re interested, hit the subscribe button in your podcast app. Also, if you feel inspired, head to iTunes and leave <\/span>Insights at the Edge<\/span><\/i> a review. I love getting your feedback, being in connection with you, and learning how we can continue to evolve and improve our program. Working together, I believe we can create a kinder and wiser world. SoundsTrue.com: 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-9598","transcript","type-transcript","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nTracking Wonder - Transcript | Sounds True<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Read the full transcript from this Sounds True conversation with Tracking Wonder. Explore teachings on meditation and spiritual wisdom.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Tracking Wonder - Transcript | Sounds True\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Read the full transcript from this Sounds True conversation with Tracking Wonder. Explore teachings on meditation and spiritual wisdom.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sounds True\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"48 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/\",\"name\":\"Tracking Wonder - Transcript | Sounds True\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2021-12-07T15:54:22+00:00\",\"description\":\"Read the full transcript from this Sounds True conversation with Tracking Wonder. Explore teachings on meditation and spiritual wisdom.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Transcripts\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"Tracking Wonder\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/\",\"name\":\"Sounds True\",\"description\":\"\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Sounds True\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/soundstrue-logo-footer-color.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/soundstrue-logo-footer-color.png\",\"width\":1035,\"height\":235,\"caption\":\"Sounds True\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Tracking Wonder - Transcript | Sounds True","description":"Read the full transcript from this Sounds True conversation with Tracking Wonder. Explore teachings on meditation and spiritual wisdom.","robots":{"index":"noindex","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Tracking Wonder - Transcript | Sounds True","og_description":"Read the full transcript from this Sounds True conversation with Tracking Wonder. Explore teachings on meditation and spiritual wisdom.","og_url":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/","og_site_name":"Sounds True","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Est. reading time":"48 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/","url":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/","name":"Tracking Wonder - Transcript | Sounds True","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#website"},"datePublished":"2021-12-07T15:54:22+00:00","description":"Read the full transcript from this Sounds True conversation with Tracking Wonder. Explore teachings on meditation and spiritual wisdom.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/tracking-wonder\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Transcripts","item":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/transcript\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Tracking Wonder"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/","name":"Sounds True","description":"","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#organization","name":"Sounds True","url":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/soundstrue-logo-footer-color.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/soundstrue-logo-footer-color.png","width":1035,"height":235,"caption":"Sounds True"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}}]}},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/transcript\/9598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/transcript"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/transcript"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/resources2.soundstrue.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}