In this special podcast episode, we sit down with David Treleaven, author of “Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness,” to explore the intersection of trauma, safety, and meditation. David shares his journey through intensive meditation retreats and the transformative impact of integrating trauma-informed practices. We discuss the role of jhanas in emotional processing, the concept of the window of tolerance, and practical strategies for ensuring safety in meditation retreats. This conversation highlights the importance of balancing deep meditative practices with trauma awareness to create a safe and effective retreat experience.

00:01:04 Introduction to David Treleaven and TSM
00:07:48 Jhanas: Synthesizing depth, safety, and emotional work
00:10:14 Running experiments with awareness and tension
00:13:14 Understanding trauma work and progress
00:17:04 Window of tolerance, "How do I know when to meditate less?"
00:23:23 Memory reconsolidation and virtuous cycles for trait change
00:26:49 What does it mean to be safe?
00:30:09 Downsides of overemphasizing trauma and hurt
00:33:12 Jhourney's POV on safety and responding to persistent challenging experiences 
00:38:05 Taking an iterative approach to instruction
00:41:20 Healing by staying mindful while out of the window of tolerance
00:45:40 "Being with" vs. "working with" practices
00:52:00 Designing for a safety-informed retreat experience
00:57:48 "It's all good, we can work with your experience here"

In this episode, we speak with Leigh Brasington, one of the most famous jhana teachers alive today. Leigh is the author of Right Concentration, a remarkably clear and simple book that is commonly cited by novices who learned to enter jhanas on their own. We discuss how he first learned the jhanas, spent years looking for a teacher to show him how to navigate them, and how the jhanas changed his personality to be happier and more prone to glee over time. He shares how he believes the jhanas can show you it’s possible to be happier than you ever realized for no apparent reason, and most importantly, how they can help you see what Buddhists call capital-I Insights: things like how malleable your ego really is. Leigh visited us during an online jhana retreat, and fields several questions from the audience near the end.

Sections:

• 0:54 How Leigh got started with meditation 
• 6:42 Quitting marijuana in order meditate clearly
• 8:54 Leigh’s first jhana
• 11:49 Discovering how to enter piti (glee) consistently
• 14:18 Learning what jhanas are
• 15:44 J1 and piti: like the rush of marijuana
• 18:19 Moving to the second jhana
• 21:46 J2 and sukka: happiness
• 23:04 The effects of J2 on baseline wellbeing
• 28:53 J3: wishlessness
• 30:37 J4: stillness and a mind ready for Insight
• 33:26 Jhanas as a warmup for Insight
• 37:21 You’re more malleable than you think you are
• 39:36 Leigh’s advice to his younger self
• 41:20 What traits in students predict success in learning jhanas?
• 43:13 Common pitfalls
• 46:33 How many people are practicing the jhanas today?
• 47:41 Why aren’t they more popular?
• 49:31 How Leigh’s teaching philosophy has changed
• 50:37 What might be done before meditating to make jhana easier?
• 52:55 Supplements or drugs that might make jhanas easier
• 54:13 Audience Q&A: lucid dreaming and body scanning
• 55:31 Insight and changes in values stemming from jhanas 
• 57:42 Does Leigh currently have a sense of self?
• 58:28 Jhanic experiences in mundane activites, like sports and dating
• 1:01:15 The value of following instructions in meditation
• 1:05:13 Asking the “why” behind restlessness
• 1:07:46 Injecting jhanas into life off the cushion
• 1:10:31 Learning jhanas via Leigh’s book alone has proven surprisingly doable

In this episode, we talk to Zach Lauzon, a Google engineer and novice meditator with less than 100 hours of meditation experience who learned the first five jhanas on a recent Jhourney retreat. He shares how the jhanas have changed his worldview, changed his relationship to hard things, and unlocked personality-change in what he describes as “self-therapy.” I tear up as he describes how he used the jhanas to finally process the suicide of his best friend after 7 years of therapy. I think you’ll find many of his tips and ideas, like how he welcomes distractions in meditation, counterintuitive, articulate, inspiring.

0:00 Memory of initial jhana experience

5:05 Benchmark "as joyful and exciting as getting my dream job" but within you

7:05 Do big payouts have to come with big work? Or it there within,  just waiting to be found?

9:30 Worldview shifting to know the internal resource is just within you

14:25 Seeing difficult material in meditation as things to be understood, accepted, loved

19:25 Jhana as a basis for difficult emotional work

25:22 Experience with parts work and somatic therapies like internal family systems (IFS) affecting meditation

29:07 Unshakable resource from deeper jhana and working with the trauma of losing his best friend

34:35 Deep sense of equanimity and okayness

37:40 To you, what are the jhanas and what do they feel like? (states of harmony and unification). Aliveness/timeliness, then still calmness

47:10 Seeing it as "safety and assuredness"

50:00 How can it be familiar yet worldview breaking? From "finding" rather than cultivating

55:05 Getting into meditation 8 months prior and just 100hrs practice before jhana

1:05:40 Recap of 3 learnings for a novice

1:06:50 Growing up, professional background as a software engineer, personal interest in music

In this episode, we talk to David Phelan, music producer and songwriter for Zayn, Sia, and Blackpink, who was on a recent Jhourney retreat. He shares how music, psychedelics, and a challenging time led him from identifying as a confident materialist to a regular meditator. He developed panic attacks, and then cured himself by intentionally inducing and observing them in meditation. For the first two thirds of the interview, I ask him detailed questions about his background, habits, and decisions that led him to where his meditation practice is today. In the final third of the interview, he shares how his recent jhana experience was as personally significant as his wedding day, and how he hopes to use jhanas to make music with less fear.

00:00 - Introduction and Background

06:30 - The Role of Music in Profound Altered States

08:44 - Growing Up in Ireland

11:45 - Transition from Materialist Worldview (Pre-2018)

13:55 - Diving into Music: Collaborations with Zayn, Sia, Nicki Minaj, Blackpink

18:08 - Concert Peak Experience: Turning to Wim Hof, Yoga, and Cold Showers

21:55 - Personal Growth: From 2 Million to 60 Million Followers and a 2-Hour Morning Routine

24:55 - The Bootstrap Problem and Catalyzing Peak Experiences

28:15 - Rational Approach to 'Woo' Content with a Focus on Experience

34:02 - Meditation: Confronting Fear and Creating Fearlessly

39:05 - First-Time Panic Attacks and Aversion to Altered States, Exploring the Phenomenology of Anxiety

46:20 - Overcoming Panic Attacks with Teachings from Mingyur Rinpoche and the Timing of Life Lessons

51:20 - Observing Panic Attacks Over 50 Times in Real-Time

56:00 - Discovering Teachings from Rob Burbea and Ram Dass: Moving Beyond State Chasing

1:00:05 - Using Meditation as an Inner Resource During a Friend's Death

1:03:40 - Experiences with Jhana Meditation

1:10:00 - Paradigm Shift in Intention During Jhourney's Retreat

1:16:50 - Deep Connection to Self and One of the Most Profound Life Experiences

Welcome to the Collection of Jhourney’s podcast, where we explore the stories of everyday people who have had their lives changed by the blissful and therapeutic states of jhana meditation. The jhanas are profoundly altered states of meditation that are a growing trend among meditators and scientists. Practitioners have described it as "MDMA therapy without the drugs", and early neural images suggest the jhanas may lead to distinct, measurable changes in the brain. Further studies at places like McGill and Harvard are just getting started. Despite these dramatic qualities, these states are historically controversial. Some believe they're a distraction & others doubt their attainability. We believe pragmatic instruction and feedback can save you months or years of stagnant practice. We've heard from hundreds of regular people who meditate (from engineer to musician) that have had their lives transformed by these states. Now, you can hear their stories. Enjoy the podcast, and check us out at jhourney dot io! That's j-h-o-u-r-n-e-y dot i-o.