Rebel Buddhist

Can money buy happiness?

Many great minds throughout history have tried to answer this age-old question. And I bet you’ve pondered it a time or two...

Over the years, there haven’t been any great anwers eithe, leaving many of us still wondering if money can truly buy happiness, and others assuming that it does.

As a result, millions of people have bought into the idea that they need to spend their lives chasing wealth as the way to happiness and wellbeing.

Which totally works out for capitalism, right? Make people feel like they need more shit to be happy. Keep the world turning round.

Enter Daniel Kahneman, a 2002 Nobel prize winner, whose research has added some interesting perspectives on the role of money in increasing a person’s sense of well-being.

In a nutshell, his study determined that having enough financial resources to afford life’s basic needs is crucial to avoiding significant degrees of emotional distress. 

He found that in the United States, the income that seems to hit the bullseye on the money-happiness relationship is about $75,000 per year. At these levels, higher income may increase life satisfaction, which refers to how people think about their lives. But well-being or how life feels on a daily basis, stays the same.

More recently, a 2018 study from Purdue University used much wider data from the Gallup World Poll and found that the ideal income point for people is $95,000 for life satisfaction and $60,000 – $75,000 for emotional well-being. 

So taken together, these studies found that people’s emotional well-being, or how they felt on a daily basis, didn’t improve as they made more than $75,000, but their life satisfaction, or how happy they were with their life overall, did...up to about $95,000.

Interestingly, above $105,000 it started to go down!

Dr Sonja Lyubomirsky, a leader in the field of positive psychology, summarizes the idea like this:

You need money to meet basic needs, such as access to healthcare and a safe place to live. If you grow up without resources like food, clothing or shelter, then having more money really makes a huge difference in your life and overall well-being.

But once you hit that middle class level, there really is no correlation above that. When you have a bunch of money, at the end of the day you still ask yourself, “Am I living a meaningful life?”

“What is my purpose?”

And here’s the other thing: being rich is relative.

We have an evolutionary tendency to compare ourselves to other people. 

When we feel like we can’t maintain the same standard of living as our peers, it makes us unhappy.

How you rate yourself in terms of your subjective well-being, like whether you feel like you’re happy or satisfied or not, is very dependent on how you see other people doing around you and what they have.

But here’s something I want you to remember: despite the role that money does play, purpose is more important than money to be happy.

Research consistently shows that if you want to be happier in your job, you shouldn’t chase a high salary. It doesn’t mean you should turn down a good salary, but don’t let that be the driving force. 

From a happiness standpoint, it’s more important that your job provides a sense of meaning or purpose.

A place for you to have your strengths shine.

And the ability to have those basic needs met.

Not only does having meaning make you happier, but studies have shown that you tend to be more productive, too. 

When you’re engaged in an activity that you find challenging and satisfying, you experience that flow state – what I like to call your “Peak Experience”.

In today’s episode, I share some pro tips on what this could look like and offer suggestions for a few places you can start right now.

We are in a time when our habits around money and shopping are changing.

Simply understanding what will make you happy is essential. 

Being aware of our money beliefs and being open to challenging them and shifting them, is more important than ever.

The work needs to start on the inside – with your thoughts, your goals, your values, your living with meaning and purpose.

Finding balance between finances and other life-domains is a key aspect to achieving happiness. 

I invite you to dig in with me. And I challenge you to ask yourself:

:: What level of financial freedom do you want to see in your life?

Like you’ve heard me say before: Money in this society is power. And we need more people with that power who want to use it for good.

Money is not evil in and of itself. It's how you earn it and how you spend it. So earn it with integrity. Spend it with love. 

• Why how you spend your money is critical to your happiness – and why spending it on experiences, rather than material things, might be a good place to start;)
• Various studies that have examined the plateau point for money’s impact on people's happiness
• Why dream-based budgeting can make all the difference – stop wondering what you need, and be honest about what you actually need vs want
• About the psychological phenomenon called “hedonic adaptation” – and why it explains that simply getting more money doesn’t make us happier
• How to understand the difference between pleasure and happiness – because although money can buy pleasure, it doesn't necessarily mean it can buy happiness
• Why imagining your dream income is the first step to making it happen

// Want to dive in deeper? Check out Freedom School, the coaching experience where you learn to master your mind and emotions in all domains of life – relationships, career, money, health, and more. www.JoinFreedomSchool.com We have an entire month on Money Mindset and it is FUN!

// Check out this article I wrote on “How Much is Enough?”

// If you’re new here, grab the starter kit I created at RebelBuddhist.com. It has all you need to start creating a life of more freedom, adventure, and purpose. You’ll get access to the private Facebook group where you can ask me questions! Once you join, there’s also a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

What is true success? What is a truly “rich life”? What is a life of true FREEDOM?

We all may have our own preconceived notions of what the answers to these questions look like – notions that are subliminally based on societal norms, familial or cultural expectations and the systems of power that order our world.

Today, we’re digging into what “living a life of freedom” means to you – and how to move from just imagining this, to making it happen in the here and now.

For me and for many of my clients, ‘freedom’ is also about being able to choose the lifestyle you want.

Is a life of freedom:

:: Being able to get up at 8am and have two hours to go for a hike or a run on the beach...and then a yoga class?

:: Always waking up with the sun, not when someone else thinks you should set your alarm?

:: Traveling for four weeks at a time?

:: Not wasting three hours fare-shopping when trying to save $50 on a flight?

It may be all or none of these. 

Truth is, freedom doesn’t always mean being a dirtbag (in my case, climbing guide) or a millionaire.

And it’s important to acknowledge that it’s a huge privilege to be able to think about what “our path” even is. To have the mental space to think about what we “want” to do in life. To not just be focused on survival, safety, and putting the minimum amount of food on the table.

I understand from personal experience that it’s not possible for everyone to be this selective.

But I also know that most people assume it isn’t an option for them to be picky when – and I’m living proof – it actually is. 

Here’s the thing: not everyone prioritizes freedom, per se. If this is you, no problem! All the principles and tools in this episode are still applicable. 

Instead of “What would a life of freedom look like for me?” ask yourself, “What would a RICH life look like for me?”

:: Would you only work while your kids were in school?

:: Would you earn enough to give freely to organizations you care about? Or only work for organizations aligned with your big values?

:: Would you travel the world and learn about other cultures?

This is all up to you. There is no right or wrong way to design a life of freedom.

But first you need to decide. And then you need to start creating it. 

Because rebels, we never know when our last breath will be – and that means the time is now. 

I want you to die knowing you lived this life fully. I have my own definition of freedom. I challenge you to cultivate yours.

• How to figure out what ‘freedom’ means to you – and how to design a truly rich life, right now
• What the many different levels of freedom can look like – and how to choose where you want to be
• Why my parents realized that giving me options – the freedom of choice – was the best gift they could have ever given me
• How my time as a climbing guide helped me understand why there is “a leisure class at both ends of the social spectrum” – and how to make the most of the time you have
• Why learning to define your freedom is 100% crucial to creating the life you want and deserve

// Go to DefineYourFreedom.com and get my Clarity + Courage course now – FREE for a limited time only!

// Check out some of my past blog posts for more of this Jedi juice: True Freedom is a Feeling and The Truth about Freedom: 3 Common Mistakes People Make

// If you’re new here, grab the starter kit I created at RebelBuddhist.com. It has all you need to start creating a life of more freedom, adventure, and purpose. You’ll get access to the private Facebook group where you can ask me questions! Once you join, there’s also a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

At an early stage in our lives, most of us have been taught that we need something outside of us to be happy – the right body, partner, job, car, house, bank account. Then somewhere along the line we also get taught something like, “True happiness comes from within.”

And we think we’re totally on board with that. We think, “Right. It’s not stuff that makes me happy – it's things like kindness + compassion that make me happy!”

The thing is, none of the above is true. 

Want to know why? Because while it may seem obvious to many of you that “things” don’t cause lasting happiness, neither do kindness and compassion. It’s deeper than that.

Sound blasphemous? Stay with me.

Here’s the deal: we need to get really clear (like ASAP) on what, exactly, comes from outside of us and what comes from within.

And we need to learn this not from someone telling us what’s-what, but through our own experience, our own investigation, our own inner knowing.

Most of us think that what’s going on in our mind is the same as what’s going on in the external world. 

When we don’t understand the difference between the two, we’re constantly exhausting ourselves trying to control the world in order to feel better.

We’re always grasping, searching, and believing that if we could just get fit, if we could just find the right partner, if we could just make more money, if we could just move to a different state, then everything would be so much better. We would be able to stop feeling like shit about our lives.

But the thing about how humans roll (and let’s be honest, capitalism hasn’t helped with this) is that we want something, we get it, and then we want the next thing. 

But there IS no “thing” we can “get” or achieve that would stop us from wanting.

The truth is: even if there was, none of that outside stuff controls how we feel. Facts, things, circumstances...they don’t cause feelings. 

Our thoughts about the facts in our lives cause our feelings. The good ones and the bad ones.

And compassion and love? They don’t cause a feeling like happiness either...because compassion and love are feelings, just like happiness. So what causes those? Yup. Thoughts

In order to stop feeling like shit, we need to know what causes the shitty feeling. ALL feelings.

When you understand that our thinking is really what creates our feelings, you realize you can create any emotion you want right now. 

And this is the Jedi mind trick to top them all.

Because think about anything you want in your life. You want it because of how you think it will make you feel. Anything you don’t want, you don’t want because of how you think it will make you feel. 

And since we do everything in our lives because of how it will or won’t feel, we get into a whole new place of empowerment when we learn how to create that feeling ourselves instead of needing something outside of us to feel it.

We no longer need to wait to feel a certain way. It is accessible to us right now.

In the meantime, we also need to learn how to feel emotions – any emotion – because this isn’t about being happy all the time. We can choose to feel grief when a loved one dies or anger when we witness injustice. But we can’t effectively create a new emotion without completing another.

And until we master being with any emotion, we will still be wary of feeling the hard ones – which will hold us back. We’ll be afraid to feel embarrassed or humiliated or like a failure.

But once we learn how to be with any emotion mindfully, without judgement – to sit with the sensation it creates in our bodies rather than our narratives about the feeling – only THEN will we stop reacting to and resisting it.

Instead, we will open up to it. And we will understand that the only thing holding us back is our fear of feeling our feelings.

And then we’ll say, “C’mon world. Bring it on. I can handle it.”

1. Discern what comes from the external world and what comes from your mind;
2. Learn and believe that facts, things, and circumstances don’t cause our feelings. Our thoughts about those facts do;
3. Know how to feel an emotion. Allow it. Don’t resist or avoid it;
4. Be willing to feel anything.

Now, I don’t want you to just take my word for it. Go check it out for yourself. Try to find evidence against these things!

Because when you move beyond just understanding them intellectually, and you integrate these teachings into your bones and believe them wholeheartedly, I promise:

You’ll be able to create any emotion. Take any action. Manifest any result.

We need more people using this wisdom for good. To live the life they were meant to live, grounded in loving kindness and compassion and justice.

We need more rebels like YOU to step up and start practicing these Jedi Mind skills so we can stop acting from fear and feeling powerless in our lives.

Hear me when I say you are more powerful than you can ever imagine. To own that – and use it for the right reasons – is one of the most amazing ways you can make a difference in this world.

• Why, in order to stop feeling like shit, you must understand the difference between what’s happening “out there” and what’s happening in your mind
• How to recognize what different emotions feel like IN YOUR BODY – and why this is key to creating new feelings
• Why you have to be willing to really feel any emotion to do the things you want most in your life
• How to quit the circular thinking of “If I could just do X, then I would do Y” so that you can make tangible change right now and see your results in real time
• Four real steps you can take to stop feeling like shit and start making the most out of this wild + precious ride we call life

// Enrollment for Freedom School is now OPEN – but it’s open for just ONE week. Freedom School is my amazing group coaching experience where you learn ALL kinds of skills to train your mind to work FOR you instead of against you.

Every month I teach a new essential skill so you can stop wondering “what it would be like” and start LIVING it. If you've been itching to join, now’s your chance. Head over to JoinFreedomSchool.com and snag your spot and the amazing bonuses I created for you before the doors close again. That’s JoinFreedomSchool.com.

// I mentioned @theNapMinistry and here is their amazing IG account

// If you’re new here, grab the starter kit I created at RebelBuddhist.com. It has all you need to start creating a life of more freedom, adventure, and purpose.

Whether or not you had a childhood marked by conflict, or grew up in an environment of rage, you have likely – at some point in your life – struggled with anger.

Even in the closest relationships (especially in the closest relationships) anger and conflict are inevitable.

And so, when they show up it’s not necessarily a bad thing – it’s not a “bad sign” about the relationship, per se, because what anger is most often showing us is that our basic, most fundamental needs are not getting met.

In this sense, we need anger – it is important and helps us function.

Anger is awake. It's a signal – part of our human makeup when we've experienced a violation to our basic needs – that there's something going on.

But to understand anger, and to be able to use it in a helpful way or even to move beyond it, we must remember that something deeper lies beneath our rage.

When someone loses their shit over you not sending a text, or when you lose your shit about your partner not calling you to say goodnight, it isn’t about that.

It’s about a deeper need for connection, or safety – something vulnerable below the surface. And that can be difficult to recognize; even more so to name and communicate effectively.

People hurt each other. We come into relationships with pre-existing wounds from our childhood experiences, from systemic racism, heterosexism, ageism, from a misogynistic and patriarchal society, from traumatic life experiences and the collective wounds of our culture.

So then, in each relationship we create an energy push and pull. We want to move closer, then we pull back… We feel the need to be close then we get a little wounded and we move away or lash out, which results in a reaction from the other person...

We get attached and then we cut our hearts off.

In a relationship, both people are trying to get their needs met, and those needs are often different or even conflicting.

And it’s completely natural that we react. Our limbic brains were wired to react when we weren’t getting our needs met; as we were evolving, we needed that to survive – to react when someone took our food or threatened our safety.

As I’ve spoken about in previous episodes, we humans are evolving.

I deeply believe that it involves a more refined ability for compassion, and also less vulnerability to the whims of our emotions that arise from our more primitive brain.

To truly transform and break old patterns, we need to become aware of our own default strategies. How do we react, how do we manage our mind and our emotions, when we are hurt by someone – whether deeply or superficially?

When someone breaks your trust, or judges you or criticizes you, pulls away from you, harms someone you care about... what happens?

We know that what happens initially is we get “hooked,” as Pema Chödrön likes to say. Then we usually lock onto defensiveness, blame and aggression.

When we don’t have a regular mindfulness or meditation practice, all this can happen in milliseconds.

So we also need to ask ourselves: when we get hooked, are we in the habit of calling on some mindfulness and some compassion in our response?

Today, we dig into why one of the initial steps to addressing our anger and the conflict in our lives is to wake up to our own coping mechanisms. The next is to cultivate wisdom and compassion, for ourselves and for others.

I ask you to consider: how can you interrupt your default behavior and create more freedom in how you choose to show up in the world?

I invite you to remember: you have 100% capacity to respond to what's going on within you in a way that is wise and kind.

In the end, working with anger is about moving from reacting from a small sense of self, to responding from a more whole sense of our being (which we are totally capable of).

Because we NEVER get our needs met when we are raging.

And if we keep going around eliminating triggers, and leaving relationships, and dropping friendships, and judging, and self-justifying, then we'll never process the places inside ourselves that need the emotional healing.

This work isn’t easy. And for many of us, it takes a long term commitment to persevere. 

So in this moment:

:: Give yourself some self-compassion.

:: Ask yourself what you need.

:: Then set out to go give yourself exactly that. And rejoice in it.

I promise, you will feel so amazing and FREE when you realize you have what you need within you.

In This Episode You’ll Learn:

• How to recognize different types of anger – and what is really underneath when it comes to the surface
• Why, when we act out of our default mode, we don't actually get our needs met
• The basic formula for expressing our anger in a helpful way
• Why it is so empowering to enter ‘emotional adulthood’ – and accept 100% responsibility for our internal experience
• How to respond to situations that trigger anger from a place of freedom, wisdom, and compassion instead of from our reactive primal brain
• A handy acronym (HALT) that reminds us to take a moment and ask ourselves if we are feeling Hungry, Angry, Lonely, or Tired when we're starting to rage – and how to use this to keep from getting ‘hooked’ into self-destructive behaviors
• How to bring attention to the suffering that anger causes all parties involved – and why it’s helpful to experience the tenderness that this recognition releases

Resources:

// Need a bit of guidance on how to mindfully resolve conflict when tense moments arise? Check out this PDFbased on Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings.

// Head on over to RebelBuddhist.com and get access to the private Facebook group where you can ask me questions! Once you join, there’s also a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

// Enrollment opens soon in Freedom School, my one-of-a-kind membership program that helps you free your mind and free your life. We deep dive into everything I teach here. If you want to be the first to know when enrollment opens and grab the early bird bonuses, go here to get on the waitlist.

As a life coach, part of my job is helping people develop the tools and skills to be able to do something really crucial to their own long term growth: coach themselves.

Yes, I am here as a sounding board, a listener, a co-conspirator and a co-mastermind in helping my clients create the lives they want and deserve, (as a kick in the you-know-what if that’s what they need!) – but I cannot do the work for them.

We all have to do our own groundwork to free our minds, so that we can free our lives.

Self-coaching is a tool that I use on myself daily, and it’s also a model that I teach to my students in Freedom School and use regularly with my clients.

In practical terms, it is a way to apply many spiritual teachings while off the cushion, or off the yoga mat.

Really, self-coaching’s power is that it shows YOU how to understand your own mind.

And best of all, you can use it on the fly.

Today, I dig into why unlayering your mind, deliberately easing into new thought patterns and building a reflex of self-compassion in the process is essential to creating the life you want to live.

I also offer up a tool us life coaches use – called The Mindfulness Model – to help you begin to break down and understand your problems (through an approach that parses out your circumstances, thoughts, feelings, actions and results) so that you can create real, tangible change in your life.

It may sound kind of abstract right now, but you can start to think of The Mindfulness Model as a form of active meditation, or applied meditation – a practical way to engage mindfulness.

One of the biggest mistakes people make with mindfulness of thoughts is that they think thoughts, in and of themselves, are true. They are real – but not true. Coming to understand this distinction may just be one of the most important elements of thoughtwork you ever do.

So, I invite you to take this in today.

:: I invite you to consider different ways of thinking about your past that actually serve you.

:: I invite you to learn how to use these tools in a way that really works – for YOU.

If this is your first introduction to this model – or it’s the first time you’ve ever even heard about it – you may very well be like, “Ana, what are you talking about?”

I get it. It’s often unsettling because it often means you need to be willing to be wrong about your old worldview.

But if you are willing to open to that, then you’re going to be willing to adopt new ways of thinking about your life and about yourself and those in your life…

And this will help you create the life you were meant to live, to less suffering, to more joy, more compassion for yourself and for others, and to not wasting this one precious life on believing things that no longer serve you, on regrets and resentment and anger.

It will help you free your mind, and free your life. I want to share this gift with you in this episode.

• What The Mindfulness Model is and how to use the tools it offers to free your mind so that you can free your life
• About the components of the model (circumstances, thoughts, feelings, actions, results) and what they mean
• Why any problem can be categorized into The Mindfulness Model – and how this can empower you to become a pro at working through your shit as it comes;)
• How to build self-compassion into your reflexes – and get rid of the negative self-criticism that isn’t serving you
• Why paying attention to what is going on in your brain takes a lot of effort – and is absolutely essential for real personal growth
• What the process of ‘unlayering your mind’ looks like, in real time
• Why, when you start understanding your mind, you’ll develop the ability to change your feelings, change your actions, and change your results in your life
• How to get to the place where thinking really positive, nurturing, nourishing thoughts comes naturally to you – and why this takes lots of practice

// Click here to download a visual of the mindfulness model and a sample model form

//See a visual of The Mindfulness Model at 

// Check out Episodes 3 and 14, on how to change the past and learning how to believe new things – both offer tools applicable to the teachings in this episode.

// If you need any help with starting to use The Mindfulness Model, please go to RebelBuddhist.com and get access to the private Facebook group where you can ask me questions! Once you join, there’s also a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

// Enrollment is currently closed for Freedom School, my one-of-a-kind membership program that helps you free your mind and free your life. We deep dive into everything I teach here. If you want to be the first to know when enrollment opens, go here to get on the waitlist.

Human brains love black-and-white thinking. Thinking in terms of absolutes: of ‘right or wrong’, of ‘good or bad’, of ‘all or nothing’.

With black and white thinking, there’s no tension or resistance – none of the discomfort that comes with cognitive dissonance. Because things are either one way or the other way, and this allows us to settle into the comforting absence of ambiguity – the comfort of being 100 percent convinced that we’re right, or that we are good, or that they’re wrong, or that that’s bad.

In truth, there is a level of indulgent comfort in this way of thinking. It saves us from having to think critically or negotiate the complexity of the reality we want to create in life.

Here’s the catch: humans are not good or bad. Humans are good AND bad.

And ideas, thoughts and approaches are not right or wrong. They are, most often, right and wrong.

So, when we can hold these conflicting truths – of both things being true at the same time – and use our critical thought, we can evolve ourselves much more quickly.

When we understand that life is about succeeding and failing, getting it right and getting it wrong, being a good person sometimes and being a “bad person” others...there’s freedom in that.

Freedom in being able to use the word “and”, instead of “or.”

Today, we dig into what black-and-white thinking looks like and why it’s necessary to shift these thought patterns in order to grow in big, tangible ways.

If you’re bent on being good and being right and only speaking when you’re the ‘expert’ on a topic, you’ll miss that opportunity to evolve as a person.

You also miss the opportunity to listen deeply, to be curious, and to learn.

Being open and not afraid to consider other ideas – knowing that your values will hold true for you, or that maybe you want to question your values or your history, and that you’re starting to identify how you want to change – that is a beautiful thing.

That is evolving. 

When you can embrace the ‘both/and’ that exists in the world and in yourself, it will be easier to forgive yourself, to cut yourself a break AND show up in ways that are important, to both hold yourself to higher standards and understand yourself (and other people) more authentically.

Let me be clear: the path to get there is a much harder one. It takes strength and stamina to learn these skills, because it’s easier to rest on your ‘either/or’ laurels.

But we NEED to learn to hold both at once.

So I ask you:

:: Can both/and be true?

:: Can you hold space for the both/and’s in yourself? All the contradictions in your life?

:: And when you do, what do you notice? What happens inside your brain and inside your body when you’re willing to give up the all-or-nothing thinking?

Consider this. It’s an urgent invitation.

In This Episode You’ll Learn:

• Why black and white thinking is limiting for personal, professional and societal growth
• How to train your brain to be able to hold all the ‘both/and’s’ that exist in this one precious life
• Why it’s easier to think in absolutes than sit with the discomfort of cognitive dissonance
• How to apply the tools shared in this episode to your life so that you can start to see change in your thinking habits and patterns
• Why the spaces in between all the polarities that exist in the world are where the magic happens
• How to use ‘both/and’ thinking to grow, evolve and live more authentically – in the long term, and everyday

// The reason many humans like all-or-nothing thinking is because there’s no cognitive dissonance. Check out Episode 14 for more on what cognitive dissonance is and how to create new beliefs that actually serve you.

// Read this piece I wrote in Elephant Journal about How to Drink like a Buddhist, and learn the 4 steps that helped me cut back on the booze.

// If you want more of this Jedi juice, head over to our Rebel Buddhist Facebook page and join the free private group where important conversations are happening in a safe place. There’s a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, and it’s a place where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

// Want to learn more about how to free your mind and free your life, go to RebelBuddhist.com and grab my free Rebel Buddhist Toolkit, where you’ll receive a video training on cultivating resilience, a copy of the gorgeous Rebel Buddhist Manifesto, and more!

// Enrollment is currently closed for Freedom School, my one-of-a-kind membership program that helps you free your mind and free your life. If you want to be the first to know when enrollment opens, go here to get on the waitlist.

Have you ever noticed that we think we need to control the world, and that – somewhere in the back of our subconscious minds – other people need to behave a certain way so we can feel good?

We have so many rules for our relationships that we’ve stopped experiencing them and are locked into the expectations of how the relationship SHOULD be, instead.

The secret is this: your relationship with anyone is dependent on your thoughts about them. That means that, in reality, our relationships are simply thoughts about another person.

The big kicker here? Your thoughts about them are dependent on your expectations of them and how well they meet those expectations.

Here are a few simple truths:

You can’t have love for someone – you just have love when you think about them

You can’t be mad at someone – you have thoughts that make you mad.

Someone can’t hurt you – you have thoughts that hurt.

These can be tough pills to swallow.

That’s why this episode is all about getting to know the other person you are in relationship with – whether that relationship is romantic, platonic or professional.

In order to get there, we wade through what your thoughts and expectations actually are – how to recognize them – and why you’ve got to eliminate them to truly move toward unconditional love, friendship or respect.

Once you truly understand this, your relationships will never be the same – they will be so much better in every way.

Because the truth is, while we may not realize it, we all have a manual of expectations that informs how we want others to behave so that we can feel better in the long run.

It’s like an operation manual... a book of rules and expectations of what is normal, kind and acceptable behavior according to us. In Buddhist terms we can see this ‘manual’ representing our attachment to how we want other people to behave.

When we get along with people or love to hang out with them, it's usually because they are following our manual. We may not even know we have one until someone isn’t following it.

And here’s the catch: we often don’t realize we’re doing this.

We forget that, as adults, people – including you – have the freedom to behave how they want.

Often, relationships morph into two people just following each other’s manuals. This has become a primary focus of modern therapy, and self help too: “What do you want or need? And what does the other person want or need and how can they show the other person this?” 

And then you meet in the middle and end up with no one getting what they really want. Just a life of compromises.

Now, I'm not saying relationships don’t take compromise. That’s a given.

But this is also true in any relationship: we are responsible for meeting our own needs.

We need to remember our happiness comes from within ourselves – not whether or not our partner/friend/employee lives up to our expectations.

Today, I invite you to lean in to the process of letting go of your manual, of setting boundaries and honoring the responsibility we carry to take care of ourselves.

Start out by asking yourself: in what ways DO I want to control other people? Why? Where does this come from within myself?

Real talk? We lose our power in a situation or relationship in which how we feel is dependent on someone else's behavior.

Let’s change that. 

Choose to focus your brain in ways that serve you. Choose to invest in your relationships in ways that feel good. Choose to shift your expectations and stand in your truth. Cause one thing’s for sure – you won’t regret it.

• What ‘The Manual’ is – and how to better understand the expectations we carry that dictate how we want others to behave (so that we can feel better)
• How to stop trying to control other people – learn instead to control your mind and your response to how other people behave
• Why I believe we are responsible for meeting our own needs in our relationships
• Why you’ve got to know what makes you happy to do this work
• The two main things that have us compromise more than we need to in relationships
• How to stop denying yourself love when someone doesn’t follow your manual

// Want to know more about how to create boundaries like a Buddha? Grab this free training on how to set boundaries that actually work – and how to do this from a place of kindness. And stay tuned for an episode on this coming soon!

// If you want more of this Jedi juice, grab the free Rebel Buddhist Training Kit and get insider access to join the free private group where important conversations are happening in a safe place. There’s a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, and it’s a place where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

// Enrollment is currently closed for Freedom School, my one-of-a-kind membership program that helps you free your mind and free your life. If you want to be the first to know when enrollment opens, click here to get on the waitlist.

Ever find yourself wishing you could just stop over-drinking? You don’t identify as an alcoholic, per se – your drinking habits may be affecting your body or brain power a bit negatively, but they’re not affecting the lives of others or those you love – and maybe you don’t want to quit cold turkey, you just want to...reign it in a little?

I hear you. I’ve been there too. And it ain’t easy.

When I quit drinking, so many of my friends changed.

When I stopped over-drinking, it made me less easygoing – in a good way.

Because when we drink, we don’t care as much about things. We’re not thinking about them as much. We’re overeating, we’re thinking and worrying about our bodies instead of thinking and worrying about our lives.

So first thing’s first: why decide to drink less, or stop altogether?

There’s no moral judgment about alcohol here – I want to know what it is inside you that is urging you to cut back?

What is that still, small voice in your head saying you’re missing out on something when you over-drink?

It may seem like freedom is the ability to drink however much you want, whenever you feel like it.

It may feel like you are constraining your freedom when you stop at one or two drinks, or when you don’t drink at all.

But friends, what’s going on when you change your relationship to alcohol is this: you get your freedom back.

When you NEED a drink to feel better?

When you NEED a drink to deal with boredom or the lack of self care?

When you NEED a drink to loosen up or to have fun at a party?

That is NOT freedom.

The truth? Having something like this to work on – whether it’s over-drinking or over-eating or over-binge watching...etc – will help you in the long run. 

Because when you learn to manage your urges, when you learn to address attachment and desire, you learn skills you can apply to any area of your life.

Luckily, there are tools out there, like this podcast, to help give you a boost in that direction;)

In my life coaching programs, I use a lot of tools to help people do things like finally free themselves of anxiety, create the confidence they need to leave the job or the mediocre relationship, or lose the weight they’ve struggled with for years. 

And all those cutting edge tools are based on mind management from Buddhist psychology, applied positive psychology, and brain science.

Turns out – those exact tools work on drinking too!

So I invite you. Take charge and honor that little tug inside you that draws you to this topic. 

:: Find out what resonates with you.

:: Envision what you want out of life and start building the skills necessary to change your habits.

:: Don’t wait to try the tools offered in this episode. Your rebel self can’t afford for you to not GO for it.

If there’s one thing I’d like everyone who wants to drink less and feel free to know, it’s that it is possible to release this unwanted desire to over drink. It is possible to get to where you want to be, to reach those new heights of Jedi magic.

I did it, and I’m here to share how.

• Why, for some, drinking less can be a lot harder than stopping altogether
• How having this challenge can help you live a more full life.
• How to stop your ‘drinking thinking’ – and free up more time and energy to put towards living your life to the fullest
• Some of the brain science behind all this + how to combine it with Buddhist mind management tools to help you honor the ways you want to grow (and act on them)
• How I used to overdrink as a way to tolerate things in my life that were waaay out of alignment – and how I turned this on its head
• A bunch of steps you can take RIGHT NOW to drink less and feel free – to be more present for all that this one wild and precious life has to offer

// Read this piece I wrote in Elephant Journal about How to Drink like a Buddhist, and learn the 4 steps that helped me cut back on the booze.

// Learning how to drink less goes hand in hand with learning how to quit buffering. If you missed it, check out Episode 13 on exactly that.

// Alcohol is one of the most common forms of buffering, and can be one of the hardest to recognize or know how to change. Check out my Drink Less, Feel Free training and sign up for FREE to learn the 3 most crucial steps to changing your relationship with alcohol.

// If you want more of this Jedi juice, head over to our Rebel Buddhist Facebook page and join the free private group where important conversations are happening in a safe place. There’s a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, and it’s a place where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

// Enrollment is currently closed for Freedom School, my one-of-a-kind membership program that helps you free your mind and free your life. If you want to be the first to know when enrollment opens, go here to get on the waitlist.

Cognitive dissonance. It’s one of those big, fancy scientific terms you may have heard before but only have a vague understanding of what it actually means when you really try to think about it.

The official dictionary definition? Cognitive dissonance is “The state of having inconsistent thoughts, beliefs, or attitudes, especially as relating to behavioral decisions and attitude change.”

But in lay people's terms – and in terms of how to apply this concept to creating a life of freedom, adventure and purpose – cognitive dissonance is as simple as this: feeling like shit as you try to create a new belief.

Because to create a new result in your life, you need to create a new way of thinking. And that process feels...very uncomfortable.

The “cognitive” part of cognitive dissonance refers to the mind – more specifically, our thoughts.

It also refers to the dissonance that exists between two different thoughts in your brain that are occurring simultaneously (a.k.a. when who we think we are is different from what we are doing).

For example, that moment when you’re like “Wait, I think of myself as a healthy person, but I’m drinking a bottle of wine every night.” There’s cognitive dissonance there that makes us uncomfortable because two thoughts are clashing. In that sense, it can also be helpful in letting us know when things are out of alignment.

But it isn’t as helpful when we want to create something new, and that something new is different from our current reality and belief systems.

Because when you have two thoughts that contradict each other in your brain, you are going to have mental discomfort.

Which (let’s be honest) feels like shit.

So here’s the rub.

Anytime you want to create a new result in life, you have to DO things differently which means you need to THINK differently.

Like Einstein said, “We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.”

To create something new – to achieve a new goal – you will need a new thought.

...Welcome to cognitive dissonance.

In this episode, we dig into confirmation bias, what it takes to change your belief systems about yourself, how to let go of old beliefs in order to create new ways of thinking, and how to sit with the mental discomfort that comes when you set goals that push you beyond what you previously thought you were capable of.

The bottom line is that developing a willingness and an ability to be uncomfortable really is what you have to do to experience deep growth and change. To go for your dreams. To make a meaningful difference in this world.

So go on, I dare you.

Develop the muscle and the resilience to hold two contradictory thoughts at the same time and not shy away from the dissonance this sparks.

Learn to bridge the gap between your old belief systems and the new ones you want to create.

Decide what you want in life – then practice believing you can get it – and build the skills to go f*cking make it happen.

The world needs you to invest in yourself like this right now. To put in the work.

And remember: there is a reward for you on the other side of all this.

• What cognitive dissonance is – how to recognize it, how to create new thoughts and let go of old beliefs
• Why cognitive dissonance is the reason most people don’t want to set goals
• Lots about confirmation bias – why the brain is constantly trying to prove what it already thinks of as true
• Why, in order to create change in your life, you need to be willing to experience cognitive dissonance and the mental discomfort that comes with it
• More on our FAVE topic: the mighty Motivational Triad – and how it relates (almost contrarily) to the way cognitive dissonance moves you towards discomfort & away from pleasure or what’s easy
• How to bridge the gap between the two models of your life – the one in which you currently live, and the one in which you WANT to live;)
• What laddering thoughts are and how to use them to change your belief systems about yourself
• Why cognitive dissonance is actually required for us to live the best version of our own lives
• How my business is literally built around helping people feel really uncomfortable – and why developing a willingness to be uncomfortable is the recurring theme that lies at the heart of SO much thoughtwork, mindfulness and resilience building
• Tips & tools for changing an old, habitual thought into a new one that can change your life – and others’ lives too

// If you want more of this Jedi juice, head over to our Rebel Buddhist Facebook page and join the free private group where important conversations are happening in a safe place. There’s a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, and it’s a place where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

// Want to learn more about how to free your mind and free your life, go to RebelBuddhist.com and grab my free Rebel Buddhist Toolkit, where you’ll receive a video training on cultivating resilience, a copy of the gorgeous Rebel Buddhist Manifesto, and more!

// Did you resonate with drinking a bottle of wine every night? Check out my free 3 Steps to Drink Less training, where you’ll also receive info on managing your “drinking thinking” and how to deal with the cognitive dissonance that comes up.

// Enrollment is currently closed for Freedom School, my one-of-a-kind membership program that helps you free your mind and free your life. If you want to be the first to know when enrollment opens, go here to get on the waitlist.

So many of us use (or have used) buffering as a way of tolerating things that aren’t acceptable in our lives.

We use alcohol to make a boring party more fun. We use food to get rid of that anxious feeling in our stomach when we know our partner will respond with anger when we bring up a difficult topic. We use Netflix to distract ourselves from a stressful job that we hate.

What’s underneath this is: you have something in your life that isn’t great, something in your life that doesn’t really work, something in your life that you want to change.

But instead of changing it, instead of working on it, instead of making it better, you just buffer instead. And all of that buffering will make the fact that something isn’t right in your life a lot easier to tolerate.

What’s wrong with this, exactly? What’s wrong with being able to tolerate something hard in life a little better?

Buffering just makes bullshit more tolerable instead of seeing that your emotions are information and are trying to tell you something – which can then lead to actions to change the situation that you’re tolerating.

When you feel anxious. Angry. Bored. Restless…

All of that is telling you that something is out of alignment. Something isn’t right with how you want to live your life. How you want to be living this one precious human life that we have.

Whatever it is, when we don’t allow space for those hard emotions and buffer instead, sure, it makes the shitty feelings easier to deal with – it buffers them – but we don’t take action to solve the actual issue.

We don’t have the hard conversation with our partner asking to be treated with more respect

We don’t start searching for another job. 

We don’t get to bed earlier and wake up to work out and meditate to deal with our stress.

Truth? Yes. It’s a helluva lot easier to buffer than face those hard truths. Because buffering doesn’t require anything of you except to escape.

But in reality, all buffering is doing (whether it’s with food or alcohol or overworking or shopping or adrenaline sports…) is helping you tolerate something you shouldn’t be tolerating.

The magic is, when you take away the buffering, your life as it really is becomes clear.

To have the courage to feel your emotions instead, to process the urges, to go through that whole process.

When you stop buffering, you get to pay attention to your deepest desires and fears. To the life you want to create.

Then you don’t miss out on life. On your authentic self.

Then you discover your power and live your truth.

And this isn’t selfish. This is what the world needs.

Think about what kind of world we’d be living in if people looked honestly at their lives and didn't try to escape the hard truths.

Think about how people would show up differently in the world if they were living the lives they were meant to live.

I honestly believe we’d be living in a more compassionate, connected world.

Buffering doesn’t make us better people by helping us tolerate. It’s totally selfish because instead of making positive changes, we tolerate all kinds of shit in order to avoid hard truths.

So yes, this is not work for the faint of heart.

But it is necessary, because all humans want to fulfill their dharma, the reason they were put here on the planet – the thing they, and only they, can gift to the world.

We ALL have a purpose.

We ALL have our unique gift.

And when we buffer, we don’t discover that. We don't know that gift, we don’t fall in love with it. 

• In what ways am I buffering?
• And if I stopped buffering, how would I feel? Why? 
• What is it that I’m tolerating that I shouldn’t be tolerating? 

When we buffer we don’t hear that soft still voice inside us, that inner wisdom, our highest self, asking us to be rebels, calling us to go against the grain, telling us to do the courageous thing, the scary thing.

Telling us we are meant for more.

I don't know about you, but I want to be awake to my real life.

So, look at your life. I don’t want you to look at the buffering as something that you’re tolerating anymore. I invite you to completely remove that from your mind for a minute and really ask yourself this:

What do I need to do in my life to make it better than anything I’m doing to escape it?

What needs to change? Where do I need to stop people-pleasing? In what ways am I not telling the truth to myself and to others? How can I start rocking my own house down instead of just going with the grain and trying to be normal to get society’s approval?

Mmmm, yes. Those are all urgent questions.

So, seriously, don’t wait. The world needs you to not wait.

Stop buffering in order to tolerate your life. Create the life of your dreams, instead.

• Why we buffer as a way to tolerate things in our life we shouldn’t have to tolerate 
• How learning to face your hardest truths and emotions will enable you to instead act to change situations that you would otherwise continue to tolerate and avoid
• Why, when you stop buffering, you’ll stop avoiding making the hard decisions – and how the act of making those decisions will give you your power back
• About how my Drink Less, Feel Free course allowed a client of mine to have more control over her own habits and be more present for the beautiful moments in her life
• How to GO FOR IT and choose your life’s red pill (yes, this really is a Matrix reference) – and become the rebel you’re meant to be rather than a person who chooses to stay in blissful ignorance by picking the blue pill
• Why I used to spend a lot of time bargaining with myself about how much I’d drink, then rationalizing when I didn’t stick to it – and why learning how to stop buffering was a game changer
• How to quit escaping and settling for an existence that’s less than the life you want to create – tips on how to find your purpose and start living as your authentic self 

// Alcohol is one of the most common forms of buffering, and can be one of the hardest to recognize or know how to change. Check out my Drink Less, Feel Free training and sign up for FREE to learn the 3 most crucial steps to changing your relationship with alcohol.

// If you want more of this Jedi juice, head over to our Rebel Buddhist Facebook page and join the free private group where important conversations are happening in a safe place. There’s a weekly FB live called Wake the F*ck Up Wednesday, and it’s a place where you can ask questions that come up as you do this work – in all parts of your life.

// Enrollment is currently closed for Freedom School, my one-of-a-kind membership program that helps you free your mind and free your life. If you want to be the first to know when enrollment opens, go here to get on the waitlist