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Dr. Lisa Miller (7:44)

John thank you. I am so grateful for your ability to dig deep with such a range of people and to bring this right into the hands of everybody. So thank you for what you bring to us.

John R. Miles (7:55)

Oh, you're welcome. And thank you for recognizing that it's been such a privilege of my life to be able to have such amazing people on the podcast and share their profound wisdom with the listeners.

Dr. Lisa Miller (8:08)

So, John, I've shared in the awakened brain and a bit with you that I am a spiritual person, as are many people in our country. And I think the most precious thing we have is our experience. I mean, really in our life, what is our gift from who I call God is our experience. And you bring that experience right into the center of our society. You bring together, really the gold nuggets of what it is to be alive. And you put that right into the center to form almost like a bonfire for our society. So I really want to elevate and appreciate you. Thank you.

John R. Miles (8:42)

Thank you so much. And I have been so privileged to have on so many psychologists, behavior scientists, neuroscientists on the show that it's for me really a learning experience which I feel so fortunate to have, because every single week I am constantly learning new things. And it's those new things that I'm trying to share, because the wisdom that comes out on this show isn't just applicable in the moment. These are life skills that can really transform people's lives and their mental states and their wellness overall.

Dr. Lisa Miller (9:19)

So, John, I am a scientist. I'm a 25 year scientist at Columbia University. But before I get into the science, I find it's very helpful to not just talk about our human capacity for spirituality, but to offer people a real taste to put both feet in. Would you be open to perhaps starting with in the Language of life, a brief practice today?

John R. Miles (9:43)

Yeah, sure, Lisa. Let's do it.

Dr. Lisa Miller (9:44)

Okay, beautiful. So I'd like to invite you into a practice. It's 90 seconds and it's an invitation to get ready to do the practice. I'll invite you to close your eyes and take five nice deep breaths to open up your inner space. Five nice breaths with your eyes closed in your inner chamber. I invite you to set before you a table. This is your table. And to your table you may invite anyone, living or deceased, who truly has your best interest in mind. Anyone, living or deceased, who truly has your best interest in mind. And now, to your table, you may invite your higher self, the part of you that's so much more than anything that you may have done or not done, anything you might have or not have your true, eternal, higher self and ask you if you love you. And now, finally, you may invite your higher power, God, whatever your word is, and ask if they love you. And now with all of those people sitting there right now, what do they need to share? What do you need to know? What do they need to let you know right now? What do they need to tell you now? When you're ready, I invite you back.

John R. Miles (11:19)

Okay, I'm back.

Dr. Lisa Miller (11:21)

I'm back. This is your counsel, and they're always there for you, always.

John R. Miles (11:27)

That's good to know. Especially during troubling times.

Dr. Lisa Miller (11:32)

Was there anyone who showed up that surprised you?

John R. Miles (11:36)

No, not necessarily. I lost my sister, who was probably my closest confidant in May, so she would be the person I would typically talk to in times like this. So that's who I invited to come to the table.

Dr. Lisa Miller (11:50)

And she came.

John R. Miles (11:51)

Yes.

Dr. Lisa Miller (11:53)

Well, that's very moving and very. I find reassuring. Did she share. Did she talk to you or convey a presence or say anything to you?

John R. Miles (12:05)

Well, I didn't really get a message, but conveyed a presence of just warmth and support and understanding.

Dr. Lisa Miller (12:14)

Oh, that's wonderful. That's wonderful. So here, all of Florida and North Carolina and a lot of our country is in flux, and there was that absolute, resolute, unassailable presence of love and steadfast presence and understanding. That's a gift, John.

John R. Miles (12:34)

Yeah. Well, as I was telling you beforehand, it's definitely been a tough three weeks as we were displaced by. To hurricanes and in the middle of it lost pretty much everything to storm surge from Hurricane Helene. So it's definitely been a period of unrest for me and for thousands of people throughout Florida and those other states, as you mentioned.

Dr. Lisa Miller (12:56)

It's generous of you to share that. And a lot of people join you. Losing homes, losing everything they own, being displaced. And any psychologist will say it's traumatic to lose your safe place of living, your home, your apartment. It's traumatic. And when everything that we have, the ground that we stand on, shifts or falls apart, the world as I counted on it, isn't holding. That's traumatic. And in times of total disorientation, the ground shifted. Really, the only way through is a spiritual response to trauma, a spiritual response to uncertainty that we don't control so very much in our lives as humans, the human being, our human experiences, we just don't. And what you invoked, your sister's loving, steadfast presence or the higher power, who I call God, always there, always loving, always reassuring.

John R. Miles (14:01)

Well, it's in times like this, I. It reminds me of that, that image of the footsteps on the sand and person walking with God and wondering where they were when all the time the footsteps were. God's holding you up during your times of need. That's the image that. That came to my mind.

Dr. Lisa Miller (14:21)

So that's the image we can all walk with, that really. We are being carried. Everyone who's lost a home right now, everyone who's lost their worldly possessions, everyone who's lost the certainty this was the home I could count on. What you've just shared, John, is the gift. That's the image that there are footprints in the sand. They're not ours. God is carrying us. You are being carried.

John R. Miles (14:47)

Yeah. I just did an episode on. Well, I did two about the hurricane. One was what it took to survive it and the importance of friends showing up, even friends you haven't talked to in a long time, lending hands of support when you needed it most, both physically and emotionally. And then I did a second episode on emotional fatigue, which I think a ton of people are feeling from the anxiety of having to go. Even if you weren't severely impacted, it's still pretty life altering to have to evacuate two times in two weeks.

Dr. Lisa Miller (15:22)

And that we really face that we don't. We have a tiny little layer now and then of control on a big life that's full of flux. And I think one way to be with that is to shift from a sense of what do I want and how am I going to get it and how am I going to make this work to what is life showing me now? Or if you are someone who feels a relationship to God, what does God revealing to me now? What is God asking of me now? What is real? What does endure? And in moments like this, we're drawn closer, actually, to an awareness we're held, we're buoyant. We're not falling through a black hole of existential annihilation. We're buoyant and we're loved.

John R. Miles (16:09)

Yeah, it really made me, as I was doing that solo episode, it made me research some people who've been through even more hardship than I have faced recently. And I came to the story of Ernest Shackleton and how he prevailed and saved all his men in a moment where most people would have felt despair and lost all hope. As you're stuck on the other side of the world without anyone knowing where you are, floating on an iceberg with no hope or help coming from anywhere, and then finding the path to taking the shot to save yourself, and then come Back and save all your men. It's moments like they give you tons of hope that even in the darkest of times, you can find your way back and recover and find something powerful out of it to learn from and to use it to shape your life going forward. So that's how I am treating this learning experience.

Dr. Lisa Miller (17:18)

So through this, then, it's not just that the, you know, upheaval is resolved. It's that we're actually made more by this. It's not just recovery. It's a form of renewal and growth and expansion that, you know. And I. I've worked extensively with the Pentagon, and we talk a lot about post traumatic spiritual growth that through hard times, we actually deepen our relationship to one another. People show up. We're ambassadors of God. We show up for one another. We help each other, we guide each other. Like the story you just told coming back for the men, we have guidance in places we didn't know it was coming. I mean, to make your way off the iceberg. You didn't do that alone. We never get off the iceberg alone. We're guided, we're held and looking and watching for God's presence and God's guidance. And whatever your tradition may be, you might say Jesus or Hashem or the universe or whatever your words are, but there's one source of life. And when we look and listen for that guidance, people show up at remarkable moments. There's, you know, what people call synchronicities God lays on our path. Symbols, Guidance. You know, turn right. No, today. Every day you go left. Today turn right. Knowing of the heart. So trauma can be the gateway to a deepening of our spiritual life. And the army works a lot with post traumatic spiritual growth. There's a lot of data, actually, that when you look at people who. All of whom are traumatized, all of whom even meet the diagnostic criteria for ptsd, post traumatic, right. They really are traumatized, every single one of them. The more trauma we have, the more we tend to grow. So trauma is not a showstopper in our lives. It is actually an accelerant. It doesn't feel good. It feels awful. And it's shocking and it's ungluing, but the more that we face, the more that we become. That's in the data. There's a great study in the awakened brain. I referenced it by Psy Tsai. He looked at 3,000 plus vets, and he showed the more trauma, the more post traumatic growth until we're so flooded. I mean, just the worst of the worst that we have to have support for that post traumatic growth. Then another scientist, that's the size study Tedeschi looked at, well, what are the predictors of the extent to which we really do grow? How do we help ourselves grow? And Tadeshi helped us understand that there were four ways in which we can take a really unwanted upheaving, traumatic experience and harvest it, that very experience, for growth. And one is being able to sit with a group of other people, like you said, not be at this alone, access that very experience and put it into words so it's not just floating around and deep and dark, but we weave it together so other people access the experience, put it into words and share it, and then shine the light of our higher power. Whether it's prayer, for some people it's some form of meditation, for others it's laying on of hands. But when you shine the light of your higher power on that really shocking, unwanted, unforeseen moment, there's an awareness, there's an awakening. And it can be that I was held through it, carried, as in your beautiful image of the footsteps. It could be that I was guided through it. Because in that image of the footsteps, there's a direction. There's a direction. It could be that I realize now, God, that I was not to blame, that we both can be forgiven, that you're with me all along. But that breakthrough post traumatic spiritual growth leaves us stronger and more resilient than if it had never happened at all because we have built a spiritual response to suffering.

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Dr. Lisa Miller (22:15)

And now a next level moment from AT&T business.

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Dr. Lisa Miller (22:19)

Of pillows and they need to be.

John R. Miles (22:21)

There in time for International Sleep day.

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Confident, but the vendor isn't responding.

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An International Sleep Day is tomorrow.

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Luckily, AT&T 5G lets you deal with any issues with ease. So the pillows will get delivered and.

John R. Miles (22:34)

Everyone can sleep soundly, especially you. ATT 5G requires a compatible plan and device. 5G is not available everywhere. See att.com 5G for you for details. And Lisa, when I was reading your book the Awakened Brain, which you've been referencing, you started out talking about the state of the world. And this book came out a number of years ago. But the state of the world has really been worsening over the past decade, with more and more people feeling out of sync. And it's interesting that we're having this discussion because I would have told you 15 years ago, I would have never thought in a million years I'd be doing what I'm doing now. But that higher spiritual guide reached out to me when I was at one of the heights of my professional life. I was a C level working for a Fortune 50 company. And I started to hear that I had a different mission that I was supposed to fulfill. And the words that were being given to me is, you're supposed to help the broken, bored, beaten, lonely, helpless, hopeless of the world. And when you hear a message like that and you're in that state, and at the time I had young kids, you're like, what in the world does this mean? And how am I supposed to do anything to better the lives of anyone when I don't even know how to identify who those people are? Because it's not like you want to go out there and use that as your marketing slogan. But your book talked to how many of how so many of those people that I just described are feeling right now. People are feeling anxious, they're feeling broken, they're feeling lonely. And as I've done more and more research on this myself, I really think it comes down to there's a huge sense right now that people don't feel like they matter or hold significance. And this leads me to an advisor of yours, Marty Seligman, who, as I was talking to Angela Duckworth, who I think he was also her advisor, he was telling me that Marty has dedicated this last chapter, he says, of his life, to this whole concept of the impact of mattering the Science of mattering. How did your early discussions with Marty influence your development of the concepts that we're now talking about in the awakened brain? Particularly the distinction between achieving awareness versus.

Dr. Lisa Miller (25:14)

Awakened awareness, Achieving awareness versus awakening Awareness is in all of us, John. Every single one of us has the capacity to look at life and say, to your point of your beautiful story, okay, I have kids, I have a mortgage to pay. I've worked really hard to get to this point of building and creating and providing for my family.

John R. Miles (25:37)

So.

Dr. Lisa Miller (25:37)

So in a very good spirited way, every one of us and has the capacity to think about, okay, how am I going to move ahead? How am I going to create financial stability? How am I going to cultivate being the type of person I want to be? And these are markers of growth and building and accomplishment. But that way of thinking, while necessary, is alone insufficient to fully fulfill our human destiny, our human journey. And your breakthrough moment, really, it sounds to me like a very sacred spiritual moment of being given a calling. Does that feel right? A calling?

John R. Miles (26:21)

Yeah, it was definitely a calling. And I think as I think about it, it's made me think about people as I've read the Bible and the stories you hear that they're given these callings like I was given and they're in whatever stage they were in life. But typically the people who get called and where they're being called to, there's a huge chasm between the two. And what I find is the more that you stay on the one side and keep going down the path that you're currently on, the more you feel negative repercussions from it. And the more you're guided towards the life you're supposed to be leading, the more I think you start coming into balance with what you're supposed to be doing and feel complete with where you're supposed to be in life. I'm not sure if that makes sense, but that's how I felt.

Dr. Lisa Miller (27:17)

So it goes from being tapped, hey, look over in this other direction to maybe directed to being pushed. And I call these, this, I call this sacred guidance. And it can come in the form of synchronicities. It can come in the form of very unprobabilistic doors opening and doors slamming shut. It really, it can get tougher and tougher until we hear it. But it's all because God does have a calling for you. And God always picks the right one for the right calling. So it's a marvelous, miraculous gift, even if it's not what a priori we had ordered or planned for. Ourselves. It wasn't in the, wasn't in the cards that we planted. It wasn't in the five year plan. It was far bigger than anything we humans could have envisioned. And that's an awakened awareness as compared to an achieving awareness that plans and research and gets everything lined up. A plus, B plus C. Our awakened awareness is a direct connection with God or higher power. One's word may be, and an awakened awareness. We go places we didn't know we were going and we have a calling that we had never envisioned. And it is absolutely the opportunity of our lifetime. But we've got to listen because as you say, John, the message heats up until we do. And in awakened awareness, we quickly realize that there's very little we control in life, that people show up, that opportunities show up, that we don't control who shows up. I don't control who's coming around the corner next, and I don't control the wonderful opportunity to speak to you here today. John and I. These are gifts. These are gifts. Awakened awareness does not say, what do I want and how am I going to get it. Our awakened awareness says, what is God asking of me now? What is God revealing to me now? What am I being called to do? And that is a dialogue with a living universe, a dialogue with a dynamic personal relationship with God. So we go from thinking that we control things to really listening and watching. Every bit of life is alive and animated with dialogue, direction, contribution. And we get to start showing up as you've done for so many.

John R. Miles (29:36)

One of the interesting things, and I'm taking where we just were. And I want to dive into a little bit more of the science of this. In the book, you talk about your experience reading an mri. And I happen to have a good friend of mine, Dr. Jay Lombard, on the show a couple years ago, and he tells me he's a neurologist and he specializes in trying to help find cures for als. But he said for him the fmri, the functionality mri, was eye opening because he said it for the first time in his life. It was almost as if you're peering into someone's soul is the way he described it to me. And he was talking about the neural correlates that he would see, and it's something that you explored as well, the neural correlates of spiritual awareness. And for a listener who might not know what these are, I was hoping you could explain what these correlates are and how they reveal the biological basis of our spiritual experiences.

Dr. Lisa Miller (30:40)

Oh, yes. Thank you, Jay. So one thing That I think is very helpful in our current day culture to clarify through the lens of science is that religion and spirituality go hand in hand for many people. They do for me, they perhaps do for you. My faith tradition is the language through which I connect with my spirit. Spirituality. But religion and spirituality are not the same identical exact thing. Religion, the prayers, the texts, the ceremonies, the ways that we might learn to connect with one another and with God. Religion itself is a gift of our parents and grandparents. Or we might choose a faith tradition. Religion through the lens of science is environmentally transmitted. All that knowledge, all the way in, all the. But spirituality built into every single one of us is innate. Spirituality is inborn. Just like we're physical or emotional or cognitive beings. We're born, every baby is a spiritual being. And what does that mean to be a spiritual being? Well, we've looked through the lens of an mri, we've tracked through FMRI functional MRI tracks the blood flow in the brain, the circuits in the brain. And what we've seen, John, is that every human on earth has this neural circuits for spiritual awareness and even more specifically, for direct personal relationship to God, their higher power. Again, whatever their word may be. And what's even more awesome is that there's one spiritual brain and everyone on earth has it. 7.2 billion spiritual brains. And it doesn't matter if I'm Hindu or Christian or Catholic or Jewish or Muslim. There's one spiritual brain and of course there's one source of life. So we have one spiritual brain and we have one source of life. We're all spiritual beings and we're on this common shared there's one spiritual journey. Now we can call it different things. There's beautiful faith traditions, Hashem, God, Jesus, a lot. But we're on one spiritual journey together. And we know some things through our faith traditions, but also through MRIs about how our spiritual inborn gift is built. When we look through the fmri, we see that the neurocircuits in our brain are built to be able to perceive. Not just believe, but see and know that we are loved and held. The bonding network comes online as we connect with our higher power. We are loved and held. We are guided. There's a shift in the attention network from the top down dorsal to the bottom up ventral, which means we're able to see. The God lays on our path. Messengers, synchronicities, symbols, bottom up awareness. Not just what do I want. I'm going to drill through life. My roadmap says left and right. Wait a minute. Something today is saying, go right. Loved and held guided, and we are never, ever alone. The parietal, which puts in and out the distinctions, the boundaries between us. You know, you're sitting in your chair and I'm sitting in mine. You have your zipped up bio body suit. In this life, you were born a man and I'm born a woman. Our differences, women have different race, different orientation. These are markers of. Yes, we all sit in our chair. We're magnificently diverse. But the parietal lets us see that we're also all children of God. We're all emanations of one source. We are one, so we are distinct, but we are also one. Loved, held, guided, and never alone. That means that anyone could be an ambassador sent by God. I don't care what they look like. I don't care what they're from. I certainly don't care if they're from a red or blue state. God loves us all and sends us all loved, held, guided, and never alone. And we're all designed to see and live that way. To live that way.

John R. Miles (34:48)

Yeah. So it sounds like a lot of what you're talking about is intuition. How do you view the role of intuition or premonition in your scientific work and how has it guided your research?

Dr. Lisa Miller (35:01)

Intuition, premonition, gut instinct. For some people, it's a deep, knowing inner wisdom. Sometimes it's a mystical experience or a dream or a daydream. But this way of direct knowing is real. This is real hard data. This is essential information for our path. John, you heard your calling to serve the broken and those who hurt, and you knew that was real. Knowing that is not just, you know, okay, I'll pay attention to that. That is profoundly important. The most important information that we might perceive, receive. We're built for that. And our whole life fulfilling our purpose hinges on knowing the profundity and the ultimate importance and significance of knowing.

John R. Miles (36:00)

So earlier you touched on PTSD and post traumatic growth, especially in veterans. I would think this applies to first responders, ICU, health practitioners, et cetera. I have seen such an alarming spike of depression, people contemplating suicide in general going up. And there's this correlation, as this has all risen to an equal decline in the number of people who are going to church who are believing in a greater power. Do you see any correlation to them? Because I found it interesting that in your research you found that people with a spiritual practice are 80% less likely to suffer from depression. But if they don't have that spiritual practice, is there any correlation to why so many more people are suffering the way that they are.

Dr. Lisa Miller (37:05)

John, you have put your finger directly on the epidemic of our time. So the epidemic in all decades of life, but particularly for people right now in their teens and 20s and 30s, the rate of death by suicide rivals the rate of death by auto accident as the number one killer of high school students. I mean, this is a dystopic. If I'm in my 50s, if you told me 40 years ago that young people were going to die form us by suicide, I wouldn't have believed it. I didn't know anyone who'd taken their life. And yet I have three children in their 20s, and every one of them has talked a friend back from suicide. And when my daughter was in middle school, she came and she said, mommy, Peter's not in school today. Something's terribly wrong. And I said, oh, Peter has the flu. She was in eighth grade. And she said, no, Mommy, I know something's wrong. We have to call his home. So we do. The mom picks up and she asks us to forward another number onto an inpatient unit to talk to Peter, who has carved a heart in his leg with a knife because his parents are separated. There's just a level of suffering in young people. And you have hit the nail on the head, statistically speaking, through the lens of research. With the decline in family faith tradition, whether they're Christian or Jewish or Hindu, whatever their tradition may be, with the decline in personal spiritual life has concomitantly been a statistical, statistically related skyrocket in the diseases of despair, suicide, addiction, depression. The two go hand in hand. So the most important thing we can do for ourselves is to cultivate and open up our spiritual life. And the only thing I need to do as a parent beyond love, protect and keep safe, is cultivate my child's spiritual life. It is the most important contribution we make.

John R. Miles (39:01)

Well, maybe I'll use that as a lead in to how can spirituality contribute to resilience in people facing adversity?

Dr. Lisa Miller (39:09)

The uncertainty in our times not getting my way is profound. My team may well not win the election. My community is shifting in a way that's unfamiliar to me. There's so much going on right now and certainly the natural disasters. And in this time of real flux, right, we can't control what comes next and we can't anticipate and plan in the way that perhaps we thought we could. Certainly 20 years ago, there was more of an illusion of total radical control. But what we can do in genuine flux, the flux is real. Is adopt a different stance. And in particular, I call this an awakened stance. It's one of quest. And then quest, we say, okay, I don't know what's coming around tomorrow, and I don't know if I'm going to live in this town or a town two over, or we might go to another state. I don't know what's in the next five years or the next five months. But what I can do is be firmly rooted in a stance of quest, which is to say I am open to what life is showing me now. I'm on a journey and I'm bringing along my kids, and I'm teaching this to my kids because the illusion of control is actually a very fragile illusion that is getting smashed right now. And it's not very helpful to tell your kids implicitly or explicitly, you can control and plan everything, but it's profoundly helpful to the resilience and health and peace of mind and heart of your children to say, you know what? Our life is a journey. It's really a spiritual adventure. And we don't sure what's coming, but at every turn we can say, hey, do you want to sit down right now? And let's ask ourselves, what is God showing us now? And even more in our family, we might pray and we might say, loving God, creator of heaven and earth and everything we see and know, what, as we open our hearts, do you reveal to us now? What do you ask of us now? And sometimes it's the parent who receives an answer, and sometimes it's a child who says, for the family, dad, Mom, God told me that as long as we're together, we're okay. You don't know what's going to come, but it's bigger and better than what we've planned. Family prayer with a common question. Here we are, we're in a hotel. We were just evicted from our home. What loving God do you lay upon us next? What do you want us to know? We feel your presence. We feel we're loved and held. We know we're guided and we'll look for your guidance. We do our part, but then we're open to what comes. And that way of being together as a family. Some people called it inviting. In the third presence, I call it the first presence, inviting in God. And you know, we are a family. We're a family in God. That's a quest, and it's much more resilient, and it actually takes you somewhere much better than you ever thought you might be going.

John R. Miles (42:13)

Well, Lisa, thanks for Sharing that I know that in the scientific community there's skepticism regarding the measurable impact of spirituality. And I want to take this a little bit further. I happened to listen to parts of your interview that you did with Scott, Barry Kaufman, and I've had Scott on the show as well as David Vegas, who you might know, David Yaden. And those three, along with Jonathan Haidt, Dacher Keltner and some others, have been doing a lot of work on transcendence and awe. And how do you feel this spirituality and the science of spirituality figures into their research of transcendence? How we experience awe in our lives?

Dr. Lisa Miller (43:02)

Yes, that's a very beautiful work. And those folks are all good friends and colleagues of many years, wonderful people. I would say that transcendence is built into the awakened brain, the capacity to perceive and receive a transcendent relationship. But where I would say that the awakened brain takes us perhaps another step along is that we are built not only to be able to see beyond ourselves to something more, but to receive and perceive a real relationship with God, our higher power, a real lived relationship with our loved ones who are on the other side, who are no longer embodied, but present on the other side of existence. So the awakened brain goes perhaps a step further in showing the neural correlates of the inborn human capacity to have a real relationship, a real transcendent relationship with God, with our family members who've crossed, like your sister. And so that's not just something bigger than ourselves. That is through all history, through all faith traditions, through wisdom traditions, bringing us back through the lens of MRIs and peer review science to what humans have already known. That we're never at this alone. That's a relationship I think that we absolutely do have a capacity for. I take through the awakened brain to be a witness of God, that things aren't just beautiful, but they're beyond beautiful. That the sparkling autumn leaves and the sun in them are not just glorious, but wow, they are expressions. They are actually the hand of God. It is the sense, whether I've put my finger on it or not, of the sanctification of life. That's how I understand awe through the lens of the awakened brain. And I think Dacher's work is beautiful. I'm very fond of Docker and I think his capacity to say nature is a place of awakening is so very true. And in fact, science shows us that a 20 minute walk in nature, instead of eat at your desk or go to a restaurant, a 20 minute walk in nature awakens our deep connection to the sanctity of life, the glory of life, that we really matter and every bit of life matters. And the whole thing is a gift. So nature is a cathedral. It simply is. And it is a place where God's very present awe is a way into that.

John R. Miles (45:41)

Yeah. I also love his work on moral beauty and how moral beauty equates to awe, especially when we see others perform. Performing acts of kindness, or we ourselves are led to do acts of service to others. So that's another fascinating part of Keltner's research.

Dr. Lisa Miller (45:58)

That's beautiful. I would call that awakened relationships, that it's not just you, John, and me, Lisa, in a discussion, but there's a force in us of profound ultimate significance. Goodness, love, direction. If we don't totally steer this conversation, God's been working through us every minute, every second. So relational spirituality is when we take the transcendent awareness and infuse in our families, in our colleagues and our friendships that say that sanctity, including towards, as you were called, the broken and the homeless and those in need of help.

John R. Miles (46:36)

Yeah. Well, the reason I wanted to go down this path is in the book you mentioned that many of us live life half awake. I often refer to this as what Henry David Thoreau called quiet desperation, chasing external achievements without realizing our deeper connection to life. What are some signs for potential listeners or viewers today that they might be living life half awake? And how can they begin to awaken a more inspired life?

Dr. Lisa Miller (47:08)

Very often there's people who, you know, every one of us. And I've certainly had times in my life myself, John, where I get up and I'm not that excited to go to work, and I'm not that excited to be at work, and maybe I go out for a drink afterwards and it's just, you know, making the sounds, and I'm just not feeling alive. So it's not that everything's falling apart or everything's terrible. It just feels like the bucket's about 50 to 60% full. And that's a common condition. And some people, it reaches. Stays around for years. It becomes dysthymia. Life has a gray hue over it. And that's really an invitation to say, you know what? You may have the home or the apartment you want, or you might be working, and you're getting there, you're not. But no matter what you have and don't have, does your heart feel alive? Do you feel excited to get up this morning? Do you feel like your life matters and that life matters and that everyone you encountered is an operation? Opportunity. Is the lights on or are the lights dim? And that's really. That's not a trap. That is the door swinging open and saying, hey, let's go look for a landscape that's a little bit brighter. And I think in my understanding of what I've seen in the awakened brain and the neural correlates of the transcendent relationship, it's really turning to God or your higher power that awakens the lights, and it's really doing that with other people, whether it's in a faith community or service community. Go out on Saturday and be part of the Habitat for Humanity that's rebuilding that fellow's house. Go out on Sunday and be part of the service community that's bringing hot meals to people who've been evicted from their homes or who are displaced from their homes. Right now. Right. In a time of upheaval, when we serve, we are using the same part of the brain through which we talk to God. And what you do to my children, you do for me. And it's extraordinary, John. The same neurocircuits through which we talk and feel God's presence are the same neural circuits through which we feel God's love towards one another. So service is a direct way in. Even if you. You could be sour on your faith tradition. You could be someone who says, I didn't like how I was brought up, and I didn't like how my grandma or my mom or my dad talked about religion. If you go serve, you're literally walking the walk of a spiritual life and the lights start to come back on.

John R. Miles (49:40)

Yeah. I think it's interesting. This really ties into something that I've heard you talk about in other interviews where you say that we're all born with a capacity for awakening, but that it's a skill we have to develop. Much like building a muscle. To me, I describe intentionality that way. You have to be intentional about the actions that you want to take in life, or you're going to keep spiraling down the path that you're leading. If you're not intentional about making change in that light. Yeah, go ahead.

Dr. Lisa Miller (50:13)

Three legs to the stool, right. You need a practice. Prayer, meditation, church, synagogue, mosque. I don't care where you go or how you. But a practice to connect with your higher power to the transcendent. You need people, the second leg, people with whom you share spiritual life. So much of a public square these days is not about, I see God's lighting you. I'm so happy to see you. It's very Transactional. It's very. I'm going to buy this from you. I'm going to sell this to you. People barely connect. Half the time I will walk down the street and people don't lift their head up from their phone. Yeah. So that God's presence in you see the lighting you. I am so happy to see you. So your practice, your people, and the third leg of the stool is purpose. By which I mean ultimate purpose, which means figuring out what is the nature of life itself spiritually. But why am I here on this earth? Who am I spiritually? I don't mean am I gonna go into business or teach or be a EMT work? I mean spiritually, what has God called me for? And what is the nature of my walk? In this bigger sacred world, people practice purpose, spiritual purpose. And it doesn't matter what tradition or some people find it outside of tradition. But the stool is stable. You need all three legs. I can't tell you how many young people are looking for a one off. I'm going to go into the woods and do ayahuasca. I'm going to go on this one retreat. And that might be a momentary awakening for some people, an altered awakening. But that is not a fully integrated spiritual life. A fully integrated spiritual life is intentional and builds and God comes forward to us as we go forward to God. But the spiritual capacity, through the lens of science, the neural correlates, all that we've been talking about, the notion that when we build our spirituality, it's 80% protective against addiction. It is 82% protective against suicide. The epidemic of our time, we have the antidote. It's spiritual life when it's shared. Well, this spiritual life, like you say, John, is our birthright. But through the lens of science, it is only one third innate. It's built into us. It is 2/3 cultivated, environmentally cultivated. Our inner environment, how we talk to each other and our prayers and our outer environment, how we spend our time, how we treat people. Where our services, 1/3 innate, 2/3 environmentally formed, means spiritual life is a practice.

John R. Miles (52:54)

Well, I love that use of the stool because interestingly, when I was on this journey myself that I talked about of trying to close that chasm. I started to go talk to a career coach that happened to be a psych psychologist. And he had me go through a similar analogy. Said John, you're living on a stool right now that has one predominant support on it. And he said, it's the constant grind. You need to change your life so that you're living on A stool that has deeper roots in different areas of your life. He didn't use the same three that you gave, but he said that each of us have has to pick what that anchoring it is, but you have to have balance. And for me, it became my relationship health, my emotional health, my spiritual health, my physical health. I had to get all of that in balance if I wanted to perform at the best that I could, whether it was at work or with others around me. So I love that you shared that. And in my book I talk about it in the words of perseverance. Passion and intentionality were the three legs of the stool that I bring up in my own book. Which has some direct correlations to what you talked about as well.

Dr. Lisa Miller (54:18)

See, John, you've already been an active mystic and science only mirrors and applauds you.

John R. Miles (54:31)

Well, just trying to put my life practices into, into use to help others because there's no use for these stories to happen to you. And I find it interesting is the stories that we tend to want to tell the least are the ones that can help serve other people the most. But they're also the ones that are making us more most vulnerable because they're typically times that we found ourselves at our lowest points.

Dr. Lisa Miller (55:03)

Yes, and that is so important because we are actually built and science is very clear about this. In our times of despair, we have extraordinary potential to deepen our connection to God, to awaken spiritually, to deepen. The depth of our spiritual life can increase. So post traumatic spiritual growth. We talked about another is developmental depression. That suffering does not mean we're off our path or that we've stepped away from God. No, suffering is part of the spiritual path and in fact fact the same parts of the brain. You can hear my dog saying, it's important she knows what's true. The same parts of the brain that are involved in perceiving and receiving spiritual life in times of despair are also engaged. Okay, so depression can be a knock at the door to spiritual awakening. Depression can be a yearning. And basically, as we start to grow and seek and when things happen to us that we didn't expect, we are in a place not just of disappointment, but existential turmoil. Like what is my purpose and point and what is this life about and is it all worth it and do I matter? And the this bottom of the barrel is a knock at the door for hey, wait a minute. Everything I wanted, I didn't get. Everything I thought I was, I wasn't. What God am I really? And what do you want from Me, really? And am I really alone? Or wait a minute. As horrible as I feel, as awful as the dread can feel, I'm actually buoyant. God is holding me. The image of the footsteps on the sand that you shared so often, the majority of the time, depression is an awakening. It hurts, it's hard, it's real. But it's the start of a decade. Discovery of a spiritual answer, of a way forward. And this builds a way of living that is a stance of quest what we want to give our kids. It's hard to watch our kids go through this. We can't do it for them. We can't pull the strings like a marionette. But we can help our children. Okay, you're suffering. We can help those we love, our partners, our friends. You're suffering ourselves. Let's take that and into our prayer life or what we opened with today, John. Take that very problem to counsel and lay that problem at the feet of counsel. And say what? Those who truly have your best interest in mind, perhaps your ancestors, your higher power. What do you make of this? My prayer in the morning is, may I be of you, loving God. Be like the trees and the sun, be of you in my being. May I see you in one another, see you in the light, in the leaves. See you in this opportunity here now to serve or help. May I be you. May I see you, may I act in you. And that's the spiritual path that's there for all of us. You're certainly living it, John, yourself in this work. I have one more practice to share that might help people see through hard times as moments of opportunity and direction. Could we. Would you be open to sharing a practice? 90 seconds.

Passion Struck Host (58:20)

Sure.

John R. Miles (58:21)

We can conclude on. Can finish on this since we started with the practice at the beginning.

Dr. Lisa Miller (58:26)

Practice and practice. This is also in the language of life. And this is a gift of all of us. To use our awakened awareness to engage our birthright, our awakened brain. To see in our road of life, what is God showing me now? What is God asking of me now? So I invite you to close your eyes, take five breaths, open up your inner chamber. I invite you to locate a moment where you wanted something so badly and you did everything right to get that goal. You wanted that job, that internship, that home. You wanted him or her to say yes. That red door was yours. A plus B plus C. You may have researched it. And you went for your red door, doing everything right, grab the handle, but it stuck. And you can't believe the red door stuck because you've Done everything right. You might kick it. You might be shocked or despairing and angry or depressed. But in time, you have no choice. The red door stuck. You have to pivot 50, 60, 120 degrees and over there is a bright shining yellow door. You might have said yellow doors don't exist. You'd never heard of yellow doors. On the other side of the yellow door is someone who is more right for you, who made you feel alive. Is a job where your boss sees in you. Gifts beyond what you knew you even had. Is a community where you feel you belong. The yellow door was not what you had wanted. It was better and better for you, more right for you. And as you sit back now and you think of the stuck red door and the hairpin turn that took you to the wide open yellow door, was there anyone there at that hairpin turn pointing you along? Maybe someone showed up you'd never met before. Two minutes, two minutes at the bus station, at the diner. It could have been someone you know well who told you a story they'd never told you before. A trail angel pointing you to the bright shining open yellow door that has so much to do with who you are and where you are today. Now finally, as you sit way back, stuck red door, hairpin turn, trail angel, and wide open shining door that has so much to do with who you are and where you are today. How really are the most important parts of our lives found? Is it narrowly through control, planning? I mean, sure, we have to do our part, but are the most important parts of our lives found in a dialogue with life? Are we messengers and trail angels for one another? Are there yellow doors that we have yet to discover better than what we might have imagined? And finally, as you sit back and look at your road of life, where in your journey is God? Where's your higher power? Is God in the wide open yellow door and the duck red door, the openings and the impasses? Is God in the trail angel, the messenger and your ability to be an open heart in relationship with God. And when you're ready on your sacred journey, I invite you back.

John R. Miles (62:15)

Well, thank you for sharing that, Lisa.

Dr. Lisa Miller (62:19)

Extraordinary conversation, John. I'm so grateful. Did you have a journey on your road of life?

John R. Miles (62:25)

Well, I definitely had a journey that came to mind. It. I, for whatever reason, a red door for me has been public speaking. I used to do a lot of it and I feel this calling that I need to be on stages trying to reach people, to help them in the way that I've been called. But at Least from a public speaking standpoint. It's as if every avenue I go to, I just hit roadblock after roadblock. And I remember before I started talking, before I started this podcast, I had this idea for the book Passion Struck, and I was talking to all these agents, and I didn't have any literary agents who would represent me. I probably talked to 50 of them, and they all said, how do you know that anything that you have to say, anyone wants to hear, you need to go out and speak to people about it? And that door was completely closed. So I happened to listen to someone I've never actually met, but I had listened to a lot of his podcasts, Lewis Howes. And hearing his inspiration led me to start this whole idea of starting a podcast. And even though I haven't gotten on these big stages that I had in my mind's eye, we just passed this week, 50 million downloads, which means we've touched, you know, tens of millions of lives through the messages that we've shared through this alternate medium. And I'm not saying that the speaking door is permanently closed, but I was presented with a different avenue through an unlikely path that I just opened myself up for something different, something that was uncomfortable, but it was another medium that I could use to reach people and to try to help.

Dr. Lisa Miller (64:20)

50 million lives, 50 million hearts. That's a very big stage, John.

John R. Miles (64:27)

Well, and then moments of doubt. I think we all have moments that we don't feel like we're making a difference. We feel like we're just cotton quicksand and we're not doing enough. And there are oftentimes I feel that way. But then you get the remark of an audience member or someone who reaches out to you, who tells you how a message that you gave that day made a profound difference in their life. And you realize that it's not the masses you're serving. All that matters is trying to impact one person. And you're doing your job. You're making an impact so well. Lisa, it's been.

Dr. Lisa Miller (65:07)

Yeah. Within the awakened brain that the red door in our lives. My husband and I wanted to start a family. And the impasse was that nobody came, no children. And it was devastating. And people don't talk about infertility. And my husband was devastated. He was lying on the floor, depressed. Oh, I have the job I want. Oh, I have the house I want. You know what? My life's empty. Nothing matters. Our lives our hollow and meaningless, without children. And that was the beginning. That was the red door of our spiritual path to Finding our beautiful son on the other side of the world, to conceiving two girls and to having a spiritual journey where we realized that actually parenting is not about having my good looks. Parenting is about deep love and commitment. And that opened into a life that was a dialogue.

John R. Miles (65:57)

Yeah. It's interesting. My younger brother. I shouldn't say younger. He's my only brother, so happens to be younger than me, but. And his wife were told that they couldn't have kids because of a medical condition that she has. So they adopted two incredible kids from Haiti and then went on to have three kids of their own. So life gives you miracles all around you.

Dr. Lisa Miller (66:16)

All around. Five sacred miracles. Exactly. Exactly. And that's how we feel and know our beautiful family. God is miraculous. And the yellow door is so much better than anything we could have planned.

John R. Miles (66:30)

Well, Lisa, it's been such a honor to have you on the show today. For those who are listening, who want to learn more about you, I mean, you're a New York Times bestselling author, so they can go to both of your books, of course, but where's a central hub that you would point them to?

Dr. Lisa Miller (66:44)

Oh, thank you, John. I try to keep up on Instagram. It's just Dr. LisaMiller on Instagram. And I try to share interviews or new books, things that share in our community. People like yourself who are leaders of making, I call it spiritual activism, people of deep service.

John R. Miles (67:05)

Well, awesome. Well, thank you so much for joining today and for doing an episode like I've never done before, which was refreshing after not doing one for a few weeks.

Dr. Lisa Miller (67:15)

It was really a joy and very meaningful to connect with you and share this together. Thank you. It's an honor.

Passion Struck Host (67:21)

Wow. What an incredible conversation that was with Dr. Lisa Miller. Her groundbreaking insights on the neuroscience of spirituality are truly transformative from understanding the profound impact of spiritual health on our mental well being. Learning how to build a spiritual core that enhances resilience. Today's episode has been nothing short of eye opening. One of the key takeaways is that spirituality isn't just a belief system. It's a powerful tool for mental, emotional, and even physical health. So I want to leave you with this. What are you doing to nurture your spiritual health? Whether it's through meditation, time spent in nature, or even taking a moment to reflect, how can you incorporate more spiritual practices? Whether it's through meditation, time spent in nature, or even taking a moment to reflect, how can you incorporate more spiritual practices into your daily routine to build resilience, find deeper meaning. If today's episode resonated with you. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Please take a moment to leave us a five star rating and review. It helps us continue bringing these powerful conversations to you. And if you know someone who could benefit from Dr. Miller's message, please share this episode with them. A simple conversation can spark profound change. You can find links to everything we discussed today, including Dr. Miller's book the Awakened Brain and the show notes@passionstruck.com videos of this episode are also available on YouTube. Don't forget to check out our sponsors and deals. Passionstruck.com deals supporting those who help support the show helps us keep bringing you these impactful conversations. Before we close, I want to remind you that beyond hosting the podcast passionate about sharing these insights with organizations and teams through speaking engagements, today's conversation sparks something in you. Do you think my message can inspire your company? Head over to johnrmiles.com speaking to learn more. Let's work to create intentional change and ignite growth. Next week I'm excited to bring you a powerful discussion with Israel Nasir, mental health educator and therapist known for redefining the conversation around emotional wellbeing, toxic productivity. We'll explore what it means to reclaim your time, energy and mental health in a world that constantly demands more. Trust me, you won't want to miss it.

MasterCard Representative (69:14)

Some entrepreneurs will just chase the outcome. Oh, I just want to like exit at X million dollars or whatever. But there's no like alignment with value that happens at the micro level in our daily lives as well. We start creating these goals that are like not necessarily connected to our value system. They're not really even connected to our lifestyle. But we're just like okay, I have to do this. I need to do this. Other people are doing it. I'm gonna look bad if I don't do it. I'm gonna left behind if I don't do it.

Passion Struck Host (69:43)

And as always, the fee for the show is simple. You found value in today's episode. Share it with someone who could benefit from it. Remember, do your best to apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you listen. Till next time. Live life, Passion, Structure.

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Dr. Lisa Miller (70:32)

Ooh.

Home Depot Representative (70:34)

Find the perfect tree now at the Home Depot.

T-Mobile Representative (70:39)

To love and to cherish.

John R. Miles (70:41)

To love and to itch.

T-Mobile Representative (70:43)

I mean, cherish.

Dr. Lisa Miller (70:45)

Uh, sweetie?

T-Mobile Representative (70:47)

For as long as we both shall live.

Passion Struck Host (70:49)

For as long as we both shall itch. Sorry, Dave.

John R. Miles (70:53)

Come on.

T-Mobile Representative (70:54)

From this day forward.

John R. Miles (70:55)

Look, I'm sorry. I just can't do this.

Dr. Lisa Miller (70:57)

Itch. If you have eczema, Michael, you know.

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