Nate Klemp 0:02
Hey, Renee, how you doing? Thanks for having me on.
Renee Benes 2:27
Yeah. Thanks for being on. I'm excited to dive in today. I know, the work that you're doing is really something I've kind of been doing myself. So I do want to kind of give an intro to my listeners and let them know who you are, what you do and how you got here. Yeah,
Unknown Speaker 2:48
well, it's been a journey. Like you, we've definitely had my my journey to getting here. The Nate short story is, I used to be a political philosophy professor. So I got a PhD, decided I was gonna learn how to live the good life and ask the big questions in philosophy. And it turns out, my life actually got far worse rather than better through that process. And so about 15 years ago, I left that career, and got really interested in what I would call practices or technologies of the mind, like learning about things like mindfulness, and meditation, and yoga, and all these different tools we have for actually changing the inner landscape of the mind. So that's what I've been up to, for the last 15 or so years is mostly writing, about mindfulness and about how we manage our minds in this increasingly chaotic and crazy world. And most recently, I have a book coming out in February called open living with an expansive mind and a distracted world, which is really all about how can we shift from our ordinary response of closing down checking out, being addicted to our screens, being addicted to political outrage, and instead turn toward life and open up a little bit more?
Renee Benes 4:10
Wow, yeah, that sounds very necessary, very needed these days. And that's something I talk a lot about, you know, just like, I talk a lot about how I used to struggle with shopping addiction. And that was just my quick turn to was just a quick fix to kind of tune out from all of the stuff that I was, you know, kind of running, I didn't want to sit and face any of the internal thoughts or any of the internal problems. Is that kind of what your book is about, or? Yeah,
Speaker 1 4:39
I think that at their core, well, shopping addiction is really similar to something like screen addiction, they're both behavioral addictions. So they're not about a substance. It's more about a behavior. So similar to gambling or some of these other things that that can easily hook us. And I think what I find really interesting about all of these addictions is that are compulsions. There's usually like an underlying emotional experience that we're having, that we don't want to face, or experience or be with. And so an easy way out for all of us is to go on Instagram or to like, go on Amazon and start buying a bunch of stuff you don't need or any number of strategies, but but at their core, I think that's one of the really fascinating things is like this, this behavior of closing to discomfort. And so one way that I love to explore of, like, how we start to uproot some of these addictions or compulsions is, well, what if we were to move toward those uncomfortable feelings or mind states or thoughts? And just be with them? And see what happens then? Because maybe then there's nowhere we need to go? Like, maybe that's all we need to do. That's that's kind of what I've been exploring and interested in for quite a while now.
Renee Benes 6:02
I love that because I think I've always kind of gravitated that way myself, like, maybe not always, obviously, there's been times weren't, I wasn't great at it. But I kind of felt like, well, if I better understand where these thoughts are coming from, then I can clear through them, then I can work through this. But I know so many friends and family are like, Nope, I'm good to just run the opposite direction. Yeah. So I guess my thought, or my question for you is like, how do you find the words to encourage people to start embracing those, you know, more negative feelings or the things they don't want to think about? How says how do you even start mindfulness? If it's something you're kind of afraid of being in your mind? Yeah,
Speaker 1 6:47
I think it's a really interesting, complicated question. One thing I think a lot about is, there's this concept of the pain, pleasure balance. So it turns out that our brains are constantly trying to balance the experience of pain and pleasure. So too much pleasure leads to pain, sometimes, sometimes pain can lead to pleasure, like you go on a really hard run, that's painful, but it can lead to pleasure. So what's what's really interesting about our predicament is that for many of us, there's this shortcut, we have to pleasure, maybe that's shopping, or maybe that's going on Facebook, or maybe that's reading the news. But it's like a really easy way to get to pleasure. And if we keep, like writing that loop again, and again, and again, the pleasure starts to go away. And it's replaced by pain at a certain point, which I'm sure you you know, from your own issues with shopping, I know this from my issues with screens that I've been dealing with or, or exploring that, that, you know, you ride that pleasure train far enough, and it pretty quickly starts to turn into something quite painful. So So there's something interesting, then I think about, well, what if we were to experience some of these moments of discomfort more intentionally. It's not pleasurable, in the in the moment, but it can lead to a much more pleasurable expansive experience of life. But but that's what I think makes this so complicated, the on ramp isn't as easy or as fun or as like, pleasurable. So it's harder to kind of get that project off the ground of being a little bit more mindful, and that sort of thing. Yeah,
Renee Benes 8:37
you're so right. And that makes so much sense. You know, like you said, it's like I do I remember getting to that point, where I had just come home, and I had spent too much again, and it was like I'm not happy at all, like it didn't work this time. Right. You know, it was like the stop it stopped giving the payoff. And to speak to your, you know, you're talking about screen time. I was just talking about this not too long ago that I for real remember a time scrolling on Facebook, and I like, threw my phone out of my hand because I could feel my like, levels of like joy. Like I just was feeling worse and worse with every single scroll that it's like, it's an addictive thing. You just can't stop.
Speaker 1 9:14
Right. Well, I was curious, Rene for you. Because shopping addiction sounds like it was a big thing in your past. What what was like the key turning point for you, when you were able to just sort of like shut down that habit and create an alternative route in your in your mind and your brain and your life.
Renee Benes 9:34
And that's why it's so different from everyone else out here because I talk a lot on minimalism and decluttering because it kind of went hand in hand. But it was actually thanks to probably people like you like mindfulness books, I started reading. I accidentally found like the Self Help section of the library. And it was talking about, you know, the bigger things we can do with our lives and what we're capable of and I just had this overwhelming feeling thing like I had just been filling my life with stuff that really wasn't filling me up. Like it wasn't working, like you said, you know that it wasn't bringing me pleasure anymore. I just kind of felt stuck and icky. And I just knew it wasn't working. So I thought, Well, maybe if I get rid of some of my stuff, and I just stopped, I went cold turkey shopping, like I just was like, I don't, it's not working. It's not working, I need to figure out what does. And I figured I'd rather try to figure out a different route, then just stay stuck where I was, because I knew that for sure wasn't leading me anywhere.
Speaker 1 10:32
Yeah, I love that story. Well, and it's so amazing that you were able to see that, but then have the will and the discipline to stay with that commitment. It's really cool.
Renee Benes 10:44
Right? And that's I, I know, a lot of people don't, you know, have that same kind of my you know, it's one of those things that was just like in my mind. So, I guess, you know, for people who have the resistance or don't have the clique, what do you what do you do?
Speaker 1 11:04
Well, I have experimented with something really kind of radical here that I might not recommend for shopping addiction, actually, I definitely wouldn't recommend it for shopping addiction. But for screen addiction, it was really interesting. And that is, you know, for anybody who's experienced this, there's this, like shaming that happens internally, and all of this resistance and all of these control strategies of like, I'm gonna try to limit my screen time and but now I'm on Instagram, and I feel bad about myself. And so there's a lot of like pushing away of the object of desire or craving. So one of the things I did for my most recent book is I thought to myself, well, what would happen if we flip this strategy on its head, and it for three days, I just continuously binge on screens. So it's kind of like, you know, the old school parenting thing where you catch your kids smoking, and you haven't smoked the whole pack or like three packs. And then they never smoke again, because it's just so disgusting at a certain point. So I wanted to see if I could do that with my screens. And the reason I wouldn't advocate this for shopping, is that you spend every last cent through major problems, Do this, don't do this with shopping it but with screens. What was really interesting is, I mean, first of all, it destroyed my sleep. I woke up every morning at 250. Just like, boom, up like I had had a shot of espresso. I had all sorts of like headaches and weird things from just like watching my screens all the time. But the most interesting thing is I got to the end of this experiment, I woke up the day after. And usually when I wake up, that's the time where I go grab my phone and go to the bathroom like most of us these days. But the morning after this experiment, that desire just like wasn't there. It just disappeared. And I realized that the reason we're so addicted to screens and distraction is they give us this experience of novelty. You know, like you check your text messages, and there's a new one or your email, there's a new one, or like the news feed or social media, there's something new. And by going all the way for days at a time with my phone, I realized I had destroyed its superpower. It could No, like I saw everything there was to see. So so that was kind of an interesting moment where I realized, Okay, well, that's an interesting alternative strategy that we could use. But also, it helped me understand the nature of these cravings themselves that the in many ways what we're looking for is just like something new. And I think that's probably do you think that's true of shopping addiction that there's it's like, I want this new thing. And then you get it and you're like, oh, that's just a shirt? And then you want the new shirt? Or like the new dress or whatever. Like is that how it works with shopping? Oh,
Renee Benes 13:57
totally. And then it's just you're not. It's all it's never ending. It's always something, you know, you think it's gonna be like the end all be all. I talk a lot about how I did it with home decor, like, Oh, I just need these three things. And then I'm going to feel so happy and content with my space, it's gonna be perfect. But then I'd get those three things and like, you know, what would really be a blank it would be nice, too. And then I like one more thing, it was just never ending. And that gets so exhausting. Like, I think I burnt myself out like you did, like I got to the point where it was too much. You know?
Speaker 1 14:29
Well, have you heard about these studies in psychology about the hedonic treadmill. So basically, they they did all this research on people who won the lottery, you know, and like so these are people who didn't have much money, they won $10 million $20 million. So all of a sudden, they're rich, and their happiness level goes way up for like three months. And then after six months, it goes right back to exactly the way it was before. And and what's I mean, that's an extreme case, but I think it's a great representation of a lot of what happens to us in life that, you know, we just have this idea that like, Oh, if I could just get this house or like this car, or if I could afford that really fancy outfit, or whatever it is, then I'll be happy, we get the thing. We're happy for maybe two weeks, three weeks, a month, maybe a couple months. And then we totally habituate to that new state. And our desires expand, and there's some new thing. So So I think that recognition is so essential for us just to be like, wait a minute, this is not making me happy.
Renee Benes 15:38
Right. And that's what I kind of think. You know, they talk about like, I just read the, because Matthew Perry, the actor passed away last, right. And my mom gave me his book. And so I read his book. And he talks a lot on that, where he very openly about wanting the next thing wanting that fame. He craved fame, he craved the stuff and he just was never satisfied. Like, it worked for a while, obviously, like riding the friends high, when you're super famous, and everything's going great. But then there's just that crash. And I think I got to that point where I was, like, I need to find something that's actually going to, you know, going to be long term satisfying, I'm going to actually be happy. Like, I feel like more internal goals, like emotional goals, you know, goals for my soul, my spirit, my mind, that kind of thing, versus the stuff I can have, or the things I can buy.
Speaker 1 16:32
I would say that it's about the stuff we have. I love that point. But it's also about there's this craving, I think that's that's emerged for an experience of pleasure or happiness. And I see this a lot in just kind of like the well being, culture of Instagram and social media and podcasts, right? There's all this stuff about, like, being happy, and living a more optimized life. And, you know, like having better focus and all these different things. And I think to a certain degree, we're also experiencing this treadmill, in the in the realm of wellness culture, as well, where it's just like, many of us have this baked in desire to achieve, you know, higher level of fitness, or mental fitness or focus. And it never really arrives, is what I found, you know, I've been chasing after this Mirage for years and years doing yoga and meditation and all these different things. And they're amazing practices. But when I'm doing it from that, that place of striving of like, Oh, I'm gonna get to this state where I wake up every day, and I feel amazing. And yeah, I've got like, pleasure just radiating through my body. It's like a mildly orgasmic experience of life every day, then I will have made it. And I'm starting to get to the point where I realized like, I don't think that's true. I don't think anybody experiences that. And I think we ought to just give up on that goal. And just realize life can be hard sometimes, you know, that's fine.
Renee Benes 18:07
Yeah, no, that's hilarious. Because it's so funny. I feel like every time i i Like I love being able to get new guests on, because so often, I feel like you're speaking to everything that's currently going through my mind. You don't I mean, it's just perfect. I've been saying that for probably the last few years, I just, I just need to stop trying, I just need to stop trying. When I give up. Things work so much better. But truly, because I did that probably right along when I started decluttering and stop shopping, I saw what you're saying where I was meditating all the time. And but I always ask if I talk to someone in the wellness space, you know, do you feel like sometimes it's just one more thing we add to like our to do list, like, oh, and I'm going to meditate, and I'm going to focus and I'm going to be so great, and I'm gonna do my yoga, but it's just adding to the stress of like one more thing we have to do. And one more thing we're gonna do. And one more thing, we're going to be great at one more thing we're going to accomplish, when maybe the whole goal is to Yeah, just kind of
Speaker 1 19:07
let it all go. I think letting go is, to me, the most profound practice, but also, it's the one I understand the least, because I don't really even think there is anything to understand, you know, unlike these practices that are based on we're going to start at point A and go to point B, and you're in control and you're going to do it through your discipline and your will. Those all make sense to me, but but a practice like letting go is so paradoxical. I mean, this idea that, that we're just totally okay. You know, right now we're having this conversation. Everything is fine. And we don't need anything more than this. Like this is this is good. I mean, it just, it doesn't even make sense to me at a certain point. But, but I've also I think we've all had this experience of trying to control something in our life. And then whatever we might do to control it, maybe we take the supplements or we like, do the practices or work really hard on on getting rid of it in some way, and it never goes away. For me, like I have Chronic tinnitus in my left ear, I've had it for 15 years. And I spent, like over a decade, just like trying to get rid of it, you know, like, I gotta just, like, get that, if I do yoga, if I meditate hard enough, I'm gonna get rid of this thing. And it never went away. And I started to realize that this ringing in my ear was actually like, my most profound spiritual teacher in a way. Because I got to a certain point. And that's actually what led me to write my most recent book, I got to a certain point where I realized this is never going away. And so I can either fight against this thing, or I can just allow it to be as it is, and see if I can become friends with it, as it is. And that that was one of those moments in my life where it just felt like, wow, that's a that's such a more skillful strategy, and so much easier to just like, allow it to be, versus fighting against it, spending all this money trying to get rid of it. So yeah, I agree with you. 100%, about the power of just letting go.
Renee Benes 21:23
Oh, totally. I love that. Because you're so right, that it's something I think we we've fight against so much. Yeah, rather than just embracing it, you know, I, I think there are times, you know, maybe where we do have to take action. Like if I'm sick and throwing up, I'm probably not gonna like whatever. I'm gonna, you know, but finding that balance has been such a tough thing. And even though the concept of like letting go sounds so great, and so easy. It's not easy. It's really quite difficult.
Speaker 1 21:53
Yeah, I think you're right. I mean, so there's a trap. I like to say there's a trap to every idea or practice. And the trap to letting go, is this idea of like, well, now, I'm just not going to do anything. I'm just gonna like Lego and see what happens. I'm like, stop making money and see how long it takes for me to get evicted or kicked out of my house or the bank is going to foreclose me or whatever, that that's a trap. And I don't think anybody wants to go there. So I think it's kind of like finding that balance where, yeah, there are moments where you get to the edge of what you can control and letting go is super powerful. And there are a lot of moments where, hey, my, my daughter needs to be picked up at 320. This afternoon. I'm going to control my day and my schedule such that I can be there. Like, like that is not skillful for me to be like, You know what, we'll just, I'm just gonna, like go, I'm sure she'll find a way home. There's probably some other parent there who she can like, talk to, and she'll find her way home. So I'm gonna let go on that one.
Renee Benes 23:00
So that's a fair, that's a parenting strategy.
Speaker 1 23:03
Yeah, I don't think that's that's not the kind of parent I want to be. But But yeah, so I think it's like this weird, paradoxical dance where, yes, we want to be in control sometimes. But then we also want to see when we've reached the limit of what we can control. You know, like, I'm not very good at controlling the flow of, of geopolitical events and who our next president is going to be, you know, there's certain things I could do potentially, but like, that's one where I probably need to let go a little bit.
Renee Benes 23:31
Right. That's, I think, the control where you can and kind of let go, but you can't so I guess when you were working. What do you call your ear? What? Oh,
Unknown Speaker 23:44
tinnitus, just ringing in the ear. Okay,
Renee Benes 23:46
so I think maybe it's a Minnesota thing, because I have a few friends and a family, a few friends or family friends who have that thing to call tinnitus? No,
Speaker 1 23:55
no, actually, a lot of people. They're both correct. Okay. Okay. From what I've gathered through. Yeah. All right. I
Renee Benes 24:02
just had to specify, like, maybe it's just started Minnesota way of seeing the soda. Right. But, you know, did you what took it? What was it for you? Where you got to that point where? Because it's good to maybe see like, what you can't control if there's ways you can maybe mild it or make it less awful. But how do you get to that point where like this, I'm just fighting too hard. I'm trying too hard to stop. You know, yeah. Was there like a turning point for you? Yeah,
Speaker 1 24:31
I can tell you exactly. I was lying on the floor of a hotel room in Rawlins, Wyoming. My wife was sick, she had bronchitis. My daughter was like, why are we doing a road trip? We were driving across the country. And for whatever reason, maybe it was the noise in the car, I don't know. But it was the the loudest and the most destabilizing experience of that hearing that I had ever had to that point. And not only that, It had come on the heels of a month or two before me being like, you know what I'm going to figure this out, me just being like, I'm going to, I'm going to put my time and energy toward this, I'm going to see a new doctor, I'm gonna do this. But, uh, so I was doing all these things, and it was actually getting worse. And that was kind of the breaking point. And the way it relates to my most recent project around opening is I really got to the point there where I felt just despair, I guess the best way to describe it hopeless. But in that moment, I thought to myself, well, what if I were to just open to this sound, and allow it to be. And I just started playing with that experience. And it's not that I was able to stay in that state forever. I was, you know, maybe it was 10 minutes or 15 minutes. And, and then I went back to my old habits, but, but I saw something there that that like, the resistance changed the amount of suffering I was experiencing changed. And so that really led me on this journey of thinking, well, how can we open up more to those kinds of moments? And it's a tricky question, because like, that, there aren't obvious answers to that question in our culture. So so really, I started exploring just different experiences and experiments and different different ways to kind of open to things that are uncomfortable or chaotic or crazy, or, you know, make us close down and withdraw.
Renee Benes 26:35
Yeah, I'm curious, some of the things that you found because, like, I know exactly what you're talking about, I can think of so many examples in my life, where I felt like the right thing to do was like, I'm gonna go all in, I'm going to go hard. I'm going to, you know, give this my Yeah, give it my all do my best. Put every ounce of effort I have toward this thing, because I think we get that message a lot that that's what works. And everything would just work way, way worse. So what are the things that you found that kind of go against that? Yeah,
Speaker 1 27:11
well, so I, I've been exploring a number of different practices. One is what I call opening to the enemy, which is more of a political practice. Because I think a lot of the ways in which we're closing now, it's, it's both to our own minds, but to other people who don't believe what we believe. And so, as a boulder, left leaning gun control advocate, I got my concealed carry permit with the NRA. And I spent a day in rural Colorado, shooting guns, learning about guns. And it was amazing, like the so that was like, its own little amazing thing, realizing the there is no enemy here. I also spent about two years exploring psychedelic assisted therapy. As a I mean, this is just one of the more interesting new approaches to opening the mind, especially around things like trauma. So I had experienced flight anxiety for about 20 years, when I would get on an airplane, I'd feel pretty significant fear and, and so this was another interesting experience or experiment for me was going into these states where I had a therapist who's guiding me, and I was able to just completely re experience this traumatic event. And, and really, that was another one of these experiences that just completely opened up the space that I was feeling in my mind. And then one other one, just to mention these, and we can, we can drill into any of these if you want. But I'm really fascinated by this idea of, of taking meditation out of these kind of protected serene settings, you know, we think about like, go to the mountain retreat center, or like, put on your noise cancelling headphones. But I find it really fascinating to just kind of like bring meditation to the chaos of the world. So one of the things I did was I spent a day doing a meditation retreat at my local Costco. I just like, meditated on the outdoor furniture, chairs and in the pharmacy department and like walked through the aisles while I was doing walking meditation, and went to my local er waiting room did the same thing that was a place that usually freaks me out. But again, it was like this really cool experience of realizing that these places that are stressful or chaotic, or even terrifying. Like there's a way to sort of open ourselves more up to those experiences. So I'll stop there. But that's kind of just a little swath of what I was exploring here.
Renee Benes 29:49
No, I love that. Are these all in your new book? Yes, because I would love to in depth go and see what you uncovered. And I love that So I have like a bajillion questions now, of course, because I so interested in all of those, but I think I kind of understand what you mean about the Costco or the ER place. I feel like it's a habit that I've or like a practice I've worked on unintentionally, just, yeah, it kind of call my nervous system where it's just like, working to breathe my way through. And I can feel feel the internal shift in my body happen in like maybe potential high anxiety cases where I work to keep my calm. And I largely did that for my children. It was like, I need to be the calm for everyone, you know, that kind of thing? Yeah. But explain to me what walking meditation looks like. Because I think that goes against what any of us probably imagine, we think of like the meditation pose, how do you kind of practice it as you're just going through Costco? Yeah,
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