Self-Awareness – Page 2 – The Blog of Nishant Garg

Dr. Gail Brenner — Be Empty of the Exhausting Story of “Me”, The End of Self-Help, Conscious Life and Embodied Living, Suffering Is Optional, Healing from Early Trauma, and More (#189)

“Suffering is optional“
Dr. Gail

Dr. Gail Brenner, Ph.D. is a psychologist, author, speaker, and lover of truth with a fire that burns brightly. She is an expert in healing from early trauma and brings years of experience with individuals and groups. Her work lovingly illuminates our everyday humanness with the deepest spiritual truths, and she is known for creating the safe space needed for inner exploration.

Gail has special expertise working with older adults and their families in the transitions of aging, death, and dying. She was an assistant clinical professor at the University of California San Francisco where she trained physicians and maintained a clinical practice. She has published numerous professional articles on coping with stress and chronic medical illness and is the author of the award-winning The End of Self-Help and Suffering Is Optional. She loves healthy living and exploring different cultures through international volunteering.

She received her B.A. from Carnegie-Mellon University and her Ph.D. from Temple University. She completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Florida and a clinical internship at the Veteran’s Administration Hospital in Palo Alto, CA. She has special expertise working with older adults and their families, bringing clear seeing and compassion to the transitions of aging, death, and dying. As a member of the clinical faculty at the University of California, San Francisco, she helped physicians develop communication skills and learn to address psychosocial issues with their patients. She has authored numerous published articles on coping with stress and chronic medical illness. And she has consulted with staff of assisted living and skilled nursing facilities about aging, dementia, and caregiving and given presentations to the community at large on these topics.

Check online 5-session course with Gail Brenner, Deep Trauma Healing: Finding Ease and Well-Being in Everyday Life

Please enjoy!

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The Top 30 Episodes of The Nishant Garg Show from 2021

Thank you to all of you to make The Nishant Garg Show successful and take it to the next level. It would not have been possible without your support. I hope this mission will help you live mindfully and learn new habits and routines to live with abundance and manage the struggles and challenges of life.

The Nishant Garg Show has listened in to 32 countries based on Spotify statistics.

Here is a list of the Top 30 episodes downloaded/listened to in the decreasing order of the downloads in 4-5 weeks of publishing an episode. Each episode is unique and dear to me. I owe a huge thank you to all the listeners and guests on the show.

Please enjoy!

#1: Denise Shull — The Role of Emotions in Decision Making, Resolving Mental Blocks, Performance Coach to Professional Athletes, Understanding the Feelings, Experiencing Peak Performance, and More ( Episode #169)

#2: Sarah Sarkis on Mastery, Psychological flexibility, Emotional Skills and Self-Regulation Practices, Relationship with Risk, Sense of Wellness, and More (Episode #153)

#3: Loch Kelly on Awakening, The Way of Effortless Mindfulness, Creating Spaciousness, Meeting with Anthony de Mello, and More (Episode #146)

#4: Jeremy Hunter on The Quality of Life and Attention, Meaningful and Engaged Life, Why Moments Matter, Japan Bathing Culture, and More (Episode #152)

#5: Ruchika Sikri — Head of Well-being Learning Strategy at Google (Episode #133)

#6: Debbie Millman on Deep Relationships, Creativity and Growth, Importance of Therapy, Hope and Resilience, and More (Episode #154)

#7: Ariel Garten — Co-founder of Muse: The Brain Sensing Headband, Meditation Practice, Kill Your Inner Critic, and Much More (Episode #136)

#8: Ora Nadrich — Transformational Thinking, Dream Work, Questioning your Thoughts, Cultivating Calm State, Life Gazing Practice, and More (Episode #158)

#9: Dr. Dan Tomasulo — Learned Hopefulness, Science of Happiness and Hope, Cherishing Relationships, The Craft of Storytelling Writing, and Much More (Episode #131)

#10: Dr. Maria Sirois — Overcoming Victim Mentality, Happiness in the Darkest Times, Finding Meaning in the Suffering, Lessons Learned from the Hospice Facility, and More (Episode #129)

#11: Dr. Ronald Siegel — Full Catastrophe Living, Escape vs Engagement, Restoring Moments of Sanity, Healthy Romantic Relationships (Episode #132)

#12: Marisa Porges, Head of The Baldwin School — The Power of Connection, Military Veteran, Building Adaptability and Courage, The Habit of Obsessive Note-Taking, and More (Episode #151)

#13: Kelly Boys — The Blind Spot Effect, From Autopilot to a Life of Insights, Developing Intelligence, Stepping out of Lifelong Patterns, and More (Episode #126)

#14: Raj Sisodia on Wholeness, Healing and Spiritual Journey, Mind Maps for Writing, Ayahuasca Experience, Feminine and Masculine Energy, Conscious Capitalism, and More (Episode #159)

#15: Della Duncan on Right Livelihood, Relationship with Money, Reducing Suffering, Sexual Violence Prevention, Buddhist Economics, 5Rhythms Dance, Finding Moments of Happiness, and More (Episode #160)

#16: Terri Lonowski — The Maven of Soulful (Episode #156)

#17: Jordan Harbinger — The Maker of The Jordan Harbinger Show and The Larry King of Podcasting (Episode #145)

#18: Dr. Susan LaCombe — Coping with Trauma, Emotionally Available Therapist, Somatic Models, Connection of Trauma with Nervous System, and Much More (Episode #135)

#19: Hunter Clarke-Fields on Raising Good Humans, Healing Childhood Trauma, Mindful Parenting, Doing the Inner Work, Expect Humanity and More (Episode #161)

#20: Cindy Vuu — Meeting with Dalai Lama, Foundation of Happiness, Living a Good Life, Interdependence and Impermanence, and More (Episode #155)

#21: Bryan Robinson on Work Addiction Recovery, Internal Family Systems(IFS) Therapy, Helping Recover Alanis Morissette, Why Relationships Fail, Doing Nothing, and More (Episode #165)

#22: Maureen Healy — How to Build Resilience in Children, Emotionally Healthy Child, Emotional Self-Regulation, and More (Episode #157)

#23: Dr. Romie Mushtaq — Optimizing Brain Health, Cure for Busy Brain, Restore Sanity, Sleep, & Sense of Connection, Wellness Paradigms, Connection with Divine, Root causes of Depression, and More (Episode #165)

#24: Nina Paul — Calming Anxiety and Distress,, Emotional Resilience Work, Emotional Freedom Tapping(EFT) technique, Therapy and Healing Modalities, and More (Episode #166)

#25: Michael Ostrolenk – The Emergent Human, Exploring Optimized Mind, Body, Health, Embodied Spirituality, Transcend Limits (Episode #141)

#26: Wendy Quan on The Calm Monkey, Beating Cancer, Taking a Leap of Faith, and Much More (Episode #137)

#27: Dr. Jacinta M. Jiménez — ‘The Burnout Fix: Overcome Overwhelm, Beat Busy, and Sustain Success’, Science-backed steps to address Burnout and increase Resilience, and More (Episode #168)

#28: Judi Miller — Healing Inherited Trauma from Ancestors, Forgiveness Recipe, Past Life Connections, 90 seconds rule, Reflections to Open Your Heart, and Much More (Episode #128)

#29: Daphne Rose Kingma — Finding True Love, Coming Apart, Why Relationships End, Living Through Crisis, and More (Episode #150)

#30: This place has ties between the two below episodes as they’ve got the exact same # of downloads.

Scott Shute, Head of Mindfulness and Compassion Programs at LinkedIn on Full Body Yes, Changing Work from the Inside Out, Creativity, and More (Episode #147)

Kristi Roe — Lessons learned from 9/11, Creating Shared Meaning, Building Organizational Resilience, Handling Difficult Conversations, and Cultivating a Greater Sense of Purpose (Episode #130)

Please enjoy. Thank you so much for all your support. Your support drives me to do the work. This belongs to you all.

The Nishant Garg Show:

This show is about extracting information on Mindfulness, Personal Development, and Spirituality. I am on a mission to spread Mindfulness and I’d love for you to join me in this movement. For any questions, please contact me. If you have enjoyed listening to my podcasts, please subscribe to the new podcast updates on Itunes please provide your reviews on Itunes which will really help me.

Allison Jackson Interviews Nishant Garg — My Personal Story, Self Care Non-Negotiable, Letting Go, and More (#178)

Usually, I interview experts on The Nishant Garg Show, but this time, tables were turned. In this episode, my friend Allison Jackson interviews me about how I go to Where I am, my superpower, my recent favorite books and etc etc. Allison Jackson is the founder of Allison Jackson Fitness. She is passionate about all things health and fitness, but she really loves sharing her knowledge and expertise to help corporate moms get lean eating foods they love so they can be at their best. Allison has spent the last seven years training and competing in figure competitions – even winning three pro cards in one year – so she has a crystal clear picture of what it takes to get to your ideal weight and stay there.

I interviewed Allison in 2020 and you can find that interview Allison Jackson – The 3-Legged Wellness Stool: Nutrition, Movement & Spirituality

Please enjoy!

Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, or on your favorite platform.

Ora Nadrich — A life Unexamined is Not Worth Living

This post is a selected excerpt from my interview with Ora Nadrich. I read the whole transcript and highlighted the important sections that I personally want to read and revisit. For my own convenience, I decided to put the highlighted sections in this post so that you can also learn something new or remind yourself of the things you already know.

Check out her new book Mindfulness and Mysticism: Connecting Present Moment Awareness with the Higher States of Consciousness.

You can find the full details about the interview Ora Nadrich — Questioning your Thoughts, Transformational Thinking, Cultivating Calm and Relaxed State, Mindfulness in Motion, Dream Work, Live True, and More. Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or on your favorite platform

Let’s begin:

Dream Interpretation Work:

Upon awakening, I try and retrieve a dream. I’ve done a lot of dreamwork over the years. I love to dream catch. I love to not hurry out of bed but to try and remember the journey that I took in a dream state, which is your unconscious. And, I love to spend some time in bed doing that. I never jump out of bed quickly, or I do a bit of meditation in the morning — a breathing meditation, and it’s really more of a meditation of gratitude. I really acknowledge that I’m one more day alive and connected to the breath. So it’s a mindfulness-awareness meditation upon awakening.

My dream work has been very extensive and there’s something called dream interpretation or dream amplification. And really what I encourage people to do with the work that I do, which is in the area of mindfulness, which is the practice of being aware. And I say, take a couple of minutes just to see if you can retrieve a dream because it might have a very special message for you that your unconscious presented to you in a dream state and and it can be really very illuminating

Cultivating a calm state of being:

I think each of us has our own true nature which is the essence or perhaps what can also be called one’s Buddha-nature. It’s just really maybe who we are and I think that if we accept who we are and we allow for our true essence to come forward, we can discover that it is probably much calmer than when we are engaged in life. French philosopher, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, which says we are spiritual beings having a human experience. And it’s our human experiences that really sometimes take us out of those calm states.

Karen R. Koenig — The Psychology of Dysregulated Eating, Steps Towards Ending Emotional Eating, The Rules of Normal Eating, Improving Relationship with Food, and More (#177)

We are not addicted to food, we are habituated.

Karen R. Koenig, LCSW, M.Ed., is a licensed psychotherapist, motivational speaker, and international author who has specialized in the field of compulsive, emotional, and restrictive eating for more than 30 years. She received a B.A. from Boston University, an M.Ed. from Antioch College, and an M.S.W. from Simmons College School of Social Work. She lives, teaches, and practices in Sarasota, Florida.

She is a co-founder of the Greater Boston Collaborative for Body Image and Eating Disorders and a former member of the Professional Advisory Committee of the Multi-service Eating Disorder Association of Massachusetts.
During the past three decades, she has taught and made presentations to venues such as the adult education centers of Sarasota, Florida and Boston and Brookline, Massachusetts, Manatee Memorial Hospital, University of South Florida School of Social Work, National Organization for Women, Center for Disordered Eating, Bayside Center for Behavioral Health, Boston Women Communicators, Women on the Scene, American Business Women’s Association, Florida Writer’s Association, Minnesota’s Breast Cancer Awareness Association, and Lake Austin Spa.

She has conducted professional trainings for the Multi-service Eating Disorder Association, the National Association of Social Workers, the Massachusetts Dietetic Association, the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology, T.W.I.C.E. Educational Seminars, Simmons College School of Social Work and Feeding Ourselves.

Among other publications, her essays and articles have appeared in Social Work Today, Social Work Focus, The Newsletter for the Society for Family Therapy and Research, Positive Change, Attitudes Magazine, The Boston Globe, The Boston Herald, The Sarasota Herald-Tribune, The West Roxbury Transcript, Equal Times, and Single Living. She has been quoted in The Wall Street Journal, Ladies’ Home Journal, AARP Online, Women’s Health, Shape, Self, Berner Zeitung, and OK magazines. Among three of her books, there are 10 foreign-language translations.

Please enjoy!

Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, or on your favorite platform.

Connect with Karen: Website | LinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook

New Book: Words to Eat By: Using the Power of Self-talk to Transform Your Relationship with Food and Your Body

Mo Edjlali — Inner state of being, Mindful Leadership and Contemplative Practices, Uncovering Unconscious Beliefs, Processing Grief and Sad Emotions, and More (#176)

Mo Edjlali is the Chief Community Organizer of Mindful Leader, our mission is to enable people to foster the advancement of mindfulness and compassion in the workplace. He has served as a board member or advisor to multiple non-profits including Insight Meditation Community of Washington DC, Insight on the Inside, Minds Incorporated, Think Impact, Art for Humanity, and Hungry for Music.

Mo is a serial entrepreneur and has over 20 years of experience in management, technology, and marketing for start-ups, non-profits, F500 companies, and government agencies. He graduated with a B.S. in Computer Engineering from Virginia Tech. In his free time, he likes to go on toddler safe adventures, sometimes he takes his toddler, baby girl, and wife along too.

Please enjoy!

Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, or on your favorite platform.

Connect with Mo: Website | LinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook

Sean Sessel — Seven Layers of Reality or Seven Planes of Existence

I’ve known Sean for about 6 months and I’m impressed by his vast amount of knowledge in multiple dimensions. We both are part of a collective where we get to hang out with really amazing people to discuss all the facets of life. This collective is led by Dr. Mickra Hamilton and I’m grateful to interview her on the podcast. Listen to the interview.

While at a weekend retreat sitting on the couch, he was explaining “Seven layers of reality” to a mutual friend Sidney. I was sitting next to Sean and I said – wait, and asked him “how about you write a blog post on this fascinating subject” and I’ll share it with a wide audience. As you know, I only place content on this platform that I enjoy and learn from. This piece from Sean is remarkable and it might take you several reads to understand it. If you’ve questions, I will get those answered as well. I’m still learning this model and I couldn’t wait to publish it.

Before we do a deep dive, let’s see who Sean is:

Sean Sessel is the head of The Oculus Institute and a voracious learner with a fervent belief in the ability of the individual to better himself or herself. Through the Awaken program (which shows people how to escape burnout jobs and craft careers that truly inspire them), Sean has found a means of enduring impact. Many thousands have been inspired by the introductory presentation, and Sean has personally worked with over a thousand different people on solving the problems discussed therein, including entrepreneurs, Fortune 500 executives, and professional athletes. His career advice has also been cited in numerous media outlets, including Business Insider and AskMen.

Before The Oculus Institute, Sean was Director of Quantitative Research and Co-Portfolio Manager at Tectonic Advisors, a Registered Investment Adviser with over $1 billion in assets under advisement. Prior to that, he worked as an Associate at Boston Consulting Group, where he specialized in consumer survey analysis and organizational structures. Sean received his B.S. in Bioengineering from Rice University. Throughout this time, he has also been involved as a founder, equity hire, or board member in 12 different startups and 2 different nonprofit organizations.

His hobbies include traveling, games of calculation (including chess, backgammon, various card games, etc.), CrossFit, mixology, and Muay Thai.

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: LSD and Psychedelics are illegal in many countries, and even possession can carry severe criminal penalties. None of this post constitutes medical advice or should be construed as a recommendation to use psychedelics. There are serious legal, psychological, and physical risks. Psychedelics are not for everyone—they can exacerbate certain emotional problems, and there have been, in very rare cases, fatalities.

Erica Keswin—Rituals Roadmap: The Human Way to Transform Everyday Routines Into Workplace Magic, Working with Executives and Leaders, Grounding Practices, and More (#171)

“Good things happen when people connect”. Purpose has to be actualized in every day to day work.“

Erica Keswin is a workplace strategist who has worked for the past twenty years with some of the most iconic brands in the world as a consultant, speaker, author, and professional dot-connector. Her bestselling book, Bring Your Human to Work: Ten Sure-Fire Ways to Design a Workplace That’s Good for People, Great for Business, and Just Might Change the World, was published by McGraw-Hill in the fall of 2018. Her second book, Rituals Roadmap: The Human Way to Transform Everyday Routines Into Workplace Magic (McGraw-Hill), was published in January 2021 and made the Wall Street Journal, Publishers Weekly and USA Today best seller lists.

Erica’s work and insights can be seen in various media outlets, including Harvard Business Review, NY Post, Forbes, Huffington Post, O Magazine, Entrepreneur, Business Insider, Mogul, Conscious Company, Quartz, and Fast Company.

Recent keynotes, workshops, and webinars (virtual and IRL) include the American Red Cross, SXSW, TIAA, IBM, New York Times, HighTower Associates, AllianceBernstein, Standard Industries, Banfield Pet Hospital, and Radio Flyer. Erica was named one of Marshall Goldsmith’s Top 100 Coaches in 2020, as well as one of Business Insider’s most innovative coaches of 2020.

Please enjoy!

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