Rhonda: So I hear like, Darya, you had a very unique and interesting
experience, like, very recently.
Darya: Yes.
I just came from a 10-day silent meditation retreat
at Spirit Rock up in Marin.
Rhonda: Ten-day silent retreat.
That's, like, super crazy intense, like, can you explain?
Darya: So, to clarify, so no talking like I feel like it's a bit of a misnomer.
Because it's like, yes, it was silent, but like that wasn't the hardest part.
Like, it was, I mean, I was meditating, just sitting
meditation over seven hours a day.
And then also like probably six hours of walking meditation plus instruction,
you know, there was time off for meals.
I had a little bit of time to exercise.
But, you know, it's a vegetarian diet.
You know, you actually couldn't even really...you weren't supposed
to make eye contact with anyone.
Rhonda: Was there like...when you're sitting and meditating for seven
hours a day, was there, like, light?
Was it dark?
Was it...
Darya: Well we start at 6 in the morning when it was very dark.
But usually there was a meditation hall where we would all gather and,
you know, you sit on your cushion.
And it was never a stretch of more than...it was usually either 30-minute
stretch or 45-minute stretch and then we'd switch to walking meditation or switch
to a guided meditation or something.
But, yeah, it was...
Rhonda: Okay.
Kevin: I did not go on this.
Darya: ...intense.
Rhonda: Yeah.
That sounds like super...
Kevin: It sounded way too intense for me.
Rhonda: So, what was it like?
Were there like, were you totally, you know, introspective and
just sort of analyzing your own behavior and stuff like that?
Darya: Yeah, yeah.
So, I mean, I wish I could say the whole time that I was sitting there
and just like having epiphanies.
But like, it was...
I think the best analogy I've heard is it's kind of like
getting a deep tissue massage.
Like, it starts out you're like, "This is gonna be great."
And then you're like, "Oh, my God, oh, my God, this sucks, this sucks, this sucks.
How can I keep doing this?
It hurts."
But then you're like, "Oh, no, no, that's good, that's good, that's good."
And then so, it's like a mixture of like awesome and torture.
And then by the end you're like, "That was something else," but like I'm really
glad I did it because now I feel amazing."
But it was not easy, not easy.
No.
Kevin: Well the crazy thing is you didn't do a ton of meditation
prior to going into this.
Darya: Zero, pretty much.
I mean, I did a little bit.
Rhonda: What?
So, from 0 to 10 days, like silence meditating.
Darya: Yeah.
Anybody who's ever tried to meditate, like meditating for 10 minutes is really hard.
So, yeah, I'm kind of crazy, but I was working with the founder of
Spirit Rock, Jack Kornfield, and a friend of mine, Adam Gazzaley who's
a scientist at UC, San Francisco.
And we're sort of piloting an app to train meditation.
And I was one of the beta testers.
So, like my whole experience of meditation started there and...but I didn't
know any, I mean, this was a Buddhist like, Vipassana meditation retreat.
So, I like...
They were saying words I had no idea what they're talking about.
And I had to like, you do actually get to meet with the teacher every couple
days, and in one of my first meetings I was like, "What does dharma mean?"
Like, "What is enlightenment?
Is that real?"
So, yeah, I have a lot to learn.
Rhonda: So, you're working with a neuroscientist there and were
they like measuring brain activity and things like that when you
were meditating or was that...
Darya: They're working on things like that.
The first part was just behavioral.
So, they were basically trying to train our attention to just focus on the breath
and just to see if that's possible.
So, I was part of that study and they're continuing on that.
Kevin: But that wasn't part of this 10-day.
Darya: No, that was just my introduction to meditation.
Rhonda: Okay.
I see.
Yeah.
Meditation is something that I've been talking about a lot recently.
Mostly, because I'm very interested in...
You may know Elizabeth Blackburn, she works a lot with Elissa Epel, I think
I'm saying her name right, at UCSF.
And they do a lot of work looking at the effects of buffering the negative
effects of stress with meditation, you know, they measure telomere
length as a biomarker of aging.
So, they'll like, you know, they'll look at the effects of meditation,
stress, and things like that.
So, I've become sort of, you know, interested in buffering some of the
negative effects of stress because, you know, I do experience chronic stress.
Kevin: Have you tried any apps like Headspace or any of the others?
Rhonda: I downloaded Headspace at the recommendation of Tim.
Kevin: Headspace is awesome.
Rhonda: But I have yet to use it.
You see, because I'm always making excuses because I have so much to do.
Kevin: So, it starts off with 10 days, 10 minutes a day.
It's their 10-day challenge.
Rhonda: Okay.
Kevin: And it's really easy to do.
It's all guided.
So, they walk you through from the get-go.
I found it was a great way to get started for the first time.
Rhonda: Yeah.
I've made one step, I downloaded the app.
So, I know it's there on my phone.
I just need to start doing it.
I did yoga this morning and so, I think that yoga, you know, sometimes...
And I was having a conversation with another doctor that I had met.
He's a professor emeritus.
I met him in Amsterdam when I was trip traveling recently and, you
know, he talked about meditation.
It's something that he's been getting into recently in his emeritus, you
know, years, whatever you wanna call it.
You know, he's been talking about how it changes gene expression,
like 100 different genes change when you start to meditate.
And you probably might know more about this.
But he was mentioning like immediate changes in blood flow to the brain, brain
activity just like immediately, not to mention the long-term benefits that occur.
And so, but then he went on to say, you know, meditation, a lot of people
make a big thing about it, like what you experience is like that's work.
I mean, that's, you know, real...you have to dedicate, you have to really
practice, you know, doing something.
But he was talking about meditation in the sense of just taking some time
and being now, here, right here, like looking at whatever some nice tree
outside of your window, listening to some music, not thinking about what you're
planning an hour from now or what you did last night, but just being here now.
And so, not everyone has to like sit there and om or whatever, you know?
Not everyone has to sit there and focus on their breathing.
Maybe focusing on your breathing helps if you have a wandering mind which I do.
So, I think I probably would have to focus on my breathing.
But...
Kevin: Yeah.
There's like...
Sorry.
Darya: I was gonna say, there's definitely a lot of styles of meditation and a lot of
them are eyes open, focusing on something you're looking at or an active...
I mean, there's even like movement-based meditations.
Like, we did some Qigong practice while we were there.
Rhonda: What's that?
Darya: It's kinda like Tai Chi, but it was very much like, it was
like full body breathing, you know?
So, you focus on your breath, but it's also your entire body,
you're embodying meditation.
So that was really fascinating.
Rhonda: So, someone like coaching you and telling you what to do while you're doing?
Darya: Yeah.
Rhonda: Okay.
So, there is some like...you're having...
It's not pure silence like forever.
Darya: It's not pure silence.
Rhonda: But...
Okay
Darya: Right.
Yeah.
Rhonda: And so, like, when you're doing some of these techniques,
were you experiencing any sort of feelings of happiness or calm or...
Darya: Yeah.
So, there was a couple like big takeaways.
I think my first big question when I got there, I was like...
So I had tremendous benefits from meditating just after using
the app, I meditate like 20 to 30 minutes a day, 3 days a week.
Totally helps with my insomnia, really helps me focus at like work stuff.
You know, I'm much better at not switching between e-mail,
Twitter, Facebook, blah-blah-blah.
And like, that has helped dramatically.
And while I'm there I'm just like, "Dude, we've been meditating for 11 hours."
Like, "Why do I need to do two more hours?
Can I just like, go to my room and read?"
And they're like, "No."
And the reason was because when you're in retreat it's not the
same as meditating at home.
When you're in retreat it actually...
So, I would say it took three to four days before I really felt like
I wasn't completely at the mercy of my compulsions to like check e-mail,
check Twitter, check those things.
It takes that long to relax.
And so, the first day sitting in the hall, everybody was like, you know,
we'd be like, "Okay, quiet time."
And people, you could hear them wrestling, and sniffling,
and coughing, and adjusting.
By the last day, you could hear a pin drop in that room of 100 people
because we'd all actually chilled out.
Rhonda: Wow.
Darya: Yeah.
Rhonda: I know that when I'm standing in line to get some tea
I'm like, "I can't just stand here.
I gotta pull out my phone and do something," you know?
So, that's...
So, do use Headspace also with Darya?
Kevin: Yeah.
I use Headspace a lot.
I just started using it more...
I go in waves.
I think all of us we get busy and get caught up with life, and then
all of a sudden you're like, "Wow, I haven't meditated in a month."
So, I just started getting back into it.
There's a great book called "The Miracle of Mindfulness" that
I recommend and it talks about applying meditation to everyday life.
And have it being just outside of sitting, but actually doing other things.
One of the things it mentions in there is washing the dishes for
the sake of washing the dishes.
And the whole practice is about the fact that when most people are washing the
dishes, they're thinking about e-mail, they're thinking about a thousand other
things they should be doing and they're not actually focused on the task at hand.
And this is about meditating while you scrub, and really being like
mindful about what you're doing.
Darya: You should definitely do more of the dishwashing meditation.
Kevin: Yeah.
Exactly.
I wash a lot of dishes, by the way.
I do most of the dishes for the record.
Rhonda: Well, talking about being mindful while you're washing dishes, I was
reading Darya, like one of your posts.
You were talking about being mindful while you're eating.
Kevin: Yeah.
That's hard for me, that's the hardest one for me.
Rhonda: And I found that very interesting.
Do you wanna talk a little bit about that?
Darya: Yeah, yeah.
I think actually, so my whole thing is I'm really interested in, I mean,
we're sort of in the same subject like, nutrition, neuroscience, and health.
But one of the things I've come up against over, and over, and over
again in my work is that a lot of people want to do this stuff.
But it's practicing it, it's doing it, that's the hard part.
And so, I've really gotten into psychology and behavior change in terms
of like getting people to eat healthy.
And mindfulness came out to be like a huge one.
Because so many people don't think before they eat.
They don't think about what they're eating, they don't appreciate what's
in their mouths while they're eating so they don't know when they'll stop eating,
they don't make the best decisions.
And practicing mindfulness in day-to-day eating practices is
actually tremendously effective.
Because what happens, what the science shows is that you enjoy your food more