On this episode I speak to Major Pat Burgess who has been deployed on operations to Northern Ireland, the invasion of Iraq (and subsequent tours) and a further three tours of Afghanistan. This is perhaps at a juxtaposition with what he has trained in and now advocates to thousands of military personnel – mindfulness. Listen to find out more.
Pat’s interest in Mental Health, Resilience and more specifically Mindfulness started in 2009, whilst on operations in Afghanistan. He completed an Open University degree in Psychology after noticing the lack of a ‘therapeutic relationship’ between soldiers returning from operations and their counsellors. He ran weekly online Mindfulness sessions throughout the COVID-19 period and continues to do so. Currently he is leading the implementation of Physical Attention Training (PAT), an innovative approach to bringing Mindfulness based coping strategies into the existing culture of physical training.
More about Major Burgess
Major Burgess was brought up in Wells, Somerset, joined the Army in September 1992 and started his career at The Second Royal Tank Regiment in Fallingbostel, Germany. He served with the regiment in Germany, Northern Ireland, Canada, Poland, Iraq and Afghanistan in a career that saw him from Trooper, through Tank Commander to Regimental Sergeant Major. He was recently promoted to Major as Officer Commanding the Combat CIS School.
He was awarded an MBE in the 2020 New Year's Honours List in recognition of his tireless work in bringing mindfulness to Defence and has more recently been awarded an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Science (DSc) by Glasgow and Caledonian University. He is a member of the Defence Mindfulness Steering Group and his course content and delivery are endorsed by the Counselling and Psychotherapy Central Awarding Body (CPCAB).
For more on Major Burgess go to his website www.oneworldmindfulness.co.uk
For more from me go to www.fionamurden.com
Fiona
So, I am really excited to speak to Pat Burgess today. Pat, you've got such an interesting background and something that I think people will find fascinating from a lay perspective, but also fascinating from how they can apply some of the insights and learnings that you've had with your work to everyday life as well. So, Pat, tell us who you are.
Pat
I know some really big questions. You're probably more interested in why I am in this case then. So, I am major part Burgess MD, bizarrely, and Doctor of Science, honorary Doctor of Science and Glasgow and Caledonia University. I mean, those words coming out of my mouth, are really alien to me of many of a few years ago, but yeah, so I'm a serving officer in the in the Royal Tank Regiment, in the army. And I've been through the ranks from private soldier, so Trooper through to regimental Sergeant Major. And now I am the Officer Commanding this combat Communication School. Amazing. So, so good. Your military career is great. The reason that you're speaking to me is because what I do is a secondary role. So, I took it upon myself to teach mindfulness to defence because it's a very important skill that is lacking, I believe, in our in our ability to make us the best human beings that we can be.
Fiona
And, and that's the bit that I think the bit that can get overused, I'm not saying you're overusing it, I use it, but it's because it's used so much in the public domain of being the best version of ourselves, reaching our potential, all those things people lose, it loses the substance, and the depth that someone with your experience brings to it. So those words, to me don't actually completely give the colour of what you're talking about, because there's so much more to it. And there are a lot of people out there now who could be this itself. And
Pat,
That's a concept though. So that would be my best self that you're talking about it is it is a psychological construct. It's just like, I'm going to be something other than what I am. Well, that's not what mindfulness is about. Mindfulness is about being the real us. It's about, it's about not creating false roles or creating new roles to fit into which aren't actually it's about turning inwards and, and being the real you. And I think that's where the confusion takes place. I mean, most people will look at mindfulness and say, right, where does it fit like to say I was in a clinical setting, because it helps people with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder helps people with depression, it helps deal with anxiety. And that's not why I apply in defence I employ in defence because it keeps fit soldiers fit. It keeps us at our optimum, our best performing level for all of the complexities and the the improved psychological, physical health, the improved performance, the improved output, the improved focus, the improved attention, and all of the other wonderful things that we're all looking for in little bite sized chunks can be achieved by by one approach. And so that's why I say the best version of yourself. It's not a it's not, it's not a creation. It's you.
Fiona
I love that I love that description. And if you if we wind back the clock a bit then so you're saying that you came to mindfulness more than 10 years ago. So mindfulness has obviously gained a lot of a lot of airtime in the public, which I think personally, I think, in some ways is fantastic, because it's raised awareness of it as a tool, but in some ways, again, it can lead to people misunderstanding what it's about and oversimplifying it or, or not recognising the depth of what it can bring. So, tell us about how you came across mindfulness as it were.
Pat
Yeah, okay. Sure. So, so I'm sort of spare you the really early stuff from when I was about so when I was 18. Before I joined the army, I hastened to add, when I was a little bit of a tearaway and and attempted to try every kind of substance known to man to try and remove myself from what I thought was really difficult. Well, not in terms of, you know, taking drugs, drinking alcohol. of solvent abuse, all that kind of did all that before I joined the Army, and had a little bit of an epiphany, people would say it was an awakening on using, like psychedelics at one stage anyhow. So that was where I went to start with and then moved swiftly away from that, and came back into what would be considered normal society, and realised that I needed to do a role, a job, and all of those things that were acceptable to normal. I was always a little bit anti-establishment when I was younger, believe it or not, you can you can see me sat around a uniform. And so So I joined the army went up through the ranks, and I was on a really punchy operational tour in Afghanistan. And we were a small subunit of Squadron, Egypt squadron. And we were involved in some pretty kinetic activity, and we lost three of our members. And we had about 20% life changing casualties across the Squadron which was only 130 odd people. So a big, big impact on the squadron. So we came back from that tour and and I noticed that not only the physical injuries, but the psychological scars, people were suffering. And so people will go into the Department of Community Mental Health, to speak to counsellors to try and help them with the psychological difficulties, but they couldn't establish a therapeutic relationship because the counsellors had no understanding of the experiences themselves. So I decided I decided it was I that's what I needed to do. So I didn't do Gregorian psychology in the Open University with a view to becoming a counsellor. Well, I've been reading a book by Eckhart Tolle The Power of Now, alongside all of this. And when I turned, I was turned a page of my psychology textbook, and I found this thing called mindfulness. And I was when I was reading, I thought, that's exactly what Tolle's talking about, but just in a slightly different framework. And I thought, okay, so there's, there's an understandable recognisable thing that says what he's talking about. So I finished my degree, did a diploma in mindfulness and then we went to Oxford and did the eight week NBCT course mindfulness based cognitive therapy course. And I saw a framework at Oxford, I thought, there's a framework that I can incorporate. So, I pursued then the the purpose of trying to create a mindfulness course, to teach in defence. So I was going around and delivering talks, I mean, I've reached over 10,000 service personnel so far, and teaching talks around defence of a mindfulness and about what it really is, you know, remove the trappings, there's no robes, there's no tie dye, and all that stuff, you know, just as it is, is a really accessible tool. And then I decided to create my own courses. So I created my own online course to start. I taught it to a boxing team, actually, to the, to my regimental boxing team first, which was really successful. Then I then I decided to create my own courses, I did an online course physical course. And that's kind of grown. And I'm now teaching people to teach mindfulness in defence and still running courses as well, no matter who they are in defence contractor, be the civil service, be they serving personnel, or they can just get on these courses might teach them over teams, and it's we're just sort of building stuff up.
Fiona
I love the fact that you you not only took it, but then you took it and translated it to an audience that needed it, but in a way that could resonate and actually land with them. Which, obviously, if you don't get through the door, with with something like that, you're not going to help anyone. So that's
Pat
Also great fun, honestly, you'd love to be on one of my talks, because like, you get like an auditorium with about 500 soldiers in it from like, private, up to left and Colonel Brigadier. And they see mindfulness come up on the screen, and there's always like, and then and I use that, you know, I normally start my talks, I just go out onto the stage without any introduction, get down into a meditative posture, like a lotus position, and I meditate in front of them. And I can feel like the physical resistance coming at me. It's amazing those - I use it, I harness, it's awesome. I can feel it all coming towards me, and I get up off the floor, and I throw a few explosives on. And then I add, you know, and then I sort of challenged them to understand what it is that I was doing and what they think mindfulness is, and then I tell them what it really is. And I use humour and I use stories and jokes and stuff, and I get them all involved in it. And by the end of the talk, they're all meditating.
Fiona
Amazing. Would love to come to one of your talks. But for listeners if they don't happen to come to one of your talks, tell us how you describe mindfulness.
Pat
That's a good question. Yeah. Okay. So there's there's the standard Jon Kabat Zinn fantastic. You know, definition paying attention to the present moment. And on purpose non judgmentally. Fabulous. But I can just bypass people, you know, paying attention people like, Yeah, I'm doing that now. They, you know, most of you aren't to the present moment, like, when's that? Now, okay, but nobody spends hardly any time in the night, they spend nearly all the time in their imagination, and paying no attention to the physical moment that they're in. Because they're creating that future based on the past. You know, on purpose is a biggie in that as well. It's a by, there's effort required in mindfulness, what you're doing is bringing yourself into the present moment, there's a really misunderstanding that mindfulness is about going into a meditative posture, and drifting off into some dream world, some light day dreamy bliss day, where everything's cool, man is amazing. And then you come back from it into the real world, it's the opposite. You actually come into the real world out of your dream world is a bit matrix like, and you come into the actual present moment without the labels and the judgments. And you see what's really there. And it's, it's absolutely astonishing, when you see what's really there, because you've missed it, because you've put labels on all of it and decided what life looks like. But, but it ain't that. And when you come back into that moment, and look at it, through the present moment, awareness is stunning. And that's the non judgement that, you know, these labels, these judgments that we constantly place on things to try to protect ourselves from this amazing, this sort of perceived fearful world that we live in. It's amazing, because once you realise that there's nothing to fear that you've created all that for yourself. And then you can step back behind the labels and the judgments, then my gosh, what a what a gift. What an incredible experience.
Fiona
And there's a lot of a lot of research about the impact it has on the brain and how it strengthens the connection between prefrontal cortex and the limbic systems of the brain. And, and it is massively misunderstood. A lot of the time, I think I was talking to, I don't know, if you've come across Russ Harris, he's, he's a world leader in something known as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, which is a very successful therapy, which incorporates mindfulness. But his first book, which is called the Happiness Trap, he didn't actually refer to it as mindfulness, because people misunderstood it. And so he introduced the concepts and the ways of using it without actually using the word and I think quite, quite far on in the book, and in a later edition, he's changed that. But even now, with the the use of the word in the public domain, I don't think people really understand what it means. And you know, something else Russ said is people talk about colouring as learning. Mindfulness is not you know, colourings relaxation. But it's not mindfulness. Mindfulness is it is a skill, and it does take effort. It takes effort to learn how to do it. And I mean, I talk from personal experience, I've had the headspace app for years. And I do think that Andy Puddicombe does a great job of not only coaching you through a mindfulness session, but actually teaching you a bit about it as well. But I find that if I'm disciplined enough to do a little bit every day, for maybe a couple of weeks, when I wake up in the middle of the night, I find it easy to get back to sleep. Because you're in the rhythm you're trained, to be able to unhook from thoughts and emotions and to take that non judgmental standpoint. But it's not something a that we're taught, when we're young, be that society supports in the West, or see that our brain actually supports. So it's effortful, isn't it is
Pat
effortful, and it because it goes against however many hundreds of 1000s of years of conditioned thinking that we've that we've got as a as an organism as a species, because because like you say, all of those, you know, all that stuff, that's all the cellular memory that sits around in our body kind of drives us towards this way that we behave and the way that we treat things as a threat and we move we always operate from the fear base, which is which is really powerful. So very powerful emotion and it's so fast. When it comes in it really is really difficult to intervene between it and your action. You know that lovely space. I think it's Frankel wasn't it? Who said about the space between stimulus and reaction? So finding that bit, and this is where I think it's so so important and there is a huge misunderstanding about what mindfulness is and can do I sympathise with the guy sorry, I don't know him who are I didn't know his work, who didn't use mindfulness I resisted, or every attempt to take it out of what I was doing. So everyone was saying, you need to change it. No one's going to accept mindfulness, we need to call it something else. We came up with things like fitness, integrated resilience, skills, training, you know, and, and all these things that didn't have mindfulness into titled and make it sound punchy and make it sound, you know, so people would go, Yeah, I'm doing this because it's making me a stronger person, right kind of stuff. And I was like, we're actually missing the point. We're really missing the point. Because there's this lovely phrase that she was called, like the wise warrior. And, and wisdom is so important and knowing when to employ the skills of a warrior, knowing when to employ compassion, knowing all of those things of where they fit, rather than creating this persona of aggression is so so critical to us as human beings. And we all I don't think there's anybody that doesn't realise at the moment that there's a little bit of a crisis going on with the species. And that is troubled inside and is trying to work out what it is that they're troubled for. They know what they're doing isn't the right thing. They know that they're not moving along the right path, or they're not quite sure what the path should look like. And there's very few people out there guiding people to the right path or to work to their own path, the path that they should really be on. And the only way that people will ever find that it's not externally buying new cars, getting new job getting new, this getting you that fabulous, looks lovely on the outside, it's so fleeting, it stays with you, you know, a new card for the first six months looks great when people look at it with new covers, and then suddenly, it's just a car on it. So I need another new car then because that one's rubbish, because now it's just, you know, I must need the next one, the next one, all that's fleeting, inside isn't free.
Fiona
And that also reminds me of other work by Frankel or comments that Frankel made Viktor Frankl about a hedonistic reward being being short term and shallow. But something that fits with mindfulness and takes you beyond that is the compassion for other people. So we know that process reality, connection with other people is immensely powerful for our well being or happiness or fulfilment. And mindfulness, although we say it's looking in which it is, it is also about that compassion towards the world around us.
Pat
Yeah, of course. I mean, this is timely, either email yesterday, someone talking about the research about the whole pro social thing, and I hope that, you know, it's, you know, it shows that you're, there's more damage done to your health, by having poor relationships, you know, friendships and stuff that is shallow than by drinking loads of alcohol and smoking loads of cigarettes, you know, physically damaged your body, you know, and that shouldn't really come as a surprise to us. And the comment that came with it was, it seems that the where mindfulness helps us is it makes us more compassionate towards other people more aware of other people more aware. And then people want to turn to us to speak to us because we come from a much calmer centre. But I would also argue that the turning inwards is more important. And the reason I say that is, is that no, you can't love anybody until you love yourself, right? So because it because all you're doing is creating stuff outside you. So if you know who you are inside and accept you for what you are, suddenly you're able to accept everything because you're not comparing anymore. There's no requirement for comparisons, there's no requirement for all of those other things that you need to do with other people to make yourself feel valued, and to make them feel valued. And suddenly when that space is open, then people want to speak, people want to be more open, and that's where compassion flows. I,
Fiona
I mean, I agree, I would say it's quite a high expectation to have is to say, I have to love myself before I love anyone else, for example, because we, again, will naturally not love ourselves, we will be self critical, partly because of the way we've been brought up culturally but partly because of the systems in the brain. So
Pat
there's beautiful there's a beauty sorry, interrupt this beautiful story about a king and a queen, who are sort of meditators than a passive meditators, and I'm sure you are, if you're your listeners, but they they're really advanced the person the meditators, and they sit down on the cushion and meditate and then the king says that those in the days where the king is somebody disagree with you just chop off those kinds of days, right so So the king finishes his meditation and goes and speaks to the Queen says to the Queen. He said I was had a very interesting experience on the cushion and he said, I'm not allowed to ask this question. He said, Who do you love? And the Queen sort of looks at me, she goes is interested. So because that was what I was focusing on, she said in my meditation today as well. And she said, and I realised that behind all of it, or the person that I really love is myself, because what I want other people to do is meet my needs. So so when I say when, you know, if I, the reason that I most of us like people is because they fit into our model of what leads to they provide things for us to make us feel better about ourselves. So often, I mean, it doesn't make love shallow, it's not shut out, because because the whole feeling the experience, the emotion is beyond that. But we do spend a lot of time only being attracted and helped and working with people and loving people until they stop fulfilling our needs. And the minute they stop from filling our needs. We don't love them anymore. Well, that's not love. And that was just getting somebody to do stuff for us to make us feel better about ourselves. So really, the only person we cared about that moment in time was us. That's what you that's what I mean. So so it's important to really accept you for who you are, know, all those flaws that are within you, as a human being know that you've got all these things going on, but just still accept that, then you can accept anything and others.
Fiona
So something else I find really fascinating from a more clinical perspective of psychology would be the, we're seeing more and more that words. And this, this fits with mindfulness as well. But that cognitive behavioural therapy, or worse miss the experience of trauma. So when someone has experienced trauma, whether that's a child, or whether it's in the sort of situations that you've seen, or any other situation where someone might have experienced as in a car crash, or it gets incorporated at an emotional level, not a cognitive level. And so there can be a level of hate or dislike or disrespect, that it's so ingrained in a way of being that it's quite hard to find that awareness of that's what I need to do differently. I'm not being kind to myself, or I'm not caring about myself.
Pat
That's where the, that's where, like the Vedic system, like the yogic system would be really useful to apply or to consider, isn't it the whole energy, that with the body, so all those things, you know, hate is hate, or news, whenever we're feeling resistance. As a as a, you know, whenever we go tight, whenever our fists clenched, wherever we do, what we're doing is we're resisting something, we may not be aware on the surface level on the cognitive level, that that's what we're doing. But we're actually stopping things moving through us. And when we cling to those things, so you'll be aware of the whole idea of clinging and aversion. And, you know, craving when we, when we cling to stuff that comes through when we cling to stuff was trying to repress stuff or trying to push stuff down, it just gets stronger and stronger and stronger within us. But what it does, it actually blocks us and stops the energy moving through us. And it just like creates blocks in our, in our system. That's what that that can then stop it coming out properly, cognitively. For this for us to be able to really understand the feelings that we're feeling. Because what we do is we go back into our past, because that's already a reference point. And we create, like, sort of ideas and memories around why we're feeling the way that we're feeling. And then we project them and decide that that's why we're experiencing what we're experiencing, rather than just letting the feeling emotion through us and accepting that it's part of us. That's where like contemplative practice can be really, really helpful. And I know that sounds pretty out there. You know, I mean, you're, again, you're looking at a guy in a military uniform and thinking, What is he talking about? And possibly, I don't know. But what it does is it stops that stops that flow, and it stops the covenant, that cognition working correctly, and then we could we put like lids on stuff. And it makes it really, really difficult to open those boxes again, once we've decided on entrenched positions and push them down.
Fiona
So a question for you. Do you live what you're talking about? So do you love yourself completely? And do you look to others with no judgement?
Pat
Oh, so I'm aware of judgement. So you have to, okay, you have to embody the practice. Otherwise, there's no point in teaching this. You don't embody what you're teaching. And then you're not teaching it. You're sort of teaching a consumerized version of it, which is lovely, but it takes but it takes years to really in trench yourself, I'm not going to I'm not doing a political answer. Don't worry, I will get to it. Yes, I do love myself, with all my faults with all my foibles with all the stuff that stored in me as memory, not any of my own memory, that memory of the race, all those things that are within me, that make that that can push me to act a certain way. But the difference is that you don't have to do that. You can and actually sit back even though it's a very powerful emotion, even though it's a very powerful thought, even though it's a very powerful drive to do something, there is a space between you and it that you can find by intense practice. And what that will enable you to do is to go into the wonderful privilege that we forget, we've got choice. Because we can choose, you know, we can choose what world we live in, by what we create that our own minds by, you know, if we wake up in the morning, it's raining outside, you decide it's going to be a miserable day, guess what, it's gonna be a pretty miserable day. But because the rain is just the rain, it's got no mood, it's got no intentions, it's got no nothing. You know, the sun isn't beautiful, glorious, are wonderful, the sun just shines. Go to Australia during bushfire season, tell me if the sun is beautiful, glorious or wonderful. We we create the labels and the judgments and all the things we do and that that narrows us as a person, if you know that, and you're aware of how you create that, and you're able to notice when you start creating those thoughts and experiencing those feelings and emotions, you can just let them through and experience them and accept that you're that and then you can accept it and others. Because you know, they're coming from the same point as you did about
Fiona
what I've done through my career. So I've profiled senior leaders in depth for our psychological profiles go through the history from when they're children up to where they are today. And then say it's two people who've been narrowed down for a chief exec role. And I would say that, if you hire this person, this is where our strengths lie. This is where they might get tripped up. This is where they need more support. This is where their values align with the values of the team and the organisation. This is what difficulties could arise, these are the risks. But to do that, to do that initial profiling took many months of watching and observing other people doing it and training. And part of that was removing myself from the judgement. So we have to go into those sessions as much of a blank sheet as we can. And then we observe our own interpretation, and even interpret what that interpretation means. So for example, if someone was to make me feel uncomfortable, under confident, I then think, what's happening here? Why is that person making me feel like that? Is it something that's coming from me? Or is it something that's coming from a situation that they've created? And then you explore new hypothesise, and you keep doing, people often say to me, Fiona, do you do this when you're in the pub? And I'll say no. Why? Because it's hard work. So I I'm not disagreeing, I totally agree with everything you're saying. But I do think there's this piece of, it's not easy to do. It's like you can be trained, you can practice it. I've practised it for more than 20 years in that sense. But I'll still go in and make judgments on people and then have to correct myself and think hang on a minute, Fiona, you're making a judgement on someone, you don't know them yet. Because the natural default position that our brain will go into is to initially make that judgement. It's hard work. It's like doing maths all the time, because we are actually, with mindfulness, you're using the prefrontal cortex. So your is your thing, that area of your brain
Pat
Sees why you say that, I'm sorry, I keep cutting across you told me to tell me this is your podcast, not mine. What I was what I was saying, is that you and what you're what you're describing, or the way that you're describing it, it's like it's, you know, it's a skill, it's a has to be done like this, it must be done like that, I look at this, I look at that. And of course, that's taking more cognitive energy, because what you're doing is analysing naturally occurring phenomenon within yourself, your whole behaviour and all the rest of it. And then you'll put in another layer of work on top of that, to try and work out what you're doing why you do it. And then you're saying, Why am I reacting like this, by the way that why are they reacting like that, like, the psychosocial profiling or what you're doing? And that's, of course, that's a really useful skill, because it enables you to write all that down and do all that. But what I'm talking about is not that what I'm talking about is not it's not an effort. It isn't you, you just you just are you, it's I don't know how to explain it in a better way than just you know, just being yourself not. And you know, noticing the labels and the judgments when they come up, don't then analyse them. Why did that come up? Well, I don't know why I felt like that. It's acceptance.
Fiona
If I come back to Andy Puddicombe, again, I am a fan of Andy Polycom. My publisher has told me off the only writing about his his app in my first book, I had to then put some other ones in. So Andy Peterkin. And he's not the only one I'm well aware, but we'll talk about the clouds and the thoughts being like clouds. And actually that's a perfect distinction because I'm looking at the clouds thing. What's the cloud telling me? Is it a dark cloud? Is it? Is it a cumulus Nimbus? Or whatever it is? What's the wind doing? You know? Whereas what Andy, a new would suggest is you say, oh, there's a cloud, and then you let the cloud go, you don't then think, what type of cloud? Is it? Oh, what's that telling me, You're just saying there's a cloud. And it's this all the other expression I've heard, which I find personally useful is it's like touching a glass with a feather. And so it's not putting that huge effort into making it go away a thought, or trying to work out where it's come from, or where it's going, or what it means or anything like that. It's saying, Oh, interesting. There's a thought
Pat
you can if you want, you don't have to do that with anything you can if you want, you know, if there's a thought there that you want to explore, go and explore it. So that you know, it doesn't stop you doing that it doesn't stop you planning, it doesn't stop you creating, it doesn't stop you imagining it doesn't stop all of those other things. But what it does is it makes you more in control of those things, because you direct your mind, which is the tool, rather than being directed by your mind, which is where most people are, most people are just moving from pillar to post, through being thrown around by emotion and judgement and stuff and have no idea you know, and just feel all at sea. Whereas this gives you the opportunity to watch that occur. And then to go well, that's an interesting thought, I'm going to go and pursue that. And because you can do it with single what I think was the principle of Zen do one thing at a time, you can focus your attention, like a laser beam on this one thing that you're in, and then there are times, there are times even then, even then, but But yeah,
Fiona
so this is I mean, this is a fantastic. And I think it's incredible that you are making such an effort, which is obviously paying off in terms of the audience, you're bringing it to someone I interviewed on the podcast a while back with a friend who has done seven tours of Afghanistan. And he's very open about having quite severe PTSD. And what would you say to someone like that? Because I know that he, for example, and other people I know in similar situations have tried every type of therapy, would you say Mindfulness helps. And if they've missed that, it helps. Why? Why? Because I'm sure you've come across many people who have severe PTSD, who will say to you know, Pat, I've tried that it doesn't work.
Pat
Firstly, I'm going to front end this by saying I'm not a clinician. Okay. So this is my opinion. This is this is not me as a professional saying this. Okay, so I just need to front end, I'm a tank commander by trade. But but but the point, the point is you that you raise is that sometimes the way that mindfulness is given to people or the way that mindfulness is portrayed, or the way that it's taught, or the package that people put it in? Is the wrong package? Because some people are teaching mindfulness and are still learning about it as they're teaching it. I mean, we all do we learn it at the start, and then we feel the need to impart it to other people. And during that impart, and it's when we did a real learning as we started going through our journey, the military specific journey that people have been on, particularly with post traumatic stress disorder, is to really understand what's happening in trauma, what what is, what are we doing, when we experience a traumatic incident? How are we not processing the traumatic incident? So the repression of it, which is what we tend to do, there's some great work by David Treliving, I don't know if you're familiar with him. So trauma sensitive mindfulness. There's another really useful, Peter Levine, waking the tiger, which is all about trauma. And then of course, there's Gabor Mati. He was an absolute like superstar. In terms of fantastic book, gosh, I can't remember it now. Anyway, anyhow, he talks about addiction and trauma, and about how addiction should be of the realm of the hungry ghosts at school. So it's understanding what trauma is, understanding how it's sort of stored and where it is and how we can be blind to it ourselves. So we're blind to the fact that we're repressing it. We don't even know that we're seeing it. It's a protective mechanism to stop us from re experiencing. And then when you know that and you understand that you can teach mindfulness in a trauma sensitive way that you can see if you can notice people's triggers. You can notice people's body movements when they're reacting to something, you know, through a somatic experience coming through the body, and you can be really sad insertive to enable them to, I'm not going to say relive the experience, because that's not the purpose, but to accept the experience that they've had, because that's causing a massive blockage. It's stopping them living their lives. And they're defined by that moment. And that a number of pressing that moment because they don't want to face it, at some stages, you have to face the experience. You can't keep pretending it's not there. And you can talk around it. And you can do lots of other things, you can gradually let it lift. But at some stage, you have to, you have to accept the experience, otherwise, you can't move forward. And mindfulness can really help with that. Because what it does, in terms of while certain teachings of mindfulness can really bring you in touch with the soma with the body, which is processing the experiences for you. And it can show you where it's blocked. And then you can go into the pain, where it actually physically sits in the body and experience the pain for what the pain is not attach it necessarily to the story. And the pain can often dissipate. Because most of the suffering we experience in our life, we create ourselves. We experience pain, everyone experience pain, just pinch yourself, you're feeling it works, you know, they're genuinely paying us to stop you from hurting yourself. But suffering we do, we do it to ourselves, we create stories about the pain that we're experiencing. And when we attach to pain, what happens is all we try to repress it, what happens is we multiply it in our minds. And then we make it bigger and bigger and bigger and scarier and scarier and scarier. And then we don't want to face it. It's like running away from something in a dream. You know, and it gets bigger and more worrying. You feel like the random fruit freak or if you if you're a lucid dream, reveal the opportunity to do it, and turn around and face yourself coming in your face the thing coming at it will load reduce massively in size, firstly, and then if you ask it, Okay, what's next? It's likely response will be I've absolutely no idea you created me. Because we've run away from these self creations. And they're only our perception of things that have been. So somebody else's perception who was at the same situation would have viewed it differently. But we are stuck by our, you know, our, by our biology, our environment, and by our experiences, which create the world that we see through our eyes. And we see through our own eyes, but we can open that up when we experience the physical feeling and sensation. And we can create the space between it. And again, the reaction, the thoughts that and then we can explore it. So really long answer to a really short question. Yeah, really can be very, very helpful with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Fiona
Those references are really helpful. I'll put them in the show notes as well. Yeah, sure. Um, where do you hope to get to with mindfulness and your role that you're playing?
Pat
I like that and the role that I'm playing, that's good. Okay, so within defence, what what I would I would like mindfulness to be recognised. accessible tool variably. In defence, now we're partway there. We've worked on defence, we've got three licences to headspace. Okay, so defence pay for everybody in, in defence, to have access to headspace for free. So that's been negotiated and done. But what I'd also like, and it doesn't want, I don't want it to be compulsory. There's this thing where people go, everyone should be taught, you know, people go on the course. And they finish the course. And this is amazing. Everyone should be taught this. I'm like, no, they shouldn't. It they could. But they don't have to. It's some it's not going to be for everybody. And it's got to be at the right time of their life before they come to mindfulness. So for it to be established, you know, rubber stamped and said that this is a defence. This is a product that's acceptable in defence, and is widely accessible to anybody that needs it. And I'd say headspace almost ticked that box. But, you know, I like the word that Polycom does, too. But to me, it's a toe in the water.
Fiona
Yeah, and I think that's absolutely right. It's a toe in the water. And not everyone's gonna like Andy Parker. I mean, I remember I think, I told my brother to listen to it ages ago, because he really nice bloke, you know, it's he's not going to annoy you. And my brother, listen, is that? And it's like, well, fair enough. You know, it's not, it's not for everyone. And I haven't got with me, there's a book that I picked up, which is mindfulness on the go. And I think there are so many different ways of doing mindfulness. There's so many incorrect ways of viewing it like there are many aspects of psychology. But there are so many helpful ways that if you're someone who doesn't want to sit even for 10 minutes, there are still ways of understanding it and incorporating it, even going for a walk and noticing the colour of the sky, noticing the feel of the air, on your skin, and all of those things. But I think what I think is really important, which is what you're talking about as well, is understanding why because if you just introduce it, which is hot, which is happening in a lot of schools that will teach mindfulness, why, what what, what, what is it for? Why are you doing it? What does it mean in the context of who I am as a child, because otherwise, if we can't make sense of things, we don't use them or we don't incorporate them as a practice. So then that's, that's something that's really important.
Pat
So there's a real balance there that you're striking. So the intellectual understanding is really important than knowledge, the understanding of what you're doing and why you're doing it. But that is really important. But it to me, it's actually less important than the practice. So there is that you've got to know why you're doing what you're doing. And then you do the practice, and then you experience the benefits and the practice. And then you find that why did I enjoy it? Why did I experience benefits from that, you find that out that you do a bit more practice. And then it's so it's like a, it's a sort of, you know, my sessions, probably about 6040 60%, practice 40% explainer and reflection for people to really understand what they're doing with their, you know, with mindfulness for them, and that you enter sort of, so my role in the military is to try and make mindfulness as accessible as possible to everybody. You know, beyond headspace, should they wish, and then beyond that my role, because I mean, I've only got a few more years left in the military. And then I may, beyond that, I this tool I, you know, I this has to be given to the wider society, because society is struggling in a lot of areas give me there's frequent I like the way you say that it's not me, it's not going to be for everyone. And the Polycom is not for everybody, this person is not for everybody. mindful walking is not for everybody. That's not fair. But it's, it's a bit like frequencies, like radio frequencies, if you're not quite tuned into the right frequency, you're not going to hear that person. And you know, you can read one book one week, and it can be like this rubbish and throw it away. Two years later, you pick the same book up again, it's like, why, why did I miss that? Because you're sort of a different person. Because you because you've had much more experiences in your life. And it's changed the way that you, you experience your life. So for it to be there for when people need it in an simply explained package. You know, warts and all, and why it does, that's what that's what I that's what my role is, that's the role I'm playing. And that's what I want to continue to do.
Fiona
And again, I think, I'm totally in agreement with you with this sort of gradually extending the knowledge and the practice and the understanding, it's not sort of dumping a whole load of intellectual stuff on right at the beginning. But when I was in my 20s, I travelled around the world, on my own, and I spent time in China, and then Lao. And when I was in Laos, I became really interested in Buddhism. And I came back to London, and I started reading everything I could on Buddhism, I got lost, because it was gone from a nice sort of, like, simplistic understanding of what it meant and what it looked like in daily life, to trying to understand it too much from an intellectual perspective, which actually then completely put me off. Because it was so like, there's so much to it. It's so intricate, and dense. And I thought, whoa. And I think I think it's really important for people to realise that it is that it's like you said, the dipping the toe in the water at start slowly, gradually see the benefits, see what works for you what doesn't, then, but then it's also kind of keeping a log. And I find that when I work with people, I work with people who are very driven to understand more about themselves as leaders, they want to because they know they're going to be better leaders, they're going to perform better, they're going to have better mental health, they're going to help the people that work for them better. But they forget, because we all forget. So they forget what worked for them five years ago, 10 years ago. And I think somewhere along the way, we need to kind of almost keep a log of ourselves for ourselves. That makes sense. So which mindfulness books do we enjoy and why? And you know, as you see, it might go back to that, and it might not resonate the second time, but which approaches work for you. And it's keep that little thing. So when we are in positions of stress or distress, and it's very hard to think straight. We can kind of go back and get oh, yes, I remember when I went to perhaps talk on this. And he said X, Y and Zed that was really helpful.
Pat
This is why I think the the experiential understanding is so powerful, because once you've felt physically experienced the benefit, and if you keep up the practice, and you just you evolve with the practice, you learn with the practice your knowledge increases with the practice everything just so work flows out of it. But you have to do the practice first. And then once you're embodied and established in the practice, then it becomes really, really simple. And that's why I think it's so important because it is a tool for life because you heal yourself. So it's not going to a clinician to ask them to do whatever they need to do or put you on antidepressants, or whatever people would do. This is about like dealing with your own internal stuff, by facing yourself and accepting yourself for who you are. And then you know, being comfortable with your place in the world, and realise that what present moment actually is not what you thought it was. It's like why this is this is I mean, this is it. This is incredible. It's so important.
Fiona
It is incredible. And you know, I have done a lot of research into lots of different areas. But that doesn't mean that I do stuff. So I'm, hats off to you in that you actually do the stuff that you talk about I try. But I would say, my, what's my intention, behaviour gap is still bigger than it should be. I have the intention, I have the understanding, but I don't always do it. And headspace is a prime example of that. So mindfulness is a prime example of that, because there will be times when I do get into a good habit of doing it more often. And then, despite all the intellectual knowledge I have about how good it is I go, oh, oh, this is really helpful. So, so just taking myself as an example, I would say to people, just keep at it, just try it does. But don't just try it once or twice or three times, keep up with it, find the approach that works for you, and then keep practising it.
Unknown Speaker
You know, the eight week course approach created by Jon Kabat Zinn, this is a really is really good, you know, and there's loads of scientific research that it takes at least eight weeks to establish a practice to establish a routine. And even then you can fall off the waggon at the end of it. But what it what it does is it gives you that it gives you that it embeds it in your in the way that you operate, you find the space for you to do it. And remember, the meditation practices are only teaching you to be in mind for what they can, they can read, you can reach a point where actually you don't need to meditate anymore to so because you're mindful of every moment, because you know, where else you're going to be other than here, now. It's all about coming into the now. But when it's when you start noticing that you're constantly jetting yourself forward, what am I going to do this evening, I got to do with this blog stops talking about what am I going to do with that I'm not going to do with this, you know, when you still don't live in that space, when you live in the space, because you've practised enough meditation to bring you to be mindful in everyday life and the things that you do. You might not, you might choose not to meditate.
Fiona
Just want to say a massive thank you, Pat. found it really fascinating. I would love to come to one of your talks. Okay. And if people want to know more about you, you've got a website too, haven't you? I do. Yes,
Pat
one world mindfulness.co.uk Is everything on this. There's a free eight week online course on there's, there's a there's a podcast on there. And not that I do a podcast regularly. But as a recording of what I did a few a couple of years back, I have to confess that I didn't keep the website up to date, because it's not my day job. So it's just sat there as a presence. And it's got some tools and practices that people can use to understand mindfulness a little bit better. And when I get right into getting some time to do it, I'll try to refresh my website, but it's there. If people want to look at it and visit then please, please do.
Fiona
Thank you so much. And I'll put that in the show notes as well. Thanks so much for your time.
Pat
It's been my pleasure.
Fiona
Thanks to my guests, thanks to you for listening. If you want to find out more about me and my work, go to Fiona murden.com. All my social media handle is also Fiona Murden. If you enjoyed this, please do subscribe, review and tell your friends it'd be a massive help. But for now, goodbye and I hope you have a great week.