EP#4- So You Became A Buddhist Monk? with Patrick Tulaphorn, Student at Washington University in St. Louis

(gentle music) Hi, welcome back and happy Thursday. I don't wanna spend too much time talking about Incher and how you should absolutely buy a bag of coffee from Strive with the code Endorphins for 10% off your order because I don't wanna keep you in suspense for too long for this really cool story I'm about to share with you all. So I'll keep it brief. (gentle music) All right, let's get into the episode. Patrick and I met at WashU about two years ago and I learned for the first time that he trained to become a Buddhist monk the senior year of his high school. I was immediately shocked, blown away. I've never heard of someone becoming a Buddhist monk who was so young and I felt like this would have been a perfect opportunity to talk about it on the podcast. So we talked about what his experience was like, how that experience shaped his perspective on meditation and its benefits and we also caught up now to see how he's doing without further ado, let's get into it. (gentle music) Hey Patrick, I am so excited to talk about your really unique experience in high school. Spoiler alert, this title, this episode probably is informing my listeners that you were a Buddhist monk in high school but if people were catching onto that, this is what we're gonna be talking about today. So can we start from like the beginning? How did you even decide to become a Buddhist monk in high school? - Yeah, sure. I mean, first of all, thanks for having me on your podcast. I love talking about this experience. So this was during my senior year of high school and kind of some background. I'm Ty, both of my parents are from Bangkok and that's where Buddhism is the majority religion and kind of to become a monk is a big tradition within Thailand but it never really carried over into the States. And I also have an older brother who did this ceremony as well as a side note, but basically the whole point of the kind of tradition to become a monk is so that you kind of give a good luck to your current life and your next life since reincarnation is a big thing but not only to yourself, but to your parents and your family and kind of those who you love. And I kind of came to this, I guess, option to do it or not. Like the very beginning of my senior year and my parents had brought it up and said, "Your brother did it 10 years ago "because he's quite a bit older than me." And at the time I was really reluctant just 'cause I was a senior in high school and I was young and I just wanted to have fun to be frank and they like made me think about it but they never really pressured me into it 'cause they felt as if they were to force me to do it then it wouldn't hold the value that it should. If that makes sense. - Right, that makes a lot of sense and let's backtrack just a bit. So your parents came to the United States from Thailand. And you grew up in the Buddhist culture. So can you talk a little bit about what that cultural exposure was like growing up Buddhist and then making that transition to commit yourself to becoming a monk? - Sure. Yeah, I could pinpoint a couple of examples of things that I did growing up that were just kind of tradition through the family. We'd go to the temple on our birthdays and just pray and give food to the monks. And also we would spend our New Year's celebration there. It's actually pretty cool at the temple during New Year's like tons of people, hundreds of people come and they have a bunch of tents that just set up food and everyone is just celebrating the New Year and they wish each other good health and wealth and all that shazam. But it was pretty normal for me to go to the temple just whenever. It didn't have to even be a birthday or New Year's. Sometimes my mom would just suggest that we go on a weekend. So I grew up seeing those monks that I eventually lived with. It was pretty interesting because I would only see those monks for maybe like an hour or two hours at a time. But during this, I guess my time at the temple, it was like I was seeing them every day for hours on end doing the same thing that they're doing. And it was pretty different because when you go to the temple, it's like something's always happening. But you don't realize that once you leave, the monks are just on their own to do their own thing. So I had like a lot of fun just like chatting with different monks about their journeys there and kind of what made them want to become a monk. But that's just kind of like, I guess, how the temple played in my upbringing. - Can you talk a little bit more about what exactly the Buddhist philosophy is? And I've studied Buddhism, but I can't really speak to it because even though I've studied it, sometimes, I think my memory fails me. So I don't want to misquote or not explain in the right way exactly what Buddhism is. And I know there are lots of ties to Buddhism and meditation and mindfulness and yoga. But since you grew up in this culture, in this philosophy and religion, I'd love for you to talk a little bit more about some of those foundational principles behind Buddhism and how those values transfer to your life. - Sure. So I guess, like, okay, so I was a novice monk and that means I kind of lived by 10 tenants, whereas if you were like a monk that's dedicated for life, you would live by like hundreds. But in the sense of like Buddhism itself, I think my parents did a pretty good job of kind of framing it in a way that I didn't really think about it as like a Buddhist lifestyle. It was more ingrained into how to be a good person. But I'm sure that things that they taught me kind of overlap the Buddhist philosophy, some things are just like, I guess you probably have heard, you know, just trying to be like at peace with yourself and not care about those like materialistic things and always be grateful for the things you have. And I think those things are really easy to say until a kid who's, you know, 10 or 12, but it's kind of hard to solidify into them and, you know, make sure that they actually live by those values. So it's, you know, my parents, I would definitely say, are way more religious than I am. I think my mom goes to the temple like every week on most and she tries to help some monk as much as possible. So she might follow the Buddhist, the like philosophy way more than I do, but I feel like if it makes sense through what my parents have taught me, I kind of also follow them. But I would say like the key ones are just to, you know, be grateful for the things that I have, but also respect everyone around me and just trying not to get caught up in those like really little things in life that kind of tend to tick you off really easily 'cause it's just like not really worth it. - Yeah, and those values are foundational principles behind Buddhism really just seem to be like ways to be a good person. So that's exactly what the philosophy is stating and is asking of those who practice it. What actions can you take to ensure that you're being grateful and you're living your life with a strong moral compass? - Yeah, I mean, I myself have like personal self-assessments throughout the years. It's easy to kind of look at somebody who's achieved a lot or has a lot and say like, you know, I wish I had that or I wish I was in their position. But as you know, there's always the other end where somebody has it worse. And there are things in life that, you know, you just can't replace. And I think that's a big thing to realize, specifically like family. Like for example, you know, like my brother and I were, I had mentioned before like 10 years apart and being that much time apart, there's bound to be conflict. We just like had a lot of arguments all the time and there's this one time where we just got like into a huge argument and, you know, you feel like really angry at the time but then you kind of realize that, you know, your family is the only kind of constant in your life that you can rely on. So you have to make sure that, you know, you don't act on emotion and you kind of realize, like I said, those people can't be replaced. And just some other things, you know, just whenever you wake up, just looking around you and just being blessed that you have a roof over your head and you have food to eat are just really basic things you can do. But like I said, of course, there's so many temptations out in the world. There's always that next new thing, especially in the era we live in, technology is always evolving and you always want, you know, that new shiny thing that, you know, the most expensive thing and it may bring you happiness for, I don't know, a couple of seconds, a couple of minutes hours a month. But that's not the thing you're going to be remembering when you're, you know, 80. And I try to keep that in mind. It's the memories I make with the people that are around me that I'm going to remember, not, you know, the new iPhone that's coming out. - Yeah, so moving away from a sense of materialism and being tempted by wanting those materialistic objects or items and you're right, we live in such a fast-paced age especially with technology. There's always the new iPhone. There's always the new MacBook computer, the new this, the new that. So it can be really hard to stay grounded in the present moment when you're constantly, constantly striving for something else, something more. When that's constantly what's being fed to us in society, how do you slow down and just focus on that present moment? - Sure. So I mean, I guess this kind of like builds into my like father's journey in a sense, 'cause he came to the States when he was about 16 and he like started, he started working in Bangkok and he was like 13 and he, you know, he didn't have much when he started, you know, kind of, I guess, lived American dream in a sense where he became, you know, successful enough to support his family and, you know, sent me to school where I got in and, you know, I'm really blessed for that. But kind of ingrained the goal in my mind that I wanted to do the same for my kids, but not in a way that I would be leveraging like, I don't know, like a trust fund or anything. I wanted to kind of bring it in on myself and create that wealth for myself. So I could, you know, give my kids the equal, if not equal more opportunity that my dad has given me. And that's a really big driving factor for me because, you know, when I want that new thing that's, you know, $1,000 or $500, I always think that $1,000 can be saved for the future. And, you know, even though it's, you know, $500, it can mean the difference later on the future. And I'm, you know, I'm currently in that mindset where I need to save as much as possible. Right now I have the goal of trying to get a house before 25. And that's just something I feel like I need to do. And it really helps me not, you know, get trapped into that marketing of, this is faster, this is better. It's more investing in your future. And, you know, it plays two parts. It helps me in my future, but it also helps me not, you know, go into that materialistic mindset of really short kind of happiness, and just try to, you know, as I say, flex the item. - Yeah, and everything that you're describing requires a lot of discipline to say, I'm not gonna spend a lot of my money right now to get this new shiny object that's really attractive and tempting, I'm gonna save it because I have this long-term goal and I'm gonna work towards that. That's really hard to stay that disciplined. And I have a hunch that becoming a Buddhist monk helped to instill some of those values in you, but I'd love to hear a bit more about, once you had decided that you were going to become a monk, what that process was like. - Sure. And also I'd like to put in a side note, like I feel like the timing was perfect because I was 17 and I feel like that's a, like a shifting moment in people's life, you know? They're starting to apply to colleges, getting to colleges. And they want a lot, they expect a lot out of their future. They wanna be up to date, especially going into like a new environment, but I'm glad that my experience had happened at that moment because I feel like if it hadn't happened at that moment and later on in my life, then I would have definitely been more into, like, buying items and stuff like that. But yeah, in terms of kind of getting into being an actual monk. So like I said, I kind of was prompted with the question the beginning of my senior year and my mom handed me scripture that she had gone from the monks at the temple and she said, you know, if you wanna go through this process, you're gonna have to memorize these. And this wasn't like, like I can understand Thai and speak a little bit, but this wasn't like normal Thai, it was like scriptureed Thai. - So your mom was giving you these scriptures. - Yeah. - And she was saying, okay, if you wanna become a monk, you have to memorize these scriptures that were in the language of Thai. - It was like a dialect of Thai. - So that was challenging for you. You never would have encountered that. - Yeah, that was challenging because it was kind of like, trying to learn a language without anyone translating it. That makes sense. So it's all based off sound. But I have to say some of these like lines are lines that the monks like repeat whenever we go to the temple during like a lunch ceremony to bless the people there. So I was familiar with some of the lines, but some of them I just had to go off just, I guess like just listening to it. - What are those scriptures? What were they saying? - You know, I still like to this day, I don't even know, but I think it's just to bless you. And because my parents always told me that a certain line in the scriptures, they're very feeling stressed, just repeated to yourself. And even in high school, I would have all my wall. It was just a piece of paper that I wrote down and I taped it. So when I was feeling stressed or I had an exam the next day, I would repeat it to myself. - So it was like mantra for you? - Yeah, in a sense. That's super, that's really nice. And so these scriptures are in this dialect of Thai. And how long did you have to memorize them, learn them, and then recite them? - Yeah, so I took about two or three months on my own to just memorize them. And then kind of a month leading up to the actual ceremony, I would go into the temple and just practice how everything would go down. So where I would walk, how I would sit, when I would recite the scripture, what would happen next. And that's a little bit scary just because when I was practicing the scripture, it wasn't like I was practicing in a mirror. I actually performed it in front of like a fellow alone. So he would critique me on my pronunciation and how the pace I was going at. And of course I got nervous 'cause he's been doing this forever. But yeah. - The word learning was, let's say, could we break it down into two different phases? So the first phase was, those few months where you were learning the scriptures, you're studying the dialect of Thai. And then the second phase is where you read those scriptures in the temple to the Buddhist monks. And I guess become ordained to become monk. - Yeah, so yeah, first stage was done. Second stage was like the ceremony day. On that day, I showed up to the temple in all white. It's just like a symbol of like purity. And then they shaved off all my head and my eyebrows, all my hair and my eyebrows. And that's just to represent like, I guess the closest you can get to when you were born. Kind of like a baby so that you're in a fresh body. And the journey you're about to take on kind of makes you a new person. So then after they shaved off all my hair, we waited till a lot of people came and I went into the, it's called bold in Thai, but it's like the mini temple innocence. And I recited all the scripture. It was in front of like 200 people, which is, I didn't expect that many people. But then they robed me in all the orange. And after that, people would come up and basically ask for my blessing. But then after that day, they all left. And I lived at the temple for the remainder of my screen break. So the second half of the time of you becoming a monk where you had done the ceremony, you shaved your head, your eyebrows, you performed and you were a Buddhist monk. That was how long did that span? Like a few weeks and the end of your senior year? - So it was just my spring break 'cause it was in the middle of my senior year. So if I remember high school from my age, it's like a week or two weeks. I was about to go that first phase, the studying phase. Let's say we're a few months from the beginning to the middle of your senior year. And during that phase, you were studying the scriptures. Did you also have to learn more about the philosophy of Buddhism? I know there's certain terminology, like the eightfold path, the Nirvana, enlightenment, lots of buzzards within Buddhism that I've kind of picked up over the course of the past few years. But was that something you were also learning while studying the scriptures or did you just kind of have a knowledge of that before any of this had started? - I kind of had a knowledge of it before it started. And the only thing that I kind of also picked up on was just like dos and tones in a sense. So like, for example, when I became a monk, I wouldn't be able to be touched by like females or I can't touch them like my mom. She couldn't give me a hug. And my mom can't directly give me an item. So it can't be passed from hand to hand. I would have to like put down a cloth and she would have to put the item on a cloth and then I would have to like pull it to me. Some other things would just, you know, they'd warn me. It would be no eating after noon. So then we'd have to do all our eating during the lunch ceremony, which ended at 12.30. And the rest of the day, you can't. Some others are just, you have to be sitting down when you're eating. You can't be walking around. So those were just like small things that I had to learn and be aware of before I got into the process. So I didn't like break any rules or anything. - So when you had done the ceremony and for the remainder of your spring break, you were a Buddhist monk. What was a day in the life? What was it like from the time you woke up to the time you went to bed being a Buddhist monk in the temple? - So I would wake up at around 6 a.m. And then we would all amongst would go to like that mini-tempo-i-run friends earlier. And all the lights would be off, but we would start with, they gave me like a script for book. And we would read that for about 45 minutes. And afterwards, we would meditate for 45 minutes. And that meditation was just, you know, pure silence, all of us in a room, eyes closed. And that was like pretty difficult. And then afterwards, you can choose to eat, you know, some breakfast if you want. So the morning was wake up, meditate, then have breakfast. - Yes, yeah. - Really like hungry when you woke up. Did the meditation help with the hunger? What was that like? - Yeah, so I mean, I personally, I don't get hungry when I'm like wake up in the morning. The biggest thing, I guess like the biggest challenge was just staying still for 45 minutes or in the meditation. 'Cause I feel like in the morning, like you kind of want to move around and like stretch, you know, get the blood going. So just to wake up and then kind of sit back down and try to meditate was a little bit difficult. And it's not like you're in a comfortable sitting position either, it's not like crisscross applesauce. Your legs are kind of folded over one another, which, you know, kind of leads to some back pain, but you kind of get used to it. So you know, yeah, hunger wasn't like an issue or anything. - So after you had done that 45 minute meditation, you had your breakfast and what came next? - So then after that, you most monks would have studied like scripture, but I decided to make them most use of my time would be to kind of talk to, I was like, I had kind of like a mentor monk in a sense. I would talk to him about, you know, kind of like how he got into the monk process. And he would teach me some things. So like just like how to retie my robe. The cloth itself is like a pretty large cloth and to just learn how to tie it correctly so that it doesn't fall off, it is like pretty necessary. And it took me maybe like a couple of days to learn it correctly. He also just, you know, he just like talked to me, which was nice. The other monks would just re-scripture, but there, I guess it wasn't that much time until like the lunch ceremony. So then the-- - Breakfast and then the afternoon, you have a break and then you have the lunch ceremony that happens in the afternoon. - Yeah. - What happens in the lunch ceremony? - Yeah, so then this is when like, not in comments anyway, but normal people would come to the temple and they would bring food for us as our lunch. We would kind of read scripture to them and bless them and their food. And all the men would get in the line. So the way like we're arranged is, it's we're kind of on like a podium where we can sit and we have a metal bowl where all our food goes. So all the men would line up and they would pass the food down the aisle. It would kind of be like a seniority kind of thing. So I was at the end of the line. But remember, it can only be men because women cannot directly give to monks. So then we would scoop our food into the bowl and then afterwards we would-- they would-- or like the head monk would chant some more scripture. And then afterwards we would get about 30 minutes to eat. And that 30 minutes, you're kind of just like scarfing down as much as possible because that's pretty much all the food you're going to get for the rest of the day. So when you have lunch and you have the food then, you're done eating for the rest of the day. Are you fasting at night? Yeah. So there's no more eating. Hunger is a huge temptation. How did you try to not let the hunger get to you? If it was at night and you were exhausted and really hungry, but you just had to do the same routine the next day and the day after that. I mean, I definitely think it helps that you're not the only one that's kind of fasting in a sense. Because I know when people try to diet and when I feel like they're on the journey on their own, and you have that temptation to kind of get a snack or something. But since this was the norm, it felt kind of natural. And yeah, I got hungry at times at night, but I would just drink some water or something. And it just helped that you actually get a lot to eat during lunch. Like it wasn't a normal proportion of food. It was just-- it was almost in a sense like a buffet because you get a scoop however much of whatever food you want that was brought that day. So and also on top of that, you would sleep kind of early since you'd have to be up at six the next day. I personally, like my cravings come late at night. I know like midnight 1am to 1am. So I feel like hunger wasn't that much of a battle as you would think it is. So just to recap, your day would start at 6am, have a 45 minute morning meditation. Then you would have breakfast. Then there would be that down period of time where it seems like you had a lot of fun with your mentor monk. And then it would be the lunch ceremony where people would come and bring you gifts and food and whatnot. And then you would basically towards the end of the day, you were done eating. And the day would just start over again. Well, so then after you would have some more time until the evening ceremony. And the evening ceremony isn't like nobody comes for that. It's just the monks themselves. And we would go back to that kind of mini temple building. And that's when we would meditate for an hour and a half straight. So that was a little bit more challenging than the morning. Because the morning was 45 minutes a script for 45 minutes meditation, whereas nighttime was just a straight hour and a half of meditation. So you're hating over two hours every day for the entirety of your senior year spring break? Yeah, exactly. Did you find that challenging? Yeah, definitely. Because I would definitely get distracted sometimes, just hearing birds outside or just random noises. I feel like when you go about your normal day, you're trying to take in as much information as possible and be responsive to your environment. Whereas when you're meditating in the temple, it's really about just forgetting about everything and trying to clear your mind as much as possible. And it's hard to turn off that instinct of hearing something and responding to it or thinking about something that you have to do. And something that really helped me that-- I don't know, you could try maybe-- is that one of the monks told me that I should just think of my breath as a sweeper. And when I breathe in through my nose, it goes into my head and just sweeps out all my thoughts, collects it. And then I would blow that breath out and take with the thoughts with it. So yeah, an hour and a half is challenging. I think it would have helped had I started meditating before this whole process just a couple of minutes a day, getting thrown into that kind of-- I guess, like, schedule is definitely difficult. But I try to work on it as much as possible. Even if I got distracted, I would try to focus myself up again. And eventually, the hour and a half went by pretty fast. But I remember this one night, specifically, after the hour and a half meditation. The head monk decided that he wanted us to walk around the temple. And I think we did about seven times. And he wanted us to counter steps. In the end, he was trying to ask, how many steps did you take? It was to hone in to your ability to focus about one thing, because counting your steps can be a really boring thing. When you're doing it in a circle, it's easy to get distracted, especially when there are other monks around. Unfortunately, at the end, a lot of us had different numbers that were very skewed. So clearly, a lot of us lost our focus. I'll admit, I did lose my focus sometimes. And I try to, I guess, backtrack about how many steps did I lose focus at. But his lesson at the end of that night was just, you have the ability to focus on something if you want to. But if you get distracted, you should try to always re-hone in on what your objective is. And our objective was to count the steps, which is a pretty easy objective. But people get bored. Attention spans are short. And it's hard to just maintain that focus. So I think he was trying to make the point that you can do it. You just need to really, really put yourself into it. I really love, first, the imagery about meditation, of having the thoughts in your inhale sweep out the thoughts in your head. And then on your exhale, just kind of like this cleansing process. And I mean, when I think of meditation, I think of focusing on the breath. And using the breath as kind of that anchor to always come back to, whenever a thought passes by recognizing what the thought is, not really attaching judgment, just seeing it go by and not really attaching an emotional response to it and letting it go. And I think that imagery of the sweeper really aligns with that. And I feel like this is the perfect transition to talk a little bit more about your journey with meditation, because you clearly were meditating a lot every single day. That's a hard thing to do. And I love how you talked about meditation as a tool to hone in on your ability to focus. Because I think when we think about meditation, we associate meditation and mindfulness with a tool to ease anxiety, which I think it definitely does. But I love this idea of talking about meditating as a way to become more focused. So I'd love to hear, you know, here. or if that practice of meditation, that rigorous daily practice, had any physiological or psychological effects that you began to notice shortly after you adopted that practice? - Yeah, after the experience, I was able to kind of not get as aggravated as things, especially being a senior in high school. You, there's a lot of things going on. I'm sure you're aware of applications, just promm going on, you're trying to figure out where you're gonna go for the next couple of years. It's just really stressful. But after my experience, I felt that it was really easy for me to relax and realize everything is gonna be okay. And in terms of meditation, I don't know if you guys had silent, sustained reading SSR during home room in high school still, but I did. It was like 15 minutes at the beginning of fourth period or something where you would just like read. But I would take that time to meditate myself instead of reading, which was, I feel more beneficial to myself. There were things that had immediate impact, like I said, just being able to forget really small things that would take me off. So if I did bad on a quiz, normally that would have been something that I would have thought about for one or two days. But then afterwards, I would be able to just take it as it is, process information, try to move on from it and learn from it. Just like cutting out all the negativity, feeling that I failed myself where I didn't try hard enough 'cause deep down inside I know I did try hard enough. It was just that before I wasn't pleased with my results and I would take it out on myself. Whereas afterwards, I would be able to say, you know, you tried your best. It wasn't what you expected, but it's time to move on because there's nothing you can do. I kind of lost the like schedule to meditate, but I need to mention that I was a competitive swimmer in high school and it was really easy to connect the two. And what I mean by that is that when I went to the pool, I would just try to focus on forgetting what had happened about that day and just focus on my swimming. And swimming kind of became my meditation equivalent in a sense because, you know, I'm staring at that blue tealine at the bottom of the floor for two, three hours every day. And there's a lot of time to think. And I used to think a lot during swim practices about what kind of homework I had, test coming up, things I needed to do, but eventually it just became me and that blue line. And I was really able to just clear my thoughts and feel that peace at the pool. And I think that I was able to do that because after meditating at the temple, it showed me that I had the ability to forget things and relax and I didn't think that was possible before, but I'm glad I was able to kind of connect it to my swim practice. I'm so happy you drew the parallel between the effects of meditation and being a competitive athlete in high school or middle school or whatever it is. I was a rower in high school. So it was also a water sport because you're on the river rowing about, but I felt similarly, I think when you go to practice whatever sport you're doing, it's a chance for you to leave everything that happened in the day behind and really be present in that moment and focus on your performance. And I can't speak to swimming because I'm not a good swimmer at all so I can never actually be like a competitive swimmer, but at least with rowing, a lot of it is focusing on breath with movement. So every time you take a stroke, you're inhaling, you're exhaling. It's very rhythmic and very, you have to have a very strong sense of coordination between your breath and your body. And that, like you said, is a form of meditation. It kind of calms you down when you're physically feeling so much pain from the sport that you're engaging in. If you can focus on your breath and not let your mind wander to the homework that you have to do that night or the upcoming exams or the stress in your friend-gripper, whatever it may be, it can really be a special moment to just get kind of lost in the flow. And I actually do have an episode that's coming up that's gonna talk about flow and mindfulness because there's a lot of intersection between flow and flow psychology. But I think there's also a lot of overlap between the two. And one last thing that I wanna say is I really liked how you talked about examples of stressors being your homework or your exam schedule or going to prom or trying to apply to college because most of the people listening on this podcast are recent college graduates or still in college or maybe in high school. And those are our day-to-day stresses. Granted, things happen in life that you can't predict and the one constant thing in life is change. So people can experience varying degrees of suffering and stressful situations in their life. But baseline, I would say, for our age group is exams and school and friends and social life and all of that. So I totally agree with you. Meditation can really help just ease those smaller day-to-day anxieties. - Yeah, and I wish more people would realize that it doesn't need to be sitting down and closing your eyes, trying to meditate in order to find peace. There's definitely a multitude of activities you can do whatever makes you feel comfortable. As long as you dedicate yourself to it and you feel relaxed and it's something that you can really focus on, I think that's a good way to start trying to find that inner peace that everyone strives to get. But I think meditation could be a good way to start. It might not be for everyone, but if you find something else that you think fits the criteria to help you achieve that, then that's something you should definitely keep in your life and do consistently. - And you definitely were meditating finding that inner peace very consistently at the spring break of your senior year of high school, while you were among, what happened once you graduated from being among or decided you weren't gonna continue with that and then coming to college at WashU, like have you kept up your meditation practice? - Yeah, so after my experience as a monk, I ended up meditating almost every day throughout my senior year and throughout the summer. And this was really easy. I think it was just kind of something that I liked to do, but it also helped that I was still going to the temple after my experience. It kind of reminded me of my experience and the things that I learned there. However, when I went to college, I tried to find a group that was similar to the experience. I had back at home, which would have been the TSA or the Tai Student Association. And I had read that they took you trips to the temple, I think monthly. And the first one that I went to, it was not at all what I expected. I thought we would be able to go into the same type of meditation room or building and kind of have time for ourselves. But instead it was more of a cultural exchange in the sense where they just had Thai food and you could pay to kind of try different foods. So that, I feel like that led to the downfall of my personal meditation. But that's not to say that there aren't times where I still get stressed and I just take 10 to 15 minutes of myself to close my eyes, take a pause, a deep breath, and just realize that I can tackle these things that I feel stressed about as long as I focus up and don't get overwhelmed with what if this batting happens? Because you can always be thinking the other way, what if it turns out well, what if it turns out good? And a lot of people don't think that way, they always think, well, what if I do bad or what if I forget something? But I feel like many people don't really think, what if I kill it, what if I do the best out of everyone? And I feel like that's a good mindset to have. It might be difficult to picture yourself doing that because it is normal for a lot of people to think about the consequences or the negative effects in the future and that's what builds fear. But if you're able to take, like I said, 10, 15 minutes as I do and just try to think of a positive image or outcome, then it really helps you get over that stress hump and just tackle the task at hand. Definitely. And I think it's a really great point that you brought up saying that you don't have to meditate two hours every day to reap the benefits of what meditation has to offer. I think, as you mentioned, it's more about taking a pause and having the self-awareness to know when you're feeling overwhelmed, taking that pause, thinking more positive thoughts because at the end of the day, the thoughts that you think that you feed into your mind, it shapes your perspective and your mood and that can really play a huge role into your own physical and mental health. So trying to be cognizant of the negative, thoughts that come into your mind and trying to reframe them into something a bit more positive. Sounds like that's kind of what you do whenever you're feeling a bit overwhelmed or stressed or anxious. Yeah, that's exactly it. I think that's so important and I just do you feel like because you were a monk it's easier for you to make those cognitive reframes do you feel like because you gone through that extensive training and had a very strong community through that process, it feels a bit easier for you to take that pause and just think happier thoughts and conquer that fear. I definitely think it's easier for me but at times I can get out of touch with it but whenever I go home I try to go to the temple and it's to the point where I feel like I have a special connection to the temple whenever I pray there now it really there's this feeling I get around my body whenever I'm in the temple that I meditated at and I just close my eyes I feel really connected to just the area around me and I feel like that's a good reset for myself and my mind for whenever I go back to college that's why I try to come back as much as possible from college because I know I can't get that hard reset in college but it's really nice when I can come home and just go to the temple realize that I need this reset and just meditate as long as I need to you know my mom doesn't mind be spending time there so it's nice and it makes it easier to kind of I guess focus up again. And if you could boil down your experience you know that the entirety of your senior year really studying to become a monk then becoming a Buddhist monk what were you know the top three lessons that you learned doesn't have to be three but what were some real key um realizations that you taken away from that experience and that you hope to continue to implement in your life moving forward. Sure I think the biggest one for sure is definitely the materialistic stuff like I said it's easy to get caught up in the new thing but I realized at my time at the temple you know just turning off my phone being in the present is really what matters. On top of that I also have a greater respect for my family and just all the things they do for me because they were supporting me throughout my experience there they came to visit me at the temple and you know make sure that I was fine and I was okay even though it's just during the spring break and I was only a couple minutes away from home but family and just not being caught up in those small new things were kind of the biggest takeaways I feel like it's really helped me go about college in a in a different way trying not to impress people with the things I wear or the things I have and more of the person I am now I know for sure that my number one value in life is my family and I'll always kind of support my family no matter what they're by my side and I would give basically anything up for them. That's so wonderful and I love how you you're able to kind of understand like what your most important values are because at the end of the day our actions I believe that leading a fulfilling life is when your actions really align with your values and you're very aware of what your values are and they can change but I do think that you've derived a sense of purpose from acting with intention and aligning your actions and your thoughts and your words with what you believe in. Well Patrick it was so wonderful to have you as a guest on the podcast today before we go I do have one question that I ask everyone I bring on to everyday endorphins and it really aligns with the name of this podcast so what is something that brings you endorphins every day? I think something that brings me endorphins honestly is talking to my dad and that's because you know he was a pretty strict dad when I was growing up and he helped like high standards for me to do well in school and I took it the wrong way as a young person I didn't realize I always thought you know he doesn't want me to have fun he doesn't want me to have friends but it was more of him looking out for me and making sure that I'm building discipline so that I could you know achieve the things that I want to achieve later in life and now that we have a more of an understanding of each other of what's expected of each other and the things that I want to accomplish in what I can and cannot do and that really came in high school where we had a conversation I don't want to go too deep into that conversation but we came to an understanding where he only expects me to try my best and that's also something that I kind of live by I can't feel sorry for myself if I try my best right because I know I couldn't have done any better and just talking to him every day I feel like I learned something new and I feel like he's always there for me now instead of he you know he he doesn't want me to have friends or anything it was really he's looking out for me so I'm happy that we have that relationship and you know just talking to him it's just it always makes me happy