In this conversation, Anthony interviews John about his journey with acceptance, commitment therapy, and mindfulness. John explains that his interest in these practices was sparked by his experience with obsessive-compulsive disorder. He describes acceptance commitment therapy as a form of therapy that teaches individuals how to accept and make committed choices towards their values, rather than being controlled by their thoughts and emotions. John shares how long it took him to gain a good handle on Acceptance using these techniques. He also discusses how these practices have changed his life for the better and why he is passionate about sharing them with others through his book and podcast. Special thanks to Anthony Lisi for agreeing to do this interview.
The Universal Lens
Special Episode - Exploring Acceptance Commitment Therapy and Mindfulness - one on one with John Emilio
(upbeat music) All right, hey everybody, welcome back to a special episode of, well, a little short special episode of the Universal Lens. I'm here with Anthony. Anthony brought up a good question. We go to Jimmy Workout a lot together so we talk a lot and he had said that he had questions about the show and about kind of what brought me here and what I've learned and maybe it'd be a good idea to put a little interview together where he could ask me some questions and maybe we could give everybody some pointed answers. - Exactly. - So to speak, right? Give everybody an opportunity to kind of, instead of listen to a 60 minute episode, they'd listen to a 20 minute one shorter and just ask some questions. So without further ado, I turn it over to my good friend and partner here, Anthony, take it away, bud. - Thank you. You know, I figured if I had some questions and I'm around you all the time, odds are, somebody else might ask me a question. So here's the first question I have for you, John. He briefly described what brought you to studying acceptance, commitment, therapy and mindfulness. What brought you to that point? - It was a culmination of different things, but the ultimate one was probably my experience with obsessive compulsive disorder, which was kind of the straw that broke the camel's back for me. So it was that episode of dealing with that navigating that that kind of opened the door to act for me through therapy. And then that kind of evolved and just kept evolving to sense. So, yeah, I mean, and basically it was my, my, me dealing with the anxiety and the OCD. Yeah, yeah, that kind of brought me there. - Yeah, that was during a time, John and I weren't touched as much 'cause we were in the middle of all careers, but it was crippling for him, for what he says. - Yeah, not fun. - Not fun. - Yeah, so what, can you explain exactly what is acceptance, commitment, and therapy? What does it entail, which is basically a lot of the show? What is acceptance, commitment, therapy? What are you trying to teach the people? - So without going into a half hour. - Yeah, three, you know, monologue about it. So acceptance, it's called acceptance for commitment therapy. Basically what it is, it's a form of therapy that I believe and for when I've spoken about or form with therapists, it's kind of modeled after Eastern spiritual mindfulness, kind of thinking, right? The kind of that, that one is that presence. Yeah, based in acceptance, right? So basically it's a scientific version of that. And it's not the same, it's the same thing, but it acts differently. Act teaches you how to accept whatever you're dealing with. Not just a thought, it could be a physical pain, it could be a real life situation. And to make committed choices towards your values. So when you're dealing with something, you tend to follow the emotion and not the intelligent, valued decision that's sitting you in the face. We tend to follow the emotion. The emotion is sad, we act sad, we play the sad role. We're angry, we act angry, we're anxious. We act anxious, we play the anxious role. This teaches you how to see the anxious feeling, the angry feeling, whatever it is. And say, but that's not what I want to do. So I always use the example, if you weren't anxious right now, would you be doing this? And the answer I usually get from somebody is yes. So then what's stopping you from doing it? A thought, a feeling, nothing else. There's actually nothing holding you back. Physically, yeah. Physically from doing it. And that's where it teaches you how to cross over from the acceptance part to the, I'm gonna take a committed action. Then to go deeper into it, there's different things like expansion, which they talk about, which is a, just different kind of rules or a little, what's where I'm looking for pointers that they're having there to kind of teach you how to work on the acceptance part of it, right? So I mean, I can go deeper into it, but I don't know how much-- - Is it related by any chance, and this is just a question on the top of my head, is it related to, for any kind of drastic situation it might have been involved in with, acceptance is usually the final stage of the process. - Is there anything to do with that? I'm just curious-- - So it's funny, you asked that. You know, a lot of people, like I've said that, well, acceptance is the final stage. You go through all these different things. - Is that grief though? Is that-- - That's all I was gonna get. I was gonna get it. - Maybe I had it wrong. - No, no, but I was going with that, but here's the beauty of it. Acceptance is the first stage. Once you understand it, it becomes the first step. If you accept that it's happening, truly accept that it's happening, and then you start to diffuse from those thoughts, diffuse from that situation mentally, and you start making choices based on the things that you wanna do in life. Like there's an example Dr. Steven Harris gives in, I'm not sorry, Dr. Russ Harris gives in his book, The Happiness Trap, where he says, there was somebody who lost her husband and kids, devastated in the car accident. - Yeah. - And obviously you don't wake up and acceptance is there and you find the next day, but he was a client to his. He was a therapist. And over a little bit of time, she slowly started making value choices, even though that pain was still there, but she started living a valued life. Value means meaningful life. - You think hiding from the pain prolongs it? - Absolutely. You could face the pain, you could face something. Acceptance is not, when you accept something, you're not repressing it. A big difference. Acceptance is like, oh yeah, okay, it's not happening. No, it is happening. I feel it, I understand it, I know it, but I choose to live my life the way I want to. In that choosing to live the way you want to live, even if there is a void or a pain or something that you're dealing with, there's meaning in that. You're making meaningful choices. You're actually doing the things you wanna do, not expecting it to feel a certain way, because at this point in time, something has happened in your life, that joy, that happy feeling is just not gonna bubble up. It's not gonna happen, right, you lose somebody. - Sure. - It's hard to wake up to the next day and be happy. It's just the way the human body works, but you can make value choices and do meaningful things. And in time, like they say, time heals up, in time, yes. With expansion and diffusion, you start to, those feelings starts to subside and you really start to be able to enjoy other things on a different level, but in the meantime, you're not stuck in a corner. - You're not paralyzed. - You're not paralyzed. So you get to live your life. - Gotcha. - Which is great, gotcha. All right, well, how long did it take you to, you know, everybody's different, but how long did it take you, personally, to feel like you had a real handle on your OCD using the acceptance for chemotherapy? - That's tricky. I would say it probably took about six months for me to get a really good, but hold an understanding. - And now you were studying it, you were going to therapy again. - You were in bed. - You were in the beginning. - So you were probably in the accelerator program. - In the beginning, I was going twice a week for two months and then we toned it down to once a week and then as time went on, I went, you know, the therapy sessions became once, twice a month, once a month, once every two months, and all of my decision. And then, but I probably say six months, it took before, not that I understood it, I understood it right away, but before I, it became, well, or it became a routine, it became where it would have an automatic, like my response would now be automatic. - Yeah, it became part of your daily thoughts, your daily routine. - That awareness became a little bit stronger. It took, but I was also coming from a place where I was really in a hole. So, you know, if you teach somebody who's really not struggling with anything, acceptance, commitment therapy or act, mindfulness, or any of the stuff that we talked about, it'll probably grab quicker. Well, maybe, maybe not, 'cause a lot of times I'll say when you're actually in pain and when you're hurting is when you're most open to accepting a new way of looking at life. - Oh man, grasping at straws, you'll find something that works, you will hold on to this. - So I say about six months and then from there, it just kind of just amplified. - All right, so how do you think it's changed your life for the better, obviously is it a better, but hasn't changed it, you know, worse in any kind of way? - And I kinda know what you're saying. - I mean, 'cause I can think of a few, you know, that you've told me personally and what do you think? - I mean better, yes. - But of course, the fact that you're able to function in society. - Well, yes, that's wrong, right? - Yeah, you're back into this. - Absolutely true, but one, but beyond that, better because it's just changed my whole perspective on life. Not just the intrusive thoughts anymore. It's gone way, like it left that in the dust and it's applicable to everything in life. So from there, it's great, better, the best, awesome. It's a great way to live your life and it's a great application to put to life. - What do you think about worse? Give me the worst. - And so I'm not gonna say worse, but there is a downside, there is a downside and here's the downside, and it's really not a downside, but if you're gonna look at it, if you're gonna find the negative-- - You can't get with your own words. - No, if you're gonna find, well, because, yeah, sometimes, I hear myself saying word, I'm like that, it's not right. The only, the negative, if I had to choose one, would be, it works so well, people don't understand you sometimes. - Understood. - And people will tend to walk away from you if you don't understand how you are. - Because, yes, if they're still very attached and identified with their thoughts in their mind, they won't understand that you're not and they can't comprehend why or not. And they start creating stories to why you're the way you are. Now, you think you're better than us. When none of that is true, it's just you're looking through, I'm looking through a different lens of life. - I get it, but, you know, anything, any kind of method, as long as it's, you know, a good method to help yourself and feel better, you should be happy for that loved one. I mean, really, that's how I look at it. - Yes, but this is-- - You're obviously in a better place. - Yeah, but this is something where it's not just, well, you know, and they are happy that you're doing better, but then they expect you to be like the old version of yourself. - Yeah, well, they have things up that things have changed. - Oh, well, so John, you don't think like that anymore? I'm like, well, that's, if you really think about it, no, and I can let that go. And that doesn't piss you off. And no, why would I want to give somebody my peace? Why would I want to surrender that to somebody? That's for me to give away, yeah. - So now, what made you, obviously, years down the road, you've got a good handle on this, you're studying it, you're going to, you've flown places to see people do sessions and so on. What made you want to write a book about your life, let people in on your struggle, and what made you want to do podcast with Henry, and then me later on? - The beauty of finding something in life, when I was younger, I always thought, wow, this is great, this is mine, I've obtained this. As I've gone through this, I realized the beauty of discovering something that really works in life and that really unlocks doors for living a valued, better, just joyous life, it's not for me to hold onto, but it's for me to share. Like it said, that old adage, I climb to the top of the mountain, I'm not going to sit there, I'm going to throw a rope down actually, and I'm going to tell you, I'm going to throw a rope and go, now join me up here, right? - Okay. - And I'm not saying I'm out like the peak or something, but I'm saying, yeah, what about this? - The work I've done is, yes, in short, yes, it's to offer a knowledge branch to people to be like, this works, here's my story. - Let me build off of that, that was good. You wanna let others know that this, hey, this works. Why do you think that you are at the top of a mountain, why do you feel you've reached that, and now you can show other people how to get there on their own? What, why do I feel like I've reached that? - Well, like I said before. - You use the analogy of throwing a rope down, so you feel like you've hit a different lens, you're looking at things differently, so, why do you feel that you wanna pull people aboard and go, hey, look at this, it's been working for me. Why do you think the rest of the world needs to know about this? - I mean, you and I have had discussions over this, but tell everybody what you think. - Because it'll help. - The kind of mindset will help other people. - It'll simply help cure the problem of people believing everything they think, that'll help cure the problem of having an ego-driven world, that'll help cure the issue of having people believe thoughts when they wanna do harm onto somebody. - I'm just gonna say suicide's a big one where you convince yourself of things that are not true. - It could be a suicidal thought, and that's an OCD, that's a version of OCD. No, no, but that's a version of OCD where people have suicidal thoughts, and it scares 'em 'cause they don't wanna do it, but their mind gives 'em these images of them killing themselves. - Maybe what I'm trying to say is, maybe it's not a suicidal thought, maybe it's something minor like you're a low life, you're a low, and you keep on convincing yourself. - And then OCD, you lose respect for yourself, and then it goes down that rabbit hole. - You believe the negative banter in your mind. - Exactly. - This helps cure you from, this frees you from the grips of the thoughts in your mind, which can be over-inflating or under-inflating. It allows you to choose what works best in this moment for you in your life, from a centered position. Not from my mindset until it must be true. My mind tells me shit every day, 90% of it's garbage. - Exactly. - Garbage, so I walk around in silence a lot of times because I'm like, no, no, no, no, that's a thought that I could work off of something positive, something positive could come from it, so-- - I think you, I'd be honest with you, that final answer, I think. Summed it up, summed it up for me, hopefully cleared things up for others. - Yeah, yeah, no, listen, it's a great way to live life, put it that way, and that's the book, the podcast, it's all a culmination of, you know, I didn't invent the wheel, I didn't reinvent the wheel, I'm just trying to show everybody, look, this wheel works. This wheel is a great way to live life, and it's not something to believe in, it's not a belief system, it's not, it's an applicable way to navigate our mind, which is evolved from what it was eons ago to what it is today, you know, and we're not equipped to deal with the way our minds work today. - You were a walking example, John, of how it could be, you know, so useful in your daily life, 'cause, you know, I see you use it all the time, I see how you slow things down in your brain, sometimes it could be quite annoying, but in reality, you know, that's what it is, but it works for him, and he's a better person for it, and I can tell you, 'cause I've known the guy at long time, he's changed a lot of his ways and his thinking and everything, and he seems like a much happier human being for it, so there's gotta be, you know, there's gotta be a little something to this, and it can't hurt to look into it and stuff. - No, it doesn't. - Why not? Look at these Buddhist monks, they're a reason why they lift to be 100, and they're peaceful, and they're happy, the whole life, there's gotta be an answer to it, you know? - It has a beauty, this gives you the option where if you say, I don't wanna go live in a Zen Monastery, because it's not for everybody either, right? People make that choice because it's actually, it's appealing to them, yeah. This teaches you that, without going there, without having to go, this show is based on teaching you that. I've worked with spiritual teachers who've been in Zen, you know, Monastery for 14 years, and they came home, and they're teaching people, and they're like, you don't have to do what I did, you don't have to go to a Zen Monastery. - I'm bringing it to you, I'm bringing it to you. - I'm bringing it to you because it's that applicable to everyday life. Before, that's how they thought about it, the Zen Buddhist monks was like, come here and you learn over time, but what we've evolved, what we've learned as we've practiced it more and more, is we could teach it, that's what acts as great. We could teach you how they feed things in a certain way, right, 'cause Zen Buddhist monks are also, they go deeper into the spirit in the mind, which is where this took me, but that is a great appetizer for it. So if you learn act, it's like having the appetizer now, if you're ready for the main course, you can go deeper with it, you can go deeper into yourself, and really learn to dis-identify what your mind and your personality and all that stuff. - That's up to the individual. - It's up to the individual. Some people want to use it as a tool, and that's fine. - I gotta be honest to you, I enjoy using it as a tool. I really do, that's how I look at it. I look at it as a tool, John for John, it's a way of life, and I think it's useful for both of us, and just-- - It's useful for everybody. - That's it, you know, but it's different levels of use, so. - Not everybody is meant to be an Eckhart Tolle, or a Sagguru, or Ramdah, so it was a good suit. - Yeah, it's not everybody's meant to be that. It's not for everybody's calling, but people are meant to find their own path, but whatever path you're on, this works, and if you want to go deeper like I did, that's great, right? You know, that's why some of our conversations get a little deep with us. - I appreciate you answering these questions, John. I mean, for me, it was worth it. - Hope it helped. - Hope it helped everybody else. - Yeah, yeah, I hope you guys got a little bit out of it, and next episode will be coming up in a few minutes, so. See ya. (upbeat music) - The insights and discussions that we speak about on our show are our own opinions and based on our life experiences. If you or someone in your family or someone you know is suffering and in need of help, please get them that help through medical attention or seeking proper therapy. Again, what we speak about are based on our experiences and not intended to be taken as a form of therapy. Thank you.