The Practice of Holding Nothing | Elena Brower

Elena Brower spent two decades as one of the most visible yoga and meditation teachers in the world, stages of thousands, a growing platform, the whole forward-facing life. Then she started doing the opposite. She got quieter. She trained as a chaplain. She began sitting with people in hospice, in silence, holding nothing but presence. Her new book, Hold Nothing, draws on that journey and on an ancient Chinese sutra that became her compass: Welcome nothing. Refuse nothing. Reflect everything. Hold nothing.

This is a conversation about what happens when the drive to impact as many people as possible gives way to the desire to impact as few as possible, as quietly as possible. We explore what Elena's time in hospice has revealed about presence as the ultimate offering, the hidden cost of living a double life while teaching wholeness, how the practice of letting go transforms the closest relationships in your life, why silence is the thing most of us are allergic to and also the thing we most need, and what it actually means to prepare, through every small daily choice, to die a good death, and why that might be the clearest definition of a good life.

A deeply honest, quietly powerful conversation for anyone in midlife who is beginning to sense that the most important work ahead isn't about building more, it's about becoming less.

You can find Elena at: Website | Instagram | Episode Transcript

Next week, we're sharing our conversation with Dave DeSteno about the 'spiritual technology' that can lower your stress and mortality risk, even if you don't consider yourself a person of faith.

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