From Mob Lawyer to Mindfulness Mentor: A Journey of Transformation

SpeakBob Martiner A00:00:00

And, and whether they were the victims, you know, who are living at the edge of existence and dealing with their trauma, or whether they're with the offenders who made some really bad mistakes and now are looking at, you know, life ending situations or life as they knew it ending situations. They're all. I remember reading a Kafka quote once. He said, a condemned man can be beautiful if one has an eye for that kind of thing.

Michael Herst00:00:30

Hey, one more thing before you go. What happens when a mob lawyer embraces meditation and transforms chaos into clarity? Today's episode, we have the answers and so many more.And it's going to be a journey you won't want to miss. I'm your host, Michael Hurst. Welcome to one more thing before you go.Bob Martin's life story is one of the most extraordinary transformations you'll ever hear.From navigating the turbulent underworld of Miami's cocaine cowboy era as a criminal trial lawyer to becoming a mindfulist mentor and a spiritual guide, Bob's path is a powerful testament to human capacity for change. Under the guidance of Master Hao Xing Ni Hunter. Hopefully I've said that right.A 72nd generation Taoist master Bob experienced a spiritual awakening that reshaped his priorities and his life's mission.Now serving as the mindfulness coordinator at Elon University, Bob combines his extensive and extraordinary legal expertise with brain science, psychology, and a Taoist philosophy to help others escape limiting beliefs and cycles of suffering.In today's conversation, we're going to explore how Bob's incredible journey led him to discover timeless towers, principles of balance, adaptability and harmony. Tools that are more vital than ever in today's fast paced, chaotic world.Get ready for a thought provoking and inspirational, packed with wisdom, insightful conversation. Welcome to the show, Bob.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:02:12

Wow, great introduction. Thank you so much. I'm so happy to be here.

Michael Herst00:02:16

You know, what an amazing life.Not just a career, but because you've had a couple of them, you know, one on one side and one on the other side, which the transformation from one to the other is like brilliant. So I can't wait to jump into this.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:02:36

Yeah. You know, I remember my dad was born in 1898 and he lived into 1997. 99 years.

Michael Herst00:02:44

Wow.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:02:45

And in his 80s, I remember going up and saying, dad, you know, your life, I mean, you started before there was indoor plumbing in Hungary and then you lived to see a man walk on the moon. What an incredible life. You know what, what can you share about that? And of course he talked like Dracula because he was Hungarian.You Know, he says, babe, it all happened kind of slowly and that was all I got from them.

Michael Herst00:03:15

So that's a great.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:03:17

I thank you for saying it was brilliant. But it all happened kind of slowly.

Michael Herst00:03:22

I think life, life sometimes happens slowly and I think it's better that way because we get to experience the ups, the downs, the highs, the lows, you know, the good, the bad in the amazing. And so it allows us to live life, I think, the way that we're supposed to be living it.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:03:38

Yeah, yeah, yeah.No, what you say, I mean, just taking a little segue on that, what you say, I mean, we'll get into meditation in a little bit and mindfulness, but it's an important thing to understand that we. Well, whether if you're a creationist, as some people are, you know, you know that God created us for the Garden of Eden, but then we got kicked out.And there's nothing in scripture that says that he came down and read just in our brains since then. If you're an evolutionist, we spent 1.7 million generations in the jungle as hunter gatherers, but it's only been 500 generations since agriculture.So we are the same animal, we're the same creature that we were, and we're designed for a lot of hard physical labor and very low density caloric foods.And we're not designed for this environment, you know, so, yeah, we, we have to do something intentionally to readjust ourselves to fit the environment that we're in, because we're not designed for it. That's why people go to the gym, because they know they're not getting enough physical activity, so they go to the gym to work out.You know, our ancestors would have thought we were crazy to actually go and ask for more work.

Michael Herst00:05:03

You know, it, it's.I, I agree with that and I think it, you know, a brilliant observation that I had a, I, I practiced qigong and I'm qigong because I have some health issues after I get injured in the line of duty. And I retired with those injuries, but I started practicing qigong.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:05:20

Beautiful stuff.

Michael Herst00:05:22

Yeah.It is in, in meditation, in the slow methodical movements there sometimes mimic what our ancestors had done about raising your arms, picking fruit and stuff from the trees. You're constantly up and down. Your arms are up and down or sideways, wherever the case may be, toiling on the ground and things like that.And I think we, we've come to, well, I won't say be lazy.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:05:49

Well, it's a much less physically demanding life.

Michael Herst00:05:52

Yeah. Too many things are. You can Pick up the phone and you can have your food delivered to you. You don't even have to walk out the door.You can live on the couch literally 24 hours a day, sleep on the recliner, call your food in, have it delivered to you. Don't have to go shopping.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:06:11

Yeah, but, you know, the old cravings, you know, for sugar, fat, and salt, because there's so little of that in the jungle that we developed a craving for it. So now those cravings work against us because there's more fat and sugar in a McDonald's Happy Meal than we would have gotten in the jungle.So no wonder there is a epidemic of obesity.

Michael Herst00:06:34

Oh.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:06:34

I mean, we're designed to want that stuff, and, you know, the people that are selling it, they know it.

Michael Herst00:06:40

Absolutely. That's a whole nother conversation.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:06:43

Yeah, it's a whole nother conversation.

Michael Herst00:06:45

We could just go down that rabbit hole, and we'd be here for about three hours. Let's. Let's start. I like to get started at the beginning. So where'd you grow up?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:06:56

Where'd I grow up? Well, I grew up in amusement parks and carnivals and in New York. Queens, New York.And my folks discovered that their path to the American dream was through popcorn and cotton candy. So. So we had popcorn and cotton candy stands, and it was that. That was the environment that I grew up in.And to tell you the truth, I never in a million years ever thought that I was going to become a lawyer. And neither did my dad. But I did have a.A friend who kept telling me, because, you know, it was back in those Nixon days, Watergate, you know, Vietnam. And there was a lot of protests and arguments going on. I was always arguing some point, he says, you should be a lawyer. You should be a lawyer.And the guy goes out, gets a job and earns 350 bucks and buys me a ticket to take the law school aptitude test and gives it to me in a money order that I can't cash because it's made out to the Educational Testing Service. Says, you should be a lawyer. Go, go take the test. All I ever wanted to do is sell enough hot dogs in the summer to not have to work in the winter.But he pushed and I. I got pushed. And, you know, Bri always brings to mind, you know, was it coincidence that I had this guy in my life, or was it synchronicity?Was there a force that glued us together, or was it just, you know, random? Thing is, is that John stayed with me all the way through the time until I Got sworn in, and then he died three days later.

Michael Herst00:08:56

Died three days after you got sworn in?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:08:58

20.

Michael Herst00:08:58

Wow.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:08:59

Stuck by me, encouraged me, pushed me. And then three days after I got sworn in, he died. So almost as if it was his mission.

Michael Herst00:09:07

That's amazing. Actually, I think that, you know, we. I believe in synchronicity. I believe that there are.We are faded to certain aspects of our life and what we should be and what we shouldn't be kind of a situation. Sometimes we have to redefine our purpose in midlife. And we've done that. You've done it, I've done it. I had to redefine my purpose. I was a sergeant.I. I went from being a sergeant to being disabled. But in that process, I had to redefine my purpose because I wanted to be a lieutenant.I was studying to be a lieutenant. I wanted to go up the ladder, and that got shortfalled. So I had to redefine my purpose.But it took me a while to really come back, especially with my meditation, which we're going to talk about here in a little while, in mindfulness.It allowed me the opportunity to say that portion of my life helped me to come to where I am at today in what I'm doing today, because those skills, they worked really well in the job that I was in.And the skills that I use in this new profession of mine, which is having conversations like this and sharing them with the world, allowed me to take those skills and move them into this. So I believe in synchronicity, and I would never have done that if I hadn't met certain people in my life either.So I think that, you know, we all have that somebody that we had that we're looking for to kind of put us in the direction that we need to go. And mine was my oldest daughter. My family overall, but my oldest daughter in particular. So, yeah, it really. It's cool.Do you have any brothers, sisters?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:10:46

I have an older brother. He's a Marine, 82 years old now.

Michael Herst00:10:51

He. And he stayed in the family business. Did he. He go on to something else? Did he become.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:10:57

Well, he did until the family business, you know, ended. You know, my dad. Well, the amusement park. The amusement park that we were in eventually, I think in about 19. Let me figure this out. It would be 1977.About 1980, it shut down. But my father was 82 by then, and by then we act. He actually was selling enough hot dogs in the summer to not have to work in the winter. And so the.Just about the time I Went to law school. About four or five years later, the amusement park closed down. My brother went into the book business. He was a book. Book salesman. Not salesman.He was.

Michael Herst00:11:48

He had a bookstore, had a book, but. Which is, again, a great profession. My. My father.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:11:53

Yeah, yeah.

Michael Herst00:11:54

So, yeah. Yeah, that's pretty cool. I will just touch upon this a little bit because it's an incredible journey.What was it like being a mob lawyer during the Miami. A lot of people may not know this. I do, because I grew up in that era as well. The Miami cocaine cowboy era.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:12:12

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, it was. It was a wild time.I'll tell you if you've ever seen the movie Scarface or you've ever seen the TV show Miami Vice, of course, you know, all of that was fiction, but it captured the vibe of the era. It really was between. For those of you who remember the Marielle boat lift in the Carter administration.But teams and teams of Cuba's criminals and mental institution residents were shipped to Florida in that time. And there were agent. There's stuff. I know that there were agents of the Cuban government, the communist Cuban government.There were agents giving guns out to these guys when they were released from immigration. And Miami just blew up. That.That combined with the fact that the Italians were transporting cocaine out of Colombia, through Haiti to the docks of New York, and the Colombians were running speedboats out of Bimini into the Florida Keys. It was just. It was just. It was a mess. So, yeah, the Italians had a family. Had a. Had a branch of their family down.

Michael Herst00:13:34

There, so that part of the mob. How did you get involved with the mob as a lawyer?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:13:41

Well, the way that I got involved in is that I started out as a prosecutor for Janet Reno, who was. Who later became the attorney general for Bill Clinton. But she was the DA for Miami Dade.She hired me, and while I was with her, we took a racketeering charge, civil racketeering charge against the mob, and hit him for 70 million bucks. And shortly thereafter, I left the office, hung my shingle out.And about two weeks later, Johnny Giovanni, member of the Gambino family, comes walking in my office, walks right by the front, you know, the waiting room. Just walks straight in, walks into my office, sits down in front of me silently and just looks at me. I knew who he was.And finally he said, you know, yeah, hit us for a lot of money. I said, yes, sir. He goes, we got good lawyers. You beat him, you good. We want to hire you.

Michael Herst00:14:48

Is it better than we want our money back?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:14:51

Right? Yeah. So we had to have a really, you know, good heart to heart conversation and understand what we would do and what we wouldn't do.And I said nothing illegal and nothing unethically. Grumbled a little, but I told him, hey, you want a lawyer that is respected by the court and whose word is gold?If I lie or do anything untoward one time, my reputation, you know, dirt.

Michael Herst00:15:15

Sure, yeah.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:15:16

And he said, yeah, that makes sense. So that was our agreement. And it worked for a bunch of years until. Until. Until his son got arrested.Then it was no, you will do this, you will get him off, whatever you have to do. And I said, I think maybe what I'll do is move to North Carolina, which is what I did. And we parted friends.

Michael Herst00:15:47

Well, that worked. I think that. Yeah, that's a. Was that the pivotal moment that you decided or found kind of your spiritual awakening?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:15:56

No, I.I actually, that was a few years before, about five years before, because I was hanging out with them and a lot of other shady characters go into all the glass and chrome discotheques that were in Miami. And, well, you know, it was the cocaine cowboy era. And I was being pretty excessive in my behaviors, and my personal life was kind of hitting the.Hitting the rocks. And I would rather stay at work or go out to bars with these guys than go home and be with my family. And so everything was kind of falling apart.And I was seeing a therapist, and I came to a real important decision. And rather than answering me the question, he started throwing coins on the table.And I'm getting more and more pissed off because I think my therapist has become a tarot card reader or something. And finally he opens up a book, comes up with a number, and opens up a book to that chapter and shows it to me. And the chapter's name was Retreat.So I cursed him out and I stomped out and took the advice, pull back, went back to see him, and I said, what was that? And he says, well, that. That's a Taoist practice called the I Ching. And I go, what's Taoism? He goes, it's kind of a sister of Buddhism.I said, well, how do you know it? He says, well, I'm a student of watching me. Who's that? He's a 72nd generation master from the Shaolin Temple. Oh, well, what is this Taoism thing?So he started to kind of like, explain it.And not having grown up with any religious background at all, my folks, all their ancestors had been wiped out either by the Bolsheviks or the Roma Gypsies. My mom was Roman Gypsy and they got wiped out by everybody. So there was just no talk of religion in our home.And so he started telling me about Taoism and about going with the flow and yin and yang and the wu wei, the idea of doing, not doing, and being lost in the zone and gaining mastery in life. And all of a sudden I said, well, this. This really sounds more like owner's manual for being human. And I just, I loved it.And Master Knee came a week later. And I'm sure that you've met some people in your life that the moment you meet him, you say, this guy's got it, I want it. And that was Master Knee.The moment I met him, I just knew that he was going to be very special in my life. And I studied under Master Knee for five years.So again, synchronicity just kind of when Master Knees teaching is really starting to transform me, that's where Johnny's kid gets arrested. And I, you know, had to move away.But when I moved away to North Carolina, I went from prosecute from defending people in homicides to defending people for shooting deers with no antlers. It was a big culture shock.

Michael Herst00:19:18

That's a. That's quite a reversal.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:19:25

And. But it was, it was great because it was a blank canvas. I. I could paint my life any way I wanted. And I wasn't the same person that I was before.I wasn't the same person that I was in Miami. I was. I was five years of study under Master Knee. So I. My values had changed.I decided that I would devote myself to public service and to taking care of what the great wisdom teacher Jesus would call the least of these. And so I moved to. So that's what happened. That was the transformation.

Michael Herst00:20:05

That's amazing. I think that especially being out that opportunity to study under. It's Hao Ching Knee. Master Hao Ching ni. He. And I have to remember this. It.He's a 72nd in line to teach this.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:20:23

No, 72nd generation.

Michael Herst00:20:25

72Nd generation, yeah.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:20:28

So 1400 years of father passing wisdom down to sun, growing up passing it down to the sun for 1400 years, you can't even wrap your head around.

Michael Herst00:20:38

Something like, that's a wow. What a line of. Of philosophy and theory and wisdom to be passed down that many generations and continue to do so. Yeah. That's amazing.What, what an opportunity that was placed in front of you. That's pretty cool, actually. Yeah. Yeah.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:21:00

And obviously it's funny, you know, we, you know, we call him Master Knee, right. So we asked him once, why do they call You Master Knee. So he said, well, because I'm a master of life. And he chuckled. He always chuckled.He was always chuckling, giggling, giggling and chuckling. And he walked away. So we grabbed him once and, well, not literally, but we got him and we said, well, then, what is. What does it mean to master life?And all of a sudden, his face was very serious, and he looked at us and he goes, when you can interfere with the natural flow the least and yet have your required or appropriate effect and impact, you've begun to master life.

Michael Herst00:21:51

Now, those are some words of wisdom. Yeah, I mean, I. I've had 450 conversations on this podcast, and I think those are the most profound words of wisdom that I've.I've been able to share. So thank you for sharing that.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:22:08

Well, thank him.

Michael Herst00:22:09

Yeah, that's. That's. Yeah, that's amazing. How did you come about meeting in and being trained by him?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:22:17

Yes, well, my therapist was. I'm sorry, my therapist through the I Ching. And he was. Master Knee was very prolific.He'd write books in Chinese and they'd be translated into English. And my therapist was the English language editor for Master Knee.And he had a Dallas group in Miami, and Master Knee came to Miami often almost once a month.And so between Master Knee and the Taoist group that I spent five or six years studying underneath them, but it was all the coin throwing that, you know, got me interested in it.

Michael Herst00:22:52

Yeah, that's. That's one question. That's one thing I have not spoken about on the program.Talked about all kinds of tarot and psychic medium and crossing over and death doulas and. But I've never had a conversation about the I Ching.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:23:08

Oh, the I Ching. I I. One of the things Master Knee was just very, very. He says, if you want to master life, you need to practice the I Ching every morning.Every morning. Throw the coin. Takes you 10, 15 minutes. It will change your life. And it does. It. It met.What the I Ching teaches you is it teaches you how to masterfully and profoundly go with the flow.

Michael Herst00:23:39

Oh, very cool.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:23:41

You know, because most of us, when we hear the word go with the flow, we think, oh, you know, take your hands off the wheel, you know, merrily, merrily, merrily. Life is but a dream. And that's all fine and good if the flow happens to be a calm river.But when the flow is white water, you have to have a different response to the flow. And if the flow is heading towards a waterfall, you have to have a different response to the flow.And if it's a thunderstorm or if it's a hurricane or if it's a light drizzle.So recognizing the nature of the flow and then having the wisdom to appropriately align yourself with it is the way to be the most effective and efficient in life. And that's what the I Ching teaches. Can I give an example?

Michael Herst00:24:39

Absolutely. I think. An example. We're all here for lessons in life, and I think this is a valuable one.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:24:46

So let's say that you're out in the water. You're not in a riptide, but you. You're pretty far out in the ocean, and you want to get to shore. There's probably three ways you can do it.One, you can panic and drown. Not. Not the best response. The other way is that you just say, I need to get to shore, and you just swim and you swim into shore.And you'll probably get to shore, but you'll be tired and exhausted and have used a lot of energy. The third way is the Dallas way.You take a look at the flow that's around you, and you'll see that sometimes, just like all cycles in life, sometimes the tide is moving towards the shore, and sometimes it wants to sweep you out to sea. So if you can align yourself with it so that when it's heading towards the shore, you swim your heart out.You put out everything you got and make utmost advantage of it. But then when it turns around and goes against you, well, you don't want to be swept out to sea, so you can't just relax.But if you just put out enough energy to be able to keep your spot, and then wait until the tide changes and goes in again. Swim like heck. Hold. Swim like heck. Hold. You get into shore and you've used the least energy possible, and you're energized to go do something else.So if we look around us, we see that all of life has these cycles. Not only does the day turn tonight and the night turn today, but good times turn to bad times and bad times turn to good times.So just like a squirrel, when things are good, you want to put some chipmunks, you want to put some acorns aside for the bad times. So that's. That's like learning how to go with the flow effectively and efficiently.

Michael Herst00:26:37

That's an amazing. Yeah, it's amazing lesson. I had never thought of it from that perspective.I know the theory behind what you had said with, you know, to keep yourself from drowning, but I. I had never kind of tied that together with going with the flow, right.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:26:54

And you do qigong, so, you know, those repetitive motions, especially in Tai Chi, you know, swim to shore, hold, swim to shore, hold. You know, if all of that is the.When you do your qigong and when people do their Tai Chi, they're actually physically manifesting the sense of moving forward and moving back in the cycle of the universe.

Michael Herst00:27:23

I never looked at it from that perspective either. I practice both Tai Chi and qigong, and now I have a new look at it. Now I have a new perspective from it, because I haven't thought of it that way.What are some of the lessons that maybe have resonated with you most deeply? That one in particular. But are there anything else that we can get from Taoism?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:27:49

Yeah, you know, Bruce Lee, lovely quote. He says, the man that practiced a thousand kicks does not. I am not afraid of the man who practiced a thousand kicks.I fear the man who has practiced one kick a thousand times.

Michael Herst00:28:07

I love that quote.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:28:11

And.And so even brain science, you know, tells us that when we have a thought or we do something, you know, neurons that fire together, wire together, and they form a little neural pathway. And the more times we repeat something, the thicker that neural pathway goes and the easier it becomes for us to do it.I mean, we all understand habits and developing habits, and, you know, that's what's going on in the brain. You're actually physically changing the architecture of your brain when you practice something over and over.And so, you know, if I sat down with the I Ching one or two or three times, I would be fascinated with it, but it wouldn't be life changing, but practicing it over and over. And the same is with meditation. You know, doing it two or three times gives you a taste. But in Taoism, there is a phrase called wu wei.And wu wei means literally doing, not doing. And we once asked Master Ni what's it like to be master knee? And his answer was so simple and so profound, he just said, no rehearsing thoughts.No rehearsing thoughts. So this guy never thought about what he was going to say or what he was going to do.He was just completely responsive to the environment, and he was totally in the flow. You know, in athletics, we call it in the zone.So when, you know, when you practice something and do it so that you become muscle memory and things become automatic, then life becomes, you know, extremely easy. You're doing, as the Tao Te Ching says, you do nothing, but nothing remains undone. And so there. There is this possibility of living life in the zone.I think that to get to where master knee is. You need to live in a monastery on a mountaintop and have the time to do that kind of practice.But, you know, even moving slightly towards it for every little step there is, you know, that ease of life that comes with it.

Michael Herst00:30:56

I think that's the way that we should all try to practice our approach to life and living. You know, it, it's. It is. And I know that you can relate to this to a certain extent. When I was a cop, I was like a AAA personality.It was, I mean, just constantly alert, constantly on edge, constantly. My brain was always moving a thousand miles a minute.And even when I came home, you know, I wouldn't sleep well because every little noise I hear, because you're trained to listen to noises, you're trained to see things. And every time I'd see something out of the ordinary, whatever the case may be, my brain was constantly active.And once I retired and once I had to try to get six months after I retired, I was calling so much stuff in. The guys were going, sarge, we got this. Stop calling stuff in. Because I wanted to stay involved. And I didn't know how to relax.I didn't know how to take a breath.I didn't know how to stop doing what I was doing in that constant move forward, in that constant need for what you said you do stuff so much, you practice things so much that it just integrates within you.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:32:16

Yeah. You know, the right side of the brain is where our fight flight responses, our response to danger.And like I was saying before, when we were out in the jungle, that was not activated all that much, but we knew that the potential was there. And so every, even if we were picking berries, every few seconds, our brain would scan the environment to see if there's any snakes or tigers around.You know, when it comes to meditation, what happens is people say to me, the moment they hear I'm a meditation teacher, they go, oh, yeah, meditation, that really sounds great. But I could never do it because, you know, all my mind does was go crazy and like.But all that's happening is that primitive response of scanning for danger is what is causing your mind to wander. And we all have the same brain that we had when we were in the jungle. So it's a completely natural thing and you can't stop it from happening.People think that meditation is about quieting the brain, but it's not. It's, it's. It's about allowing the brain to do things in, in response to that. Now, you know, so when you were when all of this stuff was happening.I mean, we could get into like, you know, let me just back up a second. These days, danger is not snakes and tigers and boars.These days danger is, I mean, for most people, except folks that were in our professions, but danger is things like deadlines and getting the kids on time and having left something out that may go bad or, you know, hearing all of the warnings from the CDC and you know, that's all the danger. And it comes from so many places that we really can't fixate on what it is. And so it becomes kind of an undifferentiated, chronic sense of danger.And we have labeled that stress. That's what we call stress. It's a chronic, undifferentiated sense of danger.And our mind is always going to be looking for the danger, but because it's all melded together, we can never really identify it. And, and the like. Now we neglect the other side of the brain, which is our rest and digest and creativity and connection and beauty and the like.And if they take a brain scan and the right side is much more electrically active than the left side, they, they can predict 87, 86, 83% accuracy that that person will, will self identify as cynical, negative, find the glass half full, be critical, all of those things. On the other hand, if the left side is more active, the personal identify as optimistic, connected, caring, happy, kind and the like.So here's a little, here's a little piece of advice for your listeners. You, you have a responsibility to beauty. You have to curate your environment.You have to intentionally bring beauty into your life in order to balance off the right side. You have to activate the left side on purpose. Because today you don't get it from the world. What you get is a lot of news.You got a lot of danger, you got a lot of breakouts and measles and everything in the world. Activating the right side, not enough comes into the left side. You gotta take some care and intention. Put beautiful things on your desk.I, I have, I have my favorite little Tai chi guys.

Michael Herst00:36:26

Oh, very cool.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:36:27

I sit here on my desk.You know, they always remind me, you know, to take, take a breath and, and, and we just have a responsibility to intentionally do things that are inspirational, that make us feel connected, that give us a sense of awe to watch, you know, great sunset or go and, you know, sit by a waterfall and, you know, suck in the negative ions. We have to do these on purpose. Not because we, but I mean, just from brain science, you just want to balance the. Balance your brain out.

Michael Herst00:37:04

Well, I think that from my perspective, what I've learned as well, not clearly, not as much as you in regard to this, but from my practices I have learned that balancing my mind, my body and my soul has allowed me to achieve more functionality in my life from both a happiness perspective, a less stressful perspective, a mindful perspective. So I make sure that I eat the right things.I make sure that I balance my time with my family, my wife, my kids, my sister, my brother in laws and my friends. I balance that with everything else in my life so that I am not constantly. I occasionally fall back into that. Because we're human.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:37:53

Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course.

Michael Herst00:37:54

But you know, I do my best to try to balance that. I think mind, body, soul balance includes what you just said. I feel my home is filled with artwork and statues and paintings on the wall.And when I'm feeling bad, I take a walk through the house and you know, I'll study my paintings again, I'll study my pictures again. I try to, I try to again integrate that within myself. How do you suggest that we integrate the brain science that you just talked about?Our psychology and our spirituality in our work life in totality?And when I say work life, I mean not only physical work or our jobs, but we have a responsibility to work on our relationships, our family, our environment, what the backyard looks like, what the front yard looks like, and how we fit into that. Could we maybe talk about that just a little?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:38:55

Sure, sure, sure. You know, the Buddha said you must put guardians at the portals to your mind. So, you know, it's a great way to think about it.You know, you see all these kids who go to these hack and whack Friday the 13th movies and then they have nightmares and they go, IG, I don't understand why I have nightmares. Well, you know, you're letting all these images into your brain and it changes the brain.So what is really interesting on the forefront of investigation these days is that they're looking at awe, the sensation of awe as a, as something to investigate.The psychologists at the Greater Good Science center, which is a great place, great web area to go to, the GGSC Greater Good Science center, it's at Berkeley, California.And they do all the work on happiness and the like, but right now they're studying awe and they're saying that they feel that awe, the positive, positive answer to ptsd. That ptsd, you know, when you experience it, changes the structure of the brain immediately. And awe does as well.But in a Different way, you know, in a positive way. And so bring on to your life. Now, a lot of people say, well, you know, I mean, I can't go out and see a sunset every day.But I promise you that if you put yourself in the position of sensing and feeling awe and you reflect on it and you bring it back in your memory and you experience it again, practice awe, take that walk in the forest, and really just be in awe of nature. If you do this a few times, you'll find that it's easy to pull up the sense of awe. And, you know, maybe you will cry with happiness, but that's okay.Yeah.

Michael Herst00:41:12

What do you think of. I mean, I agree with that. I think that we should all take that moment to take a breath.Even when I learned meditation, it took me a while to understand meditation and what it, what it can do for us in regard to balancing ourselves from that perspective. And, and what you said earlier about, you know, people have a misconception, I think, about meditation. When you talk about meditation.Oh, you're one of those kind of people. You're a hippie, you're a, you know, it, it's.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:41:44

My sister wasn't a tree hugger.

Michael Herst00:41:48

Right, Exactly. But I think that meditation can play in a very important, a very important part of mindfulness. I believe in mindfulness.It took me a long time to be able to learn what mindfulness is in regard to ourselves being mindful and then projecting that mindfulness in our environment and those people around us.Can you help us understand maybe what you think might be the biggest misconceptions people may have about mindfulness and how meditation plays a factor in that?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:42:26

Well, most folks don't even distinguish between them. I would say that mindfulness and meditation is kind of like the old adage that you can put a boat on a ship, but you can't put a ship on a boat.Meditation is a part of mindfulness. But. But not all mindfulness is meditation. Mindfulness. I think John Kabat Zinn's definition of it, it's paying attention.Paying attention with intention. Yeah, it's just, it's just paying attention with intention. It's like if you're going to be mindful about washing the dishes.Matter of fact, in my, in my teaching, you know, when I teach people meditation, I.The people at Duke University came up with terrific digital infrastructure that reduces the time till you get to the point where you really get what meditation is. From months to weeks. It's a four week. They just did some terrific work there. But they built into the app, a gratitude journal.You start out by saying, you know, what are you grateful for? And I'm grateful for these students. And then it also asks, what do you want to do mindfully today?And that's where, you know, the teacher explains, what does that mean? So let's say that I choose I'm going to do the dishes mindfully.Well, to do it mindlessly means that you're off in caught in a fog of rumination and projection, and your mind's going, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.And you're kind of just doing it, and your hands are doing it, but they're disconnected from your mind, and you're thinking about what that son of a gun said yesterday, or whether, you know, or you're complaining about your partner who should be doing the dishes because you cook the meal, you know, and grumbling and mumbling about something.Whereas if you do it mindfully, you're actually picking the plate up and looking at it, and you're seeing that, oh, there's a couple of pieces here that are stuck on, and you scrape them off.You feel the water and the warmth of the water and the slipperiness of the thing, and you get a thrill out of the fact that, yeah, you have actually cleaned this plate plate, and you stack it up and, you know, you're looking at your little accomplishments and, you know, you're just attending to it.You're attending to it, and there's a lot more joy in attending to it than there is in being lost in a fog and just having it as another thing that happened. You know, our lives are. Our lives are. Are just a series of small, small events. It happened kind of slowly.

Michael Herst00:45:07

Always goes back to that, Right? And I think that.And I think sometimes people might complain about the fact that it happens slowly, but in reality, as we said earlier in this conversation, you know, happening slowly gives us the opportunity to experience it. Experience the goods, the bads, the highs, the lows. What. What can I walk away with with this?One of my favorite sayings is, what can I walk away with this? You go back to Bruce Lee. Bruce Lee says, learn everything, right? Take what you can use, throw the rest away, and, you know, go ahead, go ahead.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:45:41

No, you go.

Michael Herst00:45:42

Well, yeah, it. As I. I think I've taken that philosophy in life myself. I try to learn as much as I can. I appreciate what I have learned.But what I also have learned is that even the stuff that I.That I want to throw away, I still keep tidbits of it there or it Handy because I think it still has information that can provide us for something in the future.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:46:06

So going back to your question about misconceptions, okay, here is the biggest misconception.I think besides the fact that, you know, supposed to quiet your mind, the biggest misconception is that the purpose of meditation is to maintain focus on something, to be able to maintain your focus on something and stop your mind from wandering.And that is the biggest misconception because really, meditation is about noticing when your mind wanders and then returning back to the focus and beginning again. It's noticing, returning and beginning again, noticing, returning and beginning again, noticing and returning and beginning again.The healing, the meditation is in the noticing and returning and beginning again. And then over time, you do increase your ability to maintain your focus. But that is a side benefit. That's not where the real healing occurs.The real healing, your mind wanders because it's an evolutionary safety device. It has to wander.But when you notice it and you return and you begin again, it's this, it's this beginning again that has the same neurological effect as any other accomplishment. It builds a sense of self efficacy that I can do this, that I have strength.And when you build that mental strength by beginning again, getting up on the saddle after you got thrown off, beginning again, beginning again, beginning again, you're building this really thick neural pathway in your brain that says, I can do this.Once you, once you do that, then you notice that you have the strength to look at your judgments about yourself and realize that they're all just bs and you can, you can say, no, that's funny, I, it's not true. And yeah, they're going to come up and yeah, I'm going to hear them, but I'm not going to give them the importance and the power they used to have.Because you know what? I'm okay, I can do this. And that's what you're building in.And that that strength of character, strength of brain that you build up gives you the ability to watch your thoughts and not be sold into them.Not to be in your thoughts, but to back out and be able to watch your thoughts from a place which is much more neutral and much more stable than the emotional roller coaster that we're on. And that doesn't mean, it doesn't mean that you're not going to fully engage in life.You're still going to feel grief, you're still going to feel anger, you're still going to feel happiness, you're still going to feel joy, you're still Going to be horny, all that stuff.But at the same time, you have a certain stability from this experience, this sense of I'm okay, this other identity that you have built up that says, I'm okay. And I can watch the thoughts. And I will. I will be. I'll be okay. I'm going to make it through.

Michael Herst00:49:45

I agree. I.I think that I'm going to bring another Bruges Lee quote, if you don't mind, because I think what you just said might have something to do with that. I love. And this helped me. I've been through eight operations, as my audience knows, in order to get out of a wheelchair.I spent four years in a wheelchair. And my oldest daughter, when I was asking her what she wanted for a wedding present, she. She said, I want you to walk.She put hand on each one of my arms, and she looked at me square in the face. She said, I want you to walk me down the aisle. And she said, I know you can do it.Because I had lost myself and felt sorry for myself, and I was angry and resentful. My situation and what had taken place and why I was in that wheelchair. And that lit the match under my butt, so to speak. And she made.She reminded me. I followed. I learned kung fu. I learned kung fu in the beginning of my life, about probably 19 years old to.Well, up until just a few years ago, I was practicing kung fu, but I moved into qigong because it was more beneficial to me in that regard. But in that process, I learned a lot of philosophies from Bruce Lee.And, you know, I believe that his philosophy on life and the triumphs that he had overcome allowed me to help me overcome mine. And I walked out of a wheelchair and I walked my daughter down the aisle.And every time I went through a surgery and had to relearn to walk and I had to relearn to do things, I followed that philosophy in the strength and the fortitude within myself. And one of my favorite quotes, and I have to read it directly, even though it's one of my favorites, which fits what you just said.I think he said, empty your mind. Be formless, shapeless, like water. Now, water can flow or it can be. It can crash. Be water, my friend.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:51:38

Be water.

Michael Herst00:51:40

That. And I think that's kind of what you're saying a little. A little bit. You.And with the flow, what you said earlier about going with the flow and understanding the flow, do you think that applies to everything that we just talked about?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:51:56

Well, you know, water is very, very important. In Taoism, Lao Tzu says that we all seek, you know, to rise high in the hierarchies. However, water always takes the lowest position.But by taking the lowest position, it provides the foundation for everything that comes above. Water also is irresistible because if it meets an obstacle, it never could. It, it will. It will always overcome every obstacle.However, it never contends with the obstacle. If it is a wall, it will simply grow in power until it flows over it. If it can't flow over it, it will flow around it.If it can't flow around it, it will seep through it, but it never contends with the obstacle. So, yeah, what, what breeze be like?Water would be the absolute arrival at some mastery of life because you're doing, you're doing what is the appropriate thing to do in the situation that you're in.

Michael Herst00:53:11

I, I, that I will, I will take that with me. This, you know, as when we, when we end this conversation, I will take that with me.I think that it allows me a big better understanding of even that statement in itself with that explanation. Thank you for sharing that.Obviously, your perspective on life has changed since your time in the courtroom, especially from all the, at times, courtrooms can be chaotic. I've been in a few myself. I know that you've been a few.What advice can you give to someone who feels like they're stuck in a chaotic situation or stuck in life or trying to transform their life into something more positive like, like what we're trying to share with them today, that they have an opportunity, they can choose to take a path that can transform their life to be unstuck.

SpeakBob Martiner A00:54:07

Little story. So in, in the criminal justice building in Miami, there were four, 14 felony courts that met on, you know, all during the week.But on Monday was the calendar call, and that meant all the defendants that were set for that week and all their lawyers were crowded into the courtroom. And it was chaotic. It was like a battlefield. There were papers on the streets.The air conditioning couldn't keep up with the heat, with the body heat.And, you know, all the lawyers would be bouncing from court to court because they'd have four cases in three different courts and all this stuff, except for one court, except for one courtroom, and that was one of my mentors, Judge Gerald Kogan. And in his courtroom, it was like an oasis. Everybody had a seat. It was cool.And you walk into that courtroom and you just took a breath, catch your breath.So I went into chambers once, and I asked Judge Cogan, I said, judge, you know, do you get less cases than everybody else, or, you know, what's the story? He goes, no, I. I'm the administrative judge. I have a higher workload than everyone else.I said, have you ever walked around here on a Monday morning and seen the craziness? He goes, yeah, Bob, I have. I said, but your court's not like that. He goes, no, it's not. I said, how do you account?And he goes, well, I think the other judges kind of get their emotions stuck up in the decision making. They get contentious and they contend with all the lawyers and with all the defendants and they want to accomplish.And if they feel somebody's trying to get one over on them, they kind of get, you know, emotionally involved. But it's kind of like this. It's a matter of timing. He said, if you.If you try to pick an apple off a tree before it's ripe, you're going to struggle and twist and pull and yank. And when you get the apple, it's going to be sour. And if you wait too long, it's going to drop and rot.But if you pick it just right, it comes off easy and it's sweet. So I think the other judges just continue cases when they need to be tried, and they try cases when they need to be continued.So they wind up doing a lot of stuff over. I try not to take things personally.You know, the situation is what it is in front of me, and I think I just have a better sense of when a case needs to be continued because it's not right, and when a case needs to be tried because it is right. So I would say that. That when it comes time to be an adult, you know, don't be a child.

Michael Herst00:57:00

Oh, yeah, I like that. That's. That's. That. That's brilliant. Don't be a child. It's. Yeah.I think too many, especially in today's world with road rage, everything from road rage up, you know, that. That is. It takes me back to my domestic violence. I worked at domestic Violence Task Force. That's all we worked was domestic violence. And we did that.I did that for a number of years. And it was. It was chaotic.Each and every time we went into those environments and even to try to get people separated, to say, just take a breath, you know, that. So, yeah, I wish. I wish I could. I only wish if I could go back in time. Right. Kind of go back in time. We.If somebody was trying to understand how to be wise and happy and learn mindfulness and meditation and Taoism and how to be the best person that they could be. How can they reach out to you?

SpeakBob Martiner A00:58:05

Well, I've tried to put everything together in one place and it's on my website. A wise and happy life. And just so that we don't leave people hanging about what meditation is and what it's not and whether it's right for you.People ask me those questions all the time. So I figured, well, let me just put it all down in a book.So I wrote a little 40 page illustrated ebook that you can go to my website and it's free and it's downloadable and there's no obligation. Just click on the download it and.And it will open it up to a flip book and you can read it and you can download it from there and keep it and it'll answer all your questions about meditation.And you know, I just thought of one more thing I wanted to leave them with because, you know, you notice that I have another book called I am the Way and it is a Christian reimagining of Taoism. The main book in Taoism is the Dao to jing.It has 81 short little chapters and I kind of rewrote those in Christian terminology so that the wisdom of that thinking could be available in the Western mind and that of course you can find out more about it there.But no matter what your culture is, whether the met, whether the wisdom teacher was Lao Tzu or Gandhi or Krishna or Buddha or Jesus or Moses, they all, we think that they all came here for the purpose of making us better people and creating a better world. And I say maybe not. Maybe what they really were intending is for us to be happy.It just so happens that the road to happiness is along the path of kindness, generosity, wisdom, empathy, sincerity, authenticity. These things are the things that when we cultivate those aspects of our personality, we wind up being happy.And the proof of it is the people that are mean and greedy and people that are ignorant, they just ain't happy.

Michael Herst01:00:36

I can understand that and I agree with you.I think that sometimes we're following the yellow brick road and you get to see the monkeys and the villains and the witches and sometimes you get to see the positive and the good and the what can be given to you. Would you be grateful for the path that you walk, no matter which one it is?We can always again talk about the ups, the downs, you know, the, the good, the bad. But as long as we can walk away with something that makes us a better person and more happy, then we become a better person naturally. So thank you.That's what Amazing. I could talk for another. We could talk for another two hours, man.

SpeakBob Martiner A01:01:18

Oh, easy, easy.

Michael Herst01:01:19

You'll have to come back. You will have to please come back on the show again. I will continue this conversation. So. But thank you for coming here and thank you for.It's been a pleasure to meet you. It's been a pleasure to have a conversation with you, and I look forward to another one.

SpeakBob Martiner A01:01:33

Yep, I'm up for that.

Michael Herst01:01:36

This is one more thing before you go. Do you have any words of wisdom you can share with with our viewers?

SpeakBob Martiner A01:01:40

Well, one more thing before we go. Yeah. You're not your thoughts. You may think that you are your thoughts. You may feel like you are your thoughts, but you're not your thoughts.You're so much more. You are the creator of your thoughts.And when you finally get it that you are the creator of your thoughts and you're not the thoughts themselves, you're going to find a freedom that is unimaginable.

Michael Herst01:02:11

Amazing words of wisdom. Thank you for sharing those.I think we should all print those out and put them in front of us and look, look at them every day so we can understand that we have opportunity and choice. So thank you very much. Also, I forgot to mention this.You've got some classes on your website as well that people can get involved in and learn how to be happy and to be mindful about meditation as well. Correct?

SpeakBob Martiner A01:02:39

We do. And I just tell you the one thing that's unique about the way that we teach meditation. Most people want a teacher or they want an app.We have an app that is designed to you get me and you get the app. Because on the app is a way every time you meditate, you log what you feel that comes to my dashboard. I respond to it, it goes back to your app.So we stay in conversation every single day for five weeks. And the difference it can make in five weeks is incredible.

Michael Herst01:03:16

Oh, that's amazing. And you can find that on the website.I'll make sure that the web address is in the show notes so that everybody can just click on it and go right to you. Bob, again, thank you very much for a wonderful conversation.I really appreciate your wisdom, your experience and everything that you brought to the audience today.

SpeakBob Martiner A01:03:35

Thank you so much, Michael.

Michael Herst01:03:36

Have a great day. One more thing before you all go. Have a great day. Have a great week and thanks for being here. Thanks for listening to this episode of.

SpeakBob Martiner A01:03:47

One more Thing before you go.

Michael Herst01:03:49

Check out our website@beforeyougopodcast.com youm can find us as well as subscribe to the program and rate us on your favorite podcast listening platform.