Ep 171: Falling Down and Getting Up with Mark Nepo
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Ep 171: Falling Down and Getting Up with Mark Nepo
Episode 171: Show Notes
Every day, we are offered opportunities to choose between surviving and thriving. When faced with adversity, we can choose to give up or we can choose to enlarge our sense of things when pain and fear make us feel small. Sometimes, all it takes is a shift in perspective.
Today’s guest is Mark Nepo, a beloved poet, master teacher, and New York Times bestselling author who has been called one of the “most spiritually influential” people alive today. In his most recent book, Falling Down and Getting Up: Discovering Your Inner Resilience and Strength, Mark invites readers to view adversity from a different viewpoint and navigate the challenges of life by transforming them into opportunities for deepening and renewal.
In this episode, Mark shares his experience of coming face-to-face with his mortality when he was diagnosed with cancer, the perspective it gave him on life, and how it led him to become a “student of all paths.” We take a deep dive into the shifting meaning of success, what it means to find your God-given element, and how to follow the truth that’s in your heart.
We also touch on how Mark retrieves his poems and books rather than authoring them, views pain, grief, and fear as teachers, and more. Filled with humble insights and wise words, Mark’s new book (and this conversation about it) will encourage and inspire people from all walks of life. So, tune in and join us today!
Key Points From This Episode:
How Mark found his “God-given element” in metaphor and learned to create from his father.
Why he says that his parents, who grew up in scarcity, were literal-minded.
Allowing your heart to tell you what’s true, even if you don’t understand it yet.
Why we need both the wisdom of our own souls and the wisdom of others.
Mark’s love for words and the divine things they point us to.
The “more whole” definitions of words that etymology can offer us.
What Mark means when he compares being a teacher to being a greenhouse.
From being driven to being drawn: how his early ideas of achievement have evolved.
How great love and suffering drop us into the depths of life, where the real journey begins.
The story of how Oprah discovered The Book of Awakening thanks to a yoga class.
Ways that Mark’s perception of dreams, goals, and success has radically shifted.
The importance of detaching from the stories we tell about ourselves (and others).
Insight into Mark’s complicated relationship with his parents.
Advice for writers: hold your ideas loosely and allow your writing to guide you.
How pain, fear, and grief have been Mark’s most profound teachers.
What he means when he says it’s more important to be real than to be positive.
Why we only grow by enhancing risk and stepping into the unknown.
Mark’s advice for tapping into your inherent creativity
Quotes:
“My definition of poetry is not stanzas and all of that. It's the unexpected utterance of the soul. You don't even have to write it down. I just happen to.” — Mark Nepo [0:07:42]
“By following what I know to be true, then it becomes my teacher.” — Mark Nepo [0:15:57]
“I became a lover of words after realizing that they were the only way to help make visible the truth of life. There's a paradox there because, as a poet, the only things worth writing about are the things that can't be said.” — Mark Nepo [0:23:22]
“Being a teacher is like being a greenhouse. It's our job to provide light and warmth and what is before us will grow as it knows how to grow, not how I want it to grow.” — Mark Nepo [0:29:41]
“Great love and great suffering drop us in, and once we're dropped into the depth of life, that's when our real journey begins. For me, almost dying from a rare form of lymphoma in my 30s was that drop into the depth of life.” — Mark Nepo [0:34:33]
“I've come to understand that the soul wants the heart to be alive. It doesn't care how.” — Mark Nepo [0:43:12]
“This is one of the hardest things to teach young writers – once [a book] comes alive, it tells us where to go.” — Mark Nepo [1:00:26]
“Being human is a thousand moods. Being fully alive is feeling all of them as they arrive through us. It's letting them through us that transforms us.” — Mark Nepo [1:10:02]
“Those who suffer have a wisdom the rest of us need. Since we all suffer, we all take turns being wise.” — Mark Nepo [1:11:51]
Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode: