Discovering What Matters in a Distracted World with Soren Gordhamer [Episode #995]

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This Week’s Episode Special Guest: Soren Gordhamer

In this enlightening conversation, Kimberly Snyder and Soren Gordhamer explore the themes of mindfulness, presence, and self-discovery in an age filled with distractions. They discuss the importance of embracing emotions, living from a place of fullness rather than lack, and the role of technology and AI in our lives. Soren shares insights from his book, ‘The Essential,’ emphasizing the need for authenticity, connection, and creating conditions for our gifts to flourish. The dialogue encourages listeners to reflect on their own journeys and the impact of their choices on personal and collective well-being.

About Soren Gordhamer

SOREN GORDHAMER is the founder + host of Wisdom 2.0, the premier conference for exploring living with greater mindfulness, wisdom, and compassion in the modern age. His new book THE ESSENTIAL: Discovering What Really Matters in an Age of Distraction  explores the influence of AI and cutting through distractions to uncover what truly matters in our lives, and engaging purposefully and creatively.

He is the founder + host of Wisdom 2.0, the premier conference exploring living with greater mindfulness, wisdom, and compassion in the modern age. It brings the leaders of technology together with leaders in wisdom to explore how we can create a truly livable world. He is also founder and host of Wisdom & AI, an annual event that explores the impact AI will have on society and how we can harness it wisely. Soren is also the founder of the Lineage Project a New York City-based nonprofit that offers awareness-based practices to at-risk and incarcerated teens. He also spent a year walking through parts of the United States, India, Pakistan, and Japan as a part of the Global Walk for a Livable World.

He is also a Co-Founder and General Partner of Wisdom Ventures, along with Jack Kornfield and Yung Pueblo, which invests in companies creating a more just and compassionate world. He and Jon Kabat-Zinn also co-hosted the Mitigation Retreat, which was a free 3-month course held every weekday offering meditations and teachings during Covid. He has taught techies at Google, incarcerated youth in New York City, and trauma survivors in Rwanda. Soren is currently focused on the impact AI will have on our world, and how our society can prepare.

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Guest Resources 

Book: THE ESSENTIAL: Discovering What Really Matters in an Age of Distraction 

Website: https://www.wisdom2summit.com/

Social: @wisdomventures

 

Episode Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Mindfulness and Presence
02:49 Navigating Chaos and Embracing Emotions
06:01 The Journey of Self-Discovery and Healing
09:00 Living from Fullness vs. Lack
12:00 Understanding Our True Essence
15:07 The Role of Inquiry in Personal Growth
18:01 Practical Steps to Connect with Self
21:02 The Impact of Information on Our Lives
24:04 Nurturing the Next Generation
27:03 Conclusion: The Gift of Presence and Authenticity
27:26 Understanding Misunderstanding: Embracing Our True Selves
28:52 Visionaries and the Courage to Follow Inner Guidance
30:25 The Role of Technology in Human Connection
32:45 Wellness: The Balance Between Self-Care and Self-Obsession
34:52 The Intersection of Spirituality and Health
37:48 AI and Humanity: Navigating the Future Together
41:14 Rethinking Society in the Age of AI
44:50 The Essence of Humanity: Connection Over Technology
47:52 Creating Conditions for Our Gifts to Flourish

 

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OTHER PODCASTS YOU MAY ENJOY!

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• How the Power Foods Diet helps with Weight Loss with Dr. Neal Barnard EP. 877
• How Not to Age with New York Times best-selling author Dr. Michael Greger [Episode #873]
• How to eat to reduce anxiety with Harvard nutritional psychiatrist Dr. Uma Naidoo [Episode #867]

 

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Transcript: 

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (00:00.6)
Hi everyone and welcome back to our Monday interview show. I am so excited for our very special guest here with me today, Soren Gordhammer. He has a new book out, which I absolutely love and did read cover to cover. It’s called The Essential, Discovering What Really Matters in an Age of Distraction. Soren is also the founder and host of Wisdom 2.0, the premier conference for exploring lives with greater mindfulness, wisdom and compassion in the modern age.

Thorne, thank you so much for being here with us today.

Soren Gordhamer (00:34.169)
It’s great to be here. Thank you for inviting me.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (00:36.718)
No, you and I were chatting before the podcast and we were just going on and on. said, wait a second. We had to make record. is.

Soren Gordhamer (00:41.425)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I’m super excited to talk to you because it feels like, you know, it’s always nice to meet somebody who kind of comes to the same kind of like insights, but maybe for slightly different channels.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (00:56.088)
There are so many topics in the book and I ear, what’s the word, dog ear or ear march or whatever you like to call it. I fold it down so many different pages, Soren. I’m like, I really love this. This piece of wisdom really speaks to me. it’s, you know, it’s just something that in the way that you’re packaging is so beautiful. You talk about wholeness, you talk about presence. It’s funny because I had a really challenging morning this morning. I’ll share with you.

Soren Gordhamer (01:01.222)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (01:24.654)
I was reading your book afterwards, my son’s who I love so much, one’s in preschool and one’s in third grade. You know, boy energy, I know you have a son as well. And there was just this, you know, like fighting over toys, breakfast, and just so many things. And I was sitting there and I was breathing. And one of the things you talk about in the book is the tension builds when we’re not resisting. And it’s funny because, and I was reading that part of your book after this.

Soren Gordhamer (01:49.264)
Mmm.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (01:53.186)
And when I became a new mom, and I know we have a lot of moms in the community, it was just, it just felt so challenging to really, you know, have to manage all these different personalities and all these different energies. And it’s not that it’s not challenging now, but a little bit further along the path toward, there is a lot of wisdom in what you said about just sort of being in chaos or messiness.

Soren Gordhamer (02:05.2)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (02:09.915)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (02:18.555)
Mm-hmm.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (02:20.042)
and not trying to wish it with something else and just sort of relax into it.

Soren Gordhamer (02:22.799)
Yeah. Yeah. I think that’s really our challenge today. There’s so much coming at us and I think virtually there’s even more coming at us than our phone pings and alerts and the energy just can get pretty intense. And part of the reason, you know, I really kind of questioned or struggled with the subtitle as like, how do we, you know, discovering what really matters in an age of, is it distraction? Is it stress? Is it turmoil? Like, what’s that word?

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (02:33.154)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (02:49.037)
And I think it’s more that there’s just so much coming at us that we lose center, we lose balance. And when we come back, just like you did to our breath, to our body, to how we’re feeling, it’s not like the kids all of a sudden start behaving better, but our resistance to them and our frustration with them and our anger towards them takes on a different context because we’re no longer seeing them as the enemy. We’re seeing that there’s this challenge coming through and that we get the opportunity to respond.

And how might the response expand me? How might it open my heart? How might it develop my compassion versus like, this should not be happening. They should not be doing this thing. They are the problem. The problem needed to be solved. And I’m not saying they don’t need to have rules and guidelines and sometimes have repercussions for their actions, but the energy behind that can either be one of this should not be happening. You’re doing something wrong.

or it can be the energy of just like, wow, this moment is inviting me into something. How do I expand into it? And I think that inquiry is really the inquiry that we need to make.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (03:48.942)
Exactly. it’s really, there’s a part of the book where you talk about feeling a full spectrum of feelings and knowing that as humans, do experience all these things. And that’s part of, I think, what real presence is in aliveness. Because many of us are not taught to feel feelings. know Sorin, for as an adult, I’m unlearning and relearning a lot. And part of that is saying, wow, you know, there was so much of my…

Soren Gordhamer (04:10.545)
We’re all, yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (04:16.216)
childhood and what I learned to be like, this doesn’t feel good. Let me prove my worth. Try to mitigate this pain of not feeling lovable by, hey, look at my A’s, look at my perfect grade, look at this. Right. And so then there’s a lot of blocks and things that, you know, certainly in your book can spark just a different way of revisiting things that you can do.

Soren Gordhamer (04:27.673)
Yeah, yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (04:38.265)
Yeah, think, yeah, and what I tried to do in a very, hopefully, you know, honest way is just to tell my story around it and how I got accustomed to the fact that I’m carrying my past with me in the present moment. And how do I become curious about the stories, the myths, and the attitudes that I kind of grew up with that are carrying me today that maybe don’t serve me. And sometimes I like to think of it as like cages.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (05:02.744)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (05:06.309)
that we put up or armor that we put up. And at one point in our life, we did need to put that armor up because it was really dangerous outside and so we needed bars. And then that danger leaves, but we’re still walking around with bars. You know, the bars are still in the cage and we have to go back and like tend to those parts of ourselves that are still hurt, that are still in pain, that are still wounded. So we can show those parts that it’s safe now to let down some of those bars and open our heart in a way that maybe we couldn’t when we were younger.

And so I talk about how my own life has unfolded and how my drive to be successful was in part a way of covering up an early pain I had of being a kid and my parents divorcing, my mom leaving and live with my dad. And the narratives that I started to develop around unworthiness and of course something must be wrong with me. Why else would your mom leave and your parents divorce? And there’s something I did.

And if you had asked me, like I would say, oh no, I don’t have that thought, I’m fine. But when I really took a deep look at it, I realized that there was this unconscious motivation driving me and it was never fulfilled. was not like, oh, I made it now. I did the successful this or the successful that. There was just like a constant seeking and a constant running. And I think the only way to be free of that is to question that story and to be like, is that really true?

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (06:26.894)
Mm.

Soren Gordhamer (06:27.033)
and to go back and to see if we can heal whatever parts of ourselves that we exiled or pushed away. So for me, a lot of it was in order to be a success, I have to push away my vulnerability and my not knowing and my fear. Like I have to make sure that nobody sees those, only people see my confidence and my happiness. And yet we’re humans, we’re all of it. Parts of us are fearful, parts of us are angry, parts of us are happy.

For me, that wholeness involves embracing all those parts and not just building an identity around a pain that we had that really doesn’t serve us. through my conference, I’ve been able to interview, as you probably have, some of the most successful people in the world. I’ve interviewed the founders of OpenAI and Anthropic and LinkedIn and eBay and PayPal and all the different companies. And it’s not like those people succeeded, but not all of them have been healed where they’re actually satisfied and content.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (07:01.794)
Right.

Soren Gordhamer (07:24.965)
And I think how do we live in a way that’s content with the present moment and when our heart is open and we don’t necessarily have this like enormous either thriving energy or fear energy. I think it can go either way. Either we’re thriving towards success or we’re afraid of putting ourselves out there. We’re afraid of being seen. So we’re just going to spend our days on TikTok or Instagram or the news because we’re kind of hiding out in our apartment or our house and the life.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (07:28.59)
more

Soren Gordhamer (07:51.801)
question is just like, do we move forward and how do we more fully show up in the world in an authentic way? And that was my hope with the book was just to kind of share my journey in that.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (08:02.614)
Yes, I love all the stories along the way and the honesty. you know, if people are different parts of the journey, soreness, sometimes we think, well, hmm, how do I know if I am stuck in the story or I am in the past? And I could say for me personally, one of the biggest markers of my growth has been just feeling more peace because we’re on that treadmill of achievement. What we would say is the propelled heart stage.

Soren Gordhamer (08:17.649)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (08:32.686)
It’s like always on, like you said, social media, always consuming, always producing, always trying to uphold this persona or this mask or this identity. And then there’s that dopamine hit if you get a viral post or whatever it is, but it’s not really sustainable. And if we’re really honest with ourselves, it’s not really peaceful. It’s like walking on this razor’s edge of like, hey, let’s just up and down. And there’s something to be really said of, know, things aren’t always going to work out. It’s not always going to look.

Soren Gordhamer (08:41.061)
Mm-hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (08:44.496)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (08:56.593)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (09:00.913)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (09:02.646)
you know, neat and pretty and how we want, but can I find more peace with what is with myself?

Soren Gordhamer (09:08.24)
Yeah, yeah, 100%. I think that’s the number one thing. if we do that, and we were talking before, the creativity that comes out of you is so much different than just that striving for some future moment that this moment doesn’t have. And if I can just get this moment, if I can just get my life situation in this little perfect way, everything is going to be great, right? If I can get all these things and we’ve seen it again and again and again, it doesn’t necessarily satiate, right? There’s still this sense of lack.

And I think that’s really a beautiful question. Are we living from lack? Are we living from fullness? And I’d like to think we can create more things. We can make more money. We can have better friends. We can be a better partner, better parent when we actually know ourselves and we’re coming more from a place of fullness rather than a place of lack. And when you’re with somebody and you can feel that lack and they could have bazillions of dollars and be the most famous person in the world. Like they could have all the external, but internally they still feel lack.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (09:55.032)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (10:05.435)
They feel like they’re not enough. And I think that is the thing that we have to be so careful of and the algorithms that now run our lives on social media. Give us lack. Yeah. They make a ton of money on us feeling lack and continuing to stay on the scroll of the next hit and the next thing and keeping us glued to that. it’s…

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (10:13.696)
Attention. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (10:27.633)
I want to complain about that, but it’s just the truth. There’s a system there that wants you to feel lack because it makes more money the more you feel lack.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (10:36.48)
Mm, you know, it’s funny, so when you and I were talking about the journey a little bit and earlier on, as I mentioned, I was pulled into this celebrity world and I was just pretty fresh off of backpacking and it wasn’t something that I planned or chose. A lot of people like, how did you do that? Like I didn’t try, I don’t know what it’s taken to this day. I’m not a movie person. Suddenly I’m on and, you know, what was really interesting, cause I would ask God I aspire. I’m like, why am I here?

Soren Gordhamer (10:58.971)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (11:06.178)
And then I started to get this knowingness, know, everything is growth, everything is learning. And one of the growths for me was sort of getting that inner peak into some of these, you know, the lives of people that are on all the magazine covers and be the most famous, the most beautiful and all the timeless and, know, people’s most, whatever beautiful list and having a lot of anxiety amplified and

Soren Gordhamer (11:09.275)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (11:20.421)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (11:24.835)
Mm-hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (11:31.845)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (11:32.674)
then there’s a part of the book where you say, this system that you speak about is trying to convince us that what is not really essential, like what all these celebrities are doing or having the most followers or all these things aren’t really essential to our wholeness and our wellbeing. It’s not gonna bring the connection to our hearts, to ourselves, to other people. And so it is this giant fallacy. And I’m not saying,

Soren Gordhamer (11:42.513)
Thank

Soren Gordhamer (11:51.653)
Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (11:58.267)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (12:00.728)
Believe, you know, I’m not trying to say, know, the amazing things came out of that period and it certainly helped to find my voice as an author and things. I’m very grateful. But it was, it was a little bit, at the time of being in my early twenties, a little bit disconcerting, like, you know, why is the world as it is? Like, why are we striving for something that just feels like the compass is so off?

Soren Gordhamer (12:06.118)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (12:19.238)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (12:24.985)
Yeah, I think it’s because we don’t know who we are. We don’t know who we are. And when we can better understand who we are, which is only an inner journey, like nobody can tell you who you are, but you can get glimpses of who you truly are, like the beauty that you truly are, independent of the shape of your body or the age of your body or your intellect or your bank account or your number of followers. There’s like a beauty to each one of us. And I think when we discover that, we walk

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (12:29.495)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (12:53.521)
through the world a little differently. Granted, we will forget it probably 10,000 times going forward, but if we can get in touch with that inner dimension, that inner knowing, that inner intelligence, I think that’s the only medicine. And then if life wants us to be a successful actor, actress, amazing, and we can play that role, we can do that dance, or an ex, or a CEO of the largest company, whatever, we can play that dance, but we know that’s just a dance. We know that’s not who we are.

So we’re not living in this incredible fear that we’re going to lose that status that we have, or there’s a more beautiful model that’s coming up, who’s going to take over our job and then we’ll be less than again, and this fear of lack, this constant searching back and forth. So I think the beauty is to know who we are and then to be able to play in this world of form. mean, isn’t it amazing to write books or to post things or to build companies? It’s all like amazing.

if our identity doesn’t depend on it, if we think that I’m this now, I’ll be more of a better person or my rank will increase when I get this, we’re totally lost the path versus like, know who I am and this just wants to be expressed out of me and I’m just going to enjoy it and celebrate it. And I’ve always liked the Buddha, the Buddha said, I teach the path that’s glorious in the beginning, glorious in the middle and glorious in the end.

And it might be hard, but there still needs to be a gloriousness with it, right? Like you’re in the process of creating a business or writing a book or doing something. And we feel like we’re supercharged by a power that we’re aligned with that makes that moment so sweet. And we still want to create something and we still want to make an impact. And I think that’s the balance that when we can find that balance, extraordinary things come from that. And it’s not so much by me, but it’s through us, right? We’re tuned to something and it’s happening through us.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (14:37.708)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (14:41.145)
And we can feel like, and we talked about, it’s just the most beautiful feeling because we realized we’re just a channel for something to move through and we each have different karmic assignments, right? So one person might, karmic assignment might be to go into the food industry or the fashion industry or the healthcare industry or whatever. And it doesn’t matter really. I mean, it’s not like, this form is better than being a hermit or being a spiritual teacher is better than being a business owner. Like, I don’t think so.

I just think we have different karmic assignments and then how do we fully embody what those are from a place of deep love and compassion and openness. And I think that’s what the world is hungry for. We’re hungry for that presence and that authenticity. And I think the algorithms tell us on you just keep staying here and we’re going to eventually give you something satisfying, but you just keep have to stay in here long enough. And so like people spend four to five hours a day on the platforms and

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (15:22.093)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (15:34.457)
I just think it’s really, really sad. And I totally understand using the platforms for business and, you know, it’s where people’s attention are and it makes sense to have some engagement. But there’s a moment where it shifts from like, this is useful use of social media to now I’m just bored and lonely and I’m just being fed this algorithm that doesn’t serve me. And I think it’s really important for us to know when that turn happens so that we’re aware and we realize like, wow, what actually matters to me? Maybe it calling a friend or going for a walk.

or going to a yoga class or meditating or, you know, there’s certain things that are probably more nurturing than being caught in that loop.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (16:12.48)
Yes, yes, it’s true. It’s, I think a lot of people listening to this can say, know that feeling of sort of disconnection or not feeling really peaceful or really fulfilled. And there is a journey between what you’re saying, knowing who we are, which sounds, you know, it sounds true, but there’s also practical steps. And for me, it’s practice, consistency to get there. Because I think about myself, you know, 15 years ago when I was starting

really out on the path and the anxiety and the masks and they’re not really knowing who I was. I used sit and meditate and I was, you and I am and I still follow the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda, Kriya Yoga, and now our own Heart Aligned Meditation and that consistency soren of sitting in meditation and also in nature, not having my phone, the stillness and the spaciousness.

Soren Gordhamer (16:45.937)
Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (16:54.661)
Yeah, yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (16:59.334)
Mmm.

Soren Gordhamer (17:07.557)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (17:08.384)
and inquiry because your books raise a lot of, you know, I love to read and sort of reflection have helped me progress. Those are some of the practical steps I would say. What are some of the practices or steps you would say to someone or what’s really helped you to go from identified with a mask or spaciousness of I know more of who I am.

Soren Gordhamer (17:13.509)
Mm-hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (17:25.659)
Yeah.

Hehehehe

Soren Gordhamer (17:32.891)
That’s a beautiful question. I think, you I appreciate what you said about my book because I try to make it more of an inquiry for people. So at the end of the chapter, I’ll be like, you you might want to ask, what are the stories that are running your life? I’m not going to tell people what stories are running their life or assume, but I think that kind of inquiry is actually really, really valuable. It’s like, huh, you know, it’s almost like we’re handed a backpack and it’s all the stories of, you know, our society and our family.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (17:57.835)
You

Soren Gordhamer (18:01.041)
And at some point it helps to look in that backpack and be like, are these true for me? Like, what are the stories that seem impactful for me? And I think to discover who we really are, it’s not a story, right? It’s not like even we can say I’m a spiritual person. Like to me, that’s so limiting because like we are the essence of the cosmos, you know, really like the big bang happened, whatever 13 billion years ago. We are the expression of that. Like we are the energy of that.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (18:22.358)
is.

Soren Gordhamer (18:29.859)
you know, what else could we be? And so I think anything that helps us kind of connect to that deeper intelligence, and I’m the same with similar to you in terms of meditation, time in nature, time where I’m outside and I’m just like connected in a way that is not with my phone and not with technology, time I’m deeply bonding with other people and there’s other humans and I’m like, this is what life it’s about. Like we’re all connected. Those are the experiences to me that feel like

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (18:54.35)
Thank

Soren Gordhamer (18:58.223)
And I’m a little bit like, I think that they’re always here in the present moment. It’s just certain conditions kind of create more of an openness to discovering them. But I actually think like looking at you right now and being on the Zoom with you, like, am I here right now? Can I see you and see this world and be with it in as deep a place as possible? So for me, it’s both about being in nature and meditating, but then also realizing like every moment.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (19:02.808)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (19:26.331)
potentially is that moment, right? Like it is that gift when we show up. It can happen both in meditation, but there’s no reason it can’t happen in every moment. And because I think what’s truly, truly valuable is always here and it never goes anywhere. We just lose access or we lose sight of it. And what I think is going on on the planet right now with all of our challenges and climate change and

instability and stuff is it’s an AI in particular it’s a bit of a wake-up call can humanity discover who they are and live wisely with all these challenges and all these powers or are we going to stay divisive and stay disconnected and stay addicted and miss the incredible opportunities that we have

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (20:06.07)
Really?

You know, what you’re describing, Yogananda calls practicing the presence where eventually we are sort of in this perpetual state of connection and attunement. And I think it’s helpful to have those moments, you know, as we were talking about in nature, it seems like a lot of, a of us have the same practices and being in stillness. And it’s almost like scaffolding on a building, right? They’re like supporting everything. And eventually it’s like, you’re always in it. So I do, and I have had that experience or

Soren Gordhamer (20:26.459)
huh.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (20:40.608)
You know, being, especially meditation in the morning brings more of that aliveness, that quality to when I am with someone and it supports. And then this is also, you know, just being here is also beautiful practice. And so it’s, you know, it just keeps weaving together and getting deeper and deeper. And I also love, I’ll quote Yogananda one more time. He says, introspection is one of the greatest tools.

Soren Gordhamer (20:49.573)
Mm-hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (20:55.525)
Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (21:02.865)
Yeah.

Uh-huh.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (21:09.614)
of self discovery, right? And so I think it is important to read and reflect besides sitting in meditation to say, like, you know, step back and really, you know, consider my relationship with me or all this information. I already Veda says that, you know, we’re digesting everything through the senses. It’s not just so the beginning of the essential you talk about how many bits of information

Soren Gordhamer (21:15.386)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (21:19.121)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (21:26.39)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (21:33.009)
Mmm. Mm-hmm.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (21:39.042)
we’re taking every day. And is that really benefiting us? Are we being more concerning with what we’re taking in?

Soren Gordhamer (21:39.216)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (21:43.227)
Yeah.

Yeah, I think that’s hugely important because, you know, if you had a child and there was somebody who knocked on the door and said, can I come and talk to your child and give them this information? You’d probably be like, well, who are you and what are you going to tell my child? like, like you’d be very careful, right? Like, hold it. Yeah, I don’t know you, but these days our kids are on these like media platforms where like all these strangers are walking in telling them all these different things.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (21:59.113)
yes, very little screen family.

Soren Gordhamer (22:13.557)
And do we want those in our kids’ brains? And then I think we also have to ask, what do we actually want in our own minds and hearts? And how much of what we’re digesting is of service to our own human flourishing? And how much are we digesting that just feeds our pain body and our ego and our sense of the world being separate and the world being a dangerous place?

And so I think when all of that is fed into our system, it’s no surprise then that the world manifests in the way it manifests. And if we start planting other seeds and planting like different seeds and putting different information and reading books that really speak to our heart, the world will change. Our life will change, but it only changes when we start planting new things in that garden. And I think that’s an incredible like point you made, which is just like, what are we planning in our garden?

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (22:56.419)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (23:07.471)
And I think it’s easy to complain about the world and our lives and we wish we had more of this, we wish we had more of that. And I totally get that. And it’s also really interesting to be like, what are we planning in our gardens? And I have friends who are like, I don’t have time to meditate. You I just don’t have 10 minutes a day and I’m busy and I got all these things. then they’ll tell me about a new Netflix series that they just, you know, watched. And I’m like, dude, that Netflix series was like a 10 part series. It was like an hour every series.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (23:19.191)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (23:36.025)
You’ve spent 10 hours, of course you have 10 minutes to meditate. And we can be really honest with ourselves, not in a way that’s harsh, but just like, you know what, we only have so many heartbeats to live. We never know when those heartbeats are gonna end. So how do we wanna spend our heartbeats on any given day? Some of that we might not have a lot of choice in if we’re working at a company and we have to do certain things, but some of that we do have a choice in. And when we start intentionally spending those heartbeats, it’s as if the universe or life just moves in to support us.

not instantly, but over time, because it sees that we’re more more aligning with the path. And I think to the extent that we align, the universe aligns, and then things start to open up.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (24:16.16)
It’s true. And it is this level of energy, frequency, quantum fix in terms of the heart, the magnetism of the heart, the fields that are emitting from our hearts at all times. There is an alignment happening, Sorin. And, you know, there’s so many things that we don’t see with the physical eyes, but we can really feel and we can perceive and we can actually experience. It’s interesting when you talk about, you know, bringing information into children, because, you know, the way I was raised,

Soren Gordhamer (24:20.486)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (24:45.934)
And I, you know, waking up as an adult and saying, oh, you know, I wanted to be different for the next generation. And what I can do is make different choices for my children. So my children actually go to Waldorf, a Waldorf school, and education is very much about self-connection. And it’s amazing seeing how my boys are growing up in a way where they didn’t have, you know, memorize. Of course, we’re very grateful to be able to.

Soren Gordhamer (24:58.769)
Mm-hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (25:12.038)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (25:13.006)
put them in that school, without memorizing, reading, being delayed so much about the creative force and energy inside. And it’s such a different way. And I feel like it’s also helped to heal part of my childhood. It’s really amazing being so present when you’re parenting. It’s almost like this interesting relationship with time. It’s like parenting yourself. I don’t know you’ve had that experience with your dad. It’s like you’re changing your classroom present.

Soren Gordhamer (25:18.341)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (25:36.245)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (25:43.278)
It’s a funny thing.

Soren Gordhamer (25:45.361)
It is a really funny thing. I have friends because I live in the kind of Bay Area in Silicon Valley and I know a lot of people work at all the different tech companies and it’s lovely. But you know, some of them will come to me at a certain point and they’re like, I always wanted to be an artist. I always wanted to be this. And they’re just discovering where is their energy actually drawn? And then what did they have to do just to make money? And I totally understand we have to do this to make money. But at some point in every day,

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (26:02.339)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (26:12.529)
can we spend five, 10, 15, 20, 30 minutes going where our energy wants to go? And that could be writing, that could be singing, that could be dancing, that could be playing. But I think like we each have that like energy. And I think that’s part of the gift that we provide children is like, you know what? Your life is not to make me look good. You’re not on the planet.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (26:34.178)
So.

Soren Gordhamer (26:36.037)
to fulfill all the dreams that I didn’t fulfill and to be that great athlete or that great dancer, like our family name, to continue our family name. It’s just like, my God. And what we can give them is like, you are unique being that’s connected to all these other beings and you have a beautiful karmic assignment. I don’t know what that is, but let’s create conditions for you to follow that as best you can, knowing that you’re gonna have incredible pain, incredible suffering, incredible heartache.

And we want to make you strong enough to be able to move through that and to be kind of a warrior in the world. But it has nothing to do with me. You know, it’s like, you’re not here to make me look good. And I think that that’s a gift that we can offer our kids. And then to the extent that we can be as present with them as possible and give them that gift, I think that it’s a magic.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (27:24.035)
Right.

There’s a quote in the book where you talk about not putting energy into making people see, but supporting yourself. I’m paraphrasing here, but that is important. If we didn’t get in childhood, we certainly can. I know I’ve learned that more as an adult. Not everyone’s going to understand. People put their own labels on you, but back to the wholeness. I know who I am. I know what I’m…

Soren Gordhamer (27:36.165)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (27:47.493)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (27:55.886)
And sometimes we are misunderstood and that’s part of life.

Soren Gordhamer (27:58.533)
Yeah. Yeah. And can we allow people to have their stories about us without needing to attack them or believe them? Like that’s just your world, dude. Like I appreciate the fact that you see me either in a really positive light or negative light, all kind of explorers if there’s any truth to it. But we’re basically always telling each other what our stories are. Like we’re living in our own universes. And then we bring our universe to this person and like, well, you’re not this. You should be that.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (28:04.558)
Correct.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (28:09.327)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (28:26.339)
And I think it’s so easy to take those for reality and not just realize like, they’re just telling me their world and I don’t have to follow that story. And I think this goes back to when we don’t know who we are, life tells us who we should be and we follow that. And when we know who we are, we can follow our own guidance. And, you know, one of the interesting things is I’ve been pretty active in the AI world, you know, for last year is I’ve interviewed a lot of the leaders and

One thing that I appreciated about the tech world is when they started like OpenAI seven years ago, everybody told them they were crazy. They’re like, what are you doing? This makes no sense. You hold it. You’re going to have an artificial intelligence, be able to guide us and tell us all these things. It’s like, you guys are ridiculous and stupid. But they felt internally that there was something there that they were trying to bring forth. And most great entrepreneurs, for better or worse, they’re tapped into something internally.

that the rest of the society says that makes no sense, you’ll never do that, but they trust themselves enough to follow that for years and years, and then eventually the society comes around. So the fact that we can see something or we wanna do something and the society might not be ready for it or might think it’s dumb or stupid is not a sign to not do it. Sometimes or often it’s actually a sign that we are a visionary and we’re bringing something forward.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (29:17.632)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (29:43.673)
and the world will eventually see it and be like, yeah, you were right. And I think that’s the kind of determination and courage that we all need. But we only know that when we know ourselves. But my hope is that going forward, we can raise a whole new generation of young people who deeply, deeply know themselves and who deeply, deeply care about the future of the planet. And they can move things forward that are supportive to this next evolution that I think we’re about to go through.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (30:01.218)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (30:11.505)
We are going through it, but I think it’s going to speed up with AI here in the next number of years where technology is going to advance to such a degree that humanity and the technology are going to have to, we’re going to have to work it out somehow.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (30:25.23)
Yeah, it’s true. And I hope that with that knowing who you are, because I think at the heart of us, Orin, there’s this connection, love, kindness, we get to the point where we can’t hurt each other in the ways in which things are happening now. This disconnection of this group here and this group here, I it’s just heartbreaking even thinking of

Soren Gordhamer (30:36.187)
Mm-hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (30:41.647)
Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (30:48.505)
Isn’t it? I know. I know. And you see that like, it’s not that the world doesn’t have enough food. It’s not that the world doesn’t have enough resources or doesn’t have enough places for people to, to live, you know, there’s plenty of space and like these places where we see, whether it’s in most places, you know, it isn’t that lack. It’s a lack of consciousness and it’s a lack of humanity and it’s a lack of love and it’s a lack of seeing togetherness versus seeing other. And that’s the problem.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (31:12.898)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (31:17.061)
You know, and if we can heal that, then it’s very easy to then come together and say, let’s build houses for everybody. Let’s make sure that everybody gets food. But as long as there’s this sense of division, and so how do we heal that division? I think that’s the answer of our time. And if we can heal that division in ourselves and in society, then no matter what comes from that, I think we’ll be beautiful. And if we don’t heal that, anything that comes from that is probably not going to be helpful.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (31:46.422)
Right? Well, and even to break it down to some, you know, everyday material, because a lot of this division can actually be quite a distraction from energy and looking outward and service. So there’s this part of the book, it made me smile. Something I observe all the time is this sort of hyper focus on fitness and biohacking and self-improvement under the guise of, you know, longevity and wellness. of course, listen, I work in the wellness industry.

Soren Gordhamer (31:55.195)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (31:59.597)
Soren Gordhamer (32:07.75)
Mm-hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (32:13.487)
Yeah. Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (32:16.074)
wellness friends and wellness. So I am a big proponent of wellness, but then there’s a difference between what is driving us to have 50, 70 supplements. Why do I have to get this next device? Always, always, always. And underneath is this, as you mentioned in the book, perhaps a fear of degradation or lack. And it’s so much energy that’s being consumed in upholding, resisting. And that can happen in many microwaves.

Soren Gordhamer (32:26.459)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (32:33.797)
Yeah, yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (32:38.99)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (32:45.696)
in our lives. So I think that’s part sort of healing this division and just really honest look at what is driving me and some of these.

Soren Gordhamer (32:49.648)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I think it’s a beautiful question. It’s a hard question to ask ourselves. And, you know, I do supplements and I’m on an anti-inflammatory diet and, I’m jogging and doing the cold plunges. And so I’m with you in that journey. And I do think that, you know, when there is, when we’re not aware of our motivation, there is a compulsiveness to it. And we miss the present moment because we’re constantly seeking the next thing. You know, we’re constantly seeking like

We’re on like almost this rat race to be the healthiest person alive, you know? And that rat race stresses us out. And it’s not coming from spaciousness and love. And I think that’s one of the questions we can ask ourselves. Is this coming from spaciousness and love? And if it is, it’s beautiful. We’re taking care of this incredible vessel of our body. We’re doing things that will allow us to be a greater spirit offering what we offer in the world. And we need a healthy body for that and a healthy mind.

Why not be able to live in a way that we can pick up our grandchildren, you know, whatever years from now and just not have to be bedridden and, you know, all that stuff makes total sense. And if it’s coming for a love from ourselves and a care for ourselves, that has a whole different energy, whether it’s coming from this place where we think we’re not enough and we’re constantly trying to get this moment of enough. So I write about that in the book because I feel like I’m in that same world and it feels like

We need to be conscious of that because if we’re not conscious of that, it’s like we’re going somewhere and we never get to land. We’re driving or traveling somewhere and we don’t get to land. And so my question is always like, what if we land? Like, what if we are enough and we live from a place of enoughness? And that means some supplements will probably be great and some exercise is probably gonna be great, but it’s not this energy of…

Soren Gordhamer (34:46.545)
constantly seeking and I think that’s that’s the scary part and it’s very much active in the longevity and health movement.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (34:52.838)
We know what’s not necessarily in keeping with this expansive wholeness energy that we’re talking about, Sorin, which is experiential. It’s this feeling, it’s connectivity. And I know this from personal experience is there’s this feeling and then there’s the data, right? There’s numbers, devices and the wearables. someone such as myself, which is coming from a place of disordered eating, looking at the scale, I was 10 years old, weighing myself.

Soren Gordhamer (35:09.359)
Yeah, yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (35:22.418)
numbers, which seems so, they’re so linear, right? Like black or this, or this is your BMI or whatever it is, can really, if we don’t have that relationship with our wholeness, can define us and vulnerable aspects of our life. So it can be really tricky. There’s all these advances in wellness, blood work done every week and all these things. And then, you know, some of it’s helpful, but then some of it can exacerbate those underlines.

Soren Gordhamer (35:26.159)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (35:35.888)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (35:41.744)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (35:47.876)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And there’s always something wrong with us at some level, right? And so, and we have to be careful not to label us or focus on that. So when we do the blood test, maybe like 99 things are great and like 10 things are maybe not great. And so we need to address those. But if we lose sight of the fact that we’re also these human bodies and we’re going to die and we have to really appreciate every moment we have.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (35:51.234)
feelings of life.

Soren Gordhamer (36:17.701)
then that brings a different context in. And so on some level, think we also, it’s really important to kind of realize we actually don’t die or there’s some part of us that actually doesn’t die because we are part of this universal intelligence. And can we rest in that? I still want to live to be 90 or a hundred and healthy, like totally true. But if I don’t know who I am and I think that I am my body,

and I need to survive in this body or it’s a failure if I leave, if somehow life situations happen, I have to leave this body. First is if I know myself at a deeper level and I think that’s where the kind of spiritual dimension comes in. And I think in the optimal world, they work together, the health and the wellness and the spiritual work together. And like, yes, we’re gonna die. Yes, we are intelligence itself. And…

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (36:58.678)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (37:08.666)
Let’s heal our bodies and heal our hearts so that we can be more, you know, a clearer vessel in the world. But I do think that it’s easy to get a little obsessed.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (37:18.754)
We have the vessel itself, right? Because Jeff Krasno, who’s a friend of both of us, we were talking about him earlier, he and I are big fans of the Tao Te Ching, we would, period where we would text each other back and forth our favorite verses. And the Tao talks about the bowl is useful, not just because the bowl, but the spaciousness, like the bowl to hold. And so the body is our vessel, we’re moving through. And yes, we want our bodies to be as healthy as,

Soren Gordhamer (37:20.784)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (37:28.689)
Mmm

Soren Gordhamer (37:40.39)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (37:48.302)
possible and to, as Yogananda says, to be a distraction while we’re meditating. But it’s not the end goal. There is this intelligence and I love how you use the word power, this energy moving through us that is beyond that. There’s beyond the body.

Soren Gordhamer (37:54.224)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (38:02.543)
Yeah, yeah, it’s we’re the fabric of the existence. And so can we tap into that? And if there’s anything that I think will help us survive, you know, moving forward, because, and I’m not to scare people too much, but they’re the the world of AI, I think is just going to happen really, really fast in this world, we’ll have robots, and there’ll be super intelligence, and there’ll be all these different things that, you know, humanity will have to grapple with.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (38:26.402)
No.

Soren Gordhamer (38:28.517)
that can be used incredibly harmful ways and also incredibly powerful ways. So the capacity to addict us, the capacity to misinform us, the capacity to know everything about you, to either help you or coerce you, you know, it’s already there. So the AI is already working behind the scenes. If you go on TikTok or Instagram, the AI knows each one of us completely. You know, it’s just what to feed us within the algorithm to keep us doing whatever it wants us to do.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (38:43.084)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (38:57.027)
And so I do think there’s a potential for this like spiritual renaissance of sorts where we realized all this technology is coming our way. It can be of service, but we first have to connect again to this whatever we want to call it source or deeper dimensions. And what excites me and partly why I wrote the book was like, I want to invite us all into that. And I want to share the pieces that I can offer that I feel like are potential paths to that.

to that world that we couldn’t create together.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (39:29.26)
love that you’re involved in AI, and then on this other side, there’s such a deep connection to the mystical, to the wholeness. And so it’s not, know, I’m getting back to the math, I’m a spiritual person, I reject AI, or I’m a tech-based person, and you know, I believe in this. It’s that, there’s, you know, it’s in the wholeness, it’s all in there.

Soren Gordhamer (39:40.657)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (39:48.485)
Yeah. Yeah. And life is manifesting in all these interesting ways, right? Life is manifesting as AI, life is manifesting as human form. And a lot of the AI leaders actually are big consciousness people. know, they’re psychedelics and meditation and they do a lot of these things and they kind of feel like they’re birthing a new intelligence in the planet and that that’s going to be helpful to humanity. You know, it’s going to solve

it’s going solve all the health issues. we just don’t, we can’t process all the pieces of data that, you know, impact the microbiome or impact ourselves. And now with AI, it can like go through and do this testing and various scenarios that can show us maybe a path for a new type of drug or a new type of treatment that the human mind or our current computers just can’t process in the way that it can process. So they actually think that they’re

doing that and we’ll see to what extent that becomes a reality. We’re funders of Function Health and other companies like that which are trying to use AI to help people better assess what’s going on. And I think that’s all super, super helpful. But there is a deeper invitation here, which is how does humanity evolve? And I do see a world coming.

where a lot of our needs will be met and be through technology. A lot of our needs will be met. The whole situation with energy is still to be figured out, but there’ll be robots that make all of our food and all of our products and build our houses and drive our cars. We won’t be driving cars anymore. They’ll all be cars or most of us will be driving in cars that are robots. yeah, yeah, Yeah, I think so.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (41:39.438)
Do you think this our lifetime? Wow.

Soren Gordhamer (41:44.729)
I mean, there’s already these called dark factories in China, and they’re dark because there’s robots working. Well, they clean them for an hour, so they work 23 hours a day. And they’re smart enough to put together all the devices that usually humans had to put together, but they’ve trained them. Like, here’s how you put together this toy or this phone or this object. And I think that will increase.

significantly in the next five years so that a lot of those products that used to take humans and factories, increasingly, robots will be able, will be doing those jobs, which means we have to completely rethink our society and rethink capitalism because when all of a sudden you have this new intelligence and these new entities, what’s the new society that we can create based on that? We have these Waymo cars in San Francisco. I think they have them in LA.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (42:25.805)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (42:37.879)
some in LA.

Soren Gordhamer (42:38.873)
Yeah, they just drive by themselves. And I think that will just continue throughout the society in the next five years as well, that they’ll just be, but, but, and on one level, that’s super interesting. By another level, there’s millions of Uber drivers and taxi drivers and you know, what happens to them and how do we create a society where the people used to work in factories have a meaningful vocation or have a meaningful way of being of service. And so from a consciousness, if you have a conscious culture, they can easily figure that out.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (42:54.03)
Right.

Soren Gordhamer (43:08.187)
But if you have a culture that’s based on ego and separation and division and winning, that’s a very dangerous world.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (43:16.002)
Also Sorin, if time is managed where some of this AI can be used to complete some of our tasks, can it then be funneled into more connection? I did podcast interview yesterday with this woman, Kate O’Brien.

Soren Gordhamer (43:27.429)
Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (43:32.165)
Hmm.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (43:34.584)
who’s essentially a death doula. She sat with a thousand people and helped them transition. And she has a whole international organization. She won this humanitarian award, but she was saying how many, you know, the aging population is increasing so much and how many elderly people really die alone. And we haven’t created that, you know, that support system on her to be with the elderly. It’s just gonna increase. It’s been like this thousand-fold increase in

Soren Gordhamer (43:37.738)
wow.

Soren Gordhamer (43:42.833)
Wow.

Soren Gordhamer (43:53.073)
Mmm.

Soren Gordhamer (43:57.722)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (44:01.297)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (44:03.182)
You know, we’re talking about getting our needs met with AI, but there’s certain things, and you point this out in the book as well, AI can never meet being someone and having them have a dignified death. And like all these parts of no technology can ever replace that humanity.

Soren Gordhamer (44:11.643)
No.

Soren Gordhamer (44:16.634)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (44:20.785)
No, I don’t think so. have not seen it. I’m, I’m, I mean, I’m open to being wrong, but I don’t think any robot, imagine your children, imagine having a child robot or, you know, or a husband or wife or partner robot or boyfriend, girlfriend, like, they might say all the right things at all the right times, you know, and do all the things, but that there is that essence of humanity that if we lose that, I’m

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (44:34.85)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (44:42.561)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (44:50.437)
deeply, deeply worried about the fate of humanity if we lose that sense of human contact. And so I think on some level, all the technology can be a great servant, but it’s a horrible master. It’s horrible if we let it take over. there’ll be some hard years, I think, where there will be a lot of people who, you know, like,

We’re doing an event with Van Jones in LA a few days ago and he was like, you he has a young child three years old He’s like, you know that child have first crush be a human or a robot or be an AI You know like 10 15 years from now will people be choosing these AI worlds over these human worlds and I never thought this would happen in my lifetime, but it’s how it’s happening It’s it’s in the process of happening and I think even better for us to know know who we are and to wake up

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (45:46.67)
Yeah

Soren Gordhamer (45:48.369)
and to discover what is inherent in each one of us. And I think what’s inherent in each one of us is this connection to, again, where the consciousness started, the Big Bang, it started at some point, and we are the expressions of this. And so we are the inherent energy of the universe, as crazy as that sounds. And if we tap into that as best we can, that

is the energy that guides us. And so let’s say there’s all of a sudden robots here and we think collectively as a whole, as a we, we’ll easily tax the AI and we’ll tax this and we’ll figure it out. And what I worry about though is this like mindset of anger and greed and hatred. And that’s what we need to tackle. And we need to understand that because the power that we’re gonna be given is getting stronger and stronger. And so if our…

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (46:19.234)
the week.

Soren Gordhamer (46:39.545)
If our systems is based on greed and hatred and division, we’re going to see more greed and hatred and division. And if our system is operating on care and love and connection, then this AI actually can, I think, help us in enormous ways. But people are always worried about the AI. And I’m like, I’m not worried. I’m worried about humanity. I think if humanity can evolve, we’ll be just fine.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (47:00.386)
you.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (47:04.814)
Well, it takes each of us. Yeah, exactly. Back to the light, back to the conscience that grows inside of each of us, back to what we can contribute because sometimes it feels like, oh, like these big issues, like, you know, it just feels scary and overwhelming and like, what can I do? But what we can do is to wake up ourselves. Each of us, you know, can affect many. We can affect circles around us, our children, our loved

Soren Gordhamer (47:06.737)
Yeah, and that’s why I love you’re doing your podcast. It’s all just like drops in the ocean. Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (47:27.269)
Yeah. Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (47:33.425)
Yeah.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (47:34.092)
ones, our workplaces. you know, and back to your book, Soren, which is really the purpose of your book, you know, to bring that wholeness back in each and every single one of us, no matter what trials and circumstances, technologies come into place, we can always connect here. So that’s so important.

Soren Gordhamer (47:41.905)
Mm-hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (47:48.635)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (47:52.389)
That’s it. That’s it. And I tried to make the chapters, as you know, like very short. So for all of us who are super busy, can read, you know, it’s two to three pages and you get a little teaching story from either me working in juvenile halls or walking through different parts of the world. Sounds like we should have another podcast on our travels, but I traveled for a long time and also interviewed a lot of different amazing leaders from different companies. so.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (47:58.574)
Yes.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (48:12.715)
What a fuck.

Soren Gordhamer (48:18.467)
it’s gathering all those insights and trying to make them digestible and applicable for someone who’s 20 or who’s 80 and who’s just kind of interested in the journey, journey of spirituality, the journey of wisdom. And I always was impacted as a kid by the Zen stories and like we were talking about the Daode Qing kind of images and like little short pieces that like they stick with you, right? There’s something about the image or about the story.

And so I wanted to write a modern day version of that, you know, based on my own, my own learnings.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (48:52.116)
I love the story about you were in juvenile hall and you talking about being calm, teaching a meditation and one of the people in your group was explosively saying something like, know, why should I be calm? I’m about to go to court or part of a gang or whatever his life situation was, which was incredibly chaotic.

Soren Gordhamer (49:06.139)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. And I was realizing I was coming in with my own story that they should be calm. And that’s not a good story to come in with. Like calm is not the goal. What we need to focus on is what’s real and true. And how do we welcome that fear and welcome that anger and welcome that frustration versus push away that anger and that frustration with this hope to get somewhere else.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (49:18.318)
Thank

Soren Gordhamer (49:39.281)
And the kids taught me so much. Every day they taught me so much about myself and about life because I would come in with these notions and they would question those notions. And they were never, they never held back because these are like 14, 16 year old kids, tough kids in New York City. And I really miss them and they really taught me a lot. And one of the things they taught me was just about authenticity. And if you’re telling someone, imagine if you’re talking and somebody’s like, calm down.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (49:39.307)
Yes.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (49:48.43)
Hmm.

Soren Gordhamer (50:08.379)
Like, what does that make you feel, right? It usually makes you feel like, who the fuck do you think you are telling me to calm down? Like, it’s much more helpful to be like, tell me what you’re experiencing right now. Tell me what’s actually happening. So yeah, that was one of the lessons the kids taught me.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (50:24.878)
But in being authentic, you can let that anger sort of be felt and rise up and be invested. And without pushing it, it does sort of come down to this place of calmness without forcing it back to the force. Let the energy be.

Soren Gordhamer (50:28.88)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (50:33.637)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (50:37.103)
Yeah. Yeah, let the energy be and say to the extent we can, beautiful, come here beautiful anger. What do you have to show me? Like, thank you for showing up. Thank you for raising your hand. I’m seeing you. I’m paying attention. And that to me is the gift. again, we’ll probably forget that 10,000 times going forward, but as soon as we remember, like, the energy is not wrong or bad. It’s our resistance to it.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (50:50.914)
Hmm. Amazing.

Soren Gordhamer (51:06.373)
that is actually worth the issue.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (51:09.39)
Amazing thought to end on. Love the book. Once again, everyone, it’s called The Essential, Discovering What Really Matters in an Age of Distraction. Where can we get the book?

Soren Gordhamer (51:21.815)
You can get it, yeah, easiest way to get it is online at one of the, whether it’s Amazon or one of the other places where you can buy it online. And it was a joy to write. I wrote it kind of in my free time, like here and there, like I think as you do as well. it just, something wanted to be birthed, something wanted to come through. And I’m like, okay, I’m going to make space as much as I can every week or every day to kind of like allow this birthing process to happen. So it’s very excited to have it out in the world and to,

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (51:35.693)
Yeah.

Soren Gordhamer (51:52.217)
see what it wants to be. And as they say, your job as an artist is to create art and what the world thinks of it in some ways is none of your business. And I would love for people to read it and find it useful. And it’s also just like, this is an expression that came from my heart. And if one person reads it and is impacted, then it’s a success. so my hope is that people who read it or don’t read it, that we also realize we each have a gift to give.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (51:59.949)
Yes.

Soren Gordhamer (52:19.195)
We each have something that might not always be a book, but we each have gifts. And so part of the dance of life is how do I create conditions for my gifts to come forth? And so I would just leave people with that, that we all each have a gift to give or gifts to give. And how do we create conditions where those gifts can come forth more easily?

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (52:29.006)
Well.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (52:40.074)
So beautiful. Thank you so much, Soren, for sharing your heart in this beautiful book and sharing some of your wisdom with us here today. We will link everyone directly to the book in our show notes at mysaluna.com, as well as more information about Soren and his work and other articles and podcasts I think you would enjoy. Thank you, everyone. Thank you, Soren, again, for tuning in to this very present conversation.

Soren Gordhamer (52:48.881)
Hmm.

Solluna By Kimberly Snyder (53:07.342)
I just loved being with you, Sorin, so once again, I love you so And we’ll be back, everyone, in a few days for our next interview. Until then, speaking of which, see you on social media at under Kimberly Snyder. I know our channels, we try to keep really heartfelt and inspiring. And remember, you can always ask questions for the show on our website as well, mysalina.com. Until next time, sending you all so much love and take great care.

Soren Gordhamer (53:09.925)
Likewise, thank you. Thank you.