If you’re like me, after you finished college, you found moments in your life when your friendships with others changed. Maybe you wanted to grow and evolve spiritually, and they did too. But you’ve also probably walked away from friendships that, for one reason or another, no longer served you.

I’ve often thought about the concept of renunciation – and how I have a resistance to it. Don’t get me wrong. I lived out of my car for 7 years and I was a climbing guide who only made $14k a year for a looooong time, so I understand how living simply can be really fulfilling. That chapter of my life was one of the happiest.

The to-do list and project ideas are endless and it all seems really important. And the really annoying part is that when we look at the lists and get overwhelmed, we end up doing nothing instead. The secret is that it’s NOT all as important as it might seem.

So how do we narrow down that list and figure out what ACTUALLY needs to get done?

With passive action, you’re doing something but not creating a result. So, you might be reading or learning or studying – which feels really good. It’s like you’re doing something, but not in a massive action sense because you haven’t created a result.

This episode is all about releasing one of the most common toxic patterns many of us have (and that easily that hooks me, personally): judgment and blame.

This past week when I was on a silent retreat, as the days went by and we all got deeper into our meditation practice, I could see that people were walking really slowly…taking long pauses to enjoy the nature around us; stopping and touching the leaves of a bush and even petting it in appreciation; gazing at a wild turkey and laughing at all its sounds and attempts at impressing us with displays of their feathers, or perma-grinning up at the full moon.