EP20 Recap | Bede Draper: How to transform your psychology & elevate the way you live

It’s our last episode before the close of Season 1 of the Ultrahabits Podcast and we are joined by my friend, mentor and teacher Bede Draper for a conversation about how we transform our psychology from one of endless searching, craving and dissatisfaction to one that is more stable and integrated into the flow of life. This interview was very timely as we have just closed out Men’s Mental Health Week to acknowledge the escalating rate of men’s mental health issues and suicide rates is an epidemic.

Bede is a trained psychotherapist, expert in religious and philosophical studies and while his vast training and knowledge are far more than impressive, none of this was able to help him solve his own fundamental unhappiness and inability to live life “free” as he calls it.

In his fifties, Bede gave up his thriving psychotherapy practice and with his wife Sylvia they embarked to India for 18 months, Bede had been in contact with a monk named Swami Dayananda in India for several months and had become convinced that within this monk’s psychology laid the solution to our human condition.

What was initially a trip to study the psychology of monk ended up becoming a completely transformational experience for Bede, and with the learnings, teachings and ultimately blessings received by Swami Dayananda, he brought the teachings back with him to the West and has integrated it into his overall approach in a completely secular and non-dogmatic approach which has culminated in an impactful approach impacting people all over the world.

Bede is an existentialist, like a stoic, he is more concerned with changing the way we operate in the world through what he calls “conduct and goodwill.” He teaches us that the way to change our psychology and therefore “stability” is not through trying to change our psychology itself or embracing more positivity, or self-help, rather it’s about changing our actions and how we relate to people, places and things, adding more value to the context of life is ultimately how we start to lift ourselves out of the human condition.

This show will leave you with some insights and practical tools that will help you deal with the darkness of your psychology, Bede has been a force in my life ever since we coincidentally met those years ago on a 6:00 am flight to Melbourne, the conversation that we struck up has continued for a few years now, and I am so stoked to be able to finally bring you in on the discussion.

Enjoy folks!

RJ Singh

Listen to the episode | Watch the episode

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Follow Bede’s Journey:

Websites – https://beingfreewhileliving.org | https://www.manability.com.au/about/