Jeffrey Besecker:

This is The Light Inside. I'm Jeffrey  Besecker. Pathology, or the way in which something occurs. To many, considering the path of our behaviors becomes emotionally triggering. In this episode, we're going to look at how identifying patterns and moving beyond our program narratives allows us to see a clear pathway to reintegrating unresolved trauma. When facing discomforting emotions, it can be difficult to see beyond the struggles at hand. But those obstacles aren't just problems, they offer insights into how past experiences have shaped the terrain, helping us create a map that integrates the natural layout with our goals for healing. Tune in to find out how when we return to The Light Inside. 

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Episode introduction:

Jeffrey Besecker: The path of our behaviors is often misunderstood and stigmatized, leading to avoidant and defensive coping mechanisms that obscure emotional truths and hinder self-awareness. Pathology at its core simply describes the manner in which something occurs. When facing discomforting emotions, it can be difficult to see beyond the struggles at hand but understanding how early perceptions shape our journey can provide clarity and direction. Healing emotional trauma is much like navigating a forest after a storm. Each unresolved emotion is like a fallen tree blocking the trail, evidence of past chaos, yet also as a guidepost pointing to where care and attention are needed. These obstacles aren't just problems, they offer insights into how past experiences have shaped the terrain, helping us create a map that integrates the natural layout with our goals for healing. After exploring the causal factors, the why behind the patterns, we can move beyond emotional suppression and transform the behaviors that hold us back. In today's episode, we're exploring how primary and secondary patterns like over-habituation and over-personalization fuel cognitive dissonance and emotional suppression. 

We'd like to welcome our guest, Holistic Transformation Coach, Fred Moss. Fred, thanks for joining us today. 

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, I'm a psychiatrist as well. And thank you for introducing me and thank you for having me on. I've been in the mental health field for 45 years and as a psychiatrist for the last 36 plus years and have over 30,000 patients and actually treated patients around the world in seven other countries, as well as all over the United States. So thank you.

Jeffrey Besecker: Fred, the path of our behaviors is often misunderstood and stigmatized, leading to avoidant and defensive coping mechanisms that obscure emotional truths and hinder self-awareness, pathology at its core simply describing the manner in which something occurs. Yet, as we work with patients, as we work with clients, that understanding of pathology can often create emotional resistance. Just that act of identifying and labeling our behaviors can sometimes be turned inward and become an internal conflict. Fred, give us a little background on your approach to dealing with psychological and mental health.

Dr. Fred Moss: So one of the things that has happened over the last 45 years since the advent of Prozac is there's been this notion of biological psychiatry, or maybe more accurately, a chemical imbalance to explain discomforts that we have in the world. And managing our discomforts is a very difficult aspect of what it means to be human. So we handle our discomforts in whatever way we do. And we do develop patterns in how we do that. And identifying those patterns and then getting a handle on those patterns is the onus of what life is about. What we're really here to do is take a look at the things that we do because of familiarity and the things that we do out of, we'll say, impulsive reflex, as well as the things that we do with good intention, sort those things out, and in some ways, remind people that Maybe they have a full capacity to make new decisions starting now about habits and patterns that have led up till now. And to be very careful about continuing to do the same thing and blaming past patterns for that purpose. In other words, you're not the habits that brought you to now. You have an opportunity to do something different from now and into the future, minute after minute. And as long as we can clear away some of the limiting thoughts, ideas, beliefs, and behaviors that prevent us from doing those things that are who we know ourselves to be, maybe the idealized self, when we can move away those sticky spots that prevent us from doing the things that we know are right, we get an opportunity to gain excess or extra freedom, like a new agency and a new sovereignty in what it means to be human. Each and every person can do that. And that's been my experience. I treat people as if what they want more than anything else in the world is to be connected to as a human. I believe that that is the number one place where healing takes place. I've seen it so many times with people that are otherwise like incurable or some, I don't know, whatever, whatever words have been tossed on them. And when I resonate harmonically with them and connect with them and really get who they really are, a tremendous amount of healing takes place at that very second. And it's a pleasure to behold, a pleasure to witness and be a part of. And it's inside human connection where it's a source of all human healing. So that's at least a little bit of my approach.

Jeffrey Besecker: Looking at that introduction, you mentioned how our past inherently is behind us. Yet, research and study in various fields of approach on mental health look at how subconscious and unconscious patterns influence how that past inherently travels through life with us. Looking particularly at effective forecasting, how we start to form emotional predictions about our present, past, and future. What role do you feel those factors play in transforming that path of healing or that path of emotional well-being?

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, I think that when we do our next behavior, because our past created the pattern that I'm about to do again, we are missing an important space where we may have been able to take some agency in our next behavior. So I am really going to stand strong on the idea that we are not the habits that brought us here. But when we look back at a past, when the studies show and they show a pattern over the past, we're still looking at the past. There's no studies that have studied the future, for instance. We don't study the future. And so any study that you're referencing is studying the past. So what I'm suggesting is in the flashpoint, in the linchpin of right for this very moment, we have thousands, if not infinite choices in front of us of what we can say, what we can do and who we can be. And that past that has led me to here, even if I've done so-called the same thing a thousand times leading up till now, does not force me to do it a thousand and first time.

Jeffrey Besecker: Our team has undertaken curious study on the Interspection Illusion, a subjective unconscious bias which inhibits us from being completely objective about ourselves, based on foundational attribution errors and our inability to bring a diverse representation of our being into conscious focus. The Interspection Illusion is demonstrated in studies by Perrin and Johansson highlights how individuals overestimate their introspective accuracy, while underestimating the influence of external biases, reinforcing these filtered errors in how we judge our core self-concepts. So as a result, this illusion exasperates disassociative and avoidant behaviors, leading us to emotional suppression and allostatic overload resulting from stress. So ultimately, do you feel that would have an impact on how we view both the past and the future? Of course. A hundred percent.

Dr. Fred Moss: It's what got us here.

Jeffrey Besecker: So what role do you feel that plays in shaping our internal narratives and how subconscious biases or mental heuristics might play into that mentally?

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, I think, you know, we hang on to past events or past experiences or past emotions and we make up stories about them. We manifest stories about what they really mean and what really happened and how they're affecting us and, you know, trauma responses and hypervigilance or those kind of things that we take on as a response to our experience about our past reality. Now, the fact is that past reality is not still happening, and one can separate the past from the present and the present from the future so that we are no longer dogged by our past or perceiving the future as a function of our past. When we can do that, we create a real possibility of new levels of freedom that otherwise are not typically found by default. By default, we normally place our past experiences into the future and assume the same stuff is going to happen again, which prevents us from doing things that we might otherwise be able to do out of fears or concerns housed in that notion. So the idea here, again, is there's a flashpoint, there's a linchpin, and that linchpin's called now. And in that now, we have an opportunity to do something different than the past that brought us to now. And with all due respect and acknowledgement that the past brought us to now, it's true. But from the future, we don't have to continue doing the same things, even though there's been patterns set.

Jeffrey Besecker: So in that respect, we can look at the psychological concept of the introspection illusion that considers how those unconscious or subconscious variables affect our mental health and our emotional outlook. where there are certain elements of our psychology that we're always unconsciously unaware of. We're not consciously aware of the roles of the central nervous system and how those processes are playing to the path of our behaviors. That's one example. We're not consciously aware all the time of our implicit biases until there's a trigger point there to bring it back into our explicit memory. What role do you think that plays in shaping our narratives and how we look at our relationship to the path of our behaviors?

Dr. Fred Moss: Well, I'm not sure I understand the question exactly, but I'll try to take it on anyways. When you're asking me the role, I'm not really sure what that… Can I clarify that a little better?

Jeffrey Besecker: Sure. So the introspection illusion is a psychological theory that there are certain parts of our psychology, you know, from How we form beliefs to the parts of our implicit memory that are stored that we're not able to consciously recall. Yet these patterns significantly influence how we view the past and future based on those unconscious memories. And some of that's historical in nature. Trauma is largely a stored implicit memory. We're reacting with that past memory again. So how does reconsidering those factors of those missing elements shape our treatment path?

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, I think that the way our thoughts go, we don't really get to assign or order up our thoughts. Our thoughts come to us as they do. And our responsibility is to respond to that, respond to those thoughts as they happen. So our thoughts in and of themselves don't create the doing or the being. And so in the world of mindfulness, for instance, One can put up a barrier, if you will, or an access to getting that we are not our thoughts, we are not our feelings, we are not our emotions or our physical sensations, that those are experiences that we all have during this lifetime and we don't have to become them. So, you know, where does mental health start and stop if I have ugly ideas or if I have concerns or worries or regrets or resentments that are overwhelming at times? Am I mentally unhealthy? No, I'm just having a mentally uncomfortable experience. And how that gets translated into who I be, what I say and what I, you know, what I. you know, how I react or respond in the world is still up to me. So I get to have my thoughts, my memories, my concerns, my past, my resentments, my worries, my fears, my desires. I get to have all of that. And who I am as a mentally healthy person is one who in the now can incorporate some of that and actually author my doing and my saying and my being.

Jeffrey Besecker: So, if portions of that are unconscious, or beyond our ability to access and control, as I unravel this here, I'm kind of setting up here a little bit, parts of that, like our conditioning that come into play, that are subconscious and unconscious, have an incremental influence on everything we do throughout life, are we completely the author of those, or are we sometimes naturally aligned to that default programming? You know, that becomes a part of our default habit, our default pattern.

Dr. Fred Moss: Absolutely. I think we do have these default patterns and we have these dogging thoughts and notions that have been with us that live in our so-called unconscious and so-called subconscious. And, you know, these are the distinctions between those two beasts are have changed over time. So most people think they know what they're talking about when they say those two things as a real item. But in fact, those things are pretty vague and nebulous on the edges. Nevertheless, we certainly, you know, I haven't met the perfect being who isn't dogged by his thoughts, his concerns, his worries, his regrets, and his fears and all of those things. And they do certainly color how we, you know, where the constrictions or restrictions are of how we behave and interact with the world around us. No question about that. It isn't a matter that we are completely free from those, but we have access, in fact, to making decisions and who we get to be, the more we can actually detach ourselves from our feelings, thoughts and past experiences and get in the present so we can make good decisions moving forward that may or may not be consistent with the patterns that brought us to now.

Jeffrey Besecker: The introspection illusion constrained by access control, studied by cognitive scientist Bernard J. Behrs in 2025, illustrates how this distorts affective forecasting or our ability to predict the impact of past and future events. By limiting our ability to accurately retrieve unconscious insights, creating perceptual gaps in how we interpret past experience and predict future emotions, Ultimately, this reinforces misaligned self-perceptions and behavioral inertia. So, in that regard, how do those factors start to shape and influence that narrative, again, on how we label and identify with our patterns of behavior? You know, plain and simple, we have to be aware of what we're experiencing. I'm trying to generalize here so I don't go a little too contextually broad, maybe. But do you feel it's essential that we identify Faulty behavior, however we label that, or maladaptive behavior, or negative if we want to go to a very generalized. Sometimes we just generalize and call it negative. From my perspective, all of our emotions are valid. All of our emotions are helpful. They all serve a very integral understanding of who and what we are as beings. So in that regard, how can reframing the path or pathology that causes our behaviors create mental health challenges? In that identifying itself, are we sometimes triggered because somebody said you've got a maladaptive pattern? We're going to put it plain and simple.

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, certainly we can be triggered by someone saying anything. I mean, you know, that someone is allowed to say anything someone says.

Jeffrey Besecker: That's a great point.

Dr. Fred Moss: So, you know, we can all be triggered by that. And that's an opportunity. You know, it's an option. We don't have to be triggered by that. What's really interesting is we have more access to whether or not we're triggered by what someone else thinks or says than we typically give ourselves credit for. Yes. So the possibility of being able to be you know, stand in your own sovereignty, in your own agency, and in fact, take into consideration all the dogging, all the, you know, past issues. And when describing behavior, absolutely one can describe behavior. Once we attach assessments or evaluations or judgments on those behaviors, For instance, calling them maladaptive, you know, it's really, this is a, this is a context that lends itself towards points of view rather than inherently maladaptive. It may have been maladaptive because it didn't produce the intended results. That's typically the definition of maladaptive that people utilize. And, you know, Are you justified in the fact that you made a maladaptive move or behavior or thought? Yeah, sure. This is what led up to the truth of that matter. Are you caught up in maladaptive behavior as a way of being? I would really suggest that that's not as a way of being. It's a pattern that has led up until now. And we have an opportunity, as I say each and every time, from the now to make any of them, you know, countless possible decisions about how to go, which may or may not be directly aligned with the patterns it brought us to now.

Jeffrey Besecker: Yeah, it's a great point to kind of bring us together here and look at how there's research that indicates, although we're not aware of it consciously, how contextual basis and situational basis influenced how we reason it, how we emotionally interact with it, the logic we form about it, what implicit beliefs we bring in, All of that acts as an emotional and psychological filter. Simply looking at the word maladaptive itself, at its core is just what is adaptive, and Mao is not being in an adaptive state. How comfortable are we with the idea of growth and change at the core of that? Becomes a more fluid concept to me, wouldn't you agree?

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, certainly. I mean, we are, you know, it's only, I don't know, seven something in the morning here, and I've already made a handful of errors before the day has started. You know, and so the idea here is that maladaptive is it's actually a judgment of now of things from the past when, you know, I'm not going to predict or declare myself future maladaptive. I'm not going to quite do that. I don't know when that's going to take place. But when we look back at behaviors, and we determine whether or not they were the best choices or thoughts or ideas, and were they the best choices or were they counterproductive, again, it's from Monday morning quarterback, it's from after the fact, it's from now looking back at the past. So again, the opportunity arises from the now to have the freedom, a greater sense of freedom than we typically give ourselves credit for because we often get ourselves caught up in the weeds of thinking that our past is predicting our future.

Jeffrey Besecker: So doesn't that comparative analysis play a beneficial role in some regard to go back and look at where you've made a past mistake or had a past issue or a past opportunity to grow and change? Let's frame it that way. Do you feel that's beneficial to go back and have that comparison? Does that not involve a judgment of some sort?

Dr. Fred Moss: No, it doesn't have to involve a judgment, but yes, it's beneficial entirely. Yeah. By all means, looking back at the data, you know, because judgments, you can have your judgment. I can have my judgment. They could be different. We can both be right. And that's what's really here. So a judgment, although it will naturally come because we naturally do judge, evaluate and assess our situation. can be respected for what it is. But going back and looking at the experiences of the past, it's not like the past is off limits. It's just that the past doesn't inherently predict the future. But what the past is the past, it happened, it got us to here. It just doesn't inherently predict my next move. And that's all I'm saying is that we have the capacity to bust out of patterns that have been established no matter how deep they've been.

Jeffrey Besecker: So to me, that speaks to going back to that idea of effective forecast, which is looking at the influence our behaviors have on that future. And in that regard, we automatically issue judgment or discernment to various degrees of context and situational basis, depending on how we frame it, how we align it. How do we shift that judgment to make it a beneficial or reinforcing habit of our wellness, rather than seeing it only as a limitation?

Dr. Fred Moss: I certainly don't see it as a limitation. I see it as a limitation if we use it to predict the future. And there is no limit on what I can do now going into the future. And although if I continue, if I pick up another cigarette and I start smoking it and then say, well, I'm a smoker, so I picked it again, it's overlooking what really happened in that moment when I picked up the cigarette. I certainly can fall into the default of the patterns that have me smoking cigarettes. And each time I pick it up, if I continue to say that that's due to the fact that I'm a smoker, I am overlooking that linchpin decision point of what took place when I picked up that cigarette, which I had a say in the matter to some degree, maybe not 100 percent about what my next action was. and I chose to pick up a cigarette. And that's where in that flashpoint, if I'm ever going to stop smoking cigarettes or start smoking twice as many cigarettes, I all of a sudden have a decision flashpoint to make at that moment in now, even though there's been a highly specific pattern that led up till now, I don't have to continue on that pattern. I believe that's the only thing that I'm really pointing to this morning so far is this idea that the now allows us the freedom to access our sovereignty and agency and make decisions into the future that are not predicted by the past.

Jeffrey Besecker: That's great input, Fred. That brings to mind to me that role of identification and how those associations connect with how we view our behaviors, our actions. Are we identifying, you know, as I'm a smoker and how does that reinforce beliefs? And sometimes do we have to dis-identify or depersonalize with that? You know, where we step back and take psychological distance. In order to change the behavior, if we convinced ourselves subconsciously and unconsciously, especially, those patterns stay in the background. We're not consciously present with them in the now. How can we utilize that to step into the future? So my question being is, what role does personalization and depersonalization play with being able to detach from that emotion and allow it to stand on its own?

Dr. Fred Moss: Personalization and depersonalization. All right, so You know, I think that if we feel like we're on an automatic train that left to its own default will lead to predictable behaviors based on past patterns. If we're willing to look at that possibility, that if we do nothing, we continue to do the same thing. And therefore we will have similar patterns established in the future that are consistent with the past patterns that brought us to now. Now, if we're gonna consider that if we do, if we notice nothing, if we don't have access to the tools to change, if we're on a particular pattern and we have no sense of actually disrupting that pattern from a momentum standpoint, then we're gonna continue having the same pattern. I'm not gonna deny that, of course. However, had we had access, and in some cases we do, to altering that pattern, We have any kind of access or any kind of memory that can detach the fact that the past does not inherently predict the future. And the only space where we have access to that disruption is in the now, between the past experiences that led to now and the future experiences that we're designing by the now. We have an opportunity of really stepping into our wholeness and greatness by stepping out of patterns when we have access to them. If we don't have access to them, of course, I have nothing to say. If we have no access to them, then we will continue to breathe. We'll continue to have our heartbeat. We will continue to blink. We don't have access to stopping some things, for sure.

Jeffrey Besecker: Looking at that idea of access, you know, that's an essential role to me, doing some study. I'll say study, you know, it's not research unless I'm actually going through some of the scientific rigor, perhaps, but studying where others sit with that idea of access. Access recall or access memory, being able to actually pull that behavior into our conscious awareness comes into play. Inherently, again, we're dipping back into that past. We're not discounting that past, but we're keeping an open mind to that past. That plays in here, I'm going somewhere with it, to the idea of perceptual lag. Are we ever present fully now? Because our processes are inherently running slightly behind. We're automatically starting to dip into natural default programming. where that becomes a part of that introspection illusion. We're already drawing from the past, yet sometimes we stigmatize that idea of being in the now. Would you not agree?

Dr. Fred Moss: No, I think I mostly agree. I think the idea, again, is it's, you know, you do our best to be in the now, and you're right. It's an illusion that we're not in the now. There's never been anybody who's ever lived not in their now for even one second. So we're always in our now. And so when we get that, whatever our thought process are taking us, we are in the now in our efforts to be in the now or not be in the now, it's we're always in the now. And so, you know, the thought processes or the automatics that happen here, again, is what all we're looking at this flashpoint of what you know, this idea that there's a there's a time lag between what we think and what we do and which one comes first and all of that. And I the elegant, elegant, you know, eloquent, elegant studies and videos and teaching that exact thing. And if we start looking at the areas that we can access, those are the ones that have the pay dirt. And there's countless areas that we can't access that aren't going to shift, that we, that those patterns will continue, such as breathing, blinking and, you know, having my heartbeat. And so it will, which typically get called, I believe, something like parasympathetic or, you know, outside of our voluntary access. Once we get into our capacity to voluntary access, life becomes possibly more free, that there's more peace, that there's more sovereignty and agency. The access to that mindset that I have found is through mindfulness and meditation.

Jeffrey Besecker: Those are excellent practical steps we can take. So looking at that idea a bit here, and I lost my thought already because that was kind of a good jog to get me back into now of looking at the mindfulness. Let me search here. Maybe it's not a point I need to make because I've already lost it. That's a perfect example because I was instantly drug back into now with you, Fred. I wanted to look at that idea again of how we frame. Sometimes do we get stuck in a rigid framing that only gets us stuck in the now, where we can't be open and available to a future, or we can't even be open and available to effectively utilize the past. I feel there's power in that past. I feel if we learn to develop those skills and traits of emotional regulation, those skills of that open, vulnerable availableness, we should be able to dip back into that past at will, again, with agency and volition, with efficacy and having an ability to have the emotional maturity to look at it. At any time, you know, if we've reframed it and we've alchemized it, there again, without extending an empathy gap there. I have to be open that others aren't always in that frame. So, going back to a question from the ramble, it was a ramble, How do we start to avoid those rigid constructs that often hold us either a party to the time frame themselves, you know, time frame therapy, or a party to the rigid concept or belief itself? How do we start to unravel that?

Dr. Fred Moss: Well, you know, rigid constructs can dissolve in the face of mindfulness again. And once we start doing a little bit of gratitude, mindfulness, yoga, tai chi, qigong, you know, unifying, you know, nature, creativity, spirituality, service, you know, nutrition, hydration, social interactions, and detoxifying ourself, these type of things. Once we start doing those things, there's greater access to, you know, what's really here. to allow us to be in this thing called now, you know, and the perceptions that we've had up until now, although they, you know, the battle is on the there's the it's a it's a, you know, it's difficult being human. And it's difficult putting our thoughts together. New ones. And so, you know, really not easy, not easy. And it's never been, it's never been, you know, there's been a period of time where people said, these are the easy times. It's not really true. That's so relative, right? Yeah, and that's the whole point, that once we start comparing and contrasting, that's when we get to the pathologizing. And the idea I like to see is it isn't that we don't have access to the past. We should actually use the past for the beauty that it is. But the thing that I'm suggesting we don't need to do is predict the future based on us staying in the same pattern as the past. There is a possibility so frequently to alter our game to make a mild little left or right turn and get off disturbing patterns that have led to disempowering context.

Jeffrey Besecker: That's a great point to kind of hang on there a little bit today. You know, what is an empowering context ultimately shapes that narrative. I'm just going to reinforce that for a moment here. Looking again at internal narrative therapies and timeline therapies, how essential or how beneficial do you view things like regression therapy when we're having to move past that past pattern and resolve that past trauma?

Dr. Fred Moss: Well, you know, the regression therapies and constellations, you know, past life therapies, et cetera, very interesting, very interesting access to some of the past that has got us to now and things that are stored, maybe ideas or references or trauma responses that are stored at various points of our body or our psyche that can then be accessed with that therapy and in fact resolved as something in the past that is sitting unresolved. So the idea of resolving our past becomes a really interesting chore, like going back there and fixing and changing and dealing with relationships that have gone sideways or with events that have left us feeling scarred or injured or in some way wounded. We have the opportunity to go back and do that and absolutely go back from the now, take a peek at this stuff, actually re-experience it and then repair it. And in that possibility, we clear up a lot of the stones that have been in our shoes that feel like they must be followed. We can clear the fundamental keystones of different patterns that have been created such that the patterns naturally dissolve.

Jeffrey Besecker: Looking at that idea, you know, I even question myself and even in how we communicate to others, do we ever truly, in the purest sense, resolve those experiences? Or is that resolution sometimes being a little contextually wobbly in its framing, you know, where we're reaching resolution rather than dissolving it or putting it behind us or completely ridding ourselves of it? How does that affect that narrative from your perspective?

Dr. Fred Moss: Well, I think those are all just thought-based ideas as if there's a difference between resolving it and putting it behind us. I don't know. I'm not sure what the qualitative difference is from that experience in a subjective or an objective way. And I think that, you know, we start looking at what does resolution take? What does it really take? You know, the repairs become obvious, and oftentimes there's been incomplete conversations with somebody. Oftentimes, that's what I'm speaking to. It's like, usually it's a human-to-human interaction are the ones that tend to linger. And if that human-to-human thing is me and me, then me and me get to have a conversation. But if it's me and somebody else, like actually coming to grips and getting really honest about what happened and what didn't happen, what got said, what didn't get said, and ridding ourselves of the emotional, you know, the emotional, we'll call it like… Data. It's just data. It's information. Ridding ourselves from it.

Jeffrey Besecker: And it's core, most neutral, it's just data and information. That's all our thoughts really are at their core. It's a little bit more slippery once you start to move the context and nuance around, but essentially we're just using the data or the experiences we have.

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, exactly.

Jeffrey Besecker: So you mentioned that point of connection. Yeah. Communication of listening and establishing psychological safety and security with each other. What do you feel going right to the gist here is probably the primary or from your speculation, the most primary role that inhibits that?

Dr. Fred Moss: The most primary role of, I'm sorry, I just didn't hear that.

Jeffrey Besecker: Human connection, of being open and adaptive to each other, receptive, vulnerable.

Dr. Fred Moss: We're social beings and the resonating harmonic connection, the value of a resonant, of a harmonic resonance with another person is for sure where the magic of humanity actually takes place. And I've had enough personal experiences with this in a professional and a personal way where, you know, really connecting with someone, especially those who have not been connected with for years, creates a massive amount of healing. And in that healing, just like a rebirth, like a capacity to breathe again, an inspiration, the. So the capacity of where, you know, what does a human connection, what's the maybe the impact of what the essence of the human connection is, you know, at the heart of the human connection is humanity. And once we feel heard and once we don't feel alone and can, you know, and because that's what happens once we feel heard, get, wow, I have made an impact over there. And that person actually gets me a terrific amount of true and honest, perceived and somatic and cosmic healing becomes available. It's invited into the interaction. And I don't think, I'm pretty positive that there's never been anything more valuable than the essence of the human connection.

Jeffrey Besecker: So in that regard, you brought in that element of perception. How might we sometimes filter and distort that perception, being one level of questioning, and how do you feel we measure that level of perception? Or is it measurable and is it so infinite and complex that it's beyond measuring the fully logic and reason?

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, I think, you know, whatever metrics you're using to measure perception, you should use a tool that uses that metric. And I'm not sure what, how we measure the area.

Jeffrey Besecker: It's in the measuring itself. We sometimes go off the path, perhaps, you know, we can infinitely go down there.

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, and as long as you're using a tool that utilizes metrics that actually are affiliated or associated with perception, then you should be able to get that done. I don't know what that meter would look like. So I don't know how to measure perception quite yet. Whether or not we distort, well, certainly we do. And that's assuming there is such thing as non-distorted. So it's really an important piece to get. that even what we're calling non-distorted is just another version of- Even that could be distorted and there is a paradox.

null: 100%.

Dr. Fred Moss: Because we don't really have a benchmark of what undistorted is. And I think that's what the whole problem is with pathologizing, is we don't have a real benchmark of what normal is. And that's really a hard, that makes calling abnormal abnormal a little bit audacious.

Jeffrey Besecker: No, there again that calls into play that role of contextual bias and situational bias. What is contextually normal? What is situationally normal becomes another metric. How deeply we want to go humanistically is kind of up to the observer in that role. How nuanced do we really want to know ourselves? You know, sometimes we're only comfortable with knowing a very surface level of self. Would you not agree in some regards?

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, you can be, I mean, but comfort is only one measure of whether or not you should pursue it anyway. So being uncomfortable with pursuing how well we know ourselves doesn't stop me from wanting to know myself. There's a deep value in being extremely reflective and self-aware and the passaways to that are numerous and take some time and at least some intention and land in that list that I just kind of told you about that we talked about earlier, this idea of, Self-knowledge doesn't have to be nearly as painful as the pain we anticipated we would find when we started looking, that's for sure.

Jeffrey Besecker: That's kind of the contextualized version of effective forecasting. We're just making that prediction once again. As we look at those roles of resistance, where we might be filtering or resisting that connection, what do you feel starts to come into play there that creates those filters, that creates those patterns where we're forecasting a mispredicted forecast about someone? We're simply assuming a role or model to place on them.

Dr. Fred Moss: So again, I'm trying to capture the question itself so I can make sure I answer it.

Jeffrey Besecker: You answer the question. Sometimes we screw up our prediction based on faulty information. There's a blunt contextualization of it. What distorts that projection sometimes from your perspective?

Dr. Fred Moss: We have no access to predicting the future. That's the basic distortion.

Jeffrey Besecker: Yeah. That's at its basic level. What tends to come in from a contextual awareness of things? How familiar are you with the concept of parataxic distortion, where we are simply just projecting a future prediction on it, and that itself becomes a filtered distortion? Whether it's right or wrong becomes a filtered context distortion. Whether we're fully experiencing somebody. Whether we're starting to assume that because Fred's smiling, it means this. Because Fred is frowning, it means that. Because Fred tilted his head this way, I'm going to assume now that that meant this. I'm projecting that on you, hopefully illustrating how I do that sometimes. I'm owning it vulnerably because I know I do it. It's not that we get rid of the judgment. It's not that we get rid of the projection. It's that we perhaps form a better, open, more vulnerable understanding of it in that regard. So, that's kind of prothesizing a little bit on it, but back to the question, you know, what factors do you feel start to distort that awareness of not only our own emotional interaction, but our projection onto others?

Dr. Fred Moss: Again, when you use the word distort our awareness, you're assuming that there's an awareness that's undistorted. And I think we have to be a little bit careful about that because each and every one of us have distortions based on limitations of what our senses or what our counter senses allow us to perceive. For instance, there's just inherent limitations that cause distortions all the time, 100% of the time. So this idea of being distorted or undistorted is an important distinction here in this question, as if there's a way to be undistorted. I want to make it very clear that there's no way to be undistorted.

Jeffrey Besecker: Yeah, there again, that's the parataxic part of it, that we're forming an assumption based on the past and future.

Dr. Fred Moss: Except the assumptions of the future are typically based on our past experiences and here we are again where we've been a couple times on this conversation which is the past is not predict the future the past is the information that brought us to now and we can choose to stay on the same patterns or we can choose to predict that since x has happened every day for. some number of days or weeks or months or years, it is more likely to now continue to happen today. We like doing that, but with respect to our own behaviors, rather than the world of objectification out there, our behaviors have a linchpin. They have an eye of the needle called now. And in that now, we have an opportunity to grab onto what we say, what we do, and who we'd be next. And we have an opportunity to truly make choices at that flashpoint. And that's where the real beauty of what it is to be someone who has freedom and agency, sovereignty and power over my life. I have the opportunity now to do something different than the pattern that led me up until now. And I can do that by this notion, this very weird and vague notion of mindful choice, which becomes more available to me when I see myself into a mindfulness practice. So when I'm in a mindfulness practice and I can center myself on a daily basis, I have new access to the things available to me in the now in responding to all this so-called distortions or so-called intrusions or memories, fears, regrets, resentments, those experiences, as well as wishes, desires, wants, needs. And, you know, you know, hopes and dreams. I have, you know, all of that plays a role into how I perceive things. But if I really give myself room to have access to the tools of altering how I next do things by living in the now and incorporating all these things, there's some degree increase in my freedom, my peace, my power, my sovereignty, my agency.

Jeffrey Besecker: We look at that idea of mindfulness and being in the now being one of the key measurements or filters we often use. It inhibits and sometimes influences what we experience. What role do you feel internal processes that are inherently rooted in the central nervous system play in that that are completely unconscious? We can't access them at all with mental power and connection. I'm not sure that… Central elements of trust. What are your views on that role of the central nervous system in ultimately dictating trust? When the central nervous system feels regulated, scientifically, we're starting to unravel that and say, we might have a new perspective here. How far do we run with that?

Dr. Fred Moss: Mm-hmm, yeah. Okay, and help me out with the question in this one as well, please.

Jeffrey Besecker: So the question is, if some of that is unconscious, where might there be a gap in just the perception of mindfulness? Sometimes that's a doorway into what we can consciously, quote-unquote, bring into our awareness, but there's always inherently that implicit bias in filtered perception of the central nervous system that operates outside of that awareness.

Dr. Fred Moss: Well, I mean, if we again, if we have no access, it's indescribable and can't be found or located anywhere.

Jeffrey Besecker: It can be located. It's easy to locate. You know, we now can't locate that.

Dr. Fred Moss: Where is it located?

Jeffrey Besecker: It's in the central nervous system between the enteric system and the brain, you know, the lower brain stem, bringing in the process. These you're looking at the hypothalamus connection there, which part of that is mindfulness. yet it brings in heart rate coherence in the systemic process. When we talk about being heart-centered, we're largely talking about heart rate variable. Where is heart rate coherence? Where are we within a variable range that regulates stress? So, we're able to identify those now with some predictive certainty. Again, predictive certainty becomes a filter. But we're able to now form an association to it. We can run with that. Again, it becomes a narrative context and situational basis comes back into play.

Dr. Fred Moss: Okay, I accept the theory and, you know, as a theory, and, you know, may actually last the test of time or not. And I think that, you know, where are we is that we can, if we don't have access to altering things, then we can make simple conjectures of what things are there that inherently color our thoughts, behaviors, and perceptions that we don't have access to. And what role do those things have? Well, there are inherent limitations. A fish doesn't know that it's in water. And so there's inherent limitations here.

Jeffrey Besecker: That's an interesting analogy I always like to look at. Yeah. Do we assume what a fish is doing again in water? You know, we say, does a fish know it's in water? It's kind of a vague assumption. Sometimes that's a filter distortion. Maybe a fish fully is aware that it's in water and we just aren't able to discern what a fish does. Going very perceptually broad where my mind goes today. Sure.

null: Yeah.

Jeffrey Besecker: I don't even know if there's a point in that. I'll leave it out there for somebody to discern. All right. It was probably a deflection. I'll admit it was probably a subconscious deflection of some sort. If I were to honestly assess psychologically, there was probably an unconscious pattern in that of deflection.

Dr. Fred Moss: Now it's the past and we get to look at it. Once it's the past, we get to look at it as something that occurred. But while it's occurring, while it's shifting from the now to the past, we have access to that lynch point, that decision moment, that flashpoint, that eye of the needle to make a decision about what to do. And sometimes we're really right on spot on point, and sometimes we're very awkward or clumsy about it.

Jeffrey Besecker: You know, that brings a valid point right here to the forefront for me to mindfulness. What role does that certainty play in how we emotionally connect and how we psychologically connect? To frame that a little bit and then go back to the question. I'm out of order here, but do we always have to have that point of certainty to express something? You know, what role does that need for certainty then play in that interaction with not only how we relate to our story and narrative, but how we relate to our journey of mental health?

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, I think certainty is to be taken with a grain of salt nearly all the time. Although we love to have the notion and the perceived internal experience of being certain about something, there is a degree of uncertainty in all things. And most things we're much less certain than we declare ourselves to be. And so I don't think that certainty is a requirement, although I think we drag it along with us because we're addicted to the sense of things being in focus and certain. But in fact, certainty is sort of a dragged on afterthought and is not a requirement to to be confident or in being a human or competent in being a human. I mean, We have a lot of different components that make up all the filters and all the ideas and thoughts of how we see the world at any given moment. And, you know, back to the point of the point of the point, which is what's so fun about that is taking into consideration all available pieces of data that are here at any given time and make decisions that are different than the patterns that left us to now.

Jeffrey Besecker: I love how you back that down to a basic narrative and timeline. We're just simply reeling that point back and forming a new direction, a new path. So thank you for that. That's a great point to make. Looking at that role, I'm going to hang here a little bit, uncertainty, uncertainty. I know you speak openly and honestly very frequently about that role of our perception of authenticity in ourselves and in others. So in that regard, what role does that need for psychological certainty in that battle sometimes? Contrast, however we want to frame it, with uncertainty playing not only how we perceive what's authentic to us through our filters, but through the filtered view in our perception of authenticity in others.

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, so authenticity is a now experience. It has nothing to do with the past or the future. It's really being present to where I am at any given moment and then speaking to that. Now, the truth is I can do my very best to translate this multidimensional experience of being alive into the linear experience of words, but I'm not going to be very good at that. I mean, because I'm a human and none of us are very good at that because that translation is not obvious. We have a multidimensional experience going on called life. And we then have a non-rehearsal flash of speaking to whatever our experience is at any given moment. Given our limitations of a vocabulary and sentence structure, et cetera, inside of verbal communication, there is other aspects that make this very challenging, including sifting out, like, how do I communicate with you? my present experience from an authentic vantage point. And the way I do that is by saying my truth and getting access to my truth is a function of moving out all the cobwebs, all the mud, all the dirt, all those things that prevent me from otherwise being authentic. which have developed over years. So once I can move those things out, there's a new level of freedom available in me being authentic or closer to being authentic, meaning that I am who I say I am and say things and be things that are consistent with who I know myself to be or who you know me to be. I mean, whatever. There's this idea of authenticity being you know, some form of resonating your soul with your experience, your soul with your behaviors. And I can really pursue that once I move out all that muck and the mud and the, you know, and the cobwebs and the rust that is in the way of me exploring my authentic self and presenting that person to myself and for others.

Jeffrey Besecker: So, we look at that idea of a soul. We'll look at that a little bit here. Let's just jump into the forefront here. And again, that's a focusing bias. It's a filter. I'm going to acknowledge that. We're largely uncertain what a soul is. We've formed a lot of speculation. Are we really certain we've had contact with a soul? It becomes very broad and fills us up.

Dr. Fred Moss: I'm very certain about anything.

Jeffrey Besecker: There again, I'm uncertain where I'm going with that. But just looking at that idea can trip us up sometimes, how we filter our view of that. What I'm ultimately driving here is that look at bias and the way it influences and filters our perception of authenticity. Why do we reject something in the past as not authentic to who and what we are now? Those experiences happen. There's a truthfulness to it if we're open to acknowledging some of it. Sometimes there is a mistruth in some of it because we've just projected an assumption on it. How does that change our perception of authenticity in ourselves or another? Isn't that somewhat selective and kind of binary, random? We're just making an active guess and forecast about what we feel and believe is authentic and not authentic in that regard.

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah. I think this idea of rejecting aspects of the past, I don't think that that's, you know, I think things that have happened, we should recognize them as having happened and then make sure that we don't drag along our experiences of what happened when it happened as being part of the reality of what happened. So there's things that happen and there's the stories that we tell about those things that have happened. We usually like, you know, collapse those things on top of each other. and then call that what happened. And what's really possible is really not rejecting at all anything that has happened in the past, but incorporating it into our present as a learning tool so that we can utilize all the wisdom that's available and learning from our past mistakes or past successes. and designing in the now a plan for the future starting now that is consistent with whatever this core person called me thinks. And whether I call it a soul or a central core human or myself or whatever we want to call it, I have an opportunity to utilize all the tools that are available to me and to have maybe a slightly better shot of making something that, you know, of doing the next behavior or, you know, interaction and calling it adaptive rather than maladaptive.

Jeffrey Besecker: Back to that idea of narrative again, comes to the forefront for me here. We look at that idea of when an accident occurs. So sitting there and you're a bystander on the street, and suddenly a car veers off and runs into a bus. And you look at that scenario, and you can ask 20 different people, what occurred in this instance? What happened? How did it play out? There'll be gaps, and somebody might have noticed this, that they are consciously aware of. They're able to access with recall. back to that idea of access recall. Well, I believe I saw this happen. And then person Y, Fred, comes in and says, but I believe I saw this happen. Whose version of the truth is more real in that situation and more authentic based on that context?

Dr. Fred Moss: No, of course, all versions of the truth are fully accepted.

Jeffrey Besecker: I like that framing. Again, I'm being very biased in my opinion about that. They all have something to offer in that. That's where I'm ultimately taking that also affects how we view authenticity, not only in ourselves, but others. What part are we truly noticing and are we truly mindful of?

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, I only have access to my authenticity. I can only judge, evaluate and assess whether someone else is being authentic. But I do have access to my own scale of authenticity. And I don't really my judging about someone else being authentic is not very helpful.

Jeffrey Besecker: So if there's something subconsciously repressed, suppressed, things we hold in our implicit memory, how do you relate to that? You know, if a client comes in and they're in a regressive mode where they're blocking out elements of their past that are affecting them right now, and how they perceive right now, and how they write their story now, and how they see the future, I'm the kind of anxious person that will never change. That's my narrative I'm bringing to you. How do we start to address those two and bridge that gap?

Dr. Fred Moss: We really look at, you know, kick the tires a little bit. Like, how did you get to where you are now? And, you know, what are your plans for the future? What kind of life are you looking for? Why are you here for any help at all? What are you hoping I can do for you? And what, you know, what are your dreams and your wishes and your goals? Once we see these things get on the table, things that are just limiting beliefs that have earned their space there based on trauma response can dissolve or at least be alterable or movable. But if we really get what's really here to connect with a person right now, right this moment, why are they here? What are they looking for? What is interesting to them? What kind of interaction are they? expecting to have, what kind of outcomes are they hoping to have, and what is their experience with life that is causing them to come see me as a client or a customer or a patient, whatever. This is a great place to start, and that can only happen when I put myself in their world and actually get connected to them. That's why that's the essence of the human connection at the heart of all of you.

Jeffrey Besecker: Here again, in that regard, do you feel sometimes we have to set ourself very idealistically aside and not make it be about us? Exactly. It's not about us. Therein lies the other paradox or another paradox. Looking at some recent events that transpired and how people can have 20 different views of that event. I'm not going to point it out specifically, but point out that sometimes it's not about us, you know, and that's authentic to the situation. Sometimes we have to just authentically honor the situation and remove ourselves from it.

Dr. Fred Moss: Yeah, exactly.

Jeffrey Besecker: That self is fluid in my mind, you know, it's just a construct. We can set it out here metaphysically, moralistic sometimes, put it out here in front of us and not be so attached to it. Would you not agree that's a skill we can develop, that if we can set that self aside in a healthy manner or a valuable, productive, adaptive manner, quote unquote, in air, is that a valuable skill and trait to develop?

Dr. Fred Moss: Well, of course, you know, any access we have to our smaller bit large selves and how we can put properly position ourself so that we're not limited by our own fears, concerns or beliefs and or at least less limited than, you know, less limited than we need to be from the illusions of the fears that we have based on the past experiences when we can really access our small and large selves and have, we then get access to positioning and properly inside of our interactions with the world and other people.

Jeffrey Besecker: Red, I want to honor you today. This has been such a great opportunity to sit and consider this from a different perspective. To me, that is the essence of our conversation today, to just be present and move beyond our own blocks. You know, I have to admit coming in, I was holding onto my own biases, my own blocks, my own filter perception about how and what this conversation should be, a certainty. Yet in so many ways, I thank you for showing me so many new ripples. Thank you for that.

Dr. Fred Moss: Thank you. I appreciate it, Jeffrey, and I appreciate the honesty and authenticity in your conversational efforts.

Jeffrey Besecker: As we wrap up here today, I feel like we've covered a lot of ground. You, I feel, are a master at seeing connection in others, in relaying how to form that bond and communication with each other. What are three practical tips our listeners and anyone that experiences this conversation can go away with today that will help increase that bond of human-to-human interaction?

Dr. Fred Moss: Three tips. Okay. I think the first tip, the one that's really paramount is maybe there's nothing wrong with you and maybe there's nothing wrong with them. And can you come at that, any conversation for that bond with that being the basic premise, there's nothing wrong with you and there's nothing wrong with them. And if you were them, you'd be doing exactly what they were doing. And so when we really get that and we honor the other person for what's there, then we can get to the second tip. And the second tip is, Listening is much more powerful than speaking, much more powerful. When you really listen, when you're really there out of curiosity and there to capture and receive what another person is saying, that's what drives conversations forward. And in fact, you have more access through listening than you do through speaking to change the direction of a conversation. When someone feels heard and resonated harmonically, healing actually takes place instantaneously at that second. And it's a beautiful experience. And it can only happen through real and honest listening. And what is listening about? Listening is about the third tip, which we've already just touched on, which is it's not about you. It's not about you. It's never about you. You're here to serve others, you're here to listen, you're here to be of help, you're here for a short period of time to make a difference in the world for others, by others, through others. It's not about you, even though you, you and me, as my version of self, want to take the storefront, you know, want to actually hear ourselves speak and, you know, pat ourselves on the back for being so good or so brilliant or so something. It's not about you. It's about the difference that you're making in the world with others. And when we can be there at that level, that it's not about you, there might be nothing wrong with you. And that listening is the most important feature, much more important than speaking. We will make big, big strides towards connecting with other humans.

Jeffrey Besecker: Thank you, my friend, for this opportunity to be present with you, to lean in and listen. I truly honor and respect this connection. Thank you. Thank you for sharing this brilliant conversation with us.

Dr. Fred Moss: You're welcome. Thank you, Jeffrey.

Jeffrey Besecker: Namaste, the light in me acknowledges that eternal light in you, Fred.

Dr. Fred Moss: Namaste, sir.

Jeffrey Besecker: Let's chat again soon. This was fun.

Dr. Fred Moss: Okay.

Jeffrey Besecker: Besecker.