Everyday Buddhism Interview

Episode 75 of the Secular Buddhism Podcast

Introduction by Noah Rasheta

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Secular Buddhism Podcast. This is episode number 75. I'm your host, Noah Rasheta, and today I'm doing something a little different. I'm sharing the audio of an interview I had on another podcast called Everyday Buddhism.

So I want to tell you a little bit about this before playing the audio for you. My friend Wendy is the host of the Everyday Buddhism podcast. She's a fellow graduate of the lay ministry program that I did at Bright Dawn—it's a two-year ministry program. She graduated a year or two before I did and even facilitated in some of the classes that my group was going through.

She reached out to me and invited me to be interviewed for her podcast, and I was really excited to do that because I know that based on the training and studying we've both done, our approach is very similar when it comes to discussing Buddhism—specifically the everyday aspect of it. Her podcast is very appropriately titled "Everyday Buddhism" in the sense that a lot of what we talk about and study in Buddhism can seem esoteric and mystical. What we're really trying to get down to is whether or not these teachings actually work. Can they actually improve our day-to-day lives? I believe they absolutely can, and so does Wendy. That's why her approach to this podcast and her approach to Buddhism is what she calls "everyday Buddhism"—it's about how we apply these teachings in everyday life.

In this interview, Wendy and I talk a little bit about my story and what brought me to Buddhism. I don't think I've ever shared this on the Secular Buddhism Podcast—it's only been shared on other podcasts. So that'll be new for you, and I think it gives good background on what led me to Buddhism. Since you enjoy this podcast, you should definitely check out her podcast, Everyday Buddhism. You should be able to find it in any of the podcasting software you're using, or at everyday-buddhism.com.

So without further ado, here's the audio of my interview with Wendy.

The Interview

Wendy: Welcome to Everyday Buddhism, making every day better by applying the proven tools found in Buddhist concepts. Welcome to episode 5 of Everyday Buddhism: Making Everyday Better. I have a special guest today—Noah Rasheta. Noah is a Buddhist teacher, lay minister, author, and the host of the podcast Secular Buddhism. He teaches mindfulness and Buddhist philosophy online and in workshops around the world.

He has a unique story of what brought him to Buddhism and what prompted him to start his podcast and write his first book, Secular Buddhism. I think you'll enjoy and learn from Noah's story. He has since written a second book, No Nonsense Buddhism for Beginners: Clear Answers to Burning Questions About Core Buddhist Teachings.

In addition to our shared commitment to sharing and teaching what we learned through our own practices of Buddhism, Noah and I share another thing—training and ordination as senseis and lay ministers with the Bright Dawn Center for Oneness Buddhism. I wanted Noah to be my first guest because he was one of the hosts and one of the podcasts that inspired me to start this podcast. I've guest hosted and presented on the Bright Dawn Center's Live Dharma Sunday show on Blog Talk Radio, and I've thought about starting a podcast for years. My brother and nephew both suggested I should think about it, but it was Noah's podcast that finally lit the fire of desire to turn that from an occasional idle thought into action.

So welcome, Noah. Thank you for being an inspiration to me and for probably hundreds of others, and thank you for joining me on my first podcast episode.

Noah Rasheta: Well, thank you. It's an honor to be with you on your podcast.

Wendy: So, Noah, I think our listeners would enjoy hearing the background story of what brought you to Buddhism. I know you were raised LDS—Mormon—and went to church there in the US and in Mexico for all of your growing-up life and most of your twenties. From what I understand, you served in an LDS mission and were also married in an LDS temple to your wife Giselle, which I believe—she's still part of the LDS church. So I'm just giving you the overview of what I know. Please correct me if anything's wrong, but I'll turn it over to you for more of your story.

Noah Rasheta: Great, thank you. Well, everything you summarized is accurate. I think the summarized version of my faith transition, as we might call it, happened in my twenties. I was going through a really difficult stage in my marriage and just difficulty with life in general. I had one of those eye-opening moments where life isn't going the way you thought it was supposed to go.

And I had been deeply hurt by someone very close to me—a betrayal of trust. As hurtful as the situation was, what made it more difficult was trying to understand how wrong I could have been about this person. Being so blindsided by it really shook me because I thought I knew this person so well. It left me shaken because I thought I had a pretty good skill with being able to discern people.

And that left me shaken to the point where I thought, "Well, what else could I be wrong about in life?" I didn't start questioning my faith at that specific moment, but I did start trying to develop a deeper sense of my beliefs. Why do I believe what I believe? Where do these beliefs come from? And as I started to dig deeper into my own belief system, that's when I started feeling more doubt, more uncertainty.

In the LDS faith, you have a lot of certainty. You're told where we come from, why we're here, and where we're going. It's all laid out in a very concise plan of action—this is what you have to do, this is what you avoid doing, and everything's spelled out pretty clearly. It gives a very strong sense of certainty. And I was feeling that certainty had collapsed in my marriage. Suddenly there was a lot of uncertainty.

I was trying to cling to the only other area of certainty in my life, which was the existential certainty that I gained through my religious views and beliefs. So when that started to crumble as well, I thought, "Now what? How do I make sense of life?" The more I tried to regain that certainty through my beliefs and faith, the more troubling it became because I started to see it as an illusion. Maybe all of these beliefs and all this certainty they gave me—what if they're all just a complete illusion? And that was very scary. I felt like the ground under me was shaking and breaking up, and at some point I had this feeling of just falling into free fall. I don't know what's real. I don't know what to believe anymore. And it was really scary.

It was during that time that I heard things like, "Oh, meditate. That brings peace." And that's what actually led me to explore Buddhism.

Wendy: Wow. So you reached out to Buddhism almost as a lifeboat in a storm. Is that fair to say?

Noah Rasheta: Yeah, I think that's fair. I was looking for something that felt stable, something that felt real to me. And I remember listening to some talks by Stephen Batchelor, who is a Buddhist teacher and author. He talks about Buddhism from a secular perspective, without all the mystical stuff. And when I listened to him, something just clicked for me. He wasn't asking me to believe anything. He was asking me to question, to investigate, to see for myself whether these things were true.

That was so different from what I had experienced before. I wasn't being told, "This is the truth, and you need to have faith." Instead, I was being invited to explore and discover things for myself. That felt refreshing. That felt honest. And that's what drew me in.

Wendy: So the core thing that drew you to Buddhism was the invitation to question and investigate rather than to accept on faith?

Noah Rasheta: Yes, exactly. Buddhism, at least from a secular perspective, is less about believing and more about testing things out. It's like the Buddha himself said, "Don't believe what I'm telling you just because I'm telling you. Try it out. See if it works in your life." That approach resonated with me because I had reached a point where I was exhausted from trying to maintain beliefs that weren't working for me anymore.

Wendy: Mm-hmm. And how did that exploration into Buddhism—how did that look? Did you start meditating right away? How did you begin?

Noah Rasheta: Yeah, I did start meditating. I found some resources online and started learning about meditation. I think what happened is that through meditation, I started to experience something real and tangible. It wasn't something I had to believe in—it was something I could experience directly. I could sit down, meditate, and actually feel a difference in my mind and my body.

And the more I practiced, the more I started to understand the teachings intellectually as well. So it wasn't just about reading about Buddhism or hearing about it—it was about practicing it and seeing how it actually worked in my life. And that's what convinced me that there was something here worth exploring further.

Wendy: That's wonderful. So you went from this place of uncertainty and free fall to finding something that worked in practice. And that led to you starting the podcast?

Noah Rasheta: It did, eventually. It took time. I spent several years just practicing, studying, and learning for myself. But then I felt this desire to share what I was learning with other people. I noticed that a lot of people out there were struggling the way I had struggled. They were looking for answers, for meaning, for peace. And I thought, "What if I could offer something like what was offered to me—an invitation to explore Buddhism in a practical, secular way?"

That's what led me to start the Secular Buddhism Podcast. I didn't want to convince people to become Buddhist. I just wanted to offer an alternative perspective, a different way of looking at life that might help them find more peace and contentment.

Wendy: And now you're doing the work of teaching. You're not giving people the answers, right? You're inviting them to question and explore, just like you were invited to do.

Noah Rasheta: Exactly. That's the spirit of Buddhism, right? Just sit with the questions. That's how I got here. But you may go somewhere else, right? That's excellent.

Wendy: Right. And I imagine your wife—Giselle's still part of the LDS church. How has that journey been for you two?

Noah Rasheta: It's been interesting. I think the key has been respecting each other's paths. I'm not interested in converting her away from Mormonism, and she's not interested in converting me back. We've found a way to support each other in our different spiritual journeys. And honestly, what I tell people about this is: if what you're doing inspires you to be a better person and it brings you joy, stick with it.

The moment it doesn't do either of those two things—the moment it stops bringing you joy and stops motivating you to be a better person—then at least be willing to explore that. Ask yourself, "Why isn't this working for me anymore?" That's what was happening for me with Mormonism. I had reached the point where it wasn't bringing me joy, and it didn't motivate me to be a better person. I was unhappy, so I was willing to explore something different. But that doesn't mean it was wrong and Buddhism is right. It just means they're different, and Buddhism happened to be more skillful for me at that time in my life.

Wendy: That's important to say because a lot of people worry about converts or people changing religions. They think someone has to be wrong and someone has to be right.

Noah Rasheta: Exactly. I try to emphasize this with people who listen to my podcast or read books on Buddhism. Don't approach this as, "Hey, this might be better than what you've got over there." It's not that this is right and that is wrong. This is just different. It might be more skillful for you, sure. But it might not. It might be very unskillful to try to make Buddhism work given your social circumstances and family dynamics and all the things you're going to encounter. Maybe you should just stick with Mormonism and be a better version of yourself within Mormonism.

Wendy: Mm-hmm.

Noah Rasheta: I think that applies to any ideology.

Wendy: Yeah, that's excellent. Noah, I think we should probably wrap up, but I have a closing question for you. You've been teaching Buddhism—not giving people the answers, but teaching them through your podcasts and meditation and through your workshops and mindfulness. You've seen a lot of people come to you with their issues and questions. Because you know how that is, I started my podcast so I could reach out to people from a career coaching aspect, and Buddhism does help people in all parts of their life if they learn to try some of the techniques and practices.

So in what you see in your relationships with people and the questions they bring you and the troubles they have, what do you think is the single most important thing that Buddhism has to offer everyone?

Noah Rasheta: That is a big question. Based on my experience, I would say the single biggest thing that Buddhist ideas, doctrines, and teachings offer is the ability to find more contentment with who you are now.

I think that's what we struggle with most. What I see people struggling with most in life is this constant comparison. It's like there's who I am, and then there's who I could be if I went to the gym or studied more or read more books. There's always this comparison between who I am and who I think I should be. All of the ideologies and whatever's out there that tries to give you comfort cannot give you peace with accepting who you are in this moment—until you are willing to accept who you are in this moment.

That's what I think Buddhism is really good at. It helps you spend less time searching out there in the external things and more time searching internally. And in that process of inner exploration, hopefully you discover that you're actually okay with who you are and how you are.

Wendy: Because I will change.

Noah Rasheta: Right. That's not to say, "Hey, don't try to change yourself." That's not what this is at all. The understanding is that change is inevitable. I'm not who I was ten years ago, and I won't be who I am now ten years from now. But in the middle of all that constant, inevitable change, can I accept who I am—the one that's changing? When I find that ability to accept myself in that process, inner peace is what happens. It's like, "Okay, this is me."

Wendy: Yeah. Yeah. And you know, there's this big thing you're talking about—inner peace—and this little thing about accepting yourself. But it is so true. But I think it probably seems ludicrous to people. Yet that is an excellent answer, and I think it's a great way to wrap up. I hope we can meet up again and do some of these, because I think it would be fun to kind of play around with different concepts of Buddhism in the world, right?

Noah Rasheta: Yeah. And I want to say I love what you're doing, which is exactly what I was interested in doing—taking these big, esoteric, sometimes over-my-head type concepts and saying, "But what does this look like in everyday life?" My approach with Secular Buddhism was that—outside of the big mystical stuff, what does this look like? Just the pragmatic approach. And I love that you're doing that with this podcast. Everyday Buddhism is saying, "Okay, all this is great and stuff, but what does it look like in my everyday life when I come home in a bad mood and step on the Legos? Or when I'm stuck at a red light?"

So I want to also extend a deep bow to you and the work you're doing with presenting these ideas and concepts in the context of everyday life. It's wonderful. It's what we need. It's what our society needs—not to be good, but to be a little bit more skillful. If we could be more skillful as a society tomorrow than we are today, that's a great thing. And I see your podcast as being a very valuable tool for that. So thank you.

Wendy: Oh, thank you, Noah. That's a big thing. It actually kind of scares me—helping the world get better. But we'll work on one person at a time, right? Yes. All right, Noah. So thank you so much again for joining me.

That's it for episode 5 of Everyday Buddhism: Making Every Day Better. I don't know about you, but that sure made my day better listening to Noah's story. He has a lot to say, and he is a great inspiration for many people, I'm sure.

Before I wrap up this episode, I want to thank Noah again. And I want to thank everyone who has subscribed, downloaded, and shared links to my podcast and left reviews. I can't express how honored I am to have all the positive feedback and enthusiasm. Don't forget to check out my website, leave me an email or comment telling me how I'm doing, and let me know if there's anything you want me to cover in my next podcast. And if you liked what you heard so far, please subscribe and take a minute to review the podcast so more people can find out about it.

Thanks again, and until next time, keep making your everyday better.

End of Episode 75