#2: Alexander Avanth - How to use technology in a mindful manner that improves your life Growth Island

Today's guest is Alexander Avanth who is a former monk, experienced meditation teacher, has done a Tedx talk with the title Navigating digital mindfulness and today helps companies and individuals in the role he defines as Spiritual Technologist.

It is a very honest talk where Alexander shares his experience about life not always being Instagram perfect but actually difficult and having anger. He shares how he uses meditation to deal with challenges and negative emotions.

He shares some of his routines and practices for living a mindful life.

He also touch on how to use technology in a mindful manner that improves your life.

I hope you get as much out of the interview as I did. I have definitely reflected on several of his point and already downloaded one of the apps he mention.

You can find links in the show notes to the different tools that Alexander reference throughout the podcast. So lets jump into the conversation.

Show notes:
- Why Alexander is being called a spiritual technologist. 2:25
- How Alexanders Thai heritage among other things brought him to become a Buddhist monk. 4:30
- How to get accepted to study as a monk. 6:58
- How some monks use technology. 13:25
- What Alexanders Tedx was about. 14:56
- How Alexander uses social media. 16:34
- Calling people instead of texting. 18:40
- Tracking phone use to stay mindful of how the phone is used. 19:00
- Tracking your time spend on a computer. 19:46
- Setting a timer to stay focused and be productive. 20:23
- The app Alexander use for motivation. 22:02
- Setting intentions for the day in turbulent times. 24.20
- A routine for journaling and what to write down. 25:23
- Finding out what makes you happy. 26:30
- How Alexander got started with meditation and how it helped him through depression. 33:20
- Why you should meet your anger and then let it go. 37:45
- How Alexander currently meditate and why you should not start with that practice when being new to meditation. 40:43
- Figure out your reason for meditating. 45:16
- A powerful way to meditate with a partner. 47:30

Links to selected resources:
Alexanders Tedx talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBjtgGqNcLg
https://inthemoment.io/
https://www.rescuetime.com/
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/motivate-daily-motivation/id1068278823?mt=8
https://drjoedispenza.com/collections/books/products/breaking-the-habit-of-being-yourself-paperback-book
https://www.headspace.com/
https://www.calm.com/
https://insighttimer.com/

Links to people mentioned:
Joe Dispenza - https://drjoedispenza.com/

One ending tip from Alexander:
Pursue the mission of becoming the best version of yourself.
You can start by sitting down and thinking about a time when you were the best version of yourself. Then reflect on what the circumstances where at that point.
If you cannot come up with a time you were the best version of yourself. Then it is an opportunity to explore and take risks to test out what it takes to be the best version of yourself.
If you right now in time is the best version of yourself then congratulations my friend. That joyful situation means you have a responsibility to yourself and society to nurture this state so you can continue to stay in this wonderful situation and contribute to others. The best time to fix your roof is when it is not raining.

Links to Alexander:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/avanth/
https://www.instagram.com/avanthgarde
https://www.avanth.io/

More info at www.growthisland.com