January 20, 2025 • 41 mins
In this inaugural episode of Leadership on Purpose, host Kathryn Ficarra interviews Jan Loukonos, a martial artist, filmmaker, and head of the US Tai Chi push hands team. Jan shares how Tai Chi principles can transform leadership and personal development through breathwork, visualization, and mindful awareness. He discusses how slowing down to speed up perception allows for better data gathering and decision-making in both physical practice and leadership contexts.
The conversation explores Jan's journey from childhood martial arts training to developing innovative approaches in leadership and entertainment. He shares insights about his work with tech leaders at Google and his unique approach to teaching Tai Chi for leadership development. Jan emphasizes the importance of understanding how to redirect pressure and energy, whether physical or emotional, toward specific goals.
The episode delves into Jan's entertainment ventures, particularly Justice for Hire, a groundbreaking project that combines martial arts philosophy with storytelling. This innovative platform allows anyone to become part of a global hero narrative through a cinematic social network, emphasizing the importance of community and positive social impact.
Jan discusses the significance of visualization in high performance, sharing techniques for developing greater awareness and control over attention. He explains how these practices can help leaders claim space and expand their influence while maintaining authenticity and purpose.
The conversation concludes with Jan's perspectives on transforming society through storytelling and martial arts principles, highlighting his work in creating positive change through both physical practice and narrative development. His approach combines traditional wisdom with modern applications, offering practical tools for leadership development and personal growth.
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Show Notes:
Jan Lucanus is a 3X Tai Chi World Cup Tuishou Champion, former Captain, and current Coach of the US Tai Chi Push Hands Team. Trained in martial arts by his parents and guided spiritually by his family’s unique wisdom, Jan combined these influences with studies in gaming and filmmaking to share ancient teachings through media. As the founder of ReelwUrld, a cinematic social network, he integrates his expertise in storytelling, Tai Chi, and pattern recognition to elevate high performers and consult on major brand transactions.
Website:
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
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(00:08):
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(00:35):
Welcome to Leadership on Purpose, the podcast series. I'm your host, Kathryn, and this is where we shatter the status quo and dive deep into the raw, unfiltered stories of those who are embracing their inner alignment.
If you're tired of the cookie cutter approach to success and you crave a life that resonates with your true self, you are in the right place. Join me each week as we uncover powerful insights from those who have had the courage to lean into their purpose, live authentically, and create a life they were made for.
(01:03):
This isn't just a conversation.
It's a movement.
This is a revolution of authentic leadership, but we don't just talk about change. We live it.
And you can too.
I'm really excited for you guys to meet our guests today. So Jan Loukonos is joining us. I met him at an event a little while ago in LA, and we had this amazing conversation that I'm excited to share with you and a couple of things that we're going to do for you.
(01:40):
Jan is the, he's a martial artist, he's a filmmaker, he's a head of the US Tai Chi team. He's a champion of push hands, and he is transforming the way that he leads inside and outside of the dojo. So Jan, thank you for joining me.
My pleasure. Thanks for having me.
It's funny because when we first started talking and I said, Hey, I would love to have you on my podcast. I don't know where we're filming it. I don't know how we're doing this and in like three weeks, this kind of all came together. So we're in your town, your hometown of LA, not mine in Seattle, in this beautiful space.
(02:14):
And, you know, I think we were, I listened to the signs, and I think that we just when you lean into what you think is the right thing, things just unfold. So I just want to say thank you for all the ideas and all the help that you were, and how instrumental you were in getting us here.
Oh, well thank you for allowing me to be the first guest on your podcast. Huge deal.
Yeah. So, the head of the US Tai Chi team. What does that mean?
(02:37):
Sure. Specifically, I am the coach of the US Tai Chi push hands team and former captain for the 2009 to 2011 seasons.
Okay.
So, Tai Chi push hands is the, there's a sport, and then there's the more holistic sensitivity drill. So the sensitivity drills are part of the Tai Chi system.
(02:58):
And these Tai Chi allows you to slow yourself down and speed up your perception, and essentially gather more data through breath work and visualization, gather more data in a moment in your life, then someone who's not putting in the work to slow themselves down and speed up their perception.
So push hands is a pressure and sensitivity training drill. And you're essentially allowing yourself to feel someone else, feel the pressure they're putting on you and redirect that pressure toward a goal and a specific area and that relates more deeply into how you do that internally, and how you do it with your emotions, with your thoughts, and how do you redirect all those things towards your goals, whatever those goals are, which of course you first have to define.
(03:43):
Right, right. Yeah, I think when we were talking, I was really interested in when you said, because you just met with the Google leadership team, Sergey and all those guys over in the Bay Area, and you were like, you talked about how you took the emotion out of the body with with the push hands approach.
And is that something that we can do and play with today?
To clarify, I was brought out to a space which Sergey owns as a co owner and was definitely guided experiences, multiple experiences, essentially Tai Chi seminars for leadership.
(04:16):
Okay, and then started bringing that to more athletic folks in the Bay Area as well. And this is again what I do across the board for many years and my parents both train as well. So it's just, I love doing it, I love sharing it, I'd love to share it with you now.
Okay, well, tell me though, when you say Tai Chi for leadership, how does that tie in? Like why if you're a leader that you're, and when I talk about leadership, I want to clarify, I'm not just talking about your manager and a company, you're a CEO, you are a leader in your life, right?
(04:53):
Like you're leading your friends, you're leading your children, you're leading your spouse, you're, you know, you, you have a leadership position in every aspect of your life because your life is built around you, right?
So, I love the idea that Tai Chi focuses on, on, you know, on that, right, on sustain building that and sustaining that but talk to me about why that's important for people like what does it do for you when you, when you participate in these exercises, you know, what is, what is the outcome that they can experience from like an internal perspective?
(05:30):
I think the outcome is going to be different for every person. If you're, I'll say that the format of one of my, let's say introduction, introductory classes is meant to give you an overview of the Tai Chi system and the Tai Chi system as it relates to how we train on the US Tai Chi push hands team, which is, you know, I was recruited onto the team along with my father by Coach Josh Wateskin who is the chess prodigy best known for the movie,
(05:59):
the movie searching for Bobby Fischer was based on his childhood and he also wrote an amazing book called The Art of Learning, which Tim Ferriss picked up and got him to narrate his, which I highly recommend, get the audible for that.
And he talks a lot about his experience in the Tai Chi world and becoming world champion and the way that Josh, having grown up myself around masters of martial arts of all sorts, especially Tai Chi, Josh's approach was unique in the sense that he would take one thing, he would call it his formula for mastery.
(06:37):
You take one thing, you break it down into three parts, you train each part individually, and you put it back together and you've mastered it. And to be able to do that and allow yourself not only the deepening of the experience of finding within those three things, three smaller things and three smaller moments to train and to continue to deepen, but also to be able to have the sense of mastery of a thing and then to be able to move on to the next thing, a piece together, your own repertoire.
(07:06):
That to me is really, really powerful because then it allows you to have a sense of pattern recognition. And when you have pattern recognition, you can start to strategize around what your goals are.
And that applies to pretty much every area of life. And having done it at the highest level in the world of Tai Chi, push hands, which is again the push hands, there's the sensitivity, as I mentioned before, but then there's a sport.
(07:30):
And that's what I coach, the sport of Tai Chi push hands, the grappling side, it looks like sumo wrestling or Greco-Roman wrestling. It's a very, very fast, explosive sport. And there's two games, one you play inside of a ring where you throw someone on the floor or push them out.
And then there's another one where you play on pedestals and you have to knock your opponent off the pedestals or at least get them to lift their foot. And so these high pressure balance games are a litmus test for the mechanics that you're training, the philosophies that you're training.
(08:04):
And I love the idea of putting your philosophy to the test via a method that allows for objective achievement. It's like, okay, well, this is actually working when this is actually not working.
And when you start to get into the world of objective clarity, where people can actually see, that's why I love martial arts so much and how it applies to pretty much all my strategies across business, entertainment, etc., is that everyone knows what a knockout looks like. It's very obvious.
(08:34):
So how can you find the obvious wins, the obvious manifestation of the technique, whatever technique, how can you find it? And how can you repeat it? Because if it's not repeatable, it's not competition worthy.
So those are really important concepts for me that are woven into an introductory class of Tai Chi and how I would share push hands and how I would acquaint that to emotional strategies that you might have, emotional otherwise, across the board and applying the system to your life.
(09:10):
So interesting. And obviously you have such mastery over what you do every day. If there's someone that's watching you...
I need more. I definitely need more.
But if someone's watching you and they're like, you know, I know that I have this... we're all here for some reason, right? I think part of our journey in this world is to figure out what our purpose is and then find fulfillment through that purpose.
(09:33):
I'm a really big believer in that. And, you know, even in my journey, I think that I thought my purpose was one thing and I kept coming up against my own internal resistance. And so I had to give myself a little bit of a time out, kind of tear apart my life and rebuild it again.
And I'm pretty clear now what that is. But for someone who's, you know, sitting there saying, well, I don't want to rip up my life, but I would like to find my purpose and I would like to feel a little bit more fulfilled. You know, how did you tap into like this is your genius, right?
(10:05):
This is how you are, you know, you're transforming the people around you by giving them these gifts and teaching them that. Like, how did you really tap into know that this is what I want to do? And this is what I'm here for.
You said so many things that I want to touch on because I think it's really powerful for you to say to tear apart your life. And that is... I'm very interested in your narrative.
(10:29):
I don't recommend it, but it's good on the other side. I completely agree. And I've had to do that myself multiple times. And, you know, so it's challenging for me to speak from a place of...
Yeah, I want to only speak from the place of experience rather than, hey, like, you know, you don't have to do that. Well, of course you don't have to. But I'm not sure I may not be able to coach you. I say this all the time.
(10:51):
That there are different ways to approach Tai Chi and I can only coach you on what has worked for me. So a lot of times my expertise does not negate someone else's expertise.
And someone else may say, Jan's wrong. And I might say the other person, well, that's different.
(11:12):
But even that, even what you just said, like, that's a version of mastery, right? You're like, no, this is where I know that I can help you, where I know I'm good, where I know I can create change for you. Not here, but over here.
So was there like a moment in your life where you're like, this is... I'm going to like tap into this and this is going to be what I, you know, what I jump off of. This is going to be my platform. This is what I'm here to do.
(11:36):
Well, I would say there's a trifecta. And, you know, I watched my coach Josh use writing as his counterbalance to training.
And then the training would inform the writing and the writing would help him clarify the training and he'd bring back the clarity into the training.
And so I was, he was coaching the team while he was writing the Art of Learning. And it was an amazing process to watch.
(12:00):
And because I grew up in martial arts, it was always part of what I... it's literally been the gateway for me to other types of work.
You know, my father's also a comic writer and he was in politics prior to that. And so to be able to have his leadership and my mother's spiritual leadership combined, you know, I grew up under a family guru.
(12:23):
So there's always, always the spirituality, there's always the martial arts and then there was always the clarity that the training that we're doing has to be shared narratively.
And so because through stories is how we communicate as humans. So how can we, how can all these things work together?
And so that trifecta has been very consistent throughout my life and getting out of the way of myself and all these other things that I might have learned
(12:52):
that may block that foundational gift has really been the biggest challenge. So it's really like, okay, well, why don't I just do that and stop worrying about these fears that are learned fears from other people rather than the inherent gift that I've been given.
And I think that...
Okay, so and that's exactly where I think people get stuck, right? So because you have a paradigm, right?
(13:16):
A paradigm is just an externalized behavior based on a belief system. So, you know, and a paradigm is really shaped by our limiting beliefs that are created from, you know, when we were seven, eight years old.
So, I mean, I, you know, I work with a lot of people right now that are imprisoned by their mindset, right?
They're like, oh, no, I can't, I have, you know, fear of rejection or fear, you know, self doubt and all the, all the things, right?
(13:41):
And there's ways I think when you get to be really clear on that, you know, how to rewrite that narrative and flip that script.
But I think when you don't have that clarity and you don't realize you're running off a paradigm that doesn't serve you, it's like, in what ways have you found, like you said, I had to get out of my own way.
And I think that's a really hard thing for people to do. But like, what does that look like for you? When do you know you're coming up against that resistance and you're like, I gotta just, I gotta figure out why I'm leaning into something that's, you know,
(14:10):
clearly coming from a belief that doesn't serve me and how do I get out of my own way?
I think that's what I want people to really understand and take away is like, I mean, what you're doing is so incredible, right?
And you're so successful at it. And everybody has this opportunity, right?
Everyone can look at their life and say, you know, maybe I don't like where I'm at right now or I know that I'm made for something better.
(14:32):
And part of getting to that place is to peel back that onion and say, OK, well, I'm responsible for the way that my life is right now. You have to take responsibility for that, right?
Your inner world creates your outer world. So if you've created the world that you have, chaotic or not, or whatever it is, and you want something different, you have that opportunity to do that too.
And it's really leaning into what's the story I'm telling myself, you know, what's the belief system I have, and, you know, what is the vision I have for my future and how do I get out of the way for that?
(15:01):
And I love that you said that. And I'd like to hear like in what ways you find, you know, you find the tools that enable you to do that.
Well, key tools, breath, work and visualization. Yeah. And I think another one that.
I always think about Bruce Lee saying be like water. And I love that saying. And for me, there's been a lot of unpacking of that over time because the road signs that we all get every day toward our highest self that oftentimes we ignore.
(15:38):
And we're flowing to them. But then somehow we're also putting up a blockage to flow us away from it. And that blockage could be a thought or a feeling. And it normally creates a chain reaction.
So having a method to slow yourself down and speed up your perception, it doesn't have to be Tai Chi, but having a method to do that is key because then you can start to analyze yourself and having making sure that you actually have time for reflection, for contemplation, for meditation, which I love the definition of meditation as rising above desires.
(16:18):
That is simply that is meditation. However, you achieve that state is a great method. But can you rise above desires? And that doesn't necessarily mean be a monk and sit there quietly and not want anything.
But I think more so that you're not affected by the waves of desire in a way that pulls you away from your purpose. So and to be able to clarify your purpose.
(16:40):
And there's there's there's all these wonderful folks I love that have helped me, whether it's Vim Hoff or or Deepak Chopra. And, you know, I think Vim Hoff has this great he did this great post on Instagram about it's okay if you haven't found your purpose, just look to find like your the compass of the heart.
And I'm that's not an exact quote, but you know, your heart is directing you and Deepak Chopra always talks about the heart having a higher computing power than the brain. And so I think it's really interesting to recognize your heart as a compass and what is your heart pulling you?
(17:12):
What do you feel pulled toward? And I also love Deepak's idea in the seven spiritual loss of success is saying that every human being needs an efficient way to generate and store energy.
So can you fill yourself enough? Most of our the Western exercises deplete you. So how do you fill yourself up enough so that you have the energy to self analyze to break down what's happening inside of you for yourself.
(17:42):
And, you know, if you need to verbalize, that's great. But I think oftentimes conversations with others before having a conversation with yourself can be another distraction. So there's a lot of people who are like, I need to talk about this with someone I think that opening up my phone and for me doing a self diary, self journaling with just audio and speaking to myself asking myself questions helps me say, be devil's advocate to myself.
(18:09):
And I like that. It's a really, really powerful process to be able to I'll do this probably once a week, sometimes more if I need it. And, you know, and these are just for me, it's just for me to figure out myself. And if I, if I keep on asking these questions and keep on testing reality, you're going to see different results. And if you don't like one result, you can just change the behavior to a different result.
(18:33):
Right. I think it's hard for a lot of people to understand how easy it is to change. Right. It's a decision. And you should lean into that. You know, when we talk about, okay, so visualization, visualization, for an example, I'm, I'm a pretty big visualizer. But I think, you know, when you think about what you want for your life, the real reason why you visualize, and if you look at it from a scientific perspective, this is what really got me because I used to think, am I just daydreaming? Am I visualizing? But now I understand it.
(19:02):
So like, you can basically rewrite the neurons in your brain, right, when you start visualizing, and your mind doesn't know if what you're visualizing actually happened or not, right, if you can get yourself to a place where you feel the emotion, and you feel like it's really true, then, you know, it kind of put your subconscious to work to say that, oh, this is an experience that already happened, right. So you can like rewrite, you can rewrite, that's why your brain is neuroplastic, made of neuroplasticity, right, you can rewrite those neurons. And I love that concept, because it just is one of the things that we're talking about, right.
(19:31):
It just is one other way that people have the opportunity to really change the situation they're in that they're not, they don't feel fulfilled, or they're not happy in. And breathwork, actually, this morning, there was a breathwork class downstairs before we started this. So I did that for an hour. And that came with a lot of visualization and journaling. And it was like, oh, my God, it's like a perfect start of the day. But really important to just reset your nervous system and get to a place where you're coming from, you know, you're utilizing your parasympathetic nervous system, you're coming from a place of your creative genius. And,
(20:01):
your power and, you know, I think socializing that is really important for people to understand that, you know, you don't have to be stuck, you don't have to, you know, you don't have to cycle, you can get to a place where you're, you're living your genius, which is what you're doing, which is why I really want to talk to you. And I really want to do some push hands work.
I would love to share that with you. I want to add something to what you just said in terms of, you know, there's, you're correct, all this data, especially with high performers, let's say athletes or musicians who would visualize their field of play. And when visualizing their field of play, the same neurons fire as if they're actually on the field of play. I think that's really important to recognize that high performers have to visualize, you just have to do it to achieve at scale.
(20:47):
So if visualization is allowing those that we know, across cultures and society, to be known by us, they're essentially, they're getting to a level where they can be seen and heard. How can we apply that same, those same techniques into our bodies, into ourselves so that we can actually have it in our lives in a more tactile way. And Tai Chi does that.
(21:13):
Be essentially being able to give yourself your visualizing your breath. And by visualizing your breath as a color, you're giving your attention a vehicle. And by giving your attention a vehicle, you're getting more control over your attention. And by getting more control, you can start to program your attention with intent. And once you do that, you can start to have a greater sense of willpower. And that's very powerful.
(21:34):
Oh, my gosh, massively powerful. That is amazing. I think I would color my breath like a gold color when you I don't know, came to my mind when you were talking.
Whatever intuitively comes to you, there are there are meanings to each color. But to be able to just allow yourself to intuitively find the color and to see how it might change in different areas of your body, I think is really the first step.
(21:55):
I love that. Okay, cool. Let's do it. Okay, what do we do?
Well, let's let's first for anyone who's watching, I think that we can do something sitting down first, and then we can do the two person exercise standing up.
You tell me. So first and foremost, you imagine a string lifting you from the top of the head. And this imaginary string is from so many different modalities. But right now we'll just tie cheese like gateway to a lot of things. But right now we just want to feel like we're dangling.
(22:21):
And you're going to allow relaxation to cascade down the spine all the way through the tailbone. And when you're sitting, it's different than standing. You're sitting, you're going to push the tailbone into or push the sit bones into the chair that you might be sitting in.
And just feel that lift. Gentle pull in the belly as if the belly button is going toward the spine very gently.
(22:43):
Very gently. And we're going to have a tongue gently placed on the ceiling of the mouth, the mouth closed and all the breathing will be in and out through the nose.
We're going to focus on our lower Dan Tian or our second chakra, the orange one in yoga, three finger lengths or two inches below the belly button.
(23:04):
We're just going to inhale into that area, drawing the breath in, using the belly as the pump, the lower Dan Tian, and exhaling, washing the color down the arms and legs.
So inhaling, visualizing the breath as a color. See it gather in the belly in that second chakra like a sun getting brighter and brighter. And exhale, washing the color down.
(23:29):
And when you're doing this, you're doing your best to take pressure off of what my yoga teacher would call the middle diaphragm and the upper diaphragm.
So he would say that you have three diaphragms, upper, middle and lower. And as you get older, you start to breathe higher and higher and have more shallow breath.
So you want to breathe more like a baby and maintain the breath in the belly area.
(23:50):
So we want to soften the shoulders and we also want to soften the breath, meaning that the breath should be strong, but gentle, rather than allowing you to hear your breath.
Because multiple things. One, the sound, if it's too loud, it's going to distract you vibrationally. The vibration is going to distract you from the color visualization.
(24:11):
And strategically, as we go into the sport, we'll start to strategize around the breathing patterns of a person. So you may do a hard push on someone at the apex of an inhalation or when they're fully exhale.
So we're inhaling deep. And then we just play with this attention drill, which is put the attention on the tip of the nose. I think this is really fun.
(24:32):
And just feel the circulation in your nose. And then get more specific, feel the pulse in your nose.
Then feel the currents of air, whispering around your nose.
Then feel the currents of air, whispering around your nose. Feel how your breath adjust those currents of air.
(25:06):
Feel the heat that the nose generates.
Shift the attention to the right middle finger. Feel the circulation. Feel the pulse.
Feel the currents of air in the room, whispering around the finger.
Feel the heat the middle finger generates, coming from the finger and experienced by the other fingers.
(25:36):
And notice what we're doing here. It's almost like we're listening to a song and choosing what parts we enjoy the most, whether it's the vocals or it's a particular instrument.
Our attention, we can go through the different sounds, the vibrations in our body, and we can scan for what we might be looking for, very specific things.
(25:58):
I think it's really beautiful to be able to do that inside. And let's shift the attention to the left middle finger.
What should we be looking for when we're scanning the inside of our body?
Well, it depends on what you might be dealing with in life.
Some exercises, what we'll do is we'll scan for dark patches, blockages, or cold areas, or areas that are overly heated.
(26:21):
And to be able to identify those areas. And then what we'll do, this is part of, this is the introduction.
I said Tai Chi is a gateway to many things. This can be a gateway to what's called programmatic breathing.
And programmatic breathing is utilized in many healing methods to be able to relax the entire body and then program specific areas of the body to recover.
(26:47):
And if you read Josh's book, he did some of that work to help you relax.
I used to fight semi-pro Sancho, which is boxing, kickboxing, Mongolian wrestling.
And my old captain broke my coach Josh's hand in a fight years before I met, I think, both of them.
But then Josh had to train for the Tai Chi World Cup with a broken hand and had to make sure the hand didn't atrophy.
(27:12):
So there was a lot of work that he did, mental work.
And there's a great book on self, I think it's called the Book of Self-Defense,
I'll give it the specific name, but it's all about programmatic breath work.
And so what we're doing here is starting to allow ourselves to relax the entire body,
shift the attention to that left middle finger and just allow yourself to feel the different waves,
(27:34):
whether you start with something general, the circulation, and then you get more specific to the pulse.
And then you go into feeling around the body, and then you go into the body.
And then you go into feeling around the area, which is why we're looking for the currents of air.
And then you start to allow that area to be more clear in terms of the heat,
(28:00):
what it generates and how it's experienced by the areas around it.
Then you expand the awareness to both middle fingers so that you can feel both at the same time.
And the expansion of awareness really is the end goal for all this stuff.
It's like, how can you walk into a room and claim space?
You can only claim space if you've expanded your awareness enough to recognize you can claim space.
(28:20):
So, I look at, I believe every human being, I think that us as a society, as a human race,
I believe we have superhuman capabilities, all of us.
And they're all latent, and it's because of how we're educated, how we're trained.
And how can we build systems that allow us to touch those things on a daily basis?
(28:44):
How can you bring the breathwork and visualization to your...
Yes, that's so good.
In high school, when I really started getting into, you know, I grew up in a Tai Chi family,
but I stopped training.
I got beat up by a family defending a friend of mine when I was nine,
and I like denounced martial arts.
And then I didn't pick it up again until I was like 15 and a half.
And so when I started doing it again, I really started connecting to the visualization more than anything else.
(29:08):
And it made more sense than anything I had previously focused on.
So I'd walk around my high school breathing into every step, and I'd look like a nut.
I'm like standing on my heels trying to keep the passive...
When you anchor on your heels, you're in a passive state.
And so I wanted to be in a passive state to feel as much as I could,
because then when you shift your weight to the balls of your feet,
(29:29):
you go into an aggressive state from a primal standpoint.
Everyone can feel this.
Once you're money back from...
You bought something in a store, you hand the receipt over,
you shift your weight to the balls of your feet,
and you shift into a more aggressive mode.
And even if it's polite...
It's interesting. I haven't thought about that.
If you want to train an actor to be more aggressive, you may put them in boxing,
but boxing is going to keep them on the balls of their feet,
(29:51):
which again gets you more to that aggressive mode.
So it's really interesting to be able to program yourself on what you want when you want it,
using this breathwork and visualization.
Yeah, I know. I love that.
OK, so in the beginning, I introduced you as a filmmaker.
I know you have a filmmaking technology company.
And tell us about what project you guys are working on now.
And then we're going to do a little fun line capture that you asked me to do.
(30:15):
Thank you. Yes.
OK, so the project's called Justice for Hire.
And it is a show that we're making with a global community.
The concept is like Uber for Heroes, where you can hire a hero or become one and get paid.
So anyone can join the cast of this show right from their phone.
And you go to justiceforhire.com to learn all about it.
You can access the app from there.
(30:36):
It's a progressive web app.
You go to app directly from justiceforhire.app.
And for me, this the show and even the technology company Real World were
patent pending on a cinematic universe model, which is the manifestation of Tai Chi
for me in my observations and work across media.
(30:56):
So I went to film school at NYU.
I came out of NYU film school, came out of there,
you know, immediately jumping into the to the Hollywood world.
And I had a senior thesis called Justice for Hire.
And my father, like I said, he wrote comic books and we wrote a comic book of J.F.H.
together, and that did very well as in the digital comics world.
(31:18):
And we like set records for digital downloads.
And it's a fun project.
It's been going on for a while.
We have a global community.
We have 80,000 people worldwide working with us right now and following what we're
doing, you know, as part of the community.
And it's it's a massive passion to show how how can we take these principles?
(31:42):
I've really story to me.
The only reason I'm in entertainment is to gain access to people's hearts and minds.
That's the only reason.
And the only reason I should even want to have access to people's hearts and minds
is because I feel like I have something of value to share.
And so I'm like, how can I offer
people some of this amazing stuff that I grew up with and also not only offer it,
(32:02):
but also clarify it for myself in terms of we have we have a world that can be better.
We can do better.
And how can we reframe some of the things that we have access to and optimize them?
I really I'm speaking generally right now,
but it gets very specific when we talk about behavior in society.
(32:25):
How do we meet our day?
How do we meet each other?
How can we show up for each other with courage
and and love and compassion?
And one of the big issues that I've had with superhero narratives since I was a
little kid was that there was always it seemed like there was fighting
between the heroes and between it like fighting.
There's all this infighting.
(32:45):
And oftentimes the superhero narratives, they started the status quo.
They go through this whole like drama of saving the world.
And then they save the world to return to the status quo.
And we're not actually better as people oftentimes in these narratives.
So I look at something like Star Trek and sci fi.
Great science fiction has always pushed us as a society.
(33:09):
You know, we have cell phones because of Star Trek.
We have triquarters for health that are coming out now inspired by Star Trek,
like vision technology for the blind inspired by Star Trek.
So I say to myself, how can you use the superhero model
to essentially get an effect on society that not only not only allows us to be
(33:33):
inspired, but actually take something into reality for in a tactile way.
And that's where the Tai Chi comes in.
Everything we do with Justice for Hire,
when it comes to our events, we always start with Tai Chi, where we slow
ourselves down to speed up our perception so we can create what we're doing live
action scene events now so we can create action scenes together as a community.
(33:54):
And we're doing comic cons and we're doing them in film festivals and we're
doing them on our own now here in L.A.
So and anybody can be anybody can be involved.
Anybody.
It doesn't we have some professional actors, some professional fighters and more.
But most of our community is just people who want to be a part of something, be a
character, their own character and a shared story, because we're all in a story
(34:15):
together on Earth. So we're framing.
OK, yeah.
We look at a social network as a story we're all telling together.
But it's not normally framed that way.
So we're we built an app that's a cinematic social network that allows us
to tell a story together intentionally.
And the whole concept is how can we transform ourselves in this world of heroism?
(34:37):
How can we make a world where people show up as heroes in their own lives for each
other when someone needs something?
You know, I had to stop in real life.
I had to stop a an attack at a church last year.
And I was reminded there was unfortunately a homeless man who had some mental
challenges and I was at my family guru's gathering at a church.
(35:01):
And I was the only able body adult that could do anything.
And so, you know, it's I've always had
very good relationships with police, law enforcement and military because of my
martial arts background.
But that doesn't mean that it took like 45 minutes for the cops to come.
And I was holding a guy for 45 minutes.
And so, you know, I look at these these moments in our our society and reminded
(35:24):
that it's the stories we tell ourselves that influence the systems we build.
So how can I use story right now to cause transformation and for people also,
first and foremost, have fun, have fun, become a better version of themselves,
but also know that the best stories give us the tools to build a better society.
(35:46):
That's how story has always been utilized since the foundation of human
storytelling. It's meant to give the morals and values to the tribe so that we can
spread these morals and values through our our culture and uplift more.
So how can I return to that in a very intentional way?
And that's what I'm doing my best every day to do with Justice for Hire, myself and a team.
OK, and we'll make sure that we add all
this stuff in the show notes so that somebody wants to join.
(36:09):
They can find they can download the app and figure out how to be part of that.
But what line did you need?
So right now we just started doing kids events.
OK, and these kids events were training them.
We're putting that and it took me a long time to feel comfortable doing this
because I was like, wow, like little kids, I would I don't want this to be a satire.
It's not supposed to be like really crazy over the top action.
(36:30):
We're actually doing our best to create a world of nonviolence.
So how do you create a world nonviolence?
To me, it is the ability to have the ability to to influence greatly allows you
to choose how to influence, meaning that if you have the great power,
the great power can be used constructively or destructively.
So I think martial arts and martial training is very important.
(36:52):
So we're training the kids framed in this way.
So now we're training kids to be vigilantes.
No, we're training kids to be heroes, so we don't need vigilantes.
Awesome. Well, I really appreciate your time.
This was super fun and hopefully transformative for everybody
(37:13):
that had the opportunity to watch.
Two things I want to ask you, number one,
if you were to ask yourself advice six months ago, what would you tell yourself then?
And the reason I ask this question is because I think there's a lot of
conversation around, you know, what would I tell my younger self?
What would I tell myself, you know, in college?
But we change every day, we evolve every day.
(37:36):
And it doesn't really take that long to make a big change in your life.
So if you were just to take Jan six months ago,
knowing from where you are now and think of the evolution you've had,
what would you tell that person? You already resonate.
Oh, I like that. You already resonate.
Keep going. It's good. That's good.
(37:56):
OK, and then tell everybody how they can find you.
You can find my Tai Chi work on Janstaichi.com.
You can find Justice for Hire on Justiceforhire.com
and be part of the show we're making in the global community.
And, you know, my handles are at Janlucanus, at Janstaichi,
and then there's at Justice for Hire.
So that's awesome.
(38:17):
So good. And we'll make sure that all of that is also below on the show notes.
And if you're in a place where you're like,
you know, I think that I could use some mindset work or you're not sure,
you can text SHIFT to 55444 and you'll get my free assessment.
And if you need more help from there, you can contact me.
Thank you so much for coming.
And we'll talk to you soon.
(39:00):
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(00:35):
Welcome to Leadership on Purpose, the podcast series. I'm your host, Kathryn, and this is where we shatter the status quo and dive deep into the raw, unfiltered stories of those who are embracing their inner alignment.
If you're tired of the cookie cutter approach to success and you crave a life that resonates with your true self, you are in the right place. Join me each week as we uncover powerful insights from those who have had the courage to lean into their purpose, live authentically, and create a life they were made for.
(01:03):
This isn't just a conversation.
It's a movement.
This is a revolution of authentic leadership, but we don't just talk about change. We live it.
And you can too.
I'm really excited for you guys to meet our guests today. So Jan Loukonos is joining us. I met him at an event a little while ago in LA, and we had this amazing conversation that I'm excited to share with you and a couple of things that we're going to do for you.
(01:40):
Jan is the, he's a martial artist, he's a filmmaker, he's a head of the US Tai Chi team. He's a champion of push hands, and he is transforming the way that he leads inside and outside of the dojo. So Jan, thank you for joining me.
My pleasure. Thanks for having me.
It's funny because when we first started talking and I said, Hey, I would love to have you on my podcast. I don't know where we're filming it. I don't know how we're doing this and in like three weeks, this kind of all came together. So we're in your town, your hometown of LA, not mine in Seattle, in this beautiful space.
(02:14):
And, you know, I think we were, I listened to the signs, and I think that we just when you lean into what you think is the right thing, things just unfold. So I just want to say thank you for all the ideas and all the help that you were, and how instrumental you were in getting us here.
Oh, well thank you for allowing me to be the first guest on your podcast. Huge deal.
Yeah. So, the head of the US Tai Chi team. What does that mean?
(02:37):
Sure. Specifically, I am the coach of the US Tai Chi push hands team and former captain for the 2009 to 2011 seasons.
Okay.
So, Tai Chi push hands is the, there's a sport, and then there's the more holistic sensitivity drill. So the sensitivity drills are part of the Tai Chi system.
(02:58):
And these Tai Chi allows you to slow yourself down and speed up your perception, and essentially gather more data through breath work and visualization, gather more data in a moment in your life, then someone who's not putting in the work to slow themselves down and speed up their perception.
So push hands is a pressure and sensitivity training drill. And you're essentially allowing yourself to feel someone else, feel the pressure they're putting on you and redirect that pressure toward a goal and a specific area and that relates more deeply into how you do that internally, and how you do it with your emotions, with your thoughts, and how do you redirect all those things towards your goals, whatever those goals are, which of course you first have to define.
(03:43):
Right, right. Yeah, I think when we were talking, I was really interested in when you said, because you just met with the Google leadership team, Sergey and all those guys over in the Bay Area, and you were like, you talked about how you took the emotion out of the body with with the push hands approach.
And is that something that we can do and play with today?
To clarify, I was brought out to a space which Sergey owns as a co owner and was definitely guided experiences, multiple experiences, essentially Tai Chi seminars for leadership.
(04:16):
Okay, and then started bringing that to more athletic folks in the Bay Area as well. And this is again what I do across the board for many years and my parents both train as well. So it's just, I love doing it, I love sharing it, I'd love to share it with you now.
Okay, well, tell me though, when you say Tai Chi for leadership, how does that tie in? Like why if you're a leader that you're, and when I talk about leadership, I want to clarify, I'm not just talking about your manager and a company, you're a CEO, you are a leader in your life, right?
(04:53):
Like you're leading your friends, you're leading your children, you're leading your spouse, you're, you know, you, you have a leadership position in every aspect of your life because your life is built around you, right?
So, I love the idea that Tai Chi focuses on, on, you know, on that, right, on sustain building that and sustaining that but talk to me about why that's important for people like what does it do for you when you, when you participate in these exercises, you know, what is, what is the outcome that they can experience from like an internal perspective?
(05:30):
I think the outcome is going to be different for every person. If you're, I'll say that the format of one of my, let's say introduction, introductory classes is meant to give you an overview of the Tai Chi system and the Tai Chi system as it relates to how we train on the US Tai Chi push hands team, which is, you know, I was recruited onto the team along with my father by Coach Josh Wateskin who is the chess prodigy best known for the movie,
(05:59):
the movie searching for Bobby Fischer was based on his childhood and he also wrote an amazing book called The Art of Learning, which Tim Ferriss picked up and got him to narrate his, which I highly recommend, get the audible for that.
And he talks a lot about his experience in the Tai Chi world and becoming world champion and the way that Josh, having grown up myself around masters of martial arts of all sorts, especially Tai Chi, Josh's approach was unique in the sense that he would take one thing, he would call it his formula for mastery.
(06:37):
You take one thing, you break it down into three parts, you train each part individually, and you put it back together and you've mastered it. And to be able to do that and allow yourself not only the deepening of the experience of finding within those three things, three smaller things and three smaller moments to train and to continue to deepen, but also to be able to have the sense of mastery of a thing and then to be able to move on to the next thing, a piece together, your own repertoire.
(07:06):
That to me is really, really powerful because then it allows you to have a sense of pattern recognition. And when you have pattern recognition, you can start to strategize around what your goals are.
And that applies to pretty much every area of life. And having done it at the highest level in the world of Tai Chi, push hands, which is again the push hands, there's the sensitivity, as I mentioned before, but then there's a sport.
(07:30):
And that's what I coach, the sport of Tai Chi push hands, the grappling side, it looks like sumo wrestling or Greco-Roman wrestling. It's a very, very fast, explosive sport. And there's two games, one you play inside of a ring where you throw someone on the floor or push them out.
And then there's another one where you play on pedestals and you have to knock your opponent off the pedestals or at least get them to lift their foot. And so these high pressure balance games are a litmus test for the mechanics that you're training, the philosophies that you're training.
(08:04):
And I love the idea of putting your philosophy to the test via a method that allows for objective achievement. It's like, okay, well, this is actually working when this is actually not working.
And when you start to get into the world of objective clarity, where people can actually see, that's why I love martial arts so much and how it applies to pretty much all my strategies across business, entertainment, etc., is that everyone knows what a knockout looks like. It's very obvious.
(08:34):
So how can you find the obvious wins, the obvious manifestation of the technique, whatever technique, how can you find it? And how can you repeat it? Because if it's not repeatable, it's not competition worthy.
So those are really important concepts for me that are woven into an introductory class of Tai Chi and how I would share push hands and how I would acquaint that to emotional strategies that you might have, emotional otherwise, across the board and applying the system to your life.
(09:10):
So interesting. And obviously you have such mastery over what you do every day. If there's someone that's watching you...
I need more. I definitely need more.
But if someone's watching you and they're like, you know, I know that I have this... we're all here for some reason, right? I think part of our journey in this world is to figure out what our purpose is and then find fulfillment through that purpose.
(09:33):
I'm a really big believer in that. And, you know, even in my journey, I think that I thought my purpose was one thing and I kept coming up against my own internal resistance. And so I had to give myself a little bit of a time out, kind of tear apart my life and rebuild it again.
And I'm pretty clear now what that is. But for someone who's, you know, sitting there saying, well, I don't want to rip up my life, but I would like to find my purpose and I would like to feel a little bit more fulfilled. You know, how did you tap into like this is your genius, right?
(10:05):
This is how you are, you know, you're transforming the people around you by giving them these gifts and teaching them that. Like, how did you really tap into know that this is what I want to do? And this is what I'm here for.
You said so many things that I want to touch on because I think it's really powerful for you to say to tear apart your life. And that is... I'm very interested in your narrative.
(10:29):
I don't recommend it, but it's good on the other side. I completely agree. And I've had to do that myself multiple times. And, you know, so it's challenging for me to speak from a place of...
Yeah, I want to only speak from the place of experience rather than, hey, like, you know, you don't have to do that. Well, of course you don't have to. But I'm not sure I may not be able to coach you. I say this all the time.
(10:51):
That there are different ways to approach Tai Chi and I can only coach you on what has worked for me. So a lot of times my expertise does not negate someone else's expertise.
And someone else may say, Jan's wrong. And I might say the other person, well, that's different.
(11:12):
But even that, even what you just said, like, that's a version of mastery, right? You're like, no, this is where I know that I can help you, where I know I'm good, where I know I can create change for you. Not here, but over here.
So was there like a moment in your life where you're like, this is... I'm going to like tap into this and this is going to be what I, you know, what I jump off of. This is going to be my platform. This is what I'm here to do.
(11:36):
Well, I would say there's a trifecta. And, you know, I watched my coach Josh use writing as his counterbalance to training.
And then the training would inform the writing and the writing would help him clarify the training and he'd bring back the clarity into the training.
And so I was, he was coaching the team while he was writing the Art of Learning. And it was an amazing process to watch.
(12:00):
And because I grew up in martial arts, it was always part of what I... it's literally been the gateway for me to other types of work.
You know, my father's also a comic writer and he was in politics prior to that. And so to be able to have his leadership and my mother's spiritual leadership combined, you know, I grew up under a family guru.
(12:23):
So there's always, always the spirituality, there's always the martial arts and then there was always the clarity that the training that we're doing has to be shared narratively.
And so because through stories is how we communicate as humans. So how can we, how can all these things work together?
And so that trifecta has been very consistent throughout my life and getting out of the way of myself and all these other things that I might have learned
(12:52):
that may block that foundational gift has really been the biggest challenge. So it's really like, okay, well, why don't I just do that and stop worrying about these fears that are learned fears from other people rather than the inherent gift that I've been given.
And I think that...
Okay, so and that's exactly where I think people get stuck, right? So because you have a paradigm, right?
(13:16):
A paradigm is just an externalized behavior based on a belief system. So, you know, and a paradigm is really shaped by our limiting beliefs that are created from, you know, when we were seven, eight years old.
So, I mean, I, you know, I work with a lot of people right now that are imprisoned by their mindset, right?
They're like, oh, no, I can't, I have, you know, fear of rejection or fear, you know, self doubt and all the, all the things, right?
(13:41):
And there's ways I think when you get to be really clear on that, you know, how to rewrite that narrative and flip that script.
But I think when you don't have that clarity and you don't realize you're running off a paradigm that doesn't serve you, it's like, in what ways have you found, like you said, I had to get out of my own way.
And I think that's a really hard thing for people to do. But like, what does that look like for you? When do you know you're coming up against that resistance and you're like, I gotta just, I gotta figure out why I'm leaning into something that's, you know,
(14:10):
clearly coming from a belief that doesn't serve me and how do I get out of my own way?
I think that's what I want people to really understand and take away is like, I mean, what you're doing is so incredible, right?
And you're so successful at it. And everybody has this opportunity, right?
Everyone can look at their life and say, you know, maybe I don't like where I'm at right now or I know that I'm made for something better.
(14:32):
And part of getting to that place is to peel back that onion and say, OK, well, I'm responsible for the way that my life is right now. You have to take responsibility for that, right?
Your inner world creates your outer world. So if you've created the world that you have, chaotic or not, or whatever it is, and you want something different, you have that opportunity to do that too.
And it's really leaning into what's the story I'm telling myself, you know, what's the belief system I have, and, you know, what is the vision I have for my future and how do I get out of the way for that?
(15:01):
And I love that you said that. And I'd like to hear like in what ways you find, you know, you find the tools that enable you to do that.
Well, key tools, breath, work and visualization. Yeah. And I think another one that.
I always think about Bruce Lee saying be like water. And I love that saying. And for me, there's been a lot of unpacking of that over time because the road signs that we all get every day toward our highest self that oftentimes we ignore.
(15:38):
And we're flowing to them. But then somehow we're also putting up a blockage to flow us away from it. And that blockage could be a thought or a feeling. And it normally creates a chain reaction.
So having a method to slow yourself down and speed up your perception, it doesn't have to be Tai Chi, but having a method to do that is key because then you can start to analyze yourself and having making sure that you actually have time for reflection, for contemplation, for meditation, which I love the definition of meditation as rising above desires.
(16:18):
That is simply that is meditation. However, you achieve that state is a great method. But can you rise above desires? And that doesn't necessarily mean be a monk and sit there quietly and not want anything.
But I think more so that you're not affected by the waves of desire in a way that pulls you away from your purpose. So and to be able to clarify your purpose.
(16:40):
And there's there's there's all these wonderful folks I love that have helped me, whether it's Vim Hoff or or Deepak Chopra. And, you know, I think Vim Hoff has this great he did this great post on Instagram about it's okay if you haven't found your purpose, just look to find like your the compass of the heart.
And I'm that's not an exact quote, but you know, your heart is directing you and Deepak Chopra always talks about the heart having a higher computing power than the brain. And so I think it's really interesting to recognize your heart as a compass and what is your heart pulling you?
(17:12):
What do you feel pulled toward? And I also love Deepak's idea in the seven spiritual loss of success is saying that every human being needs an efficient way to generate and store energy.
So can you fill yourself enough? Most of our the Western exercises deplete you. So how do you fill yourself up enough so that you have the energy to self analyze to break down what's happening inside of you for yourself.
(17:42):
And, you know, if you need to verbalize, that's great. But I think oftentimes conversations with others before having a conversation with yourself can be another distraction. So there's a lot of people who are like, I need to talk about this with someone I think that opening up my phone and for me doing a self diary, self journaling with just audio and speaking to myself asking myself questions helps me say, be devil's advocate to myself.
(18:09):
And I like that. It's a really, really powerful process to be able to I'll do this probably once a week, sometimes more if I need it. And, you know, and these are just for me, it's just for me to figure out myself. And if I, if I keep on asking these questions and keep on testing reality, you're going to see different results. And if you don't like one result, you can just change the behavior to a different result.
(18:33):
Right. I think it's hard for a lot of people to understand how easy it is to change. Right. It's a decision. And you should lean into that. You know, when we talk about, okay, so visualization, visualization, for an example, I'm, I'm a pretty big visualizer. But I think, you know, when you think about what you want for your life, the real reason why you visualize, and if you look at it from a scientific perspective, this is what really got me because I used to think, am I just daydreaming? Am I visualizing? But now I understand it.
(19:02):
So like, you can basically rewrite the neurons in your brain, right, when you start visualizing, and your mind doesn't know if what you're visualizing actually happened or not, right, if you can get yourself to a place where you feel the emotion, and you feel like it's really true, then, you know, it kind of put your subconscious to work to say that, oh, this is an experience that already happened, right. So you can like rewrite, you can rewrite, that's why your brain is neuroplastic, made of neuroplasticity, right, you can rewrite those neurons. And I love that concept, because it just is one of the things that we're talking about, right.
(19:31):
It just is one other way that people have the opportunity to really change the situation they're in that they're not, they don't feel fulfilled, or they're not happy in. And breathwork, actually, this morning, there was a breathwork class downstairs before we started this. So I did that for an hour. And that came with a lot of visualization and journaling. And it was like, oh, my God, it's like a perfect start of the day. But really important to just reset your nervous system and get to a place where you're coming from, you know, you're utilizing your parasympathetic nervous system, you're coming from a place of your creative genius. And,
(20:01):
your power and, you know, I think socializing that is really important for people to understand that, you know, you don't have to be stuck, you don't have to, you know, you don't have to cycle, you can get to a place where you're, you're living your genius, which is what you're doing, which is why I really want to talk to you. And I really want to do some push hands work.
I would love to share that with you. I want to add something to what you just said in terms of, you know, there's, you're correct, all this data, especially with high performers, let's say athletes or musicians who would visualize their field of play. And when visualizing their field of play, the same neurons fire as if they're actually on the field of play. I think that's really important to recognize that high performers have to visualize, you just have to do it to achieve at scale.
(20:47):
So if visualization is allowing those that we know, across cultures and society, to be known by us, they're essentially, they're getting to a level where they can be seen and heard. How can we apply that same, those same techniques into our bodies, into ourselves so that we can actually have it in our lives in a more tactile way. And Tai Chi does that.
(21:13):
Be essentially being able to give yourself your visualizing your breath. And by visualizing your breath as a color, you're giving your attention a vehicle. And by giving your attention a vehicle, you're getting more control over your attention. And by getting more control, you can start to program your attention with intent. And once you do that, you can start to have a greater sense of willpower. And that's very powerful.
(21:34):
Oh, my gosh, massively powerful. That is amazing. I think I would color my breath like a gold color when you I don't know, came to my mind when you were talking.
Whatever intuitively comes to you, there are there are meanings to each color. But to be able to just allow yourself to intuitively find the color and to see how it might change in different areas of your body, I think is really the first step.
(21:55):
I love that. Okay, cool. Let's do it. Okay, what do we do?
Well, let's let's first for anyone who's watching, I think that we can do something sitting down first, and then we can do the two person exercise standing up.
You tell me. So first and foremost, you imagine a string lifting you from the top of the head. And this imaginary string is from so many different modalities. But right now we'll just tie cheese like gateway to a lot of things. But right now we just want to feel like we're dangling.
(22:21):
And you're going to allow relaxation to cascade down the spine all the way through the tailbone. And when you're sitting, it's different than standing. You're sitting, you're going to push the tailbone into or push the sit bones into the chair that you might be sitting in.
And just feel that lift. Gentle pull in the belly as if the belly button is going toward the spine very gently.
(22:43):
Very gently. And we're going to have a tongue gently placed on the ceiling of the mouth, the mouth closed and all the breathing will be in and out through the nose.
We're going to focus on our lower Dan Tian or our second chakra, the orange one in yoga, three finger lengths or two inches below the belly button.
(23:04):
We're just going to inhale into that area, drawing the breath in, using the belly as the pump, the lower Dan Tian, and exhaling, washing the color down the arms and legs.
So inhaling, visualizing the breath as a color. See it gather in the belly in that second chakra like a sun getting brighter and brighter. And exhale, washing the color down.
(23:29):
And when you're doing this, you're doing your best to take pressure off of what my yoga teacher would call the middle diaphragm and the upper diaphragm.
So he would say that you have three diaphragms, upper, middle and lower. And as you get older, you start to breathe higher and higher and have more shallow breath.
So you want to breathe more like a baby and maintain the breath in the belly area.
(23:50):
So we want to soften the shoulders and we also want to soften the breath, meaning that the breath should be strong, but gentle, rather than allowing you to hear your breath.
Because multiple things. One, the sound, if it's too loud, it's going to distract you vibrationally. The vibration is going to distract you from the color visualization.
(24:11):
And strategically, as we go into the sport, we'll start to strategize around the breathing patterns of a person. So you may do a hard push on someone at the apex of an inhalation or when they're fully exhale.
So we're inhaling deep. And then we just play with this attention drill, which is put the attention on the tip of the nose. I think this is really fun.
(24:32):
And just feel the circulation in your nose. And then get more specific, feel the pulse in your nose.
Then feel the currents of air, whispering around your nose.
Then feel the currents of air, whispering around your nose. Feel how your breath adjust those currents of air.
(25:06):
Feel the heat that the nose generates.
Shift the attention to the right middle finger. Feel the circulation. Feel the pulse.
Feel the currents of air in the room, whispering around the finger.
Feel the heat the middle finger generates, coming from the finger and experienced by the other fingers.
(25:36):
And notice what we're doing here. It's almost like we're listening to a song and choosing what parts we enjoy the most, whether it's the vocals or it's a particular instrument.
Our attention, we can go through the different sounds, the vibrations in our body, and we can scan for what we might be looking for, very specific things.
(25:58):
I think it's really beautiful to be able to do that inside. And let's shift the attention to the left middle finger.
What should we be looking for when we're scanning the inside of our body?
Well, it depends on what you might be dealing with in life.
Some exercises, what we'll do is we'll scan for dark patches, blockages, or cold areas, or areas that are overly heated.
(26:21):
And to be able to identify those areas. And then what we'll do, this is part of, this is the introduction.
I said Tai Chi is a gateway to many things. This can be a gateway to what's called programmatic breathing.
And programmatic breathing is utilized in many healing methods to be able to relax the entire body and then program specific areas of the body to recover.
(26:47):
And if you read Josh's book, he did some of that work to help you relax.
I used to fight semi-pro Sancho, which is boxing, kickboxing, Mongolian wrestling.
And my old captain broke my coach Josh's hand in a fight years before I met, I think, both of them.
But then Josh had to train for the Tai Chi World Cup with a broken hand and had to make sure the hand didn't atrophy.
(27:12):
So there was a lot of work that he did, mental work.
And there's a great book on self, I think it's called the Book of Self-Defense,
I'll give it the specific name, but it's all about programmatic breath work.
And so what we're doing here is starting to allow ourselves to relax the entire body,
shift the attention to that left middle finger and just allow yourself to feel the different waves,
(27:34):
whether you start with something general, the circulation, and then you get more specific to the pulse.
And then you go into feeling around the body, and then you go into the body.
And then you go into feeling around the area, which is why we're looking for the currents of air.
And then you start to allow that area to be more clear in terms of the heat,
(28:00):
what it generates and how it's experienced by the areas around it.
Then you expand the awareness to both middle fingers so that you can feel both at the same time.
And the expansion of awareness really is the end goal for all this stuff.
It's like, how can you walk into a room and claim space?
You can only claim space if you've expanded your awareness enough to recognize you can claim space.
(28:20):
So, I look at, I believe every human being, I think that us as a society, as a human race,
I believe we have superhuman capabilities, all of us.
And they're all latent, and it's because of how we're educated, how we're trained.
And how can we build systems that allow us to touch those things on a daily basis?
(28:44):
How can you bring the breathwork and visualization to your...
Yes, that's so good.
In high school, when I really started getting into, you know, I grew up in a Tai Chi family,
but I stopped training.
I got beat up by a family defending a friend of mine when I was nine,
and I like denounced martial arts.
And then I didn't pick it up again until I was like 15 and a half.
And so when I started doing it again, I really started connecting to the visualization more than anything else.
(29:08):
And it made more sense than anything I had previously focused on.
So I'd walk around my high school breathing into every step, and I'd look like a nut.
I'm like standing on my heels trying to keep the passive...
When you anchor on your heels, you're in a passive state.
And so I wanted to be in a passive state to feel as much as I could,
because then when you shift your weight to the balls of your feet,
(29:29):
you go into an aggressive state from a primal standpoint.
Everyone can feel this.
Once you're money back from...
You bought something in a store, you hand the receipt over,
you shift your weight to the balls of your feet,
and you shift into a more aggressive mode.
And even if it's polite...
It's interesting. I haven't thought about that.
If you want to train an actor to be more aggressive, you may put them in boxing,
but boxing is going to keep them on the balls of their feet,
(29:51):
which again gets you more to that aggressive mode.
So it's really interesting to be able to program yourself on what you want when you want it,
using this breathwork and visualization.
Yeah, I know. I love that.
OK, so in the beginning, I introduced you as a filmmaker.
I know you have a filmmaking technology company.
And tell us about what project you guys are working on now.
And then we're going to do a little fun line capture that you asked me to do.
(30:15):
Thank you. Yes.
OK, so the project's called Justice for Hire.
And it is a show that we're making with a global community.
The concept is like Uber for Heroes, where you can hire a hero or become one and get paid.
So anyone can join the cast of this show right from their phone.
And you go to justiceforhire.com to learn all about it.
You can access the app from there.
(30:36):
It's a progressive web app.
You go to app directly from justiceforhire.app.
And for me, this the show and even the technology company Real World were
patent pending on a cinematic universe model, which is the manifestation of Tai Chi
for me in my observations and work across media.
(30:56):
So I went to film school at NYU.
I came out of NYU film school, came out of there,
you know, immediately jumping into the to the Hollywood world.
And I had a senior thesis called Justice for Hire.
And my father, like I said, he wrote comic books and we wrote a comic book of J.F.H.
together, and that did very well as in the digital comics world.
(31:18):
And we like set records for digital downloads.
And it's a fun project.
It's been going on for a while.
We have a global community.
We have 80,000 people worldwide working with us right now and following what we're
doing, you know, as part of the community.
And it's it's a massive passion to show how how can we take these principles?
(31:42):
I've really story to me.
The only reason I'm in entertainment is to gain access to people's hearts and minds.
That's the only reason.
And the only reason I should even want to have access to people's hearts and minds
is because I feel like I have something of value to share.
And so I'm like, how can I offer
people some of this amazing stuff that I grew up with and also not only offer it,
(32:02):
but also clarify it for myself in terms of we have we have a world that can be better.
We can do better.
And how can we reframe some of the things that we have access to and optimize them?
I really I'm speaking generally right now,
but it gets very specific when we talk about behavior in society.
(32:25):
How do we meet our day?
How do we meet each other?
How can we show up for each other with courage
and and love and compassion?
And one of the big issues that I've had with superhero narratives since I was a
little kid was that there was always it seemed like there was fighting
between the heroes and between it like fighting.
There's all this infighting.
(32:45):
And oftentimes the superhero narratives, they started the status quo.
They go through this whole like drama of saving the world.
And then they save the world to return to the status quo.
And we're not actually better as people oftentimes in these narratives.
So I look at something like Star Trek and sci fi.
Great science fiction has always pushed us as a society.
(33:09):
You know, we have cell phones because of Star Trek.
We have triquarters for health that are coming out now inspired by Star Trek,
like vision technology for the blind inspired by Star Trek.
So I say to myself, how can you use the superhero model
to essentially get an effect on society that not only not only allows us to be
(33:33):
inspired, but actually take something into reality for in a tactile way.
And that's where the Tai Chi comes in.
Everything we do with Justice for Hire,
when it comes to our events, we always start with Tai Chi, where we slow
ourselves down to speed up our perception so we can create what we're doing live
action scene events now so we can create action scenes together as a community.
(33:54):
And we're doing comic cons and we're doing them in film festivals and we're
doing them on our own now here in L.A.
So and anybody can be anybody can be involved.
Anybody.
It doesn't we have some professional actors, some professional fighters and more.
But most of our community is just people who want to be a part of something, be a
character, their own character and a shared story, because we're all in a story
(34:15):
together on Earth. So we're framing.
OK, yeah.
We look at a social network as a story we're all telling together.
But it's not normally framed that way.
So we're we built an app that's a cinematic social network that allows us
to tell a story together intentionally.
And the whole concept is how can we transform ourselves in this world of heroism?
(34:37):
How can we make a world where people show up as heroes in their own lives for each
other when someone needs something?
You know, I had to stop in real life.
I had to stop a an attack at a church last year.
And I was reminded there was unfortunately a homeless man who had some mental
challenges and I was at my family guru's gathering at a church.
(35:01):
And I was the only able body adult that could do anything.
And so, you know, it's I've always had
very good relationships with police, law enforcement and military because of my
martial arts background.
But that doesn't mean that it took like 45 minutes for the cops to come.
And I was holding a guy for 45 minutes.
And so, you know, I look at these these moments in our our society and reminded
(35:24):
that it's the stories we tell ourselves that influence the systems we build.
So how can I use story right now to cause transformation and for people also,
first and foremost, have fun, have fun, become a better version of themselves,
but also know that the best stories give us the tools to build a better society.
(35:46):
That's how story has always been utilized since the foundation of human
storytelling. It's meant to give the morals and values to the tribe so that we can
spread these morals and values through our our culture and uplift more.
So how can I return to that in a very intentional way?
And that's what I'm doing my best every day to do with Justice for Hire, myself and a team.
OK, and we'll make sure that we add all
this stuff in the show notes so that somebody wants to join.
(36:09):
They can find they can download the app and figure out how to be part of that.
But what line did you need?
So right now we just started doing kids events.
OK, and these kids events were training them.
We're putting that and it took me a long time to feel comfortable doing this
because I was like, wow, like little kids, I would I don't want this to be a satire.
It's not supposed to be like really crazy over the top action.
(36:30):
We're actually doing our best to create a world of nonviolence.
So how do you create a world nonviolence?
To me, it is the ability to have the ability to to influence greatly allows you
to choose how to influence, meaning that if you have the great power,
the great power can be used constructively or destructively.
So I think martial arts and martial training is very important.
(36:52):
So we're training the kids framed in this way.
So now we're training kids to be vigilantes.
No, we're training kids to be heroes, so we don't need vigilantes.
Awesome. Well, I really appreciate your time.
This was super fun and hopefully transformative for everybody
(37:13):
that had the opportunity to watch.
Two things I want to ask you, number one,
if you were to ask yourself advice six months ago, what would you tell yourself then?
And the reason I ask this question is because I think there's a lot of
conversation around, you know, what would I tell my younger self?
What would I tell myself, you know, in college?
But we change every day, we evolve every day.
(37:36):
And it doesn't really take that long to make a big change in your life.
So if you were just to take Jan six months ago,
knowing from where you are now and think of the evolution you've had,
what would you tell that person? You already resonate.
Oh, I like that. You already resonate.
Keep going. It's good. That's good.
(37:56):
OK, and then tell everybody how they can find you.
You can find my Tai Chi work on Janstaichi.com.
You can find Justice for Hire on Justiceforhire.com
and be part of the show we're making in the global community.
And, you know, my handles are at Janlucanus, at Janstaichi,
and then there's at Justice for Hire.
So that's awesome.
(38:17):
So good. And we'll make sure that all of that is also below on the show notes.
And if you're in a place where you're like,
you know, I think that I could use some mindset work or you're not sure,
you can text SHIFT to 55444 and you'll get my free assessment.
And if you need more help from there, you can contact me.
Thank you so much for coming.
And we'll talk to you soon.
(39:00):
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