Episode Transcript
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Logitech BRIO (00:08):
Hi, and welcome
to Habits for Humans, the
podcast that explores what makespeople tick and how to program
this brain of ours.
And today, actually, we're gonnatalk about programming this body
of ours to do what we want it todo.
Today's topic.
I've been super excited aboutthis.
It's Bob Gardner.
He's gonna talk to us abouthappiness on autopilot, how to
train the.
(00:28):
To do it for you.
Come on.
That's not interesting.
I don't know what is.
I'm super excited about thecontent today.
We have giveaways from ourlisteners today.
We've got an offer from Bob.
We've got an offer from oursponsor.
So if you like free stuff, staytuned all the way to the end.
And first of all, word from oursponsor habits for Humans is
brought to you by Retreat Works.
We train coaches, businesscoaches, life coaches, wellness
(00:51):
business owners how to build aretreat in five days.
And we do.
At a retreat.
You can double your sales earn50 k per retreat by adding a
retreat model to your existingbusiness and having deeper
client impact than you've everhad before.
So stay tuned to the end andwe'll tell you how you can
participate in that.
I'm so excited to introduce Bob.
(01:12):
Bob Gardner's, body-based, nononsense approach to mental,
physical, and emotional freedomcame from his decades long
struggle with depression,addiction, anxiety, and never
feeling good enough.
It's so interesting to mebecause the people who are
really good at those principlesnever have an easy story.
It seems it seems like they havea grueling story and overcoming
(01:34):
that is how they got to bereally good at what they do.
So I'm excited to talk to Bobabout.
His sometimes goofy, but alwayspractical method has since
helped thousands of people maketheir own struggles a thing of
the past, to include suicidalideation, P T S D O C D,
childhood abuse, and evenchronic pain as he often says,
freedom is a skill, not a pill.
(01:54):
That sounds like a.
That sounds like a logo to go ona shirt.
Freedom is a skill, not a pill.
Once you've trained your bodyand your mind how to do it, it
will begin to happen by itselfwhile you continue to, Jo, enjoy
all the other bits of your life.
Bob, I'm dying to get into this.
Let's just jump straight in andlet's start out with the first
question we always ask, whichis, what is the number one habit
(02:15):
that you have in your life forpositive mental wellness?
What do you.
I don't have a number one habit.
I live in wonder.
That's a, I don't I don'treally, because I do all kinds
of things all the time and Ihave some practices that come
and go, but the core thing forme is to just live in this place
of wonder where I keep askingmyself.
(02:36):
What's actually happening rightnow, and when that happens, like
a whole new world opens up notto start with a Latin and
Jasmine or anything.
All right.
Will you please break into song?
Is that something No.
A whole new world there.
It's there.
It's, I like it.
All right, so let's jump into itthen.
So it sounds like you're lessabout prescriptive, like here's
the recipe for happiness andyou're more principal based.
(03:00):
Talk to us about your journey,how you got there.
Not a big question At.
What's your entire journey andhow did you get there?
Sure.
In a sound bite?
Yeah.
Go.
Bad then.
Good.
There's your sound bite.
There it is there.
It's.
It wasn't.
What's crazy about it is that Ididn't have what most people
would consider to be a traumaticupbringing.
I wasn't abused as a child.
(03:21):
Bullied.
I went through junior high.
That's pretty much what bullyingis, right?
But I wasn't picked onnecessarily.
I was a little bit of a nerdykid.
I wasn't an athlete.
Most of the bullying thathappened to me was in my own
head, not necessarily by other.
And my parents were committed,devoted I had a traumatic birth,
but I didn't have anything thatpeople would call trauma.
(03:43):
And when as I grew up all ofthis feeling starting, I
remember having some depressivefeelings at age, like five or
six in the desert down in NewMexico.
And then I remember at 8, 9, 10not feeling like I belonged
anywhere.
And in the middle of that place,this feeling of I messed up.
There's something wrong with me.
Started to show up.
(04:04):
Maybe that just came from how Iinternalized how my parents
tried to correct some things andmaybe they didn't praise me when
I wanted to.
Like it wasn't trauma.
And then all of a sudden, by thetime I hit 14, I'm got into
pornography, and that became aroller coaster ride of its own.
And I couldn't quit.
So I felt like there wassomething dreadfully wrong with
me at that point in time becauseI'm the only one struggling with
(04:27):
this, and everyone else seems tobe living their life just
perfectly happy.
Yeah.
You are the only 14 year old boythat that struggles with that,
by the way.
You're the only human on theplanet, so I'm just kidding.
Keep going.
Thank you for confirming mysuspicion.
Yeah.
Apparently I can't be happyanymore.
Thanks, Kim.
And so I.
(04:49):
Then I got into psychedelicdrugs at a certain point and
started chasing those to try andfigure things out.
I was massively depressed.
I was wandering the streets at3:00 AM wanting to a car to hit
me, but not wanting to killmyself.
Cause I didn't wanna leave amess for somebody else.
And we, I almost got divorced acouple times.
All of this kind of came to ahead when my wife was like, Hey,
we got four kids.
I know, but I can't handle this.
(05:12):
And so then I was facing likeall the stuff I was dealing with
and the rest of my life, I wasgonna have to be alone and I
needed to just, I didn't wannakill myself at that point in
time, but I needed to find asolution.
And so I buckled down.
And forced myself into being agood little boy for a while.
And all along the way, I hadbeen learning in body-based
(05:34):
methods of healing and I hadchased all kinds of things and
traveled the globe looking forsolutions and masters and
teachers and all this kind ofstuff.
What did forcing yourself intothat mold look like?
I just imagine that's like thehappiness diet.
Like I will do these 17prescriptive things to force
myself.
Is that what you're talking?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So at the time it was like,okay, I'm gonna read scriptures
(05:54):
every day.
And I'm gonna pray and I'm gonnaget up in the morning and I'm
gonna do this type of exerciseand before I go to work, I'll
have this much stuff.
And then I was doing mindfulnessbased practices that I had
studied for several years with amindfulness guru.
And so I was doing one of thoseevery day.
And it was just this massively,growing list.
It was like a list of rabbits.
They just kept multiplying allthe things that I had to do.
(06:17):
In order to be like, now I willbe happy, but by the time I was
done, there was no time left toactually enjoy being alive.
Wow.
That's powerful.
I think a lot of people in thewellness space end up in that
space of, I, I remember one yearI was reading like, Eight
wellness books all at the sametime, all with different
methods, trying to follow all ofthem.
(06:38):
And you get into this ugh, likebox where you feel like you're
bound and gagged, honestly.
So anyway, that's where youcontinue on in your journey.
Bound and gagged.
Bound and gagged.
And I think that's a great,that's, I think a lot of people
run into this that.
And that's why they don'tcontinue, is they feel like they
have to do more in order to behappy and they don't have the
bandwidth to do more becausethey're already doing more.
(07:01):
They're already doing theirbest, otherwise they wouldn't be
doing something different.
And So it got to a point whereone night, one afternoon my wife
left to go pick up the kids fromschool.
I'm standing in my officewatching her leave cuz I was
running my own martial artsschool at the time and I, the
computer's in the corner and sheleaves and the used car salesman
(07:21):
in my head's ah, no, Bob.
You have the chance, it'll onlybe five minutes.
No, it'll be wiser.
You've done a thousand and soI'm standing.
My feet are rooted to thecarpet.
My heart is thumping.
There's that metallic taste inmy mouth.
My hands are shaking, and thiscold wave washes over me.
And then I have a vision, and Iwish I could say it was a vision
of God, but it was a vision ofmyself at 90 years old, still in
(07:47):
the same spot, struggling withthe same thing, where the only
thing that I could say for mylife was.
At least I didn't go back, likemy only merit badge in heaven
was You didn't go back to thething.
And something in that was like,no, I can't I don't wanna die,
but I don't wanna live thatlife.
(08:07):
And so despite all the 12 stepmeetings and all the counseling
and all the therapy and all thebooks and everything else, I had
been trying, I just recognizednone of it was working.
So I flipped the bird to thewhole industry and I was like, I
gotta go figure it out on myown.
And so then I took all theseother stuff that I've been
learning about the body andwithin literally a week, Massive
changes had started to happenwithin me to where the cravings
disappeared, the angry responsesstarted to vanish.
(08:31):
And I like the addiction piece.
The uncontrollable just barelykeep it together.
All the struggle of that justevaporated.
And I was in this place of nowwhat do I do?
I don't know where to go fromhere, but yeah.
Yep.
So what I'm hearing is so you'retalking about a porn addiction?
Is that what you're talkingabout?
At that time.
Okay.
At that time.
Okay.
So you were like, Baggo I'm justgonna walk away from all my
wellness principles and walktowards other wellness
(08:53):
principles.
I'm a little, you lost me alittle bit there.
I was like, I am going to, Ididn't, I felt like I had a lot
to offer on the planet.
There was a lot within me and Ididn't wanna spend my lifetime
having a career of healing.
Constantly going to meetings,constantly having to have a
wellness practice.
What if life is a wellnesspractice?
(09:15):
What if I don't have to have aseparate wellness practice?
And so it was like, I'm notgonna sit here and try to fix
myself anymore.
What I'm gonna do is just look,stare straight down the barrel
of this like thing that I'mfiguring out.
And while I'm sorting out allthe stuff that comes up, all the
rest of my focus was how can Ilive well?
And it just to turns out thatover time, Living well, learning
(09:39):
how to work with my mind and mybody, made all the other stuff
go away on its own.
Wow.
To the point where, you know,oh, I used to be triggered by
this thing and then I would, itwould, something would happen
and later the day I was like,wow.
I used to get triggered by that,but it happened by itself.
I wasn't busy going oh no, I'mgonna handle my trigger.
It was just because the more,all of our thoughts, all of our
feelings, everything is built.
(10:00):
Brain's not in touch with the.
At all.
So the only thing, it's in ti,it's the little security guard
in the corner, like looking atall the screens going, okay,
what's going on outside, withthe twin key or whatever else
he's doing.
Or she.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it's in there and the onlything it has access to is what's
happening in the body.
And so as the body starts tobecome better and better
(10:23):
instinctively on its own, thebrain, like you've changed the
building blocks.
So rather than having the Legopieces it was building with
before was like Harry Potter andthe Baskin, the basement of the
castle and Voldemort coming outof everywhere.
And now all of a sudden it'slike Bob the builder, whatever
else, because it, you changedthe Lego said the brain can.
(10:45):
Stuff out of what the body isgiving it.
And so working with the body andhelping it to live better
automatically starts to settleall the mental stuff that is
downstream.
Wow.
Okay.
So this is so interesting.
I filmed a podcast yesterdaywith a woman who had lost 140
pounds.
Over six years, which I love,and she'd kept it off for 20
(11:06):
years and she's super, superhealthy.
And her principal was similar toyours.
It was as soon as I dropped thediet and started paying
attention to taking care of mereally well.
Things just naturally fell intoplace.
And I'm hearing this again forthe second time.
As soon as I dropped the diet ofall these wellness principles
(11:27):
and all these, spiritual, I mustfollow these rules, and you
started doing somethingdifferently, it all fell into
place.
So what did you actually dodifferently?
So I I started I made a, thefirst thing I did was I made
like a playlist, which was like,let me just 50 things.
50 is a big number for me at thetime that just make me feel like
(11:48):
I come a lot and that could havebeen a favorite food because,
okay, cool.
People are like yeah, you can'tjust eat yourself.
But at the time I feltmiserable.
I might as well feel better,eat, pray, love.
Eat, pray, love.
Sure.
So so it was like I used tostick my head in the freezer.
I don't, that was from when Iwas a kid in the grocery store,
(12:10):
like the smell of stale ice andthe sound of the worrying
generat.
I don't know what it is but Iwas like, oh yeah.
People are like, what are youdoing?
I'm like, oh, I'm feeling alittle hotheaded.
And Walking through the grassbarefoot.
I loved sitting on the roof andjust watching the sun set.
It was like 20 minutes a day.
It was my appointment withmyself where I was just like, I
need more light in my life.
(12:31):
I'm just gonna sit here andwatch the light, and over the
course of months watching it goacross the horizon and back and
like things just started tosettle.
As my body got, I was givingmyself permiss.
To do things that helped me feelmore and more alive.
So that was the first place thatI started.
Okay.
I've got a comment on this causeI feel this.
So probably about five or sixmonths ago, I spent a lot of
(12:53):
time in Costa Rica.
I was there for two months, andthen I've been coming back for
about, I don't know, three orfour weeks at a time ever since
then.
And what is it about Costa R.
That I love.
It's not like this resort town.
It's not that it's carrying mygroceries on my back.
It's walking and navigating mudpuddles.
It's like these so simple thingsthat like bring us back to our
(13:16):
very human bodies and very humanroots, so I'm feeling that wa
just watching the sun go up anddown, there's something about
being so connected to.
I don't know your body andfeeling, so I'm with you on
this.
Yeah.
And the doorstopper, like on thebottom of the door, that little
kid.
Like any, it can be anything.
(13:36):
Like I really gave myselfpermission to just be like, it
might be something that I feellike is stupid, but if at the
end of it I come alive, that'sgreat.
And that could have been.
Cool conversations with friends.
It could have been dancing.
I allowed myself to put bigthings on there that take a
little planning and like littletiny things that are like, pick
your nose in public, like justto mess with people, not that
(13:58):
wasn't actually on my list, butdo you really enjoy that, Bob?
You can tell that one.
You could give it a whirl rightnow if you want to.
And yeah, there we go.
But the idea was like, this isthis life that is inside this
body.
It's never been here before.
It'll never be here again.
There is something incrediblyunique and special about each
(14:21):
individual life, and I willnever see it blossom unless I
fertilize it.
Unless I nourish it.
And so it's no longer aboutfixing this.
It's about watering it andmaking sure there's sunlight so
that it sprouts.
I love that and I get to witnessit because I don't want to go
another day and miss the lifethat I am because I'm too busy
(14:43):
trying to be what other peopleexpect.
I'm loving your plant analogy.
I'm just thinking about when Iget into those habits of okay, I
have to work out every day and Ihave to do this and I have to do
that, and it's this is for myhappiness.
And you get into the bound andgagged space, I imagine a tree,
what is it called?
Is it called as spier orsomething?
It's like where they tie, that'slimbs up in these like perfect
(15:04):
little, positions.
It's living a life like thatversus giving yourself like just
what you.
Fertilizer, sun, water, and Jessletting it breathe.
That sounds really nice.
Yeah, and I, it's, you imagine acarrot trying to be a potato.
That's what we're all.
Doing.
And if you look at all thewellness gurus there's people
(15:27):
that are writing books, and Iwrote a book, people write
books.
And a lot of the people writingbooks are gonna tell you like
the 17 laws of success and the47, do hickeys of, wisdom and
the, whatever it is.
And they're gonna tell you allof these patterns that make
people healthy and make, andthere is something to that for
sure.
But if you looked at any personwho was genuinely.
In life that is genuinely happy,their life would not look like
(15:50):
any other life.
They would not fit all thecategories that everybody says
you have to do.
And so all of those suggestionsthey sound like, no, I have to
do this, and then I gotta dothis.
And if I'm not meditating 15minutes a week a week.
Yeah.
But some people's meditation isthe way that they read a book,
or the way that they, the waythey eat their food.
Some people does, they naturallymeditate that way, but they
think no, I need to have theheadspace.
(16:12):
And then I need to do this otherthing, and that's not
necessarily the case.
Every single person on theplanet is really a unique being,
and what matters is understandyour.
Your tool set your body, yourmind, learn how they're working,
but then also learn how yourunique car, what are all its
features.
That's fun.
One of the things you get to doin that car that are just what
(16:33):
your life gets to do.
Yeah.
So let's talk about the actual,like connecting to your body.
So the title of this is gonna besomething like, how to program
your body to.
Instill happiness naturally.
What did you do to startprogramming your body or
listening to your body?
Will you walk us through that?
Yeah.
So the first it is, it's funnybecause people who think that
(16:53):
they're really in tune withtheir body often are only in
tune with their emotionalstates.
Or they're in tune with theirthoughts.
To be able to just be with whatthe body is doing is the first
step.
Like to really get tuned intowhat is going on in the.
Now most people's triggerstrauma, depression, and anxiety
and pain.
All of that stuff happens whenthe sympathetic nervous system
(17:14):
is really on high alert.
So it doesn't happen when you'relike drinking my ties on the
beach or something.
It happens when you're justlike, amped up, stressed, you
got a deadline and then the kidthrew up in the backseat.
Like it happens when there isthis need to fix life and most
healing method.
They happen only when the personis like calm and collected and
(17:37):
they feel safe.
And so that's why it takes solong.
So what I did was I was like, Iwanna get into a place where I
can amplify my nervous systemconsciously.
And then re give it anotheroption.
Cause the person only ever feelsstuck when they don't like the
options in front of'em.
They can have 400 options.
If they hate all of'em, they'llfeel stuck.
(17:58):
But if they only have one optionand they love it, they won't
feel.
And so what I had to do was givemy instincts more than one
option for how to respond to anygiven circumstance.
Okay?
So I first could figure out whatthat was like.
And a lot of this came back tomartial arts training for me
because, Ultimately what I wasdealing with was conflict with
(18:18):
life, and so I went to placesthat trained conflict, not
typical martial arts training.
This is from like old Russian,like cossack training way back
in the day.
It's an old tradition with allkinds of deep, intense work
that, that I worked with peopleand I learned we're taking like,
okay, someone pulls a knife onyou.
(18:38):
Okay.
What does that do in yoursystem?
And then I notice how my bodytenses up and it freezes and how
my breathing changed andwhatnot.
And in that moment, I train itto have another option.
And then all of a sudden whensomebody pulls a sharp word on
me when my body reacts like itdoes a knife, it then also
recognizes, oh, there's anotherway out.
And so then it automaticallydoes the one that feels best.
(19:00):
Wow.
Okay.
So slow down here because thisis like a dense, meaty steak.
So this is not, this is nightnot light.
We're not in fruit here.
We're like in density.
So I wanna slow down and reallyget this.
And so what you're trying to dothen is you're trying to.
Purposely trigger your nervoussystem.
You may or may not be pullingknives on your client.
(19:21):
That's what I'm hearing.
And then you're trainingyourself to say, I don't have to
freak out, or something likethat.
We're go back and fix what?
What?
I'm misunderstanding on that.
No, you're good.
Like I, we use knives, we usewhatever else because the knife
represents everything thatcomes, that is cutting remarks
and sharp things and things thatstab you from behind him when
you get stabbed in the back.
(19:42):
So we work with the edge of aperson's ability.
So if just having a knife in myhand is enough to make a person
freak out, that's all we have towork with.
Yeah, because that's where theirfreakout is.
And so we just, how about abutter knife?
I think that'd be safe with abutter knife.
That's totally fine.
If a butter knife works.
But remember that if you'replaying with only where you're
safe, then you haven't retrainedthe places where you feel
unsafe.
And it's the places where peoplefeel unsafe.
(20:03):
Struggle.
Woo.
I can already feel that.
I can feel myself getting pushedinto even thinking about someone
having a knife, like justhanging out with you and you're
like, Ugh.
Okay.
All right.
So you work with your, andthat's wait.
Yeah.
What's happening in your body?
What exactly is happening?
Just thinking about it like alittle bit of like in my
stomach, like it's like agurgling in my stomach.
Okay.
And a little bit tightness.
Tightness my throat too.
(20:23):
There you go.
Tightness in the throat and thegurgling in the stomach.
So now breathe.
Let that happen, but breathe andunhook yourself from that.
Ah.
How do I do that?
There you go.
Shug the shoulders.
Okay.
Wiggle your throat.
Maybe massage your throat.
Okay.
All right.
Push your belly a little.
Okay.
(20:43):
Relaxed again.
Yeah, make a big time.
Okay, cool.
So now we now think about itagain.
Think about somebody pulling aneye on him.
It still tightens my throat alittle bit.
Yep.
Is it tightening the same way?
It's your belly.
Gurgling.
My stomach is better, but mythroat still, it's as tight.
Yep.
So notice that, okay.
You in just like 20 seconds, youliterally changed your body's
(21:04):
reaction to a thought.
Now, what if that is thisdeadline coming up?
What if that is, oh, I gottahave a hard conversation with my
spouse.
What if that is my son just isconstantly disrespectful.
What if that is the house that'sdirty or a new bill that showed
up in the mail and thinkingabout it causes your body to do
that?
Hold on a second.
Okay, let me help my body.
It's showing me that I have athought that it believes is
(21:24):
real.
See, a belief is only a thoughtthat your body is making Feel.
And so all you're doing isyou're teaching your body to
open its eyes again and go, isit really real?
Is it really happening rightnow?
Oh, it's not actually happeningright now.
Cool.
I don't have to react to athought that way.
And then as your body ceases torespond to whatever the quote
(21:47):
unquote trigger is, then all ofa sudden now creativity opens
up.
Possibilities open up and you'relike, somebody holds a knife all
the time.
You hold knives when you'regoing to cut vegetables.
You walk around the kitchen witha knife.
What's wrong with a knife?
Knives are used in surgery.
Knives are used for whittlingwood and making presents for
people and soak carb bangs and,but we only think, oh, it's
(22:09):
dangerous and it's only thethought that's making our body.
Okay.
So what I'm hearing then is youfeel the trigger in your body,
you name it, and really feel it.
Try to figure out what's goingon there.
And then you ask yourself torelease it.
Just you whatever you need todo, just let it go a little bit,
(22:30):
and then you bring it up againand ask your body.
If it's scared or what's thatnext step?
I'm looking for a step by stephere.
Yeah.
No.
That's perfect.
This is what I did because I waslike the super skeptical, I did
this with pornographic imagery,like when I was like, I don't
want to have that in my head allthe time, so can I delete it?
And then I was like, okay, cool.
Now I want to try and think of,again, if it's still coming up
(22:51):
or I'm still having a reaction,then okay, it didn't work.
So I was always a skeptic.
So you're testing, all you'redoing is testing.
Does this have a reaction?
So you have the thought in yourmind.
And you just watch, how is mybody reacting to it?
If it's reacting at all, then onsome level it believes that it's
still really happening in thismoment, even though it's a
thought.
(23:12):
And so all you're doing is youaccept the reaction.
There's nothing wrong with it.
And then you work with thatreaction.
You massage it out.
You breathe differently.
You move differently.
And then as it goes away, thenyou test again.
Bring the thought up.
Is my body still reaction?
Oh, the reaction's changed.
Cool.
I did that.
That wasn't something else.
(23:33):
I was doing both the damage tomyself and now I'm doing the
cure to myself.
Congratulations me.
That's interesting.
Okay.
And then you work with the nextreaction and then you test it
again.
And maybe, big things in lifelike grief, someone dying or
divorce, those take time.
There's a lot of layers to.
But having a bodily experienceof watching your body let go of
(23:56):
pain and let go of struggle andtension and worry gives your
body like tools now to deal withall the other stuff that shows
up.
Because in the end, how do youknow you're having an emotion?
Your body is doing something.
How do you know you're beingtempted?
How do you know you're, you aredepressed?
How do you know you're anxious?
How do you know that things arepainful?
(24:17):
The only way you'll ever know isthat your body is making it feel
that way.
And it, that's the same way asif someone had walked up to you
and squeezed those spots.
So you re you release it in thesame way you would as if it were
a real knife.
Okay.
So just to recap, I'm a num, I'ma step-by-step bulleted kind of
person We let go in yourjourney, you let go of all the
prescriptive do this cuz thatwas just binding you, right?
(24:39):
And you just started payingattention to the one tool that
you really wanna pay attentionto, which is your body.
How am I reacting when somethingcomes up?
And then just beinghyper-focused and doing a scan
and saying, what do I feel rightnow?
And then, Gently trying torelease it through, and I'd love
to hear it in a second, methodsto release that, but gently
(25:00):
trying to release that, thenchecking back in and saying, has
it changed?
And if so, awesome.
Look what I did, and if not,awesome.
Also I get to keep checking onthat and see if it wants to
shift.
Is that, am I on the right trackon that one?
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
So let's talk about the basiclevers because, pe A lot of
(25:20):
people will talk like when wetake prescriptions, medications
for, not that they're bad, butwhen we take them for our
wellbeing, our mental health andstuff, all we're doing is
managing chemistry.
We're taking chemicals from theoutside and we're trying to
change the chemistry from theinside and.
We can do that.
There's nothing wrong with it,but what, the only reason we're
doing that is cause we haven'tlearned to manage the chemistry
(25:41):
from the inside.
The difficulty is, I don't knowanybody who has seen a molecule
with their naked eye or knowswhat a cell is, or okay.
Let me just go ahead and producesome more, nitric oxide in my
body real quick.
Let me just go ahead and do thatand will that happen?
Okay.
Yeah.
I think I should release some,adrenaline right now.
Let's go.
I don't know anybody who knowshow to do that, and so I had to
find.
(26:01):
The most practical levers thatare in a normal everyday
experie.
That you can toggle to start tochange what the building blocks
your brain has in order to makea new experience.
And those boil down to grievingfastest way to change your
internal chemistry is thinking,but that it's also unreliable.
(26:22):
Cuz if your brain's like mine,it's like squirrel and then it's
gone again.
And every fluctuation of thoughtchanges chemistry, so you have
to be really focused.
In order and hold that thoughtfor a good period of time,
really intensively in order forit to work.
But the second fastest way isbreathing.
When you breathe, there are somany different ways to breathe
(26:42):
that I've covered with clients,and that just depends on what's
going on.
But when you breathe, You changeup the oxygen CO2 ratio in the
chemo receptors, in the brainand in the body, and you can
start to normalize the pH in theblood.
Most people's blood is running alittle bit too acidic because of
all the stress hormones andeverything else, which is
breaking down things that'scausing the bones to dump
(27:03):
bicarbonate into thebloodstream.
And so now you're leechingchemistry off of other parts of
the body in order to balancethings.
And that's a big toll on thebody.
So people are like, I don't knowwhy I don't have any energy.
You don't have any energy cuzyour body's doing a whole lot of
extra squirrel races that itdoesn't need to do.
So if you breathe, however, youcan prime the body and it will
hold that state for longerperiods of time than just
(27:25):
changing your thoughts aboutsomething so you can change your
thoughts.
That's one thing.
You change your breathingpatterns.
That means maybe holding abreath on purpose.
On empty.
Does one thing unfold, doessomething else?
Maybe you take more inhale, moreair in, then you take it out.
Or maybe you exhale more thanyou breathe it in.
Maybe you inhale and exhale onlythrough your nose, or maybe you
(27:45):
gotta do it through your mouth.
There's a lot of different waysto work with breath, and I do
have a couple of them on myYouTube channel.
One for anxiety, one fordepression, things like that
that people can find or weconsent to them or something.
But there's just a lot ofdifferent ways to do it.
So move the breathing, thenthere's tension in the.
So just places where you'retense.
How many times have you beenthere in a day where you're
(28:06):
sitting there and you realizeyour arms are near your
shoulders for no reason?
And then you're like, why am Idoing that?
Just releasing, that changeswhat's going on in the brain.
It's giving differentinformation to the mind, and now
it's gotta produce a differentexperience of reality.
Then there's movement.
Are your movement sharp andjerky, or are they calm and
smooth and.
Are your movements of your eyessharp and jerky and they're
(28:28):
jumping around like somebodywho's anxious or paranoid or
having a panic attack?
Or do you go to cuz that's likethe Jason Bourne movies where
it's all shaky camera work andyou kinda get sick in the middle
of it.
If you were to watch the fightscene, nothing's actually
happening, but some dude jerkingaround a camera, then it just
looks like a whole lot's goingon, which is what it feels like
in a fight.
But instead, if you were to backout and have a panoramic vision,
(28:50):
Relax your eyes and take in thescene just like you do when
you're driving on an open road.
People do this all the time, andthen you just focus them as
needed.
But if you keep a panoramicvision with your eyes, that
changes what goes on in themind.
And then with then you haveposture.
A lot of people are like hunchedover, they're slouching and
whatnot.
There's a TED Talks.
You can find all kinds of thingsaround power poses and what
(29:13):
simple changes in body positiondo to change your internal
chemistry and to put your bodyinto a different state.
This is kinda what yoga is basedon, right?
That there are certain positionsyou put the body in that when
you can really relax into thosepositions, a whole different
world of experience can open.
And so you have movement, youhave posture, you have muscle
relaxation, and you havebreathing.
(29:34):
You can change your nutrition.
That, that is, that takes alittle bit more willpower.
But these are the things thathappen that you can deal with,
on the fly all the time.
So here's an example.
One time I'm in my bedroom, inmy like standing desk closet
working on my website cuz itbroke.
So I'm feeling the jitters,right?
We're not gonna have any money,but we're gonna die.
(29:55):
We're gonna be on food stamps,whatever's, all the thoughts
going in.
So I'm sitting there working onthis stuff coming up and I'm
trying to.
Breathe and calm him down.
And then my wife walks in andshe's Hey Bob, do you wanna go
fishing this weekend with mybrother?
I just need to know, cuz hewants to make sure he wants.
And my internally, my, my headis French Jam, I'm busy here,
and now I'm gonna get, gottagive up my weekend.
(30:16):
I never get time to be myselfand sure, fine, whatever.
If I had to really let that go,I would've been seething for
several weeks.
Instead, what I did was Idropped to the floor and did
snow angels on the carpetbreathing in, ah, So my wife's
looking at me and she's are youall right?
You need me to punch in thechest or something?
(30:36):
And I was like no, I'm just, Isaid, I'm really frustrated that
the website's broken and downand I'm having a really rough
time at the moment, and can yougive me like a couple hours
before I have to respond?
I don't think it's probably agood time for me to respond
right now.
And she was like, sure.
And she walked out andeverything about how I was
feeling had changed.
I had breathed differently.
I had changed my body position.
(30:57):
I had changed my elevation forcrying and out loud I had moved
differently.
Maybe that's not something youcan do in the grocery store,
although it's worth it to try.
But it's something you can do inthe car.
When my kids are freaking out inthe backseat, sometimes it's
just too much noise.
So I just start going.
(31:17):
And they know what comes next.
So they're like, oh, dad,breathe in again.
And that helps too.
But I'm changing things on theends inside.
Just by moving, breathing,relaxing, changing my body
position.
Wow.
I love it.
This is a masterclass here.
This is this is some good densestuff you're giving us.
(31:37):
This is really helpful.
We have to move on because we'reout of time, but I could talk to
you or listen to you for anotherseven hours.
So if our listeners are anythinglike me and they're wanting
more, where would you point themto?
Okay.
There's a couple places.
The free, the freedomspecialist.com is a website
where you can find onlinecourses, you can find that you
(31:57):
can do from home.
You can find access to, to getsigned up for our retreats, we
do run retreats.
Congratulations.
Retreat works and there are fivedays and they are intensive
where I have stacked a whole lotof physiological experiences.
One after the other to build away to open up the body from
years and years of baggage andtrauma and all that stuff.
We've had people with chronicpain, people with childhood
(32:19):
abuse for 50 years that they'vestruggled with and all these
kinds of things come and in fivedays just really clean the
decks.
And find a level of freedom thatthey didn't even think was
possible.
It, we have men, we have'em forwomen.
We have'em for couples.
There are retreats thereavailable and you can schedule a
call.
It's a free call and just talkthrough your situation with one
(32:39):
of me or the guides that are onthe call and see if it'll work.
But there's other stuff.
There's the free podcast is onthe website that's at the
freedom specialist.com.
If you want a copy of my book,built for Freedom Adventures
through stress, anxiety,depression, addiction, trauma,
pain, and our body's innateability to leave them all
behind.
You can go to built forfreedom.org and there you can
(33:01):
buy it for five bucks.
You can get a digital versionactually.
And it also comes with the audioversion.
I did it along with all thevoices and things inside the
book and stuff.
You can read that rompingadventure that way.
And so it comes with somebonuses and some options there
as well as a discount to some ofour other programs.
And so that's a reallyinexpensive way to, to get
(33:22):
ahold.
This material and to startfollowing along with the stories
in the book and start to feelexperiences that way.
So built for freedom.org if youwanna catch the book or the
freedom specialist.com if youwanna find any of our online
programs and stuff.
And there's the Alive and Freepodcast if you just wanna jump
on and listen to me Jabber.
(33:42):
I love it.
Awesome.
Awesome.
Thank you so much for that.
I'm curious about your retreats.
How often do you do your.
We are we usually, the past fewyears we've had six or seven.
We usually do that many.
We're trying to work to where wecan do more.
But they are here in Utah, wecover all of the housing and the
food and everything.
We pick everybody up at theairport on a bus.
(34:04):
It starts on the bus guys, andAnd then we take'em out to
whatever place we've managed torent to, usually out in Heber or
someplace like that.
And and we just run you throughlike first day is really getting
your system aware that it ispossible to change and cleaning
the decks of all the oldstories, all the diagnoses,
everything else, ripping off allthe labels so that we can see
(34:25):
what's really going on in eachperson's individual.
And then the next couple of dayswe work with vocalization and
posture and showing you how totease your brain into producing
your own endocannabinoids, whichis like getting high on your own
supply.
So you don't need opioid stuffas well as more B D N F, which
is your neuroplasticity.
(34:46):
You have the ability to makechanges in your habits and your
patterns and to do that onautopilot on its own.
So like you train your systemhow to do that.
Then we spend mid-morning doingmovement practices really subtly
at first, for the first day orso, and then we move into it to
where we're teaching you how tomove in a way that stops
disturbing and creating extrastress in your life.
(35:08):
So that all you're dealing withis whatever's on the outside,
the afternoons, we do big breathwork stuff.
Evening we have time for deeptissue body work that I and a
couple of my assistants, my sonincluded do with each individual
person.
So it's one-on-one attentionalong with time and space to
just relax as well as be withthe coaches.
The nutrition is covered to bereally dialed in, so it's very
healthy.
(35:28):
We cover all the dietary stuffthat we can so that nobody needs
to feel like they have to be anoutsider.
We try to do what we can there,and then we spend a day with
darkness.
We do some cold water stuff,like we really stack them in a
very particular way so thateverybody's all the places that
they think they can't handlelife, their deep fears, their
inner worries, their oldmemories, everything else they
get to.
(35:49):
And discover that it's notactually something that has to
control them anymore, and theyfind that they're okay in the
middle of it.
They leave in a such a differentplace.
Do you know that I, I lovehearing about this.
I love the idea of you probablytake'em out to a river and
experience the cold water orwhatever else.
Like just those kind ofexperiential things are what, I
don't know, make retreats magicas you very well know, because
(36:11):
you can experience things inthat setting.
Can't in any other setting, soyou can't experience I'm loving
it.
That's the retreat, that's thebody.
That's the body They.
Yeah, so the retreats come withthree to four months of support
on either side where you'redoing all the online stuff and
learning and whatnot.
The retreats specifically arethe place where I'm taking
people through experiences thatthey just can't create on their
(36:31):
own, cuz you need a group or youneed a guide, or you need
something else, agreed.
Agreed.
I love it.
Bob, as we wrap things up, areminder that the goal of this
podcast is to instill wellnesshabits into your daily life.
To build a life beyond.
It's fine.
Let's achieve spectacular,joyful, and deeply satisfying
and do some snow angels on theground.
(36:52):
So the giveaway from yoursponsor or from our sponsors
retreat works.
We're doing free livemasterclass.
I do these it's me that doesthem.
I do'em live.
About every once a month toevery other week.
So once or twice a month.
And I train you the system toadd a high-end retreat if you
wanna be like Bob.
(37:13):
We ran in my company, 200retreats a year.
And I love retreats.
I love going to people'sretreats.
I love training retreats.
For me, there's nothing like,just like what Bob said, that
magical connection that you getof being able to take those
clients through that experience.
You can't get that any otherway.
So if you want to add a retreatlike Bob to your business come
(37:34):
join me.
Go to retreat.works.
It's not.com, it's dot works.
And learn how.
Add a high end retreat to yourbusiness.
So Bob, thank you so much forjoining us.
Thank you.
This has been a feast ofknowledge and I bet people
rewind this and like back in theday when you used to hit the
rewind button and watch it twicebecause it was so good, I took
(37:54):
notes like mad.
So thank you so much for yourtime.
Thanks for your guidance, andthanks for joining us and thanks
to our listeners.
Have a wonderful day and thankyou to our listeners for, in
advance for giving us a positivereview.
Thanks everyone.