October 15, 2025 • 41 mins
In this enlightening conversation, Anthony Abbagnano, a pioneering breathwork expert and founder of Alchemy of Breath, discusses the profound impact of breathwork on mental health, consciousness expansion, and personal transformation. He emphasizes the importance of conscious breathing, the misconceptions surrounding breathwork, and shares transformative stories from his practice.
The discussion also explores the integration of breathwork into various healing modalities and the significance of presence in facilitating healing. Anthony highlights the need for practitioners to embody the principles of breathwork and encourages a holistic approach to healing that embraces both psychological and spiritual dimensions.
Key Takeaways:
- Breath is a fundamental relationship in our lives.
- Conscious breathing changes our quality of consciousness.
- Breathwork can be a tool for transformation, not just coping.
- Healing is a continuous state of being, not a finite process.
- The breath can serve as a pure form of prayer.
- We share the same air as historical figures, connecting us all.
- The greatest challenges can lead to the greatest gifts.
- Breathwork is essential for all healing modalities.
- Presence is crucial in breathwork practice.
- Random acts of kindness can create significant change.
Anthony Abbagnano is a pioneering breathwork expert and founder of Alchemy of Breath, the world's top-rated breathwork institute. He has helped thousands transform their lives through free weekly Breathe The World sessions, Facilitator Training, and BreathCamp retreats at ASHA in Tuscany, Italy. Learn more at www.alchemyofbreath.com and buy Anthony's book at https://iam.alchemyofbreath.com/book-podcast
Visit Heallist.com - your portal to holistic healing, connecting seekers and thousands of practitioners across the globe.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Yuli (00:00):
Welcome to the Heallist Podcast, where we unpack the
many layers of holistic health.
I'm Yuli, founder of Heallist,your portal to holistic healers
worldwide.
Now let's go deep.
Hello, dear friends, and welcometo the Heallist Podcast.
Today we're unpacking breathwork as a foundation for mental
health, consciousness expansion,and accessing inner wisdom.
(00:24):
Anthony Abbagnano is apioneering breath work expert
and founder of Alchemy ofBreath, the world-rated breath
work institute, and he helpedthousands to transform through
his sessions, through histrainings and retreats.
And his work is noted inapplications of fields of
addiction, transformation, andpersonal empowerment, and
(00:45):
integration of psychotropics andplant medicine experiences.
So he's also an author of Outof Chaos, Inner Calm, an
incredible book that I highlyrecommend.
I had a chance to check out.
I'm just so, so grateful tohave you, Anthony, with us
today.
I couldn't imagine a betterguest to help us dive into
(01:05):
breath work and really inspireothers to try this modality, or
even for practitioners who arelistening to us to really
explore this world of breathwork and how they can
incorporate into theirmodalities because I see it as a
trend that's happening now thatreally breath work is becoming
this fundamental modality thatthat plugs through any healing
(01:30):
process.
So welcome.
So grateful to have you here.
Anthony (01:34):
Oh, thank you, Yuli.
It's a pleasure.
It's a great pleasure to bewith you.
Yuli (01:38):
So I like to dive in into things.
And I would love to talk lateron about your journey into
breath work because I find itreally fascinating and
inspiring.
But can you just give us someof the fundamentals and maybe
talk a little bit about alsosome misconceptions about breath
work?
Like what are you seeing thatpeople come to you with and what
it actually is?
Anthony (01:58):
Well, I think first of all, that the breath, it's a
huge word, right?
Breath work.
Or it's a small word, but itmeans an enormous amount.
It means that we get to workwith our breath to create
changes and accomplish things.
And the breath also works.
Breath works on its own.
So all we need to do is show upand do it consciously and
things shift.
(02:19):
So it's a bit of a paradox.
It's something we participatein actively.
We work with it, and it alsoworks back with us.
So it's a relationship.
I believe it's the mostimportant relationship in our
lives that we could possiblyhave.
More more important than mylittle puppy at my feet right
(02:40):
now, more important than my wifeor my children, or anybody, any
human is my relationship withmy breath because it changes the
quality of all of the otherrelationships.
Yuli (02:50):
So people, there's a lot of talk about breath in general,
and I agree how important itis.
Um once you add that other partof it, breath work, right?
It becomes something else.
So talk about that shift.
When we just move fromoptimizing improving our breath
consciously, right?
Which is one practice.
And and it's really, I recentlyread this book called Breath,
(03:14):
and it was really eye-opening aswell, how important it is.
But when you add the work toit, what happens?
And like to me, this is kind ofwhere the transformation
begins, right?
Anthony (03:24):
Yeah, and I I mean, even before the even before we
can work with it, we have tochoose to work with it.
An experiment might be rightnow to pay attention to your
breath.
If you pay attention to yourbreath right now, is it the same
as it was before you paidattention to it?
And the answer is no, it's not.
(03:45):
Just by virtue of payingattention to it, it changes.
You become kind ofself-conscious.
Literally, you become consciousof self.
And so you the act of noticingit changes its pattern in
itself.
And that act is not justchanging the quality of your
breath, it's changing thequality of your consciousness
(04:07):
because you are making a choice.
And a lot of us live in achoiceless world.
How many times have you beentold to just calm down, just
relax?
And it's the most infuriatingthing you could ever hear,
right?
It's like someone comes up tome and says, you need to
meditate.
And you know, that's exactlythe it's the last thing that you
(04:29):
would think of doing becauseyou're feeling stressed or under
pressure.
But actually, the choice oftaking the time to take a breath
is a very creative act.
So I wish we could geteverybody to commit to taking a
breath when they don't want to.
I have a student that says it'sa measure of our emotional
intelligence, a measure of ourEQ, that we can stop and take a
(04:53):
breath when we don't want to.
I know in my own relationshipwith my wife, we have a contract
between us that says if we everget into deep trouble, either
of us has the right to ask theother to take 10 breaths
together and look at each otherin the eyes.
And you might start off reallyreluctant.
It's like, yeah, okay, Ipromised I would, so I'll
(05:13):
pretend I'm breathing, but I'mnot going to show you I'm
breathing, or I'm going tobreathe, but I'm not going to
look at you in the eye.
You know, we find try to findall these reasons to stay in
that ugly rut that we're stuckin.
But the truth is, when you dolend your consciousness to your
breath, it does work.
And things change, ourperspective changes.
Yuli (05:33):
What a beautiful practice.
I might have to adopt it withmy husband.
So those are the kind of thesimple things, right, that
people can do when theyencounter a block or a
challenge.
Is there anything else that youfeel like maybe breath is
underutilized in certainsituations that you see people
(05:56):
kind of falling into?
And, you know, I can help themin this moment.
What is your kind of go-to toolor a technique?
Anthony (06:04):
Well, it depends.
There's a whole range oftechniques, and it starts with a
consciousness of what onebreath is.
I don't think we carry anawareness of how significant one
breath is.
If you consider the firstbreath of your life is how you
entered consciousness on thisplanet, and if you consider that
(06:26):
the last breath of your lifewill be how you exit
consciousness on this planet,these are quite significant
things.
There are significances, thereare physiological significances
that are happening to the bodyto prepare for life.
We're having to clean out theliquid from our lungs.
We're no longer using theumbilical cord as our life
source, as our life force.
(06:47):
We're now transitioning to theair.
So we have to clear theremaining half or so of the
liquid that is in our lungs ifwe came through a birth canal.
If we're cesarean, we have toclear out even more uh liquid
from our lungs in order to bebreathed in order to breathe.
So there's a lot that's goingon physiologically that gets
(07:08):
kick-started with that firstbreath of life.
And then if you take a breathand you just wander into it, my
goodness, I'm in, I'm in, thisis life, right?
This is this is perhaps thegreatest awakening that happens
to us in a lifetime that we opento flow, to feelings, to
(07:32):
sensations, to awarenesses, tolight, to dark, to all of the
chaos and confusion and wonderthat exists on the planet.
Wow, that's pretty big.
And that's that's half abreath.
And then we go to the otherhalf of the breath, which is
when we exhale, and my goodness,there's nothing you can hang on
to.
Every thought, every feeling,every attachment, every material
(07:54):
piece of wealth, every problem,everything as we are conscious
of it, we will release.
So perhaps we can take anotherbreath and contemplate, wow,
this is actually more than Iconsidered.
This is more than I consideredbecause I am, in a sense,
rebirthing myself by that act ofbreathing in, and I'm pre-dying
(08:20):
with the act of breathing out.
And so that's one thing, butthen consider this is happening
25,000 times a day.
And how many times of those25,000 are you aware of your
breath?
So there's clearly somethinggoing on that I'm not paying
attention to, and it's notsmall.
(08:42):
Life's it's life force, it'sthat which I need most urgently
in order to survive.
Even a free diver can hold itfor maybe 10 or even 15 minutes,
but we always have to give itback.
There's a bit of a paradox herethat we call it our breath, but
really it's not.
(09:02):
We borrow it, and then we haveto return it with each cycle of
breath.
So these are things to me thatI find very humbling, first of
all, because, you know, yeah,I've worked with the breath for
decades, but I feel like I knowa tiny quantity of what exists
in one cycle of breath.
(09:24):
For example, there is argonthat exists in the air that
never goes away, and we allbreathe it in and out.
It comes in our inhale and inour exhalation.
That means that we're breathingthe same argon that Jesus
Christ breathed, that the Buddhabreathed, that Muhammad
(09:46):
breathed, and on the other sideof the scales that Hitler
breathed and Stalin and some ofthe most unsavory characters
that have existed on the planet.
So as we sort of spirituallysay, yeah, we want to be one, we
are all one, there's truth tothat, scientifically, true, too,
that we are actually partakingof the same, we are sipping from
(10:11):
the same cup, if you will.
So there's there's a lot ofparadox and a lot of parable,
and I think a lot of learningopportunity around this subject
of breathwork.
And as I said earlier, lendingconsciousness to it is a major
step and creates significantchanges.
And then I guess the big kahunain breath work is what
(10:34):
everybody's talking about today,which is the conscious
connected breath, which is ahighly transportative,
transpersonal experience wherewe're actually taking that
conscious breath and stacking itone upon the other, each one
upon the last.
And I kind of see it as astairway to a different realm
(10:55):
because they do stack.
And if we do it with diligenceand in the right conditions,
there are some what we wouldcall extraordinary things that
can happen.
I think the more that we workwith the breath and the more of
us that help others work withthe breath, we're perhaps less
surprised than people who firstcome to it at some of the
(11:16):
transformations that can occur.
Some of them are massive, someof them people would refer to as
miraculous, and they'redefinitely non-sequential.
They're not they're not aboutaccumulating a state of mind,
they're not measurable in thatway, they're more in the quantum
realm of kind of downloads thatwe get and awarenesses that we
(11:39):
bump into very experientially.
It's not an intellectualprocess of accumulating
knowledge.
It's it's an experientialprocess of seeing the other side
of the coin, perhaps, orperceiving the world from
another state of awareness.
Yuli (11:56):
Absolutely.
And I've uh definitelyexperienced some of those things
that you talk about, so I canso relate.
But I wanted to ask you, sinceyou worked with so many, we
worked with thousands of peopleand you watch them transform.
Is there any uh maybe one ortwo examples of uh really you
mentioned miraculoustransformations that you can
share with us that maybe evensurprised you in that breath
(12:20):
work process?
Anthony (12:21):
Yeah, I want to be a little cautious about this.
Yes, I can.
I can come up with all kinds offantastical stories.
And at the same time, it's notjust the breath.
I want to, you know, I thinkthe breath is the most
magnificent thing that exists inmy life.
And at the same time, it is atool and it depends how we use
it, and it can be misused.
(12:42):
And certainly in today's world,there's a fantastical approach
to breath work as a way ofgetting high on your own supply
and just changing reality andgetting out of this kind of
mind, an escapist thing ofgetting out of the mindset that
I'm in because I I'm just toomiserable and I can't stand it.
(13:02):
And I think it has value inthat way, but I think also
there's a distinction betweenusing breath to cope with life
and using breath to transformwho I am.
And those are two verydifferent things, would be the
difference between seekingrelief and holding out for
resolution.
So it's not just the breath,the ability to be in
(13:26):
non-resolution, to recognize thedifference between relief and
resolution, that's where thethat's where the transformative
moment exists.
And I'll give you an example.
I did this in a groupyesterday.
If I sing you eight notes ofthe octave, do, re, mi, fa,
(13:46):
sola, ti, do, those are eightnotes, but the first note and
the last note are the same,right?
It's a scale of seven notes,and then the eighth one is a
repeat of the first one, butjust one octave higher.
If I instead sing the firstseven and I stop, just notice
(14:06):
how it feels.
Dore mi fa sola ti.
And now when I I did this in agroup, and every single time I
do this in a group, someone'sgonna do the do because they're
so uncomfortable that they haveto fill the gap.
It's like, you know, andbecause it's unc it's it's
uncomfortable.
And this is actually usedmusically as a way of creating
(14:30):
dynamic to the music.
And it's called resolution whenthat final note comes in.
And music plays with thesuspense that exists before that
resolution comes, except forjazz that keeps on suspending
and suspending and suspending,and then sometimes comes back,
and you could feel your body go,okay, now I feel more
(14:51):
comfortable.
And I think it's a goodmetaphor for life and the
breath, because in that momentbetween that seventh and the
eighth note is a state ofdiscomfort.
It's a little confusing, it'supsetting our normal way of
thinking, and we want to skipover it.
We want to end it as quickly aswe can.
(15:11):
And in life, when we look atthe problems we have in life, we
look for solutions that make usfeel better.
And this is indeed, especiallyif we're traumatized, a pathway
to the kinds of addictions andhabits that are negative for us
and that actually keep uslimited in life.
So it's not just the breaththat creates the incredible
(15:36):
leaps of consciousness andhealing.
It's the ability to actuallyfeel what's wrong and breathe at
the same time.
And this is, I think, thebiggest alchemy in breath is the
ability to feel sometimes whatwe don't want to feel and to
breathe at the same time,especially with things like
(15:58):
fear, with anger, with anxiety,the negative feelings that tend
to haunt us, if we can learn tofeel and breathe at the same
time, they will dissipatebecause breath works.
I've never seen it fail.
That said, the kinds of thingsI've seen happen in a breathwork
(16:18):
session are blind in one eye,coming back to sight, chronic um
chronic pains that vanish andnever come back, repeatedly
stage four cancer that isreversed and disappears.
Things that we would callmedically somewhere between
unlikely and impossible,spontaneous healings that can
(16:41):
occur.
I've also seen on the emotionalrealms, I think my favorite was
very early on in my breathworkcareer where I had a couple come
to me after a breath work andshe had her husband by the hand
and he was quite shocked.
You could tell he was quiteopen, he was completely soft.
And she said, You know, myhusband has never told me he
(17:03):
loved me in 25 years.
Thank you.
And so I think those aremiracles too, because they're so
touching to the heart, anddefinitely this practice of
using the breath in consciousways is a way of slowing down
the normal 60,000 thoughts wehave a day and opening up to
(17:25):
what exists in the gaps betweenthoughts.
And there's a whole heck of alot there to be discovered.
Yuli (17:32):
I love those stories, and thank you for this beautiful
description.
Um I wonder how you um came upto your own technique and maybe
tell us a little bit about whatit is and how it's maybe
different from some of the otherbreathwork techniques that
people are familiar with.
And I'm curious what was yourjourney uh realizing that you
(17:56):
have something unique that youcreated.
Anthony (18:00):
Well, I I wouldn't claim to be the creator of it,
and I and I wouldn't be Iwouldn't claim to be the owner
of it either, honestly.
And a conscious connectedbreath is something that many
practitioners and facilitatorsshare.
There are techniques with, youknow, putting emphasis on the
inhale and the a soft release onthe exhale, or like Stan
(18:24):
Graff's holotropic breath work,putting more emphasis on a
stronger exhale and letting theinhale come more naturally.
And there is chest breathingand belly breathing and nose
breathing and mouth breathing.
And there are differenttechniques.
The one that I use alwaysshifts, it always changes as I
explore more.
Um, but I I generally focus alittle bit more on the inhale
(18:46):
and let the exhale be naturaland not to exhale all the way,
about 70%, and then pick up theinhale again.
And that connection isfundamental.
The fact that we we don't pausebetween the top and the bottom
of our breath is fundamental tothat stacking that I mentioned
earlier.
But that will occur if I putmore emphasis on my chest or my
(19:10):
belly or inhale or exhale.
It will still occur as long aswe connect.
I think the differences that Isee in breath work is that I mix
it a lot with psychology andspirituality and philosophy.
I come from a family ofphilosophers, and I find this
I've always been fascinated by acouple of things.
Number one, man's or human'seffort to build a ladder with
(19:35):
psychology that can reach farenough above to touch the spirit
world.
And it seems like no matter howbig a ladder we can build with
the consciousness that we livein, it will never be long
enough.
I find that interesting.
And I also find compelling themoment which is breathwork, as
(19:56):
we see so frequently, which issuch a blessing, that people
open to a level of consciousnessthat they didn't have before.
And how that can be it's like,how can I use that?
How can I utilize these truths,these these things that
actually do happen to helppeople create the changes that
(20:17):
they really want to change?
And that is around, as I said,feeling and breathing, going
towards feelings rather thanisolating ourselves from them,
or looking for somebody else orsomething external that I can
take in order to cope.
(20:38):
And it also means the way Iwork is encouraging people to
become comfortable with theuncomfortable.
Um I was speaking with a clientof mine who has stage four
cancer today, and we have aparticular alchemy meditation
that I teach and I do I'vedeveloped over the last 20
(20:59):
years, and we spent an hourinquiring into the tube, one of
the tumors, she has tumors allover her body, but the the
biggest one is in her left lung,and we were we were inquiring
into the relationship betweenthe outermost cell of the tumor
and the next cell that was notaffected, the healthy cell next
(21:23):
to it, and what would theconversation look like between
those two cells.
And that's the kind of intimacythat I want my facilitators to
be able to guide people to whenwe're talking about this level
of healing.
That we don't leave a stoneunturned and it's an intrepid
(21:47):
journey, but we really get to gointo the heart of the core of
what's actually going on andunderstanding how we can
participate in itstransformation.
We don't just need to takemedicines or hope or pray, apart
from the fact that breathingconsciously is to me the purest
(22:11):
form of prayer, which I'll talkabout another time.
But in this particularcircumstance, instead of saying
I'm gonna get rid of my, I'vegot to get rid of my cancer, I'm
saying, let's get intimate withthis cancer and really
understand not just what theobvious messages are, that, oh,
(22:31):
I ate the wrong things or Ismoked too many cigarettes, you
know, whatever those precursorsmight have been, but to really
get granular about this and gointo nano detail and put our
attention and our focus there aswe breathe, and that's the
altar upon which the miraclescan occur.
(22:52):
But there are some things thatneed to be in place for that,
which are somehow difficult forthe mind to do.
That is, if you have any needfor the healing occur to occur,
or if you have any expectationthat the healing will occur,
then it cannot.
That's a contaminatory thought.
So we need an absolute state ofpresence in order to allow
(23:17):
these very natural things tohappen, because the body wants
to heal.
It's that we have to get out ofthe way.
We put in the interruption.
But if we can, and this is thesame with any psychological
issue that I work with withpeople, if we can align the
deepest of our subconscious, orin this nano-concentration of
(23:39):
the physical body, identify thesmallest particle that we can
with our awareness.
And if we consciously bring ourbreath to it, then we're
bringing in somethingsupernatural, which is this life
force that's a mystery.
It's referred to assupernatural or God-given in
every religious document thatexists.
So I'm suggesting this might betrue.
(24:01):
And if it is true, what happenswhen we align our subconscious
with our conscious and thesuperconscious?
What happens if we put them inthe same test tube in our
laboratory?
Is the alchemy that I teach isthat there's a natural force
that will rearrange what'sdiscordant or out of true and
(24:23):
realign it with cosmic code oruniversal force or whatever you
want to name it.
That's really the processthat's occurring.
Pretty fast.
Yuli (24:34):
That's incredible.
And um, I believewholeheartedly that this is this
works and I witness that.
But for some people that mightbe listening and they still need
that scientific evidence forall of this divine interventions
that we're talking about.
Do you incorporate that intoyour teachings?
(24:55):
Like what's your point of viewof that, or you just kind of,
you know, go go with the withthe what your experience and and
your understandings?
Anthony (25:04):
That's a really good question.
And I I definitely tend to leanmore into the metaphysical than
the physical.
Like I said, I I'm from afamily of philosophers.
So I think the day my curiositydies is the day I'm no longer
alive.
And I I tend I love thescience, but I think the science
is the ladder that can't reachthe spirit.
(25:25):
So it has its limitations andit needs to name things in order
for them to be permissible.
So there are there are limitsof consciousness.
And one of the greatestteachers I ever studied under
was an Indian man called KrishnaMurti.
And his thesis was how can youcreate new consciousness from
(25:46):
existing consciousness?
It's actually a mathematicalimpossibility.
So there's something outsideour consciousness.
If we're going to become awareof it, what does that actual
process look like?
It has to include somethingbeyond science.
Because scientifically, how canyou create something, you know,
like what I think one of hisstatements was: how can you ever
(26:09):
expect to vote for a primeminister or president that can
change things if he is operatingwithin the consciousness that
you're operating in?
You can only recreate whatyou've already created.
And I think that's demonstrablein our world.
I don't mean just politically,I mean even scientifically, that
we're used to recreating thingsall the time.
(26:32):
It's only when we can't do itanymore, like we're running out
of fuel.
I mean, we knew we could havecreated battery-operated
vehicles, you know, 50 or 60years ago.
It's only when there's no fuelleft that it really becomes
serious enough for us to makeourselves available for other
thought patterns.
And I think this is where I seethat the healing happens is
(26:56):
when we think differently, notwhen we think the same way.
There's something that needs toknock us out of our thought
processes.
And the breath is a really goodtool for that.
So I don't want to put awayscience because there are
physiological things that arehappening, and I think they're
incredible and virtuallyincredible.
They're just credible, andthey're magnificent, the
(27:18):
mechanisms that are working inthe body in order for these
nonlinear things to occur.
But I do believe there thereneeds to be an embrace of the
fact that we don't know what wedon't know, and that I bow to
the mystery in one breath inorder to be able to stand for it
(27:39):
creating quantum changes forother people.
So I do stand for that.
Yuli (27:45):
Love that.
Beautifully said.
Let's talk about breath workand how it integrates into other
healing modalities.
Because as you know, people onthe healing journey, and to your
point, I think something thatdrastically needs to happen for
people to be open to those othermetaphysical modalities.
And I see it a lot in my workthat unfortunately it takes some
(28:06):
sort of um uh really um youknow thermal disease for to
bring people finally to toexplore things that are maybe
non-conventional, right?
So, and it's happening in somany places in so many different
areas of life, but when itcomes to healing journey, what
I'm also seeing on thepractitioner side, people come
(28:30):
and um come to differentmodalities and they often don't
know where to start, where tobegin, what's for them.
They come often some sort ofdesperation, right?
Uh, hoping maybe someone likementions something about this
particular practice or another.
But practitioners more and moreare tasked on the holistic
(28:51):
side, they kind of catcheveryone who is either desperate
with the medical system, right?
They're they're uh helpless,they're catching a lot of cases
that are very complex, right?
What I'm seeing as a responseto that in terms of holistic
healers, we moving from thisidea of like, okay, I'm I'm this
I'm a nutritionist or I'm ayoga teacher or I'm a Reiki
(29:15):
master to this beautiful blendof practitioners really
embracing all those differenttools because they have to
respond to this greater need foruh this multiple toolbox
healing, right, that theirclients might be seeking.
So I do see a lot ofpractitioners, you know, they're
(29:36):
getting now, maybe it's on theextreme side, some of them
getting like 10, 20 differentcertifications, right?
Just to kind of accommodatethose different cases.
But I do find that breath workis becoming that fundamental
modality that a lot of holistichealers are adding to their
toolbox.
And I'm seeing, you know, yogateachers are going and getting
(29:56):
training in that.
I'm seeing um, you know, allkinds.
Anthony (30:00):
of acupunctures getting so i'm curious because you
trained so many practitionerswhat is your where do you see
breath work fit how do you workwith practitioners maybe talk a
little bit about the yourtraining program because a lot
of our listeners arepractitioners and i would love
to help them discover thisbeautiful tool yeah thank you i
(30:21):
it's such a valid question andsuch an important thing to speak
to i'm i'm super grateful forthat question i agree with you i
think fundament I I think thebreath is fundamental to all
modalities just as it isfundamental to life and I've
seen many people who willaccumulate certificates of study
(30:44):
but still lack the presencethat's required to be alongside
someone that is in difficulty.
You know that the real tool isnot there.
It's not about an accumulationof knowledge alone.
It's the knowledge and theexperience and the presence I
(31:04):
think most important of all isthe presence.
And you cannot be conscious ofyour breath without being
present with what is actuallyhappening right now.
That's the short answer.
That's a subtitle to that isthat we're not just facilitating
breath work.
We're actually facilitatingholistic life and that shows up
(31:27):
as getting opening a session andstarting and stopping at the
other end.
But actually what we'refacilitating is a quality of
presence by offering ourpresence giving someone else a
beacon that gives them hope.
And the people that I trainrange from goodness judges,
lawyers, police officers,psychiatrists, psychotherapists,
(31:49):
brain surgeons, orthopedics allkinds of medical practitioners
from doctors to nurses, prisonofficers, you know, I mean just
just every walk of life everyone of them is making the same
journey to being able to bepresent in the face of challenge
and difficulty because they'reusing their breath.
(32:10):
The journey that I train peopleon honestly like I said earlier
the techniques of breath youknow you can get them in a
one-month workshop or in aweekend workshop you know you
breathe in and out, right?
You hold for three, you exhalefor four.
You know, that that's notreally the essence of what we're
talking about.
(32:30):
I want people to make an innerjourney that is going to prepare
them to really be in a state ofhealing and to demonstrate to
other people that this ispossible.
And what I actually seehappening is that the greatest
challenge that people face intheir life actually becomes the
(32:53):
greatest gift that they canbring to the world.
So I see addicts helping otheraddicts I see cancer survivors
helping other cancer sufferers Isee prisoners helping ex-cons,
helping other prisoners.
I love to sponsor ex-convictsto help people who are in prison
transform their lives.
All of these things are whatreally motivate me but they're
(33:17):
not going to happen unless we doour inner work.
So 50% of our training is basedon the book which is an
introduction to the inner workthat we do.
And I know our time is limitedbut there's I think a really
important message to downloadright now.
First of all healing is a stateof being it's not a process
(33:38):
it's a practice it will alwaysbe there.
We never complete it.
So let's let go of hopes ofonce I'm healed then I'll we're
always healing.
That's why the wounded healeris so functional because we get
to work with our own wounds atthe same time as healing.
And secondly this world ischanging and it's changing so
(34:00):
fast now it's now known asexponentially exponential it's
no longer just exponential likewe've seen in the technological
age.
We're now exiting thetechnological age as a result of
AI knowledge has zero value.
The knowledge is availabledepending on the question you
ask.
Already we're shifting awayfrom a knowledge-based culture
(34:24):
into a question-based culture.
Where is this going to lead?
We've exhausted every materialinvestigation that we can we've
now got created an intelligencethat's thousands of times faster
than we are.
There's no way we'll ever catchup with that or get a saddle or
(34:44):
a bridle on that.
That's just destiny.
That's now happening and as Isay the word happening it's
actually already happened.
It's going so quickly.
So I think the question that weget to ask ourselves is what
role of leadership do we want totake in this post the world,
the aftermath of the chaos andthe conundrum that we live in
(35:09):
today take your position nowbecause and train for that
because you're going to beneeded and we are already the
minority I used to say 1% 9 99%of the world is in trouble and
1% is trying to help them dosomething about it.
I think we're probably up to 2or 3% now.
(35:30):
It's it's amazing it'swonderful to see but let's get
ready because the show is comingon and we need to go out there
and do things about it.
And I do believe it's aboutspirituality.
I do believe that we'veexhausted the material
consciousness and we've reachedits edge and something else is
waiting to happen.
The question is do we want toparticipate?
(35:51):
Do we want to be co-authors inthis transformation that's
happening on the planet rightnow or do we want to be in the
whatever they call it flotsomthat's what it is that that fish
sort of gather as they opentheir mouths.
Are we the flotsom or are wereally going to be co-creators
of what's unfolding today?
Yuli (36:12):
Wow you're channeling my mission so thank you for
expressing it so beautifullythat's how I I feel in my work
and definitely I think a lot ofour listeners too at some point
of our lives um you know we wehave this choice right do we do
we step on the other side andstart helping others and or do
we kind of continue in the umthis earth game I mean we're all
(36:34):
still in the earth game but atleast I love being on the
serving side um or at least Ilike to believe so and I think
breath work is just a beautifulway to serve others very simple
way right at first but now thatyou're unpacking it and help us
understand all the intricaciesand how much uh it takes and
this word presence I think thatyou mentioned it just uh often
(36:57):
taken for granted but it'sactually one of the hardest
things I think to receive todayfrom somebody in this age of
distractions is just fullpresence and um I do agree with
you that's part of the healingwork.
You mentioned your book and umI'm really grateful to have this
another tool of you that peoplecan explore and we're gonna put
(37:20):
in show notes of course for forpeople to get but what and and
I know we're running out of timebut I really want to hear
briefly about your journey intoall of this and how it changed
since discovering Breathwork andthe journey of creating the
book and all this beautifulteachings that that you share
with the world now.
Anthony (37:40):
Thank you.
I I uh it's it's a bit a messyprocess writing this book I've
lived every mistake I had tolive in order to learn enough to
help other people not have tolive those mistakes and live the
pain of those errors.
So I'm certainly no hero.
I I come to this with a longlife of many experiences and
(38:05):
many of them seemed irrelevantas I grew up.
Many of them seemed contraryeven to what I do now.
But I'm grateful for everysingle one of them because
without them I wouldn't havebeen able to see what I see now
and to say what I say now.
And so the message that I'mwanting to share is that and to
(38:27):
save people time with with thisbook is that there's a template
that exists.
There's a hero's journeytemplate that exists but there's
another template that I callthe Miracle Matrix that exists
that we don't notice in life.
It's what the shaman noticeit's what we strive for when we
take plant medicines andmeditate a lot and do a lot of
(38:49):
breath work and this is hereexistent in our world today and
it's a navigable matrix.
It's not like the movie whereit's the blue pill or the red
pill there are still choiceslike that to be made but it's
actually a miracle matrixbecause some wonderful things
can happen and the book is aseries of stories and a
(39:12):
description of what this matrixmight look like for you.
And it's also an introductionto the training that I do which
is this inner journey which Icall the alchemist is this inner
journey that I get people tomake and is separate from the
breathwork training.
We pulled it out of thebreathwork training because
there are so many otherpractitioners of other
(39:33):
modalities that want to do itand it's now become an advanced
facilitation program for doctorsand nurses and psychiatrists
and psychotherapists andeverybody, yoga teachers
everybody because it developsthis sense of presence that we
need to really be a beacon in avery dark night of a human soul
(39:54):
which is kind of where I see theworld at right now.
Yuli (39:57):
Incredible what a journey well again it's just so grateful
to have your wisdom here and aswe are running out of time um I
do hope people check out thebook, check out your um amazing
teachings and I will do so aswell.
Any last parting words ofwisdom for our incredible
audience?
Anthony (40:16):
God I'm all out of wisdom now I I think what I have
is a lot of love for everysingle person who's on this path
and a lot of gratitude to you.
And I also I want to ask you todo something whenever you're in
a public forum in a group or ina class or online or wherever
it may be would you considerending your transmission by
(40:38):
asking people to do a random actof kindness and that's what I
would like to ask you to do asyou close from me is to think
what that might look like foryou as your next act out there
in the world because I feel ifenough of us keep doing this
it's going to make a a lot ofdifference.
So that would be my request.
Yuli (40:59):
Amazing well I love this challenge I take this challenge
although I feel like literally Iwake up every day and I really
my path is my act of kindness tothe world I think working with
healers this is my you knowafter spending decades and kind
of in the more of a traditionalcareer and being tech
entrepreneur and all that thisis my chapter of act of kindness
(41:22):
so I'm gonna challenge you backand say it's not just one act
can we really leave our path ourour life as an act of kindness.
Anthony (41:30):
That's beautiful thank you.
Yuli (41:32):
I love that beautiful thank you so much Anthony so
grateful to have you and um uhagain look forward to staying in
touch and explore more of yourwork thank you.
Thank you
Welcome to the Heallist Podcast, where we unpack the
many layers of holistic health.
I'm Yuli, founder of Heallist,your portal to holistic healers
worldwide.
Now let's go deep.
Hello, dear friends, and welcometo the Heallist Podcast.
Today we're unpacking breathwork as a foundation for mental
health, consciousness expansion,and accessing inner wisdom.
(00:24):
Anthony Abbagnano is apioneering breath work expert
and founder of Alchemy ofBreath, the world-rated breath
work institute, and he helpedthousands to transform through
his sessions, through histrainings and retreats.
And his work is noted inapplications of fields of
addiction, transformation, andpersonal empowerment, and
(00:45):
integration of psychotropics andplant medicine experiences.
So he's also an author of Outof Chaos, Inner Calm, an
incredible book that I highlyrecommend.
I had a chance to check out.
I'm just so, so grateful tohave you, Anthony, with us
today.
I couldn't imagine a betterguest to help us dive into
(01:05):
breath work and really inspireothers to try this modality, or
even for practitioners who arelistening to us to really
explore this world of breathwork and how they can
incorporate into theirmodalities because I see it as a
trend that's happening now thatreally breath work is becoming
this fundamental modality thatthat plugs through any healing
(01:30):
process.
So welcome.
So grateful to have you here.
Anthony (01:34):
Oh, thank you, Yuli.
It's a pleasure.
It's a great pleasure to bewith you.
Yuli (01:38):
So I like to dive in into things.
And I would love to talk lateron about your journey into
breath work because I find itreally fascinating and
inspiring.
But can you just give us someof the fundamentals and maybe
talk a little bit about alsosome misconceptions about breath
work?
Like what are you seeing thatpeople come to you with and what
it actually is?
Anthony (01:58):
Well, I think first of all, that the breath, it's a
huge word, right?
Breath work.
Or it's a small word, but itmeans an enormous amount.
It means that we get to workwith our breath to create
changes and accomplish things.
And the breath also works.
Breath works on its own.
So all we need to do is show upand do it consciously and
things shift.
(02:19):
So it's a bit of a paradox.
It's something we participatein actively.
We work with it, and it alsoworks back with us.
So it's a relationship.
I believe it's the mostimportant relationship in our
lives that we could possiblyhave.
More more important than mylittle puppy at my feet right
(02:40):
now, more important than my wifeor my children, or anybody, any
human is my relationship withmy breath because it changes the
quality of all of the otherrelationships.
Yuli (02:50):
So people, there's a lot of talk about breath in general,
and I agree how important itis.
Um once you add that other partof it, breath work, right?
It becomes something else.
So talk about that shift.
When we just move fromoptimizing improving our breath
consciously, right?
Which is one practice.
And and it's really, I recentlyread this book called Breath,
(03:14):
and it was really eye-opening aswell, how important it is.
But when you add the work toit, what happens?
And like to me, this is kind ofwhere the transformation
begins, right?
Anthony (03:24):
Yeah, and I I mean, even before the even before we
can work with it, we have tochoose to work with it.
An experiment might be rightnow to pay attention to your
breath.
If you pay attention to yourbreath right now, is it the same
as it was before you paidattention to it?
And the answer is no, it's not.
(03:45):
Just by virtue of payingattention to it, it changes.
You become kind ofself-conscious.
Literally, you become consciousof self.
And so you the act of noticingit changes its pattern in
itself.
And that act is not justchanging the quality of your
breath, it's changing thequality of your consciousness
(04:07):
because you are making a choice.
And a lot of us live in achoiceless world.
How many times have you beentold to just calm down, just
relax?
And it's the most infuriatingthing you could ever hear,
right?
It's like someone comes up tome and says, you need to
meditate.
And you know, that's exactlythe it's the last thing that you
(04:29):
would think of doing becauseyou're feeling stressed or under
pressure.
But actually, the choice oftaking the time to take a breath
is a very creative act.
So I wish we could geteverybody to commit to taking a
breath when they don't want to.
I have a student that says it'sa measure of our emotional
intelligence, a measure of ourEQ, that we can stop and take a
(04:53):
breath when we don't want to.
I know in my own relationshipwith my wife, we have a contract
between us that says if we everget into deep trouble, either
of us has the right to ask theother to take 10 breaths
together and look at each otherin the eyes.
And you might start off reallyreluctant.
It's like, yeah, okay, Ipromised I would, so I'll
(05:13):
pretend I'm breathing, but I'mnot going to show you I'm
breathing, or I'm going tobreathe, but I'm not going to
look at you in the eye.
You know, we find try to findall these reasons to stay in
that ugly rut that we're stuckin.
But the truth is, when you dolend your consciousness to your
breath, it does work.
And things change, ourperspective changes.
Yuli (05:33):
What a beautiful practice.
I might have to adopt it withmy husband.
So those are the kind of thesimple things, right, that
people can do when theyencounter a block or a
challenge.
Is there anything else that youfeel like maybe breath is
underutilized in certainsituations that you see people
(05:56):
kind of falling into?
And, you know, I can help themin this moment.
What is your kind of go-to toolor a technique?
Anthony (06:04):
Well, it depends.
There's a whole range oftechniques, and it starts with a
consciousness of what onebreath is.
I don't think we carry anawareness of how significant one
breath is.
If you consider the firstbreath of your life is how you
entered consciousness on thisplanet, and if you consider that
(06:26):
the last breath of your lifewill be how you exit
consciousness on this planet,these are quite significant
things.
There are significances, thereare physiological significances
that are happening to the bodyto prepare for life.
We're having to clean out theliquid from our lungs.
We're no longer using theumbilical cord as our life
source, as our life force.
(06:47):
We're now transitioning to theair.
So we have to clear theremaining half or so of the
liquid that is in our lungs ifwe came through a birth canal.
If we're cesarean, we have toclear out even more uh liquid
from our lungs in order to bebreathed in order to breathe.
So there's a lot that's goingon physiologically that gets
(07:08):
kick-started with that firstbreath of life.
And then if you take a breathand you just wander into it, my
goodness, I'm in, I'm in, thisis life, right?
This is this is perhaps thegreatest awakening that happens
to us in a lifetime that we opento flow, to feelings, to
(07:32):
sensations, to awarenesses, tolight, to dark, to all of the
chaos and confusion and wonderthat exists on the planet.
Wow, that's pretty big.
And that's that's half abreath.
And then we go to the otherhalf of the breath, which is
when we exhale, and my goodness,there's nothing you can hang on
to.
Every thought, every feeling,every attachment, every material
(07:54):
piece of wealth, every problem,everything as we are conscious
of it, we will release.
So perhaps we can take anotherbreath and contemplate, wow,
this is actually more than Iconsidered.
This is more than I consideredbecause I am, in a sense,
rebirthing myself by that act ofbreathing in, and I'm pre-dying
(08:20):
with the act of breathing out.
And so that's one thing, butthen consider this is happening
25,000 times a day.
And how many times of those25,000 are you aware of your
breath?
So there's clearly somethinggoing on that I'm not paying
attention to, and it's notsmall.
(08:42):
Life's it's life force, it'sthat which I need most urgently
in order to survive.
Even a free diver can hold itfor maybe 10 or even 15 minutes,
but we always have to give itback.
There's a bit of a paradox herethat we call it our breath, but
really it's not.
(09:02):
We borrow it, and then we haveto return it with each cycle of
breath.
So these are things to me thatI find very humbling, first of
all, because, you know, yeah,I've worked with the breath for
decades, but I feel like I knowa tiny quantity of what exists
in one cycle of breath.
(09:24):
For example, there is argonthat exists in the air that
never goes away, and we allbreathe it in and out.
It comes in our inhale and inour exhalation.
That means that we're breathingthe same argon that Jesus
Christ breathed, that the Buddhabreathed, that Muhammad
(09:46):
breathed, and on the other sideof the scales that Hitler
breathed and Stalin and some ofthe most unsavory characters
that have existed on the planet.
So as we sort of spirituallysay, yeah, we want to be one, we
are all one, there's truth tothat, scientifically, true, too,
that we are actually partakingof the same, we are sipping from
(10:11):
the same cup, if you will.
So there's there's a lot ofparadox and a lot of parable,
and I think a lot of learningopportunity around this subject
of breathwork.
And as I said earlier, lendingconsciousness to it is a major
step and creates significantchanges.
And then I guess the big kahunain breath work is what
(10:34):
everybody's talking about today,which is the conscious
connected breath, which is ahighly transportative,
transpersonal experience wherewe're actually taking that
conscious breath and stacking itone upon the other, each one
upon the last.
And I kind of see it as astairway to a different realm
(10:55):
because they do stack.
And if we do it with diligenceand in the right conditions,
there are some what we wouldcall extraordinary things that
can happen.
I think the more that we workwith the breath and the more of
us that help others work withthe breath, we're perhaps less
surprised than people who firstcome to it at some of the
(11:16):
transformations that can occur.
Some of them are massive, someof them people would refer to as
miraculous, and they'redefinitely non-sequential.
They're not they're not aboutaccumulating a state of mind,
they're not measurable in thatway, they're more in the quantum
realm of kind of downloads thatwe get and awarenesses that we
(11:39):
bump into very experientially.
It's not an intellectualprocess of accumulating
knowledge.
It's it's an experientialprocess of seeing the other side
of the coin, perhaps, orperceiving the world from
another state of awareness.
Yuli (11:56):
Absolutely.
And I've uh definitelyexperienced some of those things
that you talk about, so I canso relate.
But I wanted to ask you, sinceyou worked with so many, we
worked with thousands of peopleand you watch them transform.
Is there any uh maybe one ortwo examples of uh really you
mentioned miraculoustransformations that you can
share with us that maybe evensurprised you in that breath
(12:20):
work process?
Anthony (12:21):
Yeah, I want to be a little cautious about this.
Yes, I can.
I can come up with all kinds offantastical stories.
And at the same time, it's notjust the breath.
I want to, you know, I thinkthe breath is the most
magnificent thing that exists inmy life.
And at the same time, it is atool and it depends how we use
it, and it can be misused.
(12:42):
And certainly in today's world,there's a fantastical approach
to breath work as a way ofgetting high on your own supply
and just changing reality andgetting out of this kind of
mind, an escapist thing ofgetting out of the mindset that
I'm in because I I'm just toomiserable and I can't stand it.
(13:02):
And I think it has value inthat way, but I think also
there's a distinction betweenusing breath to cope with life
and using breath to transformwho I am.
And those are two verydifferent things, would be the
difference between seekingrelief and holding out for
resolution.
So it's not just the breath,the ability to be in
(13:26):
non-resolution, to recognize thedifference between relief and
resolution, that's where thethat's where the transformative
moment exists.
And I'll give you an example.
I did this in a groupyesterday.
If I sing you eight notes ofthe octave, do, re, mi, fa,
(13:46):
sola, ti, do, those are eightnotes, but the first note and
the last note are the same,right?
It's a scale of seven notes,and then the eighth one is a
repeat of the first one, butjust one octave higher.
If I instead sing the firstseven and I stop, just notice
(14:06):
how it feels.
Dore mi fa sola ti.
And now when I I did this in agroup, and every single time I
do this in a group, someone'sgonna do the do because they're
so uncomfortable that they haveto fill the gap.
It's like, you know, andbecause it's unc it's it's
uncomfortable.
And this is actually usedmusically as a way of creating
(14:30):
dynamic to the music.
And it's called resolution whenthat final note comes in.
And music plays with thesuspense that exists before that
resolution comes, except forjazz that keeps on suspending
and suspending and suspending,and then sometimes comes back,
and you could feel your body go,okay, now I feel more
(14:51):
comfortable.
And I think it's a goodmetaphor for life and the
breath, because in that momentbetween that seventh and the
eighth note is a state ofdiscomfort.
It's a little confusing, it'supsetting our normal way of
thinking, and we want to skipover it.
We want to end it as quickly aswe can.
(15:11):
And in life, when we look atthe problems we have in life, we
look for solutions that make usfeel better.
And this is indeed, especiallyif we're traumatized, a pathway
to the kinds of addictions andhabits that are negative for us
and that actually keep uslimited in life.
So it's not just the breaththat creates the incredible
(15:36):
leaps of consciousness andhealing.
It's the ability to actuallyfeel what's wrong and breathe at
the same time.
And this is, I think, thebiggest alchemy in breath is the
ability to feel sometimes whatwe don't want to feel and to
breathe at the same time,especially with things like
(15:58):
fear, with anger, with anxiety,the negative feelings that tend
to haunt us, if we can learn tofeel and breathe at the same
time, they will dissipatebecause breath works.
I've never seen it fail.
That said, the kinds of thingsI've seen happen in a breathwork
(16:18):
session are blind in one eye,coming back to sight, chronic um
chronic pains that vanish andnever come back, repeatedly
stage four cancer that isreversed and disappears.
Things that we would callmedically somewhere between
unlikely and impossible,spontaneous healings that can
(16:41):
occur.
I've also seen on the emotionalrealms, I think my favorite was
very early on in my breathworkcareer where I had a couple come
to me after a breath work andshe had her husband by the hand
and he was quite shocked.
You could tell he was quiteopen, he was completely soft.
And she said, You know, myhusband has never told me he
(17:03):
loved me in 25 years.
Thank you.
And so I think those aremiracles too, because they're so
touching to the heart, anddefinitely this practice of
using the breath in consciousways is a way of slowing down
the normal 60,000 thoughts wehave a day and opening up to
(17:25):
what exists in the gaps betweenthoughts.
And there's a whole heck of alot there to be discovered.
Yuli (17:32):
I love those stories, and thank you for this beautiful
description.
Um I wonder how you um came upto your own technique and maybe
tell us a little bit about whatit is and how it's maybe
different from some of the otherbreathwork techniques that
people are familiar with.
And I'm curious what was yourjourney uh realizing that you
(17:56):
have something unique that youcreated.
Anthony (18:00):
Well, I I wouldn't claim to be the creator of it,
and I and I wouldn't be Iwouldn't claim to be the owner
of it either, honestly.
And a conscious connectedbreath is something that many
practitioners and facilitatorsshare.
There are techniques with, youknow, putting emphasis on the
inhale and the a soft release onthe exhale, or like Stan
(18:24):
Graff's holotropic breath work,putting more emphasis on a
stronger exhale and letting theinhale come more naturally.
And there is chest breathingand belly breathing and nose
breathing and mouth breathing.
And there are differenttechniques.
The one that I use alwaysshifts, it always changes as I
explore more.
Um, but I I generally focus alittle bit more on the inhale
(18:46):
and let the exhale be naturaland not to exhale all the way,
about 70%, and then pick up theinhale again.
And that connection isfundamental.
The fact that we we don't pausebetween the top and the bottom
of our breath is fundamental tothat stacking that I mentioned
earlier.
But that will occur if I putmore emphasis on my chest or my
(19:10):
belly or inhale or exhale.
It will still occur as long aswe connect.
I think the differences that Isee in breath work is that I mix
it a lot with psychology andspirituality and philosophy.
I come from a family ofphilosophers, and I find this
I've always been fascinated by acouple of things.
Number one, man's or human'seffort to build a ladder with
(19:35):
psychology that can reach farenough above to touch the spirit
world.
And it seems like no matter howbig a ladder we can build with
the consciousness that we livein, it will never be long
enough.
I find that interesting.
And I also find compelling themoment which is breathwork, as
(19:56):
we see so frequently, which issuch a blessing, that people
open to a level of consciousnessthat they didn't have before.
And how that can be it's like,how can I use that?
How can I utilize these truths,these these things that
actually do happen to helppeople create the changes that
(20:17):
they really want to change?
And that is around, as I said,feeling and breathing, going
towards feelings rather thanisolating ourselves from them,
or looking for somebody else orsomething external that I can
take in order to cope.
(20:38):
And it also means the way Iwork is encouraging people to
become comfortable with theuncomfortable.
Um I was speaking with a clientof mine who has stage four
cancer today, and we have aparticular alchemy meditation
that I teach and I do I'vedeveloped over the last 20
(20:59):
years, and we spent an hourinquiring into the tube, one of
the tumors, she has tumors allover her body, but the the
biggest one is in her left lung,and we were we were inquiring
into the relationship betweenthe outermost cell of the tumor
and the next cell that was notaffected, the healthy cell next
(21:23):
to it, and what would theconversation look like between
those two cells.
And that's the kind of intimacythat I want my facilitators to
be able to guide people to whenwe're talking about this level
of healing.
That we don't leave a stoneunturned and it's an intrepid
(21:47):
journey, but we really get to gointo the heart of the core of
what's actually going on andunderstanding how we can
participate in itstransformation.
We don't just need to takemedicines or hope or pray, apart
from the fact that breathingconsciously is to me the purest
(22:11):
form of prayer, which I'll talkabout another time.
But in this particularcircumstance, instead of saying
I'm gonna get rid of my, I'vegot to get rid of my cancer, I'm
saying, let's get intimate withthis cancer and really
understand not just what theobvious messages are, that, oh,
(22:31):
I ate the wrong things or Ismoked too many cigarettes, you
know, whatever those precursorsmight have been, but to really
get granular about this and gointo nano detail and put our
attention and our focus there aswe breathe, and that's the
altar upon which the miraclescan occur.
(22:52):
But there are some things thatneed to be in place for that,
which are somehow difficult forthe mind to do.
That is, if you have any needfor the healing occur to occur,
or if you have any expectationthat the healing will occur,
then it cannot.
That's a contaminatory thought.
So we need an absolute state ofpresence in order to allow
(23:17):
these very natural things tohappen, because the body wants
to heal.
It's that we have to get out ofthe way.
We put in the interruption.
But if we can, and this is thesame with any psychological
issue that I work with withpeople, if we can align the
deepest of our subconscious, orin this nano-concentration of
(23:39):
the physical body, identify thesmallest particle that we can
with our awareness.
And if we consciously bring ourbreath to it, then we're
bringing in somethingsupernatural, which is this life
force that's a mystery.
It's referred to assupernatural or God-given in
every religious document thatexists.
So I'm suggesting this might betrue.
(24:01):
And if it is true, what happenswhen we align our subconscious
with our conscious and thesuperconscious?
What happens if we put them inthe same test tube in our
laboratory?
Is the alchemy that I teach isthat there's a natural force
that will rearrange what'sdiscordant or out of true and
(24:23):
realign it with cosmic code oruniversal force or whatever you
want to name it.
That's really the processthat's occurring.
Pretty fast.
Yuli (24:34):
That's incredible.
And um, I believewholeheartedly that this is this
works and I witness that.
But for some people that mightbe listening and they still need
that scientific evidence forall of this divine interventions
that we're talking about.
Do you incorporate that intoyour teachings?
(24:55):
Like what's your point of viewof that, or you just kind of,
you know, go go with the withthe what your experience and and
your understandings?
Anthony (25:04):
That's a really good question.
And I I definitely tend to leanmore into the metaphysical than
the physical.
Like I said, I I'm from afamily of philosophers.
So I think the day my curiositydies is the day I'm no longer
alive.
And I I tend I love thescience, but I think the science
is the ladder that can't reachthe spirit.
(25:25):
So it has its limitations andit needs to name things in order
for them to be permissible.
So there are there are limitsof consciousness.
And one of the greatestteachers I ever studied under
was an Indian man called KrishnaMurti.
And his thesis was how can youcreate new consciousness from
(25:46):
existing consciousness?
It's actually a mathematicalimpossibility.
So there's something outsideour consciousness.
If we're going to become awareof it, what does that actual
process look like?
It has to include somethingbeyond science.
Because scientifically, how canyou create something, you know,
like what I think one of hisstatements was: how can you ever
(26:09):
expect to vote for a primeminister or president that can
change things if he is operatingwithin the consciousness that
you're operating in?
You can only recreate whatyou've already created.
And I think that's demonstrablein our world.
I don't mean just politically,I mean even scientifically, that
we're used to recreating thingsall the time.
(26:32):
It's only when we can't do itanymore, like we're running out
of fuel.
I mean, we knew we could havecreated battery-operated
vehicles, you know, 50 or 60years ago.
It's only when there's no fuelleft that it really becomes
serious enough for us to makeourselves available for other
thought patterns.
And I think this is where I seethat the healing happens is
(26:56):
when we think differently, notwhen we think the same way.
There's something that needs toknock us out of our thought
processes.
And the breath is a really goodtool for that.
So I don't want to put awayscience because there are
physiological things that arehappening, and I think they're
incredible and virtuallyincredible.
They're just credible, andthey're magnificent, the
(27:18):
mechanisms that are working inthe body in order for these
nonlinear things to occur.
But I do believe there thereneeds to be an embrace of the
fact that we don't know what wedon't know, and that I bow to
the mystery in one breath inorder to be able to stand for it
(27:39):
creating quantum changes forother people.
So I do stand for that.
Yuli (27:45):
Love that.
Beautifully said.
Let's talk about breath workand how it integrates into other
healing modalities.
Because as you know, people onthe healing journey, and to your
point, I think something thatdrastically needs to happen for
people to be open to those othermetaphysical modalities.
And I see it a lot in my workthat unfortunately it takes some
(28:06):
sort of um uh really um youknow thermal disease for to
bring people finally to toexplore things that are maybe
non-conventional, right?
So, and it's happening in somany places in so many different
areas of life, but when itcomes to healing journey, what
I'm also seeing on thepractitioner side, people come
(28:30):
and um come to differentmodalities and they often don't
know where to start, where tobegin, what's for them.
They come often some sort ofdesperation, right?
Uh, hoping maybe someone likementions something about this
particular practice or another.
But practitioners more and moreare tasked on the holistic
(28:51):
side, they kind of catcheveryone who is either desperate
with the medical system, right?
They're they're uh helpless,they're catching a lot of cases
that are very complex, right?
What I'm seeing as a responseto that in terms of holistic
healers, we moving from thisidea of like, okay, I'm I'm this
I'm a nutritionist or I'm ayoga teacher or I'm a Reiki
(29:15):
master to this beautiful blendof practitioners really
embracing all those differenttools because they have to
respond to this greater need foruh this multiple toolbox
healing, right, that theirclients might be seeking.
So I do see a lot ofpractitioners, you know, they're
(29:36):
getting now, maybe it's on theextreme side, some of them
getting like 10, 20 differentcertifications, right?
Just to kind of accommodatethose different cases.
But I do find that breath workis becoming that fundamental
modality that a lot of holistichealers are adding to their
toolbox.
And I'm seeing, you know, yogateachers are going and getting
(29:56):
training in that.
I'm seeing um, you know, allkinds.
Anthony (30:00):
of acupunctures getting so i'm curious because you
trained so many practitionerswhat is your where do you see
breath work fit how do you workwith practitioners maybe talk a
little bit about the yourtraining program because a lot
of our listeners arepractitioners and i would love
to help them discover thisbeautiful tool yeah thank you i
(30:21):
it's such a valid question andsuch an important thing to speak
to i'm i'm super grateful forthat question i agree with you i
think fundament I I think thebreath is fundamental to all
modalities just as it isfundamental to life and I've
seen many people who willaccumulate certificates of study
(30:44):
but still lack the presencethat's required to be alongside
someone that is in difficulty.
You know that the real tool isnot there.
It's not about an accumulationof knowledge alone.
It's the knowledge and theexperience and the presence I
(31:04):
think most important of all isthe presence.
And you cannot be conscious ofyour breath without being
present with what is actuallyhappening right now.
That's the short answer.
That's a subtitle to that isthat we're not just facilitating
breath work.
We're actually facilitatingholistic life and that shows up
(31:27):
as getting opening a session andstarting and stopping at the
other end.
But actually what we'refacilitating is a quality of
presence by offering ourpresence giving someone else a
beacon that gives them hope.
And the people that I trainrange from goodness judges,
lawyers, police officers,psychiatrists, psychotherapists,
(31:49):
brain surgeons, orthopedics allkinds of medical practitioners
from doctors to nurses, prisonofficers, you know, I mean just
just every walk of life everyone of them is making the same
journey to being able to bepresent in the face of challenge
and difficulty because they'reusing their breath.
(32:10):
The journey that I train peopleon honestly like I said earlier
the techniques of breath youknow you can get them in a
one-month workshop or in aweekend workshop you know you
breathe in and out, right?
You hold for three, you exhalefor four.
You know, that that's notreally the essence of what we're
talking about.
(32:30):
I want people to make an innerjourney that is going to prepare
them to really be in a state ofhealing and to demonstrate to
other people that this ispossible.
And what I actually seehappening is that the greatest
challenge that people face intheir life actually becomes the
(32:53):
greatest gift that they canbring to the world.
So I see addicts helping otheraddicts I see cancer survivors
helping other cancer sufferers Isee prisoners helping ex-cons,
helping other prisoners.
I love to sponsor ex-convictsto help people who are in prison
transform their lives.
All of these things are whatreally motivate me but they're
(33:17):
not going to happen unless we doour inner work.
So 50% of our training is basedon the book which is an
introduction to the inner workthat we do.
And I know our time is limitedbut there's I think a really
important message to downloadright now.
First of all healing is a stateof being it's not a process
(33:38):
it's a practice it will alwaysbe there.
We never complete it.
So let's let go of hopes ofonce I'm healed then I'll we're
always healing.
That's why the wounded healeris so functional because we get
to work with our own wounds atthe same time as healing.
And secondly this world ischanging and it's changing so
(34:00):
fast now it's now known asexponentially exponential it's
no longer just exponential likewe've seen in the technological
age.
We're now exiting thetechnological age as a result of
AI knowledge has zero value.
The knowledge is availabledepending on the question you
ask.
Already we're shifting awayfrom a knowledge-based culture
(34:24):
into a question-based culture.
Where is this going to lead?
We've exhausted every materialinvestigation that we can we've
now got created an intelligencethat's thousands of times faster
than we are.
There's no way we'll ever catchup with that or get a saddle or
(34:44):
a bridle on that.
That's just destiny.
That's now happening and as Isay the word happening it's
actually already happened.
It's going so quickly.
So I think the question that weget to ask ourselves is what
role of leadership do we want totake in this post the world,
the aftermath of the chaos andthe conundrum that we live in
(35:09):
today take your position nowbecause and train for that
because you're going to beneeded and we are already the
minority I used to say 1% 9 99%of the world is in trouble and
1% is trying to help them dosomething about it.
I think we're probably up to 2or 3% now.
(35:30):
It's it's amazing it'swonderful to see but let's get
ready because the show is comingon and we need to go out there
and do things about it.
And I do believe it's aboutspirituality.
I do believe that we'veexhausted the material
consciousness and we've reachedits edge and something else is
waiting to happen.
The question is do we want toparticipate?
(35:51):
Do we want to be co-authors inthis transformation that's
happening on the planet rightnow or do we want to be in the
whatever they call it flotsomthat's what it is that that fish
sort of gather as they opentheir mouths.
Are we the flotsom or are wereally going to be co-creators
of what's unfolding today?
Yuli (36:12):
Wow you're channeling my mission so thank you for
expressing it so beautifullythat's how I I feel in my work
and definitely I think a lot ofour listeners too at some point
of our lives um you know we wehave this choice right do we do
we step on the other side andstart helping others and or do
we kind of continue in the umthis earth game I mean we're all
(36:34):
still in the earth game but atleast I love being on the
serving side um or at least Ilike to believe so and I think
breath work is just a beautifulway to serve others very simple
way right at first but now thatyou're unpacking it and help us
understand all the intricaciesand how much uh it takes and
this word presence I think thatyou mentioned it just uh often
(36:57):
taken for granted but it'sactually one of the hardest
things I think to receive todayfrom somebody in this age of
distractions is just fullpresence and um I do agree with
you that's part of the healingwork.
You mentioned your book and umI'm really grateful to have this
another tool of you that peoplecan explore and we're gonna put
(37:20):
in show notes of course for forpeople to get but what and and
I know we're running out of timebut I really want to hear
briefly about your journey intoall of this and how it changed
since discovering Breathwork andthe journey of creating the
book and all this beautifulteachings that that you share
with the world now.
Anthony (37:40):
Thank you.
I I uh it's it's a bit a messyprocess writing this book I've
lived every mistake I had tolive in order to learn enough to
help other people not have tolive those mistakes and live the
pain of those errors.
So I'm certainly no hero.
I I come to this with a longlife of many experiences and
(38:05):
many of them seemed irrelevantas I grew up.
Many of them seemed contraryeven to what I do now.
But I'm grateful for everysingle one of them because
without them I wouldn't havebeen able to see what I see now
and to say what I say now.
And so the message that I'mwanting to share is that and to
(38:27):
save people time with with thisbook is that there's a template
that exists.
There's a hero's journeytemplate that exists but there's
another template that I callthe Miracle Matrix that exists
that we don't notice in life.
It's what the shaman noticeit's what we strive for when we
take plant medicines andmeditate a lot and do a lot of
(38:49):
breath work and this is hereexistent in our world today and
it's a navigable matrix.
It's not like the movie whereit's the blue pill or the red
pill there are still choiceslike that to be made but it's
actually a miracle matrixbecause some wonderful things
can happen and the book is aseries of stories and a
(39:12):
description of what this matrixmight look like for you.
And it's also an introductionto the training that I do which
is this inner journey which Icall the alchemist is this inner
journey that I get people tomake and is separate from the
breathwork training.
We pulled it out of thebreathwork training because
there are so many otherpractitioners of other
(39:33):
modalities that want to do itand it's now become an advanced
facilitation program for doctorsand nurses and psychiatrists
and psychotherapists andeverybody, yoga teachers
everybody because it developsthis sense of presence that we
need to really be a beacon in avery dark night of a human soul
(39:54):
which is kind of where I see theworld at right now.
Yuli (39:57):
Incredible what a journey well again it's just so grateful
to have your wisdom here and aswe are running out of time um I
do hope people check out thebook, check out your um amazing
teachings and I will do so aswell.
Any last parting words ofwisdom for our incredible
audience?
Anthony (40:16):
God I'm all out of wisdom now I I think what I have
is a lot of love for everysingle person who's on this path
and a lot of gratitude to you.
And I also I want to ask you todo something whenever you're in
a public forum in a group or ina class or online or wherever
it may be would you considerending your transmission by
(40:38):
asking people to do a random actof kindness and that's what I
would like to ask you to do asyou close from me is to think
what that might look like foryou as your next act out there
in the world because I feel ifenough of us keep doing this
it's going to make a a lot ofdifference.
So that would be my request.
Yuli (40:59):
Amazing well I love this challenge I take this challenge
although I feel like literally Iwake up every day and I really
my path is my act of kindness tothe world I think working with
healers this is my you knowafter spending decades and kind
of in the more of a traditionalcareer and being tech
entrepreneur and all that thisis my chapter of act of kindness
(41:22):
so I'm gonna challenge you backand say it's not just one act
can we really leave our path ourour life as an act of kindness.
Anthony (41:30):
That's beautiful thank you.
Yuli (41:32):
I love that beautiful thank you so much Anthony so
grateful to have you and um uhagain look forward to staying in
touch and explore more of yourwork thank you.
Thank you
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