Day Christensen - 2 Day with Day 1 - Native Yoga Toddcast

Episode Transcript
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Todd McLaughlin (00:33):
Welcome to Native Yoga Toddcast. So happy
you are here. My goal with thischannel is to bring
inspirational speakers to themic in the field of yoga,
massage bodywork and beyond.
Follow us @nativeyoga, and checkus out at nativeyogacenter.com.
All right, let's begin.

(01:05):
Hi, Welcome to Native YogaToddcast. My name is Todd
McLaughlin, for those of youthat are seasoned guests welcome
back. And if you're new, I'm soexcited to have this opportunity
to introduce to you DayChristensen and I really want to
know what your feelings andthoughts are about this, please

(01:27):
reach out to either me, and orDay. You can email me at
info@Nativeyogacenter.com Checkout Day at her website,

https (01:38):
//day1yoga.com. Also on Instagram and Facebook, you'll
find her at @day1yoga, she's gota YouTube channel as well. Her
website will direct you to herofferings, her online course
offerings or online teaching.
And this was a reallyenlightening conversation
personally for me. And it feelslike it's coming at exactly the

(02:02):
right time. And that is amazinghow this works. You know you,
you need some information tohelp you out. And at the right
time, boom, it lands in yourlap. And I think just being an
sincere seeker, and trustingthat we can be happy and
healthy. Like really trulybelieving that it's possible to

(02:27):
feel a little more connected.
healthier, healthy, and happy.
Like that's a big one, likebelieving that and then actually
cultivating it. And I feel likethis conversation with de feeds
that theory. I'd love to knowwhat you think after you listen.

(02:51):
Alright, let's get started. I'mso excited to have this
opportunity to speak with DayChristensen. Good day. How are
you? How are you?

Day Christensen (03:03):
Yeah, I'm good.
Thank you.

Did I pronounce your last name correctly?

Not totally correctly, but almost correctly.

Can you correct me?

Yeah, it's Christensen

Christensen. I knew that I'm sorry. Thank you.
Where? Where? Are you joining mefrom today?

Um, secret location?

Is it planet Earth? Are you are you
somewhere? Fair enough. Awesome.
And well, I'm really excited tohave this opportunity. I had a
chance to meet you many, manyyears ago when you were teaching
in Miami. And I've beenfollowing you on social media
over the years. And I reallyappreciate how, from my

(03:48):
perspective watching you, I getthe feeling that you don't want
to just be satisfied withmediocre, I get the feeling you
really tried to make yogaauthentic and personal and not
just accept the status quo forwhich you really inspire me. So

(04:09):
I'm just really excited to havethis opportunity. I've been
wanting to reach out to you fora while. And I'm glad that this
day is here on that. Yeah, yeah.
Thank you. On that note, can yougive me a little bit of an idea
about what you are up to thesedays?

Yeah, so basically, I'm exclusively
working online at the moment.
I'm not super opposed to goingback to traveling and doing some
workshops or seminars here andthere. But for the most part,
online is the thing. It's justwhat happened to most of us, I

(04:49):
think, and it was good for me,just because I was traveling a
lot and it was because that wasexhausting, it was getting to
the point where it's gettingexhausting. So this has been a
really nice way for me toconnect with people all over the
world at the same time. So it'sbeen really good.

Cool. Was your switch to online because of
COVID? And or were you alreadyon that trajectory prior to?

Um, it was the thing that kicked me in the butt
to do it. Yeah, I probablywouldn't have. Honestly,

I understand me too. Did you already have a
YouTube channel going?

I did. But truthfully, I neglect my YouTube
channel. I shouldn't, but I do.

Why do you say you shouldn't?

Uh, you know, it's, it's just another
resource. It's just another wayto reach people. And I hear
Yeah, let some of those ideasacross. But yes, I'm a little
bit lazy about about some ofthat stuff.

Do you feel like it's a lot of work? It's
totally a lot of

work. And it's not really my wheelhouse. My
thing is just teaching and be inand, you know, coaching and
helping people get better, andYouTube doesn't quite feel like
that same interaction, you know,it's one step removed. So I'm,
it's harder for me to do it.

Do you mean, you feel like you can connect
with students more via zoomslash? You know, where it's a
live experience where you cansee people through the camera?

Yeah, I, all the people that I work with, are
doing live classes, their groupclasses via zoom, and everybody
that I work with, I try, I triedto get people on the phone, I
tried to call and talk to everysingle person regardless of
location. And I just do it viaWhatsApp. And just to get a

(06:51):
sense of, you know, where peopleare coming from, if they're, if
they're hurt, if they'reinjured, obviously, but also
what their goals are, and whatthey're really interested in.
And, you know, sometimes whatcomes across on my social media
is handstands and jump backs,and some of those vinyasas and

(07:12):
some of that stuff, but that'snot all that I do. Sometimes
people are just feeling lost inin their own yoga practice or
feeling. You know, like,they're, they're not progressing
or they're not happy, or they'renot loving what they're doing
anymore. And I also feel likethat's a good place for me to

(07:35):
step in and say, Hey, you can dothis differently. And obviously,
I just speak from experience.

Yes, cool. I've had the pleasure of being able
to watch your career unfold. Butfor the for you that's
listening. Can or for those thatare listening? Can you give me a
summary and or snapshot of wherewhen you first interacted with
yoga and how you fell in lovewith yoga?

Oh, yeah, I mean, I don't know if I ever
fell in love with you.

It's not it's not the honeymoon, there would
never was a love affair. Andthere was no honeymoon and

no, not not really know what, what my
experience was, was for me kindof a quarter life crisis and
kind of hitting a metaphoricrock bottom, where I was feeling
really disconnected from mybody, really physically unfit,

(08:35):
feeling, unhealthy, feelingunmotivated. And I went from
being in high school to beingmore of a jock, more athletic,
to going into college. And Iwent into art school, which was,
it's not physical. I mean, thereare physical elements of it. But
you know, it's very cerebral.
And I think that, through all ofthat, it actually put me into a

(09:00):
little bit of a emotional mentaldownward spiral, where I was
just feeling really disconnectedand unhappy with where I was.
And so when I graduated, I kindof realized that I wasted a lot
of years doing something thatreally didn't make me happy. And
I just wanted to feel good. Ijust wanted to feel healthy. I

(09:22):
felt beyond the point of beingable to participate in team
sports, which is what I reallyloved. And I became kind of
interested in this idea of chior prana, or energy, or quantum
physics or whatever. I was veryattached to that. That

(09:43):
philosophy and that way ofliving. And so yoga seemed like
the thing versus let's saysomething like Tai Chi. Yoga
seemed like the thing that wasathletic enough that It sort of
filled that void. And thephilosophy portion that I was
kind of interested in, in a moreintellectual way was there. And

(10:06):
so I started doing yoga. BecauseI was really hoping that I would
feel better that I wanted, Ijust wanted to feel better. I
wanted to feel healthy, I wantedto be fit. And I thought, well,
let's dive in this, this isgoing to have to work. No choice
because it was it felt like myonly option.

You know, that's really cool that you said
that I'm listening to HowardStern interview right now with
the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Andthey were, Howard was asking a
question of like, Why do youthink musicians make it versus
those that don't. And theguitarist for the chili peppers
said that he'd heard a theorythat if we were given a pill
that said, if we didn't make it,we wouldn't survive, that we'd

(10:55):
be shocked at how creative wecould become. And the way you
just explained that reminded meof their comment where it feels
like you had a similar type of,I have to do this, like I have
to figure something out, orelse. Or else I don't know what
the other side is, or the otherthe outcome. So that's
interesting, because, obviously,you have to be really passionate

(11:17):
about what you do. You'reobviously really passionate
about what you do to be assuccessful as you are. That's
cool. What was your firstinteraction? Like? What was the
first style of practice that youfall into? What did you
gravitate or what door openedfor you? on that level?

I really had no idea that there was so many
different styles of yoga when Istarted, you know, when I
started doing yoga, social mediawasn't a thing. It didn't exist
other than my space. What yearwas that? So I started in 2004.
And so I really didn't, like Isaid, I really didn't know that

(11:54):
there were so many differentsort of physical takes on what
yoga was, I just thought yoga isyoga, right? So it tried a whole
bunch of different things. Notreally knowing that I was trying
different things, especially inthe beginning. And then the most
accessible. The most availabletype classes that I wound up in

(12:14):
were vinyasa classes. So Istarted taking them and I liked
the fact that they were, youknow, kind of faster paced, and,
you know, it felt like I wasmore physically engaged in those
type of classes than maybe someof the slower what people call
HOFA classes. It's all happened,I guess. But, um, so that's what

(12:36):
I was doing. And then I starteddoing like a work trade at work
study with the yoga studio, thatI was taking classes that so
that I can take, you know, allthe classes for free. And the
only time that really didn'tconflict with my schedule, which
I was working as a painter fulltime, were Sunday morning

(12:57):
classes, or Sunday morningshift. And so I was working that
Sunday morning shift, and therewere only two classes going on,
which was a Mysore class andsort of what I call like a
grandma style, slow flow class.
Yeah. So I would have to go inthe room and check in the
people. And so that was myreally my first experience

(13:18):
seeing what a Mysore room lookedlike. And obviously, it's it's a
stark contrast compared to doinga Vinyasa class with music with
somebody talking all the time.
And one of the things that I sawthat really inspired me was that

(13:38):
people were working on their ownthing. And people were doing
things they were able to sort oftake a specific goal movement,
Asana, whatever it was, andbuild it according to whatever
their level was physically. Andso I was seeing things like
dropbacks that was not exposedto me and vinyasa classes, very,

(14:03):
very rarely. I was saying thingslike scorpions and tiktoks and
handstands. And I was like,there's something to this method
of, you know, having everybodydo the same practice, but
individually doing the you know,so we're all in a room together
doing our own thing. It's thesame thing, but it's our own

(14:24):
thing. We're all at differentlevels. We're all at a different
sort of rung on the ladder. Andthat concept is really nice.
There are obviously problemswith it that I that I felt like
I uncovered the longer I spentin it, but in the beginning the

(14:46):
philosophy the concept seemedreally interesting and seemed
really something that wasprogressive and useful.

Isn't it When you then started practicing that
method as well,

well, I thought probably, you know, not not
correctly thinking, but Ithought that I should
familiarize myself with whatAshtanga was by taking guided
classes first. So I tried a fewguided classes. And truthfully I
thought they were super easy.
And the reason why I thoughtthey were super easy was because

(15:26):
I wasn't doing half of it. Thehalf that I wasn't doing with
were the jump backs and the jumpthroughs I was doing the poses
which I had already gottenmyself to the point of being
fairly flexible. Some of theposes were super weird, you
know, the the length behind thefade that had thing that the
garbage can dossena, Lotusrolling around in the circle

(15:48):
thing I was like. I mean, ifthat's part of the deal, I guess
I'll roll around in a circle,you know, I mean, it didn't the
poses didn't really speak to menecessarily. What spoke to me
was what I saw in the Mysoreroom. So I dabbled a little bit
before I actually kind of jumpedin said, Okay, I'm going to just

(16:10):
try this Mysore thing, whichseemed difficult, because again,
you don't have somebody per seholding your hand.

Yes. Were you in Miami at the time?

No, I'm from Chicago. So I was in I was in
Chicago. Gotcha. Yeah, I hadn'tmoved to Miami yet until I was
probably practicing. I waspracticing about six years
before I moved to Miami.

I'm curious, because you had made mentioned
thus far that you didn't reallyfall in love with yoga, that it
was maybe more you felt youneeded to something needed, you
needed it to help you in someway. At this point, it doesn't
sound like you're extremelyenamored with the Mysore style,

(17:02):
like just at first glance, likeyou were intrigued. But it
wasn't a whole like mindblowing. Whoa, what's going on
today? Am I getting that right?
Or do you agree with me there?

Um, no, it was more of an appreciation of the
method of not having everysingle person in the same room
kind of moving in sync, therewas an appreciation for
everybody moving at their ownpace and doing their own thing
kind of at their own level. Soit was it was an appreciation

(17:35):
more of an intellectualappreciation. And I thought it
was, as I said, it would it was,it seemed to be the thing that
was going to be more productive.

Yeah. It sounds like but you progress pretty far
into the Mysore world becauseyou started to go to Mysore in
India, correct?

Yeah, it was something that I avoided for a
really long time, truthfully wasnot on my list. I wasn't like,
Sign me up. Let me live. Let medrop my life. And take take a
month or two often in, you know,go to India. And by the way,
when you're in in I don't meanto say think about going to

(18:20):
India, go to India, if you wantto go to India, I didn't want to
go. But I went because I was insome ways kind of backed into
it. One, I was getting to apoint where I felt like the
people around me in my localcommunity had taught me all that

(18:41):
they could. And so I felt likeand I wasn't ready necessarily
to teach myself without feeling.
So I was teaching. I wasteaching kind of vinyasa hybrid,
Ashtanga ish classes. But Iwasn't teaching Mysore
regularly. I was subbingsometimes, but I wasn't ready to

(19:03):
take on, let's say, a program.
And so yeah, I just didn't feellike I had learned everything
that I could learn. And when Igot the offer to move to Miami,

(19:23):
it was sort of the requirement.
It was like, if if you want towork here, if you want to
participate in what we havegoing on, you have to go to my
source. I said, Okay, well, Iguess there's no other choice
now. I have to go. So that'swhat I did. Yeah. And that was
fine. I didn't have highexpectations, per se. But that's

(19:44):
what I did

ya. How many times did you go? I went six
times. Wow. That's a solideffort.

It was a pretty solid effort.

I just saw, I mean, it's a big deal to be able
to take a whole month or more totravel, adjust to being in
another country travel back,then pick up where you left off
and have a career and be able topay bills.

Are there and hope that your students are
still there? And yeah, yeah. Allthose things. Yeah, it was a
huge, huge sacrifice. And I washoping that I was going to get
something in return, which Imay. So my first two trips, I
took a month long trips, andthen everything after the last
four trips, were two monthtrips. So it was it was a big

(20:41):
sacrifice, no work, no money.
You know, there wasn't. Therewasn't options for it like that.
Then now I see, you know,probably if I were to continue
doing something like that, youcan still work online and things
like that. But at the time, itwas like you teach in a studio?
Yeah. Yeah, it was leaving thatin hopes that I would get

(21:05):
something in return. Of course,knowledge, you know, more
information more, more attunedto the system, and all those
things. And then the secondthing would be some sort of
accreditation, some sort ofacknowledgement that I've done
the work I've put in the work,because, you know, I went

(21:26):
through college, and I got adegree, so you sort of feel
like, well, that was useless. Itwas for me. So now to do
something that was moremeaningful, and, and be able to
say, look, this is, you know,this is here's my accreditation,
here's what I've accomplished,which could position me to be
more of an authority and say,you know, I'm a person that you

(21:49):
can study with train with, andyou know, it would be worth your
while, because I've put in thistime. Yes. Yeah. So my third
trip, I was authorized to leveltwo authorized and, and I really
saw myself on the path forcertification, but that didn't

(22:09):
happen. Things changed beforethat happened.

Yeah, yeah.
Yeah. That's so interesting daybecause, you know, we went to
Mysore. And prior to going toMysore, we had gotten certified
and Bikram yoga, and how toBikram yoga studio and San
Diego. And had such a, I don'tknow, like, how do I say this,

(22:39):
you know, to watch someone whowas playing the guru role, and
then just really not act in away that felt authentic or like
very caring. And then we couldeven stretch a little further
into like, quite abusive andmean and nasty. And then so when

(23:00):
I went to when we went to India,I was really enamored with the
Mysore experience in similar waythat you when you saw a Mysore
room, you're just like, This isso interesting, what a cool
aspect or concept where you areall these different levels can
be in one place, but I think Igot, I'm gonna say burned. But
from watching the Bikram worldand all of the stuff that went

(23:22):
on in that scene, I justcouldn't subscribe again to
another ladder climbing scenarioagain. So I feel like that first
experience kind of cured mewhich allowed me to go into this
jungle realm. A little moreskeptical is the right word, but
just cautious, I guess. And nowhaving teaching been teaching

(23:45):
for 20 plus years or whatever, II'm very happy and secure just
being like my own person and notreally a part of any
institution, although I reallyappreciate the institutions to
for what the positive thingsthey can offer. Does any of that
seem similar for you and yourtransition from Have you have
you kind of handed over yourauthorization back? Have you

(24:07):
made a formal declaration or

so what happened was when, at the time
that I received theauthorization, of course, it's
not, you know, the way thatpeople make it sound is that
it's some sort of a blessing.
It's not something that you cansort of check the boxes and say,
well, here I've paid my dues.

(24:33):
Now it's time to authorize me.
The way that it's sort ofpresented is that oh, like, if
this guru sees something specialin you, He will just offer it to
you so you can't ask. So thatwas stressful. Because it didn't
seem clear. It didn't seemdefined to me. But um, so I just

(24:56):
kind of inserted myself in frontof shots face as often as I
could to be like, Hey, don'tlike neglect me, like, you know,
for for the good or bad. Youknow, there were some things
that I would do that he reallydidn't like, like doing some
high jumps or some hands downlooking ish vinyasa is in class,

(25:19):
just so he would be like, Hey,don't do it. And I'd be like,
sorry, you know, oops. But I didsort of make myself stick out as
best as I could. Because there'sa sea of people. You know, there
are 200 people. At that time,there's probably more now I
think I'm sure it's more likethree or 400 people that would

(25:40):
be practicing at one time. Sohow do you stand out? You gotta
make yourself stand out. So I'm,I'm probably going off on a
tangent.

No, I'm interested to hear everything
you're saying. So it's not atangent.

Okay, good. So, so anyway, I did, um, you know,
part of the, the unspoken rulesis that you have to make or
maybe it's spoken, I don't know,but that you have to make three
trips. On my third trip. As Isaid, I had been practicing for
six, seven, by the time that Igot authorized, I had already
been practicing for nine years.
So but I, it was only my thirdtrip. So I kind of skipped

(26:25):
authorization level one, I wentto I completed second series,
and boom, I got theauthorization level two. And I
was at a really sticky point,because when you complete second
series, part of the gateway tosecond series into third series,
is doing tic TOCs. Which Ialways say that there's two

(26:51):
different types of people. Andthere are people who tic tock
and there are people whoscorpion and very rarely do they
does someone able is someoneable to do both very well. So I
was definitely on the scorpionside, I can do you know, it's
static, it's controlled, it'sslow. I'm not one for hurling my
body through space, you know, agreat gymnastic Tumblr, I would

(27:15):
not make, you know what I'msaying. So tic TOCs were really
sticky for me really, reallydifficult. And there was a lot
of pressure to I had alreadystarted doing some third series
poses. So there was a lot ofpressure for me to perform, and
to do it consistently. And whenI was practicing in Mysore, you

(27:39):
know, there there that pressurewas known. Schrott would stand
by my mat, every time that I wasdoing my back bends, and I would
sort of feel like oh god, nowthis is my fault, I should not
feel this way should do whateverthe hell I want. But I was I
succumbed to the pressure andstarted doing things much
quicker than I normally would.

(28:01):
And it was kind of the strawthat broke my back, not the
camel's back my back. So Ireally, I really didn't number
doing all these backbends doingthem so quickly and doing them
in such high volume on a dailybasis. And if you've if anybody
has ever been in a nicer room,in that type of experience, one

(28:25):
of the things you hear over andover and over again is catching,
catching, catching. Did he catchDid she catch digit, so
catching, obviously grabbingyour ankles and a backbend, or
your knees or your shins orwhatever was a part of the daily
practice on top of all of this?
And it just, I mean, think aboutit. There's not it's not a
cannot be healthy. There'snothing about that that can be

(28:49):
good for anybody. I don't carehow wonderfully physically
inclined you are, that's goingto take its toll. And and of
course it did. So yeah, I wasmoving through third series, but
feeling quite a lot of pressureto keep up this really strong
back bending thing. And it kindof ruined me. And in combination

(29:14):
with the back bending and notfeeling good and eventually
being in chronic and cripplingpain to all the things that came
out about Pattabhi Jois duringthe whole me to push all the
issues, which I think was trulya distraction was that a lot of

(29:37):
teachers certified andauthorized a like we're getting
their authorizations orcertifications where you vote
for seemingly no reason. And Iwas like, one of my friends who
I'm sure everybody knows wasMark Roberts and I was there for
his certification. Mission and Ithought meeting mark and knowing

(30:01):
Mark, I thought, Wow, what anice guy with a nice, reverent
person mark is. And when he gothis certification, I was like,
Wow, I'm sure he really trulydeserves this. I didn't even
know him that well. And, andthen a few years later to find

(30:21):
that Mark certification wasrevoked more numerous times. And
I thought, well, if a nice guylike Mark can get his
certification revoked, revoked,or, you know, doing a couple
back handsprings on Instagram orwhatever he was doing, that was
non Ashtanga. I thought, Well,I'm not reverend. I'm not that
nice. I'm not that respectable.

(30:46):
I don't I don't love all thisstuff like everybody else. I'm
just here, because I'm sort oflike I'm committed now. And I'm
like, Well, if skylight Mark isgoing to get his, his
certification revoked, who thehell am I I'm just this person
who is, you know, I'mauthorized. I mean, who cares?
You know, I'm going to be theleast Reverend person, the only

(31:07):
thing that saved me was I keptmy mouth shut for so long. And
so I was like, You know what,this is just a ticking time
bomb. It's just a matter oftime. And, and I can't, I can't
do this anymore. I no longerbelieved in it, you know,
especially when I can see allthese people. I mean, postural

(31:27):
issues and pain, back pain, kneeinjury, hip injury, I mean, some
of our quote unquote, greatestsenior Ashtanga teachers all
walking around in pain, andrunning to see the guy who does,
you know, the physical therapy,or the trigger point therapy. I
mean, he he made, I'm sure, youknow, a really nice living off

(31:48):
of all of us yoga students. SoI'm thinking, well, Let's retry
and go back to why this allstarted. And for me, it was
because I wanted to feel good, Ididn't want to feel. So then I
started to realize there's atotal disconnect, I got too
caught up in the game andgetting ahead and trying, you

(32:10):
know, I want to be authorizedand want to be certified. I want
you know, I want to get up theladder, and and do this pose and
do the next pose and do the nextpose. And I want to be the best,
because that's my personality,if I'm going to do something, I
want to be the best. So and thatdoesn't mean better than anybody
else. It just means, you know,more the best for me. I just
wanted to really, really, yes,push it. Yes. It wasn't, it

(32:34):
wasn't the thing, that wasn'tthe direction that I shouldn't
be pushing. So. And I think alot of people do that. And what
I really started to understandwas that, first of all, most
people are not going to have mymentality, when it comes to
yoga, most people are going tohave a job, have a live, do do
yoga in the morning, orwhatever. Because they think

(32:58):
it's going to be the thing thatkeeps them healthy, keeps them
fit, they're not going to be ascommitted or like as psychotic
about it like I was. And so Iwas like, Well, you know, what,
if you only have so much timeyou have a life, you have a job,
you have a family, you haveother things going on yoga isn't
your life, then yoga probablyisn't the thing for you, there's

(33:19):
probably better ways that youcan contribute to your health
and fitness, that does notrequire this 90 minute, two
hour, practice six days a week,you know, doing all these really
deep Yoga Asanas that seem to bemore harmful than beneficial. So
anyway, long story short, whenSchrott had a big falling out

(33:42):
with his family, I think, and hedecided to not go under K p. J,
but go under Shirat yoga, orwhatever it was. And he asked
everybody, all the people whoare authorized and certified to
resubmit, and say, Yes, I'm anauthorized teacher, and I'll put
you up on my new list my Shiratlist and not my patottie Joy's

(34:06):
list or whatever. I just neverdid it. Because as I said, it's
just a matter of time. Yeah, so

Well, there's there's wisdom and seeing, like,
if I don't put some water onthis fuse, there is going to be
an explosion and the explosioncould be bad for you and bad for
other people. Right? It could beI'm not saying it would turn
into violence, but I just meanmore on the level of like, who
knows how that could progress.
And so that's that's a sign ofwisdom day, I think. I mean, I

(34:35):
love hearing your story becauseI feel on the same trajectory.
Yeah, yeah. I'm really curious.
I almost teared up a little bit.
When you started talking aboutthe back my palms were sweating
and I just like Mike had avisceral reaction to talking
about the like the back beenbreaking In the camel's back,

(34:59):
but my back, I'm curious, didyou have any sort of X rays or
MRIs or any interaction withother healthcare professionals
that started to coach you andhelp you to understand some of
these observations that you'vecome into conclusion about?

Yeah, so for the most part, that was also um,
what's, uh, what's a nice way ofputting it unhelpful? Because I
did, I got the X ray, I got theMRI, I went to see
chiropractors, I went to seeacupuncturist. I went to see
massage therapists, I went tosee healers, which is not I

(35:41):
don't know if you can tell frommy personality, but it's not
necessarily my thing. But I wentto see everybody and anybody
physical therapists, like, youknow, anybody who I felt like
could help me with the pain thatI was experiencing. So I spent
tons of money and tons of timeseeking the expertise of the

(36:02):
professionals. Of course, fromthe X ray and the MRI, I could
tell you can see what's wrong.
So what was wrong, according tothe imaging was that I had two
degenerated discs. So thatdegenerated for anybody who's
listening or wondering is beyondthe point of herniation. So some

(36:23):
people say, Oh, I herniated adisc, or I have a bulging disc.
Well, it's beyond that point.
It's to the point where all thespinal fluid is gone. And all we
have left is one vertebra on topof the other. So I was getting
to the point of degeneration andgetting to the point of fusion,

(36:43):
the only point the only reasonwhy those bones didn't calcify
and start to fuse together wasbecause I was so active. So
that's it's sort of a doubleedged sword, I kept moving, I
kept practicing, I kept doingyoga. Of course, I was forced
into modification majorly. But,on the other hand, that all that

(37:10):
tells me is that that wassomething that was ongoing, and
that it didn't really, in otherwords, the degenerated discs, or
the herniated discs weren't thecause of my pain. Because they
had, they had been herniated forso long, that I didn't even know
it until the point when theywere already that the spinal

(37:32):
fluid was gone. So of course,when you get an image, and when
you talk to a doctor orsomething like that, they don't
know, all they can tell you iswhat's wrong. They can't tell
you why it happened. And theycan't tell you what to do about
it. They're there. The solutionis, well, you can take a
painkiller, you can take amuscle relaxer, you can get a

(37:53):
surgery, you can, you know, butthere's nothing to do in terms
of lifestyle, or movement, orwhat what particular things have
contributed to how this hashappened in your body. There's
none of that. So a lot of timeand money, like I said, and I
and I felt like I still had noanswers. I came up dry, I had

(38:16):
some temporary solution. Youknow, sometimes a massage would
feel good. Sometimes I wouldmaybe think I was feeling better
after a chiropractic visit. Butit wasn't sustainable. It wasn't
long lasting. So I started justto say, well, no one's gonna fix
this, but me, I got myself intothis and I'm gonna get myself
out of it. And I started reallydigging deep and experimenting

(38:40):
with movement myself. And thenkind of looking looking more
into postural dysfunctions,looking more into repetitive
movement, injuries and pain. AndI really feel like I came up
with some things that werereally strongly affirmed by my
research in terms of, you know,this is good, this is bad. This

(39:05):
is a healthy way to move. Thisis an unhealthy way to move
because and when I say good,bad, I mean that or functional
or dysfunctional, I mean, thatwhatever movement pattern or
repetitive pattern that youhave, that that that you keep
doing, if it makes you feelgood, it's good. If it makes you
feel bad, it's bad. So that'swhat I mean. It's all based on

(39:28):
feeling, not necessarilyanything else, not necessarily
looking at somebody's X ray orMRI, but saying Does this feel
good? Does this feel right? So?
Yeah, anyway, that's how that'show all that started was. I
started just changing mypractice into doing something
that felt better.

I'm so happy to hear this day, because about
three I've been having reallyserious back pain and it's then
for a few years, and but it'sjust gotten hit a point about
three weeks ago, where I waslike, I've gotta go get this
checked out. And so no disk inbetween L five and S one and a

(40:14):
spunglo thesis on L four. And sothat basically means
backbending. So then I'm gonnalook at these pictures of me
being pulled and me holding myankles and a couple of Toskana
and or like you said, catching,catching, and that pressure to
catch and that like, everythingthat comes with it, like the

(40:35):
adrenaline and the ego thecongratulatory after practice,
like, Whoa, you got to inchhigher up that time than you did
yesterday, or that person thatisn't catching that's jealous,
like, Yeah, and you, you know,you don't want to feed off that.
But like you said, we're kind ofcompetitively orientated

(40:58):
individuals. And, and I agreewith you, 100%, where he said,
I'm, I don't, I want to be thebest, but it's not so much like
better than you, or my neighbor.
It's just our own drive is sointense. So you know, I had a
moment of catharsis where I waslike, What am I going to do? And
but I'm having a similarrealization is what you're

(41:19):
speaking of, as soon as I'mstarting. I mean, there's an
element where like, yeah, thatdisk, I mean, some people will
try to be really positive, butthey call maybe that disco
comeback, or I've seen this growback, or I've seen this happen,
but man, when you're in pain,you're on bone on bone or close
to it. It's so frickin intense.
So and it's like, every movementhas to be so calculated, like,

(41:39):
the way you lean your body whenyou're standing has to be
corrected this way. And you haveto spend 110% of our attention
and time on trying to find theright spot for the spine where
there's not this pressure, andit's just so intense. But quite
honestly, today was one of thebest days I've had in a while.
But I know, you said about,like, and I went to the
chiropractor yesterday. So I waslike, oh, you know, you get this

(42:00):
moment of like, maybe this isit. I'm gonna be okay, right.
And today, I'm in the leastamount of pain that I've been in
for months. And I'm so I'm sohappy. But at the same time,
it's other part in the back ofmy mind is saying, watch out
too. Because tomorrow's a newyou know what I mean? Like,
don't get too excited, which Iknow is a horrible way to
probably come at this. But Iknow that's real. Because every

(42:22):
day, I mean, our bodies justdon't feel great every day. And
like sometimes we do everythingwe possibly can for our bodies,
and it still can have a reallybad day. So I'm super curious.
How long ago was it that you hadthis sort of revelation and that
you started to honor your edgeand not care what your postures
look like at all? And do them100% For you and your health,

(42:44):
and you're feeling good in yourbody? And how is that going on a
day to day basis for you. So Ican get a little insight into
how I can go about this too.

That was it. I wish it happened sooner.

I know I feel the sense of like rebirth that's
coming out of this. Like, I'm sothankful that I had that pain
because I would just keephearing myself if I didn't
actually listen to it finally,or something like that.

Truthfully, it was a very long process of
letting go. It was sort of like,you know, the stages of grieving
of death, whatever those aren't,you know, like anger,
depression, bargaining? Well,maybe if I just take off a
couple days, and then I do this,and then you know, all these

(43:36):
things. Then finally, you know,you get to a point of
acceptance. Well, all of thatprocess of grieving the death of
my Ashtanga practice and mycareer. took years. It took
years. Yeah. And then had, youknow, now having the experience

(43:58):
that I'm having now andunderstanding first of all
patterns of pain. Everybody hasthe same shit. We're all doing
the same shit. And we all havethe same shit. We all have the
same injuries, but it's usuallythe back pain that really is the
the alarm for most people, youknow, okay, hamstring, knee,
shoulder, wrist, elbow, youknow, all things we can kind of

(44:22):
live with without sounding thealarm, so to speak, and saying,
Well, there's something wrong.
But when there's back pain, itfeels so devastating that it
really starts to call intoquestion, the practice our
practices, what are we doing?
What are we doing on a day today basis, that we're devoting

(44:43):
our time, our energy, ourbodies, our money to doing a
practice that's making us feellike this? And that's, you know,
my my whole message is Wake up,wake up, everybody who's do
doing this and who's not feelingphenomenal. It's not worth the

(45:05):
investment. It's not worth thesacrifice. You're literally
sacrificing self for somethingelse outside of you. And so had
I understood that perspective, Iwouldn't quit a long time ago.
And I would have said, No, mefirst. But I was so hooked in
this idea that I have to begreat at this, I have to keep

(45:27):
doing this, I still want to becertified. Being certified means
by the way, going through all ofthird series, well, there's some
real doozy is in third series. Imean, there's some real bullshit
back, Benny, not mention thatyou're still having to do second
series at least once a week. Orif you're still kind of in that

(45:47):
path of doing, you know, secondseries, and then half a third or
whatever it is, which by theway, it was my most miserable
time in life. I was doing secondseries, and then like half of
third before I had been splitinto doing third alone. I was
the most miserable human beingon the planet. It was

(46:09):
exhausting. It was. It was notfun. It took time, my energy
effort. I mean, I didn't have alife outside of that. That was
my life. So in order for me toundo all that had been done, all
that I did, I willinglyparticipated in. took years, it

(46:32):
took years for me to slowly letgo and say this doesn't feel
good. I'm not going to do it.
And then this and then this, andthen this. And then I started
dropping things, you know,little by little, and then
eventually I started adding somethings. Okay, well, I'm gonna
start adding a little bit ofstrength training. I'm gonna
start doing a little bit ofthis, because some of these
things just, they just don'twork. So, yes, that's

Wow. Yeah. Can I know it doesn't the specifics
don't matter. But just more onmy own curiosity. So that I feel
like as a teacher, if I canlearn from you and I can help
somebody who might have the samearea of dysfunction. But do you
mind if I ask what area of yourspine though?

Right, right where you're feeling it. So my
the two degenerated discs are Lfour, l five and l five s?

Yeah. Can you give me some insight to can you
give me insight into some of thebetter rehab exercises slash
things that you've implemented?
Well, first off, Are you in painright now? How when's the last
time you remember being in that?

(47:53):
Just like can't see the light ofday type of discomfort? How long
ago was that? years? years? Wow.
Yes. That's encouraging. Thankyou. Because I remember a couple
of weeks ago, I was just like,what if I'm like this for the
rest of my life, I don't know ifI can do this.

No, that's another big piece of the message
is you do not have to live thisway. People. Currently, all the
Yoga people, I mean, you know,this is for you guys. It's you
do not have to live like this.
It can change this, what youthink is structural damage, you
know, you have damage to yourspine is not the biggest

(48:30):
indicator of pain. I never got asurgery, I still have the
degenerated discs, and I feelfine. It's muscular. So when I
say I went to the chiropractor,and I did do that for a few
rounds, I think I spent like amonth or two months doing weekly
visits to the chiropractor. Butwhat happens when you go to the

(48:54):
chiropractor is that theycorrect the bone, wherever the
joint whatever is going on. Soyou know, you hear you get you
get a little twist in the backcracks or, you know, they do
this and this and crack yourneck and whatever. So they can
correct any sort of misalignmentto your bones. That's fine. But
what is the thing that's missingis what moves bone, muscle and

(49:19):
lose bone. So when you leave achiropractic office, and you've
just been adjusted, most peoplefeel pretty great. They feel
wow, I'm an inch taller. I feelgreat. I feel amazing. Okay, and
then 24 hours, if you're lucky.

(49:39):
48 hours goes by and you feelthe same. It goes right back.
Why does it go back? It goesback because it's muscular.
muscle moves bone. So if youdon't address the muscular
imbalance, then you're going tobe taking a portion of your
paycheck or Whatever howeveryou're earning your money and

(50:02):
your time and devoting it to theguy at the chiropractic office
who's never addressing thesource of the problem, he's
addressing the symptom, thesymptom is that you're out of
luck and you're out of whack.
Right? So you have to addressthe source of the problem, the
source of the problem is alwaysmuscular, and it's a muscle
imbalance. And so, again, to goback to good and bad,

(50:23):
functional, dysfunctional, youhave to understand that there's,
we all have muscle imbalance,it's part of being human, it's
part of being able to move theway that we move. But once you
reach a certain age, your muscleimbalance, let's say that you
have some muscles that arestronger, some muscles that are
weaker. So what most peoplethink happens when you age is

(50:44):
that you just become weaker, mmhmm, everything goes down. But
what really happens is that thatfunctional imbalance grows and
there's a disparity between yourtight strong muscles and your
weaker muscles, it grows, sothat you become your muscle
imbalance essentially becomesdysfunctional. So your postural

(51:07):
muscles, the muscles that areperceived as tight. So what are
tight muscles, what are musclesthat cause you pain or tension,
your trapezius, your low back,hands, everybody has tight
hamstrings, I don't care howflexible you are. So all of your
tight postural muscles areprimarily composed of type one,

(51:32):
postural slow twitch musclefibers, they don't have the same
ability capacity for mass forgrowth. So those muscles always
stay strong. Those musclesalways say tight, it's the
weaker muscles that have thetight to what they call fast

(51:54):
twitch muscle fibers that willdeflate if you don't use them.
And that's where that muscleimbalance grows. So everybody
starts to get that gap is biggerand bigger and bigger as we age,
especially past the age of 25.
And if you learn how to addressthat, if you start to learn what

(52:14):
are your tight postural muscles,and what are your weaker phasic
muscles, if you understand thatrelationship right there, you
can save your body. Nice.
Exactly how you're how you'refeeling. You don't have to live
that way. If you understand howto address that.

Awesome day.
Great info you've been studying,you've been learning so much. I
love it. Through experience,doesn't it feel amazing when you
actually learn it? Because youhave to versus like,
intellectually like, Oh, I'mgonna go to school and study
muscles? Versus like, whoa,what? What do I need to do today
to fix to feel better. So thisis pretty cool. So the people

(52:58):
that you're working withcurrently, so I know this next
question, everyone has adifferent answer for it. And I'm
really curious what yours is.
You have the 19 year old whoseems born to do legs behind the
head slash porn about syndromeand I like a really deep Lotus

(53:20):
slash whatever. And, and theyhave no restriction. They feel
no pain, and they're amped aboutthe heat. They love the fire
like it just the adrenalineeverything's firing doo, doo,
take them into those places andencourage that, or do you use

(53:41):
this sort of elder wisdom vibeto say, Whoa, look at the long
term picture. And prepare,prepare for your future. What do
you what do you think aboutthat?

There's an expiration date on anything that
chases deep flexibility. It's abuy now pay later situation. So
yes, you can go nuts.

Get the credit card.

No, go go. But the bill will come. It will come
and you're not gonna like it. Soat this point in my life, my
teaching my career, I no longerteach yoga asana period. I don't

(54:31):
teach yoga asanas at all. Soanything that looks like a
pretzel is not even on my radaras far as what I'm doing in my
classes. So yeah, I don't Icertainly don't encourage it. I
I've had people I've worked withwho did what I did, are having a

(54:55):
hard time letting go of whatthey know of the practice that
they know and continue. But nowI sort of dip their toe into
what I'm doing. And like I said,I just feel there's an
exploration to it. You know,there's time will tell.

I've been watching some Instagram posts of
people that are in my storecurrently. And I've seen some
people looking you know, whenyou get elated? I don't know if
you've ever been elated. Haveyou? Have you had? Of course?
Yeah. You know, from thepractice, and, and I've been
hearing some people. It's beenlike an up and down thing of

(55:35):
like, I feel it sold and likeunbroken. Yeah. And I guess in
my mind, I'm thinking, Oh, thankGod, I'm not there right now.
Like not to be. But honestly,like, I'm like, Oh, my God, I
just, I just can't even imagine.

Doesn't that sound a lot like a drug?

Being being addicted to like substance,

and feeling elated and feeling broken? From
the same thing? Yeah. Inpractice,

same thing.
Yeah, good observation.

It's an addiction. It's a it's a very
serious addiction. And so whatpeople do is try to replace and
we all have an addictivepersonality, you know, you don't
have to be in AAA or NA oranything like that. This is a
human trait. And we have onenegative behavior that got us

(56:36):
maybe dug us into a hole. Like Isaid, I had my quarter life
crisis, I hit my virtual rockbottom. And I decided to replace
my negative habits with what Iperceived to be positive habits.
And it was just another drug. Itwas another thing that I place
more importance on, then,myself, it took it took over. So

(57:00):
I stopped thinking about do Ifeel good, I didn't feel good. I
didn't want to wake up at fivein the morning. I didn't want to
do two hours of bending andwhatever. I didn't feel good.
But I was doing it because Ifelt like it was going to bring
me some sort of peace, joy,health, fitness, all those

(57:22):
things that I really wanted itto do. Of course, it didn't do.
But I kept doing it. Because itwas like, you know, investment
bias. Yeah, I had the time.
Yeah, I wanted to work.

Oh, I know. I mean, great point. Do you
remember being a kid seeingeither a parent or an elder
somebody's older? And thinking,How come they are so entrenched,

(57:55):
and you'd like to have thiscareer for so long, and they
just couldn't, you know, it'stheir whole life was around it.
But you could kind of watch thatand go, I'm never going to do
that. And then you find yourselfactually doing that. And at some
point, having to have to, like,relearn being willing to try
something totally different.
Does that? Did you ever havethat as a kid of like, kind of

(58:18):
saying to yourself, I'll neverdo that, like watching that. And
then finding yourself in thatpattern? Or? Yeah,

I mean, yeah.

Have you have you? Sorry, I'm just one more
quick question, do. One of thefears about it, to be honest,
one of my fears is, well, whatam I going to do? And so, are
you more successful now? Becauseyou're following your truth? Or
have you had to take a pay cut?
Because you're following yourtruth? I'm more successful.

(58:53):
Yeah. Good to hear. That'spositive to two really positive
messages. You're not in painanymore. I'm sure you have a
field few things, but not like,major major, and you're
successful. So this is awesomeday. This is cool. Thank you.
Yeah, I think the adulation.

I think that for anybody who's looking to be
successful, a huge component tosuccess is that you're enjoying
what you do. And that it'smeaningful. There's purpose.
Yes. So yeah, now that I feellike I'm truly living in my
purpose. Of course, if youbelieve in karma, it's, it comes

(59:42):
back. Right. So that's a hugereason why I'm able to continue
doing what I do, which by theway, I've had many, many a time
where I'm like, you know, I'mjust going to get myself out of
this yoga world and just feltlike Got it, it's toxic. It
doesn't work at all, you know,80 90% of people who are

(01:00:06):
practicing yoga in the fashionthat I was practicing, you know,
the constant six days a week,Ashtanga two hours a day,
people, I can't think of anyonethat's not living with some sort
of pain or injury. So, you know,when you're actually doing

(01:00:28):
something that makes you feelgood. And you put that into the
world that's contagious. Comeback. Yeah, if you're, you know,
putting out into the world, I,you know, I was a really bitchy
person. You know, I have areputation from my olden days of
teaching Ashtanga where I wastough. It was hard. I was, you

(01:00:52):
know, that's because that's whatit was. That's what it was. For
me. That was my experience. Andso that's what I was putting out
there. And I And of course, whatI attracted were people who were
like me, people who neededsomething to fill the void. And
so those are the people I got,yeah, now, putting out hey, I'm

(01:01:13):
putting out a message ofhealing. I'm putting out a
message of strength and puttingout a message of, hey, we can do
better. And so now I'm gettingthe people who are interested in
those things. So it's, it'swhatever whoever you are, is
what you're going to attract.
Yes. So this is a much, muchbetter way to live. For sure.

Todd McLaughlin (01:01:35):
Can you speak a little bit about the healing
process that occurs from feelinglike you have to beat yourself
up to be good? Do you agree withme on that, like is, I mean, I
then so at some point, I'm like,okay, like this, um, let me try
triathlon. Let me try enduranceevents. And all of these types

(01:01:59):
of things are like reallyintense, pushing the body to
like, see if you can get it tobreak to then see how I can
respond to that. And if I cansomehow prove that I'm a beyond
the human body. And bigger thanthat, that that will equal
enlightenment and or selfmastery.

Day Christensen (01:02:22):
I'm pretty sure Well, I'm

pretty sure I want to because everyone I speak
to that's gone down that wholeendurance triathlon world is
just as beat up and broke. Andat some point, look back and go
hole am I doing? What did I do?
Why, what was I doing another

endurance activity? Yeah. So this, this is
another thing that I've sort ofteach in one of my courses,
which is that the enduranceactivities, yoga, marathon
running, triathlons, anythinglike that, that's a repetitive
movement that's done foranything longer than 30 minutes

(01:03:00):
is an endurance activity. Andthat is what they call a low
impact steady state activity. Soit starts to become mindless. So
cycling, endurance, longdistance, swimming, long
distance running, it becomesthis mindless sort of in yoga
becomes that because when youmemorize the sequence, it's just

(01:03:22):
that just this kind of mindless,this pose and this poses. So
there's studies that have beendone. And they were done in the
early 2000s. In Canada, the theMcMaster studies that determined
that these long endurance styleactivities are actually not that

(01:03:45):
great for you, in fact, thatthey're the highest source of
injury and pain, and actually,ill health. So if you look at,
let's say, the muscle massbetween a marathon runner and a
sprinter, what you'll see isthat a marathon runner, as

(01:04:07):
amazing as an athletic feat asit may be, oftentimes the best
marathon runners, if you look uplike the best male and the best
female marathon runner of lastyear, or one of the fastest
times was a Kenyan who did amarathon in like, two hours or
something. I don't know. If youlook at that person, if you were

(01:04:30):
just to look at that personwithout the the tank top without
the number without the shorts,if you were just to look at that
person and say is this a healthyperson, you probably would not
identify that person as healthy.
But if you were to look at asprinter, and you look at their
body, their physique, theirglow, their skin, their muscle

(01:04:51):
mass, and you said is this ahealthy person? Is this a fit
person you would most likelyagain Take off the takeoff, the
gear, take off the, you know,the running shorts and running
shoes, and just look at theirbodies in just normal clothes,
you would identify the Sprinteras being a healthy fit person.
And the reason why is becausewhen we sprint when we do

(01:05:14):
activities at a near all outthreshold, and this can be done
super fast, or it can be donesuper slow, there's two ways of
doing it. What happens is acentral adaptation, meaning that
if you were to look at, let'ssay the muscle mass of a

(01:05:35):
sprinters deltoids, you wouldfind that a sprinter has massive
deltoids, biceps, triceps, well,what the hell does that have to
do with running? Not that much.
When you look at a marathonrunner, there's no arms, right?

(01:05:55):
skinny fat, sort of, not musclemass. So what is determined from
these studies is that there's acentral adaptation. Meaning that
when you run you make your wholebody when you sprint, I should
say you make your whole bodyhealthy, and you have a positive
cardiac effect. Whereas when youjog for a long distance, it

(01:06:18):
actually has a negative impactbecause you lose muscle mass.
Yeah. And you can see that Imean, it's black and white. So
that's the same thing with theyoga. Yeah, we're doing these
long endurance activities thatare actually make making them
skinnier and weaker. Rather thanstrong, robust and healthy.
These people are literally and Iwas one of them, literally

(01:06:40):
breaking down their bodies. Youknow, and the skinnier you are
in yoga, the better because whocan bind push us know when
you're fat or muscular.

Good point. You can't I mean, one one weekend.
Yeah, oh my gosh, day. I want tobe so respectful of your time.
We've I just put my glasses backon. I'm like, Oh, wow, we're
over the hour mark. And I knowyou're probably busy. Am I
holding you up right now?

No, I'm okay.
Right now.

Yeah. Can I ask you one more question? Sure.
Sure. I'm coming into yourclass, Aman zoom. Are you using
the word yoga anymore? Or areyou using a different word to
describe what you teach? Andthen what are you going to ask
me to do? Or what do you whatare you going to encourage or
teach me to do? And I'm guessingalready, like, maybe it's just

(01:07:37):
for half hour? Maybe it's not anhour? Or half an hour classes?
30 minutes, 30 minutes. So canyou paint a picture for me what
I could expect?

Sure. So most of my classes are sort of like
if yoga and CrossFit and had ababy. So combine a what I called
a list in low impact steadystate, remove that add in HIIT,
high intensity intervaltraining, that sort of format

(01:08:13):
with a lot of the CrossFit termsof Imams and reps to Bottas in a
way that is athletic. Handstandtraining is mostly what the
classes that I offer. I alsooffer corrective exercise,
therapeutic classes that dealwith functional strength
training, that are at a muchslower pace, that still do the

(01:08:37):
job of building that phasicmuscle, fast twitch muscle
fiber. But they're done whereanybody can do it. Anybody can
do it scaled up or down, anybodycan do it. So I have kind of a
slow pace class that's morestrength focused. And then I
have these kinds of athletichandstand training classes. That

(01:09:02):
and of course, the intention isfor it to be fun. So that you,
you feel energized, you feellike you're enjoying yourself,
you feel like you're working onthe skill, and it's done in more
of a athletic way, which isreally what my interest was,
when I when I when I left myconservative high school job
days, and when you know, thatthat was the piece that was

(01:09:25):
missing for me was having thatkind of like, you know,
excitement. Yes. Yeah, but Idon't recommend I mean, nobody
would come into one of thoseclasses without being prepped
first, which is where my coursescome in.

Yeah, you mentioned that you'll have
somebody take one of your prerecorded courses first. So does
in those do just kind of givesome of this philosophy to
folks. So hey, don't expect todo things exactly the same way
you've done a different class.
This is the reason why I'm doingwhat I'm doing. And let's have
fun Okay,

so I have the three courses. Number one is the
course I called the four pillarscourse, which would be like for
someone like you and me, who wasdealing with pain. And that is
basically just some of thethings, some of the ideas that I
touched on. And essentially,it's meant to educate and
empower the person, the student,the participant, rather than

(01:10:25):
what I was doing. And what weall do is going to the teacher
going to the doctor, going tothe therapist, going to stop
looking outside of yourself andlearn how to understand your own
body. So that's the wholeintention of the four pillars
course, understanding muscleimbalance, postural dysfunction,
some movement patterns, yourshoulders, your hips, asanas,

(01:10:47):
and quote, unquote, stretching,most people don't know how to
stretch most. And so stretchinghas actually become an unhealthy
thing. And the way most peopledo it is unhealthy. So I talk
about all those things in a waythat you can then start to
approach what was your yogapractice in a completely
different way. Option number twois for somebody who's really

(01:11:11):
interested in handstandtraining. So I have a course on
handstand, the handstand course.
And then the other portion. Theother course is what I call the
more is less course, whichessentially has to do with the
ideas that I talked aboutsprinting versus marathoning. So
that has to do with shorteningyour practice, or shortening

(01:11:31):
your strength training orshorten whatever workouts you're
doing. And understanding whybeing doing a shorter, more
intense exercise is by far morebeneficial than doing a less
intense extra exercise that'sread out through a longer
duration. So I talked about thatin that course.

Cool. Well, I'm gonna check it out. Great. Thank
you. Yeah. Yeah.

Thanks so much, Todd. I really appreciate you
letting let letting me get itall out there.

Oh, man, I was so excited for today. And I had
a feeling that it was going tobe as good as it just was. Thank
you, thank you so much. Thankyou, I'm gonna I'm gonna stay in
touch and keep communicatingwith you because I, I really
appreciate this. And it's reallyinspiring. And I know there's

(01:12:30):
got to be a lot more people thanjust you and I that are in a
very similar boat. Yeah. Andthat there's, you know, still
some really fun times ahead. Sothank you day. I really
appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks so much.

You're welcome.
Thank you. Native yoga podcastis produced by myself. The theme
music is dreamed up by BryceAllen. If you liked this show,
let me know if there's room forimprovement. I want to hear that
too. We are curious to know whatyou think and what you want more
of what I can improve. And ifyou have ideas for future guests

(01:13:08):
or topics, please send us yourthoughts to info at Native yoga
center. You can find us atNative yoga center.com. And hey,
if you did like this episode,share it with your friends, rate
it and review and join us nexttime

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Day Christensen - 2 Day with Day 1

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Day Christensen - 2 Day with Day 1