May 20, 2024 • 25 mins
I have always been in love with stories and the art of storytelling. Like many people though, I was never able to incorporate that love into my career path; until recently, when storytelling evolved from a natural flair to the cornerstone of my career. Venturing through the lush landscapes of Bali, I discovered that breaking away from my comfort zone could reignite inspiration in unimaginable ways. My personal struggles would ultimately become a source of strength and inspiration to others. Witnessing the effect that my story would have on other people would ultimately help me find purpose within the art of storytelling.
The darker chapters of my life would lead to the most significant healings. In this episode I get candid about overcoming childhood trauma, reshaping my social identity, and my battle with Crohn's disease, laying bare my shift towards holistic practices over conventional medication. I get honest about my feelings toward the western approach to "medicine", the negative effects that it had on my health, and my discovery that healing occurs more from lifestyle changes than from medicine. As we conclude with the transformative power of yoga and its role in personal growth, I share a piece of my soul with the recitation of "Almost Broken," a poem that mirrors the resilience within us all. Join me in this intimate exploration of self-discovery and the extraordinary impact of aligning with our true calling.
#BGIR #Motivation #MentalHealth #Discovery #Mindfulness #intentionalliving #Meditation #Yoga #Selfhelp #themotionalhealer #growth #journey #explore #wonder #manifestation #intention #sayyes #yougotthis #choice #yesyoucan #poetry #poeticjourney #poetryinlife #thebrokestguyintheroom
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Welcome back to the Brokest Guy in the Room.
This is Chris Kushnier.
This episode is about giving into your gifts.
A lot of people struggle withthe thing that they're most
natural at.
In my case, for as long as Ican remember, I've had a bit of
the gift of gab Spoken word,poetry, communication,
(00:29):
storytelling.
It's all come so naturally tome and it's something I
absolutely love to do.
It's something that I love todo so much that I could have
never dreamed that it could be asource of income, could be a
source of income.
I love doing it so much andit's so much fun that it was
(00:50):
hard for me to imagine ever thatthis could be something that I
did for a living.
And in this journey coming toBali, I have experienced so many
different opportunities and somany different things to make me
feel, to make me realize thatthis couldn't be further from
the truth, and in fact, I had amassive opportunity to make
(01:10):
things happen for myself in thisspace.
Um, because of the effect thatit has on other people.
Uh, you know, coming here, Itend to get stuck in patterns a
lot.
Uh, you know, I have to.
I am a creature of habit and sowhen I'm at my best self.
You know I'll start my day 6 am.
Lately I've been doing the 30,30, 30, try and get.
(01:33):
This is based on the four hourbody, so I'll try and wake up
within 30 minutes in just 30grams of protein and then follow
that up with 30 minutesintensive cardio, be it the
Bikram Yoga Series or weighttraining or some CrossFit
exercises or a combination ofall the other, and that's
(01:54):
usually the best start to my day.
And then I'll go into mycreative space and I will come
back.
I'll try and write or I'll editcontent if I'm not feeling the
flow, and you know I kind of getin that routine.
Well, a pattern has emergedhere that every time that I kind
of break the routine I'll findmyself going out and almost
(02:17):
every single time there will bean interaction with a human
being who really needed thatinteraction on that day.
And when I do this, it tends tore-spin my wheel and my cycle
starts all over again, of whereI start to feel explosively
inspired and fluid with the penand I start remembering what I
(02:40):
have to offer and that the artof storytelling truly is an art
form and it's one that I excelat and it's one that I've fallen
madly in love with, see beingable to inspire people, to
motivate them, to lift them up.
Uh, by talking about theexperiences I've had, the
hardships I've survived, thetriumphs that I've experienced,
(03:02):
um, the struggles that I'veendured, uh, the things that
have made me stronger, thestruggles that I've endured, the
things that have made mestronger, the things that have
broken me, the things that haverebuilt me.
For years, I would spend a lotof my life wondering why I had
to go through so many of thesethings in such great frequency.
Why do I have to keep beingtested?
Why do I have to keep beingtested?
And, of course, ultimately, yourealize through time that the
(03:23):
reason I have to keep beingtested, why do I have to keep
being tested?
And, of course, ultimately yourealize through time that the
reason I had to keep beingtested is because I was destined
to be strong, I was destined toempower other people, to help
people find inner faith, to showpeople what was possible, what
you can survive, what you canachieve.
And I think the most impactfulthing that I can offer now
(03:46):
through this experience, at thispoint in my life, is the
realization that, if you arewilling to give into your gifts,
you can have the dream lifethat you always wanted.
Perhaps it's something that youwouldn't dare to articulate.
Perhaps it was something thatscares the hell out of you, I
(04:07):
know.
For me, the thought of beingable to live my life, simply
speaking, as my trade is soattractive to me that it's
terrifying to reach for, andit's one that I've constantly
created my own distractions toget in the way of.
(04:28):
For years, I've had peopletelling me well, I mean even
since I was a child, since I was13 years old, you know, when I
was 13, or, I think, when I was14, actually, that was the first
time I had the opportunity totouch thousands of people at
once, and this happened inDisneyland in Anaheim,
california.
First time I got on stage, youknow, it was a few thousand
(04:50):
people in the room and I sharedmy poetry and at the end of it,
all of those people were ontheir feet, most of whom were in
tears, and after that I hadpeople embracing me in every
possible way, telling me theirstories and how it related to
them.
Now, I had no idea this is whatwas going to happen, when I did
(05:11):
something that terrified memore than anything I could have
ever imagined.
And I experienced on that day areward that I've spent the rest
of my life trying to recreate,that I've spent the rest of my
life trying to recreate.
And I can tell you that I havenot been able to do this through
any sort of financiallymotivated thing.
There's no amount of money thatI've ever made that has given
(05:33):
me even the slightest, slightestbit of that satisfaction, not
even close.
And you know I've done well formyself over the years.
But there is nothing that I'veachieved financially that has
ever hold parallel to what I'veachieved emotionally.
In fact, some of my greatestfinancial gains have led to my
(05:57):
worst depressions.
Empty pursuits, you know,because when you acquire that
which you pursue and you realizeit was an empty pursuit, you
realize that all of that effortthat went into it was truly for
nothing.
But nothing is for nothing.
And as you sort of evolve intothis emotional space, you
realize that and it's one of themost important realizations
(06:19):
that a person can have, at leastin my eyes, one of the most
incredible, you know, epiphaniesI've had is learning to have
gratitude for everything thathappens in my life.
When I was younger I wasseverely bullied.
I was heavyset, I was awkward,unsure of myself, and this had a
(06:44):
lot to do with the fact that Iwas the youngest, by a mile, not
just in my own household, buteven of my cousins, and so
everyone in my family, all thepeople that you know, I was
always that younger, fat kidtrying to tag along, and I never
felt cool, I never felt like Ifit in.
In fact, this actually led meto have a lot of abandonment
issues.
Um, you know, because it seemedlike, from the moment that I
(07:10):
showed up, everybody hadsomewhere else to be.
And, of course, as a kid, youstart to internalize that and
you think, well, that must bebecause you know, because I suck
or because, like you know, youstart creating all of these
horrible things and that, noneof which are true, but you know,
they make sense to thecircumstances.
Because, um, well, because theymake sense to the circumstances
(07:30):
I guess there's no other way tosay it and so, you know, I felt
, uh, I spent most of my youth,uh, feeling alone, feeling not
good enough, um, wondering why Iwas put in this position.
Wondering why I was put in thisposition, wondering why, you
know, why did my parents have towait so long to have me?
Why did my brothers have to goto military school?
(07:51):
Why is everyone who I want tobe around far away?
How come nobody wants to hangout with me?
How come everybody's gotsomething better to do?
How come I don't have anythingto do?
And then, as you set intoschool and you realize just how
cruel kids can be, you know, setinto school, kids will be cruel
(08:14):
and I I, uh, you know I gotteased a lot.
Um, there, there was a lot ofthings that made me feel
terrible about myself and, um,what happened as a result?
Well, what happened as a resultwas I started training in karate
and, coming this summer, goinginto seventh grade, I knew I was
going to be able to joinwrestling the next year and I
(08:36):
had been wanting to wrestleforever wrestling and football
mainly because my older brotherswrestled my cousin Willie
wrestled.
Pretty much all the people Ilooked up to and wanted to be
like they were all good on thewrestling mat.
And so, going into that summer,I decided I was going to
transform my body and I didsomething incredible.
I made a pact with myself andI've told this story before in
(08:57):
this podcast, but I made that.
I made a pact that I would notleave my room until every
morning I had done, done 1,000sit-ups, 1,000 push-ups and
1,000 body squats.
I didn't care how long it took,and I did this to exhaustion.
And over the course of thesummer I transformed my body and
(09:18):
going into seventh grade,everyone thought I was a new kid
and my experience in seventhgrade was completely different
than any experience I had hadgoing forward or previously.
Suddenly I was popular.
Suddenly I was attractive.
Suddenly, girls wanted to dateme, and it would be years before
(09:39):
I'd be able to associate thatdirectly with the bullying that
I received.
It would be years before Iwould be able to have gratitude
for all of that, because I neverwould have found the strength
if I didn't need it.
You see, I needed to bechastised in order to realize
(10:01):
what it is to be able to resist,in order to realize what it is
to be able to react Throughoutmy life and you know there's a
lot of people who believe that alot of ailments are
trauma-related.
And one of the things when I wasa kid because I was chubby and
I didn't want to be I used tohold in my stomach all the time,
(10:22):
all the time.
As an adult, I've beendiagnosed with Crohn's disease
and I've struggled with stomachissues my whole life, struggled
with stomach issues my wholelife.
And one of the amazingdiscoveries was that, better
than any medication, certainlybetter than that poison Humira
that they offer as a solutionwhich essentially shuts your
immune system down, certainlybetter than that was life change
(10:43):
style.
See, this is one of the thingsabout Western medicine, is that
you know most, at least in myexperience, most ailments, be
them psychological, physical,most of them can be directly
addressed with lifestyle changes.
But lifestyle changes are hard.
That's the reality, and mostpeople want an easy solution.
(11:04):
And so we turn to a medicineand I use that term very loosely
because I truly do not believethat most of what medicine
Western medicine offers ismedicine.
It's a scapegoat, a bait andswitch.
You know here, take this, it'llget rid of that, but it'll give
(11:24):
you this.
Tell me I'm wrong.
I got into a discussion theother day with my sister because
you know, I spoke about how Ibelieve that antidepressants are
poison, and the reason that Isay this is because, in my
experience and I've beendiagnosed as bipolar I've been
(11:44):
put on all sorts of differentgarbage, and none of it actually
helped me.
What helped me was addressingthe root of the problem, right.
In this case, on thatparticular post.
What I was talking about is howpurpose is the cure for
depression and how, every timethat I've had, you know, a
(12:05):
focused goal that I was workingtowards on a daily basis, there
was no depression.
Depression settled in when Ifelt absent purpose, and so my
belief is that you change yourenvironment, you change your
pattern, and you will find achange that is greater than any
pill that you can offer.
(12:26):
You change your diet, thethings that we consume
physically, mentally they impactour body.
Yeah, big secret, believe it ornot, what you put in your body
affects your body, right?
Simple concept.
Yet, as Americans, we're soprone to put poison in our body
and then wonder why we feel sick, wonder why we're upset,
(12:48):
depressed, wonder why we don'tlook the way we want to look
sick, wonder why we're upset,depressed, wonder why we don't
look the way we want to look.
What I've found, what I wasshocked to find after spending
seven years being poked, proddedand going down the diagnostic
tunnel of discovering that it'sCrohn's disease, which, quite
frankly, I knew from thebeginning.
I knew, since I was 19 yearsold, that what I was suffering
(13:10):
from was Crohn's disease.
However, I needed to be, youknow, poked, prodded for
hundreds of thousands of dollarsso that I can, you know, be
told that this is what I have,and then be offered a medicine,
namely Humira, that wouldultimately cause me to get sick
(13:30):
from everything else.
And finally I said enough'senough.
And it was here in Bali that afew things happened.
You know one?
I discovered yoga and breathwork, and I discovered that so
much of my stomach pain wasdirectly related to improper
(13:51):
breathing.
And one of the things aboutimproper breathing is that when
your body undergoes traumathat's actually how your body
sends the signal that it's goingthrough trauma your breath
pattern changes.
I discovered this in yoga, andso, when you are in a traumatic
situation or in pain, if you'reactually able to regulate your
(14:14):
breath, you'll find remarkablethings start to happen in your
body.
You can reduce your heart rate,you can regulate cramps, you
can redirect energy flow.
If you get really good at it,you can even activate your
pituitary gland, if you getreally good at it.
(14:35):
You can even activate yourpituitary gland Through yoga,
particularly through hot yogaand thermodynamics, heating up
my body to a point at anaccurate point in a day and then
breathing through it would helpall of my systems, all of my
circulatory and regulatorysystems, execute properly.
Then you add into this theremoval of all the toxic foods,
(14:56):
poisons, things that my bodycouldn't have and there's a lot
of them and that also dealt witha very disciplined path of
diagnosing these things, keepinga food journal, actually paying
attention to the effect thatthe things that I put in my body
had on my body directly andimmediately.
All of these things helped meto start to identify and to
(15:18):
improve my circumstances.
The first time that I was awayout of the country for over
three months was the first timethat I went months without
stomach pain, and I can tell youit's happening again here now.
You know, since I've been here,I've started shopping at local
markets, trying to learn thelanguage, cooking all of my food
, eating good, clean, healthyfood, having daily practice of
(15:43):
meditation, daily practice ofexercise, daily dedication to my
craft, and identify the factthat I am working towards a
dream goal of a life that Ispend practicing my greatest
skill, which is storytelling andinspiring, and I've always put
(16:06):
other distractions in place inthe way of this, finding
different businesses, financialpursuits in place in the way of
this, finding differentbusinesses, financial pursuits,
and, ultimately, all I've beendoing really is hiding from the
life that I truly wanted.
And so I'm going to take thismoment, on this episode, to make
(16:28):
a pact and to tell you that,going forward, everything that
I'm doing is going to be to honein this craft and is going to
be to take steps forward towardsgiving into my gifts so that I
can share them at their highestlevel with the people who stand
to benefit from them, and that'sall of you, wonderful people
listening and following andwatching.
All of the support that I'vegained during this journey has
(16:54):
made me better at what I do, andso I want to take a moment to
express my eternal love andgratitude to all of you for that
, and I want to take a moment toexpress the same love and
gratitude to all of the criticsof what I've been doing, because
equally, if not greater, theyhave caused me to retract and to
(17:16):
hone my craft and to get betterand to improve my offerings,
and so thank you.
Going back to the idea of mostillnesses being related to
trauma and this is one of thethings I've come to believe is
that my stomach issues isbecause even as an adult and it
wasn't until I was doing yogathat I identified that I was
(17:37):
constantly sucking in my stomachand not allowing myself to
breathe properly.
You see, if you want to knowhow a human being should breathe
, you just look at a newborn andyou'll see their belly inflate
and deflate, inflate and deflate.
Most adults trap their oxygenin their chest.
They take shallow breaths,subconsciously, they slouch
(17:57):
their shoulders forward, whichcloses your air passage.
They develop poor posture.
Over the years and I can tellyou that myself, I've even
identified that after I have ameal, big or small, my tendency
is immediately to kind of slouchover in my seat and this causes
an immediate production of gasand immediate pain.
(18:19):
And this is something that, asI've started to correct and
become aware of and really focus, particularly after eating, on
sitting up straight, pulling myshoulders back, chest out, and
breathing deeply into my belly,and the pain goes away, the
cramps go away, the productionof gas slows and I feel better.
(18:44):
It's one of the reasons that inBikram Yoga series there's a
constant repetition of focusonly on your breathing.
Focus only on your breathing,because, well, your breathing is
what gets you through.
See, it's very easy in thatmoment to start to really just
(19:10):
focus on trying to pull yourbody, force your body, into a
posture that you're going tohave difficulty getting into,
and most of us know the truth isthat you can't force your body
to do anything because yourbody's going to develop negative
muscle memory, it's going tostart to react, and so every
time you go into that spacewhere you start to try and
execute a posture, theresistance you're going to get
(19:32):
is amplified from your ownmuscles.
Versus if you learn to breatheand relax, breathe and relax and
every time you exhale you'reable to just relax a little bit
further into the posture, asopposed to forcing your body
into it, before long you'll findthat you're able to exhibit a
flexibility you never knew, andfrom that flexibility and the
(19:55):
ability to breathe within thatposition, you truly gain the
benefits of that position.
And through the variouspositions you can do things such
as activate your thyroid gland,slow it down, regulate it,
improve your blood pressure, youcan get rid of things like
tennis elbow, you can relievepressurized gas in the wind,
removing series, you caneliminate back pain, hip pain,
(20:21):
you can increase your mobilityand, in doing so, actively
increase your strength, albeit adifferent kind of strength.
I've been getting the comment alot lately from people that tell
me that I look so skinny.
And you know, truth is Ihaven't really lost a ton of
weight, but my muscle structurehas changed.
My muscles have started toelongate and, as a result, again
(20:43):
, my flexibility has gonethrough the roof.
Every time I think I've kind ofhit as much as my body will
give.
Through the continued practiceof yoga, I find that I'm able to
reach new heights and newplanes and set new goals.
Closing out on thetrauma-related thing, it's
similar to giving into yourgifts when you're able to sort
(21:07):
of identify that a practice thatyou have that's a negative one,
that's associated with a traumaor perhaps an illness, and
you're able to truly get to theroot of it and identify it and
work with it and come to peacewith it.
I promise you you will start tofind relief from it.
There's a great author who Ilove, louise Kay, wrote a book
(21:29):
called Heal your Bodyno-transcript and forgiving the
(21:55):
offender for well, for I'mtrying to find a kind way to say
it, but essentially she was,you know, sexually assaulted by
somebody very close to her inher life and she had to come to
terms with this and was able toactually cure cancer from this.
And if you've never heard ofher, definitely check her out.
(22:17):
She's an incredible author,louise Kay.
I was so, so blessed to findher books and they had such an
impact on me because, ultimately, every time I realized and you
know, it's still to this day noone's perfect, everything's a
path of growth, but even stillto this day, no one's perfect,
Everything's a path of growth,but even still to this day I
find myself in situations thatare tense or where my nerves
(22:37):
start to get the better of me, Ido the same thing.
My breath becomes shallow, mystomach becomes locked and,
before long, anxiety turns intostomach pain, and the moment
that I become aware of it, I'mable to work through it.
But awareness is key, and thattakes time to sit.
It's one of the things that Ilove about meditation.
Meditation will force you intothe present moment to be
(23:01):
completely aware of everythingthat you're feeling and also why
you are feeling it, and that'sa very powerful tool for moving
forward.
Quite frankly, it also hashelped me hone in to always know
what I'm doing and why I'mdoing it.
Many of us seek out in ourpursuits without really taking
(23:22):
the time to think about whywe're doing what we're doing or
how we're going to do it, andthat's one of the true benefits
of the present moment is that itenables you to truly look at
everything that is there for youand against you and to move
accordingly and appropriately.
On that note, I'm going toclose out this episode as I'm
(23:48):
coming into.
Later today we're going to bedoing some workshops, and this
is in the space of manifestation, but I'm going to close out
here on something that I justwrote last night.
It's called Almost Broken.
When I started up this mountain,I saw the world through
different eyes.
I had no thoughts about fatigue.
I focused only on the prize.
(24:10):
Somewhere along the journey, myknees began to shake, my body
lost its strength and my willbegan to break, forcing air into
my lungs.
I tried to stand up straightand in that moment I was certain
that failure was my fate.
As the world began to spin, Ifelt my body hit the ground.
I tried calling out for help,but I couldn't make a sound.
(24:31):
As I lie there contemplatingall the things I'd never do, all
the dreams that I once had,that now never will come true.
I decided that I wasn't done andsomehow I began to rise and
again looked up this mountainwith that same old set of eyes.
I was renewed.
I was reborn with a purpose toinspire all of those who
wouldn't take the climb, so thatI could take them higher.
(24:52):
I was renewed.
I was reborn with a purpose toinspire all of those who
wouldn't take the climb, so thatI could take them higher.
I continued on and reached thetop and I let out such a roar
and released all of my doubts.
They weren't needed anymore,almost broken, until next time.
My friends, this is ChrisKushnier, with endless love and
gratitude.
Namaste.
Welcome back to the Brokest Guy in the Room.
This is Chris Kushnier.
This episode is about giving into your gifts.
A lot of people struggle withthe thing that they're most
natural at.
In my case, for as long as Ican remember, I've had a bit of
the gift of gab Spoken word,poetry, communication,
(00:29):
storytelling.
It's all come so naturally tome and it's something I
absolutely love to do.
It's something that I love todo so much that I could have
never dreamed that it could be asource of income, could be a
source of income.
I love doing it so much andit's so much fun that it was
(00:50):
hard for me to imagine ever thatthis could be something that I
did for a living.
And in this journey coming toBali, I have experienced so many
different opportunities and somany different things to make me
feel, to make me realize thatthis couldn't be further from
the truth, and in fact, I had amassive opportunity to make
(01:10):
things happen for myself in thisspace.
Um, because of the effect thatit has on other people.
Uh, you know, coming here, Itend to get stuck in patterns a
lot.
Uh, you know, I have to.
I am a creature of habit and sowhen I'm at my best self.
You know I'll start my day 6 am.
Lately I've been doing the 30,30, 30, try and get.
(01:33):
This is based on the four hourbody, so I'll try and wake up
within 30 minutes in just 30grams of protein and then follow
that up with 30 minutesintensive cardio, be it the
Bikram Yoga Series or weighttraining or some CrossFit
exercises or a combination ofall the other, and that's
(01:54):
usually the best start to my day.
And then I'll go into mycreative space and I will come
back.
I'll try and write or I'll editcontent if I'm not feeling the
flow, and you know I kind of getin that routine.
Well, a pattern has emergedhere that every time that I kind
of break the routine I'll findmyself going out and almost
(02:17):
every single time there will bean interaction with a human
being who really needed thatinteraction on that day.
And when I do this, it tends tore-spin my wheel and my cycle
starts all over again, of whereI start to feel explosively
inspired and fluid with the penand I start remembering what I
(02:40):
have to offer and that the artof storytelling truly is an art
form and it's one that I excelat and it's one that I've fallen
madly in love with, see beingable to inspire people, to
motivate them, to lift them up.
Uh, by talking about theexperiences I've had, the
hardships I've survived, thetriumphs that I've experienced,
(03:02):
um, the struggles that I'veendured, uh, the things that
have made me stronger, thestruggles that I've endured, the
things that have made mestronger, the things that have
broken me, the things that haverebuilt me.
For years, I would spend a lotof my life wondering why I had
to go through so many of thesethings in such great frequency.
Why do I have to keep beingtested?
Why do I have to keep beingtested?
And, of course, ultimately, yourealize through time that the
(03:23):
reason I have to keep beingtested, why do I have to keep
being tested?
And, of course, ultimately yourealize through time that the
reason I had to keep beingtested is because I was destined
to be strong, I was destined toempower other people, to help
people find inner faith, to showpeople what was possible, what
you can survive, what you canachieve.
And I think the most impactfulthing that I can offer now
(03:46):
through this experience, at thispoint in my life, is the
realization that, if you arewilling to give into your gifts,
you can have the dream lifethat you always wanted.
Perhaps it's something that youwouldn't dare to articulate.
Perhaps it was something thatscares the hell out of you, I
(04:07):
know.
For me, the thought of beingable to live my life, simply
speaking, as my trade is soattractive to me that it's
terrifying to reach for, andit's one that I've constantly
created my own distractions toget in the way of.
(04:28):
For years, I've had peopletelling me well, I mean even
since I was a child, since I was13 years old, you know, when I
was 13, or, I think, when I was14, actually, that was the first
time I had the opportunity totouch thousands of people at
once, and this happened inDisneyland in Anaheim,
california.
First time I got on stage, youknow, it was a few thousand
(04:50):
people in the room and I sharedmy poetry and at the end of it,
all of those people were ontheir feet, most of whom were in
tears, and after that I hadpeople embracing me in every
possible way, telling me theirstories and how it related to
them.
Now, I had no idea this is whatwas going to happen, when I did
(05:11):
something that terrified memore than anything I could have
ever imagined.
And I experienced on that day areward that I've spent the rest
of my life trying to recreate,that I've spent the rest of my
life trying to recreate.
And I can tell you that I havenot been able to do this through
any sort of financiallymotivated thing.
There's no amount of money thatI've ever made that has given
(05:33):
me even the slightest, slightestbit of that satisfaction, not
even close.
And you know I've done well formyself over the years.
But there is nothing that I'veachieved financially that has
ever hold parallel to what I'veachieved emotionally.
In fact, some of my greatestfinancial gains have led to my
(05:57):
worst depressions.
Empty pursuits, you know,because when you acquire that
which you pursue and you realizeit was an empty pursuit, you
realize that all of that effortthat went into it was truly for
nothing.
But nothing is for nothing.
And as you sort of evolve intothis emotional space, you
realize that and it's one of themost important realizations
(06:19):
that a person can have, at leastin my eyes, one of the most
incredible, you know, epiphaniesI've had is learning to have
gratitude for everything thathappens in my life.
When I was younger I wasseverely bullied.
I was heavyset, I was awkward,unsure of myself, and this had a
(06:44):
lot to do with the fact that Iwas the youngest, by a mile, not
just in my own household, buteven of my cousins, and so
everyone in my family, all thepeople that you know, I was
always that younger, fat kidtrying to tag along, and I never
felt cool, I never felt like Ifit in.
In fact, this actually led meto have a lot of abandonment
issues.
Um, you know, because it seemedlike, from the moment that I
(07:10):
showed up, everybody hadsomewhere else to be.
And, of course, as a kid, youstart to internalize that and
you think, well, that must bebecause you know, because I suck
or because, like you know, youstart creating all of these
horrible things and that, noneof which are true, but you know,
they make sense to thecircumstances.
Because, um, well, because theymake sense to the circumstances
(07:30):
I guess there's no other way tosay it and so, you know, I felt
, uh, I spent most of my youth,uh, feeling alone, feeling not
good enough, um, wondering why Iwas put in this position.
Wondering why I was put in thisposition, wondering why, you
know, why did my parents have towait so long to have me?
Why did my brothers have to goto military school?
(07:51):
Why is everyone who I want tobe around far away?
How come nobody wants to hangout with me?
How come everybody's gotsomething better to do?
How come I don't have anythingto do?
And then, as you set intoschool and you realize just how
cruel kids can be, you know, setinto school, kids will be cruel
(08:14):
and I I, uh, you know I gotteased a lot.
Um, there, there was a lot ofthings that made me feel
terrible about myself and, um,what happened as a result?
Well, what happened as a resultwas I started training in karate
and, coming this summer, goinginto seventh grade, I knew I was
going to be able to joinwrestling the next year and I
(08:36):
had been wanting to wrestleforever wrestling and football
mainly because my older brotherswrestled my cousin Willie
wrestled.
Pretty much all the people Ilooked up to and wanted to be
like they were all good on thewrestling mat.
And so, going into that summer,I decided I was going to
transform my body and I didsomething incredible.
I made a pact with myself andI've told this story before in
(08:57):
this podcast, but I made that.
I made a pact that I would notleave my room until every
morning I had done, done 1,000sit-ups, 1,000 push-ups and
1,000 body squats.
I didn't care how long it took,and I did this to exhaustion.
And over the course of thesummer I transformed my body and
(09:18):
going into seventh grade,everyone thought I was a new kid
and my experience in seventhgrade was completely different
than any experience I had hadgoing forward or previously.
Suddenly I was popular.
Suddenly I was attractive.
Suddenly, girls wanted to dateme, and it would be years before
(09:39):
I'd be able to associate thatdirectly with the bullying that
I received.
It would be years before Iwould be able to have gratitude
for all of that, because I neverwould have found the strength
if I didn't need it.
You see, I needed to bechastised in order to realize
(10:01):
what it is to be able to resist,in order to realize what it is
to be able to react Throughoutmy life and you know there's a
lot of people who believe that alot of ailments are
trauma-related.
And one of the things when I wasa kid because I was chubby and
I didn't want to be I used tohold in my stomach all the time,
(10:22):
all the time.
As an adult, I've beendiagnosed with Crohn's disease
and I've struggled with stomachissues my whole life, struggled
with stomach issues my wholelife.
And one of the amazingdiscoveries was that, better
than any medication, certainlybetter than that poison Humira
that they offer as a solutionwhich essentially shuts your
immune system down, certainlybetter than that was life change
(10:43):
style.
See, this is one of the thingsabout Western medicine, is that
you know most, at least in myexperience, most ailments, be
them psychological, physical,most of them can be directly
addressed with lifestyle changes.
But lifestyle changes are hard.
That's the reality, and mostpeople want an easy solution.
(11:04):
And so we turn to a medicineand I use that term very loosely
because I truly do not believethat most of what medicine
Western medicine offers ismedicine.
It's a scapegoat, a bait andswitch.
You know here, take this, it'llget rid of that, but it'll give
(11:24):
you this.
Tell me I'm wrong.
I got into a discussion theother day with my sister because
you know, I spoke about how Ibelieve that antidepressants are
poison, and the reason that Isay this is because, in my
experience and I've beendiagnosed as bipolar I've been
(11:44):
put on all sorts of differentgarbage, and none of it actually
helped me.
What helped me was addressingthe root of the problem, right.
In this case, on thatparticular post.
What I was talking about is howpurpose is the cure for
depression and how, every timethat I've had, you know, a
(12:05):
focused goal that I was workingtowards on a daily basis, there
was no depression.
Depression settled in when Ifelt absent purpose, and so my
belief is that you change yourenvironment, you change your
pattern, and you will find achange that is greater than any
pill that you can offer.
(12:26):
You change your diet, thethings that we consume
physically, mentally they impactour body.
Yeah, big secret, believe it ornot, what you put in your body
affects your body, right?
Simple concept.
Yet, as Americans, we're soprone to put poison in our body
and then wonder why we feel sick, wonder why we're upset,
(12:48):
depressed, wonder why we don'tlook the way we want to look
sick, wonder why we're upset,depressed, wonder why we don't
look the way we want to look.
What I've found, what I wasshocked to find after spending
seven years being poked, proddedand going down the diagnostic
tunnel of discovering that it'sCrohn's disease, which, quite
frankly, I knew from thebeginning.
I knew, since I was 19 yearsold, that what I was suffering
(13:10):
from was Crohn's disease.
However, I needed to be, youknow, poked, prodded for
hundreds of thousands of dollarsso that I can, you know, be
told that this is what I have,and then be offered a medicine,
namely Humira, that wouldultimately cause me to get sick
(13:30):
from everything else.
And finally I said enough'senough.
And it was here in Bali that afew things happened.
You know one?
I discovered yoga and breathwork, and I discovered that so
much of my stomach pain wasdirectly related to improper
(13:51):
breathing.
And one of the things aboutimproper breathing is that when
your body undergoes traumathat's actually how your body
sends the signal that it's goingthrough trauma your breath
pattern changes.
I discovered this in yoga, andso, when you are in a traumatic
situation or in pain, if you'reactually able to regulate your
(14:14):
breath, you'll find remarkablethings start to happen in your
body.
You can reduce your heart rate,you can regulate cramps, you
can redirect energy flow.
If you get really good at it,you can even activate your
pituitary gland, if you getreally good at it.
(14:35):
You can even activate yourpituitary gland Through yoga,
particularly through hot yogaand thermodynamics, heating up
my body to a point at anaccurate point in a day and then
breathing through it would helpall of my systems, all of my
circulatory and regulatorysystems, execute properly.
Then you add into this theremoval of all the toxic foods,
(14:56):
poisons, things that my bodycouldn't have and there's a lot
of them and that also dealt witha very disciplined path of
diagnosing these things, keepinga food journal, actually paying
attention to the effect thatthe things that I put in my body
had on my body directly andimmediately.
All of these things helped meto start to identify and to
(15:18):
improve my circumstances.
The first time that I was awayout of the country for over
three months was the first timethat I went months without
stomach pain, and I can tell youit's happening again here now.
You know, since I've been here,I've started shopping at local
markets, trying to learn thelanguage, cooking all of my food
, eating good, clean, healthyfood, having daily practice of
(15:43):
meditation, daily practice ofexercise, daily dedication to my
craft, and identify the factthat I am working towards a
dream goal of a life that Ispend practicing my greatest
skill, which is storytelling andinspiring, and I've always put
(16:06):
other distractions in place inthe way of this, finding
different businesses, financialpursuits in place in the way of
this, finding differentbusinesses, financial pursuits,
and, ultimately, all I've beendoing really is hiding from the
life that I truly wanted.
And so I'm going to take thismoment, on this episode, to make
(16:28):
a pact and to tell you that,going forward, everything that
I'm doing is going to be to honein this craft and is going to
be to take steps forward towardsgiving into my gifts so that I
can share them at their highestlevel with the people who stand
to benefit from them, and that'sall of you, wonderful people
listening and following andwatching.
All of the support that I'vegained during this journey has
(16:54):
made me better at what I do, andso I want to take a moment to
express my eternal love andgratitude to all of you for that
, and I want to take a moment toexpress the same love and
gratitude to all of the criticsof what I've been doing, because
equally, if not greater, theyhave caused me to retract and to
(17:16):
hone my craft and to get betterand to improve my offerings,
and so thank you.
Going back to the idea of mostillnesses being related to
trauma and this is one of thethings I've come to believe is
that my stomach issues isbecause even as an adult and it
wasn't until I was doing yogathat I identified that I was
(17:37):
constantly sucking in my stomachand not allowing myself to
breathe properly.
You see, if you want to knowhow a human being should breathe
, you just look at a newborn andyou'll see their belly inflate
and deflate, inflate and deflate.
Most adults trap their oxygenin their chest.
They take shallow breaths,subconsciously, they slouch
(17:57):
their shoulders forward, whichcloses your air passage.
They develop poor posture.
Over the years and I can tellyou that myself, I've even
identified that after I have ameal, big or small, my tendency
is immediately to kind of slouchover in my seat and this causes
an immediate production of gasand immediate pain.
(18:19):
And this is something that, asI've started to correct and
become aware of and really focus, particularly after eating, on
sitting up straight, pulling myshoulders back, chest out, and
breathing deeply into my belly,and the pain goes away, the
cramps go away, the productionof gas slows and I feel better.
(18:44):
It's one of the reasons that inBikram Yoga series there's a
constant repetition of focusonly on your breathing.
Focus only on your breathing,because, well, your breathing is
what gets you through.
See, it's very easy in thatmoment to start to really just
(19:10):
focus on trying to pull yourbody, force your body, into a
posture that you're going tohave difficulty getting into,
and most of us know the truth isthat you can't force your body
to do anything because yourbody's going to develop negative
muscle memory, it's going tostart to react, and so every
time you go into that spacewhere you start to try and
execute a posture, theresistance you're going to get
(19:32):
is amplified from your ownmuscles.
Versus if you learn to breatheand relax, breathe and relax and
every time you exhale you'reable to just relax a little bit
further into the posture, asopposed to forcing your body
into it, before long you'll findthat you're able to exhibit a
flexibility you never knew, andfrom that flexibility and the
(19:55):
ability to breathe within thatposition, you truly gain the
benefits of that position.
And through the variouspositions you can do things such
as activate your thyroid gland,slow it down, regulate it,
improve your blood pressure, youcan get rid of things like
tennis elbow, you can relievepressurized gas in the wind,
removing series, you caneliminate back pain, hip pain,
(20:21):
you can increase your mobilityand, in doing so, actively
increase your strength, albeit adifferent kind of strength.
I've been getting the comment alot lately from people that tell
me that I look so skinny.
And you know, truth is Ihaven't really lost a ton of
weight, but my muscle structurehas changed.
My muscles have started toelongate and, as a result, again
(20:43):
, my flexibility has gonethrough the roof.
Every time I think I've kind ofhit as much as my body will
give.
Through the continued practiceof yoga, I find that I'm able to
reach new heights and newplanes and set new goals.
Closing out on thetrauma-related thing, it's
similar to giving into yourgifts when you're able to sort
(21:07):
of identify that a practice thatyou have that's a negative one,
that's associated with a traumaor perhaps an illness, and
you're able to truly get to theroot of it and identify it and
work with it and come to peacewith it.
I promise you you will start tofind relief from it.
There's a great author who Ilove, louise Kay, wrote a book
(21:29):
called Heal your Bodyno-transcript and forgiving the
(21:55):
offender for well, for I'mtrying to find a kind way to say
it, but essentially she was,you know, sexually assaulted by
somebody very close to her inher life and she had to come to
terms with this and was able toactually cure cancer from this.
And if you've never heard ofher, definitely check her out.
(22:17):
She's an incredible author,louise Kay.
I was so, so blessed to findher books and they had such an
impact on me because, ultimately, every time I realized and you
know, it's still to this day noone's perfect, everything's a
path of growth, but even stillto this day, no one's perfect,
Everything's a path of growth,but even still to this day I
find myself in situations thatare tense or where my nerves
(22:37):
start to get the better of me, Ido the same thing.
My breath becomes shallow, mystomach becomes locked and,
before long, anxiety turns intostomach pain, and the moment
that I become aware of it, I'mable to work through it.
But awareness is key, and thattakes time to sit.
It's one of the things that Ilove about meditation.
Meditation will force you intothe present moment to be
(23:01):
completely aware of everythingthat you're feeling and also why
you are feeling it, and that'sa very powerful tool for moving
forward.
Quite frankly, it also hashelped me hone in to always know
what I'm doing and why I'mdoing it.
Many of us seek out in ourpursuits without really taking
(23:22):
the time to think about whywe're doing what we're doing or
how we're going to do it, andthat's one of the true benefits
of the present moment is that itenables you to truly look at
everything that is there for youand against you and to move
accordingly and appropriately.
On that note, I'm going toclose out this episode as I'm
(23:48):
coming into.
Later today we're going to bedoing some workshops, and this
is in the space of manifestation, but I'm going to close out
here on something that I justwrote last night.
It's called Almost Broken.
When I started up this mountain,I saw the world through
different eyes.
I had no thoughts about fatigue.
I focused only on the prize.
(24:10):
Somewhere along the journey, myknees began to shake, my body
lost its strength and my willbegan to break, forcing air into
my lungs.
I tried to stand up straightand in that moment I was certain
that failure was my fate.
As the world began to spin, Ifelt my body hit the ground.
I tried calling out for help,but I couldn't make a sound.
(24:31):
As I lie there contemplatingall the things I'd never do, all
the dreams that I once had,that now never will come true.
I decided that I wasn't done andsomehow I began to rise and
again looked up this mountainwith that same old set of eyes.
I was renewed.
I was reborn with a purpose toinspire all of those who
wouldn't take the climb, so thatI could take them higher.
(24:52):
I was renewed.
I was reborn with a purpose toinspire all of those who
wouldn't take the climb, so thatI could take them higher.
I continued on and reached thetop and I let out such a roar
and released all of my doubts.
They weren't needed anymore,almost broken, until next time.
My friends, this is ChrisKushnier, with endless love and
gratitude.
Namaste.
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