April 29, 2024 • 31 mins
Emotions hold power over our ability to manifest the life we desire. In this heartfelt episode, I peel back the layers of my own struggles with Crohn's disease and anemia, sharing how the alignment of intention, exercise, and meditation has been crucial in not letting these challenges dictate my existence. My narrative is enriched by the insights of a shamanic healer whose wisdom on intention has profoundly influenced my perspective. Together, we navigate the complexities of the coaching industry, affirming my resolve to offer you this self-funded podcast, packed with valuable insights devoid of any price tag, because sometimes the universe has an uncanny way of presenting the right tools when our intentions are pure and focused.
The journey continues with an exploration of the emotional landscape, starting with a transformative workshop me to reclaim my voice. From anger and depression to assertiveness and self-expression, discover how embracing my emotional spectrum reshaped my world view and led me back to my passion for poetry, breathing new life into my social media presence. The episode culminates with a recount of my personal transformation at Soham Wellness Center, where I emerged with a new mission to heal and educate. As I unveil my ten-year vision intertwining hospitality with social empowerment, I also reflect on the implications of a potential TikTok ban on my message's reach. Join me for a compelling exploration into emotional intelligence, self-love, and the profound gratitude that arises when we confront and harness our emotions.
#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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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Welcome back to the Broke Sky in the Room.
This is your host, chrisKushnier.
This episode is entitled Havinga Relationship with your
Emotions.
Today was a really interestingday for me.
I started today waking upfeeling uninspired, unmotivated.
(00:25):
I struggle with this a lot.
I struggle with this a lot.
When I'm feeling inspired andmotivated, my creativity flows
and I'm able to write poetry anddo things that help other
people lift up, and when it goesaway, it can be so hard for me
(00:47):
to find it again.
You know, usually I have tolook in all the places that I
didn't, that I don't want tolook, for lack of a better way
to say it.
You know, there's a phrase thatI live by it's one of the many,
many things that I havetattooed on my arms here and
it's that all good things areborn of discomfort.
What that means to me is thatyou have to look for the
(01:12):
uncomfortable situations,because the uncomfortable
situations provide theopportunities to grow, and
that's most certainly been thecase with me.
So as I was feeling this waythis morning, I really tried to
lean into it.
You know my stomach was hurtingthose of you who are just
(01:35):
tuning in.
So I live with Crohn's disease,and Crohn's disease and anemia,
and this is kind of the bigbattle of my life, and one of
the things that I've learnedabout Crohn's disease is that it
really behaves a bit like abully.
At least in my case, I can'tspeak to other people with the
disease, but for me, when I giveinto it and I let it immobilize
(02:00):
me, it amplifies.
It doesn't help.
Laying down and resting is notthe answer for me.
Usually I have to do somethingto get my endorphins flowing and
my blood flowing.
I have to go work out, I haveto go do yoga, or I have to sit
in meditation and really, reallyfocus on my breath work to help
(02:22):
get things moving.
Well.
Well, today I did just that andit's difficult as it was to do.
I went to one of my favoritegyms here in in Bali brothers
gym, bati belong in Canggu, andI got a really great workout in.
You know, I was feeling goodand had a feeling I was going to
(02:46):
get inspired Now, around thistime, a friend of mine here who
I've spoken about in the pasthis name is Sebastian.
Sebastian is a shamanic healerand transformative coach.
I met him during the secondYoga Effects hot yoga teacher
(03:07):
training that I attended and hewas actually the reason that I
stayed for another month, muchto you know, creating many
challenges in my life back home.
He offered to apprentice me onmanifestation techniques, and
(03:28):
what he taught me I thenimplemented and used.
And after the firstmanifestation ceremony, tied to
the full moon here, slowly butsurely, all of the things that I
desired, all of the things thatI was hoping to accomplish,
started to happen in greatsuccession.
They started to materialize sofast that it was alarming even
(03:49):
to the people around me, to thepoint that people started
telling me to shut up.
They literally started tellingme that they were afraid of what
I was going to say because theyknew it was going to happen.
And Sebastian and I have hadcyclical challenges that have
kind of made it difficult for usto reconnect.
So I hadn't heard from him in abit and randomly today he
(04:11):
messages me and he says, hey,I'm going to this workshop today
at Cafe Coach here in Bali, andimmediately my hairs go up.
I've got a bit of a thing withcoaches, coaches, therapists, a
lot of people who are out thereto help other people.
(04:33):
Well, to find the good ones.
It's like a needle in ahaystack.
It's a very easy field to getinto.
People can go take a quickclass and get certified and all
of a sudden they're a coach.
You know business coach, lifecoach, and what I've found from
so many of them is that, youknow, the business coaches have
(04:54):
never really ran a business,they've never started one,
they've never created one, theytook a course and now they're
teaching it.
It falls in the line of thosewho can't do coach or those who
can't do teach, right and samewith life coaches.
Most of the life coaches thatI've met, you know, when I take
a closer look at their life,their life is in shambles and
(05:19):
yet they're willing to takemoney from other people to give
them advice on how to fix theirs.
And so I've always had thisfundamental sort of issue, and
it's a reason that that Ihaven't become a coach or that I
haven't offered my services,because I didn't, I didn't want
to be associated with that, youknow.
And so, for that reason, thispodcast and everything I've done
thus forward has been 100%self-funded and has been in
(05:42):
offering nothing more than that,a simple offering for those of,
for those out there who need it, who can gain something from it
.
It's free across the board, andI look to do as much as I can
to keep it that way.
It's not easy.
It's not easy.
Certainly, keeping this all uphas been a challenge, and
learning how to do it and fundit all it's been a challenge.
(06:04):
Keeping this all up has been achallenge, and learning how to
do it and fund it all it's beena challenge, but somehow the
things that I need to make ithappen always seem to show up in
my way.
Fortunately, I've been shownhow to be aware of that.
I've been taught to relish thepresent moment and to really,
you know, sort of expect thatthose solutions would show up
(06:33):
when I have clear intention andclear purpose and when I'm aware
of what I am trying to do andwhy I'm trying to do it.
As long as I am aware of whatI'm trying to do and why I'm
trying to do it, I'm able torecognize when the tools that I
need are going to show up infront of me.
At this point, I expect them toshow up in front of me, and so
(06:54):
it's very easy for me torecognize them right away.
Anyway, so this workshop, hetells me, is about finding your
voice right Now.
This is a particularlyinteresting topic for a guy who,
in the past three weeks, usedhis voice and was received to a
viral extent on TikTok.
Right, the poetry that I write.
I had been using to createpromotional videos for TikTok,
(07:19):
and they were edited videos withB-roll footage and my voice
over the background.
And the change that I made thatcaused this explosion was that
I got on camera.
I decided to, you know, forgetall the b-roll, forget all the
editing, uh, to let you see meand see the emotion behind it,
the person behind it.
And I just read and, videoafter video after video, uh has
(07:41):
been, you know, receivingthousands to hundreds, to tens
of thousands, to hundreds ofthousands of views, and so thank
you all for the support, thankyou all for following.
It gives me the fuel to keepdoing what I'm doing, and so, if
you're watching this, if you'relistening to this, please do
show your support.
If you really take somethingfrom it, I'm going to start
(08:03):
offering some subscriptions andsome other things, some other
exclusive content, to helpcreate some revenue, to help
keep me doing what I'm doing.
But I digress.
So the workshop was entitledFinding your Voice and I got a
look here.
The woman that was holding it.
(08:25):
Her was uh nuna and uh, let'ssee her.
Her instagram is nuna dot mindbody me, uh, and you know I
didn't know anything about her.
Um, nuna, come, come, howie andnuna.
Forgive me if I butchered yourname, but I looked to have her
(08:46):
on an episode.
I actually just asked her, andshe's graciously agreed, to come
on with me and be a part ofthis as well.
And so, finding your voiceright this is something that
I've done.
I've found my voice, and from anearly age I was very gifted
with poetry and found that itwasn't difficult for me to
(09:08):
express my voice.
But in my journey I used tolive in sort of resentment of my
own emotions.
I often felt that if I allowedmy emotions to be present in my
decision-making process or toinfluence my communications or
anything like that, that theresult would be counterintuitive
(09:29):
to or counteractive to what Iwas trying to accomplish.
And I used to actually say oneof the phrases that I used to
live by was that any decisioninfluenced by an extreme emotion
, good or bad, would be a baddecision.
An extreme emotion, good or bad, would be a bad decision.
Over the course of mytransformation and you know, at
37 years old I came to Bali andI went through a massive
(09:52):
transformation, both mind, body,soul, inside and outside.
I transformed.
It's one of the reasons that onmy arm here I have tattooed
born at 37, because at 37 yearsold I truly became a different
human being inside and out.
And a big part of that processand I hadn't really realized
(10:14):
just how big a part of thatprocess until this workshop that
I went to Learning to controlmy emotions was, or rather I
shouldn't say control, learningto listen to my emotions was, or
rather I shouldn't say control,learning to listen to my
emotions right.
What I started to realize wasthat it wasn't the emotions that
were driving me wrong.
It was my own reaction to myown emotions.
(10:38):
It was that I was reacting tosomething that I wasn't
understanding.
I was reacting to somethingthat I wasn't understanding.
See now, on the flip side of it, a couple years later now I
realize that my emotions are thebiggest asset that I have and
it's critical that I understandthem before I judge and react to
(10:59):
them.
And so now I've started to useand listen to my emotions to the
extent that they are behindevery decision that I make, but
first, before I can react tothem, I have to understand where
they're coming from.
Just like when you have adifficult conversation with
another human being, if youdon't understand what they're
(11:20):
actually saying and you startreacting to it based on what you
think they're saying, theoutcome of that conversation can
be way far off from what youhad intended and what you had
hoped.
Right Now, I wonder how many ofyou struggle with this, how
many of you feel misled orbetrayed by your own emotions?
(11:48):
An interesting thing that alsocame up in this see, I've
struggled with anger, anger anddepression.
Anger and depression and I knowa lot of you out there
listening struggle with this ona daily basis.
Anger and depression are very,very real challenges.
You know they are tough and, um, for me, learning to control my
(12:12):
anger, um, even grew into as Istarted to understand my
emotions, learning to fear myanger, uh, and learning to um.
Well, I realized I was beingparalyzed by it.
See, one of the things in mylife the effect that I've
(12:33):
started to learn that I have onother human beings is a very
interesting effect.
People who get close to me very, very badly want to please me,
and when they feel they've letme down or I'm unhappy with what
they've done for me, the effecton them can be catastrophic, so
(12:55):
much so that I've learned torun away.
I run away, no-transcript.
(13:39):
And so this is a challenge,right, because it's an unhealthy
behavior.
Everybody gets angry, everybodyhas all the emotions, and to
think for a second that youwouldn't be allowed to have
these emotions is a problem.
It's no way to live.
So what do you do with that?
(14:01):
You know, as a result of beingangry, people can be passive,
they can be passive-aggressive,they can be aggressive or they
can be assertive.
Uh, and that was one of thetopics that she covered in this
workshop, and I started reallysitting with it and really
thinking about just how, how myown anger, or rather the fear of
(14:27):
people's effects of it, canparalyze me.
And this is interesting on somany levels because, like she
asked the question, when's thelast time you got angry?
And since I've gotten here, youknow we've got this construction
project going on.
We're building a vacationrental as proof of concept for a
real estate management companyhere, and construction is well
(14:49):
behind.
It was supposed to be completedwhen I first arrived in January
and it's still not completed.
It's March 14th and I've nowhad to extend my stay here
another month, even over anothermonth, in order to see it
through.
And you know, one of the thingsI've learned is that when
you're starting a business,especially starting in an
(15:11):
international business uh, youhave to be ready for things not
to go according to plan.
And another thing that I'velearned given that all things
happen for a reason, is thatwhen that happens, you know when
what you're looking at doesn'tlook how you want it.
Sometimes that's a message foryou to look somewhere else.
And I can tell you that had Inot stayed, I wouldn't have
(15:34):
found the inspiration that I had, I wouldn't have started
writing again, I wouldn't havepicked this microphone back up
to start this podcast again, andI wouldn't have taken a chance
to read my poetry on TikTok, andI wouldn't have reached over a
million people in the past threeweeks.
I was just adding up thenumbers the other day, and just
(15:55):
from my poetry videos alone,just from TikTok, over a million
people have watched them inless than three weeks, and
leading into that there was anentire year of weekly efforts.
That didn't even scratch thesurface of a number like that.
I didn't even scratch thesurface of a number like that.
I don't even think thecumulative views would have been
10,000.
(16:16):
All that happened as a result ofmy disappointment.
All that happened as a resultof me having to do something I
didn't want to do, and I justfind that remarkable.
So she asked when's the lasttime you got, you know, angry?
And I realized that I was angrythat the construction wasn't
happening as it was supposed to,but it wasn't really anger.
(16:38):
What it was was disappointment,and it wasn't even as much the
disappointment in them.
It was the disappointment thatI had to then pay forward, see,
because I couldn't go back home,I couldn't be attentive to my
wife, to my businesses, to myproperties, to my dogs, my pets,
my ferrets, my fish, my dogs,to all these things that I love.
(17:00):
I knew that, because these guyswere disappointing me, I was
then going to have to disappointother people, and that made me
angry.
Disappoint other people, andthat made me angry.
And so I had to sit with that.
And that's when I startedrealizing that, had these delays
not happened, I would havenever found this inspiration and
(17:22):
I would have never been able toarticulate myself and express
myself through this poetry toreach all of you.
And so, as I said at thebeginning of this episode, all
good things are born ofdiscomfort.
That phrase really has become akey pillar in my life, in the
way that I move about, thedecisions that I make, the
(17:44):
things that I do.
And prior the Chris of the past,I would have suppressed those
emotions, I wouldn't havelistened to him, I would have
simply probably reacted to them,and that reaction would have
yielded negative results,certainly results that were
(18:06):
contrary to what I was trying toaccomplish, see, at this point,
resulting from thetransformation that I went
through, coming here a broken,beaten and angry, humiliated
human being, and throughlearning my emotions, what was
really behind them and, in doingso, finding a way to love
(18:31):
myself and, in doing so, reallyrediscovering what my true self
was.
I then started to realize howto communicate both my needs and
my abilities and understand myabilities and recognize them and
start to recognize the effectthey were having on other people
.
And, before long, I was nolonger restricting my offerings,
(18:54):
I was simply giving into them,and the healing effect that they
were having on the people I wastrying to motivate and empower
was like nothing I'd ever donebefore.
And I realized that, you know,poetry.
Poetry wasn't even the big giftthat I was born with.
I was born with the ability toconvey how I'm feeling, so so
(19:18):
drastically that it actually isinfectious.
See when, when I'm feeling likethe light, I can go up and I
can light the darkest rooms onthis planet, and when I'm
feeling like the darkness, I canhave the same effect on the
brightest rooms on the planet.
Well, sitting with that andunderstanding that became
(19:38):
critical.
It goes back to why I run away,even to this day, when I'm
feeling an overwhelming emotionof anger, because that's not
what I want to convey.
See, the last thing I want todo is make somebody else on this
planet feel angry, feel small,small, feel weak, feel broken.
I have dedicated my life to theperpetual practice of the
(20:01):
opposite.
I will lift up every humanbeing I come into contact with
if it kills me, because when youfind a purpose in your life, it
is not something to toy with,it is not something to ignore,
it is an obligation.
You know, there's a line in aNick D song that touched me,
(20:22):
that I reference all the time,and it's purpose is greater than
pleasure, and that resonateswith me to no extent, because
one of the grand epiphanies thatI've had about life is that the
cure for depression is purpose.
I have yet to find something todisprove this.
(20:43):
I have yet to encounter a humanbeing that has purpose driven,
who is suffering from depressionbecause there's no time for it.
When you're working towardssomething, it's exciting, it's
empowering, it's uplifting.
I know that when I start toreally struggle with depression,
(21:04):
it's because I don't have apurpose.
At that time, there's nothingthat I'm, there's no objective
for me to accomplish, and soidle hands become the devil's
tools and there I sit and startto slowly self-destruct.
I start to slowly make baddecisions or things that are in
no way going to help me findpurpose or become a better man
(21:25):
or be a better human being, orgo out there and impact somebody
.
Right, what a game change.
What a game change.
Right, what a game change.
What a game change.
In my case in particular and weall have demons but I have been
(21:46):
able to learn how to usenutrition and wellness practices
and fitness practices tocontrol my Crohn's disease.
Crohn's disease, for those ofyou who don't know, is an
inflammatory disorder.
It's an autoimmune inflammatorydisorder of the intestine and
(22:07):
the colon.
It behaves very much likerheumatoid arthritis,
fibromyalgia and a number ofother of these conditions, and
the issue with this is that whatWestern medicine offers as a
solution to this is animmunosuppressant Notably Humira
(22:28):
is the one that I was on whichis what they call a biologic,
and it's something that activelyshuts down your immune system.
And so, as you might havementioned this very expensive
drug, when I started taking it,I started to become dependent on
other drugs because I wasconstantly getting sick and,
over the course of a few years,this grew to be absolutely
(22:52):
debilitating.
The first month of the pandemic,depression settled in.
I had one of the worst Crohn'sslayers I've ever had in my life
.
It lasted an entire month and Idid everything to make it worse
by feeding it with alcoholbecause I was depressed.
I was on the couch and, slowlybut surely, I just started
drinking every day to try andknock myself out, to get through
(23:14):
it, not to snap out of it, tosurvive it, and that's a
critical distinction.
You know I was being driven byemotions I didn't understand and
reacting to them and having anoutcome that certainly was not
one that I would desire orbenefit from in any way.
Well, the next time I stepped onthe scale, and you know I live
(23:36):
and die by fitness.
You know I used to be 220pounds and the next time I
stepped on the scale I was 180pounds and an alarm went off and
suddenly that was the wake upcall that I needed.
That was my own personal rockbottom of my wellness journey
and I started to look for achange because I realized that I
was going to die, if not for myphysical conditions, for my
(23:59):
emotional conditions, because Iwas falling apart and I needed
to find a way to break the cycle.
Thankfully, you know, and itwould be, it would be the result
of an ad I saw on Instagram fora week of partying in Bali, and
I would decide that I was goingto just go, you know, run away
(24:22):
to Bali, as if partying was thesolution.
Yeah, well, three days in, mydisease took over again and I
had to find a different route,and so I ended up at Soham
Wellness Center.
And you, that was the first in along series of events that led
to me completely transforming mymind, body and soul, through
yoga, through writing, throughbreath work, through various
(24:45):
different healing techniquescranial energy healings and
chakra cleansings or auracleansings and chakra balancings
and all of these differentthings that started to transform
me as a human being, from thebroken, angry, bitter, wounded
animal that came here to thehealer that stands before you,
(25:06):
and it's been an incrediblejourney, I can tell you.
Somebody said to me when Ifirst got here that Bali's where
the world's broken things go toheal, and that was certainly
the case for me.
And now I've repurposed my lifeto help lift other people up.
It's why I'm chasing this dreamof having an educational
program here that would offerfree English and environmental
(25:28):
awareness lessons to kids bytrading free stays.
So the villas are a part ofthat.
Once I've got enough rooms,I'll be able to offer a free
trip to paradise.
Right, come stay for a month.
Catch is, you're going to teachEnglish to kids and teach kids
about environmental awarenessfor a few hours a day.
So that's my 10 year plan.
That's what I'm working towards, that's what all these efforts
(25:49):
are going to.
Along those lines, I'm going totake a quick second to thank
TikTok, because TikTok becamethe gasoline that lit this fire,
that really helped get mymessage out to millions of
people, and right now there's abill in Congress to ban TikTok
and I just want to put out thereto anyone who's you know,
(26:13):
benefited from it.
Um, because there's a lot ofinformation on tiktok and it
behaves how you use it.
You know, I've heard people saythings like tiktok is just this
.
Tiktok is just that.
Tiktok feeds you what you lookfor, and so what your tiktok
feed is a reflection of, of yourdesires and what you've looked
for.
Uh, and that that's the simpletruth of the algorithm.
(26:34):
So, you know, be weary ofmaking the ignorant statement
that TikTok is this, because itcertainly exhibits what you are
and your limited understandingof it.
But I for one, am in completesupport of TikTok.
I think banning it would be acrime.
And so, you know, I encourageanyone listening to call your
(26:56):
representative at Congress andlet them know how you feel and
let them know that you standwith it as well, if we have your
support Along those lines.
Getting back to you know my ownstruggle with emotions, and the
epiphany was that my emotionsweren't the problem.
My problem was that I wasn'tunderstanding my own emotions
(27:20):
and I was reacting to them, andthe message that I was putting
out was not my real truth, itwas not coming from the real me,
it was coming from a distorted,manipulated version that was
reacting to emotions they didn'tunderstand, that was reacting
to an environment that wasdifferent than the one perceived
(27:40):
.
I was reacting to myperceptions, not to my reality,
and that caused me to haveresults in my life that weren't
what I wanted.
And the moment that I flippedthat perspective see, my life
didn't change.
My perspective did.
But with that change ofperspective I was able to change
my life and in a span of twoyears, I went from a man who was
(28:04):
suicidal to a man who is livinga life that you couldn't even
dream of.
My life is amazing now, and Ihave more love for myself than I
could have ever dreamed.
And to think I came so close tonot knowing what it feels like
to wear this skin.
I have my emotions to thank forthat and I have my awareness of
(28:29):
my true self to thank for thatand the transformation I went
through, and everybody andeverything that was a part of it
.
So thank you, and that includesmy loved ones, my enemies, just
the same, everyone who's takenadvantage of me, everyone who's
helped me, everything that wasin my way and everything that
opened the door to give me way.
All of it played an equal partand had any one of those things
(28:51):
changed, I wouldn't be heretoday.
So a moment of gratitude forall of those things changed, I
wouldn't be here today.
So a moment of gratitude forall of those things.
With that, I'm going to closeout this episode with something
I just wrote and I will be backfor more on this topic.
You know, as I said, I look tohave some interviews and future
guests, because this is a bigone.
This is a hell of an onion andthere's many layers to it to
(29:13):
unpeel.
I used to think that my emotionsbetrayed all my desires.
Trying to solve my problemsfelt more like starting fires.
As a result, I tried to pushthem back and go numb to their
effect, but then my truest selfbegan to suffer from neglect,
feeling damned by every outcome.
(29:34):
I had to find a better way.
So I sat with my emotions tohear what they had to say.
What they told me made merealize all that I'd
misunderstood.
Suddenly, the feelings that Ithought were bad revealed that
they were good.
I had to learn how they reactedto what I was feeding them.
(29:54):
They were not the enemy, butrather my truest friend.
Now I listen when they speak sothat I can understand that they
are simply guiding me to becomea better man.
Emotions.
That's all for this week, guys.
Again, just thank you.
(30:15):
Thank you all for listening.
Thank you for your massive showof support.
A couple quick announcements Iam going to be putting out some
T-shirts that are going tofeature some quotes from my
inspirational poetry, with thetag the Emotional Healer on the
back, hashtag BGIR on the frontand a QR code on the bottom to
take you to all the social, andso those will be available for
(30:38):
purchase on the BGIRME websitecoming soon and a lot more to
come.
So stay tuned, stay a part ofthis journey.
There's a lot more growth,transformation and motivation to
come.
I'm going to be in Bali foranother month here, and during
that time, I hope to interviewuh, interview some other people
who've gone through this.
(30:58):
I know a lot of people here whohave incredible stories to tell
and, uh, I hope for theopportunity to share them with
you all.
So until next time, my friends.
This is your host, chrisKushnier, with endless love and
gratitude.
Saying namaste.
Welcome back to the Broke Sky in the Room.
This is your host, chrisKushnier.
This episode is entitled Havinga Relationship with your
Emotions.
Today was a really interestingday for me.
I started today waking upfeeling uninspired, unmotivated.
(00:25):
I struggle with this a lot.
I struggle with this a lot.
When I'm feeling inspired andmotivated, my creativity flows
and I'm able to write poetry anddo things that help other
people lift up, and when it goesaway, it can be so hard for me
(00:47):
to find it again.
You know, usually I have tolook in all the places that I
didn't, that I don't want tolook, for lack of a better way
to say it.
You know, there's a phrase thatI live by it's one of the many,
many things that I havetattooed on my arms here and
it's that all good things areborn of discomfort.
What that means to me is thatyou have to look for the
(01:12):
uncomfortable situations,because the uncomfortable
situations provide theopportunities to grow, and
that's most certainly been thecase with me.
So as I was feeling this waythis morning, I really tried to
lean into it.
You know my stomach was hurtingthose of you who are just
(01:35):
tuning in.
So I live with Crohn's disease,and Crohn's disease and anemia,
and this is kind of the bigbattle of my life, and one of
the things that I've learnedabout Crohn's disease is that it
really behaves a bit like abully.
At least in my case, I can'tspeak to other people with the
disease, but for me, when I giveinto it and I let it immobilize
(02:00):
me, it amplifies.
It doesn't help.
Laying down and resting is notthe answer for me.
Usually I have to do somethingto get my endorphins flowing and
my blood flowing.
I have to go work out, I haveto go do yoga, or I have to sit
in meditation and really, reallyfocus on my breath work to help
(02:22):
get things moving.
Well.
Well, today I did just that andit's difficult as it was to do.
I went to one of my favoritegyms here in in Bali brothers
gym, bati belong in Canggu, andI got a really great workout in.
You know, I was feeling goodand had a feeling I was going to
(02:46):
get inspired Now, around thistime, a friend of mine here who
I've spoken about in the pasthis name is Sebastian.
Sebastian is a shamanic healerand transformative coach.
I met him during the secondYoga Effects hot yoga teacher
(03:07):
training that I attended and hewas actually the reason that I
stayed for another month, muchto you know, creating many
challenges in my life back home.
He offered to apprentice me onmanifestation techniques, and
(03:28):
what he taught me I thenimplemented and used.
And after the firstmanifestation ceremony, tied to
the full moon here, slowly butsurely, all of the things that I
desired, all of the things thatI was hoping to accomplish,
started to happen in greatsuccession.
They started to materialize sofast that it was alarming even
(03:49):
to the people around me, to thepoint that people started
telling me to shut up.
They literally started tellingme that they were afraid of what
I was going to say because theyknew it was going to happen.
And Sebastian and I have hadcyclical challenges that have
kind of made it difficult for usto reconnect.
So I hadn't heard from him in abit and randomly today he
(04:11):
messages me and he says, hey,I'm going to this workshop today
at Cafe Coach here in Bali, andimmediately my hairs go up.
I've got a bit of a thing withcoaches, coaches, therapists, a
lot of people who are out thereto help other people.
(04:33):
Well, to find the good ones.
It's like a needle in ahaystack.
It's a very easy field to getinto.
People can go take a quickclass and get certified and all
of a sudden they're a coach.
You know business coach, lifecoach, and what I've found from
so many of them is that, youknow, the business coaches have
(04:54):
never really ran a business,they've never started one,
they've never created one, theytook a course and now they're
teaching it.
It falls in the line of thosewho can't do coach or those who
can't do teach, right and samewith life coaches.
Most of the life coaches thatI've met, you know, when I take
a closer look at their life,their life is in shambles and
(05:19):
yet they're willing to takemoney from other people to give
them advice on how to fix theirs.
And so I've always had thisfundamental sort of issue, and
it's a reason that that Ihaven't become a coach or that I
haven't offered my services,because I didn't, I didn't want
to be associated with that, youknow.
And so, for that reason, thispodcast and everything I've done
thus forward has been 100%self-funded and has been in
(05:42):
offering nothing more than that,a simple offering for those of,
for those out there who need it, who can gain something from it
.
It's free across the board, andI look to do as much as I can
to keep it that way.
It's not easy.
It's not easy.
Certainly, keeping this all uphas been a challenge, and
learning how to do it and fundit all it's been a challenge.
(06:04):
Keeping this all up has been achallenge, and learning how to
do it and fund it all it's beena challenge, but somehow the
things that I need to make ithappen always seem to show up in
my way.
Fortunately, I've been shownhow to be aware of that.
I've been taught to relish thepresent moment and to really,
you know, sort of expect thatthose solutions would show up
(06:33):
when I have clear intention andclear purpose and when I'm aware
of what I am trying to do andwhy I'm trying to do it.
As long as I am aware of whatI'm trying to do and why I'm
trying to do it, I'm able torecognize when the tools that I
need are going to show up infront of me.
At this point, I expect them toshow up in front of me, and so
(06:54):
it's very easy for me torecognize them right away.
Anyway, so this workshop, hetells me, is about finding your
voice right Now.
This is a particularlyinteresting topic for a guy who,
in the past three weeks, usedhis voice and was received to a
viral extent on TikTok.
Right, the poetry that I write.
I had been using to createpromotional videos for TikTok,
(07:19):
and they were edited videos withB-roll footage and my voice
over the background.
And the change that I made thatcaused this explosion was that
I got on camera.
I decided to, you know, forgetall the b-roll, forget all the
editing, uh, to let you see meand see the emotion behind it,
the person behind it.
And I just read and, videoafter video after video, uh has
(07:41):
been, you know, receivingthousands to hundreds, to tens
of thousands, to hundreds ofthousands of views, and so thank
you all for the support, thankyou all for following.
It gives me the fuel to keepdoing what I'm doing, and so, if
you're watching this, if you'relistening to this, please do
show your support.
If you really take somethingfrom it, I'm going to start
(08:03):
offering some subscriptions andsome other things, some other
exclusive content, to helpcreate some revenue, to help
keep me doing what I'm doing.
But I digress.
So the workshop was entitledFinding your Voice and I got a
look here.
The woman that was holding it.
(08:25):
Her was uh nuna and uh, let'ssee her.
Her instagram is nuna dot mindbody me, uh, and you know I
didn't know anything about her.
Um, nuna, come, come, howie andnuna.
Forgive me if I butchered yourname, but I looked to have her
(08:46):
on an episode.
I actually just asked her, andshe's graciously agreed, to come
on with me and be a part ofthis as well.
And so, finding your voiceright this is something that
I've done.
I've found my voice, and from anearly age I was very gifted
with poetry and found that itwasn't difficult for me to
(09:08):
express my voice.
But in my journey I used tolive in sort of resentment of my
own emotions.
I often felt that if I allowedmy emotions to be present in my
decision-making process or toinfluence my communications or
anything like that, that theresult would be counterintuitive
(09:29):
to or counteractive to what Iwas trying to accomplish.
And I used to actually say oneof the phrases that I used to
live by was that any decisioninfluenced by an extreme emotion
, good or bad, would be a baddecision.
An extreme emotion, good or bad, would be a bad decision.
Over the course of mytransformation and you know, at
37 years old I came to Bali andI went through a massive
(09:52):
transformation, both mind, body,soul, inside and outside.
I transformed.
It's one of the reasons that onmy arm here I have tattooed
born at 37, because at 37 yearsold I truly became a different
human being inside and out.
And a big part of that processand I hadn't really realized
(10:14):
just how big a part of thatprocess until this workshop that
I went to Learning to controlmy emotions was, or rather I
shouldn't say control, learningto listen to my emotions was, or
rather I shouldn't say control,learning to listen to my
emotions right.
What I started to realize wasthat it wasn't the emotions that
were driving me wrong.
It was my own reaction to myown emotions.
(10:38):
It was that I was reacting tosomething that I wasn't
understanding.
I was reacting to somethingthat I wasn't understanding.
See now, on the flip side of it, a couple years later now I
realize that my emotions are thebiggest asset that I have and
it's critical that I understandthem before I judge and react to
(10:59):
them.
And so now I've started to useand listen to my emotions to the
extent that they are behindevery decision that I make, but
first, before I can react tothem, I have to understand where
they're coming from.
Just like when you have adifficult conversation with
another human being, if youdon't understand what they're
(11:20):
actually saying and you startreacting to it based on what you
think they're saying, theoutcome of that conversation can
be way far off from what youhad intended and what you had
hoped.
Right Now, I wonder how many ofyou struggle with this, how
many of you feel misled orbetrayed by your own emotions?
(11:48):
An interesting thing that alsocame up in this see, I've
struggled with anger, anger anddepression.
Anger and depression and I knowa lot of you out there
listening struggle with this ona daily basis.
Anger and depression are very,very real challenges.
You know they are tough and, um, for me, learning to control my
(12:12):
anger, um, even grew into as Istarted to understand my
emotions, learning to fear myanger, uh, and learning to um.
Well, I realized I was beingparalyzed by it.
See, one of the things in mylife the effect that I've
(12:33):
started to learn that I have onother human beings is a very
interesting effect.
People who get close to me very, very badly want to please me,
and when they feel they've letme down or I'm unhappy with what
they've done for me, the effecton them can be catastrophic, so
(12:55):
much so that I've learned torun away.
I run away, no-transcript.
(13:39):
And so this is a challenge,right, because it's an unhealthy
behavior.
Everybody gets angry, everybodyhas all the emotions, and to
think for a second that youwouldn't be allowed to have
these emotions is a problem.
It's no way to live.
So what do you do with that?
(14:01):
You know, as a result of beingangry, people can be passive,
they can be passive-aggressive,they can be aggressive or they
can be assertive.
Uh, and that was one of thetopics that she covered in this
workshop, and I started reallysitting with it and really
thinking about just how, how myown anger, or rather the fear of
(14:27):
people's effects of it, canparalyze me.
And this is interesting on somany levels because, like she
asked the question, when's thelast time you got angry?
And since I've gotten here, youknow we've got this construction
project going on.
We're building a vacationrental as proof of concept for a
real estate management companyhere, and construction is well
(14:49):
behind.
It was supposed to be completedwhen I first arrived in January
and it's still not completed.
It's March 14th and I've nowhad to extend my stay here
another month, even over anothermonth, in order to see it
through.
And you know, one of the thingsI've learned is that when
you're starting a business,especially starting in an
(15:11):
international business uh, youhave to be ready for things not
to go according to plan.
And another thing that I'velearned given that all things
happen for a reason, is thatwhen that happens, you know when
what you're looking at doesn'tlook how you want it.
Sometimes that's a message foryou to look somewhere else.
And I can tell you that had Inot stayed, I wouldn't have
(15:34):
found the inspiration that I had, I wouldn't have started
writing again, I wouldn't havepicked this microphone back up
to start this podcast again, andI wouldn't have taken a chance
to read my poetry on TikTok, andI wouldn't have reached over a
million people in the past threeweeks.
I was just adding up thenumbers the other day, and just
(15:55):
from my poetry videos alone,just from TikTok, over a million
people have watched them inless than three weeks, and
leading into that there was anentire year of weekly efforts.
That didn't even scratch thesurface of a number like that.
I didn't even scratch thesurface of a number like that.
I don't even think thecumulative views would have been
10,000.
(16:16):
All that happened as a result ofmy disappointment.
All that happened as a resultof me having to do something I
didn't want to do, and I justfind that remarkable.
So she asked when's the lasttime you got, you know, angry?
And I realized that I was angrythat the construction wasn't
happening as it was supposed to,but it wasn't really anger.
(16:38):
What it was was disappointment,and it wasn't even as much the
disappointment in them.
It was the disappointment thatI had to then pay forward, see,
because I couldn't go back home,I couldn't be attentive to my
wife, to my businesses, to myproperties, to my dogs, my pets,
my ferrets, my fish, my dogs,to all these things that I love.
(17:00):
I knew that, because these guyswere disappointing me, I was
then going to have to disappointother people, and that made me
angry.
Disappoint other people, andthat made me angry.
And so I had to sit with that.
And that's when I startedrealizing that, had these delays
not happened, I would havenever found this inspiration and
(17:22):
I would have never been able toarticulate myself and express
myself through this poetry toreach all of you.
And so, as I said at thebeginning of this episode, all
good things are born ofdiscomfort.
That phrase really has become akey pillar in my life, in the
way that I move about, thedecisions that I make, the
(17:44):
things that I do.
And prior the Chris of the past,I would have suppressed those
emotions, I wouldn't havelistened to him, I would have
simply probably reacted to them,and that reaction would have
yielded negative results,certainly results that were
(18:06):
contrary to what I was trying toaccomplish, see, at this point,
resulting from thetransformation that I went
through, coming here a broken,beaten and angry, humiliated
human being, and throughlearning my emotions, what was
really behind them and, in doingso, finding a way to love
(18:31):
myself and, in doing so, reallyrediscovering what my true self
was.
I then started to realize howto communicate both my needs and
my abilities and understand myabilities and recognize them and
start to recognize the effectthey were having on other people
.
And, before long, I was nolonger restricting my offerings,
(18:54):
I was simply giving into them,and the healing effect that they
were having on the people I wastrying to motivate and empower
was like nothing I'd ever donebefore.
And I realized that, you know,poetry.
Poetry wasn't even the big giftthat I was born with.
I was born with the ability toconvey how I'm feeling, so so
(19:18):
drastically that it actually isinfectious.
See when, when I'm feeling likethe light, I can go up and I
can light the darkest rooms onthis planet, and when I'm
feeling like the darkness, I canhave the same effect on the
brightest rooms on the planet.
Well, sitting with that andunderstanding that became
(19:38):
critical.
It goes back to why I run away,even to this day, when I'm
feeling an overwhelming emotionof anger, because that's not
what I want to convey.
See, the last thing I want todo is make somebody else on this
planet feel angry, feel small,small, feel weak, feel broken.
I have dedicated my life to theperpetual practice of the
(20:01):
opposite.
I will lift up every humanbeing I come into contact with
if it kills me, because when youfind a purpose in your life, it
is not something to toy with,it is not something to ignore,
it is an obligation.
You know, there's a line in aNick D song that touched me,
(20:22):
that I reference all the time,and it's purpose is greater than
pleasure, and that resonateswith me to no extent, because
one of the grand epiphanies thatI've had about life is that the
cure for depression is purpose.
I have yet to find something todisprove this.
(20:43):
I have yet to encounter a humanbeing that has purpose driven,
who is suffering from depressionbecause there's no time for it.
When you're working towardssomething, it's exciting, it's
empowering, it's uplifting.
I know that when I start toreally struggle with depression,
(21:04):
it's because I don't have apurpose.
At that time, there's nothingthat I'm, there's no objective
for me to accomplish, and soidle hands become the devil's
tools and there I sit and startto slowly self-destruct.
I start to slowly make baddecisions or things that are in
no way going to help me findpurpose or become a better man
(21:25):
or be a better human being, orgo out there and impact somebody
.
Right, what a game change.
What a game change.
Right, what a game change.
What a game change.
In my case in particular and weall have demons but I have been
(21:46):
able to learn how to usenutrition and wellness practices
and fitness practices tocontrol my Crohn's disease.
Crohn's disease, for those ofyou who don't know, is an
inflammatory disorder.
It's an autoimmune inflammatorydisorder of the intestine and
(22:07):
the colon.
It behaves very much likerheumatoid arthritis,
fibromyalgia and a number ofother of these conditions, and
the issue with this is that whatWestern medicine offers as a
solution to this is animmunosuppressant Notably Humira
(22:28):
is the one that I was on whichis what they call a biologic,
and it's something that activelyshuts down your immune system.
And so, as you might havementioned this very expensive
drug, when I started taking it,I started to become dependent on
other drugs because I wasconstantly getting sick and,
over the course of a few years,this grew to be absolutely
(22:52):
debilitating.
The first month of the pandemic,depression settled in.
I had one of the worst Crohn'sslayers I've ever had in my life
.
It lasted an entire month and Idid everything to make it worse
by feeding it with alcoholbecause I was depressed.
I was on the couch and, slowlybut surely, I just started
drinking every day to try andknock myself out, to get through
(23:14):
it, not to snap out of it, tosurvive it, and that's a
critical distinction.
You know I was being driven byemotions I didn't understand and
reacting to them and having anoutcome that certainly was not
one that I would desire orbenefit from in any way.
Well, the next time I stepped onthe scale, and you know I live
(23:36):
and die by fitness.
You know I used to be 220pounds and the next time I
stepped on the scale I was 180pounds and an alarm went off and
suddenly that was the wake upcall that I needed.
That was my own personal rockbottom of my wellness journey
and I started to look for achange because I realized that I
was going to die, if not for myphysical conditions, for my
(23:59):
emotional conditions, because Iwas falling apart and I needed
to find a way to break the cycle.
Thankfully, you know, and itwould be, it would be the result
of an ad I saw on Instagram fora week of partying in Bali, and
I would decide that I was goingto just go, you know, run away
(24:22):
to Bali, as if partying was thesolution.
Yeah, well, three days in, mydisease took over again and I
had to find a different route,and so I ended up at Soham
Wellness Center.
And you, that was the first in along series of events that led
to me completely transforming mymind, body and soul, through
yoga, through writing, throughbreath work, through various
(24:45):
different healing techniquescranial energy healings and
chakra cleansings or auracleansings and chakra balancings
and all of these differentthings that started to transform
me as a human being, from thebroken, angry, bitter, wounded
animal that came here to thehealer that stands before you,
(25:06):
and it's been an incrediblejourney, I can tell you.
Somebody said to me when Ifirst got here that Bali's where
the world's broken things go toheal, and that was certainly
the case for me.
And now I've repurposed my lifeto help lift other people up.
It's why I'm chasing this dreamof having an educational
program here that would offerfree English and environmental
(25:28):
awareness lessons to kids bytrading free stays.
So the villas are a part ofthat.
Once I've got enough rooms,I'll be able to offer a free
trip to paradise.
Right, come stay for a month.
Catch is, you're going to teachEnglish to kids and teach kids
about environmental awarenessfor a few hours a day.
So that's my 10 year plan.
That's what I'm working towards, that's what all these efforts
(25:49):
are going to.
Along those lines, I'm going totake a quick second to thank
TikTok, because TikTok becamethe gasoline that lit this fire,
that really helped get mymessage out to millions of
people, and right now there's abill in Congress to ban TikTok
and I just want to put out thereto anyone who's you know,
(26:13):
benefited from it.
Um, because there's a lot ofinformation on tiktok and it
behaves how you use it.
You know, I've heard people saythings like tiktok is just this
.
Tiktok is just that.
Tiktok feeds you what you lookfor, and so what your tiktok
feed is a reflection of, of yourdesires and what you've looked
for.
Uh, and that that's the simpletruth of the algorithm.
(26:34):
So, you know, be weary ofmaking the ignorant statement
that TikTok is this, because itcertainly exhibits what you are
and your limited understandingof it.
But I for one, am in completesupport of TikTok.
I think banning it would be acrime.
And so, you know, I encourageanyone listening to call your
(26:56):
representative at Congress andlet them know how you feel and
let them know that you standwith it as well, if we have your
support Along those lines.
Getting back to you know my ownstruggle with emotions, and the
epiphany was that my emotionsweren't the problem.
My problem was that I wasn'tunderstanding my own emotions
(27:20):
and I was reacting to them, andthe message that I was putting
out was not my real truth, itwas not coming from the real me,
it was coming from a distorted,manipulated version that was
reacting to emotions they didn'tunderstand, that was reacting
to an environment that wasdifferent than the one perceived
(27:40):
.
I was reacting to myperceptions, not to my reality,
and that caused me to haveresults in my life that weren't
what I wanted.
And the moment that I flippedthat perspective see, my life
didn't change.
My perspective did.
But with that change ofperspective I was able to change
my life and in a span of twoyears, I went from a man who was
(28:04):
suicidal to a man who is livinga life that you couldn't even
dream of.
My life is amazing now, and Ihave more love for myself than I
could have ever dreamed.
And to think I came so close tonot knowing what it feels like
to wear this skin.
I have my emotions to thank forthat and I have my awareness of
(28:29):
my true self to thank for thatand the transformation I went
through, and everybody andeverything that was a part of it
.
So thank you, and that includesmy loved ones, my enemies, just
the same, everyone who's takenadvantage of me, everyone who's
helped me, everything that wasin my way and everything that
opened the door to give me way.
All of it played an equal partand had any one of those things
(28:51):
changed, I wouldn't be heretoday.
So a moment of gratitude forall of those things changed, I
wouldn't be here today.
So a moment of gratitude forall of those things.
With that, I'm going to closeout this episode with something
I just wrote and I will be backfor more on this topic.
You know, as I said, I look tohave some interviews and future
guests, because this is a bigone.
This is a hell of an onion andthere's many layers to it to
(29:13):
unpeel.
I used to think that my emotionsbetrayed all my desires.
Trying to solve my problemsfelt more like starting fires.
As a result, I tried to pushthem back and go numb to their
effect, but then my truest selfbegan to suffer from neglect,
feeling damned by every outcome.
(29:34):
I had to find a better way.
So I sat with my emotions tohear what they had to say.
What they told me made merealize all that I'd
misunderstood.
Suddenly, the feelings that Ithought were bad revealed that
they were good.
I had to learn how they reactedto what I was feeding them.
(29:54):
They were not the enemy, butrather my truest friend.
Now I listen when they speak sothat I can understand that they
are simply guiding me to becomea better man.
Emotions.
That's all for this week, guys.
Again, just thank you.
(30:15):
Thank you all for listening.
Thank you for your massive showof support.
A couple quick announcements Iam going to be putting out some
T-shirts that are going tofeature some quotes from my
inspirational poetry, with thetag the Emotional Healer on the
back, hashtag BGIR on the frontand a QR code on the bottom to
take you to all the social, andso those will be available for
(30:38):
purchase on the BGIRME websitecoming soon and a lot more to
come.
So stay tuned, stay a part ofthis journey.
There's a lot more growth,transformation and motivation to
come.
I'm going to be in Bali foranother month here, and during
that time, I hope to interviewuh, interview some other people
who've gone through this.
(30:58):
I know a lot of people here whohave incredible stories to tell
and, uh, I hope for theopportunity to share them with
you all.
So until next time, my friends.
This is your host, chrisKushnier, with endless love and
gratitude.
Saying namaste.
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