July 8, 2025 • 27 mins
Anxiety doesn’t always scream—it simmers. It steals focus, hijacks your body, and leaves you wired and worn out. In this episode, Lyndsay Soprano sits down with Jeff Patterson to talk about what it means to actually live with stress—and how you can meet it differently, without burning out.
Jeff shares his own path into meditation and Tai Chi, a journey that led him to create the Yielding Method: a practice that invites you to stop bracing and start softening—physically, mentally, emotionally. This isn’t about retreating from life; it’s about learning how to face it without clenching every muscle and thought along the way.
They talk about how anxiety and chronic pain feed off each other, how stillness isn’t laziness, and why meditation doesn’t need to be perfect—it just needs to be practiced. From tiny daily rituals to full-body awareness, Jeff and Lyndsay break down the real-life tools that help people stop resisting what is and start creating space for what could be.
Tune in if your nervous system feels like it’s on overdrive and you’re ready to breathe again—on purpose.
Find Jeff Patterson Online Here:
Website: theyieldingwarrior.com
Instagram: @theyieldingwarrior
Facebook: TaiChi Yielding
LinkedIn: Jeff Patterson
TikTok: @theyieldingwarrior
Book: The Yielding Warrior
Find The Pain Game Podcast Online Here:
Website: thepaingamepodcast.com
Instagram: @thepaingamepodcast
Facebook: The Pain Game Podcast
LinkedIn: Lyndsay Soprano
YouTube: The Pain Game Podcast
Episode Highlights:
(00:00) Introduction to Chronic Pain and Trauma
(01:47) The Journey into Meditation
(09:29) Understanding the Yielding Warrior Method
(16:27) The Power of Consistency in Practice
(21:29) Overcoming Barriers to Meditation
Jeff shares his own path into meditation and Tai Chi, a journey that led him to create the Yielding Method: a practice that invites you to stop bracing and start softening—physically, mentally, emotionally. This isn’t about retreating from life; it’s about learning how to face it without clenching every muscle and thought along the way.
They talk about how anxiety and chronic pain feed off each other, how stillness isn’t laziness, and why meditation doesn’t need to be perfect—it just needs to be practiced. From tiny daily rituals to full-body awareness, Jeff and Lyndsay break down the real-life tools that help people stop resisting what is and start creating space for what could be.
Tune in if your nervous system feels like it’s on overdrive and you’re ready to breathe again—on purpose.
Find Jeff Patterson Online Here:
Website: theyieldingwarrior.com
Instagram: @theyieldingwarrior
Facebook: TaiChi Yielding
LinkedIn: Jeff Patterson
TikTok: @theyieldingwarrior
Book: The Yielding Warrior
Find The Pain Game Podcast Online Here:
Website: thepaingamepodcast.com
Instagram: @thepaingamepodcast
Facebook: The Pain Game Podcast
LinkedIn: Lyndsay Soprano
YouTube: The Pain Game Podcast
Episode Highlights:
(00:00) Introduction to Chronic Pain and Trauma
(01:47) The Journey into Meditation
(09:29) Understanding the Yielding Warrior Method
(16:27) The Power of Consistency in Practice
(21:29) Overcoming Barriers to Meditation
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
This is Your Pain Game podcast where we talk about
the game of living in and with chronic pain and trauma,
getting to the heart of how to heal. I am
your host, Lindsay Soprano. On the show, I plan on
discussing with doctors, chronic pain patients, holistic practitioners, loved ones,
and anybody that is interested in having their voice heard
(00:26):
in the chronic pain and trauma world that we live in.
I am an anxious, sleep deprived little stress ball every
single moment of my life, and it's incredibly difficult for
(00:48):
me to relax in my skin most days.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
And this has been something that I've dealt with since
I was a little girl.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
We talk about it on the show often about stuff
that happened when I was nine, and eleven and fourteen,
just name all the years of stuff that makes me
not feel relaxed that's happened to me over my lifetime.
And with all of that, though that stress that I
was so instantly introduced to, I actually liked it, And
since that introduction to it, I was always functioning at
(01:14):
a really high level in my life. In my career,
I thrived under stressful conditions. I strived under stressful situations.
I liked stressful people. I loved the chase of it.
I liked the thrill of landing new clients, of landing
guests on the show, traveling for work, going to conventions,
doing all of it. I loved all of it and
all the stress that came with it, until I have
realized over the past couple of years that living like
(01:36):
that constant fight or flight has contributed to my illness
of CRPS.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
And I cannot get out of this stress loop, you know.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
And I've tried a bagillion things to do this, including meditation.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I'm not very good at it, though.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
That overwhelm that I live in every minute of my
life is quite frankly devastating, and keeping busy distracts me
from my debility pain as well. So if I keep busy,
I'm not thinking about it. So what do we do
to get out of this stressful state? Well, I've got
somebody for you here today, So without further ado, i'd
like to introduce you to my guest today, Jeff Patterson.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Hey, Jeff, how are you.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Hey, I'm doing great. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Oh, of course, it's good to have you. You've got
a great voice too, so I'm happy about that too.
Jeff is from Portland, Oregon. He has over thirty six
years of experience practicing and teaching the meditative and martial arts.
He is the founder of the Yielding Warrior, Northwest Fighting
Arts and Portland Taichi Academy. He has published two books
and hundreds of instructional videos and has worked with thousands
(02:36):
of students from around the world. What sets Jeff apart
from other meditation practitioners is his unique approach, known as
the Yielding Warrior Method. He teaches the five basic regulations
that are fundamental to any meditation practice, going beyond traditional
methods by incorporating ritual, active, and philosophical techniques to help
individuals build a personalized, evolving meditation program that seamlessly fits
(03:00):
into their lives. And I think that that's part of
the scary thing about meditation, is how am I going
to be?
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Quiet?
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Certainly for me, it is all right, Well, I'm rolling
out the red book carpet for you, babe, and I'd
like to start with talking about your personal journey into
meditative arts and then let's take it from there.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
Yeah. So I was introduced to the meditative arts in
a bit of a roundabout way in that I was
a nineteen year old kid who was very much into
Western boxing, and I used to go to a boxing
gym just a few blocks down the street here from
my academy. Well, at this one particular gym, one of
the coaches that was there, he said something to me
(03:38):
that changed my life forever. He said, you know, if
you really want to be a good boxer, you should
start doing meditation and taichi. Not the time, I was
this nineteen year old kid thinking, you know, isn't that
like for old people in the park. How's that going
to help me be a better fighter? And I had
a lot of respect for him. I took on the practice,
and not only has it changed my life in many
(04:00):
ways through the years, you know, I've had thousands of
students come through the academy and through my online programs,
and I've heard hundreds of stories of how the meditative
arts has positively influenced people's lives. And that's what's made
me so passionate about trying to get the message out
there and help as many people as I can with it.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Well, and I thank you for doing that and for
sharing that, because it is it's like I'm nineteen years old.
Speaker 4 (04:23):
I love I love the visual of the old people
in the park because it's true or just out there
doing like taichi in the park on a Saturday morning
or whatever. But I love that you were able to
apply something that you learned at such a young age
and have continued to do that. That is incredible, especially
starting so young. How did you keep doing it that way?
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Just changed your life so much that it was like
this is just natural because you've stuck with it.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
Well, So, to be honest, for me, it was pretty difficult.
I was not really wanting to do meditation, but I
knew he was telling me that I should, and the
last thing I wanted to do was to go to
the gym and have him ask me if I did
my practice today and have to tell him no. So
I did it every day religiously, like I was brushing
my teeth. And it wasn't until about the sixth or
(05:12):
seven month mark where I went down to my basement.
I normally did about an hour and a half ritual
every morning, with some sitting meditation and some taichi forms,
and I looked up at the clock and an hour
and a half went by, and it felt like it
was fifteen minutes and I had this euphoric feeling like
what just happened? I couldn't explain it, and from that
(05:34):
point forward I was hooked.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
I can meditate for about twenty minutes.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
That's like about as long as I can go without
the world coming in. But I have to do it
in a very secluded environment. I have to do it
in my infrared suna or do it in my little
wellness room. But I can only get through twenty minutes
of it. And I know we're going to talk a
little bit about how to fix that. How can we
go farther than five minutes of meditation? Well, baby steps,
(06:01):
I would assume here with you right.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
One of the things that I hear most commonly from
new practitioners is that they've tried meditation but it didn't
work for them because they couldn't quiet their mind.
Speaker 4 (06:16):
Exactly precisely my point, I am a monkey brain, exactly
what you said.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Somewhere along the way, people got this misguided idea that
in order to be successful at meditation, you have to
reach this state of nirvana where nothing bothers you. And
you know, it couldn't be further from the truth. The
idea is maybe you're sitting for twenty minutes or doing
a twenty minute movement practice like a tai Chie or
chie going form. If you get distracted fifty times during
(06:47):
that session, and every time you get distracted, you notice
the imbalance, you find your center, you come back to focus.
You just got fifty repetitions of being out of balance
and finding And if you do this every day, every month,
every year, you start to develop this power and this
ability that no matter what life throws your way, you're
(07:09):
able to come back to center and find that focus.
And so it's through that consistency that we really reach
that benefit. You know, there's this old story that I
really like about these two old monks who are walking
down this dirt road after a huge rainstorm.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Not walking into a bar. Two monks walking into a bar.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
Not walking into a bar. They come up to a
huge mud puddle, and on the other side of the
puddles this beautiful little girl and she's standing there in
a white dress and she's crying, and the older monk
he hollers across the puddle and says, is everything okay?
Can we help you? And she says, I need to
be somewhere, but if I walk across this puddle, I'm
going to get my dress all dirty. So the older
(07:50):
monkey rolls up his pant legs and he walks across
the puddle, picks her up, puts her on his back,
takes her to the other side, sets her down, and
she's off on our way. Him and the younger monk
are walking a few miles down the road, and finally
the younger monk is just furious and he says, you know,
we're not supposed to touch girls, but you did back
there at the puddle. And the older monk looks down
(08:12):
and says, I left that girl back at the puddle.
Why are you still carrying her around? And how many
times in life do we have to get two miles
down the muddy road before we realize kind to let
that stuff go? And so regulating the mind is an
extremely important part of any meditation practice.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
It sounds simple the way that you put because I know,
meditation just seems scary to people are too woo woo
or you know, all of that stuff. And for me,
while I opened with stress reduction and anxiety, and then
we've got pain, and then heart health and emotional regulation.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
I mean, all the things that you listed.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Are like ding ding ding ding, and I've got like
twenty other things on there. Obviously I'm high energy, I've
got all That's how I've always been, no matter how
crappy I feel. And the regulation of the central nervous
system is a big element of why I am in
the pain that I'm in. And there's all these different
things that are going on in the CRPS community, which
(09:07):
is what I have, a chronic regional pain syndrome and
lime disease and all these other things that are going
on with me. But in the pain community, a lot
of what we all are going after, unfortunately, is band
aids to fix the pain right now and see if
it works, then it causes all these other problems. And
now we're unwinding. Now we're getting rid of all those
other problems that we have. And it's been the craziest
ten years of my life trying to fix it, and
(09:30):
meditation has been something that has been so challenging for me,
but I know the benefits of it. What is the
best way for us to get our monkey minds to
get in there and just get started.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Is it five minutes, is it two minutes?
Speaker 1 (09:42):
What are some tools that we are some quick tips
that we could do to kind of get started.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Yeah, so, you know, one of the most tough challenges
I've faced as being a teacher for over thirty years
is that how do I get people to see the
value in the practice so they take this on and
they are successful with it. And through the years, I've
tried many different things, and I've come up with three
(10:08):
considerations that I like people to spend a little bit
of time with when they're thinking about taking on the practice,
and I find that if they do, they're so much
more likely to be successful with the practice, and I
feel like it really helps them. And the first one
is what is it that's drawing you to the practice?
Do you want to get healthier? Do you want to
(10:30):
reduce stress, Do you want to stay mobile so you
can watch your grandkids grow up? Or maybe you want
to improve your performance on the field, whatever that is
for you. And then when you have that idea, then
I want you to take it a step further and
think about ten or twenty things that will positively change
if you take on this practice and accomplish that goal,
(10:53):
from your interpersonal communication to your overall health to your
relationships to whatever that is. And then I like to
flip the coin and think about ten or twenty negative
things that will happen if they don't accomplish this. And
in doing this, now those days that come when you
feel like you got to get up and do this chore,
(11:14):
you stop looking at your meditation practice as a chore
and you start start looking at it as something that
you get to do and you get excited about because
you see so much value in the benefits that you're
receiving from the practice. And when you can make that
mindset shift, that's where you really start hitting those next
levels in your practice.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
And I like that because it's kind of how I
feel with swimming.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
I just recently started in about six months ago, and
when I first got in the pool, I was like,
I'm not going to even be able to do this,
Like this is way too tough for me, even though
I'm not that person.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
That's and my whole life has been tough.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
And then I started doing it, and I started doing
and then when I miss it in the morning, like
I did this morning, unfortunately, I can totally tell the difference.
Because it is my version right now of meditation. I've
music plane, and I'm swimming and I'm dancing in the water,
and I'm doing everything that I can't do on land.
I'm going backwards, I'm going into the water and the
water and it is my form of meditation right now.
(12:12):
So I like that that idea of you falling in
love with it, you know, and making it's not a
chore anymore, because it's not. It's not just oh, I
got to exercise, it's I'm doing this for the whole,
my whole being, my heart, my spirit, my soul, my sleep,
my all of that stuff.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
So that's good stuff, good stuff.
Speaker 3 (12:30):
Yes, And then once they have that why and that reason,
then they need to understand the importance of consistency, because
without a consistent practice, it's just a hobby and you're
really never going to see the benefits of it. And
there's this old story that illustrates this idea very well,
and it's about the stonecutter who was very well known
(12:51):
all over China for making these beautiful sculptures of animals
and landscapes. And his work was so unique that anytime
some he would see it, they just knew it came
from him. And because he was so well known, people
from all over China would come to stay with him
and apprentice with him to learn the trade. Well, every morning,
(13:11):
this old stonecutter would start his day by going down
to the river and meditating. And one morning, after his
meditation session, he's walking along the river and he has
this profound vision of this big, six foot tall, mystical
Chinese jade dragon. And he was so taken by this
vision that he just knew it had to be his
(13:32):
next project. So he spent the next few months traveling
all around looking for the perfect piece of jade. Finally,
when he found it, he brought it back to his place,
and for the next period of time, day in and
day out, he would just sit with the rock and
study it. He'd feel the energy coming off the stone
and envision how this dragon would soon appear once he
(13:54):
began his work. One day, when he began working on
the stone, carefully placed his chisel on the backside of
the rock and started tapping away with his hammer hundreds,
if not thousands of times a day to the exact
same place. A few days went by, and nothing happened.
He's still tapping on that same place. A few more
(14:15):
days went by and still nothing and his apprentices started watching,
thinking maybe you should try something different. They started second
guessing him. A few more days went by, still tapping
away at that same place, and finally this big three
foot section of the stone separated and created the smooth,
slightly curved line that was going to soon be part
(14:35):
of the dragon's back. And one of his apprentices, who
was watching, said, how did you know that that strike
was going to break the stone? And he said, it
wasn't that strike that broke the stone. It was the
thousands of strikes before it that broke the stone. And
with a bit of a discouraged tone, the apprentice said,
but I've been watching you and there was no change.
Why didn't you try something else? And the stonecutter got
(14:58):
down on one knee and he felt the smooth line
that he just created, and he said, each strike was
not wasted. The stone was changing beneath the surface. And
not only was the stone changing, so was the one
who wields the hammer. And the reason why I resonate
so well with the story is that this is the
meditative arts. We're not always seeing these changes happen day
(15:20):
to day, but through that consistency and effort, we're laying
the foundation to reap these benefits for the rest of
our life. And so you have to understand the value
in this and make it part of who you are.
And then the third and final consideration is this is
an extremely deep practice and you need to find a guide,
(15:43):
somebody to help point you in the right direction. If
you think you're going to sift through the millions of
videos out there on YouTube and get any depth in
your practice, you're going to waste a lot of time.
And in fact, you know, I've had students come in
here to the academy who have been self taught, and
they some of them have trained fifteen even twenty years,
and they'll come into a place where there are people
(16:05):
that are guided in certain directions, and they'll see people
that have only been here six or twelve months that
have a deeper understanding of the practice than they do
after fifteen years. You know, and our life is short
and your time is valuable. Finding somebody to help point
you in the right direction is not that hard to do.
And if you do these three things, you really spend
(16:26):
some time thinking about your why, you understand the importance
of consistency, and you find a guide. You're going to
be successful with the practice.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
But I love that story.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
It reminds me of David the statue David of He
knew that David was in there.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
He was in that.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
Stone already, So while you were telling that, it was
the first thing I thought of. But it's such a
beautiful visual of It's true because when we start, we're like,
you know what, everybody knows what happens on jan one,
Everyone's out in their yoga pants and they stop beating
shitty for like a week, and they're like, why haven't
I lost thirty pounds?
Speaker 2 (16:57):
You know, it's a good visual.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Have somebody's It wasn't the last strike, it was the
ones all before that.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
It's very well, very well said, and it resonates with
me very much.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
So how can we move into the Yielding method and
what that's all about? Because he's got one of his
books that he's written is called the Yielding Method. It actually,
excuse me, the Yielding Warrior. And then he's got the
Yielding Method. Can you talk a little bit about what
that is and how it's useful.
Speaker 3 (17:26):
Yeah, So, within the meditative arts, there's usually five directions
of practice. There's the performance side of the practice, which
helps athletes, you know, be more in tune with their
body and their awareness so they can perform at higher levels.
There's the therapeutic side, which is great for longevity and
overall health. The medical side, which you know all of
Chinese medicine is based off of Chigung theory. There is
(17:48):
the philosophical side, which is something that I've always been
passionate about and part of the reason why I love
this part of the practice is that it helps expand
your peripheral visions so you see things from multiple angles.
It helps you be more strategic, and that's kind of
where the yielding concept came from. And then there's also
the spiritual side of the practice. So when we're talking
(18:10):
about the philosophical side, there's many different philosophical concepts in
the meditative arts, and yielding is just one of them.
And the idea of yielding I've broken down into three
basic pillars. We have physical yielding, mental yielding, and emotional yielding,
and basically I'll break those down and kind of talk
(18:31):
to you about what they mean. So the physical yielding
is the idea that I push you, you push me,
whoever's a bigger, stronger person with the most leverage. Eventually
is going to push the other person over, but with yielding,
instead of us trying to see who the bigger meat
head is. When you push me, I get out of
the way of that force, and now I can respond
(18:53):
with less effort, so I'm not trying to butt heads
with you and see if I'm bigger and stronger. Now,
it's essential for athletes to understand how to do this
because they're always going to come up eventually against somebody
who's bigger and stronger and faster than them, and understanding
how to use yielding can help them get the advantage
(19:13):
on those people, and that's why it's been used in
martial arts for so many generations. Now, in order to
be good at physical yielding, a lot of things have
to come into play. You need to be well rooted.
The lower part of your body needs to be strong
and flexible so you can change your central equilibrium without
getting tight. The body has to be relaxed, the breath
(19:34):
has to be calm, and the mind has to be present. Now,
while it may be a lifetime journey to really master
these skills, from day one, by integrating a meditation practice
into your life, you start to see these things with
more clarity inside yourself. And this is where it becomes
very interesting, because not only do you see those things
(19:55):
inside yourself, but you also start to see them with
more clarity and other people. So say, for example, you
and I are having a conversation and I say something
that unbalances you and throws you off center. It's a
lot easier for me to pick up on that sign
of imbalance and bring us back to center. Then if
I'm not paying attention and pretty soon I'm so far
(20:15):
off track, you want to knock me upside the head.
And so learning how to use yielding and all of
our interactions is extremely powerful. Then we have what we
call emotional yielding, and emotional yielding is very much like
mental yielding, but with our own interpersonal conflicts. So oftentimes
(20:36):
things will happen and we'll respond and we'll go down
this path and we might get an hour a day,
a week down the road and realize maybe that wasn't
the best choice. But with yielding and our heightened awareness
through integrating meditation into our lives, we're able to step
back when these things happen and not let our emotions
get involved and be more present and oftentimes make a
(20:58):
more educated decision. This saves us a lot of heartache
on the other side, you know. And I've been explaining
this idea of yielding now for many years. I've been
running my academy for over thirty years here, and one
of the most common things I'll hear people say is
that AH yielding makes a lot of sense. In fact,
I do yielding all the time. Well, I would agree
(21:20):
in that. I think everybody does some degree of yielding
all the time, whether they label it that or not. However,
it's kind of like if you or I were to
walk into a crime scene with a detective who's been
on the job for thirty years, I guarantee you that
person would see things about the series of events in
the timeline that I know at least I would have
no clue of. And the meditative arts helps us see
(21:43):
things inside of ourselves and inside of other people that
I truly believe most people will go through life and
never have any clue of unless they have a practice
like this in their life.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
This is something that I always wanted to do.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
I hold space for it, and then.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
I pop out of it and I don't commit, and
I'm not consistent, like you're saying the consistency part of it.
Speaker 3 (22:06):
You know, you mentioned that some people do think that
though that the meditative arts are not for them, or
they're too busy, or they've got the wrong mindset, or
it doesn't work. And you know, every person I've had
just here in my academy, over twenty six thousand students.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
Come from the whole.
Speaker 3 (22:24):
In my online programs, I've had thousands more, and I
have never once met anybody who meditation couldn't help them.
And you know, when if you're somebody who thinks that
you're too busy, For those of you that think this,
and I'm bringing this up because I know there's a
lot of you out there, is that what I've found
over and over again is that when somebody comes here
(22:46):
that is busy and they take on this practice, the
fact that they start learning how to become more centered
and more present and more productive, they end up getting
more done because of their meditation practice. It doesn't take
them away from the things that they have to do.
It helps them do those things with more quality and
get more done. And so you're never too busy. And
(23:07):
in fact, the Dahalai Lama once said that everybody should
meditate for twenty minutes a day, unless you're too busy,
then you should meditate for an hour. And I enjoy
that saying that it's so true. You know, if everybody
just meditated for twenty minutes a day, the world would
be such a better place.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
I agree with you, and i've I went to this
really interesting breath work, this huge room of a bunch
of people all laying on mats, and it was intense.
It was like four hours of like this crazy breathing
and screaming and yelling and crying and sobbing. And when
we left, it was like, wow, I feel light, like
(23:43):
I sobbed out stuff I didn't even know it's in
there still, all from all this crazy breathing exercises and
all this holding your breath and letting it go, and
the whole room and the energy and there was drums
in it made oh, I just got the chills now
even talking about it, because that evening shifted me in
a whole different way about how I was going to
(24:04):
approach my pain just from that one night, and all
I had to do was breathing.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
That was it. It was unbelievably powerful.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
You were saying something earlier, and I wanted to chime in,
but I didn't want to interrupt you because that breath
work and that breathing while you've been speaking, while you've been.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
Talking to me.
Speaker 1 (24:20):
I don't know if you've noticed, but I've like, I've
been trying to work on my posture. I've been trying
to slow my breath and because you make me want
to do that, like you literally make me want to
do the practice, just by sitting with you during this conversation.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
Well, hopefully it sticks and you stay with it.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
I would love to, and I want my audience to
as well, so we can share each other's stories about
how wonderful his methods work for all of us.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
So, oh my gosh, Okay, so how can we find you?
How can we get involved with you? I know that
you're an organ. The whole world is not an organ.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
So what can we do to get more in tune
with our bodies and get into this meditator and into
meditative arts like you do?
Speaker 3 (25:00):
So if you go to my website, The Yieldingwarrior dot com,
you can get access right now. I've got a two
week trial up there where you can check out my
online program I've got a bunch of different solo products
on breath work or movement practices or chieging sets that
you can get focused on. That Also, right now, I'm
giving away a free copy of my book if you
just pay for shipping and handling. You can go to
(25:23):
the Yieldingwarrior dot com forward slash book and get access
to that there. And for those of you that are
interested in learning how to teach these practices and wanting
to take it to the next level, there's access for
those of you as well.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Well.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Thank you so much, and I'm definitely I mean, I've
already checked out all of your stuff, but i wanted
to have this conversation with you. A because I was
nervous about it, B because I know that I need it,
and see because I my audience needs this like nobody's business.
I mean, the people that come on this show and
the audience and the people that reach out to me.
Oh my gosh, the things that people have gone through
(25:59):
that we're all trying to do all these other things,
And I feel like you've made this feel so much
more simple and less complicated today during this conversation than
I've ever felt about meditation. So thank you for that
because it doesn't feel so scary or like I'm going
to fail at it.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
I'm too like performance based. I'm like, oh my gosh,
that's not going to work. Oh my god. You know,
so we want to be successful at it.
Speaker 1 (26:23):
It's like, oh my god, don't go in there trying
to be like the warrior princess of.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
Day one.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Chip away at the rock, chip Away at the Rock. Well,
thank you so much for being here with us. You
have anything else that you'd like to leave our listeners with,
because I know we're getting close on time here.
Speaker 3 (26:40):
Only one thing, and that for those of you that
are on the fence thinking about doing a meditation practice,
whether it's with me or somebody else, if you just
go out there and do twenty minutes a day and
you stay consistent with that every day for one year,
I bet ninety eight percent of the people that do
that will do this for the rest of their life
because they'll see so much value and what they've gained
(27:01):
over that one year that they'd be crazy to stop.
And I've seen that over and over again here with
students come through the academy. But you've got to put
the discipline in. You've got to put the time in
and you've got to make the effort, but it will
be one of the best things you ever do for yourself.
Speaker 2 (27:15):
Thank you. I appreciate that so very much.
Speaker 1 (27:18):
You are exclusively invited to share this yielding Warrior VIP
pain journey together.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Let's get to the heart.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Of how to heal with you and Jeff by my side.
Please follow the Pain Game Podcast wherever you digest your.
Speaker 2 (27:30):
Podcast content, we will be there.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Visit us at the Pain gamepodcast dot com and follow
us on all the socials. Thanks for listening, my little VIPs.
Catch you on the other side.
This is Your Pain Game podcast where we talk about
the game of living in and with chronic pain and trauma,
getting to the heart of how to heal. I am
your host, Lindsay Soprano. On the show, I plan on
discussing with doctors, chronic pain patients, holistic practitioners, loved ones,
and anybody that is interested in having their voice heard
(00:26):
in the chronic pain and trauma world that we live in.
I am an anxious, sleep deprived little stress ball every
single moment of my life, and it's incredibly difficult for
(00:48):
me to relax in my skin most days.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
And this has been something that I've dealt with since
I was a little girl.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
We talk about it on the show often about stuff
that happened when I was nine, and eleven and fourteen,
just name all the years of stuff that makes me
not feel relaxed that's happened to me over my lifetime.
And with all of that, though that stress that I
was so instantly introduced to, I actually liked it, And
since that introduction to it, I was always functioning at
(01:14):
a really high level in my life. In my career,
I thrived under stressful conditions. I strived under stressful situations.
I liked stressful people. I loved the chase of it.
I liked the thrill of landing new clients, of landing
guests on the show, traveling for work, going to conventions,
doing all of it. I loved all of it and
all the stress that came with it, until I have
realized over the past couple of years that living like
(01:36):
that constant fight or flight has contributed to my illness
of CRPS.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
And I cannot get out of this stress loop, you know.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
And I've tried a bagillion things to do this, including meditation.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I'm not very good at it, though.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
That overwhelm that I live in every minute of my
life is quite frankly devastating, and keeping busy distracts me
from my debility pain as well. So if I keep busy,
I'm not thinking about it. So what do we do
to get out of this stressful state? Well, I've got
somebody for you here today, So without further ado, i'd
like to introduce you to my guest today, Jeff Patterson.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Hey, Jeff, how are you.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Hey, I'm doing great. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Oh, of course, it's good to have you. You've got
a great voice too, so I'm happy about that too.
Jeff is from Portland, Oregon. He has over thirty six
years of experience practicing and teaching the meditative and martial arts.
He is the founder of the Yielding Warrior, Northwest Fighting
Arts and Portland Taichi Academy. He has published two books
and hundreds of instructional videos and has worked with thousands
(02:36):
of students from around the world. What sets Jeff apart
from other meditation practitioners is his unique approach, known as
the Yielding Warrior Method. He teaches the five basic regulations
that are fundamental to any meditation practice, going beyond traditional
methods by incorporating ritual, active, and philosophical techniques to help
individuals build a personalized, evolving meditation program that seamlessly fits
(03:00):
into their lives. And I think that that's part of
the scary thing about meditation, is how am I going
to be?
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Quiet?
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Certainly for me, it is all right, Well, I'm rolling
out the red book carpet for you, babe, and I'd
like to start with talking about your personal journey into
meditative arts and then let's take it from there.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
Yeah. So I was introduced to the meditative arts in
a bit of a roundabout way in that I was
a nineteen year old kid who was very much into
Western boxing, and I used to go to a boxing
gym just a few blocks down the street here from
my academy. Well, at this one particular gym, one of
the coaches that was there, he said something to me
(03:38):
that changed my life forever. He said, you know, if
you really want to be a good boxer, you should
start doing meditation and taichi. Not the time, I was
this nineteen year old kid thinking, you know, isn't that
like for old people in the park. How's that going
to help me be a better fighter? And I had
a lot of respect for him. I took on the practice,
and not only has it changed my life in many
(04:00):
ways through the years, you know, I've had thousands of
students come through the academy and through my online programs,
and I've heard hundreds of stories of how the meditative
arts has positively influenced people's lives. And that's what's made
me so passionate about trying to get the message out
there and help as many people as I can with it.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Well, and I thank you for doing that and for
sharing that, because it is it's like I'm nineteen years old.
Speaker 4 (04:23):
I love I love the visual of the old people
in the park because it's true or just out there
doing like taichi in the park on a Saturday morning
or whatever. But I love that you were able to
apply something that you learned at such a young age
and have continued to do that. That is incredible, especially
starting so young. How did you keep doing it that way?
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Just changed your life so much that it was like
this is just natural because you've stuck with it.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
Well, So, to be honest, for me, it was pretty difficult.
I was not really wanting to do meditation, but I
knew he was telling me that I should, and the
last thing I wanted to do was to go to
the gym and have him ask me if I did
my practice today and have to tell him no. So
I did it every day religiously, like I was brushing
my teeth. And it wasn't until about the sixth or
(05:12):
seven month mark where I went down to my basement.
I normally did about an hour and a half ritual
every morning, with some sitting meditation and some taichi forms,
and I looked up at the clock and an hour
and a half went by, and it felt like it
was fifteen minutes and I had this euphoric feeling like
what just happened? I couldn't explain it, and from that
(05:34):
point forward I was hooked.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
I can meditate for about twenty minutes.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
That's like about as long as I can go without
the world coming in. But I have to do it
in a very secluded environment. I have to do it
in my infrared suna or do it in my little
wellness room. But I can only get through twenty minutes
of it. And I know we're going to talk a
little bit about how to fix that. How can we
go farther than five minutes of meditation? Well, baby steps,
(06:01):
I would assume here with you right.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
One of the things that I hear most commonly from
new practitioners is that they've tried meditation but it didn't
work for them because they couldn't quiet their mind.
Speaker 4 (06:16):
Exactly precisely my point, I am a monkey brain, exactly
what you said.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Somewhere along the way, people got this misguided idea that
in order to be successful at meditation, you have to
reach this state of nirvana where nothing bothers you. And
you know, it couldn't be further from the truth. The
idea is maybe you're sitting for twenty minutes or doing
a twenty minute movement practice like a tai Chie or
chie going form. If you get distracted fifty times during
(06:47):
that session, and every time you get distracted, you notice
the imbalance, you find your center, you come back to focus.
You just got fifty repetitions of being out of balance
and finding And if you do this every day, every month,
every year, you start to develop this power and this
ability that no matter what life throws your way, you're
(07:09):
able to come back to center and find that focus.
And so it's through that consistency that we really reach
that benefit. You know, there's this old story that I
really like about these two old monks who are walking
down this dirt road after a huge rainstorm.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Not walking into a bar. Two monks walking into a bar.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
Not walking into a bar. They come up to a
huge mud puddle, and on the other side of the
puddles this beautiful little girl and she's standing there in
a white dress and she's crying, and the older monk
he hollers across the puddle and says, is everything okay?
Can we help you? And she says, I need to
be somewhere, but if I walk across this puddle, I'm
going to get my dress all dirty. So the older
(07:50):
monkey rolls up his pant legs and he walks across
the puddle, picks her up, puts her on his back,
takes her to the other side, sets her down, and
she's off on our way. Him and the younger monk
are walking a few miles down the road, and finally
the younger monk is just furious and he says, you know,
we're not supposed to touch girls, but you did back
there at the puddle. And the older monk looks down
(08:12):
and says, I left that girl back at the puddle.
Why are you still carrying her around? And how many
times in life do we have to get two miles
down the muddy road before we realize kind to let
that stuff go? And so regulating the mind is an
extremely important part of any meditation practice.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
It sounds simple the way that you put because I know,
meditation just seems scary to people are too woo woo
or you know, all of that stuff. And for me,
while I opened with stress reduction and anxiety, and then
we've got pain, and then heart health and emotional regulation.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
I mean, all the things that you listed.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Are like ding ding ding ding, and I've got like
twenty other things on there. Obviously I'm high energy, I've
got all That's how I've always been, no matter how
crappy I feel. And the regulation of the central nervous
system is a big element of why I am in
the pain that I'm in. And there's all these different
things that are going on in the CRPS community, which
(09:07):
is what I have, a chronic regional pain syndrome and
lime disease and all these other things that are going
on with me. But in the pain community, a lot
of what we all are going after, unfortunately, is band
aids to fix the pain right now and see if
it works, then it causes all these other problems. And
now we're unwinding. Now we're getting rid of all those
other problems that we have. And it's been the craziest
ten years of my life trying to fix it, and
(09:30):
meditation has been something that has been so challenging for me,
but I know the benefits of it. What is the
best way for us to get our monkey minds to
get in there and just get started.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Is it five minutes, is it two minutes?
Speaker 1 (09:42):
What are some tools that we are some quick tips
that we could do to kind of get started.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Yeah, so, you know, one of the most tough challenges
I've faced as being a teacher for over thirty years
is that how do I get people to see the
value in the practice so they take this on and
they are successful with it. And through the years, I've
tried many different things, and I've come up with three
(10:08):
considerations that I like people to spend a little bit
of time with when they're thinking about taking on the practice,
and I find that if they do, they're so much
more likely to be successful with the practice, and I
feel like it really helps them. And the first one
is what is it that's drawing you to the practice?
Do you want to get healthier? Do you want to
(10:30):
reduce stress, Do you want to stay mobile so you
can watch your grandkids grow up? Or maybe you want
to improve your performance on the field, whatever that is
for you. And then when you have that idea, then
I want you to take it a step further and
think about ten or twenty things that will positively change
if you take on this practice and accomplish that goal,
(10:53):
from your interpersonal communication to your overall health to your
relationships to whatever that is. And then I like to
flip the coin and think about ten or twenty negative
things that will happen if they don't accomplish this. And
in doing this, now those days that come when you
feel like you got to get up and do this chore,
(11:14):
you stop looking at your meditation practice as a chore
and you start start looking at it as something that
you get to do and you get excited about because
you see so much value in the benefits that you're
receiving from the practice. And when you can make that
mindset shift, that's where you really start hitting those next
levels in your practice.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
And I like that because it's kind of how I
feel with swimming.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
I just recently started in about six months ago, and
when I first got in the pool, I was like,
I'm not going to even be able to do this,
Like this is way too tough for me, even though
I'm not that person.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
That's and my whole life has been tough.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
And then I started doing it, and I started doing
and then when I miss it in the morning, like
I did this morning, unfortunately, I can totally tell the difference.
Because it is my version right now of meditation. I've
music plane, and I'm swimming and I'm dancing in the water,
and I'm doing everything that I can't do on land.
I'm going backwards, I'm going into the water and the
water and it is my form of meditation right now.
(12:12):
So I like that that idea of you falling in
love with it, you know, and making it's not a
chore anymore, because it's not. It's not just oh, I
got to exercise, it's I'm doing this for the whole,
my whole being, my heart, my spirit, my soul, my sleep,
my all of that stuff.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
So that's good stuff, good stuff.
Speaker 3 (12:30):
Yes, And then once they have that why and that reason,
then they need to understand the importance of consistency, because
without a consistent practice, it's just a hobby and you're
really never going to see the benefits of it. And
there's this old story that illustrates this idea very well,
and it's about the stonecutter who was very well known
(12:51):
all over China for making these beautiful sculptures of animals
and landscapes. And his work was so unique that anytime
some he would see it, they just knew it came
from him. And because he was so well known, people
from all over China would come to stay with him
and apprentice with him to learn the trade. Well, every morning,
(13:11):
this old stonecutter would start his day by going down
to the river and meditating. And one morning, after his
meditation session, he's walking along the river and he has
this profound vision of this big, six foot tall, mystical
Chinese jade dragon. And he was so taken by this
vision that he just knew it had to be his
(13:32):
next project. So he spent the next few months traveling
all around looking for the perfect piece of jade. Finally,
when he found it, he brought it back to his place,
and for the next period of time, day in and
day out, he would just sit with the rock and
study it. He'd feel the energy coming off the stone
and envision how this dragon would soon appear once he
(13:54):
began his work. One day, when he began working on
the stone, carefully placed his chisel on the backside of
the rock and started tapping away with his hammer hundreds,
if not thousands of times a day to the exact
same place. A few days went by, and nothing happened.
He's still tapping on that same place. A few more
(14:15):
days went by and still nothing and his apprentices started watching,
thinking maybe you should try something different. They started second
guessing him. A few more days went by, still tapping
away at that same place, and finally this big three
foot section of the stone separated and created the smooth,
slightly curved line that was going to soon be part
(14:35):
of the dragon's back. And one of his apprentices, who
was watching, said, how did you know that that strike
was going to break the stone? And he said, it
wasn't that strike that broke the stone. It was the
thousands of strikes before it that broke the stone. And
with a bit of a discouraged tone, the apprentice said,
but I've been watching you and there was no change.
Why didn't you try something else? And the stonecutter got
(14:58):
down on one knee and he felt the smooth line
that he just created, and he said, each strike was
not wasted. The stone was changing beneath the surface. And
not only was the stone changing, so was the one
who wields the hammer. And the reason why I resonate
so well with the story is that this is the
meditative arts. We're not always seeing these changes happen day
(15:20):
to day, but through that consistency and effort, we're laying
the foundation to reap these benefits for the rest of
our life. And so you have to understand the value
in this and make it part of who you are.
And then the third and final consideration is this is
an extremely deep practice and you need to find a guide,
(15:43):
somebody to help point you in the right direction. If
you think you're going to sift through the millions of
videos out there on YouTube and get any depth in
your practice, you're going to waste a lot of time.
And in fact, you know, I've had students come in
here to the academy who have been self taught, and
they some of them have trained fifteen even twenty years,
and they'll come into a place where there are people
(16:05):
that are guided in certain directions, and they'll see people
that have only been here six or twelve months that
have a deeper understanding of the practice than they do
after fifteen years. You know, and our life is short
and your time is valuable. Finding somebody to help point
you in the right direction is not that hard to do.
And if you do these three things, you really spend
(16:26):
some time thinking about your why, you understand the importance
of consistency, and you find a guide. You're going to
be successful with the practice.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
But I love that story.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
It reminds me of David the statue David of He
knew that David was in there.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
He was in that.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
Stone already, So while you were telling that, it was
the first thing I thought of. But it's such a
beautiful visual of It's true because when we start, we're like,
you know what, everybody knows what happens on jan one,
Everyone's out in their yoga pants and they stop beating
shitty for like a week, and they're like, why haven't
I lost thirty pounds?
Speaker 2 (16:57):
You know, it's a good visual.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Have somebody's It wasn't the last strike, it was the
ones all before that.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
It's very well, very well said, and it resonates with
me very much.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
So how can we move into the Yielding method and
what that's all about? Because he's got one of his
books that he's written is called the Yielding Method. It actually,
excuse me, the Yielding Warrior. And then he's got the
Yielding Method. Can you talk a little bit about what
that is and how it's useful.
Speaker 3 (17:26):
Yeah, So, within the meditative arts, there's usually five directions
of practice. There's the performance side of the practice, which
helps athletes, you know, be more in tune with their
body and their awareness so they can perform at higher levels.
There's the therapeutic side, which is great for longevity and
overall health. The medical side, which you know all of
Chinese medicine is based off of Chigung theory. There is
(17:48):
the philosophical side, which is something that I've always been
passionate about and part of the reason why I love
this part of the practice is that it helps expand
your peripheral visions so you see things from multiple angles.
It helps you be more strategic, and that's kind of
where the yielding concept came from. And then there's also
the spiritual side of the practice. So when we're talking
(18:10):
about the philosophical side, there's many different philosophical concepts in
the meditative arts, and yielding is just one of them.
And the idea of yielding I've broken down into three
basic pillars. We have physical yielding, mental yielding, and emotional yielding,
and basically I'll break those down and kind of talk
(18:31):
to you about what they mean. So the physical yielding
is the idea that I push you, you push me,
whoever's a bigger, stronger person with the most leverage. Eventually
is going to push the other person over, but with yielding,
instead of us trying to see who the bigger meat
head is. When you push me, I get out of
the way of that force, and now I can respond
(18:53):
with less effort, so I'm not trying to butt heads
with you and see if I'm bigger and stronger. Now,
it's essential for athletes to understand how to do this
because they're always going to come up eventually against somebody
who's bigger and stronger and faster than them, and understanding
how to use yielding can help them get the advantage
(19:13):
on those people, and that's why it's been used in
martial arts for so many generations. Now, in order to
be good at physical yielding, a lot of things have
to come into play. You need to be well rooted.
The lower part of your body needs to be strong
and flexible so you can change your central equilibrium without
getting tight. The body has to be relaxed, the breath
(19:34):
has to be calm, and the mind has to be present. Now,
while it may be a lifetime journey to really master
these skills, from day one, by integrating a meditation practice
into your life, you start to see these things with
more clarity inside yourself. And this is where it becomes
very interesting, because not only do you see those things
(19:55):
inside yourself, but you also start to see them with
more clarity and other people. So say, for example, you
and I are having a conversation and I say something
that unbalances you and throws you off center. It's a
lot easier for me to pick up on that sign
of imbalance and bring us back to center. Then if
I'm not paying attention and pretty soon I'm so far
(20:15):
off track, you want to knock me upside the head.
And so learning how to use yielding and all of
our interactions is extremely powerful. Then we have what we
call emotional yielding, and emotional yielding is very much like
mental yielding, but with our own interpersonal conflicts. So oftentimes
(20:36):
things will happen and we'll respond and we'll go down
this path and we might get an hour a day,
a week down the road and realize maybe that wasn't
the best choice. But with yielding and our heightened awareness
through integrating meditation into our lives, we're able to step
back when these things happen and not let our emotions
get involved and be more present and oftentimes make a
(20:58):
more educated decision. This saves us a lot of heartache
on the other side, you know. And I've been explaining
this idea of yielding now for many years. I've been
running my academy for over thirty years here, and one
of the most common things I'll hear people say is
that AH yielding makes a lot of sense. In fact,
I do yielding all the time. Well, I would agree
(21:20):
in that. I think everybody does some degree of yielding
all the time, whether they label it that or not. However,
it's kind of like if you or I were to
walk into a crime scene with a detective who's been
on the job for thirty years, I guarantee you that
person would see things about the series of events in
the timeline that I know at least I would have
no clue of. And the meditative arts helps us see
(21:43):
things inside of ourselves and inside of other people that
I truly believe most people will go through life and
never have any clue of unless they have a practice
like this in their life.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
This is something that I always wanted to do.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
I hold space for it, and then.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
I pop out of it and I don't commit, and
I'm not consistent, like you're saying the consistency part of it.
Speaker 3 (22:06):
You know, you mentioned that some people do think that
though that the meditative arts are not for them, or
they're too busy, or they've got the wrong mindset, or
it doesn't work. And you know, every person I've had
just here in my academy, over twenty six thousand students.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
Come from the whole.
Speaker 3 (22:24):
In my online programs, I've had thousands more, and I
have never once met anybody who meditation couldn't help them.
And you know, when if you're somebody who thinks that
you're too busy, For those of you that think this,
and I'm bringing this up because I know there's a
lot of you out there, is that what I've found
over and over again is that when somebody comes here
(22:46):
that is busy and they take on this practice, the
fact that they start learning how to become more centered
and more present and more productive, they end up getting
more done because of their meditation practice. It doesn't take
them away from the things that they have to do.
It helps them do those things with more quality and
get more done. And so you're never too busy. And
(23:07):
in fact, the Dahalai Lama once said that everybody should
meditate for twenty minutes a day, unless you're too busy,
then you should meditate for an hour. And I enjoy
that saying that it's so true. You know, if everybody
just meditated for twenty minutes a day, the world would
be such a better place.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
I agree with you, and i've I went to this
really interesting breath work, this huge room of a bunch
of people all laying on mats, and it was intense.
It was like four hours of like this crazy breathing
and screaming and yelling and crying and sobbing. And when
we left, it was like, wow, I feel light, like
(23:43):
I sobbed out stuff I didn't even know it's in
there still, all from all this crazy breathing exercises and
all this holding your breath and letting it go, and
the whole room and the energy and there was drums
in it made oh, I just got the chills now
even talking about it, because that evening shifted me in
a whole different way about how I was going to
(24:04):
approach my pain just from that one night, and all
I had to do was breathing.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
That was it. It was unbelievably powerful.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
You were saying something earlier, and I wanted to chime in,
but I didn't want to interrupt you because that breath
work and that breathing while you've been speaking, while you've been.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
Talking to me.
Speaker 1 (24:20):
I don't know if you've noticed, but I've like, I've
been trying to work on my posture. I've been trying
to slow my breath and because you make me want
to do that, like you literally make me want to
do the practice, just by sitting with you during this conversation.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
Well, hopefully it sticks and you stay with it.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
I would love to, and I want my audience to
as well, so we can share each other's stories about
how wonderful his methods work for all of us.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
So, oh my gosh, Okay, so how can we find you?
How can we get involved with you? I know that
you're an organ. The whole world is not an organ.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
So what can we do to get more in tune
with our bodies and get into this meditator and into
meditative arts like you do?
Speaker 3 (25:00):
So if you go to my website, The Yieldingwarrior dot com,
you can get access right now. I've got a two
week trial up there where you can check out my
online program I've got a bunch of different solo products
on breath work or movement practices or chieging sets that
you can get focused on. That Also, right now, I'm
giving away a free copy of my book if you
just pay for shipping and handling. You can go to
(25:23):
the Yieldingwarrior dot com forward slash book and get access
to that there. And for those of you that are
interested in learning how to teach these practices and wanting
to take it to the next level, there's access for
those of you as well.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Well.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Thank you so much, and I'm definitely I mean, I've
already checked out all of your stuff, but i wanted
to have this conversation with you. A because I was
nervous about it, B because I know that I need it,
and see because I my audience needs this like nobody's business.
I mean, the people that come on this show and
the audience and the people that reach out to me.
Oh my gosh, the things that people have gone through
(25:59):
that we're all trying to do all these other things,
And I feel like you've made this feel so much
more simple and less complicated today during this conversation than
I've ever felt about meditation. So thank you for that
because it doesn't feel so scary or like I'm going
to fail at it.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
I'm too like performance based. I'm like, oh my gosh,
that's not going to work. Oh my god. You know,
so we want to be successful at it.
Speaker 1 (26:23):
It's like, oh my god, don't go in there trying
to be like the warrior princess of.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
Day one.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Chip away at the rock, chip Away at the Rock. Well,
thank you so much for being here with us. You
have anything else that you'd like to leave our listeners with,
because I know we're getting close on time here.
Speaker 3 (26:40):
Only one thing, and that for those of you that
are on the fence thinking about doing a meditation practice,
whether it's with me or somebody else, if you just
go out there and do twenty minutes a day and
you stay consistent with that every day for one year,
I bet ninety eight percent of the people that do
that will do this for the rest of their life
because they'll see so much value and what they've gained
(27:01):
over that one year that they'd be crazy to stop.
And I've seen that over and over again here with
students come through the academy. But you've got to put
the discipline in. You've got to put the time in
and you've got to make the effort, but it will
be one of the best things you ever do for yourself.
Speaker 2 (27:15):
Thank you. I appreciate that so very much.
Speaker 1 (27:18):
You are exclusively invited to share this yielding Warrior VIP
pain journey together.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Let's get to the heart.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Of how to heal with you and Jeff by my side.
Please follow the Pain Game Podcast wherever you digest your.
Speaker 2 (27:30):
Podcast content, we will be there.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Visit us at the Pain gamepodcast dot com and follow
us on all the socials. Thanks for listening, my little VIPs.
Catch you on the other side.
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