Podcasts about thanks lisa

The Panti Personals - a new podcast hosted by Panti Bliss, started May 1 2021. Panti Bliss is breaking out of lockdown and getting up close (well two metres) and personal. In this new podcast, a child of the multi-award winning Pantisocracy, Panti Bliss is escaping her husband, Penny the dog and Crayon the lockdown cat, to have some intimate and revealing conversations with old and new friends who also, since, they're all performers, entertain her in a private audience of one. In this season she meets the handsome beast, mindfulness and music man, Niall Breslin, aka Bressie of the Blizzards, American singer and songwriter, Galia Arad, film-maker and musician Myles O'Reilly and the Dutch singer and songwriter Jane Willow. For more go to the mothership pantisocracy.ie/panti-personals/ The Panti Personals is an independent podcast production by Athena Media. The producer is Helen Shaw and the digital editor is John Howard. This first season of The Panti Personals is made with the support of Camden Recording Studios in Dublin. The theme music for The Panti Personals is Knots by Lisa Hannigan, and used with her kind permission. Thanks Lisa! If you like what we do, please share the podcast using hashtag #ThePantiPersonals

The Panti Personals - a new podcast hosted by Panti Bliss, starts May 1 2021. Panti Bliss is breaking out of lockdown and getting up close ( well two metres) and personal. In this new podcast, a child of the multi-award winning Pantisocracy, Panti Bliss is escaping her husband, Penny the dog and Crayon the lockdown cat, to have some intimate and revealing conversations with old and new friends who also, since, they're all performers, entertain her in a private audience of one. In this season she meets the handsome beast, mindfulness and music man, Niall Breslin, ala Bressie of the Blizzards, American singer and songwriter, Galia Arad, film-maker and musician Myles O'Reilly, the unstoppable Bronagh Gallagher, and the Dutch singer and songwriter Jane Willow. For more go to the mothership http://pantisocracy.ie/panti-personals/ The Panti Personals is an independent podcast production by Athena Media. The producer is Helen Shaw and the digital editor is John Howard. This first season of The Panti Personals is made with the support of Camden Recording Studios in Dublin. The theme music for The Panti Personals is Knots by Lisa Hannigan, and used with her kind permission. Thanks Lisa!

In this interview Lisa interviews top Holistic movement and health coach David Liow of www.hm-coach.com.   Lisa and David do a deep dive into why our circadian rhythms are out of whack, what blue light blocking glasses can do for your health and sleep dysfunctions. They also look into health optimisation and foundational health principles.   David Liow completed a post-graduate MPhEd (dist) at Otago University and became a Occupational Therapy lecturer in rehabilitation, anatomy, and kinesiology, then a senior lecturer in Exercise Rehabilitation and Resistance Training.   While teaching in higher education, he kept following his passion in sports training and spent a decade working with High Performance Sport New Zealand as a lead strength and conditioning coach. This gave him the opportunity to work with a wide range of world class athletes.   Some career highlights so far are: Head trainer for the New Zealand Black Sox for two successful World Series campaigns Head trainer for the New Zealand Black Sox for two successful World Series campaigns Head trainer and regional trainer for NZ Women's and Men's Hockey for several Commonwealth and Olympic Games. Head trainer for the NZ Titleist Men and Women's Golf Academy for several Espirito Santo and Eisenhower Trophy Championship teams. Trainer for numerous Commonwealth and Olympic athletes in athletics, basketball, through to swimming. Regularly speaking at FitEx NZ, Filex, Asia Fitness Conference, ExPRO, Asia Edufit Summit, and other international health and fitness events. Health coaching pop bands on international concert tours around the globe. Co-directing Kaizen Exercise Physiologists to develop a world-class team of exercise physiologists Co-founder of the Kaizen Institute of Health David says the Holistic Movement Coach Programme is the perfect vehicle for him  to live his mission and share his life's work.   He is obsessed with finding the best ways to be healthier and move better.  To balance out his obsession(s) he is also a tai chi and chi kung practitioner and teacher, and practices the lifestyle that he teaches   Findo out more about David and his work and courses at www.hm-coach.com   To get a discount on the blue light blocking glasses mentioned in this podcast use the coupon code Lisa at checkout at  https://hm-coach.com/index.php/store/   Grab your blue blocking glasses here in our shop https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/clothing-and-accessories/products/blue-light-blocking-glasses-v2-0-free-postage   We would like to thank our sponsors for this show:   For more information on Lisa Tamati's programs, books and documentaries please visit www.lisatamati.com   For Lisa's online run training coaching go to https://www.lisatamati.com/page/running/ Join hundreds of athletes from all over the world and all levels smashing their running goals while staying healthy in mind and body.   Lisa's Epigenetics Testing Program https://www.lisatamati.com/page/epigenetics/ measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home   For Lisa's Mental Toughness online course visit: https://www.lisatamati.com/page/mindsetu-mindset-university/   Lisa's third book has just been released. It's titled "Relentless - How A Mother And Daughter Defied The Odds" Visit: https://relentlessbook.lisatamati.com/ for more Information   ABOUT THE BOOK: When extreme endurance athlete, Lisa Tamati, was confronted with the hardest challenge of her life, she fought with everything she had. Her beloved mother, Isobel, had suffered a huge aneurysm and stroke and was left with massive brain damage; she was like a baby in a woman's body. The prognosis was dire. There was very little hope that she would ever have any quality of life again. But Lisa is a fighter and stubborn. She absolutely refused to accept the words of the medical fraternity and instead decided that she was going to get her mother back or die trying. This book tells of the horrors, despair, hope, love, and incredible experiences and insights of that journey. It shares the difficulties of going against a medical system that has major problems and limitations. Amongst the darkest times were moments of great laughter and joy. Relentless will not only take the reader on a journey from despair to hope and joy, but it also provides information on the treatments used, expert advice and key principles to overcoming obstacles and winning in all of life's challenges. It will inspire and guide anyone who wants to achieve their goals in life, overcome massive obstacles or limiting beliefs. It's for those who are facing terrible odds, for those who can't see light at the end of the tunnel. It's about courage, self-belief, and mental toughness. And it's also about vulnerability... it's real, raw, and genuine. This is not just a story about the love and dedication between a mother and a daughter. It is about beating the odds, never giving up hope, doing whatever it takes, and what it means to go 'all in'. Isobel's miraculous recovery is a true tale of what can be accomplished when love is the motivating factor and when being relentless is the only option.   Here's What NY Times Best Selling author and Nobel Prize Winner Author says of The Book: "There is nothing more powerful than overcoming physical illness when doctors don't have answers and the odds are stacked against you. This is a fiercely inspiring journey of a mother and daughter that never give up. It's a powerful example for all of us." —Dr. Bill Andrews, Nobel Prize Winner, author of Curing Aging and Telomere Lengthening.   "A hero is someone that refuses to let anything stand in her way, and Lisa Tamati is such an individual. Faced with the insurmountable challenge of bringing her ailing mother back to health, Lisa harnessed a deeper strength to overcome impossible odds. Her story is gritty, genuine and raw, but ultimately uplifting and endearing. If you want to harness the power of hope and conviction to overcome the obstacles in your life, Lisa's inspiring story will show you the path." —Dean Karnazes, New York Times best selling author and Extreme Endurance Athlete.   Transcript of the Podcast: Speaker 1: (00:01) Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati brought to you by lisatamati.com Speaker 2: (00:14) Today I have a special treat for you guys. I have David Liow on the podcast from the sunshine coast, originally a Kiwi. Now David is a Legion and the fitness industry in New Zealand and Australia and Australasia. Uh, he has, uh, MPH ed from Otago university and was an occupational therapy lecturer in rehabilitation and anatomy and kinesiology. And then a senior lecturer in exercise rehabilitation and resistance training. He worked for a decade with high performance sport New Zealand and was the head trainer of the New Zealand black socks, was two successful world series campaigns. He's also worked with golfers and a number of Olympic athletes and athletics, basketball right through to swimming and he as a holistic movement coach. And today we're going to be diving into the topic of light and blue light blocking glasses. Um, something that David has developed his own range of blue locket, blue, blue light blocking glasses and why you should be interested in this. Speaker 2: (01:17) We get into sleep, uh, dysfunctional sleep. We get into, um, holistic movement and what that's all about. So a really, really interesting interview with David. Uh, before I go over to David, I just want to remind you my book relentless is now available in the bookstores right throughout the New Zealand. If you're listening from New Zealand, you can grab it at any bookstores around the country or of course if you're overseas or you want to grab it off my site, I'd love you to do that. You can go to relentlessbook.lisatamati.com To do that. Um, just reminder too, we also have a regular epigenetics webinars that we're holding. Our next one is on the swings day night, but if you're listening to this podcast later, go to epigenetics.lisatamati.com for the next webinar. Now this is all about our epigenetics health program, which is using the latest in genetic science to understand your genes and how to optimize them and what's, what's the best environment for those genes. Speaker 2: (02:16) So information about every area of your life from nutrition of course, and exercise, what to eat, when to eat, how often to eat, what types of exercise will suit your genes right through to your social, your mental, your intellectual talents that you may not be aware of, what the way that your brain works brought through to the neurotransmitters and the hormones that are dominant and how they will affect your personality. So it's a really amazing insight for health program that we're using both with corporates and individual athletes and people interested in optimizing their health. If you want to check that out, go over to the programs tab on our website at lisatamati.com right now over to the show with David Liow. Well hi everyone. Lisa Tamati to hear back at pushing the limits and I am with David Liow How are you doing Dave? Speaker 3: (03:08) I'm very well this morning. Thanks Lisa. You're over on the sunshine coast. I am, which is looking quite sunny this morning and we had a lot of rain last night, but the sunny coast is a sunny coast today. Speaker 2: (03:17) That was perfect. We've already, uh, um, Rick the morning for your whole family, trying to get on the same call and waking your daughter up and getting your laptop and stuff like that. So apologize to you, to your family, but you, we've got you on here, so I'm really, really privileged to have you on. Again, Dave, you're a return offender to my, uh, podcast. Um, you were on a couple of years ago I think goes so well, but so really excited to catch up with you. And today we're going to be talking a couple of different areas and we'll probably wander off path, but today everyone, it's about light and blue light blocking glasses that you may have heard about and why this is important and sleep. Um, Dave's an expert in this area and there's actually gone out and designed his own, uh, glasses for people. Um, so we're going to be getting into all of that good stuff. But Dave, tell us what you've been up to in the last couple of years and what you do over there on the sunshine coast. Speaker 3: (04:12) So in the sunshine coast, I have a exercise physiology clinic, which unfortunately isn't shut down at the moment. So we're on a, we're doing a lot of remote work, which is why communicated well, zoom has become a big commodity here at the moment in my household. So I also mentor a group of, uh, some of the best trainers in the world, many of which are based in New Zealand actually. So I worked with that group there and take them right through their education work. I do a lot of presenting to, so I'm often in Asia and New Zealand. I spend a lot of time in New Zealand. In fact, I was in New Zealand pretty much the whole of February. Just got back in time before things went the Casta key way. Of course, I am of course a Kiwi. Absolutely. So, but I've been, I've been over here for about 10 years now. Um, but certainly, um, I still do a lot of work in New Zealand in particular and a fair bit in Australia, funnily enough. Cause that's where I live. Speaker 2: (05:08) Yeah. And you have a hell of a reputation, uh, in the, in the personal training and the fitness training space. Um, you talk to anybody who's done anything, you know, above the sort of basic stuff and they know who you are. Um, so you've got a long, long history. You are a holistic movement coach. Can you explain what that is? Speaker 3: (05:27) Absolutely. So holistic movement coach, the idea is it's more than movement and that's pretty much what they're, what the logo says. So much more than movement because what I found is, I guess I've been doing this for over 25 years now and what I've, what I've always specialized in is the, the mechanics of the body. Yep. So I look at what's connected to what, look at how the tissues work, look at how joints work, look at how people move. And that was my world. But what I found after a while is that's not enough because we're more than just joints and leavers so much more. So if you don't look after the other part, that's where the holistic part comes in. If you don't look after the whole person after everything from their mindset through to the asleep, through the nutrition, there's just no way you can, you can get your results. So you can have the best training program in the world, the best corrective exercise program in the world. But if, if your minds are, you're stressed out of your brain or sleeping, I don't care what you give someone that's just not going to work. Speaker 2: (06:23) That's so funny that you come to the same conclusion and we, I mean a lot of people have late. I think as we do more research and starting to see also when you're training somebody or two people and you're getting completely different results and you're giving them the same program and the same goals and they're the same type of person and same age or whatever and you're like, why is that person getting results? And they're not. So really being that personal spaces in that holistic looking at, cause I truly believe like our mind is so like important for healing. You know, it's not just mechanical isn't, it? Isn't just when you've got a sore back. It isn't just necessarily about the back. Oh no way. Can you explain Speaker 3: (07:03) cliques and I know you've had some speakers talk about pain as well. Pain is extremely complex. That said output not an input. So certainly when you're talking about pain and injury, there's so much going on with the brain with there. Surely some mechanical parts that can have a role. But I mean the top two inches are just absolutely vital and you know with your background only. So you know that in terms of a high performance, but you can apply that to any field. You know, I guess one of the big differences there that I've come across is we're so focused on loading people. That's been our thing. How do we train people? How do we add more load onto people that's adding more stress on the people. So, and you know, I'll talk at a conference, there'll be, you know, there might be 50 talks on at the conference, 45 of them will be about loading, how to lot people with heel bells, how to load them with power bands, how to, how to Olympic lifting. Speaker 3: (07:55) Those things are great. Don't get me wrong. And I teach those and I do those. But where's the other part about getting people recovering? Well, getting them in the right place. So one of the key fundamentals and holistic movement coach is getting people in the right place so they can accept load. And then that's a really big point of difference. So if you can get people in the right space, then you apply your load, you can apply whatever load you want and they'll be fine. But until you're in that space, you're going to have nothing but breakdown. Speaker 2: (08:24) Yeah, and this is like, this is a real mind shift because like I know you've worked with a lot of elite level athletes and you know, in, in, in my stupid career, and I don't count myself as an elite athlete, I count myself as one of those stupid stubborn ones. But that I had that mentality just go hard or go home, you know, go harder, go harder, go harder. It was always the answer. If I wasn't getting results go harder. And it took me a long time to realize, especially as I got older, that approach was no working. And how do you reconcile that for people that are in the elite space set are just used to going full bore and then that suddenly not getting the results they used to get. Speaker 3: (09:06) Yeah, it's funny, I had a conversation with a group of athletes the other day and what I normally find is you are the classic woman, high performance athlete. You really are most of the guys, well I always find the individual athletes work harder than team athletes. Um, ones that work in funded sports and you know, great athletes here. And this is a massive generalization, sorry guys out there who are listening to this and going, hang on when work with you, I worked hard. But you find that the individual athletes work harder. Most of the men, you need to kick up the ass. You need to hold them back. So you, you're the classic one, but you live, you got smarter as you train. And I've read your journey and how you, how you run. You're constantly there to listen to, you know, when the, when the, when the student's ready, the teacher appears and, and you know, you certainly, um, you know, you figured out some, some pretty cool stuff and you know, that's the stuff that you apply in your program now. So yeah, Speaker 2: (10:14) you know that someone like Neo because I would argue and argue and argue with him, but eventually I came around cause what I was doing was right. Speaker 3: (10:22) Hello. He was right to have it Speaker 2: (10:27) fancy that I had to, Murray was right all along. But it is, it's a really hard shift and I think, you know, cause you get away with a lot when you're 20, well you knew 40 and you're still trying to be at the top of your game or your mid thirties even. You start to have a different things going on and things aren't recovering as well as they were. And even though you're doing the same thing, it's just not more of the same to every decade. I reckon you need a complete new approach. Speaker 3: (10:56) You need to do it smarter. And I've got a guy who, um, is in, he's, he goes to the world championship, um, uh, triathlon every year and he's been doing that for, I've been working with him for the last, since I arrived here, nine years now. And he got a three fastest times last year actually. The last one was blue, which is the last triathlon event before they closed down all the events here. So he's getting faster and faster and faster and know when he sees 50, 53 now. And we had a chat the other day and we were laughing about it and he's saying, you know, my three fastest times I've been in my last, you know, my last year, he said, yeah, we were actually starting to get the hang of it now. So look we can, we can flip the age card. Look there is a part to play I'm getting on as well, but we're looking at that experience you can bring to the table there. And I'm often training with young guys and I'm not going to, you're doing it right for an old guy. And I say, you got really well for young guy. He hasn't got nearly experienced I have, Speaker 2: (11:55) but don't ever compliment them so I can find out the hard way. But there is, it just has to be done smarter, so much smarter. And you know, we all look at ourselves as young athletes and go, Oh man, I had so much raw ability there. But then you look at how you're training now and go, boy, I'm so much smarter now. If you can take the, I'd much rather have a smarter than a roar athlete, get combined the two and you've got something really special and give it time. And I think like now we're starting to crack and this is an area of study that really interests me is longevity for obvious reasons. I'm getting older, my parents are getting old and I want to keep everyone alive and healthy. So that's the focus of my study in a lot of ways. Um, and we are working things out now to slow that aging process and reverse a lot of the danger, a lot of the problems that we've caused ourselves. Speaker 2: (12:47) So, um, I'm excited for some of the stuff I've been getting, you know, reading all sorts of stuff. I'm on peptides and all this sort of stuff and just wishing I could get access to some of the stuff and try it all out cause I'm a tree blew by a hacker, you know, try everything out on your own body, see how it works. Um, and there's some amazing stuff coming in. The information that's coming, uh, down the pipeline. If we can just stay healthy long enough, we, we've got a good chance at living really long, healthy lives. I think, you know, in the next 10 years there's going to be so much change happen that, you know, good things are gonna happen if we're onto it and we know we're aware of what's coming in the space. So I'm really excited for the, you know, being able to maintain performance for longer and have, you know, health and longevity, you know, beyond the hundred. Speaker 2: (13:35) I think that that's, you know, well and truly possible. So exciting. Um, and of course too, because health has that foundation. Yeah. We call it health and fitness. I mean it has to be healthy. Then fitness. You can't have one without the other. I know you had some real challenges in the query there and when that health goes, you can forget about the other part of it cause it's just not going to last year that's still undoing some of the damage I've done to my body. I've managed to save my kidneys and get them back on track, but then, you know, hormones came into the picture and um, you know, uh, troubles in the lady department and all that sort of jazz that's not on a fix and he has a lot to unravel. If I'd done it differently, um, back then. And of course, you know, doing extreme ultramarathons brings with it dangerous. It's not, you know, it's not, um, you know, a couple of hours running around the roads. It's doing really, really at the limit things and what is a coach now, I'm always like concerned. Sometimes I find myself like being that old mother be, it's like, Hey, no, don't push that hard. Go to those lengths because you know, sometimes it's not worth it for a competition. You know, um, one of the things that I often find myself saying to people as they, you know, they, they equate, Speaker 3: (14:52) uh, fitness with health. But boy, you know, sports not about health. It's about seeing how hard you can push yourself before you or your opponent breaks. So, you know, and that is the pointy end of performance. So you know, the way you've been pushing yourself, there's, there's, that's where you've, you've got to have everything covered and that's where a lot of that approach you said about your health and getting all those bits and pieces there. Because if you can get all those, those bases covered, you have got potential to push yourself through. Well, but a lot of people don't bring that health to that, that base health to the Speaker 2: (15:26) they face table. In other words, yeah. High performance sport or extreme endurance sport in my case is not healthy in of itself. Um, and I like, I truly believe like I was extremely fit in one way. I could run for hundreds of Ks, but I was sick. And if I look at myself in the way I looked and the way my body and my phenotype, my body was presenting, I did not look healthy. I look healthier. I look, funnily enough, more athletic now because I'm not holding all the fluid and my kidneys and working again. And my, you know, I was always four or five. I was quite puffy, you know, I was quite, um, I was always a muscular build, but I was puffy and unhealthy looking. And I always sort of was carrying white, you know, and wondering why when I'm doing millions of kilometers a year. And, um, and now I know why. Cause my body was just complete in hormonal hell and adrenal hell and, and, and so I was fit, but I was not healthy. And now for me, it's all about being healthy and longevity in having foundation or health. Speaker 3: (16:36) Yeah. And bringing that to you, you runners that you're working with in your groups. That's, that's, um, you know, that's gonna make, uh, uh, people enjoy what they do, so much more in it, achieve great things. So that's the way it should be done. So good on you for learning the lesson. Speaker 2: (16:51) Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And then being able to share the insights. And it's funny that we both come to the same sort of conclusions. Well it's probably logical. I suppose it's also a part of the age that we're at and having that maturity to be able to not just, it's not all just about much Muchow call I go go. It's about being strategic and you know, and I look at you, a lot of young athletes that are, you know, it's all about their abs and it's all about, you know, how sexy they look and that approach has also not healthy. Like it's not going to bring healthy just cause you're like ripped. Um, especially when it comes to woman. I think, you know, like we have this, you know, the ideal that isn't actually necessarily or always a healthy ideal. It's uh, it might look good for five minutes and your beginning ideal, but it's not exactly, we should be health wise and hormonally and all of that sort of stuff. We've gone completely off track cause today was me talking. But I love talking to people like you. So let's get back to blue light blocking glasses. Um, and why, why these are important, what they do and how, how does, um, having the wrong light at the wrong time affect your health? Speaker 3: (17:59) I guess we need to kind of talk about light to start with. And you know, if you think about the foundations of health, we think about the foundations of who we are as as humans we've always been exposed to light and dark. Those are two things that have never changed. We've had ever, and the way that we've operated, well, most and most cultures is that you are active in the day. That's the time you hunt together and at night that's the time you sleep. Because as cave men and cave woman, we were the fastest beings or strongest. So if you go hunting at night, unfortunately that say with two tigers got a better night vision than you have. So that's not a logical time for you to go and do your thing. So we've always been exposed to that as a way of regulating where our systems at and where we are. Speaker 3: (18:46) Every cell in your body has a circadian rhythm. So it's Acadia means about a day. So every cell in your body knows has a certain function at a certain time. And there's a neat little Wikipedia article on this, which basically says at different times where your reaction times best and you know this yourself, you get up, you have a certain routine that you'll go through. There are times you'll feel hungry, there are times you'll go to the toilet. There are times that your your most awake, most alert times that you want to go to sleep. So we have a whole rhythm built into our behaviors. In every single cell in our body has behaviors and actions that are governed by Diana light. So this is one of the foundation rulers of how our body works. Speaker 2: (19:29) Absolutely. So, so, okay, so what we've done in the last couple of hundred years, or I don't know how long we've actually had electric life, but ever since we've had electric glide, we've tipped everything up on its ear and we now have light at night time, whereas in the caveman days, and this is where our DNA hasn't evolved with the way that we've changed our lifestyle so quickly. Um, so we were exposed to, you know, televisions and lights and artificial lights and fluorescent light and horrible, lots of light, uh, at nighttime when our bodies are producing the hormones to go to sleep, your melatonin and things like this. Um, if, if we even go back, like I've just been reading a book by T S Wiley on hormone or health for woman and so on. And she talks about the fact that back in the old days when we were only governed by Moonlight, all woman's cycled at the same time. And I was like, wow. So we used to be all in sync with the moon and, and, and like how much light male camping trips that are out there. Months. We're outta here. But isn't that interesting that we, you said we used to be completely governed and this is, you know, back in the cave man days by those cycles of day and night and now are who is so, um, you know, bombarded with other types of light that are all about cycles, have now become individual. Speaker 3: (20:51) They're that light exposure. That's a better message. That's a, that's a great point because we used to have real light and real dark. So if I'm looking outside now, it's a pretty sunny day here. Um, so lights measured and what the units called a lax. And ALEKS is the amount of light put out by a candle when it's one meter away from you. So that's one Luxe. So, um, if you're looking at Moonlight, we'll go with Moonlight. Moonlight is around maybe 0.5 to one Luxe. So it's a very light amount of light. Well, it's a very small amount of night. So if I'm looking at a room, let's say you're, um, soft lighting in a, in a bedroom that's 50 Lux. If you were sitting in your room, you're in your dark room. That's not a dark room. That's 50 lacks. And what's happening now is with all the artificial light. Speaker 3: (21:38) And um, for me, I live in the suburbs so my neighbors have their light on it. It puts a, you know, I can, if I walk outside I'll see that. So we're not exposed to real dark. Our darks not dark, right. If we flip it the other way too, our light's not light. So I'm looking outside at the moment. I've probably got 50,000 Lux of natural sunlight out there. If I'm sitting in an office though, I've probably got 300 Lux. So when I'm in day sitting in my light, I'm not sitting in real life. And when I'm at night, I'm not sitting in real dark. So now we have 50 shades of gray thing going on at that movie. We've got that all the time. So we're not seeing real dark and real life. Some of the people that probably, well hopefully watching, listening to our interview today, um, they may get up in the morning, it might be dark where they are too. Speaker 3: (22:29) They might flick on a light bulb, they'll hop in their car, they'll go to their office underground, they'll go to their office where they'll sit in their cubicle all day with their first flight. They can't get out for lunch, cause are busy. They'll come home by then it might be getting a bit dark too. They'll go and they'll sit in front of their TV. So I get no exposure to real dark or real life. And boy that is a foundation for how our body operates. You get that wrong, you miss that up. Um, you can get a whole range of interesting symptoms. Every system, every cell in your body is affected by that. So we're at see where it goes. Nobody knows, but it's not going to be good. Speaker 2: (23:06) No. And this is, it fixed. So many systems like we have, you know, a hormonal system as a, as I mentioned before, we've got out melatonin production and now our eyes. Um, and, and also the fact that like, that's getting to the, you know, uh, the subject of, of why sunlight's important and we've all been told like, you know, don't put sunscreen on and make sure you're covered up when you go out in the sun and so on. And that is actually, we're not giving enough vitamin D. I mean, everyone knows that we produce vitamin D when we go in to the sunshine, but I don't think people know how important vitamin D and all of the processes is actually a prohormone. They're calling now, not a vitamin because it's so many parts of the body and so many organs. Everything from your, your mood, which we do understand that, you know, that produces it seasonal, um, disorder. Speaker 2: (23:56) Um, but it also like is, is a, is the building block one of the building blocks of your hormones, of your, your, uh, your mood in, you know, all of these things are being affected. Even your bone health, you know, like vitamin D is one of those crucial things. Um, and we can supplement with vitamin D. And I think for a lot of people that's a great thing to be doing if you can't get the normal amount of sunlight. Um, and I was reading, but yeah, we need to actually go outside and get sun on our eyes and sun on our skin. What actually happens when we go out and we get that sunlight, cause I used to wear a, I still do most of the time because I've got very sensitive eyes to light. So I've been wearing my sunglasses forever and a day outside. Why is it important that I take my sunglasses? Speaker 3: (24:44) So what are doing Mary can mean particularly for people who have sleep problems is they get some real sunlight in your eyes, particularly in that first half of the day. So their morning sun. So that's the most important time. So when that light comes through, so lights made it a whole lot of different colors. So all the colors of the rainbow, the Roy Bev thing, but typically a daylight or or, or a real real life. It's very high in blue light. When that comes through, it goes through your eyes and there's some photo of, there's some fairly sensitive ganglion cells. So there's some specific cells in your eyes which are right in your written to the there which, which sends signals to your master clock in your brain, which then sends signals out to the rest of your body letting you know what time it is. Speaker 3: (25:31) So that morning sun. So sunglasses, I've got no problems with sunglasses. If you're out in the sun all day, but getting up, you know, being in sunglasses all day, that's going to do you a disservice. So ideally you want some, some real light in your eyes. Take the 15 minutes is great, you know, thirties fifteens, but even five minutes better than nothing, right? So if you are struggling with sleep, even if you can eat your breakfast outside or get a little bit of a walking from your car to the office or around the block, getting some real sunlight that will help your brain distinguish, okay, this is daytime. Then if you can get some real dark, okay, then your brain can start thinking, okay, now I understand what time of day it is so I can start getting my cycles right. Speaker 2: (26:14) Wow, that's, that's powerful stuff. And then, and then so many knock on effects for our health and we'll do that and when we do it wrong. And you know what, um, I'm working with a few different people that are unfortunately in hospital at the moment with, you know, various problems, um, delights in the hospital. Like we were sticking our sickest, most vulnerable people under these horrific lights that are going all night. I mean, of course the nurses need to move around and see. So it's a bit of a, I don't know how to fix the problem. Yeah, jeez. Yeah, Speaker 3: (26:44) so there's the fluoro. So flouro and led lights are particularly high in blue light too. So when you're in those hospitals, um, Chang airport says another place if you wish. I'm obviously not at here at the moment, but I go and the amount of light in their places, often they're at 3:00 AM in the morning in between places. Those lights. Singles are incredibly strong and that's effectively that blue light coming from those lights here is telling your brain that it's, it's middle of the day. So I always thinking about the nurses that work in those places too. That's a know that's a real health hazard for them. So unfortunately we've got all these lights in our houses now too. So led lights are very energy efficient but also extremely, extremely powerful. So you've got a whole of intensity but also very, very high in blue light. Speaker 3: (27:34) The old school filament, like light bulbs are very low and blue lights. So the old school lights though, they do more energy. We're actually far better for your health, for your health. Wow. That's no good. No, not unfortunately not. And that's where you, you candle lights really great too. And you know, when we were thinking back to our roots, and this is, you know, if we look in the past to find out how we need to kind of operate for our health today, um, you know, fire is also very low and blue light. So sitting around a fire is actually very common. It doesn't wake you up unless you're sitting too close to the fire. That's out candle lights. Speaker 3: (28:16) Um, just on that, you know, um, a change of temperature, but before you go to bed is also another good sleep. You know, this is why when you, when you increase the warmth or what, um, or even cold would actually, well, as long as you change the temperature that you've been in, that signals to your body is a change coming at something you go to sleep. So that's another little trick and you know why? Probably sitting around the fire that doesn't have blue light and that will help you go, go and not off afterwards. That idea of sleep routines is just fantastic and yeah, you know, and you know, having a good receipt routines, fantastic. And we do this with our kids where we're grading it, you know? Yeah. Okay, we're going to get ready to go to bed now. Okay, we'll brush your teeth. Speaker 3: (28:55) Now we're going to do a story here. Okay. We're going to put on your bedside lamp. We'll turn the light down and we'll go to sleep. But when we're adults, we kind of forget about that. And you go, Oh, okay, I'll watch till the end of this program here. And it might be one big, one time you'll go to bed, might be 9:00 PM. Next one, it's 1130. It's all over the show. We don't do that with our kids. And we forget about those routines. And part of that is, is light light's a big part of that. That's the most important part of your sleep routine is getting your light source right. That's exactly right. And this is why. So you learned this and then you said, right, I'm going to go and buy some blue light blocking glasses. Yeah, I did that too. And um, you know, you go on the internet, you Google up somewhere on Etsy or eBay or somewhere and you buy something. Speaker 2: (29:41) And what did you find with those glasses? Speaker 3: (29:44) Yeah. Um, so achieve one of your, I know we um, a previous speaker you head on was talking about sleep apnea and positional sleep apnea. So look, I've always thought I slept pretty well, but when I started working on my sleep apnea and my breathing boy, I went to another level and I got quite excited about it and once I fell out of a blue light and the effects that have, I thought, man, I've got to get that right. So exotic executive, same as you. I went out and I bought about 20 pairs of glasses from, from all sorts of people. And when I did my research there, I found out, okay, I need to find out about transmission spectrum or in other words, what colors or what, what frequencies of light were blocking, uh, with those glasses. So every pair of glasses that I bought, I emailed the manufacturer and said, tell me about your glasses. Speaker 3: (30:36) What transmission spectrum are they are and what have they been tested? Most of them never even got back to me. And the ones that did had no idea what you're doing. I started thinking, well come on, this can't be right. And it didn't seem to matter what price I paid for those glasses either. Even some of the so called blue light glasses websites. They had no idea or no data supporting what they're actually doing. So what you were getting was all over the show. Sometimes I'd actually find, I'd get the same pair of glasses from, from two different manufacturers and they were the same pair of glasses, but they were totally different. I had totally different stats on them. All the lenses were different colors and they said they were the same. Speaker 3: (31:17) Absolutely. Here's an example of when I got here and I'll just put that this is what a typical, yeah, blue light glass looks like. It's got a slight orange tinge to it and that blocks certain colors. So particularly the blue is the color we want to block. And what that does is that takes away the signal to our brain that it's, it's, it's daylight. So the idea with blue light blocking glasses is to tell your brain you with them at night to tell your brain that it's not daytime. So that was a so called blue light blocking. These are cheap here. I think that was maybe, maybe 40 bucks or something off some internet site and that's mine. And if we have difference in color block the same amount of light. Wow. I completely different. No they don't because I actually ended up getting an optometry lab, um, to produce mine cause I got so disappointed with the quality of, of glasses and I said there's no way I'm going to wear these myself and if I shouldn't wear them, why the hell would I ask other people to wear them? We Speaker 2: (32:18) had as a lay person, you read the advertising material and you, you know that the science is correct. Like the, the, you know what we've been saying about and it makes sense to you and then you go and buy some and then you're disappointed because it's not doing well. You don't notice. You just think I'm doing it right. And I, and I've got it right and I haven't. So now you've got these available. So, um, I will be putting, uh, the links of course to, to your glasses and uh, in the show notes. Um, but just let us know where we came. Can we grab your glasses from? Speaker 3: (32:49) Yep. So holistic movement coaches though my company, so it's H M with a-coach.com and they are available in the store there and I'm sure if we ask Lisa nicely, she might put a coupon code in for you. Speaker 2: (33:04) We're going to do that and I'll put that in the show notes or I'd actually like to list them up on our site and drop, you know like yeah. So that people have them available. So yeah, either go to Dave's website or my website and you'll be able to grab those ones. We'll, we'll sort that out afterwards. Um, so Speaker 3: (33:21) Lisa, you were talking about melatonin before then. That's one of the things that got me really excited when I started looking at the glasses and there was one study there that kind of, I looked at it and went, wow, that's amazing. And they had two groups of people. One had a clear lens and the other one had a blue light blocking glasses lens and that it was good quality lens. It was pretty much the same as mine. Yup. And they showed the melatonin levels creeping up during the night and that's what should happen. So melatonin is, is it's basically a hormonal signal for dark. It's your body's way of saying it's dark and those levels creep up as soon as it starts getting dark and they were going the same, um, until what happened is the blue light blocking glasses guys had a much higher level of melatonin than the ones that were wearing the clear lenses. Speaker 3: (34:10) So since I were in a, they were in a, a room, which was about 150, lax, which is a, uh, and average lounge. Yep. Um, the blue light blocking glass folks had a much higher melatonin level so that we're getting the appropriate signal. But what was interesting though was after they went to sleep in the morning, the folks at block blue light had less melatonin first thing in the morning. Absolutely. Because the last thing, when you're awake, you don't want melatonin running around your body. So they wake up drowsy. So typically people who don't block blue light will struggle to get to sleep because they're not getting their chemical message from melatonin that it's dark. But then in the morning they get stuck with that excess melatonin and find it hard to get going. There are a few, one of those folks that struggle to get to sleep and also struggle to get going in the morning. That exposure to light could be a really big factor Speaker 2: (35:03) and this and the melatonin and the cortisol are related and I'm not an expert on this, but I, I started taking, cause I was having trouble sleeping melatonin tablets, you know, um, supplements and I was, you know, it was good. I was sleeping much better. Um, then I did a blood test and I'm not quite sure, you know, but my, my doctor rang me up in a bit of a panic going, you know, your melatonin levels are 10,000 times too high. Um, uh, and um, your, your blood, I think you've serum levels or whatever. It's not, you know, actually 10,000, but it was, it was a lot higher and I had no cortisol like when they, cause they did the cortisol tests and I don't know whether it was related to the melatonin or not, but since stopping the melatonin and implementing some other things to be fair, um, my cortisol levels are now back at the top end of normal range. So they're toppings. But um, so it's a bit of a uh, uh, so you're just taking a supplement of melatonin, um, can be a good thing, but you have to be a little bit careful with that as well. Speaker 3: (36:09) Melatonin's is a strange one and I used to recommend people to take melatonin once upon a time, but you know, melatonin is the only hormone that you can buy across the counter or even online and get it shipped to you. I mean, imagine doing that with testosterone or, or any other hormones you've got in your body. It's, it's, it's a strange one and it's very unregulated. So when you get a melatonin, if you're taking a pill or a capsule or drop, the dose you get is often very different from the dose that you experienced in your body too. So it's very unregulated. So you pay a little bit tricky with the brains you're using. Now what you found nearly so in your perfect example of that is your levels went sky high because often what happens is melatonin builds up and production peaks around the middle of your sleep cycle. If you were went to bed at 10 and woke up at six, halfway through that would be about 2:00 AM. So that's when your melatonin levels are really cranking. But when you take a melatonin before you go to sleep, you're going to get that peak very, very early as well. So now you're going to get a hormonal message, which is in the wrong time of that cycle too. So they can still sit up some, some little issues there. And if you're getting crazy high levels of that, that can cause you some issues. Speaker 2: (37:22) And this was only one tablet, a little wee tiny tablet. So it wasn't, you know, like overdosing or anything. And then the cortisol, which is your stress hormone, but it's one we want in the morning, absolutely was in that gutter. So I was like waking up like, Oh my God, do I have to get out of bed because I don't want, you know, there's just no get up and go. And it was just sheer grit to get up Speaker 3: (37:41) flooded with melatonin. That time there and you know, you did right cortisol as you'd get up and go in the morning. So melatonin should plumb it in the morning because it's no longer dark. It's time to get up cortisol levels. It should be the highest there to get you out of bed. So you start playing around with that system. Um, bye. Introducing foreign substances in. Yeah. You Speaker 2: (38:02) know, you can get some varied results, which you may not be wanting to do it under controlled if you're going to do it, you know, Drake that you're measuring it too though, you know, at least you know what's working for you and what's not working for you. Yeah. And, I mean, unfortunately we can't go and get a cortisol test every week or a blood test every week. So it's always a time and point. Um, but you know, and when you, because I've, you know, struggled for a long time with adrenal insufficiency, surprise, surprise, and, you know, a lot of people have high cortisol, whereas I was like, no cortisol, like not producing any hormones of any sort for everything in the gathering, wondering why, why, when I'm training my ass off, things aren't working, you know. Um, and, and starting to, you know, over the last couple of years, starting to unravel that mess and get it back. Speaker 2: (38:54) And it's not a, it's not easy and it's, it's, it's hard in course when you're going through the change changes in life anyway, and you've got all that going on. But we, um, you know, we can optimize this if we, if we, if we learn enough, if we get the right doctors, if we get the right support and this and getting our hormones right so that we stay in the best optimal ranges I think is, um, but you do need to do that under the auspices of a good, hopefully a functional doctor if you don't want to be playing around with these things Willy nilly, you know, even melatonin, even though you can buy it over the counter, can have adverse effects. Um, as a culture we're always looking for that quick fix or that pill always. I think melatonin is like step 42 and ways of getting better sleep. Speaker 2: (39:44) A good way of putting it is it is one of the tools and the cats, it needs to be done in a regulated fashion and it needs to be done a little bit carefully. And the other things are lower hanging fruit. The natural way is a better way. If we can go what it looks like looking glasses and angel. Certainly, you know, if you can sleep in a dark room, I love that temperature. The idea of temperature you had before. Get the temperature right in your room. If you can dim your lights as well and try and keep away from bright lights at night, that's got to help. And look, something's better than nothing. But you know, certainly if you are really struggling with your sleep and you want to get that back on track, working with light and dark is number the number one thing I work with with sleep disturbances. Speaker 2: (40:25) That's the first thing I'll look at. Yeah, absolutely. And then, I mean we had that lovely interview last week with James Morris on the show. Um, it might be a couple of weeks back by the time people hear this. And that's a really important one to to go and, and understand. Cause you know, like someone like you, you said you have positional sleep apnea. Um, you know, you are extremely fit and extremely, you know, uh, into health. And most people are quite amnio with people who are overweight. To people who drink too much, people who you know have diabetes perhaps or, or those sorts of co-morbidities. Um, how did you discover it? If you don't mind sharing and what, do you have to be on a C pap machine? Or are you just doing the mild sleep apnea, which a lot of us will have by the way? Absolutely. So I've always been a snorer. My father's a snore and my brother's a snorer. Yeah. So, and it comes down to airway. So when you sleep, part of sleeping is, is relaxation. And that's where the repair happens. That's why we spend a third of a bedroom, a third of our life there. But, um, when you're, when you're relaxing, part of the issue too is that your, the muscles around Speaker 3: (41:34) your, um, your jaw relax as well. So if you're lying on your back, and particularly what that means is the tongue can come back and it can block the airway. The railway is only about as thick as a straw. It's a, it's a very small thing. So, particularly if you have a jaw that doesn't sit very far, if you don't have a big, unfortunately like my jaw comes back and shuts off my airway and I'm the victim. It's like someone's smothering me in the night so that that causes snoring, but also, um, it can totally block my away and wake me up. So, um, yeah. So I ended up measuring a lot of sleep and I looked into measuring sleep. I did that for looking at every device under the sun. And um, I tend to use this one here called a night shift. Okay. Speaker 3: (42:19) See on the picture there, you can actually put it around your neck. That's the idea. And that's a medical grade. Um, sleep, sleep measuring device without people going into a sleep lab, it's the best, um, the best device you use. And so here we go. You just pop it off you go. And basically what I ended up doing is measuring my own sleep, then hundreds of people after that. Then teaching lots of people how to do that and how to analyze that and figure out what's going on with people's sleep. We can we get those, you know, it's a medical one, so not easy to get by because not everybody wants a full blown stuff. Speaker 3: (43:01) So what we actually do with my guys and holistic movement coaches that I train, they're actually trained to actually, we actually hire them out. We get people to actually click the data, they send them back to us, and then we actually take them through what the data means. So, wow. Yeah. You've got your watches that you can wear, which you know, which can give you some sleep sleep. That's called actigraphy. And the idea is you put your watch on your wrist. When you move your wrist, it means you're awake. When you're, you're not moving, you're asleep. That's probably a little bit too simplistic. That's kind of looking at, you know, looking at the Speedo and your car saying, okay, that's how my car is running. There's a lot more going on on the surface. Just that one reading. So, yeah. What a, what a, what a sleep study does. Speaker 3: (43:45) And what they do in a sleep lab is I'll put, um, that leads onto your head looking at your brain activity. They'll look at your breathing, they'll look at your heart rate, they'll look at movement. So the movement, the actigraphy, Pat's only one small part of it. So what a, what a night shift does is it actually attaches around your neck because if you're moving your, your neck device on the back of your neck, you're awake. So it's much more accurate for a staff, but it also measures snoring as well. So snoring, volume and also any position you're in. So what I found is when I'm lying on my back, well that's the time we, my airway is mostly when I'm laying on my side, it's not so bad. So, um, and there's also a sitting on there where you can actually get it to buzz you when you're on your back so you can use it to retrain sleep on your side, which is what I did. Speaker 2: (44:33) Wow. Okay. So, uh, I'll be really interested. Maybe we can talk afterwards where we are, uh, get work. Cause like, um, I've got Jesus as a friend and so on. Um, but convincing your father or your husband to go and have a full on sleep study is one thing and they won't. Speaker 3: (44:52) That's what we found as well. So if I'm going to measure something, if I'm going to do something, I want to do it the best I can and certainly, and look, the aura ring is also pretty good at getting orders on your hands. So you move your hand around, kind of give you some misleading data there. The night shift is the most accurate way I've found of measuring sleep in the home. That's great because if you want to change sleep, I mean measure it so you can measure it to manage it. There's also some questionnaires which I'd really recommend and we get our guys to fill those in as well because we want to kind of find out how they're feeling as well and also getting an idea of their sleep habits, but there's no lying. The amount of data that comes out of that is incredible. I've had some people really change their sleep habits around once they see what's going on. Speaker 2: (45:38) Oh gosh. Yeah. When you put them under the data, cause everyone's like, ah, I'm okay. But I was like, you know, and I probably shouldn't say as well as, you know, listen to my husband sleep the other day and he like, he stopped breathing for like three minutes. I got the, I actually got the thing out and I timed and I was like, Holy crap, he's not, you know, and then he would go back onto his side and then he would, you know, do that. And I'm like, yeah. Speaker 3: (46:01) Oh, Speaker 2: (46:02) and he's not overweight and he's fit and the next, you know, like he's, he's like, okay, how can I have a problem, you know? Um, so I'll talk to you after this thing, but can people virtually contact you in, in, in, um, do that or is it has to be an in person thing? Speaker 3: (46:17) No, we do that remotely. So the idea is, you know, you don't have to come and sit in the lab and get hooked up with a hundred leads around your hand. We send it out, you wear it. We get a couple of nights data to make sure we've got a reasonable, we want a reasonable, um, if there's such thing as an average night's sleep, you have some questionnaires as well. You send that back to us, we get all the data off it and then we remotely, we take you through and go, okay, here's what's happening with your sleep here and here's some of the patterns you've got. And just like you'd have a training program for your running. We have one for sleep as well, so you can get your sleep more on track. I'm doing that, I'm getting that for the family, Speaker 2: (46:54) you know, like, um, the reason I had sleep apnea and GS on last week was because it saved my mom's life. It's that important. You know, when you have a stroke, especially, you need to get a proper full Braun, you know, sleep tests done. If you've had a brain injury. It's, this is something that's really, really under no, and it's just not knowing that this is a problem, uh, in the general medical world. Um, and I'm like, that's why like I do not believe my mum would be alive if I had not gotten a sleep apnea machine and got a C pet machine. That was the first step. Speaker 3: (47:27) I think there's a lot of really good that goes on in sleep and particularly around the brain. So you know, there's a lot of prices where they, where you're there, the little cells are going around cleaning up all the debris, they're cleaning out the brain also cleaning out the psyche as well. So if you can optimize sleep there, boy, it make such a big impact on, on people's health and particularly if they've had, um, central nervous system damage. Yes. In fact, that was one of the, when I first put these glasses out, I actually gave a talk, um, to a group of physiotherapists and um, some of them were working civically with concussion and they looked at the stuff and they went, Holy cow, can we try all these? And, and with our patients, I said, yeah, of course you can. And data's got back to me, said, wow, the different sets making is incredible because you know, think about when you get central nervous system damage, it's hard to filter in with all that information that's coming at you. And if you're getting abnormal light signals all the time, particularly at night, um, that's another stress your body has to play with. So often they were getting some great results with people sleeping better, feeling a lot better. Is that key with concussion types, um, and heat injuries, uh, by using blue light blocking glasses. Speaker 2: (48:40) Yeah. And this is why we're having this conversation because this is going to go in my new course on brain optimization and longevity because this is a big piece of the puzzle for people who have suffered, whether it's strokes or concussions or, uh, you know, even for people who have vascular problems like dementia or Alzheimer's I think is all foundational health things that we need to be addressing. And those people especially, Speaker 3: (49:02) and sleep is the, you know, there's, there's, there's is the foundation of our healing, our self healing. So you get that right. You know that that's, that's money for jam and I'm looking for these fancy things and he's got an inbuilt system. We've got all these inbuilt systems, we just need to use them and tap into them. So what you've got, you've got those sleep cycles, which I'm sure has been covered elsewhere, but you've got your non-REM and your rim sleep. So your REM sleep is when you notice that your eyes were moving a lot. But that's the one where you get your dreams a lot more. So what happens, you get cycles of non-REM and REM sleep throughout your night when when you first go to bed, your non-REM cycles are longer than your rim cycles. But as those no cycles repeat over and over again, as you keep into your sleep, by the time you're getting closer to the morning, you will rim, sleep, other bigger parts of the cycle. Now the non-REM sleep is really important for physical repair. So if you've got, if you've got some, if you've got clients who are ill or have physical illness that's really important, they get to bed early and make the most of those, those in REM cycles. So they need those bigger long cycles at the start because if you go to bed really late, you're going to miss some of those longer, uh, in rim sleep cycles. Speaker 2: (50:19) I knew that, but I didn't know why. Like I knew that that was when the physical healing, psychological healing sort of stuff as later on, but I didn't. Speaker 3: (50:28) Yeah, that's, that's it. Right? So you've also, if you, if few have got a lot of emotional stress going on and you may have both as well, that's where it's really important to make sure you're not getting up at 4:00 AM in the morning cause you're missing that. You're missing that, that, that, that REM sleep, which helps clean out all those emotions there, the stress you've got going on. Um, and also consolidate a lot of learning processes as well. So both of those cycles are really important. And respecting where you are and which ones you need is a big determinant on probably how you should be kind of using your sleep as well. Speaker 2: (51:00) And that's like, um, so short term memory processing would be done in that phase two so that you're actually putting the stuff that you learned yesterday into the filing cabinet, so to speak. Yeah, Speaker 3: (51:10) that's right. Tidying it up in the library in a box away Speaker 2: (51:14) and the MIS, which is what happens and when we, when we go to sleep, we have this, um, what, what scientists have only recently discovered, from what I understand is that our brain actually shrinks in size and the cerebral spinal fluid comes in and does a brainwash, so to speak, and gets rid of the amyloid plaques. And so we have these beta amyloid plaques, which you may have heard from people who've have Alzheimer's. And one of the, the risk factors for people getting developing Alzheimer's over time, over a long period of time is a poor sleep because they're not washing out these, these speeder amyloid plaques Speaker 3: (51:51) disease and inflammatory process. Sleep will have an effect on every single one. Speaker 2: (51:57) [inaudible] I, I'm just doing the section in the brain optimization longevity course on uh, information and people do not get the concept. And I didn't for a long time either. And what the hiccup, I may have had this conversation with my mom yesterday cause I teach her all this stuff as I'm learning stuff and she's going, but I'm not inflamed and Speaker 3: (52:20) chronic disease. You have inflammation and I see Speaker 2: (52:22) you don't feel this type of information, man. This is on the inside. This is the endothelial linings of your vessels. This is from the brain injury, the mixing of the blood in the brain and causing inflammation. You don't feel that. It's not like, cause we all often think that our information, Oh that's when I've cut my hand and I've got that red thing around the cat. That's information. Now that is information too. But that's not the type of information we're talking about. And we're talking about systemic inflammation and there are so many aspects to lowering inflammation in their body. And sleep is a big piece of that puzzle. As with just heard and the right nutrition for your body, the right amount of exercise for your body at the right times. And all these things can help lower the inflammation levels and our systems and information is the cause of so many degenerative diseases, which are our biggest killers. Speaker 2: (53:17) You know, heart attacks or heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer's cancers, even all of these have their root, one of their main things is in the inflammation process is going on the body. So if we can allow our inflammation, if we can look after our mitochondria, which has a little battery packs in the hour, each one of ourselves and help them produce more energy efficiently and not, you know, doing new, taking the DNA and things like that because of the inflammation, because of the free radicals and so on. Um, and you know, this is a topic for another 10 sessions, but that then we have foundational health and then we can do and be a lot more for a longer period of time. You know, and, and this is, it's all, it's also interconnected. So having the right sleep and wearing your blue blocking glasses and doing all these little bits and pieces will add up to longterm health. Speaker 2: (54:14) Do you agree? Brilliant. What a great summary of health. You went right from cellular health, right through to inflammation. That's a really great summary. If you've been doing your homework for this stuff, you know, and I just wish I had more brain power and I'm, you know, I'm well to optimize my brainpower to put more in, you know, so that you can understand more so that you can help more and the more you get into this world. And I mean, you know, that was just a very, um, you know, simplistic overview of, of things. Uh, and we have so complex and there's so many other things to learn, you know, immune systems and you know, God knows what, um, but it's all pieces of the puzzle. And I think when we have the attitude, I'm going to learn about my, and my health and what happens in my body because we spend ages, I don't get this, but we will spend ages planning our next holiday. Speaker 2: (55:07) What car are we going to buy and all the details of it. And we won't spend the time to actually look at what's going on in our, in our health and our body because we've outsourced that to the doctor. And I just think that that is the biggest disaster that we can do for ourselves. We can't outsource our health to any one person. We have to take ownership of our health and we have to be vigilant i

In this interview, Lisa talks to physiotherapists, entrepreneurs and podcaster Brodie Sharpe on the science of pain, how pain starts in the brain and how we can negatively reinforce or positively intercept pain and the experience of it.    Lisa and Brodie do a deep dive into the psychology of pain and injury and how to optimize your healing abilities.  They also delve into REDS - Relative Energy Deficit and it's implications for optimal sporting performance and health and much more.   Brodie is the host of " The Run Smarter Podcast" and is an online physio you can find Brodie at the following links.   Links to facebook group: 'Become a smarter runner' https://www.facebook.com/groups/833137020455347/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brodie.sharpe/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/BrodieSharpe Website: www.breakthroughrunning.physio   Bio: Graduated from Masters of Physiotherapy 2012. Owner of The Breakthrough Running Clinic: Online Physiotherapy for runners of all abilities.  Podcast host: The Run Smarter Podcast.    We would like to thank our sponsors for this show:   www.vielight.com   Makers of Photobiomodulation devices that stimulate the brains mitocondria, the power houses of your brains energy, through infrared light to optimise your brain function.  To get 10% off your order use the code: TAMATI at www.vielight.com   For Lisa's New Book Relentless visit the website below to order https://shop.lisatamati.com/products/relentless   When extreme endurance athlete, Lisa Tamati, was confronted with the hardest challenge of her life, she fought with everything she had. Her beloved mother, Isobel, had suffered a huge aneurysm and stroke and was left with massive brain damage; she was like a baby in a woman's body. The prognosis was dire. There was very little hope that she would ever have any quality of life again. But Lisa is a fighter and stubborn. She absolutely refused to accept the words of the medical fraternity and instead decided that she was going to get her mother back or die trying.   For more information on Lisa Tamati's programs, books and documentaries please visit www.lisatamati.com    For Lisa's online run training coaching go to https://www.lisatamati.com/page/runningpage/ Join hundreds of athletes from all over the world and all levels smashing their running goals while staying healthy in mind and body.   Lisa's Epigenetics Testing Program https://www.lisatamati.com/page/epigenetics/ Get The User Manual For Your Specific Genes Which foods should you eat, and which ones should you avoid? When, and how often should you be eating? What type of exercise does your body respond best to, and when is it best to exercise? Discover the social interactions that will energize you and uncover your natural gifts and talents. These are just some of the questions you'll uncover the answers to in the Lisa Tamati Epigenetics Testing Program along with many others. There's a good reason why epigenetics is being hailed as the "future of personalized health", as it unlocks the user manual you'll wish you'd been born with!  No more guesswork. The program, developed by an international team of independent doctors, researchers, and technology programmers for over 15 years, uses a powerful epigenetics analysis platform informed by 100% evidenced-based medical research. The platform uses over 500 algorithms and 10,000 data points per user, to analyze body measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home   For Lisa's Mental Toughness online course visit:  https://www.lisatamati.com/page/mindsetuniversity/ Developmental strength, emotional resilience, leadership skills and a never quit mentality - Helping you to reach your full potential and break free of those limiting beliefs.    For Lisa's free weekly Podcast "Pushing the Limits" subscribe on iTunes or your favorite podcast app or visit the website  https://www.lisatamati.com/page/podcast/   Transcript of the Podcast Speaker 1: (00:01) Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati, brought to you by Lisatamati.com Speaker 2: (00:13) If your brain is not functioning at its best checkout what the team at vielight.com do now be like producers, photo biomodulation devices. Your brain function depends largely on the health of the energy sources of the brain cells. In other words, the mitochondria and research has shown that stimulating your brain with near infrared light revitalizes mitochondria. I use these devices daily for both my own optimal brain function and also for other age related decline issues and also for my mom's brain rehabilitation after her aneurism and stroke. So check out what the team do at vielight.com that's V I E L I G H t .com and use the code Tommasi at checkout to get 10% off any of their devices. Now this week I have running physiotherapists, Brodie sharpe, two guest from Melbourne. Now, Brody has been on the podcast earlier talking about prevention of running injuries, but today we delve a little bit deeper into the science of pain, how much our brain influences and the way we frame a pain in our minds and our perceptions of it and how that actually affects our healing process. Speaker 2: (01:28) So it's a really, really interesting topic. We also get into a relative energy deficit which is looking at overtraining in the problems associated with pushing your body too hard, too fast when you don't have enough nutrients going in. So make sure you check this out. Now before I go and hit over to Brody, just want to remind you my book relentless is coming out next week. So the time of this podcast is the beginning of March and it's going to be out on the 11th of March. So if you're listening to this after that date, it will already be published. We are going to be launching starting a new Plymouth and we have a launch tour going right through New Zealand. So if you're keen to come and meet me, if you want to find out more about the book you can come and meet me at one of the launch events. Speaker 2: (02:14) Head on over to Lisa Tamati And you'll see the book launch tour and you can also already preorder the book now at my show in my shop. So Lisatamati.com Push the shop button and it will take you over to the box and the shop. Okay, so now over to Brodie sharpe in Melbourne. Well, hi everybody. Welcome back to pushing the limits with Lisa Tamati today. I have Brodie sharpie with me, Brodie is in Australia and he is a physiotherapist with a bent for running people by putting an eyebrow Barney. And Barney has been already a guest on the show. We don't have many repeat these solar shy, but Brody's knowledge is just insane. He has really some specialized areas that he's working in that and I want Speaker 3: (03:00) It to Shay with you guys, his latest insights and also he's got a brand new podcast themselves. So he's going to tell you a little bit about that. But for only welcome to the show. Thanks Lisa. Thanks for having me. And congratulations with the new book as well. Oh, thanks. It's not a Coke maybe know two weeks and I can at least get this baby out, but it's been a rough road now Brodie, just because people haven't heard your first interview that we did, can you give them a quick sort of synopsis of who you are and what you do? Yeah, sure. So I'm from Melbourne, Australia and I've been a physiotherapist for about seven years. This go into my it and now, and it was about two years into my physio career that I started running and becoming a runner and just realized as soon as I started running and went through my own running injuries myself, that I just became a lot more passionate seeing Ramez. Speaker 3: (03:59) And as soon as the Ronald would come in the door, I'd have this like and passion and just want to talk about all things running all like, do you measure your cadence, what are you training for, what shoes you're wearing, all that sort of thing. And yeah, I just was really passionate about ah, getting them back onto the track and seeing them achieve their running goals and just overcoming the injuries, getting back to whatever goals I have and sort of bound a need and wanted to just address that more. I want to say more runners. I want to say more people getting back to the running goals. And so started a couple of things. I started everyday running legends podcast, which was like a passion project of mine. Trying to inspire a lot of people. And now I've just transitioned to a bit more on the business side of things. Speaker 3: (04:49) Starting my new company, it's called the breakthrough running clinic and I'm offering a online physio for runners. Yeah, yeah. Has taken me into then the last couple of months starting another podcast called the run smarter podcast. Wow. That's a whole lot for a to be doing one at once. Cause I know what it's like to start a new company in online especially. So congratulations on that. And you know, the last time we did speak gosh, it must be a year and a half or something like that ago. Yeah, you were thinking about the sentence. It's really nice to see that you've actually taken the leap in starting to transition out and onto your own and then into your own employer and you know, in your editing all the time to your knowledge base. And that's what I really love about you, is that you're, you're constantly on the search for the next and the, you know, constant learning. So we've, we've got a lot to talk about today. So Brodie, I wanted to start and yeah, everybody go and check out the run smarter podcast. So make sure you do subscribe to that and, you know, take advantage of meeting these core people by the forecasts Speaker 2: (05:57) And get more knowledge from Bryony. But probably let's talk about now going into pain and what is pain? And we've all experienced it. Well, none of us like it. Well, most of us don't. There's a few myths that's around, but what does Brian, and why is the brain what does pain and what does the brain have to do with it and why is it so important to be looking at deeper levels of pain and what, what's going on? Speaker 3: (06:23) Yeah. Cool. I should start with like, I'm no expert on the actual pain science, but I have delved into a lot of the books in a, all of the research and I've put together a little bit of a mini series a, my new podcast about this. It's the pain science explaining the pain science and it's hard for people to kind of wrap their mind around because a lot of people get really defensive when a health professional or doctor talk to someone about their chronic pain and say, it's all in your head. And, Hmm. I've had clients in my clinic come in with years and years of low back pain or knee pain and they sit down, they're a bit frustrated and they say, the doctor says it's all in my head, but it's not all in my head. I can feel it and I kind of associate it all being in their head, like they're making it up. Yeah. But that's not the case at all. And we have known for a long time now that 100% of the pain that you experience is from your brain. That's where the science lies and saying it's all in your head is kind of poor. Mmm. Well it can be misinterpreted really. Yeah. Really quickly and well they're trying to say is it's from your brain and it's how your brain perceives a threat. That's when all the pain signals arise. Like you could have,uyou could have someone who Speaker 3: (07:51) Believes has certain beliefs that increases a threat. Well, certain beliefs that day crisis, that threat and the pain signals generated signify that. And a couple of examples I use on my podcast is, Mmm. Like you hear a lot of stories of people of not knowing like that been mugged and yeah. Adrenaline is pumping and I don't really know that they've actually been stabbed in the back or it's just like, Oh, go on too quickly. They don't realize and yeah, I have no idea. It's not until later on when they realized that's when the pain starts. There's also a could go the other way where someone has some really, really Manet pain Speaker 3: (08:32) And okay. The, the level of damage is really, really low. But the brain starts to think, ah, had knee pain in the past. My mom had knee pain and she was limping for three years and she was on crutches for two months. And what about if I can never run again? I've got this marathon in two weeks. What about if I can never run again? And old days messages that you send yourself fades that Brian and the brain starts to assess the level of threat and we'll produce that adequate level of okay. Depending on what, yeah, not necessary what the thread is. Yeah. So to paraphrase it that it's reinforcing. So yes, there's a, there's a small tissue damage, but it's reinforcing the fact when you, when you focus in on it in a negative way with negative stress towards state of being, and sometimes it can be blown out of proportion. Speaker 3: (09:25) And I love the analogy with the, you know, you've been stamped in the back, but you don't feel that because you're so adrenalized. So that's, yeah, it's actually, you know, a neuro transmitter actually dampening down the pain responses. So just a question that pops to mind. They're like, I know when I've had a huge, horrendous blusters for example, right? And you'd stop for a break and then you get back out there and the pine isn't signed for the first 10 minutes and mean it, it's a really possess sort of, I don't know if people have had that experience where every time you stop and have a break and then restart, that's when you notice the does a hundred times more. You know, it's more extreme and then after 10 minutes or so it's like the endorphins or something kicks back in and the pain level becomes manageable. Speaker 3: (10:15) So what's going on in that sort of a case? Can you, do you know what's happening? Oh, I could try to answer it the best I can. The first, the first concept I talk about in the podcast is a context. What, what sort of context do you give? The scenario and I played a clip on the podcast, this guy called Lorimer Moseley. He has the, is the author of this explained pine book. And he uses the example of he's walking in the Bush and he trips over a twig and scratches his legs. Nothing really happens. He's like, Oh, it's this used to watch your legs all the time. You used to scratch your legs on twigs when you were a kid. This is not a big deal. And it turns out he was bitten by a snake and he was in hospital and his a life threatening scenario. Speaker 3: (11:05) Yeah. But he didn't experience any pain until he realized he was bitten by the snake. A couple of years later on that same track and he finds that he clips his foot on something and he's in extreme pain because the Brian things hang on you a, he, he is a guy I knew almost died. Level of threat goes up. And uho he's in extreme levels of pain, but then realized it was only a twig. And so it's what the, the Brian tends to interpret. So going back to your blister question, as you can stop running, the Brian can say, Oh look, I'm running and I'm not dying. I'm okay. There's no real threat. Yes, it hurts, but I'm not limping. I'm not. Um'm still continuing. Like it's not the, the level of threat isn't as bad as like another injury per se. And so the, ah, Speaker 2: (11:54) I guess you could say the level of threats starts the day, Christ and then nice and really say it as much of a priority. I wonder if there's some neurotransmitters involved here. You don't like endorphins and stuff that was 200 or something that it actually dampens down the pain response or whether it is your cause. Another, another example I'll give was around, you know, when I ran through New Zealand and we're doing 2,250 and 42 days at two now. Mmm. And at the beginning, the first two weeks it was just getting worse and worse. And like the pain was horrific in my body was falling to pieces and noon system was going up. And watching all the rays. And it got to a point where I just had absolute rock bottom and I didn't think I could continue, but I did continue. When I did continue, I actually, we back up the other side. Speaker 2: (12:39) I actually got stronger and stronger and it was almost like the body's way of going, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. You're over. You know your apps that you're going to kill us, so I'm going to throw everything at you to stop. And then you didn't stop. So it went like, shit, we've got to get on with it. And we've been dealing with it and you actually got better and stronger. And I've heard that phenomenon from other ultra runners who've done thousands of kilometer races that that's what happens. And actually gets, goes really down to the rock bottom. And then if you don't stop at sea, it comes back up. And you see it even an ultra marathons where you think you're at the end and then you, you keep pushing on somehow slowly, you know, groveling your way forward and then all of a sudden you back, you know, and you don't know why or how or, or, and that's not just a pain thing, but it's more of a,uan energy thing as well. Speaker 2: (13:31) But it is bizarre. Had a body like we, when it perceives a threat, sorry, I say an example when I'll stop. I promise I'll stop giving examples, but let's say an example is every, almost every major race that I've done where it's been a big steering horrifying, these threatening rice if you liked, you know, 200 K or something like that. The days ahead of the race, I, I seem to always end up with either an injury, a cold or something happens in the end up not being in good shape. I think it's the body's knowing this battle is coming in. It's trying to stop you from actually standing on the start line, if that makes sense. Do any way you it teams to be a nonevent. It's like the body is faking it. Just try and stop you actually taking on this because it sees it as a threat and knows a threat is coming. Speaker 2: (14:32) Yeah. I think when I was talking about the pain science side of things, I tended to stay, I guess I didn't cover the endorphin side, like in the heat of the moment type of pain because that's definitely a science that is proven and shown that if you have these endorphins they can get you through these like a really intense moments. Insurance athletes. I just have another mindset that is far beyond what anyone else can experience. But it's funny that you have that story because if it's a really long endurance rice and you're doing month's wakes, so like days and days of these intense exercise, your body's going to think, not ready for this. Let's start. Yeah. Giving out signals for the body to slow down because this is a threat, right? As soon as you go through that dip and you sort of see the other side has gone through its shock and it's almost like you're convincing it, yeah, we can do this. Speaker 2: (15:36) Let's, let's go do this. Then there's definitely these peaks and troughs in those troughs usually come at like the halfway point where you lock audits, don't know if I can do this, but then when your mind is so strong, yeah, you're like, no, I don't care how bad we're feeling. We're doing this. The body's like, okay, let's do it. And so, Mmm. Stop prioritize other things rather than pain and say, okay, let's do what we can to get through this. Yes, I really believe that. So I mean, this is transgressing from just purely a painting, but also, you know, and that whole mindset thing and when you go in it, you know, same with the story with my mom. When you go all in and when you have an open mind to the possibilities of therapies outside of what you know, you were told as possible. Speaker 2: (16:22) And this is the issue that I have with doctors taking away people's hope or giving people terminal Tim prognosis. You know, you've got terminal cancer and you're going to die in three months. Well, you've just bloody he and did before by sick late because you, you, you've seen that seed in the, in the brain in and that becomes a reality. You're like, it's a self fulfilling prophecy often. And there've been examples of this where people, you know, subsequently died within the time frame they've done the autopsy and there's nice no cancer misdiagnosis off that or something. And people go, well, why did they die in that timeframe? Because you've set your mind onto something and whatever you believe. And so one of the things that, with this book is that I want people to understand that either even when the doctors is telling you there is no way you have to, if you want to chance it, success, you have to go all in and ignore the naysayers completely. Speaker 2: (17:23) Whether they have a scientific point or not, you know whether they're actually correct or not. If you want a chance at beating the odds, then you have to go in with an attitude of not, not listening to that. Absolutely rejecting that I'm doing it my way and this is why we going because only thing do you have a tiny chance of actually making it. That's not the same. You will make it but then is to say that you have a chance because your mind is at least going on that road and you'll see things, you will learn things, you will find things that you wouldn't otherwise find. And one of the problems that I've, you know, cause I work now with a lot of people with brain injuries of nature or Alzheimer's or things that it's icing pretty major going nicely in. The problem they have with a lot of people is they don't in to what I'm saying 100% and they don't have an open mind and they have that. Speaker 2: (18:16) I'll try it attitude and then try it. Attitude is never ever going to get you there. Not with something as major as what, you know, when you're dealing with a mess of running a vein or a mess of healthy, you have to be, I'm going all in and my mind is open and I'm taking all this information and I'm going to price this as that and I'm going to actually be proactive. And if you go on, you know with a halfhearted attitude towards it, you don't have a show, you know, because we are talking about beliefs as well, like whatever you believe is what the brain is going to perceive. And so if you go in half-heartedly, that's not shifting your belief at all. It's I'll still believe my old thing. Yes, this one a try. It's not shifting any of that belief and you won't be successful. Speaker 2: (19:07) And I, and I've seen this time and the time of the game with the people and I can almost predict who are the ones that are going to have at least some level of success because they're all then that, you know, if you tell me to jump and put a Karen up on eyes, I'll do it because they are all in on the process in. And it's not about even what therapies are you doing or what are you, what are you achieving? It's the mindset first, go in with an approach into any challenge that you're facing in pain. And the hard thing with pain is that it's so intense, you know, and it's so immediate. I've been in situations, you know, I've had incredible create a big bad pain with a few of the health issues that I've dealt with. Without going into the details where I was, you know, trying to mobilize all my mental power to control the pain and was still unable to, you know, I was still unable head to get morphine shot or whatever for it to go. Speaker 2: (20:06) But the mass boy to get in there, like when you've got an acute pain happening and you're trying to breathe through it and you're trying to, you know, you see the ladies and giving birth and they're told to just breathe and relax and it sounds so ridiculous. But the more you fight it worse it actually is. And that's what they're trying to portray. But it isn't as easy as just, Oh well, you know, I'll take myself off to a happy place and it'll go away. I wish it was that easy, but it isn't quite that easy with intense, really intense finds at least. So what else can you tell us about the pain? You said fear plays a part, you previous experience plays apart. The context that you associate around this pain by a major Norman most Mosely or Mosely. Was it hard to say? I know I saw his Ted talk on that and actually I've seen it to my brother who was dealing with some back injury issues. And I think that was, that was really gold, you know? Yeah. And you thought that the snake was like, so it is already good. Thing. Okay. So anything else you want to add onto the painful session? Speaker 3: (21:24) Yes. If we're talking about beliefs and if someone does have a running injury, I ask people to have a, a good self reflection of what beliefs you have held onto. Because I say a lot of injured runners and especially those ones who have multiple running injuries or really chronic running injury, they have certain beliefs. They'll say, ah my health professional in the past has said that I have one leg longer than the other and my glutes on the left side doesn't fire right. And my hips go out of line. If I run 10 Ks and I just need to readjust that and stop firing up my glutes again, I don't know how, I don't know how to activate my glutes, but they're just not working right now. And my fate collapse and all this sort of stuff. And it's this extremely disempowering belief that they have. Speaker 3: (22:19) And how are they meant to thrive if they keep fading that Brian with these beliefs? As soon as I go for run, the Brian's going to be like, but why you have a one leg longer than the other? And those messages will stop fading the body and they will start arising as like I said, it's really, really disempowering. And if you play yourself victim to those beliefs, you just going to continuously have these injuries and it's not until you shift your focus and all those things I mentioned these leg length discrepancies and hips out align, there's no, you like science around that. If you have a one centimeter leg length discrepancy, it's not going to affect you by mechanics or what's firing or anything. There is science. Once you get beyond 20 mil leg length discrepancy, that's when it comes Flowly start to yeah, change of biomechanics. But it's extremely rare that someone has that level of discrepancy. It's like usually a couple of mail here and there. And so really what those beliefs, you give yourself a, has some self reflection and say if, what if the beliefs you have, if they really, really serving you or if they're hitting in the other direction. Speaker 2: (23:30) They definitely are. And then I kind of agree with you more and things like, you know, I'm an aesthetic need for our current run. You know, the amount of times that I've heard that. And it's like, do you want to seek an ominous meadow? I know lots of other rest medics who run and we, you know, like as a child with severe asthmatics, when you, when you, when you program that, that means I cannot do this. That's when you're going to limit yourself as into your potential. And on the other, the other extreme, you know, I've seen people with crazy injuries doing crazy things like, you know there's one league running for Steve's belly or a blind person running across the Sahara and Morocco or a person with model's crisis going across the desert on crutches cause they couldn't run anymore. You know, like it is up to you as to what you believe and how you think that they can be dealt with. Speaker 2: (24:21) And you know, one of the, the areas of study that I'm that we do an air company called epigenetic testing and it looks at the different phenotypes and health types of people. And there are certain people and within the, you know, the, the differences of human con isn't like a, there's six different health types and these are a broad overview and there are a couple that have a heightened sensitivity to neuro pain and sensitivity to the environments and seminars. So these are what they call people who are st sores, which are usually very a lot of the development we know are an embryo went into the nervous system development. So they're very brain and nervous system focused and they're very sensitive to the environment into they feel pain more intensely. They are reactive more than they are environment. Speaker 2: (25:19) They usually very slim eco, more body types. And they've usually very much in the O'Brien, very cognitive, like very big thinkers. And, and they have a tendency more to be, to feel the pain than say someone who is like an activator, which is another of the types in there. The short, muscular body types, very good coordination, very athletic, and they are dominant hormone is adrenaline in the adrenal and means that they can withstand more pain because they have more adrenaline going through the system. Now it has other disadvantages by having so much adrenaline. But they don't, they're not as sensitive to the pain. Well, they don't experiences it as intensely in someone over have a sense or makeup who's you know, more a similar but hard to explain but limit the sensory overload very quickly. So I think there's some gene genetic reasons why people, some people feel it more than other people as well. Speaker 2: (26:24) And again, this comes down to the whole chemical makeup and the dominant hormones and the dominant neurotransmitters that we have running through our bodies to how much we will experience pain and other, other areas as well. So it really, really fascinating talk next time. Yeah, absolutely. Another thing on the fee on the injury side, you know, like again, working with someone who has a back injury and they definitely have a mechanical back injury lessons, couple of disks that are, that are than a bulging and so on. But I'm convinced that the pain is not only from the back injury because I've had that for years that it's suddenly intensified. And I think there's a lot to do with other health issues going on and that's exacerbating it. Things like the gut health is affecting the, the pain levels in the body and the inflammation in the body. Speaker 2: (27:22) That put on weight a little bit around the middle, which is pulling me back in a different way. They mop and you probably dehydrated and not doing enough a aerobic exercise. So then stagnant in the periphery. Circulation is stagnant. What are these things contribute to the back pain? And so you can't just go and take an antiinflammatory and think you know, you'll be right or even have surgery and think you'll be alright because you're not addressing the system. And he can eat. We can have a tissue related mechanical reason that you have an injury, but it's not the only part of the equation that you need to be addressing. I mean, I've got four disks that are completely, but there's nothing in between my destiny. I don't have any pain because, but I did, but I spent a lot of time working on, on things like hydration, my immune system, my gut health my core strength in all of these aspects to it and not focusing just on I've got to go and get surgery to fuse the back, which was what was recommended. And I now don't have any touch word time, which I used to have on an absolute, you know, debilitating Speaker 3: (28:41) Navel. I'll quickly add, like when we're talking about mechanical pine and a law of back in discs and things like that we need to be really careful with how we explain these to patients and how people interpret their scan findings. And there's, if you're beyond 40 years old and into the 50 sixties, there's going to be date generation, there's going to be disclosures, there's going to be all these findings. Which can lay like which can be asymptomatic. And if you have, if you scan a hundred healthy paper with no pain whatsoever, you scan their backs up to, well, depending on the age, let's say if they're about 50 up to 80% of them are going to have some disc bulges. They're going to have some degeneration, they're going to show some findings and they're all healthy. They're showing no pain. So with back pain comes in and they're like, I want to get a scan and I scan that show these disc bulges. Speaker 3: (29:33) Okay, is this related to their pain? Who knows because they're you know, you've got all these studies of all these healthy people that have these findings. How can we correlate the two? There are very, very low percentage people that will have like a really significant disc protrusion that's obstructing one of the nerves or impinging one of the nerves, which usually causes like weakness and like permanent numbness down the leg. That's a very serious condition. But when I have someone come into my clinic and they've had years of back pain, they like, well, could all this look at all these scans. I like shelve these results into my face. And they're like, look, look at this level, this level, this level. And you have to really peg them back a little bit and show them, okay. You need to give them a little bit of reassurance as well because they are panicking and it doesn't really serve them with their rehabilitation. So you need to be really careful with how you deal with these sort of clients. Speaker 2: (30:26) Yes. And, and then actually, you know, doing proactive things before you grow up to surgery. You know, like, let's try strengthening the core. Let's try sorting your gut bacteria out. Let's try re reducing the inflammation load in your body through other means. You know, cutting out the bad stuff and doing more, more aerobic exercise and, and doing these things in more sleep. And you know, all of these basic things, they, a lot of people neglect because they, they want the more complicated answer they want. The more the surgery, the pill though, whatever that might, it's going to make it this magically go away and see the taking a systems approach and it, everything that we don't, we always looking at the whole system as best as we can with our knowledge. You know, it's understanding what could be possibly contributing it before we go and get code under the knife, which is addressed at thing for anybody to do. Speaker 2: (31:18) So like it's worth my opinion trying everything else before we try that route, you know. And you know, if I hadn't done what I'd done, I wouldn't, I wouldn't be speaking from experience, but yeah, it was either get four discs fuse, which would be a huge, I'd never be as mobile again or I'd probably never be able to do a lot of things if I'd done it. And now just spending a huge amount of time in the core. There's a lot of exercise and work that goes into keeping my core and my, you know, my back and all that happen or these areas strong but on pain-free. And I know this is only one anecdotally example of this, but it's not an isolated case and same. Sure. But, okay. So now let's, let's leave the pain conversation now. Read one of your blogs on read East. Can you explain that and what the heck you mean by by that? Speaker 3: (32:18) Yeah. Relative energy deficiency in sport is a recognized condition. It used to be the female triad which I'll explain in a second, but now it's applied to males also cause they say this and it's a condition where you have like your body. The best I can explain it is like your body has a certain amount of energy that it can dissipate when you exercise. And if you, you need to replace that energy with things like nutrition, like proper diet. If you really exceed the app, put your energy output and your input doesn't make that level. Your body is going to stop producing, I guess you could call it output energy by extracting minerals from your muscles, from your bones and just try, they have to get the energy from some way. It can't be just created out of thin air. Speaker 3: (33:15) And so if you're starting to do more and more work, if you're starting to really push yourself and get into ultras and all that stuff and you're not feeding yourself the right energy, then you're going to get into this energy deficit. And so the energy deficit, if it's over a longer period of time it can take enough minerals out of the bone and stop causing things like stress fractures. It can redirect the energy from say your internal organs and you can start having gut issues and all they sort of things. And it can just be a really downward spiral into a lot of injuries, a lot of stress, a lot of chronic issues and it can get really, really dangerous and can start to lay to a lot of real health complications. And so it used to be very common in females who were in adolescents who were very like had a lot of body image issues and was like under a lot of pressure to perform as well. Speaker 3: (34:20) And so they would really work hard but also not feed themselves enough because they wanted to have a better image of themselves. And if they were told that any to lose a few kilos or whatever have you. So they're working hard on the track and they're also not feeding their body and they would start having like an altered menstrual cycle or because their body is redirecting preferences away from the internal organs and they started having gut issues because we're redirecting that we need to prioritize the, the energy output like the running and the body's always going to give your energy to the the physical activity that you're giving yourself. Because if you think evolutionary, you need to run away from a predator. That is the highest priority that the body's going to give is the physical output. And so then the internal guts and the, the minerals from all the other stuff that is gathering all those resources and putting it into that energy output and can lead to really, really serious consequences over training syndrome or adrenal adrenal burnout would also play into this. So I'm full of today Speaker 2: (35:38) As a young girl was a gymnast. And of course we would tell we had to lose weight all the time cause we had to be tiny, tiny, tiny and I was way too heavy. And that lead to a whole lot of complications. And that's very common thing with young pubescent girls, especially when they, you know, chatting the body shapes changing as well. So they hope, you know, self-image just changing. And then you're told you're fat all the time. It's brought in taught senior girls to gymnastics or something. I can say old ballet unless they're really, really tiny and don't have an issue with us. And then looking at even things like I'm studying DNA at the moment in looking at the hormone cascade and which which costs you, your body type. So if you're an anger dominant female, a female who produces quickly from your progesterone into testosterone, but very slowly into estrogens, then you're very likely, if you overtrain you, you're very likely to lose your mutual stock cycle, which is a very big red flag. Speaker 2: (36:38) If anybody is experiencing that. It's not something to go, well let's describe it on you have a period every month. No, this is a serious health events. You need to be looking at why that's happening. So if you yeah, if you and your dominant and you, you know, usually you have this small embrace and you're very likely to lose your, your cycle very quickly so you can go into over-training quite quickly. And if your Easter dominant, then you can, it depends on which way you cross this in the estrogens and that's another conversation. But what, what is really important at known here is that you are running the rest when you over train, you're not actually improving when you're actually training to the optimum levels. So when you overtrain all that hardware that you're putting into it is then being wasted because you're not recovering and not giving it the nutrients. Speaker 2: (37:34) And when, like you said, when you are under stress and your body will prioritize the physical energy because of the fight or flight syndrome. So you then you're producing your cortisol and your adrenaline constantly, which a lot of us in dealing with, not on the athletes but just with the lifestyle that we have constant demands from computers and emails and bosses and sewn bows. So we are in this constant cycle fodder flight and that takes energy away from your immune system, takes energy away from, excuse me, mum's ringing energy away from your immune system, from your ability to fight diseases and infections, your hormonal cycle, everything, your digestive processes, your recovery processes are all in deficit. And this is why optimizing your nutrition on top of, of your training is really important in prioritizing the right amount of recovery. And this is very difficult territory for marathoners, especially if you had the mentality, I'm tough, I can handle it, I can just push her and push her and push Sheree. Speaker 3: (38:42) And that can be really problematic, you know because it's a, it's a problem that I've dealt with definitely. Because you, you on the one side you want to be tough Speaker 2: (38:53) And push through and you can, and that has great benefits. Speaker 3: (38:57) But on the other side, you're actually doing yourself health, the service and you can be fit but unhealthy. Which is a really important point. You might also be interested, I've got a an a podcast episode on this interwoven relationship between sleep and stress and recovery. And I do mention this cortisol that gets released through the body and the importance of that and it's this really interwoven relationship that all those concepts have and the impact it has on your running and your injury risk and performance. It's, it's a really interesting concept that not a lot of people would take into consideration. Like you were saying, people just care about Apple, they just care about running. If I run faster, if I run further, if I do it more frequently, that's how I'm going to get stronger. But it's not really the case. You get stronger, faster when you actually go and sleep better and eat properly. Good. Yeah. To try and hydrogenate a Islay pod. I've been told that a couple of times and it rings for absolutely. So yeah, we have a like a thing like a check list that we get our athletes to do. And you can do this with your HIV apps as well. They, they measure your heart rate variability. But then you can see if you're actually going in. Speaker 2: (40:14) So over training, you know, if you're just writing on a scan of one to 10, your hydration is today. Your sleep, your stress levels, your injury levels, your mood, all of these things will give you an indication are you getting in the wrong direction? If you're coming back with low scores and you've got a big training day to day, it might be what do I do? You not to do their training and then leave a love responsibility and not feeling guilty and understanding your body is really something that you have to learn and grow with over time. Or if you've got a great coach, you can say, your numbers aren't looking good on your HIV or whatever you need to call back today. I want you to have a day off. And that's scary for athletes. You know when you're training for some great huge beat and you've got to have a day off, you don't want to go, ah, it's all going to go to custard, but I can tell you if you can, if you start to this and then read your body better, you have a bit of performance on lists on this training. Speaker 2: (41:07) Then if you're pushing it to the absolute Instagram and you see this like with athletes in the last three weeks, I haven't done enough training throughout the program and then the last three weeks they're trying to cram in what they didn't do because Oh my God, the rice is around the corner Speaker 3: (41:21) And that's the worst thing you can do. Yeah, not going to recover enough to be, I want to run. I'm glad you're talking about this because this is the idea of the podcast. It's called the run smarter podcast because you could train hard, but you actually need to base Mott, and I say this all the time, like Ron says, don't make the best decisions. They really, really don't. And they come into my clinic and they're injured and they tell me about their story. And you feel like you just want to slap people ahead with your hand because they're just talking through their story and you're like, why are you making these decisions? Like why? It just seems that it's Ava, just their drive, their personality and they dislike their perfectionist and I want to perform and they just have to do it. Sometimes it's a bit of an addiction, but sometimes it's this lack of knowledge and they just don't understand the consequences certain things can have and the importance of sleep and recovery and having rest days and having the slow recovery days and, yeah. So it's all about training smarter and being a smarter runoff that's going to lead you to be a better runner. Speaker 2: (42:21) Yup. And then that then is, and this is just runners, but for everybody in learning and understanding and having that maturity and you know, having, having done everything wrong in the early years of my career or even in 11 years of my Korea. But now that I'm talking about, I mean, not going back to the release syndrome or would he be Kona? I'm even doing the rice in the Himalaya's. It's 222 K rice and I came back the next week and three, three teeth fell out, you know. See something doesn't it? That the minerals in your body, it just getting smashed the hell XY even in loose to lose teeth means sure. I shit, that's crazy. Yeah. it was pretty extreme. Three tastes and awakens, it speaks of wait for failure. A lot of implants. I mean this is a, you know, I like, I have the speed, an absolute fortune of my mouth as a mortgage in my mouth in a lot of that is because I just over trying to overtrain for years and lost TAFE. Yeah. So and you can imagine what that's doing to your bones and all the other things you cycle and everything else. So sometimes being, being tough and having a strong drive and having a willpower in it and having a mainstream toughness and all that is right. But not at the expense of your health. And you have to sort of have a little bit of experience and wisdom and listen to these sorts of things to try to understand when am I just being an idiot and when am I, you know, really being sensible. Speaker 3: (43:54) I think it's like, well, when you talk about that, like how do I know if I'm being sensible? Take her like a birds eye view of your performance in your training over the last six months, 12 months, couple of years. Like have you been battling injuries constantly? Have you been increasing your performance? Have you been increasing your running times? Have you do you feel like you can jump out of bed? Do you feel like you can like stop the day? It's really like, I don't know if it's just a running thing. I think it's like a human thing. We really struggle to like get a mental image of what it's been like the last 12 months. We see in this like little one though and say like I need to perform, I need to get better and to get better and you need to really, really take a step back to analyze all of that thing. Speaker 3: (44:41) Like, you know, I know for myself, I haven't really, like I say, if I stopped performing now, I'm going to in one year's time I'm going to be at this level from a two years time. I'm going to be at that level and you can just say it happening. But in the last three years I've got no idea that, so it's taking a, a good bird's eye view of how you're tracking. It could really be a good helpful tool to, like you were talking about saying am I making smarter decisions? Am I you know, taking the goals I want to NMR making the right decisions. Speaker 2: (45:12) And, and that's so true. And you know, we are, we are also individuals and this hap spec to the epigenetic stuff, like not everybody's going to respond the same to each training regime like that. We can have a, an athlete that we're training and two of them, they've got the same dog, they've got the same, maybe the same age, the same, seeks the same goals and they'll get completely different results because one has different set of genes and the other one in understanding that they will, and being able to personalize it to the genes. Well that's, you know, just next level information that we can add into the conversation and change the way the times of the day that you do it and the foods that you are eating and all of that sort of information. So it's exciting times that we're living in because we never had insights into this sort of nation area. Speaker 2: (46:00) So now, you know, you see people making new records in, in things being broken all the time and even the average person getting much more good results. But I think from this whole conversation and we'll wrap up now, Brodie you know, you've given people a lot of food for thought, a lot of food for thought about the brain, the limitations in your, you know, are you limiting yourself with your pain, the way you're experiencing it, with the way you're experiencing your belief systems and how it's influencing your injuries. Also the release, the what does it, the energy and relative energy deficit and overtraining and just wisdom. Like, you know, for a young guy you've got a great mature outlook and obviously your education, your ongoing education has enabled that. So once again, where can people find you, your podcasts, your links, how can they reach out to you if they need help? Speaker 3: (47:00) Okay. So on Instagram it's bertie.shop is my handle. I've got a Facebook group called become a smarter runner and it kind of backs off like links in with the podcast. If you want to follow the podcast, it's called the run smarter podcast and it's available on all the platforms, wherever you listen to your podcasts. My website is breakthrough running.physio and that has my blogs Speaker 2: (47:30) And as well as like my Facebook groups and stuff like that, I'll just post my blogs, I post to evidence and couple little tips, couple of exercises here and there. So I think that's all the links will penalize links in the show notes. Alrighty. So thank you very much for your time today and your expertise and your insights and it just makes me smile because you know, a lot of the stuff I can actually relate to, obviously with my crazy anecdotes, but also it reinforces the learning that I have is that you have another, another, another means in another way of bringing it across. So really, really appreciate your time today and look forward to doing some stuff with you in the future. You're very welcome. It was a lot of fun. Good luck for the next two weeks of just grinding out this book. Thanks night. Speaker 1: (48:16) That's it this week for pushing the limits. We showed her write, review, and share with your friends and head over and visit Lisa and her team, at Lisatamati.com.

8 years ago a 22 year old Chloe Hogan was on her way to work at 5.30am one morning. She was gearing up for her second marathon a few weeks out and heading to the gym where she was a PT but disaster struck. An accident, a major one and Chloe was left with a massive brain injury. She lay in a coma for weeks, the Doctors after 19 days telling the family to turn off life support, that there was no hope. 4 days later she awoke and proved them all wrong. But the damage was massive and there wasn't much left of their beautiful daughter. But Brian is a fighter and a feisty Dad who wasn't willing to give up on his beautiful girl so he started researching and working. He ignored all the negative naysayers and powered through years of hard grind, always believing, always looking for the next level and slowly inch by hard won inch they bought Chloe back.  After 4 years they discovered Hyperbaric oxygen therapy, Chloe was still completely wheelchair bound, could only speak very slowly, and was incontinent. After 20 treatments the incontinence was gone, Brian did more sessions with her, another 165 to be exact and slowly combined with thousands of hours of physio, a change in diet and a never say die attitude Chloe got better and better. Now 8 years into their journey Chloe surprised her parents for Xmas with the greatest gift on earth, she took her first steps completely unaided.   Chloes story is outlined in my new book "Relentless" due out on the 11th of March. This book is about bringing my Mother Isobel back after a major aneurysm and stroke left her like a baby and she, like Chloe has clawed her way back. Against all odds and against all the medical professionals prognoses.   You can pre order "Relentless" right now at   https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/books/products/relentless and if you grab it right now (before the 1st of February 2020) you will get free access to my MINDSETu online mental toughness ecourse.  Valued at $275.  So hurry over and pre order your copy right now.   To Watch Chloes feature story on TVNZ's 7 Sharp program go here: https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10162529755070114&id=552205113&sfnsn=mo   and reach out to Chloe on Facebook at Chloe M S Hogan.   We would like to thank the sponsors for this show  www.vielight.com Makers of Photobiomodulation devices that stimulate the brains mitocondria, the power houses of your brains energy, through infrared light to optimise your brain function.  To get 10% off your order use the code: TAMATI at www.vielight.com     We would like to thank our sponsors:     For more information on Lisa Tamati's programs, books and documentaries please visit www.lisatamati.com    For Lisa's online run training coaching go to https://www.lisatamati.com/page/runningpage/ Join hundreds of athletes from all over the world and all levels smashing their running goals while staying healthy in mind and body.   Lisa's Epigenetics Testing Program https://www.lisatamati.com/page/epigenetics/ Get The User Manual For Your Specific Genes Which foods should you eat, and which ones should you avoid? When, and how often should you be eating? What type of exercise does your body respond best to, and when is it best to exercise? Discover the social interactions that will energize you and uncover your natural gifts and talents. These are just some of the questions you'll uncover the answers to in the Lisa Tamati Epigenetics Testing Program along with many others. There's a good reason why epigenetics is being hailed as the "future of personalized health", as it unlocks the user manual you'll wish you'd been born with!  No more guesswork. The program, developed by an international team of independent doctors, researchers, and technology programmers for over 15 years, uses a powerful epigenetics analysis platform informed by 100% evidenced-based medical research. The platform uses over 500 algorithms and 10,000 data points per user, to analyze body measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home   For Lisa's Mental Toughness online course visit:  https://www.lisatamati.com/page/mindsetuniversity/ Develop mental strength, emotional resilience, leadership skills and a never quit mentality - Helping you to reach your full potential and break free of those limiting beliefs.    For Lisa's free weekly Podcast "Pushing the Limits" subscribe on iTunes or your favorite podcast app or visit the website  https://www.lisatamati.com/page/podcast/   Transcript of the Podcast:    Speaker 1: (00:01) Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa [inaudible], brought to you by Lisatamati.com Speaker 2: (00:13) If your brain is not function at its best, then check out the team at vielight.com. Vielight producers photo biomodulation devices. Your brain function depends largely on the health of the energy sources of the brain cells, the mitochondria. Now research has shown that stimulating your brain with near infrared light revitalizes mitochondria. I use these devices daily for both my own optimal brain function and to slow age-related decline and also for my mom's brain rehabilitation after her aneurysm in stroke. So check out what the team at Vielight like, do it and use the code Tamati. That's T A M A T I at checkout to get a 10% discount on any of the devices. Speaker 3: (00:59) Hi everybody, Lisa Thomas to hear it pushing the limits. And today I have a very special couple of guests with me, Brian Hogan and Chloe Hogan all way from Oakland. Hi guys. How you doing? Good. Thanks. Good morning Lisa. We've had a little bit of technical troubles trying to get you on here, but we've worked it out. So now I have, this is a very special story guys that I wanted to share with you, the audience because Conway's had an incredible difficult journey and who did in a family. And I wanted to shoot a little bit of the story because it sort of parallels a little bit. And so I'm going to start with you. Brian, we what actually happened to Chloe? Can you take us back eight years ago. Speaker 4: (01:49) Okay. Well in the morning of the 22nd her birthday, like she left to go to work at around five 30 in the morning and when about full bath rate case down the road, she for some unknown reason the stage well, what we want you to get or not chase way up to miss something on the road. There was a funny morning. Speaker 3: (02:10) Yup. Speaker 4: (02:11) Yeah, she lost control of the car and slammed passenger side on a heavy concrete pap on. She sustained a traumatic brain injury. Fortunately, there was a, a chromo theater nurse. Well, living within steady. Yeah. 30 meters of the crash. Yeah. It has been, came out sort of situation called the called his wife came out and she stabilized Slatery way stabilized, got a breathing soon after that. Somebody had run a very one of my mum and the ACE arrived and then the ambulance arrived and she was taken to Middlemore hospital. Yeah, no, we were there and it's seven o'clock in the morning, we're gonna knock on our door and our street placements, standing here and of course you get to wonder what this is all about. You think the worst and it was the worst or most and they say cloud and being involved in an accident and that she was very serious. Speaker 4: (03:08) Accident was Neha terminology. A great 9. And right team is a fatality, so like currently offers to drive us through the middle more, which they did at great speed. And we arrived to fund how he had been stabilized in the hospital and that she was totally unconscious. Of course it was hooked up to all sorts of houses and gadgets. And then they then we were told that they didn't have the, the equipment to continue the treatment there she needed through the engine and eventually medical intervention. So put it in an ambulance. And again, we following her, rushed through to walk hospital where she went into intensive care and wow. Yeah. So it was quite a day I had a morning. Speaker 3: (03:56) Yes. Yeah. So it was, and so Chloe was only 22 years old. Major brain injury. So she's hanging on for dear life. She's in the hospital. Of course. Clara, you won't remember any of this. Nothing. Thank goodness. That's a really good thing. So Brian, I know that then it was touch and go for a fairly long time. Chloe was in a coma and the ICU unit what was that time in your life like? Speaker 4: (04:27) Well, I guess that first two or three days you are just a sideline, I observed that really, you couldn't do anything. We were totally numb, totally numb, or it was like an out of body experience. You know, the way we can tell the truth is going to poke through and tell that she was going to die really new. So it was a time of great concern and she was blissfully sleeping. Thank goodness. Yes, I was sick. Mmm. But anyway, I think on the third day Dr. Stevens straight cold us coordinating with the family and set the stage, there was a a high likelihood that she wouldn't die. It's a big paper, a long journey and go with it right at the store. Speaker 3: (05:18) So I know that she was in coma for I think 23 days, but a day like 19 or something, they said to you, you might have to turn off the life support. Speaker 4: (05:27) That's correct. That's correct. She was transferred to high to begin and see after, okay. A week out of 'em [inaudible] and after, I think it was the 19th day or the 20th day, real cold to a meeting with them seeking you register on a high dependency ward, Hey saved to S there is no chance Chi [inaudible] out of her coma. Injuries are too severe and you probably the family to consider the alternatives, which was withdrawal of life support. And I pushed a document or pamphlet across the [inaudible] devastated. Speaker 3: (06:08) You were devastated and you actually refused and you're Brian, we've thought about it. Of course you're has five runs. So yeah, you, you basically you, you know, it came to be that you lifted the life support on and thank God you did. Is that what happened? Speaker 4: (06:35) Well, in it to the little no document on the wall that says they can't, that's where they are intervention. You know, I'm on the ward. You lost it all as your rights. Yes. Brilliant. And so that was it. And everyone went away pretty safe. But anyway, just normal for Kali on the . Speaker 3: (06:58) 22 days she woke up, she woke up just four days later and I were expecting her to, you know, not, not wake up even at all. This is pretty frightening though, Brian. If you think about it, like how many times has life support been tuned off when it didn't need to be tuned off? Yeah, yeah. Certainly not three weeks on and to the drama. I remember with my mom, I was, you know, given non resuscitation orders to sign and I wasn't as polite as you just saying. No, I use some stronger language. It wasn't that way. Always still going there. And you know, so after Callie woke up, of course she had massive brain damage. And Chloe, what is the very first memories that you have? How many months passed or you know, your dad will be able to help you here, but how many months before you can actually remember anything? The first thing I remember was the patient. Okay. So you have actual little bits of memory of actually in the, in the hospital, so okay. No, and their rehab. The rehab. Okay. So after hospital. Speaker 4: (08:25) Yeah. Especially as an open book or hospital for two months to Kevin IBI, which was out in route around Nelly and yeah, so that was probably four months after accident before she has that numeric. Speaker 3: (08:41) Wow. And that was the very first one. Now the cloud we have any any movement, any, any speech, any memory of you at all when she, you know, after a couple of months or was she pretty much you know, non functioning Speaker 4: (08:59) Well at open hospital once well she had an issue with biting her tone. Yeah. We all them. So they had to end up vein was gadgets to stop it tongue movement, which was very divisive and terrible. So she had shaved an amount, the must gadgets stuck in the mouth and she had a trunk. Yeah. And she has had a pig on to tell me to be fade. Sorry. She goes, Oh, what up. So even though she had woken up, she had no real response. We couldn't, she couldn't talk. She could say us. And she made, she'd made eye contact. Yeah. The the left side of her body wasn't functioning, so she couldn't see out the left side. And so that will took probably six months to come back slowly. Speaker 3: (09:57) Then we came back. Okay, Speaker 4: (10:00) Well forget, say what, say you on a high rot side, but hang on. Oh God, that ran the wrong way. My left and right. She could say, say on her right side and left side wasn't functioning. So she couldn't say, Hey, we'll stop. Stop. But then anyway, they, it's but now we're getting after the two months when it was obviously she was stabilized and she was reactive. And little by little like pulled some of these troops and things out. But you're so stuck with us math thing. But once the truck and that came out and I was there on the, not a senior nurse sick, well I think she can cope what ourselves and we're going to remove. So she moved there and they pulled them out, I think to me, his daddy. Speaker 3: (10:59) Oh, then it might give so she remember Jude, she had obviously some functions and some memory still there. No really good sign because I'm early on in the pace, you know, it's pretty hard not, you know, you don't know. I know with mum I didn't know whether she knew who I was and what I was or anything. And Tony, you've got a very, very special mum and dad, haven't you? Yep. So you've been now in this journey for eight years and from that time that you woke up from the injury and then that whole time you've been working really, really hard and your heart and your appearance and your family been working really, really hard to bring you back. How hard is this journey been for you and what, what does it mean? Like terrible. Yeah. So hard. Tell me some of the worst things that you've been through. Like at the very beginning you obviously couldn't control anything in your body at all. Speaker 4: (12:04) No. I don't think so. Well she had 'em up a little reasonable. Not reasonable, but okay. Up. I've I've actually, but she had, you know, we had to help feed her every meal, months, probably six months. Like to go back to one thing and it might, your audience might be interested that and for others going through this, you know, I did as much research as possible. Everything. Dr Google is probably really wonderful. Yeah. And one of the other things on that that I found out was stimulation was important no matter what. So while she goes and well while she was in and and not and high dependency, she I used to sing to her. Speaker 3: (13:08) Okay. Speaker 4: (13:09) And I also used the read to this, I agree to a book laugh out loud so she could hear it, but every time I did that end, even my staying here hat right wig down. So she was selling it for around 90 to a hundred beats per minute hot. Right. Well it had dropped her 70 almost every time. So she was getting it. She was, she was [inaudible] and stimulating and that suddenly, you know, for folks that are in the same situation, they might like to try that. There was a young guy at IBO who was a boxer and he sustained a traumatic brain injury in the prefab and his training and he was almost totally climatized. So his mother was, they regulate but wouldn't, she wasn't nice gun sit with him. And I talked to him about boxing and gosh, you just, yeah. You could say he'd smile and he'd give me . Mmm. Your responsible. Sorry. Can I just, as I said, never give up and try it. I was like this possible, but know simulation on happiness. Is it great? Mmm. Speaker 3: (14:23) And I think it's really important that people treat them as if they are the or O'Brian. Don't talk to them as a fan, not reasons or over them. That's what I found very, very frustrating. In the early days, did you find that like they would talk with a car? We didn't exist. Speaker 4: (14:41) Yeah. Do you let the medical staff talk to, talk over her as like when you're in hospital? But I might've pissed no, and I made them talk to her and address that. Ava, she was our sponsor. We just, we just stuck with it. We're not gonna give out. Speaker 3: (15:04) Yeah. And, and giving people that respect, even though they can't respond, is very, very important for anybody who has disabilities or anybody who can't communicate or has had a stroke or brain injury, you know, always give them the full respect that you'd give anybody else and talk to them about this situation. You know, I find that really, really offensive when people don't do that, even though they can't respond. Yeah, you, you went to dr Google. That's exactly what I did. I went like hardcore researching every thing in the universe on brain injury. And I know like for the listeners, Brian and I connected a few years down the track with Curry and actually I was probably half a year in or a year and with mom's rehab when we connected, I think, and you rang me one day about hyperbaric oxygen therapy and see what I, what I thought about that. I think you'd, yeah. Tell us a little bit about that journey cause that happened already. That was already four years in or so to two colleagues rehab, is that right? Speaker 4: (16:07) Yeah, it was it. Well, almost daily diary, as I said to medical staff, you know, how bout hyperbaric oxygen treatment. And so every single person, every single metal comparison I spoke to gave him no joy at all. Don't know anything about that. That's not proven. It's a hurry. But I, you know, I played, I played in the open rugby up hydrocod color dry for seniors and we played Navy and I took the bait fuck shelf it before it was no blood. Speaker 3: (16:40) Was almost an old black. I'm sure he was glowing Speaker 4: (16:47) That vaccines may or the boys go and you know, we're talking after the guy and mother boys go into the, into the decompression chamber, which I had on the night device, but the next day after the game, and I said, you could watch bruises disappear now that was when I was about 19 or 20. So it was a hell of a year long, long time ago. But that sort of stuck with me. So one of the early things I thought about or have have hyperbaric Novia with it and I, I sort of gave up on it because we got so much negativity from it. Speaker 4: (17:24) But anyway we, she hadn't had an operation, a middle matter hospital to correct her foot. So while we're sitting on the there for bed awakened and I was reading books like really got stuck into this hyperbaric and I found this chamber that's private chamber in, the seven mountain Nelson. And so that was approximately four years. Oh, on this journey. Did we rent them out to her? And Jose, actually, if there's someone who's down the call, I was going through hopper. Greg did, I rang you or she had 2020 treatments of MACRA the first time. And within a week of coming away she'd be, she'd be, she got control of about, so she was before years there was incontinent, a nappy for four years. And and so that, that was just a huge step. Now there was nothing else different than we did the fixed date. Speaker 3: (18:27) So this is 4 years. I want people to listen. Keep it. This is four years into the rehabilitation cause a lot of people have said to me, it's too late. I had a stroke five years ago or 10 years ago. It's now used to be doing that for years after the event. 20 sessions. And you've already got a major, major breakthrough. This might not sound major, but as it is, as both of us and all of us have gone through, being in consonants is major and it's not fun. It's not fun as it Chloe and after 20 treatments to get control, that means that part of the brain is coming back online. That's what that is. And then you, you had to go all the way to map or, so there's a, there's a a medical hyperbaric facility down in map or a Nelson, which I think is unfortunately closing if it hasn't already close his it, Brian. Speaker 4: (19:20) Ah, yeah, it's on the, in the process of closing down, but the much, Oh, absolute tragedy, you know, saying there's so much pressure from people who know about it. So it starts trickling along, but it'll eventually closed. I imagine by the end of this year, Speaker 3: (19:40) If we had, if we had lots of money, we'd go and buy it and get it up and running again. And no. So dr Tim are, is the, is the, is the doctor down there? He was in charge of the costume, a hyperbaric facility before he went in private. Now hyperbaric is a hugely beneficial, and then if you're listening to this guys, he was a, one of the world's leading experts on this podcast over two years ago now, Dr. Scott Scheer, who she has insights and go back and look up and I'll put it in the show notes, the link to that episode because this is really powerful. You did that 20 sessions and then you went back again and this, each time you're taking Kali right down to Nelson, you're staying, living down DHEA, which is a hell of a sacrifice day, isn't it? Speaker 4: (20:24) Oh yeah, I see it. You want to have a holiday? I got him out. Poets. Speaker 3: (20:29) It's a lovely place. But in karma you had to go in this chamber every day pretty much every day. Apart from weekends, weekends I got to go shopping. She's an expensive daughter, isn't she? So how many sessions did you end up having a map or Brian? Speaker 4: (20:52) 195, I think. Speaker 3: (20:54) 95 of the medical grade hyperbaric treatments in as she progressed. What were the things that you saw come back online? Cause when I met she was fully in a wheelchair, unable to stand or anything like that. What happened over there? 185 sessions. There's a lot of sessions, but that's, it's nothing when you compared to a lifetime. Speaker 4: (21:18) Oh yeah. Like it was well it just changed everything. She, she gained weight gain control of her alum. So her feet, you know, the walking out of it, she doesn't and I, I'm a high Walker. Speaker 3: (21:39) Yep. Yep, yep. Speaker 4: (21:40) And she has to have somebody in front of it pulling in somebody behind my conception 40th and the tray. That's as good as she had got. After half the Brack, she was able to walk to the gutter frame and assisted, you know, over a period of talking to them while we were down there. So her fake placement there was a first thing I noticed was probably after 40 stations she could manage her feet and place them in the right place instead of getting them 10 without. So then she was stable on like other friends. So it didn't make a person in front of the person to be healthy. And from that she's going on, she entering the Walker and now she's four, she's walking through and we'll link to basketball court. Speaker 3: (22:27) Wow. Probably tell you you were on television recently. We'd show because it was a Christmas miracle that you gave to your dad. What did, what did you do? May and Jane organized, did they own seven shop? Oh, I wanted to be on TV. Hey, curious, why not? And you showed them and this buddy you showed your dad and your mom, you for the first time taking some steps, is that right? Yeah. And I caught it on camera. I'll put the link to that guy, that video. Guys, these are copies for your steps. Now this is after 195 hyperbaric sessions, thousands of hours of physio therapy. Goodness knows what else you've done as well, Brian, for everything you've done, everything under the sun, pretty much. If someone sees this weird musical therapy, have you stuck? I've got lasers that I stick up mom's nose. I've done everything possible. Speaker 3: (23:33) Yeah, I've still got that. I actually think it's great. You know, in other words, we didn't just, both of us approach this with try everything. If it's risky, try it. And if it's risky, we'll weigh up the risks and we'll have a go at it and research like how, and take responsibility. Don't wait for the medical professionals to give you the go ahead. Don't wait for the green light for hyperbaric therapy. You know, this isn't an advert for five very clear free, but it is a very powerful therapy if you have enough sessions. And it's just an absolute travesty that Maffra is perhaps closing because the regulations around the just terrific. That made it very, very difficult from what I hear for dr terms to function and you leave are these stories. My mum has had 250, half of Barrick sessions. I ended up buying a, what they called a mild hyperbaric chamber, which is not as good as the one in Maffra, but it was the best that we could do. I had the first 53 sessions with you in a, in a proper, if you want to call it then a proper chamber. But it was through a dive company and it was, you know, taken off and we couldn't use it anymore. And I created that would giving me enough brain back of mom's brain that I could then teach you to walk and to do the things. And the same would have been with you I Brian with the, with the, with the policies coming back. Speaker 4: (25:05) Oh yeah, absolutely. And I like fake placements, quite important now with ums and she's got control of them. And I put that down to hyperbaric because nothing else is, well, she's had lots and lots and lots, lots and stuff. But I suppose that's been one of the pickiest parts of the puzzle and putting it back together. Speaker 3: (25:32) It's the key of it because it ha so what hyper hyperbaric does people is it hyper oxygenates your your body. So you're getting about seven times the amount of oxygen into the body and it's compressing the oxygen molecules so that it can actually pass through the blood brain barrier to the parts of the brain that are damaged but not deed. So the deed pats were unable to bring back. But typically around the deep parts of tissue there is what they call way ischemic penumbra and these are cells that are alive but they're not functioning. And these are the ones that we can hopefully target with hyperbaric and bring back. It also hits the inflammation pathways in the brain and in the body. And it also helps produce more STEM cells and all of these things help the body to repair it. So it's not a quick fix. Speaker 3: (26:18) It's something that you need to have a lot of sessions in. But as you can see with probably after four years of not getting very far at all and then having these 185 sessions over the period of, I don't know, a year and a half, two years, she's now walking that is massive. She now has control over her bowels and 40 in control over a hell of a lot more. Whose features also improved greatly, hasn't it? Karma. You're talking pretty now? Cause when I, when I meet slow, yeah. I think when I met you it was quite slow. It was. It was, and that's a huge difference. So it's a hugely powerful and you've got your whole life ahead. You're a super young lady and I know that you've got your 30th birthday coming up. Is that right? You're invited. Oh, I'm invited. It's fantastic. Speaker 3: (27:09) I'll try and get to that point. And so Chloe's dad and I have had sort of exchanged notes along the road, however we, Brian and given each other tips, some trucks of what we've learned along the way. And this has been really a multipronged approach. It's not just the one thing, a huge part of it has been hyperbaric, but it's also thousands of hours and the therapists and training and retraining the mind. It's having the guts and the determination like if Brian wasn't such a feisty, don't take any shirts person who is going to push through every barrier and if I wasn't the same then I don't think mum or Chloe would we be with AR. And by the same token, Chloe and mum are also identical and that they are fighters. They are people that persist that resilient. The positivity that Callie brings to this really difficult journey is nothing short of mind blowing. I've been absolutely astounded to watch you over the last few years on how you've just fought your, your differently. A chip off the old block, aren't you daughter? Speaker 3: (28:23) I have lots of grit. Exactly. So call me. You are just a couple of weeks away from running your first marathon when the accident happened. Day one. So I forgot. I forgot. You'd already need the one. Sorry. I was going to do it and then you want to smash that toe. I'll tell you what though, that dream is still alive in you, isn't it? To athlete again, get out there and race and be in a, in a, in a racing, you've actually done a fiveK , is that right? Yeah. Fun run. And you did it on your, your frame at that time. Zimmer frame funding. Yeah. Speaker 4: (29:14) She doesn't, well, yeah, I guess because it, but yeah, she doesn't walk. Oh by Southwest. We have lots of people around helping her. Oh, and encourage her, right. Very steep that she needed. Speaker 3: (29:30) Yeah. That's insane. That is so amazing. Chloe, you've got mum, I'm up to two Ks with mum. The five K's yet. And story in Brian's story is in my new book, which is coming out in match called relentless. And it's, it's another example of an incredible comeback story. And that's why I was really keen to share this. And Brian is hopefully gonna write the book one day and Brian and chloe, you're gonna get the bums into here and share this insight as well. Even though writing a book is a mission. I hope so because this is an incredible story, Callie and it's not finished yet and she's still got a week wise to go on on. Definitely to get full independence. Ron, do you think Chloe will ever reach full, full independence again and be able to no flat on her own or, or live in a house with, with flatmates and they talked to them. Speaker 4: (30:28) Oh, without a doubt. But they have a death. Speaker 3: (30:30) Really? That's amazing. So at the moment you with mum and dad? Yeah. Yeah. And yet are you sick and mum and dad, do you want your own independence? He goes away sometimes. So it's okay. It's just you and ma and then you girls go shopping, but more on spend. Spend some more money there. Yeah. Yeah. Doesn't really like shopping. They keep a grip on it. They'll say, Oh, hype site. So I call it. What are the next steps in your journey? What are you working on at the moment? Because you're always working on something. Hey. Yeah. To be able to walk without the Walker. Oh, like a long period of time. Yep. Yep. And what are the things that she's struggling with Brian in that respects as a balance or spatial awareness or con coordinating your face and things. Don't Speaker 4: (31:28) A balance really chase get, you know, like every day she gets better at it. You're like, we, we have been away to Tyro since Christmas or so before Christmas. And even I notice even though we're here all the time with it, even I know she can climb the stairs and stairs now with minimal assistance, whereas at Christmas it was, you know, you have to keep a class on I, but she can do it all by herself. Now just with my mind, Speaker 3: (32:00) Are you using functional neurology? That's something that I'd highly recommend you go out and start looking into if you haven't to Willy, which is using a, so doing things like with your eyes balancing, you know, different eye exercises that really helped me with non, with your facial awareness and who balance stuff. So if you, if you, are you doing that at all with, with PI? Speaker 4: (32:20) Yeah. maybe they're not that I'm aware of. Exactly. If you could save me that. Speaker 3: (32:26) Yeah, I'll send you a couple of videos. I'm in links to doctors who, who teach this online. I'd also recommend you go to a good car, Frank, cause it knows about functional neurology or I'm not sure if there's up in Oakland or not, but and just get things looked at it from that perspective because adjusting the bet can also help with I've got mum at the chiropractor at the moment, we're trying to straighten out. It's fine. Of course things are going a little bit skew with after four years of being, you know, leaned over on one side and that can help with neurological function as well. So it's just say people like it's really important to share these insights and information with each other cause we're still learning, we're still growing, we're moving forward. And each time you come, you take a step forward, you actually come up against a new obstacle. I've found a Braun, there's something that, some new place that you haven't thought about. A new, a new level, a new deal sort of thing. Speaker 4: (33:19) Yeah. You know, like the other thing that I think is important is as I'm assessing the notes that you know, the right to make a significant difference as well. I think Speaker 3: (33:33) The right food for our brain is really, really important. And having good high fats, good Omega threes, really important. I have a whole regime of different supplements that I also have mum on. And we also do something called epigenetic testing. And I got into this Brian, it looks because it looks at your gene genetic makeup and how they're expressing now and gives the exact right diet for that person's genes. So it'd be something that we Speaker 4: (34:02) Yeah, for sure. I like look at them. Speaker 3: (34:07) Yeah. Cause I think what, what, what the key takeaway from this guys is obviously hyperbarics really important. Second is resilience in fight in persistence and not giving up in certainly having the support of a wonderful family or friends or people that can help anyone going through a drama like this and being resilient and then also the right diet and taking a really multipronged approach. Not just relying on drugs, not relying on just physio. It's not enough. It's not enough. It's a part of the puzzle, but it's, it's not, it's not enough for brain injury, but there is a way back and there is quality of life. You know, Chloe, you're pretty happy lighting it nowadays that you, you always seem to be jetting around the place and having all travel. You love travel, you've got a wonderful family. You're moving again, you're walking in, you're going somewhere, you've got your job, sort of sit for the next couple of years. What do you get yourself back to? More independence and, but near as quality of life and nearest happiness. Fear and it sounds, yeah, it's an amazing story guys. Brian, are there any last words or closing any last words that you want to encourage people who might be going through hardships? It doesn't even need to be brain injury, but just hard times. Speaker 4: (35:23) Well, I, you know, I, my bag disappointment through or laser as a, a number of the professionals just don't get it. And you know, like a lot, probably more than 50% of the you know, they use psychologists if you like. Have said in front of Chloe, you'll never walk again. You've got unrealistic expectations to hit face. And some of them say, you know, you'll never have you know, never have a pattern in your life and you got any issue and you're going to get [inaudible] don't get used to it. That's, that's how it's going to be. The phone a lot. And I've got so angry and in front of people, I never quite lose it, but I felt like Speaker 3: (36:21) A few times and my big brother have lost it toe a few times. Speaker 4: (36:27) Yeah. And it's just stupid. They put themselves up as so called experts and they, yeah, I know nothing for those facts. We just kept them. You don't want to know anything about them. I've tried them in the door. That's it. We're not coming back. We keep looking and, and we've had some absolutely wonderful caregivers or professionals that are help Chi and, and an event like I, we keep changing providers cause he goes to speech therapists almost every two or three years until we find the right one. But they run out of ideas. They run out of experience and colleagues continue to improve. So therefore some of them you get to a stage where they've topped out, I don't know any more and can't take it to the next stage. Or the challenge is to find the next person who can take it to the next day. And we've been relentless at that nonsense and we look constantly for people that can help. And we just kept the negative ones there immediately. Non-Native might, I don't know. And I just really totally surprises me how how these people lie and I still operate and I just wonder how many people get discouraged by that and just accept it. We're, you know, we document, Speaker 3: (37:52) No, we don't. And, and, and we've, you know, like the thing is like, we're feisty fighters. We, we not people that give up and how many people go under the bus who don't have feisty daughters or fathers or people that will help them. I had times at the hospital where, like in front of my mum, I remember vividly, we had a, we were finally got into a physio program and of course she wasn't ICC like you guys. So we didn't get a lot of support. And I finally got her into a physio program after a year and we did this training with him, which was excellent. And he preceded, I could have done more in my, you know, when lunch break than they did. And at the end of the six weeks, they'd done all these tests with here and they'd talk to her like she was an idiot. Speaker 3: (38:35) And we were in this panel that we had to present the senior, that we were allowed to stay in the program. And we were taken into this room and I said to her, look, Isabel is below the level of the worst dementia patient we've seen. There is excellently no hope. She will never do anything again. We not going to continue in the program and this is in front of my mum. Right. And, and I just turned around to my mum and I said how does it make you feel mum? And she said, well, I was feeling quite empowered until I heard that, that I'm below the level of dementia patient now I'm absolutely depressed and I don't know what to think. And the mouths dropped open. They have never heard her speak a full sentence because that talked down to her, realized she had an intelligence via that they, they had ignored. And these are the professionals, the doctors, they send the fuzzier therapists and you know, I'm not saying that all like that from pig. God, they're not complete idiots. We told them to stop the program. Speaker 3: (39:42) I bet you've seen hates cause I've seen hates and in people who had told me, even, you know, good physios who would come to the end of their abilities, who told me you won't get any more rubbish. Yeah. And you can imagine when you've got a 78 year old how they're even more so, because they're like, she's 78. What do you want? You know, made it go, no, she's my mum and I'm going to fight and I wanted to live to 120, you know, then my attitude and I'm not, I'm not, I'm not happy with where we're at it, I'm very, I'm glad we're here but I want more and Callie wants more. We keep looking for the next layer of people that can help us and that's why we keep exchanging ideas and I've got a couple for Chloe to look into. So Speaker 4: (40:36) Yeah, I guess that that was really my point. I think just don't give up and when you get a divorce that you don't think is right, seek a second opinion or just go elsewhere and I just tell them out. They're not talking to our my niece has just qualified as a medical doctor and I said to her, she was here just over Christmas period. Said to her, what you know, what did they teach your bed? Hyperbaric oxygen treatment. And she said nothing. Nothing, absolutely nothing. Absolutely stupid as that I've been back works for almost, even though I dislocated my shoulder playing rugby years and years ago. And when they told me what I need a shoulder reconstruction thought and I was functioning okay. But I couldn't wash my hair with my left. Well wash it with my right. But so I put up with that for years and years and after that first 20 treatments, Speaker 3: (41:35) Yeah. Wow. What's flowing? No question. That there's no growth like crazy me. It does. We don't ask Dr. Scott share who was on this you know, earlier this, this podcast he said to me, if we can get three treatments, if anybody who's had a heart attack or stroke within a few days we can have the mortality. Right. And I see, why the hell is this not an every single ICU in the world. And you see, because there's no money to be made in it. He said that I'm a doctor, this is not from [inaudible] the company behind it, the clinical trials, they won't do anything cause you can't patient oxygen and they can't make money out of it. And unfortunately that is the general state of our health system. It's very pharmacological based and it's very surgery based. And while that brilliant surgery and the brilliant at those parts of the puzzle, they're not good when it comes to chronic health management and they're no good when it comes to a situation like this. And that's why, you know, I know this is controversial, unnoticeable piss some people off, but this is our experience and it needs to be shared because there's a hundred other people that will back up what we're saying a thousand other people. Yeah. Interesting enough. Was the next a customer in the door, was that an American lady? And we're talking about, she said, well, funnily enough, almost every new mall would you go on until you are in the States nowadays as a wellness clinic. Speaker 3: (43:33) There you go. Yeah, it's growing and, and, and the popping up. We'll have New Zealand. I opened the clinic here with a, what they call a mild hyperbaric facility with, so we can't afford the big ones with the big medical grade, but they are justice just about as good, not quite as good, but it just about as good, they don't have a hundred percent oxygen and these are popping up all over the country. So you guys, if you want to find out about it, this is not just for people with brain injuries. This is for people who want an anti aging. Good for you, for athletes. This is good for healing wounds. This is absolutely proven stuff. And there is clinical trials. I have a season. It is a powerful and by the same token, there's a hundred other Sierra pays or biohacking or whatever you want to call it, stuff out there that is worth looking into. Speaker 3: (44:21) We can't give recommendations for everything there is, but there's a hell of a lot that I've tried. And all combined together. Nope. Do the restaurant, do the risk assessment yourself. And if you think it's for you, go for it. And don't be told what you can and you can't do. And you know, just keep powering on clothing. Brian, you've been fantastic today. Thank you so much for sharing your story. It's really awesome. It's so important Chloe, that you get out there and you tell people this journey that you've been on, there's a reason why you've been through this. We've got to tune it into a positive, even though it's been health, you and your family. This is why the book for me is important to get it out there, to share these insights so that other people don't have to have it as hard as we did. Speaker 3: (45:11) And if we can help people then it's great. So if anybody wants to reach out to calling weaker, they find you guys your famous snare Chloe. Yeah, my Danny that drew runnings, my Facebook page, my journey back to running Facebook. So clubby Hogan on Facebook and I can find you the year under Chloe Hogan. That be right. Chloe is Hogan. Okay. Chloe, Ms. Hogan, what a complicated name you've got. Wow. That is very fancy. So fire was my granddad. Oh wow. That's a pretty cool name. So Chloe, Amy's Hogan, if anyone wants to reach out to Corey, I'm sure she'd love to hear from you. If anyone wants to reach out to me or to Brian, please let us know. You can email me and I can pass any messages on. If you've got any questions. Thank you very much guys for sharing your story. We've got to get it out there more. It's an absolutely amazing story and you and mum, Chloe are both rock stars, so thanks though. Thanks Lisa! Speaker 2: (46:20) We're pushing the limits this week. I hope that that was really interesting for you and you took some really strong takeaways from that interview with Brian and Chloe. It's been a, an amazing to watch her journey over the last few years parallel to my mums and some of the insights that we've both gained a really along the same path. So I hope you'll take heat of some of the notes that we talk. I just wanted to remind you to hop on over to our website. If you want to check out our programs. We've got three flagship programs. We've got our online run training Academy running hot. We you can learn everything you need to know about running with you are doing your first five K or 10 K or maybe you're gone for an a half marathon. Or if you're doing a hundredth hundredth miler, we would love to help you. Speaker 2: (47:04) We have a holistic run training system that is based around our five pillars. So these are your run training sessions, you mobility work, your strength work, your nutrition and your mindset and all those pieces of the puzzle. Really, really important. It's not just about putting one foot in front of the other and winging it and seeing how you go. Certainly not when once you start getting into the longer distances or once you start running sort of any injury issues. So please check that out. We also have mindset U, which is our mental toughness Academy. And this is all about developing a stronger mindset. You know, all the stuff you just heard about. And the interview with colleague, that sort of stuff. It's about resilience, it's about persistence. It's about overcoming that negative voice in your heads, those limiting beliefs that were programmed into you perhaps as a young person. Speaker 2: (47:53) All of that sort of good stuff. So cheek out mindset you're in. The third program that we have is our epigenetics testing program. Now this is just really next level. Now this is a program that's been put together by hundreds of scientists working from 15 different science disciplines to look specifically at your genes and how they are expressing right now. And so this is the next step in personalized health. Never before in the history of mankind. Have we ever had an insight into our bodies like we do now. And then information can help us really nail down our health problems, our optimizing our house, tuning the clock back on time and reaching high-performance. It give you information right from like having Google for your, for your own body basically. You know, it'll tell you exactly the right foods to eat, the right times of the day, your chronobiology all about the different times of the day, your hormones, when they're replacing what your dominant hormones are. Speaker 2: (48:54) It'll give you information on your mindset, how your mind works, which parts of your brain you use the most are just absolutely next level of information. So if you want to check out our epigenetics program, hop on over to my website, Lisa Thomas E. Dot com and hit the programs button and you'll see all three of our programs. I've also got our new book relentless coming out on the 11th of March, 2020 then this is a story of bringing my bump mum back from a mess of aneurysm. And you can preorder that book. Now, if you do preorder it, you'll get free access for the next three weeks only to mindset you. So you'll get your free X's to mindset you, you also get a discount on the book if you preorder it. The book does not ship until the 11th of March. But if you support me in getting this underway, I'm actually going to give you access to mindset. You now, that's a value of $275 and that program has been running for a few years and has helped countless people. So if you want to get this as a onetime only offer only to promote the book, please head on over to the shop at lisatamati.com Under the books button and you'll find relentless the preorders available there. So thanks very much for your time everyone, and we'll see you again next week. Speaker 1: (50:12) That's it this week for pushing the limits. Be sure to write, review, and share with your friends and head over and visit Lisa and her team at Lisatamati.com.

Dr Rob Bell from Indianapolis in this USA is a renown Mental Toughness Coach, Speaker and the Author of 6 and soon to be 7 Books on the subject. In this interview he shares his top insights from working with elite level athletes across a number of sports and corporate athletes as well. He discusses his approach, his philosophies around developing mental strength to optimize performance and upgrade your life and the tools and perspectives he uses with his athletes. Dr Bell says: Mental Toughness means performing your best when it matters the most AND dealing with the adversity and setbacks that we will face. If performance is important in your life, then both of these are inevitable, so it isn't a matter of "if", but "when" mental toughness is needed. The odd thing is that many people don't actually need to be mentally tough in today's society. These people are comfortable on the sidelines. I'm not sure about you, but we just survive in mediocrity, not thrive. Our goal is to be the BEST at getting BETTER." You can learn more about Dr Bell and his work, his books and courses at www.drrobbell.com. His books include No One Gets There Alone Don't Should On Your Kids No Fear Mental Toughness Training For Golf 50 Ways to Win Hinge   Mental Toughness - The Key To Success with Dr Rob Bell Timestamp:   4:20 About Rob 5:32 About the hinge  7:50 hinge moments 11:05 lisa's hinge moment 14:34 Rob's coaching stories 17:45 a new level, a new devil - being excited vs being fearful 24:02 focusing on success vs focusing on segnifficance 28:32 Mental Toughness Hacks 33:28 reprograming our subconscious & choosing our tribe 37:52 Scarcity vs Abundance mindset   We would like to thank our sponsors:   Running Hot - By Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff   If you want to run faster, longer and be stronger without burnout and injuries then check out and TRY our Running Club for FREE on a 7-day FREE TRIAL Complete holistic running programmes for distances from 5km to ultramarathon and for beginners to advanced runners.   All include Run training sessions, mobility workouts daily, strength workouts specific for runners, nutrition guidance and mindset help Plus injury prevention series, foundational plans, running drill series and a huge library of videos, articles, podcasts, clean eating recipes and more.   www.runninghotcoaching.com/info and don't forget to subscribe to our youtube channel at Lisa's Youtube channel  www.yotube.com/user/lisatamat and come visit us on our facebook group   www.facebook.com/groups/lisatamati Epigenetics Testing Program by Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff. Wouldn’t it be great if your body came with a user manual? Which foods should you eat, and which ones should you avoid? When, and how often should you be eating? What type of exercise does your body respond best to, and when is it best to exercise? These are just some of the questions you’ll uncover the answers to in the Epigenetics Testing Program along with many others. There’s a good reason why epigenetics is being hailed as the “future of personalized health”, as it unlocks the user manual you’ll wish you’d been born with! No more guesswork. The program, developed by an international team of independent doctors, researchers, and technology programmers for over 15 years, uses a powerful epigenetics analysis platform informed by 100% evidenced-based medical research. The platform uses over 500 algorithms and 10,000 data points per user, to analyze body measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home Find out more about our  Epigenetics Program and how it can change your life and help you reach optimal health, happiness, and potential at https://runninghotcoaching.com/epigenetics You can find all our programs, courses, live seminars and more at www.lisatamati.com    Transcript of the Podcast:   Speaker 1: (00:00) Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati, brought to you by Lisatamati.com Speaker 2: (00:11) How everyone listed. Somebody here at pushing the limits today. I have a real treat for you, but before we get underway, I'd just like to encourage you to hop on over to our website and to check out all our flagship programs. We have an online run training Academy running hot. It's called a holistic run training. Whether you are doing your first half marathon marathon or doing ultra marathons or even if you're just taking your first steps, check out our system, what we do and how we can help you achieve your goals. We also have an Eaton genetics testing program. This is absolutely my blind stuff. I've just been away actually on the weekend doing some more training. On this. And this is a personalized health approach. This is taking the last 20 years of hundreds of science work from festing different science disciplines. Bring this all together into one online tool that will enable you to get insights into you and your genes. Speaker 2: (01:12) Like [inaudible] before. You'll be able to understand exactly what foods to eat and what time of the day you should be eating, what types of exercise to you, but you're learning so much more than just food and exercise. It's all about how your brain works, what hormones are dominant in your body and what a fixed means will have and what time of the day these are these are happening. You'll get information about what types of work you'll be put at, what times of the day you should be doing different types of activities. Just insights that will absolutely change your life, blow your mind. I'm really, really excited about this genetics program because it's no longer a one size fits all approach, which it has been throughout history up until this point of time. Now we can look at who you are, how your genes are expressing and give new personalized recommendation. Speaker 2: (02:08) So that's our second bag ship program. And the third one we have is mindset here, which is all about developing mental toughness, a strong mindset so that you can achieve the things in life that you want to without all the problems getting in the way and stopping new wrench in your potential. So check those all out at Lisatamati.com. Now, today I have Dr Rob bell on the show and he is from Indianapolis in United States and dr Rob is an author, a coach, and a speaker. He's trained hundreds of executives and athletes of all levels and across all sports. He's the author of six books and soon to bring out his seventh and you're going to get so much value out of today's show. So without further ado, I'd like you to introduce you to Dr. Bell and one last thing before I go. Please, please, please give the show a rating and review if you enjoy the content that really helps the show get exposure and really helps our ratings on iTunes, et cetera. So I really, really appreciate you doing that right over to Dr. Bell, everybody, Lisa Tamati here at pushing your limits. Fantastic to have you with me again on the show. We've got a very exciting geese. We've got to the Rob bell all way from Indianapolis in the United States with me today. So welcome to the show that grew up. Speaker 3: (03:33) Awesome. Thanks. Thank you. Thanks Lisa for having me. Speaker 2: (03:37) So Rob and I have connected by LinkedIn as you do these days. And I have delved into Rob's work and what he's done and he's a meeting toughest coach and an author and a speaker. Someone who speaks my language obviously. And I just loved what he was doing in his work, so I wanted to share that with you guys and my audience and to maybe get some insights from Rob about about me to toughness and he works with a whole lot of different types of athletes and corporate to golf to, to NFL, I think, or you'll be able to share. So, dr. Rob, welcome to the show. And thanks for being here. So tell us a little bit about yourself. Speaker 3: (04:22) I mean, well, thanks so much for introduction. And I mean, again, we connect over LinkedIn and I was like, wow, like this, this lady's amazing. Like, look at all the races she's done. So anybody doing like those ultra marathons, like Badwater like yourself and you know, the salve there in the Sahara. I mean, I'm all about, I mean, not just I'm in my, my whole life is just dedicated I think just to helping people get to where they want to go. So it's just being the coach and, and you know, as well as I do, I mean, the, the greatest satisfaction I think we get as a coach is just being that small part. And that piece of, you know, I think what we're always trying to get is just that one moment that, that one point in our lives, and I call him these hinge moments where we don't know what it looks like, but if we can make that small difference in that person's life. So helping them connect with who they are, with who they're going to become. And I always preach and I know you, you're on the same vein, but you know, no matter how bad things aren't, our life only takes more. It takes that one moment, that one person, that one event to make all the difference. And that's why I just love no one. I do. So I mean I've been blessed enough to just always kind of follow that passion and just leave me here, the podcast today. So I'm excited. Speaker 2: (05:34) Absolutely. And you actually have, why you have seven bowls, six books in the seventh one on the way. Is that right? Your books is called the hinge. I know. And so this is all about hinge moments in sport does it, right? So what do you do? Speaker 3: (05:51) Well, so I say like every door has a hint. So if you hear about doors opening and closing in life, that's of the hinge you hear of a rusty door. It's not the door that's rusty at all. It's the Hinsey gets rusty. And so always say is every, you know, a, a door without a hinge hinges a wall. It just doesn't work. And so what the Hanjin is, the answer is going to be that one person that's gonna be that one moment or one event. Sometimes that one decision that makes all the difference in our lives. We just don't know when that's coming. We can't connect the dots in our life looking forward, but can only connect the dots looking backwards and seeing the impact of that one person or that one moment made in our life. And when it comes to, you know, mental toughness, like I said, it only takes one. Speaker 3: (06:34) Now we might not know the hinge connects sometimes two weeks, months, years later. The impact of one person saying you can't do it, you're not going to be good enough. Or one decision or that one person that we, that we met that connected us to somebody else. And since we can't know when that moment's coming, that's the importance of being present and not taking any day off and making sure that every moment that we do and every person that we meet matters. Because it does. Because we don't know when that moment's going to happen. And that's, that's the real point about the hitch. Speaker 2: (07:10) That's a real insight. Yeah. I hadn't even thought about this. This just opened up my mind to a new way of thinking. I hadn't thought about that at all as being, I was sort of thinking hinge moments, those, you know, crucial moments. And, and in the sporting event where, you know, either we left or it went right and you succeed, but you're saying the opportunities are going to come towards us, these opportunities, but we don't know or see them necessarily as really important pivotal points. And if we're not paying attention and if we're not out there actively looking for these hinge moments then we're gonna miss them and miss opportunities in our lives basically. Is that right? Speaker 3: (07:50) Yeah, absolutely. And I mean a lot of, a lot of these come when we're, when we're not even ready for them, you know, and one of the half iron mans I did, I mean one of the hinge moments was somebody to stop the change my tire for me. And I have no idea even what I was doing in the race, how to change a tire. And that changed my entire life. Just that one moment. And we're going to have several hinge moments throughout our lives. But I think that's the real importance. And, and that's the part that I really think is, is so crucial is no matter how bad our situation is, right. No matter how bleak and outcome looks, no matter what, it only takes one. That's what we're getting. Speaker 2: (08:29) Yeah. Actually I, I re listen to that little video on your website about the doctor. Rob was in a, in a halftime, it was one of your early first ones. I believe Tony wasn't signed up with no training at all. And then suddenly your talk gives up and then you standing on the side of the right guy. What do I don't disappoint? People that are riding past you as they doing it. Rice. Yep. Named some nice person. Decided to sacrifice basically their position in the rice to help you out, help you change a tire and get you back on the road. And prior to that, what was your way of thinking before and what was it afterwards? Speaker 3: (09:13) Well, I mean I think like people don't think people don't do things to us. They do things for themselves and it's kind of the two by four principle and no matter what, no matter what the kind of situation is, I mean it was, it wasn't like I was a bad person, but when it comes to racing, you do that suit best that you can. I asked myself in the question when this guy stopped and I would tell people about this, what I have stopped and the answer to that point, Lisa was no, I wouldn't have stopped. I wouldn't even have thought about it. But once he stopped, then I started exploring then other professional examples of why would other people stop their own race and what was it about these individuals that they got that I didn't get. And so now every race that I go into isn't focused really on how I do every race is who am I going to be able to help. Speaker 3: (10:03) And then it's one of the things I just kind of pray about, put me in a situation Mark and help somebody. And so then the whole viewpoint changes. And the reason why is cause you know, we can't help out others in life without also helping out ourselves. And that's the part that we never get. I mean, if anybody has volunteered before, it's a perfect example. We volunteered. No one leaves volunteers situations helping out kids at a hospital saying, boy, those kids are so lucky that I was here to help them. We say the opposite, right? We say, boy, those kids helped me more than I ever helped them. Yeah. Why is that? Would they give us where they gave us perspective, right? They gave us an appreciation and gratitude for our own problems. I'd gladly take that stuff and we cannot help out others. But that also helping out ourselves. That's the point about getting outside of our own head. If we can just focus on other people, that's how we get outside of our own head and that's how we help ourselves at the same time. So it's, and I think it was like Gandhi or author Ash that said it, you know, one of the most selfish things you can do is to help somebody else. Speaker 2: (11:05) Wow. That's real. It's really insightful. And I tell you what, you're getting into Oak marathons now of light and you've got a hundred model. You, you said you were hoping to play next year, a hundred mile are coming up this year. Yep. What I've, one of the things I love about ultramarathons, and this is how it's changing slowly, but it's very much not about the winners. It's, it's, it's different to say iron man's where it's really competitive and crazy. Most people are doing outwards because they have a personal challenge that they're trying to overcome themselves. It's, it's, you know, me versus me sort of situation for most of the people, the top couple of esteem going for the placings. But for most people understand that it's all about survival and getting to the finish line some which way, and the moments that I've, in my school where I've been literally people saved my lives, people have helped me. Speaker 2: (11:58) I've helped other people in medical situations where you're in dire straights. I mean, one comes to mind. I was running across Nigeria a 333 K race. I'm terribly organized, one of the most poorest, most dangerous countries on earth. Civil war going on. I got food poisoning an hour into the race, passing out and really deep trouble. And one of the other girls comes past me in the race. You know, I'm alone, unconscious in the same, she gets me, you know, wakes me up, gets me out, warms me up, stays with me, keeps me on my feet, drags my ass until the next checkpoint. You know, it took a good couple of hours that she lost out of that in a, in a race that's, you know, on the edge of crazy. And that, that's sort of a sacrifice for someone that she didn't even know, you know, she'd meet two days before and was just phenomenal, you know? Speaker 2: (12:54) And it's those sorts of moments that you think, wow, this is more than just about, did I get to the finish line or not? This is about humanity and this is about, and you know, you, when you, when you go outside of yourself and you, you might be suffering in an ultra somewhere, right? And you're just like, Oh my God, I don't know how I'm going to get there. And then you come across someone who's in worse shape tell you what you like, focus fully on them and you'll forget that you're suffering and they're not an arrow to go buy a new guy. Like, where did my pain go? It's absolutely amazing how when you focus on someone else, your own suffering disappears or diminishes. That's the point. Like when we're stuck in center head, that's when we're behind enemy lines. The only way to get out by an enemy lines is turn your thoughts towards helping somebody else. Speaker 2: (13:48) I mean, think about it, right? When we started encouraging others in those races, we're encouraging ourselves at the same time. So church is, so that's the, so if anybody wants to get actually any of your books, where do they go? They just go to www.drrobbell.com or have they always said that's the best way. Yeah, www.drrobbell.com and and the book on so no one gets there, gets there alone is also sort of a story that was the story of the half iron man and the guy's not going to change my tire. Absolutely. Yeah. And nobody does get there alone in life in general. We all need a team of people and we all need to stand on each other's shoulders, so to speak, to, to reach the top. Tell us a little bit about now your, your work with the athletes that you worked with and some examples perhaps of, of amazing experiences that you've had and things that you've seen in your time as a coach. Yeah, I mean, Speaker 3: (14:53) Yeah, I was saying, I mean I was, I was blessed enough to know early on in my life, this is what I wanted to do. And I got into the field because I was the athlete that would always think too much and no one can, no one could ever help me out, at least never go in, would always say, Hey, those butterflies go away and playing baseball then everyone away for me. And you know, I had a really, I had a hinge moment when I got to college and that was because I was partying way too much. I thought I can play baseball and party in college and be the best, no accountability, what could go wrong. And I, and I fell off a 80 foot cliff in college and you know, fraction my back broke my arm and that was the end of sport. Speaker 3: (15:31) And yeah, that was a hinge most of my life because from that moment on now, everything was different. If that didn't happen, I don't know if I would have taken that psychology class. I don't know if I would've had that one professor who had just spoke right to my soul and I knew I want to do with my life. And you know, always, always be in the ultimate sports honk. And it didn't matter what it was, but if we're trying to do something to the best that we can I just discovered early on that everyone needs a coach. Speaker 4: (16:06) Okay. Speaker 3: (16:06) There's all these demons that I think get in the way of us trying to reach greatness and what we're doing and really as a coach and, and you know, as well as I do, I mean, it, it does take a team and there are no shortcuts. There are no shortcuts to it. And our job is to point out the blind spots in people's lives. I think there's many ways, many routes up to that mountain. There's not one route. And which is going along the journey with athletes and helping them get to where they want to go as just been absolute blessing. I mean, you know, with any coach, I mean there's two types of coaches, those that have been fired and those that will be fired. I've been fired before, you know, so I've been at the lowest of lows. And then when in in the highest of highs you know, our job as coaches sometimes to work ourselves out of a job that's not, that's not the best business model. Speaker 3: (17:02) I don't know. Somebody, I don't know, somebody selling insurance that wants to come in there and be like, boy, I don't really think you need me anymore as insurance sales. So if we're trying to work ourselves out of a job because you know, we're trying to build them up in their capacity, you're gonna get fired. So, I mean, that's, there's just so many examples. I mean, it's just I really just focus on the office that we have and what's the office? So my office is a swimming pool. My offices, you know, is there going to be that golf course sometimes? Is that executive board, but other times, I mean, it's a you know, it's the race track. It's, it's going to be you know, on a, you know, at the tennis match. And then that's, that's the best part. It's just what the office looks like. So you, you, you try and cut Chinese leaps, end Speaker 2: (17:50) Corporate executives. So in all types of sports, what are the, some of the biggest things that in general now people are struggling with? Like is there a couple of central themes that people just keep coming back to that you see again and again as being a major Speaker 3: (18:09) Problem for people on their bridge? Sure. So I think when whenever we hit a new level, there's going to be a new devil. And so a lot of the difficulties when we get like that success and how do we deal with that if, if I've got to boil it down in what I think like the essential mental skills come. I mean obviously the building block of all mental toughness is, is going to be that motivation, right? It's going to be that persistence is, gets back to our why. You know, your goals, your, how are we willing to do the things that we don't want to do? Yeah. After that, then it comes into confidence and I mean confidence that, that trust, that belief in ourselves. And what we're trying to do. There has to be that belief. I believe that everyone has that, but it just gets really muted throughout our lives. Speaker 3: (18:59) A lot of times when we listen and then to that wrong voice, we're not, I think it comes to confidence. What I believe is that we have to adapt the philosophy that it all works out in the end. If it hasn't, then you know what? It's just not the ENT. And that's, that's a big part of what people suffer with. I think another one then it comes back to then focus like how do we build our confidence to what we're focused on? Are we focused on the excitement? Are we focused on being nervous? If we focus on being excited physiologically? I said same exact thing, right? Like we are palms get sweaty. Like we get real anxious, you know, it gets rolling. Our thoughts are a lot, but boy is that nervous or is that excited? Because I think it's excited. It means I want to be in this situation something good can happen. Speaker 3: (19:45) Being nervous means I don't want to be in the situation. This is a threat. And then being able to train our mind to focus on everything is an opportunity. That's how we build a confidence in ourselves. And then that, and then I think that last field, so we got the, the motivation, the confidence, the focus. And then I think that last mental skill, which I suck at is how do we let go? Mistakes. If you show me, if you show me an athlete that can let go mistakes, I will show you somebody that's mentally tough. So I like to say this, our confidence focus is how we build our confidence. How we refocus just reveals the level of confidence. Wow. What I mean by that, if you show me an athlete that makes mistakes and still stay school calm and collected, well what they're really saying is I don't need everything to go my way in order to be successful. And we know bad stuff's going to happen, right? But it's all about how we adjust from that. If you show me an athlete that his or her cool when stuff starts going bad, I'm going to show you somebody that never had any confidence to begin with and then they got to play the mental gymnastics and not as well as competing against themselves. That's where it gets really tough. Speaker 2: (21:00) See, this is a journey for you as I'm making toughness coach, it's not like it's, it's an easy thing we've got at once and we've, we're away laughing and we're never ever going to have a problem again. That doesn't quite work like that. Speaker 3: (21:11) No man, people were, people make more fun of me when I get upset because it's like, wait a minute, I thought you're supposed to be good at this stuff. Speaker 2: (21:16) Yeah. You know, I have moments, Tobin, I'm thinking, you know, you just watch your own behavior sometimes and you're going, hang on a minute. This isn't cool and I'm glad I was watching. Speaker 3: (21:29) Right. It is. I don't think we were really made to coach ourselves. Speaker 2: (21:32) I think we need others to coach us. Very, very good point. It's hard to get out of your own forest and see the trees when you're in the middle of it and someone who has that seed perspective on you can give you a lot of more insight into your behaviors that you're not actually even seeing. And I really love that challenge versus, and I have been in mind, you know, things that I talk about, the challenge versus the threat and changing your cause. It actually changes your physiology when you're standing at the start of a massive race and you start to feel fear and step B, feel nervous and Oh my God, am I trying enough? And all of those things that are going to be absolutely no good to you, they're not. They're not going to help you and your performance then by changing the narrative and your story, like you said, exciting opportunity. Speaker 2: (22:19) This is amazing what you know, what a chance to have that releases actual hormones in your body. The more testosterone you get, more bold feeling rather than the nerves. And that can just change your perspective. And it's a subtle change. Sometimes it's not, you know, like a massive thing. But it'd be enough just to get you over the line and get you going. And we all know like that waiting around for rice can be the worst time once you're actually on the way and you're five Kaizen. It's like right, I got this. But those nerves at the beginning can be pretty bloody horrible, can't they? And that's I can imagine with someone like golfers, I don't play golf, but the mental toughness, a completely different type of mental toughness, but the ability when all eyes are on you and on the, you know, one sick and when you hit the ball, they must have some special challenges as its own. Speaker 3: (23:10) Yeah. And that's it. Cause there's so much time in between shots, you know, but that's why we need people like you to the poor my life and to coach me up cause I can't push myself. Speaker 2: (23:19) Well I had, I loved me to help me get to that a hundred miler that would like, and we can swap some, I need some coaching on, on the mental toughness. How do you do this? How do you bring it across? Be, you know, cause you've obviously been doing this a long time seeming books as let's say in lots and lots of athletes who are Olympic athletes and corporate people and you know, Ben have really had massive success working with you. That's always exciting to connect with and you know, amazing people. And this is, this is one of the selfish reasons I have this podcast. So I get to meet cool people like you. So this is not all selfless. Once again now you see it on your website, there was a quote there that I really resonated with. If you only focus on success, then you'll never reach significance. But if you're living in a life of significance, then success will follow. Yeah. Quote. so if you're focused on Jess winning all the time, just on the money, just on the whatever it is, it's all gold. It's not going to bring you the joy in life. Actual the legacy, if you like. Is that right? Speaker 3: (24:31) Well, that's absolutely true. And the, and the reason why is because well let's use Mount Everest as an example, right? I mean the, the year it takes in terms of preparation, the four to 30 to 40 days of actual hiking, they spend what, 10 15 minutes at the top and when did most of the deaths occur on the way down from Mount Evers? And so I mean, if it's all about the journey, it's all about the process and it's all about who we can help along the way. That's how I think that we get real significance in our life. The fact of you know, even those that hold up the trophy, even those that fly back with a gold medal from the Olympics, there are people that had that feeling lease of, boy is that it? Or okay, okay, now what? Now I've spent my whole life for this and I got it. Speaker 3: (25:25) What now? And, and, and that's the part, right? The new level, new devil. If we focus on other people and making that impact along the way of our journey them, that's how we just focus on, you know, success is going to happen from us. And that's the part of just being able to focus on that process. And be able to make that impact. Those with elite athletes, I mean there, there has to be selfishness there because of how much time it takes. But at the same time, how can we help others along that journey and, and using our skill and our craft and our God given talent to help others. That's how we get that. That's how we get that significance. Speaker 2: (26:11) Yeah. And so it's not just about that gold medal and most people who have, who have a gold medal or something massive success will also understand that it wasn't them alone that got them there. Unless, you know egomaniacs but most of them will understand that this was a team effort. You know, and this was and like you say, we're not all going to be on the gold medalists. We're not all going to be world champions. So it's defining success, insignificance as well. Like the significance for me, like I want to have an, I knew obviously the same, want to have an impact on, on many, many lives and change lives with the knowledge that we have and help people through the journey and help them avoid the problems and the, you know, fast track them to, to success and help them reach their full potential. Speaker 2: (27:06) And therein lies the significance more than the couple of finish lines that are, you know, reached or the podiums that I've managed to reach in the middle that's hanging on the wall. That's all great stuff. But at the end of the day, I think you and I at least when we get to the end of our days, want to look back and go, wow, that all right. I helped a lot of people and I made a big impact in the world and I left the legacy. And these are, these are words that I think you know really, really important for us to have in our vocabulary and to be thinking about, it's not just the individual moment, it's not the selfish endeavor. And I mean, as an athlete I was, when I look back over my younger career and stuff, I was selfish to the point of, you know, I didn't understand I was selfish, but I expected everyone else. Speaker 2: (27:58) But there were doubts around my mission. You know, I was very mission oriented and very focused and that was the only thing in the world that was important. And I understand now that we added a lot of sacrifice on the behalf of other people, had to sit price for me to get there. And you know, you do lead that single-mindedness to, to achieve those sorts of things. But understanding now it's a bit more older person that you there isn't the only macro of success in the, yeah. So Dr Rob what book are you working on at the moment and what are some of the other sort of mental toughness tricks that you can help people gives people, you know, there are a lot of people suffering out there. There are a lot of people with lacking massive self confidence and self belief. They've been told perhaps their whole lives, they're not good enough, that they're not the right shape and not the right height. They're not the right one either to be good at something. Have you got any words of wisdom for them? Speaker 3: (29:03) Sure. I mean the, or the next book that I'm working on, it's called puke and rally. How, how champions adjust. And I know you get this one cause you thrown up and racist too as well. And it's not, yeah, it's not about the puke, it's about the rally and the fact of, you know what? Everyone in our life, everyone has puked. So no matter what, everyone has had setbacks, everyone has had failures. They are inevitable. That is going to happen. The only way to do it is to sit on the sidelines of life. And then you just live a completely different life. You know, if you want to be in the game, there's going to be, there's going to setbacks. And I believe, and if anybody listening that that resonates with this, that it's not about the setback, it's about to come back. Yeah. That's, that's what matters. Speaker 3: (29:51) So it's about the rally. It's about how we rally on your point. I believe this is everyone that has reached high levels of success was told you can't do it. That's a dumb idea. Don't try it. Why is that? Cause I haven't come across anybody that's achieved anything that has, you know, you especially with your mom were told by doctors, there's no way that that person's going to come back. And what does it do? Well, it Galvin not yes it has proved people wrong and I'm going to prove them wrong and that motivation, but it also has like in order to do something, you better believe in yourself. And so if we listen, I mean we got to really thank the people that say you can't do it because they're the ones that are given us a diner, are going to galvanize our own spirit, our own soul and our own confidence towards achieving that goal. Speaker 3: (30:45) And no matter what it's going to be there. Now I think it's really difficult to like coach that way. You know, you can't coach that way. I mean, but I do it all the time. Sometimes I can in short situations tell my pro golfers, boy, there's no way you get this ball up and down and say par and you know what it does, I'll watch me. Right. I'll show, I'll show you. Yeah. And that's the point is who is it that tells you you can't do it? And then what's the other voice say? What's that true voice? Cause like I said, I believe everybody has that confidence muscle. It's there, you know, it just sometimes getting muted so much in our life. But what is that voice really saying and allow that voice instead to be able to come out. You know, a lot of times what I think is we as individuals, I mean we, we hear that voice that we were as a nine year old kid, you know, from our dads saying, you know, how could you strike out? How could you miss up? And then that's the voice that we got in her head. Well, if that's the voice in our head, then what's the real voice that want? And that's, that's the key is just allowing that real voice then and be able to come out and, and sometimes, you know, we've gotta be able to tell ourselves and yell at ourselves rather than just listen to it. Speaker 2: (31:57) Yeah. And, and, and this is, and we've all had those naysayers in their life. And I know in my life I wouldn't have got there inanely of the things I did if I didn't have those people. And if I wasn't trying to prove something, and some people might say that that's a negative motivation, but I actually think that this is a really powerful tool that we can use to really fire the furnaces, to push through those hard times, those obstacles, those times when you want to give up and you think about those people who said you couldn't do it, and you're like, nah, I want to keep going, even though it's painful. When I want to quit, I'm gonna keep on going. And I think that that's a really powerful, and what you see at about the nine year old child, we all have this inner child. Speaker 2: (32:41) I believe this, this kid who took on staff without sautering it, which has landed in our subconscious and then become a part of our thinking mechanisms. You know, when we were paid ugly, told as kids, and often these were teachers, appearance or whatever, we're just having a bad day, you know? But they were telling you things and that they weren't perfect. But when you hear this repeatedly becomes a part of your subconscious programming, and when that becomes the, the voice that sees you useless at sport, you were too dumb to go to university. You're to this, whatever that was that was programmed into your brain. And as an adult, you've got a heck of a job to override that in a subconscious thinking. Is there some ways that you've found to get around that, that programming that we had as kids when Speaker 3: (33:36) Just Speaker 2: (33:37) Put into our subconscious without us even thinking about it? Speaker 3: (33:40) Yeah. The best thing we can do is tell ourselves rather than listen to ourselves. You know what I mean by that is you got to tell yourself what it is that you're going to do here. When you tell yourself then commit to it. When you commit to it, it gets done too often. If we listened to it, then we hear that, well, that voice in the back of my head, you've got to tell that voice sometimes where to go and that it doesn't have a vote in this kind of situation here by confidence. Yeah. Confidence in doubt. Like they live in the same house, but it's confidence. His house now it is a squatter, like it just lives there. Rent free. Well, if there's somebody that overstays their welcome, I'm going to, I'm going to tell them where to go. Right. At least I'm gonna say like, look, it's been a little bit too long. Why don't you just hit the road? But we think you know that doubt that that has a right to live there. And that's the part is tell yourself what you're going to do. Don't listen to yourself. Speaker 2: (34:31) Yeah. And program the stuff that you want in there. So then whether that's through affirmations and outfit gnosis and being around people who are positive, giving the support, the coaching, the mentors, the tribe of people that tell you you can or these things will happen slowly. Speaker 3: (34:51) We assist who you are and what you're capable of. Speaker 2: (34:56) That brings me to the point, you know, the five you have it on your website too. The five people that you hang around with the most. I think it was something, something around there. And so w who you will become. And I think this is also a very important point that we need to bring up. Speaker 3: (35:13) Well, I mean, we, we are, we're a, you show me your friends. I'll show you your future. So true. I mean, if we want a higher net worth, you've got to hang out with people that have a higher net worth. It's just, it's so important because the mindset's different. You know, they, the conversations are different. You know, if you look at any kind of any kind of sport team, I mean, I'll take baseball for instance, but I mean, well, I mean, let's just look at the all blacks, right? The starters are hanging out with the starters all the time. Those are sitting on the bench and not playing. They're hanging out with one another because the conversations are different. And you know, I love the all blacks when it comes to the culture because man, they're focused on the team and boy and I don't know how many little kids are there that aren't thinking, boy, I want to be one. Speaker 2: (35:58) Oh yeah. Everything. Speaker 3: (36:01) And that's the part, I mean, we've gotta be able to hang around successful people and winners, not people that were better than just so we can feel good about ourselves. Yeah. Harrison game. And that doesn't work. Speaker 2: (36:14) Yeah. So when you're hanging around people that you are actually at the top of the class, and if you like, then you don't really, but when you're hanging around people who challenge you and stretch you scare the hell out of you sometimes. Those are the ones that are going to help them change and develop and grow. So pick your tribe carefully is a, is a, is a hugely important message to take away from that one and get the coaching you need and get the support that you need around you so that those naysayers, when they come calling and they will come calling, don't have the control in your mind. And when you do have those naysayers or then you use it as fuel to overcome. Absolutely. Man. Yeah. You find ways to get there. So not people Speaker 3: (36:57) And this, and this is the point, Lisa, and I need you to, I need somebody, show me somebody that that reached success that did not have, somebody said you can't do it. Yeah, maybe there is, but I haven't seen it yet. Speaker 2: (37:10) We've all had those people want, I mean, yeah, I've had them all less through my life and in there can be your family, be your best friends. And it's not to say they're not good people. There may be reasons why they are saying this to you. I know, you know, parts of my family. It was like fear for you because they're scared that you're going to get hurt, you know, or going to fail. And what happens then? And so that can be well-meaning naysayers, but they can still be nice. I as, and we have to get ourselves away from that and listen to the people who've done it and listen to the people who tell you you can do it and that you're going to get there and give you a pass to get on your way. And that's why it's really, really important. I want us to just talk a little bit about scarcity mindset versus the abundance mindset and why it was competitive world that we live in. Speaker 2: (38:03) You know, we don't have to be, well, if I help that person, I mean, classic example, so mental toughness coaches, right? We could be going, well, I'm not talking to him because he's competition, you know? Or I can go, wow, he's got insights that I don't have and perhaps I haven't sliced the, you don't have. And we can. Yeah, we can. We can learn from each other and we can grow. And that's a, that's a classic example of the mindset we both have, which is an abundance mindset and not a scarcity mindset. Do you see a lot of the other, you see a lot of the scarcity mindset and how do you. Speaker 3: (38:37) I mean, you know, I think we all possess, I still possess it. You know what I mean? I, I think true success, true success is when we can root for everybody. Because then what that means is, is, you know, and I, I grew up sometimes I would go to my wife's you know, Thanksgiving and they'd have these meals, but it's a big Italian family. And if you don't get in there, that's going to be gone. Speaker 2: (39:01) Well, right? Speaker 3: (39:04) Yeah. I mean, so if we approach life that way, then what we're saying is, is that there's one piece of pie for me. If I don't get that piece of pie, then it's gone. Look, there's the, being able to root for everybody means that I can still have my slice and you can be successful too. Being able to root for everybody is true success because it means just because that person's successful doesn't mean I can't be successful too. And then we're not playing a zero sum game, then we're playing a game of abundance and then just the game changes, you know, we're playing on a different one. That's the part where I kind of look at like how often am I room for other people and if not, then I'm coming from the point of scarcity. The real part about that and the scary part is then that's what I start projecting. Know the people only when I can get that abundance mindset in here, then, then I'm able to give that away. Speaker 2: (40:01) Yeah. Without being, these are my little pressure steams when no one else is giving them and having that mindset of I have to hold everything in and my knowledge or my, whatever it is, skills or whatever is a scarce thing. It isn't just about one, one point. There's only one slice for you. It's actually lots of highs when you start walking in. And I think just adopting that attitude in life makes you a more generous and caring human being for other people. So doctor, I'm thinking very much for all of these insights today. I really appreciate your time and I hope we will get to have a few more sessions like gruesomely I'd love to swap notes and maybe work on an idea or two with you. And dr Rob also has his own podcast. Can you tell us where people can, can listen to your show wants? Speaker 3: (40:49) Oh well yeah, it's a, it's 15 minutes of mental toughness either on my website, www.drrobbell.com or or Apple. I am and I look forward to having you as a guest on their tool. I can collect is, yeah, cause your book will be coming out. Thanks. Fantastic. And that would be great. Speaker 2: (41:06) No, it'd be absolutely fantastic to do that and I can't wait to do, to do a few things with you, Dr. Rob, I'm very glad that I found you on LinkedIn. It's been fantastic and I'm sure that my listeners would have gotten a lot out of today, so I really appreciate that. Dr Rob bell.com six books Siemens on the way. Go and check those books out. There's also a 30 day challenge on, on Dr Rob's website. Make sure you check that one out as well. And if you've got any questions, I'm sure Dr Rob will help you. If you've got, if you've got anything that you want to know from him, so please reach out to them. Have you got a Instagram handle or a Facebook or anything? I do. It's you know, with Twitter and Instagram says D R or B B E L L. Easy. So doc, Rob, thank you very much for your time today and we'll be in touch again soon. Speaker 1: (41:55) That's it this week for pushing the limits. Be sure to write, review and share with your friends and head over and visit Lisa and her team at lisatamati.com.  

Have you ever wondered if your camels learn from each other? Todays question comes from Lisa and she asks: “Do camels learn to trust humans and human requests from other camels? For example, if a camel sees another camel being saddled or ridden, will it think about what they see and be less anxious when it’s their turn? Thanks guys, love your podcast.” Thanks Lisa, GREAT question we’re excited to answer this! We give a few examples that we’ve see in our small herd of camels in their training, natural environments and even eating habits that will help answer this question. Tune in now to hear if camels learn from each other (and, if this can make your camel training and handling easier…) DO YOU HAVE A CAMEL QUESTION? Ask your camel question here: https://camelconnection.com/ask-a-camel-question Enjoying this podcast? Please help us help other camel loving people AND camels across the globe by leaving a review so we can spread the positive message of camels! Get your free camel training video & camel eBooks over at https://camelconnection.com Make sure you subscribe to our channel to never miss an episode!

In this episode, Lisa interviews one of the athletes she and Neil coach through Running Hot who has just completed his first 100 milers but Vin is not just one of their athletes but the head of the technical department in the business. In this race debrief they go deep into the mindset of what it takes to overcome injuries (a broken back) and temporary setbacks to ultimately succeed. About Vin Framularo Vin Framularo is from Trumbull, CT, USA, and has been a member of the Running Hot Coaching family for over a year.  Vin is coached as an athlete through the Running Hot Coaching program, and also excitingly helps the Running Hot Coaching team lead digital marketing initiatives. He has been a competitive runner since high school and has been ultrarunning for over 2 years. Vin recently completed his first 100-mile race at the New Hampshire Hamsterwheel Ultra Race in November of 2019.  His journey as an ultra runner and overcoming a broken back was recently featured in UltraRunning Magazine online in November 2019. Vin is the CMO & Co-Founder of The Framularo Group.  He has been in the marketing and interactive media sector for over 15 years.  Vin is an entrepreneurship graduate of Babson College and has his MBA in Management and MS in Interactive Media from Quinnipiac University.   When not leading fun marketing initiatives or running, Vin is an avid skier, snowboarder, and coach at EPIC Interval Training in Connecticut.   In 2019 Vin raised $3,976 for Vermont Adaptive Ski & Sports to benefit adaptive athletes, as part of the Vermont 100 Mile Endurance Race and Team Run 2 Empower.   He is a member of his local trail running group the CT Trailmixers, a Freemason, a member of the Sons of the American Legion in his community, and a member of Sigma Phi Epsilon alumni board. Connect with Vin at: vin@framularo.com http://instagram.com/vinframularo https://www.linkedin.com/in/vincent-framularo-1690505/ https://www.facebook.com/vinframularo   We would like to thank our sponsors   Running Hot - By Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff If you want to run faster, longer and be stronger without burnout and injuries then check out and TRY our Running Club for FREE on a 7 day FREE TRIAL Complete holistic running programmes for distances from 5km to ultramarathon and for beginners to advanced runners.   All include Run training sessions, mobility workouts daily, strength workouts specific for runners, nutrition guidance and mindset help Plus injury prevention series, foundational plans, running drill series and a huge library of videos, articles, podcasts, clean eating recipes and more.   www.runninghotcoaching.com/info and don't forget to subscribe to our youtube channel at Lisa's Youtube channel  www.yotube.com/user/lisatamat and come visit us on our facebook group   www.facebook.com/groups/lisatamati Epigenetics Testing Program by Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff. Wouldn’t it be great if your body came with a user manual? Which foods should you eat, and which ones should you avoid? When, and how often should you be eating? What type of exercise does your body respond best to, and when is it best to exercise? These are just some of the questions you’ll uncover the answers to in the Epigenetics Testing Program along with many others. There’s a good reason why epigenetics is being hailed as the “future of personalised health”, as it unlocks the user manual you’ll wish you’d been born with! No more guess work. The program, developed by an international team of independent doctors, researchers, and technology programmers for over 15 years, uses a powerful epigenetics analysis platform informed by 100% evidenced-based medical research. The platform uses over 500 algorithms and 10,000 data points per user, to analyse body measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home Find out more about our  Epigenetics Program and how it can change your life and help you reach optimal health, happiness and potential at: https://runninghotcoaching.com/epigenetics You can find all our programs, courses, live seminars and more at www.lisatamati.com    Transcript of Interview   Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati, brought to you by Lisatamati.com.   Speaker 2   00:12 Hi everyone. This is Lisa Tamati here. I'm pushing the limits. Thank you very, very much for joining me once again on our podcast. We lo ve to have you join us. And today I have a special guest all the way from Connecticut and the USA and this is a guy who has been a part of our world now for about a year and a half I think. And is actually works with us at running hot and is our VP of everything I called them. Get involved with the head of the technical department if you like. And he's the one that makes everything run smoothly in the background because Neil and I definitely don't know what the hell we're doing. So welcome to the show Vin Framularo. Vin How you going?   Speaker 3   00:54 Oh, thanks Lisa. Great, good morning. Thanks for having me and always loved talking with you every week and yeah, it's, wow. It's, you're right. Almost a little more than a year. I've been part of the running hot family and pretty excited and have been following you for a little time before that. And I'm sure we can get into that a little bit. So I'm excited to be on. I love your podcast and you know me, I'm huge on the personal development and stuff. So excited for your answer.   Speaker 2   01:23 One of the reasons I wanted to bring Vin on the show, we had a, one of our other athletes and we're going to do a few athletes over the next few months. One of our other athletes met, scrapped and from New Zealand who just did his first 100 K we, we might've been a case study out of ed of him and we did a bit of a coaching session. So we're going to do something similar today. We're going to, she it VIN story and his background and how he's just got to complete some very, very big races. So Ben came to us, well he found us on the needs as you're doing joined us, joined up, and then we actually connected over all the technical staff and we ended up getting him on board with our company. But then his has got an incredible mindset and this is what I really want to delve into today because he has, he has a relentlessly positive editor that I just cannot lay sometimes. And his mindset really, really shines through. So I want to dig in today a little bit into Vin's history and his running successes that he's head, but also how he's got the, because he's had a couple of massive obstacles to overcome on the way. So then I want you to start by telling us a little bit about you, your family, where you're from and how you got into running and what you've been doing.   Speaker 3   02:44 Sure. Thanks Lisa. Yeah, so I'm from Trumbull, Connecticut, born and raised and I've lived a lot of different places, but that's always been home base. And right now I'm talking to you in my house, which is about a mile away from my parents and where I grew up. So we have our entire family in our neck of the woods here. And I have, I'm one of five siblings, so I have an older sister and older brother and two younger twin sisters. And I think you know, I, I'm the only runner in the family and I always tease people about that cause every family needs one of us crazy endurance athletes or renters. And kind of interestingly, I got into running when I was about nine or 10 years old because basketball was my first love and big sport at the time. And I remember telling my dad, we used to go vacation up in the purchasers and I really want to improve my speed and my vertical jump for basketball.   Speaker 3   03:47 Now I'm not the tallest person, but man, I could jump jump like a kangaroo. And when I was like a young kid, I was like, okay, I want to be even better. So I, I forget how I came up with the idea. I think I saw it in a movie and I was like, dad, I need to get ankle weights and strap them to my, my feet and then I can run up and down the mountain when we go on vacation. And most parents would tell you you're crazy, you know, and especially to a nine or 10 year old, I wanted to do this and my dad was like, sure, no problem and I'll follow you in the car. So I would do this two two mile loop around the mountain with ankle Wade strapped my feet and my dad would follow me in the car and took his day.   Speaker 3   04:29 He still takes credit of not just the genetics as an athlete, but that he's strapped ankle weights on my feet and I'll tell you, that worked excellent. I got good at basketball. It helped my overall fitness and just as a young kid to take that initiative, now that I think about it, I'm like, wow, what kind of nine year old wants to be like, yeah, I want to go run two miles up the mountain with ankle weights on my feet. Especially nowadays, it's like, no, I'll probably just play video games or hang out with my friends. Right. But yeah, so that really led into, I really started to get serious about running in my high school career. I was still playing basketball and then I needed a sport to do in the fall. So I first played soccer and then spring ran track and the track coach was like, Hey, congratulations, you're going to run year round.   Speaker 3   05:25 And I'm sure a lot of runners have probably been through that and they were a Multisport athlete and I was like, wait, you mean like run for fun? Like distance and what the hell? And you know, just like most runners, I fell in love with it. And it was really at that time I learned, unlike most sports where it's like you fight for playing time or you fight for to be on a team. This was the first sport I was part of. Not only if you weren't as good, you got more playing time. So to say that it really had a direct correlation to the hard work that you put in, you get out. And I was always a really hard worker and I was, you know, went on to captain, all of my teams in high school as well as ran in college and grad school. So that was really the base of running. And then fast forward, you know, till about a year and a half ago when I found running high, I started getting into ultra running, which is ironic because I remember in college reading runner's world and having your senior buddy Dean carne ASAs on the cover of a magazine. And I'm like, man, this guy's nuts. Why would anybody want to do that?   Speaker 3   06:44 And I think at the time I had just run my first marathon and I was probably 18 years old and ran the, ran the Boston marathon just for fun and for training. And I was like, gosh, sounds terrible. Why would I be? And at the time I was so, so it's funny how life, you know, he kind of point you in certain directions and I'm very grateful. I found you guys and ultra running for a lot of reasons, but that's kind of a brief background to my story there.   Speaker 2   07:15 Yeah, right. That, that, that sort of, I can't believe you did a marathon at 18 years old. Okay. You have definitely got a nutty gene and yet that's definitely come out of late. So, and then last couple of years, so I think it was like two and a half years ago. Then you had a really bad accident that you were currently in training. Can you check, go into a, into the story a little bit?   Speaker 3   07:41 Yeah. So I've told myself after college, but after college I'm like, gosh, I'm never going to run a marathon ever again. I'll just be a weekend warrior and have fun doing some five K's and half marathons and stuff. And then it all kind of ebbs and flows. So I eventually recapped marathon and thought it'd be a great idea to sign up again for a marathon. So I signed up for the bend, Oregon marathon, and that was right around my birthday, which was in April. So I was pretty excited and I was like, I'm getting started training for it and started really get back into running shape because I went for about a year or two where, you know, my career took precedence over. I was still running but not, you know, training as much as I should be. And you know, those rest days would turn into week long rest days and stuff instead of hitting the gym when he should be.   Speaker 3   08:35 So I was snowboarding in February and I went off a mogul and landed really hard. It was super ICL. I'll never forget it was presence day weekend. It was a Monday, which was our holiday and I didn't realize at the time, but when I fell back on my back, I'm a mogul. I could barely get up and couldn't move my right leg at all. So I got, went to the mountain doctor in ER, and then when I got home, went to the ER and it turns out I broke my back. And of course, like a typical runner, I don't know. I said, you know, I just want to know, well doc, how, how long is my recovery time? Cause I have a race in nine weeks. So if my marathon was nine weeks away and he looked at me like, you don't understand, you probably won't be walking right through about a year or two and you'll, you might not ever run again.   Speaker 3   09:27 Wow. And my response to the list, I remember kind of just looking at them and go, well what if I dropped to the half marathon marathon? And the doctor just looked at me like I had two heads and says, that's not going to happen. And so I left the doctor that day and I was like, no, that's going to happen. I'm, I'm going to that race compromise. I'll do a half, but I'll be there. So I went and got a second opinion. Of course that doctor kind of said something similar and that I decided to take it into my own hands and say, no, I can heal myself. I'll do lots of stretching, lots of rehab for my back. Lots of exercises and a lot of mindsets. So I started to look into alternative therapies and it's kind of like if you want different results, you have to do something extra ordinary.   Speaker 3   10:23 I heard about this book called self-mastery through conscious autosuggestion by you know, it's from the 1920s lease and it was this author, a meal, a meal QA, and basically it's just all the power of your mind and the power of belief and saying every day in every way I'm getting better and better. And I listened to that book. I got the audio version at the time religiously for like two hours at night when I went to bed and two hours in the morning. And I did that for weeks between the rehab that I was doing, just stretching, strength training and as well as constantly feeding that belief system and my mind through that book, I was able to not just be walking back to normal, but the pain was totally gone and I was, we're not to run that half-marathon nine weeks after hurting my back.   Speaker 3   11:18 Granted it was the slowest half marathon I had ever run in my life. But it was also the most fun cause I was just so grateful to be running. And and there was also a lot of fun for me cause it was made me be really grateful for the running and my body that I always kind of took for granted. And my running career up to that point was always just about trying to hit PRS, you know? So this was really eyeopening just to be grateful to my slow time. Yeah. Was a PR for someone else and just to be able to be out there and to have something. I love that. I've been doing my pretty much my whole life be kind of almost ripped away.   Speaker 2   12:01 You Beck was damaged or wasn't so your spinal cord was obviously intact or like your, your right knee looking properly.   Speaker 3   12:08 I broke my sacrum and my L L four and L five and so those just leading all the way, it felt like all the way from my buttocks up through my, my lower back. So that was   Speaker 2   12:24 A lot of rehab as well as the mindset stuff. So you are really focused on both of those aspects for that nine weeks to get back to that.   Speaker 3   12:34 Sure, yeah. Yeah. And and now, you know, I still take that as a priority. I'd never go to my chiropractor regular really to keep taking care of that back and I'm fully heal now and you know, thankfully. But really that also taught me that,   Speaker 2   12:51 Yeah, you, you really believe that. I mean, and I, and I certainly believe this too. And that's funny that that book that you mentioned, self mastering, what does it, self-mastery,   Speaker 3   13:00 Yeah. Conscious auto suggestion or auto suggestion through self-mastery, through conscious autosuggestion science, say that self-mastery through conscious auto suggestion.   Speaker 2   13:17 Now this is really important because this was written in the 1920s, and like the science is now catching up to what was then probably very woo and not, not validated, but it was obviously a great book already. And now science is really validating. Like wait was Dr. Joe Spencer and Bruce Lipton, who I talk about constantly on the show, talking about the power of what you believe and what you put in your head. It's not just you know, you, you, when you are, you're willing something to happen and you actually influence yourselves and your, your body to heal itself. And I do think that this is a very, and this is not an easy thing to do, it's not like, well, I've just decided today to believe in this. It's going to have to really reprogram that subconscious mind, don't you? And this has helped you like moving forward from this where you like, you're really interpersonal development. It's like you're always reading everything.   Speaker 3   14:19 Yeah. I'm even rereading your book right now. Yeah. We're running hot, which is a great one. I would recommend that to anyone listening. So,   Speaker 2   14:28 And we're re-publishing that guys soon. So running hot does Stacey you know, I are editing a whole lot through that book and re re what do you call it? You're republishing it. Putting out a second edition, hopefully in time for the release of my other book, relate those which comes out in March as well. So bit of a plug there for myself. So what chapter? That one, but next to the personal development. It's really, really so important that you do the work before you need it. You actually, you've got the tools when you, when you hit a crisis side.   Speaker 3   15:03 Yeah. And you know, great example that we still, I was thinking of it recently and I just encountered right before we got on the call, I was talking about this woman I met at my, I just finished my first a hundred miler as you know, and thanks to your Neil's awesome coaching through running hot and you know, I could talk for hours about that. And yeah. And cause woman that was at my race, she was pacing a friend of mine who was an adaptive athlete visually impaired. And it was my first encounter with her and I got to see her again this weekend and she was like, man, you're so positive. And the whole time. I remember at one point you were, we're sitting around the campfire, I wasn't sitting by, just came in quick, said hi and then went back out cause it was a loop course and she goes, man, you look like you were, you could be asleep walking up, but you're still smiling and you are still, Nope, I gotta just keep moving forward and that, you know, and I, she asked me if I'm always like that and I'm like, yeah, generally I am, but you know, I take a lot of deliberate practice to work on my mindset.   Speaker 3   16:13 I'm constantly reading books. I'm constantly listening to podcasts such as yours. I remember the start of that race, someone was complaining about the weather, you know, it was 30 degrees Fahrenheit and then it got down to like 26 degrees   Speaker 2   16:28 Fahrenheit zero here. Yup.   Speaker 3   16:29 Yeah. At all. I just remember thinking, well I got to get, get away from this guy because they're not going to last. You can't go into a race like that with that kind of mindset. And sure enough, that person only lasted for about five hours in a 30 hour race because you can't look at it.   Speaker 2   16:49 You got to surround yourself with people who are positive and who believe that you can get there and, and, and avoid like the plague. Like anybody who's going to tell you you can't do something or it's all complain about everything, every five minutes because that is going to set all of your energy. So you had the, the, the way it was all at that race to go, I'm going to remove myself from here to keep myself. And it's protecting yourself, you know, that's protecting your mindset. And we need to all do this. And our daily lives protect their mindset from people who will run us through a nice size, who are negative, who tell us we can't do things like the doctor who said that you won't, you know, you know, you'd probably run it run again and you certainly won't. You're running a marathon, you know, a half marathon and I'm weak.   Speaker 2   17:38 So, so this, and this is what I've noticed with you is you have, I mean, you and I both do a hell of a lot of personal development stuff. We find a bitter out stuff. In fact, I think I'm a development junkie. But I, I still have a ways to go I think in comparison to you as far as the positivity that you bring on an absolute daily basis. Yeah. A couple of months ago, VIN was doing I think 400 monitor at the malt 100 mile race over the now I want, because this is a rice that didn't go according to plan and you'd spend a freaking long time gone hard out training, sacrificing a hell of a lot to be at this race. Can you walk us through that, that race in what happened?   Speaker 3   18:28 Sure. How you approach that. Yeah, that was exciting and I was, I was super pumped for that race. That was my first a hundred mile attempt. And going into that, you know, I'd run a handful of 50 milers and 50 Ks and I'm still a very much newbie ultra runner. But thanks to you and, and Neil, I got on that starting line. My fitness was on pointed, my mindset was on point, but it was a lease as you know, it was one of the hottest days of the year and about a decade here, back home. So in Vermont, the average temperature including in the morning and at night was about 98 degrees Fahrenheit, which I don't know the conversion of Celsius on your end, but then it got up to 115 degrees during the day. And again, and you know, and I was like, I trained for that. I, you know, based on your recommendations and made sure I trained in the sun and the heat and my family was there, so I was really excited and I was fundraising for Vermont adaptive.   Speaker 3   19:36 So I was pumped. I got bib number seven through fundraising, which is my lucky number. So I was like, approach that starting line. And I, I always make a joke, I'm like, the hardest part of a race is over once you show up for the starting line. Right. And on the hardware people. Some people look at me like I'm crazy and some people laugh, but the race is supposed to be fun for me. As long as you're like, you put in all the hard work and if you can wake up and not hit that snooze button and you know, some of these ultras start at like weird hours and once you get rid of all that pre-race anxiety, it's like boom, okay, let's go. And it was so hot that day. I experienced something I would never even expect to be a race, obstacle size, starting at really bad trench foot just from sweating into my shoes so much.   Speaker 3   20:28 And I changed my socks multiple times. I changed my shoes. You know, I put all the stuff that you're supposed to put on your feet, but it was just so hot. And I remember I got to mile 50 which was the first point I saw my family and my mom's a nurse and going into the race, I told them, Hey guys, make sure, just no matter what, tell me to keep going and you're doing great. So no negativity and my family's not negative, so I didn't have to tell them, but they're also the type. If I was like, Oh, I'm a little tired, they'd be like, Oh, we're proud. Yeah, you can sit down. Like, so I, I got to mile 50, and at that point that had been the furthest I'd ever run. And I felt great and I was holding back a lot cause it was really hot.   Speaker 3   21:15 But I knew my, my foot was getting aggravated. So I took my shoe off and I knew I needed to bandage up my foot and my mom's face just went white. She just looks, cause my foot looks so bad from the trench foot. And she was such a good sport. She didn't say anything and she was like, sweetie, I'm so proud of you and what do you want to eat? And she just, but I could tell by the look on her face as a mom and a nurse, she was like, Oh gosh. So my family bandaged me up. I had a little snack and I kept going. And you know, I felt great. The fitness was still there and everyone was like, Hey, it's your first hundred milers, especially on this course. If you could still run at mile 70 you're in good shape.   Speaker 3   22:01 Very good shape. So I got to mile 70 and I still had plenty of time for cutoffs and I was like, yeah, okay, let's see if I could still run comfortably and I could. But then the next two miles it went downhill at parts where it should have been runnable at least that was basically the mile. Before that I was like, okay, I can still run like a nine 30 mile. Which honestly I wasn't doing the whole race but I can still comfortably run that pace. Then my gate got so messed up from the trench foot and my shin got so swollen like a golf ball that I then limped a mile that should've been runnable in about 25 minutes and then the next mile took me about 34 minutes. This last one can grow, which, which is so frustrating cause all I could think was like, wow, you spent all this time and I, you know, I spent all year training and just visualizing the finish line of that race. And I started to do the math in my head. I go, okay, worst case scenario, if I just lived for the rest of the race in 25 minutes per mile or 30 minutes per mile. And that put me farther than the cutoff, which was like, you know, I did the runner math in my head, which normally I can't do math. But then it became all of a sudden you're like a math genius and you're like, that puts me out like 35 hours in 12 seconds, you know?   Speaker 3   23:24 And I remember dropping out and I told one of the volunteers and he said, man, but you still got, you've got plenty of time for the cutoffs. And I go, well that last two miles basically took me an hour. And he was like, Oh yeah. And I knew at that point it just, and if there wasn't a time cut off me, I probably would've kept calling. But I just knew I had eventually would miss some of those cutoffs. So that was hard. But I was still very proud of myself cause that was the further side ever go and run.   Speaker 2   23:55 And this is the, the the thing that got me about that story cause I mean any, you know, things can go wrong in, in a race and yes you could have carried on and just got to the the time limit and then, and then being shut down by the rice people organizers and there was a hell of a fallout on that race. So many, many people didn't finish that race would normally fell. And there's always reasons and there's always things that can happen and we can't, we cannot control all the variables. What we can control is the preparation we do, which you had done, you're done the work, done the mindset sit stuff you've done, the visualization and the it should happen. Basically you got through, what was it, 88 mile 81 or something. And then you hit, you had to pull it out of the rice.   Speaker 2   24:42 Yeah. So most people that I've worked with that would have just st them into the doldrums, like they would have been hitting the net carb once they actually got over the pain and the physical thing then comes in the a I find out I didn't make it. I sit this huge goal and the disappointment is huge cause you, you've given your heart and soul and all the time that you could have been spending with your friends and your family and or has gone to nothing apparently nothing. But you and I know that they, it's not the case with you. And I was expecting like we've got a couple of days later we go to on the, on the phone or on the, on the call and I was expecting to have to give you a really good pit talk. Call me pulling you out of the doldrums.   Speaker 3   25:27 A nice coach. Yeah.   Speaker 2   25:30 But how I did it late too, I was like, you got on the plane. Yeah, this happened. That happened. But I was still great and it was all SEM and I, and I was just like, Holy hell   Speaker 3   25:42 Yeah. You know, and I think I described it when people are like, then how's the race? And I made it to mile 72 that day and I go, Oh my gosh, it was such an Epic day. And even though I didn't hit my goal, I knew like I know going in that race for next year, like my fitness was there and I felt awesome and you know, base thanks to our training program and just mindset was there. And then I understood it and I kind of laughed a little cause I'm like, Oh, this is why all these ultra runners describe the races and like, Oh, I've had this many starts and this many finishes. And I was just laughing about just, you meet all these interesting people during the day that you're just cheering on and supporting and you might run with some people for half a mile or you might just pass them at an aid station or, you know, I shared with some, even some folks like 10 or 15 miles or even more throughout the course of the day.   Speaker 3   26:38 And it was just so emotional, like taking your whole lifetime of emotions and compressing those into one day, like all the ups and downs in the laughs and you know, and the friendships in the family. And so I think that's why I came out of it really positively. Cause I even though didn't hit my mileage goal to the finish, I still had all these awesome experiences and and a lot of us failed and we failed hard, you know, and it's like I left it all out there and really happy. It's not like I was, I finished, but like half, you know, you hadn't given it a go. They didn't give him my all. I'd definitely give them my all. And I definitely was you know, out there when I, I remember coming to the decision to stop. And I, at first I was like, Aw man, I is, cause I'm not like that.   Speaker 3   27:35 I'm not a quitter at all. But I was like, Nope, I'm good with this. I made it this and, and, and that's hard to do. You know, he's, and I was huge and the next day I took it as a sign, as the proper decision cause we were in line for lunch and I met this nice woman who had had trench foot and like kept pushing through it. And to this day she says she still has like nerve damage from it. And I just took that as a sign from like a higher being, you know? Yeah. Ava and you made the right decision so you can still come back stronger.   Speaker 2   28:08 You know, though, we gotta think about this like we're not, we're not in a war and we don't need to do permanent damage to ourselves. If we, if you were a soldier and you got three to four, you had to carry on in any option, you'll never die. We have the luxury of not being in a silly situation like that. And it's your question like Dave. And so there is no point in an ultra marathon in my opinion now as a mature person to depend on a damage and I've done permanent damage to my body. It's like paying the price or not pulling out when it should have pulled out of races and so are really convenient with like, you know, it's not about being lazy, it's not about giving yourself excuses to pull out. It's about really when it's time to pull out.   Speaker 2   28:52 And I'll tell the story from a friend of mine, Mecca who he and I were in the New Zealand thing together and we're doing 24 hour ricing and we were over in England and we worked so hard, both of us for eight years to qualify as being the national team to go with me for our champs and stuff and the Commonwealth games. And we were over in England and we were racing in two hours into the run. His leg broke like wrist fracture and a broke and he was trying to run with a broken leg, you know, because this is how strong you Monte can get to a point where you can nearly like and he actually had to be dragged off like kicking and screaming. He was not taking off and we had to really calm him down and he was so badly disappointed and he, we'd make the next five years in, in knocked it out of the ballpark and at the age of 50 was 55 when he did his best time ever of 217 Kaizen in 24 hours.   Speaker 2   29:47 Wow. He came back, you know what I mean? But the thing is he was, he was going to be running in doing real massive damage. You know, you shouldn't [inaudible]. And so the moral of the story is yet, remember this is a sport and that we don't have to do, this is not a life on the line and we shouldn't be pushing fit degree. Now when you did do this and you worked through this in your mind and you keep yourself positive, so a lot of people lose their confidence and then they're down on themselves and then everything starts to spiral downwards. And of course you've, you've absolutely naked your body. Like you've used a hole or reserves cause you've just run 72 miles. We're emotionally in a, in a, in a whirlwind anyway cause your body's naked and with you, I just didn't see any of that. I've never not seen that. I've usually seen people go down and really depressed and then it might take two weeks or it might take a year for people to sort of come back out of it. And you like, right. I remember saying to you it was the next week or something that you were like, right, we'll find another race.   Speaker 2   30:54 What's up? And I'm going, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. Just let you better come up close and, and, and, and so on. You're like, I haven't done with thing. I want. Oh, another one. Yeah. You did some other rices. The theme just was last weekend. It was the weekend before.   Speaker 3   31:10 Yeah, two, two weeks ago, it seems like months ago.   Speaker 2   31:16 Did you go to us and say, right, I'm gonna do 30 hour rice and I want to hit a hundred mama. Yeah. She wanted that a hundred Mahler. And this is, so this was a course that went around around, so you pick up the story of the event.   Speaker 3   31:30 Yeah. So this was exciting. So I was excited for this one. It was again, local, this was in New Hampshire and they call it the hamster wheel race, but race directors were awesome and I was looking at different ones to pick out and I, you know, to your point, importantly, I did take my much needed rest days. I took almost like that month off and I think I have the mindset after the Vermont, I made sure I signed up for another race, but I made sure I took those rest days and caught up with friends and family and enjoyed social time and just enjoyed, you know, going to the movies. And I think that really helps you rebound too from what I went through in Vermont, at least from me because it gives you something else to look forward to. And then I also knew, I was like, okay, I don't need to go out and crush it this week cause I, I know I'm resting cause I had this other big challenge coming up. But I was excited about New Hampshire cause it was a much more runnable course and remodel, you know, obviously a lot of pills and I, I do not like power hiking. These, I am like the worst power Hager, which I've been trying to work on as an [inaudible].   Speaker 3   32:38 So I was like, yes, I'm going to go. And the weather temperature was totally the opposite of Vermont. So that was exciting. I went out this race fell feeling really good all day. I was probably like leading the race up until about mile 70 and thanks to your great advice coach you said, you know, careful the cold weather can just suck the life out of you. Man. Did it ever, especially the New Hampshire called and, but again, going back to my mindset, people are like, Oh my gosh, it's so cold. And this one had a very high dropout rate because of the cold. But instead of focusing on how cold it was, I was just running and I had just got like a, a new cheap jacket and some new gear from Amazon essentials and instead of focusing on how cold it was, I was just like, Oh man, this gear's great. I'm so glad. You know,   Speaker 2   33:30 It's hard to get a ton of gear and have everything I own.   Speaker 3   33:33 Yeah. I was like, I gotta send that Jeff Bizo as a thank you now cause this stuff is keeping me warm, you know, so, so it was really picking out those things. And you know, I went through the first 50 miles way too quick. I think I went through and about, but I felt good. I went through about eight 40 paces and I had some friends yelling at me like slow down, slow down. And I was teasing them. I go, you're not the boss of me. Like let me run my race. And sure enough, my second half of the race was much slower, but I just told myself, Nope, just keep going. It doesn't matter how fast you go. And I remember when it got made in my body tightened up really bad and really started to slow down and I always say like I, I have a quote from, it's from you, from one of your podcasts. And I, I remember telling myself, Hey, it's okay to be the tractor and not the Ferrari as, as long as I'm just moving forward one step at a time. And that, that definitely got me through with my time at that race. And then once the sun came back out, it was almost like gives you a second life and you have a little breakfast snack or something pushing through that night.   Speaker 2   34:49 There's a couple of points I wanted to bring out the so you pet your, you're still new to the, out to running game on us. So pacing is is still something that you are learning and it's, it's really hard to know like when you're feeling really great and you've done 50 miles and you're still feeling great but your pace is actually, you know, is too high, then you are going to pay the price and you can't imagine it and feel it until you've done maybe half a dozen races. And the me guy, I know, I know what's coming at more lady, so I'm gonna really take it, consumed it. And of course your tendency at the beginning, and I still did this, I just told a is to want to, I'll just get as much behind me as I possibly can and then if the wheels fall off, you know, but you actually causing the wheels to fall off, you know, but it's a, it's a really fine balancing it because even just naturally over the day you start to lose energy like we all do just in daily life. So your, your thoughts are get the most done as fast as possible in the first six hours. When it's more about the consistency and the planning of the, of the speed that you're going in. And then when it comes to cold, absolutely called I written told is way harder than heat to deal with for me personally, at least   Speaker 3   36:04 I think it is for me too. Yeah.   Speaker 2   36:06 Yeah. Cole just takes you will to live because   Speaker 3   36:09 I'll take the suntan.   Speaker 2   36:11 Yeah, it's the suction dry and makes you want to stop just moving and you just want to go to sleep. And that's, that's something that's really, really hard. So we had another couple of athletes doing a 24 hour rides here around one of the lakes here and it was freezing cold, not quite as cold as you, but was cold. And when you've been running all day, you have no glycogen left in your body and basically you're living on fat fuel and protein. Hopefully not breaking down too much muscle of your own muscle, but usually you are. So you've got no glycogens. They actually heat the body. All your reserves are gone. So even when it's hot, you can be freezing and shaking. So when it's really cold, you can be very Simic very, very quickly in a net sets. And we'll do that. So what happened then? You got through the night and then the does some, when the sunrise comes up, isn't it like a new Brie reborn?   Speaker 3   37:05 Oh yeah. And I kept telling myself to the food 0.2 weeks like what you and Neil have taught me. I just made sure I knew because it was cold or my body was burning more calories and I could tell I was much hungrier than, you know, you would be in the heat. And I just kept being like, it's okay, just keep snacking, keep snacking, keep eating, you know, follow my nutrition plan. And I had my nutrition plan laid out, but I was also supplementing that with a lot of aid station food and like real food and soups and stuff. And then I remember the last loop before the sun came up and I was almost falling asleep, like, like running, falling over. And, and I just remember going, Nope, just keep going. And my family had gone home and gone to the the hotel and I, I remember just saw myself, no, you're here to do work, just keep going. And once the daylight comes and we'll be back in the afternoon and you get to see them. So it's like I just told myself, keep going. It doesn't matter how fast keep eating and one foot in front of the other. And that really got me through and then I just kept being like thankful for packing the proper gear in the cold because I was like, Oh man, this is as people. Some people were running by me and, and like singlets and I'm like, how do you aren't a single it right.   Speaker 3   38:29 But yeah, it was,   Speaker 2   38:31 Yeah, you got to the a hundred mile.   Speaker 3   38:34 Yeah, I was pace most of the day for like, you know, at least 120 miles and I made it to the a hundred mile Mark and I still have time left in the race director said, Hey Ben, you got to keep growing. And I felt good up until I got kind of like a second wind at mile 88 and was running strong again. And but then around mile mighty six was a struggle. I think just mentally I knew I was hitting my hundred mile goal goal cause I had one minute to go and I knew it was going to happen and even if I crawled for the next four miles. So once I got to that hundred mile Mark I was like, no, I'm, I'm happy with that. Cause that was   Speaker 2   39:17 What was the goal that was, and this is an interesting point, what do you mean you put in your head is your goal. You will stop it there. So even if you like you could have carried on because you had time to carry on and go over. But in your mind you would actually sit a sit lemon of a hundred and even though, like you'd said, talked about possibly going on and doing maybe 110 or something like that, when you have that backup, go back to come to Priceline. So you have to be really, really careful about what you do as your, as your affects goal because that will be where you get to and not appealing more sort of like,   Speaker 3   39:55 And you're rightly say it absolutely was. My baseline goal was that a hundred mile and my big, I always try and set a big scary goal too. So my big scary goal was like, you know, 120 miles. But then I, my baseline was a hundred miles. But if I, if I had a baseline of a hundred K I would've stopped at a hundred K absolutely. Cause it was so cold and you're just like, but I told myself, Nope, I would, I'm here to do this and just keep it going. And I'm, I'm getting that a hundred miles ago and obviously I didn't have any serious health things like in Vermont. So I was able to continue and I felt good and honestly at points you feel you got to expect, you're going to feel like crap at multiple points in the race and not like a serious injury like your friend that broke his leg.   Speaker 3   40:43 But just knowing that you're like, Oh wow, I'm out of energy. I feel like crap. And once you're, I kind of expect it. I can recognize it, internalize it and then realize that it's going to get better. And that's really important for me because then when it does happen, I tell myself like for mile 70 to like 88 was when I say a struggle bus, Lisa, it was like a complete, but I told myself, I was like, yeah, I came to run this race until the wheels fell off and I was there to, you know, I had been training all year as you know, and I was like, yep, I expected the wheels to fall off so I expected this. So just keep going.   Speaker 2   41:27 You had prepared yourself so well and you'd sit, this next goal was a hundred mile. You wanted to join the a hundred miler club and I have to congratulate you because you know after, after that that problem that the mold that you experienced, it would be very easy to go, well, I'm not going to do anything for an exciting months. Yeah, maybe never come back again because I failed. And I know one of these sort of things that go through his mind and they're all legitimate. But the thing is, you had the resilience to get back up and just, just, what was it? I don't know, eight weeks later I would do another one was probably a little bit short for my liking or, you know, as a turn around time and I would, you know, you were ready for it. And, and I think you, you illustrate so many points that are so important then that's resilience.   Speaker 2   42:17 That's what have you set your goal out to be. That's what it becomes. You just, you learn a lot about pacing. You learn in the first race in Vermont, you learned a lot about, you know, the shit can happen regarding, you know, and you've gotta think like people, even like people are like thinking S's have races where they fail it and don't make it. You know, every ultra marathon runner has times when things go pier shade. I mean I've definitely hit enough of those. And then never, not cause you're heartbroken because you've just speak, you know, I was doing a rice in the, it wasn't even a rice, it was expedition. I know Himalayan is trying to do the world's highest marathon ever recorded a world record. And I'd spent a year and a half in preparing and I'm not good at our student. I'm not good in the cold.   Speaker 2   43:05 It's not my forte. I'm bitter and desserts. But I was with a guy who was a Mountaineer and done neighbor us and stuff and we were on entree and I get up there and after a year and a half or preparation, you know, over $50,000 of money raised from crows, the prime minister on African documentary, you know, like every, it was really big deal. And I get altitude sickness and I couldn't even start like the heartbreak and the disappointment. And this was getting towards the end of my career anyway. And it was just like freaking out, you know? And it ran off the crap out of me. But I had a couple of really good friends and my husband Haisley who just with a to pick up the pieces and it's really important that you have those people that they can channel. Come on, you've got this, we've got you. And we've got yet to blow you to pieces. When you sit big here he goes and then you fail at them. What I want you to understand is hurts, but you are someone who's pushing the limits. You're an ambitious person that's reaching for the stars and you cannot control all the variables.   Speaker 2   44:14 So if I don't think any, I just want you to wrap up. We've got to wrap up now. We've got a meeting coming up. We're going to get to our technical stuff. So we've been to get onto there, but then I just want to leave the last week to you. Tell us what you want to get across to people listening to this who are doing the first five K two who are just starting out on running. Who or who had aiming for an ultra marathon. Tell us what you want to get across.   Speaker 3   44:39 Yeah, I want to add it. This leads right to your point that you just brought up, Lisa too, that these things happen and everything happens for a reason and you're much more capable than you think you are. So you might be thinking right now it's all of those failures and those successes I think all provide a great frame of reference. So someone right now might be training for their first five K and say, Oh man, I'm struggling to break 32 minutes or 30 minutes or whatever their time goal might be. But then they might look back a year from now and be like, wow, now I'm running 25 minutes with ease. And remember when, you know, I was really struggling. So it's off frame of reference. So even those, those struggles that you go through and they really help you become a better person to kind of get the job done that you need to be, to be able to, you know, not just run these races and push the limits, but it's really a metaphor for life.   Speaker 3   45:37 Right. And I think I've learned so much from that. And at the time it might seem disappointing or it might seem difficult, but then when you look back and you're like, wow, look at the person I've become now because I've challenged myself and I've gone through those successes and pushed my limits to hit those goals and I might've hit a lot of them and I might've failed at some of them. But when you look back a year from now or even longer, it becomes like, wow, those help make me the person that I am today. And I can certainly say that for myself from my running career, you know, my business career going through like my broken back, I'd probably never would've found ultra running. I wouldn't have been introduced to you. You know? So everything really happens for a reason, to the development of who you are as a person. And if you look at it that way, I think you can be totally unstoppable with whatever you say your minds who, right?   Speaker 2   46:35 Definitely unstoppable than formulary. Yeah.   Speaker 3   46:38 Oh thanks Karen.   Speaker 2   46:41 Absolutely. Relentlessly positive. You're a real poster boy for the personal development side of things. And then if you work really hard on your mindset, you can change your own personality and you can become a stronger, better, more positive, happy person. You've certainly shown me a thing or two over the last year because, you know, like with our business side of things you know, ven really has changed their whole dynamic and the, our company because he brings a, a super amount of technical knowledge to the whole, to the whole business which we desperately needed. But he also brings when things don't go wrong, because by the same token as things go wrong and ultra marathon running, things go wrong in business. And when we, you know, we've been, you know, months preparing for a launch or months doing all of this sort of, you know, technical staff and then crickets, nobody got.   Speaker 2   47:33 And we're like, and we want to give up. And then it's like, well, no, we'll just try this other thing and we'll go down this track and we will learn, you know, he's relentlessly positive in every aspect of his life and that has been so valuable to us in our company. And is an escalate. It just really shows what you can achieve when you have this incredible mindset. So Venice, awesome. Having on the team. Thank you for sharing your, your story today with everyone from running hot. Any last things, any last words, Mike, before we get onto the actual words tonight? No, I think, you know, just what we said and I, I would encourage everyone to really at least listen to what Lisa and Neil put out and you know, I'm constantly learning from you weekly research. I really appreciate it.   Speaker 2   48:18 And yeah, just keep pushing forward team and take those wins and take those, you know, those use those losses to his growth opportunities. I mean that's a good place to stop. Thank you very much. Vin, if you want to reach out to Vin, we can, they find you on Instagram and Facebook and all that good stuff. Yeah, you can find me at Vin Framularo. So my first name, V I N and M, last name F R a M U. L. a. R. O. I'm on Facebook, Instagram. You could even email me vin@framularo.com or even reach out through running hot page and we'll put on the show notes because Vin if anybody needs help with anything technical and computers as far as things like sales funnels and click funnels and pretty much everything technical I don't really like to share you because you're too good to go. If anyone wants help, he's man. So thanks very much and we'll get onto our work now. Excellent. Thanks Steve. Have a great day.   Speaker 1   49:22 That's it this week for pushing the limits. Be sure to write, review and share with your friends and head over and visit Lisa and her team at lisatamati.com  

In this interview Lisa Tamati speaks with Lisa Whiteman - Lisa's background is in biological health science, with a specialty in the biomechanics of human motion, and she worked in private practice sports and rehabilitation for over 20yrs. Lisa also is at the cutting edge of research related to human function and performance and is working on a new running tech device call "Run Vibe" which is set to help runners improve their performance through this biofeedback device. Both Lisa's discuss the shortcomings in the health sector, the future of health and fitness, running biomechanics and much more. Lisa is also an experienced entrepreneur who has grown start-ups, turned around failing businesses, bought and sold businesses, mentored business owners, employed staff, and worked from the coal face of health care to the boardroom of private-sector education. Developing dynamic leaders through instilling continued learning, self-awareness and self-improvement form a large part of Lisa's current role and she believes strongly in the power of communication, the power of connection; and the power of relationships, in business and in life. Lisa works with organisations and individuals to improve wellbeing and performance by distilling the science and research in ways that are meaningful and achieve positive outcomes.   You can learn more about Lisa's Podiatry Group which has 8 branches throughout NZ at www.respod.co.nz and  follow Lisa's blog at  https://thebeingproject.nz/ where Lisa discusses everything health, wellness, science and whatever is taking her interest at the moment.   We would like to thank our sponsors Running Hot - By Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff If you want to run faster, longer and be stronger without burnout and injuries then check out and TRY our Running Club for FREE on a 7 day FREE TRIAL Complete holistic running programmes for distances from 5km to ultramarathon and for beginners to advanced runners.   All include Run training sessions, mobility workouts daily, strength workouts specific for runners, nutrition guidance and mindset help Plus injury prevention series, foundational plans, running drill series and a huge library of videos, articles, podcasts, clean eating recipes and more.   www.runninghotcoaching.com/info and don't forget to subscribe to our youtube channel at Lisa's Youtube channel  www.yotube.com/user/lisatamat and come visit us on our facebook group   www.facebook.com/groups/lisatamati Epigenetics Testing Program by Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff. Wouldn’t it be great if your body came with a user manual? Which foods should you eat, and which ones should you avoid? When, and how often should you be eating? What type of exercise does your body respond best to, and when is it best to exercise? These are just some of the questions you’ll uncover the answers to in the Epigenetics Testing Program along with many others. There’s a good reason why epigenetics is being hailed as the “future of personalised health”, as it unlocks the user manual you’ll wish you’d been born with! No more guess work. The program, developed by an international team of independent doctors, researchers, and technology programmers for over 15 years, uses a powerful epigenetics analysis platform informed by 100% evidenced-based medical research. The platform uses over 500 algorithms and 10,000 data points per user, to analyse body measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home Find out more about our  Epigenetics Program and how it can change your life and help you reach optimal health, happiness and potential at: https://runninghotcoaching.com/epigenetics You can find all our programs, courses, live seminars and more at www.lisatamati.com    Transcript of interview     Speaker 1: (00:00) Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati brought to you by Lisatamati.com Speaker 2: (00:10) Well how everybody to tell somebody here at pushing the limits. It's fantastic to have you back again with me this week. I have another fantastic guest that I've managed to meet this week. I was at a woman's conference in Wellington and I met some fantastic ladies down the, a shout out to everyone who was at the woman's leadership conference. It was an absolute awesome to be down there and to be amongst amazing ladies in one of the ladies that I got talking to afterwards is Lisa Whiteman. So welcome to the show Lisa. Thanks Lisa licensee today. Now Lisa is, I'm not even going to say what she is cause she actually got such a broad, so I'm going to hear to her a broad area of interest. And, and so many projects that she's working on that I thought would be really beneficial for my audience today to hear from these tourniquet who type on us on a few different things. So at least you're in Wellington now by trade or by profession or whatever you wanna call it. You're a podiatrist. You started your journey, but you've also gone into a number of other areas. And Lisa said, can you just give us a brief overview of what the does that you do? Speaker 3: (01:19) Sure. it's a really difficult question to answer, Lisa and I always struggle, I need a better elevator pitch around this. So, so my day to day work, my day to day role I look after an umbrella organization to support podiatry business owners, to have both successful businesses but also to drive clinical excellence in shitty expertise. So we at nationwide the group is called resonance. It's reasonably podiatry group and there's a reason why resonance comes up a lot. And and a number of my, my brands, CF, so I manage businesses and I manage clinical outcomes. And that's my day to day. Okay. As a segue from that, I also do quite a bit of work in leadership and development in other sectors. Areas is diverse as the music industry. So I've worked with musician and purposeness. And another business I work with and the Bay of plenty is around positive reinforcement training for horses. Speaker 3: (02:30) Well, it's a different way. So this is another, another business and quite a unique and a unique skill set. So I work on businesses, I work in leadership and I have a passion for noticing life and I like to notice with intent. Yeah. I don't want to live life just going through the motions. So noticing has brought me to have a blog and it's called the being project. And my blog there is just a talk about stuff. It is the versus, you know, pressure or stress or pain or relationships or communication. The only areas, I mean, I guess, yeah, it is. It's about, I'm challenging myself to intentfully live my life every single day. Does that make sense? Speaker 2: (03:26) Yeah, absolutely. And in whatever area you're interested in, that's where you go down the rabbit hole on that area. Speaker 3: (03:32) And generally, Lisa, it's the things that pop out of a conversation. So you can guarantee you watch my blog over the next week or two. Yep. Our conversation. Well yeah, because you will spark a need for me to write something Speaker 2: (03:47) That's, that's been fantastic. And in laser and I both, we've, we've just been talking before we got on this recording, we're internal students and we're always looking for what is the latest and, and newest in the app with the science. And Lisa has also a biomechanic she's got some other stuff that she's going to add in too. You just got a charity as well. But let's talk a little bit about your bio mechanics side of things because obviously a lot of the people that listen to my show runners so tell us a little bit about, you buy a mechanic background and what you do there. Speaker 3: (04:20) So as a, as a podiatrist, obviously we're interested in gate, so can gate running gate. And I found I had a, I've always off physics, so the physics of motion and leavers. And so it was a natural place for me to specialize in, gravitate through my clinical Korea. So rehabbing runners from injury on one side and then more recently looking at how we can improve performance in runners. So esteemed the so that they can achieve the goals that they want without them being broken. Cause you know, the running statistics are huge. We're going to have 80% of our run as in any 12 months I'd go into heaven running injury. Yeah. So how do we navigate through those things? So I spend a lot of talks being too, a lot of time learning both bio mechanics function can emetics kinetics, you know, how we run, how we move and then the science of injury. So but looking at the fact that not only are we addictable from a neurology perspective or neuroplastic, we're also bioplastic out tissues have the ability to read, generate, and to get stronger. It's how we find they, for an athlete, that sweet spot, we are getting stronger, but before they're going to break. Yeah. So I'm fascinated and that area of potential Speaker 2: (05:46) It's, and that's for us to, as coaches is a really fine line between over training and your athletes breaking down and optimal performance. Exactly. Speaker 3: (05:58) And it's a really, so you've got a can we talk about the, the, the, the tone if you like, of that you were working on the running bribe. Can you tell us a little bit about that? Just this is something that's cutting edge and new people. So it's coming, it's not yet on the market, but this is what's coming. I've been, I've been working for the last five years, becoming up five years on a project review, research and development about looking at whether we can pick out markers in someone's running gait. So specific metrics in the running gate that put together can give us a really accurate indication of the performance. So that's the power that producing and the efficiency at boundary shifts in body forward. So that's what I've been working on. And we've gone through pilots. Speaker 3: (06:51) We've done pilot done trials and pilots studies and we have a patient we've done a patient and our next step is to go to commercialization. So it's something the goal was, is a lot of complicated metrics out in the Elisa. And the really had to understand, and I really hot right as it is, is great. It's nice and simple. We can understand that you start adding layers and layers and layers to that. It can be overwhelming for the athlete. So every girl was something really, some people that looked at the ability for you to take your body and efficiently move it forward. Yep. And not so, so we're talking about your gait and your, so your, your Tommy, your feet on the ground, your ground resistance, your cadence, not when, what we're not talking about is those specific pieces of form. Speaker 3: (07:47) So what we know is that the metrics that we put weight that we gained from the sensor, we can alter those by things like increasing Hep extinction or increasing the affliction. So what we wanted, and I guess I often call it, we want the best, the most bang for our buck. Meaning we want one number that to alter it or to improve it, he'll base in three simple changes that you'll need to make. So it could be increased cadence. It could be a little bit more high steeper purge. It could be a little bit more hip extinction. It could be a little bit of a tweak to the position of the pelvis. But rather than having to measure those things, measuring the output of those things, one metric which is life a lot easier and simpler. So you know, as running coaches, we're obviously very interested in this because it's very hard to, we have a set of rules that we all take, you know, in regards to bio mechanics, mechanics and what what constitutes and this changes obviously, because don't getting your research Speaker 2: (08:56) All the time, as you will know. So we can generally say that, you know high cadence as a, as a beta wide run and we don't want to be planting our legs in the ground. And we want to keep our hips stable and things like this. But this is going beyond that, the mechanics of that and looking at this one metric which will tell you whether you're approving the force forward or not. Speaker 3: (09:19) Yup. Exactly that. So rather than the, so for you, you'd probably still do that stuff. Yeah. But you do it exactly that we know these things. We know that cadence is important. We know ground contact time is important. What we want to achieve is that runners out there practicing this new technique that you may have guided them through and they want immediate instant feedback that they are achieving that step-by-step-by-step and that's our goal. We know that gait and this is on the science. We know that gait retraining is definitely doable. Yeah. We know that gate retraining takes a minimum of 12 weeks and then it has to be continuously churned until it becomes muscle memory. So I would team decide to my X lights. It's going to take you a year to be able to confidently say you've altered your gait in a month. That, imagine if you had feedback that you were on task and your training runs, you knew that you could hold it for five K but you can't hold it for team. What do we need to do in the gym to improve your, you capacitate to that, that load. Yeah. He know how you're going. So that's what we're, we're that's what we're working on. That's very exciting. And talking about it. I get re invigorated. Speaker 2: (10:41) Yeah. I hate [inaudible] and it's a long process to get something like this to market. So then ultra-marathon in itself. But this is coming in. So people watch out for this in the, in the, in the hopefully near future. What is now you've got podiatrists all through the country in some of those do video gait analysis or do they do all, do live gait analysis in the businesses? Can we, so Speaker 3: (11:12) With so with the reason it's group, we have, everyone does video, gait analysis analysis the ones that specialize more in that running a running analysis or it could even be running for other sport. So we see, you know, a lot of the footballers love rugby. Or the netball is, we use three different forms of gait analysis. One we do mobile motion capture, so that's using a mobile, a HD camera and it can be on the field, on the court. So you're looking at, you might be looking at landing skills or you might be looking at type of skills or it may be a particular thing you want to assist, not just running. And then we do dual camera today. Video capture using treadmill. So we've got two cameras, one at the back when it's side. So we're doing that and there's a really good Bella to tape between or correlation between running on the road and running on a treadmill. So the difference in kinematics is very, very minor. We know the science of that, so things that works well and the food that we do, which is unique for new Zealanders. We do three D, I'm both running and walking Gates. So we use a three D capture camera yup. That plots all the points, creates an avatar and looks at what's loading correctly, what's not loading correctly. So that's really unique and we're the only clinics in the country to be using three D motion capture. Speaker 2: (12:41) I will be able to [inaudible] we can talk afterwards about hooking us up with it so that we can talk to, I mean we do, we just about to which video analysis, like online, but the analysis, but head's got its limitations. You know, we can look at the big areas of change that we can improve upon, but it's not looking three D it's not, you know, doing the stuff that you were doing. So perhaps we can workout something after this conversation or I at least the ones in New Zealand. Now let's change tech a bit, a little bit. So you've got a, obviously a very big science background and by mechanics you've also got a charity that you're involved in that is, tell us a little bit about that one. Speaker 3: (13:24) So today's future is the name of the charity and today's future is an education based charity to support and facilitate a pathway a learning pathway through gifted in neuro diverse young people. So we've particularly focusing on young people between the ages of 14 and 24. And we know that those are critical. If you don't fit, if you don't fit into society or you feel you don't fit into school, which is a big thing. And you might struggle with relationships. This is the time we have, we see a rise in anxiety and depression and really concerning and often these young people, these young adults are functioning, are really high level academically. Yeah. Don't have a peer group to relate to. They often don't relate well to be a thorough in their own peer group. And we find a lot of them will shut down. Speaker 3: (14:23) So we lose this potential for the future. And I have a strong belief that it's our kids have now that hold the case to LC mutual survival. So what today's future wants to do is to nurture these kids through into adult hood. So we have openly lifelong learners who have the courage and it's mental fortitude, laser, the stuff you work on day in and day. I mean to fortitude, to be able to face whatever the future is to throw at us in this planet. It's small, it's growing. And we have resource issues like every other small business organization. We just want to try and make a difference. Speaker 2: (15:09) Trauma can definitely lead to individual kids' lives. So, you know, so these are some of the gifted kids but who have maybe a certain learning difficulties or difficulties fitting in with the groups in your peer groups than in some sort of social difficulties. So that's a really good thing. So you've got a very, very diverse background and I know we were talking earlier about your life as well and you've got a very diverse background. You've had a brain injury, so we can make that. I have a brain injury and talking about rehabilitation, you know, we obviously I used to hit my story with mum. Do you want to share like your insights on, on your journey with them? Speaker 3: (15:50) Yeah, yeah, I'm, I'm happy to and I'm reasonably new as well in, in, in this journey. So I three years ago I unfortunately fell off my horse, which wasn't ideal and broke my back. So I broke 'em T 12, L one and L two. And I did what's called a retropulsion burst fracture of T 12, which is where the part of the, the fracture ends up in the spinal cavity, in the spinal column. Wow. You don't need the spinal nerves. And it was really unfortunate in amongst all of that, I hit the Dick with my head and it's team relay. People recover really well from a single episode head injury. So I was unconscious for a very short period of time. I was a really low risk patient. The thing that no one asked is, have you had a head injury before? This was my food. He didn't drink. Now you would know from probably your research that that puts me in a completely different camp. I should've been looked after quite differently than I was. So I was sent home from hospital after a week and a spinal brace from my chin to my butt and I was a net for 16 weeks. I didn't have surgery because I chose not to. Yup. And my Beck's pretty damn good. As long as I say strong and my cool Lisa. Speaker 2: (17:15) Exactly. Yes. Thanks. So did you hear that everybody, if you've got a bad back, you need to have a strong core that's at the end. Don't necessarily yet jump into the operation side of it so quickly. Speaker 3: (17:30) Well, it's interesting because again, coming from, I'm just a little secret here. Coming from the sports medicine, the Australasian sports medicine and science conference, he was significant. Talk about don't operate. Yeah. Avoid and not just a spinal arthritis, knee arthritis foot. The pain that we are experiencing. I have a passion for pain science. The pain that we experience is not due to tissue damage. The pain we experience is due to the perception of our central nervous system around how safe we are or not. So pain is our response to a feeling of not being safe. And it can be heightened by fear. Fear heightens pain. The longer you've had pain, the least it is linked to tissue. Speaker 2: (18:26) Wow. So the chronic pain is actually it's a more of a a side. Yup. Yup, Speaker 3: (18:34) Yep. It's more, and I'm in around belief systems. So if somebody takes the pain to the body part, like I broke my back, I have back pain. If I believe that I'll continue to have pain. Yup. I understand that actually my back's fine and I'm strong. Then my pain will reduce and I have to tell you this way story. So what they did, and this is on the research, what they did is they used VR. So part of the hip seat on and head. Somebody look at themselves with this really strong back to broad shot, beautifully muscles. So it was their bag that was their body, but it was, it was strong Apple. And they asked them to do stuff and they did what they were asked to do with the strong back. Then they gave them this really weeding Bodie week hunch, looking back in, ask them to repeat the same tasks. They couldn't, they couldn't lift the weight. They didn't have the mobility, they were stiffer. This is how much the mind, the crux of everything we do, Speaker 2: (19:41) Of everything we do. And when we, when we diagnose and when we get a label and we have a back injury and we think with powerless to do anything. Have you heard of the work of dr Joe Dispenza? How? Okay, so he's amazing. I mean, he healed his own back through visualization. I'm talking about, I don't know how many weeks was that? 16 weeks or something. And now he teaches about the belief. Have you also heard about Dr. Bruce Lipton? Really everything of his biology of belief. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So I'm all over there and you're by phone and say why I tips. So people basically what, what these two doctors, dr Joe Dispenza, who I highly recommend you go and search out, Dr. Bruce Lipton, who I've mentioned a couple of times on this podcast, and looking at the biology of belief. So what did you believe in? You put in your mind carries through into your body in a fix your actual physical body. And this is why it's so important that we're not telling ourselves we're going to be sick. We are weak. We have this repeatedly and over and over again. Because you are creating a self fulfilling prophecy basically. Speaker 3: (20:46) Exactly. And when we're talking Speaker 2: (20:48) About that it does, it hit and the mind filters through the body. It changes not just the, that, the structure that we think of like our bones and our muscles. It changes the structure of every single cell. No, it's down to the, it's down to more Kyla. And I think that that's the most mind blowing thing with Joe's work. The whole thing around VI visualization gain and the, this is wonderful. It's coming in through the science. The reels, the idea that's coming into college, they talk about the visualization is priming the brain for success. Yup. It's critical. It's a critical way of reducing the pain. People are in this critical for performance. Totally. I mean, I've, I've preached this for a long time as an athlete preparing for big races. That visualization is one of the biggest pieces of the puzzle. I had a, a guy actually was on my podcast last week, met script and who, who a few weeks before the event had an injury and he was training for a hundred K and it was in a very bad space mentally at any, you know, Sydney walls reached out for help. Speaker 2: (21:58) And I didn't spend time working on his injury, his fault. You know, Neil dealt with it for business. We could, but he wasn't going to be able to train much up until we had been. And he was going to have to go in blind and, and the train to say. So we spent the time concentrating on his mentality and the way he approached it and strengthening his mind and the, the just, you know, within 48 hours, the shift that his mindset was huge. And suffice to say he went on and even though he hadn't been able to try and hit a fantastic race, not that out of the ballpark because he went in with a strong mindset because you went in with the belief that he could do it rather than going in, which is what we all tend to do. I've had an injury, things haven't gone to plan, therefore I'm not going to be able to do it and leave it home standing on the start line. I don't believe I can actually do it. And of course you're right. You believe as Henry Ford saying, I believe you can or you can't, then you're right. Speaker 3: (22:54) Okay. And this is why we put so much. And you know, my husband's a does iron man and triathlon and if you look at that lead up, they do the lead up, they do the big, big, big training days and then weeks and then they have the rest week. And then what does everyone do? I miss drop into nutrition stuff here, Lisa. They all go out and have pasta party. It's terrible. I just don't know how in this day and age, when we know so much about nutrition, is it that it's almost like it's so instilled in a bit in our culture, even if it makes no sense in the science, Speaker 2: (23:33) But used to make seeds so that yeah, we used to think load up with carbs. You know, you blockage on the spot cause up to the top, but you loading it with shit, carbs and probably stuff that you wouldn't normally, so then you'd double distressing your body. And then you're overloading it. So we don't get out our athletes at all to carb low. We, we want them to be on good, healthy nutrition and it depends and we work on the epigenetic side of it. If they do that, that program, if we can fit knowledge available and then we get them just to eat a little bit more and hydrate a little bit more in dry sleeper. That'll get more in the preparation and focus on the meditation. Focus on the breathing techniques, lowering the stress levels low, which CLIA, Speaker 3: (24:17) And that all lowers the inflammation, right? Speaker 2: (24:20) No, only the, the this, this whole mind, body connection, the home, you know, it's not just nutrition, it's not just meditation, it's not just training, it's this combined multipronged approach that really leads to ultimate success and long longevity in the sport as well. Speaker 3: (24:37) And even if we take that out of the sport, and I guess where I started that my, my big goal, my, my, my daily approach to life is, is I'm noticing stuff, noticing everything with intent and if we stop going through life half asleep, as most of us do, you know, statistics or die or we've got 85% of people hate their job based on a 2018 Gallup Gallup poll on average. It's, what is it, a 5.2 hours per day watching telly and four hours on social media as the average. Wow. You go to work for eight hours hating what you do, you traveled there and back. You spend the next nine hours either on social or watching television, you have to eat and sleep. That's a lot. That becomes a life. Yeah. And I think that our approach to our, I'm hoping repo if we can approach how we're running our life and the same way with the same intent fullness as we approach our running isn't going to get better. Speaker 2: (25:41) Yes. Yeah. And, and this is again going back to dr Joan in the leptin, they talk about the power of the subconscious mind that it's, you know, runs 95% of our day up to 99%. In other words, we're running on autopilot. You know, when you're driving home and you're listening to music and singing, you actually doing the singing, maybe consciously, but you're driving it subconsciously and you know, it's great because it means we can do things automatic and it's easier. We don't have to overthink it. And when we're training in developing a ritual, that's why it's hard at the beginning to develop a habit because we haven't got those groups in their brain where it's all subconsciously run. By the same token, they, that subconscious controls our behavior to a degree that we not aware of where their behaviors come from. So we've got this programming that we've had since childhood usually, or something that's happened traumatically and it's got into our programming. Speaker 2: (26:38) You're useless. You're not able to run your, to, you're always fed you or whatever it is. You can't speak, you're, you know, you're not, you're not going to be good at this. Whatever that programming was at that time, that's now sitting in your subconscious and you can read all the personal development books you want and you can consciously try and work on this. But if the subconscious program is running its own ship, you're fighting against David versus Goliath. It's such a powerful force. And this is why going in doing the meditation, doing self hypnosis, doing the co, you know, definitely doing the conscious exercises as well, the affirmations and the visualization and all that sort of stuff. But trying to go in and not let it subconscious just run, ride on its own without any, I'm doing that thought again that I don't want to do. You know, and I'm, I'm constantly working on my own sets of behavior. You know, I get very I've got a team Pat and I get really angry and frustrated at the computer mostly. And now I'm trying and a lot saying I'm perfect and [inaudible] straight to the main donation. When I feel that frustration and they want to Chuck it out the window, I'm damaging myself. When I'm feeling that stress, I'm damaging myself. So I try and get up and like try and leave it for five. Yup. Speaker 3: (27:57) And I think one of the really important things via, and we know it's critical and again, it's in the science we had designed, we must move on. I'm reading a fascinating book. The name is escaping me, but we can talk about it another time. Which looks at the connection between us becoming bipedal is never walking on two legs as organisms as opposed to being on four. And the connection between that and our consciousness developing and our cognitive development and the talking about how it's in so much science. If you, if you go and Google movement movement as medicine, we have to move. So when you get frustrated with your computer, nothing to do with the computer. But I beat show at least some of it as a smidgen that listen, Speaker 2: (28:47) Yes, a deadly. And I don't think it's just me, although I'm probably an extreme case of counselors though. But I, we know, and this is when I, something I miss now that I'm not doing the long distance running for example. And my, my business partner and coach Neil wakes up, pointed out this to me one day. He said, I see I'm really frustrated at the moment. I'm feeling really down and you know, and I've got all these tools to deal with it. The, where's it coming from? He said, we used to have hours running and that was time for your brain to sort stuff out and meditate it away and you are in motion all the time. And it gave you just your, your brain time to process everything. You don't have that now you're going from one, you know, computer job to another computer job to another computer job to working with mum to, you know, and it's just don't have that it's face in that time. Speaker 3: (29:42) It does. So it's, so movement is, it's, it's great for mental health. It's also exceptionally good for creativity. So we are creative brain finding novel solutions, novel outcomes, problem solving in our life happens far better when we're moving than when we're still, the book is called perfect motion [inaudible] motion. It's, it's very good. And it comes from a very strong science and you know, historical and scientific basis. It's very, very good. So movement is key. Movement is medicine movement and when we're injured, can I just jump back to X some and whether it's escalates or, yup, my injuries, whatever. Movement is the only way to rehabilitate. In the old days. If you sprained your ankle, you tweaked to knee. What did they do? Mobilized. You stop being active and mobilizing does not do anything to heal tissues, tissues here with movement. Now, sometimes we might put a patient in a moon boat, but we're putting them in the moment so they can keep emulating, keep moving, keep walking. And they will give them some limited exercises to start that strengthening happening or rehabilitation happening. But to risk something that cause it sore is the worst thing you could possibly do. Speaker 2: (31:12) Yeah. Now this is a really know this is an interesting and dangerous piece of knock off. Got the opposite problem. Like selfishly I'll ask you a question. I've got an injury with plantar fasciitis and I keep running and I do all the foam rolling and the foot release and the sayings and the what's the waivers and you know, then they help. But I keep running cause they can't stop run it cause I'm addicted to them up to, to training. Is that bad in which zone? Like, or is this a good thing and I'm, it's okay to keep, I mean, pushing, in other words, pushing through injuries, running, it's Speaker 3: (31:52) Through injuries. Well, it depends, doesn't it? It depends on is this, this, this safe, that safety buffer between your self protecting. So therefore you're not, you, you don't, you could actually do a little bit more. You're not going to break these, that safety barrier. And then at the top is the point that you're going to break. Now if you it decide to keep on going to the point of breaking, it's not gonna turn out well for you. Yeah. So that's knowing where you are in the middle of that. So I'd be asking you a few questions now. Plantar heel pain, we call it chronic plantar heel pain these days or chronic plantar heel pain syndrome. We don't use plantar fasciitis anymore because firstly itis means and there was no inflammation to be found of the plantar fascia. Right? So we've changed the same with like Achilles tendinitis gone. Speaker 3: (32:50) It's, it's Achilles tendinopathy cause there is no inflammation. So anyway, those just changes in our medical world. So it's the most caught heel pain. Chronic plantar heel pain is the most common injury that we see at any one time with 15% of the adult population suffering from it. At any one time. So the things, the questions that I would be asking you with these things, like have you got first stick pain in the morning when you first get out of bed, how many steps does it take for that pain to reduce or probably four minutes and five minutes of walking around the Hills. Yup. And then it reduces right down again. That's right. And then it's, if you sit at your computer and get up, does it feel erupt again? Yes, it does. It does. And if you go for a run, does it get worse? No, I can cope with it. That's the dangerous thing. Of course, when I'm warmed up Speaker 2: (33:45) I can, I don't feel it as bad. And so I think I'm lots of add. So I keep training and then again, the next morning I wake up again. I'm a negative. Speaker 3: (33:53) Okay. What do you wear on your feet during the day at home? I'm just at home. Right usually. Yup. So the first thing, listening to your story, and I haven't examined, you know, because I'm not sitting with you. First thing I would do would be to suggest we changed that one sector that you have. And I probably suggest something, I don't want to do a brand push here, but something like a also heel gender or something like that that has a contoured sole and a slightly flicker field to forefoot and that you don't do anything, be a foot. Okay. So it's a bit like Speaker 2: (34:30) Kelly's really we shouldn't if you've got an Achilles' don't run around before. Speaker 3: (34:34) Yeah cause the Kellys the interesting thing is there was the Achilles in the plant, that plant of first year runs from the heel to your toes underneath your foot and the Achilles that runs from your calf to your heel to function together. Yes. It's like a cradling. Yup. Right. So you should be doing your calf work. Yeah. Heel pain. So that's good. Yup. So all I want to do is change the forces on that bitch. That fascia. Yup. Alter those forces at the points that you normally in pain. Let's see what it does to your pain. Remembering that pain and tissue damage and not always exactly correlated. So I'd start with that one thing only and changing. Now I've got a free tip. Thanks for that. Yeah. And like you said, you posted was the science is changing all Speaker 2: (35:24) The time. Like we've been teaching, you know certain things play into the shadows and we all know that that does take a while to heal. It does take its time. But it's a pain in the ass, you know, and there's so many. We try and avoid injury obviously as much as we can. So and it's one of the most common things that we see coming up and he began to gain. So I'll try that. I will not go around bare feet anymore or actually at least put some shoes on when I'm at just walking around the house even. No, no, no. That works for the Achilles cause you know, when you in, when people are going from a cushioned shoe to a zero drop show, that's when we often see athletes get problems as well. Speaker 3: (36:08) Again, they can adapt. It's balancing out in that comfort and that little safety zone. Yes, we're, we're, how am I going to build the tolerance to new load without breaking them? And that is the challenge of every trainer out there. Speaker 2: (36:23) Yup. This is under training. We did talk briefly, we'll have to wrap up in a minute, but the buyer plasticity thing, we were talking before we got on this call recording about the fact that different people have abilities to withstand different amounts of pain in regards to whether the body with the dead individual thinks hurting themselves or not. And I said to you, I know that in my life, in through lots and lots and lots of training, I could get to a point where I nearly killed myself a few times because I would ignore my body's signs and signals to the point of, of stupidness looking bag. But, and, and I seek you by the same token, now that I'm haven't been doing super long stuff for a couple of years, that horizon of variability to go and push out to that level is also gone. But you reconnect via plasticity. Once you've got it, you have it will come back quicker. Speaker 3: (37:20) It w and, and the science is telling us, and this is recent, this is from last week's conference. The science is telling us that if we get young people active and moving and resilient and building tissues when they're younger, even if they spend, you know, 10 years sedentary and don't do anything, their ability to return to that is fun. It's easier and faster than someone who's never done that when, when they were younger. So we're starting from scratch. So Bioplast as a T is around the fact that our tissues are strong, we have huge ability. And one of the things I found fascinating we were talking about the league bone, the tibia. This was at the conference, the tibia, all the a runner. This is a hockey player and this is the thing that your guys may find really interesting. So bones, a deck with load. Speaker 3: (38:16) We all know that, right? So the more you load, and we know that people who run have higher bone density than people that are seen in tree. Okay. What I didn't know and I learned last week is that if we look at the shape, if we do a cross section of a tibia of a runner, the tibia will be from to back elongated. So it'll be long front to back and quite narrow. Yup. If you do the same thing with a hockey player, so cross section of a hockey players tibia, it will be the bone. This is the bone. The bone will be wider. Wow. As well as long. So what that suggests that the, and this is what they were talking about is that multidirectional exercise, stop, stop, push forward site. Yup. That is dynamic and high frequency is the best protection from, from bone injuries and bone injuries. Speaker 3: (39:17) Decreases the risk of stress fractures is one of them. Now you've talked about having heel pain. The other biggie in our runners is what we call medial tibial stress syndrome. Shin splints. Yup. Okay. Part of that is quite possibly because we're not doing enough multi directional work to build that within the bone would be going in one direction. So that was brand new to me. Thanks to sports medicine Australasia conference. So movement variability the question they asked of us to ask about our patients or about in your case, the people that you're training, can you do the same thing in different ways? So I try and avoid that. This is where we talk about mix up your shows. I talk about in my work with different shows and run on different terrains. Wow. It's awesome as well as cross training. So this is a model that is much more than this. Speaker 2: (40:13) There's some real deems eye for us to take away and I'll, what I'll do is I'll get you back on laser and we will go but more of a deep dive and the next time that we do this all those chips and injury prevention side of it if you wouldn't mind you're gonna yeah, we're going to have to wrap it up for the day, Lisa. But you have been absolutely wonderful. Thank you so much. Now I'm going to link in the show notes to your group, your website. I'm also your charity. And where can people find you on like Facebook or Instagram and that type of thing lists. Speaker 3: (40:45) If it's around the bio mechanical side. So just find me through business but I a tree, that's that, that's the easiest way to find me there. And otherwise probably the links that you gotta use the being project as well, there is ways to hook up with me through that as well. Speaker 2: (41:03) Awesome. No, you're fantastic when they said thank you very much for being on the show today. We really appreciate all your insights and your enthusiasm for this topic and I'm cheering the latest and science and watch out for that. What does it running vibe, run vibe, run vibe, run vibe. Watch out for that in the future guys. And I'm checking it out when it comes on the market. Speaker 3: (41:23) Thanks Lisa. Speaker 1: (41:25) That's it this week for pushing the limits. Be sure to write, review and share with your friends and head over and visit Lisa and her team at lisatamati.com

This week Lisa interviews one of her athletes from our Running Hot Coaching Tribe, Matt Scrafton. Matt joined Running Hot with the goal to run a 100km trail race at Taupo in New Zealand.  Previously he had successfully run a couple of 50km events and really wanted to push himself but as a Dad, husband and having a full on career he wanted to do this challenge without breaking himself.   Matt shares his triumphs and struggles on his road to 100km glory in this no holds barred honest and raw account of what it takes to run 100km when you have a full on life and you don't have the luxury of being a full time athlete or having all the talent of a Scott Jurek or Dean Karnazes. Many will relate and find inspiration in this story.  Matt describes himself as “An incurable dreamer. An unapologetic introvert. A Husband and father. Just a guy who loves life and running long distances. Since moving to New Zealand 14 years ago, Matt has swapped the rugby boots for endurance sport. He’s completed Coast to Coast, cycling round Taupo and and a few ultra races.”   You can follow Matt on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/mattscrafton/   We would like to thank our sponsors Running Hot - By Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff If you want to run faster, longer and be stronger without burnout and injuries then check out and TRY our Running Club for FREE on a 7 day FREE TRIAL Complete holistic running programmes for distances from 5km to ultramarathon and for beginners to advanced runners.   All include Run training sessions, mobility workouts daily, strength workouts specific for runners, nutrition guidance and mindset help Plus injury prevention series, foundational plans, running drill series and a huge library of videos, articles, podcasts, clean eating recipes and more.   www.runninghotcoaching.com/info and don't forget to subscribe to our youtube channel at Lisa's Youtube channel  www.yotube.com/user/lisatamat and come visit us on our facebook group   www.facebook.com/groups/lisatamati Epigenetics Testing Program by Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff. Wouldn’t it be great if your body came with a user manual? Which foods should you eat, and which ones should you avoid? When, and how often should you be eating? What type of exercise does your body respond best to, and when is it best to exercise? These are just some of the questions you’ll uncover the answers to in the Epigenetics Testing Program along with many others. There’s a good reason why epigenetics is being hailed as the “future of personalised health”, as it unlocks the user manual you’ll wish you’d been born with! No more guess work. The program, developed by an international team of independent doctors, researchers, and technology programmers for over 15 years, uses a powerful epigenetics analysis platform informed by 100% evidenced-based medical research. The platform uses over 500 algorithms and 10,000 data points per user, to analyse body measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home Find out more about our  Epigenetics Program and how it can change your life and help you reach optimal health, happiness and potential at: https://runninghotcoaching.com/epigenetics You can find all our programs, courses, live seminars and more at www.lisatamati.com    Transcript of interview: Speaker 1: (00:01) Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati brought to you by LisaTamati.com. Speaker 2: (00:14) Well, hi everybody. Lisa Tamati here at pushing the limits. Fantastic to have you back again. I really appreciate your naughty checking in on the show every week. Today. We've got a little something special for you. I've got actually one of our athletes it running hot coaching has agreed to come on and share his story. So it's a little bit of a debrief, a little bit of a coaching call. Hopefully you guys will pick up some gems of wisdom. We're gonna, she's gonna. She has insights and the journey that he went all to get to a hundred K, which was his ultimate race recently. So welcome to the show Matt Scrafton how are you? Morning, I'm good. How are you? Very, very good. So I met his sitting in Wellington. You got to sunny day down there. Speaker 3: (00:56) Yeah, it's beautiful and it's, there's no wind for once. So yeah, really nice. Speaker 2: (01:01) That's unusual. So I met let's step back at the beginning. So tell us a little bit about yourself, where you come from and then we'll get into the running side of it. Speaker 3: (01:13) Alrighty, Um so I'm British. And I've be, I moved to New Zealand in 2005 where I met my now wife. So I grew up in, in the UK and political Brighton by the sea. And we live in the mighty Waikato in Cambridge and we've been all over the place. You know, Alton, Wellington, Melbourne, but Cambridge is home and some my wife and I have a baby girl, Darcy's four, and we have a crazy eight months old poodle, Daisy. So life is pretty full. But yeah, no, I've been, I'm, I found running probably about six or seven years ago. I've been doing endurance sports or Madi sports, probably longer. But as time went on, it got harder to balance all three disciplines. And then I decided that I really wanted to do something that had an endurance element to it and trail running or running was the easiest, you know, put on your shoes, get out the door and go. Speaker 3: (02:07) So yeah, so I got into sort of trail running proper about six or seven years ago and set myself the goal as I kind of do with, with life of, of running a 50. And and we were living in Melbourne at the time and the North face 50 was a, an annual event in may of each year around the blue mountains. It's just outside of Sydney. Gorgeous rice. Yeah. And so I spent probably about a year building up for that with a few feeder events. But the big goal of running the 50 yeah. And did that eight hours, 39. And that was really tough. It was quite a hard race. But yeah, I was surprised that what I now understand to be that mental state that you there are so important to an athlete. That went, that race went really well mentally for me. Speaker 3: (03:02) So I thought, yep, this is definitely not a one off. So a couple of months later, Darcy arrived and, and life changed. So took a while. Yeah. Yeah. It took a while to find that, that rhythm. We moved back to New Zealand and I then locked in the terror wearer this year, actually, 2019 and so spent it about, you know, another year building up for that. But I was kind of, yeah, so doing the, I'm doing the 50, I did have aspirations to run further, but my wife said, no, no, get another 50 under your belt before you, before you go further. You know, that it definitely wasn't a one off. So yeah, spent about a year building up for the 50 and did that in I think it's February of this year. So came home in about seven hours and yeah, it was just a really hot day. Speaker 3: (03:55) And I thought there's no way I'm running and as our ultra in the middle of summer, it's just crazy times. Which probably discounts the marathon disabler but there we go. But the it was, it was pretty cool race fantastic atmosphere and some really great support crew and aid station folk that rock up and make it a really memorable day. And then I woke up, I got home, woke up the next day and I had this, this kind of overwhelming feeling that it wasn't, you know, it wasn't a sense of mission accomplished. I had done that, but there was more. And I didn't quite know what it looked like. So before everyone else got up, I was looking online for big events or things to do, you know, huge running goals to chase and telco was on in October, so it was always, Speaker 2: (04:45) Let's back up a little bit. So you ran 50 Ks, paid him some seven hours or something and the tank wasn't in thi the next day. Like most people get to the finish line on any race and go, never again. Well that's it. Unless a very experienced one or something, they know that that's, that's going to be temporary. But you in the very next day started looking online. Usually it takes at least five days. Speaker 3: (05:11) Yeah, no, I think I'm really like goal-orientated I I think I, you know, you, we do what we do during the hours of nine to five to make ends meet and pay the bills, et cetera. But running is I've come to learn that it's a, my thing, it gives me that time and space. And it's, you have a, there's a fantastic mental feeling that goes with running. And if you marry that for me with huge, big, hairy audacious goals it gives me that balance. And if I don't have that big hairy audacious goal on the horizon or near, then I start, I start to struggle. Yeah. And my life is a bit out of balance. So I think it was physically I was, I was a bit poked, you know, my legs hurt and you know, I had a few tight muscle groups. Speaker 3: (06:09) But there was definitely a sense of there's more in the tank. And for me it was a case of you've got this base, you've legs, you've come through, okay, yeah, they're gonna hurt, but whose legs wouldn't after running 50 a day and let's use that base as a launching pad for the next big hairy audacious goal. And the counsel or guidance from my, from my wife was find a 70 or 80 K wise woman. This lady, she is, yeah, very, very wise. She's my CEO, my CFO and everything else. But to ignore that, no, she's a lovely lady. See no, I, I did ignore it and as I tend to do with some guidance and I thought, no, let's go a hundred now. Let's lock it in because there was nothing else on the horizon that was closer and telcos on our doorstep and yeah, it was on. Yeah. Speaker 2: (07:05) Well, so Topo 100 K for people who, let's see, from overseas. So taco is universal part of the country in the North Island of New Zealand, and I have a hundred K of the year, which is, can be a muddy, muddy, and hilly fee. So you signed up for that already straight after, straight out of the gate after Tyler WEDA. And what happened then? Speaker 3: (07:28) Literally I text my brother in law and said, what are you doing on the 12th of October? I have a deal for you. And I, then you came back and said, yep, nothing. What have you got in mind? I said, Oh, would you like to be my support crew for 'em a hundred K? It's like, are you sure? It's crazy idea, but let's do it. When Shelly and Darcy woke up, I kinda very casually dropped in conversation and yeah, it, you know, I gave myself a good few weeks to recover. Possibly from what I've learned from Neil subsequent after the a hundred possibly digging it myself long enough to recover which then is how I, I met you Lisa. So yeah, so I started training and, and literally followed the same sort of process and build up that I'd been doing for the 50, but obviously slightly longer distances for the a hundred. And I think it was around may or June of this year that I started to realize that what had got me through the 50 wasn't necessarily gonna get me through the a hundred. And that's when I, yeah, that's when the world changed. Speaker 2: (08:35) And that's when you found us. Speaker 3: (08:37) Yeah. So I was looking for not only coaching but a community that I could connect with. Cause I think when we run, we do a lot of this stuff in isolation. And I think I was looking for more than just a frequent, frequent contact the coach. I wanted to understand how everyone else was doing the trials and tribulations irrespective of distance and just share that knowledge. And yeah, I did my research and I think you and I had a phone call and yeah, gave it a go and yeah. Jumped on board Speaker 2: (09:11) And yeah, so we were, we were start the heavy onboard and we've now got this 100 K goal. And you said, I think it's what's important is a lot of people stand out on their own and they, they, they do fine for a little while. And then you start to either run into injuries or you go weeks bigger or you start to have troubles in some way, shape or form. I begin a bit burned out, maybe lose your motivation. And that is some people often come to us and say, Oh, I need a bit of structure. And it's an, it's not like probably 90% of people who join us have hit the wall in some way or hit a big, big, big scary goal that they know they need to take a little bit more seriously. So it's one or the other. Or they're just starting out that that's another thing and they want some really good guidance and structure. So what was the main difference like when you came to running hot coaching and jumped into our planes, what was the major difference that you found campaign to say and screeching off the internet? Speaker 3: (10:17) Yeah. So I think the catalyst for looking beyond our training in isolation on my own was I wanted a more rounded approach to the a hundred. I realized that I wasn't spending enough time on core strength for example. And I also knew that my own knowledge and experience wasn't enough and that there were people out there who had years of experience and I'd be daft not to tap into that. So recognizing that I had my own limitations. So from a knowledge perspective and actually I, the biggest thing for me is that I was starting to get a sense that I wasn't approaching my long runs fresh. Yup. So I was going into the weekend quite fatigued and I wanted a more, I wanted to know if there was a way to balance training for a hundred so that you didn't feel you know, shot all the time and fatigued. Speaker 3: (11:11) So that was the catalyst. And and then the conversation with yourself and then actually working with Neil, it's on pick the a hundred K plan. I was like, wow, the longest run in the week, mid week is actually shorter than my current longest midweek run. So automatically the, I'm going to start feeling a little bit fresher. Yeah. And then I started getting actually the first core strength session I did, I probably couldn't walk proper for about a day or two. I remember doing the lunges and I was like, Oh wow, I'm going to, yeah, this is, there's a reason why I'm doing this. Speaker 2: (11:46) Oh, that's fine. So, and like [inaudible] that is a key thing. Like you don't know what, you don't sometimes how weak you've gotten to, like when you run, it's a catabolic exercise. So it starts at eight, you eat away at your muscles. And so if you're not counteracting that with strength training, with a, also with your mobility and for, for different reasons then over time you're going to get weaker and more flacid than the, in the, in the core for example, you'll have strong leaks, but that's what, you know, run isn't going to have strong links obviously, but the rest of you will, will suffer from. And that's when things can come unstuck as well, especially if you're not 20 anymore, you know, you need to start thinking about muscle max loss, which is, which we sort of lose around 200 grams a year after the age of 40 on average. So let's say they say so we want to be counteracting that as well as the fact that you are in a catabolic sport that is actually eating away at you and you want to be able to maintain. So, okay. You started into the strength program is think, well this is, this is different. Yeah. And how, how, how was it for you when the mileage, like a lot of people think, okay, I've gone from 50 to a hundred, I have to double the mileage. Doesn't work, does it? Speaker 3: (13:00) Absolutely not. No. So the a hundred, the leap from 50 to a hundred was for me, surprisingly manageable. I'm working in within the a hundred K plan that you guys gave me. So midweek run automatically shorter. So there's some gains there. And actually the, the longest run was actually comparable to my 50 K. Yeah. And I think we added maybe another hour onto it just because I was questioning, well, if I'm going to take 15 or 14 hours, then you know, do I need to run a little bit longer than what I've been doing? 50. And then it was like, you know, if you want to run a little bit longer, that's okay. But there isn't a one size fits all. You've got to just make it work for you. Speaker 2: (13:42) Yeah. Yup. And this is a, the thing that's like, I've said to people sometimes when they think, how the hell am I going to double that? And, and I'm not actually doubling the distance and I say to them like, when I'm running or set of 200 K race or two 50K race, I don't double it again, because you can't double it. You can't keep doubling that. You're training distance to suit your and with, we've come from, you know, most people have come from maybe a marathon,udistance training. We are, you know, from half marathon, two marathon, you steeping up your mileage a lot more and your long run does get a lot bigger and you're doing sort of three quarters, you know, 32, 33 K run as your longer time before Marisol. So people extrapolate that and think that that's what happens when you're doing a 200. Okay. And it isn't, you can't, you cannot physically recover from training intents on this. You kept choking or somewhat [inaudible]. Speaker 2: (14:39) But generally you can't recover. And that's where the wheels start to come off. People if they start to try to do this high mileage, so we're not high mileage coaches. And we get a lot of people coming to us who've come from high mileage coaches and that approach would work at the beginning and it will work when you're younger. When you've got kids in careers and you're getting a little bit older, they had approached that to unravel. If you're a lady, you can often start getting hormone problems as well. And so both sixes adrenal exhaustion is on the horizon too. So those are things that we always very aware of and you're trying to keep you from tipping over there. It's a very fine line to walk sometimes. Okay. So walk us through the next part of the process. Speaker 3: (15:23) So I think we're just on that around the longest run. So I training was going really well. You know, mobilization work, strength work, and then I got through what I turned my apex weekend, the longest run weekend. Yep. And I run it as per the schedule where I may be through one half an hour for mental confidence and yeah, it's about 43 K I think in total. Five and a half hours in the Hills. Yeah. And then that the following week is when it all came crashing down, fell off. The wheels did come off big time. Yeah. Yeah. I, I'm Speaker 2: (16:03) You run into an injury problem. Speaker 3: (16:05) I did. I had basically an absolute awful pain sensation in my left ankle tendonitis. They turned out and that, yeah, that happened literally on the Wednesday after my long run. I could feel it. You know, in the sort of the Tuesday morning and then I went for another run on the Wednesday, which I shouldn't have done. And it was hurting like never, like no other pain I'd had before. So I knew something wasn't quite right. And managed to get to see my awesome physio in Cambridge and and she said, yeah, you've got some, some tendonitis. And we basically worked up a plan where I would, and I, I think at that point, if I don't take it back a step, there was a day, I think it was a Thursday where I was sitting in my office in Cambridge and I was literally in tears because I thought, how am I, how am I going to get to the start line, let alone the finish line and put all this effort in. And you know, I spoke about the balance or the need to have balance in professional life and personal life. Suddenly I could see the Seesaw completely, you know, mounted as broken for overseas friends. And I I was just learning bits because I thought, I can't run. How the, what am I going to do? I can't walk this thing. So I think I flipped you guys a note and said, how do I typo? Speaker 2: (17:35) You were in immediately black spice and you, you reached out and I could tell from the, you know, you asking about specifically about the, the injury I think, which was part of the same, but the what, what, where I jumped in was more the, the meaningful side of it because you were, you were taking the deep dive. So when you've put your heart and soul into something massive and then it starts to unravel and then you're thinking you're fearing not being, because it's not along to the race now that you're not going to get there. And every decision that you're missing in this is very, you know, normal things that though it still starts crashing down around your ears. So how did they, so I, I jumped on a call with you and we started to work through some of the, the mental stuff. How did that help you? Speaker 3: (18:18) Yeah, it was, it was really interesting cause I, I went straight to the physical side. So how do I taper? How do I still do these sessions? You know, I've got an internal session tomorrow. How do I run that with an ankle that I can't run them? And you're like, no, no, no, no, no. Take a step back here. This is you, you, I think you actually said you've got this your legs have got all the miles they need to do to do the a hundred is now about the upstairs. How do you mentally stay, stay in the fight to get yourself to the start line and through the race. And I was, I was actually quite taken aback about that because I thought, well, I'm missing all these sessions or I'm going to be missing all these sessions. Speaker 3: (18:59) And I'm generally fairly confident person, but I guess susceptible to blows from life as, as anyone is. Yeah. And I couldn't, I wasn't listening to you, I think at first. And then you followed up in an email and it, I actually, it took me three or four attempts to reread what you'd written. And then we communicated over the next 48 hours. And you said over the weekend, I want you to read a book if you can. And the book is the biology of belief. Yeah. Bruce Lipton. Yeah. And it was a little too it took me way beyond my, my scoring. Yeah. School level science around biology, but it was the last section that really knitted it all together, which is about how your perception and beliefs influence your physiology or can influence your physiology. And I think that's when the penny dropped for me that this is all about the mind going into these next three and a half weeks. Speaker 2: (20:06) Yup. And that's the key point because the situations happen, the injuries happen. Speaker 3: (20:12) Yup. Speaker 2: (20:13) What we've got, we can, we can, the, the, the, the thing that you're going to do wrong is to keep training over that injury and to try and fight through it when you've got a rise at the other rains. So the panic is that I'm not going to be fit enough when the reality is if you, if you get through 70, 80% of your total training malls, you're going to be fine. And I, and as a coach, you don't, you, you trying to get your people, I'm a bit more than that, but if something happens, you, you will get there. The best race I've ever had in my life, one of the most amazing races put that way, let have, was that one that I did in the Himalaya's, which I shared with you, that 222 K rice. So of the two highest mountain passes and in the world mudroom bubble passes and I ripped the ligaments off my league team weeks out from the rice. Speaker 2: (21:01) I couldn't run for seven weeks and I had a hypoxic brain concussion from doing altitude training. So I didn't have enough oxygen in my body. So of course all these evictions and so on. Some of the listeners would have heard this story, but eh, when I, and I was either I'm going to pull out or I'm going to carry on. And I decided I'm carrying on because I'm put in so much. If it as you know, the effort that goes into training for something like this, we need alone the sponsorship, the foam, the documentary that, you know, the whole works just made that I couldn't just pull out. And so I had to try and face it with only a couple of weeks training at the end of that seven week. So not being able to train on my foot. So I did cross train, I didn't want to cook with my body and I spent the rest of that time on my mindset. Speaker 2: (21:44) And when I got to the stat line, my body was actually in better shape than if I'd smashed it right till the end because I'd actually given my, my body hadn't had a recipe years putting it, you know, mildly. And so this actually was the best thing that could've happened and it was fit. And I did the 222K race mind do like a really hard, tough, long at altitude, extremely dangerous race and, and killed it, you know, was, was briefly had, I've got documentary if anyone was walked,uI'm slightly simplifying it, but the point was you didn't need to do every one of those training sessions that you think you need to do. And when you don't have the choice, it's either you change your mindset to the whole thing and you stay on board with it and you better, or you give up and you pull out or you keep trying and you and yourself even more, and then you might be out for six months, you know? Speaker 3: (22:37) Yeah. And I think the, the biggest thing as human beings, we often always easy to do, is to, is to not learn from the mistakes as we go through life. You know, to the definition of madness is to repeat the same action and keep expecting the same or different outcome. Okay. And, yeah. So, so I think you know, when I spoke to you in that scenario that you described around that, that race, you said to me, the one thing you did do was you asked your support crew and those around you on that day or leading up to the event and through it to be 100% positive that you didn't want any negativity around you. So when I was going through this over that weekend I said to my wife, you know, do I pull out? She said, well, you can't because you, there's no point. Speaker 3: (23:20) You missed the withdrawal date. Yup. No, you might as well just take each day as it comes, see where you are. We're going to go down, everyone's booked in to come down and stay, et cetera. So that's just do it and just see what happens. My wife is a Kiwi. She's her world view is inherently positive. I'm, I'm British and naturally cynical about most things in life. So glass half full glass half, we kind of marry each other out. But yeah, so, so I I got through that weekend and I jumped in the pool and on the bike and I was having physio, physio sessions and I wasn't running and it was a really weird sensation. Weight in the sense I felt like I was getting behind. So that's when I, little things like, you know, I did that accountability mirror exercise where I took post-its and wrote down in a motivational statements or words on a mirror and I took a wee picture and I know it's a silly thing I did just to hold myself accountable going through the next three and a half weeks to do towel pose. Speaker 2: (24:28) And that is not silly. That is really, really good. Anything, any positivity that you can surround yourself with is, is the mental game, is everything in ultra? Speaker 3: (24:37) Oh, it is totally. And this is the biggest, you know, you do these events in life and I've, the one thing I've learnt this time round is that it is all mental. It is a hundred. I mean you're also, you're palsy, you know, needs to be conditioned. [inaudible] Speaker 2: (24:52) Healthy and you need my foot. But the rest is in your head. And Oh man, I'll say next weights, you know, finish races that they shouldn't have been running cause they went far enough to do it, but mentally they were strong enough to get through it. We don't recommend doing that because you're going to scroll your body in the long run, but it is about this up here. How much, how much pain can you suffer, how much can you overcome, how much, what's your why and how big is that? Why and how strong is that? Why you really, really want this? And then you find ways around obstacles. And, and I think having seen what I've seen in other athletes, I've seen people with incredibly bad injuries survive races. I've seen you know, people who are blind run across the Sahara. And I've seen this before. People with, with one leg run across your belly. And a whole bunch of people who carry kids who had cerebral palsy is to give them a cross them a mouth on the Saturdays, you know incredible stories. People who really believed in saving the rhinoceroses and addresses the rhinoceros the entire time across the Sahara. You know, absolutely crazy things that physically shouldn't be now able to do. But they did. Speaker 3: (26:05) But because of their why and their purpose, they did. Yeah, absolutely. Speaker 2: (26:08) In a very, very strong why. And there has to be the, the ultimate. OK. So you, you started to tune your mindset around, so this positivity and surrounding yourself with positive people and your wife's telling you, you could, you know, you got this, we started, we just starting and that is the thing. Get to the stat line, start, see what happens. Speaker 3: (26:24) Yeah. And I think the biggest thing they have along the way, I was training with a guy it lives in Oakland and we've done a few training runs together and I sent him a text set, ah, you know, with start together, but we'll be finishing separately. I don't know if I'm going to finish in my current state. And he phoned me and he, he's a really happy go lucky guy, positive outlook. He said, no, no, we will walk this out together if we have to. And I thought, wow, okay. That's, that's pretty cool. So yeah. Speaker 2: (26:58) Oh yeah. This guy gives us his name. Give them a shout out. Speaker 3: (27:01) Johnny. Johnny, Denise. Yeah. Nice. Good guy. So yeah, so Johnny and I were, we ended up training separately of those last couple of weeks. And I was trying not to look at Strava and you know, get envy about long runs that he was putting in. And I was in the poll in my Emma Speedos. It wasn't good. But anyway yeah, no, so sorry, go on. Yeah, it worked. It worked. Yeah. So we got through that through those last few weeks. I'm in the pool and on the bike and having some fun on the mountain bike. And actually it was really nice just to get out in the Hills and just turn around. And then I remembered actually coming down one single track in, in Cambridge that I was actually doing a race the following weekend, so I should probably take it easy and not go too fast in case it came off. But yeah, no. So I, I started just to test the run walk literally the Monday before the race on the Saturday and that was the first time I'd got back on my feet and it was a really tentative run walk. And then I did another one the next day. And then the final one I think was on the Wednesday and no reactions from the ankle. So I thought, well, yeah, big, big mental hurdle cleared. You know, we're locked in to do this and we're going to do it. And yeah. Speaker 2: (28:18) And that's pretty like, it's pretty ballsy to be fair. You know, like it is hard when you're facing a hundred K and you haven't been able to try and fill the last few weeks and you're in the last phone a week, people before the race and you're like, can I even walk, run, walk, run in a couple of days you can change it. We'll be trying this out. And you're standing on the start line and said, and the morning it a hundred K, you know, it takes a lot of mental strength. So well done. Thank you Chuck it all in. Speaker 3: (28:44) No, definitely not. And I think at that point even I think my physio had said to me you are doing this, you can do this. And that you will break, you will not break anything in your ankle if you do this. And it hurts. It's just, it's not just ligaments, tendons, just tendons and they will recover. And I think that hearing that actually, I was like, okay, so if my body hurts, it's going to have to live with it and my mind is going to tell it. And that was the process I was going through. I think I spoke to you in the buildup and you said to me that this could be the body's way of trying to tell your mind that this isn't a great thing to do. Let's just sit back and watch some Netflix on the Saturday. Speaker 2: (29:20) Yes. Let's dive into that for a sec. The, in my experience in nearly every big race that I've done and the week before or two weeks before, something goes wrong on my body. Like I get sick, I'll get a cold, I get the flu, I get something, some, some single play out. And I, and I S I think it's the subconscious we aiming already actually body because it knows that you've got this big race coming up and it's trying to stop you. We'll throw everything at you. Just stop you. Speaker 3: (29:50) Yep. And that book I mentioned earlier yeah, a lot of it was about using your conscious mind, so not drifting off into unconscious thinking, focusing on the now using your conscious mind. And there's a lot more power in, in, in potential, in the using your conscious mind rather than the subconscious mind. So if you play it forward, then my subconscious was trying to tell me not to do the race because it's going to be tough. It's going to hurt. But my conscious mind was going, no, you've got this, you can do this. It's going to hurt, but it's gonna be fine. Yeah, yeah. We are doing this. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So we got through that last week and you're headed off to Topo and it was just a really interesting segue the night before Johnny and I, we've got a big house in our families came down and my, my mother and father who I love them to bits and my father in law was chatting away with Johnny who was really laid back and Johnny was having a, just the odd beer, one beer before the race. Speaker 3: (30:55) And I'm quite serious about my prep. I was not talking to anyone. I was going through my mental checklist and all that stuff. And my father in law said to me, man, why aren't you more like Johnny lay back and relax? I was just like, nah, we're all different. You know, everyone's got a little different around different ways of preparing. So yeah. So there's nothing wrong. Speaker 2: (31:17) And by the way, cause I mean, I talked to me the night before you know, I'm in the zone, you're in the zone and, but there are people who are just totally chilled out and whatever happens happens when that, the different personality types, unless I wasn't really be confused because everyone has their own way of preparing for such a battle because it is going into Epic bed already. Speaker 3: (31:37) Yeah. I think physically I'd appreciated the difference prior to this race around ultras and running and athletes, you know, we all come from different shapes and walks of life, but mentally as well, I was seeing some really interesting sides of people and athletes. So yeah. So yeah, John and I were up the next day about I think four o'clock got to the start line half five. It was absolutely freezing and telco. And I actually, I've never done this before, but I fell asleep again in the car on the way to the style line is about a 40 minute journey. But for me it was a sign of just how relaxed I was and whatever was going to want to fold was going to one fold, but it was going to do so in a way that was going to have a positive outcome. I was, I was quite relaxed about it. Which was really bizarre. So Speaker 2: (32:27) Thanks. Turn around to the T is three weeks before and the Speaker 3: (32:31) Oh, chalk and cheese. Yeah. Chalk and cheese. Yeah. I yeah, so there's, so we got going and Johnny had forgotten his headlight as usual, so I let us out and I said to John, look, we're going to run, run what I call fifteens, which is you run 10 minutes and maybe walk for five minutes. And I think I said to Johnny that it's going to be the pattern for me throughout the race. And he was like, yep, sweet. I'll run with you would walk this together. You just set the pace you, you'd be mr timekeeper. And we go so we we started off and are we running really comfortably? I think we ran the first 20 miles you know, I don't know, roundabout, just under four hours or something. Yeah. and at one point we were, Johnny was leading in and we were running up the Hill, then we were running down a Hill and he said, Oh, I probably ran that a bit hard. Speaker 3: (33:21) How's that? Yep. So but we were trying not to get too excited and carried away with ourselves. So to got to that first checkpoint, all good. And then I think it, it started to hit home around the, you know, you get into the race and we were running this sort of 15 thing where you run 10 and walk five. And I had this little checklist in my head where I'd come up with four things to think about on a rotation deliberately so that I could focus on the now using my conscious mind. Does that make sense? Yup. Yup. Yeah. So I, I'd ran through this little cycle where I'd go you know, what's my effort? Am I running comfortably? Am I running too fast or too slow check. My nutrition you know, have I eaten in the last half an hour? Have I taken some water in fuel? Speaker 2: (34:11) It's called association. I call that association where you're associating, you're actually checking in with your body. Yeah. And then another strategy, which is just association, when you're in pain that you're actually go off and do your heavy place and might be visualizing, may swimming with whales or something like that, that I'm in somewhere else or I'm renovating my house or I'm doing something like that and I'm taking my mind somewhere else. So these two strategies are really, really good to open to your practice. Speaker 3: (34:37) So now I know that I was doing the disassociation thing around the ADK Mark, but the yeah, so I was, and the other thing I deliberately, I was checking, you know, am I in touch with my environment? Can I feel with my feet and in whatever, my body, the physical environment, just to make sure that I was using my conscious mind. And I would go through this little checklist again, every 20 minutes or so. And so we got through the first 20 miles, it felt quite, quite quickly. And we hit the farm lands, which is a really monotonous physical environment, more walking or hiking than it is running. And it's not fun. It's not inspiring. But we got through that, hit the first major aid station, I think it was around the 50 K Mark. And I said to Johnny I'm now running into territory unknown territory from a distance perspective, even though I've technically run longer time on feet, this is going to be your ground. Yeah. so they'll talk about the different approaches. Johnny and I Johnny got to that big ice station and he had a white bike fritter. And I was like, no, I cannot stand that stuff. Speaker 3: (35:53) So yeah, so I, as, as we left the ice station, my wife said, how you feeling? And I said, honey, I'm really suffering. She said, well, you're halfway. This is all upstairs now. I see the neck see you at 75 K or whatever it was. I was like, Holy moly. So here we go. I'm sorry. It literally felt like I was stepping off an area called comfort and known into the unknown and uncomfortable, and this is going to hurt. It's gonna hurt. And this is where growth happens. Yeah. Yeah. So and we were running together, but we were always about, I don't know, three or four meters apart just because that's how you find yourself. And I think I got to about 65 K in Kinlock or something like that. And I said, I was crying behind my glasses, my sunglasses, because I was going through this dark patch where I was like, if I stop, I'm going to stop and I'm going to let all these people down and I will have this sense of underachievement pressure, yeah. Speaker 3: (36:59) For hanging around my neck. And as we approached, or one of the mini stations, I said to Johnny, Oh, you run on now, I'm I'm close to DNS thing. I'm gonna work through this. He said, no, no, no. We are, we're going to walk. We start if we have to together. Wow. He's doing. Yeah, he is. He's a really good dude. So so then our run at that point became a shuffle and you know, you're tired, you're physically tired. You can't run at that same pace. So we're still running, but it was just a, a shuffle and yeah, Johnny dragged us into the into the Kinlock aid station where we picked up our pacer. And my wife's friend who's training for coast Hannah, so she she signed up to be a pacer and yeah, my my wife took a video. Speaker 3: (37:48) She she asked me a question and she was videoing the response at the, at the 74 K line and a station, sorry. And she said, how do you feel? And I said explicative tired. And she said, Oh do you want to do a another hundred or on 160 after this? And there were a few more expletives that followed. And she she's kept the video and I've, it's a nice reminder, but so then we, yeah, we Johnny had another white bite fritter and I was just like, my God, he's going to suffer in a minute. And yeah, so we hit the Hill behind Kinloch and off we went. And that's, I think when the disassociation came in for me, cause my, my body was really hurt and my feet were really broken, like listers, toenails, just feet were sliding all over the place in my shoes. And it got through Kinlock with a reduced shuffle. And then I think we popped out around the 90 K Mark and into the, off the Hill. And I think that's when I th I finally felt that I was going to do this or sort of finish it. Yeah. Speaker 2: (38:58) That's a good feeling when you think, yeah, I've got this now. Like, Speaker 3: (39:01) Yeah. I mean I think we are our pacer was really good. She, you know, was checking in and if you're pacing someone that you've, you, you know, haven't done that sort of distance with, it's you've got to find your rhythm. And when we got to that last day station, I think, you know, eight K to go or whatever it was that's when we all thought, yeah, this is this, we're on the home stretch here. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And across the finish line and yeah, happy days Speaker 2: (39:30) Come back to like be like you've been in the, in the hurt locker for a good city. K so 25 Ks or something, which is an awful long time by the way. And I always say to people, the rice doesn't really step from Sydney. [inaudible] Usually that's when you know, when you pace yourself, right, with you hydrated, right. Whether your nutrition was right up until that point. And there's always going to be a time in those big long races and that can laugh for hours when you're absolutely miserable and you just want to die every second and give out. And if you can get through that, sometimes what happens is very often as you come into another space where suddenly it's all good again, you don't know how or why, but you, Bonnie sort of comes back. Did you experience that? Speaker 3: (40:09) Yeah, I think so. I took the, I spoke about in that 60 K Mark, you know, where I was close to DNF thing and you know, when Johnny said to me no, we're going to walk this out if we have to. So let's just keep going. I think what I now understand a little bit more about, I was going through a battle with my body and mind and what my body was going. Now let's just stop, you know, there's an aid station, there should, it can come pick you up. We'd go home and my mind was like, no, no, you were going to do this. And it was, it was like there's a little war going on between the two. Totally. Yeah. And Speaker 2: (40:39) Welcome to the, I enjoy the devil, the lion and the snake. Yeah. Louder. And it gets more and more frantic up there. Right. Speaker 3: (40:46) And I, I'd, I'd heard about it from, from you and others around in that war, your, your mind is telling your body, no, we're going to do this. So just shut up and just live with the pain. And that pain that I was experiencing physically actually reached a point and it didn't go any further. It just settled, it dissipated. And and then I got into a happy, happy place where I thought, yeah, I've got a shuffle going on. I'm not gonna run this full bore, full bore. I can't, but I'm moving forward and I'm getting closer to the next stage station and we're going to pick up HANA, you know, 74K and then we're going to do the same from there, up and over. Kinlock. Uand even with my, you know, like going through that,uI found a way to keep moving. Speaker 3: (41:39) It was almost as if the blisters, they were just blisters, they were going to go away. Toddlers grow back. And that's how I kind of quickly processed it. But it was just keep, even if you have to walk up the Hill, walk up the Hill, yeah, it's fine. Cool. so yeah, we got to, you know, from the 63 to Kinlock, which is a 74 and I think I mentally was getting into happy site. You know, like I, my body had quiet and down. The pain had kind of reached a point but hadn't got worse. And mentally I was I was over, you know, picking up the pace of 74 was a significant milestone. And we were, I think I could see the end you know, it was, we were close and it was just a case of getting through it. Yeah. And I was, I was still trying to bring myself back to the now going through my little checklist I mentioned earlier. And it was a way of just kind of putting into a little box the different pains or feelings I was experiencing. Discomfort around my feet, discomfort around my legs, you know, it got worse or sorry I've got bad, but it wasn't gonna get any worse. Speaker 2: (42:58) It's quite funny on that point. That yeah, when the body starts to scream at you, it's a bit like when it does pre-race, you know, when it throws it, you know, a sickness that you at the cold or some something that or try and stop you doing it and also does it arise. We are getting to the point where you like, the pain is so bad. You're thinking, how the hell am I going to carry on? And then when you do persevere, once again, the brain seems to go, Oh well she's not stopping. We've got to keep going. So I better stop putting those signals out. I don't know how it works. And I'd be interesting to see if other athletes have experienced the same thing, but it doesn't actually get any worse than bad. It's already bad, but keep getting worse. Speaker 3: (43:40) Yeah. And you know, it's, I don't know whether it was a combination of you know, mental fortitude or whatever word you wanna use or we'd reached a significant milestone. So getting up and over Kinlock Hill was huge cause it in 90 K there's two little eight stations and hitting the eight, the ice station at 90 K, as soon as you turn the corner off the ice station, it was like a wall of noise from the finish area had made its way up to up. You could hear it. And it was like, wow, we are so close. So any, it was like another wave just picked you up and was going to carry you down this, this fricking mountain. And you know, you could just, where that point, we were kind of walking shuffling and it was in the dark and it was quite wet. Speaker 3: (44:30) So you'd probably didn't have any other choice to be honest. And it was just, you know, you could feel the end. So we just made our way down the mountain. And we were joking amongst the three of us, you know, pace from Johnny about, you know, what we're going to have to, we was our favorite post race mill, just really silly crabs that was just getting us through the finish to the finish. And yeah, so yeah, we, we, we hit that last cause like a sty that you've got to climb over and it's like a physical barrier where you're leaving the trials to a four wheel drive tack that literally throws you out at the finish line and climbed over that STI. And it was just, we've done it. We know we're almost there. Speaker 2: (45:20) And you can see, you know, you can see that you can hear the people and you can feel that you're getting near and you can light at the end of the tunnel after a very dark long tunnel. Speaker 3: (45:29) Yeah. And it was, it was funny. It's like, wow. You know, you crossed the line, we crossed the line together. I had a big of a bit of a hug and you know, like we've, I think it was a realization for me that, wow, we'd, we'd just done this. There's a huge achievement personally, yeah, Speaker 2: (45:48) It is a huge achievement. What did you feel at the finish line? Because some, sometimes in sunrises I felt like, you know, I've just broken down in tears, absolutely with relief and I can actually stop because you dream about being able to stop and other times it's just no emotion because you just like numb. You sort of wanted that beyond anything. What was your reaction? Speaker 3: (46:10) So what I didn't mentioned is on that way up and over Kinlock Hill towards the 80 and 90 K stations, I, I was going through a real roller coaster of emotion, you know, just trying to get to that final eight station. When I'd, I was on the home stretch, I was, I'm really struggling to hold back the tears. And Johnny was in front of me. My pace was behind me, so they had no idea what my facial expression was. But so, so I thought, and I actually Johnny Johnny and I said, look, there's going to be some tears at the finish line, Hannah pacer be prepared across the finish line. And my overall overwhelming feeling was done it job done. And yeah, it was just satisfaction. I think it was w with no tears at the finish line because I think that emotion had passed and I think it was just sheer bloody relief. Yeah. Keep going. And I think it was excitement of now being able to eat real food like chips or dip or pizza or just something other than you know, a gel or you know, the equivalent paleo equivalent. Yeah, Speaker 2: (47:27) Yeah, yeah, yeah. All the horrible stuff. You're sick to death of what in and you thought EEG and it starts really, really interesting. The emotions that you go through. I did a a hundred K rice with Neil, you know, my, my offsider running hot coaching and it was his face on hundred and I mentioned this before, but he got, you know, he's a, he's a strong, tough med, but it's 70 Ks. He was in tears. He was in so much pain and he couldn't see his way to the finish line. You know, when you get into that deep dark space of absolute despair. And it also, and I cried pretty much every race, you know there's this, I don't think there's ever been an ultra where I haven't balled my eyes out somewhere. It's just part of the thing. And what happens is that when you get, when you have given everything at your body, you are so raw and you're so emotional, like everything is like any little thing can sit you off. Speaker 2: (48:27) Hello D and I was like 180 Kazan or something into death Valley, 270 K the same thing guys. And I was in such a world of pain and there was a 60 kilometer strike road that was just blowing my mind. And Neo was running behind me and he exited. We hit my ankle when he was running, just, just a couple of steps behind. And he hit my ankle and he tripped me up. And the adrenaline rush of being tripped and falling just opened the floodgates of the emotions. Like, cause I was holding it together desperately. And when I fell on the drill and came out, I was just bawling for the next hour, still running up, polling my eyes out and just could not control myself, you know. And he was like mortified. I swapped people who are, who are cruising for me. And it wasn't, it wasn't about him. Just that shock of falling just released everything that you are holding on so tightly toe. It's a ultra marathon and doing something like this huge achievement that you've just done is really it's life squeezed into a 50 an hour or 50 narrow or whatever it was, timeframe. Speaker 3: (49:46) It's, yeah, every emotion that you can possibly feel you in a, in a human lifetime, you can, you know, you just go through a roller coaster of emotions. And I think for me that, you know, from 60 K through two sort of 80, 85 when we crossed that last day station that was probably mentally quite tough, you know, just to keep moving one step after another. And then you, it was just sheer, utter relief. Yeah. Job done. Yeah. Speaker 2: (50:21) Yeah. So now you've done your Europe year in the hundred K club, you're an ultra marathon now done, you've done a few FFTs already in this, your first hundred. How are you feeling? You're three weeks out, have you, what w what often happens with runners, and I won't free that with you, but how did you go through a bit of a elation stage and then a ho down the other side stage and a bit of a depression before you started coming out the other end? Are you still in that roller coaster of a post race situation? How are you keeping now? Oh, we lost you there for a sec. [inaudible] Yup, yup, yup. We know on the pool was sorry about that people. So yeah. Did you F what are you going through now? Emotionally? Speaker 3: (51:16) So I I think I, I probably relaxed too quickly post race. I, I'm is my wife's 40th birthday, a couple of days after. So you know, that new, that normal discipline around diet and hydration probably relaxed a bit too quickly. And I suffered that first week not only with like aching niggles and blistered feet, but I had a, a really heavy, bad, nasty cold. So my immune system was absolutely smashed from the race I think. And just my body going, I think know, thank God that's over. But I, I started walking you know, daily on the Monday. So I had Sunday off, started walking and then walk, running again by Wednesday just to keep the body moving. And I got through the cold and I'm back running. But I've, I've seen some advice in the group around from Neal around, you know, try and keep that long, run to no more than an hour. Speaker 3: (52:14) First month I had a chat with Neil actually around you know, what is my recovery looking like? And I wanted to I, I S I swore during the race I would never do this, but I've started to look at what next and I actually, I'm getting itchy feet around. Myla so 160 K so but it's not for, it's not for cause North burn really appeals to me from a sheer physical challenge. I don't think I wanna go back to Tara [inaudible] and do the a hundred or the 160, because the environments are similar to telco. Yeah. So I'm drawn to really challenging races, physically challenging, like really gnarly mountainous, hilly, tight races. So North really appeals to me. Yeah. So that's a 20, 21 goal, I think. I want to, somebody said to me the other day, take some time to smell the roses. And I'm just going to enjoy running and just mountain biking. You're having fun, but my body's coming. Right. yeah, I I'm just gonna still run absolutely by just, I just wanna run for the enjoyment Speaker 2: (53:26) Of it at the moment for my, for my 2 cents as, as when, when after a race, you often do have an immune system because you have knocked the hell out of your immune system. Really. You've, you've used that point every, a lot of your hormones, like your endorphins and serotonin. So you can go into it at depression about usually 10 days out seeming to teen dies yet is when you usually have a bit of a mental job. You can be on a high for a couple of days straight after the race because you're, you saw you're tired, but just so stuck with yourself and you're on this adrenaline. Your body's been in a fight or flight state during that race. And so it's still in that fight or flight state often for a good couple of days. And then you start to come down from it and that's when you can start to get sick. Speaker 2: (54:10) And you also usually ravenously hungry at this time. So you just pigging out like no tomorrow. And your body is actually goes into a repair state after, you know, a couple of days and you come down and often that can be quite a Rocky road for people. Not always, but it is number one, you've lost the big goal that you had that is now achieved and done and there's a bit of an empty space in your life and then you're, you're also, you've had a bit of a trauma, you've gone through some trauma, so there's some post-traumatic sort of stuff going on. Some you're still working through. What the hell was that that I just experienced, especially when you do overseas races and you are out of your actual cultural environment on top of it all. And then after team dies, you might start to come out of it. Speaker 2: (55:01) That sort of adept, which often happens and then is when your mind starts to go, what next? Because you've got a big hole and you sort of need something to be aiming towards again. Yeah. Thing is, and this phase is, it's great to have and I'm glad you say 2021 because that means that you're being like sensible in, in, you're going to let your body get over this experience and then build yourself up again. And you have some other races, no doubt along the way that will build you to Wallington northbound 2021 and North burners approach little tasks a hundred mater. Like if you, if, if you wanted an easy a hundred water, that ain't it, you know, I bet any easy a hundred motto cause a hundred most soccer balls. But that one is a particularly tough, tough, tough one. But super exciting and an amazing, have been really lovely family. Speaker 2: (55:54) I was cofounder of that race and loved it and I sold it last year to the guys teary and Tom and, and they, they've done a fantastic job with it. And it's really a special special event and it's a small family event as opposed to the big Tyler widow. I'll post that. It's a lot more this corporate feel. It's a lot more intimate. And I also think for me that I wanna quite life is so precious. I want to, I want to spend time being as well and not just getting lost, chasing massive goals all the time. Oh, you're so wise. Honestly, like honestly the, a lot of people go into this phase because I've seen it like, you know, after having trained so many people and gone through this process with so many people, you get to camps, you get the ones who say on never even want to do that to myself again. Speaker 2: (56:44) And then they gone out of, out of it. Hopefully if you've prepared people well, like don't actually fall off completely, but often they need a really decent break or you get other ones who go, that's totally lost without the next huge thing. And I, and I fell into that camp for many, many years on this hamster wheel of having to do events because I didn't know what the hell else to do with myself if I wasn't completely, this was my identity and it was very tied up with who I was and my self esteem and my confidence. And so when, like three years ago, and I actually retired from the long staff because my mom but it was overdue, it was overdue to have a break, you know, at least a break if not, you know feminine. Like, because I was just in this hamster wheel of, of trying to outdo myself all the time. Speaker 2: (57:39) And you can't, you know, there comes a point where you can't do more than you did. You know, you can't keep topping it and keep trying and you just blowing yourself out completely and you're not allowing yourself that recovery time in between. And I can even see it in some of the top, top elite, you know, famous super crazy ultra runners out there that I'm friends with who are still doing it as they're getting older and older and older and this like the fifties and sixties, but that, that they, they the obsessive, you know, and then not as healthy as I could be if they actually took a step back now and I'm going to take some time out for a year or two and just reassessed where my body's at. And it's really hard to do that to step away for a while because you know that to get back to that level, why are we're out now and do a hundred K or something. Speaker 2: (58:36) I couldn't go and just do it because I haven't been trained to get back there would be in your mind, the hard part is when you've done so many is that you expect yourself still to be there even when you are not there. And it really hard one for people coming back from injuries for older runners, people who have retired and then we'll come back out or then I they did to get I've got a lady at the moment who's been struggling with a really bad illness and was comparing herself to how she was two or three years ago as to how she is now and rebuilding and keeping and being very disappointed in herself because she still thinks she's back there instead of going, starting from scratch again in moving forward in what was, is gone and not comparing yourself to who you used to be. Speaker 3: (59:27) Yeah, I think, yeah. And I think you know, when I did coast 10 years ago, coast to coast I started and stopped very abruptly, the whole endurance small sport journey and it took a few years to reconnect with running. I don't want to stop running, but I, there's no way I could do why I probably could, but I, I would just, I wouldn't be best prepared. Do you know what I mean? Speaker 2: (59:53) Wouldn't be the best husband and you wouldn't be the best father, the best person you are at work. You know, so it these things and this is what I try to get across to people is that when you take on these message goals, you are sacrificing some other part of your life and it's, it's and that's fine if that's what you've decided you're going to do, but to understand the impact that it's going to have on your husband and wife and your children, what impact, you know, for positive infinitive it can, but if you are doing it back to back to back to back, it can actually have a negative effect on your family and your friends on it. So what's weighing all that sort of stuff up and understanding where we are as my focus going now? It's something I battle with constantly because part of me wants to go back and do all that crazy stuff right now when I have other priorities, it's just life. Sometimes it's very hard to, to knock it down on yourself and to feel guilty cause you're not doing everything. Speaker 3: (01:00:54) Yes. Yeah. And, and life's important, you've gotta enjoy it as you go through it. And if, yeah, I dunno. That's so I, I, yeah, I finished and I'm happy, but I'm actually at peace now with the fact that next year is some smaller races. But the big one is me potentially in 2021. Speaker 2: (01:01:12) Yeah. And you've done this one and what your friends said celebrate and smell the roses. That is a fantastic principal to take away. And it's something that someone told me at the end of a big race when I just went, Oh, what, you know, I wasn't as fast as so-and-so and I didn't, you know, I bet it's a bit a longer race and they went for goodness sake, you know, after I'd just run a mess. Okay. Right. They just said, you know, cannot, can you not just congratulate yourself, celebrate your wins, integrated into your psyche and who you are before you go chasing the next goal. Yeah. Actually type this hundred K telco run and put it in your hat and go, I fricking did that in our religion for doing that. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna suck this, I'm gonna suck this one dry before I go and chase the next. Speaker 3: (01:02:04) Oh, totally. Yeah. So I think I think with the the English get into the rugby world cup final thing, I'm going to have a little beer or two this weekend. Speaker 2: (01:02:14) Yes. I was saved and then I apply. Well they were, they were absolutely amazing. And, and hits off their guys too. You know, you, you can always be no. So, Hey man, thank you very much for sharing your story. I hope this is empowered and lots of other people listening to this. I hope it's made you think maybe I can do it if Matt can do it. And to understand the journey that you go through and then it isn't or you know, roses, it is difficult along the way, but that you can overcome any final words that you'd want to. If you were talking to you two years ago, what sort of advice would you give Mitt Speaker 3: (01:02:57) If you believe in yourself and believe in others around you? And Oh yeah, just if you want something, go after it and, and no, no distance, no goal is too big, if you know what I mean. Life is, you get one lap in life and you've got to make the most of it Speaker 2: (01:03:17) I made to that one. Speaker 3: (01:03:19) Yeah. So thank you Lisa. I really appreciate the opportunity. Speaker 2: (01:03:22) No, it's been absolutely fantastic. It's wonderful to have you in a running hot coaching tribe in. If anyone else wants to join us, of course we'd love to have you come and join us and check us out. I'm sure Matt will agree it's been a a good journey with, with having a bit of structure to your training and having some goals and someone to, to ask questions to and to make sure that you're doing things right. So Matt, congratulations once again on your huge success and your mess of victory. And we'll talk to you again so no doubt. Awesome. Thanks Lisa. Speaker 4: (01:03:55) [Inaudible] Speaker 1: (01:03:55) That's it this week for pushing the limits. We showed her write, review, and share with your friends and head over and visit Lisa and her team, at least at www.lisatamati.com.

Emily Miazga is a 3 x winner of the  Coast to Coast World multisport champion she is also a clinical nutritionist and found of "Em's Power Cookies" - a range of nutritious and delicious  Cookies, Bars, Power Bites, they also sell Hemp Protein Cookies! In this episode Canadian born Emily shares how she got into multisport and just what it took to win the coveted Coast to Coast race three times and what she learnt about herself along the way. How she used her insights as an athlete to help power her business dreams and what life after competitive sport looks like. She shares her philosphies on pushing through sporting and life obstacles and how she managed to keep her mind on track during the toughest of her races.   We would like to thank our sponsors Running Hot - By Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff If you want to run faster, longer and be stronger without burnout and injuries then check out and TRY our Running Club for FREE on a 7 day FREE TRIAL Complete holistic running programmes for distances from 5km to ultramarathon and for beginners to advanced runners.   All include Run training sessions, mobility workouts daily, strength workouts specific for runners, nutrition guidance and mindset help Plus injury prevention series, foundational plans, running drill series and a huge library of videos, articles, podcasts, clean eating recipes and more.   www.runninghotcoaching.com/info and don't forget to subscribe to our youtube channel at Lisa's Youtube channel  www.yotube.com/user/lisatamat and come visit us on our facebook group   www.facebook.com/groups/lisatamati Epigenetics Testing Program by Lisa Tamati & Neil Wagstaff. Wouldn’t it be great if your body came with a user manual? Which foods should you eat, and which ones should you avoid? When, and how often should you be eating? What type of exercise does your body respond best to, and when is it best to exercise? These are just some of the questions you’ll uncover the answers to in the Epigenetics Testing Program along with many others. There’s a good reason why epigenetics is being hailed as the “future of personalised health”, as it unlocks the user manual you’ll wish you’d been born with! No more guess work. The program, developed by an international team of independent doctors, researchers, and technology programmers for over 15 years, uses a powerful epigenetics analysis platform informed by 100% evidenced-based medical research. The platform uses over 500 algorithms and 10,000 data points per user, to analyse body measurement and lifestyle stress data, that can all be captured from the comfort of your own home Find out more about our  Epigenetics Program and how it can change your life and help you reach optimal health, happiness and potential at: https://runninghotcoaching.com/epigenetics You can find all our programs, courses, live seminars and more at www.lisatamati.com    Transcript of interview  Speaker 1: (00:01) Welcome to pushing the limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati brought to you by www.lisatamati.com Speaker 2: (00:13) Well, hi everyone. Lisa Tamati here at pushing the limits is fantastic to have you all back again. I'm super excited to have you. And today we have a very special guests. I have Emily Miazga and if you don't know who Emily is, you probably know who famous cookies, which are IMS power cockies. So I'm sure a lot of you are going, Oh yes, I know in South of his well him is now two based on pushing the limits. Welcome to the show, Emily, how are you? Speaker 3: (00:39) Hi Lisa. I'm really good. Thanks for having me on. It's, it's a real pleasure. Speaker 2: (00:43) Well that's, it's super exciting to have you on. We actually had a case sorry, a fan of the show, write to me and say, can you please have Emily on? And she's so evoke and I want to hear her talk. So I reached out to Emily and who we are today. Speaker 3: (01:00) Awesome. Thankfully I'm too for that. It's very cool. And we finally got gotten here, so now it's very, very cool. I love it when a good plan comes together. Speaker 2: (01:08) Took us about three months, but we did get there. Speaker 3: (01:11) Absolutely. Speaker 2: (01:13) Now Emily is a Canadian born but she's living in New Zealand and Emily is famous for her Em's cookie. So let's go there for a stylist. Before we get into your athletic career, you've been an amazing athlete, but you have cookies. What are the, what are these about? Speaker 3: (01:30) Oh my cookies. I should've had one here with me. I'll have to run, get some kitchen. But my, my power cookies, it's quite funny. I had been making them since I was a little kid growing up in Canada because in Canada we just love, you know, it's like cookies are really the thing to do. And I was a sporty kid, I was always running and I was always into nutrition as well. Like I ended up studying dietetics and became a dietician. But when I came to New Zealand I was, I was traveling and I ended up here for coast to coast. And I, what I do, this is just kind of how I roll. As I would stay at friends houses and I'd make them buy power cookies as it, as a thank you or give them to the guys at the bike shop, the bribing them, you know what I mean? Speaker 3: (02:12) Like it always works a treat. And in the faculty I lied. I had always wanted to start my own business and I didn't, I decided I wanted to stay in New Zealand. I didn't want to go back to work in a clinical dietetics setting. So I actually brought power cookies to Robin Jenkins, the director, the creator of the coast to coast and wow. Yeah. So after my first coast to coast in 2004, I went and saw Johnny and I brought him cookies and I'm like, Hey, I'm thinking of starting a business and selling these cookies because you know, everyone like always said they're so good and I should sell them. So, so I, I basically just started the business and it's, it's a nice, I always loved giving them to people and to share them with people. And so that was like a real behind wanting to do it. Plus of course, you know, having my own business and doing my own thing because the products, they just, they really, they just really work. And so what, what the actual power cookies are, is they're just made from ingredients that, you know, you'd probably find in most pantries, you know, typical bloody fine ringing in the background. Oh, I probably should. I should probably put mine on airplane mode while while we're here. Just ignore it, carry off. Speaker 3: (03:32) But they just have like, like rolled oats as the base ingredients drive through. It's real dark chocolate bit of Brown sugar a and rice syrup, peanut butter in a peanut chocolate farm. But just naturally, I think the reason why they work so well is because they're yummy. They taste really good and they're really and digest and they just don't, especially when you're racing or doing something hard, they just don't upset yourself. And I think it's because like, I don't use component chocolates. I don't use processed oils. There's no Palm oil. I don't add all these protein powders, like soy protein isolate. And you know, whey protein it of ISO. So, you know, go into that a little bit. So I saw it like, no, we all read that on the packet means not much to math. Why is they the bad thing? I just don't think, and this is just my sort of anecdotal feeling I guess. Speaker 3: (04:29) I, you know, it's, it's not, you know, a real like dietetic thing, but I just think your, your body when it's under the pump it up just can't digest those types of foods. They're not real foods cause that processed in a way that it's, yeah, it's processed and it's concentrated. It's kind of like when people try to race and they just try to only consume gel. Oh terrible. Yeah. I know like gels have their place. Like if you're, if you, if you need them in an emergency or like for example, in the coast to coast mountain run, I use gels because they're convenient. They work for that specific purpose. But to fuel a whole iron man or a whole ultra or whatever on just gels, you're just going to end up with majors. Yeah. Because it's just really hard on your gut to digest it. Speaker 3: (05:17) So that's where having real food I think works works a lot better. And so that's the main difference between my products and your sort of commercially available nutrition bars. Like they'll look good on paper nutritionally. But for me, I guess I'm a dietician and as a foodie, sure it's got to look good on paper, but it also has to taste good. It also has to be digestible and it has to give, it has to fulfill the intended purpose. And so with M's, the intended purpose is to give them a really nice sustained energy. And this is really, really important because yeah, a lot of things look good on paper or they don't, you know, have this or that. I mean, I've had some really bad experiences gels and in Speaker 2: (05:58) A lot of our athletes that running hot have, have come unstuck with gels and the in I, yeah, stay away from the completely, or if you're running something like a teenK or even a half marathon, you can get away with it. But if I was that we as soon as your guys' use of track is going to be struggling because all the blood is out of the muscles, I'm going to go for a little bit longer that just not, but yeah, there was some new ones on the market that I haven't tasted and that, that are meeting the new formulations and so on. But even, even ones that are fruit based, I find that they go very acidic and your tummy and served, at least for my stomach,uduring,uduring your vendors is a no go. So food is something that I'm quite passionate about getting white athletes to adopt to and in food. It tastes good. So really good too. We will have to talk a little bit about getting some Eames cookies for our athletes to Speaker 3: (06:56) Yeah, yeah, absolutely. That. That's right. You know, one of the types of gels that I used to use it was just actually the corn syrup. Yeah. But it, but it was better than the glucose. And the maltodextrin ones, like a lot of them have that multi Jack strain, which is just like eating, trying to consume paint, paint stripper. And it's just like, Oh my God. They, like I said, y'all do have their place, but you can [inaudible] their playground, Speaker 2: (07:25) Not on the rise and the bloody fight. I don't know who it is. It's trying to get me, but Speaker 3: (07:30) Somebody you can answer it and put them on the podcast. Speaker 2: (07:38) Yeah, it's it's my business partner. Neil's, not everybody does blame Neil for bringing me in. Speaker 3: (07:44) Yeah. Speaker 2: (07:48) And it happens every week. So those things, but I think my lessons sort of get it that we've got life going on. So now I want to change tech, then I want to talk a little bit about your sporting career. We've touched on the fact that you did coast to coast now. You didn't just do coast to coast. Take, take show your, your, your history with the coast to coast and your amazing records. Speaker 3: (08:12) Oh, thanks. How long did we have? Talk about coast to coast all day. It's a very, very dear race to me. It's what really connected me in New Zealand, you know, the mountains and just how inspirational the courses. It's amazing. So I would, I was traveling and I was doing some adventurous thing. I was living in Australia and training with a guy named by Andrews. He was served by Ironman lifesaving champion of Australia. And he won that a few times and I met him while I was traveling and racing and, and he's just like, you're all right. You're a good cheek. And I'm like, yeah. So I was living in Ozzie and spent about six months training with guy and he really helped me with my kayaking because I hadn't kayaked before. Yup. But that was all ocean paddling. And anyway, I thought, well after my stint there, I've, the plan was to come to New Zealand to race the coast to coast cause it was, you know, like I guess on the bucket list and I thought, well do the coast to coast and then I'll go back to Canada and you know, settle down and get a life and go back to work as a dietician. Speaker 3: (09:20) Well that's, you know, I came in, never left. So, so the first year I came, it was in, when I raised, it was 2004 and that year it flooded out and shoot thirds of the field never finished. They were getting the mountain, it was carnage man. Like it was. And, and I had only been through the run on like I'd gone through the run a couple of times on five days and I hadn't experienced that New Zealand rain around mountains, rivers coming up. I had no concept. I grew up in the prairies in Saskatchewan, like where kind of stuff just doesn't happen. And so I remember going up through goat pass and it was just like, it's Torrens of water coming down. And we're collaborating while we're, you know, using the trees to get up and like skirting these like waterfalls. It was in the Harley and I was like, Holy shit. Speaker 3: (10:09) Like this is, I knew it was pretty, pretty intense. And so I've got through goat pass and there was a Marshall, they're asking us how we were doing and I was definitely probably hypothermic probably, you know, probably wasn't so good for me to carry on, but I actually felt okay. And I said I'm a little cold but I'm okay. And I just kept my head down and I kept running. Didn't stop cause I knew if I stopped they would, that'd be it. And I got through the mountain run and got onto the river and I'm like, you know, and everyone, like it was just like one of my friends from Australia, Chris Clawson, he was like walking back up the Hill to Mount light when I was running down to the river. And I'm like, what the hell is going on? Like I didn't realize the corners that was unfolding both in front of me and behind me. Speaker 3: (10:59) Wow. My crew, like the, the marshals were, we're checking people at the [inaudible] transition and if we are hypothermic, they were pulling you off and not letting you get on the water. If I was able to sneak through and my crew like put me in the boat and they're like, Oh, you'll be fine. And off I went. And anyway I made it through and I finished. And like I remember we, I remember reading some Chaffey Lynch's stuff about the coast to coast will make you grovel and Cathy Lynch, for those of you who don't know Kathy Lynn, she's probably one of the toughest athletes. We'll stop, you know, on the planet. She's amazing. I've never met Kathy, but she's one of my inspirations. Yeah. And I just remember her like on that final ride about groveling and as I have like on the final ride, cause I was completely, and when I got to the finish line I just said there is no need to ever do that again. Speaker 3: (12:01) And then two days later with my buddy Lynn, and I was like, you know, my keys, my chronic sponsor, and he's been with me from the start helping me. I love Lenny and I'm, you know, you can start conspiring again for the next, the next year. And, and at the time I was being coached by Michael jacks and Wellington and he emailed me and said, Hey, I reckon you can win this race. And so he coached me through and, and we got there in 2005. I actually had a pretty good race in 2005 I came third again. But I was recovering from knee surgery and I was still getting used to the course. And then 2006 was a major step up for me because I upgraded my class and actually learn how to really handle that river. And I really started to master that river. And I also, I think I had a shift as well in I guess my mental approach. Speaker 3: (12:57) Yep. When I first started it was about, you know, I'm going to come smash the coast to coast. And it was very ego driven. And like I was out to prove something and then it started to transition into more introspection, learning. What was it that was driving me? Why was I wanting to do this and feeling more gratitude and most driving you do you think? No, when you look back? I think, well in the beginning it was, I, it went hand in hand with the cookie business and I needed to be successful in the race because I wanted, I was literally using my racing as a testimony, as a Testament to my power cookies. Yeah, true. And so that was a big driver. I wanted to actually show people how it could, how it could be a big driver was just the, the sheer beauty of the course in New Zealand and being in the mountains. Speaker 3: (13:57) And I think, you know, I've always been a competitive person, so of course that comes through. But, but it was, but it was beyond that. It was a Oh, understanding. Like why, you know, why was I going on this earth? Why was I here? You know, what is it that, that, that I can do? And, and when I would, when I would do well it would, it would inspire other people. And you've probably have this as well and that actually feeds back on to you and, and it really, I was really in tune to that and really receptive and, and you know, like I'm all that kind of stuff that the philosophical stuff and you know, sort of this mind, body, spiritual thing, you know, it's all up to individuals as to how they interpret or assess it. And you know, it might be real, it might be not, but what's, what is real is what's in your head. Speaker 3: (14:47) And I, I was listening and I, it kind of become a part of me and I let it become part of my story and part of my motivation. Wow. So now we're at where we were in two thousand sixty thousand students. So have some flaws you've done and you want it now, how many times is that entitled? I want it. I want it three times. So yes. So 2007 I had a foot injury, I had plantar fasciitis and I tried pushing through and it just didn't work. Like on race day, I always say like with longest day coast-to-coast, if you try to hide an injury or if you have a problem, the race pulls it out of you. And it pulled it out of me. I go past and I was like, Ooh, I just can't do this. And so I pulled that other ACE, which was really sad, but I I it was too much. Speaker 3: (15:40) And it's pretty penis. I mean that's racing when you're pushing the limits, things are gonna go sometimes pear shaped and there was, and if it was easy everyone would be doing it, you know. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So that year Fluor pausey wanted and she sort of popped up and surprise people with her when I pulled out Elena, Asha, one of the other top girls, she didn't have very good race. And so people were sort of speculating and saying, Oh, you know, who's this blur? And, you know, kind of talking about her when, and like it wasn't a, a worthy winner because girls kind of dropped out, but which is just stupid. Like she had an absolutely brilliant race, but like the longest day is about who manages themselves the best. And that day Fleur was amazing. And so the next year in 2008 with a pretty exciting year and I was really working on my mental game and that year I learned a lot. Speaker 3: (16:34) So I, I ended up beating for buying 44 seconds that year. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. So she was leaving, coming off the water. I had a bad paddle light at that point. I still, I wasn't eating on the water, I was just using sports, drinking Coke and the river was really low and it was taking longer than I thought. And so my nutrition fell a bit short and I had to pull over and I had an emergency gel, so I had a gel in the backup. I normally don't use gels only on the round bit. So I came off the water's seven minutes behind Fleur and we still have the 70 chain time trial to Christchurch and that's a lot to make up. But one thing that I was really good at with my racing, I sort of took a feather of some Steve Grundy's hat and I mastered that final ride. Speaker 3: (17:21) Yep. Most people hated it. I loved it. I knew every inch of that ride and I knew that I could probably ride 10 minutes quicker than any other woman. So I like I was, and I was very good at my energy management and I think, I think that's why it was good at posting coast is not because I was the best runner or the best paddler or whatever cyclist. I think it's because I was really good at managing my energy and I think that the power cookies had a lot to do with it because it push me to do so. I I had to chase her. Oh, what's up? Speaker 2: (17:54) Yeah. I think that's actually one of the things that I was good at too. I wasn't fast. It wasn't anything bad. W over the really long was sort of races. Yeah. How do you manage your body and your energy levels. And I did have difficulty with dodgiest of things, but I managed to even still be moving, you know, I mean I have all that wall that you're out here. Speaker 3: (18:17) Yeah. You know, my, my coach that year I changed to John Newsome in pressure. She's a triathlon coach. And one of the things that he said to me, which really stuck was when you're in these races, it's, you're always gonna have those low points, but it's all about when you have those low points to really minimize the losses. So I was always open and it's like, well, if I'm having a shitty time right now, chances are my competitors are as well. And so I am going gonna acknowledge it, I'm going to accept it, I'm not going to fight it, but I'm going to deal with it and I'm going to get on. Because before, you know, you'll probably have that next part of your human race where, Oh, all of a sudden I actually feel quite good. And and so it's just a little moment in time and it passes. And so you just have to accept it that those low spots are going to happen and you just got to minimize those losses. So that was really good advice. Speaker 2: (19:09) It's a good quote that it's one of my favorite quotes in the world that says this too will pass. Yes. Keep it in your head when you're in the deep dark prices and rice, it will pass as well. And sometimes, and this is I think for new athletes who haven't experienced this before, they think it's all over. Yeah. They think there's no, there's no coming back from this. I'm feeling so bad. There is no way out. I'm so glad. So I've lost so much energy on vomiting or whatever that they, I bet very 99 times out of a hundred deer is a white bag and they will pass. And if you can give your body maybe just a few minutes break or slowing down a little bit or walking for a bit and then hello, you come back and you [inaudible]. Speaker 3: (19:51) Exactly. Exactly. It's so true. And I think what, what does help with having a bit of experience w well, well you can practice this without racing, but you have to work on like, it's really easy to sit and talk about it out, you know in a, in your living room. But it's another thing to actually put it into practice. And so that's where, when the heat is on and you're in, in that moment, having the wherewithal to kind of look at yourself objectively and know yourself out of it. And that was, I used to joke about doing that. I used to joke about, Oh, I'm brainwashing myself and we would kind of laugh because it's kind of true. I literally was like, that's how I thought of it. I was like brainwashing myself and you know, being able to master your mind. And so, so when I was chasing floor on that final gride and I remember my coach, we, they put me on the bike and he's just like, right to settle in when you're ready, John, put in the big gear and do what you know you can do. Speaker 3: (20:51) And he's like, whatever you do, just never give up. And so on that ride was my first real experience because I'm chasing and I'm, you know, seven minutes isn't a lot of time to make up two hour ride. And I was like, well, okay, am I going to catch her? What's the split? You know? And I was going through all these scenarios and I was thinking, and I was worrying about like, I don't want her to win because that's, you know, I, this is my race and I wanna win this race. And then, you know, and I was thinking beyond into the future and then I was worrying about, you know, stuff that had happened in the past. And as I was observing in myself, as I was thinking futuristically or in the past, my energy would literally drain from my legs. Wow. But when I stopped, when I re, I realized that that was going on. Speaker 3: (21:39) Cause my, I was working with Renzi Hannon, who's is spent in eighth grade. And he, I remember him saying like, when you're thinking futuristically or in the past, you, you literally lose your energy when you're in the presence. And you and I, I gave, I realized that I was like, right, I gave myself permission. Yup. Let her go. Don't worry about her. Don't worry about whether or not I'm gonna win or catch her. Just like dropped my elbows, relaxed my back, click it up a couple more gears, pull off with my heels, take a sip of my Coke and I just focused on writing as fast as I could. And and you know, I still got the split, like the radio guys were going back and forth and giving us splits and you take it on, but you take it on as useful information, you assess it, you take it and then you move on. Speaker 3: (22:27) You don't hang on to it. And so once you get to that point where you're completely in your zone and it's not a magical enigma, you can create it and you can make it happen. And once you're in that zone, you literally feel like super woman. It was, it was an amazing thing. And when I started reeling her in and when I knew I was going to catch her and, and, and this is where this energy thing really came into play because, because it was such exciting racing and the girl, I'm Rachel Cashin who was in third place, she was only a couple minutes behind me so you could ride a bike as well. So we were all, we all finished within a few minutes of each other, which is really exciting racing 13 hour race, but you can feel the energy people were pulled over on the side of the streets like I had never seen before. And I just, with support that was out there and that electric energy, I could literally feel it. And it really fed me cause I was like, I was, I was using it to my advantage. I was taking it and using it and that was a really pivotal time because it made me realize how you can actually put into practice harnessing that, that mind body connection and mastering your mind. Yeah. And this is something that, you know, I try and do nowadays whenever, because most, Speaker 2: (23:46) Most of the time, most of us in the future or in the past, you know, held bet with the crap that makes up my past. We get where in the predictable future is. Dr Joe Dispenza talks about if someone I follow very closely, we're emotionally one way we're being pulled or the other instead of actually being in the present and then creating our future without the baggage and in the middle of a rice, I can totally understand how that drains your imagery and yeah, keeping your mind in the right place. Yeah. Just such a crucial piece of the puzzle wasn't it? Yeah. You can try and everything, but you have to train that mind and then having that experience. So you managed to, so take us over the finish line on those last couple of minutes. What was it like Speaker 3: (24:36) Everybody, everybody was out on the street and a couple people that I trained with and my coach and everyone, it just seemed like everyone was there for me. I think they were there for both, for all of us. I felt like we were there for me and it was just electric and it was almost, I remember riding through red cliffs floor in red cliffs and when I went by her and you know, she, she was at, she was spent and I was just like, I was just like wrapping up. Like it was really crazy shift. But I just remember this, this feeling of the, the Hill I'm riding past the Hill and the people out cheering. It was like riding in an amphitheater. Wow. It was almost like an out of body experience. We just love lunch n*****s. But when I, when I got across the line, I absolutely freaked out. Speaker 3: (25:26) I just lost it and I was screaming and Jenny was like, we were like, cause I was just like, you know, I had such exquisite focus and discipline and then to get across the line and to actually achieve, you know, what I had set out to do, it was just like amazed. Like it was, it was an amazing feeling. It was like, it was pretty life changing. And then when when flare across the line and we high fived it, it was, I think she was really happy as well. Like obviously she didn't win, but it was an amazing thickened the story. It was a moment of empowerment for women in sports to see like, take that boys, this is not a boring one. Wars race. Our girl, and we made this awesome race and Florida and I knew it and it was all that moment wasn't about who won. It was about look at what, look at what an awesome race we just had Blake. Speaker 2: (26:23) Oh no, Ben is such a, you're such a good storyteller and I can feel the emotions of it. And having been in similar situations myself and just, yeah, a hundred K nationals that running around Talco and I'd had a really bad, I injured my back then the night before I, or an actually falling off, went here and hit my kidneys. So my kidneys were hit painkillers and at midnight we were starting it early in the morning and at midnight I was liking Hagan, me, you know, spasms and stuff. And I had take all these painkillers and of course then I was completely woozy with the painkillers. My mum had to dress me. That's how bad I was. And I'm standing on the, that line at 3:00 AM with my business partner and my coach Neil, who was doing his first hundred K and three o'clock in the morning and I'm like completely out of it. Speaker 2: (27:12) But going right, we're going, you know, yeah, here we go. We're doing what we're doing. That's agony. Like the first couple of hours, you're really, really bad. And then and then I started falling asleep because of the painkillers and I just kept, you know, who, who's doing his first hundred and I'm meant to be helping him. Right. And him holding my hand and trying to keep me away. Can you kind of, you know, wake me up as I'm passing out. It was probably good for him. He was great. And then as far more on in the day came in and my body started to wake up, as it often does in the painkillers was out of my system. And some have the kidney pain at least, and got out. Isn't it funny how that happens or the way you think it's all over. And then if you just go, sometimes you can get through it. Speaker 2: (27:59) And then we were running along, we're doing quite well. And then we got to about 70 kilometers in and Neil started to really break down then because it was his first race doing this. He was, you know, having those really deep, dark moments and the spear and crying and, you know, I should do, Oh, and going along and I'm talking to him and we, you know, so we've been helping each other way. And then for about 93, 94 kilometers, and one of my crew came back and they said, the number one lady is just ahead of you. I'm sorry, number two. So I was in third place at the stage and we reckon you can get her, you know? And so I was like, Oh, I've got to go. I'm leaving yet to my Mike Neil and I usually don't like to bend someone fishing. Speaker 2: (28:44) That helped me through the first half, faced as crying and God and go for, I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine. And so then I started drinking the Kaka call. I would watch guys don't drink, I only drink Coke if you're doing all [inaudible] it was like anything goes and was drinking and I was just going like in that flow state where you see you can see here and hitting me and I was just mowing or getting away from you. There is no way honey poke the call. I had my little cousin as a probably year old and he was running beside me and bringing me the codes and stuff and can come on, come on, come on. Speaker 2: (29:26) We passed that. She broke. Of course. You know, cause when you was yeah, and I didn't want to do that too, but I want to know like you have to do it. It's like liquid. And so I mowed down on and I ended up, so I was sick. And so the first birthplace gave it already come across but sick and the nationals. And that was just like one of those Epic moments, you know, one of those times that you and my poor might, Neil came over a few minutes later and he was fine. He had us be a standard Chi under his belt and just, you know, so you never quite know how race is going to go Speaker 3: (30:07) And it's never, it's, it ain't over till it's over. And you know, it was so funny because at that year, when, when in 2008 when it was such a close race, and I remember we were staying with some friends and I was debating about, Oh, should I wear an Aero helmet for the last ride or should I just use my normal helmet? And my friend said, well, you can make it up to, you know, 30 seconds quicker. And it's just like, well then we may have 30 seconds else. I've worn the Aero helmet, you know, one thing that people can do to train themselves to work on, on that being in the moment kind of thing is first of all I think just acknowledging that you are the master of your mind and it's your decision how you take things on. Are you gonna let external things that distract you cause that's all they are, what your competition's doing, what the weather's doing. Speaker 3: (30:56) Those are all just external distractions that you cannot control. So you have to acknowledge what you can control and what you can't control and be really mindful of, of, of just filtering things out. And if something does come at you, take it as like, just be really objective, be really clinical and clear and just take it as information and then, and then you can do some exercises too. Like you know, I'd be out on a training run and you know, long run and you're looking at that Hill way out in the distance of it's like seems so far. But then you go, well actually is it far like who decides how far it is? Like, depending on your perspective, it could actually be quite close. And then you, you run that, you do that run and then you quickly learn, well actually that only took me 10 minutes to run up to that Hill and it looks like ages. Speaker 3: (31:50) And so then you, you kind of take that and go, Oh okay. And then next time it doesn't seem so bad and next time it doesn't seem so bad. So like in the beginning when I was starting the training for longest day, like I had never done that kind of long training before. I was mainly doing like five days days and a few like triathlons and stuff. So to do like a six hour bike ride or a three hour, four hour run like that or big paddles, that was way beyond my variance level. And so in the beginning it almost seems unfathomable to have volume of training. But in the end it was like no big deal at all. And it was just, the only difference was a bit of experience and a bit of just gone, Oh it is fitness. Speaker 2: (32:34) But mostly it's your mindset. And you know what's interesting is like we, you've retired now and I've retired now and for prime going through, yeah, we're suitable now. [inaudible] For a while I'd go and try and do something long. That experience is actually gone. Like I have to reopen up their horizon again, Alex for when I, when I decided that I'm doing something along with today and it's like, what was I so far again where I was, it doesn't stay open. Like just the, I used to do hundreds of kilometers. It doesn't mean you can always stay there. So you actually have to keep, in other words, it's a muscle that needs to be [inaudible]. Speaker 3: (33:15) Yeah. And your body will only let you do so much. And that, that's actually kicked my butt a little bit because like I won't do anything for awhile. Like I'll do stuff but like, you know, getting yoga up and working on my lands, you know, cutting some gorgeous or whatever, and then it's like, Oh, I haven't been for a run in a way while I'm gonna I'm just going to go out for a run. And then, you know, you just think that, but like there's a bit of muscle memory there, but then you pay for it. Cause you know, yeah. Just Speaker 2: (33:41) You think, you think I remember my very last run that I did, which was right across the North Island for a charity of a three days. And with my, my husband [inaudible] and Neil, and it was for a friend of ours who had died and we were running across and I hadn't trained the entire year because I'd had mum sick and I sort of thought, ah, I'll be fine lot, way, way, way more. And then, Oh my God, it kicked my butt because I shouldn't been training. And I hadn't had that mental thing for basically a year, so I got to the finish line, but Oh well I wasn't in good shape, you know? Yeah. I know. And you think it would remain with you by the thousands? Speaker 3: (34:25) Yeah. It's like anything, you have to train it and practice it and that. Yeah. But that keeping your muscles active and [inaudible]. Speaker 2: (34:33) Yeah. And even like, like you're training and you're doing your fitness, it's very different to be doing those long sort of stuff. And they're grueling. What's in store for Emily now. So you're still doing that in [inaudible] week and people get them and yeah. Tell us a little bit about, Speaker 3: (34:49) Well, people can get the ends at the most bike shops in New Zealand. Like especially like the torpedo sevens and the bike shops. We have pretty good distribution there. We've been in the, the new worlds nationwide. Not all the new world stock, all the products though, but if you have, but, but they can certainly get fun. So if you bought like a favorite new world you can in there or you can go ask for them because that Speaker 2: (35:17) You get them in name or, huh. Speaker 3: (35:19) That's what picks peanut butter did. He got his customers to go in and harass the grocery buyers. So go in and like, just be shamelessly, you know, harassing, harassing them. Last year I brought out, I was the first to the New Zealand market with the him a protein cookie. Ed. I'd always wanted to make a protein cookie, but I wanted it to be vegan and natural and I wanted it to taste good. I didn't want to just load it up with sugar substitutes and protein powders. So my ham cookies are made with natural peanut butter dates are, and I'm hemp protein. Wow. And it's not just a token amount of hat. It's like 16 and 18% protein, which we source from New Zealand. And those are in all the countdowns. So most of them countdown. So countdown doesn't have my other range, but they have the ham cookies. Speaker 3: (36:07) Okay. So yeah, so bike shop, BP connect nationwide has, has a few of the bars and I'm actually just working on a distribution deal with a company and, and we're just still going through the process of pulling together all the information. But I'm hoping that that's going to help to give us more widespread distribution because that's like, that's one thing that I've always struggled with over the years. Cause we're a small company. I'm not, I'm not owned by a big food conglomerate. I don't have like big marketing budget from this kind of stuff cause it's really, it's really expensive to to really distribute it and service your product. Like when, when I first met Julisa I was doing that in store tasting new world and Wellington and like to do that all over the country. Obviously you can't do it yourself because you just can't be everywhere at once. But if I were to pay somebody to do that for us, like it's thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars and to do his disdain campaign like it's so it's hard but we're, but we are getting there. We're slowly, slowly just like just like a ultra or just like coast-to-coast, you know, you just take it, chunk it down one step at a time. Speaker 2: (37:18) A fun and fascinating whole distribution thing in the whole [inaudible] their business. Cause you know, I'm entrepreneur toe and I've got the same, it's different product obviously, but we've got my new book coming out and it's the whole same thing. You have to get it to distribution. You have to get into bookstores, you have to get on the Amazon Kindle. God knows [inaudible] box, get it actually, get it translate into other languages. Hopefully get it into Australia or new ways or this with stuff that you have to be aware of. Speaker 3: (37:44) Yeah, no idea. Oh, Oh totally. And like little things like packaging, like, like all of their packaging designs, there's so much that goes into it and people just think, I don't think they, I don't know if they realize just what goes on behind the scenes and just his magically arrived here. There's a lot that goes into it. So yeah. So I'm looking at, yeah, we want to hopefully get this distribution happening and, and it'll give us a little bit more like, you know, they'll be able to get us into more places like the four squares and hopefully more of the new roads and get more ranging and top down. So, so that's what's coming up. What else? So really working on that. And then we've got our property. And so I'm a bit of a homebody and I love working on my land. I love planting trees. Speaker 3: (38:35) I planted about 5,000 native trees on our property rehabbing. So we've got wish out the back, which is, it's absolutely beautiful. But the front section is on a whole hillside, which I, well it's funny cause it's got gorse on it. And you know, at first I was gonna just flip all the Gores to get rid of it, but it's actually really good to stabilize the Hill, but it's also nitrogen fixing it. The legume. Oh wow. It's actually really good for the soil. And nutritionally as a dietician it's the course isn't so bad. And also to the NATO, it's a good nursery plan for the natives to come through. Wow. So we've been up here for a few years now and even in that time I can see the native starting to overtake the course. Wow. But I'm still doing a lot of planting. Like I did a whole section that was quite steep and then I've got like along our road side that I've done. And it just takes a lot of maintenance and a lot of that'll keep your foot good guys. Keep me fit. Like if I, if I do a day on the scrub powder, I feel like I've done a big post to coast. Yeah, yeah. Speaker 2: (39:43) The aim. Let's, let's Oh, we got to wrap up now, but I just wanted to thank you very much for coming on the show and for sharing your wisdom because it's really interesting. I have no idea what it takes to doing coast to coast, so all I've ever done is run. Speaker 3: (39:58) I'm the same thing with all, like I, I'm sure like I could do an ultra, but I just couldn't imagine doing like a hundred or 200 Kane. Why? Oh, I don't know. My, I think my feet, I think my body's limit is about that 33 K of arch. Okay. That's me. Yeah. Speaker 2: (40:20) But yeah, it's different. A different, you know, techs, different skills and disciplines and to do something that complicated, I always look at coast-to-coast and go, Oh God. And the biking in the running in, you know, how much money that takes and how much it, yeah, I'll put it over here, shows a runner, Speaker 3: (40:37) This animal can, I can totally get that. The simplicity of running is, is there's a lot to be said for that. And then I have to say like bat is my go to fitness is yoga and running. Cause you just put on your shoes and go, there's no stop to the gear. Yeah. It's easy. Speaker 2: (40:52) So nice not to be fiddling around with stuff sometimes. Speaker 3: (40:56) Oh that's totally, totally, yeah. Speaker 2: (41:00) Wait, is it, you want to see like if you, you know, you've got the young girls out there that are starting out in their careers 40 or, or just thinking about things like anything. Speaker 3: (41:08) Yeah. If there's something stressing you out, don't worry about it. Just focus on yourself. Focus on what you need to do and just don't worry about other stuff. Just, you know, I used to spend a lot of energy wasted worrying about things I couldn't control. Yes. Like it's like Len, my quiet guy. I remember one time, you know, he just, you know, we were talking about something, I was stressing about something, you know, unnecessarily. And Lynn just said, don't worry about it. You'll be fine. You'll be fine. And that was, that was actually really good advice. So yeah, don't, don't stress stuff. And Speaker 2: (41:44) That might Manson was at a mall hose and just keep pushing forward. Hey, Speaker 3: (41:49) That's right. That's right. And just get out there and do it and just yeah, we're work on your mental game. [inaudible] There's some really great stuff. Like, I know you mentioned Joe does better than my husband actually just mentioned him. I'm going to start getting into his stuff. Speaker 2: (42:03) Amazing. Oh. Cause the whole mind body connection and the, the meditation and the power of leaving all the crap that you've gotten past behind. And it's some pretty deep stuff, but it's a, yeah. Work in progress. Speaker 3: (42:14) Yeah. It's all over. Can programs and just, you know, remember that you're not going to accomplish everything in a day. Like just do, do what you can do within your control and understand your limits and just put one foot in front of the other and just Speaker 2: (42:27) Go for it. Sounds brilliant. Awesome. So everybody know, kick kick-out aims cocaine and brought them support here. What's your website? Him? So it's power, cookies.com. Our cookies.com. Speaker 3: (42:41) Yay. Thanks so much, Lisa. That's be good. Speaker 2: (42:45) It's been lovely having you on and thanks for being such a great role model and yeah, we're hopefully we'll catch up with you again, so. Speaker 3: (42:52) Okay, that sounds really good. Thanks Lisa. Look forward to catching up with you as well. Speaker 1: (42:59) That's it this week for pushing the limits. Be sure to rate, review and share with your friends and head over and visit Lisa and her team. At www.lisatamati.com  

This week on the Single Mom Tribe, I connected with Lisa Verlo whose written and produced her One Woman Show in the Hollywood Fringe Festival - Hollywoodn't - She was an early voice heralding the 'Me Too' movement and in her show has developed many pieces that explore the grey areas between consent and coercion. We discuss how her experience in this industry has shaped the way in which she raises her son; and how her passion for her career helped her to dedicate time to building a community in which supported her growth, self-development and creative endeavors. Lisa is a huge fan of Mastermind groups and believes that we as mothers should create the community that we are called to, because support on this journey is essential, as we've all come to realize, it takes a Village... so why not build our own?Lisa has 2 shows left this month - One today, Saturday - June 22nd and the Grand Finale is LIVE on Wednesday - June 26th... If you would like to check out her performance, tickets can be purchased through the links below. If you tune into her episode on the Single Mom Tribe, she also offers a discount code to all of our listeners. Thanks Lisa!Here are links to Lisa's Show and Bio:https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/projects/6087https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/users/47168

The Mysterious Black Box (20 March 2019) This show originally aired on WCSB, a Cleveland based radio station, hosted by Lisa. Thanks Lisa, for saying nice things about Mini-Mutations, and playing one of our tracks! Enjoy! https://ia801401.us.archive.org/18/items/MysteriousBlackBox/MysteriousBlackBox.mp3   Playlist: *Jethro Tull – Ring Out, Solstice Bells – “March, The Mad Scientist” *Prince Rama of Ayodhya … Continue reading The Mysterious Black Box (20 March 2019)

Who is Tim Rutili: Temistocles (Tim) Hugo Rutili is a Leo raised in Chicago and surrounding suburbs. Presently living in South Pasadena. Musician, filmmaker, visual artist. Founder and principal songwriter of critically acclaimed bands, Califone and Red Meat. Also a member of Boxhead Ensemble, Ugly Casanova.   Favorite Career Highlight: Premiering my first feature film as a director/writer, 'All My Friends Are Funeral Singers' at Sundance was a highlight. Touring Italy a few summers ago with my old bandmates/best friends was another. Lovely times.   What Tim learned about Moses: I can relate to the character more than I'd like to - long, dangerous journeys, battles, bizarre demands from a powerful and sometimes spiteful God, and the kicker -- Being denied entry into the promised land by that same God (for a minor infraction!!!). There's a really excellent book called 'Moses, a life' by Jonathan Kirsch. Doing this podcast made me start reading this book again. I began to see Moses, this mythical being who gave us law and structure, as a good, strong, humble and also kind of insane, murderous and cruel. I saw God as much the same - jealous, petty, all-powerful, deeply loving and deeply hating. And all of us humans are the same. we carry everything in us - the capability to murder and the capability to love. God and this world are rarely exactly what we want them to be. We have to accept that and work with that in order to experience our moments of joy and peace. it may only be moments, and the end of the story may not justify the journey. I guess we have to be ok with that. It is all horrible and beautiful and hilarious and tragic all at the same time. I had a great time doing the podcast. Thanks Lisa!   Who is Moses: Hebrew prophet, teacher, and leader who, in the 13th-century BCE (before the Common Era, or bc), delivered his people from Egyptian slavery. ... Sinai, where the Ten Commandments were promulgated, he founded the religious ...(more)   Special Notes: Tim has an amazing song about Moses... Link! Thank you, Kelly June Hutcheson, for the wonderful Moses song that closed this episode. You can also find Kelly on Instagram   How to show love to Project Woo Woo: Click here to buy Lisa a cup of joe.   This episode was also supported by Amazon. Click on this link --> Amazon any time you need to make an Amazon purchase. A small percentage of your purchase will support the show (no extra cost to you).  I receive an affiliate commission from some of the links above. Go get your free be happier than all your friends morning routine over here --> Project Woo Woo Listen to Lisa's other podcasts at Love Bites & Honestly Lisa

We are at it again ~ answering your terrific listener questions. We love getting your emails with details about your decor dilemmas many with photos! Also keep your tips coming! As you know we now have turned the Tips of the Day spotlight on YOU! Listen in as we dive into your questions & give you details on our latest giveaway... As you heard we reached quite a milestone last week - ONE MILLION DOWNLOADS of DTT episodes. Without YOU this obviously would not be possible (I mean, how many times can we listen to ourselves talk ~ hahaha!) So a HUGE thank you for taking the time to hang out with us. To show our appreciation we are inviting you to enter to win a chat with us. It can be about decor or really anything you want to chat about. To enter pop your email into our list right HERE (https://www.decoratingtipsandtricks.com/email-signup) If you have already joined our list, then consider yourself entered. We will pick a winner on 4/11 and contact you with the email you entered. Can't wait to talk to you! Today we are talking about a myriad of decor topics from window treatments to the value of antiques and a bunch of stuff in between. In answering a question about bedroom furniture Anita mentioned this stunning duvet (https://cedarhillfarmhouse.com/rose-linen-ruffled-duvet/). Listen to the Heidi Rew show to hear Anita running solo talking all about her life's reinvention into what she was born to be doing ( no, not just hanging out with Yvonne & me;) ). Click HERE (https://theheidirewshow.fireside.fm/24) I know you will enjoy every word. I did! The sponsor for today's show is Third Living. We have a very special Third Living give away going on our blogs. We are giving away a complete set of Third Living Sheets which includes a whole lot more than just sheets. Head over to our blogs Stone Gable (http://StoneGableblog.com) - Cedar Hill Farmhouse (http://cedarhillfarmhouse.com) and/or My Soulful Home (http://mysoulfulhome.com) to enter. Of course you can visit thirdliving.com/tipsandtricks and use the code TIPS at checkout for $20 off any complete set of sheets too! Our Tip of the Day is from Lisa S. - Lisa shares a company that transform your children's art work into a beautiful hardcover book. The company is ArtKive. You can check them out HERE (http://www.artkive.com) . Thanks Lisa!! You know what would be SO awesome?  If you would share Decorating Tips & Tricks with your friends.  Do it in person or on Facebook using THIS LINK. It is easy just click & share DTT to your page. Thanks in advance!! x Subscribe so you never miss an episode. And please drop us a line and let us know what you think of the podcast. Our email is decoratingtipsandtricks@gmail.com   XOXOXO, Anita, Yvonne and Kelly We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

In this episode, Lisa answers the question: Would StrengthsFinder make a great hiring tool? Although it might seem logical, once you dig a little deeper you realize it might not be a great idea. But don’t despair — Lisa also gives you tips on how to use your team’s natural Strengths to compensate for the ones it is lacking. Have You Downloaded Your Strengths Tools? One of the best ways leaders can build a strengths-based culture is to offer an appreciation of strengths in action. If you’ll notice what works, you’ll get more of what works because people can replicate what they’ve already done well. Get started by downloading this awesome tool that offers you 127 Easy Ways to Recognize Strengths on your team.. Would StrengthsFinder Make A Great Hiring Tool? Today the question is about StrengthsFinder as a hiring tool. This usually comes up when one of my StrengthsFinder training clients happens to also have an open position while we’re doing a team-building event. Or, this question comes up when a leader sees a visual map of their team’s natural talents. They spot holes. They want a well-rounded team. And the logical next thought is, “Oooh, this would be the perfect tool to help me find new hires who have these talents we don’t naturally have on the team.” I’m with you. That feels totally logical, yet there are at least 5 reasons that this idea is flawed. Yup, I’m telling you that StrengthsFinder isn’t a hiring tool. Whahhhn. Wahhhn. So hang on. If you’re thinking that you want to use it to vet your candidates, slow down juuuuuuust a sec while you consider the whole picture. Reason 1: StrengthsFinder Shows A Stack Rank, Not An Intensity or Maturity Take two candidates: Madison and Abraham. Madison’s #2 talent theme is Focus. You’re psyched because that’s the talent you’re missing on your team DNA charts. Abraham has Focus at #10. So on the surface, Madison wins because she has that elusive talent you’re looking for. But wait! One thing you need to know about the tool is that it tells you each person’s top talents ... for them. But it doesn’t give you a measure of how well developed that talent is. And it doesn’t give you an intensity level for that talent theme. So Abraham’s #10 Focus could be stronger and better developed than Madison’s #2 Focus talent.  Reason 2: CliftonStrengths Was Designed As Development Tool, Not A Hiring Tool CliftonStrengths (or StrengthsFinder as many of us know it by), is a tool offered by Gallup. Gallup is well known for their research, and they take their tools seriously. They designed the assessment as a professional development tool, not as a hiring tool. They recommend offering it to new hires when they join your company on the first day. Imagine what a cool change-up that would be: being a new hire, coming in for your first day, and spending your onboarding experience learning more about what will put you at your best. That sounds so much better than filling out paperwork all day! Gallup does, in addition to CliftonStrengths, have a consulting practice around Analytics Based Hiring. They have a whole segment of their business focused on employment, predictive analytics for a role, and custom assessments for hiring. Most listeners will be saying, “Thanks Lisa, but I don’t have a five or six figure budget for that kind of consulting.” No worries. Of course, the main thing is to know how the research scientists designed the tool so that you don’t get yourself into liability hot water. Reason 3: You Might Make Your Search Tougher Than It Already Is Here’s a reaction I get constantly. It’s something like, “Oh my gosh. Not a single person on the team has the Command talent theme. We need to add some bold, decisive people because we have tough client base, and we need people who can hang. The next new hire absolutely has to have Command.” Here’s the thing. If you tried to act on that thought, you would be creating a search for a needle in a haystack. See, the Command theme is the least commonly seen talent in the entire database. A small percentage of people will have that theme. And once you find this elusive person, they may not be qualified for the job. Imagine that Madison has Command at #1, and she has spent her entire career as an accountant. Abraham has Command at #19, and he has spent his entire career nerding out on rare coding languages. If you’re filling a role for a software developer — and you need one of those critical and tough to find skills — you would be absolutely silly to prioritize Madison’s Command talent over Abraham’s rare skills. Not to mention, you would be dipping into reasons #4 and #5 …   Reason 4: Searching By Strengths Might Distract You From Outcomes When you look at a strengths DNA chart for your team and you see that your team has no one with Focus or Discipline, you might think, “Oh no, we’re doomed. We’ll never be able to make a plan and follow it to completion.” You could take this deficit mentality and start obsessing over how your current team doesn’t do well with written plans. But don’t lose sight of the bigger goals. Ask yourself: What are the outcomes your team is responsible for? Do you currently meet them? If you do, you probably use the existing talents you have in a way that acts like (or gets the same results of) a talent theme you’re missing. So maybe you have a person on the team with Activator who gets projects off of the starting blocks. And another guy with Arranger and Adaptability who shuffles things around seamlessly during your mid-project madness. And another team member with Achiever drives you to get-it-done status by keeping an eye on the finish line for each milestone. As long as you’re meeting the outcomes, it doesn’t matter which talent gets you there. And finally, here’s reason #5. Reason 5: If You Prioritize Natural Talents, You Might Diminish Critical Hiring Factors This one is, in my opinion, the most powerful of all. It’s that your hiring decisions take into account a lot of factors about a candidate. You interview someone to vet their Knowledge, Skills, Experiences, and Talents. A lot of times, you have critical timing factors as well. So for example, say you landed a big contract with a client. Your marketing team is creating a piece of cutting edge geo-targeted advertising software. You need this person yesterday (isn’t that always what it feels like?). If you hired by talent themes, Madison’s Command and Focus would tell you she’s the one. But if you consider Abraham’s specialized coding languages, his experience with the client’s specialized urban agriculture industry, and the knowledge and skills he built in the last 10 years in marketing, it sounds like a no-brainer that Abraham will be a top candidate. So remember: even though talent is important, it’s one of many factors. Leverage Strengths To Build The Team With all of that, you’ll want a takeaway beyond a list of watch-outs. What do you do if you are still thinking that your team is hurting because you’re missing a couple of talents? Three things: 1: On your existing team, have a conversation about how to partner up the talents you already have. In combination, they can act like the ones you’re missing. 2: On your existing team, remember to focus on your team’s strengths and easy buttons. Your talent gaps can stand out on a chart like a sore thumb and lead you to obsess over what you’re missing, yet if you’re building a strengths-based team, you’ll want to focus on leveraging what you do have. 3: For the role you’re hiring for, come up with questions that get to the thing you need. So, if you’re lamenting the lack of planning on the team, rather than only considering candidates with the Focus or Discipline talent, ask questions and open conversations that get to similar outcomes. Things like:  Tell me about a time when you took a complicated project from start to finish. What’s your process for creating project timelines and communications? How do you keep yourself accountable to your commitments? Tell me about a situation when you were given an unrealistic deadline for a product launch. You get the idea here. Think of the things that you want from the talent theme you don’t have. And then ask about those things. You’ll find that people can get to those same outcomes through many different talent themes — and the label doesn’t matter as much as the result. Strengths Resources To get more of these strengths-focused conversation starters, check out our resources page — there are a bunch of tools related to StrengthsFinder, strengths-focused leadership, and on noticing what works so you can get more of what works. Enjoyed the podcast? To subscribe and review, here are your links for listening in iTunes and Stitcher Radio. You can also stream any episode right from this website. Subscribing is a great way to never miss an episode. Let the app notify you each week when the latest episode gets published.

Welcome back! This week, the girls are mad about the effect that social media has on their daily lives, like, ugh, Instagram. Anna and Sarah's old friend (old, like, they have been friends a long time, Lisa isn't that old or whatever) came all the way from California to be on the show! Thanks Lisa! Other stuff that the girls are mad about this week are crappy airlines and pretentious wine snobs acting all pretentious at east coast wineries, like they are special or something. I mean, seriously who actually spits out all the Syrah? That's a waste of good Shiraz! Also Lisa's hair is really long. What's the deal with that? Stayed tuned to find out! Hit us up on Insta @3madgirlspod and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts! "Four out of five stars!"               -Anna's mom **CORRECTION** (ugh): The Royal Society for Public Health and Young Health Movement study only observed 1500 adolescents and young adults, not 15,000. 

Lisa Pertoso: design facilitator, writer, and comedian. In this episode, our guest is Lisa Pertoso. She teaches experiential learning processes to companies and organizations, and she writes. "…in my younger years I did a lot of thinking and obviously talking myself out of doing a lot of things, Just stop that. Try to kill that voice and just do, and by doing you’re already creating and you’re some kind of artist… and, no one can take that away from you." Today we discussed the struggles of maintaining a writing routine and the inspiration for writing her memoir, her blog 100 First Dates. We spoke about her reaction to being heartbroken, why a routine helps to maintain a sense of normalcy when freelancing and, how to just get off your butt and start something because now is always the best time. Lisa has so many good pieces of advice, but this stood out to me, self-doubt should never play a factor in your creative journey — Just do, and be happy you did. Thanks Lisa!   Where else to find Lisa: on the Web on Twitter on Instagram 100 First Dates Blog - 100fd.com Follow the Fear. Be a Strong Creative Leader - www.followthefear.co   Visit the Works in Process website for more on this episode: http://wip.show/episode/wip01-lisa-pertoso/ About the Works in Process Podcast: A podcast series by George Garrastegui, Jr. — designer, educator and creative catalyst. Works In Process is a collection of discussions that exploring and demystify the creative process. I interview creative individuals to highlight and gain more insight into the way they work and the projects and/or products they produce. Help Support the Process. I'd like if you can share your creative process, notes and/or pic using #works_inprocess on Instagram. And, if you like this or some of the other episodes please leave us a rating, a review and subscribe to WiP. Offical ways to subscribe to Works in Process: Apple Podcast > http://ukr8.us/wip_ApplePodcast Google Play Music > http://ukr8.us/wip_GooglePlay Stitcher > http://ukr8.us/wip_Stitcher TuneIn > http://ukr8.us/wip_Tunein

Episode 112 of the PetaPixel Photography Podcast. Download MP3 -  Subscribe via iTunes or RSS! Featured: Lisa Bettany, photographer and Camera+ co-founder In This Episode If you subscribe to the PetaPixel Photography Podcast in iTunes, please take a moment to rate and review us and help us move up in the rankings so others interested in photography may find us. Photographer and Camera+ co-founder Lisa Bettany opens the show. Thanks Lisa! Should photographers have to ask permission in before photographing someone in public? (#) Samyang indicates that Canon and Nikon mounts are in the works for their autofocus lenses previously available in Sony E-mount. (#) Photos and videos posted to Facebook from your smartphone and tablet aren't necessarily in high resolution without this setting. (#) Laowa unveils one of the most unusual lenses we've ever seen. (#) Listener Dave Dougdale wants to know how best to focus on swimmers consider they're creating splashes of water that might grab your camera's focus...and a bonus tip for easily lighting dark indoor pools. Reviewers pan the new DJI Mavic Pro...but apparently don't know how to focus the drone's camera. (#)   Outtakes Connect With Us Thank you for listening to the PetaPixel Photography Podcast! Connect with me, Sharky James on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook (all @LensShark) as we build this community. We’d love to answer your question on the show. Leave us an audio question through our voicemail widget, comment below or via social media. But audio questions are awesome! You can also cut a show opener for us to play on the show! As an example: “Hi, this is Matt Smith with Double Heart Photography in Chicago, Illinois, and you’re listening to the PetaPixel Photography Podcast with Sharky James!”

This Episode’s Focus on Strengths In this episode, Lisa has a fun conversation with Melissa Dinwiddie. Melissa is a multi-talented, creative person who lights up your day with her voice and enthusiasm! She helps her clients to use their strengths to get their mojo back when they feel like their innovation gene has left the building. You’ll find lots of ideas to spark your creative mojo in this episode. Plus, you’ll hear about her “Passion Pluralite” life, as she calls it, so listen in. You’ll walk away with a newly formed opinion of what’s possible for a multi-passionate person. It’s inspiring to see someone who wouldn’t settle for “one thing” or one activity driving her entire career path. As she’s working with her clients, Melissa always keeps in mind her Top 5 Talent Themes from the Clifton StrengthsFinder: Connectedness, Achiever, Input, Futuristic, and Positivity. You’ll hear why this combination of Talents makes Melissa one of the most knowledgeable, multi-talented, creative people you will ever meet.   What You’ll Learn Find your unique you. Melissa Dinwiddie is a multi-talented woman who has many different interests. She knows a lot about a lot of things. She always took for granted that she had so many interests, until she had a conversation with a client that led to a life-altering Ah Ha moment. In that moment, she realized that she had a unique gift, and that her Connectedness and Positivity Strengths made her a natural at consulting and collaborating with others. This led to her career working with clients to improve their creativity – which leads to innovation, increased profitability, and achievement. Use your Strengths. Connectedness and Positivity also enable her to look for meaning and connection all around her. She is always using that information to figure out how she can help her clients. Always say “Yes, and…” Improv class, which is one of Melissa’s newer hobbies, taught her to always say “Yes, and…” instead of “Yes, but…” because when you say it, you keep thing going and growing. This approach generates more new ideas, and allows for more creativity. Saying “but” is really just another way of saying no. It shuts down creativity. It leaves your team with more potential conflict and stifled creativity. Adding many ideas to the big mosh-pit brings forth more possibilities, and will empower your team members. When people are scared that they’re gonna be cut down, they become afraid to speak up (and you might be missing the best idea yet). Understand your Strengths…to overcome them. This might sound counter-intuitive, yet Melissa gives a great example when speaking about her Achiever Talent Theme. In the past, her need to achieve kept her stuck in self-perfection. By understanding how the Achiever Strength has the possibility to (counter intuitively) limit her ability to finish projects, she has developed self-compassion. She now considers herself to be a “recovering perfectionist”. So, if you tend to be a perfectionist at work, remember, everything doesn’t always have to be perfect; sometimes it just needs to get done. Give yourself a break! Lisa adds that the Achiever Talent Theme in its pure form is all about completing tasks and getting to the finish line. She hypothesizes that Melissa’s other StrengthsFinder Talents may be playing into her perfectionist tendencies too. While her Achiever wants to get things done, her Input will want to keep sponging up learning and insights that broaden her view of the project. Speaking of opening up possibilities, her Futuristic Talent will keep her in constant “what-if” mode. The fascination and vision of what can be can also keep you in rework mode. And her Connectedness Talent could have event played into her perfectionist tendencies because she sees connections and wants to share them with other people. Imagine when she’s creating courses and wants to keep tinkering so that every person with every perspective can get what they need. Ahhh, feeding your talents can be so energizing. And, sometimes, they can derail your progress if you’re not keeping an eye on the outcomes you set out to achieve. Schedule sandbox time every day. Our modern lives are super-busy, and often jam-packed with activities and projects every single day (even the weekends). Melissa suggests you spend 15 minutes every day relaxing, like you used to do as a kid. Play in the sandbox, doodle on paper, or go for a walk – whatever floats your boat. She’s proven that just that short amount of downtime can rejuvenate your creativity, and you will have a much easier time coming up with new ideas or finishing projects you’ve neglected. So schedule a short break time every day, and see what happens. Finding your “true passion” takes practice. People often ask career coaches and StrengthsFinder consultants how they can find their “true passions”. Melissa has an answer for them: Go out and try different things. She cites the example of learning to dance, another recent hobby. It took her 3 – 4 years of different types of dancing to figure out that she loves salsa and Argentine tango. In the work environment, you may be in a role you don’t love. Maybe you even hate your job. Look at the tasks your perform, and pay attention to what you actually do enjoy. Then find ways to get more of them added to your job responsibilities. If you stick with it, you’ll end up happier, more successful, and your business will be more profitable. Remember, knowing your Strengths and understanding them can have a huge impact on your personal and professional lives. So go out there and create.   Resources of the Episode To connect with Melissa and grab some creativity resources, check out her website. You can also connect with her on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Ready to live a full-color life? Melissa’s Live Creative Now podcast is filled with practical tips and inspiration on creativity and creative productivity. Feeding your creative hungers is one of the fastest ways to happiness, joy, and self-fulfillment. Not only will you feel more alive, it’s how you will change the world!   Subscribe To subscribe and review, here are your links for listening in iTunes and Stitcher Radio. You can also stream any episode right from the website. Subscribing is a great way to never miss an episode. Let the app notify you each week when the latest episode gets published.   StrengthsFinder Mini-Course For Managers If you’re a people-manager and you want to sharpen your strengths based support, come join our monthly mini-course. We don’t charge for this because we want to help you keep the StrengthsFinder momentum going. Teams who receive strengths feedback have 8.9% greater profitability. Yowza! Sounds like a great reason to join. Source:  Asplund, J., & Blacksmith, N. “Strengthening Your Company’s Performance.” Gallup Business Journal.   Go Live Your Talents Remember, using your strengths every day at work makes you a stronger performer. Go claim your talents and share them with the world! Read the full conversation: Lisa: Today, this show is all about using your natural talents to unleash your creative side at work. Your guest is so super interesting. She's actually dedicated her career to instigating creativity around the world. She works with teams to help them get their Mojo back when they feel like their innovation gene has left the building. She might even change your mind today about how very important play is at work. And speaking of play on the literal side, your guest plays the Ukulele and even brings that into her work world. So get ready. You're about to see how your creative expression can help you offer your value to the world. So Melissa Dinwiddie, welcome to the show. Melissa: Wow. Thanks Lisa. That was like the greatest intro ever. Lisa: It could have only been better if I had primed you for it so that you could have your Ukulele ready to play a little tune. Right. So, okay. You know, this show, it's all about exploring strengths from every angle. We're getting a unique angle of creativity today and we're bringing in strengths to that. So when you mentioned to me that when you first considered your top five StrengthsFinder talents that the one called Input was interesting to you because at first you didn't see that as something special and you. So tell us more about how that went down for you. In your mind, how did you open yourself up to the idea that it could actually be a superpower that you were overlooking? Melissa: I was doing a trade with a woman who was, at the time, my yoga teacher and she's also a life coach and so she was trading coaching. She was giving me some coaching and I was creating a website for her. It was maybe the third time that she had asked me about how to do something inside of a WordPress website, upload an image or create a new page or something, and I was showing her. And then she said, well, what if I want to do, you know, x, Y, z? And I said, oh, well there's three different plugins that I know of for that. And she looked at me and she said, how do you know all this stuff? And I said, I don’t know, I just, I made my own website a number of times so I know this stuff. And she's like, I think you don't appreciate how that, you knowing all this stuff, like that's not normal, that's normal in a really cool, really cool way. Melissa: Like you could, you could do consulting and you know, Blah Blah Blah. And it, it was that moment that made me realize, wow, this is something that's unusual about me in a good way. And it made me flash back to a moment, years earlier, this would have been back in the late 90’s, mid 90’s when I had started doing calligraphy, which became a huge passion of mine and that ultimately turned into a career. But at this point I was still a relatively new calligrapher and I was at a workshop and it was one of the first workshops I had been to with this calligraphy guild that I had joined. And somebody asked about a tool called an automatic pen. Well, what is an automatic pen and how is that different from, you know, this other kind of pen? Well, I, when I got into calligraphy, I had taken, like I'd ordered all the, there were two big stores that had, at the time, this was really before the Internet took off, so they had these paper catalogs. So of course I had ordered these paper catalogs and that was my bedtime reading. I would go to bed and pour through these catalogs and read all the details about every single tool and every single book. And so I just knew all this stuff. And so here I was, I'd been doing calligraphy for, you know, less than a year or something, and I was spouting off “well and automatic pen is its way and it works in this way and the way it's different from quick pan is blah blah”. And I remember the people looking at me like, are you an alien? Like they just didn't know you've been, I've been doing calligraphy for eight years and you just started, eight months ago, how do you know all this stuff? Melissa: And I, didn't realize that that was, I didn't have a word for it. I was just who I was. So I didn't realize that it was unique or unusual or a particular strength. And it just was this quirky thing about me that I didn't even realize was quirky. So yeah, that, was probably of my StrengthsFinder strengths. That was probably the first one that I went, oh yeah, that I can totally see as a strength because the things that I'm passionate about, I dive in and I learn everything that I can about them because that's what I do and then it nothing makes me happier than sharing that knowledge with other people, so it's a natural for consulting. Lisa: So cool. I love when I have clients with Input. It is so much fun to hear because they love going deep and gathering all the information and learning about a topic and then really directing it to what they're into, whether it's a hobby or work and then sharing it and it becomes such a collaboration strength too because you can add so much value because you realize, oh, not everyone does that. I mean, if I know if I got into calligraphy, I would flip through and look at the pretty pens and that's about it. I didn't know anything about any specs. Melissa: Right, right. Yeah, it, it definitely comes in really handy. The other one, I'm number five for me is Positivity and that one I recognized right away and people are always telling me, Oh my God, you have so much energy and you're such a cheerleader, you know, and that's just my personality. I hadn't really thought of that as a particular strength either, but I see it like I use that every day and the work that I do with clients and the groups that I lead that, that I am always essentially cheering people on. I mean not with like pompoms or something, but you know, I always have a positive spin on things and that it's not pollyannaish. It's just, it's just how I am. I think actually that's quite related to my top strength of Connectedness, which I mean I read that and when that's a strength, what? Lisa: That one always surprises people. They go, Huh, I would never think of that one. Melissa: Never would have thought of it. But I think that really ties in with my Positivity that this sort of outlook of always finding meaning and connection and you know, there's always this sense that everyone and everything is connected and I'm not like a religious person, but I'm it definitely infuses kind of everything I do Lisa: Well, knowing a little bit more about you and how you bring play into your work and how you’re an improviser, that's a high Positivity. It just makes complete sense because there's a fun-loving elements of it. It's finding the good times and things like if you're going to be here on the planet, go have a good time while you're at it, why not? And that tends to be one of the outlooks of people with high Positivity. So when I saw that and then knew that you were into play and Improv, I thought, oh well, it's just so perfect. Melissa: Yeah. And of course the sort of core piece of Improv is to say “yes, and”. Lisa: Yes, please say more about that. How that has shown up at work for you? Because most of the corporate people I work with are completely unfamiliar with Improv. Maybe you can talk about how that looks for people in a meeting or how that looks for people in either supporting each other's ideas versus squashing it if they gave it a “yeah, but.” Melissa: That got really clear for me when I think it was like my first Improv class, I've been doing improv for about three years now and although I've been improvising, interestingly enough, I've been drawn to improvisational creative forms for a really long time. For example, I got into salsa dancing and Argentine tango and those are purely improvisational dance forms. They are based on a vocabulary of movement and each social dance has its own vocabulary of movement, but within that vocabulary it is 100 percent improv and then when I got into music, the music that I was drawn to was jazz, which is an enormous umbrella that covers so many different styles of music within it, but the one thing that is a consistent among all of them is that there have improvisational elements, so it's really not that big of a surprise that I would end up doing improv. Melissa: Now I can connect that all together. My very first improv class, there was an exercise where a group of us were sitting up on the little stage area. We were supposed to pretend that we were in a meeting creating, we're talking about creating some, I don't know, some random object that we made up on the spot and about how to market it, I think. And so the first part of the exercise was that whenever anybody says something, let's, you know, let's throw a big party with confetti and invite the whole town or you know, whatever it was we were supposed to respond with, “yes, but,” and then add something. Right. So we did that for a while and then we stopped, and we replayed the same scene essentially. But this time whenever somebody gave an idea, the response was to be “yes, and”, and what was so interesting was when we did the “yes but” or “well, but” it would turn into just squashing, squashing just that: No, no, no, no, no. And it stopped everything where when the exercise was “yes, and” it became this like crazy mashup and it just kept growing and growing and growing and growing. And when you bring that “yes, and” to say a meeting where you're generating ideas or something and if you can respond to somebody else from that space of “yes, and” it opens up so many possibilities, you know, there's time later where you can refine things and cut things out and look at the, you know, the reality of our budget is limited to x or whatever. But to generate ideas, you have to be in that space of “yes, and”, and people don't like to put an idea out there if they know that there's a chance that it's going to be cut down. Right. Nobody likes that. That feels terrible. So that's a really important place to bring that Improv scale of “Yes, and”. Lisa: I love the example too, of how you used it and actually had the contrast of the “yes, but” or the “well, but” with the “yes, and in the same situation because right, it just stops all the momentum and turns everything. And it's kind of like the eeyore moment. Melissa: Totally. Yeah. And “yes, but” is really another way of saying “no” Lisa: it true. Another thing that you're getting me thinking about reflecting on a work day and how you can have these breakthroughs and also sparked me to think about something you mentioned about your Achiever talent, how when now when you look back on a work day, you can kind of see that when you're fueled up, it's because you've achieved something and felt productive and that you feel frustrated when you're not. What does that process look like for you? And just exploring them and seeing how they show up. Melissa: That one for me, in some ways it feels like as a liability as much as a strength only because, my history is being way too much of a perfectionist. I mean, I am now a card carrying him perfectionist, which means a recovering perfectionist. It's the same thing, which means basically that I treat myself with self-compassion. I was so stuck in perfectionism. I mean my Achiever strength was, you know, so blown out of proportion, there was no balance to it. There was nothing, nothing connected with the Achiever that you know, just sort of say it's okay. You get to be a human being, you get to be human. What ended up happening was, I mean, I call myself an artist. I had a career, a business. I still have a business and our business primarily making Jewish marriage contract. It's basically a side business these days. It used to be my main business and for about a decade while I was making my living from my art, I didn't create anything for myself purely for play, except once a year I would go on a retreat with my calligraphy guild and then I would do some things for myself, but the whole rest of the year, all the other 360 days of the year, the only art I ever created was to other people's specifications and partly or a big chunk of that was because I was so trapped in perfectionist paralysis that anything that I would create, I would think, well that's not good enough. That's crap. And so it became so painful to try to do anything that I just didn't do it. But I was in such denial about it that I told myself, you know, I bought into the story, I created this story that it was because I just didn't have time and it wasn't until February 1st 2011 when I was actually interviewing an artist for my first online course that I created called the thriving artists project and this particular artist mentors other artists who want to have fine art, you know, professional fine art gallery, exhibiting art careers. Melissa: And they get stuck in resistance as anybody else on the planet. Surprisingly enough. And so this artist that I was interviewing would tell her mentees, if you can't put 15 minutes a day into your art, you're making an excuse. And she was just talking about what she told her mentees. But in that moment, I was so nailed. She was, she was talking to me. She didn't realize she was talking to me, but she was saying to me, and by the time I got off that phone call first I got very defensive inside. But then I realized, oh my God, she is right. For the past decade I have been making an excuse because of fear, and so that day, and it was February 1st 2011, I committed to putting 15 minutes a day into making time for the joy of creative sandbox time that you talk about. Lisa: Is that your creative sandbox time? Melissa: Absolutely. That is. I didn't have that terminology at that point, but yeah, that's, that's my creative sandbox time. That is my playtime where in fact, in order to get myself into that head space where I could put even just 15 minutes into making art, I had to set up a bunch of sorts of ground rules for myself and it started off with maybe four or five. You know, it's all about the process. It's not the product let go of the outcome. When you get to the place where, you know, it's not done yet, it needs something, but you're not sure what and you're afraid to try anything because you might ruin it. One of my rules was go ahead and ruin it. And over a period of a two or three years that expanded into 10 rules for the creative sandbox. It's now what I call my creative sandbox manifesto. Melissa: And the sandbox image was because I realized at one point that I wasn't taking time to do art. I'd started making some art, but the art that I was making, I stopped after a while, a couple of weeks into it or something, I just wasn't getting to my art table anymore and I couldn't figure out why because I wanted so badly to get back to making art. And one day I was looking at the table and I realized, oh my God, the art that I'm making right now has nothing different from when I'm working for a client. So it feels like work to me. It was very meticulous. It was very design-y. There was nothing improvisational about, there was nothing playful about it. It was the opposite of play. And I realized it was like this light bulb went off over my head and that's when I thought I need to play. Melissa: I need to be like my little four-year-old nephew playing in a sandbox, making messes, thinking, oh, what would happen if I poured water on this? What would happen if I did this? That's the headspace that I needed to be in. And so that's, what I develop those, those rules to help me get into that headspace. Lisa: It's so cool. And the boy, I mean, you know that in the corporate world this is such a thing for people because you have this push-pull and your mind whether or not someone's specific talent is Achiever. People have a drive to get stuff done is push for the next thing, but then you know you need white space. You have to explicitly sometimes not manage yourself to a goal or you burn yourself out. And there's this internal fight thing and you even sparked for me a thought that takes it beyond the moment to moment push-pull, but even the overall career stress that people put themselves under when they think of finding their passion or finding their calling. Lisa: And I, think I remember you talking about callings as an elusive thing and that it's normal to resist them and refuse the call, that sort of thing. And I'd love to hear… you just got me sparked on that idea to what's your take on work as a calling and what do you do for those people who are beating themselves up over the fact that they feel like they don't have one? Melissa: Oh my God. So that makes me think about a conversation that I had a number of years ago with a woman in my synagogue and I was talking about this stuff was pretty new to me then I was like, wow, I'm discovering this new direction for my life or I'm helping people get connected to their creative side, which for most of us has been, you know, got quashed down pretty early, including me. Melissa: I mean a lot of people get quashed down at age five or six or something was like age 13 when I stopped making art. But for most of us that that gets really squashed and you know, so I was finding my passion again and our passion number 17 or whatever. So I figured out that I have a lot of them and this woman said, well, what do you do if you don't, if you don't have a passion. And I was stumped. I did not know how to answer her question. And it was only later when I was reading an article by somebody who I think she calls herself like the passion mentor or something, I can't remember, but she was writing about how, you know, passions, we have this idea that you're going to have this Eureka moment. You're going to open a door and boom. Melissa: Yeah, that's my passion, I found it. And the reality is, even though I spent, I can't tell you how many times I've told the story of various passions I've had in my life: dance, calligraphy, getting back to social dancing, writing, improv, music. So many different passions. And the story has always been, oh, you know, then I discovered this and that became my next passion. But that's not really what happened. Really, what happened was with dance, I was too scared to try dancing as a little kid. I had some movement classes when I was like four. And then I had friends who were in ballet, but I had this image of the mean ballet teacher with the big stick who would like hit you if you don't do things right or. So I never took any dance classes. And then in I think my freshman year in high school, some friends of mine, we got together, and we took a class at a community center. Melissa: We thought it was going to be, you know, mtv kind of how to dance to Madonna's material girl or something, you know, like the music video kind of dance. And it was actually, it was a modern dance class, which I didn't realize was much more classical style. And we were like, wow, this is lame. So I didn't, you know, I ended that class and forgot about it. So finally, you know, years later after, you know, first thinking about dance, I took a class at this local dance school and that's the moment where I went, oh my God, I want to do this every day. But it was, you know, three or four years of, tipping my toe into different kinds of dance before I discovered that dance school and Bingo had my Eureka moment. Every passionate I've ever had has been like that. Melissa: You have some kind of interest in something enough to try it. And you know, maybe the first time it doesn't do anything for you. But for some reason you go back to it at some point again and maybe the next time you find something new in that and eventually you know, you try it a little more and then it starts to develop a little more meaning for you. And then you dive in a little bit deeper and it's the sort of back and forth thing and it happens, you know, much more organically. It's much more like, you know, there are people out there in the world who feel like they had this instant, you know, love at first sight moment with their spouse or their partner. Right? But most people, it didn't actually happen that way with me, my husband, it took me two and a half years to see him as a contender and, he's like best match I could ever imagine for myself. Melissa: And that's what it's like with, with our passions for activities or pursuits. Lisa: What a good metaphor because it is like, I mean I can see the relationship metaphor so strongly that you meet somebody and then you think, hey, I actually enjoyed my time there, or I feel better when that person enters the room. Then when they leave the room and then you think, well, I'm going to hang out with that person some more, and it's the same with responsibilities and tasks in the work that you do. You can say, oh, that things kind of neat. I've never done it. I'm going to hang out with that thing a little bit more. And then you start exploring all the offshoots of it and it's so much like that at work and people for whatever reason, feel like there should be the Eureka moment you talked about and not the process of experimenting and going, okay, that thing's cool. I'm going to follow that path and all of the arms and legs that it has, and then you find that one thing that's super awesome and really fuels you up and I don't know why it's like that, but it does make me sad because a lot of people beat themselves up because they haven't found “the calling” or “the passion” and I know you use that term passion, plural light and looking at the plural like we have. We love a lot of things. Yeah, you have a lot of hobbies. You have a lot of interests, so let yourself feel that way about your work as well and go explore them. Maybe we can end with that exploration combined with how you explore your creative energy through your doodles because I think that's so fascinating and people will dig finding their own version of what you do with your doodling. Will you share about that? Melissa: Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So what I know about myself is that if I don't get a little bit, at least a little bit of time in the creative sandbox every day, my day doesn't go as well. It just, it makes me happy. It feeds me, it nourishes me. I also know that, uh, the thing I do first is the thing that gets done. So if I want to make sure that I get something into my day, it works best if I get it in first thing. I was not making, not making time for my creative play and realized I have to do it like before I even get out of bed. So I figured out, well, you know, I can bring a sketchbook and a pen, have it on my bedside table and then I can draw first thing in the morning. And so I set a timer for 15 or 20 minutes and I doodle first thing in the morning and I intentionally call it doodling because I want to be in that space of Improv. Melissa: That space of being in the creative sandbox like a four-year-old playing in the sand so that it's all about exploration and following my curiosity and not about trying to make something perfect or even good. And so it's just been an incredible self-growth experience to do this for the past, well, it's really since the start of the year, so it's been three months that I've been doing this. Every day I spend, you know, 15 or 20 minutes usually with a pen and some paper and a sketchbook, just doodling. It's like a spiritual, a spiritual practice because you learn so much about yourself. You know? Just today, there was a page where I had started something and I got really frustrated with it weeks back because I could see that it was going to require all this meticulous work that I just didn't want to invest in. It was going to drive me straight into that perfectionist place, which I don't like. I don't want to be in. And I came back to it today and thought, oh well I don't have to look at it that way I could come at it from a creative sandbox mindset and not worry about if these lines are perfectly rounded or whatever. And I was able to come back to that piece that I had totally rejected and really enjoy it and learn something and kind of expand my ability to break down those perfectionist walls from this one little doodle. So I highly recommended it. And it doesn't have to be pen and paper. I mean, you could do it with sound, you could do it with movement. You can do it with, you know, they're just so many ways that you can express yourself in, the equivalent of a doodle. Lisa: And I even do my white space. It's not quite my creative sandbox, but just my white space to clear my brain. My office is at home and in the woods and I take walks with the dogs and I just insert them in the middle of the day to give myself that moment. To not be distracted, to not be listening to shows. To not be learning, to not be in a meeting and it clears, it clears the space in a different way. And I'm the uber efficient. I mean I get so caught up that I'll listen to podcasts while I'm in the shower just because I want every moment to be so productive. And so it's that moment where I go, no, I'm just breathing, I'm listening to the wind listening to the birds and just let it rest for a minute. And then I get all these strokes of brilliance in that time and the sandbox time and the white space time. Lisa: I hope for everyone reading that this gives you some inspiration to bring that creativity back into your work day. To try yes, and if that's not something that's been part of your vocabulary, that you give that, some, just give that some air go, try that. It's easy to implement at work. Just show up and say “yes, and”, and your next set of meetings and don't squash an idea even if the squash comes to your mind, let it ride, let it ride and do that later. And let the ideas and the big breakthroughs happen. So thank you everyone for reading this Lead Through Strengths today. Melissa, this has been great. The readers are going to want to check you out. You have a show to tell them about, tell us how they can find you and your doodle delicious life. Melissa: Oh sure. Well, my website is Melissadinwitty.com.com, but that's hard to spell so you can also get to the exact same place livingacreativelife.com and my podcast is livecreativenow, which you can find there are. You can go to live creativenow.com, which will take you there as well. Lisa: Thank you. And we'll put all of that in the show notes so you guys can find it super easily and we'll get you her twitter and Instagram and Facebook links as well. So guys, remember using your strengths makes you a stronger performer at work. If you're always focused on fixing your weaknesses, always stuck in that perfectionist zone she's been talking about today then you're choosing the path of most resistance and you can choose instead to claim your talents and share them with the world.

This very peppy episode of Voices of Mindfulness features Lisa Nirell, the author of The Mindful Marketer.  She is the Chief Energy Officer of EnergizeGrowth LLC and is an expert in strategic growth.   Lisa is a sought-after speaker for associations and leaders worldwide. Thanks Lisa!!!

Host Lisa Kiefer interviews Colin Pape, CEO and Co-Founder of ShopCity.com. Located in Berkeley and Canada, ShopCity.com helps local businesses leverage the Internet to compete against online retailers like Amazon.com and other global chains. Its mission is to create thriving local communities with strong, prosperous economies - places where bustling local shops and vibrant downtowns are filled with proud local shoppers happy to support their friends and neighbors as they shop locally first!TRANSCRIPT Speaker 1:Method to the madness is next. You are listening to method to the madness, a biweekly public affairs show on k a l ex Berkeley celebrating the bay area innovators. I'm Lisa Kiefer and today I'm interviewing Collin Pape, the Co founder and CEO of Shop city.com. [00:00:30] Welcome to the program, Collin. Thanks Lisa. So what is shop city? Speaker 2:A shop city. It's basically a platform that enables communities to build a stronger, more sustainable local economy with a platform that's similar to amazon.com. Okay, so you're located in Berkeley and also in Canada. You just opened in Berkeley? That's correct. Oh, we're in the, we work a coworking facility corner of Shattuck and university. Okay. So I want to understand this better. What is the problem you're [00:01:00] trying to solve with Shoppe city.com? Yeah, so, uh, the Internet, uh, to date has really been a tool to drive globalization, global commerce. It's kind of been breaking down and geographic and boundaries and unfortunately that's really been to the detriment of local economies. But we really see a huge opportunity to enable local businesses to use the internet to reach local customers. And to decrease their marketing costs and to make it easier to shop locally first. And so [00:01:30] that's the platform that we've built. Speaker 2:Okay. So tell me about how you're doing this. Sure. So, uh, basically each community gets its own local site, so there's a URL for each community. So, and how did you get those? It's been a long process. We've been at this for about 15 years and so we secured a about 8,000 domains starting in 2000. Okay. And so once you got those domains, what happened? Yeah, so, so there's a URL for just about every community, about 85% of the ones across [00:02:00] the u s so we have big ones like shop New york.com, shop boston.com down to a smaller shop, sf.com we effectively provide at, at Turnkey model to a local entrepreneur. Could be a municipal government, could be a local business group. And, uh, so we provide them with the URL and then a, a platform that enables them to do the marketing out in the community and then, uh, to use the internet to basically drive local commerce. Speaker 2:Can you give me, walk me through an example from [00:02:30] the point of view of a small business or medium sized business? Sure. Yeah. So, so there's, yeah, really a, a multiple stakeholders that we serve. So, so the top is the partners, but uh, effectively it's about the businesses and so we provide them with the ability to create an online storefront. They can do email marketing and they can update their social media accounts and they can have their content published on a trusted local domain like shop SF dot conference. Who manages that shop domain? Is it the city of San Francisco? [00:03:00] It could be a city. We've got a couple of city governments that are running the platform, but generally it's a local entrepreneur, somebody who's got a, an interest in the local business community. And what has been the reaction of cities to this sort of chamber of commerce like, right. Speaker 2:Well it's a, it's something, especially here in California because there is a sales tax that's, that's fed into the city coffers. We don't really have that up in Canada. So they've got a pretty strong interest in ensuring [00:03:30] that purchases happen within their borders. And so they're very supportive. A lot of them are already running shop, local campaigns, shop city campaigns and a, so this is a way to really activate those campaigns and enable people to take action online. Uh, we give them a, a brand that they can market all through the community, drive people to a destination where they can find all the products, services and business available locally. So you're trying to create strong economies, it sounds like local economies. That's right, yeah. Using the Internet. [00:04:00] What was your inspiration to do this in the first place? Yeah, so it started in my hometown, which is a Midland, Ontario. Speaker 2:It's a recreational community, about 20,000 people. My parents had a retail paint store for 28 years and a around the turn of the Millennium, uh, home depot came to town. Walmart came to town and, uh, I'd started building small business websites. A lot of the local merchants were really fearful that they were going to be forgotten as these flashy new stores came into the community. And so [00:04:30] a thought that there had to be an opportunity to use the internet to provide the community with information about what was available locally. And then it was really just about marketing and getting it out into the community so we could hit home your own family. Big Time, big time. Definitely they were concerned. I mean paint is a competitive industry. There were probably six, seven places where you could buy paint already in the small town. And then yeah, you've got the Walmart and home depot during the outcome of you creating this local platform there. Speaker 2:It [00:05:00] was really well received. So, so it was really about the marketing. Uh, we, we did a bit of a grill and marketing campaign. We, we went out to, we put core plus signs all over the community. Two foot by one foot shot, midland.com support your community signs and a did it on a Sunday night. Everybody came into work on Monday and all the street posts had signs. And, uh, so that then we started getting businesses really getting behind us, uh, wanting to put signs in their windows. A Chamber of Commerce wanted to get involved. The, the town of Midland asked us to do a deputation. [00:05:30] And so, uh, everybody really, uh, just saw the value in, uh, supporting local. And what is the cost to a local business to become part of this local community? Or is there a, yeah, there's a, a range of different, uh, uh, opportunities. Speaker 2:Uh, everybody has the ability to create a profile page. They can tell their story. Uh, but if they wanted to use some of the more advanced features, the shopping carts, uh, the ability to send email newsletters, uh, they would pay. It's anywhere from 30 to $400 per month. At the high [00:06:00] end, they're getting a dedicated account manager. So if somebody, uh, if they don't really have the time or the technical capabilities, they can hire somebody to do it. It's your background in technology, is that how you yeah, exactly. I started building small business websites and then develop the platform and now we've got a team. But, uh, yeah, yeah. A lot of people have written about the value monetary economic value of small communities versus the big box stores like Michael Schumann. Had you been reading some of these books in college or I mean like when did you [00:06:30] I get inspired about this. Speaker 2:I just intrinsically understood it growing up in a, a small business environment. My parents, they'd come home and we'd have dinner every night and we talk about just the trials and tribulations of running a local business. We really understood intimately the need to have reciprocal relationships. So you're spending money with somebody, they're spending money back with you and just that, that every dollar that you spend is really a vote for what you want to see more of in the community. And [00:07:00] uh, it's, it's a way to support the people who are doing good things in the community but also creates a lot of intangible benefits. You know, like you can see in the u s especially in the Midwestern areas, the small cities, there's nothing there. They're just a shell of their former self. Yeah. And they have a lot of problems. They have a lot of problems with young people and people leaving and Yep. Speaker 2:Yeah, they, they, they've really been gutted. And it is an unfortunate because I think the, the small community model is actually one that's a [00:07:30] little bit more sustainable and a little bit more connected. You're, you're closer to your local food producers. Uh, you end up having stronger relationships. You have less of the financial nightmares created by Wall Street. And uh, it is unfortunate that things have not gone in their favor over the past, uh, 30, 40 years. But I, I think you're going to see, uh, the tide turning and we're certainly hoping to be a part of that. Speaker 1:If you're just tuning in, you're listening [00:08:00] to method to the madness on k a l x Berkeley. Today I'm interviewing Collin Pape, the CEO and founder of Shop city.com. Where are you now in the process here in the u s I know that you, you started in Canada, you were successful with shopping and this is your next forum. So where are you in that process? Speaker 3:Yeah, it started in Canada with shop midland.com. We've got about 25 markets up there that [00:08:30] are currently in operation, but one of our founding partners, Speaker 2:he is from the bay area, born and raised in San Jose. What's his name? His name's Jim Terry. Great Guy. And uh, so now, uh, what we're doing is a kind of a, a master franchise if you will, and we've kind of, uh, sectioned off the 430 California communities. So we, we've got a new company called Shop california.com. Uh, it has the rights to all those different territories. We're doing a direct public offering through a company cutting edge capital [00:09:00] and we're, we're now actively, uh, working with people who are interested in bringing the model to their community. And we're going to do the expected, it's going to be up and running. Uh, so we're, we're launching a pilot project in September, so, uh, we've got a couple of different communities that are on the shortlist, right? We're right now down to three. Uh, so, uh, it's going to depend on the order, but a shop, sonoma.com shop, alameda.com shop pleasanton.com. Speaker 2:So as a consumer I [00:09:30] can instead of local can mean many different things. Let's say I, I'm loyal to a town in New York, maybe out in upstate New York, so I could search online potentially someday in the future and shop locally and in that small town versus going to Amazon for a product that, that maybe previously carried it. Yeah. Ultimately the model is actually going to funnel up to shop locally.com. So it's basically going to be an aggregator so that, uh, for instance, if you wanted to buy Michael Schumann's new book, uh, you could go onto [00:10:00] a single page that has that a book and then you could buy it from wherever is closest to you. And what are the statistics about local? If I buy a book in my local bookstore versus on Amazon, do you know the statistics on the benefits? Yeah, and there's a, a lot of different ones out there. Speaker 2:Uh, but one that we, uh, have have found to be fairly valid is a 45 cents return to your local community with an independent store versus 15 with a local chain store. If you're shopping on Amazon, odds are there's zero [00:10:30] return to your local community. Where's that money going? Yeah, it's uh, it's going, going to corporate headquarters in somewhere. You interface to city government if they want to. That's right. What do they get from it? Do they get anything? Uh, yeah, so, so for instance, we're working with, uh, the city of Corona in southern California Shop corona.com and uh, for, for them it's really just the kind of more intangible longterm benefit of enabling their local merchants to be more competitive online. Uh, they're trying to, again, keep the tax dollars local and they're trying [00:11:00] to ensure that they don't have vacancies and they're just trying to build a more vibrant economy. Speaker 2:Uh, so we're kind of helping them do that. It seems like you could disrupt Yelp and all the chamber of Commerce's and become like the new 21st century chamber of commerce slash she helped because you could also have rating systems. You have local companies, right? Or are you already planning yet? We do have that and yeah, certainly we're, we're looking to disrupt Yelp. We'd like to disrupt Google. We'd like to disrupt Facebook, we'd like to disrupt Amazon. It's all [00:11:30] the big guys and it's about putting all that money back into the community. Uh, chambers of commerce. We actually work with them. They're one of our partners. So we've got a way for any local organization, but in particular chambers to get their own business directory that's powered by kind of the master, uh, shop city directory and a, they can get mobile apps, they can get lots of tools to basically minimize their costs and improve their online experience. Speaker 2:I think it would make them better actually. Yeah, we work so in, in Midland, [00:12:00] uh, it's a huge benefit for the local business. They can update their shot midland.com profile and it automatically updates their chamber of commerce profile if they're in the downtown BIA, it updates that it'll update the business directory and the town of Midlands website. And that's really the model that we're looking to build out all throughout. Uh, the communities that we operate in. There is the opportunity for rev share so that these partners can actually earn money through the system. So, yeah, it's a pretty holistic offering. Everybody can win. That's right. Except the big, big companies. [00:12:30] Exactly. That's right. I wanted to talk to you about redundancies in the system. Yeah. You know, with drought and there's so many problems and there are more stresses on the planet as we go forward. Speaker 2:So people are talking about creating redundant food systems, redundant financial systems, and this feeds right into that. It does. Yeah. It's, it's all about resilience. And, and so you asked earlier about, did I read Michael Schulman's Book Smart Revolution for instance? Uh, I didn't at the time, but, uh, the more [00:13:00] that that we've studied it, the more we see that this is extremely relevant to, yeah. The future of, of the world environment. It's a about building a stronger, more resilient economy that is not so susceptible to these, uh, systemic shocks. Uh, like what happened in 2008. And it's really just a, about enabling people to focus on their own backyard and not so much to worry about what's happening in the rest of the world. So they have an impact locally. Then it feeds up to uh, [00:13:30] uh, the global level. So what are your challenges in this process? Speaker 2:Have you encountered anything unusual in the u s that you did not encounter in Canada? Uh, what we, we had, uh, some challenges with Google actually back in 2011. And, uh, they, they ended up blocking our sites and, uh, they just didn't like the business model where we are running multiple domain names. We're enabling each community to have their own site. They, uh, wanted us to all do it through one domain, one brand, which was really, uh, not the strongest model for communities. [00:14:00] And so we, we ended up, uh, going to battle with them and we were involved with the FTC investigation. We connected with, uh, a lawyer, Gary reback, who was the man who was responsible for the antitrust regulations against Microsoft with windows and Internet explorer back in the day. And, uh, we actually made some progress with them. We were on the, the front page of the San Jose Mercury News business section and Google ended up actually building it with a whole bunch of processes around some of the complaints that we had. Speaker 2:So that was probably the big one, [00:14:30] sort of one that we did win that one. Yeah. Yeah. It was a, a big challenge and uh, certainly I, I, it was unprecedented. Nobody really had done it, but, uh, yeah, we came out on top. I mean, in general, um, yeah, we're, we're going against all the, the largest companies in the world. And so, I mean, there's, there's, uh, a lot of, just overall resistance to the model, but at a local level, everybody is really supportive of it. Everybody intrinsically kind of understands it. It's a message that the merchants and the local [00:15:00] stakeholders, the people in the community want to see promoted. And so we've got this kind of dichotomy where on the larger level, I mean raising capital from a venture capitalist for instance, that's really not something that a, we're, we're, you know, seeing success with or not even anything that we're pursuing at this point because they want to steer us in a direction that is contrary to strong communities. Speaker 1:Food comments has been on my program and one of the things that they say is, um, it kind of helps getting the message out that they aren't competing head to head with these large systems. [00:15:30] They think of themselves as another alternative track running alongside them. And then over time that track gets bigger and bigger and bigger. But there's room for both. That's right. And so people can digest it a little bit better I think. Speaker 2:Yeah. We've, we've, we've slowly been shifting our message from, you know, shop local to shop local first and trying to just give people that, that choice and make sure that, that the merchants are represented and that the community is represented and ultimately it is up to, [00:16:00] uh, to the consumer, the person spending the money. Speaker 1:Yeah. Cause you know, you can go on Amazon and order vacuum cleaner bags, but there's a little store down the street and I don't know what people would prefer to do now. So that to me is a challenge. A certain we've gotten used to not having to deal face to face or look for something or walk down the street and find something Speaker 2:that's right. And yeah, I think that's really where we can play a role in. And Yeah, there is just, there's a disconnect because nobody wants to live in a holiday community that has vacant storefronts that [00:16:30] doesn't have the services immediately available and accessible when you do want them. Everybody wants the best of both worlds. They don't want to have to support local, but they want it there when they need it. And it really is. Speaker 1:And they want to see people walking down the sidewalk and the restaurants open. Yeah, Speaker 2:that's right. You want it. You want to be in a, in a vibrant community. Um, and, and so there is this kind of dichotomy, but I think that is where we can, can really have an impact, uh, enable people to have that convenience shopping from home in their pajamas in the middle of the night whenever they want, but still have that money [00:17:00] feed back into the community and enable that merchant to thrive and maintain a storefront and, and provide the infrastructure and the support to the community that Speaker 1:they are small businesses provide the same amount of money into the economy. I think it's $7 trillion as the big corporations, right? I mean, I didn't know it was 50, 50. I think if that, the word gets out about that, people will look at their communities a little bit differently. Speaker 2:People don't realize that there's a, something called the local multiplier effect, which we've actually got a website, local multiplier.com [00:17:30] with some information, some statistics. Uh, but it, it's, there's really two components to the economy. There's the, the volume, and then there's the velocity and the velocity is equally as important as the volume. So how quickly money is spent, uh, has as much of an impact as the amount that's spent. Everything that we've statistically shows that small businesses actually spend money a lot more rapidly than the big companies. If you look at apple for instance, they've got about $170 billion in the bank that is not being spent. [00:18:00] So it's not circulating, it's not creating a wealth and enabling people to offer products and services. Whereas most small businesses, they run extremely lean and they're spending that money pretty much as soon as they get it in and it's actually creating a stronger, more prosperous local economy. And so it's about how quickly that money is spent as well. Speaker 1:So Colin, you have a son, what kind of future are you envisioning for him with what you're doing right now? Speaker 2:Right. Yeah. So Jackson is, [00:18:30] uh, just over two years old. I'd love for him to have a future. Certainly we're where we've addressed a lot of our environmental challenges. I think those are all all looming. And then from an economic standpoint, I'd love to see just a fairer, more just systems, something that is a little bit more focused on the producers and the people that are really adding value to the economy versus the financial architects that are figuring out how to extract money. So I'd love to see a future where he and his friends [00:19:00] can, can start up their own local businesses to find the money to do it. Exactly. Community capital, just to have that support from the community where people recognize the value of the services that they're offering and the fact that they are local. Just a bit of a more connected world as far as where we all, I think idealistically believe things should go. And then where we're actually spending, Speaker 1:I'm on it. If you're just tuning in, you're listening to method to the madness on [00:19:30] k a l x Berkeley. Today I'm interviewing Colin [inaudible], CEO and founder of Shop city.com. Do you think generally speaking, Canada leans more toward community than the u s Speaker 2:I I think actually it's, it's, it's fairly similar. Uh, I think there is really a, a strong pull to community. I think, uh, ultimately everybody supports it. It's just a, again, these, uh, these big brands [00:20:00] have, have made it so frictionless to, to go in and to, you know, spend your money in. And I mean, local merchants need to do a better job as well. I mean, it's hours of operation, it's a just selection. It's all those different types of things. And, uh, so I, I think intrinsically everybody wants to shop locally, support their community. It just needs to be, if not as easy, very close to, as easy Speaker 1:to do that. When you, as a business person, beyond marketing help marketing my business, [00:20:30] do you provide other things too, like say business analysis tools or is that something you guys are staying away from? Speaker 2:Uh, so that, that's definitely on the roadmap. What we'd like to do at some point is, is be able to share the statistics across comparable. So there's always just that challenge of, uh, of data integrity and you know, sharing information that's too personal, uh, within a competitive environment. But if you have a, a similar community and [00:21:00] you can show them what's happening in another community, then there's, there's an opportunity to improve Democrat study, demographics, trends, and, and if this community to this, this was the, the outcome. Uh, I think internally within our community, there's a huge opportunity to help businesses and nonprofits close gaps. So identify places where there's a lack of service and an abundance of demand, and then the city could benefit from that. Definitely know your data says [00:21:30] you're lacking a pub or you're lacking a restaurant on this corner and it looks like it could be really successful. Speaker 2:That's right. Definitely. Yeah. And then ultimately we, we'd actually, local currency is something that's very interesting as well. So enable people to create and circulate a local currency. I mean, all that stuff's pretty far down the track, but I think in the next 10 years, things are gonna they're going to be so many stresses that we're not seeing. Right. That's right. That's what at least the futurists are saying. Yup. Do you involve students at all here? We haven't yet, but that is the plan. Yes. There's [00:22:00] a, I think, a big opportunity to build a community for the creative, uh, economy. So, so people who are building websites here in graphic design, social media, marketing, these are all services that local businesses use and need. And a lot of the challenge is really just, it's around the sales side. It's around the operational side as far as just, you know, billing goes and customer support. Speaker 2:But we, we'd really like to create a bit of a marketplace so that all of those services are fulfilled locally [00:22:30] by local creatives. And so we can, uh, help them on the sales side, connect them with the businesses that need their services, help them on the invoicing side and just maintaining customer relationships but enable them to actually fulfill the work. Right now we've, we've got, you know, people in, in Midland, we've got a couple of different satellite offices where, where people are doing that work, but ultimately we'd like it all to be done at Berkeley for the Berkeley businesses for instance. And uh, that will definitely require tech savvy, creative [00:23:00] students. I would say fulfill that demand. And how would they reach you? We've got a couple of different websites you can go to shop city.com that's got some information on the company, kind of the opportunity to open up a local market. Speaker 2:And then we've got, right now it's just a landing page woodshop california.com, which is really just more specific to the opportunity, uh, in California. And uh, he'll be able to find all the different, uh, local communities, the 430 that are, that are on there. And uh, ultimately it will aggregate all of that content [00:23:30] that's put into the California communities. They can, uh, find me on that site. All the contact forms. I uh, I'm on those lists that, that those go into a, so you could just fill out the contact form and it'll come across my awareness for sure. Creative idea. And I wonder if anyone else in the world is doing some type of in Europe or do you know of any other examples? Generally people end up doing it with a, a, a single brand. And so it doesn't become really local in the same regard that [00:24:00] our platform enables that to happen. Speaker 2:Our, our sites are only about that community and they're, they're very specific and it's really a, a grassroots bottom up approach. And it is about marketing it out in the community. That's how you drive local awareness and you drive participation. And it's difficult to do that if you don't have that local brand. And so we were fortunate that we recognize the opportunity back when domain names were a little bit more plentiful and we've certainly spent a lot of money acquiring them and, and we've taken some risks, uh, you know, dot com bust everything [00:24:30] everybody's getting out. And uh, Jim Terry for instance, he went all in one day, he bought a $50,000 worth of domain, 750 of them dropped and he bought them all. So yeah, so we've got them. Yeah. And uh, and yeah, nobody that we know of is really doing it in that same way. Speaker 2:Well, I can envision somebody like, let's say Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the Amish community where they sell their quilt. I only think they would love something like, you know, little communities like [inaudible] you can go in and, and it almost becomes a tourism draw. Yeah, that's right. [00:25:00] I think that the, the world is, is changing and, and uh, we've gone through different waves. Uh, you know, used to be a very localized world. And then, uh, ever since mass transportation, airplanes and mass communication with the television and phones, things will become more globalized. But I, I think there were really, I'll, I'll, there's a lot to be said for the original local model and then layering some of these newer technologies and opportunities on top, but to just create that stronger [00:25:30] core where we are more connected to a community, uh, I think everybody's is really longing for, for more of a connection. Speaker 2:And, uh, and I think local is really the, the, the way to do it where it's a true, authentic connection. A lot of the stuff that's just online, if it, if it's Facebook, uh, you know, some of the other, you know, channels, Twitter for instance, uh, you can reach a lot of people and you can have a frequent connection. But, uh, you know, it's not [00:26:00] the same as, as walking into a store and bumping into somebody that, you know, who intimately knows that all the same things that you do, the areas, the businesses, uh, the people, uh, the politics, all those different things. I mean, ultimately everything is still local here. You're still getting all of your services locally. And, uh, I think that that, that's where things are going over the next, uh, you know, 10, 20 years because it's, it's a lot more sustainable people. Speaker 2:Honest. I [00:26:30] think it does, you know, you're seeing people that in doing business, spending your money with them and they are with you as well. It's sort of this, that that's right. It's, it, it really is. Uh, it's, it's a lot deeper as far as the, the connection goes. I think it, it just builds a better world when people are more authentically connected to community. I saw you came in here with a book. What are you reading? It's by Michael Shuman. It's called the local economy solution. Uh, we were actually featured in the, in the book, which I'm really excited about and [00:27:00] very proud of. And, uh, it's, it's, yeah, it really, it's a, a practical book. It's a different economic and technological and business models. He calls them pollinator businesses that, uh, that really do a great job of, of building up a local economy and they're, they're sustainable financially, so they're, they're profitable models. Speaker 2:I, I did some research over the past 10 years and I've looked at the history of money. Basically. There's, there's a one documentary that really influenced my thinking, uh, called money masters. [00:27:30] And it talked about, uh, the role of money throughout the, the past millennium basically. And, uh, I think we have a really distorted view of money currently versus what it really is. Well, ultimately money, it's, it's just a, a way to account for things. It's really a debit and a credit system and we've distorted it so that it's all about finances and about, uh, kind of shifting the responsibility [00:28:00] and the control of money to the centralized organizations when it's really in the age of Bitcoin, for instance. Uh, it's really not, not going to be necessary in the future to, to delegate that control. And so, uh, by doing that, you can build just a, a tighter economy where those, those debits and credits are a lot more aligned than they aren't now. Speaker 2:Right now we've, we've got a whole bunch of leaks in the system. Really. We're, we're entrusting the control of, of that accounting [00:28:30] system basically to somebody who has the, the right and the ability to create their own debits and credits at will. And I think that that, that really does a huge disservice to the people that are actually producing things and, uh, particularly locally. And, uh, so, so yeah, really excited to, to prove out the community capital model where the, the money that comes to fund this, this operation is from the community, the, the money that is generated, returns to the community. And ultimately, yeah, to look at a, [00:29:00] a different type of accounting system that returns things a lot more freely to the community. It's a huge, huge subject. It's, it's all very recent. A lot of these new mechanisms that have been put into place. Speaker 2:And I mean they, they're not working. If you look at quantitative easing, how much money is being pumped into the economy just to keep things going at kind of the snail's pace that they are. It is a system that's broken and it needs a, a solution that that is more sustainable. That's what is really intriguing about small business. Growing up [00:29:30] in that environment, we knew where all of our dollars were going and we were very aware of the connection and of the power of spending and you would know that, okay, if I spend money with guy, he's got a project coming up to to supply it and so you just start building that. Really, I would say it's a, it's a relationship and it's an awareness and I think that's lacking in a lot of the models today. The community itself has basically been replaced with all these different networks that don't ultimately work for [00:30:00] the greater good and work for the community as a whole. Speaker 1:Colin, I really wish you luck on this and I want to thank you for being on this program. Thanks for the opportunity. Lisa, you've been listening to method to the madness, a biweekly public affairs show onK , a l ex Berkeley, celebrating bay area innovators. If you have questions or comments about the show, go to the Calex website, find method to the madness and drop us an email. You'll also find a link to previous podcasts. [00:30:30] Tune in again in two weeks at the same Speaker 4:[inaudible]. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Host Lisa Kiefer interviews Vicki Abadesco, the director and co-founder of Soul Shoppe, an organization that teaches empathy, anger management, and peacemaking to school children and their adults with programs across the US, Canada, and Holland. Abadesco is an author, Packard Foundation-Ashoka Changemakers "Building Empathy" Award winner, and fellow for the Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values at MIT.TRANSCRIPTSpeaker 1:Method to the madness is next. You're listening to method to the madness. I Biweekly Public Affairs show on k a l ex Berkeley celebrating at bay area innovators. I'm Risa Keefer and today I'm interviewing Vicky Abba Jesco. She's the director and Co founder of soul shop, an organization that teaches empathy, anger management, and peacemaking to school children and their adults with programs across the u s Canada and Holland. [00:00:30] Welcome to the program. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Speaker 2:You're the director and Co founder of soul shop. What is the problem that soul shop is trying to solve? How to really create safe environments for kids and really safe environments for anyone. We know that we want kids to have a happy and fun and productive time at school, and sometimes that just doesn't happen for lots of different reasons. And so our [00:01:00] role is to go into schools and really support schools to create that kind of environment where kids feel safe, kids feel respected when oftentimes they don't. I'd be reading so much about bullying. I mean, it's in the paper magazine articles. It's not new. I mean, I remember bullies in school. Why is there such a surge of interest in it right now? Has something changed? You know, we've been doing this work for 15 years and I'm currently in my 30th year of education and I feel a lot of these skills [00:01:30] that we're teaching in soul shop. Speaker 2:I've been teaching my entire career and the issues that we see in young people are really the same issues I feel like I've seen through the years. Um, and we started doing bully prevention work 15 years ago. It wasn't a so popular in the news or the media, but we know that the behaviors are still the same. That just seems to be a highlight of that in the recent years and again, with so many suicides and deaths and the social media issues, [00:02:00] we really see it highlighted. So we're just, we just have more access to the information. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. I think there's a way that kids have always suffered and always felt alone and that the pain of that, and I think there need to get attention to be seen to be heard. I've shown up in so many different ways, right? We can say drugs and alcohol and you know, all sorts of things that we see, you know, those, those kids or those teenagers, those young people doing that are really just a need [00:02:30] for them to be seen and acknowledged in some way. Speaker 2:And so both the students who are victims and even the students who are doing the bullying, we feel like everybody needs the same and equal respect. And how do we listen to both sides and how do we give all kids the things that they're really needing emotionally and socially? Well, I know there are several different people in this space. Yeah. How is yours different for us? You know, we really believe that learning and things shift through and connection. [00:03:00] And so a lot of other programs that are out there tend to be focused on how to teach the teachers how to teach this content in their classrooms. And we know that they're such a burden and expectation on our teachers and our educators right now. And so we want to come into schools and really help them with this issue to make sure that the, the issues and the topics are really taught in a way that the kids are grasping. Speaker 2:I'm still, we're not a curriculum or [00:03:30] a video or DVD that a teacher can pop in and show the students. It's us really having a relationship and a connection to be able to teach these skills and these tools in real time. So we get to act out scenarios that are actually happening in the classroom and really help teachers resolve conflicts and help students talk through issues that are, that are showing up that might be disrupting the classroom and their learning. And also again, disrupting any fun that they might be having in school. [00:04:00] So you do this by teaching the teachers the empathy of feeling what that's like. So is it role playing? Can you describe, yeah, so for us, you know, when we go into a school, we see the entire school. So we see every kid in that school through storytelling, through activities, through games that we play with them, uh, through our own personal sharing is they really get an experience like, wow, yeah that has happened to me. Speaker 2:And Oh that happened to you too. And then we get to ask the entire room, [00:04:30] how many other people has that happened to her? Have you felt that way? And when we see every hand go up, then every kid gets like, oh, it's not just me, I'm not alone. And then that experience that so many young people have about feeling so alone or feeling so isolated, there's some relief that comes to them knowing that the person next to them is also raising their hand. So you've been doing this since 2001 so you've had time to measure the results of all of this work. What have you found out? So [00:05:00] we found out a few things. One is I think teachers and principals really appreciate having an extra person on campus that gets to come in once a month or once every other month to have these kinds of conversations with the students. Speaker 2:And we get to work with the students in a really different way and get to support the teachers. And so, you know, we'd been around for 15 years and those first few schools we had 15 years ago, we are still in those schools today. And to me that's like the greatest measure of the success [00:05:30] of our programs is the longevity in which the schools are committed to working with us and invite us in year after year to work with their students to really cultivate and hold this kind of a compassionate school community. Um, you know, at the end of every year we ask teachers how they feel we are impacting their school and when they tell us that they're spending less time on discipline, when we actually see discipline records on the school level [00:06:00] through the school district go down, principals will acknowledge that we are a big contributor to that factor. Speaker 1:Yeah. We talked to you about a couple of things. What age is this the most successful in and how you engage the home life, which could be the source of the [inaudible] Speaker 2:problem. Yeah. That's one of the biggest concerns that schools have is that, you know, we're teaching these skills throughout the entire school community, from the students to the teachers, to the administrators and all of the school support. Everyone gets trained [00:06:30] by us. And so we're always trying to bridge how do we have the students take these skills? They're learning here at school and take them back home. And so we do parent trainings and parents get an opportunity to practice the skills themselves and practice with the students. And how do you even get them to come in? You know, we do whatever we can to partner with that school to get parents in on that parent night where we get that opportunity. One of the things that we like doing is at the end of every workshop that we do, the students get a bookmark [00:07:00] and sometimes on that bookmark there are questions and we really invite the students who take that bookmark home, show it to their parents so they get like, oh, this is what I learned today and these are some questions you can ask me. Speaker 2:And they're prompts for the parents so that the, again, they know what their kids are learning. Oftentimes we also get emails or calls from parents saying, wow, I didn't realize what my kid was learning through soul shop and thank you so much cause you know me and my partner were arguing and my kids stepped up and said, [00:07:30] hey, there's a better way. And they taught us how to communicate in a way where we're not raising our voices, we're not yelling and we really thank you for teaching our kids skills that we didn't have. And so we're communicating in a different way and I [inaudible] Speaker 1:may not ever yell at my kid again because of these skills. If you're just tuning in, you're listening to method to the madness. A biweekly public affairs show on k l expertly celebrating Bay area innovators. Today our guest is Vicky Ebid Esco. She's [00:08:00] the director and cofounder of soul shock and organization teaching empathy, anger management and peacemaking to school children and their adults. Tell me about the differences of presenting this whole program from Grade School, Middle School, and high school. How is it different? What are your challenges? So when I started my career Speaker 2:30 years ago, I worked in San Francisco high schools and I taught life skills and I taught violence prevention, conflict resolution, [00:08:30] and it was a challenge. You know, I was teaching very similar skills on that level. You know, they called me prevention specialist and I did a lot of intervention work on that level. And I started to question when does prevention really happen if we're doing true prevention one, does that happen? And so after 13 years of working for San Francisco School district, I thought, I want to try something. I want to see how can we work with younger kids, bring these same tools to [00:09:00] elementary schools and see how they embrace learning these skills at that level. Because by high school, they're just in the midst of it, right? There's lots of ways that they're being in the way that they're socialized is really anchored into their body. Speaker 2:The way they communicate all of that from what they've learned at school, their communities in their homes, their families. Yes, they can learn new ways of doing things, but it's so much more of a challenge and so when we started looking at working with elementary kids, we thought, wow, [00:09:30] what would it be like as they're growing developmentally to learn these tools just in how to socialize and make friends and be friends. What if we get really gave them the language skills to be able to communicate and resolve conflicts at that age so that when they got some middle school, when they got to high school, when they're really faced with the peer pressure and the stress and all of the physical changes that somewhere in their body they're going to remember that there's another way that they're gonna remember that they have tools [00:10:00] and skills to make a different choice that's not going to hurt themselves or hurt someone else. Speaker 2:The earlier the better. That's what you're saying. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. You're also an author of a book free to be and you've written curriculum and you have activity cards for teachers and all that stuff. Can you talk about this book free to be, what is it about? I was curious about the impact of bullying and I set out to just do interviews with people and part of this kind of, it showed up organically because [00:10:30] when I would meet people and they would ask what I did for a living, I would share with them and right away they wanted to tell me the story about how they were bullied some time in their life. And so stories from being kicked out of a friendship to stories about being bullied in the workplace, to being teased for their body, their high, they're weight smarter, this being smart, having money, no money, all of these things. Speaker 2:And as the years have gone by [00:11:00] and people have shared so many stories with me, I could still feel the pain and the impact that that incident, whether is onetime or ongoing, had on people sharing these stories because it was always so ripe for them in their mind, the situation, the scenario, the pain, what it felt like. So I thought, wow, I think I want to write a book about this that just has the stories in them. And so people can just really see that no [00:11:30] matter what age you are. So I have a young person who is 11 years old who also wrote her own book about what it was like for her to be bullied to somebody in their sixties and so they've lived this long life and yet they still can remember being taunted, being teased, being chased down the street for living in a certain part of town. Speaker 2:And also for being, you know, a single parent living with a single parent and it just never leaves. And that was what I was really curious about. And so when I was writing this [00:12:00] book, I just thought, wow, look at how profound it is. And for so many people, most of the people I've interviewed and that are in the book actually never told their stories to anybody. Even for them, sharing it with me and having it written out in this way in this book brought a lot of healing and closure for people because it was also the first time that people, that somebody just listened to them. And I feel like that is what's true every day when we walk into those schools is kids just want us to stop [00:12:30] and listen. Speaker 3:Well, it's interesting to me that you know, these things, they don't ever leave you, which makes me curious about your life. Did something happen or things happen to you that kind of led you to education in the first place and specifically conflict resolution and all that? Speaker 2:Yeah, there was a saying that our greatest wound is our greatest gift and I definitely believe that is true for me. I'm the youngest of four kids. My parents were immigrants to this country and um, did their best [00:13:00] to assimilate, uh, here and they did a great job and they did what they could to provide for us. And we had a house and food every day. And as a California, I was born and raised in San Francisco and it was still a struggle for my mom especially. And so she just struggled emotionally with lots of different things. So she started to, to drink and so she was an alcoholic and that alcoholism was just a way for her to cope. And so being the youngest kid, [00:13:30] I really felt like I was invisible. There was just a way that I wasn't really seen in my family. You know, we have students in our program that we call peacemakers. Speaker 2:I feel like that's what I was when I was a kid in my family. And part of my role was making sure that everything was okay. And so when my mom was drinking, making sure she was calm enough that she wouldn't go into, you know, crazy psychotic episodes, which sometimes she would do. Um, and I really just felt it was my role to just calm her down and make things peaceful. [00:14:00] And so at a really early age, I really was able to, I've managed a lot of emotions and manage the people that around me to make sure everyone was safe. And meanwhile, there wasn't a place for me to go. There wasn't anyone for me to talk to. I'd go to school and not really know like, you know, I didn't feel like this was something I was supposed to be sharing with anyone and have my own shame and sadness and really felt isolated. Speaker 2:And at an early age felt. Now as I look back, you know, really [00:14:30] I was a depressed kid and nobody really saw that. And I know that I must've gone to school looking sad or looking depressed and I don't remember one teacher ever saying, hey, what's it like to be you today? What's going on? You seem sad. You look sad. Is Everything okay? And back then, that wasn't roles of teachers. They didn't do that. And it wasn't until I was in middle school that I felt like a teacher saw me and asked me those questions and it was a first time that I got to [00:15:00] share what it was really liked to be me. And so when I was in high school, I got involved with the peer education program and I became a peer educator because I was that kid that everyone came to you with their problems. Speaker 2:When something happened, people were feeling sad, they were having problems in their own family. My friends came and they talked to me. So I always knew that I was that person. And so when I went to college and I got a degree in psychology, I thought it was going to be a therapist because I felt like this is just [00:15:30] my natural skill. This is just what I do. And but it wasn't it. I felt like there was just something else. And so when I got my first job in a high school in San Francisco and was teaching a group of students who were in these gangs and it was my job to just keep them in school and just keep them enrolled and I just did everything I could to just be with them. And no matter what fancy curriculum I pulled out of the hat for them. Really what was most valuable [00:16:00] that somebody was just sitting with them, not trying to change them, not judging them, just being with them and listening to their stories and giving them a place to just be seen. Whether they were mad, whether they were sad, whether they were confused, whether they felt hopeless. So I feel grateful for everything that I've lived through because it's giving me that capacity to hold a lot of emotions and to really just be with people and to be with young people and anybody with whatever it is that they're feeling. Speaker 3:You're in Canada and you're in [00:16:30] Holland and other parts of the United States are the challenges different outside of cal, I think of California is a little more progressive, but how, how is it different or is it different or do you have the same bullying, conflict problems everywhere? Speaker 2:Yeah, I've done youth programs all over and I'm going to say the bottom line is still the same that you know, you could plop me anywhere. So even in Holly and yeah, there's just something really interesting about this. You know, I want to do more traveling internationally to, to really [00:17:00] look at this phenomenon because I, you know, it makes me curious about do other kids and other places where, you know, in our country here we're so, we pride ourselves in our independence and being low, being able to do things to a level where, I mean this is where the isolation hurts us. Other communities and cultures where, you know, entire families live in a really small Shakka home room. Everyone sleeps together, everyone eats together and you know, for some cultures are almost like [00:17:30] literally we're like right almost on top of each other. And I wonder if they feel lonely. I wonder if they feel that same level of hopelessness that I feel like sometimes we hear in our young people, Speaker 3:I want to talk to you about technology in relation to this because exponentially there's a tremendous amount of technology in these kids' lives since you, this program. Speaker 2:How is that impacting what you do and in the schools themselves with the ability for kids to be on social media at all times? Yeah, it definitely [00:18:00] makes it a challenge for, you know, we see so much especially um, high school college where, you know, social media is just used in such a way to hurt other people. You know, again, I think there's a level of expression that is happening that maybe they're not able to get in other places. And so it happens through social media and I see that on a lot of different ways where, you know, people want to share like here's the highlight of my day, or wow, this thing happened to me. [00:18:30] Or you know, again to be able to use it to gossip about somebody to spread a rumor about someone. But there's still a place underneath it all where someone's trying to get acknowledged for something. Speaker 2:Somebody is trying to be seen for something, you know, emotional intelligence, life skills, what are these things had been around for a really long time. And it's interesting for me to see us come back to some of these things that have been around, which are helping us to put down our [00:19:00] devices, figure out how to get eye to eye with somebody and really have those conversations because technology has been around enough so that we are seeing the impact that's having on our brain and the way you know, the different parts of our brain that's being used in ways and how empathy is really a skill that needs to be cultivated and that can be cultivated personally. Right? It's like we want to be able to make sure that our body language, eye contact, those sorts of things that are so important [00:19:30] are really helping, you know, putting down devices and being able to connect personally with people is what I feel like we're coming back to because of so much of what we're seeing happening to that. Speaker 2:So for sure that the part of the brain that we're empathy happens. Is it diminished with technology? Do we know this? Yeah. There's some neuroscience neurobiology that are coming up with with some of the that research. And so this is what they were saying about why it makes it easy for somebody [00:20:00] to gossip or bully through social media because there's a disconnection there. There's not a personal connection. So if I know you, if I had a chance to really hear your story or get who you really are, what you're going through, I wouldn't even think about getting on social media and saying something bad about you. And so there's this place where yet it's like where does empathy really come into play? And so one of the things we're curious about and we know other folks are, it's like how do we then help to have this experience [00:20:30] of empathy or forgiveness and compassion? Speaker 2:Where does that show up in the world? That leads me to a question I want to ask you. You're a fellow at the Dalai Lama Center for ethics and transformative values at MIT. I am really curious about what goes on there. Are these the kinds of things that you talk about? Yeah, absolutely right. So like his holiness, the Dalai Lama is really committed to youth global leaders. You know, he has a vision of how do we bring more compassion to young leaders everywhere. And so [00:21:00] part of that is some of the things that the folks at MIT are looking at, right? And so they're experimenting with both in person workshops, also different types of technologies and games to really bring to young people and in schools to really practice how do we really work with empathy in this way? And so, you know, one of the things that we're finding is that it's a challenge to just have technology do that alone. Speaker 2:It really takes some human components [00:21:30] of whether it's just somebody facilitating a conversation about how to use this technology. It's still giving somebody a personal experience. Do you were chosen as one of six a Shaka changemaker awards? Was that a monetary award? Yeah, it was a, a what they called an empathy competition. And they were, um, you know, a show Kia changemakers along with Packard Foundation. They partnered together to really look at how are people building empathy through communities. And so [00:22:00] we thought, well, we definitely are building empathy through communities. And so we went ahead and applied in the competition and we were able to receive the award and it's been such an honor. But how much did you win? We won $100,000. Um, and it's been such an incredible blessing for us, you know, again, do you have to get grants every year? How do you fund this privately? Speaker 2:Fine. A lot of private funding. A lot of individuals who really have seen [00:22:30] our work, love what we're doing in schools and know that we've been around as long as we've been around, money comes directly from schools and there are some schools that can't pay the full price of our program. And so getting donations and having programs like this really helped to supplement, um, those schools who can't afford to bring in a program like ours. Uh, the a hundred thousand dollars helps us to do some things that are new and different that we're looking at. We're looking at some online training as well. We're having [00:23:00] conversations again about, you know, how do we build something digitally to so teachers could download the two 10 institute them and their school well to do it more as follow up some ways to really help teachers and their own empathy building skills and you know, we want teachers to be able to have some of these conversations with their kids when we're not there and some of the teachers get that kind of training. Speaker 2:I think that's one of the reasons we're looking at this online course to really have them look at, you know, how in a six week course can they just [00:23:30] work on their own empathy skills, you know, in order for us to be great teachers, anything we have to have the experience of it as well. That's one of my visions is that every teacher have that kind of training just for themselves so that they can find way where they can have more capacity, emotional capacity, so that when the things show up in their classroom, they can handle it better. That there is a way that they're not personally triggered by what's happening with the kids. That may be empathy, could be there as an option. Can you tell [00:24:00] us a story about someone or some school where this was, you have lots of stories. So I tell this story about this young girl, you know, we got a call from a principal, he said we're having an issue with bullying and will you come in and basically kind of fix what's happening here. Speaker 2:And so, you know, he wanted to tell me about this kid and I didn't want to know. I just like, you know, let us come in and let's see what's happening. And he invited us to come in for one time to do this one assembly. And so we got on campus and as soon as we got on [00:24:30] campus, the principal wanted to point out this belief and we didn't want to know who this kid was cause it's not about one kid and it's about the entire school community. And so we start our assembly and we talk about feelings. And when we have so many feelings, we get really full. And when we get really full, we do things, push somebody. We might talk behind someone's back. We might ruin somebody's four square game, you know, we're just disrespectful. And [00:25:00] we asked, you know, how many of you ever felt that full little hands go up? Speaker 2:And this is a room of maybe 204th graders. So we see those hands go up and then we ask is there anybody that wants to share what they're feeling inside you? And usually at this point when we ask this question, it's like silence. The kids are all looking around like no one wants to raise their hand, but we patiently wait cause we know what's in the room and we're not expecting, you know, this kid that they called us to this school to raise their hand, [00:25:30] you know, which just like it's anybody. We know, there's lots of kids who have really that they feel really full in that way. So all of a sudden we see this little hand go up and the whole room moves and then we hear like this whispering. And so we know this is the bully, this is that. We know it. Speaker 2:So this sweet little girl comes up to the front of the room, she sits in what we call the chair of help, and we ask her, what's going on with you? And she's got these little tears coming out of her [00:26:00] eyes. So it's like silence. And these kids are mesmerized that this kid who's been labeled a bully is in front of all of them crying. And so even right in that moment you feel something shift in the room. And so she says that she lost her best friend, that her grandmother died. And the room is stunned because this was a girl that when the principal called us, he said that they did everything to fix her behavior on the playground, including suspending her two [00:26:30] times for her behavior that they didn't know our grandmother died. I think they knew her grandmother died. I don't know if they knew the extent of the impact because here we had a broken hearted little girl who lost best friend. Speaker 2:And so she went on just to share about how it's really harder to mom, how her, her mom doesn't want her talking about her grandma. Let's just not talk about it. She comes to school, she pushes people around, she creates havoc on the playground at recess. Nobody knows what to do with her and she's just [00:27:00] sad and brokenhearted. And so we asked her to tell us about her grandma. And so she gets a big smile on her face. She tells us how she made the best cookies ever. She was the only person in her life that told her she loved her and she was sad. And then we ask, you know, how many of you have also lost someone? Right? So we see these hands go up. So how many of you would be willing to sit with her and maybe ask her about what her grandmother was like? Speaker 2:Almost every hand in that room went up. So a kid who previously everyone [00:27:30] was staying away from now is the most popular kid. Yes. What happens to this girl? All right, so a couple weeks later we call the school and principals like, yeah, it's really gray. We haven't really seen any more incidents from her or the kids are asking and they, he found that there was an opportunity for the other kids to share the people in their lives. They also lost it. They didn't know how to talk about doe. Now this girl becomes this, like you're saying, they can talk to someone they can talk to. That's really a beautiful transformation. Yes. [00:28:00] You know, so for me it's like that's, that's part of the success story. And so, you know, when you ask about the challenge, it's, you know, that school didn't have much more funding for us to come back and we would have loved to have done that. Speaker 2:And so I would say that's always the biggest challenge is for us to be able to have the resources to be able to do followups for stories like that. What are your goals for the future? It sounds like you've done a tremendous amount. We are looking at models to be able to grow our programs throughout the country. Again, we're looking at some things digitally [00:28:30] so that that will help to make that happen. And we're looking at some online courses for teachers so that teachers everywhere can get even at least this first level course on how to get empathy skills for themselves. So again, that they have a greater capacity and understanding about that personally to be more available to their kids and their students. How do we get programs up throughout the country and also enough facilitators and train in a certain way so that I feel confident [00:29:00] that folks who are out in schools are really able to facilitate these kinds of conversations with kids because it definitely takes training and a lot of time working again on our own self development to be able to have the capacity to really work with kids on this level. Speaker 2:It's fascinating to me all the ways that we have found to hurt each other through our words. Right? And any way that we can separate ourselves. So somebody else is just different, right? And we're all different, so we all at any time are targets of this [00:29:30] on some level it's so ridiculous. And then on another level, we can't seem to stop ourselves, but it's great that you've gone deeper to see that, that there's something else behind all of that, right? That's the superficial manifestation, right? If people want to get a hold of soul shop or you personally, do you have a website that they can go to? Soul shop, which is s o u l s h o p p e.com and to get ahold of me, you would just put Vicky v I C K I at [inaudible] Dot Com Speaker 1:do you have a Jessica, [00:30:00] thank you for being on the program. Thanks Lisa for having me. You've been listening to method to the madness, a biweekly public affairs show on k a l x Berkeley Celebrating Bay area innovators. If you have questions or comments about this show, go to the calyx website, find method to the madness and drop us an email there. You'll also find the link to previous podcasts. Tune in again in two weeks at the same time. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Welcome to Kid Power Radio. I'm your host Max and each week I review what's happening on TV, at the movies, books and music I like ….You get the idea This show we have something a little special. If you listened to me interviewing Miranda Cosgrove I asked her if she could get me tickets to go to the Kids Choice Awards. Over a couple of weeks I was informed that I was going to the Kids Choice Awards. This is what happened. (Talk about Kids Choice Awards)  At the orange carpet I got to interview a lot of celebrities.  We will be letting you hear these interviews over a period of time. We will be releasing 1 interview every show. Today we are releasing the Nick Jonas, from the Jonas Brothers interview. Enjoy! I would like to thank all the people for making this awesome experience. Jodi and Scott and Jaden and special thanks to Miranda Cosgrove, star for Nick's iCarly meeting me at the ice cream shop and Kevin and Linda from Entertainment Tonight for all their help. I would especially like to thank Lisa Lillien, the Hungry-Girl for getting the tickets for me and making this all happen. Thanks Lisa! And everybody should buy her new book. Remember, you can email me at RADIO STAR MAX at YAHOO.COM That's it for now. See you next week.  Bye!

Time for some more of that Listener Feedback goodness! Listener Lisa arranged a special treat for our 100th episode but it didn't quite get to us before the celebration show. We really enjoyed it though and wanted to share it with you this week. Thanks Lisa! Episode 7 was packed with action and everyone has a theory about the "mutiny" option. You guys had a lot to talk about. Let's get to it! This week we hear from: Lisa, JoAnna Ward, Shelley, Bonnie, Toledo Dave, Ethan Zohn, Mike, Amy, Denver Dave, Bonnie (part 2), Mal Gal, Brian, Carol, Sandi, Bob, and Sarge We love hearing what you thought, and we've got several ways you can reach us. You can call and leave a voicemail at 206-350-JASS(5277). You can record an audio comment and attach it or just type up a quick text message and send it to us via email at joannandstacyshow@gmail.com. Lastly, there's a link for comments on the web page here. You can click that link and post your thoughts out there for everyone to see. Our intro and outro tunes are once again dedicated to Jessica. She added value to the team in the challenges but never really caught on to the whole "Survivor is a game" concept and was finally discarded when the adults decided it was time for her to go home. Here's a link to the artists in case you want to learn more about them. I'm Going Home by Lee Maddeford In A Child's Eyes by Ron Maryann Sfarzo 00:01 Date 00:05 I'm Going Home by Lee Maddeford 01:17 Show Intro 02:50 Lisa's 100th Episode Gift 03:18 Joanna Ward from Survivor Amazon wishes us a Happy 100th 05:37 Shelley from Australia 06:40 Bonnie from North Carolina 11:11 Toledo Dave 14:29 A Happy 100th from Ethan Zohn Survivor Africa and All-Stars 14:58 Mike from California 24:47 Amy from New Jersey 28:27 Denver Dave 35:16 Bonnie from North Carolina 38:33 Mal Gal from Georgia 41:16 Brian from Georgia 44:20 Carol from Northern California 48:29 Sandi from Georgia 53:07 Bob from Minnesota 64:10 A Happy 100th from Sarge 64:30 Survivor Live Recap 69:20 Mike in California (Part 2) 75:21 In A Childs Eyes by Ron Maryann Sfarzo Links for Today's Show JSFL Results Update for Survivor: Cook Islands JSFL Rules for Survivor: Cook Islands Here's a tip from Mike in California for how to find the extended "Next Time on Survivor" preview clip. From the CBS innertube site select: All Shows > Reality/Alternative > Survivor: Cook Islands > Pre-Show > Preview Contact Info:Voicemail: 206-350-JASS(5277)Email: joannandstacyshow@gmail.comGizmo: Enjoy, Jo Ann and Stacy