The Ultimate Human with Gary Brecka - 79. Jillian Turecki: Keys to Healing Trauma and Finding Love

Starting point is 00:00:00 I always say that our relationship before we got married was 90% great and then 10% problematic. And people think that when you get married that that 10% will go away when really the 10% becomes the 90%. Everyone always like all men are going to lie and cheat to you. It's like well no man is going to lie to you more than you lie to yourself ever. You have to look in the mirror and say how have I been lying to myself about who this person is so that I don't have to be alone. If you don't heal your relationship, you'll never really be the best version of yourself physiologically. In the dating world, you want to find love. You want to like really settle down with someone. Here's a tip.

Starting point is 00:01:00 Hey, guys, welcome back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. I'm your host, human biologist Gary Brekka, where we go down the road of everything anti-aging, biohacking, longevity, and everything in between. And today's guest is going to be a really special treat. She is a relationship coach, a teacher, a podcaster, a writer, major influencer in the area of relationships and love. So if you are looking for advice on how to improve your relationships or how to improve the way that you look and love yourself, today is going to be the podcast for you. So welcome to the podcast, Julian Turecki. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. And I just actually realized that you're local. I thought you flew in from New York. I am a New York City girl. It's hard for me to say that I'm a local, but I am living in Miami. Yes. For, for a little time. And we immediately started

Starting point is 00:01:49 talking about the struggle to find really good, healthy food. Yes. Um, she's like, where can I get a grass fed burger around here that I don't need to cook myself? I go, well, you can get it right here in my place. Exactly. So I'm glad that we both are aligned on good, clean foods. But I'm excited about this podcast today because as I was sharing with you earlier, one of the criticisms that I rightly get is that I have a tendency to lean towards a male audience and sometimes have male guests on. And I think that while relationships are for everybody, I really want to give something back to the ladies today and talk about some of the complications and things that they face that they may not have otherwise been able to struggle,

Starting point is 00:02:31 I mean, been able to solve with basic mainstream modern medicine. Because this is all about longevity and living your best life, becoming an ultimate human, bio-optimization. And I find your background really fascinating. And when we were eating lunch right before the podcast, one of the things I mentioned to you was that a lot of my guests have some really inspiring journeys that they've been on. And they've either solved the problem or found pain in their life, which led to their purpose. And it was that journey that kind of shaped their contribution to humanity. And you promised me you would share your journey. Yes, I did. So I'd love for my listeners to know a little bit about where you started and what brought

Starting point is 00:03:16 you to being such an influencer in the relationship space. Sure. So I am an avid practitioner of yoga. I've been practicing yoga for about 25 years and I taught it for almost 20 years. So I have been a teacher for a very long time and I've always been very obsessed really with the mind body connection and healing, healing the mind and healing the body through the practice of yoga and meditation. And so, um, when I started teaching, I loved it. I, it felt like a calling. I mean, I was one of those people who had a dream that was like, this is what you're going to like, literally a literal dream, like you're sleeping and you have a dream that this is what you're going to be doing. And so I followed that calling. I had incredible teachers and it was wonderful. And I would say a few years and maybe I'd say like seven years into teaching pretty heavily in New York City, I was feeling like I wanted something more, but I didn't know what that was. And I also really wanted to get married and start a family. So I was at that stage of my life where I wanted more, but I also wanted a family. And I, so definitely it was, it was a, a mixed message of

Starting point is 00:04:49 you need to have like a really good job with a 401k, you know, cause you need, because with the immigrant mentality is you need safety, you need security. You're in the United States. Like you need to like have that kind of that, that financial stability. And I was also giving the message. I was giving the messaging that, you know, you need to find yourself like a well-to-do husband. So that's the mom. Yeah, that's the mom.

Starting point is 00:05:17 Dad's like, got to earn money. Got to be safe. No, no. Mom was got to earn because my mom had a stronger influence over me than my father. But my indirect influence. But no, my mom, it was both. And it was like, you have to have a job. You need to do that. And and you also need to have a husband, start a family. So, you know, I was like, well, I kind of want to teach yoga, which doesn't really mean, which has like no financial stability. And, you know, my mom was so, you know, at the end of the day, she was just like, you are who you are and I need to accept you for who you are and you need to, and you need to be who you are. So, and then, so I was in this, I was, you know, I, like most women, we grow up wanting to follow our boyfriends, not follow our dreams. And that's something that was like something that Gillian Anderson once said, like, you know, follow your dreams, not your boyfriend.

Starting point is 00:06:13 So, you know, I was in this stage of life where I didn't know what I wanted to do. And then I met at the yoga studio the man who had become my husband. Wow. Yes. Because that's sort of like how. So far it's mom zero, Gillian one. Wow. Yes. Um, cause that's sort of like, so far it's mom, zero Julian one. So I'm keeping score here. And that's like, you know, we yoga teachers, that's like where we meet our lovers and our, and our partners. And I think that's a good

Starting point is 00:06:34 metaphor for life. I mean, go to the places where the people that have the same, you know, moral fabric that you're going to be where, you know, the same aspirations, but a lot of people who are messed up, end up on a yoga mat because everyone's trying to heal where, you know, the same aspirations. But a lot of people who are messed up end up on a yoga mat. Okay. Because everyone's trying to heal. So you just never know. Okay. So, so, you know, the blind leading the blind kind of.

Starting point is 00:06:53 So I met the man who had become my husband and we had, I always say that our relationship before we got married was 90% great, excuse me, and then 10% problematic. But that 10% was actually very big. Even though it was only took up what seemed like 10% of the relationship, it was significant. And people think that when you get married, that that 10% will go away when really the 10% becomes the 90%. Wow. And the 90 percent because like marriage doesn't solve things. It amplifies where the problems are. Yeah. And so we got married and it was we were only married for two years and it was a very, very difficult marriage. And he left me very abruptly over the phone, over the phone, over the phone via text.

Starting point is 00:07:44 He decided not to come home from work that day even though that morning i'd woken up to a miscarriage oh my gosh and my mom had just been given two months to live because she was diagnosed with terminal cancer so um that that started a dark night of the soul because it was literally, I was like, okay, this is what it feels like to have your life completely fall apart. And, you know, it was one of those things where you think to yourself, how am I actually going to get through this, you know? Do you ever look back on that? I mean, cut you off, but do you ever look back on that and think cut you off but do you ever look back on that and and think that this is one of those tipping points that in retrospect might have been a blessing

Starting point is 00:08:29 now i look back and see that that was um absolutely essential like i would never be where i am today like i see i see i see the the higher meaning behind it I wouldn't want to go back and change it it is what it is and um so it became about survival and i remember speaking to my friend who found me on a bench i was sitting outside with my dog and you know she could see in my physiology that i was devastated and we were talking and she was like you know you should like watching tony robbins videos and i was like the infomercial guy because i grew up with him on infomercials she's like no no I think you'd find this interesting and I'm I'm a skeptic so I was like oh no it's gonna suck whatever and um but I watched some things that like now you may be able to find on YouTube back then because we're we're talking

Starting point is 00:09:39 they were on tape cassette yeah just for the audiences yeah no. No, I mean, this was 10 years ago. Okay. 10 years. So it wasn't a tape cassette, but it wasn't so it wasn't CD. CD-ROM. So I watched and I was like, I was like, wow, this is inspiring. And this has given me insight into something. So I started following his work and I started working with a coach and I was also seeing a therapist and I became obsessed with why my relationship did not work out completely and utterly obsessed. I could not understand it. I did not know, um, at all what really made, I thought I was like this mature, you know, evolved person getting into the relationship. You know, why did this not work?

Starting point is 00:10:27 And so I became obsessed with trying to figure out why it didn't work for me and then why it doesn't work for certain people. And it's been an obsession for the last 10 years of my life. And so here I am today. I started teaching it. I started learning it. I started applying it to my own life. I got certified. I started teaching it. I started learning it. I started applying it to my own life. I got certified.

Starting point is 00:10:48 I started a newsletter. Podcast. Book. Book, podcast, yeah. You've been very active. Yeah. But do you think that when people find themselves in those situations, because certainly I don't profess to be a mental health expert by any, by any means, but I'm tangentially very

Starting point is 00:11:05 involved in it because we, you know, we have a large clinical practice for bio-optimization and obviously people are in various stages of what's going on in their life. And the one thing that I hear our clinical team talk about all the time is when people start to ruminate on things. It's this rumination that never allows them to progress and they are sort of always stuck in the past. Right. So if you were waking up with this, you know, searing desire to understand what went wrong and you're probably blaming some of it on yourself or at least like wondering what you

Starting point is 00:11:40 did wrong and, and the, but isn't that rumination on, on that event, something that's actually going to keep you from healing or moving forward? Or how, how did you eventually end up dealing with that? And what kind of advice do you give to people? Well, um, look, going through a breakup or a divorce is some of the worst pain that a person will experience. It's a trauma. And not every breakup is created equal, but some breakups are absolutely emotionally catastrophic. And so you really do have you can either just stay in that pain or you can do something about it. But it's not I don't want to romanticize growth. It's actually very painful and you have to, um, you have to do the deep self reflective work.

Starting point is 00:12:33 Um, I wasn't obsessing about, I was trying to figure out what went wrong while at the same time learning new tools of communication and learning new tools of how to change my state, how to change my emotional state, how to actually, um, how to have a better day. And I think that one of the most healing things that a person can do when they're going through something emotionally catastrophic is to pour their energy into something that really inspires them. Now, it's not going to take your pain away, but it will take some of the suffering away. I challenge you to transform your life in just three days.

Starting point is 00:13:19 Join my three-day cold plunge challenge and experience the incredible benefits of cold water therapy. For three minutes each day, immerse yourself in cold water and feel the difference. Cold plunging can boost your energy, improve your mental clarity, and enhance your mood. It's easy to join. So head over to TheUltimateHuman.com, download the Plunge app, track your progress, and connect with our community. Let's do this together. Now let's get back to The Ultimate Human Podcast. So it will give you something to focus on. And it's not about not processing your feelings because you have to

Starting point is 00:13:45 process your feelings, but you also have to give yourself permission to, to dive deep into something. And listen, I think I was, I, one of the ways in which I'm extremely fortunate and I've been unfortunate in a lot of different ways, but one of the ways that I'm extremely fortunate is that I have just have had amazing mentors. and I don't think that anyone can really succeed in life without teachers. You talked about Joe Dispenza when we were. Yeah, exactly. But I, but even before that, you know, I've just had amazing, amazing teachers. And so you need to recruit help where you can and learn from the best. And, um, yeah, I've just been very lucky. Do you believe that people really can truly heal from trauma? I mean, people that have had

Starting point is 00:14:34 traumatic experiences, breakups, um, but maybe not just breakups. I think everybody goes through breakups at some point in your life, but when you have traumatic breakups or, you know, God forbid abuse in your, in your past, do people really heal from trauma? I've often wondered if, you know, you hear both sides of the coin, um, you bury it and get past it. Um, you address it and it's over. What's your opinion? Because I, you know, one of the other concepts that we talked about before the podcast started, which I'm absolutely you and I are aligned on is that there is a mind body connection and a body mind connection, right? You can't be, you can't have a sick gut, healthy mind. You also can't have a sick gut and a healthy mind. You also can't have a healthy mind, I mean, a sick mind and a healthy body. Yes.

Starting point is 00:15:29 And I think a lot of that comes from trauma, maybe unprocessed trauma. So it depends what you would define as trauma. Because sometimes people will, there's the trauma from a breakup breakup and then there's a trauma from your parent dying. And those are two at the time, a breakup trauma can be just as intense, but most people get over the breakup and you never really stop grieving the death of a loved one. Um, it depends, you know, there, you cannot compare, in my opinion, the trauma of being sexually molested as a child with the trauma of a divorce. As crazy as the pain can be from a divorce, it is simply not the same as being a child who was helpless and being abused.

Starting point is 00:16:29 Right. I would agree with that. It's just not the same. So to answer your question, I think that I do think that trauma can be healed, but most people don't know how. And also there's lots of different ways to heal. So it's not necessarily going to happen in the therapy office, though it could. I think that if you really want to heal deep trauma, there's layers to that. You have to go to the body because the body stores trauma so you have to do some sort of somatic exercises for sure um love heals trauma love really does the i mean love is very powerful so people who love you well and support you well um can be incredibly healing i don't believe that what about loving yourself though but we also, but part of what helps us love ourselves is the love from others.

Starting point is 00:17:30 And no one could ever truly love themselves if they've never experienced love from another person. Wow. I really believe that. Pretty profound. Yeah. But what about those people? I mean, just to sort of bring this back to the masses. I mean, there's so many people watching this podcast right now that are in a relationship, um, and they either feel stuck, um, or they don't feel stuck. They're deeply in

Starting point is 00:17:57 love with their significant other and they want the relationship to work, but they just can't find a way to communicate. They can't find a way to get over that 10%, which is now slowly becoming the 90%. And, and, you know, I see that, you know, the breakdown of the family infrastructure in this country and even in the world, in my opinion, is, has catastrophic consequences for society as a whole. And I think we, just in general, I feel like we've gotten a lot more superficial with our relationships.

Starting point is 00:18:32 Like they're more easy to discard now because social media makes us feel like there's somebody else that's always available out there and there's definitely somebody better than what you're with right now. I mean, just look at Instagram. This chick's got a perfect body this guy's got a lambo this guy's happy and he has his own plane and you know and i think it creates this on

Starting point is 00:18:51 maybe this unrealistic expectation of um i actually saw a very funny video and and uh about this female pastor talking about the husband's door and you gotta google this video sometimes it's hilarious but um but what advice would you got to Google this video sometimes it's hilarious, but, um, but what advice would you give to them? I think people just need the basics without going to a therapist or getting into psychotherapy or, you know, deeply going on this interpersonal journey. Where did they start in their relationship to kind of figure things out? Okay. So if you're struggling in your relationship, the first, the very first step is you have to look in the mirror and ask yourself, how am I contributing to the dysfunction that is currently happening in my relationship?

Starting point is 00:19:29 Well, I've never contributed to dysfunction. So that's easy. I mean, of course, me neither. I'm just kidding. And that is the hardest thing to do. You know, we're not talking about like highly abusive relationships here. We're not talking about that. But if your relationship is, you're having a hard time in your relationship, if it's becoming unhealthy, if you're unhappy, whatever it is,

Starting point is 00:19:53 you're just like, you're not happy. You have to look in the mirror and say, how am I contributing to what's not working? Because a lot of people, I would say most people get into relationships and there's an unconscious expectation that we all have. We cannot deny the force that is romanticism and the influence of the soulmate and the perfect partner. And we go in and we think this person,

Starting point is 00:20:21 even if we intellectually understand this is not true, we have this expectation, this person is going to be perfect. They're going to embody everything that my parent who sucked didn't embody. And they're going to see me completely. They're going to understand me completely. They're going to soothe my inner child and they're going to be perfect. And then we get into a relationship and we realize, shit, this person is flawed. This person's just as fucked up as me. Right. Right. And so, and then, and then, and then we get mad and then we get resentful. And then all our stuff comes up because no one teaches us that our childhood is going to come out in our romantic adult relationships. And so all our stuff comes up. And then what happens is we, with the other person, we create a dynamic.

Starting point is 00:21:11 And that dynamic is the space that exists between me and this other person. That's our relationship. And so you have to be each person, but start with yourself. Forget about what they're doing or not doing, because you want to be able to look in the mirror and say, at least I did the work. And you say, how am I, like, what is the dynamic that's not working and how am I contributing to this? Have I not been kind? Have I been expecting them to meet my needs all the time without me even expressing what my needs are? In other words, am I expecting them to read my mind? Am I expecting my partner to be perfect? Am I not being flexible or tolerant

Starting point is 00:21:54 of their imperfections? Or am I someone who's constantly accepted less than I deserve? And here I am again, accepting less than I deserve. And I, and I'm not speaking up about it and I'm not doing anything about it. What is your pattern? How are you contributing to it? It always begins with us. It always begins with you. You ha that's the very first step. Accountability is literally the most important element. Being very intellectually honest with yourself. It's, it yourself. It's not just intellectually honest. It's honest in every way, you know, and that's very hard because we lie to ourselves all the time and we want to seem like the better person and we want to feel like, you know, that

Starting point is 00:22:38 the relationship is happening to us. I mean, do you know how many times I've worked with people who will like say that they're unhappy in their marriage, but really what turned out is that they're unhappy. They're just unhappy. They were unhappy going into the marriage. They were unhappy before. And now I'm not, I am not saying just to be very clear for your audience. There are some relationships that will make you miserable. And I, and I'm the first one to say, get the hell out. Right. But there are, but there also are a lot of cases where we get into a relationship wanting to be happy. And the relationship is going to, in many ways, not in all ways, nor should it magnify or highlight the ways in which you were unhappy before you even met this person.

Starting point is 00:23:31 Wow. So it starts with this very introspective, honest look at yourself. Yes. You come to the realization that, you know what, maybe I am contributing to this mainly because I have an expectation that's unrealistic. Or I'm not communicating well. Or I'm not communicating well. I'm not listening well. Right. Which is the expectation you were talking about. I'm expecting this person to just understand how I feel. Yes. And because they don't, then they don't love me or they don't appreciate me.

Starting point is 00:23:54 Or I'm not prioritizing them. Yeah. You're not prioritizing them. And so you go through this exercise and some things come to the surface during this introspective view of yourself, but now you still have somebody else to contend with who may or may not be going through that same exercise. Yes. Right, because I think what happens is,

Starting point is 00:24:17 you know, as much as a disequilibrium in expectation leads to this friction and this tension, a disequilibrium and, um, really the willingness to solve it is, is also there. Yeah. So, I mean, you, the first rule of thumb is lead by example and lead with an apology. If you can look in the mirror and say, oh yeah, I've been doing this thing. I mean, a great, if you want a great relationship, you are going to have to like confront your ego all the time. Wow. And you're going to have to say. That is a great point. I don't want to gloss over it. If you want a great relationship, you're going to have to confront

Starting point is 00:24:58 your ego all the time. I think actually that's true in business partnerships. Every, all relationships. So true. Yeah, all relationships. If you want a great life, I think you've got to confront your ego. All the time. And so it would start with, you know what? I've noticed that I've been doing something that's not fair to you. And you say whatever that is. And you say, I'm really deeply sorry.

Starting point is 00:25:22 And that could, it's not a guarantee, but that could then let the other person or give permission to the other person to relax. Because in that moment, they feel so seen. Yeah. They feel so understood. And that's when they're like, you know what? I realize I've been doing this too. And I'm really sorry.

Starting point is 00:25:44 Wow. And that's when healing starts but you but what people do is I'm not doing it until they do it oh my gosh I know that is so true and it's hard I get it I mean I get it I've been there I understand that but if you want if you love the person and you want to make it work and you feel, because rarely do people end their relationships because they don't love the person. They end the relationship because they feel helpless. They get into a state called learned helplessness

Starting point is 00:26:14 where they do not see a path forward. And they think that the only path forward is to end the relationship. It's because they don't know how to fix it. And so I'm telling people how you can start the journey of trying to fix whatever's broken in your relationship with the person who you really deep down desperately wanted to work with. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:26:39 Wow. I mean, this is like, it goes far beyond relationship advice. I mean, this goes right into advice on business partnerships and relationships. This is like, um, you know, this is like the human emotion, right? I mean, and I love how you just opened that door right there. Um, and if, you know, you go through this exercise of deep introspection and you find out some things about yourself and you, um, how important is it to be able to approach your partner, um, without the expectation of receipt, right? I know, very hard.

Starting point is 00:27:14 Yeah, that's, that's difficult. Very, very hard. Very hard. And so how do you, how do you handle that? How do you bring down their defenses, right? How do you lower their guard so that healing can begin? You know, every situation is different because it does take two, and both people absolutely have to put in the work.

Starting point is 00:27:35 What I would say is bring your best self to the relationship for a couple of weeks, maybe three weeks. Intentionally. Intentionally bring your best self. Because here's the thing, what we need to be doing if we want a great relationship is study our partner. If you don't know what moves your partner, what your partner's deepest longings are, if you don't know how the pain and the joy of their childhood shows up in their adulthood, if you don't know what they're terrified of, then you don't understand your partner. And you're never going to fully understand them because we can barely fully understand ourselves, but you have to study. And people are, we get so obsessed with, cause we're self-protective with our own needs. So you need to know what their needs are. And if you don't, you need to ask them what, how do you feel most loved by me? When do you feel most important to me? When do you feel like happiest? And then you meet your partner's needs. You make a promise to yourself and you say, I am going to show up as the person who I want to be in a relationship. And I'm going to give this three weeks.

Starting point is 00:28:57 Wow. and then you know there's lots of different conversations that could happen like you know i'm really trying here i could really i really need you to try to or you know i really think we should go speak to someone i need you to put in more effort i mean there's lots of different variations of conversations that people and doesn't one or the other always think that they haven't done anything wrong i don't need therapy you need therapy um there's a lot of yeah a lot of times where people go to the therapist's office or the coach's office and they sit down, they think, fix them, change them so that they can be easier for me to live with. A good therapist or a good coach will make it very, very clear that actually the problem

Starting point is 00:29:40 is you as much as it's them. And here's the thing. It's not necessarily a 50, 50 split. Right. There are some people who are a bigger problem in the relationship than the other, but you know, you ha you can't control your partner. You can only control your own behavior. And I think that, um, again, if we can be committed to being the kind of person that we want to be in a relationship. And that really, you know, we're going to have to confront a lot of beliefs. Like how did mom or dad influence

Starting point is 00:30:10 your beliefs about women? How did mom or dad influence your beliefs about men? And how is like, how is their beliefs about men and women love and relationships? How is that fucking you over and your, and your relationship right now so it really is about looking inward and pretty deeply inward to to to figure this out this is this is self awareness yeah and what a lot of people lack is self-awareness in the relationships and i always say that the road to relationship hell is paved with very charming people who have no self-awareness right so this is that, it's important. So, you know, let's say that you're not in a relationship.

Starting point is 00:30:48 Yeah. You're single or you're out of one and you're out of it and you're happy that you're out of it. Because I think a lot of people, like even after my, you know, I went through a divorce. I've got three beautiful kids out of it. My, my ex-wife and I made a conscious decision to separate the husband and wife, but never separate the mother and the father. And we've been great co-parents. She's remarried, I'm remarried. It's gone tremendously well for us. I thought, you know, when I look back on it, I'm pretty proud that we took such a mature approach.

Starting point is 00:31:19 You should be proud. That's impressive. Not many people do that. So that's great. You know, we, we barely have a, have a crossword, uh, with each other and she gets along with my wife now, which is amazing. But I think too, there was a period after, um, divorce probably for both of us where I was pretty content. Um, you know, um, I wasn't, I didn't have this big expectation of them. You know, my next spouse or my next relationship. I was pretty content. I was raising my kids. I actually really focused back on my kids. But how important is it to engage in things that improve your self-love?

Starting point is 00:31:57 I mean, I think a lot of us don't really love ourselves. Yeah, no, very important. I think that the journey towards self-love and self-acceptance is lifelong. I think that, you know, one of the ways in which we lie to ourselves, we suppress, you know, the ways in which we have our flaws and the ways in which, you know, I mean, we, I tell people this all the time. There isn't a single human being on the planet who hasn't had a thought that if you actually heard that thought, you would be frightened of them. Right. So we all have a violent side. We all have a rageful side.

Starting point is 00:32:36 We all have a mean side. We all have a vindictive side. We all have a lazy side. I mean, we have parts to ourselves that are not our highest selves. And so part of it is just learning to live with that ambivalence about ourselves and accept ourselves anyway. And self-love is very important. I mean, because if you don't, look, you have to love yourself just enough to know that

Starting point is 00:33:01 you are worth being loved. Wow. You have to love yourself just enough to know that you are worth being loved. Wow. You have to love yourself just enough to know that you're worth being loved. I like that. You know, I think too that we spoke a little bit about this before the podcast. You know, I'm in a very data-driven space

Starting point is 00:33:21 where we do blood work, we do gene testing, we look at biomarkers, you know, we use different things to try to shift certain biomarkers. One of the things that we spoke about that I really want to kind of dig into is if you don't heal the mind, you never heal the gut. If you don't heal your relationship, you'll never really be the best version of yourself physiologically. Yeah. And I think there's a lot of focus, and by myself included, I'm guilty of this, of the gut-brain connection or the body-brain connection, but not so much focus on the brain-body connection

Starting point is 00:34:02 and the impact of emotion on our wellbeing. And we talked about the impact of our ruminating state of thoughts and how that can keep our bodies in a sympathetic state, you know, fight or flight state. And if you're in a fight or flight state, I mean, if you're actually ready to fight or flight. Chronically. Chronically. Chronically. Then digestion is not going to work.

Starting point is 00:34:32 Weight loss is not going to work. Sleep is not going to work. None of it. Focus and concentration is not going to work. And you're going down this road, going to a great functional medicine doctor, going to a great human biologist, going to a great doctor. And nothing seems to be working. No, in fact, it's getting worse because you're putting all these supplements and you're actually getting more neurotic about what you're eating, what you're not eating. I mean, I think the

Starting point is 00:34:54 biggest problem with today with all the food stuff is like, everyone is just like, well, what the fuck do I eat then? You know, like, should I eat fruit? Should I not eat fruit? Is that my blood sugar? And so we're all in our heads. Carnivore, keto, paleo, vegan, vegetarian. When the reality is that every individual is so incredibly different. Want to get an extra hour of quality good sleep every single night? Let me tell you how I do it. My wife and I sleep on Eight Sleeps Pod 4 Ultra. This is a technology that fits over your mattress to cool or warm each side of the bed,

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Starting point is 00:35:43 you can leave your wearables on the nightstand. And I even had this thing independently EMF tested to make sure that I was not getting any extra EMF at night, which I'm not. Get $350 off the Pod 4 Ultra at 8sleep.com forward slash Gary. That's 8sleep.com forward slash Gary and use the code Gary, G-A-R-Y for your discount. Transform your nights and elevate your sleep. Now let slash Gary and use the code Gary G A R Y for your discount, transform your nights and elevate your sleep. Now let's get back to the ultimate human podcast. Um, as a practitioner of yoga for as many years as I've been a practitioner of yoga, I want the, when you, when you study, um, yoga, um, whether that's through meditation or through the physical practice of yoga, you're studying the nervous system. So I love that the nervous system is like a trendy thing now.

Starting point is 00:36:27 This is something that the yogis have understood for thousands and thousands of years, is that if you do certain postures with the correct alignment, you are aligning the energy centers in your body, you're aligning your breath, and what you are actually finding is homeostasis. And in that homeostatic state, you're going to have a calm mind. Now we're meant to go in and out of balance. You're not going to always be calm. You're not going to always be in a perfect balance, balanced nervous system state. I mean, you're not always going to be happy. The expectation that you should always feel good and

Starting point is 00:37:02 be great is the expectation that leads to depression. We are, we're going to move in and out of various states, but we want to be able to be returned to homeostasis. We don't want to be stuck in that sympathetic state, which is what so many people are from trauma, from just lifestyle, you know, the phones, technology, stress, and the mind and the body are one. And like I said, you cannot supplement your way out of, you know, out of trauma. Right. So I really believe that like, if someone is dealing with a chronic physical symptom, whether it's physical pain, whether it's something in autoimmune, I'm not a doctor, but I have worked with many people when it comes to the mind-body connection. Almost always what you will find at the core of that is some sort of relationship issue with a key person in their life, whether it's family, whether it's romantic, whether it's a

Starting point is 00:37:57 spouse, whatever it is, and or a dysregulated nervous system. Yes. And by dysregulated nervous system. Yes. And by dysregulated nervous system, you mean too much time in the, for those of you guys know, there's two sides to the nervous system. There's the sympathetic, which is fight or flight,

Starting point is 00:38:15 which I don't know why they named that one sympathetic, but we're not responsible for that. And then there's the parasympathetic, which is, you know, your rest and digest. And your body should move between those. It's very, it's perfectly normal. Um, but when you're stressed, you're sympathetic. When you're frightened, you're sympathetic. When you're, um, when you're scared, when you're neurotic, usually when you're exhausted, you're in a sympathetic state. Yes. And, um, how,

Starting point is 00:38:42 what are some ways, what are some just healthy practices? Because I think that this is vastly overlooked by modern medicine. It's even vastly overlooked by regenerative medicine a lot of times. And I'm in that space. And I'm sometimes even guilty, and so is my clinical team team of being too clinical and not taking a step back and looking at the person's mental wellbeing. Because if you're not well mentally, you know, then things are not going to be good physically. So what are some practices that people can do? I love that you gave very practical ways for people that are stuck in a relationship to maybe walk their way out of it or at least bring some color to it so they can

Starting point is 00:39:28 figure out what the problem is. But lots of people suffer from chronic illnesses that are not really defined, right? We have these catch-all terms in medicine, chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, generalized anxiety, which I think is like a casting net that we throw at these things. Cause we don't really know what's going on. Um, and when you have one of those sort of catch all the irritable bowel syndrome, right. Yeah. I've got constipation, irritability, cramping. Um, yeah, you have irritable bowel syndrome. Well, now what? I mean, so what are some of the practices that people could engage in to begin to really heal from the upstairs down? And, and, and I, and then I want to talk a little bit about why modern medicine really looks at the mind and the body as being so separate. Okay. Well, the first thing I would say

Starting point is 00:40:22 is that if you're dealing with something chronic and you're like, I've tried everything and nothing's working, then what you have to look is the emotions. What are some of the things emotionally that you've been suppressing for so long? And that could be, you know, journaling of emotion, the suppression of emotion and feelings that come from hard experiences, traumatic experiences. It's like the book, The Body Keeps the Score. I love the work of Dr. Sarno, who's no longer living, but he, you know, he's helped millions of people heal their back pain by dealing with the emotions that are behind it. Wow. And so the first thing you need to understand is that emotions are driving this in some way. My belief, this is my opinion. Again, I'm not a doctor.

Starting point is 00:41:13 This is just based on my experience. And I'm not a doctor either. My audience knows that. But for the record, I'm not licensed to practice medicine. There is something emotionally going on. There just is. You're stressed or you're suppressing something or you're suppressing a memory or there's something that's not working.

Starting point is 00:41:29 So first thing to do is to understand that. Start journaling. I believe everyone should practice yoga. Start journaling. Yes. I don't want to overlook that. So what's your idea of journaling? First of all, what I suggest today, not everyone is going to say this works.

Starting point is 00:41:44 There are many roads to healing. I want people to not everyone is going to say this works. There are many roads to healing. I want people to understand there are many different paths to healing. There's not just one way you have to find what works and resonates with you. Um, waking up in the morning, journaling for about, um, it doesn't matter how long, but you journal about three pages and you do it in the morning. Like you go and you pee, you come back and you get in bed and you start journaling because you want your subconscious mind to be much more awake than your conscious mind. So don't look at your phone. Don't eat.

Starting point is 00:42:14 Don't do anything like that. Just journal and just get everything out. And what are you just word vomiting? You're word vomiting. And not particularly trying to be like, I'm grateful for the following 10 things. Do not forget gratitude. Get out the frustration and the anger. Wow. It's the first time I've heard that. Yeah. Get out the frustration and the anger. But then you want to change your state after that.

Starting point is 00:42:35 I really believe in meditation, but I think that you need to find the right meditation teacher. And the kind of meditation I like these days is I like visualization and I like music and I like there to be someone who's guiding the meditation. So that's very like in the mornings. Yeah. I do this in the mornings and I sometimes do it in the afternoon as well. Something like Joe Dispenza, like Joe Dispenza has great ones and he's not for everyone, but this is what I really like.

Starting point is 00:43:00 I believe everyone should be doing yoga. Okay. You're not, um, if you're not stretching, if you're not stretching, you're missing out. You've got to do some sort of stretching. I, I believe in yoga because it's the certain movements that's coordinated with the breath. So certain breath work and stretching. Big believer in breath work. You just reminded me to take a big breath yeah so i really really believe that that's incredibly important and i think everyone should do yoga that's just my bias

Starting point is 00:43:31 i think it's uh like a metaphor for life it's learning to be calm under stress yes and if you've never been in the candlestick pose that will tell you what it's like to be cold yeah because i shake and i you know every time i man, I, nothing makes me sweat like yoga. And I, I feel like I'm conditioned and, you know, and I, and I lift weights and then you get into a yoga studio and you feel like a baby. You're like, I am always the most like athletically built dude in the yoga class. Who's like struggling the most. Yeah, I agree. I totally, totally agree. So, um, so journaling in the morning, but I, I like what you're saying about journaling because, um, even journaling people have an

Starting point is 00:44:12 expectation. It's like, this is the way you do it. You write three things that you're grateful for, three things you want to thank God for three things you're going to get accomplished that day. But you're just saying, just wake up and just let it out. Like word vomit. And you're probably going to discover. Yeah. And you just want to get it out. You just want to get it out. And then the types of meditations that I like to do where you focus on the heart and all that, that then brings me to a state of gratitude. And that's really important, but I, that's, that's the way that I do it. Um, you have to move your body and, you know, and then, and then maybe you need to see a therapist or, you have to move your body and, you know, and then, and then maybe you need

Starting point is 00:44:45 to see a therapist or maybe you need to have a really difficult conversation with a family member that you've been avoiding for so long. Um, you know, family stuff is, is, is very big and that's why I'm such a big believer in family therapy because I think that there's so many things that need to be healed within the family system. I agree. Um, so, so yeah, that's, so it's first just understanding like you, it, you can go raw vegan, you can go paleo, you can do this, you can do that. You can take a bunch of different supplements and, but it's, if you're not addressing yourself emotionally and your nervous system, if you are stressed out, you know, in a chronically reactive state, you need to get a whole nervous system reset. You can work with a somatic coach or you can do the – and or the meditation, the yoga. You need to be doing stuff that actually targets your nervous system into a place to, so into more homeostasis. And for somebody that's starting out, um, meditating, cause I,

Starting point is 00:45:52 I find it very hard to meditate cause I just have a very active mind. And, um, so I find it very hard to quiet center myself and, and focus, you know, on meditation. I've even had guided meditation. Did that help, the guided? The guided was better. Yes, it helps. Although I went to this Ayurvedic retreat for a week. I love Ayurveda. Oh, Ayurveda is the oldest form of medicine. And it's, yeah.

Starting point is 00:46:15 And what's astounding is it's all based on observation and Pitta, Kapha, different body types. And it is astounding how accurate it is i believe in ayurveda 100 that's why i'm like no not everyone should be necessarily eating meat and some people definitely should like i really do believe it's very very very specific to a person's constitution yeah well during this um week-long retreat it was was in the Blue Ridge Mountains in this beautiful resort. And, well, it wasn't that beautiful, but it was nice. Not that I remember.

Starting point is 00:46:50 It actually wasn't that nice. But the retreat was amazing. And a lot of lentils. Oh, wait. Is this in the Carolinas? Yeah. That's okay. Do you know the one I'm talking about?

Starting point is 00:47:00 I know exactly the one you're talking about. It's in the Blue Ridge Mountains. If you said the name, I would know it. Yeah, I forgot. But they just reached out to me saying if I wanted to do a retreat yeah well they have this so somebody apparently spent like 40 million dollars oh wow and then when went bankrupt on the and they and they bought this resort but it has a gorgeous temple like it looks like a buddhist temple middle and then all of these satellites off and um and what was interesting was when I first got there, I was like,

Starting point is 00:47:27 it's a little hocus pocusy. Um, and by the last day I did not want to leave. Yeah. We did chanting, we did yoga, we did meditation, the spa treatments. Um, you ate very, very little. Yeah. Um, which wasn't my favorite part, but lots ghee butter lots of lentils but um one of the really interesting things um about this ayurvedic observation was that you know this ayurvedic practitioner would would um look at you and look at your tongue and these other things exactly like what it is that you struggle with and what you need and yes and he was so spot on yeah it. It super freaked me out. Yeah. Nothing like an Ayurvedic master.

Starting point is 00:48:09 And then one of the exercises that they made me do, this sounds so crazy, but I had to, for three hours a day, sit in front of a bay window in a chair and just look out the bay window by myself, no phone, nobody in the room. Yes. And just look out the bay window by myself, no phone, nobody in the room and just observe out this bay window. And before I was looked out the bay window, I had a little, like a quarter cup of ghee butter. And what was amazing was when I first started looking out this window,

Starting point is 00:48:39 I was like, this is going to drive me crazy. Like my ADHD is kicking in. Get me out of this room. Where's my phone? You know, how do I get something to eat in this place? And he just told me that I really needed to learn to be still. Yes. And so I was like, screw it. I'm going to force myself to look out this damn window for three hours. Yes. And I'm just going to deal with it. By the second day, I started noticing things in this tree. I started noticing that

Starting point is 00:49:14 this bird came to the same part of this limb every, you know, in the morning. And I started to notice the squirrel running the same pattern and like going out to the end of this branch and i've noticed that you would make these chirping noises um by the end of the second day i started noticing all of these insects all over the tree yeah by the third day i kid you not it was like watching a disney movie there was so much activity going on in the screen, you know? And I saw the birds and the flowers and the squirrel and the squirrel actually throwing nuts down on another animal on the ground and like the bugs going up the tree. And it was just, and the three hours went by like that. Yes. And I think that's what he was trying to do was, you know, there I am hard charging, you know, as was a young entrepreneur, ADHD through the roof,

Starting point is 00:50:06 could never sit still, quarter cup of ghee butter and a bay window. And I actually wanted to go back the fourth day because I was so curious about what was going on with the squirrel and the bird and the insects and all of that stuff. And that's when it really made an impact on me that. Okay. I have so much to say about that. Yeah, you do. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:50:24 That's huge. I mean, yeah, it's, here's the thing because he saw the imbalance, he saw it and everyone needs to learn how to get still. And what, what I love about your story is that, you know, you're throwing out terms like ADHD, anyone, everyone is capable. It does not matter what you've been diagnosed with. You are actually capable if you put your mind to it and you, and you, and you surrender and you accept the challenge to do it. And what happens is the reason why it became like a Disney thing is because when we're too busy, this, this, and this, and that we become unconscious. And this is what happens to bring this back to relationships. People become very unconscious in their relationships. It's going to happen, but they become chronically unconscious where they're not even, they're not

Starting point is 00:51:15 present. They're not present. And so what that exercise taught you was presence. And what happens when you're present, you start to notice the beauty in the world. You spread your awareness. You spread your consciousness. And we, in our rush state and all of that, and then we get more and more imbalanced. We get more imbalanced through some of the exercise that we do. We don't even realize it's driving us into deeper imbalance. Some of the foods that we're eating drives us into deeper imbalance. Some of our, you know, the, the need to achieve throwing us into deeper imbalance. And what we are doing is that we are missing life. And then it gets time for your life to end. And you're like, what the hell did I just do? And this is what happens. It's like, we missed, we missed the beauty of,

Starting point is 00:52:01 of a conversation with our loved one. Right. And we are all missing that. And let me tell you something. And another reason why your story is so important to what we're discussing is like, if you want to heal, get still. And you know what was amazing was I fought it tooth and nail the first day. I'm sure you did. When I sat in this room, I was like, how in the fuck am I going to sit here for three hours?

Starting point is 00:52:29 I'm out of my mind. But you did it. And I only did it because I said, I paid for this retreat. I'm committed to be there. And then there's another voice in my head saying, I paid this kind of money to sit in front of a bay window. I could have done this on my own.

Starting point is 00:52:41 But you never would have. I never would have. But when I got past it, second day was amazing. Third day was incredible. And I actually was ready to go back the fourth day. I was, I was like, can I go back and do the window thing? Cause I want to see what's going on with all my little friends. Um, but I think you're right. You know, now that you sort of put it, put that in perspective. Um, and that was where I first did, you know, guided meditation. Um, and when they first started the guided meditation,

Starting point is 00:53:10 you know, not to sound comical, but to, you know, they were talking about this hallway and a light at the end of the hallway. And I literally asked him, I'm like, well, can we get down the hallway then? Because clearly something's going on at the end of the hallway and you're taking so much time to get there. He's like, that's part of the journey. Please, Mr. Braca, stop, stop interrupting me. Um, and, um, and then eventually, you know, I sort of succumbed to it and it was, and it was, um, amazing. So journaling, and I love your approach to journaling, um, uh, you know, practice of yoga, stretching. Um, and, and when you say journaling, this is also your, you're referring to this time to be still. Yeah. And I, and I would say if it's possible for

Starting point is 00:53:53 your, for your life, for one's lifestyle, cause I know like if you're raising small kids, this is not necessarily an easy thing to do, but what's transformative if you're feeling like you are running on empty is you take 24 hours. You don't look at a television. You don't look at your phone. 24 hours. 24 hours of a retreat where you don't speak at all. Oh my gosh. My wife plays a silent game with me for, I can't go 10 minutes. I know. So you do not speak at all and you, um, don't look at any screens for 24 hours and you know, you eat light, you eat light. Um, I would say no animal protein for this. Um, no garlic or onions, nothing that's going to be, that's going to require a lot of digestive fire. So just easy to digest, like chill foods, nothing major, grounding foods, not salad, grounding

Starting point is 00:54:51 foods, simple. Yeah. Lentils, you know, just like really, really simple digestively. You don't work out. You're not doing. And, um, look, I, I, I'll be the first to admit, like putting this into practice is not easy in today's world, but you do that and then we'll talk. You want to transform your overall health and connect with me directly? Then you need to visit theultimatehuman.com. On the site, you can ask me your most pressing questions, suggest podcast guests and topics you'd like to hear more about, and sign up for my completely free newsletter. In the newsletter, I share valuable insights on living a healthier, happier, and longer life, free from harmful chemicals. While you're there, you can also pre-order my book and find the genetic tests I frequently discuss. If you're curious about

Starting point is 00:55:43 products I use for a clean, healthy lifestyle, you'll find all of my recommendations from toothpaste to household cleaners. So head over to theultimatehuman.com. Your journey to better health starts here. And now let's get back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. Wow. That is really pretty profound. And you, do you encourage couples to do this? I encourage couples to do it like together. I encourage a lot of individuals, couples to do it, you know, if they don't have kids, obviously it's difficult, but yeah, I, I actually encourage couples more to do fun things together. Yeah. Like to play Twister. Because I think that a lot of what's missing from a lot of relationships is play.

Starting point is 00:56:32 Right. So I tend to lean more towards with couples for them to actually be more playful with one another. some of the most, what are some of the most profound journeys with, uh, clients of yours that you've had to kind of stand out in your, in your mind? God, there's so many. I mean, I've worked with people who, you know, I'm, I'm a tough coach. I, no one who's worked, everyone who worked with me knows how much I care and how supportive I am of them and compassionate, but I'm tough. I don't work like a therapist. Like it's, it's, I'm going to push you and I'm going to tell you like it is. Um, so I've worked with many, many women in particular who were like, you know,

Starting point is 00:57:19 all men suck or, you know, I'm only attracted to these kind of men and you know these like very limiting beliefs and then you know i'm never going to be in a relationship and now they're all engaged you know or like they like some of them were like one was like actually there's more than one they started dating someone i don't know if he's my type i don't know like all these things yeah and i'm like you better fucking go on a second date with this dude. Like you better. You have to. And now, and then I'm getting, and then I'm getting. I love that.

Starting point is 00:57:50 And then I'm getting messages from them. They're like, I think I have met the love of my life. Like this, if it weren't for you, like I would have rejected this person. Do you think that people self-sabotage themselves? Oh, all the time. We do it all. We sabotage all the time. rejected this person do you think that people self-sabotage themselves do you think that they we do it all we sabotage all the time so what are some of the ways that we self-sabotage setting an unrealistic expectation amount setting unrealistic expectations like i would not want to be in the dating world right now yeah well sorry if you're in the dating world i've got kids i have so many things to say about that so number

Starting point is 00:58:25 one is um yeah so people who don't feel like they're worthy of love will sabotage a really good relationship because they don't think that they're deserving of love this is where the self love and self-acceptance or they're so afraid of rejection they'd rather sort of set them out self-off for rejection say yep see yeah they'll leave they'll leave first yeah yes yeah so a lot of people will you know will or they'll choose they have a story like i'm not worthy no one ever chooses me um i'm never good enough and then they choose the person who like is totally messed up is emotionally unavailable has a huge problem And then that ends up not working. And then their story is reinforced. See, no one ever chooses me or, you know, everyone always like, you know, a big one is,

Starting point is 00:59:12 you know, all men are going to lie and cheat to you. It's like, well, no man is going to lie to you more than you lie to yourself ever, ever. No man is ever going to lie to you more than you lie to yourself. Yeah yes so if you have a habit if someone has a pattern where they've been with not just one person where there's an infidelity which is a very traumatic experience i'm talking about like there's a series of like you know let's say people not treating you well um uh you know giving you crumbs of attention all this stuff you have to look in the mirror and say, how have I been lying to myself about who this person is so that I don't have to be alone. So I don't have to be single.

Starting point is 00:59:53 So we play many, many, many games with ourselves and people will play games with you too. And that's why you have to have your antenna up. And that's why, you know, it's best that you don't in the dating world, you want to find love. You want to like really settle down with someone. Here's a tip. Don't sleep with someone until you know their character and you know that you're that you guys are on the same page unless you are someone who you can have sex and you can separate love and sex. But a lot of people can't. A lot of women can't. Right. So and a lot of men can't if they actually really like the person, you know. Right. So get to know someone's character.

Starting point is 01:00:33 And yes, it's going to take some time. And yes, you may have to kiss a bunch of frogs before you kiss the right person. And that's just the way it goes. But yeah, what sucks about the dating culture today is that never have we been more starved for connection. Never have we been more starved for meaningful connection and love. And while at the same time, we're just engaging in these like meaningless relationships where we get into something that I refer to as situationships where it's like. Situationships? Yeah, where it's complicated. You should not be in a relationship where it's complicated. You need to be having the difficult conversations. Now, I'm speaking to this from a person

Starting point is 01:01:14 who never did it, who learned the hard way. So I'm telling you what to do, not from a place where I'm holier than thou. I'm doing it because I know what works. And what doesn't work is getting into relationships and not having clear conversations from the get-go about what it is that you want, what your expectations are. And you are going to meet a lot of immature people who are not going to be able to step up to the plate. Fine. It'll take a little while. That's okay. Love your life

Starting point is 01:01:41 single while you're doing it. And how do you love your life single? Love yourself? Don't set a high expectation? You love your life single. Well, first of all, you can, you can long for a relationship, which is healthy and normal while at the same time, be committed to enjoying your life single. And one of the ways in that you do that is you understand that like, you know what? Much better to be single than to be in a relationship with the wrong person. Yeah. A bad relationship will mess, talk about messing up your physical health. A bad relationship will give you an autoimmune disease easily. Yeah. And what's the mechanism of that? Just constantly being in the stress. Stress. Yeah. And stress just causing all kinds of things.

Starting point is 01:02:26 I mean, isn't that the one thing that all doctors of all, and all the, you know, nutrition and health people in your space, isn't that the one thing that, there's like two things that everyone can agree on. Stress will cause this disease. And so does eating a bunch of processed foods. Yeah. disease and so does eating a bunch of processed foods yeah and sedentary lifestyle and lack of movement to to your point too is yeah but if you're med if you're meditating all the time and you're not moving a lot you're fine really i think so okay um so i i mean i think that what's

Starting point is 01:03:01 what's amazing in in in my business and i've been talking about this a lot lately, is that we're actually getting back to a reliance and a trust on big data. And when I say big data, I don't just mean the big data that comes from artificial intelligence, large pools of randomized clinical trials. I mean, the big data that comes from Chinese medicine, that comes from Ayurvedic medicine, because what's the big data that these types of practices are based on? It's based on millions and millions of people over hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years. Yes. And then we poo-pooed it all. I know. To go to these narrow randomized clinical trials and the provability of a hypothesis and a repeatable experiment and studying things in isolation. And we said, if there's not a randomized peer-reviewed clinical trial that's placebo controlled, it's not valid. And we sort of forewent all of this big data. Yes. Right. And I call it big data

Starting point is 01:04:08 because that's what it was. I mean, centuries of observation and notes and knowing that, well, when somebody was depressed, we gave them this herb and this combination of herbs. And we did these types of acupuncture pressure points and we healed them. And yeah, but there's no clinical trial from that. Well, maybe they didn't know that they were helping with the conversion of tryptophan to serotonin and it was moving up the vagus nerve and it was helping to create mood and emotional state. They didn't have all that data. So we just threw it all out. And it's amazing that that seems to be coming back now because some of the most prominent mds phds researchers clinicians that i had the pleasure of uh having experiences with are are becoming more sort of ancient in their in their

Starting point is 01:04:57 philosophy i mean a lot of what you're talking about are just foundational ancient yeah um that that are finding their way back into um you know our modern lifestyle and i think a lot of it's our modern lifestyle has fucked us up completely you know yeah so it's not just the processed foods it's the superficial relationships and yeah it's the go go go yeah you know this is we can't look at this so, we have to look at macrocosmically. Like it's society, right? It's not just, it's not just the food. Right. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:05:31 It's not just the food. So I want to bring this full circle. I think that there's lots of people out there that are in great relationships. Yes. And one of the things that they're trying to do, and I have a hard time articulating this, you know, when, when, you know, people that know me have seen this sort of parabolic rise in, in, in my career. And I always talk about it being that I found my purpose and I found God's calling for me and I'm very passionate about it. And people always ask me, you know, how do I do that? And I don't really know what to say to them. I know how I did it. Um, for me, I wasted 20 years of my life, um, which I wouldn't recommend to somebody, um, being very inauthentic, um, not really contributing in any meaningful way to humanity

Starting point is 01:06:23 and exchanging my time for money until I realized that I didn't want to do that anymore. And I think that's when the authenticity began and my career really took off. But for people that are trying to find their purpose, not saying the meaning of life, but their meaning, What are some things that you would advise them to do to find that why? So the first thing that I would say is that, you know, somehow we turned into a society that looks down upon the ordinary. And, you know, sometimes like find your purpose in an ordinary life. Like your purpose, you don't have to have like this, you know, I found purpose too, but you don't have to be like, you know, a podcast host and doing like these huge things to have found purpose. So know that it doesn't have to be that.

Starting point is 01:07:15 That's great. That takes a lot of pressure off. It takes a lot of pressure. It's very important. You honor, you find your purpose by, number one, first figuring out the ways in which you're living by a should. You know, my parents expected me to do this, so I'm doing this. And this is not to blame parents. This is just generational stuff. Society expects me to do this, so I'm doing this. What makes me happy? What, what's going to make me feel like, um, proud of myself? What's the thing that,

Starting point is 01:07:55 what's the challenge that I have not been taking on because I've been too afraid, you know? So it's like, it's following that sort of like inner whisper of like what I really want to do versus what I think I'm supposed to be doing. And then it's the willingness to step outside the oh so comfortable comfort zone because you're never going to really, you know, you have to, you might have to disappoint some people. You might have to keep your day job while you have to you might have to disappoint some people you might have to um keep your day job while you have another while you do your passion gig on the side um you might have to move and live somewhere else so um it's about having that kind of conversation with yourself that like your purpose is this is the thing that lights you up yeah the thing that

Starting point is 01:08:46 lights you up the thing that you would otherwise do for free that maybe you could monetize yes that if you if you literally didn't have to make money like if you had the money in the bank you would do this anyway that's a that's a good one i mean i feel like that's, I sometimes say I feel like I love somebody else's life because I never imagined a place where I would be so excited to get up every day and like do what I, like this doesn't feel like work to me. Like I'm really enjoying this time with you and I'm actually learning from it. And then I know that this is going to have a ripple effect and other people are going to learn from it.

Starting point is 01:09:21 And to somehow have found a way to monetize that is to me the greatest blessing in life that, and having my kids work in the business with me. Um, and I say that a lot too, but I think so many of us are looking to other people to make us happy, right? Like we're actually entering relationships, hoping that the relationship is going to be our way to find happiness in ourself. And then just like you say, that just perverts. Yeah. Right. Completely.

Starting point is 01:09:52 It just completely perverts. And it takes a little while. It takes two years or three years. And then you're like, well, shit, this didn't work out. And now you're starting over again. And so one of the ways to fix that is to what is to, is to really introspectively look at what makes you happy. Because I think if you're standing on solid ground, you're like, this is who I am.

Starting point is 01:10:09 This is what I do. This is what I love. This is what I'm passionate about. And I'm going about doing this. I feel like if you're on that path, um, you're really solid about it. You're going to meet somebody or, or, or, or somebody that's going to come into your life has got no other choice, but to kind of be a part of that. Yeah. And I would, what I would add to that is that a lot of people like one of the worst feelings that a human being can feel is to feel stuck yeah and the reason why

Starting point is 01:10:36 people get stuck is because they have this what's called a double bind so they in their mind they're damned if they do and they're damned if they don't. So therefore they don't take any route. They stay still because they think if I go this way, I'm going to disappoint mom and dad. If I go that way, I'm going to disappoint whatever, yeah, whatever. And they feel like they can't move. And so if you're feeling stuck, it would be a really good thing to work with someone if you need to, to figure out like, what's the thing, what's the damned if you do damned, if you don't think damned, if you do damned, if you don't think that's keeping you, keeping you back. Yeah. Um, yeah. And that would be like the first step. Cause you know, you have to understand, you you know we don't there's always a reason why

Starting point is 01:11:27 we do things or don't do things for better or for worse and so if you can understand why you're not doing what it is that you want to do or you are doing what it is that you want to do it's gonna it's gonna help you understand yourself and it's gonna help you get unstuck i i'm gonna go stuck. I want to go back before we, um, wind down to that one case, one client, one, uh, you know, mentee of yours that you think had a common problem that had that you helped them solve and now they have had a dramatic shift in their life. What, what stands out to you? Or they came out of really horrific relationships with horrific people and then they really did the work to change who they're attracted to and to change their patterns. That's been really great. I've worked with couples where they've had enormous challenges really connecting in all different ways. And now they're like, they have kids and they've moved on.

Starting point is 01:12:40 So those are like the case studies that really stand out the most to me. The ones who've really put in the work and did in like the impossible, you know, what they thought was totally impossible. And yeah. Have you ever found anything to be insurmountable? Well, I found there's certainly couples who needed to break up for sure. Yeah. And this is when, I mean, the obvious abuse, physical, mental abuse, drug or alcohol abuse that can't be solved. Yeah. Or they're unwilling to solve.

Starting point is 01:13:19 The irreconcilable differences, you know, like they're not right for each other. And they put in the work and, you know, like they're really like they're not right for each other and they put in the work and, you know, we have to normalize it's not all relationships are meant to last and that is okay. And maybe the relationship, as you were describing with your ex-wife, your relationship didn't end with her. It just changed form. It did. And now we're both so happy. I mean, she's actually married to, uh, you know, John Maxwell, the big, the great success author. She's married to his nephew, his, his father and John are brothers. And she's, she's got it. And he's amazing to my kids. And, and we, we don't vacation together, but she'll come over for holidays. I go for holidays we have we have amazing amazing mixed family but but it was the conscious decision to separate the husband and the wife from the mother and the father and now i'm very happily remarried she's happily remarried and our kids are super content yeah because they don't kids especially when they

Starting point is 01:14:21 get older don't like to pick sides um and terrible. If you spend all your time trying to tell them that their mom is deadbeat in the church, she spends all her time trying to tell you that your dad's deadbeat. You ruin your kids. You ruin your kids. Yeah, you ruin your kids. Yeah, the kids are going to suffer. Yeah. And that's the one thing that I always, I'm thankful that we both were mature enough at age to see it. Because we met very young.

Starting point is 01:14:47 We met in grad school and we just grew to be different people. But we didn't grow to be different parents. But I sort of wind down every podcast the same way. And this has been fascinating. And now that I know you're in Miamiami i'm definitely going to ask you to come back um i i i always ask um you know what does it mean to you to be an ultimate human hmm what does it mean to me to be an ultimate human i think it means resourcefulness and that like learning how to not outsource outsource everything like that that a lot of what you need you already have inside of you like i believe that we have the power to heal ourselves in many different ways gosh i, I do too. I think we have the power to overcome childhood difficulties and grow up and mature to be functioning adults in relationships and beyond.

Starting point is 01:15:56 So yeah, that's what that means to me. It's like really taking like as cliche and corny as it may sound, like really making lemonade out of lemons. And I think that that's a capacity that every human being has doesn't always necessarily tap into that, but that's ultimately what I think is the most powerful part of being a human. And it's what makes someone an ultimate human. Well, that's really inspiring, Jillian. I really can't thank you enough for coming on the podcast

Starting point is 01:16:28 today. Um, where can my audience find you find more about you learn more about your books, your practice? Um, book is coming out very soon. And it's love. What is it? It's, it's, it's, we haven't officially announced the title yet, but it's On Relationships. Okay. And it'll be out in January. Okay. On Relationships will be out in January. Pre-order sooner. Okay. Pre-order sooner.

Starting point is 01:16:50 And my podcast, Jillian on Love. Jillian on Love. Yeah. And then I have a relationship school for women. Men are welcome to join as well. We don't need relationship school. Exactly. You just clearly identified that.

Starting point is 01:17:03 Exactly. It's for women only called exactly because they need all the help exactly exactly called the conscious woman and then of course conscious woman and of course on instagram and social media which is just your first and last name yes first if you know my first and last name you'll find me anywhere jillian turecki yes spelled how it guys. Well, thank you so much. I hope my audience is definitely going to look you up. I'll put her contact information, I mean, her contact information, information on her book and her course in the show notes. And as always, that's just science.

The Ultimate Human with Gary Brecka - 79. Jillian Turecki: Keys to Healing Trauma and Finding Love

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