Undoctrinate Yourself - #12 - Elyse Schunkewitz

Episode Date: March 12, 2025

In this episode, Elyse returns to discuss her experience at the Chek Institute's Holistic Lifestyle Coaching 2 (HLC2) program. This is the most epic episode of Undoctrinate Yourself yet! We go deep and share our personal stories and experiences as it relates to holistic health and the rollercoaster of healing, as well as actionable takeaways for both practitioners and bio-harmonizers alike.Elyse Schunkewitz, LCSW is a holistic psychotherapist, brain-based coach, and presenter. Through a full mind-body-brain approach informed by functional neuroscience and medicine, somatic therapies, psychology, and fitness, Elyse works with clients to effectively shift mindsets, overcome obstacles, create better habits, increase focus, and improve overall performance.Find Elyse on Instagram ⁠⁠@neurdy_therapist⁠⁠⁠⁠Elyse's Website⁠⁠: https://elyseschunkewitzlcsw.com/⁠Support the podcast by becoming a patron: www.patreon.com/undoctrinateyourselfpodcastFollow the podcast on Instagram ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@undoctrinateyourselfpod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Follow Dr. Alexis on Instagram ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@dralexisjazmyn⁠

Hello and welcome back to Undoctrinate yourself. Today I have an amazing repeat guest for you, Elise Schengowit. She was here on episode seven. And if you listen to that episode, you might remember we got really deep into mental health and strategies to optimize mental health and well-being. And she got into a lot of her health history and her interest in the Czech Institute, which is kind of what we're going to dive in today because since we last spoke, she went to HLC2 training out in California.

and we're so excited to hear all the details about how that training was, the really cool and impactful thing that she learned. But first of all, just welcome back, Elise. Oh, thank you so much for having me, Alexis. I'm excited to be here. Yes, it's so excited to have you back. And we're both long-term and big fans of Paul. So, like, I'm excited to dive into the details of what the things you were learning in

person because he shares such a wealth of information online, but I'm always curious about what it's. like to actually be in his classroom. So when was HLC2? And can you give us a rundown of kind of what that looked like at a high level? And then we can go into some details. Yes, of course. So HLC2 happened, which is holistic lifestyle coaching level two, happened in mid-November of 2023. So it was a little over a month ago. It was at the Rainbow House, which is Paul's property. It's a beautiful, it's like 12 or 13 acres of land. And, and you know, I phacetined you for the property and you saw the beautiful view of the mountains overlooking the property and he has a pond at the bottom of the

property and the energy is just so unreal. Wow. I was there. I learned that Angie Paul's wife who talked the course, she's really far in the biogeometry training courses, super into it. So the entire property is, I guess I don't know how to say it. I call it like biodeometrically sound, right? Like I don't know how to think.

But when you're there, you just feel so good. Like there was just something magical about, about his property. And as only we could imagine, right, because we've been admiring this man for so many years. And that's really kind of what was our initial bonding. I forgot if we mentioned that in our, you know, in the episode seven. But yes, yes, totally. We did like 10 minutes of meeting each other. We learn that we both have this immense love and respect and appreciation for Paul Chek.

And that's really kind of the start of our friendship, you and me, which is so nice. Which is the best because that literally never happens. I never meet other people who even have heard of Paul Chekens. I'm like huge fans. So people listening might not even know who Paul is. But how do you describe Paul? So I initially when people ask me about him, I would say like he's a holistic health practitioner, just like generally speaking.

But then I always describe about how like I found him when I was studying for my general exam at Princeton. I was listening to a bunch of podcasts on like exercise science and like physiology. and I found like mind pump media and he was a guest on there and that's what was my initial introduction to him and I was like just all the bells and whistles were going off when he was talking. I was like this guy knows what he's talking about and I just want to know more and I want to learn from him and then I went down a whole rabbit hole on like his teachings and all the other podcasts that he had been on, Aubrey Marcus, he did some incredible episodes early on with him

and this was like back in 2017 or late 2016 when I found him. And then since then obviously he started his own podcast living in 4D, which is amazing. And he just provides so much incredible information for free. And it's such a gift for people because even if you can't afford to learn from him directly, you can completely change your life, just absorbing his free content. Absolutely. Oh my gosh. It's so true. And I always say, I wish that his book, How to Eat, Move and Be Healthy was a single at every school. Required reading at every school. Because it's the foundation of health. And it's so sad to me that our children and then us as adults do not know this stuff. I mean, it even gets down to the nitty gritty of what your poop

should look like. That's one thing I love about Paul is that he does not shy away from any topic, right? Like, I love my functional neuroscience training that I did, but we never talked about things like sex and poop. And as like, ew or it, like those topics are, right, or taboo to talk about, they're part of life. And I think they're so important to talk about. And the fact that him and Angie, Chek, who taught the class, his wife, are just so open about it. A, it brings a sense of comfort to talking about it,

because I think those things are really important for us to talk to our clients and our patients about. Because it's, right, if your sex drive is low, that's a sign of health issues. If you're not going to the bathroom regularly or too much or your poop doesn't look, right, that's a sign of health issues. So that's really important information as practitioners.

And Paul is actually talking about it. And the basics are just broken down into his books. And they're not that expensive on Amazon. I think they're like under $20 or something like that. So between all the free content he has and the books that he's writing and he's working on this book right now that apparently he's been working on for years. Oh my gosh, I can't remember the name. You probably know the name, right?

I actually don't remember the gym. Did he say, the gym, the spirit, spirit, spirit gym. Oh, I love that. What a great name, right? So I mean, his, yeah, his just his, his, and his YouTube videos are amazing too. Amazing. And the blogs. The blogs, the blogs, the blogs.

You can watch for hours and hours. But this man is just so magical. And, you know, I got to the property and I remember sitting in class. We didn't see him the first. We didn't meet him the first day. But he was in the back doing his Tai Chi. And I saw him out there. And I'm just like, oh my gosh, it's Paul.

And like, I don't know anyone as obsessed with Paul as you, me and Keith. Like people love him. You and I and Keith just take it to another level. And when I finally met him on the second day, I literally, he passed me. And I said to him, I said, Paul, you need to pinch me right now to know that you're real and this is real because I just, I couldn't believe I've been admiring this man's work for eight years. And so many people have been introduced to him through the Mind Pub podcast. I was actually introduced to him because the gym that I trained at and learned to be a trainer at,

there was a bunch of Czech practitioners there. No kidding. I didn't know that. Yeah. So I was like like getting his, I was like watching some of his videos that I got from my mentor and my colleagues back then. So I was like really like surrounded by people who were embodying his values. values eight, nine years ago, which is really, really cool. So yeah, so it was just great. There were nine people in the class. It was a very intimate setting. It was taught out of, they have like a really

cute lecture hall out of the garage right next to his gym that he works out at, that Paul works out and we realize he's the gym. And it was really a class about leveling up your understanding of holistic health and wellness. And it took, there's so many medical forms that we can use with clients to really understand what's happening in their body, what organs are being impacted based on their health issues, and then even really diving into like the chakra system of which chakras might be impacted based on this data that we're collecting of what symptoms the patients or clients are experiencing. So what I love is this blend of Western and Eastern spiritual, you know, the spiritual with the practical, if you will, and really integrating it all together.

because as we know, you know, the mind and the body are not separate entities. They really drastically impact each other. So, and then within that course, we talked about pendulums. So we used these these pendulums and we talked about soul connection and we did Tai Chi and really started to embody these practices in ourselves because, as Paul says, you know, you're first and last patient of the day. Absolutely. Yeah.

I mean, if you're not embodying what you're teaching, you're not. It's like a talking head. It's not going to, and that's going to come across to your clients or patients as well, that you're just saying words, but you're not actually embodying that energy. It's not going to translate. And so we have to, you know, deal with our own health and optimize our own health first and foremost if we want to be able to have a full cup to share with others. And that is also like others who are our loved ones in our life, but also if we're working

in a clinical type setting, that's also extremely important because otherwise we run the risk of like projecting our shit onto other people. and just not having good boundaries with our energy, and that's going to impact the quality of the care for the person in front of you, too. So we're in. Absolutely. Yeah. You mentioned the pendulum, so I know there's a couple of pendulums that Keith and I had you pick up for us.

I'm excited to pick them up, but can you share about how you use those? Yes. So the pendulum is really cool. Should I grab it for those who are watching us? Great. I have it right over here. Okay. Yeah, everyone in the class thought I was crazy because I asked for four to take home and they were like four. Why do you need four pendulum? It's like, oh, my friends want them to. So what's cool about this pendulum and for those that are listening, I'll describe it who are watching the video is this pendulum has a string instead just just a thread string instead of a metal, a metal like a metal piece, which most pendulums you see have. So then the metal can't, in most cases, from what I understand,

understand the metal can attract certain energy fields, whereas like this thread can't. And then unlike other pendulums that most people use, they usually swing back and forth to say yes and they swing side to side to say no. This pendulum swings either clockwise to say yes or counterclockwise to say no. And what's cool is you can use this pendulum to check the life force in food, for example, or if it's something that your body specifically would resonate with eating, you can also check people's chakras so you can have someone lay down and then go over all their chakras and see which direction the pendulum is swinging in is spinning in and then when the pendulum is spinning really fast that's like even a more a stronger you know yes or no depending on the intensity that the

pendulum is swinging so this is one of the things we learned I'm still I'm still really working on practicing using my pendulum because something that I struggle with is you have to take your ego out of the results, right? And this is, this goes along with other things we learned in the class were muscle testing and also soul connection. So really being able to go into your body and just say, you know, like soul direct me to how I should cook this food today, right? Direct me, do I want chicken or beef or turkey? And do I want to roast it? Do I want to, you know, cook it on the grill? How do I want to cook it? these things are actually, you know, you ask your body, what do you want? What do you need right now? And Angie even told a story about how she wanted to get like these specific type of toothpicks and she

couldn't find them at a grocery store. And she said to her soul, like, tell me where to get the toothpicks. And this one particular grocery store popped up into her head. And she drove to there and they had the toothpicks. So it's really cool in that way. And really when you can tap into your body and use your intuition and ask your soul for guidance that it will direct you to the things that you need. That takes so much pressure off, right? Especially for maybe the Libra's in the audience. And you're also Libra, like decision making, like decision, exactly. Oh, bad. But instead, if you have this force that's bigger than you can trust, then once you're tapped into that, it's like you can just relax because you know that that's going to be your guiding force. It's not like you're

having to intellectually figure out what the best decision to make is. And you mentioned, like, Paul on some podcasts talked about when you're initially developing your connection with your soul to like start out with very small questions, like, what color socks should I wear? Exactly. Outfit should I wear because it's like the stakes are very low. And you can just learn to pick up on the tiny signals that like you might get in the beginning that are telling you yes or no.

And then as you become more skilled in facilitating that connection, then it will be easier to make the bigger decisions and be able to have those lines of communication open. Also, interesting anecdote about the pendulum. One of our friends was visiting, like, last summer, I want to say, two summers ago. And we were wearing the biogeometry signatures pendant, the one with all the designs for each organ system on.

And she had her pendulum on her, and we were testing the pendulum on us. and she noticed that when we were wearing the biosignatures pendant, the pendulum would just stand dead still on the chakras. It wouldn't move at all. Wow. When we took the pendant off, it would be swinging incredibly. Like, it was very interesting.

And it's kind of not what we expected. We expected that the pendulum might swing faster or like over. But something seems to be going on energetically where it's, I don't know if the signals are kind of canceling each other out or something. I'm not sure what's going on. Actually, it would be probably a good question for Angie or for, Ibrahim Kareem from the BioGem Institute. But yeah, I think that was super interesting.

So fascinating. And it really shows you like wearing this piece of jewelry with specific signatures on it is changing how your body is responding to outside forces. And that's what's so cool. And that's what so much is, so much of this is missing as we know in the Western medical model. And, you know, my favorite podcast of Paul's is, I think it's titled, you'll never make the wrong decision if you trust your intuition. It's something like that. Right. And that podcast really

changed my mindset about things because all my life, it was intellectualized, intellectualized, think, think, think it through. And we're so out of our bodies to the point that we stop trusting our bodies. And a lot of the work that I do with people before, even before my HLC training, but now I'm integrating even more is this somatic work of getting out of the mind into your body and feeling the emotions that are in your body because we're so afraid of these things because they're uncomfortable a lot of the times. But when we don't listen to the uncomfortable emotions and we ignore them, we also don't listen to the emotions that are guiding us to the things that we need. We can't selectively choose which emotions we want to experience. So when we can stop the intellectualizing

and the overthinking and get into our body, it will guide us to where we need to go. And this is a difficult practice. It's something I'm like actively working on and I have been working on. I've been working with the somatic coach now for for two years weekly to work to to start to rewire the nervous system to be able to do this. I love this thread and I actually just had Matt Tolstoy on the podcast yesterday who I really want to introduce you to but he's a somatic experiencing practitioner and also a licensed acupuncturist and a doctor of Chinese medicine and acupuncture and we got pretty deep into like somatic experiencing and what that looks like and what people could expect during those types of treatments or interactions and just how powerful it can be to

kind of rewriting our nervous systems expectations and projections onto the future because a lot of the traumas that we experience in our life kind of get stuck in specific parts of the body and then we spend so much energy and time creating these holding patterns to avoid feeling those spaces instead of just, you know, safely approaching the honest awareness of what's going on there and just witnessing it and then having an empathetic witness to actually be there with us through that. And that's Matt was really emphasizing how important that is to for trauma rehabilitation, like somebody can't really go through it alone. They need to have somebody who's an empathetic witness to basically watch them go through that therapy in a supportive and compassionate way.

and that will actually allow, you know, the nervous system or the fascia or, you know, the aetheric body or whatever is holding that pattern to kind of release it over time and facilitate healing from that trauma. 100%. And having that person present and if there's touch involved even more powerful for people who can handle touch because it just helps you to regulate and feel safe to start to feel those emotions. So I'm really excited to listen to that when I saw that. It just came out. I'm excited to meet him too. So yeah. You guys would definitely get along great. Yeah. So I mean, tell us a little bit about how many days HLC was and like kind of how the lessons were broken up

if you want to share about that. Yes. So it was a five-day program. And the first day was just really a recap of holistic lifestyle coaching level one. So just making sure we understood the foundations. And then we dove into the really, really deep into the four doctor model, which, I know you're familiar with, and I'm sure some of your listeners, if they're fans of Paul, are familiar with. But just re-emphasizing this. So there's Dr. Diet, Dr. Quiet, Dr. movement, and Dr. Happiness. Are you singing the phone for your head? I love, I cannot. I was thinking about how I should sing it on here, the Dr. Happy, now I can't get out of my head. I have the Czech Institute literally

for a week. Dr. Happy was burned into my brain. I was like, Dr. Happy is the dreamer. Dr. Happy is the dreamer. Dr. Happy is the dreamer, Dr. Happy is the dreamer, don't you know? Dr. Happy sets your rhythm. Your rhythm sets your pressure and your rhythm and your pressure make your float. Hope, poe. So I actually have been singing it to my patience. They probably think I'm wackadoo.

Fun tip, actually. I did a session, a one-on-one session with Angie last week. I'm going to be working with her a little bit. Yeah, I'm actually going to do a soul retrieval session with her on Friday. Oh, I know. Really excited. So I don't even know what to expect. But Paul popped into the end of my session with her.

and I said to him, I have, I'm really excited. I have this client who's going to be taking off a few weeks and we're going to be really diving deep into his health because unfortunately he is very, he's like on the verge of, basically on the verge of being very sick. So, and I'm going to implement all the check, you know, all the check ideas and protocols. I'm really excited about it. And Paul said, have your client sing all four doctor songs four times a day because I created the song so they have a very specific frequency and feeling that really gets absorbed into the body.

And I was like, okay, I kind of like that. That's cool. I mean, you can help but be happy and uplifted while you're singing those, right? And then you actually remember the content of it, right? Like you remember about nourishing your body and why movement is important and why quiet is important. And the biggest thing, and the reason I love the four doctors model is because it just simplifies things. It's the yin and the yang. In the yin, you have, what is it, Dr. Died and Dr. Quiet. And then the young, you have Dr. Happy and Dr. Movement. And it's really about creating this balance

in your life of both working out and doing and then working in and calming and nourishing. And we don't have enough of that, Yin. We don't have enough of that calming and nourishing in our lives, especially if you live in a city or close to a city or you're working. a lot in a place like the United States. But, you know, it's really, it's, it's about finding that balance. So, so the four doctor songs help you figure out how to find that balance. But the biggest thing that Paul drives home is, and this is not just an HLC2, but all in all of his messages is, you know, with a dream, there is no crisis. What is your dream? What is your one love? What are you here to do? What is the reason that you're excited to go to sleep so you can

wake up and feel refreshed and go do that thing that brings you so much energy. And, you know, people come to us, you know, as practitioners and they want to change things and they want to improve their health or their mental health or their physical body. But without an actual like big dream and love, what's the motivation to do it, right? What are the driving forces? So something that's really important, I think for everyone here who's listening to think about and anyone who's a practice, whether you're a practitioner, you're just, you know, you work a different type of job thinking about what is your dream and asking your clients, what is your dream? And if they don't know their dream, really try to take some time to figure it out.

A lot of people don't know their dream. So Paul says, figure out then what is your nightmare? And let's find the opposite of it. So, and you can really ask yourself, what are your values? What brings you joy? How do you like spending your time? where do you spend money, right? That's a really important indicator of what your dream is. You know, for something like some, you know, for you and me, we like, we spend a lot of money on good

quality food. That's really important to us. That's probably part of our longer term dream also is being able to have a regenerative farm or being able to access really good quality food in life. And your dream doesn't have to be just one thing. It can be a lot of things. It can be like the whole big picture of what you want in life. So that's really, really. important. That was probably one of the biggest takeaways for me is the importance of sitting down with every client I work with and really diving into what is your dream. What is it that you're here to achieve? That's so important because like you said, without that structure, that guiding force, anything could be the right answer, but it's like you don't even know because you don't have that path.

You're not on any single path. And I mean, it can be really scary for people to identify their dream because they could have been living a very, like, mediocre life to them, and that could require them to get out of the job, the relationship, the friendships, and, you know, it could create a whole massive upheaval of their life at this point in time. So that can be very scary. So, I mean, identifying and being honest about what, you know, you value, what you love and what you feel like you're here to do is going to be, like, the major first step. And I think also that's where it comes into, like, optimize.

you can start to make benefits on like your hydration, your diet, your movement, because if you can gain energy in other ways, it can help you build like the fortitude to actually do the bigger things and make those big decisions and feel okay about it because, I mean, if you're just, you know, if you're very sick and your body's unhealthy, it could be scary to get out of the relationship because maybe that's your support system and you can't take care of yourself by yourself at that point. So it's just slow steps. Absolutely. And I, to be totally transparent. You know, I woke up, the class ended on a Sunday night, stayed at the Airbnb, woke up Monday morning to fly home. And I had the biggest pit in my stomach. And I went out

into the kitchen. I stayed in an Airbnb with five other people from the class. And I went out to the kitchen and two of the guys were there making breakfast. And I said, guys, I don't know what my dream is anymore. Like, you're really like, I was dreading going back to New York a part of me was, you know, and I was on this beautiful property hanging out with these like-minded people who I was learning so much. I mean, the participants in the class were just, they were such cool people. And really what I love about going to in-person classes like this is, is a lot of times you learn just as much, if not more, from your peers as you do from the instructor in the class. So, and I was just surrounded by really, really awesome, open-minded,

kind, loving, interesting folks. And, And they look at me, you know, two of the guys look at me and they go, well, that's a good place to be, Elise. You know, when they said to them, I don't know what my dream is. And I was like, what's that the answer I wanted? Like, what are you talking about? And one of them said, well, you know, if you didn't sometimes have this kind of conflict or confusion, like, what would you be?

And I said, dead? And he said, yeah, this is part of life, you know? And it's so true is that our dreams do need to. to be redefined from, you know, as time goes on, right? I had this amazing dream of building my holistic practice and, you know, learning anatomy and movement from becoming a personal trainer and learning psychotherapy and psychiatry from working at Bellevue and working at NYU and studying functional neuroscience and studying holistic health and functional medicine practices. And then I finally built this dream of my integrative holistic practice. And I achieved it. So now I do need,

it's time to redefine the dream, right? Like it's time to figure out what's next in my life. And as I was working through this class, realizing, you know, maybe the things that I thought were my dream, maybe they need a little bit of adjusting or changing. And there's parts that are scary, like you said, right? Like, does it involve changing your geography? Does it involve changing your partnerships?

Does it involve changing your career? Those things are really, really hard to look at sometimes is when there are a sense of stability and predictability. Because our brain loves pattern recognition. It loves prediction. And what does it mean if we just one day, you know, decide that we're going to leave our partner or decide that we're going to change our career or decide that we're going to move out of the place that we're living?

That's really scary. So these are things that you have to do slowly and, you know, let your, like, you know, give yourself time to really figure out, like, what is it that I want? And what is it that I want to feel? That's the biggest thing. And you're bringing up some thoughts for me about psychedelics because, I mean, when you think about the disruption of the default mode network and how inconvenient that could be to a functioning society, you can kind of understand why they were like immediately outlawed when they first came onto the scene like in the 60s. And like they were just kind of out of left field because they were having these so unexpected effects on just the way people wanted to live their lives. and now they're kind of having a renaissance.

And I mean, for better or worse, I think they're tools. Obviously, they're not a perfect solution in most or many contexts. You kind of have to have skills like Paul talks about Tai Chi, Chi Gong, and meditation and ways to navigate that inner landscape outside of the drug experience. And then if you were to have these intense medicine ceremonies, you could actually have the tools built in already to navigate those more challenging experiences, which will undoubtedly come up. But yeah, I think

what you're saying is so true about, you know, needing to redefine your dreams and like also the role of medicine ceremonies in that because in a lot of the traditional cultures there would be rights of passage where, you know, you reach a certain age and then you have some sort of psychedelic experience that initiates you into a new period

of your life that's kind of redefining who you are in that moment and giving you a new path forward. And we're just totally missing rights of passage in general in our modern society. and I think it really shows. Yeah, absolutely. It's, yeah, you don't really see so much change between different age groups. Yeah. Childhood into adolescence and to young adulthood into adulthood into adulthood. That's true. Is that what you're referring to? No, absolutely. I mean, I feel like we work kids the same way we work adults now, you know? It's just like you're sitting all day,

you're doing this work, you're memorizing this stuff, and they're just training you to be this, like, little productive adult that's kind of an automaton that's not challenging the status quo, it's not thinking outside of the box. And it's sad because it's robbing childhood from children. And they still don't know what their poop should look like or why they shouldn't use the microwave. It's not important is learned. Right. No, 100%. 100%. I mean, could you imagine if you taught children how to trust their intuition from a young age? We're literally as adults having to unlearn all of these things. Yes.

Like how we should be acting and behaving and producing. Whereas, you know, kids should be able to be free and run around and learn in different ways. And, you know, and I wonder if now it's just if it's all starting to kind of like backlash at us, you know, with these, you know, a lot of people have, a lot of children are, you know, we're seeing like a huge influx of mental health issues in childhood and, you know, kids who do need different ways of learning. and probably should be out in nature.

I mean, rates of ADHD have just skyrocketed, right? It's like why? Kids are not out in nature. They're not eating foods that they, that are beneficial for their health and that are nourishing for their body. And they're also, you know, they're just, they're just stuck. They're stuck looking at screens all day. Yes.

And those quick dopamine hits that you get from that screen time and the social media and whatever YouTube. And you actually see the trend in like YouTube. and Instagram and TikTok, they're all going with like these very short form hits of like a minute, two minute videos that's like giving you this quick hit and then you're moving on to the next one. And then the next one, it's like this endless loop of like you're just searching for the next hit. And that's not conducive to actually living a meaningful and fulfilling life because that requires a slow buildup to accomplish a goal.

It's not like instant gratification. Right, right. I see that a lot. I see that a lot in like my younger cousins where and not to totally like hate on it, I hate a hate on them, but this lack of experience of working hard and having to do stuff you don't necessarily want to do. Like I don't know about you, but I worked at my gym. This was after college.

I worked at my gym to get a free membership and I was like literally washing towels and cleaning equipment and and I worked at Bloomingdale's, you know, putting stuff back on the rack and folding stuff up and trying to jam like huge sheets that people, you know, bed sheets that people were trying to take out to look at and jam them back into a package and the proper way, right? And you learn this, this skill of really doing shit you don't want to do, but building that resilience and that tolerance. Whereas, you know, the instant gratification, it's, it, they don't have that muscle anymore of working hard to achieve something. And it's kind of crazy because now you have young people who are TikTok influencers making way more money than you and I could ever dream up.

Literally. You know, I mean, it really goes back to that whole, that whole thing. What is it? Hard times make. Oh, yes. What is it? Hard times make strong men, strong men make easy times, easy times make weak men, weak men make hard times. Cycle. Yeah. Yeah. And oh gosh, yeah, there's so much here. And I mean, we talked about this before too where it's like on the plus side,

they're not having to engage in this like work that's not something they're passionate about and they're leaning into what they are passionate about. But at the same time, there is value in doing the hard things. And I mean, you can also see an uptick in like cold exposure and sauna and people trying to biohack in these ways, which is a voluntary form of doing something difficult, which is great. You can obviously get that through exercise as well, which is also great. And the great thing about those modalities is it does translate to other parts of your life. Absolutely.

Become more resilient to challenge in general. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Did you guys talk about cold at all during HLC2 or did you get into any modalities? Did we talk about cold? we talked about fasting and how to identify, like, whether it's right for you or not. And kind of like, yeah, like, well, Angie was like, you know, one of the things she said that I was looking through my notes is that women are really not made to fast so much. And men should not be doing it for extensive periods of time.

We talked about also, like, detoxing people. Like at what point do you start to detox people? So, you know, there's all different types of detox, right? Like even just changing someone's diet is a form of detox if you're cleaning up their diet because they're going to start getting the toxins out of their body. So we talked about how when you're going to do these things and integrate exercise practices or even things like cold exposure, that you have to really evaluate how healthy is this person in front of you.

And that's where kind of the end of the course, the last two days was looking into the paperwork of, I mean, there's literally hours and hours of paperwork you could give clients to really identify what's happening in their health. And like I said, also, you know, what organs are being affected, what chakras might be affected. But someone who may be eating a lot of fast food is not really getting a lot of movement, is not breathing well, they are going to feel really crappy when you start to put them on an exercise regimen and a different diet and making sure that they're doing some breathwork. In fact, Paul said, like, do not have them exercise right away. Have them just go on, like, slow walks and increase their movement a little bit more because they already are so stressed

out. And also in our culture, when we talk about stress, we don't talk about, like, when people hear the word stress, I think they just think about emotional stress, right? They're like, oh, I'm so stressed out at work. My boss is like being a pain in my butt. They don't think about physical stress on the body. And the reality is that if you're eating all, a lot of conventionally farmed produce and meats or you're eating a lot of fast food, a lot of processed food. That's a lot of stress on the body. If you're not breathing well, that's stress on the body. If you're not sleeping, well, that's stress on the body. So, and then on top of that, you probably have a lot of emotional stress too if you're in that

situation. So we have to think about when you start to detox people and change their, change their habits and have them engage in new protocols, really easing them into it. so they don't detox too quickly because if they detox too quickly, A, they're going to feel really crappy. And B, they're probably going to bail on the treatment plan because they're like, this isn't working. I feel worse. So doing things like, even though we didn't talk about specifically, doing things like cold exposure also like need to be eased, as you know, too, is need to be eased in because it can be such a shock. For body, it can be a stress on the body if you're too high stress. Absolutely. I actually love this thread because it's bringing up some

things we talked about in the podcast I did with Matt, but also the one I did with Rua, where if the body doesn't feel a sense of safety, then it's not going to take on that new pattern of being as a safe, efficient option. The nervous system needs to feel a certain amount of stress to get the adaptation, but it can't be over that amount because otherwise it becomes a threat that shuts down learning and memory. It pushes you away from parisempathetic activation, and that will just basically make you more rigid into your behavioral patterns that we're trying to get you out of. So absolutely so important to ease in and get just the right dose of stress needed to make the positive adaptations, but not more or less than that. No, that makes a lot of sense. Yes. And I talk,

even just like, you know, in our first episodes together, we talked about getting outside of your comfort zone and building self-esteem is that if you try to do something that is so far out of your comfort zone, like too far out of your comfort zone, it's going to cause. And think about it in the weight room too, right? If you try to lift a weight that is way too heavy for you, it's going to cause injury, it's going to cause pain, it's going to cause trauma, whether that be physical or emotional, right? And you have to find that sweet spot of how can you push yourself just a little bit outside your comfort zone in order to change the habits and get a different response. Do you have a little bit of a different stimulus to instill a different response in the body without going too far. And that's also

what I love about Czech's program is that it is so much about the individualization of treatment and of planning with people because our bodies are so different and our knees are so different. And, you know, he does a lot of the, what is it, the metabolic typing and the primal patterns for the food and really looking to see what does your body need based on genetics, based on lifestyle, based on current geography, based on where your ancestors used to live, like really understanding that your body needs different things compared to what other people need, compared to what your partner or your friends need, but also even just seasonally, our bodies need something different. We see this all the time, right?

If you eat local produce, the produce that you have available to is going to be very different in the summer than it is going to be in the winter. And there's really, I think, you know, the biggest thing is like when you're in this industries, in these health industries that you and I are in, people want a very easy, simple solution. Like they want to hear a like an absolute. And then you see people who are on social media who are very absolute about things and they blow up because they're, A, you either, you either love them or hate them, right? They're either like amazing or they're super controversial. Well, they're always controversial, but they're, you know, people love and I hate them.

And people think it's an easy fix for their problems. The people who are more nuanced like you and me, it's sometimes slower to grow an audience because people don't want to necessarily hear that it's not so black and white. Right. I love Paul Saladino. I love carnivore MD. But like the reality is he's like very, he's very absolute and very rigid in his thinking. And we know that his diet plan is not going to work for everybody.

So that's the thing about Czech's protocols is that it is not teaching you what to think. It's teaching you how to think. It's teaching you how to help the individual that is in front of you with a unique stress history, with a unique, with unique genetics, with unique life experience, and really create a plan that's going to help them grow and evolve and achieve their dream. Amen to that. I mean, that's what we all need and strive for. And obviously, it's not the easy solution, but, you know, nothing worthwhile, barely anything worthwhile is easy. And yeah, so interesting about like the human psyche, how we just tend to gravitate towards

this polarized way of thinking, right? Right. Yeah. Yeah. I guess it's maybe it's part of that predictability that the brain wants. That's true. It definitely creates stability of, like, worldview and, and less uncertainty, which makes it less scary.

Even if it's not working. Right, right, yeah. And it doesn't work for everybody. That's the thing is that and also it's very young. It's very masculine energy to just choose one thing. It's not, you know, it doesn't create that balance. So you need like I said, you know, earlier, you need a balance of both. You need that masculine and feminine. You need that young energy. And that's something I really took away from the course. I've been doing Tai Chi every day. I'm committing to a gong. I'm on day. Yeah, I'm on day 39 right now. So it's a hundred days of practice. And we did Tai Chi every day in the class, which was so nice as a group for 20 minutes. And then I thought to myself, you know, why don't I just keep this up? Like, this is great. So, you know, something that I lack. I'm going through a really big transformative, like experience and error in my life right now, a season in my life, because I have been in such intense. Yang energy for so long and so much yin deficiency that I am so out of balance. And it has messed up my hormones and my sleep and all those things, weight loss ability. And I'm really doing a lot, like integrating a lot of yin into my life at this time, which is not easy to do, especially in a place like New York City. And the most challenging thing about it is, and I heard this from Dr. Ellen Vora, is to not

yang your yin. Oh, isn't that good? Isn't that so good? Yeah, like to not basically make your yin practices, yin practices being working in practices, nourishing practices, Tai Chi, meditation, slow yoga, slow walking, any sort of activity that if you're moving, your heart rate stays the same and your mouth stays moist, right? If you're working out really intensely, your mouth tends to get dry and your heart rate tends to go up. So when we talk about yin activities, we're talking about things that are giving to the nervous system, nourishing the nervous system. But what happens is, and I'm so guilty of this for so many years, is that we tell ourselves we have to do the meditation. We have to do the Tai Chi. We have to do the yoga. And then it's become another thing on our to-do list

and then stressing us out that it's on the to-do list and we haven't done it. And then I'm sitting there, you know, trying to do my breath work. and instead I'm going, well, when is this going to be over? Because I got 500 other things I got to do. So that's really, that kind of takes away the effects of doing the working and exercise. So something that I've been more mindful of is really creating that space to do the exercise and practices with and trying not to put it, you know, bookend it with things that I'm stressed down about and really give myself the time to be present with it. And the thing I love about

these Tai Chi working in practices is, and I have a few, I actually have a really nice one on my Instagram. It's called the energy push. So it's, you know, a little like, like breathing out as you push your arms forward and extend your arms completely and then breathing in, inhaling as you bring your arms forward and just repeating that. And you could do it seated. You could do it standing. But the thing that's nice about these is that a lot of people really struggle to just meditate if they've never meditated before, right? They sit down to meditate and they think to themselves, oh, my gosh, this is the biggest waste of time.

I'd rather be doing anything else in the world. I'd rather be sitting in a dentist chair. I have 500 other things on my to-do list. I need to get done, right? And we can't sit still and we can't go into our bodies instead we're in our mind. So what's really nice about these meditative movement practices is that it's such a great way to get out of your mind and just breathe with your body moving and focusing on the exhale as you move one way and inhale as you move in another way. And a lot of my clients who struggle in meditation, they love this. They love it because they're able to get out of their mind and still have those same benefits as the meditation.

That's amazing. Yes, I think that's, I mean, certainly it's a form of meditation and especially for the busy mind or the person on the go all the time. It's going to be something that's easier for them to kind of ease into versus just sitting completely still in silence and being alone with themselves, which could be quite threatening. How have you found is the best way to not like bookend the time period with stressful things? Do you do it first thing in the morning or do you do it at night? Like what does it look like for you? Yeah. So I've basically integrated it into my morning routine. So one of the things that I do, I always do every day as I go up to my roof and take my glasses off to get sunlight in my eyes. So I was already doing 10 minutes of breathwork every morning. So basically what I decided to do was tap, tap, tack it on to the end of my breathwork. But if I'm if I'm stressed for time, because I tell myself I have to do a minimum of 10. 10 minutes of Tai Chi, even though half to sounds very yang and masculine. I'm like trying to watch the wording that I use when I talk about it.

But my goal at minimum is 10 minutes of Tai Chi, ideally 20, because I do feel like I really start to get into it at that 10 minute mark. So basically what I've said is if I only have 10 minutes, the breathwork goes and I just do the Tai Chi. And if I have longer, I'll do a full or shorter breathwork session with the Tai Chi. But regardless, I always had that time carved out in my morning anyway. Because a lot of the work, and we talk about this at HLC2, is a lot of the work is also taking away things from people. So minimizing what they do.

If you really look to see at the four doctor model what people can do to start to really take care of all four doctors, some of the best things they can do is start to remove things from their life. So instead of telling them they, you know, should be eating a certain way, maybe it's that, you know, it's like you should be, you know, eating all this organic produce every day. Maybe it's they take away one processed food in the day, right? Or you're just starting to kind of, like maybe it's about reducing social activities. You have more introspective quiet time. what are the things that you can take away so you can give yourself more of that time to nourish and relax, especially because we're in such a doing, doing, doing. So then, you know, people will say, well, at least I need a morning routine and they add five things to their morning routine. And they're doing yoga and meditation and journaling and Tai Chi. And then they come back to me frazzled being like, I don't have time to do all these things in my morning routine.

And I say, yeah, I already thought it was a lot, but you wanted to do it. So let's actually take away. Let's reduce some of those things. you don't have to do all those things every day. I love that. I actually just had a conversation with a client about this before we hopped on the call because she was saying how she needs to do more so that she can do more to free up the time. But really what you need to do is do less to free up the time instead of trying to like get ahead on things. Instead, maybe we can delegate things ideally and only focus on the things that we really feel lit up by.

That would be a good goal to have. Absolutely. to delegate the things that we're not inspired by. But in addition to that, I am always telling clients, like, people are always looking for, like, what supplement to take, what thing to do to, like, improve their life and their health. But really, it's ideal to start with what things we can take away because oftentimes it's the things that we're doing actively that are harming us and not things that we're not doing. Yes, absolutely, absolutely.

And we just, like, that kind of goes as the magic bullet answer, right? of like the absolutes is like, well, what supplement can I take to make myself feel better? And it's like, well, as long as your diet's crappy, as long as your sleep's crappy, your breathing's crappy and you're not giving yourself any sort of nourishing practices and you're not moving well, no supplement is going to make a difference. Maybe you'll feel a little bit different from it, but it's not going to like totally change your life. Totally.

And people have such busy lives in like modern society that it makes more sense to remove things or swap things instead of adding more things just to prevent that sense of overwhelm and actually lead to long-term adherence. Right. Totally. Totally. And also we are so stuck in doing that we forget to listen to our intuition about what we're actually naturally good at. So I think about, I was thinking about this a lot because a few days ago, my friend Allison came over and she read my human design. So this, so she does branding and marketing, but she actually does it based off of your human design, which is cool, right? Because then she can take her inherent gifts and integrate them into what your branding and marketing looks like. So I've had astrology readings. I know very little

bit about my human design, but this was really more of an opening. This really opened it up for me more to really understand who am I and what gifts do I have to offer in the world. And a little lot of it was confirming what I already knew, but was afraid to do or felt like was wrong to do or did I didn't think was going to actually get me the results I wanted because of noise from everyone else and society and social media and things like that. And I was sitting there thinking, okay, my therapist says to me all the time being, sources doing, sources having. So just being and listening to yourself and being intuitive and nourishing yourself sources action and actually doing the things that move you and you feel passionate about,

which then sources having the things that you want. And all this time I've been fighting my natural instincts because I didn't think that's what people wanted to see or what was the right thing to do or I thought I was going to be judged for it. So instead I'm working so hard to try to get the results that I want that are coming a lot slower and then I'm not having what I actually want. But this human design reading actually confirmed that if I just did the things that I know I'm good at intuitively and that are my natural gifts, I'll actually be excited about doing the actions that I need to take to get to the place I want to be and it will actually results in having more. That makes sense. I feel like I spoke in like very like vague.

No, no, that was very powerful. And I this is like the beauty of astrology and human design and all of these types of modalities in my mind is that they tend to tell us things that we already know at like a core level and give us some permission and confidence to pursue those directions, which can be so powerful when like you said, we have all these different people in our ears. we're seeing all these people on social media doing their thing. And it's like, should I be doing that? Should I copy what they're doing to get their result? But no, we actually have to follow our own path to get the result that we want. It's not about emulating somebody else. Just because they did it a certain way, doesn't mean you're going to be able to do it the same way. Same as like looking at somebody's body

and being like, if I follow their exercise, routine, and diet, I'm going to look exactly like that. No, that's not how it works. It's not how it works at all. And you would I know that very well. Yeah. Yeah. So I realize this is a little contradictory of what we said earlier. We were talking about young people not working hard, not doing the value of hard work. Like just the paradox, the grand paradox. Yeah. Look, but also, you know, it does, as you and I both know, it does take hard work to get to where you want to be also. But when you're excited about that work, at least it doesn't feel most of the time, hopefully it doesn't feel like work. I think the best. thing, and I've heard this quote many times, is to, you know, variations of this quote is to find

things that you love so much that the work doesn't actually feel like work. So when you can really listen to yourself and figure out what excites you, then it might bring in more than you could have ever imagined. So I'm really, you know, between the human design and the, the intuitive practices and the Tai Chi practices, this is a big shift for me right now in my life because a lot of it has been about grinding away and working really hard and just not taking care of myself in order to do what I want to do. And now I want to see what happens when I starts to lean into those intuitive, creative processes that I think that, that, that I think are inherently inside of me and slow down and give myself the rest and the being and the stillness

and see, see what happens. And then I'll report back if it works. I love that. I feel like I'm also in a similar place in my life where I'm really trying to be more and and do less and just really focus on the things that I'm that feel like they light me up yeah and I mean it can also be scary because especially if you know you you have your livelihood built around doing things a certain way then like changing that it's like well I need to survive so it's like yeah absolutely and I know you spoke about that with Greg also you touched on money and and the survival portions of that and with the archetypes so it is scary and I have to say like I don't know I don't know what the exact answer as in finding the balance. It's, it's, it is scary because we can't, we can't just

totally abandon our lives. Do I say sometimes I'm like, oh, should I just move to a remote island and not him to make any money and like figure out how to live in the, in the woods or the jungle or the, you know, in the ocean, like whatever it is. But yeah, it's, it's because of the way our society is structured, we were, you know, if we want to live here and survive and have the lifestyles we want, we do have to make money. So how do we start to find that balance? And that's, we're, you know, that I'm working through right now, is trying to figure that out for myself. Yeah, money is, money is a really weird one because it's like this weird contractual agreement that, like, we agree that this currency is a proxy for your value and your, like, the energy you're putting

into the society. And it's like, it's a construct. It's not real, but at another level, it is very real. And it's so tied in with, like, our survival mechanisms for some reason, even though we didn't evolve with money as, I mean, we evolved to actually provide real tangible value, not money, but now we have this proxy for value, which is money. And it's just, it's very, it's a stressor that's almost completely ubiquitous. It's, it really is actually, it's so funny that we're talking about this because I'm going to share something with you. I, right before a call, I had a call with a friend who is struggling with money, having some money stuff right now, come up in her relationship. And,

she said that a lot of it had to do with her dad. She realized this just recently. And she's, she realized there's all this repressed stuff that's below the surface that finally came out last week about money and her relationship to money and how it's coming out in her relationship with her partner and how it resembles what happened with her dad. So we did a little bit of a family constellation, right? This is literally right before our call, you would be getting on here. And, um, and we realized that a lot of her, a lot of her stuff is coming up because her dad has so much of his own value and self-worth tied to money that when he would give money to her, it was like, show me love in exchange for me giving you

this money. Like I need to see the value in me because I'm giving you money. So she's been really wrapped up in this. And she said to me, even though she did some somatic release practices and she's also a holistic practitioner in our world and she went to a cradiosacral therapist and she had some stuff removed, she said she still has shoulder pain. So I literally just bought, this just came in the mail yesterday last night. It's called, oh my gosh, where is, it's called feelings buried alive, never die. Whoa, I've heard of this. I've heard of this. So I just got the reference guide because

I was like, I don't want the whole book. I just want the reference guide. So I said to her, I said, what said your shoulders in a shoe. So I looked up shoulders and it says, shoulders resemble. bury burdens that don't belong to you, which makes sense because she's carrying the stuff from her dad. And then I said, which shoulder is it? She goes the right one. I said, oh, my gosh, it says the right shoulder relates to financial. So she had a shoulder pain. She had shoulder issues in her right shoulder since she's realized all these things about money. The pain is still there. And it's all like, it's all related. It's all related. So I don't know if I made, like, did I make sense just now? Basically, yeah, okay. Right. So, right? So,

she's having these financial issues, she's having right shoulder pain. And according to this book, feelings buried alive, never die, which basically tell you what physical symptoms are associated with emotional, what, yeah, what emotional symptoms are associated with your physical symptoms. Right shoulder issues are related to financial. And I was like, that is so crazy. Well, the other crazy thing that you bring up this story is that I had a similar realization about two weeks ago with the way that I interact with money. And I saw like so strikingly that I was basically repeating this pattern that like I saw my other family members doing like specifically my mom and my grandma where they didn't

have any boundaries around money and they would just basically spend all of their money on the people they love until they're like there's no money left. Oh my gosh. And then you see yourself doing it too. Wow. It is the inherited and I've done family constellations for myself around. money and it's just so interesting that we really inherit our family's thoughts and beliefs around money. Totally. It's intentional or not or even if it's over or not. Wow. Wow. So what are you like,

what are you going to do about it? Like what I don't know yet. I've just been coming to terms with like, wow, that's like a real pattern that clearly is like lineage base. So trying to figure out what to do about it. Oh my gosh. And these are things also that I think are really, and I integrate this into my practice, but I think they're really important things to look at when you're working with clients and thinking about your own obstacles and struggles is that, right, a lot of us engage in behaviors and patterns that we don't necessarily understand why and we can't always trace back to past traumas from this lifetime, but they could actually be generational. That's, they're coming from, and Mark Wollin's book talks about this. It didn't start with you who Paul

had on his podcast also. My coach trained directly under Mark, who I've been working with for the last, my somatic family consolation coach I've worked with for the last two plus years. So I've really dove deep into a lot of this and I really bring it into sessions with clients, especially like, you know, I have clients who have chronic, chronic, chronic health issues and like all five, one one client I had who all four grandparents, parents were Holocaust survivors. So really thinking about like, where is this coming from and what other, what other things from before us are impacting us?

And then we bring the unconscious to the conscious. And then as Carl Young says, we don't let it drive us and then call it fate. Yes, absolutely. And this is where it also can be tricky with like being able to tease apart what your intuition is versus what your like traumas, whether they're generational or in your life. time like what's speaking to you because sometimes the voice that is maybe masquerading as your intuition could also be from your ego from like this trauma response totally and that that is where it gets really confusing sometimes right like i have i have patients who come to a lot of

anxiety and it's like well what's intuitive and what's just anxiety and that's where the somatic practices are so valuable and i'm sure you spoke about this on on your episode of mad of like when you can actually go into your body and not be afraid to feel these things and start to be with them and let them metabolize, then you can really start to see, okay, where, where am I experiencing this from a place of fear and what is, you know, what is coming up for me and is my body safe right now? Can I distinguish between safety, lack of safety from the past and whether I'm safe in the present moment. And, you know, when you're using your intuition and you're using soul connection, like Angie said in the class, when you practice soul connection, you want to be well rested,

you want to feel safe. You want to be nourished. But you don't want to practice soul connection on like you're starving and you're exhausted and you're stressed out. So that's a really great time to then go in and ask yourself, you know, is this, is, is, Is this actually, kind of like take a break from what life is what's happening right now. Give yourself what you need and then go back from a safe space and find out. Is this, you know, anxiety because I don't want to do this thing? Is it anxiety from past trauma? Is it anxiety from inherited trauma?

And ask your, you could ask your soul. Like, where is it coming from? But you really can't ask your soul from an unsafe place because then it won't give you, it won't give you the answer that you need to hear. Yeah. or you can't even hear it because there's these other things that are speaking so loudly that they're dulling out the like the core message. Exactly, exactly. But I'll tell you like I, you know, I'll share this with the audience is that ever since I was a child, I had a terrifying fear of

pregnancy, like terrifying. And I never really understood why because even though I had, I have a history of physical abuse. I never had a history of sexual abuse as far as I know. And it just didn't make sense, right? A child, like I had like nightmares as a child that I was pregnant. Like that doesn't really, you know, it doesn't really make sense. So I, it occurred to me after doing all this work. I had this thought all of a sudden, all this inherited family trauma work. I was like, this doesn't feel like it's mine. Like maybe it actually is someone else's. So having that knowledge and then along with the work of doing the somatic practices and learning how to be in my body, I then had this moment. moment of, wait a minute, like actually, I've been sitting here thinking I have a problem or whatever quote unquote problem, but actually maybe it came from somebody else inherited. So I went to my coach and I said this to her. So this doesn't feel like it's mine actually. And she tested it and she uses the pendulum and all these things and she said it's actually carmic. She said it was that when I was in a past life, I had a pregnancy that I needed to get an abortion and it was illegal at the time to get

abortions and I went to a guy that was supposed to be reputable, a back alley, a new guy, and he actually secretly thought that women getting abortions were terrible people, and he botched the surgery intentionally, and I died. Yeah. Oh, my God. I don't know how your audience is going to take this story. This is gold. This is like the best podcast ever today.

You're like, okay, we're out. This girl's crazy. But it just like it made it made sense to me, right? Because why would I have this terrifying fear of pregnancy from a young age? Like something must have happened in previous life or in an ancestor. And then I did actually learn that my great grandmother had, I think I learned after that after sharing that with a cousin that she had an illegal abortion too. So that I had never known about. No, it was my great, great grandmother. It was my great great grandmother. It was my great great grandma. mother. So that's all. She did not die, though, from the abortion, but just really interesting experience. And I'm still working through it. But it just that once again, making the unconscious conscious, it really does help make a difference to understand where things are coming from. So then you can really start to make an effort to change them and engage in practices. Absolutely. And I mean, this even applies when,

you walk into a room and there's a bunch of people in the room and you start to feel some type of way like the energy is off like if you don't trust your body's signals you could think that you know you're just feeling that way because you feel self-conscious or you feel nervous or whatever it is but maybe you're actually picking up on somebody else's energy that's in that room and if you don't develop like the skills to be able to differentiate between those things then you may just walk around thinking there's something wrong with you when it's actually, you're just very sensitive. Yes. Oh, and I have a lot to say about that from the class also. So Angie talked a lot about finding your soul family and your soul people and your soul mate.

And something that really struck me was her discussion around being your true authentic self, because that's how you're going to attract those soul people into your life. and as someone who struggles with people pleasing and wanting to be liked, right? And also kind of that, that Libra, I think it might be the Libraness of right, the, we talked about this in the last episode, like changing, you know, being able to like be a chameleon and change kind of to a comedy other people and not from an inauthentic place, but just having that ability, you know, to hear that from Angie. Who's also a Libra.

Who's also a Libra. As soon as I found out about that, her, I was like, yay, I have to work with her. That's like one of the reasons. I was like, oh, no wonder I resonate with her so much. But it was just a wake-up call to me of, yes, this is why I have to be my true authentic self, because then I am bringing in the right people into my life. And then if I really have that strong sense of intuition and soul connection, then you walk into a room and you feel that energy.

And maybe that those just aren't your people. And that's okay. And that's how you attract all the right people into your life. And you even said, you know, us, you know, the nine people in this room who took the class, like there's some sort of a soul connection here. I mean, I remember the last day we did, we had a one of the students in the class, one of my peers in the class was our example. We basically went through all the paperwork of, you know, it's like, you know, you learn all this information in the first four days and then how do you actually implement it and put into action. So here, one of our peers becomes the

patient and we go through all of their issues and what they're struggling with and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I am not kidding you. I identified, it was a male, a male peer of mine, I identified with maybe 90% of his struggles in some way, okay, in some shape or form. It might not have been like the exact thing, but like he, like, he even like, he, like, said something about, like, he couldn't do sleepovers when he was a kid because he was too afraid to go over people's houses. I also could not do sleepovers as a kid because I was afraid to

go over, like, sleep over people's houses. I mean, it was like crazy. If you want to hear a quick story really quick, just very brief. I used to basically be the same way, except I would go to the people's houses and then I would call my mom at like 1 a.m. to come pick me up. It's hysterical. Kids, my friend's mom would like fight me like crying and the sleeping bags after everyone went to sleep and I'm like up alone being like, ah! I was like the vibe just isn't right. I need to leave. It's just like felt like I shouldn't be there. Oh my gosh. That's crazy. Oh, my. I guess this happened to more of us that we realize.

Oh, we're all soul family. So exactly. Exactly. Exactly. So that was just so wild to me because when we were deciding who we were going to use as the sample patient, it was literally between me and this guy. So like I didn't get chosen because I didn't finish all my paperwork on time. So he got chosen and I was like, oh, this is such a bummer because like if I'm the patient, you know, then that I get to actually figure out what I need to do to fix, you know, to heal some of the issues that I'm having. And instead, this guy was the patient and he had like 90% of the same issues as me. Wow. I ended up learning so much about myself by using him as the example in the class. And, you know, it's, it's really cool because it's like no accident that these people

come into your life. And even, I think I shared this with you, one of my peers in the class I had known already because he lives near me. You know him too. You've met him before. I'm not going to use his name, but I know he won't mind me sharing this story. I had met him a few times and hung out with him just like in the last like two years. And I was like, oh, this guy like gets under my skin. Like I don't like hanging out with it.

And we would hang out in group settings. So it wasn't like I was hanging out with him one-on-one. So I was like, go to the group and hang out with the group. But I was like, oh, this guy just irritates me. irritates me. I don't know why, but he really does. And then I saw a list of who was attending the class, the HLT2 class, and his name was on the list. And I was like, oh, and he wants to share the house with me. He wants to be one of the six people living in the same house as me. I'm like, oh my gosh, okay. I had to sit with staying out with this guy all week long. I can't stand him.

I can't tell you why I can't stand him, but I just can't stand him. So then I find out him and I have flights to California from JFK at the same time, just different airlines. So I was like, whatever, let's just like go to the airport together. So we meet up, we go on public transportation together. We get to the airport, split off, go on our planes, get to the San Diego airport at the same time, and Uber to the house together. And to, you know, save money. It's an over an hour Uber drive. And I'm like, okay, I don't know what gets to. Then during the week, he's kind of like saying things to me. Like he made a comment about my practice. Well, maybe you should do things this way in your practice and maybe you should and that like really got under my skin.

I was like this guy. And he's just like so blunt and honest and just like says it how it is. And that really bothered me. Probably because I'm not so good at doing that myself. Right. And in the first day of class, Angie says, the people who trigger you are here to teach you the most. And they're thinking, this guy's in class and he triggers me a ton.

and now I got to sit with him for the rest of the week and I don't know how many to deal with him. He's going to say shit. It really pisses me off. She got called out immediately and she's like, lesson one, boom. It's speaking to me. I have to tell you by the end of class, I had such an appreciation for this guy. I told him this. He knows this whole story, so that's why I don't think he'll care that I'm sharing. I'm just not going to use his name. I had such an appreciation for him. I was like, you know what? He's honest. He's blunt. He says it how it is. But, but he also is compassionate and loving and caring. And I really appreciate that.

And I got to know him more as a person and understands him more other than those few times I hung out with him in a group setting. And like, I was like, oh my gosh, I'm so happy that I live so close to him because now I get to hang out with him when I go back to New York. I love this. Right? It's just really, when you open your heart and you open your mind and you open your soul to opportunity, you never know what's going to.

come of it. And him and I, like, we, we talked about this, which was cool as like, we had an actual conversation where I said to him at the end, I was like, you really got under my skin. Like, you really get under my skin sometimes. And I don't know why. And, and he said, you know, well, the people, he's so, like, so cool in time. It's like, well, the people, you know what Angie said, the people who trigger you are going to teach you the biggest lessons. And I was like, it's just like not even phased by the fact that I have annoyed by him. And I'm like, yeah. Yeah. So you really like, that's the cool thing about being around people like this who are so open-minded. You, your friends, like me, my friends, like, you really grow and learn from your sole family

and your soul connections. And they were brought into your life for a reason. And sometimes I can't even believe these things are coming out of my mouth because there were like never things that I actually really were taught to believe. These are all, you know, new beliefs and experiences for me. But I love that. You know, if someone is around you and triggering you, like ask yourself, what about, I always tell my patience, remember, point one finger at someone, you're pointing three back at yourself. What is it about that person that is annoying, you, or upsetting you?

And is there something, is any of those things inside of you? Yeah, because it ultimately has to be, they're, they're eliciting some sort of reaction from you. It's you that's doing the reacting. So why, like, why is that happening? There must be something there to explore. and to learn from. Yeah. That's why like relationship in general, whether it's friendships or intimate relationships

are such powerful teachers because they bring you into like close proximity with somebody, especially if it's someone like you're living with, you're seeing them every day. Shit's going to come up that's going to bug you and you're going to have fights and you're going to have conflict and you're going to learn and grow so much from that. Avoiding it is it's not a feasible option if your goal is to like, you know, grow and actualize yourself and and lead a meaningful life because you actually need those moments as like a catalyst to get you into your next version of yourself. Right. Exactly. Exactly. And that's the best is when you have a partner or you have friends who are also open to discussing what's going on. Right.

The fact that this guy was so open to hearing me say to him, you trigger me and you really irritate me and he's able to just sit there and not take it personally. I mean, that's very rare to have someone sit there and not take it personally. But that's part of the belief. that your sole family will come to you and that the other people will leave and they're not right for you at this time. But to be able to have that conversation in itself, I really grew from that. And I think these things are so powerful, like you said, like when you're with a partner and you're triggering each other and you're growing and learning from each other. And I wish there was more conversation around this in friendships. You know, my friend Lisa and I talk about this idea

of conscious friendshiping. Like I tell her she should start a course called conscious friendship thing where, because you can so grow and heal in the context of friendships, but we don't talk about it, right? Like, you might go to couples therapy with your partner. And I'm not saying that friends necessarily need to go to friends therapy, but, but like, why can't we have a conversation about how you're triggering me and I'm triggering you, but also how this friendship is so healing and loving because it's nourishing and it creates a safe space to grow and share. Totally. And, And the thing that people typically do is just like ghost that friend or like faze them out of their life instead of actually dealing with the muck. Yes. Yes. And it's happened to me. I'm sure it's happened to you. And quite frankly, for me, it's the most upsetting thing when that happens. Because I just wish that the person would be willing to have a conversation with me about it.

Yeah, exactly. Because then you can't learn from that opportunity or you don't have that learning opportunity because you don't know what you did to upset them. They don't know what they did to upset you. It's like, you. you just completely miss a growth opportunity there. 100%. Obviously, it is easier to not deal with that stuff, but it's not, it's, what's expedient isn't what's meaningful typically, as Jordan Peterson would say. Exactly. Oh, Jordan Peterson. What a guy.

I was actually thinking about him earlier too, because he also in his, like he has a learning program. It's like the future self-authoring something like this. It's called. Yes. Yeah, he has you identify what you want to run away from and what you want to run away from and what you want to run towards, like what your goal is, but also what you're also basically what your nightmare is, like what Paul talks about. And he uses that as a way to help somebody

shape like the trajectory of their life, like what their big dream is and, and where they want to go. Yes, totally, totally. Yeah, I've heard such, I, I've, my mentor was talking about that like years ago. I never actually did it, the self-authoring program. We should look into it. We should look into it, actually. He's on, he's on tour starting very soon and he's going to be in Phillyo. And New York, actually. I was thinking about going because I never seen him live. I was going to message you when I saw that. I know. I would totally be down to go see him. It's actually so funny. Right before he blew up with like the whole Canada scandal and like the issue, he did a very small intimate seminar at Lafayette College. A week, like I found him and I was like obsessed with his work. And then it was a few weeks. And I looked back at like his schedule. He had some like gatherings that he had been hosting. And he was at. At Lafayette College, it was a room of like 20 people. He was giving a lecture and it was like

meet and greet after. Do you know what year it was? It must have been like 2017. Oh, so it was after I graduated. But that's crazy. I look at in Bethlehem at the time. So I was literally 15 minutes away and I was so mad. I was like, how? Oh, my gosh. You're like, how did I know if I could have met him back then? I know. Oh, my gosh, that's so crazy. Well, had I known, I would have gotten as an alumni to laugh at it. Small world, right? Like Lafayette College of all places. Really small school. Like it's great, but it's tiny. Right. So tiny. Wow. That's wild. Okay, we're going to have to look at the tour dates. I was looking at them. So let's, we're going to take a look and see if we should go. But yeah, I mean, when you really, that's what I love about people like Jordan Peterson and Paul Chack is that they really reframe how we think about things in life and challenge the way we think about things in life. and teach us about that unlearning process and getting in touch with ourselves and really

understanding ourselves and bringing that, once again, that unconscious to the conscious and the never-ending growth, right? Because the only constant in life is change. So it's probably best to not resist it, resist it. And moving forward. I love that. And I feel like there's a lot of parallels between Jordan and Paul. I've thought about this before. I feel like they're both very polarizing and they're kind of like love it or hate it. And there are also people that are like people judge very quickly without actually being

familiar with their work. Yeah. It's so true. It's so true. Yeah. And they're just, I mean, obviously I never met Jordan, but obviously I met Paul. And he's just such a loving, really warm soul and his energy. I have to tell you, his energy is unreal.

When he came and lectured us, the last lecture to us the last. of class. First of all, I was bawling, like tears just streaming down my face. I felt like he was talking right at me. I want to share some of the things he shared, by the way. I have to reference my notes. But this is a man you can tell from his energy. It's just so enlightened. Like, his presence, you feel it in the room. I've never experienced anything like that before. I mean, it could have been that in my mind, he's the biggest celebrity ever. There's just any, you know, he's just, you know, what I said to him like Paul, I need you to pinch me right now. He came over and gave me the biggest hug and kiss on my cheek, you know, and just really beautiful. But I want to share, I'm going to pull up my

notes because I really want to share some of the things that he spoke about. Is that okay? He's due. We would love that. Yeah. Okay. So I have to find them. I have so many notes. Oh my gosh. Okay. So I really like this. He's talked about the four types of clients you will ever work with. Have you come across this yet or no? So it sounds familiar, but please, tell the audience and remind me. Yeah. So he's like, obviously, I'm like, if anyone's heard any of this, it's Alexis, like, you can pass it. I should have had you take my HLC2 test because I want to. I should have called you up, but I had to take it because I was like, damn it, I need out for this. It was like, why did Paul Sol guide him to not eat meat for here?

we'll tell the audience, like I was taking, I read, I hope no one from HLC is from the Czech Institute that's listening to this, but I didn't realize I need to take all these prerequisites for HLC too. So they basically threatened to like not let me come unless I finished them and I got an extension. So I like, I was like, like, I was going through them really fast. I wasn't actually like thoroughly watching the videos, even though I, I'm upset that I didn't have the time to do it because there's such good information. So that I'm taking the quizzes and I just kept guessing and failing him. And one of them was like, why did, right? What was the question was, why did Paul Sol guide him to not eat meat for a year? And I'm like answering it wrong. And then I call

Lexus and she's like to rid him of animal spirit. I was like, and then I pressed that one. I'm like, oh, that was the answer. Like I like, I literally, I literally chose every other multiple choice answer except that one. But you know him so well. Like Paul, we're going to make Paul trivia and then send it to him a paul bingo board yeah oh my god i totally make a paul bingo board i love it i love it i also love i wanted to share this with the audience that you were like get paul's data you you were like i need and i know where he grew i know where he was born i know where he was born i just need the time i was like talking to pa i'm like so like a nabber that i'm talking to this guy and and then i'm like by the way i just my friend really needs to know your time of birth so she could do your

astrological chart. So, oh my gosh, I love him so much. Okay, so the four types of clients you will ever work with. One, those who listen to Wise Counsel do what is suggested and heal efficiently and effectively. Number two, those whose egos are so big, they will never listen to anyone and don't follow instructions. They stay in pain and go from one problem to another and one expert to another, until the pain teacher loves them and they may become a one, which we just discussed, or a three, the next one.

Number three, those who are so identified with their pathology or illness that they fear healing because they won't know who they are, which she calls a crisis of the soul. That's really interesting. And then four, those whose time has come and no therapeutic intervention will save them, their soul's work is complete in this lifetime. Wow. So I think that's really powerful because, you know, as practitioners, obviously we have these skillsets and we want to help people, but as we know, we can't save people.

And I don't know about you, but sometimes like my ego gets bruised and I'm working on this where like, I'm like, oh my gosh, like, am I a bad therapist if like, you know, I couldn't help them, and the reality is, it's like, well, A, it could not be a good fit. B, maybe my modalities aren't right for them. But C also, like, it can be that they're not the first type of patient, you know, the one who listens to Wise Counsel and heals effectively and that there's something else that's meant for their soul in this life and the pain teacher is there to maybe teach them something else or, you know.

So I think that's important to know. And people are so stuck. I've seen it where people come in and they're just like so stuck and identifying with their pain, their emotional pain, their mental pain, their physical pain. their physical pain. And I don't think they know who they are if they didn't have that pain. Yeah. Sorry. No word you said. Yeah, I was just going to say, I've seen this so much just like in my personal life with people who dealt with chronic illnesses and are so identified with like my insert illness here and like so closely identified with this thing. And without it, like maybe it's

bringing them some affection or love from people around them and getting them attention and without it, you know, they wouldn't know who they are, especially if it's been a very long-term illness. And that's always very, very hard to see because you, there is a part of, I'm sure, both of us and most people who are in the business of helping people where you do kind of want to step in and save this person, but it's just not possible. Yeah. Really hard. Obviously, number one is like the dream client. Like if everybody's like that, like, hey, we're in business, like we're going to be feeling really good about ourselves. Absolutely. are not in that camp, which, I mean, there are, there are some, of course, which is amazing when that happens.

It feels very rewarding for everybody involved. Yeah. The number two is, remind me what the number two was. Number two is those whose egos are so big, they will never listen to anyone and don't follow instructions. They stay in pain and go from one problem to another and one expert to another until the pain teacher loves them and they maybe become the first one. Yes. So the thing that that reminded me of is that like everybody kind of has a different threshold of pain at which they'll be willing to like actually make change to get rid of that pain. And some people will literally die before they reach that threshold, which is also very sad. Which is number four of that. Yeah, it's true. It's true. We feel so stuck. And you know, I had I had one client I worked with for quite some time who made really very, he made some progress, but it was very, very minimal and very, very, very. slow until he decided to stop coming. I'd actually ask myself every week. I'm like, why is coming back?

But there is, there is benefit to the therapeutic relationship, right, that we don't always see as practitioners that's serving a purpose, even if the patient or client isn't doing the work. And something I would ask him eventually, once we built, once we're working together for quite some time and built a nice rapport, I said, what do you think your soul is here to learn in this lifetime, you know, and that was just like the question just kind of like blew him out of the chair because it was something he had never thought about before and he was so stuck in his pain and really like trapped in this pathology and identification with it that I think to ask him that, you know, it really forced him to zoom out a bit and actually say like, well, what is it?

and unfortunately I think he's still even despite asking it was really still hard for him. And that might be somebody's life path, which is really hard to grapple with that, you know, on different paths and some of these paths are brutal. Yeah, they really are. They really, really are. And that's why the past life methodology or theory or whatever you want to call it is, I really like it because it reminds me that, first of all, when we go, there's other opportunities, but also that there is a purpose to this time here. And the suffering that we might experience

is supposed to be meaningful and supposed to teach us things and have us grow from it. So even though when bad things happen and we're really upset about it, if we can reframe it a bit and just remind ourselves that part of life is coming up against struggles and hardship and pain and trauma and that we are meant to experience it for a larger reason and greater purpose, that it has value as much as it does suck. Also, the patient fours also kind of bring up some thoughts around like how much of this is predetermination versus like, what's karma? what's what do we have control over even like this all happening to us do we have any control over

this at all right i know i think about that too all the time like also with astrology right like well it's not astrology is not um it's not psychic readings but you're kind of like okay like if this stuff is meant to happen like i'm obviously taking action on some things and not taking action on others and like is taking action part of that path or is it like my choice to take action or yeah yeah i mean uh paul had a really great um homeopath on his podcast i can't remember his name he was on a couple times but he was amazing but he brought up the difference between like freedom of choice and freedom of will and i thought that was really important because i mean he argued if i remember correctly that we have freedom of choice but not really freedom of will because our will would be like

an urge to do something, but then whether we decide to choose an act on that is a different story. Like, we do have that freedom of choice, but whether or not we have like that urge or that instinct to do something could be completely independent of us. That's really good. Yeah. Wow. It's just so wild. It is. Life is a freaking trip. It really is. It's a crazy adventure roller coaster. Yeah. I wanted to ask you, looping back briefly. Do you have any resources for people if they're interested in incorporating a Tai Chi practice, were you given stuff at HLC2?

Or did you find any resources that would be good to help, like, learn some beginning moves? Yeah. So that is a good question because they didn't really share, they didn't really share a ton of outside. There may be reading so I can go back and look. But there are, I believe that some of these movements are in how to eat, move and be healthy. Oh, great. Oh, would they be like the working in exercises? working in exercises exactly and my friend billy actually has a really good chigong video that he made like 20 years ago on

youtube that i really like so if you want to link to that you can send that i i played around with that before i even did paul's class i was you know working on my yin and trying that was back when i was yanging my yin and i was like oh i got to do some tai chi or chigang so i really liked his video so i can share that uh because he used to be an instructor back in the day. And it's so funny, he actually said he's, he's not wearing a shirt in the video. And he said like up until then, he like rarely got any views on YouTube and he always struggled.

And someone was like, just do the video top list. And then like, then everything took off after that. Tell me how that works. I wonder if it's like the algorithm or if people are self-selecting that more. Right, right. Yeah, I'll never forget that story when he told me that.

I have I'm going to be sharing more on my Instagram as well some practices that I've been doing. I have like I said the energy pushes on there, but I did make a few videos of different of a few other movements that we learned. So I definitely will share those as well on on social media. And then really, you know, just, you know, all you really need to do, you don't even need to pick a consistent movement. It can be a free flowing dance. if you want, right? And I know this isn't comfortable for a lot of people if they've never danced before, they've never done any sort of practice like this.

But just, you know, moving your body and then breathing, like inhaling, moving in one direction, exhaling, moving in the other direction. And just as slow as you can. And they said, you know, the slower you go, the more the she flows. So really just, I like to just listen to my body and see where it wants to take me. I love that. Yeah, I probably look like a, crazy person on my roof. I'm like lying on the floor rolling around and breathing. I'm not kidding

this morning. I was literally laying and rolling. I was like, oh, some nice vestibular training, like breathing with rolling. And just seeing where your body feels like it wants to move, right? Maybe it's a little achy in the back and you want to do a little bit of a back, standing backstretch, and you just breathe with it. And maybe you want to practice even just by slow stretching and focus. I mean, this is really yoga, right, is like slow stretching and focusing on your breathing. with the movement, but very, very, you know, keep it basic, keep it simple to make it easy to do. I love that. I just posted in my stories earlier, I was hanging out with the cat and I was just thinking like how much animals can teach us and, you know, they move intermittently, they stretch, they,

if they get scared, they shake it off. Like, they have all these kind of built in that like, they know how to deal with stress and they know how to balance their bodies and we just are so detached because we're so much in our heads and not in our bodies that so we can reconnect to that wisdom, our bodies will move us the way we need to be moved. Exactly. 100%. Ellen Vora talks out this in her book about the shaking it off, right? Like, because we are meant to shake and release trauma.

You know, if you ever stub your toe and the instinct is to like shake it, but then, you know, you're around other people so you don't do it because you're being socially conditioned. And then where is that trauma vibrating up into the rest of your body and being stored? there. And it is, I think about this all the time, how much I inhibit myself from, how much we probably all do inhibit ourselves from doing things that we want to do because they look weird or what would people think and how would we be judged. But yeah, I love watching animals move for that reason because they're just so instinctual. Yes. Yeah, it's beautiful. And oh my God, speaking of like inhibiting, like you could think about just like crying and specifically for men like it blocking that

and like shutting down those channels because it's so socially unacceptable. Like how immensely harmful that could be. So mentally harmful. Oh my gosh. I even have patients who will start to cry in session and they're like, I'm so sorry. No, they're like apologizing. No, I think let it out. Great.

Yeah. I had a patient who's been stuffing so much inside, so much fear, so much pain. And she started to cry last week and she started to apologize. And I said, no. Like, have you even had an opportunity to cry? about this and she said no you've got to let it out now then like this is the place to let it out and and it's a reaction it's a response to something inside of and think about how crappy it feels when you hold back your tears throat well my throat swells up immediately 100% or think about how crappy it feels

when you try to hold in a sneeze yep you know it's like the same thing it's your body's output of something happening and it's trying to release and then we're like no no no stuff it back in you don't need to release. Well, where do we think it's going to go? You know, like, it's I mean, crying is just, I've always viewed it as like just a way to move energy. It's just another form of moving energy. The way moving your body could be or, or shouting or screaming or whatever it is, they're all just different modalities to accomplish something similar. And there's no shame in that whatsoever. It's very weird. 100%. Oh, my God. I'm like the biggest, I mean, I don't even want to use the term cry baby, but like I cry all the time. Like, I'm not kidding you.

Yeah, there was one time I literally like walked through Times Square sobbing and then sat on the floor of Port Authority for an hour just sobbing until the police, the police officer came over and was like, ma'am, you can sit, you like, you can be here, but you can't sit on the floor. You can basically stand crying, but you can't like stand crying. I was just sitting on the floor of Port Authority crying. But the amount of times I have been out in public settings with like a relative or an ex-boyfriend and I get upset. and I start crying and they're just like, really? Like, are you going to do this now? Or like, why are you crying? There's no reason to cry. Like, so, like, they're embarrassed of me crying. And I'm not saying that I cry every time I go out to eat.

Like, that's how I was saying, but like, if I'm going through a hard time or something is upsetting or triggering, like, I tend to let it out. I'm pretty like, I just let out my tears. But other people are like, it's like, now not only are you, should you be ashamed of if you're crying, but now the people around you who are so. with you are ashamed of you're crying and it's so awful. I really think that's a reflection of like when somebody is not very secure in themselves and they have like this like issues with self-security. Then when somebody's crying around them, they're thinking that, oh, other people are going to think

that I made them cry and like that I'm a bad person and I'm going to socially ostracize. Therefore, you need to stop crying because you're making me look bad. That's a good point. I didn't think about that. Oh my gosh. That's so true. That's so true. Yeah. But I think honoring ourselves really listening to what we need and what our bodies need. And this is the same, right? The urge to cry just as much, much as there might be an urge to eat or an urge to use the bathroom. My brother actually said, I was with my brother for 10 days in Florida and he said to me, I just got back this week. He said he was listening to a podcast that said, like, we don't like, like pee on a schedule. Why do we eat on a schedule? I'm kind of curious about your thoughts on

that like from like biology perspective like do you think we should eat on a schedule from a circadian rhythm that makes sense yeah so i mean i think that's a really interesting point um there's certainly like pros and cons i would say to eating on a schedule versus not so like for a pro would be like if you're eating at the same time every day then you're kind of digestive juices and every and your hormones like all prepared for you to eat that time of day so that it's kind of ready to digest the food so maybe it could be more efficient in that way. But there's definitely the case that like for intermittent fasting and women and just in general, like it tends to work in the beginning and then it becomes really challenging metabolically.

Like the basal metabolic rate starts to fall. And it's because you're basically restricting when your body actually desired food and you're kind of bypassing that impetus or that urge to eat. Yeah. You're riding your own signals. So there is certain, I mean, when you're, you feel hungry, that's a great time to eat. But I mean, that's definitely not the only cue. I mean, eating is complicated because there's like social aspects, biological aspects, pleasure aspects. It's like this is such a multifaceted activity that we engage in. Yeah, yeah. And it's so hard because it's like, I love, I have this one friend in Florida. And when I stayed with her, I love her so much. She just like does whatever she wants. And she's like, I don't want to eat on a schedule. She's like, if you want to eat lunch, whatever you want to eat lunch, eat it. I want to eat. I want to eat. I want to eat. lunch when I want to eat lunch. And I was like, okay, like, that's so true because it's like, it's like the worst. And obviously, there are social things, right? You make plans to go out to dinner with a friend.

You're going to eat on a schedule with like whatever schedule you time yourself. But it's the worst. like when you have dinner at like seven, but at six, you're starving. And then you start eating, you know, snacking. And then your snacks turns into a meal and then you go to your dinner and you're not even hungry anymore. Totally, totally. Yeah. So I, there is like this weird dance between like the social aspects and the biological aspects that can be difficult to navigate, especially if on top of that you also have issues with like food allergies or intolerances that'll also give you some fear around eating, especially eating out, because that could create like a stress response. You don't know if you're going to get sick from the meal. And then that's also going to further

impair your ability to adjust the food and may make it more likely that you have an issue with it. Absolutely. Absolutely. No, that is so, so, so true. And this is where it's nuanced, right? It's not black and Exactly, exactly. It's really hard to make generalizations about any of this stuff, which, I mean, there's beauty in that, but it's also more challenging. But it's also, there's, there is plenty of information and guidance around what individuals can do to optimize their health. And that's where it comes into like working with a practitioner, like you or me or anybody else who's in our circles who are equipped to deal with the nuance and be able to, like, prescribe and detail the step. that somebody who have to take to feel their best. So I think that's at least the encouraging part. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.

Do you have any other things that you would like to share from the course before we sign off? Yes. Oh, my gosh. I want to dive into not too, too much. I know we're close to two hours. But I want to talk about what Paul said about ADHD that really made me cry. So and some other things. So he said, I'm sorry, I have to look at my notes for a second.

I'm going to start with this, actually, not about ADHD. He said something really interesting about endometriosis. Oh, let's hear it. Yeah, I don't have a diagnosis, but there are a lot of women who do, and I feel like it's becoming more common. So he said he calls it successful white woman's disease. Women who are too yang, too masculine energy. And in true Paul style, he said, offensive style, they are men with breasts. Oh my God.

I love him. What is the only five? Yes, I can like repeat. I love it. Paul says on. So he said, like high profile ask kicker women, the soul and the spirit cannot be separated. Spirit is the flow of energy and information, the consciousness. spirit is said to take okay i'm sorry i'm like reading my notes and i'm not sure if they make

sense i was like vigorously typing said to take course but soul had the experience of learning in the course um so i found matt really i found matt really interesting about the endometriosis because do you work with a lot of endometriosis not a lot but i've had a couple clients with endo okay would you say they meet that profile or not really i definitely one of the them comes to mind that would yeah okay yeah i also worked with someone who who who meets that profile too so it was just really interesting um so and then he said what was really interesting is that this now we're transitioning to different issues that paul had so many food intolerances growing up and he believes it was because his father was so abusive at the kitchen table at the dinner at the dinner table

wow i bet that makes sense yeah yeah so that was really really really interesting. And that, you know, we link the smell and taste in childhood with the fear. So it's causing these allergies. I mentioned that if you're getting a stress response while you're eating, it's going to potentially make your gut more permeable than it would have otherwise, which increases the probability for these food antigens to interact with immune cells and create the whole cascade that can like generate intolerances.

100%. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. That makes a lot of sense. And then he said, when kids are in an environment where it's unsafe to relax, that can usually result in ADHD. So the child unconscious programming is that it's not safe. The child has picked up on a lot of imagery, feelings, and programs so that like, you know, like if dad's abusive and he's wearing a white shirt today, that maybe if he's wearing a white

shirt another day, he might be abusive. And there's just this constantly chaos. the home happening. And that's really when like the tears were streaming down my face because that was so much of my childhood. And I actually think that I've lived most of my life with undiagnosed ADHD. I think they just diagnosed me with all the other issues. It's like the anxiety and depression and PTSD and OCD and eating disorders. And I was always a good student. So I never really got diagnosed with ADHD. But then I'm realizing it more and more that I have it. But it really makes sense that, you know, if you're growing up in a household where there's constant chaos and constant lack of prediction.

and you're always like going back and forth and really feeling unsafe that it could also, as we know, that results in trauma and it can result in a slew of other issues. But the connection to the ADHD also I found really, really interesting there. Also, like lack of safety can come in so many different flavors too and from so many different avenues. Like I'm thinking also if we're, if our kids are sitting on screens, you know, at nighttime for example, they're getting blasted with blue light. That's turning on their stress response as well. That's going to create like a physiological unsafety or a sense of unsafety in that context as well.

So you could totally see how the screens could play into that too in addition to, you know, whatever relational traumas they might also be experiencing. Yeah, totally true. Oh my gosh. So, so, so interesting. Oh, and then he said the same sex. So if we have, you know, two parents and you have a mother and a father, he says the same sex parent. So if you're a woman, if you're a girl, your mother teaches you how to engage in the outer world. And the opposite sex parent teaches you how to engage in the inner world. It's saying that for a woman, a young woman, father's way of being will have the biggest influence on how she relates to herself. And the mother will show her how to navigate the outside world. That makes sense. I think I actually heard on one of his podcasts. Like it's also Jungian work is like

the anima and the animus. the anima is like the female but all all men have an internal environment that's the anima which is like the female and then all women have like the masculine animus inside of them so it's like whatever the opposite is that's like you're having internal force so that totally it resonates with that did he mention anything about like what about families who have like a household of like a single parent did he mention anything about that no i should have asked that's a really good that's a really good question. I wonder what fills the role or the gap of the other parent that in that case. I didn't grow up with a father figure, so I wonder, is it just any male role model in the

environment that maybe takes that on? I don't know. Right. Right. Or does, is there like a lack of, you know, teaching you how to engage in that? Right. Because you're lacking that in the household. Maybe. Yeah, that's a very good question. Yeah. Yeah. It was just like, oh my gosh, when he was talking, I think I told you I tried recording it on my phone and he just like was going on and on and on to the point that my phone just died. I didn't have enough battery to like record him, teaching, talking for, no, two hours. But he, yeah, I'm just like looking through and seeing if there's anything, anything else. And, and, but he just, when he talks, it's just magnetism.

Like, it's just, it's so, so amazing. And, you know, the biggest thing that he also spoke about and Angie spoke about too is this I, we all. So when you really look at people's dreams, when you ask your patience, like what are your dreams? What is your one love? What are you here to do? Figure out, is it about them, the I? Is it about we like, you know, the people around me or is it about all? Is that everybody? because and my dreams were actually in the reverse. It was the we all I because if you're not taking care of I first, if you're not taking care of me first,

then you really can't healthfully impact the all. So you have to point that out to the client that when you look at their dream and you look at their goals, it has to start with the eye. And then when the eye is healthy, you can move to the we. And then when the we is healthy, you can move to the all. So that was a wake-up call for me of like, oh, I got to readjust my dreams and make sure that I focus on me so I can be healthy in order to impact fall even more. I'm just realizing how much that goes against the programming, especially for girls and women,

to like put other people before yourself and kind of be selfless and just take care of others and whatever happens to you happens to you. It's like totally antithetical to that. Totally. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Yeah. And it's like, you know, you're told you're selfish if you try to take care of yourself and and you know your dreams can also be about what you want it doesn't have to they don't all have to be about how am I going to impact the world in this great a big way like it also has to be about your needs and your desires and your wants as well exactly you can see people who are living their their dream and they're like making pottery or like doing some form of art and it's like they're that's their truest raw expression and they're impacting the world like

you will still impact the world through that art, through that expression. It just may not be, like, you know, dealing with people's health at a grand scale, for example, like Paul is doing. It could be you're creating this art that inspires other people to, like, tap into their creative side. Like, it could manifest in so many ways. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yes. When you really stick with a thing that you are meant to do in life, you have no idea how it will impact others. And that thing might be starting with, like you said, making a craft or healing yourself. I mean, look, a lot of the work we do is because of the work we've done on ourselves. And Paul, and the program really values that,

is that you're here as a coach and learning about this because of the work you've done yourself and you need to be your first patient. Like you cannot go to these classes for other people. You need to go for yourself. And I remember talking to Cuba, my holistic practitioner, who studied with Czech years ago. And I said, you know, I said to him, I'm ready to go to, I'm ready to go enroll in the Czech Institute.

And he said, you better be ready to do some hard work on yourself because if not, Paul's going to rip you apart. You know, like you, you got to go and know that this is the work you're doing on you first. And then you can start to implement it with your clients. And what's so beautiful is that from the work that you and I do is we are growing when we work with our clients. You know, our clients come into our lives to teach us something to. I had a Wu Tai instructor. I studied this French, it was like a weird massage, I should call it weird, but this French unique dancing massage modality that Mariana introduced me to. I found Mariana who I'm excited to introduce you to. And the instructor, Davide, he said to me, he said, isn't it so beautiful that we get to work

on ourselves through working with our clients and that we get paid by our clients to work on ourselves? Yes, totally, totally. And that's like a perspective shift too. And Oh, major. We were actually just talking about this also on the podcast we recorded yesterday, how so much, like, the vast majority of the learning doesn't happen in the classroom and in the textbook. It happens, like, interfacing with the people that you're working with. Like, that's going to be your biggest teacher by far. Absolutely. Absolutely. When I was a personal trainer, and I started training, you know, no one wants to take the hard cases, right? The people with the medical issues or the injuries or the hard personalities. And I was like,

I'll take whatever. And I wouldn't know about this medical issue and I would Google it and then I would learn about it from the client. And then you become an expert and maybe not an expert, but like, you understand it. You're, you become, you know, you get to. And then what happens? You can take on more referrals of people with similar issues or maybe more complex issues because at least you can navigate it. But I really felt like I was never going to learn it until I actually experienced it with the client. I mean, that's really how you figure it out. So it is a beautiful thing. It's a really nice paradigm shift. We work with people to think about our growth and, you know, our clients and patients in a way being part of that soul connection of they're coming in to teach us something too.

Yes. They're coming to us for guidance. Yes, exactly. And you're a match for each other. And you can always feel when your clients are a match for you or not, like it just kind of feels effortless. Yes. Yes. That's the. best when you work with people and that's what it doesn't feel like the work that's like okay i'm doing what i'm meant to do here and and it's a good fit and and it's not always easy to come across but it when it does it's it's it's really magical yes and i mean i think that's the beauty of having the financial uh freedom to be able to say to a client i don't think you're the right fit for me but i don't need your money like i think actually for your well-being i need to

send you to somebody else versus if you're relying on that paradigm financially, it's like, I'm going to maybe hold on to you longer than I should because I need the money. Yes, yes. And I've totally been guilty of that in the beginning. Totally. Oh, yeah. It's so scary. So I'm like, why are they still coming back? My favorite is when I first started, I would have people who I just dreaded working with who are not good fit. Now as soon as I have a consult call, I can tell whether it's a good fit or not. And if it's not, I'll send them to. I'll be like, hey, you know, I actually know someone who might be able to help. help you better or like I can get some names of someone who might be able to help you better. But

these people and I would like dread the sessions and I'd be like, oh my God, is this going to be the day that they tell me they don't want to work with me anymore? And but I was worried about it from a financial perspective of, well, if this is the day they tell me they don't want to work with me, then what am I going to do? Because I won't be making the money. But then the day they finally decide to tell me they didn't want to work with anymore, it was a relief. It was like, oh my gosh, I don't have to keep doing this and showing unstressed out to every session. you know, but and the prostitute archetype of, you know, working with people who are not necessarily the right fit for you, but for the money. And then it does get coming. And then I ask myself sometimes

are those people, I've asked, like, why do they keep coming back? Or like I said earlier. And I'm like, am I giving them something? I don't know. Do they just like having someone there? Is there some sort of benefit benefit to the therapeutic relationship for them? And then other people, it's just like so obvious that they're coming because they're learning and they're growing and they're excited about the work and they're making the changes and they're seeing the improvements in their life and they're feeling better and moving better and eating better and breathing better and all those things. So it's it's interesting when people come to practitioners because you do have those four different clients you'll ever, you know, that you'll treat. And they probably come

for different, you know, they come for different reasons. Absolutely. And I think that's where understanding how like energy is kind of a two-way street, where if you're feeling that very inspired, lit up, excited energy while working with somebody, they're going to be feeling it too. They kind of have to be in order to engage in that relationship versus if it feels like pulling teeth, like vast majority of cases, the other person's going to be feeling that same exact way. Totally. Totally. And you know, they call it, right, in therapy and psychology, they call it the transference and the countertransference. You know those, yeah.

But it's really, it's the feeling the energy. And that's, and this is one point I want to make sure I need too, is being sensitive. And we mentioned that earlier. But we mentioned it in one context. And I want to talk about it also in other context of detoxing is that when you start to detox and you start to have a healthier lifestyle, it doesn't feel good at first. But a healthy body is a sensitive body. And a healthy body can tell when it's eaten something that is not right for it. Right.

Like we talk about this a lot of like our food intolerances and we're sensitive to maybe bright lights at night or we're sensitive to noises or different things. And it's like as you get healthier in a way you like obviously people are unhealthy also can tell if they don't feel good. But right if you're very sensitive to coffee like Angie talks about this, she is highly, highly sensitive to caffeine and she cannot drink it. It like really wires her up and makes her feel not great. but that same sensitivity that makes her not feel good to coffee and recognize it's not right for is the same sensitivity that allows her to do her shaman practices and connect to other people's souls and do that energy healing work because it allows her to really open herself up and feel things and take things in.

So it's kind of like in a way, like it can be considered maybe a double-edged sword because maybe it's not so pleasant that she said, you know, she'll eat a potato chip, the Siette potato chip. And even though it's cooked in coconut oil, she'll still get a breakout the next day. So her body's very sensitive, but it also allows her to do this really beautiful work to help people.

Yeah. I think people are like, well, if you're so healthy, why can't you tolerate X, Y, Z, right? Like, why do you have, well, maybe my body knows that it shouldn't be eating.

I love, there's something Paul said once in a podcast he did that was like, like, like you would, you can kill animals with this crap that we're eating, right? Like it's like why?

Maybe your body knows that it shouldn't be eating. There's like processed overly processed food. I mean, I know there's different takes on that, right? Of like how much should you be able to tolerate and not tolerate things? But, you know, like, yeah, it doesn't always feel good to be sensitive. But that sensitivity is what helps you connect with your soul. It's what helps you do the work that you're meant to do.

And it helps you bring your light out and impact the world in a beautiful way. So that leads you into the right direction. Yes, absolutely. Is there anything else you wanted to share on that? I think I have to like go through. I'm going to send you more stuff of the notes just for your own personal because you're going to love it. You're going to love it.

But now I have to read through more of my notes. So I was like there's like so much. It's five days of like really long days of information. So it really like it hits you hard. It's like how do I? Yeah. You can't really integrate it fully until you start incorporating it in your own life and then also work with clients.

And then you can really see how it plays out and really understand like how to use and what the utility is for all the different tools. So totally makes sense that it would take some time to like fully integrate that and being able to articulate it is like the final step of understanding something, like the articulation part. 100%. Like talking about things they don't understand at all. Oh my gosh.

Seriously. I could like retake the course again, even though I can't lie. I really want to take HLC3 in April. Are you going to do it? I feel like almost bought it yesterday. I was like, I think, I think they say to spend more time with the material, but I'm also like, I dove right in. Literally, I got back Monday, Tuesday, I was singing the four doctors and to all my patients

and having them felt the forms and doing the exercises. And so I feel like if I have a few months, more months under my belt to really integrate and make sure I practice myself, I do want to take it in 2024 and it's only being offered once. So. Yes. It seems like the right fit then. That's so.

I did. Yeah, and I'm going to work with Angie a little bit more. Like I said, I'm going to meet with her this week and do a soul retrieval. I think I'm going to do a few other sessions with her because it's a great way to also just like be able to personalize the work. Right. Like I sat in class and learned it. So now if I have a coach to really help me implement it on my own, who is a master of the material, then it's going to be even more impactful. So my goodness, I can't wait to hear about how that goes on Friday. Yes, same, same. to tell you. Elise, I love you so much. Oh, I love you so much too, Alexis. This has been so fun. Literally, like, my favorite podcast ever. Oh, my gosh. Thank you for wanting to talk about Paul.

Like, you got on Paul, our favorite man. Oh, oh, Keith isn't going to be happy. Second favorite. Sorry, Keith. I know, oh, we got to, we got to, like, we got to get you to meet Paul one day. No. I just for both of us beyond his podcast.

Yes, yes, yes, yes, absolutely. I mean, I think we both have plenty of great information and wisdom to share on there. So it's only a matter of time. I said to Angie after Paul left during our session, you know, when I did my private session with her, I was like, I don't know how to say this other than I'm just obsessed with you guys. Like, I don't know what else to say this, but I want to be your third voice. right do you have to explain that to the audience the all has two wives last like i tell people because as soon as i tell them they're like oh and you listen to this guy and i'm like okay that doesn't invalidate his material and i would totally be his third wife

if he asked me to it's not like he has 50 wives it's only two and i met them both and they're so lovely Like, there's so, I was so fun to meet Penny and Angie in person and the kids. Like, yeah, like, Penny is, she is a tough cookie. Let me tell you. Seems like it. I feel like her and Angie are very, like, different, very different, which makes sense. Yeah, they are different. But actually, Angie told us this beautiful story how she's always wanting to go skydiving.

So for her birthday, I think it was her 40th. I'm not sure. I can't remember which one. It might have been 45. that Penny took her skydiving for her birthday. Oh, that's sweet. I know. How fun is that?

And then she showed us the video. Gosh, that is so fun. Skydiving. Yeah, like she surprised her. So adorable. Yeah, no, it sounds like, it just seems like they all have just a very authentic, meaningful relationship and, and raise their kids with such great values and lifestyle. And they have, and they have the pigs and the chickens.

on the farm that I played with and yeah. Can you imagine being raised as one of Polchek's kids? I would be like, I literally looked at these kids and I'm like thinking, do you know how lucky you are? Like, oh gosh, barely. And you just see them running around and having a blast and just being regular kids.

And you're like, oh my gosh. Like it's so fun. Yeah, it was so cool. Oh, and also just as an effect, wait, the, the gym. I just want to talk about the gym for a second. his gym is just all, it's just, it's just primal movement. It's so cool. And then he has this image.

Did I send you the image of that he has painted on the, on the gym? It's the top of the, on the top of the gym. And it's, it's basically it's people engaging in real world activities that emulate the seven primal movement patterns. Amazing.

Maybe you did, but I can't quite. I can't remember if not all sent to you, but it's like, what is it? because it's squat, lunge, hinge, push, press, pull, and twist are the seven primal movement patterns. So it's cool because you actually see people

doing these things in real life and nature. Yes. Yeah. That's why they're so important. I mean, those are like the very basics for being a human. Exactly. Exactly.

Just the rigidity of our modern lives. Like we're really just sitting, standing, maybe walking, and like not doing much else. Right. Right. Right. So it's nice. I've been really thinking more about my workouts. And I mean, I do, because I've studied these primal pattern movements for so long because of his work, but just making sure that I'm integrating them more in a functional way in the gym and having fun with it. And Angie actually said something she said, because Angie used to be a bodybuilder. So, yeah, yeah. She used to be, well, so she had her own gym for really long time. Was it a gym or she worked in a gym and then she had her own business called Angie's World.

And she did like nutrition and holistic stuff and blah, blah, blah. I think it was like before or in the beginning when she really got into the check stuff. But she said that she really looked her best actually when Paul only had her do four or five exercises at a time. and not overdoing it. So just saying that as a reminder of, you know, if you are someone who either maybe doesn't move enough or moves too much, maybe you're over exercising, which I'm definitely I've been guilty of, that you really just need to find a balance. Like you don't need to go to the gym and hit, you know, 45 sets of hamstrings.

Like that's not necessary, you know, like you can just pick four or five. exercises and just stick with those four or five exercises due two to four sets. And that might actually be the best thing for you because you're not driving a ton of, you know, stress on the body. Totally. I think this is especially the case for women, too, because a lot of the research on exercise physiology is like done with men. And then we kind of just think that we were supposed to do the same things as them. But then there's also this weird relationship that women have in the modern world with like cardio exercise. And so we tend to like turn our weight. weight lifting into cardio by just like doing back to back sets like circuit training. It's like we're

never taking breaks. We're not like lifting close to failure. We're kind of just like doing things at like a very high volume with heart rate staying high and then we think we're burning more calories. So it must be good. It's so true. It's so true. And I, I'm really reframing after hearing Angie say that I'm reframing my workout practices. And I took 10 days off of weight lifting. I went to Florida for 10 days. I didn't work out for 10 days. It was really hard for me, both from a mental, emotional standpoint because I there's a little bit of like an exercise addiction of the sense of like movement makes me feel better. But also I was like, oh my gosh, what if I lose my muscle mass? Like what if I lose like the shape, right? And I have to tell you like I got back to the gym and I didn't

really lose anything after 10 days. I didn't really lose any strength. So it was it was really valued. It was like, you know what? My body's going to take a break and it's going to benefit from it. And it'll be so good. And when I come back, I'm not going to overdo it because in past tendencies it would be to overdo it to make up for those 10 days off. I said, no, I'm just going to do, like Angie said, pick four or five exercises and just do that. And I don't need to be at the gym for more than 40 minutes. Totally. That's definitely been my experience too. I'll usually take like six weeks off twice a year of lifting. And when I go back, usually I can lift the same, if not even slightly more than when I stopped. And six weeks a long time. Yes. It's a long time. I'm still staying active.

of like I'm just mostly walking or maybe doing print work or things like that. But like lifting weights, like I go through seasons where like I feel like I'm really into it. And then other times my body's just like not about it. And I listen to that and I maintain my strength and I maintain like the physique that I like. So, you know, we can often do much less work than we think we have to to get the results we want, I think. It's so true. And that fear holds us back. Like for me, it was always fear.

Fear of losing the muscle mass, fear of not looking as good. and you're right like our bodies maintain it and and they're very resilient and and the break is good so this is part of the transformation of the shift I'm going through right now it's a big mental thing too especially because of like just weird diet culture and yeah 100% yeah yeah but I'm glad we even mentioned it even though it wasn't you know the focus just to mention it so people know like if they're experiencing that they're not alone absolutely so important Oh my goodness. Elise, thank you so much for coming on. I love this conversation. Me too, me too. And it was great for me to go back through my material. So I'm so glad we did this and didn't wait until we could do it in person. I was going to come in person today, but the weather was kind of bad. So we ended up rescheduling our New York plans. But I'm so glad we ended up doing this. It was so. Same, same, same. Oh my gosh. To be continued. Paul trivia. We'll let everyone know who released Paul trivia.

We're the only three people who will care. You and me. I literally, it's only three players here. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my God, Elise. Can you remind people where they can find you online? I'm also going to link to everything in the show notes.

Yes. Yes. So you can find me on Instagram at nerdy underscore therapist. Nerdy spelled like neurology, N-E-U-R-D-Y therapist. Same handle on TikTok. talk. We'll share our website and my website. And please feel free to reach out if anyone has any questions or follow up or any thoughts and feedback. I'd love to hear. Amazing. Thank you so much. I will see you soon. Hopefully, hopefully next Tuesday we're going to be together. And I will

your pendulums. Yes. And I get the pendulums. I'm excited to try them. We'll test all your all your chakra systems and I'll show you how Angie taught us to to heal the chakras that might not be turned on as much. You got amazing. Maybe we should film that and put it on Instagram or something. I love it. Let's do it. Let's do it.

Okay, amazing. All right. Thank you so much for listening. This was a long episode, but if you've had this similar experience as me, it's been like a riveting and very compelling episodes. So I hope you enjoyed it. You can find this on Spotify and YouTube. And if you want to become a patron, you can follow on Patreon,

on backslash Undoctrinate Yourself podcast. Thank you so much for being here. We appreciate you and we'll see you again next week. Yes, so much love. Thank you, everybody. Bye.