Balancing Act

00:00:04 Speaker 1: Comeback Stories is a production I've Inflectioned Network and iHeartRadio. Welcome back everyone to another episode of Comeback Stories. Honored to be here with you today. I'm Darren Waller, joined by my co host, my brother and friend, Donnie Starkins. Donnie, how you doing, brother, I'm doing well. I'm excited for this one. Oh yeah, no doubt. We got a friend of the show coming back around for round two, someone who in preparation for this, I went back through all the screenshots I have in my phone from the content that he's posted to social media, via books, via you know, speaking via video and things that have really inspired me again today like that inspired me for the first time. He's an author, a podcaster, public speaker, course creator, most importantly, a father helping people to grow and self awareness and healing and loving themselves properly. We've got our friend making up the third join us today, Bro, how you doing I'm doing great. I'm doing great. Thank you, Thank you for the invitation to come back. Yes, sir, it's an honor to have you here. And I'm one thing that caught me. I was looking through the like the just the titles of your books and you have loving yourself properly care package for your energy, lust for life. This is what real love looks like, dear soul. Success is a choice. I'm looking at these and I'm like, in order for you to arrive at what love is and what care is, do you have to first learn what those things are not first? Ooh, that's a good question. That is That question makes me just think about this term that I often caught, duality, you know, and duality is really just embracing the polar experiences of life. You know. It's like literally like learning what to do in a loss and learning what to do in a win, you know, or it's like learning like wow, I'm extremely angry right now, I'm ready to punch this hole in the wall. And then you do it, especially when you're younger, you punch that hole in the wall, you break something, and then you have to deal with the duality of like those consequences, and then later in life you're met with that choice of like, Okay, well I'm angry, I want to punch his hole in the wall again. But then because you've had that previous experience, now you have the duality of to know like, wow, there's this path and there's that path, and you know, then you can get some more like discernments. So I feel like it's got to be both. It has to be both for those that are listening that don't know much about your story. Are there any examples that you go to first as far as the duality in your own life? Yeah, I mean, I think it just points to you know, when you get older, you start saying things like, man, back in my day or when I was a young kid, or they don't make it like this anymore. Like, for example, there's a very popular musician who who just put out like new music. This is a musician I was I won't say the name, but this is a musician I listened to a lot when I was in college. But you know, that was like fifteen years ago. And now that musician's like music doesn't resonate with me at all. And I'm on my walk the other day and I'm trying to listen to this album. I'm trying to get into it, but I was forcing it. I just I just had outgrown this artist and this music, and so I was really like perplexed as I was walking home, like just recognizing the duality of like a younger me was completely embracing this, this music, this vibration, you know, this experience, but this me, authentically I couldn't get into it. And I even tried, like I even tried to prep myself like all right, come on, we're gonna listen to this, and it just didn't. It just didn't vibrate with me. And it was cool to have that. It was like a conflict at first, but then I was like, just really grateful because it's really growth and just maturity I have. I have a really similar story. Actually, there is an artist that a lot of people would know of that he had a song towards the near of My rock Bottom and he was talking about using my drug of choice. And this artist was, you know, tremendous influence on me. I I love the beats, I love the melodies and all those things. And now it's like, unless they're playing them in the locker room or in the weight room or I'm somewhere, any song comes on like it's not something that I can willingly choose to put on because there's elements of me, I guess that are I wouldn't say no longer here, no longer alive, but parts of me that I no longer want to to surface, that I no longer want to have the stage anymore. So I can, I can, I can very much relate to to that experience. Yeah, I love that you brought that up there, And it's funny that you brought up his books initially because with him being on the podcast once before, I do want to get in I think for people that maybe weren't blessed to hear his episode one and hear his whole story to set some context as to why he'd even be on our show, and especially I mean, I'm confident after this episode you'll understand why he's been on two times. But I think just looking through the books, I have so much respect for you as a writer in the consistency with ten books and looking through some of the names of these books, I mean, anybody that has the words love yourself in a book title like you're my people, you know, And I think it's such an important message with which our listeners have probably heard me talk about a ton. But I'm curious with each book, maybe we can talk about a couple of them, starting with loving yourself properly, and maybe you can even talk about the duality of like who you were before writing the book, and then what it means to truly love yourself properly today. Yeah, I think any journey, of any massive creative project is going to change the person that is creating it, and so specifically with loving yourself properly. When I wrote that book, I wasn't a great place. I had a great, great training regimen, my sleep was dialed in, my nutrition was great, my hydration was great, my relationships were great. Everything was going really really good. For context, I wrote it from twenty eighteen to about twenty nineteen, so right before right before COVID came and changed the entire world. And at the time, I wanted to become a dad, like I wanted to become a father. And one of the things that I told myself and my partner was like, Hey, we need to create the best vessel possible for our kid. And that's like, it's three vessels. It's the vessel of me, it's the vessel of her, and it's the best of who we are and what we are together. And she bought in and she was on board, and so she was she was doing her yoga and going to the gym and lifting and you know, taking her vitamins and you know, hanging around women who are good influences on her, and we're spending quality time together and so we really created this like just beautiful landscape that existed withinside of each other, you know, individually and collectively. And I can truly say that, you know, like writing that book, it was it was interesting because it was like when you're writing about, you know, self, love on the internet is very shallow, and I think that's because the conversation is a is a nuanced conversation that you know, requires some some color and every colors, it requires some like imagination, you know, So things you'll say on the internet maybe just be like, oh, love yourself, take care of yourself, more or less those simple reminders. But when you're writing a book, you want to go a little bit deeper, well a lot of deeper, and like you really want to get into the things. And so I feel like when it comes to loving yourself properly and really taking care of yourself, there's there's a few ways to approach it. I think you can approach it from a mindset place. That's where I like to go to first, you know, because the mind to me is the is the navigation, is the is the conductor. You know, he's the person. The mind is the person that's that's guiding the actions that you take, you know, and then your actions are going to create certain emotions, certain reactions, certain perspectives. But to me, it all starts in the mind. So like at that time period, for me, my mindset was I need to be the healthiest I can be in all pillars of my life. Now it wasn't a like pursuit of perfection. It was just a pursuit of making sure that I'm investing in each pillar and knowing that those investments will give me a life full of love. Now I have the I guess I have the ability to look back in time now five or six years ago when I started writing that and to see that it worked, you know, because now when I look at my son, he's full of joy, he can express himself, he has hell of boundaries. He doesn't let people mess with him, you know, like in any type of negative way, and you know, he loves life. He's like just enjoys his life. And that honestly, it like it inspires me just to get those reminders like man, just have fun, enjoy life because before I was such a serious person, because I had so many things to do, And I feel like there's this like just beautiful journey that started with self love and taking care of myself that I feel like has affected me, but with a different consequence because I'm seeing it coming from my son. What would you say is the biggest thing that you see? I have my own inspiration around that theme of loving yourself, But what do you see as the common theme in humanity or in other people as to why they they don't love themselves properly? It's still a most of shame. It's definitely the emotion of shame, which I believe can come from a lot of different routes. Oftentimes it comes from the family system first and foremost. And then I would say that it can be reinforced through the mass media, through marketing, through commercials, through the through these campaigns that we don't even recognize or know that we're consciously being targeted in, you know, things that are telling us that we're inadequate or not good enough, or we don't look like this person, or we don't have enough money, or it just creates and again it's playing on the emotion of shame. And the consequence of shame is you feel smaller, you feel inadequate, you feel defective, you feel unworthy. I remember when I first, you know, in high school, I was one of those guys. We're not just in high school. My whole life, I've always been the guy in my mind, I'm Mark, you know, I'll go after the pretty girl, the girl that I think is pretty. And I remember, this is such a this is such a like a basic juvenile thing when you bring it up, like, oh, go after the pretty girl. But a lot of guys won't do that, And a lot of guys won't do it because they're shamed. They have a shameful image of themselves. It's called no, she wouldn't pay attention to me, or she wouldn't acknowledge me, or what happens if I get rejected. It's all the emotion of just being small, you know. And so I remember going up to back in that day before people did you know, online dating, when you actually had to like approach girls. I remember going up to a girl the very first time and like just having that anxiety and like knowing like, oh man, this is this is hard. But you know, I gotta do it, and yeah, yeah, so I just think, yeah, let's just let's just go to the next question. I think I answered that one enough. M Yeah, when you when you think we talk of shame, like my mind directly goes to I guess what I would say is the other end is the compassion aspect of things that I've always struggled with. I feel like nowadays I can have like spurts of self compassion and it be a practice and it be regimented, but it always seems to kind of slip away, like what do you what do you say the most common like hurdles to people being able to have compassion for themselves? And what does a self compassion practice, I guess look like for yourself. Yeah, I totally can understand why, you know, someone like you would struggle with that, just like giving you your profession as well. It's like how many not everybody's being watched, you know, with their with their profession, and you know, like for you, you're being graded, you know essentially like every literally every step that you take as being greated. So I could totally understand, could stand that, but that's really what it comes from. It's like the lack of self compassion is often a reinforced habit that we learned in our family system, where we're being watched or where we're being graded, where we're being like micromanaged. Like for example, that kid who get b's and c's, which are passing grades, and they come home and their parents are like, no, you need a's. This is this is terrible. You know, it's just that reinforcement of not good enough, which creates a shame. So as far as what we can do, really we need to and this is not easy to do. It takes time, but we need to unlearn some of the mindsets that we've learned. If we've learned the mindset that everything needs to be graded and everything needs to be judged, we'll never we'll never really be able to come into harmony with our emotions because the baseline of our logic and the baseline of our thinking is everything I do needs to be judged, everything I do needs to be graded. And or we also need to practice indifference. You know, indifference is the art of I don't want to necessarily say not caring, but being being able to use not caring as a tool. Right, It's not to be disengaged from the things that we care about are the things that we value. But it's to be indifferent and just to not care as much emotionally, especially if you're a person that if the feedback to you is, well, this wasn't good enough, or this sucks or this is weak, and then if you just instantly shut down, you instantly get in shame. Then you have to learn some indifference and you also have to learn, you know, the word closure. Like I'm a strong believer that if I try my best at something like how long am I going to allow myself to beat myself up? You know, a very very simple situation. You're learning how to make pancakes. I mean, when you first do it, it's so hard to time it right. You flip it, you miss it right. But then as you age, you learn, okay, I need a medium heat. I gotta put the butter in the pan. I'll wait till those bubbles come up and get under there, make sure it's all good, and then I can flip it per quickly, right. And we got to understand that like everything in life is like pancakes, it really really is. It's a process. You gotta learn the science of it. You know, and it starts within great question. I feel like with that question, something that I want you to talk and elaborate as much as you want to on is boundaries, because I think there's such an essential part of our self care, our self looking that set proper boundaries. And I know you have an online course and you dive super deep into this, but how does that play into affect with everything? Yeah, boundaries, everybody needs them. Two different degrees and different pillars. I mean, the one that's most prevalent right now in my life, I would say is a boundary that like one of the boundary that I'm struggling with is I have a lot of work to do since I'm in the process of finishing my next book, like literally have like a week or two left to turn them back into my editor, and so I'm catching myself giving more energy, giving more time, going you know, going past my boundaries, and then it's causing me to stay up later at night, and then I'm groggy and tired the next day. And there's just like these negative consequences that I'm experiencing. And the thing is is I'm aware of it. It's not that I'm unaware of it. You know, I'm aware of this problem that I'm creating for myself, but then I'm justifying it because I'm saying, well, I have a big project. Do I have a big deadline? Dude? So it makes sense like I'm again that duality, like I'm justifying why I'm violating my own boundaries, right, And so I had to talk with myself this weekend and one of the things and yoga, there's this phrase, it's one of the yamass brama machari, and it's about the right use of your energy, and that term refers to you know, it can be it could be sexual, it could be food, it could be it could be so many different ways we use our energy. And so I had to talk with myself this weekend and say, hey, I need to make sure I use my energy the right way. And so for that was my attention for the week. And so what I did if anyone who has boundaries, I'm kind of explaining the framework now, so you recognize the problem, like you recognize the consequences of you not having boundaries, right, because recognition is step one, and then step two you have to have some type of new commitment. And so my new commitment came this weekend where I said, Okay, this week, I'm gonna make sure I have the right use of my energy. And so, for example, when you're writing, it's very easy to you know, be working on your book like and then all of a sudden, you're like looking at Halloween decorations, or you're like ordering a cup of coffee, or you're like just doing something that has nothing to do with what you need to be doing. And so what I determined was, I'm gonna do three blocks. So today, for example, I had three blocks, like literally three scheduling blocks. And these scheduling blocks represent it the boundaries, the energy boundaries, the focus boundary for me to write. So literally would just be ninety minutes, phone was off, boom, I'm doing what I need to do, disengage, take a thirty minute break, go for a walk, drink water, hydrate, just do whatever. And so that recommitment to my boundaries. As far as today, I'm completely set up and I'm set up to thrive. And then tonight I have one more session. It's gonna be ninety minutes. I'm gonna give myself to it, and then I'll get back to my family and go to sleep on time and complete that throughout this week. And so my theory is that if I stick to my boundaries, if I integrate these boundaries this week, this work related boundary, not only will I get my work done, but I won't be burnt out. I'm gonna enjoy it. I'm gonna have fun with it, and I'm gonna get to enjoy the rest of my life. You know. So that's like a real world present example of the boundaries framework that I teach that I'm using myself with the work with work thereon. I gotta say, Man, I'm loving how you've really made yourself at home in the big city. I'm curious, how are you getting around? You a subway guy, cab uber. I'm glad you're asked. Donnie Man, I'm a got the honor to partner with All American Forward over in New Jersey. They've been taking really good care of me since I got out here, and that's why I love the most about it. Man. They treat me like I'm family, not just a customer trying to get a deal or just a statistic. You know. They give me great service. You could tell they got to commitment to quality. The innovation is unmatched. And just so if anybody's you know, like me, trying to get around in New Jersey, don't know where to go, I'm telling you go check out All American Forward here in Jersey. They're gonna take real good care of you. When we come back, you'll hear more of this inspiring comeback story. Man. I mean, boundaries are an unfolding thing in my life as well, because I will still, like you said, find a way to justify me going over it, because I think it goes back to the mindsets that we need to learn of. Well, my value comes from my performance. My value comes from the grade that I get. My value comes from you know, these things I do turning into a result that's pleasing as opposed to being pleased with the process and the result before it even happens and living with the result as it comes. And you know, that's like you said something that in my profession, like in a way, I can't afford to get rid of it. But I feel like I'm kind of like always moving back and forth between the two. Like I wake up in the morning and I'm like, you know, I know who I am. I'm not here to be a I'm not a human doing. I'm a human being, you know. But here I step into this realm of where it's like, all right, now I gotta perform, I gotta I gotta make it dance, you know what I'm saying. And it's like it always leads me in this place of like, Okay, well what do my boundaries look like? They always seem so fluid as opposed to being so solid, And I'm like, how do I create more solid boundaries amidst this? You know? So, Bester, I got a question for you regarding boundaries. I think I've gotten so much better at actually articulating them and communicating them. I think the power of our words and actually it's you know, sometimes it's not what we say, it's how we say it, but being able to actually frame these boundaries or these because I believe you have to know your values, right, because a boundary gets cross when a value gets stepped on. So if you don't know your values, you're more likely to allow people to cross that imaginary line in the sand. But when you know who you are and you know how to clearly articulate why you're saying no, you're less likely to be getting talked into like shit, you just don't want to do. I'm a lot better on that. But where I struggle is the energetic boundary of guilt. So when I set a boundary and and feel guilty about it afterwards, So what would you say to myself or somebody who's asking in regards to that? Okay, So what I'm hearing is there's guilt associated with setting a boundary, and so that guilt emotion that triggers is a very healthy emotion. To feel guilt means that you're feeling empathy, you're feeling what another person is feeling. So that's a very healthy emotion. But when we feel guilt for setting a boundary, what we're experiencing is an innerviolation, and it's an interviolation. Because the paradigm before was I am going to people please, I am going to overgive, I am going to overdo whatever this thing is. And so when we have this inner conflict where we say no, not this time, not this time, we're going against We're going against our programming that we were committing to before. We're going against a paradigm that we were used to. So it feels off, it can feel inauthentic. It feels weird. Like Darren, you're you're a superstar athlete. You can sign one hundred autographs. Now you're tired, you need to go see your wife, you need to got you got other things to do. That one hundredth and one person is like, hey, can I get one? And you're like, no, I can't. I can't, Like I gotta go, and then you feel that guilt. That's where it's coming from. It's coming from like this programming and so like in that situation or any situation, what we have to recognize is a lot of the times that we're setting boundaries with people we've already given or we're already in a commitment to give, and we have to recognize the right use of our energy. It's like, you know what, I don't there's a duality again, I don't want to miss this one hundredth and one thing. There's one hundred and one person or this one hundredth in one class. We know Donnie is one of the best yoga teachers in the world. I don't want to miss this one. But then can we give ourselves credit because we did one hundred We've done one hundred reps. Can we give ourselves credit for that? Is it some self compassion we could tap into, recognizing like, you know what, I am gonna miss this one, But who's putting this expectation on me that I have to hit everything one? You know? You can. You can go to the Baseball Hall of Fame that in three hundred, which is thirty percent, you know, and I mean that that applies to all things in life. You can do things at a high rate and not be perfect, you know. And so it's just changing your language to I can't do this or something is wrong with me because I'm unable to fulfill it to I've done enough. I could do more tomorrow that's fine, but for today, I've done enough. Great, great question, Donny. Yeah, I think it's like a lot of I've heard Sylvester Youth just talk about it about maybe you just didn't say it exactly, but infection versus intention, which I think they're like so completely different energies, right, because perfection isn't perfect, Perfection isn't real, it's not attainable. And if we have any remnants of any type of not enough story, which in my experience, myself and almost every human on this earth has some form of that, then the chasing perfection never happens, which validates the not enough story. So, like you know, I'm thinking about you know, Darren, and reframing where like every route doesn't have to be perfect, but his intention or his objective in everything that he's doing, it's a completely different energy. And I have to imagine, like for you writing ten books, that difference of because I you know, I can try to create an Instagram post and there's that it needs to be perfect, come up with the right words and drop a nugget right. So how do you navigate through that? I guess as a writer. And then Darren, I'd love to hear your take on just perfection versus intention on the field in your preparation. Yeah, there's a time and place for perfection. I like to compartmentalize it. I like to look at it as a tool. If I'm gonna lean into perfection, to me, that just means I'm trying to do something right, and that there oftentime is a form component of like doing something right. Donnie. You know this As a yoga teacher, people will be in class and they'll ask you all the time, like, Hey, how's my form, how's this And there's two things that you're looking at. It's like, well, the yoga itself is not about achieving a particular form, and you want to make sure that the person is doing something that is anatomically safe for their experience. And so you're holding that duality of like Okay, you don't have to look a particular way, but if there's a particular alignment of a foot, of ankle, a door, suflection of bending, or whatever it may be, we can achieve perfection. Like inside of that tool. It's like, you know what, that is the perfect warrior too for you. You're balanced, you're pushing through both feet. But it doesn't have to be perfect. It's just perfect for that person, if that makes sense. And so there's like this compartmental connection. I can never say that part of it, right, compartmentalization that we have to do to understand, like you know what perfection is a tool? Like if they're like, okay, you know, Darren, we need you to hit this overallte Yeah, Like there is a certain amount of depth you have to get to yardage. You do have to get there in a certain amount of seconds to be like available for your quarterback. If I'm my book I'm writing, it does need to be per my contract seventy thousand words. I can't give them sixty and be like, oh, yeah, it's good enough. No, Like, there is certain expectations with things, and there are times where we can achieve or look for and even expect from ourselves set perfection, but we have to do it, and we have to make sure we're using the right use of our energy to make sure that we're not doing it to the detriment of our journey, because it's a tool, right, so it has to be an assistant to our journey as far as on the field, as far as perfection versus intention, I would say there's a lot of ways where coaches or tradition or whatever may tell you that there's a certain way that something should be done and you need to, you know, adhere to this way of running this route to twelve twelve yards and just breaking in. But I feel like with intention for me that I take into whatever my craft may be on a certain play is whatever is being asked of me to do. Like I'm putting some of my own flavor on it. I'm putting some of who I am into it because Travis Kelcey may run something this way, you know, Daniel Bellinger on my team may run it a certain way. But the way that I'm going to run, the way that I'm going to open. I'm not placing myself in this box. To whereas the way somebody tells me to do something is how I have to do it, because I feel like that in a way is already like, okay, my goal is to please this person who's handed this down to me, as opposed to the relationship I can form with my quarterback, the relationship I can I can form with my body and how I do these things to whereas I don't have to go out there and think I'm trying to be perfect. I'm out there thinking, I'm out there measuring. I'm out there worrying about oh man, well if this doesn't go perfect, what is such and such going to think? What is this going to look like? On ESPN or on Instagram reel somebody's making fun of me or talking or talking crazy about me. But whereas intention is like, I'm gonna do this a certain way because this is what I feel, this is what my intuition is telling me to do, and I can live with the result of me trusting myself at the end of the day. Yeah, you didn't get there overnight. To get to that place. I know. I've talked about this about you, but just the consistency and for both of you, I mean, go, I'll jump back to Sylvester with ten books, and I think about like the level of discipline and consistency that has to take, you know, drumming up a few paragraphs sometimes in a blog for me can be challenging. So I just have so much respect. But I'm curious. So it's been ten books. What do you think, like, what's the difference between I guess how have you grown as a writer from book one to book ten? Yeah, well I know what I'm doing now, you know, I don't know what I was doing it at first. I know, when we're young, we have all the confidence, you know, and all the bravado, and we think we know what we're doing. But at least with my profession is one of those things that you it's like you actually get better as you get older, as you get feedback, as you get criticism, as you learn and practice. So I actually feel a lot more confident from a few few ways I feel more confident in the ability to be clear in my messages when I'm writing, which is extremely important as a writer. I feel more confident in my ability to I guess, how do I say sound smart but not like so academic that it's not chewable, right, And then I'm a lot more confident in my ability to break down like complex things to make them simple, because to me that that's very important. Like I remember walking into psychology one O two, the most you know, basic freshman level class, and the professors just hitting me with all this this, these phrases in these terms, and I'm just like, wow, this is about to stress me out for the next the next semester. And I just remember that feeling of like these new terms feeling overwhelming, and I you know, I knew that I was going to be a teacher at one point in my life, so I wanted to I wanted to really learn, like, Okay, how do I take something complex and make it simple? Because that's what we all need. Like, you know, I can go through I could tell you all these like, for example, the yoga thing I brought up. I could tell you all these different things from a yoga practice, but the common person doesn't care. They're not trying to do the homework. They wanted to be breaking broken down for them so they can go back to their life. So I would say, those are some of the things that I had to learn, you know, as a writer. And then the other thing I would say is learning how to write effectively, because you can have an idea and you're like, Okay, I want to write about this recipe or I want to write about this concept, but then knowing where to start, knowing how to make it a story, knowing how to put like beginning, middle, and end to its actually very very difficult. And so yeah, I would say that now I feel confident, whereas before I was. I feel confident because I have the data in proof of my work, Whereas ten years years ago, I was confident because I had an image a visualization of what I can do, but I didn't have the data in the po Does writing still give you? Does it set you free? Does it does it feel more of a job sometimes, as I'm guessing, maybe early on they were maybe open journal entries, so like one of your books is called free Your Energy, So I'm curious, how has writing maybe from day one up until now, like, how does it free your energy? How does it set you free? I'm gonna just speak from my own journey. Does it set you free? Does it feel like a job. That's interesting that I haven't set with that a lot. But when I think back to when I first started, I was younger, and when I was a younger kid, really my life was very simple. I played football, I played basketball, I watched cartoons, I hung out with my friends, and you know, I was just an artist and athlete. That's essentially every day was saying. I wasn't making any money from any of those things. That's just what I love to do. And so it's really cool now to be, you know, in my thirties and I'm still writing, I'm still training like an athlete, and I'm fortunate to say, hey, I have a career from writing my books and doing teachers in those things. So there's like a duality there, because yeah, it does feel like a job, because there's sometimes I don't want to do it, but I don't have a choice, Like you know what you have to, Like, you signed up for this, this is your skill, this is your talent. You signed up for this, so you got to get up and find a way. But then there are some days where there is that just pure joy where it's like, man, I get to write today. You know, it's both I'm not gonna sit here and lie to you and just say, oh yeah, I live with dreaom every day. I do. But there's times I don't want to do it. There's times I'm stressed out. There's time it bothers me. Like I said, I have a deadline in ten days, and it's been hard for me to drop in the way that I wanted to because I have a kid. Now, this is something I never experienced writing a book when you have a kid. It's really easy when you don't, because you control all your time and all your energy. So much of writing is energetic, and when you have a kid, that's like, hey, come play with me, Come do this, make me some food. I'm tired. I'm gonna throw a tantrum now. Then it's like, okay, now this is a whole different beast. So I'm still learning it now. With being the dad as a creator myself, somebody that wants to use my words to impact other people, how do you deal with like, is there a clash between allowing creativity and words to flow to you and flow through you without forcing, while also dealing with a deadline, like what comes up with that as you deal with the both of those. I think deadlines are great. Deadlines are great for the psychological benefit that they give us. There's this what is it called Parkinson's law, And Parkinson's law is just this theory that states, however much time you have for something, you'll use up the entire time. Right. And so we go back to college and they're like, they give you the sillibus. Professors like, hey, so this paper right here that it's August something and it's due in November. It does anyone do that paper that's due in November in August when you get the shillaber, No, you don't do it. Don't it's due say November eleventh. You probably start working on that paper November ninth, and then you spend two days. You cram, You get to your study tables, you go to your girlfriend house, you up till two, you go to the library, you turn that paper in. So why is that though? Is it because you're lazy? Is it because you're a procrastinator? Because you had half the year to get ready for it. It's just Parkinson's law. It's however much time you're giving to do something, you'll find a way. That same paper, if the professor said, hey, this is due ob first, you probably would start it sooner and you probably would have it done right. So I like to use that with writing. I like to give myself deadlines, like I like to say, hey, For example, in the example I gave earlier, I say, hey, I'm going to write for ninety minutes, So that lets me know that writing for ninety minutes, like I'm flowing, I'm dropping in. Whatever happens in the ninety minutes is what happens. My editor or excuse me, my publisher gave me a deadline, Hey, you need to have this book in on this date. So now I know, okay, Like I'm not taking these other meetings, I'm not taking these other calls. I'm not wasting my time because contractually I have this date that I have to hit. But then there's also but this is the book writing process, there's also the daily journaling that I do that nobody ever sees. That's just me writing. To me. That is all about the free form, flowing, energetic. In the moment, I can go slow I can go fast, it can be ugly, like I can have typos, I can be completely freeform in there, you know. So there's still that space as well. You've been talking a lot of yoga since last time we had you on the episode. I don't know, maybe yoga came up, but you're you're breaking it down a lot more. And I don't think we threw it in your intro that you're also a certified yoga teacher. Now, so how's that journey going? Just what are you learning through? Just what did you learn through the teacher training process and through the practice, and how does it changed your life, because as we know, it's certainly changed mind. Yeah, so really cool for really cool nugget to drop. I actually took my my yoga certification where Donnie trains and teaches and it has been there. So that was really cool for me to you know, be with Donnie and spend time there and like literally to be where you were at, you know, for a whole month, which it was a vibe, man, it was. It was really cool. And my teacher, I feel like my teacher, her name is Gabrielle. She was just the perfect teacher for me, you know, she really just I was the only guy in the class, and she just made me so comfortable. You know, she made me so comfortable. And I'm coming from this background of you know, being an author, being an athlete, so I was feeling like a little what is it called imposteram syndrome, you know, because I'm in class with like fourteen women. They're doing splits and they're you know, they're just doing all this yoga stuff and I do yoga, but it was just different. And She's like, oh no, don't worry, Yoga's for everybody. You deserve to be here. It was such such a like empowering, you know, experience before I went to there. The reason why I wanted to do a yoga training is because I just didn't like paying twenty dollars every class to have someone lead me, Like I wanted to just leave myself. Twenty dollars adds up. You know, they're going to class two or three times a week. So that was like really my own reason, Like I just wanted to deepen, you know, my practice, and getting like the education, getting the knowledge and just you know, getting immersed in it was really really good for my journey. It brought me a lot of inner peace. And now I don't teach. I actually do not teach. I did not do the certification with the idea of like becoming a public teacher. It really truly was for my own journey and my own advancement. And I do yoga every day. Every single day. I do some aspect of yoga, whether it's just some stretching, whether it is meditation, whether it's some type of working on myself, or just trying to, you know, make myself the best version of me that I can be. I try to do yoga every day. How would you say yoga's made you a better dad and partner? Oh? Patients, easily patients. I am not a patient person. So let me be a little more clear. I'm a patient person if I'm working on something, if I'm creating something, if I'm trying to see like a goal or dream fulfilled. But I don't always have the most pay for other people. I just don't like when people make bad decisions over and over. I don't like certain low vibrational things. I don't like people are complaining. And so my tolerance for people is not that high. It's not right. And so yoga has really taught me that to have compassion for other people, to be forgiving, to be understanding, to be less critical. I grew up in a critical household, with my father being in an army, my mother, she was an administrative assistant, and my parents had very high expectations of me. And so I grew up in like this critical world. And so I wanted to be the type of parent where I wasn't critical of every single thing that my son does, because I know that that can create shame, that can create a lot of insecurities. I want to have him feeling empowered. I want to have him feeling confident in himself, you know. So for example, I won't like hover over him and say, well, you messed this up or you messed that up. Sometimes I'll just I'll just sit back and let things happen now, not to just let him be a menace, like yeah, I don't I don't discipline, but yeah I let him know, like hey, don't break this, you know, or don't mess this up please, you know. But I'm not caught up in like trying to micromanage my kid. I want him to experience his childhood without that hovering parent over, you know. Yoga taught me that patience. It truly did teach me more patients. You talked about talking about your son and your family. I remember a post that you posted one time. You're talking about being mindful of like brushing over like victories and blessings that come into your life, and that some families didn't know how to celebrate properly, Like how do you go about implemating that into your family now and keeping a vision for that going forward? Because I feel like a lot of families fall into that same just that same trap. I guess, great question. The way the human brain works, we're always looking for something to focus on. So it's so easy to accomplish something and then instantly turn to Okay, well what's next, what do I gotta do next? It's so easy to do that. It's normal. It's a normal thing for us to look for the next thing because we need something, you know, to focus on. But what can happen is like, for the school example, you can be in school for four years and never celebrate until graduation. You graduate from high school and then you're so happy. You know, your grandmother comes, cousins you never see, you're up there, there's cake, there's this big celebration, and then it's like, all of a sudden, it's like, Okay, well, what are you gonna do next? It's like, well, dann, can I celebrate just got my diploma? Can I honor this? Can I can I cherish this? Can this mean something to me? You guys are talking to me about college and my job and what kids are gonna happen in the future. I'm eighteen. Let me just enjoy this, right, So that's what I think is super important man, just to just to like enjoy. You know, we can call them small victories, big victories. I'm not here to make anybody's else's life minimize. If it's a big victory for you celebrated, if it's small celebrated, why not. Why not? And it doesn't have to be about social media, you know it can it can just be here in the home or with your friends, go out to a dinner. Guys, I passed the test, I got my driver's license. I asked that girl out. She said no, But I'm proud of myself because I tried. You know, I just feel like making space for celebration just makes it makes life so beautiful, man, because we're gonna look for the next thing. We are all, all of us, everybody listening already knows. When I say what's the next thing, you know it. You already know what you have to do, right, So why not put celebration in there. Right, it's and psychologically it's gonna give you a better wellness. Excuse me, it's gonna give you more encouragement. It's gonna give you mental wealth. Right, it's gonna give you more of a positive mindset. Why wouldn't you start to celebrate yourself also allowing yourself to be celebrated because a lot of us will reject it. Other people will call us, but hey man, good job, or I'm proud of you, and then we have this shame. So we're like, oh no, no, no no, let me reject that like or or let me know. I need to do some other things before I can get your celebration and praise. That's not true. Love is love. Let the love in, Let the love in. The more love in your life, the better. Open yourself up to the vibration of receiving love. Open yourself up to the vibration of receiving a pat on the back of a hug from yourself. And from others, Hey, you did a good job. Cool, I receive that. Right. If you're the type of person that maybe you're not open to receiving love, just literally say it when it comes to you. I receive this. I am open to receiving this. Thank you, whether it's coming from self or externally. Man, we've got to talk about well, the practice of acknowledgement. I think a lot of this ties into acknowledgment, stopping and taking a moment to acknowledge if you've done good work, or stopping and smelling the roses. But I've told this story, your story about the old lady in Sprouts when you were all dressed up in the suit, So maybe you can share that for those that didn't hear your episode one, because I share this all the time and the importance of receiving acknowledgment. Yeah. So my grandmother, she passed in twenty twelve. She was one of my best friends, one of the most loving, encouraging people you know that I ever met. And I think for any of us who you know had that soft spot for you know, grandmother who helped raise us and help be a part of our lives. It's just an energy that you really you never feel that energy again in your life, like the energy of a loving present grandmother. And so I was in La, I was doing some work. Had just flew back to Arizona where I live, and I will walk to Sprouts grocery store. I will walk there pretty much every day. I will walk there. And I had just got off the plane. I go to my go to my house, do my daily walk to Sprouts to get my food for the day. And as I'm going in, this old lady is coming out, and man, she just she changed my life because she's like, sir, sir. And again I already told you guys, I don't really like people. I'm not super tolerant. I like to just mind my business. You know, I'm historically an introvert. I won't really talk to to most people unless you know, I have to. That's kind of how I've been. And you know, I was very reserved at this point in my life. So I'm trying to ignore her. She's like sir, sir, and I'm like, no, no, I don't hear her. I don't hear I'm trying to just walk past her. And then finally she was like sir, and I was like, okay, I can't ignore her. At this part. She's like screaming at me essentially, and I was like, yes, ma'am, Yes, ma'am. And she's like, I just want to say, you know that outfit you have on and those boots are amazing. She was really complimenting the boots. And the first thing I tried to do was, oh, well, these are just some moots from Levi's. They're only like twenty five thirty bucks. Like I'm trying to justify or talk about the love that she was giving me, and she just looked at me and she was like, shut up. I didn't ask you any of that. I'm giving you a compliment, Receive it. I'm giving you love, receive it. I'm giving you acknowledge it. Receive it. And there was just this moment where I just felt the rush of my grandmother's energy just take me over. You know. It's like she had passed at this point, so I'm like I just felt her energy. I'm like man, and I just had a smile on my face and I said, okay, thank you, you know, And since that day, I have never done that. If someone's like, hey, you I like you, I'm like hey, thanks, Yeah, you did something good for me. Okay, thanks. I appreciate that I received that. I acknowledge it now, whereas previously I was taught to be humble, to reject it, to push it aside, to play it off, to be nonchalant, to act like, oh, it's no big deal. This is what I do. Now I receive it and I say those words. Now I receive this, thank you. I'm open to this thank you, and I do it when it's simple things. Now, simple things people will text me and I say, hey, thank you for I'll say thank you for this genuinely. And I feel like what this does for us is it puts us into emotion of gratitude. Right one of the most studied emotions that we experience is gratitude and choosing that grateful reaction, stopping and just saying I receive this, tan next your life right there. Well, the practice of acknowledgement, it feeds both parties because it feels good to acknowledge somebody else, So the person doing the acknowledging is filled up, but then also the person that's receiving it. So it's it's a practice that I don't think us as humans are very good at especially acknowledging ourselves for the good work, taking a step back and you know, stopping and smelling the roses, but also just acknowledging other people simply just starting a conversation out and saying, I want to acknowledge you for the amazing friends you've been. It's just, you know, I think we as humans could get better at that, and ultimately, like you know, I know for me, receiving compliments can be tricky and it's all rooted in like childhood stuff and wanting to dim my light. But yeah, I think you know they what do they say? It's not love unless you give it away. But the only way that you can really have a full cup is you have to receive. You have to be able to receive certain things and receive compliments, and then ultimately, as your cup is full, everybody else gets the overflow. So it's it's it's a powerful practice, man. But that story I share it with all my coaching clients. I if there's boundaries issues, I do a session on boundaries with my coaching clients. But if there's some some shit there, like I push them to your course, you know. So it's just so cool to have you on here and really feel like I'm being coached in many aspects with some of the questions that I'm asking. So it's just cool to have you on the show for round two, to have you in my life and consider you a friend, and to be out here in San Diego with you, and it was it's been some special moments, man, So thank you, thank you, sir. Yes, sir, man, I want to I want to say thank you as well, you know, for both the times you call on the show, for the time that I've been able to sit down with you face to face. You know, I just for all that you overcome, the energy and everything that you put out into the world. It's impacted me, it's impacting a lot of people, and it's impacting people that are listening right now. And just grateful for another opportunity to get to sit with you. Man. Thank you, sir, Thank you, sir. Appreciate you all joined us for another episode come Back Stories. Check us out wherever you get your podcast check us out and Inflection Network on YouTube as well. Love you all and see y'all next week. Comeback Stories is a production of Inflection Network and iHeartRadio. For more podcasts, from iHeartRadio. Visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.