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189. The Bachelorette Stars Eric Bigger & Anthony Battle: The Vulnerability Talk Every Man Needs To Hear
2 Playsin 23 hours
Eric Bigger welcomes fellow The Bachelorette alum Anthony Battle for a powerful conversation on somatic awareness, vulnerability, and spiritual growth. If you want to deepen your spiritual fitness and connect with your inner world in a more embodied way, this episode gives you the place to begin.
About Anthony Battle:
Anthony Battle’s journey spans many worlds, from Division I football at Northwestern and international teaching as a Fulbright Scholar, to tech sales at LinkedIn and Salesforce, television as a Bachelorette contestant and SAG actor, and advanced studies in literature, philosophy, yoga, and consciousness with a Master's degree from CIIS. Each environment has served as a cornerstone in what he calls his Cathedral, a personal architecture forged through physical, mental, and spiritual discipline. As a consciousness guide, Anthony supports individuals in mapping and constructing their own inner worlds to align with not only their personal goals but also do so in right relationship to others in romance, in friendship, and so on. He is honored and grateful to share his practice.
Website: https://www.anthonybattle.com
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Transcript
Introduction to Spiritual Fitness
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome to the Spiritual Fitness Podcast. I'm your host, Eric Bigger. And each week, we will explore powerful practices, inspiring stories, and expert insights to guide you on your path to holistic health.
00:00:18
Speaker
By blending spirituality and physical wellness, we support you in strengthening your body and soul. Whether you're a seasoned spiritual seeker or just beginning your journey, the Spiritual Fitness Podcast is here to help you unlock your inner potential and live your most vibrant, purposeful life.
00:00:35
Speaker
It's miracle season.
00:00:39
Speaker
Spiritual fitness, spiritual fitness podcast.
Guest Introduction: Anthony Battle
00:00:42
Speaker
i'm your host, Eric Bigger, and we back again with another episode. And today, oh man, I can't wait to you guys meet my guest, Anthony Battle. I call him AB, b a conscious guide, a mentor.
00:00:55
Speaker
But we also was on season 13 of The Bachelorette. We spent some time together. Anthony, welcome to the podcast. How you feeling? I'm feeling great. Good to be here. Good to be here. Yes, yeahday nice yes, yes. Biggs, yes. I love
Spirituality and Family Roots
00:01:07
Speaker
it. So before we get into like the details of consciousness and like what you do now and and how you help people, take us to the journey of like growing up in Chicago, playing football And just creating a ah name for yourself within that space. What was that like growing up? Because I don't think I have that story. Yeah, just grew up there.
00:01:25
Speaker
I got two sisters, a twin sister. didn't have a young Oh, i didn't know that Yeah. And I had my two parents. So, you know, nice little, humble, beautiful family. And, you know, grandparents, cousins. And it was a nice little, nice little unit we had in Chicago. So it was beautiful. Yeah, so you so it sounds like you grew up in a very stable environment energetically, you know outside of the things of Chicago. Because when you were saying 53rd, I'm like, it's the low ends or the hundreds? Like, I don't really know. you not Yeah, not that for ourselves. No, right, right.
00:01:53
Speaker
I'm moving to actually like in that space growing up in ah an environment you were in playing football, being from Chicago, what place does spirituality have in that part of your journey of life or or church or religion or just God? Or what was that like growing up? Or was that even a thing?
00:02:08
Speaker
when you say energetically, I think that's where I kind of root myself. And I'm thinking about what my parents, the sort of environment they they they they gave us as children is really all about love.
00:02:20
Speaker
And that that was the first thing. So even before any sort of vocabulary, any sort of i mean, we went to church here and there, you know, and they got married in the church, all that good stuff. We had that language, but it was really about what it felt like to be in the presence with my parents and in that family unit. And just felt like that was spiritual to me as God. i was That's how I understood it deeply in a felt sense. It wasn't about what somebody taught me. It's like I i saw it. I witnessed it in my parents in front of me. So that's that's how I started. And then as I grew up, I learned more intellectually about, you know, spirituality, finding different languages. Went to a Catholic high school, and that's where I started to root in in terms of what does it feel like to be a part of a specific tradition?
00:03:00
Speaker
But again, started with just energy. I saw, you know, you don't need words before you feel it. You don't need words before you feel
The Role of Somatic Experiences
00:03:08
Speaker
it. Can you, like, expand that? Just go a little deeper into that that the statement. I really like that.
00:03:13
Speaker
When you think about language itself and the way people, when you write things down or when you try to speak things, it comes second to your thoughts. And even your thoughts come second to even your somatic experiences in life. So you see things, you hear things, you smell things, you taste things.
00:03:28
Speaker
And even as a baby, you can't even speak, but you're already alive. So that's how your initial experiences of life are, is really through this really this huge influx of sensation. So that's really...
00:03:40
Speaker
you can tell You can see children now, and and and if you look at some people talk about, you know, babies having access to this world and their spirituality before there's any language that comes. and i kind of I think of that as the primordial sense of of God is before words, like this childlike baby sense of the was. you can Children have contact with that. Babies have contact with that. And then even as adults, we try to understand what it is and explain it. But it's all before words that really we get the truth of experience and the truth of what life is. And I think the world we're living in today, unconsciously or subconsciously, we've been moving out of the feeling state, right? yeah Yeah. And we're going into the knowing state. We're getting all this information that we know, but we don't even feel what we know.
00:04:21
Speaker
So then we really know it. From your practicing your journey, How does feeling translate to life, right? Far as like success, progress, love, creation.
00:04:34
Speaker
How do we get into a feeling state where we feel safe to feel what we need to feel to get to our higher self or higher calm? How does that work and what you offer to the world or what you do in your day to day? That's an important thing is to tap into that that feeling state. and And like you said, there's a lot of things that can really distract you from connection to that. But that really became another spiritual language to me. It's really, really trusting my body and understanding what it meant, understanding what pain feels like, understanding what joy feels like, like in a really...
00:05:01
Speaker
deep sense and understand how that relates to my personal development. Because you, as a football player, you see it, you see numbers, you see statistics, you kind of really early on start to measure what it feels like to tap into your body. It's not just vague emotion and feelings. It's like your attunement with your own physical sensations directly relates to your performance and your ability to really do something. So you have to know what's going on. You have to learn that vocabulary of feeling um not just emotional feeling, but tactile feeling like that. You have to learn that early. And then it just became like a root for how I even practice now with people is really diving into that somatic understanding, really making sure that people, anybody, even if you have ideas and thoughts about who you are and how you want to live, you need to embody it and live it.
00:05:46
Speaker
And that's kind of my process going forward is that everything I do is about maybe I want to do this thing. Maybe I want to be around these people, but then The next step is to jump into it and be in it physically in order to actually make it true. Because I'm curious. It's just rolling in circles. It's not real. But once you put body into the experience, that's real.
00:06:04
Speaker
Yeah. and And it's so good because that's the space I've been in these last eight months is that because I've always been an intellect, right? The intellectual mind of like like knowing life so I can move life through my mind. And I have this thing within my gene keys where I have to feel life.
00:06:20
Speaker
And the more I feel, I actually move faster and further if I allow myself to feel what I don't want to feel. So then what I'll do is try to go get information to feel that feeling. I want to ask a question about why do you think it's such a hard time to feel our true emotions? Like, what is that?
00:06:36
Speaker
What do you think that disconnect or that challenge might be for us? Is it because we're not wired like that to naturally feel and express? Or it's a conscious thing that we haven't grown to actualize because of fear? I'm just curious your your perspective.
Expressing Vulnerability as Men
00:06:51
Speaker
Yeah, sure. I'll first say that men are definitely wired to have emotions, the full spectrum. For sure, we can feel that. I would say a lot of it the the way we kind of suppress that is is just masculine conditioning, societal.
00:07:04
Speaker
Even if you think about the word vulnerability, and i'm going to go into some etymology a little bit again, like the word vulnerability is rooted in the word wound. And I think the men are not in don't have a healthy relationship to their wounds. They don't know their wounds. where they see their wounds as something that is a liability.
00:07:21
Speaker
So you walk into the world wounded. i mean, in environment that is dangerous, I mean, you look like a target. So then you condition yourself to conceal your wounds and to protect yourself and stay guarded. when that And that guardedness is is where you create disconnect from other people. Then you can't build healthy relationships. You can't be in brotherhood even without sharing those wounds. But again,
00:07:43
Speaker
There is a cast 22 because you have to be in a safe environment for those wounds to not be exploited. So then, but if you're not there and you activate it, you're just going to be conditioned to be guarded. So it's the conditioning, but it's also the environment that puts men emotionally unsafe places where they cannot be vulnerable without experiencing.
00:08:00
Speaker
Pain. And everybody's afraid of pain. Nobody wants to hurt. We have to be able to gain access to our wounds and to share that without feeling afraid that our wounds are going to destroy us. I think seeing it as ah as ah as a, not as a liability, but as a pathway to deeper connection with spirit with other people, that's what I've learned in my journey. i have wounds too. And And in the last several years, I've learned to really understand what those wounds are and to see just like the deep beauty of having experienced life life in that way. Because you can't be wounded unless you feel deeply connected to something. Like the wound comes from losing or or being disconnected from something you love. That is where the depth of it, when you when you understand it, that is really a beauty in understanding that.
00:08:42
Speaker
that you even experienced that in the first place, that you can be wounded. That means you can feel that you make, you can be in contact with life in a very deep way. But, um, yeah, so, but not, but like, that's a process. It is scary. It's very scary to, cause it feels like ego death. You feel like you're, when you, when you realize that, that deep connection, it feel that you have to let go of something and that can feel like, like death, ego death to, ah to let go of that attachment to who you think you are and to let the wounds guide you. That's a, that's a, that's tough work. And, uh,
00:09:12
Speaker
Yeah, it takes a long time sometimes. Yeah, you said something that I want to we we reiterate or re say back to people are going to listen and watch this in a moment is your wounds are not a liability. They're a pathway to vulnerability. They're a pathway to a new version of yourself.
Understanding Love and Heartbreak
00:09:28
Speaker
And I have this ideology, AB. b Help me understand if what I'm saying is true or or it's just my experience because I don't want to make my experience everybody else. But I believe as a man...
00:09:40
Speaker
In order to experience the highest form of love, you have to understand and know what heartbreak feels like. Right. And so to I always ask people, how do you know you want something you never had?
00:09:55
Speaker
Right. How do you know? And then I said, but that's why I want because I never had it. So if I don't know what pain is, right, or experience pain at a deep level, how do I really know what love is as a deep level? As you mentioned that. So I think about, um I mean, we talked, I'm going to say a few things. but we First of all, i think of a Bible passage. okay John 3, 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son and so we then we may not perish but have eternal life. And I think about that because and and I connect it to my personal experience. I have a younger brother, haven't seen him for over 10 years. I don't know if he's alive or dead. he's um It's a mysterious fate for our whole family. And it's been very painful
00:10:35
Speaker
Now we're on a healing side of things, but it was painful early on. And to hold the mystery of his sort of life and and this sort of and not knowing how things have played out, that has really shown us the depth of the love in our family because that connection still exists even in his physical absence. And then and I related to that Bible passage just because the idea of losing and and and sacrificing and disconnecting from something that you love so deeply, it does show you the amount of love.
00:11:08
Speaker
um It does show you the love there. And and it can show you how far your your heart and your soul can expand in order to continue to hold this beautiful love. It it expands beyond what you thought it was. When you so feel it pulling, when you feel something you're connected to kind of pull away from you or be taken from you, then you can feel that when you're still tethered to that in some way, then it shows you just the true expansiveness of a love can be. It goes beyond lifetime. It goes beyond space. It could go infinite, you know, and that's kind of what I learned in my experience of losing
00:11:44
Speaker
And experience of grief is that love is infinite. Love even transcends the grief and it just continues. And it becomes something bigger than just an individual. It's just like becomes about the world. And for, you know, everybody has different spiritual traditions, but I speak it in language of Christianity sometimes.
00:12:02
Speaker
That was the lesson, I think, of the the sacrifice of of of Jesus for people who resonate with that, is to show that infinite expansion in the sacrifice. that That's the point, is to teach us and God's love and that losing and that it still continues through that, through suffering, through loss, through separation, that the love is still there. And you know what? That's so good because now you're taking me back to that moment where I felt so lost and separate from myself.
00:12:28
Speaker
The love was still available. Mm-hmm. I still had enough love in me and around me to get up and do the thing I needed to do to be where i needed to be. But it's also making me think about the shadow self and the light self or the higher self. in you know In the world we live in, it's a lot of shadow energetics that's going on, a lot of darkness, right? Sure. And it's so easy to judge the shadows, to judge the darkness within us as human beings and within the world. Yeah.
00:12:59
Speaker
And I know within life, we need both polarities. We need the day, we need the night, we need darkness, we need light. So I do believe if we could take a positive aspect or approach of our pain, our suffering, our separation, our loss, our devastation, our strategy, and turn that into light, to power, to purpose, to prosperity, then we won't have such resistance to our shadow, right? yeah Or we're not so, what is it, controlled by our darkness that we're afraid of our light.
00:13:35
Speaker
In your moment, you said, you know, you haven't seen your brother 10 years and you and your family are not aware. What else in your life has put you in a space where you had to have faith and certainty and trust into something greater? Because sometimes in life, when I'm talking to people, you know, we got a five-year goal, a three-year goal, like this, that, and the third. But I'm at a point in my life where I have so much trust into the unseen, life intelligence, you know, God beyond infinite intelligence that if I'm in alignment with what I'm doing every day, God provides and life will always set me on a journey where I need to be. Not that I don't have fear, not that I don't struggle, but I've kind of moved out of that space of like, oh my God, let me control this. Or if pain comes or darkness come, I'm frantic. I'm just like, okay, maybe this is what I need to endure. But what in your life has also caused you to have deeper faith because of a shadow, a dark experience?
Community and Divine Trust
00:14:36
Speaker
In my earlier years, I've kind of always had trust that life would work out for me, you know, ah and in certain ways. And I think that the earlier version of school was fine. Everything was kind of working out and structurally. I and i was okay with the way life played out in terms of success and meeting these certain benchmarks or things like that. So I think I trusted that super early. And I was just privileged to have that.
00:15:00
Speaker
ah But in terms of, I guess, you know, after the fact of after experiencing success in my life and then experiencing extreme, like deep, like losing a brother is profoundly challenging, to to say the least. Wow.
00:15:12
Speaker
But then being able to, for people to be pulled into my life, even during that time, even as I'm sort of masking and performing and trying to still continue on this trajectory hold while holding deep pain, it really pulled certain people into my life, beautiful people, you know, loved ones,
00:15:29
Speaker
bonding with my family more, even even specifically my relationship, romantic relationships. I would say that I've been blessed in a lot of ways to to come in contact with women and now now a specific woman to be able who or who are capable of holding those wounds in a way. So really women have taught me ah in a way to be vulnerable in a way and to to kind of relax like the specific romantic space and in a relationship to be able to to to be able as a man to just kind of let go and to be able to cry and to be able to to to be that vulnerable and to not fall off the face of the earth. Right.
00:16:07
Speaker
is is is something I really felt like kept me buoyant in some and sometimes times ah of darkness. And in choosing a life partner now, that's something to be able to know that that person has has got your back in those dark times. I think that, and also seeing my parents do that, you know, and seeing their relationship and their marriage be sustained over several decades, 30 plus years, et cetera, like seeing that modeled and then being able to see that as a possibility for myself, I think that's what it is. It's just trusting that I could lean on other people is what was is what kept me through stuff. Because you know being a lone wolf or trying to be that man that pulls he himself by his bootstraps and just does it and just grinds through, you know that burns out. At some point, going reach the limit of that. And then what else you have left?
00:16:53
Speaker
You have other people. You need somebody else to reach out. You need a hand. You need a soft place to land. Yeah, that really, honestly, that's the real answer. Your blueprint was kind of set up for to see togetherness in some capacity. Whether it was happy or not, that you still had. yeah right And so then I think about my life where I didn't have mom and dad together. I didn't see that. I saw a lot of separation. I saw a lot of dysfunction.
00:17:17
Speaker
And so it's so funny that... I put a lot of my energy into God, right? That was what I had to lean on or trust, right? And then I got to a space where when I was in darkness, I wanted to lean on people, but...
00:17:36
Speaker
they couldn't hold the lean in the way I needed it or was my soul needed it. I went back to God. And the more I would go back to God and really, ah here's the thing, like you said, leaning into your woman and was vulnerable and let go with God, God brought me the people I could lean on.
00:17:54
Speaker
Exactly. Yeah. You get what I'm saying? Because sometimes our leans are different, different in, we, not we, you and I, but some of us, we lean on the wrong people. Like for years, i always, um I love helping people. I love giving.
00:18:11
Speaker
God was showing me and telling me like, I love that you give, but you're giving to the wrong souls. Their soul's essence can't receive the medicine you're trying to give them. So it repelling and you're getting upset because they're not even asking for what you're giving, but because they have a title, family, friend, associate, you think they want that. So I'm learning now who should give to, Right.
00:18:36
Speaker
And why it's safer for me to receive because I'm not playing the middle with myself. I'm all in and who I am, my shadow and my light. And like someone like you, I know my soul called you into the podcast space to have this discussion. hmm.
00:18:53
Speaker
Because I feel like in the world, we don't have enough of these as men. And people are always comparing, but pain is pain. yeah I'll tell people, doesn't matter your demographic, your class. but You know, i had someone say years ago, you know, and they say the challenges are different, but the emotions are the same.
00:19:11
Speaker
Yeah. So your experience, my experience, they're all one and the same. We still need people. And I realized that God put people in your life to represent its essence in your life, to lean on them, to give you more faith when you don't have it.
00:19:27
Speaker
And that's why vulnerability or support team, i.e. family, friends or associates matter, because And I think what I'm learning is how to trust that part of life now or and and let and allow myself to lean on people and and receive from their lesson.
00:19:45
Speaker
For you, you talked about your partner, because I feel the same way in my relating, is that I remember having a very personal conversation with my woman. And Anthony, the thing about it in my mind, i was so afraid to express what I had in my mind. But in my body, we go back to what you said earlier, feeling I knew I had to tell her.
00:20:08
Speaker
So ah in my mind, I'm like, man, this is, i don't know. And it's so crazy. As soon as I told her what I felt, she's like, it's okay. It's just life. It happens.
00:20:19
Speaker
I was like... My shoulders drop. Yeah. So I created this story about something that I felt was so heavy and deep. And I feel like I gave it more power than it deserved because someone was able to take it and hold it lightly and not give it stress that I was giving it. So again, and this is why I think it's important, you know, as men, if I had these conversations, but.
00:20:46
Speaker
for women to listen in and for men and women to listen to be a part of the experience together that we can hold heavy things lightly and we can also hold each other together if we're meant to be. Sure. But I want to create a space, at least in the podcast and with the work I do, especially pretty sure the work you do, where both parties all up in the world feel safe to be human, to be themselves,
00:21:10
Speaker
to speak their truth and not be judged and not receive resistance, you know? Yeah. And and I appreciate you sharing that. And I think about, you know, the masculine impulse so
Controlling Others' Experiences
00:21:22
Speaker
it's to some men and maybe like you or me are you know, men who who are conditioned in a certain way who want to control and think it's our job has to to do that that. And like even the holding of the withholding of truth is is a control mechanism and think, yeah,
00:21:35
Speaker
You are sort of saving somebody from reality by holding the burden of this thing and not letting them experience it, that you're doing some some service to them by by by hiding that reality. lay yeah You got you got to you got to have yeah you gotta to be able to let people...
00:21:51
Speaker
face the truth to be able to make their own decisions because it's really it's not honoring their autonomy when you're withholding the truth from them. You're robbing them of free will. You're trying to control their reaction and their response to life by by manipulating the context of what they know and receive. That's, you know, that's not a good thing. So you got to be honest and let them respond. I think about J. Cole. This is a, this is kind of ah a A refrain in my head. Anytime I feel myself going into this hero, hero complex thinking, I'm the one that's going to protect somebody.
00:22:25
Speaker
Just don't save her. So you don't want to be saved. That's not your job. It's not your job is to be the savior. You just, that's not your job. You don't save anybody. And some people have to go through lessons on their own.
00:22:37
Speaker
And they all have a timing and a process. And that's God's work. It's not yours. you just yeah You're just a conduit. And he's working on you, too. So just release the control of trying to to save people and to move them through a process that they have their own timing with that's beyond anybody's control. The best thing you can do is go through or I can do is go through my own process and maybe be a witness to what transformation looks like in certain ways. And maybe that inspires something, but I'm not doing anything to try to make that happen for somebody else. Yeah. It's impossible. And it's draining. Yeah, it's draining. Yeah.
00:23:09
Speaker
And but you'll end up dissatisfied and depleted. And you realize that you had no no power anyway to do anything. Yeah, it's so true. I think Jay-Z said two quotes that always stood out. He said, no matter where you are, there you are.
00:23:22
Speaker
Yeah. And then he said, I'm never giving a advice to someone if they don't ask the right question. So, you you know, that discernment, right? Like having discernment of when to speak, when not to speak. But what I want to say about withholding the truth, and this is like a...
00:23:36
Speaker
Not an oxymoron, but it' little it's a spiritual context of what I'm going to say is that people do withhold the truth to have um control and have power, right? Yeah. But also I experience in life where I got so much truth, I can't hold it. Exactly. Because energetically the truth is so heavy, so I can misplace the truth once I want to give it to them at the wrong time.
00:23:59
Speaker
That's true, too. Yeah. inact it's so hot And then they really can't receive it. And I'm like, oh, my God, messed up. Right. So how do you find that balance of when to give the truth, the timing of the truth and also being a evidence of the truth? Like you said, the witness. That's super important. And, you know, in my training in the last three years as in counseling psychology, that that really is the lesson is knowing when to step back and and just to be a witness and be hold space for people and not jump in too much and try to intervene too much in other people's processes. You just kind of hold it so it can kind of naturally emerge like you would a child. You don't try to you just let the child grow because they're going to grow anyway and just kind of doing that process. But there is discernment. And I think especially when choosing partners or choosing people you're around it is true that some people might have different nervous system structures. yeah And sometimes what your capacity is is not the same as somebody else's. And I think being an attunement to that and knowing how much somebody can receive is super important, but also having the discernment of choosing somebody that resonates with your frequency. And that kind of that kind of goes with the work that I do, you know specifically with individuals, helping them map the sort of internal architecture of who they are and how they operate so then you can make the right choices about who matches your own
00:25:15
Speaker
and sort of geometry so that you're not in a situation where you have to hold back your authenticity in order to manage somebody else's lack of capacity or or vice versa. That's where you're in this asymmetrical relationship um where it's too asymmetric to the point where you can't grow at your pace without this this without the burden of somebody else's development. You should be able to be in a parallel process and And then also ultimately the ideal to me is to be in process toward a higher thing, bigger than both of you, which it can be spiritual. can be God. Yeah. But it's, uh, you have to have discernment to make those choices. Yeah.
00:25:53
Speaker
Yeah. Not everybody's the same. Yeah. And then a lot of people are not even team to the atonement of their discernment to know, what that it actually means or even how that feels, right? Go back to the feeling self. Yeah.
00:26:05
Speaker
I'm curious. I want to not play devil's advocate, but I want to give a scenario. I'm curious of your perspective. And I think the audience, I think people listening will appreciate this. Okay. So you have a guy.
00:26:16
Speaker
Yep. You have a girl. And the guy, his whole life, had to take care of himself. He was in survival mode. And through that survival mode, he became successful. The breadwinner in the family, take care of his mom. um His dad really wasn't around like that, but, you know, he's around.
00:26:33
Speaker
And then he gets to a point where only thing he's lacking is like, damn, I got all the success, but I don't have love. Right. But in his relating and his and his experiences, he keep attracting partners who wants a father.
00:26:47
Speaker
Right. And he gets high off of taking care of people like he's the savior. Right. Yeah. But in the beginning of these situations, so now he was the first situation was five years. The second situation is three years because the first one didn't work. But the second situation is like the first one. So now he is aware like, oh, this is a pattern, right?
00:27:06
Speaker
And then that pattern was happening for him in the beginning. The partner, the woman, she loves it. He's taking care everything. He's providing. He's protecting.
00:27:17
Speaker
But then it's starting to get to a space where that person, the other person, doesn't have full autonomy. They might not feel like they have a purpose or meaning. And energetically, what's being separate of him is he's not allowing the relationship to flourish. He's not allowing and trusting the relationship to unfold.
00:27:36
Speaker
Because he wants to control it. He wants to be the quarterback of all things. But in his nervous system and his unconscious mind and body, that feels safe to take care because there was no masculine energy around. So I had to become the God of everything. And I'm successful. Look at me. I've taken care of my woman and this is the right.
00:27:53
Speaker
Sure. But he's not happy because now he's hitting his wall that he hit in the first relationship and the second. so He's like, how do I get into a more authentic oldness, radical wholeness space where I'm allowing my feminine to come up and soften myself and not be so heavy in my masculine? How does that person get out of that space?
00:28:17
Speaker
containment of always being in the mask and always providing, doing, controlling, and receive life instead of controlling. it How does a person shift into that dynamic? Yeah, no, it's it's important. I think at least with this kind of person in this case study, the first thing is that they're starting to become aware, at least, of a pattern that's happening. So that's's that's actually a very good step. that they're ready for transformation, they're and they're noticing they're stuck in something. And I think the next step for that person that I would i would think about, healing is necessary. I mean, they they have to go on healing journey and they have to understand what's happening to create that pattern. So I'll give like, in response to your case study, I'll give a metaphor. So think about a diamond, for example. yeah Where a diamond is formed is that you have this sort of molecule of carbon.
00:29:02
Speaker
And then over time, the the carbon around it gets sort of attracted to it and it starts to build a sort of structure around this initial molecule structure. And then you start to compress it at heat, at a time. And over a lot of time, it just hardens into this very specific shape that's really based on that really initial structure of carbons that started millions of years ago. So I think the work that this person has to do they're starting to see the structure. They're starting to see a shape in this. man
00:29:33
Speaker
But they need to go deeper into that that really fundamental moment that is that initial molecule that that that set the whole shape in motion after it. All these layers, you have to break that down and get to that first step of how did the shape get formed in the first place. And once you become aware of not just the shape, but how the shape was formed, then you can start making new decisions from the truth of What created that? if this is If I know this created this shape, it's something that happened either externally or the environment or even just how you are, then you can start to reshape it once you gain an awareness of what it actually is. So that's going to require a lot of deep work. Get into the root of things. yeah And it sounds like it could be some traumatic trauma history and things and some... those that When I talked about earlier, coming in contact with those wounds, understanding
The Journey of Introspection and Healing
00:30:22
Speaker
that...
00:30:22
Speaker
all the way down to go into the wound, the painful, like you press into an open, it's going to hurt. It's like a deep tissue massage. Exactly. yeah Even deeper. It's like surgery. It's like cutting surgery. You have to cut into it you have to you have it. It hurts more first before you get to the healing part because you have to cut. through dead tissue, you have to cut through brokenness, rupture, you have to get all the way in there and then you get to that part and then you rebuild the scaffolding from that healthy tissue that you got to the bottom of. and So, um yeah, it's going to be a little bit more pain, but it's going to be healing pain. Healing pain. I love that. that I never heard of healing pain. Yeah, because correct me if I'm wrong, because I want to talk a little bit briefly about, you know, plant medicine, mushrooms, like psychedelics, because in in my trajectory of life and doing work and I think the work works, right? You know, the prayer, the meditation, and breath work, reprogramming the subconscious, shifting hypnotherapy, all this stuff, shifting, shifting you know, the paradigm.
00:31:22
Speaker
But I realized with stuff that's so deeply rooted, like this diamond you're talking about, this pressure that's at the root of this thing, that's one that comes up, but it's so um suffocating because the person is trying to keep it so tied away because of that pain they don't want to reach again. Maybe it started when they were young. Yeah.
00:31:40
Speaker
And I can't say this is the only way because I don't think plant medicine is for everyone. But I believe like something like psychedelics helps that process. I can't say that it's easier. i think it's more potent and more quicker to get to the truth that they've been holding or it's holding for long to kind of open that part up.
00:31:58
Speaker
and not be such a long process to get out of because it's a pattern, right? And once you get to that root to understand like, oh, wow, this happened at seven years old when my mom told me she was going to do something, she didn't do it. And then I asked my father, then he didn't do it. So this has put me on a journey. like i'm not going to ask for no help. going to take care everybody. I'm going successful, right? Mm-hmm.
00:32:21
Speaker
But then you hit that pinnacle of success knowing that the anchor of that success is pain that you never acknowledge or express. yeah But you're going to get all the excess and you're still going to feel pain because you're not being honest about why you had the success. You didn't feel enough. You didn't feel worthy. So you had to prove yourself. So it was like an inauthentic ah anchor.
00:32:41
Speaker
to push that, to
Psychedelics and Personal Growth
00:32:43
Speaker
get that. And then now you realize like, why am I still, I'm not learning a lesson. So what is your take on psychedelics? And do you, are you in that space? I think when we spoke offline, you spoke a little bit about it, i just want to know your experiences within it. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the school I went to it in San Francisco, California Institute of Integral Studies, they're known for their, I mean, they even in like the seventies and the work they've done in transpersonal psychology and a lot of The work they've done and even the um just the the philosophy of the school is rooted in these um psychological and consciousness processes to really expand you into you know new spaces and healing and all that. And a lot of it is around psychedelics.
00:33:21
Speaker
They do have a curriculum and that kind of stuff, too. So i've I've learned through that, like in the program that I was I was in, it was about. Not just psychedelics was it was it was an initial interest because before the program and I had a healing journey for myself or actually a guy in Chicago. He, um you know, he calls himself a a shaman or a death doula and those kind of ways. He actually helped me process some grief with the the use of psychedelics and and that I was able to kind of sidestep some of the pain I was hoping.
00:33:50
Speaker
see it differently, like not not to erase the pain, but just really change my perspective on it to really be able to hold it and still live without being sort of weighted down by it and to really expand. So psychedelics certainly helped me with that. And then that became a journey to how can I then sort of build the integrity for myself to help other people go through a process like that. So I was like, I'm going to go to grad school. I'm going to be able to gain the skill set. So not just to really gain the reverence and respect to be able to hold the medicine in a way that is in a healing way. i think, so yeah, I'm certainly in that space and I've experienced it myself.
00:34:27
Speaker
And now I've built the hands that can hold somebody through that. mis the i so do and And the heart too. And and I think it's it's beautiful, powerful energy. And I think um I would just continue to say that it has to be a approach of reverence reverence and and skill in order for that, those positive outcomes to come. But yeah, the future for that, who knows? honestly think a lot of people could benefit from some some psychedelic assisted therapy or psychedelic ah journeys and and and retreats and things like that. A lot of beautiful work being done in those spaces. So it's helped me. it sounds like, you know. Yeah. Reverence. Yeah. like It's true. i mean, I was called to it and then i the call, I answered it and it shifted my frequency and ate that and allowed me to, whew.
00:35:13
Speaker
I cleared it by, bro. I can feel it like, damn, I'm different. So now I'm just, you know, in a process of continuing to e evolve in that space in a healthy way. um but Before we get off here, I want to tap in just a little bit. I know we ain't got to talk.
00:35:27
Speaker
And I just had two more questions. But the first question is, what did your journey on being on a Bachelorette do for you in your life that gave you a different perspective to be who you are today?
Lessons from The Bachelorette
00:35:37
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, in a way, that was kind of psychedelic a little bit, too, because, you know, going through life in a certain way, and then you kind of, at least my experience, is stepping into a whole different arena that just changed my trajectory and my perspective on on just how I was navigating life. I would honestly say it was life-changing in ways.
00:35:56
Speaker
I didn't lean into certain aspects of it, like personally, because I wanted to go, but I gained some value from it in a way that allowed me to reach this moment. But I think it allowed me at least to get more awareness of relationships. And I'll say that because it's really not the the experience on the TV show itself. I mean, of course, meeting people like you and and and and the guys and stuff, but really the the aftershock of it. Yeah. How it continues, because that's a longer, that's a longer journey. The only, it's like, you get like a month or something, whatever, two months, maybe, maybe.
00:36:26
Speaker
depending how long do you stay or whatever. And then yeah that it's like, how was it then? How was your, how do you integrate that experience? Because even now as like eight years later or something like that, there's still this, it doesn't really disappear. It's it's like it it has sort of changed in a permanent way. So, but I see how I've seen how I've changed and i see how my change actually impacts the people in my life and that kind of way. So yeah,
00:36:51
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's it's just been life changing. No, I mean, I think i think i I really appreciate your, I don't know if the word is clarent dissenting or clarent audio. Like it's like a it's like you got a gif on like how you speak.
00:37:03
Speaker
It's like you were speaking to me and about it, but you just made me realize it wasn't about the two months. It wasn't about the two months. It was the aftershot. And you just taught me by speaking. This is always empower people to speak up or ask questions because you don't know who you're helping. When you said the after shot, you made me understand how I have a gift of integrating experiences into my life. Because off of that one show, seven, eight years, I built from just that show.
00:37:33
Speaker
Yeah. But it was the energy of me integrating everything I had grew in within that space. And I think that's the part about the work you do and the work we're doing that I want to give to the world is how do we properly embody our experiences where they become our life and not just a moment, not just one month, not just two months. Like, oh, I was on a show.
00:37:54
Speaker
Like, because like me thinking about it I don't know how i actually did it. Like the formula wise, like my structure, but I know I do it a lot. Like I will get something and then I'll apply and then it'll be in my life. Yeah. We have our own process with integration. i think, uh, Yeah. Can you explain that? Like, what's the proper way or what's the simplest way for someone to integrate a phenomenal experience or or knowledge or education where it becomes their life and not just knowledge
Integrating Knowledge into Habits
00:38:23
Speaker
base? It's more feeling base. It's in the body. So it's in your life more. Yeah.
00:38:26
Speaker
Yeah, you say it. I mean, I'm going to go back to I started this conversation. You got to get in your body. i think taking this new knowledge that you have and then using it to to then change the way you approach life and and not just intellectually, but in ah in a habit way. Got it. What do you do daily?
00:38:43
Speaker
How do your daily practices transform based on this new information you've received? now take that's And then you take changing your daily practice tomorrow and you do that over and over again. And you're a new person in like in a year because what you do daily is um you have a different schedule than than than the previous person you've had, just to keep that super simple. But yeah you yeah, daily practice, change the way you move after you change the way you're thinking. And I think that that it has to align. Yeah. Yeah, that's beautiful. That's the integration. Yeah, that's beautiful because it's crazy. Like ah like he said, because I had a podcast prior then I literally changed the location of this one. So it's so funny. Different environment, right? Different person, right?
Embracing Spiritual Fitness
00:39:25
Speaker
a Last question. When you think of spiritual fitness, what what comes to you? What does that mean to you?
00:39:30
Speaker
You know, i like those two words together. I think that it makes sense because it takes spirituality out of it being just kind of this sort of woo-woo, sort immaterial, sort of vibe-y thing, and it takes it into a thing that you can get better at. it takes it into a thing that you can measure, that you can practice, that you can actually, um yeah, that you can get in the gym and you can be with people and doing it. It just it just makes it something accessible. And something that's actually beneficial to you in a very real way. So i like I like how you've connected those two concepts. Yeah, because, I mean, it's something that came to me through doing the work, right, on the journey. But this what we just did in a podcast and it's containment. This was spiritual fitness. And we was mentally, emotionally, spiritually becoming fit together because you were saying things that was connected to things. And I was like, oh, God, gotta ask him this because I know we're in a pot. You know what I'm saying? Like, it felt safe. It felt right. And I think that's what I want people to feel in everyday life. How can I be myself energetically, mentally? socially, physically, financially, spiritually, to be fit to be who I naturally am and not feel judged or fear until our life just flows through us like we did in this conversation. Not have it to be no outcome, only the income, and the income is the process of the purpose we're in right now in this moment. It's the fitness. It's uncomfortable sometimes. And I think that needs to be a part of the process too, is that you're feeling discomfort, but then ultimately you're going to adapt and expand and get stronger. So I think that's the part, not make people deluded that spirituality is just soft and happy. Right. Lovey-dovey. Sometimes this feels, sometimes you get sore after doing a workout, of course. so It's heavy. It's heavy and you get stronger. So, yeah. I love that.
00:41:14
Speaker
Well, A.B., Anthony, thank you again for your time. Where can we find you? How can we get into the containment of you? How can we work with you? What do you offer? Like, give us the whole spiel. I will put in the show notes, but I would love to hear from you. Sure. Website is anthonybattle.com. You know, Instagram, SirAnthonyBattle. I do individual work. I like to help people figure out their own structure so they can move through life in a very aware way.
00:41:37
Speaker
in a way, noticing themselves and also coming to healthy relationships with other people. So I do that kind of work too. And I have some other projects in in the tech and the AI space to really kind of help support what's happening in different relational fields. But I can, you know, that'll that'll come up later in different in places. But yeah, if you want some individual one-on-one work or even working with a couple, trying to gain more awareness, elevate your consciousness, embody experiences, integrate, you know, you can hit me up on my, my even mya my website or my Instagram and a schedule a session.
00:42:06
Speaker
Yes. Schedule a session after me battle, conscious guide, let's continue to guide people's consciousness for their higher self. Thank you, brother. i appreciate you. People, you know, follow him, get into his Instagram, build rapport, go to the website, book a session, but more importantly, subscribe to the podcast and And listen to this episode over and over because I believe integration takes repetition.
00:42:31
Speaker
Sure. Right. And the more you listen to something, you grab new things for new experiences, for a new paradigm and timeline. But this is it. Spiritual fitness podcast. Thank you. Once again, we are out.
00:42:43
Speaker
Peace.
00:42:46
Speaker
Thank you for joining us on the Spiritual Fitness Podcast. We hope today's episode has inspired you and provided valuable insights for your holistic health journey. By blood to spirituality and physical wellness, you can strengthen your body, mind, and soul.
00:43:02
Speaker
If you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe, rate, and leave a review. Until next time, stay strong, stay inspired, and remember, it's miracle season.