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Essence Over Form
68 Plays5 years ago
Essence Over Form is a mindset you can apply to increase awareness, agency, and connection with how you engage with life. It has been a powerful paradigm shift personally and professionally with clients who want to live a fully engaged life. We discuss what it means and how it presents across different areas of life, as well as personal experience in application.
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Transcript
Introduction and Listener Engagement
00:00:01
Speaker
Hello. I beat you. Hello. Hello. You did beat me. Um, hopefully you didn't scream to the microphone. We, um, I think we have a good topic today. I think we have,
00:00:24
Speaker
we've gotten a couple questions, comments, kind of things to talk about. And I think that this topic today kind of has roots in all of them. So, and I don't know why I feel compelled to say this, but I guess because I don't know the world of Instagram or whatever. I do want to say again, and I think we've said this, but like, this is our,
00:00:53
Speaker
perception our take on things like I don't there's many people with many ideas and things to share and by no means do we think this is our opinions are the only ones out there and this is a forum for us to share with people things that have worked for us you know your work but I guess I just want to be clear that we're not the people saying like flying the flag that's saying
00:01:20
Speaker
Listen to us. We're the only, you know, we're, we have the answers. Yeah. Cause there's a lot of that out there and I don't want to be part of that movement. No, I don't either, which was one of the main reasons I hesitated with even starting a podcast. And for those who have been listening from the beginning, they know what it was where it was just me talking.
00:01:46
Speaker
And I think either it had to have been in the first episode I had said like I don't want to contribute to the noise and I think that that's part of the Environment where everyone's trying to steal your attention and that's the last thing we want to do we'd like to be gifted your attention, but That's on like the listener and it is also
00:02:09
Speaker
It is also worth saying that we are very appreciative of you, the listener, someone that is giving us the most precious commodity of time.
Essence Over Form: Concept Introduction
00:02:21
Speaker
Yeah, and I think we've been very open about it, but we certainly don't have all of our stuff figured out at all. No. We've made progress with things, and that's the point of being able to share with people some of the things that have worked for us in some of our struggles and
00:02:39
Speaker
That's really the purpose of it. Not to say we're free of problems or struggles and having the same things come up again. It's just, that's kind of the space we're all in. And it's just a place to share what's maybe if someone can take something away from it and make it their own. So. Yeah. So that said, that was interesting. That caught me off guard. I didn't know.
00:03:04
Speaker
Was listening to the Scott McGee strong fit podcast and he said Scott McGee he's the guy that does the CCU podcast. Yeah, and they were talking about how he Operates his podcast and there's like all this stuff with it. But one of the things he said is he opens with a right hook with people so like he's kind of opposed to the like interview resume style
00:03:30
Speaker
podcasts were like, okay, so Bill, I hear, you know, you've been a Green Beret, like, let's hear kind of what you've done. And he opens with a question that kind of catches people off guard to start them a little bit off, like, Oh, wow, this isn't gonna be like that. Not that that's what that was. But it just made me think of that caught you off guard.
00:03:49
Speaker
Call me off guard. Yeah. Yeah. Which is good, I think, to be caught off guard, at least in the way I see it, because that's then real. Right. And... It's not scripted. It's not scripted. It's not obviously, like, we don't have, we don't know. We know what we're talking about today, but other than that, we have no idea where.
00:04:11
Speaker
It's going to go. And to be caught off guard is to also be like involved and engaged in whatever it is you're doing. And so, man, what a boring thing it would be if you knew everything coming up. So that is definitely, that is definitely cool.
00:04:32
Speaker
And actually, there's a question. So I put up on Instagram, we're recording today, if you have any questions, you know, we'll, we'll maybe have some time at the end to answer them or to talk about them or whatever. And somebody wrote in about
00:04:48
Speaker
like powerful Journal questions prompts prompts It was about prompts. Yeah, and I think it's kind of related to what we're saying about either being caught off guard or it'll be kind of the topic but the so I want to come back to this at the end and just revisit some things but That's not what we're gonna talk about today last week. We had the Q&A and
00:05:15
Speaker
there were some good things there. One of them was like how to deal with, one of them that was common were questions that was how to deal with habitual behaviors, how to raise awareness about
00:05:32
Speaker
Mindless habits, stuff you keep doing, like the loop. And we sort of talked about it, and I think we said, okay, we could probably dive into that a little bit more. And so as we started to chat about it more this morning, it was less about like, how do we answer this direct question?
00:05:48
Speaker
and more so, how does this question and how do these behaviors both with myself, yourself, and clients we work with, where does that fall into maybe a bit bigger of an idea?
Essence in Fitness and Nutrition
00:06:04
Speaker
And that's kind of what led us back to something that we talk about often, and that's essence over form.
00:06:14
Speaker
And one of the things that I don't think I've publicly talked about it. I know I've worked on, worked on it with people, but that is something that has been very, it's been a paradigm shift, at least for me, in terms of how you view things, how you approach things and how you really do engage with things.
00:06:37
Speaker
It also, I was just thinking about it before. It's another reason why, uh, between the ears and strong fit have a lot of overplay and interplay and interlap overlap and interplay, um, in the physical, that would be tension over position. So essence over form is a.
00:07:02
Speaker
way of looking at how you're doing something, why you're doing something, um, how you approach something and, and, and engage with it. So, I don't know, maybe you, what is it like, how, what's your experience? Right. So, I mean, we tend to go to different places on this, but I think, um, I try to like, Charlie is eating our wall.
00:07:32
Speaker
I try to bring it back to like something concrete. And I do think like the physical stuff is a, it helps like frame the concept in a tangible way. So like, for me, essence over form would be my relationship with working out has been like, just get it done. Just complete the tasks. These are the tasks for the day. I'm going to get them done.
00:08:01
Speaker
Check the box. That would be like the form. I went and I worked out, I did it. The essence of it would be, what was the value I got out of it? Was I present? Like what actually happened? So I think in a fitness type of thing, it's, you know, what's really happening? Where are you present? What are you extracting from it? Not just checking the box.
00:08:31
Speaker
doing what it looks like. So I was saying in the world of fitness, like for me, its essence of reform would be like, not just form would be like doing the workout, it says I'm going to do this, I'm gonna go to the gym and take the box versus the essence is like, why am I there? What am I getting out of it? Am I present? It doesn't have to be some super ethereal thing, but just actually participating and having
00:08:58
Speaker
There's a word you use and I keep forgetting it, not ownership. Agency. Agency in it. Yeah. Yeah. So that's kind of a way to look at it. Like form is just like, it looks like that. If I look out at the class, it's like they're here, they did it, but I don't know if they're really getting the essence of it. Like, right. So those are two different things.
00:09:19
Speaker
Yeah. That's a big one. And that's a big one when we look at if somebody's doing something habitually and mindlessly, it might, you know, that's not to say that's necessarily bad, but because it was submitted by a couple of people, it's worth looking into. And so for me, you know, essence over form,
00:09:40
Speaker
The essence of it is really the richness and the value and the, you know, the good stuff that's contained within whatever it is. And the form is just the packaging. You know, the form is maybe what it looks like on the outside, but doesn't have, doesn't necessarily, the form can be there, but it doesn't provide the value that is contained within it.
00:10:04
Speaker
I mean, really you could apply it to everything. Like we were talking about recently mindful eating. Like you've worked with people with that and diet and nutrition. And this is such a, I think the fitness world has made nutrition more of a form thing versus like the essence of it. Like, you know, so you can look at that also like you might, um,
00:10:31
Speaker
eat these foods, check those boxes, yep, I got all my numbers and whatever, but what's the essence of your relationship with food? And did you sit down and did you share a meal? Was it social? Whatever it is, were you mindfully eating or is it just like?
00:10:45
Speaker
The food was ingested. Right. Yeah. And that's a big thing where I don't know if everyone, and this is, you know, putting myself into that everyone category, obviously always knows what the essence is, but that's then where the opportunity is. So
Self-Awareness and Preventing Burnout
00:11:03
Speaker
if you're going to the gym,
00:11:06
Speaker
And you don't, and you haven't revisited like what is the essence of it? What is the value of it? What is, what am I getting out of it? What am I bringing to it?
00:11:18
Speaker
then it's only natural to think that it would be a habitual activity that might not provide fulfillment, that you might not enjoy, that you might actually not have. You're not really participating in it. No. You're kind of disconnected. And then what's interesting is someone asked about burnout and kind of like that type of thing does definitely lead to burnout. When you're not really fully invested, you're sort of disconnected. You're going through the motions.
00:11:47
Speaker
I think that's where like burnout can happen. Yeah. I think that the burnout is the, I don't have any statistics for this obviously. So just my observation and opinion.
00:12:01
Speaker
Burnout is not, there's not a magic point in which you're like, I have reached burnout. Like if you work 80 hours a week, then on 81 hours, you're going to burnout. It doesn't work that way. You know, there's people, we've both, there's plenty of people out there who've been in positions where it's like, holy crap, that's like a marathon effort at a sprint pace. You're not burned out.
00:12:28
Speaker
And while that's obviously not something that's probably long term, it's like, well, no, it's frankly, the burnout is the death by a thousand cuts. And if you are not really invested in what you're doing and extracting the essence out of what you're doing, then yes, the form, it doesn't have to be. I mean, there are plenty of people who are burned out that work low stress jobs.
00:12:54
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that's like, you know, I had a call with an affiliate owner yesterday, new affiliate owner. And I was really impressed, like works full time, comes home, says hello to his kids, then goes right to the gym and runs that whole gym by himself. And super energetic. I mean, I talked to him, it was 10 o'clock at night over in Europe and he was like on, you know, and it was like that, having that passion. Well, yes, he's probably working 80 hours a week.
00:13:24
Speaker
He's fired up about it versus someone that may be working 30, but they're just totally uninspired by their job. They're burned out on Monday. So yeah, I think though that also leads to like people want to have, and we've talked about this before.
00:13:39
Speaker
um the kind of pattern or like the rules like so for me if i'm feeling burned out immediately it kind of goes to the the form or the numbers well like i shouldn't be burned out because i did only do three days and then i took a rest day like you know what i mean or by the data or by the numbers or by the form of it but like if you maybe went really hard like that just looking at what it looked like on paper if it was like a really intensive
00:14:10
Speaker
couple intensive workouts, you had maybe some other things going on in your life, kind of stress, like, it's not just like a pattern that repeats itself. Three days on one day off, three days on one day off, like, today's not a rest day, I don't get to take it. It's like the essence of it is, okay, whatever happened in those three days that maybe didn't happen a month ago when I trained for three days, like,
00:14:31
Speaker
Okay. That maybe warrants a day, two days, three days of rest. But I think we tend to want to like find a pattern, repeat it. And that is when it starts to push us towards the, the form over essence, I think. Well, yeah. And the pattern form, the pattern creates comfort.
00:14:52
Speaker
pattern creates, you know what to expect and that gets delivered. So your brain is like, all right, I don't need to pay attention. And so you stop. And so there's a whole, this is like well documented within any like elite sport, performance, the outside sport, like pianists and stuff where I forget the exact phrase of it. There's a pretty cool book called the sports gene.
00:15:20
Speaker
a bit long winded and kind of like get on with it. But they talk about that and skill acquisition and someone can probably tell me what it is. But the name is escaping me. But essentially you get a point where it's like, I no longer have to pay attention. And that's not where the masters actually are. That's the people that kind of peek and burn out or are good, but never go to that next level.
00:15:44
Speaker
And so the pattern of constantly having your expectation come true turns your brain off in a sense. Well, and it's also like, that's just not realistic for how the human body, if you're looking at the body, for example, or life, like life doesn't happen in a pattern. So speaking for myself, like, um, I fall into that trap with like nutrition.
00:16:13
Speaker
this is working really well, start something new. Like when I first started auto regulation, kind of navigated my way. And then all of a sudden it's like, all right, that's it. All I gotta do is keep repeating this. But like your body changes, the environment changes, things change, your life changed. And so it's like, you get stuck in like, well, why is this no longer this pattern, this formula working? And I think we all,
00:16:40
Speaker
Yeah, it's like a very strange thing. You try to kind of hold on to like this formula because it is comfortable. Like, okay, now all I have to do is do that. I don't have to work that hard anymore. But ironically, the, the benefit is in the working, the benefit is in the learning, exploring and navigating the changes. So, but if you're focused, if you don't have the ability to access the essence of it, then it feels just harder. Then that feels like a job like, Oh, now I got to figure out like what works. It's like, but.
00:17:09
Speaker
If the essence is to learn and to connect with your body, like then it's not a chore.
Exploring Personal Habits with Curiosity
00:17:17
Speaker
It's kind of like a process, what you're going for. So I think the perception is definitely the perspective matters. Yeah. And when you point to things and say, look, I did this and you, and you, um, just focus on the what you're generally in the form side of things.
00:17:37
Speaker
when you look at kind of how and we'll say why, but that's why is a little bit trickier. Um,
00:17:48
Speaker
how you approached is now we're trending towards, okay, extracting the essence. And so we can look at that from a movement standpoint, which is, which is okay. That's tangible. Like we'll take this. Did you talk about the squat at all? So we can take the squat, for example, there's plenty of people who squat and extract the essence of the movement, which is what, what is the essence of squatting?
00:18:14
Speaker
Right. So to use, you know, your glutes, your hamstrings, your quads, your midline, lower body. Move your joint through a range of motion, whatever that is. And engage the musculature. Right. Have the muscles. Contract your muscles. Work. Yes. There are those who squat with perfect form.
00:18:39
Speaker
as defined by different bodies, you know, there's hip crease below the knee. That's a cross. A non-crossed thing would be to 90 degrees and whatever that standard is. Sure. So there's people who squat with what you say was a form or what looks to be a squat from the outside, like, Oh wow. Yeah. That person's sweating. It's like, well, they're actually just bending their legs and their hips. They actually didn't engage any, I mean, sure. By nature of moving through a range of motion, your muscles are working.
00:19:09
Speaker
but they didn't actually connect to that muscle and engage it, even though from the outside perspective, they look like they're squatting. So they're achieving the form over someone that might be extracting the essence of it. Perhaps they don't go to a standard that looks like someone's definition of a squat, but they're really getting the essence of it, what they need to strengthen themselves and use their muscles. So that presents kind of,
00:19:38
Speaker
a dilemma then and is in contrast and in conflict with how a lot of the fitness industry has taught things. Yeah. Cause you can't put that, you can't put that. So for us in making those changes, the other challenges we can't identify if someone's getting the essence of the movement. I can't feel.
00:20:07
Speaker
what you're feeling in a squat. I don't know if you feel your glutes. I can see, it's much easier for me to see, are you doing it correctly by way of form? So that, I think that's where from a coaching perspective, it's like, well, that's kind of, it's too hard for me or the class of 15 people to know if everybody's using their glutes, but I can stand here and scan the room.
00:20:35
Speaker
and tell someone get their hips lower. That's doable. Figuring out if everybody's using their glutes much harder. So I think that the trend is like, well, okay, which one, how do you tackle that? Yeah. So that's, I think an area where when we look at like what the, from our perspective, what the ideal set up program is, you know,
00:21:04
Speaker
Part one is educating people. And we've seen it after 10, 11 years when we started implementing this stuff. There's people that have been doing this for 10 years and have never actually felt some of their muscles doing these movements. So now it's like, okay, how do we make that change? And so that requires a precursor step to like, okay, this is what it feels like to use this. So, um, but I think that's a hurdle for people because
00:21:33
Speaker
back to the identity thing. I mean, it is a very real thing, but if I'm not getting my hips below my knees, I'm less than. I'm doing less of a squat. I'm doing not to standard.
00:21:47
Speaker
you're playing someone else's game. And I think that that's part of the pitfall with this stuff, but it's so easy to play other people's game. That's the template that's living by someone else's design. Got it. It helps to be guided and supported and coached and encouraged. And we're not saying just fucking anarchy for all, but like,
00:22:15
Speaker
Where is your agency? Where is your buy-in? Where is your contribution? Where is your control to some degree on your experience? And so we often say living a fully engaged life and that's what it is.
00:22:30
Speaker
And nobody can make you pay attention other than you. Yes, there's tips and tricks. You can meditate. You can nasal breathe. You can clean up your nutrition. You can stop looking at the phone. But those tips and tricks are worthless if you don't do it. And if you don't...
00:22:47
Speaker
actually show up and participate then it's not going to happen and everything else then is just the form. You meditating because they say to meditate is the form. You going to the gym because exercise is good for you is the form. You journaling. You journaling. The journaling is a great one and the journaling is a great one. It's like I'm journaling and I'm not getting it and it's like what are you trying to get out of it?
00:23:12
Speaker
And and really what that that's another thing like what are you trying to get out of a journaling? And then they'll usually say well, I want to get better at this out of the other and it's like, okay The only way you're gonna journal correctly There's a couple rules. It's got to be honest. It's got to be judgment free and you and you do need to start but aside from that the fourth rule isn't to plan the rest of your life or To figure out this problem
Integrating Essence into Daily Life
00:23:38
Speaker
at work. It's not it's it's for
00:23:42
Speaker
The purpose of it is to not have a purpose. It's an unintentional discovery. And that's kind of the thing like.
00:23:51
Speaker
with so much of the journaling, it's like I'm journaling to get this. It doesn't, it's, that's not how it goes. To have someone say, did I do this right? You know, and I think that's, I think that's normal. You know, we have clients and certainly people in class and whatever, whether it's a workout, a movement, like am I doing this right? It does. And for some of that stuff, it's like, I don't know. Are you like,
00:24:19
Speaker
I'm not your judge on that. Now I get it certain movements and things like that. It's not a blanket statement, but like, well, I don't know. Like, what did you feel in it? Whether that's a movement or journaling, like, did you get something out of it? Like those are, you can't always be looking for someone else to tell you, did you do it right? I think that's what's interesting about making some choices too with like, and I'd had a conversation with someone this morning about this, you know, being a coach or helping coach someone.
00:24:49
Speaker
isn't, and you've talked about this a lot, isn't just you imparting your goals or what you want on that person. So for instance, for us,
00:25:03
Speaker
Yes. Sandbags doing sandbag cleans. Like there's reasons that we think those are really valuable. But if there's a person that can safely and effectively like clean a barbell and they enjoy the barbell for them, like, yeah, that's essence of reform. It would be just as wrong for us to say like, no, you have to only do sandbag cleans. But that person has to know like, well, why am I making that choice? And that's where I think when we started implementing that at the class level of making choices, it's like,
00:25:32
Speaker
people are kind of caught off guard. They are not prepared to connect to like, I don't know, why would I do this or this? Which do I want to do? And we found, I think people are getting better at it, but initially it was kind of like, well, just tell me what to do. And that's where it's like, as you're saying, like.
00:25:49
Speaker
That's kind of in that category of form. Like I can't tell you that. Which do you feel would be extracting the essence of this for you? Enjoyment, whatever it is. And that's something that people aren't used to connecting with. And I think that takes a while. It's not an overnight thing, but that's really where the benefits going to be. Not just saying I came to the gym for 21 days straight. I did the work like.
00:26:14
Speaker
What? Okay. What? Who cares? Who's keeping score? You know, that's so. Yeah. Shifting gears outside of the gym too, because I don't want to just stay there.
00:26:30
Speaker
You can look at this in relationships as well or conversations and stuff. And the form of it would be like, yeah, we went to dinner or we had a chat and, or you just look around like we're spending quality. We're spending time together. Right. Everybody's on their phone. Yeah. Right. You, you were co-located in the same room and you ingested food. That's the facts. Is that really like, what, what did you get out of that? What did you extract out of that?
00:27:01
Speaker
Now we're looking at the essence. And when we go through sort of our day to day, you know, is it so cut and dry? No, of course not. But like just when we want to maybe question or be more mindful of the habitual patterns, we can look to what is the essence I am looking to extract out of my, and then whatever it is you do. I mean, job, your job. I mean, that's a huge one, you know,
00:27:32
Speaker
I think people's careers, family, your relationships.
Aligning Health with Core Values
00:27:37
Speaker
Um, and that what's interesting about that is that so, so if you go through that process, okay, so what am I looking to extract out of fill in the blank? And you do that for your main, your relationships, your, whatever it is. It, it just asking that question is going to force you to have some sort of awareness.
00:27:57
Speaker
Like you have to now think like, Oh, okay. So I don't know. I never thought about that. Let me think about that. And I think, you know, when you do that, it sort of starts to take all the noise and just the stuff you're doing in boxes and checking boxes and like funnel it down to a little bit more being present and like, okay, less is more like, if I'm trying to extract, I think this is a big one. Like if I'm trying to reduce my stress, okay. What I want from my life is like, I want to like,
00:28:29
Speaker
Reduce my stress and then I'm or you know, be more mindful. I'm like, okay, so I'm gonna like get up I'm gonna journal. I'm gonna go for this walk. I'm gonna listen to the music. I'm gonna Come back home. I'm gonna meditate I'm gonna work then I'm gonna do my workout and then I'm gonna come home We're gonna sit down and eat whatever and then you're like, well, what am I looking to get out? It's like well I want to be more calm and you realize that doing all those things is definitely not adding to your calm like okay, maybe it is that you get up and walk but I
00:28:59
Speaker
you can't journal, walk and work out all in a two hour span or else it's not extracting the essence. So I think like that's a helpful thing for me to think like, what am I actually trying to do here? If I'm trying to walk with the dogs cause it's relaxing and I'm squeezing it in, like if I get there, I get okay. And then get back like, okay, did I actually accomplish what I was saying or would it have been better to maybe just
00:29:26
Speaker
not. Right. And that's and I think something that just again think about is essence isn't just like there's not just like the one right answer about the essence and it's not to be so calculated and cold in that's where and that's where I think movement can kind of trend towards that like for movement it is fairly cut and dry because we're talking about like you know muscles and stuff
00:29:55
Speaker
For our life though it is and I say this all the time about being curious and compassionate with yourself With your experience and you know, I get it that might come as a surprise to some people I don't really care but nonetheless like When we look at the essence of what we're trying to do and what we're trying to extract and what we're trying to experience and
00:30:26
Speaker
breathe in, breathe out, relax for a second and understand that yes, there is likely going to be more than just one right answer. Like there's not necessarily one right answer. It's, it's looking at that. For example, in your case, if you're looking to reduce stress, be calm, be more present, be more aware. Okay.
00:30:45
Speaker
I'm not just like, oh man, I hope I picked the right thing, right? You're saying there's, there's many ways I can do that. Yeah. So, right. So explore them and, but then go be, be into that. And so for example, the dogs, you have got 17 minutes before a call and you know that you're going to walk the dogs and you like walking the dogs because you feel a sense of calm. So you're going to go walk the dogs.
00:31:09
Speaker
And it's like, okay, but are you going to, if it takes you 15 minutes to get to the park, you're not doing anything. Even walking the dogs is the form of it. And so it might be like, how can you extract the essence out of that? Which it might mean like, well, you don't walk the dog. Like you don't do that. Same thing with health or fitness. Like this is where we can get back to overall health and wellbeing.
00:31:36
Speaker
of I need to go to the gym because I'm somebody who up, up, up, up, up, up. And you have that, that character and it's like, well, if the essence of your movement practice and your fitness is to feel good, move well.
00:31:53
Speaker
like enjoy what you're doing, then you just going to the gym because it says go to the gym is subscribing to someone else's agenda and it's the form. That's not giving a freebie on discipline, on resiliency, on commitment and dedication. No, it's zooming. There's an ebb and a flow and it is an arch or a balance.
00:32:22
Speaker
You know, I mean, but I think when we talk about this like ideal model of like fitness, a lot of people go to the gym and we did a survey recently at the gym and we asked about stress relief and people prioritized very differently like, you know, what was the one to four in order why you come to the gym? You know, there was aesthetics, stress relief, performance, just general health.
00:32:48
Speaker
And stress relief was like up there. But if you're kind of to my point, going to the gym for stress relief, but you're just hitting it hard, quote unquote, and killing yourself every day, by definition of what we know about the nervous system, not our opinion, you are actually adding stress.
00:33:08
Speaker
So now you're saying you're going for stress sleep, but you're keeping yourself in that loop. So, you know, a perfect model or a more ideal model would allow for, yes, one or two days a week to have that. And then on the other side, what we know would actually help with stress relief and actually help with the, you know, the body would be like to bring it down. And so, you know, I think that's where like, yeah, looking at like, what are you after and from, um,
00:33:38
Speaker
the role we're in is to not just, what's the word, enable people. But you know, I think that your thing, like one of the, and I came home and I told you today on this particular podcast, you know, Scott, Miggy had interviewed Dr. Nicholas Romanoff. And Dr. Romanoff is like a brilliant guy. I've had the
00:34:07
Speaker
fortune of like sitting down and like talking with him. And it's like most of it went over my head, but like super honored to have like met him and worked with him with CrossFit. And so he's like an expert on obviously- I remember talking to him real quick at the games, whatever that was. Right. A few years ago. Many years ago. Yeah. And I felt like my brain got repeatedly punched.
00:34:31
Speaker
And he's like such a nice guy. He's always smiling, but you almost just like, Oh my God, I don't have any idea what's happening. I don't want to ask. Yeah. So expert on pose running, but also just like human movement in general. And, um, and works with normal level people, athletes, like, so obviously has to be able to translate that stuff. But I guess Scott McGee had asked him, like, how do you, um,
00:35:00
Speaker
Like kind of like, how do you help people get beyond thinking they know? Like, like, how do you help them get beyond just what they want to like, just keep believing? Cause that's what they know. Because certainly when you're someone like him and someone's been doing whatever they've been doing, then you're now encouraging them to do something different. There's often a lot of resistance. And his answer was something that was like,
00:35:23
Speaker
two words that have been like your, something you've talked about so much. And one of the tenants I feel like between the ears is like, be curious. Yeah. And when you said that it was like kind of a cool moment being curious. And I think that's such an easy thing. Like, I'll be curious. Like what the fuck's that mean? But if you really frame things like, and
00:35:46
Speaker
I use examples in my life because that's a tangible thing. So just yesterday and today, my coach said, why don't you try a little bit of a fast? Just sort of reframe some things, reenergize, refocus, whatever. I have like my relationship with food. And so immediately I haven't been hungry for
00:36:10
Speaker
Months. Months. Immediately when it's like you're fasting, I'm starving. Right. Right. Which is like, that's in my brain. That's interesting. But instead of thinking of it from, there's two ways to think of it. One, my coach is making me do this. I have to do this. I'm going to check the box. Fine. I will not eat because she told me I have to fast. That's one way. Probably not going to get much out of that.
00:36:39
Speaker
Two would be, okay, let me be curious about this. How am I feeling? What's this like? What can I learn from this? Two very different approaches that like just the simple thought of like being curious about it, not feeling like you're being held prisoner is going to provide a lot of value. And I think that is like something that is the bridge of like form versus essence. How can I be a little curious?
00:37:09
Speaker
consider, as you've said, like consider maybe there is something more of this. Let me just be open to that and curious and what that allows you to do to really extract. Okay. Let me be curious about why am I squeezing and taking the dogs to the park right now? Like what's that about? That's a great place to go back to the journal prompt question.
Understanding Essence and Identity
00:37:30
Speaker
Like even if that was your journal prompt, being curious about something that happened in your day today, I'm going to be curious about something.
00:37:38
Speaker
I think that's like a great way to explore and just be like, okay, it's a place to start versus just being in the mindless. I don't know. I do it because I have to write. Well, that's not a reason who's making you. I mean, we say that at the gym. I tell people all the time, like you don't have to, the door is there. Nobody locked you in here. No, you can leave at any time. So why are you here? Yeah. But that's like a, for a lot of people, I don't think it's ever,
00:38:06
Speaker
They're not, they don't have that agency with themselves. And, you know, oftentimes if I'm starting to work with a new client, I'll ask them, who are you? And they'll tell me what they do.
00:38:24
Speaker
Would you? Who are you? Do you want to do this? Um, I'll just ask like, Hey, like, like, who are you? And it's amazing what you get back. Um, so, and, and it's fine if that question is overwhelming.
00:38:43
Speaker
I think it's also that desire like, am I answering this right? That's the natural thing. But there's things about that, that when we, it's not that you might have not, if you had the perfect answer, if you have the perfect answer, well, right. I'm just saying if you have the rehearsing,
00:39:03
Speaker
You see this on people that are really good with marketing all the time. They say the same thing over and over your elevator pitch, your takeaway, the bluff, the bottom line up front, all of this stuff. And if you can rehearse, if you can say your rehearsed answer, I'm going to hear it.
00:39:27
Speaker
give you a little golf clap and say, so what's the real answer? And not in like a, maybe that sounds like a bit harsh, but the purpose of that, and we might come back to that if you have your things and you know who you are and you know, that's great. You know who you are, but the value in it is to just re-engage with it, touch back in with it, get to know yourself again, who am I today? And when we look at the,
00:39:57
Speaker
big question of who you are.
00:40:02
Speaker
it's going to change. And that's something that if you don't revisit, and it doesn't have to be in a crazy, you know, uproot your life and burn all your belongings and do something to find out who you truly are, but like just checking in with that, you know? And so from a journaling question, how you can maybe review that daily or be curious with it daily, because that is sort of the essence of it.
00:40:31
Speaker
you can start to put some pieces together and start to get a little bit of an idea for if you were to write on top of your paper, how do I want to be today? Or how was I today? And looking at that, how?
00:40:45
Speaker
Is a very powerful thing because you start to okay like well, I went to the gym that doesn't say anything You're not answering the question. Not what did you do? Not what did you do? Not even necessarily why you did it because that can trigger a little bit more of the defensive thing It could also we can when we ask why we can also fall back into the I know the answer to this
00:41:10
Speaker
And that's something that it might, again, we might still get there, but we can ask that again. You know, there's like the five whys thing where you ask why five times and you dig down and you know, that that's certainly fine. But, you know, writing. So what would be something currently that you feel like you are working on, like being curious about or kind of focusing on the essence over the form where somewhere you tend to go?
00:41:38
Speaker
Like, like you go to your, your, your tendency is to go to form versus essence. Is there an area of your life you feel like that's something you need to work on today? Currently? Um, I'll have to think about that. I have been
00:42:01
Speaker
I have been really trying to identify and extract pure essence out of things. We've talked about this before, wrote about presence and appreciation is a major way in which I can connect with that. Currently where I drift more towards form,
00:42:31
Speaker
Hmm. I don't know. Nothing comes to mind right now. I think it's always going to be some form of... some form of judgment. So... What do you mean? Like, where you...
00:42:52
Speaker
where I would want to, where I would focus more on the form of something is to either hedge or protect against ultimately judgment and to not want to be judged or not want to misrepresent or not want to, um, Hmm.
00:43:18
Speaker
What are you doing over here? You're messing me up. I'm thinking for those listening. Do you hear it? Yeah. So what is something currently? How should I articulate it?
Essence in Coaching and Personal Growth
00:43:33
Speaker
Um,
00:43:36
Speaker
I know what I'm doing when it comes to working with people to provide value, insight, empowerment, uh, and like life-changing experiences, your business, your craft, the essence of that, the essence of what I do I know is special. Right.
00:43:56
Speaker
I know it is incredibly powerful, and I know mostly, or most importantly, that it works. And I also know... It's effective when people do it. Yes. And I also know that it's not easy. I know that I'm not good at making it always approachable for folks.
00:44:23
Speaker
but like there's a belief within me that is very, very strong, that between the ears and the coaching and the evolution of it as well truly does change lives. Okay. However,
00:44:46
Speaker
if that's the essence, then I often look at the form of it. How is it housed? How is it presented? How is it, uh, is it, is there, are there people, what are the numbers? What's the data? Yeah. Are people receiving it? For sure. What, what does it look like on paper? For sure. What does it look like on paper? Because it doesn't take into account at all the value of providing the essence. Right. And so,
00:45:16
Speaker
I look at that and I say, well, there's a couple tactics that I would really like to use with people also that I, how do you like not like present that or go there, but yeah. I mean, how does, how does, how does some of these tactics.
00:45:38
Speaker
get disseminated, not just to people that I work with, but to people that might be curious as well or be interested. And so there's a whole bunch of judgment with not wanting to misrepresent like what I do.
00:46:00
Speaker
Um, and there's also that pressure to have the form be that which is safe, sellable. Yeah, of course. I mean, ultimately I would like to make some money doing it, but you know, I don't mean that. I mean like, yeah, people see it. They get it. Okay. Good. But yeah, this is the thing with it. And it goes back to actually you catching me off guard before.
00:46:28
Speaker
people don't want to think for themselves. It's way easier to just parrot someone else. I understand that as well, like I do. But that is not what I do. I had a very nice chat with a new client this morning, actually, and said specifically,
00:46:55
Speaker
This is not a parroting program. Memorization, knowing what I said, I don't know what I say half the times.
00:47:04
Speaker
Honestly, but it's like, where are we right now? It's like truly a presence thing and a belief in what, where, how are we operating? But at this, yeah. And so that's then what it is. It's not the, Oh yes, you're right. That's 12 steps. Now, obviously the practice is a 12 week online is a 12 week course structure to it, but contained within it, it's everybody's unique experience with how they choose to perform.
00:47:33
Speaker
Right. And so that is something that I struggle with because I think, well, I know the essence is there. I need to now, I need to perfect the form. Right. Package it. Yeah. And, and I think that where I struggle with that too sometimes is. But that in itself is a contradiction almost because
00:48:00
Speaker
the people that might grasp hold of the form, you're kind of doing a like bait and switch because it's like, oh, if you try to make it too much in the form side, you're getting the wrong people and you're misleading people. Exactly. And that's where.
00:48:18
Speaker
that is a challenge for me because there's the one thing like, and this is why I haven't really formally created an elevator pitch. I was talking with a client, um, about this recently and he's actually kind of sent me over some things and trying to help out.
Essence Beyond Fitness: Business and Life
00:48:35
Speaker
And I've, I'm appreciative of that battery just died on the thing. Super appreciative of that. But,
00:48:44
Speaker
where I haven't found the ability to really do that is because then I kind of am locked into that. Yeah. And it is so custom. I mean, yeah, it's not really reflective of. No, the nature of what you're doing. And talking about that overlap, I mean, that's very much one of the things I think that attracted you to strong fit and us is it's that same like
00:49:14
Speaker
It's not the answer. It's not someone saying just do this. You have to think for yourself and how to encapsulate like what is strong fit or what is between the ears. It's kind of like a tough one. Right. Because it's so individual. Like I'm working with someone right now and
00:49:35
Speaker
we're not really, like what I'm working with one person is completely different than what another person is. So that's the thing. Like there is no script. We can have some concepts and some pillars and some, some things like that. But anyway, so struggling with that, with that form part, there is still though, like,
00:49:58
Speaker
the desire to have something be packaged so that it can be understood. But then you go down the judgment of, am I a fraud? Am I, you know, insecurity, impostors, all of this stuff that is, I am 100%
00:50:20
Speaker
um, susceptible to these experiences and these emotions as well, the self doubt, destroying yourself, all of that. So it's like, well, if I just have the form be pretty and safe and like, whatever, then it'll be okay. And it's like, yeah. And that's where we do have, I maybe more than you get hung up on.
00:50:46
Speaker
that I feel like it's disingenuine. I put up a post recently that was like professional, not predator. And I do feel like the fitness space is filled with people that yeah, they're just putting up the sales pitch and selling it and it's misleading. It's misguided. Yeah. So, but it's, it, it captures an audience. It captures their credit card. It sells them on a hope and
00:51:13
Speaker
That's it. Yeah. But yeah. Well, I think that's interesting. Yeah. So I feel like I wasn't really articulate in that. No, I think that makes sense. But I think what's interesting about that example is it's not so concrete about like, like you said, it's not just always like the essence of like working out versus the form of it or the essence of eating versus the food. Like it, you can really take it in a lot of different ways. Like, so I think that was good. Yeah. Yeah. Cool.
00:51:43
Speaker
Any questions? Let me look. Mine is forever, of course, the same. Just not checking boxes with working out and. Yours. Yeah. Like I said that before, but just that the other thing about that is it doesn't just you don't just gain that awareness and then it's off 12 years of like just having fitness be.
00:52:07
Speaker
Checking boxes and doing whatever and not really knowing why I'm doing it right. It's gonna take a while to kind of Progress past that yeah be about the essence and like I guess one of the things you can do to just back to in this from two times the journaling Just ask stuff like what's the point? now I Have a whole bit on that because that can be a
00:52:35
Speaker
It's an interesting kind of a litmus for how you interpret that. But if you were to just write down, what's the point? And then you read it and you see that like, are you approaching it with apathy? Are you approaching it with cynicism? Are you approaching it with like, how are you approaching it? And so when you look at that, um, had to deal with burnout. So we kind of talked about that a little bit. Um, that's a good one too, because,
00:53:04
Speaker
What's the conditions of of the burnout what kind of burnout? But I think that's an interesting but I think that yeah, I think it is an interesting one and I would say just real quickly like Try to connect back to the essence not only of what you're doing but like who you are as well and if you're somebody who doesn't ever who refuses to accept that they need a break and
00:53:34
Speaker
Right, or if you can explain it really well, like it's sort of the rational and the emotional. So if you're feeling like, I don't really feel like going to the gym, there's something about it. I just, I really don't feel like it, but the rational mind is like, but it's Monday today and you always work out on Mondays. The burnout, I think comes from that.
00:53:52
Speaker
friction of not honoring like and I think that's hard and there's a whole slew of like rational but but I didn't work out yesterday either like surely you can't take two days off in a row so like it doesn't really matter how I feel like there's all that stuff and I think that's where the presence like okay well why am I thinking that why do I think that's unacceptable what is it about two days in a row that what is that rule that's been created I think that's
00:54:20
Speaker
a huge thing with the form too, like what are these rules that have been, that you've kind of created and lived by that are really just crafted out of nothing, so.
00:54:30
Speaker
Yeah. Um, yeah, that's a good one. So the rational and the emotional, cause you spoke, spoke about it. That'll be a big part of the seminar next week, two weekends, two weekends, not this week, not this weekend, next week, February 8th at Motown. Uh, there's two spots left, I think one or two spots left, uh, which is cool. So that'll be a, an exciting event. Um,
00:55:00
Speaker
What else? What else is coming up? I think right now that's kind of it. Yeah, for now. Yeah. We've got some things in the works. Yeah. Okay.
00:55:17
Speaker
If there's any questions that you do want to have us talk about or topics maybe to go into, it is helpful to get that, to get a pulse. Um, if you found things valuable, if you like things, if you want to talk more, you know, it would mean a lot to hear from, from whoever's listening. Um,
00:55:40
Speaker
like Kay started with were by no means like the experts on this stuff. I mean, we're very, we're professional. We have a ton of experience, but this is all a shared pursuit of self-discovery. And so all that to say, we'd love to, you know,
00:55:57
Speaker
hear what's resonating, what's landing, what might not be, any topics that could be talked about. We'd love to hear them. And then, yeah, just really appreciate the time of listening. So that's all we got. Until next week, we will talk to you later.