Authenticity Road
Adventures in men's work. The search for personal authenticity, emotional healing, and the meaning of modern masculinity. Authenticity Road follows our adventures through the world of men's work, as we uncover the many layers of self-discovery. #menswork #menshealth #mensmentalhealth
Authenticity Road
Episode 3.21: Neuro Linguistic Somatic Experience (NLSE) with Kyle Smith
This episode dives deep into the transformative power of Neuro-Linguistic Somatic Experience (NLSE) with Kyle Smith, who explores how our stories shape our realities and limit our growth. He discusses techniques like breathwork and storytelling to foster personal transformation, emphasizing the importance of redefining our narratives to unlock authenticity and resilience.
• Exploring the power of personal narratives
• Catalyst moments that spark change
• Understanding mindset, language, and story integration
• Breathwork as a tool for emotional release
• The significance of storytelling in processing past experiences
• Client journeys and the phases of NLSE
• Celebrating wins and setting actionable goals
• Encouragement to redefine limiting beliefs for empowerment
CONNECT WITH KYLE: linktw.in/cnnULm
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Do you ever feel like the stories you keep telling yourself are holding you back? Are you ready to explore new roads to personal transformation? In this episode, we're diving into a fascinating approach called Neuro-Linguistic Somatic Experience, or NLSE for short, with our guest, kyle Smith. By blending mindset work, breath work and self-discovery, nlse helps you clear out mental clutter, shed limiting beliefs and reconnect with the wisdom of your body. We'll explore how these techniques can shape your day-to-day life, unlocking deeper authenticity and resilience, and Kyle will share how harnessing your mind, body and language can accelerate profound personal growth. Whether you're curious about new ways to grow or just looking for a fresh perspective, my conversation with Kyle is sure to spark a few aha moments. So let's get on the road. Welcome to the Authenticity Road podcast. We started this podcast to share our stories and hear from others about their adventures in men's work. Join us on the journey to our fully authentic selves, emotional healing and the meaning of modern masculinity. Here on Authenticity Road, hello, hello, hello and welcome to Authenticity Road. I am Ator and this week on the podcast, we are delighted to welcome Kyle Smith.
Speaker 1:Kyle is the creator and a practitioner of Neuro Linguistic Somatic Experience, or NLSE. Kyle is a clarity consultant who guides wellness seekers to a better life experience through a combination of holistic techniques called story work and breath work, which he combined to create N L S E. He has a passion for productivity, learning and self-betterment and has been guiding clients in improving their health and wellness for over a decade. He's a former professional I'm sorry. He is a former personal trainer and online fitness coach and he has pivoted to help clients focus instead on mindset. He specializes in identity work, negative self-talk, reflecting on wins, and helping clients move forward after hurtful or traumatic experiences. His deep interests include human behavior, physical and mental fitness, travel, cooking, journaling, plant medicine, psychology, neurology, magic philosophy, self-actualization, business and spending quality time with his partner and their cats. So, kyle, welcome. We are delighted to have you here today. Is there anything that I've left out or anything that you would like folks to know that I did not mention?
Speaker 2:You know what you hit the nail on the head. This in the last two years. I would say that my interest in chess has increased.
Speaker 1:Ah, so you are a better man than I, for I, um, I tried my damnedest to to really pick up chess, because I'm a smart fellow and I thought smart fellows play chess and uh, try as I might, my brain just doesn't work in the chess playing way.
Speaker 2:So, yeah.
Speaker 2:Interesting. It could be the style, or finding the particular style, because when you know the routes, then it's about pattern recognition. Right, and this is a cool one. I think this applies to life as well, where there's the difference between a beginner, an intermediate and a grand master. The only thing that separates the beginner from the grand master is that they recognize more patterns over a longer duration of time, so they can see more with less of the board. So they don't look at the whole board, they look at less of the board and make better moves based off of the uh, the styles they they recognized. Okay, I guess it could be just pattern recognition.
Speaker 1:Yeah, could, could be. I mean it's funny. There are certain and this is totally off the topic but there are certain uh games, for example, that I just don't resonate with. I just don't can't hang with them at all, no matter how I try, for example. So I have a good friend who every day we trade puzzles, so we trade the results of our puzzles, right, and we play the same puzzles. And one of the puzzles that we play is the connections game in New York Times where it's four sets of four words. You match them up whatever. I get it Bingo First. Try every day, no questions. It throws him for a loop.
Speaker 1:Play this game called blossom from Merriam-Webster dictionary, where it gives you a crap load of letters and you have to organize them into words. Now I have an enormous vocabulary and he whips my ass every time on that game because I look at that jumble of letters and they're just a jumble of letters, like I can never make words out of them. It's crazy. So, yeah, just who knows? Like our brains just work in very unique ways and it's not a matter of how smart you are or you know, how much training you have or anything. Some people's brains just work in very specific ways. For me, the connections game makes complete sense. Specific ways for me, the connections game makes complete sense. Like I look at those sets of words and I go, yep, I see how they relate. He looks them and goes these fucking east coast elites, and they're fucking highfalutin games.
Speaker 1:Um, but anyway, what we're here to talk about today is NLSE, or neurolinguistic somatic experience. Now, I am very familiar with neurolinguistic programming Apparently I'm having difficulty speaking today, so you'll have to forgive me and I'm also very familiar with somatic experiencing because I trained in somatics. I am a. The way that I coach my clients is through somatics and somatic experiencing, and so I'm familiar with those worlds. You've taken those worlds and combine them, which to me is just like fascinating next level shit, and I'm and so I'm really thrilled that you're here to talk about it. Where did you get this idea? How did you get there? Where did this come from? Give me the story.
Speaker 1:Start as far back as you need to okay which I might regret that invitation no no, it's all good.
Speaker 2:Uh, so I will okay. So for the for the part of, go for as far back as possible, uh, steve jobs has a quote that says you can only connect the dots looking backwards not. And so I would say that this practice took a lifetime to develop, and now that I'm aware of the practice that I have developed, now it's become my life's work. Throughout my life, there is points that everyone has where I call them catalyst moments. Moments or you meet a catalyst character, so that's a person that you meet that has a positive pivot or has a positive impact on pivoting the trajectory towards where they want to go. So the main one cause I refer to my life as after World's Toughest Mudder and before Toughest Mudder. So 2016, I have a little bit right there. That one was a huge one. 2016 was a huge pivot year because I made the decision to make a change in my mindset and my identity and the character that I embodied. The character that I embodied, and so at that point in time, I had a very low degree of respect for myself, because I believe that self-respect is no different than respect. Self-respect and respect is just the same thing. You just put like a little freaking thing at the beginning. Respect goes two ways, where it's internal first, and then external as well. So if we can't respect ourself, then we're not going to be able to bring ourself to the point where other people can respect us. And so I did not like who I was at that point. I made a post within January and I have it somewhere on my desktop Cause I like to remind myself of where I once was and it was a one of those Facebook posts where it was asking for help, and I just didn't want to, uh, be a negative catalyst in my own life and anyone else's life, so made the post. I'm looking for therapists, counselors, uh, any coaches, anybody who would be able to help me pivot and shift my identity. Uh, so it was really cool being able to look that up after so long and be able to understand the difference in my state of being, my personal, my personal reality, my personality, and having such a shift from before that and after that. So that was that one would be the peak moment.
Speaker 2:And what the world's toughest mutter is for context? Uh, there's tough mutters which have about I think it's eight, about eight miles, and it varies depending on the location because they're all outdoors, and then there's military obstacles with it, and there's ones where one's called an Arctic enema, so it's just an ice bath, and you jump into this ice bath and they have a beam that goes under so you're forced to dunk your head in. There's another one, called walk the plank, which is a pivotal one for myself, where you just step off and normally they're about 10 feet off the ground and then you jump into the water and then you do your thing and then so there's a variety of them. So there's a variety of them. So the world's toughest mutter.
Speaker 2:After I made that post that I referenced earlier a buddy of mine who, six months prior to that, sean Curran's his name, and now he does tough murders, he does sinister sevens. He did a tough mutter with me and then he just went crazy down the endurance path and it's so sweet, like beautiful and uh. And so six months prior to that he's like do do the world's toughest mutter, cause he's done it, he already did it. He's like do the world's toughest mutter? I'm like nah, do the world's toughest mutter. Nah, man, dude, you've done like eight tough mutters, like you can do the world's toughest mutter, like nah. And then I made that post. Same day he Facebook DM'd me and he's like bro, you want to do the world's toughest mutter? And then at that point I said fuck it, cause I had no choice and it was either by choice or well, I did have a choice and I believe that it's by choice or by chance that we're going to make decisions. So in that moment I could have not done it and then waited until the chance where something so negative or severe or uncontrollable happened where I had no choice but to make a change. So in that moment I'm glad I made the choice to do it on my own terms.
Speaker 2:So went in there and what this? What this did was allowed me a physiological outlet for all the pent up tense energy within my energetic body. And when I go through NLSE, then it all makes sense when it'll tie in together. So when we have this pent up energy, there's a series of stories that are just collected around our body. And so if we don't have an outlet, whether it be meditation, breath work, story work, therapy, counseling, somatic experience, nlp, whatever the modality, I believe everyone has the same desired outcome. So I don't believe that there is any one true way to get the same outcome. I believe it's testing modalities until you find what sticks to get the same outcome and having the okayness and being okay with exploring it and having curiosity around how it could benefit you, without any prior judgment or stories connected to it.
Speaker 2:So, had all this pent up energy didn't have an outlet and I started getting into breathwork at that point. So I've been breathworking for, or I've had it as a practice that I've gone back to or a tool that I've gone back to for the last nine years, and I've definitely been doing it a lot more often because I've been breathing with more people and I'm breathing myself and it's been cool. So what the world's toughest mutter was able to teach me in my lesson I took from it is to break down the body in order to build up the mind. So after that, 24 hours after, I just tore away all those layers of stories that I've been accumulating over a lifetime of existence. At that point they just washed away because there was no choice but the pent up energy to go somewhere and in that particular case it went directly to my survival and I'm cool with that and then. So that was one that was the main lesson through it all.
Speaker 2:And then, uh, I had a really cool experience where I stepped into a decision and was scared, very scared. And so there was the walk, the plank, which is 10 feet, which I was used to, and then there was the one that they had cause. It was in Las Vegas, nevada. It was outside in the desert, beautiful sunrise and sunset. I got to see both and, uh, and I was on this and it was about 20 to 30 feet Like it was much higher, way, way higher than I've ever done before. So it was a new personal record for sure, and I went out there.
Speaker 2:And another part is they would close, open and close obstacles so that people wouldn't get all bunched up. So this one opened midnight. So it's dark. I'm on this plank. I can only I can see vegas off in the distance, because the only light that exists there, and then it's just darkness and then stars, and I look down and I'm jumping into this. It's not valley, it's river, and they have a light there. They have the boat there, just in case anybody did, like you know whatever it is Right, doesn't come up yeah.
Speaker 2:And uh, and I stood there for about two minutes and someone asked are you going to jump? And I said yes, so I made the decision and then, uh, what? What I did was I just stepped off? So I didn't think about it, I just stepped off, so I'm going down, and it was high enough where I was able to think this is taking longer than I thought. Boom, then I hit the water and they came out and I'm like, oh, and another thing that inspired me to like do this is I didn't want to run a penalty loop. So if you don't do an obstacle, you do just a smaller loop to go around it and then you keep on going. However, I wanted to freaking walk this plank because I could see the finish line pretty freaking close, so I decided to do that. So that would be a pivot point. That was huge.
Speaker 2:And then from there, I wanted to develop my communication, because I had a past client where we had a disconnect with communication and that got me into words. Words specifically like communication, how we articulate and then the impact that words have on our reality and how we experience life. So, breath work came first, story work came second, and then, with little aspects here and there that I amalgamated into it. Then I developed an LSE through that, because at this point, at this moment, I can say with absolute certainty and confidence in my competence that if I went back in time to 2016, self, I would say, bro, let's, let's do some reading and breathing and you'll be all good. And so now it's full circle.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's a great story. Um, there's, there's, there's quite a lot in there to unpack. Um, I like this idea of of you, you know, breaking down the body to build up the mind and and that's what it does. That's, that's what you did, and I actually honor that, and I'm really sort of envious of people who are able to do that, because I'm a complete wimp, I'm a total wuss and, uh, you know I'm, I'm, it's very difficult to get me out of my comfort zone physically. Um, you can get me out of my comfort zone emotionally or mentally, but but physically, that's. That's one of those hard lines for me. And you know, I have a feeling that if I hung out with you for a while, I would probably find myself getting pushed past some of these things that I think are hard physical lines.
Speaker 2:I would agree with that, yeah.
Speaker 1:But so this notion of you know, kind of the basis of neuro-linguistic programming, that we, there is power in these words, there's power in in the vocabulary that we use and the that we there is power in these words, there's power in the vocabulary that we use and the words that we use and the stories that we tell ourselves. And so you had this story that you were telling yourself about who you were and what you wanted and what you could do, and you rewrote that story in a very real way through a somatic experience. And so it's really natural that you figured out how to combine these two worlds into this one modality.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, wow. When you actually say it like that, it's like, man, you're bringing the feels in that one. Yeah, I'm very grateful for it. So you saying that was just like oh, don't cry, I don't think I'll cry today, we'll see, we'll see all right.
Speaker 1:Well, um, that's always my goal. Uh, regardless of the guest or the topic, if I can get somebody to cry, I feel that I have really done my job and earned my keep Happy tears right.
Speaker 1:Actually it's funny. I have a friend who's a religious, devoted listener of this podcast and there was one guest and I'm not even going to say who it was, but there was one guest earlier this season who I got to cry without even trying, for some reason, I said something and it just triggered something and he and the waterworks opened right and my friend said you know, I was just not resonating with that guy until you got him to start crying and then he had me and I'm like, yeah, sure, because as soon as somebody starts crying, then you really see who they are. How can you not resonate with with somebody who's crying? Right? How can you not love someone when you see their soul like that?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I agree with that. Yeah, yeah, that's huge, I would, I would, completely, uh, I would, would, I would piggyback, I'm going to piggyback off that and say with the practitioner or the practitioners that I work with, and that's another thing is, when I'm working with peeps, I consider myself a consultant, not a coach, because I view myself as a facilitator rather than I'm not an answers consultant. I'm a questions consultant, questions pull, statements, push, and so in my line of work, happy tears, sad tears, I see them often.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like, especially in the first chunk, because I go in phases where it's getting unstuck, then it's celebrating the wins, then it's creating the goals, because I go in phases where it's getting unstuck, then it's celebrating the wins, then it's creating the goals, uh, and then that first chunk, there's a lot of peeps that, uh, that tear up, cry, and it's. It's good, because exactly what you said, like there's been some folks that I've worked with where their stories were real tight, like they were holding onto the stories, uh, and that's the thing is that there's the choice to hold on to the stories and there's a choice to let go or process the stories, and there's some folks where they'll be stone-faced, like not stoned but stone-faced Right, and actually sometimes because I do cannabis-connected.
Speaker 1:Sometimes you're stoned, right yeah.
Speaker 2:I do cannabis-connect connected nlse sessions, so it is a thing yeah, interesting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's just combining another modality in there right and so, uh, there's some folks where they'll be 30, 40 minutes into the sash. They're going through stories and I'm like there's something there, there's something there that you're not allowing to come to fruition, there's something you're holding, holding onto, and then, over time, once I get that, it just takes the right realization or reflection for that person to have their own aha moments. And it's, I believe, that what you did for that other person was um, you presented, you presented a different frame of a story. And I say a story, anything that can be written down is a story. A statement could be a story, an opinion can be a story, a past experience, trauma, whatever could be a story Happy memories, sad memories, all stories, past stories, future stories we can bring it to the present. All stories, past stories, future stories, we can bring it to the present.
Speaker 2:Uh, you may have just worded something in a way where he had the aha moment and the epiphany and there was no choice for him but to shift into that identity, and then he just let go of that past identity's. That's how I view it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's, it's very possible. And, uh, in fact, like now I don't even remember the entire context, like I don't remember what I said I would have to go back and listen to it. Um, but I'm sure if I went back and listened to it I would be able to to view it through a frame of what just happened between us that made this happen.
Speaker 2:Um and um happened between us that made this happen. Um and um. But enough about me, so let's talk about you, sweet who comes to you, who's your client?
Speaker 2:uh, a couple different parts. Main one is that I'm finding I'll actually say this is this is more so than it's closer to celebrating the wins than getting unstuck for folks right now. So they've done a solid chunk of work and they've capped their progress and at that point they've reached a level of conscientiousness or presence or developed their identity to a point where the past is no longer a hindrance on their present and they're actually having trouble with dictating where to go in the future. So that's been a new one. So it's when people are unclear about where they want to go. That's been a huge one recently. And then, on the other end, with the more like feels aspect, is folks that want to get unstuck. So they've tried a series of modalities, they've probably tried the therapy, they've gone to this, they've gone to that and, uh, there's nothing wrong with any of the modalities.
Speaker 2:I believe that it's not this or that, it's this and that mm-hmm and so they come to me when they're just done with it and they just want to go through those stories and process emotions mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:So you said earlier and I didn't jot it down, getting unstuck, celebrating the wins and what was the third part targets and goals. Focus targets and goals. So walk me through that. So is that first of all, before I ask you to walk me through that? Is that a linear progression, like do we do a and then we do b and then we do c? It?
Speaker 2:yes, I, I go with a, b, c and as I'm working with someone, usually me and the participant will both know when it's ready to move to the next section.
Speaker 2:So it could be three sessions because it happens really quick.
Speaker 2:The whole experience happens really quick where it doesn't take very long to make some pivots.
Speaker 2:So after a couple of sessions and then when we reduce the clutter in the mind, the stories in the mind, when we unclutter the mind so that we can make space to throw the party, then we move into celebrating the wins, because now we're working with our own stories.
Speaker 2:We're not working off of adopted stories or stories that anchor us into our present identity. We're not working off of adopted stories or stories that anchor us into our present identity. So we alleviate those and then over time what me and the participant will see is that when they're writing stories depending on how intense they went in the beginning because I like to say, put the gorilla on the table and go with the heaviest story right off the bat, because that's going to make the energy flow a lot easier for every other story past that point, and so for folks that do that, then it works as a ripple effect where the really intense most like lingering. You think of the story, you feel it in your chest, your heart rate goes up, you're, uh, breathing a little bit higher in the chest and there's nothing happening. It's all up in here and your body's, in physiology, is just responding to your thoughts. Um and so when I lost my train of thought there for a second, what was I saying just before that?
Speaker 1:uh, so we were talking about getting unstuck. We were talking about the stories we tell ourselves. We were talking about how we tell the biggest story first.
Speaker 2:Yep, and then what happens is we dive into other stories or other ouchie stories and there's zero emotional response at all. And uh, it's weird because people want people, I think generally, and I was one of these folks as well believe that in order to feel better about the story, this, we have to forget about the story, and it's not until we remove the story from our data banks that we can actually think. Without the story we can. We gotta get rid of this. Before we get to that, and I don't think it's a getting rid of. I actually view it.
Speaker 2:Jordan Pearson has a quote. He says in order to get to the gold, slay the dragon. I have a different approach with it. Rather than because the dragon is the story that's protecting the gold and you're the knight, I have the preference towards not slaying. The dragon is the story that's protecting the gold and you're the knight, I have the preference towards not slaying the dragon, but becoming the dragon rider. So you own the story and the story ends up making you stronger. Rather than just slaying the dragon to get the gold. Why not have the dragon and the gold and go get some more gold with the dragon?
Speaker 2:Because when people process those stories that hurt, haunt, taunt, annoy us. Um, what happens is we're able to integrate and process it, so similar to shadow work in that way, for carl jung style. And so by integrating it not adopting it, but integrating it into our sense of being we're allowed to process it, alleviate ourselves of the emotional intensity, we're able to hop on that dragon and no one can use our own stories against us because we have processed it. There's no emotion, emotionality to it. So if we can decrease emotional reactivity within us, then when someone let's say it's a someone who's just wants to be an asshole, that day when they're trying to pull it out and they're using that specific story in order to incite an emotional reaction, it doesn't happen because it's already been processed. So people get less offended as a happy side effect, because it's understanding who the person is.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And so, and so, yeah, go in, slay the dragons and then celebrate the wins of what the progress is Uh, what have you done in your lifetime? Uh, and go from there, and then we go into goal setting and a game that I like, a language game or a theme story that I like to play with. This one is a day in the life of. So then you think of the things you want to do in order to get to where you want to go, because we get things as a side effect of becoming the person. It takes to get them. If we stay the same, we're only going to ever get what we've already gotten.
Speaker 2:So, in the day of the life of, we write a story going through the day of the individual that we wish to be, and so at least it gets the neural pathways and it gets the feels uh, more, more inspirational rather than fearful, because those stories that incited resistance are gone, and the less resistance we have, the more we can flow, and so when we can flow, then it becomes easier. So what this, what that particular exercise does, is that focuses on the target or the focus, if it applies, focus to what the person wants, and it's the day that helps us get there, and then, when we have focus, then we have a, then we have a floor and we have a frame. So the story is the frame, the focus is the target, the outcome, and then the floor is the plan that we come up with. So our floor can always be elevated, just like an elevator. We we start one level one, level two, level three, level four, level five, so on and so forth. So that's how the timeline of this work goes, and it's either one-to-one or one-to-many.
Speaker 2:So if I was doing a six-week process ooh, actually this sounds cool If I was doing a six-week process and if it was two weeks get unstuck, two weeks celebrate the wins and two weeks to focus on frame, floor and focus. All of these all come together to develop the self into the identity they want to step into by their choice and their doing.
Speaker 1:Six weeks sounds really fast. Is that honestly how quickly you can go with someone?
Speaker 2:I theorize, I can actually do it in less okay yeah, because it's so.
Speaker 2:The the distance between is, uh, a buffer time, because there's three things that folks that they bring into the sessions that pull the most from it. And so when someone's going in, having an openness to explore, so that goes into like different modalities. So not having any judgment to it, it's just an openness to explore, let's see what happens and if it works, cool. If it doesn't cool, uh. The next part is a, a desire to change, of an actual, true, sincere desire to change. Um, cause I cannot, I I cannot step in the way or step out of the way of someone changing. It's up to the person and I only facilitate it. So I can't. Well, I say I can't, I can technically, I just don't like to, unless it's a frame that I've used and I can explain very well. I don't like giving a lot of statements or advice, because everybody already knows the answers and no one's going to know the answers to how someone can progress better than the person themselves. And I do believe, uh, cause there's a fun.
Speaker 2:One is called the Solomon's paradox. And the paradox cause Solomon, back back in, back in the day, was known as the wisest person on the planet, and so folks would go to him all around and ask for his advice because of his. His advice was so fricking good, so people would take his advice, go and then crush it. However, he had a very poor home life and it's an indicator that he didn't live up to his own advice. So the Solomon paradox is that we already know the answers to the questions we have, and I'll also say that a question well-worded is an answer half solved. And so when we have this, when we have the Solomon's paradox, I truly believe like everybody can say to a friend of theirs hey, I'm trying to do this. Do you have any advice? Yeah, do this. Oh, and you don't do that. So it, so it's interesting. So we have Solomon's paradox.
Speaker 1:Well, that goes to the, the saying that I always have that, uh, simple and easy are not the same thing, you know. Agreed, so agreed. So, uh, losing weight is a simple matter of expending more calories than you consume yes it is not easy, it's just very simple um you know, someone comes to me and says, sensei, how do I lose weight? I can tell them uh, doesn't mean they can do it totally yeah and uh.
Speaker 2:So for that, for that two week buffer for each one, uh, that is for me and for the participant to find the sweet spot where, uh, the variable I can't control is time. So the two weeks, I would at least have two sessions. So I go weekly. Each session is 90 minutes and if it was in a group setting it would be easier to pull this off because there would be more of a community aspect. So more people would share their stories more openly and the community aspect would supercharge the fields, even if it's on zoom in person, holy crap, that's like a whole different thing. That's like you get the community aspect, you get the, you get everyone's like breathing together, everyone's sharing their stories, and it's like fricking epic.
Speaker 2:Um. So the group aspect shortens the duration of time because people see other people going into heavy stories and then they give themselves permission to go into the stories as well, because they don't seem it, they don't perceive it to be, let's say, taboo to share a particular story. So, uh, with with that it that that two weeks is for the individual to be able to really acclimate to the change, and then that's pretty much how it flows. It is a simple process because I focus on the first principles. I focus on the words and the breath, which are two skills that we learn early on in life and we very seldom practice throughout our life. So by going to that one, I just make, make the simplicity even simpler than, let's say, tracking your calories and your macronutrients.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Instead, we're tracking our words, and that's way easier and has a huge benefit. And I would actually say that tracking our words and let's say we wanted to track our words in order to adjust our identity, so that we are stepping into the identity where we are the person that tracks our calories in order to get the result. That's where I would utilize NLSE for changing someone's perspective or introducing a new frame in order for them to see the importance of the activity rather than the resistance that I believe that the resistance that folks feel when it comes to change is their old sense of self fighting to stay the same and by stepping into doing the things that may make us uncomfortable. Uncomfortable and painful are two different things. When we step into things that make us uncomfortable, that is inflicting pain on that dragon Cause, that story.
Speaker 2:I can't do this, so I can't track my food, so I can't lose weight. Go into the story and reframe it. So that's how that would go and I do, yeah, so I do believe that the time duration is really quick on average across the board.
Speaker 1:So if that's the client journey you know the getting unstuck, celebrating our wins, and then targets and goals what does the actual work look like? So, if you were in a session, right, um, you, earlier, you would. You would use the phrase like writing our stories or writing their stories. Um, I mean, are we talking literally writing or are we talking telling? Okay, so. So what does what does the modality look like from the perspective of this is what I'm delivering.
Speaker 2:Sweet. So what a session looks like is that it's a combination of both breathwork and storywork, like mentioned before, and so someone comes in or a group comes in. We have five to 10 minutes of a vibe check or a tuning our vibes.
Speaker 2:And it's also an opportunity for me to see where they are in that moment in time. So I meet the participant where they're at, rather than expect them or force them into what I believe. So after that point we have a good vibe check. Things are vibing like could be a good day, could be a down day, and then I take that information because it's all data, like how we feel is data, what we say is data. And so from there I'll customize a breath style or a breath theme to have the same effect, which is to neutralize emotions, to decrease and ground the person. So if someone's really like excited and uh, they're like talking a mile a minute and they're super, super pumped up, then I want, then what I'll do is I'll do like a slower, rhythmic breathing where it could be four seconds in, six seconds out, in order to ground them. Or if it's they're feeling lower and I want to bring them up, then I'll get them to do a breath style that brings them up. And so when there's that balance, that equanimity, when we go into the story aspect, uh, there's a, there's an accurate gauge on where someone's feeling, so they're not pulling the feelings that into the session that they had for the rest of the day. It's starting fresh and baseline, and so, before anyone starts, the first thing I do is send them a Google document, and the reason for the Google document is so that me and the participant are literally on the same page. So there's nothing else that's required other than a Google doc and a zoom account. So it's super simple. And so there's intake questions in that form or in that Google doc, and these are for exploration and because the theme is to start with getting unstuck, these are the ones where it's diving into relationships, your inner dialogue, relationships, your inner dialogue. What have you done? What haven't you done? Where do you want to go? So it's just all information, and this is just also to get the brain thinking about its thinking and reflecting, even before the session. So the person, the participant, will fill out the form and I have it done. Get them to do it 24 hours, make sure it's done 24 hours prior to our session. Then I go into the document and then I'll highlight things that could be interesting to explore, given the theme that the person wants to, like the reason that the person's coming to see me I find themes with that as well. Themes with that as well, and then when we go into the session, both like, let's say, you and I were on a session, your, your end would already be fulfilled, my end would be fulfilled. That way, when we get into the session, we would both be on the same page and we'd be good to go.
Speaker 2:So then, one thing that if we didn't before, I would introduce the language game like the should detox S H O U L Dd, not shit detox. As much as we shit all over ourselves, we also should all over ourselves, often too right. And so, uh, I'll introduce a language game if they are unsure of what translations would feel like. It's just to introduce, it's like an appetizer and it's fun, it's so much fun to do really easy intro. And then after that, well, after the breathwork, I ask is there anything that you want to work on, either on or off the document, because there could be something that had not been thought of yet. So, whatever that is, then we'll dive into it. We can play a language game, or we can dive into a series of stories, and so the stories aspect is literally writing down the story, and, uh, there's a light version which would be a shit detox, or language games like a shit detox, or what if the good shit instead of what if the shit. And then, uh, there's um translate and actually this would be a really example. When I say a translation, it's taking a harmful statement story and adjusting, changing some of the words to make it so that's more inspiring.
Speaker 2:So one that I venture into often is imposter syndrome. Folks will say, oh, I have imposter syndrome. It's like, do you have imposter syndrome? And they're like, yeah, and I'm like, okay, well, let's look at the. Let's look at what an imposter is. It's someone who says, thinks and behaves differently Right, so it's out of alignment. And sorry, not differently. They think they do and they speak incongruently with what they believe.
Speaker 2:So an imposter is someone who's faking it. They're denying their authenticity in order to I'll say, fit in, that's a good one. So I would actually say it's not. Most people are not imposters. If someone's actually looking at their hands and they're doing the things that they're say they're going to do in order to get the thing that they want to do, and it's observable from the from other person, other people's perspective, then, um, then really the person's not an imposter.
Speaker 2:So we would translate imposter into beginner.
Speaker 2:So if you say I am an imposter and you feel those feels. It doesn't feel good. Then when we say I am a beginner or I have beginner syndrome, that's more accurate, because it's about us building up our confidence in our competence till the point that we say we are who we say we are, until we are who we say we are Right. So when we're a beginner, everyone sucks. When they're a beginner, it's not that they're an imposter, they just haven't done it enough and that's it.
Speaker 2:So that's how we take a translation and we look for accuracy, because a lot of the stories that we tell ourselves are inaccurate or they're not even our own and they're adopted either from friends, family, whoever Authoritative figures from when we were a kid, right. So then we go into stories, we write it out and I'll actually tell the whole steps too, and if anyone does it, let me know. So the steps for it is let's say it could be anything for it the step one is to title it and write it out, and when you're writing out the story, you do it conversationally, with proper grammar, in a conversation, or, yeah, you do it conversationally as if you're speaking to someone else right and then, uh, or another way you can frame it is if you're watching the experience on a tv or on a cinema scene uh, cinema screen, what are you seeing?
Speaker 2:write it down. So that way it allows people to take the story from the head and put it onto paper. So we're decluttering the mind because in the mind, a story seems infinite and large, and this is something I hear often when folks are really wound up or they're experiencing some ouchy stories. Some will often say, oh man, I got a lot of stories and they actually have less than they think, because it seems like so much space is taken up in the head. So when we take it from the head, we put it to paper. Paper allows us the opportunity to be able to store the story somewhere else, so it's taking it out of our backpack and putting it up on the shelf. It doesn't go away, but we don't need to carry it with us, right? So that's the first step title it and write it. Then the second step, which the first step. If people do that alone, they'll notice a decrease in their cognitive clutter. Many people don't do that. That's huge. Now we go into a second step, which is to read it out loud. And when we read it out loud, that's a second point of exposure as well. So we're integrating exposure therapy in a safe setting where there's nothing that's a threat to the person other than their own internal dialogue. And then, uh, some folks, if it's a heavy story, they'll try to read it as quickly as possible while they have their breath high and tight in the chest so they don't have to actually feel the emotion, so they have motor mouth going on on, and so I get people to cool it Right. So let's say so. After that step two, where we read it out loud, and going into that aspect of where we read it fairly quick, step three we slow it down 30%, or we read at 70% our regular talking rate, and what that does is that forces the breath in, so we can still hold our breath and still read through a story. Pretty good, so we have not unlocked it. When we slow it down and we're going, and someone has no choice but to, or if it's an intense story, we'll have a physiological sigh where it'll go, similar to when someone's crying really hard If you, I've experienced this and they're crying, crying, crying, and then it's like that's a forceful breath. And so when we slow it down, 30% forces the breath in. We create space from the story, from the experience. So we go from being in the story to seeing the story as an objective observer. So we don't bring those feelings along, we actually completely separate it and leave the feelings in the story and understand that that story doesn't have power over us anymore. So that's the third point of exposure as well, which is awesome. And then the fourth step is that we read and breathe. So at every comma, the occasion, or every period, the occasional comma, and sometimes, and we insert a breath. So if I was reading a story while maintaining that 30% rate of speech, the third step allows us to decrease the tension in the story and the reading and breathing allows us to process the story. Yeah, and then that's it. And then what I'll ask people all through is three questions. Well, pretty much three Describe the vibe, or emotions, and emotions.
Speaker 2:Are emotion, energy in motion. Where do you feel it in the body? And on a scale of one to 10, how intense is it? So the scale aspect. On intensity, there could be a 10 out of 10 positive and there could be a 10 out of 10 negative. So you're really into either or on. On the opposite end, one you're, you have zero emotionality to it at all and you might be a little bit more lethargic or drained, and that's common. When we go from a 10 down to a one, we have a one-to-one ratio of excitement and then we have a drop.
Speaker 1:So the question that I would actually have because it's good that we kind of paused there is that so is this are these steps the same, regardless of which phase we're in?
Speaker 2:yes, it does not change at all. And the interesting thing, so with the get unstuck phase, what we're doing is we're creating space between the ouchie stories and ourselves, so we're zooming. And then when we're celebrating the wind, celebrating progress, then we actually take uh, let's say, for example, cause we, it's easier for us to remember, it's easier for us to remember the negative parts than positive parts, and that's going backwards or forwards. So if we're looking forwards, we could be discouraged by the gap between where we are and where we want to be.
Speaker 2:We use the same four-step framework and it's four-stepping, that's what it's called four-step framework in order to bring those positive moments and those celebrating the wins where we are proud of ourselves at any point in time. Because if we can take experiences from our childhood that are shitty and bring them into the present in order to justify our poor behavior and decision-making, we can do the same with positive memories as well to justify our positive decision-making and our behaviors. And it works in either direction, because the thing that's going to influence our past, our perspective of the past or the future, is our present state of being. So if we're in an elevated state, if we're in a higher state of being, or if we're feeling good about state, if we're in a higher state of being or if we're feeling good about ourselves.
Speaker 2:we're going to view either the future or the past with a little bit more, with more joy rather than criticism hmm, yeah, and so we'll be able to same process, increase or decrease the ouchies, increase the meaningful, and then, when we step into the character construction, what happens is we get to use the same stories where it goes into a day in the life of. So, if we're doing a focus being the focus or the target being, I want to do this is my own personal one I want to do I want to. This one's my own personal one. I want to do a hundred podcasts. I want to guest on a hundred podcasts before January 11th 2025. So that's a very it's a specific statement where it has the actionable aspects.
Speaker 1:So some folks will stop it at. I want to lose weight, when Right and how much and how?
Speaker 2:much Exactly, and then from there then it goes into the frame. So that's where we would use something like the day in the life of what would a day in the life of story look like for someone who's pursuing this goal? Right? And then when we feel that future in the present, it makes us action prone, we're more likely to do it because we just simply want to, yeah, because the resistance isn't there. And then I also recommend, like anyone that wants to pursue their goals, I'm in full supportive, and the bigger the goals, the the more I support simple as that. And so I think that where my my chillness comes in, where my vibes come in, is or my person, my personal being, is I automatically have the intention of wanting folks to come up with their own subjective way to live and crush whatever they want to crush, and I don't mean like crushing in a way, I mean in a positive way. So then we come up with a plan after we come up with the story.
Speaker 1:Yeah Gosh, there's so much here I want to comment on. I'm going to start with the power of the written word. The power of the written word, um. So last year, last August, a year ago August in fact I conceived of and wrote a workshop, a six session workshop called um, the men's work writing workshop. So it was doing men's work through the lens of a writing workshop. So it was doing men's work through the lens of a writing workshop, and I was convinced that this was going to be very, very powerful.
Speaker 1:And then I sat on it for a year and said no, no one's going to do this. No one's going to like this. This isn't going to work. This is all me. This is because of my background as a writer. That's why I want to do it this way. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Background as a writer that's why I want to do it this way. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So I pulled the trigger and just took a leap of faith, rounded up some guys and we're actually in the middle of it right now. We just completed the third session out of six this past Saturday and the workshop is going exactly as I fantasized that it would.
Speaker 1:The prompts that I devised, are story yeah, the the prompts that I devised are getting the guys to react the way I wanted them to, you know, to tell the stories that we were looking for, um, and all of that, but where I was going with this was around. The power of it was that this past week, when I asked the guys to read their homework because I gave them what I do is, at the end of each session, I give a prompt that you're going to write on this week and then you're going to bring that work back and I give you sort of the form and the content. So I'll say write a letter to someone who has hurt you, either expressing anger or forgiveness or whatever. And so this week the guys came back and everybody read their work and all of the guys had the same reaction where they were reading their work and they started crying as they were reading their work and getting choked up and then saying, oh my God, when I wrote this, I wasn't choked up. When I read this to myself, I wasn't choked up, but reading this out loud, like I'm starting to cry, I'm getting choked up. And then one of the guys said to me offline the things that we unearthed today to me were more powerful than any men's group I've ever been in, and I went, wow, so this notion that I had that we could do some really powerful work if we just put our words on paper and this was before you and I ever met, right, so before you and I ever spoke. So it's got nothing to do with this. It's just this pure coincidence that, coincident with talking with you today, I also had this experience of understanding the power of the written word and what it can do to set people free, and so I just want to get that out there in the open and acknowledge it and say, yes, I agree with everything you said, because I've experienced this myself just two days ago, because we're recording this on a Monday.
Speaker 1:The other thing that I want to talk about is something that I call the comfy sweater, and that is that people get so let me rephrase this when I facilitate groups and when I coach people one-on-one, one of the things that I have discovered is that people get so entrenched in their traumatic stories, so entrenched in their sad stories, that they wear them like a comfy sweater. Right, they don't want to take off the comfy sweater, they want to wrap themselves up in it, and I know it's lumpy and I know it's ugly and I know it's tattered, but it's mine and it makes me feel comfortable and I love my trauma. I love my story of why I am the way I am and why I'm sad and why I'm angry and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And they don't want to toss away the sweater, they don't want to be someone different. And the way you articulated it and which I really love and which I'm going to totally steal, is as long as you are being the same person, you're going to get the same outcomes right.
Speaker 1:As long as you are telling the story of I am in trauma because of this thing that happened, rather than saying this is a thing that happened to me and it's in the past, there's healing power right in there, in that slight difference between I am telling you a story about something that happened and I am reliving this story over and over again and reaffirming that who I am. Is that trauma? And I'm not even talking necessarily big T traumas. These can be little t traumas.
Speaker 1:We, you know, we all tell ourselves these stories and wrap ourselves up in these comfy sweaters because they feel right, because we're used to telling them right and I look back at my life and I think of you. Know, I used to tell myself this story, all these different stories, but I mean, but like, one of the stories I used to tell was that I, I am not good enough, or I don't love myself, or I am not one of the guys or whatever, um, and I don't tell myself those stories anymore. And the truth is, I'm a different person than I was and so my outcomes are different.
Speaker 2:Absolutely dude. Also, I just want to say congrats on, congrats on the two days ago as well. That's some powerful, that's some powerful stuff. I just wanted to put that in there.
Speaker 1:So cool yeah the workshop is going like. I am so proud of this. Um, I actually just it's funny. Last night, before I went to bed, I was actually rewatching the recording of the last session, um, just to sort of kind of reground myself and remind myself of what went on in it. And and I don't want to give away anybody's experiences or any of that, because because I've created a safe container and it's private what goes on in there but I will say that what I witnessed was some of the most powerful work I've ever seen guys unburdening themselves of these stories that they've carried forever love it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, dude, I love that absolutely freaking, love that so cool, um, something. That actually something I thought of here. I can, I can go through uh, what nlse and and the components mean to talk about the practice and the frames. So neuro-linguistic, somatic experience. Unless you had somewhere else, unless you had somewhere you wanted to go on that?
Speaker 1:No, that's actually someplace that I was hoping to go.
Speaker 2:Oh sweet. Well, here we are so NLSE, neuro-linguistic somatic experience. Breaking it down, it is a practice, it is something that is participated in. I don't think of it. I think of it more as a philosophical thing, rather than a practical philosophy, rather than an emotional practice. The emotions happen as a happy side effect.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:So, going into N, what the neuro is, neuro meaning of the mind and mindset in particular. And I define mindset as the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves or our opinion of ourself. So when we have a practical definition, a working definition of mindset, because folks know that mindset is important to everyone, wants to increase better their mindset, mindset is important to everyone, wants to increase better their mindset. And so folks don't have a practical working definition, so they can, they just go willy nilly. When we have a definition where it's our opinions of ourself, we can have a higher or lesser opinion of ourself and then we can adjust it accordingly. Uh, and that's how that, that into mindset and mindset is the stories that break us down or build us up. I suppose both.
Speaker 2:And then we go into linguistics, which ties into big time what we were talking about earlier, and it's what we say, what we think, what we write and how we breathe. Those are the pieces of language. So, going into what we say, what we write and how we breathe, those are, those are the pieces of language. So, going into what we say, think and say, think and write, the beautiful thing of words. So I was in, I was a trainer for a long time, so I use a trainer reference.
Speaker 1:And before you go there, I do want to remind you that you do have a hard stop in a few minutes all goods, we gots this. Okay, good.
Speaker 2:That's this. So there's carbs, fats and proteins that build up the body right. Those are the building blocks of the body. I view words as the ethereal Macronutrients of the mind. If we feed our mind quality words, we're going to have quality thoughts. If we feed our mind shit words, we're going to have shit thoughts. And so when we change those stories and translate what we want in order to work for us rather than against us, that's how we use it. And all these words are made up of characters and all of these. So it goes characters, then it goes words, then those words go into stories or statements, and when we spell them out, it's spelling, it's magic. So when we're writing things and we're bringing things into the world, we're creating them, and a fun one have you ever have?
Speaker 1:you heard the word abracadabra, of course.
Speaker 2:Okay, when I say abracadabra, what do you think of?
Speaker 1:Magic.
Speaker 2:Beautiful. Abracadabra is an old language, it's Aramaic and translated to English, abracadabra is with my words I create, with my words I influence.
Speaker 1:Hmm, love that.
Speaker 2:Abracadabra is just bringing what we say into reality. So how does our breath tie into language? Our breath is a way for our body to indicate its present state of being. So if we're breathing high and tight, it's good to fight. If we're breathing low and slow, we're good to flow. And so when we notice that we're breathing high and tight, we can take a step back and be like, okay, uh, there's nothing going on around me, I am in a safe set and setting why am I breathing high and tight? And then take a moment, remind your body that it's safe and then go with the flow, because I believe, through the breath and understanding the language of the breath, we can go from a thermometer where we react to the internal or external stimuli, we shift it over to a thermostat where we adjust our internal temperature to our liking, so we can find our Goldilocks zone.
Speaker 2:What happens out here is out of our control, what happens in here is a hundred percent us. So then that's how we have a dialogue with our breath. And then, uh, the somatic soma of the body, that is, the physiological body, because we're integrating breath work, of course, so we're just getting everything flowing, and then the physical body has an intelligence that it could heal itself if we cut our finger. It's a passive participation, it just does its own thing. The emotional body is timeless, so we can have stories from any point in time still with us in the present moment. And so with this process we actively participate in the processing of unmetabolized emotions, so that way we can allow that pent up energy or those emotional blockages to flow through and then allow it to just do its thing. So we actively participate in the processing of emotions.
Speaker 2:And I believe that's the disconnect where folks may believe that it's a passive process. So they'll say, oh, just a little bit more time and I'll be all good. That's not true. There's no active like, there's no active aspect to it, so it's just going to linger. So that's how the soma somatic ties in and then experience tying into question. You asked me earlier, it happens really quickly, right, it happens real time. People are experiencing change in the moment and then the residue afterwards is lightness, abundance, clear mind and some folks I have not had a client do this yet or a participant, but I've had a buddy of mine who does the same work and he was working with someone in a group and they got up and went to the bathroom twice. Afterwards went up to mark marks his name and said I haven't shit that much, or I've really let things out. So people's shits can actually be better through this practice.
Speaker 2:Who doesn't want better shits. Who doesn't want better shits? Yeah, and so, uh, when with the experience part, my intention when it comes to working with folks is to collect as many aha moments as possible early on. So aha moments are a pattern, interrupt and it's a dis or it's a connection of two different synaptic pathways in the brain. This is where the neurology comes in.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And so when we take two seemingly distant things and we bring them together, then there's an aha's, a particular story that we want to reinforce. Then we embody that story and what will happen is a process known as myelination, so those neurons are going to strengthen. It also works with the other aspect, with the comfort sweater.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:It's the same idea is bringing that and feeling a certain way aspect. Wow, bringing that and feeling a certain way aspect. So collecting aha moments and bringing folks to uh, bringing folks to a state where we're guiding folks I'll actually say guiding folks to a state where they're no longer uh I think I'm using the word right Cumbered by their own being. Okay, that sounded weird, but it was. I was like what's the? I could have said like cumbered by their stories, cumbered by others, cumbered by blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Cumbered by the weather. It actually started snowing today, so that's what popped up.
Speaker 2:So, then it's, then we decrease that and we alleviate any pains or ouchies, and then, through that practice, uh, the thing that I also bring in that's really important to me is anything that resonates with the participant. They can take it and they can teach it, because I don't want to work with people for a long time. I want to have people for a good time with people for a long time. I want to have people for a good time, and so I don't agree with, I don't okay, maybe not agree. I don't see, I I'm gonna reword this one again. So I want to make it like.
Speaker 2:I want to make it like polite, because I don't want to be rude right I think that when folks are linked, or when folks are holding on to a modality for 10 years and they haven't really changed anything, I don't think that modality is working anymore and it's out of habit that someone's continuing to go yeah, I can agree with you on that and I I I it short.
Speaker 2:I want it quick turnover, not turnover of participants, a turnover of the feels Right. So when people go and they teach it, then they get to have a positive impact on that person's life. So I purposefully made this so that it's a ripple effect where I am not the block. I want people to take it and go and then integrate it themselves and whatever doesn't resonate, reject it yeah, and then adopt their own sort of style.
Speaker 1:Cool, yeah. Well, I can see by the clock on the wall that we have reached the end of our time together. Well, I can see by the clock on the wall that we have reached the end of our time together and unfortunately we didn't get a chance to go to some other places that I wanted to go with this conversation, Least of all not asking you the two questions that we ask every guest. So what that means is.
Speaker 1:Okay go ahead. Well, because I have a hard stop too, unfortunately, but what that means is that you have to come back, um, no, anything, yeah, yeah, uh. So the next time you come, we'll dive into the the rest of the stuff that I wanted to talk with you about and, uh, you can also answer our two questions, um, but in the meantime, I just want to offer you immense gratitude. Kyle Smith, thank you for being here, thank you for introducing us to the world of NLSE, and you have an odd link for your website. It's a tiny URL, so I'm going to put that in the show notes rather than trying to explain it to people. I'm just going to put that in the show notes. Folks can reach you there. I'll put your email address in there if you like, if that's good with you, and folks can reach you through that, and other than that, I'm just going to say thank you, thank you, thank you. I appreciate you so much.
Speaker 1:I love what you had to say. I really enjoyed our conversation. I love your vibe, as I said before, and uh, with that being said, it is time for us to throw the bags back into the jalopy and head back out onto the authenticity road. I love how you're laughing. Um, that is how we end every show. So, uh, on behalf of the show, I am a Tor and until we meet again, please be authentic. Goodbye everyone. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you're notified when a new episode is posted. Thanks so much for listening.
Speaker 2:We hope what you've heard will help you on the road to your personal authenticity.
Speaker 1:Visit us at wwwauthenticityroadonline. Thank you, you.
