Trauma-Informed Yoga with Russel (Rusty) Price

0:00 When you're a yoga teacher or you're teaching a class, or if any description you are automatically put on a pedestal just by valid by virtue of you being at the front of the class and sharing stuff which you know, you know, and you're passionate about and people will respond.

0:15 And yeah there's a there's definitely an expectation and I think for myself having been someone who's like who's you know, I'm had the reputation as the guy who done all the workshops and being to all the courses and I certainly have studied an awful lot. And had to be humbled, by the fact that, you know, I'm still dealing with stuff, you know, I'm still having to face myself and be humbled, by my own, I guess my own traumas, or my own kind of particular quirks, every

0:46 day. And then, how do I in good faith? And with Integrity go and teach other people around. Some of the things that I'm sharing which which, you know, you know, I'm saying, I'm trauma-informed, I'm a hypnotherapist That I create meaningful change in people's lives.

1:03 How successfully if I manage to do that in my own life? And what perspective do I need to have? So that I can be in Integrity with both showing the stuff that I do, which is enormously useful for people and also acknowledging, you know, I'm not enlightened.

1:21 I'm not perfect. I'm very, very human. And, in fact, bring that humanness to everything that I do is, is kind of Of key for my own and other people's feelings. Welcome to the going pro yoga podcast, Namaste. My name is Paul chiodo joined here with Michael Henry.

1:41 Most yoga teacher, trainings are becoming watered-down and mediocre. So we've created this podcast to help supplement those of you who graduated from a teacher training and don't feel confident going out into the real world. Michael.

1:57 And I are lucky to have been trained by some amazing. Amazing people. We've gone out into the world ourselves and had success and we want you to feel confident to protect your students and to build your career with integrity and authenticity. Welcome to our podcast.

2:13 Okay, welcome back to the going pro yoga podcast. Today, we have a special episode because we're bringing a guest, a guest who happens to also be my neighbor. So, Russ or Rusty is sitting across the table from me and he is a trauma-informed, hypnotherapist in coach, and for us and the yoga space, we, you know, we talk about trauma, we mention it, whether it be with releasing, trauma, the body, trauma being stuck in the hips, you know, doing hip openers

2:43 possibly getting emotional. You know, they're be releasing some crying, whether this has happened to you yourself, or maybe you've seen it with some of your students in your classes. Basically this is all centered around trauma to some degree and it's such a vast topic.

2:59 So we're probably just going to scratch the surface on it today but I wanted to invite Rusty. Nice to meet you all to come to the podcast and just talk about some of the stuff that he knows, and hopefully help to inform us about trauma.

3:12 So, welcome to the podcast. Great to see you guys. It's great to see you again, Mike. And it's good to be here. I noticed my little nervous. Yeah, that's okay. Do the right. I want to do a good job. Yeah, whatever comes.

3:23 What is authentically you? And that's the best way to go. So there's no worries there. It's great facilitation right away. Yeah, perfect. So just allow our audience to get to know you a little bit. Maybe you could just introduce yourself, you have an accent.

3:35 So let's just try to give them a little bit of a bio of who you are, where you come from. Sure. Well yeah, I'm I'm an Aussie and spent a lot of time in Melbourne, probably my formative years. In Melbourne, where I've reparative Time study every Natural Therapy under the sun. I've got a long list of things that I've studied and I won't go into that too much other than to say that I've got a background in hypnotherapy neuro-linguistic, programming Kinesiology and some of the

4:06 Eastern movement Arts as well as well as a HEPA Bodywork. And for many years, I ran a college of natural therapies called the Australian College of energetic medicine and I taught all around Australia. And then at a certain point, I got to a place where I became very disenchanted with the, I guess the natural therapies New Age, healing, kind of whatever you want to call it industry or the sphere in which all these things were happening and I actually left everything and

4:40 chucked it away. The kind of discover what actually worked because I found it was really easy to be. It's really easy to be spiritual when you live in the monastery. But what what works cross-culturally in terms of Personal change, personal development, personal healing, you know, if, for example, you don't believe in chakras or you're not into star signs or you don't particularly resonate with psychology or any of these other kind of lenses that we can

5:07 view the world through. So then I went on a big journey I went actually back to corporate and became a geologist which is part of my other training a geologist is that like a rock? It is specializes in rocks and literally a gold digger and I've worked in West Africa with It's Chiefs, and I've worked with Bedouins and Saudi Arabia and as all across all across the world, and now I'm back in or would living next to you. And I've returned with a whole

5:36 lot of answers. I guess to some of the questions I've really been seeking questions. Like why does stuff keep coming up? You know, what is my purpose? How do we have good relationships? What are some of the principles of healing which lay beneath The stories are the modalities which lots of people practice and that's what I'm really interested in. And so becoming trauma-informed, has also given me lots and lots of Clues around how we can kind of better Usher ourselves or Steward.

6:08 Our souls are our hearts into the world that we want to do. We really want to experience. It's amazing and I'm sure there are a few of those things. Can resonate with many people listening, it's like that's kind of what I want to know about it as well. Exactly.

6:20 And and the question that comes up for me is like Probably selfishly or doing it for yourself first, which is kind of the reason why we do most things. We want to do it for ourselves and then eventually we're like, hey, this is fun. Maybe I can help some people, which is part of what you tried to do with that information, I think. Yeah, yeah, totally, yeah.

6:38 It's now, I'm definitely trying to scratch my own eh. And I think one of the things that I was looking at, with a little bit of Suspicion was like, okay. We see all these people who run these workshops and run these classes on, what is it in your how to heal?

6:52 All your emotional box. Or clear or your caramel or become the perfect descended Yogi in a weekend, what a claim. And and and then you look at the people teaching and and she go well, something doesn't add up here. So what is going on? Is it the practice itself?

7:09 That is not not the best way or is it the teacher that's not following the principles or is this something else going on? Yeah I think there's a bit of a disconnect and we talked about this a little bit. Sometimes I mean not to say that it's just yoga. Cheers.

7:23 But obviously talk specifically about yoga teachers but just the expectations that they have as a leader in the health and wellness which is a very vast industry health and wellness industry. And then, you know, you become a yoga teacher and maybe you do it in 21 days, 24 days, maybe it's online for a few months or whatever it is.

7:43 The second you graduate you are all of a sudden. Now a doctor you're now a therapist, your now healer you know, you're a movement specialist, all these things and and you know the General Public Public. If they hear that your yoga teacher, all of a sudden, all of these expectations are like, oh, you know, how to do all these things. You can help me with all of these things. And part of our job is to tell them. That's not your job.

8:05 Your job is to hold space and to provide an experience for your students to feel good. And that's it, you know, you're not a therapist to like healed or trauma. You're not a therapist, if you heal their physical ailments, you can help them and guide them, and support them.

8:18 But this expect ation that they need to know how to do these things. And some people they just they step into their like I need to know how to do. So the know, you know, at least that's what I see is, they'll try to fake it and be like I can help heal you and I can do this.

8:31 And you know, this is you may learn a few things and I'm sure they do provide some value to the people that attend their sessions and whatever like that. But yeah, I don't think there's that same depth, especially hearing the background that you have. Hold on my mic is a little funky. Yeah.

8:46 Something chuckling. But yeah, it's a when you're a yoga teacher or you're teaching a class or if any Ian, you are automatically put on a pedestal just by valid by virtue of you being at the front of the class and sharing stuff which you know, you know and you're passionate about and people will respond. And yeah there's a there's definitely an expectation and I think for myself having been someone who's like who's you know, I'm had the reputation as

9:14 the guy who done all the workshops and being to all the courses. And I certainly have studied an awful lot and had to be humbled by the fact That, you know, I'm still dealing with stuff. You know, I'm still having to face myself and be humbled by my own.

9:32 I guess my own trauma is with my own kind of particular quirks every day, and then, how do I in good faith? And with Integrity go and teach other people around. Some of the things that I'm sharing which which, you know, you know, I'm saying, I'm trauma-informed.

9:49 I'm a hypnotherapist that I create meaningful change in people's lives. How successfully if I manage to do that in my own life? And what perspective do I need to have? So that I can be in Integrity with both showing the stuff that I do, which is enormously useful for people and also acknowledging, you know, I'm not enlightened. I'm not perfect.

10:13 I'm very, very human. And, in fact, bring that humanness to everything that I do is, is kind of key for my own and other people's feelings? Absolutely. It's relatable. You know, if you're seen as this Guru non, you know, you have no trauma, then it's it's like just not realistic, you know what I mean?

10:31 Like, come on, it's not really a thing and that's a good point to make. Is that exactly that? I feel ya. Yes, to kind of forgive ourselves or release ourselves from this expectation of perfection. Well, at the same time.

10:44 I think there's a sweet spot. Michael between, you know, certainly releasing yourself from the need to be perfect or whatever the ideal is But also to kind of hold yourself to a high standard and to not be sloppy either, you know, and there in the middle is more and more of that I learn about trauma. The more I'm understanding that The Sweet Spot lies in the middle between between these extremes, but as we venture through life, we can often ping-pong between these extremes until we find a balance in the

11:14 middle. And, you know, you're going to meet people like that in your journey along the way. Well, yeah, that's profound. So yeah, I had it, you know, One of my girlfriend's was an Ashtanga teacher and we all know the reputation has done good. It's Tangy Yogi's have been very diligent and very, you know, kind of into the most actually, two. It's dated.

11:35 Two girls who were stung Yogi's and they were both. They both had this kind of fixation on achieving Enlightenment in this lifetime, and I was just very, I mean, I have no problem with that. It was just very interesting to watch how their personalities and their background kind of melded with this intense desire, Fire to be enlightened in this lifetime combined with a very strict practice.

11:58 Mmm. Yeah, as opposed to like the Kundalini Yogi's who are like very much, you know, very much about the emotions and processing staff and and working through because I think some of some of the protocols, there are specifically to deal with things like depression or increasing libido or they have like kind of therapeutic aspect to the to the Kree as Etc. And so It's just so interesting for me to observe, what kind of yoga attracted, what kind of

12:28 yoga teachers, hmm. That's such a, yeah, that's interesting. You say that because when I want to hear you say, the difference between those two, I hear very much more masculine energy, more feminine energy, and not to be, you know, not a gender thing. Just more that drive that push that moving towards the goal, that determination, the discipline, all these things, which to me are qualities of masculinity and then more, that's surrender feeling into To

12:54 kind of explore ation is more. That feminine quality from the Kundalini side yet hardly. Yeah. And I would say in these, in these two, women are the three women that I was looking at. It's very much. So, you know, the tourist Angus were had a very strong connection to their masculine. And the friend who was doing Kundalini, very, very feminine woman and so it's just interesting. I was living with a German girl, who's very, very particular about everything.

13:18 And of course she was studying, is anger and becoming an anger teacher. And so, it's just, it's just Curious to see how our personalities, and our, and what constitutes, our personalities. Also filters into the practices that suit our saw that where we best suited for right, we're drawing to exactly. Yeah.

13:36 And then the question comes up is like what do we actually need? And do we need more of the same or do we need a little bit of the opposite to try to balance out? Very good. Question again, in the Yang maybe? Yeah, I think therein lies. The getting of wisdom, you know, it's like my friend who's been doing Ashtanga who I, dated is still doing a stronger. I think she's He's let go of the veganism and, and the desire to become enlightened, but she's

13:57 still very, she's very, very dedicated and very masculine. Whereas I think the Kundalini yoga teacher is, I don't know. I think she's doing other things, she's making things out of felt and found objects. That's how wonderful is that?

14:10 Yeah, so that's great. Okay, well, that was a great little introduction. I think we went into a few little different interesting things. So let's bring it back to trauma a little bit more specifically. And Maybe just what is trauma mean to you?

14:26 Let's let's start with something and write a question trauma. Well one of the things about learning that trauma is its kind of traumatic. So I'm trying to put you can't use the word in the definition Troy. I think Troy means to me anything.

14:44 Well I've actually got a working definition of it which I use in my classes. So trauma is any automatic Behavior which is I'm resourceful. So it doesn't help you get what you want. It reduces connection, either to yourself or to another person and it reduces your creativity in the moment so that you're reacting, rather than responding.

15:11 And then I draw a distinction between capital T trauma and lowercase, T trauma. And so, in the past, trauma used to refer to things like, you know, Getting your arms blown off something happening in a war physical trauma.

15:29 That's right. Hitting your head, traumatic brain injury? Yeah, something like that. Yeah, something kind of catastrophic and very life altering and and fair enough that's it's definitely traumatic. And nowadays, we learn more and more about trauma and how things are stored in the nervous system. It's becoming more and more clear that kind of everyone has trauma, because as we grow, Growing up as our nervous systems are developing.

15:56 There's there's pieces that we miss or there is experiences either from our parents, or just from life, that impact us in a negative way. And get retained in the nervous system as a coping mechanism. And these things come out and this is what I would call a lowercase T trauma or trauma Expressions come out and things like overthinking or over-explaining or people-pleasing or Alcoholism or, you know, just kind of scrolling on your phone when you know you've got a thousand better things to do.

16:30 These are like trauma expressions and their consequence of a feeling or a sensation in the body which is uncomfortable and that we would rather avoid or we've created Pathways to avoid that feeling and hence it comes out as these other behaviors. Which you know, we know it's like it's the Classic example of a trauma.

16:54 As you say to yourself, I'm going to do this particular thing. Like I'm not going to eat this food today, or I'm not going to text that person or I'm I'm going to go for a run and we might even Proclaim that to other people and then we do something completely different and this gap between what we say and what we do there is that can also be classed as a trauma. Hmm.

17:16 Now it's not the event, the original event that happened. That is traumatic. Alma is the resulting set of behaviors that you know that get retained in the nervous system as a result of that traumatic event. So it's kind of yeah, interesting things for you.

17:36 Okay, so I've heard this before this big T Little T trauma. I call it baby T trauma, right? Yep. Right. And then Big T trauma. So I hear to explaining a lot of the baby T trauma and I'll just reiterate it just to make sure I understand it.

17:50 And for the audience is that it's like these small moments. It's of expression or small moments of where we find ways to distract ourselves or to manage an uncomfortable feeling that we like, you said, we're trying to avoid which we all do on a regular basis, really? Yeah.

18:08 So that's really interesting. So then what would be the the Big T? Like let's talk about the big to use that like the initial source of it or is it a completely different? Yeah. Beep. A trauma. Picked a trauma is kind of like a big traumatic event.

18:23 And, and Big T. Trauma can also be something like, you know, you're graphing with cancer or autoimmune disease or something, which is kind of like front and center in your entire life. And, you know, it's kind of inescapable and it can be also like, you know, the classic Dark Night of the Soul, which in my courses, I explained as a conjunction of events, so a Dark Night of the Soul can be like you're grappling with multiple multiple things.

18:53 Things across different contexts. So you might have lost your job. You might have broken up with somebody. You might have to be moving house, you might have a health condition, you might be having to live with your parents who you don't get on with.

19:08 And there's all sorts of Dynamics in there that you know we could group all of those together as a big T trauma because everywhere you look, shit, is getting fucked up. It's like where do I start? You're in a constant state of of Stress and overwhelm. And over time, we know that this burns out the body and there's no clear kind of end in sight.

19:31 There's no clear path way out. And over time, yeah, this has really military's effect so we could call that a big teacher armor or you know, something like you know getting your arms pulling or for having a right. So it could be either or so could either be a significant event that occurred or could be just trauma? That's built up over time.

19:49 That's Kind of just a reoccurring environment or state or thing that you're in. And it just that's it may start as like, not so dramatic, but because of the exposure is so consistently there that it just turns into a big T basically.

20:03 Yeah, that's right. And again, the trauma is the, the response, right? So, it's like this continuing being a continuous state of fight, or flight, which is the is the is the trauma. And then how do we then? The question becomes, how do we shift out of that?

20:20 That right? Right? The consequences of those events are those things? That's right. Interesting. Yeah. And so, you know, from a, from a yoga teaching point of view, you know, I think yoga is one of those those fabulous tools that people can use to self to help regulate their nervous system while they're in a yoga class.

20:44 First of all, someone else, you know, if you're the yoga teacher, you're telling them what to do which can be an enormous relief for someone who was just Overwhelmed by life, right? It's got like, thank goodness. Someone else can tell me what to do and obviously with the the combination of the movements, the breathing, the movement of energy and the, the the co-regulation with the teacher, because you're nervous systems, extremely important, I'll talk

21:10 about co-regulation in a bit but you as the yoga teacher in the presence in the space, you hold allows your students nervous systems to down regulate, which just Gives them some relief from the sense of overwhelm, or the incoming and quietens down.

21:27 The amygdala. In your tones, the vagus nerve does all these amazing things on the inside. But basically, people feel better and feel more resilient and able to kind of end deal with what's happening in their life from much more creative point of view.

21:43 There's just one of the many benefits of yoga for helping people who are going through and experiencing trauma, whether it's a big deal or a baby too. He said a lot of interesting things there especially the beginning, excuse me about ultimately it's kind of reiterated what I said before about. It's just about holding space and allowing people to experience what they need to experience and you know as much as we want to heal people and be therapist and provide the service and all this stuff.

22:12 At the end of the day for us as teachers, we can just be there for them. Hmm. It's very natural kind of Human desire to want to help and to want to relieve somebody of their suffering, right? And that's a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful beautiful and I've spent a lot of my life kind of developing ever more refined tools to do that and I think what you're saying is also very true because in the work that's emerging through me is Jay called Quantum. Hypnotherapy, it's a very

22:44 refined, very clear way of doing exactly that holding space. And allowing what? And as you do that, and you get really good at doing that, the person's natural intelligence in their, natural goodness, starts to reveal itself and it's an amazing thing to watch. And sometimes it almost feels like I'm doing nothing. But I'm also doing everything and gave them as a yoga teacher. The best thing you can do is to actually continue your journey into your own staff into Her own

23:21 trauma into your own practice because the more you connect with your nervous system and are able to down regulate it and hold a beautiful space for everything that arises both within you. And within the class we go into resonance you know, by a morphological resonance and that's very calming and healing for another person's nervous system. Hmm, it's really interesting.

23:46 So it's almost like, well, I shouldn't say you're doing less but kinda it's kinda Like you're doing less? Yeah, yeah well I think they're doing less feels like less mental thinking it's white. That's why it feels very easy, right? But at the same time, you are because there's less mental activity.

24:07 We get in touch. We've all had the experience of when we're teaching, you know, we get an Insight or we get a an Impulse or something kind of channels through us as like, oh, I'm going to shift the class in this direction and I feel like I should say this Nothing to this particular person.

24:22 It's a very, it's a, it's a very common experience in a very useful experience for showing you that you're in resonance and you're doing good, just by doing that thing, which feels really easy intuitive. So something we talked about before, we hit the record button and I think this might be connected to what we're just saying now, is this ability to be able to be present and, as a yoga teacher, it's really important to be present for our students to be able to see and

25:05 or guide them in the ways that they need. And just Of a little bit of context of that. I mean if we set up a sequence or whatever we want to do, we have this whole plan of what we want to do. We show up to class and the people that show up to class, maybe it's not suitable for them right now.

25:21 The sudden we got to throw inaudible, we got to mix it up a little bit. We might have to change things or if you're blind and you're not present, you might just follow through with your original plan and carry out the class. And then, you know, people's experiences won't necessarily be catered in the way that they need to be. So being present as a teacher, is really helpful for them for the students to be able to Feel seen and heard and you know, change things, modify things if

25:43 just in the tangible context of trying to do poses or things that are more challenging than the people that are actually in the class, then, you know, you'd have to downgrade or modify or maybe change it up a little bit. So it's really important to be present for us as yoga teachers. But then we did speak about the challenge of being present in general.

26:04 So let's maybe talk about that a little bit more heartily, totally. So yeah, being present is one of these kind of The Holy Grail which gets bandied about in a lot of spiritual teachings and yoga and it is a good teaching for sure. You do want to be present that said if you're working with, if you're working with trauma or if you just want to be trauma-informed, it's good to know that a lot of trauma. And again, trauma is this an automatic Behavior, which is unresolved for doesn't help us

26:33 get What It Wants what we want but it's in automatic behavior and so true. Mama can arise when uncomfortable feelings come up in the body and then we distract ourselves, that's a coping mechanism. So that we don't get overwhelmed by whatever story or sensation is arising. So then the invitation to be present to this uncomfortable, feeling can actually be the last thing that a person wants to do, or they may be so used to just talking with a client this morning.

27:09 Maybe so used to distracting themselves that they don't even know what is going on underneath. And so, there's two things, I think that you can offer as a yoga teacher is one is the invitation to be exactly where you are. So be, you know, you can instead of saying, be present because some people may not even have the understanding of what that means, right, or the ability to do it because of the state that they may be in all the abilities. So that just You know, goes

27:39 right over their head, be present there like. Yeah, I don't even know how to do that. What does that even mean to be exactly? That will, these kind of, like so there's two things there, if if a person knows what it's like to be present, let's say they've done some yoga. They're going through a really hard time and now they know that they are distracting cells or in a trauma Loop, that can be really confronting.

28:01 I mean, certainly for someone like me, I'll use myself an example, done, lots of meditation. Lots of touchy, lots of yoga, I know when, I'm present. And I know when I'm distracted, or agitated etcetera. And when someone tells me be present, the disparity, between what I know as being present versus the agitated state, I'm in at the moment only kind of fuels, my agitation, it gets really annoying. Okay.

28:28 Because I've got this concept of all, I have to do being present, right? Okay, so that's that's an example of when someone knows what it's like to be present. And if they don't then as I was talking with a friend the other day she said you know I've got no idea what it means.

28:46 When people say love yourself, this is a symptom of neglect. It's a like when we were growing up there were certain things that we didn't get as a growing nervous system and so if you don't have an experience of being present, that instruction won't mean anything either. Okay, and so how what do we do?

29:06 As yoga instructors? We can. We can offer this beautiful invitation to be present as much as you can. You know, this little tag line is much as you can or in whatever way is available to you. And this gives a lot of permission again for me, for example, to be present in what I think I should be doing, or to be just present with whatever is available, however, much I can. And for someone, if you have people who are beginners, who might not Even know what

29:39 presents is say, you're teaching a bunch of autistic kids or people in prison or marginalized people who may not have had a really good experience of this. You can do some kind of Yoga Nidra, kind of thing of like to talk them through noticing Sensations in the body because that's very tangible, being present is kind of like a concept, you know, I like I know what being present is, but I do know that I can feel which foot is on the floor. I do know that I can feel my

30:07 chest expanding, I You know that I can, you know, see which hand is higher than the other. Yeah, this again is a great instructions which everyone can can basically win at and yeah. Changing it from a concept to something very tangible is going to help ya. Guiding guiding the the idea of Presence by giving them something to change their attention or change their focus on.

30:36 So, oftentimes breath is a big one. For yoga, you know, at the beginning of class. Generally speaking, it's really important to establish breath. Bring awareness to breath, to probably allow people to, you know, become more present, you know.

30:49 But saying yeah, let's let's start to, you know, be present in the room. You know, that might not work but say, hey, let's start to pay attention to our breath. That's like it big inhale together. Perfect. Yes. Yes. And then exhale.

31:02 And that feels really good and they don't know why feels good. They don't know if they're present, but you know what? It's getting them to where they, you know, might be helpful. For them, it's hardly totally total and there was a one of our were in a training right now. But one of the women that I was chatting with, she said that she was working at a gym.

31:19 She was teaching a class there and you know, Jim cultures a little bit more intense and you know presence isn't necessarily the primary goal to usually like let's go and let's get, you know, buff and tough and all this stuff and she said that she was leading a class and she's like, generally speaking, she was catering to the audience what they wanted, you know, a little bit more intense, masculine energy and all that stuff. But she said, she found a moment

31:40 to encourage three deep breaths and she said it was the most magical thing in the world because it was like they were discovering breath for the first time. She said the way they were exhaling was just like, you know, moaning and groaning. Just like Ali.

31:53 Just feel so good. Right? And it wasn't about like being president that, it was just like, hey, pay attention to your breath. Let's do it together for three, you know, 15 seconds, literally. Just like to take a deep breath. Exactly, exactly.

32:05 That's really, and that's, yeah, that's catering to your audience. I mean, that's that Skillful means from the, from the Buddhist teachings, which is like, can you adjust as a yoga teacher, you know, are you flexible enough in your teachings, to adjust your instructions to the audience and, you know, if you with a group of advanced Yogi's, by all means, you know, you know, activate the crown chakra and become deeply present all the way through. You know, what does it, the

32:32 items? The Shimla channels pingala. I think anyway, you know what I mean versus, you know, great. We've got a group of people Prison inmates that were going to teach yoga to. Can you breathe in so deeply? You can push your belly out, you know, and then let that go naturally. And that is your ability to be present with the needs of your students.

32:55 And then if you can't be present, that's a good invitation for you, to lean into that stretch to kind of Follow You the your own teachings in yoga and kind of lean into your Edge. And okay, where do I need to expand? Knowing that I'm can be perfectly. I'm perfectly.

33:13 Welcome to be exactly where I am. Yeah, we give ourselves the same permission. As we give our students to be perfect. Exactly. As you are. And you don't need to change or to be any different. I think that's such a great. Thing to say in a class or just in general. Exactly did it.

33:32 So it's just so it's so relieving. Yes. Do not have to do. Yep. For a change. And for someone to just be like, you know, whatever is going on in your brain, whatever you're feeling in this moment. You know, that's all okay. It's totally fine.

33:48 You didn't mean. Yeah. And just giving people permission even they don't, even though they don't need permission but hearing it, hearing it is just a little. So healing itself. If to just be like, it's okay yeah, yep, totally totally.

34:01 And then, if we, if we go a little bit further into the mental aspect of trauma, you know, we give this permission your oh, you're perfect as you are. There's no need to change it to be any different something. And there's another phrase that my, my teacher said you are, you're perfect, as you are including your desire to change, okay? And this also gives permission to all the parts of us that are Stranded with what we're feeling. Now it's like those parts can

34:31 also explicitly be made, welcome, you know, you're perfect as you are including the parts of you that want to be different, okay? And this is how we this is kind of the yoga of of the Mind in terms of creating that welcoming trauma-informed space for everything that's going on.

34:54 Well, that's really great. Keep having to clear my throat and get some water here. Okay, cool. So, where should we go from here? Which, I mean, I got so many questions and yeah, there's so many things to think about. I think we should just have a little bit of a reprieve haha, for the brain.

35:10 Yeah. For our audience, to just be like, okay, you know, maybe I'll make a little break, just metabolize that in your body, let it all sink into your unconscious. There's no need to understand, just let that metabolize all by itself.

35:24 You have permission or if you want, you can go and Rewind and exactly right over again, if it didn't quite resonate, the first time. Yeah, lots of interesting things. I think about even for myself just sitting across the table. I feel like we could go for a while. Yeah, this is lots of guys here and it's super, it's super it's to be useful for you to become a really impactful teacher because we, you know, the reality is that people will look at you. As a teacher, they will look to

35:55 you for guidance and they are seeking answers and if you can offer them perspectives, you don't have to give them answers. But this is how I frame a lot of my teaching now is like these are just some perspectives which I found really useful and I've answered a lot of questions which I have grappled with for the last. You know, literally two decades and you can offer those for sure.

36:19 Well that's great. Okay cool. So let's change gears. For a second. Let's just give a little bit of a break with that, and I'm curious because Byron was here yesterday, and he asked you a question, which I thought was such a great question and I want to ask you again, okay? So, you know, we talk a lot about trauma and we're not so much about hypnotherapy with that is within your, in, your skill set.

36:40 And Byron asked the question. I think it was. What what's the number one thing that gets in the way from someone being able to benefit from hypnotherapy? Yeah. What is it? So it's a good question. So I can't remember what I Look now, but I think was along the lines of there was two.

36:58 There's two answers that question, one is the amount of safety that you feel with the practitioner. So if you feel because there's this misconception that hypnotherapy is about. Basically me saying, some words, taking over your brain and making you do things that you don't want to do. And so, part of my job is to kind of explain look hypnotherapy is you're always in control. Okay, and from that place.

37:27 And also, I'm going to guide you into a trance, and trance is a very natural state. So, we've all had the experience of hopping in a car turning on the music and then just stepping out of the car at the, at our destination with that.

37:41 Any idea how we got there? Possibly, we were talking to a friend on the phone and doing all sorts of things you're in a driving trance. So you're doing something very automatically and, as long as the person, Let me count, let me jump back a bit. So hypnotherapy is a way of kind of entering into that trance with a bit more awareness and as you're doing that just like you can put your foot on the brakes or turn the steering wheel at anytime.

38:10 If it's appropriate, you can do that when you're in a trance with a practitioner. And then, the more safety that is built, the more enjoyable, the ride is going to be quite frankly, right? As we can go, all sorts of places once you. Understand that this is the car that you've got to drive and actually it's capable of so many more things than you ever thought possible.

38:32 And I'm literally just sitting in the passenger seat going. Do you know, it's got an accelerator there, do you know it's got 20 booster there, do you know that it's got these extra safety mechanisms here and suddenly you're discovering a whole new way of getting yourself from A to B.

38:48 So when that safety is there, you can do amazing things. And the second thing I think I said was what would the question was, what would prevent someone from going into true? Benefiting from hypnotherapy session. Yep. There's also the skill of the practitioner because in allowing and giving that deep deep permission to the person who's receiving or engaging in hypnotherapy. So, because often when we, a lot of trauma is connected to Shadow work and Shadow work is

39:22 basically your ability to face things that you wouldn't really admit in polite company. And you probably don't even want to admit, to yourself. And then there are Are all there are ways and techniques and processes whereby, you can assist somebody in connecting to these parts which they don't even want to admit to themselves.

39:47 But have enormous influence on our physiology on the way we do things on our relationships Etc it's a shadow side basically and the more safety you can create around someone to connecting with embracing and loving their Shadow.

40:02 The more Effective that session is going to be because the shadow side has a lot of control over our lives. It governs. A lot of our unconscious decisions, the more we can bring a love too, that our lives changed profoundly and deeply. Hmm.

40:21 So well that makes me think not to say that. You know, we have this ability as teachers to participate in this hypnotherapy type of thing because that's obviously not true. There's Obviously, a lot of intricate, like you said skills, and, and experience and stuff like that, but when you were talking about, like the safety or the feelings secure is, it is almost a prerequisite in order to move into the next stage of using the skill as a hypnotherapist to help guide, people's experiences in this

40:54 trance to help them discover inwardly for themselves what they need to discover. So when I hear it myself saying it like that, I'm thinking, okay, that's not too far off from From what we do for yoga teachers is we create space, we hold space, we try to make people feel safe and secure in a container in a studio and a room.

41:12 Whatever it is on Zoom, sometimes a lot of times actually and then we just ultimately hold the space and guide their experience. Very very generally like at all, it's all ultimately just allowing them to just. Get go Inward and allowing them to self explore without having the guide of Someone Like You. For example, so it's like a very micro ability to be able All to notice are achieve the right.

41:36 The same thing but it's moving in the similar Direction 100%. Yeah, it's a transferable meta skill. Yeah, I would say that ability to hold space. Obviously, you know, in a yoga class is not appropriate to be doing things like, Shadow work. Yeah, exactly.

41:50 But the creation of safety is the first Port of Call and one of the, the biggest things for deep transformation. And so, this also is to some degree, a measure of your comfort with Our own shadow side and your own ability to hold all of these parts inside you with love and what I've called, loving awareness, whether you judge them as good or bad, you can still hold them with loving awareness.

42:18 And this is the transmission. This is the biological resonance. This is the mirror neurons. Crawl. What you will across different contexts. It's this. It's the depth of the space that you are holding is proportional to the amount of permission and love you.

42:33 You can give yourself surrounding all of these aspects of yourself and that I think over and above any of your technical abilities is what's going to impact, you know, you will have we've all had that experience of like students coming up to us and go. Oh my God, that was amazing.

42:51 And you thinking well why I need a couple of postures and then we lay down and breathe but your your presence and your self worked is reflecting out and Rippling out into the class that you're teaching, hmm. Now, that's powerful.

43:05 I love it. Yeah. And we can all cultivate that kind of debt. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, great. Well, we're almost about 45 minutes. We usually keep these these guests episodes about 45 minutes and I don't want to keep going, but I'm thinking maybe we will.

43:21 Maybe we'll wrap this up and have an opportunity possibly in the future to bring you back. If you like, we could go deeper and deeper and talk about more things and I'm sure there's gonna be some questions that come up from this episode, some curiosity things. So I have one more Question, just because it popped into my head and then we'll do a few concluding questions. So people can connect with you and learn for more you from Moon, learn more from you.

43:41 I know you have some videos and see stuff that you do online that Christina is telling me about. So, so before we get into that, I just have a quick question about particularly, like, disease and stuff in the body. I don't know if you're going to have the answer to this question, but I'm just thinking, there's someone in a training that we're participating in, who approached me and asked about Which fibromyalgia is, is basically a condition where you

44:07 just feel pain. Your nervous system is ultimately overwhelmed, and Trauma, as far as I understand, is an element of your nervous system being overwhelmed and unable to know how to handle it or want to be able to handle it or manage it. So I'm curious to know if you have any thoughts and maybe we can ad-lib, it just was related to, you know, physical ailments in the body and how trauma can ultimately cause them or make them grow or Turn into something

44:35 like that. Because in my brain, when she asked me for advice as a physiotherapist, I was like, that's like, that's a tough one, right? There's it's not really like, hey, go do these exercises in your face? Your fibro would go away.

44:46 I was thinking I was like, this might be an emotional, possibly a nutritional thing. There's some stuff in your body that needs to get out. Yeah, that's pretty much what I told her I was like, I'm not sure much more than that.

44:55 So emotionally traumatically. Yeah, that's what would you say to dial conversation? Well, yeah, first of all, I think it's really good to know. To stay in your lane and to know where you can offer advice and where you can see the guy don't know, but maybe go and check out these Avenues, which is also really valid. And so certainly, you know, I'm not a doctor, I'm this is not medical advice.

45:17 I can offer some perspectives on the emotional aspect and the Troy and there and the result of trauma which is yeah, over time if you, if you are stuck in a pattern of like, if you had a very disruptive childhood or you, had some very disruptive events It's you can be stuck in a state of fight or flight or hyper-vigilance which continually continually floods the body with cortisol which causes inflammation and then because it's not sustainable you will also Crash and Burn and

45:50 this Heist, you know this state of higher rails or versus you know collapse is really um yet it's very deleterious to the body and so all sorts of things can result like fibromyalgia. Etc, etc. In terms of addressing the emotional aspect. What I found really useful is this sense of co-regulation, which again is directly.

46:16 It's a skill that you're cultivating is a yoga teacher, which is as I am. And so, if I'm I'm doing hypnotherapy or I'm teaching with someone who has fibromyalgia, one of the most important things is that I am I am in regulation, my nervous system is regulated and I'm not upset. I'm welcoming her as someone with fibro and I'm able to kind of just welcomed her as she is.

46:42 And then from a, if she came to see me for hypnotherapy, for example, we would extend that welcome in that deep permission and that loving awareness, to the emotions that are arising, okay? So, one of the things about trauma as we don't have to go scratching around in our childhood, to find it. It's usually right here with us in the present. Yeah.

47:04 Like when I said, oh, I'm a bit nervous about this interview. That's a little trauma expression. Coming up, because I know you're a wonderful guy. There's no reason to be nervous, but there's something coming up and this thing wants to be met. Okay, and here's a little red flag for you around trauma. If you ever hear someone say, I just want to get rid of this thing or release this block or you know life would be better if I could get rid of it so I could

47:32 fulfill my full potential right? Kind of a Trope these days. That is the desire to get rid of something. Is keeping you in a trauma Loop and the way out is to be in co-regulation with somebody else. So that you can, you know, you can stay down regulated and then we gently sweetly lovingly meet, whatever is arising in that moment and we can welcome that intelligence.

48:02 Delilah release. And I'll If you with a very quick analogy trauma, like, and Trauma can occur is like negative thoughts. The inner critic uncomfortable, feelings, Etc. These are younger parts of ourselves that are still repeating the same pattern in there. Very much like a baby.

48:20 So what happens when we see a baby or hear a baby's cry, it gets our attention and we go to the baby but we don't go to the baby bad, baby wrong, baby. Get out of here, kind of thing. We the baby and we listen to it and we go.

48:36 Is this a hungry cry? Is this a sleepy cries? This'll only cry. We try and work out what it's saying, and as we're holding it, it feels safe and welcomed. And then over time, this baby will grow up into a beautiful human being with all of its gifts, its own gifts in intelligence, and so these uncomfortable feelings in our body, these inner critic thoughts.

49:01 These unwelcome thoughts are Like a baby crying, they know that they can get our attention. And then our job is to not push them away but to hold them to welcome them and then to listen for the intelligence behind that and when we do, the inner child grows up and becomes part of us in an adult way and you will feel The Liberation in your nervous system as you as you do this, kind of healing. And so that's kind of the basis of the work that I do on the emotional level with people.

49:35 I got to admit I think I was in a listening trans. Yeah you where you're like, had me. I was just like I couldn't I couldn't look away. I was just like why I'm so fascinated with what every single word you're saying. So thank you for including I'm not I thought yeah that's it's a really blowing me a little bit.

49:51 Yeah. Okay, great. Well thank you so much for joining us. I'm sure there's people that are wondering like, shoe this guy's cool. Like, how do I connect with them? How do I reach out with a maybe even like work with them? Because I know that you do this virtually, obviously, that's the world we live in.

50:07 So what's the best way for people to find you? I'm on Instagram at the moment at Hypno with Russ. So, at Hypno H YP n 0, dot with DOT. R u SS. Now, we'll put that in the show notes as well. Grazie click, I have a couple of, I do a couple of free sessions a week, so if you're lucky, you'll find a link to my calendar in there.

50:26 Check out all the stuff that I'm writing. I'm also on Facebook. Same thing, Hypno with Russ. And by all means, I love to chat. Drop me a message, Reach Out, connect and yeah, really wonderful opportunity to be here with you.

50:40 Yeah. Thank you so much for joining us. Really appreciate it. I can speak for everyone. I'm sure Byron myself. All in any of the listeners had so much to offer and yeah, I'm going to take a lot of what you said and let that digest and integrate a little bit. And then, yeah, I'd love to have you on again. But we'll see how that goes with traveling and the world. So you pleasure anytime great.

51:00 All right, thank you so much for listening everyone. And as always, if you Have any questions, you know, you can reach out to rest or you can always reach out to us, not really trying to rhyme there, but I kind of worked out really well on Instagram or on email. You can send us a voice note as always. So take care.

51:15 Hope you have a beautiful day and will speak to you next week. All right. Listen up everyone, Paul Byron and myself have been working so hard on putting together a platform dedicated specifically to yoga teachers and the good news is it's almost ready for you soon.

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51:55 So, all you need to do is just go into any of the description of any episode and you'll be able to sign up to the waitlist for this going pro platform. So that you can take advantage of this offer will hope to see you there.

51:49 In participating in being one of the founding members of this going pro platform, then you're going to have an opportunity to do. So, all you need to do is just go into any of the description of any episode and you'll be able to sign up to the waitlist for this going pro platform.

52:04 So that you can take advantage of this offer will hope to see you there.