Tyler Deal's SHOCKING Near-Death Experience: Why He Stayed Silent for 10 Years!

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Hi there, welcome to Grief to Growth Podcast. Your host is Brian D Smith, spiritual seeker, bestselling author, grief survivor, and life coach. Brian believes that the worst tragedies of life provide the greatest opportunity for growth. Brian says he was planted, not buried, and he is here to help you grow where you've been planted by the difficulties in life. In each episode, Brian and his guests will share what has helped them to survive and thrive. It is his sincere hope this episode helps you today.

Hey everybody, I'm back. This is Brian D Smith with Grief to Growth, back with another episode. And today I've got with me Tyler Deal.. And Tyler is a person who had a near-death experience. I know you guys love the near-death experience interviews. I'm really looking forward to this. Tyler's only been telling his story for a short while. I feel honored that he reached out to me and wanted to share it with me. We'll talk about why sometimes people don't share their stories for, for a while after they have a near-death experience, a very common experience. But he did have a near-death experience from a mountain bike accident. And he was propelled into the inner world of self-healing where he was faced to examine deep-seated trauma at his— at the molecular level, as he calls it. The self-healing has given him inner gifts that allowed him to connect more intimately with the earth, with elemental spirits, with animals and plants, and to guide people back to their beautiful core essence, which is, I think, a really important thing that came out of his NDE. So over the past 22 years, he studied, trained, and practiced in a vast number of therapeutic modalities. He has a broad knowledge and thousands of applicable hours of advanced healing in Hawaii, Lomi Lomi bodywork, and neuromuscular training, or neuromuscular therapy, I should say, craniosacral therapy, Thai bodywork. And the year 2000, been one of the only few participants in the first training of the Pulse Technique, which was developed by Joe Dunning. He's a graduate of the Centre of the Performing Arts, South Australia, now AC Arts, and the University of Hawaii at Hilo, where he studied literature and creative writing. So with that, I want to welcome Tyler Diehl to Grief to Growth.

Thank you, Brian. It's an honor to be here. And thank you for creating this platform and allowing people to come on and share their stories.

Yeah, well, I really— I'm honored that you reached out to me to share your story with me. I'm glad that you feel like this is a safe space. And before we get into telling your story, I do want to talk to people about like, after people have NDEs, you know, everybody's got a different experience. But it's not uncommon for not— for people to not share their experience for a period of years, even decades. So what is it that— why did you not share your story earlier? And what prompted you to start sharing your story?

So I didn't share my story earlier, because I didn't see that it was a— that it was a pivotal or integrated part of my, my own spiritual growth and just as my growth as a human. I felt like it was an experience that I had that didn't really have any substance to it. And there wasn't a lot of NDE material out at the time. This is back in 1997. So the few stories that I had heard about seemed like they were so much more— had so much more depth to them and, and people, you know, were experiencing talking with God and seeing angels. And I thought, oh well, I didn't have a near-death experience. So I kind of put it in the background and I felt that, um, um, yeah, I, I couldn't— I didn't want to share it with people because I, I also felt that it was, uh, maybe too much for people to hear, you know, like, um, and we'll get into this, you know, seeing fairies and floating around and being super sensitive. And, um, I— there was some fear putting that out there in the world and exposing myself. And what I believe was a time recently that I felt like sharing it was because I did begin to see more people have experience, and they weren't just the quintessential experience of of meeting angels and going to other dimensions. Um, they could have been just, you know, floating above their body. And I, and I began to examine it more, and I began to, to look at how it actually had changed me over the years and where I had been, where I've come to today. Um, that experience was, um, was very, um, pivotal to my, my growth. So, and I wanted to share it because, um, I think it's important that people have an understanding that, you know, we don't need to die in order to have a connection or to experience, you know, have experiences with, with consciousness, with, with God, or whatever their connection is to, um, other planes of existence, or even to themselves, even with their own inner self-growth.

I'm really glad that you did decide to share it, Tyler. It's— I know it's a difficult thing. I know our society doesn't accept the NDE for the most part. It's a relatively new phenomenon in terms of our acceptance. It wasn't until I started studying NDEs, I realized they've been documented for thousands of years, going back for a very long time. They're very common. They happen all around the world. It's just here a lot of times that we don't talk about them. And then we do have these stereotypes that the NDE has to be in this certain thing in a certain order. I left my body, I went through a tunnel, I saw light, I saw angelic beings. And those are all common elements, but they're not universal. And sometimes an NDE can be just as quick as like, I was out of my body, I saw my body, and I was back in my body. Or it could be a very long, you know, prolonged thing. So it's— there's room for everybody's story. And I believe the NDE is actually customized to the person having it. So that's why I'm glad to see more and more people sharing. And I appreciate you being here to share yours today.

Yeah, absolutely. And it's, it's, that's what I've come to realize as well. It's, it's that every person has their own experience with life and with their challenges, and then the beautiful experiences too. And it's very individualized. Um, so there, there can't be a cookie-cutter formula to an NDE. And, um, sharing my individual experience helps people, I believe, be able to come out and express. When we express more, then other people can we give permission for people to express whatever they've gone through. So thank you for acknowledging that.

Yeah, well, in your own words, um, and take as much time as you need, I'd like for you to talk about your experience and maybe even what led up to your experience.

Okay, well, thank you. So what led up to my experience, I believe, was a culmination of not dealing with, with emotions and not dealing with my reality as a child, having a difficult childhood growing up. And, um, so I was very sensitive as a child. And when I say highly sensitive, I mean I could— and this is my perception of the time as when I was a child I could feel everybody's emotions. I could feel the earth shaking when it wasn't shaking. I could understand animals on a level that I believe nobody could understand. And it was— I began to see that nobody else was experiencing this, or at least they weren't talking about it. And so I felt like I, I held it. I held it in my heart and I held it to myself. So when I went to college for the first time, and this is in Northern California, I was alone for the first time in a long time because I had previously been with my family. So this aloneness kind of began to fester within me, and these emotions of sadness began to fester in me. And I could say, you could say that it could be depression. I made friends in college, but I, I still felt very alone. And the depression began to grow to a point where I felt like I was so different from everybody else that I really didn't want to be here on the planet anymore. I felt like, oh, well, every, you know, everybody seems to be living a normal life, going to school, you know, but I didn't feel like I fit in. Other than the only place I felt like I fit in was the redwood forest, which was right behind the school. And I felt— I always felt like I had this connection to nature on a very deep level. And so that's where I would go, you know, in between classes or on the weekends, just to feel that connection again. Um, so what I, I guess it's kind of a belief system I have that whatever we're feeling on the inside, it's projected on the outside. So this, the sense of not liking myself, being confused, feeling depressed was reflected on the outside. My friends began to ignore me. Um, I failed a course. I had broken up with my girlfriend who I really loved. Um, So I saw that the problems that were manifesting outside of me were actually, I felt like, were my problems. And it had built to the point where, um, I began to have a conversation with God that I don't want to be here anymore. This is too much. These emotions, these feelings. I don't want to go. If I can't be happy, then I don't want to be here. So I had just finished my second year of university and I was looking for a job. I didn't know if I was gonna go back home to Seattle. I didn't know if I was gonna stay. Um, these emotions were continuing to get stronger and stronger to the point where I didn't think about killing myself. And I didn't think that would be a fun experience, but I knew that I wanted it to happen to me. Um, I called out to the sky one day. I was walking my bike through town and I said, please take me, I can't stand this. Um, you know, I don't want to be here. And it was just a few days later, I was biking through the redwood forest on my mountain bike and taking trails that I had normally taken and just trying to connect again, just trying to make sense of things. But I was incredibly depressed and I wasn't as aware to my surroundings that maybe I had usually had been. So I, on my way home, I was there for a few hours in the, in the forest, and on my way home I, I hit a jump and I hit the jump that I was familiar with, but somebody had previously built, um, maybe a few days before, um, very high. They had actually tweaked the jump to the point where it was almost, um, well, it was very dangerous. The jump had this incline that was practically vertical, but I didn't actually recognize it until I hit that jump and I was in the air. And that's when I knew it was too late. So I hit the ground, I came down on the ground, and my head and my back, and then I was completely, completely out. So when I was in the air, I, I, I— there was a moment there that was like, this is it, you're, you know, you're gonna die now. And so I just kind of let go, and my body relaxed to a point, I could say, because I hadn't broken any bones. So I just kind of gave into it. And then I was out, like I had said. And the next thing I remember, I was— I, you could say my consciousness, my being, my soul, whoever was that higher part aspect of me, was floating above the redwoods, the redwood trees. And they're quite tall. These were second-generation redwoods, which They weren't as big as the old growth, which are huge, but they're still 250, 300 feet high. And I was floating there, not my body. So it wasn't like an out-of-body experience, is more of just my consciousness, my being, almost like I could just see, but I didn't have a body. And I began to experience my senses on a very heightened level. And senses, like you could say physical senses, but they weren't even that. It was more of just like an openness. So I could see macro detail and I could see micro detail. Macro detail would be like the, um, like the needles on the redwood trees that had the dew, morning dew, and then seeing the crystals and all the colors right there in the dew. Seeing the bark on the trees and then hearing birds, hearing dogs, like, really, like almost right there in my ear, but I knew that they were quite far away. And then my vision also, the macro vision was expanded and my hearing, I could see the ocean, which was about 10 miles away. And I could hear the waves like they were right there in my ear. And so all of these senses, I could feel the wind moving through, through this part of me. So my senses were turned on, not like physical body senses, but like, like my consciousness senses. And there was a peace, there was an amazing amount of peace in this place. And I remember looking down at my body and seeing my body dead, which I believe was, was dead at the time. And looking down and just kind of realizing that this was the depressed part of me that was on the ground. And then there was a choice that was made. It wasn't like I saw an angel or heard anything. It was just this knowing from my being or a question from my being, do you— would you like to go further or would you like to go back? And my instant response was, I don't want to die. So as soon as I said that, I was back in my body, and, um, there was an incredible amount of pain. I was back on the ground with the redwoods surrounding me. I actually hadn't opened my eyes quite yet. I had I could feel, I could feel almost like my nervous system was trying to, to adjust to coming back into my body. And from what I've heard from like science, your body gets flooded again with like the blood stops and then it gets flooded again and starts moving. So it was that sensation, but it was also a sensation of, um, electrical pain and stabbing. I could feel my muscles twitching. I could feel all this pain throughout my body. I had trouble breathing. I began to open my eyes, and as I began to open my eyes, I saw, I saw fairies and little, little beings with wings coming down from the trees, floating around me. They were giggling. Um, I could see the detail, and sometimes I felt like they were, they were small, but even high above me. They were big. They were maybe anywhere from a dozen up to 25. They could have been more. They could have been 50. I don't know. And so I know that they were bringing lightness to the situation. They were— they were— it was like their energy was telling me that it's okay, that it's okay to be here, that it's okay that it's— that your choice to come back is okay. Then I began to hear this beautiful humming noise. I explain it like a Tibetan singing bowl, but it's not even quite like that. It was like this harmony, almost like this, um, you know, when voices come together and they harmonize, but it wasn't human. And I knew it was the trees because the trees I instantly had this recognition that it was the redwood trees. And, and this, this hearing, and this also came with the sensation that came throughout my whole body, and I felt like it was a healing energy coming throughout my body. So I was experiencing this, um, and then I realized, okay, I'm still in my body here, and that pain came back, or that awareness, as I brought my awareness back to my body and my breath, which was still— it was still— I'm still trying to catch my breath. That's when I lost consciousness once again. So yeah, the next thing I remember, I was in the ER there in Arcata, California at the community hospital. And a doctor was um, he had his head right over me and he was asking me questions, and he was doing like some snapping, and he was, he was saying, you were so lucky. And that's what kind of brought my attention to him. He said, I— you didn't break any bones, you're very, very lucky. And he might have even said like, welcome back, or something like that. But he asked me, you know, he asked me questions that I didn't know. He asked me my name. He asked me if I had, you know, if I was a student at Humboldt State University, asked me where I lived. He asked me if I was a man or a woman. I didn't know. I couldn't answer him. I didn't know what to say. And then he asked me, well, he actually, he asked me my phone number. I didn't know that. And then he asked me if I knew anybody in town that, you know, that they could call. And I blurted out a phone number then at that time. And it was a family friend of my parents that they had known forever that who had retired there in the town. So they came and got me. They, he gave me some pain medications and they came and got me. And I camped out on their couch for a while. I was sleeping a lot. My body had to heal. I was, when I did have to get up and eat or use the restroom, I was, um, in a lot of pain walking around. So that's kind of the crux of my near-death experience. My mom eventually came down and, and retrieved me from the Seattle area, and, um, I had to make a decision, you know, within a few months if I was going to return to school. And I, and I couldn't because I was just experiencing so much body pain, and I knew that I had to heal my body. So that became my focus, was how I was going to heal my body. And I knew traditional medicine for me wasn't the, wasn't the answer. So I sought out alternative therapies and I found a man that, um, or I was given a recommendation of somebody, um, a man named John Stiles. He was a network chiropractor and he, uh, He really helped me. I would say within 6 to 9 months, the neurological issues and the neuromuscular muscle spasms that were going on, he had helped me, assist me in that, my own body's healing. Um, the next step after that was trying to find a way to be happy in life. So it was like the body, get the body, get the body good, and then And then, you know, how can I be happy? Wow.

Wow. Yeah. So I do have some questions I'd like to ask you. So first, as you said, that was interesting, you would basically pray to die, you know, I guess a little while before you had this experience. But then when you found yourself outside of your body, and you were given the option, you said, I don't want to die, you wanted, you chose to live. Did that choice surprise you? Stay with us.

We'll be right back.

You know, one of the hardest things about grief? Most of the people in your life just don't get it. They want you to be further along than you are. They get uncomfortable when you bring it up, so you stop bringing it up. And that's why I started writing. My Substack is where I go deeper. Thoughts I don't always get to on the podcast, essays on consciousness, on continuing bonds, on what it actually means to carry a loss and still build a life. The stuff that used to keep me up at night, written out in a way that I hope meets you in the morning. But here's what I didn't expect when I started it: the community that showed up. People who are doing exactly what you're doing— listening, learning, trying to find their footing. Readers who comment, who share their own stories, who remind each other that none of us are as alone in this as we feel. And that's what the Substack has become— a place to go deeper with me and to find your people. It's free to subscribe. Find me at grief2growth.com/substack. That's grief, the numeral 2, growth.com/substack. Or just go to Substack and search for Grief to Growth. I hope to see you there.

Um, I think it surprised me. It did surprise me after, after the accident because I was still depressed, in fact even more depressed when I came back into my body. And, um, it took me actually years. So, so that surprise— I never had that initial surprise of like, you know, it was more, it was more like It was more like trying to figure out, um, not so much why I came back, but just how to heal myself. Um, it took me years later to see that it was actually this part of me, you know, it could have been, you could call it a soul contract. You could call it this higher knowing, this part that's connected to, to God actually knew what was best for me and that the depression and the sadness and the grief and everything that I was feeling wasn't really, wasn't really me, but it was a part of my, you know, the emotions out that I was holding deep inside me. And the mechanism would be like the subconscious programming, for you to get even more specific. So yeah, so it took me a while to actually figure out that's— that part of me knew what was best for me, and I didn't as a, you know, when you're in, when you're in a state of being really sad and depressed, you don't really, you can't, it's hard to figure things out on a logical level, I guess.

Sure.

To interpret things.

Yeah, I think that's very true. And I think, you know, I think a lot of times we'll say, you know, I don't want to be here, I want to die until we get actually get into that situation, then we realize there is this will this will to live that's inside of us that I— and so that's why I was, I was kind of interested that you said that, that prayer, basically, but then you realize, I do still want to be here in spite of, in spite of the pain. So when you— I'm curious as to what your beliefs were before you had this experience in terms of like, what happens when we die? Or did you have any, any thoughts about that? Or did you— were you surprised to find that You were outside of your body.

Yeah, I did. I mean, I believed, and it was kind of a vague belief. I never really explored it as, you know, as a kid and as a teenager, right? I knew that we passed on, but it was, you know, our body dropped and we continued on. I never had a religious background, but I always had my own connection, even since a little boy, connection with God. You know, that didn't make things necessarily better being here, but I felt that it was, you know, that I would be— so that I'd be okay eventually, you know, if I were to pass on. Um, you know, my parents, specifically my mom, she had close friends that had passed on when, when I was young and when I was a teenager. And, um, you know, there was sadness there, but I also knew that they were okay. Like, I could feel their presence and they were okay. I had an incident when I was 14 where I lost a close friend. Um, he knew months and months before he was going to die that he was going to die, and he was, he was total peace with that. And once, once he did pass on course, I was sad, but, but I could see him in a different form. And I could feel him in a, you know, feel him as who he was, who he really was. So what was the second part of the question, Brian?

Well, I was just curious as to what your beliefs were. And if you found yourself— if you were surprised to find yourself there. Because, you know, it's not an everyday thing, we find ourselves outside of our bodies looking down at it. So just wonder what your, what your you know, what your beliefs were before that happens.

Yeah. Yeah. So I think I answered that.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. You did. So, and, you know, I kind of smile when you talked about the fairies. And it's funny, because I know someone who has seen fairies. She's had spiritually transformative experience and seen fairies. And so my belief is, you know, a lot of these things that we consider to be mythological things, they're based on reality. I think that so I'm I'm not— until I heard her say this, I was like, I didn't know there were fairies. But now I do believe that they, they are these, you know, other beings that we don't see in a normal state.

Yeah, I, when I was really young, and these memories actually didn't come back until after my NDE, this is part of my memories that I had shut off. But I do, I do remember as a kid, when I was like 3 or 4 years old, I remember seeing them and seeing them around me. Um, and then when I was just prior to my near-death experience, maybe 6 months, 9 months, when I was in love with somebody, um, I could see them in my inner vision. So because my heart was really open, I feel like that they are drawn to that energy, the, the open heart. That's why A lot of kids can see them. A lot of kids experience them. It's because kids generally have their hearts wide open. So yeah, I mean, it was a surprise, but it was also— it was, it was like, it made sense. You know, I had this connection with these trees, and I had previous experiences with them as well. Yeah.

So, so once you came back, and as I was saying, when we first opened the interview up, it's really common because sometimes people might think, well, why would somebody have an experience like this and not share it for a long time? There's a couple of reasons. One is because society is not going to accept it. Sometimes we don't even know ourselves what we've been through. And there's just this process of integration that goes on. It's not like people come back and can process it all at once. So you mentioned already that when you came back, the depression was not, not lifted. But how, how did you go about processing this? Did you think about it? Did you, did you just dismiss it as a as a dream or hallucination, or what were your thoughts about it?

About my whole—

about the experience itself? Yeah.

Um, so I didn't— I felt like it was real, not like a dream, but I did feel like it was real, but I didn't want to share it, and I did put it in the background because You know, I was worried about what my family might think, you know, what my friends might think. So I just, I didn't want to process it. And, you know, eventually I have. So my, my goal was to figure out how to heal my body, you know, on my own and to have help from other people and then to be happy. So, um, you know, eventually things catch up with you and Eventually, you know, over time, these memories began to come back. And I began to see that it was something that was important in my own, in my own life, really. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I've known people that have had near-death experiences. And again, sometimes you're like, did that really happen? It can become a repressed memory where people just kind of, they just stuff it.. And they literally might not remember it for years. So that's not a— it's not an uncommon thing. But so when you were a student, because you were a student at the time this happened, what were you— what were you majoring in? What was your field of study?

We'll get back to Grief to Growth in just a few seconds. Did you know that Brian D Smith is an author and a life coach? If you're grieving or know someone who is grieving, his book Grief to Growth is a best-selling, easy-to-read book that might help you or someone you know. People work with Brian as a life coach to break through barriers and live their best lives. You can find out more about Brian and what he offers at www.grieftogrowth.com, www.grief, the number 2, growth.com, or text growth, G-R-O-W-T-H, to 31996. If you'd like to support this podcast, visit www.patreon.com/grief2growth, www.patreon.com/grief2growth to make a financial contribution. And now back to the interview.

So I was undeclared, although just towards the, my last year, I had found a professor, theater professor who inspired me. So I began just, just right before my near-death experience, I told myself I'm going to declare myself as a theater major because I loved it so much. And that was a, um, you know, was able to express myself, become different people, and, um, you know, make people laugh. And that was so, yeah, so that was going to be my focus. But I didn't know before then. I was just trying to, you know, picking classes here and there and trying to figure out what to do.

So yeah, so you're a very creative person, you do theater, and I know you studied literature, creative writing, those types of things. So but you're also in all these healing modalities. So when did that transition take place from the creative in that aspect to healing people?

Well, I think it's, it's, they're kind of one in the same, in a sense. I mean, there is a creativity to to, to bodywork. And there is a— you both, you have to be open to both, you know, both as a, you know, to your clients, and you have to also be open to inspiration when you're a creative artist. Um, so I had, when I was receiving help, healing help from other people, it was a process, um, of discovering that for myself that, oh, I can do this. I want to be able to help other people in this way. Um, but, but then I went off to Australia and I ended up going to, to drama school and I got into theater and I kind of put the bodywork on the background. And then the bodywork came back and I started to study that. I eventually went to Los Angeles and booked a whole bunch of commercials, uh, funny commercials, and then supporting myself as a bodyworker at the same time. So, and then there was a point when I just wanted to focus on the bodywork and the healing work. And so, because I saw that people were having results, I saw that people, you know, changes were happening within their bodies and with, you know, they're becoming happier and it was making me happier. So then, so yeah, my focus actually turned directly to energy work, you could say, and bodywork. I don't do so much of the bodywork so much anymore. I focus more on, you know, guiding people to their own healing and, and, and doing some energy work if that's required to kind of support them in the process. So does that answer your question? Yeah, I know I kind of go off the rails sometimes.

Yeah, it's absolutely fine. Um, yeah, I just, I'm just trying to help people piece together, you know, your, your journey. We are, and you talked about it, we all have a unique, you know, journey. We all have a unique path. And I believe sometimes we get little tweaks from our higher selves or guides or God or whatever you want to call it that says, okay, you, you need to get back on the path that you were supposed to be on. So we get these, we get these little kind of self-corrections along the way. So, so you do work with several different really interesting healing modalities. So tell me about some of the things that you do. I know we've mentioned things like neuromuscular therapy and craniosacral and Lomi Lomi bodywork. So Tell me about some of these things.

Yeah, so my first class was here in Hawaii back in the year 2000 from a kumu. Kumu means teacher in Hawaiian. Kumu lomi lomi, and her name was Auntie Margaret Machado. And I learned lomi lomi, which lomi means to rub. But her approach was the pule, which is the prayer.. And, and as you're working on somebody, you know, it's a prayer, an act of prayer. You're, and you have an open heart and you're helping them. So that kind of, that really just catapulted me into wanting to learn other modalities. Um, so I went to, I took a long program in Northern California at a place called Heartwood Institute where I had learned neuromuscular therapy. And, um, and Swedish massage and deep tissue. So, so I, I continued to take classes over the years because you have to keep up with your license and you take, you know, classes. And at the same time, I had learned how to work with energy in a very respectful way from this woman named Jo Dunning, who is an incredible person and She taught me back in the year 2000 as well here in Hawaii. She had a workshop here. And so that became— I kind of integrated that work into my bodywork, and then it has evolved since that time to really my own work and my own intuitive integrative approach to working with people, figuring out, you know, you know, I see people I see people as perfect, and if I don't see them as perfect, then I know there's something within me too that I need to deal with. And because of that, um, the work is very sacred. If I'm not supposed to make a connection with somebody, it won't happen, or I'll cancel an appointment. It has to be what I would call like a divine, divine right timing or divine right order, so that, that connection has to be perfect. So when I work with people now, it's very much on an energetic level, but it's very much also dealing with the physical body and how the physical body holds on to what I call like charged emotions. And what I see as, as I see them and as I experience them as molecules held within the nervous system. And I'll just go back a little bit. My own heal— I had to do my own healing first of my nervous system because that's where the damage came from the NDE. So through that, I had learned how to, to, um, to figure out on an anatomy level how to work with the nervous system or understand how the nervous system functions. But I also began to see that nervous systems very much has an energetic aspect as well. So these molecules, um, when the energy comes through, it breaks up these charges. And beyond these molecules is actually what we'd call like subconscious programming. So we might have a deep-seated belief that we're not good enough, or that we have a fear of snakes. Maybe something happened when we were really young where we got a snake bite.. So the emotion is actually the byproduct of something that had happened much deeper. And you could say this lifetime, if you believe in other lifetimes, you could say also your ancestors and ancestral lineage. So my work today is, it's very intuitive and it's very much figuring out how, where people feel like they're stuck and trying to, you know, not trying to, but, but work with them in a way where they feel comfortable. And if they're seeing if they're ready for that release, and guiding them through that.

Yeah, you know, it's really fascinating. And this is just the way life works. I was just interviewing someone yesterday, and the interview hasn't come out yet. And we were talking about this idea of bodywork. And I forgot the word she used, but the tame, to think, she said emotions, we've got these, these emotions that we actually carry in our bodies. And this is a fairly new concept to me, but I'm hearing it more and more that, you know, and it can be something that you said, something that happened to us. It could be something that happened to our ancestors. And we're hearing about now about epigenetics, that where our grandparents may have been traumatized, and we're still carrying that trauma. And we have to release it. And I love what you said about needing to heal yourself before you can heal other people. Because I guess I was— I look at it as kind of like we're like if we're full, as a cup we're full, and we're full of these withheld emotions, then we can't bring in anything else that's going to actually, you know, heal us. So the first thing we have to do is let go of all that junk that we're carrying around.

Yeah, I mean, we, we all have it. I, I believe that if, if we didn't have it, we wouldn't be here. And, um, it's coming— it's coming to terms with yourself and your connection with I believe, your body and also with the divine. There's a man that had a huge impact on my life called Dr. Ihaleakala Hew Len. He taught Ho'oponopono and his whole idea that whatever's coming up in our life, even if it's emotions, anything, it's within us. And as we work on ourselves, we're actually helping everybody else. So it's just kind of a byproduct that everything else gets cleared, everyone else gets cleared. If we come in peace and everyone else is in peace, when we're in love with ourselves, then nothing else can happen but other people fall in love with themselves. So yeah, so there's the body, and I believe the body is incredibly, incredibly important to our spiritual development, and it gets bypassed I believe in a lot of spiritual circles, there's this idea that we're not our body, we're not our mind. Just it's kind of this non-duality belief that thoughts come up, emotions come up, just let them be, but detach from them. And yes, part of that is true, but at the same time, I believe our body is actually the key in the gateway to higher spiritual experiences. And we need to understand the body, or at least begin to understand how the body functions on an energetic level, going back to emotions and the mechanism that goes— that causes the emotions, which is subconscious stuff, you know, ancestral stuff. And then it can become our spiritual journey can become a lot easier, I think. Because what tends to happen is we, um, if we go to the spiritual place too fast, um, the energy— what I would call like our solar plexus, for example— the energy can go up into the heart too quickly and cause grief, or it can go up into the mind-brain function and cause worry and fear and all of these things. Um, the lower 3 energy centers are, are, need to be worked on first before we can move up and, and understand this idea of detachment. Otherwise, um, we're gonna, it's, we're gonna get slammed back down to earth at some point. And, um, that's just my experience and that's my, my understanding of it. Course. I know there's other teachers out there, and I respect their perspective as well.

But yeah, I've never heard it put that way. But that's really fascinating that we need to work on those first 3 chakras. You didn't use the word chakra, but that's what I'm going to use. Those— we need to work on those chakras before we move up and start working on the other ones. Because there is— we're in these bodies for a reason. And while there is a, you know, there's Too many people in this world are just too attached to their bodies and think that we are our bodies, or we are our minds. And so we need to break that. But then there's another extreme that says my body's just a vehicle, and it doesn't matter. But there is, there's definitely connection. And you said something earlier, and I thought was really interesting. When you were outside your body, and you look back at your body, you said, that's my depression. And it's, it's almost like the depression lives in the body. We can't escape it though, when we're in the body, it's still, we have to still deal with it. And I thought that, I don't know if you, if you intentionally use that language or not, but I thought was really interesting.

Yeah, I did intentionally use it. Because that's, that's how I saw myself at that time. And I didn't realize that, that's until later that that's actually what, what happens is, you know, we, we, we develop these beliefs and they get stored in our body. And you believe, you believe, you begin to believe that you are a depressed person. And not just depression, but you could believe that, you know, you've got all the confidence in the world and you're a superhuman, you can do anything. But that all lives in the body first, as our spirit actually is, of course, in the body. But, but everything we're thinking and feeling, you know, the nervous system has to actually process this and decide if it's something it wants to keep or let go of, right? And eventually, and eventually, you know, um, that's why it's important to be, you know, to be grounded and to be down to earth. And like you had said, Brian, also, it's like you have to be overflowing. You have to have an understanding to be able to help people as well. You can't come with your, your cup half empty. And you, you know, having experiences, you know, like I've had experiences and I can say that you're, you're a healer as well because you help people with through their grief and through, you know, their experiences. So, um, you know, we can't put labels saying, you know, healers are this way. You know, my mom's a healer. She, she, you know, not only does her— she have energy coming through her hands and her hands are really warm, but she's a mom, she's a parent, she's, you know, raising a child. That's a healing act. So yeah, I'm going everywhere here.

Well, it's what you said also earlier, we're all here to heal each other, you know, and again, in our Western society, we've become so individualized, and we think the journey is all about us. But as we heal ourselves, we help, we heal the world. That's why, you know, I was listening to something the other day talking about, you know, about being a healer and helping people. And I love what they said. They're like, when I help one person, I'm helping the world. And I, you know, I think that's so important. And that one person we can start with is ourselves. And I also love what you said about like, you know, I have to see people as perfect, because this is another thing that trips people up when they're outside of our circle. When I say that everybody's perfect, they're like, well, clearly those people are not perfect. Clearly that person is not perfect. And it's like, no, because we all are still attached to these bodies with its beliefs and the lies, frankly, that the body tells us. And and that, that veil that, that shrouds us, that keeps that perfection that we are from actually coming and manifesting. And that's what, that's what you do is help clear that so people can manifest, you know, who they truly are.

Yeah, absolutely. And, and I know it's hard for people to kind of grasp that idea, because it can seem, you can seem, you know, kind of existential that you know, how can they be perfect? Well, it goes back to the idea of, you know, everything has God within it. And if I don't like somebody, if I feel like someone did something wrong to me, then that's, that's my belief, that's my feeling that I'm having. So it's an opportunity, actually. And you could say go within, but it's, it is really, is it is really changing these perceptions within us, uh, so, so we can be a clear vessel, and so we can feel more free within ourselves. And I think that is freedom, when we, when we begin to experience that, oh, everything is perfect, everything is beautiful, even though I'm not getting what I want right now, or even though this traumatic thing happened to me, um, I can move through this, you know. And that's what makes humans so incredible. We, we've gone through so much for so long that we can actually move through anything and come out on the other side.

Yeah, well, let's talk about challenges. And, and because, you know, a lot of times people are like, why, why is the world like this? Why do we have these challenges? What are your thoughts on that?

Well, I think— are you talking about like personal challenges? Are you talking about big global things that happen?

Either way, let's start with personal and we'll move on to the world things.

Well, I think it's really one and the same, Brian, in a sense that kind of goes back to the idea of, of, uh, once you heal yourself, you help other people heal. So I think these challenges are really opportunities and opportunities to kind of peel the layers of the onion to get to the core of who we are. And we can do that very simply, you know, I say feel the feeling to the til— to the end, till— till its completion, until you can feel it no longer. But it's also looking at the— the mechanism that's running that feeling. The challenges manifest in our lives because we haven't dealt with something that's very deep. And when life begins to flow, you know, the more we— we actually go within and continue to point our focus back within, back within, back within, within, it takes a lot. It's like being in the Olympics. You have to constantly keep going back within. We can learn to do that and just make it a pattern. Then the challenges within our, you know, our present reality, like what you see right now in front of you, begin to shift. And then slowly they begin to ripple out to the rest of the world. You know, the more people that can do this, of course, it's you know, we would be living in peace and bliss all the time, but we don't have to worry about that. We just have to worry about ourselves and not in a selfish way, just in a way that we know that shifting our inner world, shifting our reality by looking at ourself and not, you know, not blaming ourselves for what's happening within us. It's almost like just knowing this is part of life and being human and giving ourselves a break, then it can become easier to assist others and see how the world begins to change.

Yeah, I think that's, that's, I think, really an excellent answer. You know, the thing is, as I talk to people, to talk to people like yourself, I talked to a lot of people I talked to. They've taken the traumas, the challenges in their lives, and they've turned them into something, you know, incredible, something beautiful. I think that's, that's kind of what humans are. We're like alchemists. We take, we take this, you know, you're a very sensitive person. And, you know, the thing about the world is, you know, we all see it differently, right? So, as a sensitive person, sometimes we look around the world, and I was a sensitive child, you know, and it seems tragic, and we get depressed because we know it's not the way that it's supposed to be. And so we kind of go down this thing where we hit that, but then we're like, but I can transform this. I can— this teaches, this teaches you empathy. You wouldn't have the empathy you have. If you hadn't gone through that, I don't think you'd be the person you are today. If you hadn't gone through that, you couldn't look at people and see what they need to heal. But you do it because you've experienced it.

Yeah. And if I were to add to that also, I mean, that's beautifully put. We don't need to go through trauma to see that. We can just see it, you know.

Yeah, I always say that.

Make a choice.

Yeah, humans learn from experience. I'm like, we can learn from our experience, or we can learn from somebody else's experience. And it's always better if you can learn from someone else's experience. And I love interviewing people that have had NDEs. And I know I've been guilty of saying in the past, I don't anymore. It's like, I would love to have an NDE. And I've talked to too many people have had them and said, no, you do not, you do not want to go through what I went through, because it's not easy. There's, there's trauma associated with the physical event. You know, there's the pain of the healing that you had to do physically. There's the integration, the years of integration, A lot of times people get, frankly, they get suicidal, people get depressed after an NDE, because even more so they realize this world's all screwed up. And so it's not an easy thing. But we can learn from studying, we can, and this is why I love interviewing people like yourself, because I want my audience to learn from listening to your experience.

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, if you feel like you do, people do need help, then I would seek help, you know, I mean, And I'm not saying, you know, come to me. I'm saying, you know, there's therapists out there that are just wonderful, that know how to help people. There's people in the medical community, and then there's people also in the alternative community.

Yeah.

You know, when it comes to depression, I've had to deal with that for many years, and I dealt with it in my own way. And, you know, there's still moments I have, like we all have, where, you know, we're human in these bodies, where we get depressed. Yeah. And So it's, you know, we're never going to be perfect, but we are perfect. That's the thing. It's like, even, even with even that, even that depression, even that, you know, what, that grief, whatever it is, even within that, that's perfect. That's, that's, you know, it, um, God wouldn't make it that way otherwise, you know. So it's, it's, it's changing our perception, but it's also discovering, discovering what works for us.

And yeah, I love what you said. It's, it's being able— this shift is not— it doesn't physically change the world, but it changes our perspective, perspective. And being able to— remember many years ago, ran into these guys who had come to this conclusion that we were all perfect. And they would look at each other and say, you're perfect. And they look at me and say, you're perfect. And I'm like, Okay, you guys are just smoking something. I don't know, I am far from perfect. But it's being able to see the perfection even in the imperfection, because the imperfection is part of the design. I mean, so we are all, we're all where we're supposed to be, no matter where we are. And we look at other people, sometimes we can tend to judge them and say they're not where, you know, they're supposed to be, but they're where they're supposed to be.

Exactly where they're supposed to be. Yeah. And it's okay to be, you know, whatever you're going through, whatever you're experiencing, it's okay to experience that. And I think the moment we say that it's not okay, then that's when we have to, to kind of reevaluate our lives and, and figure out, you know, how we can help ourselves.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I asked you to give me some, some sample or some questions I might be able to ask you during the interview. And one you gave me, I'm really interested in exploring is releasing the resistance to life. And you mentioned the end of karma on planet Earth. So first of all, karma is an extremely misunderstood concept. So I'd like you to explain to me what does karma mean to you? And what does it mean to have the end of karma on planet Earth?

So I guess my, my understanding of karma is resisting life. And when we resist life, you know, resist life is when you have judgment about somebody or you don't want to feel the emotions, so you project your energy outward. Resisting life is, you know, if it's raining and you'd rather have it sunny. I mean, it can be as small as that. It could be as big as our traumatic experiences or what's happening in our life, you know, a loss of a loved one or a divorce, something like that. So all of these experiences that we have to go through, I believe that we have a choice. We can either embrace it, and I believe embracing it means allowing it to be exactly how it is, because when we allow it to be exactly how it is, it doesn't need to keep returning. So the, the karma part is, um, when we have karma, we're resisting life. And then when we, we can embrace life, then these experiences don't need to continue. So that's how I define what karma would be. So the end of karma on planet Earth would be ideally everybody allowing life to be and unfold the way it's supposed to. Doesn't mean that we don't have free will. It doesn't mean that we just sit back and allow things to happen, that we can still take action and live our lives. And we have to, you know, we have to keep a roof over our head if we have the privilege of having a roof over our heads. We have to, you know, feed our families and those kinds of things. But it's also very— it's a very visceral experience in our body is, you know, when things come up, sometimes we don't realize that we have these patterns that we continue. So So like this very surface level would be not resisting life would be allowing the feeling to be exactly how it is until you can feel it no more in your body. And I think there's a woman that talks about this, um, a neuroscientist, Jill Bolte Taylor, something like that.

Yeah. Jill Bolte Taylor.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. So she talks about that. Um, um, you know, 90 seconds, I think she says, is all an emotion needs to move through the body. So that would be ideally the end of karma on Earth, when people don't resist anything.

Yeah, I love that. I love that concept. And it's something that I'm working on. I hadn't heard it put that way in terms of karma before. But I tell people, you know, as long as you fight reality, you're going to lose. You know, we, we have to— no, we don't have to. It's better for us if we accept what is, but like every, like every other teaching, that can be abused, because some people take that to mean, well, that means I should have no preference, that it means that I should accept oppression, I should accept misogyny or homophobia, whatever it is, because that's just what is. And that's— I don't think that's what it means at all. But it means that we don't get emotionally tied to these outcomes, you know, and Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, absolutely.

I mean, there's, there's still horrific things that are happening, or at least perceptions of projections that are given to us about, you know, like you said, um, some of these, some of these issues. Um, it doesn't mean that, that we have to accept it, you know. We, if we feel that we need to do something to, to make a change, then we take that action. So it really goes back to the self. It goes back, you know, pointing, what am I feeling? What's going on within me? Where is it in my body? And when we keep— it's like I said, it's an Olympian task. It's, you know, you're in the spiritual journey is the major leagues. You, those that can take on these things will begin to change their perceptions about the world. So Yeah, they're horrific. They're horrific things happening in the world. There's also, you know, perceptions of things happening, whether they're happening or not. It doesn't mean we need to separate from, from those things. But it goes, it really goes back to the self and, and what's going on within you when you see something or experience something that you don't like.

Yeah, yeah, it really comes, as you said, it really comes down to the self. I was Actually, in a training earlier today, and someone was talking about a situation in their life, and we were coaches, and we're training on stuff, right? And they're like, how do I fix this situation with this person? And kind of almost asking, how do I fix this other person? And the thing is, we can't fix anybody else. All we can do is control— we can't even control external circumstances, we can only control how we react to them. And that's the, that's the teaching, I think, that we're— you and I are both talking about. It's like, accepting it internally because we— it's reality, but accepting it, being at peace with whatever it is, whatever it is, and knowing that in a sense, you know, the one life was perfect.

Yeah, and that, that ultimately changes our perception of whatever is happening as an event or as a circumstance or as the person that's in front of us. That, that will change that perception, and then we can begin to to assist somebody in a way that, in a really healthy way, when we don't have that, like you said, like that veil there that separates, you know, that filter, I should say, that separates us from the other person. So yeah, I think it's critical and it takes work, but yeah, it's important, especially when you're coaching, you're healing, you're doing anything you know, where you're helping somebody else.

Tyler, I really appreciate you sharing your experience with us and where, where your life has led you since your experience. I think it's, it's just, it's always fun. It's always great to get to know anybody's story. It's great to hear your story. And I'm so grateful for the work you're doing, healing people. So let people know how they can reach you if they want to reach out to you to possibly explore working with you.

Yeah, absolutely. So, um, I have a website, it's called radicalheartworks.com. You can contact me there, you can see my blog, I have free content on there. There's a link to— I have a YouTube channel as well, there's a link there. So, um, that's my spiel. You're welcome to go onto the site and check things out. So I work with people.

Well, any, anything that I didn't cover with you today, any last messages you'd like to give to people about healing or about why we're here or anything in general?

Anything in general, and I think it's fairly general what I'm gonna say, but it's also really important. And that's following, following your own, exploring your own story. I know there's so much material out there. And it's easy, it's easy to kind of latch on to techniques and and what this person is saying and that person is saying. But being yourself is the most important thing and just finding out what works for you and how you can be happy and following to the beat of your own drum, basically. And I know that's kind of general what I'm saying, but I think it's really important that people, you know, kind of take a step back from all the information that's coming at them and figure out, you know, how can I follow my heart? What makes me happy? What can I do? You know, and in doing that, that's, that's going to help other people tremendously.

Yeah, well, I think it's general but specific. Because it is, it's, it's universally true. We each need to find our own path. I'm a big believer in that. And the farther I go along on my own path, and the more I talk to people like yourself, the more I am convinced of that. So A lot of times we're looking for a one-size-fits-all solution, and we're all different. And even, even with you, you have different healing modalities. Most of the, most of the healers I talk to, if they've been in it for any amount of time, they don't do one thing. They've got different— it's like, I look at it like a toolkit, you know. We've got different modalities for different people. So I think what you said is extremely important, and we need to, um, it's ever— it's like everything, there's always this dichotomy. It's like Okay, we have to— we're on our own. We're individuals. But we also can't survive without each other. We need to reach out for help. So it's, it's a little bit of— it's both.

It is both. Yeah, we do need, we do need help from others. And we do need to support each other. So yeah, it does go hand in hand. Everything is— everything needs a balance, right? So yeah, yeah.

Well, Tyler, thanks again. Thanks again for reaching out to me. It's been great getting to know you. And I'm looking forward to getting this out to the listeners.

Oh, yeah, me too, Brian. It's been a— it's been an honor. Thank you. I really enjoyed talking to you. It's easy conversation to have. And thank you so much.

All right, have a great day.

Okay, you too.

Thanks for listening to Grief to Growth. Brian hopes that you find this episode helpful and will come back for future episodes. Brian's bestselling book, Grief to Growth, Planted Not Buried, is a great resource for anyone who is coping with grief or knows someone who is. If you enjoy the podcast and would like to support it, there are 3 things you can do to help. The first is to share the podcast with someone that you think it will help. The second is to go to iTunes, rate and review the episode. The third way you can support the podcast is by becoming a patron. Head over to www.patreon.com/plantednotburied.

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