Stress and the Mind With Dr. Don Wood

How do you reach that next level of performance? Even the best high performing individuals, athletes, executives or whatever I say have another gear.

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Welcome to the Intentional Leadership Podcast. This podcast will help you break through the barriers holding you back from the true life of significance you are meant to live. I'm your host Janelle Bruland and I invite you to join me each month as I share leadership lessons and specific strategies to transform your leadership, crush your goals and love your life. As a high achieving entrepreneur, there was a time when I was overwhelmed doing all of the things and found myself overworked and over committed. Through the power of intention, I learned how to shift my mindset and create success habits to achieve a healthy work, life balance and true joy in my life. Now I'm here to help you do the same. Don't just be the CEO of your business, be the CEO of your life. Let's get started. Hello everyone. Welcome to the Intentional Leadership Podcast. As a high performance leader, do you ever wonder what it would be like to take your performance to that next level? Well, you're going to want to hear from today's guest, Dr. Dawn Wood. And I'm so excited dawn that you've been able to join us today. Welcome to the Intentional Leadership Show.

Oh I'm excited. I couldn't wait to get on here. I think we have so many great things to share together so thank you for the input.

You bet. Well, let me tell you guys a little bit about Dr. Dahn. So Dr. Wood, PhD, author, speaker, he's founder and CEO of the Inspired Performance Institute and creator of the Patenton TIP method. TIP is a cutting edge method inspired and developed through the newest developments in neuroscience and designed to clear away the effects of disturbing or traumatic events, repurpose old patterns and clear away the effects and set the individual's mind up for peak performance. We want to hear about that. In essence, it reboots the brain's stuck thought pattern making it possible to enhance alpha oscillations with a non invasive and effective shift in brainwave activity. Author of two top selling books, Emotional Concussions and you'd must be out of your mind. Welcome again Dr. Dawn. We are just is so excited and I know this audience is really going to appreciate our time together today.

Well, thanks, Janelle. And I'm excited because your audience is exactly. What I love talking about is how do you reach that next level of performance? Even the best high performing individuals, athletes, executives, or whatever I say have another gear.

I love that. So tell me more about that.

Well, what I really discovered is, is that when we have events in our lifetime that have sort of been, you know, looping around, it's actually draining energy. And so what I have found is that when you can perform in an alpha brainwave state, that's where you reach your peak performance. And so people have difficulty doing that all the time. What I do is show you how you can do it because I'm going to take away the things that are interfering with your ability to stay in that moment. And we call that staying present, being in the moment. Right. So if you read all the self help books, they'll tell you that that's the key. However, the human mind works a little differently. And so you actually have to train it and develop it to be able to do that to reach your highest level of performance.

Okay, that makes sense. So for those in the audience that aren't familiar with the different brain waves, can you, can you tell us just a little bit more about that and why the importance of helping people get to a different brain state?

Yeah, so we can measure it. So we basically have four brainwave states. You have beta, alpha, theta and delta.

Okay.

So to give you an example, what they do is beta is fairly fast. So you're operating at about 15-30Hz, or think of it cycles. Like hertz is an energy measurement. Right. So 15 to 30 hertz. So if you're in a very high stress state, you're going to be in a fairly high beta brainwave state, very active.

Okay.

When you move into alpha, Alpha is between 7 and 14 hertz. And that's where the mind is very relaxed and very focused. They believe Albert Einstein lived in that state most of the time. That's why information flowed for him.

Okay. The flow state, I think sometimes that's called.

Yep. And so as an athlete, I've been an athlete and I encourage all my athletes. I want them performing an alpha because you're very, very relaxed but focused. So that's about 7 to 14 hertz. When you go between 4 and 7, you move into theta and theta basically is dreaming. So you're actually going to sleep. So when you go to sleep at night, you move into theta and theta is where you process everything you've experienced during the day. And there's where people have difficulty sometimes falling asleep because if their mind has been bothered by something earlier in the day, when you go to sleep, your mind is not okay with just letting it go. It wants to continue to process it. And so it gets stuck sometimes. And then what you want to do is move into delta sleep. And delta is dreamless sleep. And that's where all the maintenance gets done. So if you're stuck in theta longer than you should be, you're not getting enough maintenance time. So there's where people be start to become unhealthy because not getting enough restoration.

In theta. Basically there's a part of the brain called the thalamus and the thalamus is, think of it as the air traffic controller. It's managing all the information coming into the brain and distributed it to wherever it needs to go. So the thalamus, if it has a lot of activity because you've been stuck in a high beta state, it's continuing to process that data. And the thalamus is also responsible for sleep. So it doesn't want to rest until it processes the data. And there's where traumatic or disturbing events are also stuck in that state and the mind wants to fix it.

Interesting. So you've shared stories with me about some high performing athletes that were feeling, maybe they were feeling stuck or maybe they weren't stuck, but just wanted to get to that next level of performance. Can you share a story of one of the athletes that you've worked with and give us an example of how this method is effective?

Well, I know you're a golfer and I'm a golfer, so I'll share a golfer story.

I love it.

There's a gentleman, Tim Burke. And Tim Burke is a competitor in the World Long Drive Championships. You know those big as far as you can hit the ball. So, so Tim came to see me in 2019 and obviously he's a phenomenal athlete. He's built like Superman. He literally is. He looks like a superman. So he's a physically, you know, impressive guy and, and very, very capable, well known around the world. But he hadn't won in a few years, you know, at the level he wanted to win. So he came in to see me. This was in about February of 2019. I took him through my program. It's a four hour program that we take you through and the idea is to teach you how to be able to get into that alpha state. And so anyway, Tim left. He flew out to Phoenix. That was the first tournament of the year was in Phoenix. And I saw on the Golf Channel that he was in the finals on the Monday night. So I texted him and I said, how you feeling, Tim? And he wrote back three words. He goes, alpha, baby, alpha. He was an alpha brainwave state. He. What he talked about is, he said, I would have been knocked out of that tournament had I not done the program. He says, because what you taught me how to do brought me back into that very relaxed state. And then he was able to. Where he hit two really bad shots in a row. He remembered what he needed to do. And he says, and I felt this sense of peace come over me and I started striping the ball again. He won that tournament. He won two of the first three tournaments of the year and made the finals of every tournament all year. And he says, I know that wasn't going to be possible without the program because he had the physical talent, no question. But it was the mind that was interfering with him, maximizing that physical talent.

Wow.

Right?

That's amazing.

His testimonials on our site, he talks about it, that that was the difference. He says, I've never been so relaxed playing a sport. He was also a pitcher for the University of Miami, as well as a baseball player. Phenomenal athlete. And if you look at a guy like that, you say, wow, he's performing at the highest level. And he is, but he had another gear. His final drive in that tournament was 470 yards.

Wow, that is incredible.

Insane.

Insane.

Yeah. I told him, I don't go that far on the vacation. So.

Next level, next level.

And that's what he needed, you know. And then Covid hit. So unfortunately, a lot of the long drive stuff sort of happened. You sort of stopped, right?

Sure.

In as much, but I've worked with. Another really great example is a marathon runner. His name is Marco Chisetto. And Marco was a double amputee. He lost his legs below the knees from a suicide attempt. And so he. They had to train him how to run again on prosthetics. And then they built him blades to run. And so the guy who makes his prosthetics calls me and he says, we really believe Marco's got great potential, but he seems to have plateaued. He's running really well, but we think he's sort of stuck at this level. We think it's in his mind, it's not physical anymore. Can you take him through the program? So I took Marco through the program. This is again, at the beginning of 20, 19 and nine days later he ran in a race and took 15 seconds per mile off his time, which is an incredible amount at that level. And then about a month and a half later he ran in the Boston Marathon and broke the world record. He's now the world record holder for marathoners with, with amputations. And then two months later ran the Chicago Marathon, broke his own world record by another five minutes and got signed by Nike.

And what I said to Marco is, I said, Marco, I didn't make you a faster runner. You were always that fast. I just released the energy that you needed to perform at that next level. He always had the capability of doing that. So it's not me doing anything. I'm just giving them the tools to allow their brain to maximize its power. And think of it, you know, if you've got your, your phone and you charge it up overnight and then when you open it up and you start it up in the morning, five other programs open. Well, you're going to drain the power.

Sure.

So when you're performing at a world level like that, you don't want any drain except what you're working on. That should be the only place the energy is going. And that's what you do in alpha.

That's incredible. What great stories. Thank you for sharing those examples. It makes me think of, you were talking about this mind body connection and what I really heard you say is that physically there was an issue, but it actually ended up not being physical at all. Can you, can you talk more about that? Because I think that that is really key for our listeners to hear this piece.

Well, one of the things that I discovered during the research is that when we have these issues or unresolved or stress, just stress in our lives, the ATP, which is the energy, the mitochondria in the cell is affected by that. So that's your powerhouse, that's your battery, basically. So if you've got a lot of stress, then that could be coming in from previous experiences or current stress, you're actually draining the energy, the ATP of the cell. When we, then this is where the, this is where the energy increase comes from. When we calm down the nervous system and allow you to stay in a parasympathetic nervous system response as opposed to a sympathetic, you have more energy available and that's going to show up somewhere in performance. And so it was really interesting because we worked with, I took a whole team of people who work with these world class athletes through our program and when I started talking about the ATP and the mitochondria and how it affects our, our performance. The one guy stopped me, he says, you just blew my mind. He said, I'm working with these world class athletes. These are the best of the best. Right. They're prime, you know, in the prime of their career. We never. Because they measure heart rate variability.

Sure.

We never understood why when sometimes they were at rest, they would go into a sympathetic nervous system response. We never understood that. Now what you're telling me is that these events or trauma, right. Are looping, pulling energy and they go into a sympathetic response. And I said, it's exactly right. He says, we never recognized, we knew it happened, we didn't understand why, because these guys don't look like they're having anything. They're under that stress or they're having those issues. But everybody from the highest performing executives that you're dealing with to the highest performing athletes in the world all have the same issues. And so what I've done through the research and put the program together is show them how to maximize that.

And that makes so much sense in our central nervous system. And the parasympathetic and the sympathetic, we need them both and they're both important. We have that stress response for a reason. It's there to protect us. But we talked about how it's like when you're in that sympathetic mode all the time. It's like you have your foot on the gas pedal and when you're doing that constantly, that just doesn't, that doesn't work. You've got to be able to tap into that parasympathetic side, as you mentioned. And so many of us, especially those who've been under really high stress or have had some periods of trauma in their life, that you tend to be in this fight or flight and just stay there. That we talked about that alarm that just stays on in your brain because you think there's something that you have to be doing to protect yourself.

Exactly. And the sympathetic nervous system response is an emergency management system. And for a lot of people it becomes an operating system. It's not meant to be an operating system. It's meant to turn on and turn off. And it does exactly that in the animal world. So a zebra cannot feel fear of a lion unless there's a lion present. Zebras aren't imagining lions thinking about lions, remembering lions. But if a lion shows up, they will go into a sympathetic nervous system response, perfectly designed system. When they escape the lion, they'll go back into a parasympathetic Arrest and digest. Perfectly designed system. Janelle. The issue that we have as humans is we store explicit memory about lions.

Keeps putting us into a sympathetic nervous system response, even though there's no lion present.

That makes so much sense and, and so true. In our world, we, we have this human capacity. The, the reason that we, we just keep thinking and ruminating over that particular situation where you're going to have. The zebra is not going to be talking to his fellow zebra, saying, you'll never believe what happened to me, and going over that event over and over again. For them, it's over. And we can learn something from our animal friends. For sure.

That's just the way their brain works. We have two very unique features that animals don't have, and that's causing what I call glitches. Our computer is glitching. There's nothing wrong with anybody. There's nothing wrong with anybody's mind. Everybody's mind works perfectly fine. But if it's constantly running on this trauma loop or this stress loop, it's going to continually activate the nervous system. And the sympathetic nervous system, 100% of the time overrides parasympathetic.

If there's a threat, your mind doesn't say, well, we don't really have to do much about this. It's an automatic autonomic nervous system response and will override reason and logic every single time. And you can't stop that until you can learn how to reset it.

I love that. And that's the good news is that scientists used to think that the brain you had once you were an adult, that's the brain you're always going to have. And it's wonderful that you can actually reset, reboot the brain, fix those glitches so that you can have this better performance and ultimately a better life. So that's really great. I want to ask you, dawn, what, what got you into this? I know I was able to come down to your. Your institute in Florida. It was fabulous. I. I can't wait for others who are listening to be able to check out your program and see your facility and the wonderful things that you do. But you have a very interesting story of how you got yourself into this research and wanting to help people in this way. Can you share that with us?

Yeah, no, I'd love to. So. I would never, and my wildest dreams have ever come up with this if it wasn't for my wife and daughter. They were really the inspirations behind it. My wife grew up in a very traumatic household, and when and I grew up in the opposite. We talked about this, we shared that, right, that I had an idyllic childhood, no trauma. I met my wife, she had the opposite. And she was high functioning. So if you'd met her, you'd never known it. Right. She was very, you know, professional what she did, but was living in fear all the time. And then when my daughter turned 14, she was diagnosed with Crohn's. And they said, there's no cure for Crohn's. We don't know what causes Crohn's. She's just going to have to manage this for the rest of her life. Take her off of gluten and dairy, all these different. So autoimmune shows up a lot when people have had trauma. Now, we didn't know my daughter had trauma. She had never disclosed it to us. And then she developed a second autoimmune disorder called idiopathic pulmonary hemosiderosis. And I was adopted, so we didn't know my family history. So that's when my wife said to me, this must be coming from your side of the family.

Of course it's your fault.

My fault, Right. And so that's what made me start to research it. Why is this happening? And I made a direct connection between stress and trauma. Right. When we have unresolved trauma as an example, that actually creates inflammation. Inflammation is the response to trauma, physical or emotional inflammation. There's nothing wrong with inflammation. Inflammation is a cell danger response designed to protect the system on a temporary basis. However, the trauma loop keeps running, keeps the inflammation active. So now it goes from inflammation to chronic inflammation. That's the problem, is the chronic.

Right.

So inflammation compromises the immune system and compromises the neurotransmitters. And so. But it's only meant to be temporary until the danger has passed. Works perfectly well in the animal world. However, we keep ruminating, keep running the track of the trauma keeps the inflammation active. Then the immune system is compromised. What's going to happen? We're going to get sick. Then neurotransmitters are going to get. Are compromised. We're going to feel bad because now we're not getting the dopamine, serotonin, all of those things that we need to feel good. So what are we going to do? And to medicate them, we're going to put them on where, oh, there's a chemical imbalance in your brain. No, there's not. There's a temporary pause in the system. I talk about when people say, well, I have depression. What I'LL say is, well, tell me what you're angry about. They'll go, well, no, I'm not angry. I'm depressed. I go, depression is a function of the brain, not a dysfunction. It's shutting down because it's in pain.

Right.

You had mentioned that your daughter was a very happy girl, very sunny personality. It was just this physical ailment that she had, but otherwise she seemed fine. She was. Had this physical ailment that just kept getting worse and worse.

And then.

And then what happened?

Well, she had four operations. They cut out 24 inches of her intestines during four operations. That poor child suffered. I'll tell you, she still smiled. She still, like, she was loving, smiling, but just in pain. She hadn't shared with us that she had had some abuse when she was 6 that we were completely unaware of. Devastated my wife. She was like, how could this happen on my watch? Right. I was so careful, so protective, but it happens. So that's what was creating the issues, which was creating the inflammation, compromising the immune system. So she was getting sicker. And then also the neurotransmitters. So she was struggling, but she's an actress ever since she was four.

Okay.

A lot of that was a really good act because she was living in this beautiful, loving home. So in her mind, what have I got to be upset with? So she kept up the facade of I'm okay, and yet she was struggling physically. But the great news is that once we got to the issue, the core issue, which was the trauma, and we resolved it, what I do with our program, her Crohn's is gone and her lung disorder is gone. And they would say that's impossible. Right. But it's certain. She's living proof that when the nervous system comes back into regulation, it can do maintenance. And so the inflammation came down. Right. And then the system, as you know, our bodies and our minds are designed to heal.

Right.

Interfering with the healing is if you're being chased by a lion, you're not going to get much maintenance done. Your mind is not going to be worried about fixing that sore knee. When you're being chased, you're not even going to feel the pain. You'll be able to run full speed as if you had no knee injury. I don't care if you got a torn acl, you will run right as fast as you can. When you get away from the line now, the pain's going to start.

Sure. And your daughter, she had had Crohn's for years. They couldn't do anything. She had major. Four major surgeries. And then she worked with you to actually address what was going on in her brain. And then tell me about the visit, then her later going to the doctor to get a routine checkup and what it said on her chart. And that conversation that was so interesting.

Well, it was actually. What had happened is she developed a cyst on her ovary. Okay, now, here's one of the things that we're still learning is that when they use steroids for her Crohn's and steroids for the lung issue, what we have now found is the overuse of steroids creates pcos, polycystic ovarian syndrome. So we didn't make this connection yet, but the cyst that had formed on her ovary was really from the overuse of steroids.

Okay.

The doctor came in after the operation, and he said, I removed the cyst. And he says, but I'm confused because your chart says you have Crohn's. And she goes, yeah, I have Crohn's. And he goes, I operated. There's no evidence you have Crohn's. And she goes, yeah, I haven't had a flare up in a long time. And he goes, but you're not on medication for Crohn's. She goes, no, I don't take any medication now. And he goes, I hate to tell you this. You've never had Crohn's. And she's going, no, I've gone down to, like, 95 pounds, right? I mean, I've had four resections done on my. And intestines with 24 inches taken out. He goes, well, Crohn's doesn't go away. It's either active or suppressed by medication. And so I explained to him, as I said, I believe her Crohn's was a result of this unresolved trauma that created that inflammation. And then the only way you guys could deal with it was to manage it with steroids, bring the inflammation down and then take out pieces. Because what happens is the cells go into that cell. Danger response. So nothing gets into the cell, but nothing gets out of the cell. It's a temporary pause until the danger has passed. But if the. According to her mind, the danger had never passed, so it stayed in an active cell danger response. The cells died, so they had to go in and cut them out. So after I explained to him that that's what I believe it was caused by, he said to me, he says, that's impossible. If it were true, you'd have a Nobel Peace Prize.

You tell me what Crohn's is. He goes, crohn's is a lifelong debilitating disease with no cure. I said, I'm sorry, I disagree. Crohn's is just inflammation. And so now we're realizing that cyst that's starting to show up is coming from the steroid. Now, that's physical.

Sure.

Coming from psychological anymore, that's the overuse of steroids. So I know you, you know, you deal with a lot of women, successful women, who have daughters and even themselves be very aware that overuse of steroids may show up in an ovarian cyst formation. So be aware of it. Like, again, we didn't know that this is just showing up because then all of a sudden, she's. I mean, she's never been more than 115, £120. Right. And all of a sudden, she puts on £30 out of nowhere. Wow. And couldn't understand where it was coming from. That's where it's coming from. That. It's basically an insulin resistance issue that gets created by that as well.

Okay. Wow. That's really, really interesting. And what an amazing story. And. And fabulous that you. You took charge. And I think you. You told me that your wife said that you had to figure this out.

That's what she said. With the lung disorder. She says, you need to figure this out or we're going to lose our daughter. Lung disorder really could have been. Because what they told us is we don't know what causes this hemosiderosis, but she should live near a hospital because her lungs could fill up in 15 minutes.

Oh, my.

And only one in 1.2 million people get that. So it's very rare. So there was no research being done, so we had to figure it out. And that's really what I can't. I said, this is an autoimmune created by the same thing that created the Crohn's. Because I met so many people who had autoimmune disorders, and the connection was trauma and stress.

Interesting.

And if we don't get to the root of that problem, we manage the symptoms, we're never fixing it. And that's all they were doing with my daughter.

Yeah. So we've Talked a lot, Dr. Dawn, about the power of optimism and how important that is to choose that right perspective in our life that that really helps us overcome. Now, this was a situation with your daughter that she was a very optimistic child, an optimistic young woman, but yet there were these Other things going on in the background. So it's. We. I want to talk about how important optimism is, but first talk about that. That place for optimism and where you need to go get some help if you find that you continue to have these recurring issues that just continue to get in the way.

Well, that's why I think what the optimism comes in is because the belief. Right. That. That we're created to heal. Right. Supposed to heal. So what's interfering. That was what got my wife through her traumatic childhood, was that optimism and hope that someday it would be better. Right. Even in this, I think, for. For my wife and I, that we will find an answer. But it was. So, as you know, Janelle, anybody who's suffering with a child that's. That's in pain. Right. You're so frustrated when you can't find answers.

Yes.

Running up against the same roadblocks. Well, there's nothing we can do. Right. We're doing everything we can do.

Right.

No, you're not fixing it. You're managing it. And so having that optimism is so key, and I think that's what saved her life, is that all the struggles she was going through with her. Starting off with her Crohn's. Like I said, she was this happy kid. She just run and jump in your arms. And even when she was sick and she's. She'd be in the hospital, if you. You'd be thinking, people are going to say, like, should look a little sad. People are going to think you're faking it.

Right, right, right.

Because she was smiling. Right. Even though she was in pain, even though she was really suffering. Obviously not all the time, but.

Right.

The times. And she just had that constant state of hope and optimism, and I think that's what got her through. And I don't know many people that have suffered as much as she did. I mean, she was constantly in the hospital, so it was a big, big struggle. So I just believe. And I know you and I talked about it. As I said, if somebody says, well, I'm pessimistic, I just say, no, you're just low on optimism.

Yes. And it does make such a difference. I know we've. We've shared the challenges of your life and the challenges of my life. And as I looked in, some of the things that I went through, it was that shift of perspective where I went through some trauma in my own life when my first husband abandoned me and my little girls. And I, at one point wanted just to crawl into a ball in the corner of my room and just never get up. And you could be that way and feel that way. And yet that wasn't going to be the answer. I needed to look that this was all going to work out, everything was going to work out together for good. And I needed to have hope. And that really made the difference in my own life, no question, and the life of my daughters.

And I think, you know, just reading your book and getting to know you, you know, that's your superpower. I mean, just meeting you, you know, you've got this lightness, energy. You know, it's almost like you're surprised when you hear that you had any kind of stuff like that. It was like really like you. You wouldn't look like that. Right? That would be so. Yeah, so you've got a great spirit to you and, and I think that's why so many people gravitate to you for your leadership. And your book was amazing. You know, it really highlighted so many things. I learned so much, you know, from reading your book, so it was great.

Thank you, Dawn. I, I appreciate that. And that's where we're very in sync with just seeing how that power of optimism can really help us lead a better life. It really makes a difference for sure.

Go ahead.

I had that all my life. I was always an optimistic person. I always figured that there'd be a solution to something and, and again I, I share the story. When I was younger, the tennis pro who taught me if I wanted to be a really great tennis player, then I should lose a lot. And I, like I said, I didn't remember what he, at the time, I didn't understand what he meant, but he said, don't be worried about playing better people because they're going to beat you, they're supposed to beat you. They're better, they're bigger, they're stronger. When I was 13, play against the 16 year olds, right, Because I learn how to play at a higher level. And so you had to not be afraid to lose to do that. Don't let your ego get in the way. And it's tough because as a 13, 14 year old, I could go and win a tournament. Now I'm going to go to a 16 year old tournament, get knocked out in the first round, 18 year old tournament and you know, sometimes coming out of it with barely winning one or two games. It wasn't that I wasn't a good tennis player, but I was overmatched in power and speed. But I eventually caught up to it.

You know, that is so important. I Think for many of us, I mean, nobody likes to fail. I want to win, you want to win. But yet those times of failure, I think if we think about our lives, both personally growing up and as business professionals, it's those times where things didn't work, where we tried it anyway and it failed, that we learned so much to be able to then take from that and be able to make changes, to take us forward, to be able to learn and to grow and to. To have success. I mean, for you, certainly the first time that you started coming up with this treatment methodology, I mean, certainly you hit some walls trying to figure that out. And you could have given up along the way and just said, well, everybody's telling me this isn't going to work. I'm just going to give up.

So many times I had people say, you can't do that. I'm saying, I can eliminate post traumatic stress, I can eliminate anxiety and depression. You can't say that. It's exactly what we're doing. We actually got a patent on it. Right. That I say, again, it's the same thing. The brain is never trying to hurt you. When people say, oh, I sabotaged myself, I go, no, your brain was protecting you.

Right.

Always designed for survival. And it's always. And the great part about this is we can train the brain to do whatever we need it to do. And so there's where that hope and optimism comes in. If you get knocked down and you say, I just keep getting knocked down, everybody comes works against me, everybody's going to knock me down. What's the point in getting up and fighting? I'm just outmatched. Well, you're probably going to have trouble getting up, but if you can continue to get up and continue to fight and you've done that. I've done that in my life. Maybe not to the extent other people. My daughter, jeez, I. I really have to ask myself if I could have had her strength. I don't know. I mean, that was tough, right? And yet she still came out of it with this, you know, smile and, and joy in her life. And she's. You can't give her any cash because she was living out in L. A. When she was acting out there, she'd always be broke. Let's say, you know, I sent you some money. She goes, yeah, but she gave it to everybody. She gave it to every person she ever met.

Right.

And she would give last dollar. Right. And again. But she had that hope.

I'm a big believer in hope and optimism. And you are a living testament to it as well. I know that that's what got you through your life and your difficulties.

Well, definitely. Well, we are giving hope out today. And, and just to all of those listening, know that no matter what that you're going through, if you fall down, that you can get back up and there's hope. And you just need to choose the path of optimism and that is the direction to go. And if you're struggling with something that, as we talked today, this has resonated with you. I want you to learn more about Dr. Dawn's program. Don, can you share what is the best way for our listeners to get in touch with you to find out more about you?

The best place is to go to our website, which is the Inspired Performance Institute, Inspired with a D. And then we have all our testimonials. You can go there and check out. There's a lot of people you may relate to, people who've had different. We've had people from addiction to the highest performing athletes and executives that you, you'll ever meet talk about how it could change their lives, that everybody could benefit from it. And so check out the website, check out the testimonials, check out the podcast. I know you're on my podcast and that's why I'm excited to be yours. You can learn so much from listening just to those kinds of things and the inspiration of other people's stories of what they've gone through and how they've overcome.

Absolutely. Well, thank you so much for your time today. This has been so much fun. And please, listeners, go and check this out. Learn more about Dr. Don and what he's doing. And Don, thank you for the inspiration that you are and for going against the odds and finding this treatment that can help people really take care of unresolved issues in their life that are standing in the way of their optimum performance and being the best that they can be. So thanks again and we look forward to talking again soon.

Thanks, Janelle. I appreciate it.

Thank you for joining me today on the Intentional Leadership Podcast where you will learn how to train, transform your leadership, crush your goals, and love your life. Each episode, I will teach you something to take your life and leadership to the next level. Then at the end, I will challenge you to take action on what you have learned. If you're enjoying this podcast, will you please take a moment to leave a positive review? This helps get the message out to impact as many people as possible. And please subscribe to this podcast. That way the episodes will drop each time a new one comes out. Remember, when you grow as a leader, your team will grow and your company will grow. You can transform your leadership, crush your goals and love your life.