Warrior Journey Meeting 5/28/2020

Sam. Hello there. Can you hear me? Oh, I can.

Yes.

Hi there. I can see nice people.

All right, come on, Cat. She thinks she's in charge.

Hello, Trudy.

Hello.

How are you, Stephen?

You know, doing okay. We're just. Every time that we do this, we're adding a little bit of technology to it, trying to do a few more things, and so it's like trying not to panic.

Breathe.

It'll work.

Everything is going to be okay.

So you've had the contract from Wakanda?

Yes, I do. Well, t' Challa gave me the option of live streaming from the capital, so I decided, sure. Why not? Yeah, why not?

Which reminds me, I've been doing this a lot from. For meetings, for work, so I decided to find WI Fi at Cloud City in Star Wars.

Looks good. I like it. I like it a lot.

Yeah.

There's Crystal. How much longer, Crystal, until you move up to Northern California?

I'm trying to go late June.

Okay.

Get settled in with my uncle.

Yeah. I hope that's going to be a really wonderful adventure for you.

I think it will.

Good, good, good. A variety of interesting things to talk about today, so hold on for a second here. We'll get started in about 6, 7 minutes. It.

And.

I see somebody.

Hello.

Hi, Mary. How are you?

Good. How are you?

I'm doing fine. Doing fine. Just. I'm really glad to see you. I was hoping. Oh, my gosh. I hope Mary's going to be here.

But everything's fine, and here I am. A little early.

Yeah, just a little bit early, you know. Okay. Hi, Mary. How are you?

Good.

How are you?

I'm doing fine. Doing fine. Just. I'm really glad to see you. I was hoping. Oh, my gosh. I hope Mary's gonna be here. Oh, yeah. Everything's fine.

And here I am. A little early.

Yeah, just a little bit early. You know, I. It's interesting to listen to the. The time lag. How are you? I'm doing fine. Doing fine.

Somewhere on repeat.

Yeah, apparently. I don't know why. So, Grant. Yeah. Just a little bit early. You know, I. It's interesting to listen to the. The timeline. Some people seem to be having a little bit of trouble. Yeah.

Am I on the wrong channel?

I'm gonna mute everybody shortly. Just a little bit early. You know, I. Interesting to listen to the time lag. How are you? Some people seem to be having a little bit of trouble. I'm gonna mute everybody shortly. It's the instant time warp. Just about. I'm gonna mute everybody. You know, Meet me before too long. So don't worry about that.

It's the instant time warp.

I'm gonna mute everybody, you know, before too long. So don't worry. Just letting people in just a little bit. Oh, it's been busy, You know, before too long, so don't worry about that. But I did want to have let people have an opportunity to say hi to each other a little bit before we did that. Closing down other windows, we're circling in on this. But I did want to have let people have an opportunity to say hi to each other a little bit before we did that. Closing down other windows, we're circling in on this. But I did want to have let people have an opportunity to say hi to each other a little bit before we did that. Hello. Hello. We're circling in on this. Oh, no, wait a minute. That might.

Hello.

That do it. Aha. Good. All right. Figured that move out. So I'm gonna keep admitting people.

Wakanda forever.

Oh, wait a minute. That might. I'm gonna mute everybody and bring Mary. Unmute Mary. Good. All right.

And.

Hi, mary.

I'm here.

Okay, good. And so. All right. Am I hearing your screen? What's going on? That's that. That loop.

There's a loop? I'm not sure. Let me see here. I'm here. How's that?

That's much better.

My back.

Yes. Can you hear me?

Yes. I think I had you live on a page. And we were live on a page, and we were also on zoom.

Going back and forth and back and forth.

Crazy.

Yes, it is. So we'll get started. I guess it's time to really get started and, you know, just. Hi, everybody. This is me, and this is Mary. Would you introduce yourself, please?

I'm Mary Coppinger. I've been working with the warrior work for many, many years, just as Steven has. And we came together recently to do some work together.

Yeah, this is nutshell, you know, I have to be honest. It's like the work that I've been doing for the last 20, 30 years. I'm very comfortable with how it proceeds, and I'm very confident in it. Dawn's work is impeccable. It's among the very best transformative work that I've seen on the planet. Trying to find the right way to bring her work into a home study version, something that is not dependent upon the. The physical presence in the workshop was a real challenge. And dawn and I worked on it for two years to get this going. And Mary is helping us do this. How Long did you work with Dawn, Mary?

I've been working with dawn, my goodness, for about 30 years we've known each other.

So you are. I am so happy that you're here to represent her piece of this because I want to make sure to get that correct. I'm still having people pop in, joining. There's one poor person who doesn't seem to be able to get in at all and hopefully we just have to give him a replay late because I really don't want to waste anybody's time. I want to have an opportunity to get into it today. So I guess one of the first things I wanted to say is, Mary, was there something that you wanted to, to gift us with initially? Because I've got an agenda, I've got things that I want to do and say. So I just want to make absolutely certain that there's room here for you to gift us with whatever it is you wanted to say.

Well, I think that's very interesting because normally we are in the opposite direction where I am very agenda oriented and have a plan, as we've talked about. And, and our discussion started out this week with my obsessing on that a little bit. And at one point I said, you know, this is really about a time for everybody to check in, like you said earlier, in a format that is somewhat face to face, voice to voice, rather than via a post. So I'm more inclined to hear, to listen. I feel like that's where I'm at personally, is listening, listening more than talking. But I. On that note, I always have something prepared and I had shared with Steven today that the matrix of this system and so many systems is the breathwork. The matrix of the system, as far as warrior work, self protection, etc. Whether physically, spiritually, emotionally, is breaking the freeze, panic response. And that can manifest itself in so many ways. And I read an interview with Angelina Jolie recently, actually it was an article from quite a few months back that actually just happened to read. And one of her quotes is, if you feel you are not living your life, fully identify what it is or who it is that's blocking you from breathing, which is the base of this work that Steven's put together, Dawn's put together, that I've contributed to and, and really examining that over and over again in every which way, and you may not have the answer, and the answer may come in very small, subtle, subtle, subtle pieces over a long period of time until one day you think, wow, I have been really working on whatever that answer is and Here I am. I didn't know I was transforming. I've been transforming little bits every day with repetitive work with myself. And there you are. And I thought about that. If I relate it to a physical practice, which I can never help but doing, I teach a lot of physical fitness, I teach yoga. And I'll have a student say, oh my goodness, I just realized that something I couldn't do a year ago when I started my practice with you, I just did it today. And I know it didn't just happen today, it's been happening a little, little bit over time. So for example, a forward fold, I couldn't get my hands past my knees and now they're almost down to the floor. So that's my nugget for today.

Thank you very much. I know that it has to start with the breath. I mean, my teacher said that you can start with the belly brain or you can start with the heart center. However, in conversations with Dawn, I've come to believe that it is better to start with the belly brain. Because if you don't start with an absolute commitment to self protection, to feeling safe in the world, that you can trust your body, your heart to do 100% of what is possible to protect yourself, then it is unsafe to open your heart. You will actually begin to, you can actually begin to attract predators, people who see that you are open hearted but incapable of defending yourself. So the breath is the only physiological process that is both voluntary and autonomic. It happens automatically, whether you're paying any attention to it or not, or you can actually stop. Think about it, slow your breathing down, deepen it, change its rhythm, change its depth, change the emotional content of a breath. Move from being focused on the inhalation to the exhalation. There are many different things you can do with it. And when you practice enough, you will actually begin to change the nature of the breaths that you take automatically. You'll breathe differently in your sleep. I know that yoga does that, that martial arts do that, you practice them long enough and you literally begin to change. So if that is true to the degree that that is true, and we're going to, we're going to look at this from the position of. These are ideas that are traditional. I've experimented with them, Mary has experimented with them. Thousands of students, both of us have experimented with them. And we're going to deal with these things as if they are true for the sake of this time. But we want you to be scientists. We want you to try for yourselves to experiment. So the most Basic practice, the one that I talk about constantly on Facebook and other places, is every one to three hours, do 60 seconds of deep, slow, diaphragmatic belly breathing. So I would like for us to put our money where our mouth is and spend 60 seconds right now just breathing. Put your hand on your stomach, and when you inhale, feel your stomach expanding against your hand so that you are taking in as much air as possible during your inhalation phase. And then when you exhale to contract as much as possible. What this will do is it will break through that freeze response. It will turn fear back into what it was intended to do, which is the motivation, the energy that you need to either run or fight. When you steal your nervous system back from the stress that you're experiencing in life, you get that energy. You now have the energy that you need to take action. So then as long as you're taking just one action every day, as long as you can see, okay, in the arenas of my career, the arenas of my physical body, and the arenas of my. My family, my love, my children, my mate, if you're taking some step to deepen those every day in general, as soon as you turn fear into action, you stop experiencing it as fear. You start experiencing it as energy. When you're acting, you're not feeling. You feel generally when you are sitting still, thinking about the horrors of the future or the guilt of the past. So let's be here right now with our breathing for just 60 seconds. Would you please do that for me?

Do you mind if I add a little bit?

I would love for you to add something, Mary. Go for it.

Thank you. So, ideally, and I know for some people, physiologically, for whatever reasons, allergies, whatnot, it's difficult to breathe through your nose. But if you can breathe through your nose, at least on the inhale, that is ideal for a diaphragmatic breath. The other thing that I like to explore for myself and for students is while you're breathing into your belly, also breathe into your rib cage, expanding your rib cage from side to side, front to back. So let that breath fill out the back of your body as well. That area behind your abdomen, fill out that space along your spine. So something to play with.

Oh, do not just play with. I mean, well, certainly playing with. But I'll tell you something. When I can feel my back expand when I'm breathing, when I can get still enough and centered enough, when I inhale, I'm not just feeling my abdominal region expand, but I'm feeling my back open When I'm doing it, that is just a fantastic feeling. And I have never had that feeling and simultaneously experienced anxiety. For some reason. When you get that breathing right and you're breathing, that's a breath of power. It's a breath of confidence, and you're faking your brain into believing that you're okay. I mean, you can do that in the midst of. Of horrid stress, and it just works. So if we could just have 60 seconds of breathing right now, and I will time that and just each in your own timing, let's just kind of go for it. So begin, please. All right, thank you, everybody. If you do that deeply and sincerely, you will find your world calming down. And from this place, hopefully we can discuss some things. Hopefully, the screen sharing will work, and if it does, and that will be perfect. If not, I have a backup way for it. What I wanted to do was talk about what happens. Even though the Warriors Journey class is in some ways the pinnacle of what I've been trying to teach, we have other people on the call who are coming in through some of the other programs because I want them to be able to have that benefit. I want to create a community of people who understand that there is something here where we are trying to help you to first center yourself and then to progress in your life. So the question becomes one of, well, what is progress? What are we trying to accomplish? What is the ideal? In order to look at this, I want to do my first of the screen sharing. And hopefully, once again, this will work. If it does not mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. But I think that we're going to be okay. Okay, so here's the first one. Mary, can you see that?

I can, yeah. It's terrific.

Okay, great. What we have here is an image of the yogic chakras. And the chakras are one of the. The most powerful forms of looking at what it is to be a human being. It's not that you cut somebody open and you find a little spinning energy wheel inside them. No, there is theoretical. It's perfectly reasonable. Consider them as theoretical models. Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of human needs fits in here. Milton Erickson's hierarchy of the progression of a human being towards being an autonomous adult is right here. If you start from the bottom and you have the base chakras, Muladhara, Svasana, Manipura, Anahata, Vishnu, Anja, and Sahasrara are the Sanskrit names for them. But starting from the bottom, you have the basic Trust. And then you have sexuality and creativity in the second chakra, genital chakra. And then you have wisdom and power in the third chakra, which is also just below the belly. The Chinese call it the dan tien, the Japanese call it the hara. It's the center of physical mass of the body when you combine. We'll talk about combining these together in just a moment. The heart chakra is emotion, Love, especially love and fear. Unfortunately, although fear connects down with the, especially with the base chakras, the base survival chakras, Communication is in the throat chakra. That is both learning and speaking your truth. And the above, the brow is anja. Intellect, wisdom, the ability to create maps of reality. And then of course, you're going to want to communicate with them. Communicate them. And then outside the physical body is the spirit. On some images, this is depicted as a halo. Okay, so this is just a way of looking at the seven different levels that we have to play with here. Now before we go on, Mary, any, any, any thoughts on this? Because next we're going to go to the energy centers and the way these are grouped.

Yeah, absolutely. So those are. And there are so many ways to, to look, look at this. Everybody has a system that they, they work with to, so to add in for root. And maybe this is where you're getting into the energy center space. Even so, root chakra is physical. Food, shelter, Knowing, trusting that you can secure your resources. And that can mean many different things. Again, food, shelter, ability to make money, et cetera. Your chakra system disappeared.

No, it's okay. I can't admit people to the program at the same time. So I just wanted to be sure that I wasn't, I wasn't excluding some folks.

Yeah, the second chakra, again, creativity, that's also where we define emotional climate. It's from where we dance, you know, we move. From our second chakra, we get groovy. Third chakra, again, will, Commitment, determination. When my youngest daughter was a very little girl, she called it the go for it chakra, which I thought was amazing. Again, as Steven said, heart center, connection, compassion, throat center. Not only from where we communicate, but also we're asked. We ask for what we want, but we have to be open enough to receive it from there. Third eye. I always like to think about that too. It's, it's a bit related to second chakra. It's part of your psychic ability where you see without filters. You see what is and not what you have as far as your fantasy, what you want to see. You See what is without filter. And then the seventh chakra, I mean, that just is what it is.

It is what it is. Let's go back over there right now. So I think we've let some pope in. So. So there you have a way of looking at these seven centers. And once again, this is a metaphor. It's a metaphor. We're not asking you to believe in them in that sense. We're asking you to look at yourself. Asking if you have a blockage in some area, it's useful to look at the areas on either side of it. In other words, if you're having a blockage in your sexual energy, it is useful to ask, is there something about survival that is connected here? People who have been abused, who've had their sexuality connected to pain and loss often will have a shutdown there. In terms of their physical mastery, what's going on in their emotions and their sexuality. In terms of their emotions, what's going on with their body and their sense of being able to communicate. You have to feel safe to be able to open these things up. Now, this is complex. The human mind can handle seven plus or minus two pieces of information at a time. But frankly, I've been studying the chakras my entire life. It feels and it can be a little complicated. Try to understand how to line these things up. But a mutual teacher of myself and dawn simplified this pattern by talking about the three energy centers. So the belly brain, which is to the extreme left here, the lowest one would be the core. Survival, sexuality and physical mastery. The first three chakras, the heart center in the middle would be the emotions and communication, the fourth and fifth chakras. And then the head center, the extreme left. Right is at the bottom, heart is in the middle. And at the extreme left would be the head center, that is intellect and spirit. Now, the belly brain is the sight of instinct. If you are in connection with your belly brain, when you walk into a room, you can feel that something is wrong. If there's something wrong, you can ask yourself questions about what is true or what is not true and what can and cannot be trusted. But I know that the amount, some of the teachings that I got concerning the three energy centers were amazing. And at some point, I might talk about an incident that I actually saw that was mind blowing in terms of the way this relates, they relate to the physical existence. But Mary, you sat at dawn side for thousands of hours and while she talks about these things. So please share us, share with us some thoughts or what would dawn say about the three energy centers in relationship to our existence.

That's a very big question. To our existence.

What might her introductory statement have been?

Yeah, yeah, well, belly brain. We always start with the belly brain. And one thing I want to add too about second chakra reading, emotional climate, knowing when something's wrong, it's also the place from which you know something's right. You know this, this timing's right. I just know this is, this is an opportunity. And you know it to your core, literally. So I do want to layer that in as well. So basically what we talk about in the intro of our work is establishing a healthy relationship with the three, with the three lower centers, root chakra. You gotta know you can take care of yourself. You have to know you have self reliance, self preservation. And when you don't trust that, when you don't trust that you can physically survive on your own, on any level, financially, physically, emotionally, you're walking around freaked out all the time. When you can't figure out if you're in a dangerous situation or you can't figure out if you have an opportunity or not, you're walking around confused all the time and nothing gets done.

So let me ask you a question before you go on. We have a lot of people who are feeling extreme stress right now, extreme life stress. I mean, it's not just, you know, we were concerned about things about the environment and then we were concerned about the economy and then we were concerned about the political season. Now we're concerned about this disease. Literally. I don't know of a time that the average person, over the course of my life, except for the Cuban missile crisis, okay, I cannot think of a time when the average person in this country felt as much stress as we feel right now. So how can we use that insight that you just offered us to help ourselves and help our families and be of service to the people that we love? How do we engage the belly brain so as to deal with this very real stress in a more healthful fashion?

Right. The biggest thing that's been coming up for me with this current situation is we don't know. We don't know about this virus. We don't know even if there is a vaccine, what the residuals are going to be. Are we going to cover, recover economically? Am I ever going to be able to hang out with my family and friends again? So across the board is the, I don't know. And that's, that's a very stressful place to be and it's different for everybody. That's that's landing, you know, there's people that have lost their jobs, etc. Etc. So it's the big unknown. So again, it comes back to self trust. What do you know? What do you know about your own resilience, about your ability to be resourceful? And again, those abilities are different for everybody. Everyone has their own things that they're not certain about. But again, it goes back to trusting your ability to gather up your resources, know what they are and act on them. So that's, that's it in a nutshell for me. I know that sounds simplistic, sometimes harder to implement, but that's it in its basic form.

Start with your breathing. Start with, you know, every one to three hours you breathe. And if you will do that, then that gives you the beginning and the next step after that is what I call the morning ritual where you're taking one of those moments, one of those 60 second moments and you are turning it into an act of power where you are walking or exercising in some way, moving your body while simultaneously focusing on all that you have to feel grateful for in your life. Your children, your friends, your health, a roof over your head, Internet connection. You remember that we have blessings even in the midst of crisis, that there are positive things that we have to cling to, we can cling to each other. We have memories. And just like if you fell down in front of the class and everybody laughed at you when you were 10 years old and you think about that, you're still going to feel mortified by it if you let yourself think about it enough. In the exact same way, positive memories can be triggered, old memories can be triggered the same way. By actually putting yourself into this. It's learning how to play yourself like a piano. What is the music you want to experience in your life? By deciding which memories you are going to associate with and associating with them fully during the day, you actually get to control how you feel. Do that. And the people around you, if you are calm in the midst of crisis, the people around you will look to you for leadership. They will look to you. So in that morning ritual, you move, you focus on the things that you have to feel blessed for, that you feel blessed for. And you can speak affirmations that relate to all that you wish to accomplish and all that you wish to do in this day that leads you, that will lead you to your longer term goals. So what's happening is that you're literally physically moving at the same time, you're showering yourself with emotions at the same time that you're focusing your mind. And if you can do that for just 10 to 20 minutes a day in movement, you can literally set the tone of your entire day by the way you start and you remember what it felt like to move a particular way to think a particular way to hold your face, a particular way to speak in a particular way. And it's. If every one to three hours you're checking your breathing, then what happens is let's say you set your watch to one to three hours and it goes off and it's always breathing time. You can literally check in with your body. What's my posture? How's my facial expression? What is the, what have I been saying inside my head? How have I been reacting? Have I been stuck, caught in reaction loops with hostile people? What have I been doing in my life? And then you. It's important that you do this for more than yourself to remember that the entire world is counting on us. The world needs leadership. The world needs people who, yes, we can be banged up and beat up and scarred but we've still got our heads up, we're still smiling about what can happen tomorrow. We need your strength. Once you've got your strength, then I think it is safe to open your heart. So talk to us about the heart center. Mary.

That was a good, good segue that, that part of reconnecting with the first three energy centers is about being safe to open your heart. So when you're not feeling particularly resilient with your resources, you might be clinging to somebody a little too much and that comes through and you setting yourself up to be disappointed. Healthy sexuality, healthy relationships in that second chakra, the ability to dance with somebody heart to heart and not feel like a dork or whatnot. And again, the ability with discipline to set boundaries for yourself and not step on the boundaries of somebody else. That's a healthy heart connection. So that's my take on heart connection. I know a lot of people get into heart connection too about, you know, feeling ultra compassionate. But at the same time the most compassionate people I know have very, very healthy boundaries. They have self compassion and they know and express their limits so that they have an abundance of energy to give of themselves and their hearts. So it's kind of a two sided coin there.

I wish that I could get that message, what you just said about the most open hearted people needing to have and being capable of having boundaries, that without that it is not safe to open your heart. And some of the worst cynics I've Ever known of people who started out being optimists, they started out being romantics. They wanted so much to trust the world, to love the world, to give themselves away to the world. And they got hurt over and over again until they reached the point where they trust nobody and nothing, and they shut themselves down. But if you will start by protecting yourself so that. That. That divine spirit inside you or that little kid inside you has a safe place to be in the world, you will see an explosion in your life energy, in your creativity, in your ability to give love and accept love, in your sensuality. Once you feel safe, it's a completely different world.

It's really different. And knowing that you're safe, being vulnerable, that if you do get hurt, and you most likely will, that you'll be okay, that, you know you will keep yourself okay. And that sounds a little cliche to me as I'm saying it, But I absolutely 100% believe that.

I believe it, too.

Those three energy centers.

About the head center. Now, from your point of view, for me, it's, you know, it's knowledge and wisdom and, you know, developing maps of reality that you can then communicate and compare the people as scientific method and so forth. But it's also the ultimate intent of our lives. It is what my mother, who was, you know, raised in the. Raised me in the Episcopal Church. My mother would have said, only one life as soon as passed, only what's done for God will last. It is the notion that who and what it is that we are as physical beings, as animals, has to exist in the framework of our own death. That there has to be, have to be things that are more important than us. For many of us, it's our family, you know, our country, your ideals, your. Your values. Things that you would be willing to die for. If you know what you'd be willing to die for, your honor, then you know what you're prepared to live for. That framework is critical. Mary, thoughts, please.

We started out with the question about head center, but then. Is that what you're still asking?

Head center.

Head center. Okay. I think that's what you were saying, is your head center is where you create your framework. It can be your intellect. What comes to mind for me is I'm a list person. I always have a list. And my family teases me when I walk out the door. Do you have your list? Because it sets the tone. It keeps me organized. It. You know, it's how dawn always used to say, you know, you need that brain up there so you can balance Your checkbook, et cetera. It might not, but at least you have the ability to do that. And I touched on it earlier too. For me, it's where I dream, it's where I fantasize. It's, you know, those beautiful pictures that come across my mind's eye. You know, you need that space in your brain to create those pictures that you feed to your belly brain to manifest those dreams, those fantasies, et cetera. For me, too, I know I mentioned this earlier. Third eye is also a sense of humor. It's where we see the lightness of life and we let ourselves see and laugh and enjoy each other. So very, very rich in so many ways. It's the part of us that organizes our bodily experience. The messages from the other brains, you know, we don't just have one. So I think that answers your question.

Yes, it does. And I think. I'm not sure, but I see somebody named Patrick show up, and I only know Patrick Young. I think that might be Patrick Young. Hold on for just a second. Let me unmute this fellow if I possibly can. Are you gonna let me on? Are they gonna let me. Aha. Patrick.

Steven.

Is that Brother Patrick?

That is, in fact, your brother Patrick.

Okay. Are you. Do you have a camera?

You know what? I was trying to get it to work and I can't. I'm on my old computer right now.

It's okay. Well, Patrick was combat chief for dawn. For how long?

26 year old.

Oh, my God. So thank you. It's so great to have you on the call, buddy. And we were just talking about the three energy centers. And I was wondering whether or not the first time I became familiar with the three energy centers. You were there.

Yes, I was.

And would you please tell these people what happened? Because it was. It was pretty amazing.

So Stephen and I went to visit a martial art teacher who we both admired and had had classes for and had gone to workshops. Am I telling the right story?

Yes, you are.

Okay. And I was training with one of his students. So one of his students was the most talented black belt that I'd ever seen move. It was almost like watching a machine, because human beings couldn't move that perfectly. And so I went and I'd seen him do something that really dazzled me. And I saw him do it in a. During a kumite, during a fight, where he popped up in the air, wheeled his body around, was able to throw a reverse roundhouse kick that nobody saw coming because people don't move like that. And so I was telling the story To Harley, Harley Reagan. And he said, well, you could do that. I said, yeah, sure I could. And he goes, no, you can't. So what you do is you focus. You focus your attention on your belly brain to get the lift off the ground. He explained the whole thing to me. And then he just sat back in his chair and looked at me, and.

I was, okay, so let me interject for a moment here. Belly brain controls movement up and down.

Right, up and down.

Heart center controls movement forward and back, right? And the head center controls movement left and right. He just said, you just combine. Put them in the right combination and just do it. So what happened, Patrick?

Well, he even explained the combination. He goes, well, you start off and you're going to jump, and so you're going to need to use your belly brain. Anyway, he. He explained the whole thing to me. And then Stephen and Harley were both sitting there looking at me, and I thought I was kind of going, yeah, okay, so I did it. And when I landed, I looked over at Steve and his mouth was hanging open. And he said. I said, was that right? And he goes, man, you were four feet off the ground. I am not a jumper. I have never been a jumper. And that was one of the things that was holding me back and being able to get a. Being able to pass through the belt system, the style that we were in. So that was one of the things that really impressed me was these things that I considered to almost be mystical. Harley thought about and Harley and Dawn thought about as daily technique. This is just the way you. This is the business of your life. This is the way you go through it.

First of all, thank you so much for sharing that story, because I ended up writing about that incident in Black Belt magazine because I'd never seen anything like that. So the idea that these energy centers, which are conceptual, also have a physical effect, that you can ground them in your physical reality, you can ground them in your emotional reality, you can ground them in your intellectual reality. I think is essential to. To starting to play with these things. So, you know, hold on, hold on. Pat and I want to talk. I want to share the screen again and take things one more step. Okay, So there is a Middle Eastern Sufi saying that I have been experimenting with over the last couple of weeks. And it is, before you speak, let your words pass through three gates. At the first gate, ask yourself, is it true? At the second gate, ask, is it necessary? At the third gate, ask, is it kind? Now, these are. These are filters for us to evaluate our words, but also Our actions. And when you begin to engage with these three, one of the things that's very interesting is you will find out how difficult it is. It is hugely difficult to filter all of your words and your actions by making certain that they are true, that they're kind and, and that they're necessary, and that they are kind. You find out about your character when you do this and as you do that you start understanding better the character of people who cannot do these things and the character of the people who can do these things that you can actually use their expression and their actions as a way to see into their hearts to the degree that you're willing to commit to these and use them to look into your own heart. Now I wanted to take one more step with this because it occurred to me that it's possible to look at these in a slightly different way. And that is starting from the bottom. If the belly brain is what tells us what is true in many ways, the heart center is certainly about whether or not we are kind and an action is kind. The head center is what is necessary, what is useful, what is utilitarian, what is practical, and that we could actually attach these three gates to the three centers and it helps things become more three dimensional. In a way. We're looking at ourselves more. See, I'm going to stop this, stop sharing. We're looking at this in a more holistic way. Now what I needed to know is, does that make sense? So Mary, first, does that make sense to you.

That, that view those three.

Steps and connecting them to the three energy centers as just a way of, of looking. If the belly brain is what you use to ask, is something true or not?

Absolutely.

Do you get that? Is it true? The heart, is it kind? And the head, is it useful? Is it necessary? I just kind of, it looked to me like there might be something useful about aligning those things as a way to look at our actions and our thoughts. What is your impression?

Absolutely, absolutely. I mean we, see we talked about this earlier, that belly brain reads the climate. It gives you the answer without self doubt. And it's interesting the use of the belly brain and the head is you don't necessarily want to go up to your head to ask if something's true. And we use the picture of, you know, you've got the committee, you've got the board members sitting up, up there and everybody's arguing about whether it's true or not. And that doesn't happen in belly brain, it just is, you know, it is, or you know, it isn't. And then heart center. Is it kind? And. And we know that you know when something's kind or not. I know when I'm being a jerk. I do.

I think we know.

And is it necessary? So, fine, it's true, it's kind. But does whatever's true and whatever might be kind, does it need to come out of your mouth?

You know, Musashi Miyamoto, the greatest warrior in Japanese history, had his book called the Book of Five Rings. He says very distinctly, I've got it up on my wall, it says, do nothing, which is of no use. His first principle is, do not think dishonestly. In other words, is it true? But his last principle is do nothing. That is of no use. It has to be useful for us to be able to move through life. Remember we talked initially about how when you can take an action, you're turning the energy of fear into action. As long as you're taking action, the fear doesn't paralyze you. So the ability to determine whether or not this step or that step, this action or that action, this word, this conversation or that conversation, is actually moving something forward in your life is necessary. If you can do that, then even if the. If the task is a task of a thousand miles and you can take one step toward it, but it's a real step, it's a valid step. You don't feel as lost. You've done something. You've taken that storm of emotion inside yourself, and instead of getting wrapped up in it, you can ask yourself, is it true? Is this thing that I'm afraid of, is it even true? How do I know it's true? You start going into your epistemology, how do I know that it's true? Did I hear it? Did I vet it? Have I tested it? Is it kind? Is it a good thing for mankind? Is it a good thing? Am I being kind to myself? Am I being kind to the person I'm talking to? It is so easy when you're angry, to allow your anger to come out in your words. And you just want to cut. You just want to smash them. You just want to stop them. You want to make them hurt. But is that useful? There are unfortunately, contexts in life when it is useful to hurt someone. That's the warrior path that happens. But we don't have to be sadistic about it. We don't have to enjoy it. What we have to do is do it. We have to keep ourselves safe. We have to be certain that we fulfill that primary thing, which is to Be safe, safe in the world. Once you're safe, then we can ask, is it kind? I can afford to be kind to others if I'm not afraid of them, then, you know, there are things that people would like that are not useful. There are things that we would like that are not useful. They're not moving life forward. Now the fact is that it is useful to sit and watch Looney Tunes. It helps dump stress. It's useful to play with your dog, your cat, it's useful to tell jokes to your kids. It's useful to make love to your spouse. It's useful to play games. We need to dump stress. We need to connect to people. So I'm not saying that, you know, all work and I am saying all work and no play makes dull. Makes Jack a dull boy. That you have to have some time to release things. So entertainment is a part of that. But make sure that it's, you know, it's the frosting on the cake. What do you need to do today to move your life forward? I like this one principle is done by one. All the most important things that I have to do in a day are going to be done by one o' clock in the afternoon. After that it becomes the things that are negotiable, you know, if I don't end up doing them. No harm, no foul, but the beginning of the from the time I wake up in the morning until one o', clock, if I'm doing it done by one, this is business. I'm tracking every minute. I'm tracking every action, every word because I'm trying to get this all done. So in order to be kind to myself, to be able to have time where I can just be me, I ask what is necessary, what is true? Does it feel good? Is it going to help me move towards pleasure, away from pain? Is this efficient and effective use of my time and energy? So looking at all three areas, my belly brain, my heart center, my head center, asking is it true? Is it useful? Is it kind? Maybe connected to those three centers? Or asking that of everything in connection with each of those three centers. I would love for you guys to play with that until we meet again and just kind of, kind of connect with the sinners and ask yourself, is it true? Is it useful? Is it kind? And think back on the people who have behaved in a non optimal way in your life. To what degree did their words cue you to who they were? If only you'd paid attention to those three things. Now we have a chat window here and I Would like to get Mary and Pat to talk a little bit more about the three energy centers and things. But I would also like for people to type into the chat window if they have any questions that they, they raise their hand, they would like us to call on them because we would like to check in with you about how you've been doing. So Mary and Pat, take it away for a minute while we give people an opportunity to speak.

Ms. Mary hello Patrick.

How are you doing, kiddo?

I'm doing good, doing really good. So one of the tenants that we work with that I think also ties into the, the energy centers and applying is it true, is it kind, is it necessary? Is the concept of balance.

So.

Looking at where you might be out of balance in any area could also be a clue into the examination of where because you want those energy centers to be humming along all in synchronicity with each other. So if there are areas where you feel out of balance, are you putting out too much physical energy, are you working too much, are you playing too much, are you loving too much? And that is possible, believe it or not. So taking a look at those areas and applying that to a place in your body, root chakra, second chakra, third chakra, have you lost some of your ability to be disciplined? And again, that could be in so many different areas. It's different for everybody. So I would say that looking at balance in your life is also a way to get a window into, into these concepts and some self examination.

PATRICK that's a good point. Mary And I also add something to it. You can tell there are times when, especially in the last job I had, when I had to spend the day in my head, I basically the requirement was it was a stressful situation and that was what I did. At the end of the day, I was drained. I was drained, couldn't sleep that night, didn't feel well, all of those things. And it was because I had put myself in the position where I was used to not doing that, where I was used to being in my belly, brain in my heart, center in my head. And I would check into those places. So it's the out of balance. You can feel it or I don't. You can feel it, I can feel it. And the times when that happens, and there are times when it still happens to me, I will sit there and go, something is not right. And if I will stop for a minute and breathe and spend some time doing yoga, doing some of the things that relax me, it comes and I will see what it is that has.

Put me where I am, out of alignment. Thank you very much, Pat. I think that what I might want.

To do, people, can I add just one thing? What Patrick just said, and the concept of breathing and feeling out of balance, one of the things that's really, really helpful to me, and you can either do this standing or sitting. Where does our balance start? In our feet. So if you have the opportunity, when you're feeling that way or trying to, trying to feel something, is getting your feet on the floor or whatever part of your body can connect to the floor, to the ground and breathe from there.

Tai Chi, Aikido, yoga, they ask you to, you know, so we'll sometimes say breathe from your, from your toes. Breathe from the soles of your feet, right? That sense of being anchored to the earth, to trust Grandmother Earth, to protect us, to support us. There's power there. There's huge power there. We got a comment here, maybe just a quick quiz. This is from Mary Haake. Mary, just a quick question. I understand seeing if something is kind, if something is true, but I see myself not being able to tell if it is necessary. Can you speak a bit more unnecessary. I think that if one is ultimately engaged in the spiritual path, perhaps you don't say anything unless it is necessary to speak, in which case you're probably going to be a silent monk for most of the time. So let's soften that word a little bit and say useful, shall we? Does this action, is this action helping to resolve something? Are you learning something? Are you advancing something? In other words, in every day, one of the things that we talk about is the atomic goal setting. Reducing the things that you have to do in your life to the minimum amount that you can do and still move your life forward. So in terms of exercise, it might be walking. Just, you know, if you've been a couch potato, it would be useful to just walk for a block walk, a single lap. Useful to do one sun salutation. It's useful because it's getting you in touch with things. Maybe in terms of your job, it's making a phone call to someone to ask about a job, to ask, to find some resources to talk to someone who knows things that you don't know. In terms of your relationships, it might be opening up a deeper communication with your loved ones or taking some time by yourself to meditate, to get in touch with your own feelings that what you're looking for is that sense of what is useful. What is going to take me closer to what it is that I'M trying to accomplish in my life. And if this is something that you're not clear on, then one of the most important things you can do is say, I want clarity. I want clarity on what I want. I want clarity on where I'm going. I want clarity on what I can do every day to move in that direction. Because any day that you feel that you're doing something that actually moves you appropriately in the direction of your goals, you're going to feel better, you're going to feel good. In general, we are happy when we feel that we are making progress towards something meaningful. What Maxwell Maltz or Earl Nightingale or one of those guys who used to specialize in these kinds of conversations that success is the progressive realization of a worthy ideal, a worthy goal when we feel we've taken another step. So start noticing what actions take you closer and which actions take you further away. So Tom Barkley said, I'm a former. As a matter of fact, let me. Well, I'll read this. I'm a former opera singer, so starting and continuing with deep and expansive breathing has felt very natural. I didn't expect it would be as calming as it has turned out to be, possibly. Since I'm not worried about musical challenges. One of my great teachers and musical leaders died Monday of COVID 19. Related Issues I'm so sorry, Tom. It seems strange that something so tiny could kill a fearless man like Joel, but there's a reason in both halves of that statement, it is driving me forward today. I also remembered when I was most myself 45 years ago, I started the day with breathing and humming resonating exercises from a prior voice teacher and then doing the warm ups from the first dojo where I studied, I stopped doing these things and now I'm pretty sure that's been my undoing. So right now. So Tom, let me find you on here because I want to talk to you for a second. That was. That was lovely. I will find you. There he is. There's Tom. So Tom, I'm going to unmute you, Tom.

Still hear him.

Okay. So Tom, I want you to commit to me and to us right now that you are going to start starting your day with these rituals that used to empower you. I want a statement from you about this. Because when we take our feelings and our thoughts and we turn them into words, even if we're to say speaking them out, but there is a group of people here and we're here for each other. We're all here together because we're all part of the same thing. Trying, just part of this human experience, trying to move towards life. So I would like to hear you in a powerful voice, would you be willing to make a commitment to start taking better care of yourself?

Well, that's where the catch is, isn't it?

Yes, it is.

That's. There are so many things that have not worked in my life in the last 20 years, however many years.

Yes.

That it's really hard to have faith and to put that faith into action.

I'm not asking you to have faith. I'm asking you to be understood.

Yeah, I understand. What I'm saying is if I can make myself do it tomorrow, then that'll be one day. This is a lot like what you go through when you're trying to overcome addiction, and in a very real way, addiction to fear, addiction to despair, which is probably a better word, is every bit as powerful as addiction to alcohol, tobacco.

Absolutely. So can you promise you'll do it tomorrow? Yeah, that I can do. All you have to do. If you will post your results on the forum where we can support you, we can tell you that we're proud of you. We can say that because of you, we're more motivated to do what we need to do to take care of ourselves. We will support you. If you'll let us support you, Tom, we'll be there for you, I promise.

I know you will, Steve. The real trick here is for me to support myself.

Exactly.

That's what got lost.

Yes. So opening up your heart, loving yourself, and getting in touch with your survival drive.

These.

These are. This is the task for you and their kids. There can't be anything that's harder than opening those doors. Once those doors have felt sealed with pain, there cannot be. So if you can just do this for one day, I say you've won that goal, that game. Mary and Pat, would you please chip in on this with Tom?

One thing I do want to say is that this realization has solidified just because I am doing more of the breathing every day. And that little iPhone application that I told you about months ago has turned out to be quite useful.

Why don't you tell us about that iPhone application?

It's called breathwork, spelled as you would expect it to be, but without the final O. And you set it as a timer specifically to remind you to breathe. It has a little breathing sound effect to it when it is time to do something, and it has a little encouragement text there along with it when it's time to. Time to do something. And honestly, going back to the breathing. I find that I don't limit myself to 1 minute, 2 minutes, 3 minutes. This is how this is. This was the foundation of my art at one time. If you can't breathe, you can't make tone.

Yes.

If you can't make tone, you can't make words. If you can't make tone and words, no one is going to hear you.

Excellent. If you would post a link to that app in the forum so people can see whether or not that's something they would like to participate with. I would appreciate it very much, Tom. Happy to help, and thank you. Thank you very much for sharing. We have something from Sean Nixon says that the issue of worthiness is very much on my mind right now, and frankly, I am really full of crap about it. Now. The thing that's interesting about that is that he knows perfectly well that if someone were to consider one of his children unworthy, they would be unconscious immediately. I'm going to open Sean's microphone.

Sean, horrible mistake.

Hey, how you doing? So talk to us about what you've been going through with the process, please.

I'll tell you.

Okay.

Long story short, no crying, no whining. I am in the midst of a divorce. My wife is moving out of our shared home tomorrow. I have been trapped home with my kids. Like, you know, a lot of people, I'm sure, are with the. With the quarantine and. Yeah, my, you know, my marriage is unwinding and this, that, and the other thing. Now, I say none of this with sadness, regret, or anything like that. Steve and I talked about that a long time ago. You know, the thing is, first and.

Foremost.

The breathing thing, like, that works, and it works like a charm. It's been really, really helping me through this.

That's where we start.

Absolutely. And then. And then the worthiness thing, and this is. This has kind of come up in a different context for me is I've been trying to kind of restart my social life, which is exciting, after spending half my life with a different person. And the thing that has kind of come up is people are being nice to me. Women are being nice to me. And I, like, almost immediately, you know, when they do that, I'm like, you don't deserve that, dude. You gotta, you know, settle down. Like, you. You know, that that should not be happening. And I was just. I've been thinking about this and, you know, and just kind of sitting there on it, and I'm like, man, you know, everybody. People say all the time how much they want, you know, real love. And people to be connected to and this and that. But here I am with an opportunity to actually have that. And the first thing that occurred to me was, get out of here. Like, eject, eject, eject, because you're not worthy of that.

Yes.

Find out something's wrong with you, you know, and that just is. Is, you know, I don't think of myself like that. That's not like a top level thought I have about myself. Well, like, on that kind of, like, lower down on the list of shockers, that bad boy just popped right up the second anything good happened. And I was like, wow, would you look at that? Here's the thing that I say to myself up here in my head. Chakra, third eye. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, all up here, right? That, that, you know, I was like, here's what I want. But then way down lower, that was not what was cracking at all. And I gotta. That's a cool thing to me about that model of the chakras is that once you kind of accept it as a model and you start to kind of, you know, let that in a little bit, it provides a reference point to look at what is happening to you and be like, all right, which one of these things might be jammed up? Which one of these things might be too active? You know, like, what is happening here? So, I mean, first and foremost, that worthiness thing, I've never been aware that that was resonant in my conversation at all. And now that I'm at least aware of it, I feel like now there's a real ground for the fight here. Like, now there's an actual battleground. Like, okay, yeah, there is. Yeah. You know, yeah. Now, you know, now we can really look at it. Now we can really, you know, my.

Friend, you find a metaphor that fits your strengths. You're a fighter. You're a fighter, Sean. It's like, you know, so for me, you know, someone who's a gardener might have a metaphor of weeding their garden. You know, a fighter might. You know, you see something in front of you that needs to be knocked down, or you put someone behind you that needs to be protected. Okay? Any voice inside you that has told you that you are less than precious, that you don't have the right to be here, you don't have the right to be happy, to be loving. That voice lied to you. It's as simple as that. That voice lied to you. And once you become aware that you have voices inside you that will lie to you, you can sit back when you're meditating, listening to the voices in your head. Everybody's got voices in their head. And ask yourself, where did that voice come from? Whose voice is that? Do I listen to that? And when you connected with your survival drive, your belly brain right, you literally can start asking it yes and no questions. Yes, no. Is this voice reliable? And it will tell you as long as you boil it down to a yes and no question, you'll get that feeling and you'll be able to to zero in on that. But I can tell you anything that says that you do not have the right to life, to breath, to love, is the static that stands between you and your spirit. That the little boy part of you who started this journey is absolutely precious. I've had the gift you've given me the gift of seeing that little kid inside you enough that I know how much I would have enjoyed having him as a buddy. I know that. And the fact is that romantic relationships are friends with benefits. You are friends, but you also have the physical attraction. And a relationship, a long term relationship happens when you not only friends and have a physical attraction, but you also see the necessities of life sufficient that you can be in business together. We can balance a checkbook together. We can love each other, we can, we can help each other through, we can be, we can. That's when everything comes together. So. So make sure that that kid part of you is safe. It's a dangerous world out there and you've taken a lot of blows. Okay, so start with him being precious and be willing to listen to what he says to you. Don't talk to him except to ask him, what can I do for you?

I think over the years, I think that this is if we've learned nothing. It's that when I shut up, nothing really that bad ever happens. Shutting up is a great strategy.

So yeah, that's great. That's great. Thank you very much. Thanks a lot, buddy. And just. We'll continue this conversation later. But I had something that was just touching specifically about hold on for just a second here. I'm still working my way through these technologies, so please pardon me from Athletic Films says my name is Jamia Jamiah. Displayed as athletic. I was wondering, what do you listen to when you're in the middle of a creative process, when you're creating and feel like you're not doing enough? Okay, that's a damn fine question. I create every day. I mean I tend to be. I've always got multiple projects going on. And what I will do is I Will read over. I'll either create notes about something or read over those notes and just add to them. But the little voice, the voice that I listen to the most is the little kid inside me. The exact one I just told Shawn he. He has to protect. That is so precious. That little kid inside me, that's the earth below, heaven above. No one in the world like me, Buddha baby. Feeling that every child should have that sense of being ineffably precious. Absolutely precious and unique. Every little boy, every little girl needs to have that sense. It's one of the things that is so horrible about neglect and even worse about abuse, especially sexual abuse. It strips away the part of you that feels precious. Societies can do that by hitting you with messages that you are not as much as you're not good enough. So when I protect that child part of myself, I'm creating a safe place for him to play. I will literally create a playground for him where, you know, it is my job as the adult to prune the thorns off the roses and keep the pumas at bay and let my kid in there and play. And then other my wife Tananeri, you know, has a little girl who is just absolutely wonderful.

And.

I let that little girl come in and play and we can play together. And my parents side and her, you know, my dad's side and her mom's side stand at the gates and keep the mountain lions out. You know, it's like so our kids can play together. And that's when we're able to collaborate creatively. But the creative voice is the child, the editing voice. That's. That's for creating new text for coming up with ideas. The editing part of me is the adult part, the edit. The adult is the editor. The adult maintains discipline. The adult creates the safe space. But it is the child self who does the creativity. So that's that voice. Nancy Polk said that it's hard for her to write fiction. Does stress affect fiction writing? It does when it becomes strained. That access to flow state is what makes it possible to create that. When, you know, we talked about this last time, I think I'll just show this again. That stress. Stress is pressure per unit area that's pressing against the paper that is disappearing because of Wakanda magic. That's stress. But strain is deformation per unit length. Strain is when the stress gets so bad that it crunches you up. This is what you do not want. You. Stress is just fine because it actually motivates us to move forward. It creates the energy that we need. It's a way we're dealing with fear. And as long as the fear does not turn into strain, we can use that to move forward in our lives. How do you stop that? Breathing. It's great. Breathing can be a sovereign doorway into our flow state. Now, if you're not. If you're not familiar with writing sufficiently, you might do something like take write a story about a television episode or a movie that you saw. In other words, so you don't have to worry about the plot, you don't have to worry about structure. You don't have to worry about anything except trying to create a story from something you already know. Now you're working on all the skills except the core creative skills. Then you can do the creative skills. Just write an outline of something that you want to do. If you can write a story describing something that already exists, and if you can write an outline for something that does not exist, you have all the component skills to structure something new and write about it. And now it's just a matter of combining them. And at every step, you're being certain that the stress, performance, stress, fear, whatever, rejection, stress does not overwhelm you, does not become so powerful that you can't blend these things together. My very dear friend and mentor, Jerry Parnell, after he had chemotherapy, radiation therapy, actually on a brain tumor, he was no longer able to connect the flow state with the editing state. He could come up with ideas, but he couldn't write them down. It was painful to watch. So a lot of the function that I fulfilled on our last novel together, Starboard and Godson, was he and Larry would create the ideas, I would write the first draft in, and then we would all polish them together. So we're moving back and forth between those two modes. It's a way. I mean, the truth is that once you decide what your intent is, you simply look for the tools that will help you fulfill your intent. And one of those tools is definitely outlining. One of those tools is focus. Dealing with your fear, Learning how to breathe so that strength does not become strained. Your goal is to have a happy life. Your goal is to live a life in integrity, to speak truth with kindness and utility. To be balanced between our belly brains, our heart centers, our head centers, and it all starts with the breathing. Mary, I would love to start winding this down. I would love a comment from you about any of the things that we've covered here today.

I guess just speaking to a couple of the comments and questions. Tom, I want to acknowledge that you've already started taking Care of yourself by actively being disciplined about your breath work. And I just want to encourage you to keep going. And one of the words, as I thought about coming into our session tonight was curiosity. And when you're curious about something, it encourages you to explore. And you are exploring yourself right now. And when you explore yourself, you discover something about yourself. And when you discover something about yourself that can be pleasurable, which results in your wanting to do it more. So I just think you're right on, man. So keep going.

Keep letting us support you.

Yeah. And, Sean, you know, you're traveling into new territory. I guess it's. I have kind of more of a question, and we can explore this more in the group if you want to, but I heard you ask or mention two things, which was about feeling worthy and questioning a woman, or women in particular, being nice to you, that somehow that feels uncomfortable. And so I really encourage you to engage in that second chakra in a playful way and absolutely find a way that you can honestly feel in yourself that you deserve feminine attention. You deserve to be desirable, to be desired. That doesn't necessarily mean in a. In a sexual or intimate way that your company is desirable, that somebody wants to talk to you, that they find you interesting because you find yourself interesting. So those are a couple nuggets that I had. And our last person talking about, actually, there were two. And I'm. The one that I remember is about writing fiction. And again, it almost goes just intuitively without knowing more about this person. But feeling stressed. I think she said stressed about writing fiction. Is that correct?

Yes.

And to me, that feels, you know, if you're doing something nonfiction and you're researching it and it's vetted, but fiction, to me, feels a bit more vulnerable. It's your piece of artwork on paper, where there's that sense of, is it entertaining enough? Is it boring? So many of those doubts can swirl in your head, and that's a lot about your throat chakra. So maybe taking a little more of a look at that. And again, it goes to what Sean was saying, you know, feeling worthy of being heard, having something to share. So those are. That's all I have. I think it would be beautiful, Stephen, if we closed our virtual circle with another round of 60 seconds of breathing.

And would you lead us? Would you be kind? What I'd like to do is to have Patrick say something very briefly, and then I would love for you to lead us in the breathing. And then we will open up and let everybody say, you know, say hi to everybody for Just a few seconds and then we will say. We will say goodbye. So, Patrick, you have any last words, friend? Patrick Zatrick.

Oh, is he on mute still?

I hope not. Let me take a look.

There's a little microphone with the.

I know. I. I thought I'd taken him off mute. Oh, okay. Patrick, can you hear me now?

Yeah. You didn't hear that whole diatribe I just laid out for you. I can do it again. So I just wanted to say to everybody that I've known Stephen and Mary since we were children. So it's, it's, you know, it's. It's been a long, interesting relationship with them. But I got to meet all you guys tonight, and I'm very thankful for that. Very grateful for. And I wanted to say to Tom, you guys, Tom, we. We've got you on this, man. It's just a matter of getting out there and doing it. And I would suggest. I don't know what your process is, but I would suggest hills and not mountains to start out. So when I'm. When I'm getting ready to go backpacking again, and I haven't done it for a couple of years, I go take day hikes for a while until I have built myself up where my physically, mentally, I can get through this thing. Right. I would just suggest that hills, not mountains. And then for Sean. Sean, it was. I really appreciate what you said in the way that you said it. You are fearless about revealing parts of yourself to people like me who you don't know from Adam. And I really appreciated all of that and wanted to tell you that you have a voice inside of you that owes you an apology. If you've got somebody that says that, you got somebody saying that you are not worthy, that is not true. That comes across directly. So stay with it, you guys. I will do. Mary and Steve can attest. I'll do this all afternoon. So I'm going to go ahead and quit with that. But it has been very, very, very nice to meet everyone and I'll be back.

Great. Because we're planning to do this. I think it's going to be like the last Wednesday of every month. We're all going to get together for. In this particular way. There will be other gatherings that you can be a part of, and I will. I will notify you about that. But this, the emphasis here is on the Warrior's Journey. People who are part of my other programs who would like to find out more about the Warrior's Journey. You know, I put the URL. It says realwarriorsjourney.com and so, Mary, would you please do us a favor of leading us into 60 seconds of meditation and breathing? And then we will open up and let everybody say hi to everybody, and then we'll get off with our day.

Sounds good. Okay. Wherever you are, find a way to get your feet on the ground or any part of your body that's connected to the ground. Take a breath in and feel that connection, And take a breath in that comes into the root of your spine. Fill out that space on either side of the root of your spine. And take a breath in that fills the bowl of your pelvis. Imagine a nice, warm breath coming into that bowl. And take a breath in. That fills in the back of the lower part of your rib cage, right behind the pit of your stomach. And take a breath in that fills in that space between your shoulder blades.

Very similar.

And your next breath, take deep into the notch of your throat. Make it sound like the ocean or a whisper of a breeze in the trees. And take a breath that makes you smile from your eyes. And this next breath, we all take together. Even though we're virtual in our own homes, in our own space, we take a breath and we feel that vibration of us all connected together. Inhale. And breathe out. Shanti. Namaste.

Thank you so much, Mary. I'm gonna unmute everybody now. All participants are gonna be unmuted. It says all participants are unmuted now. So please, you guys say hi to each other and say goodbye today and just kind of make a little noise.

Hello.

Thank you, mary.

Thank you, steve. Thank you, patrick. Thanks.

Yes. Thank you so much.

Good to see you, patrick. Hey there, dawn. We see dawn. Thank you, everybody, so much for being here and sharing your voices and your hearts and your wisdom.

Thank you so much for your courage. It takes courage to talk about the things that are really happening inside us.

Hey, yo. For real. Real talk. Like, y' all are. Y' all are some bad people. For real, like, you know, I am always amazed.

Well, you're helping to make this real, Shawn, and all of you are. We have something that is real here. I have no idea what's going to happen with this, but my commitment is to helping the people that show up here, Period. Period. If there's something I can do for you, you let me know, and we'll do whatever we can with that. Take care. Have a wonderful, wonderful day. We will hopefully see you again very, very soon. We'll be having one sort of meetup or another. You know, almost every week. Sometimes it'll be about writing. Sometimes it'll be about life and martial arts and personal development. The subjects will vary, but the intent is the same. To live the best and most authentic and joyful lives that we can. Take care, guys. I love you for showing up here. I really do. This is my heart. I care more than I can possibly say. Be well.

Thank you, Stephen.

Bye. Bye. Thank you.

Bye.

Bye.

Take care, everyone.

Bye.