218 Andrew DeGregorio: Luminous Awareness

I see the potential for all of us and what we can do on this planet, where we could go, what we can, what we can bring through. Like, humans are absolutely amazing. We are amazing creatures, Josh. Like, we are absolutely majestic, magical creators that can do so much. And look what we've done already. It's unbelievable. So I see this in every being that I work with, every human that walks through my door, every client. I see where they can go even before they even see it. And I'm loving that I get to reflect this to them, guide them and show them. And as they begin to connect, it's like they light up. You can actually see the change in their body, in their energetic field, in their lives. So when I'm working with people, I'm always holding that with every person I work with, their perfection that they are.

That's Andrew De Gregorio, and this is episode 218 of Wellness Force Radio. What's up, my friend? It's your host, Josh Trent. And welcome back to another episode for your weekly access to global experts in all things wellness as we discover the physical and emotional intelligence we need to live life well, in this podcast, we're talking about luminous awareness, a fascinating topic that we find ourselves both grappling with and accepting today as a society that's having a current struggle with both emotional intelligence and giving ourselves the permission to process negative emotions instead of just spiritually bypassing them. Now, what's most interesting about luminous awareness is as our culture becomes more and more information laden, our word based language is becoming increasingly limited in meaning. It is becoming rare that we actually feel what is spoken, and we're tending toward an understanding of language that is based on assumption, our own personal assumption of what words mean and our own personal assumptions of the context that create those meanings. In ordinary states of awareness, we are usually so focused on ourselves that the context of our personal experience supplies only our understanding of the world around us. But there is such a deeper context, which I'm so excited to explore with you and my friend, transformational coach and intuitive healer, right now live from the Wellness Force Studio here in Encinitas. So if you've been curious about how to use your physical intelligence to grow your emotional intelligence, this is the podcast for you. And before getting into the show, the best way for us to drop into our physical body is through our breath. So this is it. This is your breath break. Take a deep breath. Right now. If you're curious about how to use box breathing as a technique for calming your nervous system, you can download a Free guide to change your Life in just 21 minutes. Six science backed practices in just 21 minutes. Go over to the WellnessForce.com website, WellnessForce.comm21 to get the free guide for your perfect starting place on how to grow this emotional and physical wellness. Now take another deep breath. You've earned it. And also you've earned the permission to care for your body through micronutrients. This is why I'm giving a huge shout out to our show sponsor, Organifi, creators of the Organifi red, green and gold juice bundle. You can save 20% off this incredible Adaptogen energy boosting micronutrient blend. Just stop over at Organifi.com Wellnessforce use code Wellnessforce to save 20% off over at Organifi.com WellNESSforce use the code, get the deep discount. You can have this for less than a few dollars a day. And today on the show we're learning about Andrew's incredible transformation. How a traumatic brain injury altered the course of his life forever. Where he made the decision to go from comedian to transformational coach. How he used EMDR therapy as a beneficial method to desensitize trauma in the body. Why doing the inner work is almost impossible unless you do it with someone who can guide you through the the practical steps you can take to love and actually accept your fear instead of fighting it. We also explore different attachment styles which is utterly fascinating. How the secure and insecure attachment styles relate to how we attach ourselves to family, spouses and friends. And we explore the awareness of the chakras, practices you can do to clear out the chakras and real strategies to help you meet and connect with your human needs in the healthiest way. Show notes from today are@wellnessforce.com 2,18 give us a shout on social media. You know, we always take the notes in depth for every single episode and they can be found 24 7@wellnessforce.com now let's drop in for the deep dive with Andrew Diggorio. Andrew, I am so stoked you're in my house.

I'm excited.

I've gotten to know you. Gosh, it's been three and a half, four years now.

Oh my God. Three, four years. Really? Yeah, about four years.

So we came together in a men's group from Johnny Blackburn who was on the show and I've actually been a client of yours in this energy work. Tell people like what you do in a few sentences because you do a lot, man. So how do you condense that?

How do you Describe it. So what do I do? Basically, people come to me for many different things. What I, what I'm offering to people is a new way of looking at development. Instead of looking at development as like, behavioral changes and mindset changes, I like to work more in the systems, more on the energetics, more on what's going on below the surface, like in the subconscious and the unconscious. Right. So we find a lot of people out there. They, they're trying to make shifts in their life, and they might have like an amazing workshop they go to or amazing experience, and they go out and they do these behavioral shifts, mindset shifts, but they don't really create permanent changes in their lives. Have you had that experience before?

Definitely. And transformation does not happen on a single night.

Totally. Exactly. So basically, when I got into this work, you know, I didn't know much about the personal growth world. I didn't know much about mindset shifts. Basically, I was looking to stop my suffering. I was sick of suffering. Like, I was like, is life only about suffering? This makes no sense. I was like, this is wild. So basically getting into discovery of myself, going inside myself and learning about myself through therapy, work, healing work, I discovered that we have these systems, these emotional patterns and defensive strategies that are basically governing all aspects of our life.

Yeah, these strategies you talk about, the ego is something that we either dance with or we fight.

Totally.

And that's been a big piece for me. You know, we'll talk about that today on the podcast. It's like, there's a strategy that the ego has to always stay in control. And then there's a strategy that our soul is constantly learning, man. Of how it can actually dissolve part of that ego so we can lead with our hearts. This connection of head to heart.

Totally.

This started for you. You were a comedian. How did you go from being a comedian to a transformational coach and intuitive healer that works with these world class performers? Like, how does that bridge even occur?

That's a good question. So a few years ago, I was basically surfing in the ocean and someone didn't have a leash on their board, and a wave took it and speared me right in the back of the head. Knocked me out. So I almost died in the ocean. Someone pulled me to shore, saved my life. I ended up with three bleeds in my brain. Had two in the front, one in the back, and I had post concussion syndrome. Every symptom you can imagine after this experience, and it led me down this path of, like, reflecting on my life, taking a look to see, like, what am I doing here? Why am I here? What's the point of all this? And I was doing comedy at the time. Actually, even. Even after the accident, I still got on stage and I was absolutely like a mess.

Yeah, I saw videos of you at the Kyle Cease event. You were on stage there?

Totally. Yeah. I got to work with Kyle. Amazing comedian, transformational speaking comedian. And through this experience, this near death experience, basically I reflected and I realized that I was seeing all these repeated patterns in my life that created so much misery, so much suffering. And I had to change, had to try to find a way to shift this. So I ended up doing therapy work. Doing EMDR therapy. If you're familiar with EMDR therapy work.

Yeah. This is where maybe you can tell this just really quickly. It's where you're tapping and you're also hearing sound.

You got it? Yeah. It activates like the left and right brain to discharge trauma, desensitize trauma in the system. And from this work, I started realizing that, like doing inner work, my outer life started changing. Like drastically changing things that I've always wanted to have in my life. Like deeper relationship with my mom, like great relationships with just friends, deepening those connections. More and more people started showing up in my life and I wasn't doing anything outside myself. I was doing this inner work. It was so wild. I was like, what? What the hell is going on? I've been taught so much to work so hard. Get out there, just do what you can. Yeah, I fight everything. Work hard, get over fear, fight through fear. And nothing would ever work for me. But this therapy work started changing my life. I was like, this is mind blowing.

What the hell?

What is going on? So through this work, it dug so deep into. I started doing Zen practices, I started non attachment practices, I started doing deeper therapy work, and wild stuff started happening. Have you ever heard of like synchronous synchronicities or coincidences?

Yeah, we talked about that so much. And that's what brought me to you. That's what actually led us to be in men's group together. And then I found out that you do this radical healing work. I mean, you're helping people let go of not just resistances, but also have permanent resolutions, these root causes of unwanted behavior. This is a reality that people entertain inside themselves. I want to go back to when you talked about getting hit in the back of the head. I. I can't think of something more traumatic than a tbi. I mean, that's a big deal. How did that shift your path at that moment, yeah.

How did that shift my path? Basically, with all the. The concussion symptoms I had. I had migraines, headaches, I had vertigo. I would have personality changes. I had insomnia for five days straight. I was up, I couldn't sleep. Doctors were prescribing all these pills, and nothing they did helped me. So for four months, basically, I was in this deep suffering state and felt very unsupported. No matter what I did, I couldn't get healthy. So that injury was such a catalyst to this work. And I'm actually so grateful I got hit in the head with a surfboard. If I could get hit in the head with a surfboard and my life would change like this all the time. Just keep hitting me in the head with surfboard. This is amazing. My life changed so much because of that accident and that brain injury. And I learned a lot about the nervous system, the human brain, my biology, all the different systems that we. Cardiovascular attachment systems, all the systems we're using in our body that we don't even know are happening. It's like a miracle that's going on in this moment, right now, right below the surface. There's so much going on just for me to speak to you, to be here with you, to breathe. And we take it for granted. And I learned all about these things.

This is something that came up in the interview with Koot Blackson. He was like, josh, are you aware that you're not actually breathing yourself, that someone else is breathing you?

Totally.

And I was thinking, what is this guy talking about? Because at that time, I. I didn't have my experiences yet through psychedelics. I didn't have as much emotional intelligence training. I hadn't worked with you yet. I hadn't really dove into all the other worlds that are happening, you know, in contrast and concurrently with this current reality. Who do you think is breathing us? What force out there do you think is breathing us?

You want me to answer one of life's greatest questions right now? Who do I think is breathing us? You know, for me, I don't think that something's breathing us. It's more like you can experience what's breathing you. And through my, like, journey, I got a chance to have that realization. That was one of the biggest things that happened to me after that accident, is that I got to feel this. This energy, this source, or this. This divine love or whatever you want to call it. God, or everyone calls it by different names. I felt it. I experienced it. And anybody can have that experience. You don't need to have it through the church. You don't need to have it through another. It's not for me to give to anybody. We all can have that. So it's a realization that is always there. And I had a chance to experience the love that was always there through this inner work. I went to therapy and I didn't know that therapy was going to help me find God, if you want to put it that way. I just wanted to feel better. And I did find out what's breathing. I was through experience. And it can't be known through thought. You can't be told what it is through an experience.

How many things in life are like that, man. To read in a book, to download it online, to even go to a training where you sit in a chair. I don't think is even close to being as powerful as one of these Luminous trainings that you've done. Oh yeah, Tell us about Luminous training. This is the next level of. The next level of emotional intelligence, Somatic awareness and the contrast of those two.

Yeah. So Luminous Awareness Institute in my third year doing advanced program. Now basically they blend awareness training, energy medicine. But the way I describe it to most people, you take Xavier's School for the Gifted like X Men Bringing Hogwarts together and smash those two things together and you got Luminous Awareness. It's absolutely epic.

Yes.

Unbelievable. They're basically teaching emotional intelligence to connect more than knowing with the feeling. So like healing the splits between the mind and the body. So really teaching us to really embody this amazing vessel that we're walking around in and bringing in more awareness to what's happening below the surface and connecting all these different energetic systems. And it's very experiential. You go there and probably like 20% is teachings, but most of it is experiential. That's the best way to learn from.

They're taking you through the breathing practices, they're taking you through the dyads, they're taking you through your awareness of your different chakras.

It's even beyond this. You have to experience this to really understand the experience. You've come to me for sessions and a lot is happening as you know.

Besides me yawning 50 times. I'm not even joking. I yawned over 50 times. What does it mean when someone's doing energy work and they're yawning like that, like what's actually going on there?

It's a great question. So as we permission ourselves not only through another, like to feel, to experience what's there saying yes. To our experiences. Our nervous system can then begin to relax. We can begin to discharge energies that are stuck. We can begin to go deeper into the system, into the body, into the brain, to begin to really get to, like, our core wounding. Some of the core woundings that create a lot of our behavioral patterns in life. So that yawning is kind of a side effect to, like, where you're starting to relax, energy's starting to flow, and you're starting to release maybe excess energy in your body and your nervous system that's creating the tension or pain or whatever it is that you're going through at that time.

It's really interesting, though, because people might think of energy workers as someone wearing a white robe, floating on a mountain. That's not you. I've been to your office. It's extremely professional. You actually work right next door to somebody that has a business called neurogym.

Totally.

I'll let you guys Google that. How have you grown in the past three years in this luminous training, working with energy medicine? Because whenever I'm around you, man, it's very peaceful. And I know it's something that you'd have to experience in person. But how have you developed this skill to allow people to relax, to downregulate their nervous system, and then to find these blockages within themselves?

So I didn't learn it in a book. I'll tell you that. It was from my experience, from my inner work, through my own healing, whether it was therapy work or experiencing my own energy healing, I was able to use those skill sets, along with my training, to guide others in this process. Energy medicine is one of the modalities I use as a tool to help people maybe shift certain areas of life, whether it's relationships or financial blocks, shifting belief systems. So through my own experience of this, I'm able to bring this and be a guide for others with that. And to me, it's also magic. Like, it's unbelievable. As you do the work, you'll start to find that we have gifts that we didn't know were in there. Like, we are superheroes. Like, we have powers and gifts that absolutely are amazing. And we all have it. We just. It's not in the mental field. You have to get out of the mind and into the body to begin to access different levels and layers of this field of energy that's always around us to access these gifts. And they're psychic gifts. People, they're amazing. People think they're extraordinary, but actually they're actually extraordinary. We all have Them. It's very ordinary for humans to have this amazing human potential to be using in everyday life. We're just not aware of it.

That's a great distinction. Extraordinary. Which is maybe the base of why that Latin word even was existing in the first place. Then we look at this subtle body energy awareness. Talk about that. And also for people that are a little, like, triggered right now, somebody might be listening. Totally. This guy just said magic. Why does he charge so much per session? Like, what is he talking about? To find energy medicine. What do you feel that is in your life and your work? And then also maybe we can talk about energy awareness in the subtle body.

Okay, I'm going to give my definition of it. So right now we're sitting here on these pillows, and they're actually made of light. Made of energy. Physics shows this. Science shows this. Right. Everything is either vibration or light when you get down to that core level. So emotions are energy. Right. Thoughts are energy. The heart puts out an energy field. Our brains put out energy fields that can be measured. Right. So when you begin to think about energy medicine, we're getting deeper into our systems, down to the core of like, where blocks may be being held in the system that aren't energetic level. And I'll give you an example of this. So subtle energy and emotion is very subtle. Right. It's not something you can see in the physical realm and the physical world. Like, it's not like a table right in front of you.

Like.

Like sadness comes up. But it's there. We feel it. I know when I feel sad or someone feels sad, you can even feel it on them. It's like if someone's sat in a room, you can feel the room actually has that sadness. That's that feeling. That's subtle energy. Thoughts are very subtle, but they're subtle energy. There's a. There's this new device I saw where you can hear your inner critic. It's like something they just invented where you plug it into your brain and you can actually hear your inner voice talk.

Holy shit.

That's subtle energy.

How many people want that device?

Probably not many, because they just hear a lot of people judging themselves, yelling at them.

Then you could hear the voice.

Oh, totally. Right.

Which might relate to this question of energy in the subtle body. And then energy as a medicine.

Totally.

Energy as a medicine. That's completely different.

Totally.

What do you see that as? I mean, what's that mean for you?

That's a good question. So when we're developing as children, we have these experiences that impact our life. Right. Growing up. When we're coming to the world, we're going through different developmental phases and tasks that we all need to complete. And a lot of us miss out on certain experiences. Those experiences are emotional and energetic. There's actual energetic flavor to each one of those developmental tasks and experiences. Example of this is when we come into the world and we're being born and if we come into a safe environment, we begin to embody this body. We begin to feel safe to be grounded here on this planet. And it creates this energetic. Have you ever heard of being grounded? Of course. This is like the energetic signature of what gets completed during that developmental task. And there's also like the oral phase of development, feeding. It keeps going on and on. So if someone comes in and they come into an environment that's harsh, cold, maybe not loving, they're very much not going to be grounded in life. They actually create a defensive strategy that prevents them from being in their body. And they don't know why they're actually out of their body. Not grounded. This is one of the strategies I used. I didn't know what grounded was to. I actually started doing my healing work and I felt what it felt to be grounded. It was unbelievable. And I wasn't into the magic side, the energy medicine side. I was very scientific, very critical. But when I started having these experiences, they could not be denied because they were my experiences. So we have to go back, we can go back right now to those places where we missed those energies or those experiences. Get to the core. Wounding through. There's a lot of layers and protections we gotta kind of navigate through. It's kind of an art form to really navigate through those layers. But when we get to the core, that way we can begin to actually insert the experience through energy medicine, through different experiences in therapy work, things like that, to re pattern and begin to shift those early on developmental experiences that we missed to create behavioral changes in our lives.

This is so fascinating to me because I've felt it experientially with you 12 plus sessions now. And I'm also thinking about the presence process, Michael Brown, where he mentions this metaphor of re imprinting our nervous system, re imprinting the subconscious from these events that happen to us, you know, from conception to 10, those first 10 years of our life. Andrew, that's when everything gets laid down. That's when the concrete gets poured, that's when the wiring is laid out. And for some of us, that wiring gets pinched or maybe there's not a safe space for sure, we're not grounded. And so I look at myself and the first 10 years of my life. I am still at 38, still doing my work, still wrapping my arms around my inner child, you know, still functioning as a responsible adult and this podcast and Wellness Force Media, but yet it's still there. And I think if this metaphor of fighting it, going back to what we talked about in the beginning versus dancing with it, if I'm angry at why I am a certain way, all it does is just perpetuate that certain way that I don't even want what's happening there from an energy perspective.

So when we have those experiences when we're young, it creates behaviors. And those behaviors are on, basically on autopilot. We're showing up in the world, we're acting a certain way, and we're creating these experiences, also attracting experiences. Each one of those experiences, for me, the way I see it, are laying grooves in our system, in our nervous systems, in our brains, neural pathways. And all these experiences, we seem to be repeating a lot of them. If we look back, we can see that we might be attracting the same type of relationship over and over and over again. Right. And ending the same, starting the same things like that, that. So every time we have that experience, we're feeding into those grooves of those behaviors and those patterns that we might not prefer to continue to experience. How do we shift out of that, though? So we need to become aware of these grooves. We are aware of these behavior patterns and begin to create new grooves, habits, or experiences to be. First, we must have a certain experience that we can create the first groove and then we can feed the new groove instead of going to the old way. And as we feed the new groove and continue to work that we begin to show up differently, acting differently, and our behaviors just naturally change. We don't have to fight ourselves, we don't have to force ourselves. Yeah, it's very. Just natural shifts begin to occur when we change those grooves and those habits on the core level, on the energy level.

But it's simple, yet it's not easy. It's like we have these grooves where. Think of a forest. If there was a trail in a forest and everybody walked on the trail for 30 years, it'd be pretty worn. Totally. So, you know, the minute that people stop walking on the trail, it's like our synapses in our brain, it takes a while for the grass to grow back. We have to be patient for this behavior change process.

We've got to be patient. But you also Made a point that you're still doing the work, right? You work at it and you actually become more aware of these grooves. You're becoming more aware of grooves that you didn't know existed and you do the work. So if we have grooves that we've been living in for 30, 40 years, we better start becoming aware of these grooves so we can create new pathways. Start walking on them and you don't have to do it alone. That's one of the most important things I think, in my world that I realize is that I don't have to do this work alone. Alone. It actually takes longer to create new pathways and grooves in the forest. If you're walking alone, right? If you have multiple people walking on that pathway, how much faster will that new pathway show up? And those people could be there supporting you. And there's a lot of amazing people that know how to do this work and how to support that have gone through it.

How do you guide people to letting go of the worn trail leading to the dark places they don't want to go and create the new one where there's the lightness, the freeness, the self trust.

So becoming aware of the path that's there and noticing that that's there first and foremost is one of the most important things. Awareness, or knowing that it's there, not fighting that path, loving that path, really saying yes to it, understanding that that strategy was there to protect, that kept us safe. As these young versions of ourselves are so vulnerable, they needed these strategies to survive, basically. So if we can see those pathways that we're so afraid of, of and have so much fear of, we see them as a. As these gifts that were given to us to help us get through times in our lives that were so complicated, so hard and so overwhelming that we can kind of begin. We can actually begin to have compassion for those pathways and really begin to start there by not fighting them. Because you know what, we hear this all the time. What we resist persists, right? It's like the Chinese finger trap. You stick your finger and you try to pull it out. Creates more tension, more resistance. So by loving those pathways, really beginning to create new pathways while you love the old pathway is going to make it much easier.

I know somebody's listening. They're like, what the hell is he talking about? I need to love my fear. Like, how do I even do that? And you're mirroring a comment that Gay Hendricks talked about on the podcast. We'll link this in the show notes because he's like, Josh, if you're ever feeling angry and you're feeling resentment and you're feeling like you're pissed off at your ego, take a breath and love the ego. Love your fear. Love that path. And at the time I was like, like, this guy's crazy, yet he sold hundreds of thousands of books.

Totally.

What do you take about? What's your vantage point on loving the fear? How do we actually do that tactically, nuts and bolts wise? How do we love our fear?

That's a really good question. How do we love our fear?

I don't know if there's an easy answer for that.

So awareness is really important beyond this. It's like first noticing this fear. If you can't love the fear, maybe love the fact that you can't love it. Start there. Stop fighting yourself. Like we fight ourselves, right? We're always fighting ourselves. We're always trying to overcome the fear, push through the fear, fight the fear. We can kind of do that and get, get away with it for a little while, but it comes back, right? So if we begin to go easy on it and begin to love it and realize that somehow fear is showing up in our body and our nervous system, it's not, it's maybe the mind is creating. But if you check your body, you're going to find this fear there. So what does that mean? The body must be doing something, releasing some kind of chemical, having some sort of. Of reaction, some sort of tension or tightness. If we can find that place in the body instead of judging it from up here in the mind, dropping into the body, begin to experience the fear, we tend to see that by experiencing it, begins to dissolve somehow. That's really intriguing. So how we start to have those experiences over and over again, we start to realize that if we stop fighting the fear, begin to embrace it, love it, and experience it, it's just tension or energy or stuck emotion in the body that begins to dissolve and release.

Man, this is where courage really plays in. A lot of people think, oh, I have to have courage in order to go to that scary place where I can feel the emotion, process it, and move the hell on with my life. But yet it's a paradox. And Malcolm Gladwell talks about this. He's like, you know, listen, you don't have the courage. Courage is something that you do. And it's that action of doing that allows you to look back and go, oh, it wasn't really that bad. But it's by doing the thing that we develop the courage. How do you help people? Do the thing.

How do I help people do the thing? Wow, that's a great question. There's got to be a willingness, right? We have to have that willingness to show up and really face our fears, face our experiences that we've been running away from for so long. So if someone comes to me, they're already in that willingness state. They're ready.

Ready.

If you talk to somebody that's not open, that might be. Not into this yet, might not be their thing, that's great. But this, they're not ready. If you try to help them, they're going to reject the support and they're going to push back. Right? They're not like, what are you doing? I don't. I don't really want to face my fear. I can. They're just pushing away at this, right? But if someone shows up, there's a willingness, and you're. If you're ready to go in and you can be there as a guide and support somebody through that. There's something really beautiful of holding a space of acceptance and love with another person and showing them that there's a way to face these experiences. And then they're not alone. Like, human connection is so important, and we're also isolated on this planet. More and more, we find that we're so connected, we hear it a lot, but yet we're more and more. We're so isolated. So through connection, through, through. Through sessioning, through this work, I've realized that just creating a really safe environment, fun environment, and healing doesn't have to be so serious, doesn't have to be so, like, tense all the time. But creating that beautiful space, People are much more willing to go deeper and through the fear, and they realize it's not so bad when they start to have those experiences.

But there's an attachment. And one of your specialties, something that you've spoken on, that you've written about, is attachment styles. People can be attached to a certain way of relating to their parents, a certain way of relating to themselves. And then really, the one that gets most people the most frustrated is how they attach and relate to their spouse, their significant other. Let's dive into this, man. The attachment styles. Can you go through them and maybe talk to us about why they even exist in the first place?

Yeah. So we all have an attachment system. It's basically the rules of connection below the system, right? And right now, in this moment, there's an attachment system at play between you and I. Our attachment style is formed from our early experiences of bonding with our Primary caregiver. So there's. There's a secure style, attachment and insecure style. This is the way they're categorized. It's not that they're unhealthy. The insecure styles I like, they're actually once again strategies they had to be used to get through experiences. So insecure styles are absolutely. Were needed at a time to get through these experiences when we were children. So these styles to me are all healthy now. We might not prefer insecure style right now because they might be creating experiences in our life that we're attracting relationships that are not, most likely not ideal or not finding the one we're looking for. So there's different types of insecure. There's an anxious and then there's an avoidant. And within the avoidant, there's a couple different subcategories. There's a dismissive and a fearful. So if you ever met, like an anxious person has an anxious attachment system, basically, they're very possessive, very needy. Nothing is enough for them. So if they're in a relationship, usually they're very demanding, very possessive. They can be very jealous. They're always needing and needing and needing and needing. Right. It's like endlessly needing. I used to have an anxious style. I have a blend of the anxious and avoidant. You can have kind of a blend. It's not so black and white, just to be clear. So typically an anxious will attract an avoidant. The very thing that created the style like this, avoidant, not getting their needs met. Right. So a lot of beings and people that come to me, they're like, I'm looking for this relationship. And they might have an anxious style, but they keep attracting a person that pulls away from them. It doesn't help them meet their needs and it creates more of that anxiety. So they keep repeating that trauma over and over again based on this attachment system. So for me, when I begin to really dive into attachment, understanding this, it's like, this is amazing. Like, we need to know this. What are we doing? Why are we not understanding the rules of connection and relationship? So having an understanding of is just the beginning. But you can rewire your attachment system, move into more of a secure system to create the ideal relationship you're looking for.

I'm sitting here so amused because I know throughout my twenties I attracted only the kind of woman that was my exact opposite. Like you're talking about, right? This polarization, this plus minus. There is a way for us to use this to our advantage to actually give ourselves deeper fulfillment. If I'M someone that has an anxious attachment style, who am I going to attract and then how can I be aware when I attract them to either work with them so I grow and everything comes through me or to where I move on?

It's a good question. So what I would say is get a really good understanding of what anxious attachment looks like. Understanding what you might be attracting. Usually typically you're going to attract the avoidance style, the one that's going to pull away or is not going to meet your needs and it's going to be the self fulfilling prophecy. Like I'm not good enough. Yeah, it's going to feel like that over and over again. And an anxious style will be in a room and will go right to the avoidant person. Right. Instead of going left, they go right, right to the avoidant one. So if they begin a way to like really for me to begin to really shift. This is get an understanding, understand what your attachment style looks like. However, begin to heal and shift that system. It's a, it's an actual primal system. It's in. We're hardwired for attachment. So if we learn about our attachments down, we try to fight it. You're trying to use logic to fight millions of years of nature, of evolution. You're not going to win. Yeah, not going to win. So you can, you can. There's ways to actually work to become more of a secure attached style. And there's different modalities out there and healing therapies that work like emotional focused therapy is a great way of doing this. If you can attract a secure person, if you have a insecure but typically you're not going to do that. But if you could, that also can help create more of a secure style. And one of my mentors, his name is Peter Cummings, his life's work, he created this amazing modality called the adult detachment repair model. We call it stick work for short. It actually is. He's worked on it for 20 years. Really profound stuff. I get to sit with him for about two years now mentoring and healing my attachment style. I'm so grateful for this man because I have this amazing woman in my life now. I have more of a secure style. I'm more confident in the world. It creates more of a sense of safety in the world. You're basically gonna go out and do more than you've ever thought you could do that you ever thought could be possible when you have more of a secure style. I couldn't believe it and I'm so grateful for Peter Cummings to actually help me learn how to heal this through his modality. It's unbelievable work. He's a great, great person.

So then how did you get through that? Because the secure, insecure, this polarity can be so strong, so automatic in these moments of being triggered that the default settings will override and take over. Did that happen to you in your 20s? When did you actually get long? Was that time to go from the insecure to the secure?

It's a great question. Yeah. So in my 20s, I repeated the same relationships over and over. Even in my 30s, I repeated the same similar relationships.

Some people repeat relationships their whole life.

Yeah, it's ridiculous. For me, it was ridiculous. It was like, this doesn't make sense, right? Just how do I keep attracting the same person? There's how many, how many billions of people on this planet? Like 7 billion.

I found you.

Yeah, totally. You came in again, same person, right?

I've seen you before.

Yeah. I end up in this very. And they're great women, but I'm ended up in like the say I, I turn around, I'm like back in this relationship where I'm shut down, years have passed. There's no emotional connection and it was just misery. And I. But I would settle for scraps because my, my scraps of a relationship because my. I'm wired for connection. My attachments, like, I want to be in relationship. I want somebody there. And I love, love. I love to be in relationships. I, I really. So how did I get out of that? Basically, I learned about attachment, became aware of it from there, found this amazing person to help me heal it. And I did years of work with him. Now, it doesn't necessarily mean gonna be years for everybody, but for me, I was pretty anxious, pretty avoidant. I had a blend of the two styles and I did a lot of work with Peter. Naturally, I shifted and I attracted this amazing woman. I'm in a very secure relationship. It's awesome.

So it sounds like really it's a commitment to the work, but then before that commitment is the decision. It's the decision. Andrew, you got really just say, you know what? At all costs, I will do whatever it takes to be reconnected to my soul. I will do whatever is necessary. And I don't care how much suffering or work or, you know, developing courage, cultivating this courage. Did you have a moment where you made the decision?

Absolutely, I did. Yeah. So my last relationship, I was on and off for 10 years. It was, it was a great, great girl. I wanted it to work so Bad that. And there was a point where I just hit this wall. I was like, how much more effort and more trying and how much more do I need to put into this? Like, what else do I need to do to make this work? And I did everything. I was doing self help therapy, work, healing work. I was doing all this at this time and still it wasn't working. And I just hit this wall. And I just realized there's something else to it. And that's what led me more into the attachment world. I mean, you could read books of how to attract mates, how to, of how to have conversations with your relationships. Like all these different great strategies are out there, but nothing would do, nothing would shift anything. It doesn't shift. You'll start doing the same thing over and over again. Attachment, your attachment system is there. It's whether you want, like, whether you like it or not. It's below the surface. Get to know how the rules of connection are at play.

Let's talk about the rules of connection then. Because there's got to be a way for us in this world where people are more stressed than ever before. I actually read something just this past week that people who have grown up in the 1700s and 1800s actually had four more hours a day of playtime, of being outdoors. Now granted, their life kind of sucked. There was no electricity, they were living in like stone huts. But yet they had these four extra hours of love and connection and of play. What are the rules when it comes to leading a life of being heart based, connecting head to heart in this frenetic modern world? Can you tell us a handful of ways that we can actually do that?

Yeah, absolutely. First, that willingness has to be there. Like if you're not willing, you're fighting yourself, right? You gotta be willing to find that place inside you that knows there's something more to life. There's gotta be more to relationships. There's gotta be more to feeling fulfilled and whole, right? It's like there's. For me, I always felt like when I was out in the world, something was missing. So that willingness needs to be there for sure. We put so much effort, effort into trying to design and create the life that we want. And we, a lot of us do, right? We're out there trying to create, get the relationship, get the money, get the car, get whatever it is. These things are actually a side effect to doing this work. Now I tell people this, I'm saying, once you hear this, don't go do the work to get the car. The woman, the Money, get it to become whole. Find connection, real connection within yourself, real alignment back to what you're here to do on this planet, whatever that looks like. And through that, you'll begin to track the things that you've been looking for, that you've been trying to create. And I heard this before, I didn't believe it, but through my work, it's naturally happened. I live a very effortless life now. It doesn't mean I'll go out in the world and take action. I live very effortless, internal. I'm much more surrendered in my body. I still get anxious, still get nervous. I was nervous here when we first started this podcast. And these are normal human experiences that show up. It's not like they're all going to disappear. If we think we're going to just like all these things are going to disappear, then we're going to be very disappointed because they don't. Yeah, we do get it more into control, more in line, more aligned with what we're here to do. So it's not really like there's a set of rules, have that willingness, really just understand that the things you're looking to create are absolutely a side effect to becoming more whole, more connected to your being.

It's this journey to wholeness, man. And no matter who I interview, it always comes back to. All roads lead to self care and self love.

Totally.

That's what this whole thing's about. But yet that's papood. That is like smoke and mirrors. What are you talking about self care and self love? Oh, yeah. Just eat well, you know, exercise more and eat less and you'll be fine. And, you know, think positive. Flick the light switch. No, it's not that simple. There's so much work that we get to do. And that's an interesting use of language. Like we get to eat, move and sleep well. We get to have real dialogue about our thoughts, feelings and actions. But it's through the dialogue. It's through. Like you're talking about experiencing the things that cause cause us the most dissension, the most tension in our bodies. Even when you walk through the door, you're like, hold on, man, I feel something right below your solar plexus. Can we tune into that? I touch that part of my belly and it's like sore to the touch.

Totally.

So let's go through these awareness areas of the chakras because I know someone's listening and they're like, how do I tactically take these things that Andrew's talking about and apply them into my life. Let's go through each one of the chakras so they can at least identify how it is they're feeling.

Healing totally. So if you're familiar with the chakra system, we have seven that we talk about. There's actually hundreds on the body. There's. They're on the hands, the feet. They're different energy centers and, and vortexes in the body that you can actually feel and experience. If you become more aware of subtle energy, you'll find these chakras, they actually exist. There's the root chakra, which is where the experience of grounding comes in. There's an energy field that when you feel grounded and in your body and on this planet, it's very palpable. It's like this heaviness. So the root chakra is actually a more of a. It's actually more of a structured chakra. When you start to apply it to different areas of life, it has to do with like feeling safe on the planet, like getting your needs met. Primal needs, like money, having a place to live, things like that. So when we have a deficiency in the root chakra and we're not grounded grounded, usually we have a lot of anxiety. We're not feeling safe, we're running around, we're in our minds. So it's really good to begin to work and, and like feed the root chakra. If that's somewhere you find deficient, if you're deficient. Now some people actually have more of a, an excess in the root and they're, they actually form much bigger bodies. The energy creates more of a larger body mass because there's more energy in the physical layer of the field. So it's pretty wild how energetics connect to creating our body type stuff too. So they need to actually begin to work other chakras. Another example is a sacral chakra right below the, the navel. Typically if you bring your awareness to that area and just feel below the navel with your awareness, not with your mind, but dropping into your body, there's an energy center that it's called the sacral chakra. It's related to intimacy, relationships. It connects to the limbic system. So when this is firing, self soothing is coming online. You feel really connected with another can create. Actually if you go really deep into sacral chakra, there's like actually bliss can show up. It's like a bliss belly. You've heard like the Buddha bliss belly.

Yes. He's so happy with this.

Totally. He's really smiling over there, looking oh, he's like, he's really in that sacral chakra, really feeling good, right. So a lot of joy. And then you have the solar plex chakra. A lot of us find in our, in our, in our current culture, there's a lot of anxiety that shows up in like the solar plexus area. These are related to the mental field, like upper mental, lower, lower mental. So when you find yourself ruminating a lot, you can drop your awareness into like the solar plex here just below the chest, like in the sternum. You'll most likely find there's like bound energy. And like you said, there's tenderness in your solar plex. Right? We're using this a lot. It's connected to like adrenals. These, these chakras actually connect to different organs in our body. So by bringing more awareness, more breath and relaxation, then there more energy can flow and we can begin to release rumination, excess thoughts. But it takes bringing the awareness into the body and really feeling that area. There's a heart chakra. This is one of my favorite just personally, because you can feel that divine love or love with another. When the heart chakra is just open, you feel a true connection between the heart, like hearts between another, between. If you're sitting in front of the being and you both have this openness, you can feel it. It's palpable. It's really real. It's real experience. If there's a blockage in the heart chakra, there could be problems with breathing, anxiety there, lung problems, heart disease can happen, things like this. So it's really good to bringing awareness to the heart, taking some breaths there right in the center of the chest. And if you keep your awareness long enough, you will feel that heart chakra. It's amazing throat chakra. This is something that has to do with expression. And when we're not connected to our throat throats, we're not expressive in the world. We're holding back, we're hiding, maybe not being as creative or sharing what we're here to bring through. Whether it's like podcasting or speaking or just having fun on stage or whatever it is. Even in conversation, when our throat chakras are blocked, it's not flowing as well. The conversations like this could be like stuttering problems. It could be issues with vocals, throat problems. All sorts of diseases can show up when we have blocks in the throat as well. Sixth chakra is more of like the intuitive chakra for me. I use this a lot. It can connect to like psychic energies. It Connects to you can see energies. If you really have a wide open sixth chakra, a lot of people try to open this. It's connected the pineal gland. So when you're actually going on like a, like a ceremonial journey like ayahuasca or things like this, usually the sixth chakras, they blow them wide open open. You have all sorts of experiences and see all sorts of things really psychedelic. And that has left to do with the sixth chakra. When you have like a little bit of a blockage or something going, going on here, there can be all sorts of different psychosomatic problems. Things like this psychosis and things. So you really want to open this up. Don't blow it wide open. There's a lot of people that try to blow it wide open. Just really be mindful of that. Go easy on that. Stay grounded. If you're opening up the, the pineal gland in the, the, the sixth chakra, seventh chakra is connected more to spirit or the divine. This is when you, it's like right in the top of the head. And if you connect to this there's a, there's like a higher knowing here. There's something that if you ever just known something out of nowhere that is just so accurate, it's usually coming from the seventh chakra. There's like a clear knowing that can you can experience from this, this, this chakra man.

That was like the best explanation of the chakras in a less woo woo way than I think a lot of people have ever given. Totally. I, I look at so root, sacral, solar plexus, heart, third eye and crown. Understanding that each one of these has its own somatic awareness point and its own work that we get to do. But it's really the inventory Andrew of like okay, out of these seven, which one did he mention where I raised my hand? The highest totally. And for me it was the root. And it's funny because all things go back to self care, self love these practices of taking care of oneself throughout the day. And that is still my a blockage. I believe in this root. For people that are raising their hand for the root chakra, they're like okay, when he was talking about the root, I totally know what he meant by that. Give a few practices for us to clear out that root chakra.

So this is actually a common problem where people are really blocked in the root. We are very ungrounded usually in our minds. Right. So we lose that felt sense of safety, confidence, security on this planet. So to really get into the root is really important. So a great practice for me is first becoming aware of where. Where's my awareness right now? It's a great question, what am I aware of in this moment? Where is your awareness? And noticing that just by noticing that something happens just through experiencing this. So you become aware of this and then drop your awareness right down into the earth. Like feeling through your feet into the ground and just really begin to experience the felt sense of gravity pulling you down, earth holding you. There's a sense of safety and just really drop in. You can use imaginations to drop roots into the ground and feeling those roots spread right through earth. As you drop in, you feel that sense of safety, Earth sense of ground being held. Whether you're sitting or standing, your body, your nervous system, your breath all begins to shift and change. So starting there, dropping into the earth and then becoming aware of your breath. The inhales and exhales, just becoming aware of breath without trying to shift or change it in any way, while feeling those roots down into the center of earth. And then if you send love down to earth, just open your heart, drop it into earth, see what that experience is for you. Because usually she might send something back. She will. And it's a palpable feeling. It's a real experience. So when I share these experiences, I usually tell everybody, I'm not here to make you believe anything. I don't want to change your minds. I want you to experience. I'll be your guide, I'll show you whatever it looks like. And you have your experience. Experience. And the results always speak for themselves. It's amazing when you start to really have those real palpable, visceral experiences.

I felt that in my root chakra. And I was actually sitting here, I'm sitting on pads and I have my knees below my hips and I was just feeling how rooted I am into the floor. And we're upstairs here. But yet I could still visualize the earth and all the roots and the rocks. And I was taking this mental picture as you were describing this. And I'm thinking about the types of people that you actually work with. Man, these are some of the, you know, world class entrepreneurs that are here in Encinitas, but also people across the world. I know you can't give names, but can you maybe give us a situation that you've really been proud of where you've helped somebody go from A to B? And between A and B? There was a lot of shit.

Yeah, I mean there's. I have amazing clients. I really love all My clients, there's. I mean, every one of them, I'm always having experiences like this where we're seeing these huge shifts in all areas of life, and it's not the way they ever expect. It's always just effortless. When we begin to do the work, the results show up. So one of the things that tend to happen when I begin to work with people that are looking to shift relationships, someone might be looking for their significant other, and they've been looking for years. We begin to really start to work the attachment work and bring in some other modalities and different, different healing skill sets with this. Most of these beings and these people that I'm working with, they find the one they're looking for. And it happens more and more times than not. It's unbelievable when they stay consistent and they do the work. They show up. Years they were trying to find their relationship, and all of a sudden the being, just the person they're looking for just naturally shows up in their life. This happens more times than not. And it's really cool to, to witness this, to feel that experience and the joy they have, and to then begin to do more work with them. Because then that's another navigation that begins to occur. The relationship shows up and it's much more fun. There's a deeper exploration to connection, intimacy, vulnerability, and just real play and fun with this person they brought in. So I have experienced that many, many times. It's really, really just beautiful how I get to see my clients grow and shift. It's like my art that I get to bring through the world, like the human form, human development. It's just something I have this beautiful skill set that I didn't realize I had until I do the work. And it showed up and I absolutely love it. So there's many, many, many experiences that I get to witness. And it just makes me feel so much joy, so proud of it.

I'm curious, is there one that's been really powerful? Because you mentioned the word intimacy, and I know that the root of that word is intimacy. It's into me that you see. And people might not always like what they see because they see the potential in that person, man or woman, and they know that that person, they can sense intimacy looking into them. They see, they can sense that that person hasn't done their work yet. They can sense that that person has unlimited potential and they feel it from them. Have you ever experienced this? Like, you know, somebody so awesome, but they don't see it in themselves yet. Give us an example like that?

Yeah.

Wow.

Notice that. Say that again. Somebody. I love that how you said somebody's so. So.

It's like somebody has so much potential. They're so amazing. They're so great at whatever they do, but yet they don't actually vibrate that awareness, that. Knowing that, trusting within themselves.

Yeah, I. I see this a lot in a lot of us, actually. Like, I. I see the potential for all of us and what we can do on this planet, where we could go, what we can. What we can bring through. Like, humans are absolutely amazing. We are amazing creatures, miracles, walking. So much potential. So I see it in a lot of people where they're. They're getting down on themselves, beating themselves up consistently and constantly. But I can see right through that. I can see through all these barriers, all these judgments they have themselves. And I can see the potential, their gifts, their magic, their. All this amazing creativity they have to bring through. I can. I always see it in everybody. So I'm working with people. I'm always holding that with every person I work with, their perfection that they are. We are amazing creatures, Josh. Like, we are absolutely majestic, magical creators that can do so much. And look what we've done already. It's unbelievable. So I see this in every being that I work with, every human that walks through my door, every client. I see where they can go even before they even see it. And I'm loving that I get to reflect this to the. Guide them and show them. And as they begin to connect, it's like they light up. You can actually see the change in their body, in their energetic field, in their. In their life. So it's unbelievable.

It's about need, and it's about what is. So one of the things that you mentioned, your work, is human needs, this reconnection back to these needs and how we can actually meet them in a healthy way, because those needs are going to get met, as Tony Robbins talks about. Right. Whether we do it in a deleterious way where we're like eating a donut, watching porn, or like having a connected conversation with somebody that we care about. These human needs and the healthy ways to connect with those, that's going to cue into our subtle energy body, and that's going to allow us to be present, to have all these chakras aligned and on fire. How do we do this healthy meeting of the human needs?

That's a really good question. So some strategies out there know they have needs, some defensive strategies that people are using, and some strategies they might be using might be abandoning Their own needs. They don't even know they have needs. I was the latter. I didn't know I had needs. So first, becoming aware you have needs and knowing that it's okay to have needs for my strategy, my own system and the way I showed up was that I didn't think it was okay to have needs. I felt shame to have needs. I abandoned my needs. I went to save everybody else, try to help everybody else. What I was actually doing was trying to meet my needs. Like you said, Tony Robbins says, the need will get met. I was projecting out into other others my needs, my little one, my. My inner child's needs, and trying to save my child through saving others. So I used to abandon myself and try to help others throughout most of my life. So this is a very unhealthy way of getting a need met, in my opinion, because it creates low energy resentment, a lot of suffering. Right. So first you have to become aware. I had to become aware that I had these needs and then do some work to repattern that, that it is okay for me to have human needs. And we all have them, whether we, whether we know it or not. There's lists of them. I have a whole list that I look through and I'm like, oh my God, that's a need. I didn't realize it. There's tons of needs. So it's really important for us to. To know what our needs are and then begin to find discernment. Is this something that I can meet myself, meet this need through myself, or can I, I, in a healthy way, ask another to help me meet this need? So that's a really good indicator that we're shifting into more of pathways and behaviors that are ideal for us because we can ask to get our needs met.

That's the challenge, though. I mean, it's in the asking that. The courage, the vulnerability, the authenticity. It's like putting your voice out there. I read this on a wall in La Jolla once. Speak your truth. Even if your voice shakes while you do it, it totally. And that right there is like getting your voice out there to ask for one of your needs. We all need these things because that's in order for us to survive that they're there in the first place.

Absolutely.

So when someone's feeling that timidity around speaking their truth, if they're listening right now, like, what can you tell them? What can you tell them in that moment?

Yeah. So it's okay that, that they have that need that's, that's needing to be met. We all have them. Every human being has. Whether we want to admit that or not, we have needs. So to, to take that courage, take that leap and ask to and take that reach to get that need met is, is a really, really powerful thing to experience. However, what I would recommend to that person is to be clear who they're asking, if they're speaking to get their need met. You want to ask somebody that's open, that is like highly attuned and connected to their own needs, where they can healthily help that person meet their need. Because if we're reaching to somebody that might be avoidant or might be shut down, they're not going to help us meet that need. And we might be repeating trauma, recreating the same experience that caused us to shut down.

Oh my God, I'm so happy you mentioned that. That's such a powerful tool. Like if. If there's one thing you get from this conversation today, it's be aware of who you share your dreams and your needs and your emotions with. That's the number one thing.

Absolutely.

So the awareness is first, which you've talked about, and there's these subtle energy bodies and the chakras. But then after that there's actually the integration, the re imprinting, which involves us speaking our truth to someone that we trust. Now that's the challenge I found Andrew. It's the person that we trust across the hall or across the table that we can actually voice that to as we wrap here. Like, what's the awareness around selecting those who in our trusted circle will actually, actually share these dreams, these feelings, these needs with. Do you have a practice for attuning to who you can actually trust?

So this leads me into thinking about types of relationships that exist. And one of my mentors shared this with me. There's three types of relationships that he said to me and he explained, he was like, there's the relationship where you're always giving, someone is always taking. Not a very ideal relationship. The second type of relationship where there's a mutual exchange, very common, common, where you're giving and the other person's giving, there's like a receiving and giving going on. And the third type of relationship is where you can show up and you can be anywhere you want, you can show up any way you want and this person is going to love you no matter what, fully loving, fully accepting, always. And this is a very rare type of relationship, but that's the most ideal. So if you can think in your life where that third relationship shows up who in your life. Life is a person that's always been there, never judgmental, always loving you will give you healthy feedback, will show up for you when you need them, and when you reach out, they're there. That's the person you go to. And for me, when I reflected on this, when he gave this to me back in my life, when I first heard this, I could think of one person that was like that for me. And now I have at least 20. Unbelievable network that I built to friends and relationships through this work. So it's a very rare relationship, but they exist and those people are out there.

We're gonna link this conversation in the show note today because you brought it up right now, man. It's the conversation with Oprah where she was talking with a woman about finance, actually. And she said, you know, the biggest skill set that people miss when it comes to trusting themselves or other people is what you appreciate. Appreciates.

Totally. Absolutely. That's great. I love that.

That's beyond just the law of attraction. It's like, oh, that's an energetic, tactical, everyday thing I can do beyond just, you know, give me three things that you're grateful for. We've all heard that a thousand times. Can you actually. And this is the key, the differentiator. Can you actually appreciate what you have in your life or the people that you have that are trusting like that? Because that's how you'll grow more of it. You started with one Andrew, and now you have 20 plus.

Yeah, for sure.

So what you've appreciated has appreciated.

Totally, Absolutely.

That is a big one, man.

That's amazing. I love that. I love that saying, how do we.

Do more of that in this planet right now? Because that's honestly what the world needs the most.

I think you said it. Appreciation. Right. Appreciate what you have, start appreciating that thing and more shows up. Right? You heard this and it's true. Happened to me. But you have to. Can't fake appreciation. I tried that for a little while.

Yeah. You can't fake it till you make it. But you can. As JT talks about, you can't be it until you see it being it. I mean, that's the real challenge, right? We're in a world of doing. And so as we close here, I'd love to ask you these three questions because we always talk about the emotional and the physical in the show. And then somewhere in there, there's the spiritual, and you operate in all those worlds. I've had so many moments on your table where I'm yawning 50 times, I'm crying, you touch like a spot on my back and I start moving around. But I always have left your office feeling like I'm back in touch with myself. And that's like a beautiful compliment I just want to give you on the show today. It's because I think you're aware of these physical, emotional and spiritual pathways which really end up to this beautiful palace of wellness. So tell us then, from an emotional intelligence standpoint, you know, with all your training with Luminous, with everything you've done, and even your experience with tbi, how would you define emotional intelligence? What does emotional intelligence mean to you?

Wow. What does emotional intelligence mean to you? That's a great question. It's a big question. Let's see, for me, being aware of, of your inner experience, not only your external, but inner experience, and becoming aware of like real time inner experience while you're aware of your external experience. This is where I, I'm, I'm heading toward, to be fully aligned in my body, in my experience feeling, my experience fully inside and outside, whether it's in connection, whether that's an experience where I'm watching a movie, whatever that is staying fully connected to my emotional body, my emotional experience inside and outside. So to me, as we build more emotional intelligence, becoming aware of emotions, feeling emotions, eventually getting to a place where it's like real time, inside, outside, seamless experience of reality, internal, external. And that's like very highly. It's a high, it's a, it's a, it's a high skill set because it takes time to reintegrate back into the emotional experience. Staying embodied, staying safe, be able to fully feel without running away. And that could be very vulnerable. That's real strength, real courage, man.

Very succinct. On emotional intelligence, it's the inner and the outer combined. And it's not always going to come with like a lack of fear. Sometimes as that inner and outer awareness increases, the fear might increase as well. Have you seen that to be true with your clients?

You know, we, we numb a lot of experiences and we hide from a lot of experiences. So before we release or move through these experiences, the intensity can increase. At first, it's like, on, it's like melting these icebergs in the body and the system. And at first you're like, I didn't realize that was there. And it can be intense at first, but eventually that intensity will decrease. For me, fear is actually at some level is. There's some sort of fear that we want to keep in our system, it's a good indicator. It's telling us something, something, it's giving us intuitive hits when it's not rampantly out of control and controlling our lives.

How about the physical then? So this physical intelligence, you know, everything that we do from our breath to the way that we speak and move our body and sleep. Do you have a practice of physical intelligence in your life right now that you're leaning into more?

Yeah, so I actually been doing a lot more like yin yoga if you're familiar with this. Have you heard this before?

This is the longer holds, right?

Yeah, you hold. I usually call it sleep yoga or dream yoga laying around, but it's long hold holds and it, it's what it's doing is helping release the fascia. And fascia is super intriguing, unbelievable system. It's really amazing. And it can harden and create all sorts of issues in the body and tension and not being flexible. A lot of people can stretch forever and they never get flexible. That's because fascia might be locked down. So I've been doing a lot of like opening the fascia and releasing this so I can get more energy flow, more movement in the system, in the body, body. It's helped me to have more energy, relax more. It's really a beautiful addition to what I, what I normally do. So I've been actually leading a lot toward opening the system, the fascist system.

Through yin yoga, this combination of the two. And we'll do another show on spiritual because you're obviously one of the most spiritual people I ever met, almost as much as JP Sears. So this definition of wellness, it's my signature question man that I love to ask people. How would you define wellness in your life? Like how does Andrew De Gregorio see wellness in his life? What does that mean to him?

It's the amount of well being that I experience every moment that I'm here. So for me it's not about chasing happiness. It's not about finding the person that's going to give me what I need in life. Like it's, it's basically how much well being being can I experience and how can I increase that well being. So there's an actual feeling of well being that is always there. And some of us, and this is really intriguing because I found this out that we actually run from well being. Some of us do. So when we start to feel well being, sometimes we run away from it. So we have to be able to experience well being, integrate it and then be able to increase it. So the amount of well being that I can experience in every moment is how I define wellness.

Man. I love having conversations with you. We're going to get feedback from the show, we're going to have another conversation. We'll go into more depth of these human needs because with all the 50 plus bullets that you can talk about, there's just not enough time, which time is an illusion anyways. So where can people learn more about you, man? Where can they go to receive some of your downlines? I know you have some resources for people on your website and social. Let us know where they can dig in.

Yeah, they can find me on my website. It's my name Andrew and my last name is Long which D E G R E G O R I O. So spell that. It's D Gregorio andrewdegregorio.com probably need a new handle because it's a little bit long but you can look me up there, you can contact me there and reach out and I'd be happy to answer questions, go over any of this info. It's the best place to reach me. There's an email, phone numbers on there. Whatever way you want to reach me through that site, it's the best way to do it.

And on social, where are you the most active? Like where are you putting out the most content and the most things for people to use?

That's a good question. I haven't actually been doing all a lot on social lately. I'm revamping that. I've really been putting together more and more content. So for the past few years I've been looking to put together what I want to put out into the world and what that looks like and I'm going to start doing that soon. Most likely Facebook, Instagram. I mean I don't really have a lot out right now, but that's where you could find me. Yeah.

Thanks so much for sharing your gifts on the show, man. It's been a pleasure to get to know you not just in men's groups but also it's kind of like having someone that had diamonds inside their pocket that you didn't even know was there. Like that's been my experience of you. The ways that I've been been able to in just 10, 12 sessions like really identify the areas, the physical areas on my body where the blockage exists and then a trusted pathway to take me through those, man. So thank you so much for what you do in the world. I just want to acknowledge you and we'll be sure to have this conversation again in the future. Andrew, thanks so much man.

Thanks brother. I appreciate you having me. You are absolutely amazing. Thank you.

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