These 10 Things Changed My Life... They’ll Change Yours Too

Everybody loves top 10 lists. Everybody loves them. But what if I told you that the top 10 list I'm going to give you today could change your life, but only if you have a certain point of awareness about it. We're talking about that and so much more richness on this liberated life series of the Wellness and Wisdom podcast. Let's dig in. So there was a time in my life where everything looked good on the outside, but on the inside, I was crumbling. And that was 2021 to 2022. I had just had my son, Nova, in 2021. God brought him to me. Which most beautiful gift ever for parents out there? You know, children are the ultimate gift in so many ways. News flash, it's one of my top 10. But today, this podcast is about giving you, from my perspective, the 10 things that have changed my life, hands down, full stop. The most coming in at number one is my breath. If you really take a strong, deep breath, you will know that everything you've ever needed is right under your nose. It's right there, and it's always been there. It's just not taught in schools. When I found the breath, it was 2016. I was deep in the middle, well towards the end of a pornography addiction. Sex addiction, just addiction being the disconnection from myself and the disconnection of sharing myself with others. That's what addiction is, disconnection from self or others. The breath allowed me to start moving the energy in motion, the emotion through my body when I started to breathe and really understand the four diaphragms in my system and create the Breathe Breath and wellness program in 2020. Took me four years to do it because I really wanted to master the breath. The breath set me free. And here's why. When we breathe, we are moving the only voluntary and involuntary lever that we have for our autonomic or automatic nervous system. This is why it's so important. You can't digest your own food. You can't blink your own eyes. Well, you can, but your body does that for you. The only voluntary and involuntary lever that directly impacts different from your eye blinking, your autonomic nervous system and your vagal tone is your breathing. It's the only lever we have. And I didn't know it. No one ever taught this to me. This is why I created the Breathe Breath and Wellness Program. It's on the screen right now. And that's why it's one of the gifts that we'll keep on giving. And that's what we talk about. And by the way, it's part of the group over@liberatedlife.com our Liberated Life Tribe. Why is the breath so important for me? Why is it so important for you? Because the first thing we do when we're born, and it's the last thing we do, and we die. If there wasn't enough coding just in that answer, that's on a soul level, I don't know what else could be there for you. When you start to turn your breath into your ally, it becomes your best friend. It becomes something that you didn't even know you didn't know was there. And it leads to number two. Number two, the thing that has changed my life is parts work. I came across parts work last year, Dr. Richard Schwartz. He wrote a book called no Bad Parts. And in this book, he talks about the exiles, which is essentially our inner children that are being guarded by our protectors, which is essentially what the Gottmans describe as the four Horsemen. Criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and stonewalling. Do my very best to not practice those things. These are the parts that are being protected. So when that behavior comes out, if I'm being angry or hyper controlling or defensive or stonewalling or resenting, it's actually not who I am. It's just a part of me. And this was really big because I didn't have the parts work knowledge before I went into ayahuasca in 2018. I didn't have the parts work and the breath work knowledge before I went into plant medicine. And I wish I did, because it would have been much less painful, it would have been so much more powerful for my nervous system to be able to receive the wisdom that nature was wanting to bring to me, but that I wasn't spiritually mature enough yet to hold. And it's because I had no idea of parts work and no idea of breath work. So breath work and parts work are a huge piece of what I teach in the Emotional Epigenetics Life method program. This is where we tune your nervous system to trust itself. Regardless of what's happened for you in this life or what happened to your parents in other lives. It's not therapy for people that are broken. I am not a therapist. I am just a scholar, researcher, and guide who has done the work to figure it out for himself. And I'm just sharing that with you. That's really simply all I am. So I didn't have parts work, I didn't have breath work, and I definitely couldn't bring those to plant medicine. But number three is conscious relationship. There is nothing that has cracked me as wide open and shattered my ego. Like conscious relationship. Nothing even comes close. I mean any man or any woman that gets with a quality soul seeking conscious partner. You know, I used to think that love would heal me if I found the right woman, then I would be healed. But be careful what you wish for. There's a clip right here on the screen where you can see Paul check in 2019 giving me the prayer from Parmahasa Yogananda. This is the soulmate's prayer. And I said on that podcast to find Kerri Michelle, my queen, my fiance. I said, bless me that I choose my life companion according to the laws of perfect soul union. Bless me that I choose my life companion according to the laws of perfect soul union. Now what are those laws? Those laws are that you may not attract the person that you're going to want to have sex with all the time and is never going to trigger you and is going to like be this perfect peace that'll never push your buttons. No, the whole point of a perfect soul union is to poke and extract all the wounds, all the triggers and all the stuff that you're carrying so that you don't give it to your children. That's what this is all about. It's just this big game of chess, this big choice board that God is playing through us as God. So yes, having a conscious relationship will bring out the best in yourself and it'll bring out your worst so that your worst becomes your best. Coming in at number four, letting go of pornography. The amount of men and women that use pornography. The data is staggering. Here's what the Data says. Approximately 3.07 billion adults worldwide have viewed pornography at some point, based on the 58% estimate applied to the global adult population of 5.3 billion. Now that number is staggering. So that's why my story. I'm open to share it. The wisdom of letting go of pornography because it has become so commonplace, it has become so, so normalized. Addiction is what we reach for when we feel incomplete in ourselves. It has nothing to do with coming or, or climaxing or looking at the screen. It's when we feel incomplete, when we feel disconnected from ourselves. And this is the journey that I've. That is when everything changes, when we feel disconnected from ourself and when we disconnect ourselves from other people. That's where addiction lives full stop right there. So freedom doesn't come from control. Freedom comes from truth. And I would love for you to name one behavior that you're honestly addicted to publicly or privately and begin to do the parts. Work, breath work, soul work, epigenetics work, emotional epigenetics work on letting that go. Coming in at number five, learning about David Hawkins specifically, and the Hawkins frequency scale, the scale of consciousness, and also Alan Watts. I remember I was, like, in my mid-20s as a personal trainer, and I came across Alan Watts, and I was like, wow, I just really like the way this guy sounds. He sounds so knowledgeable. He sounds so peaceful. Little did I know that that was a string that I was pulling on the sweater of consciousness myself. And so why has Alan Watts impacted me so much? It's because he made the things real that I had been feeling, but I didn't have the words to make them real for myself. He made them real. And the beauty in that is that when I graduated from Alan Watts to other teachers and then to learn from Dr. Hawkins, M.D. phD, that created the frequency scale it's on the screen right now. Yes, the Wisdom of Insecurity was a powerful book for me, but so was honestly just listening to Alan Watts in the shower when I was a personal trainer, when I was in a soul retrieval process, getting my soul back from a treasure chest. I'd put it in in my early 30s, before I launched this podcast. When I finally got to Hawkins work, that's when everything clicked for me. And even in the creation of the Emotional Epigenetics teaching and the being a steward of the Emotional Epigenetics program methodology is because, wow, it really came through based on my own life experience, by me not feeling the things I didn't want to feel. I wasn't able to get to the truth of what my mind was trying to get me to because my mind and my feelings were disconnected. My mind and my body were disconnected. And so what Hawkins did for me is he allowed me to bring my head and my heart closer together. And he even says in his work, you know, the greatest space for many of us is the space between our head and our heart. And so I love Hawkins work. It's a huge piece. It's really a fulcrum. It's a keystone of the Emotional Epigenetics program. Number six is mindful language and nlp. Words are spells. When I first came across nlp, it was from a podcast that I was listening to, and somebody mentioned a book called the Structure of Magic. When I looked at the Structure of Magic, I found Richard Bandler. And then when I looked at the health of Richard Bandler, I thought, huh, he's just a messenger. He's not the message of nlp. The message of NLP is neuro linguistic programming, because that's what it is. Neuro mind linguistic, voice words programming. That's what's going on. When you use the science of nlp, you can use it to harm or you can use it to heal. I use it to heal. I use it to bring people into themselves, closer to themselves, so that they can be closer to us and closer to God and nature. Now, NLP has a dark side. NLP is used for mind control. NLP is used for many deleterious things. But when I started to pay really close attention, and I get to give my mentor, Scott Jackson credit for this, when Scott introduced me to a world of NLP and taught me about the conscious and unconscious barrier, where my mind, my conscious and unconscious mind can come together by being honest about the barrier in the middle and about the fact that we process millions and millions. Some even say it's hundreds of millions of bits of information per second is what we're processing. But we can only consciously take in up to 200. That means there's a huge delta. Where's all that data going? It's going into the program. We are part of the program. We are the player and the programmer at the same time. And so NLP changed my life because I know that my words create my world. And I want you to challenge yourself today. I want you to really feel into this. How many times a day do you say I have to? How many times a day do you say I should? How many times a day do you say, ugh, I'll try those three phrases. How many times a day do you say those three phrases? Just make a note of that. The next day, consciously replace those three statements with I will, I'll do my very best, or I believe, also a bonus one. I get to those statements. When you replace the previous three with the next four that I gave you. Watch how your incredible life transforms. Watch how your entire nervous system transforms. NLP literally is a program. It's very important that you understand NLP is working at all times. It's not just a mode of science, it's a mode of programming. It's a mode of being. Number seven, Finding brotherhood and being in men's work. Look, women, if you look at the Red Tent book or if you look at how women have been gathering in tribes for millennia, and men as well, we just forgot. Women know how to gather. Women know how to share. It's a place for women to off gas. But men have had this space essentially robbed from them with modernity. If you look at the industrial age, when men came out of the home and then into the factories and then they were so exhausted from being in the factories that they could never meet in person again, well, it's the same thing here in modernity with all these screens. We actually are not so busy that we can't meet in person. It's just something that the mind is in fear of. So in 2012 and really in 2014, when I met Johnny Blackburn and Encinitas through Paul Rono and my friends Josh McMurtry and Paul and Brent Kozlowski and everybody brought me into this men's work. And I was like, what the hell is going on? I mean, talk about ripping the band aid off. Like, men were crying, men were sharing emotions. I had never been around that, ever. And so here I am in 2025. Wow. 13 years later. And after 13 years, I can wholeheartedly say that we become who we're witnessed as. When men witness you as the powerful, amazing, incredible, trustworthy, sovereign child of God that you are, nothing can stop you. When you show up in truth with your tribe, this is what we do with the liberated life tribe. When you show up in the truth of who you are and you're not trying to hide anything and you just show up as who you are, then there's nothing to fear. Then you can just work through whatever emotion, energy and motion is wanting to work through your body, and you can have men give you impact or question. This is the big piece of men's work that I. I lead a men's group here in Austin and I'm also a participant in men's work. And there's two things that you need to know about men's work. Number one, give space for a man to share. Number two, give him a question or give him an impact. There's no coaching. There's no coaching in men's work. You literally just ask those two things. It's changed my life. It's given me a space to throw up and be frothy at the mouth and just get everything out of my system so that I can just be me and I can learn how to be Josh, the son of God, a child of God. I don't believe that's possible unless we meet in tribe specifically, unless men have brotherhood. And in men's work, number eight, a wellness care routine. Wellness care. Think about what that means. Wellness. I am. Well, I care. I care for my wellness every single night. Doing a stretch, reading to my son doing something that off gases my day having maybe some Zen vertical spray from Mitozen. It's on the screen right now. One of my favorite tools ever. Do you have to buy it? No, you don't. But if you're interested in downregulating your nervous system at night, I would recommend it. You don't have to buy anything. I'm sharing, by the way. You don't have to buy shit. Don't buy any of it. A lot of this stuff is free. And then once you get good with the free, then you can invest in the things that make you evolve. That's what money is. It's just energy. So, yes, anchoring the peace into my physiology is what we're talking about. That's really what it is. I wake up, I do the sauna, I do the cold plunge. Maybe I'll do some laps in the pool. You can do this wherever you are. Anybody can go to a gym. Anybody that lives in a village can go or a city can go to a stream. It's all possible. It's just about where do you live and what does your environment look like? Because your environment impacts your epigenetics. Your environment impacts the way that you think about yourself, the way that you feel about yourself. So let well be your worship. Let your body be your temple. Choose one ritual today that you can commit to and just do that one thing. Do that one thing until you feel like you have the space for another. Number nine, plant medicine. Say it in the dark and live it in the light. When you are engaging with plant medicine, look the out. First of all, it's not for everyone. I believe that plant medicine has radically changed my life. But if I could go back, I would have done it differently. Here's why. I gave myself. I did through my own, for lack of a better term, scarcity. In 2018. A psychic break. I gave myself a psychic break. I went into a space with ayahuasca. I did way too much plant medicine. I was coming from being broken and wanting to be healed. I had the wrong intention. The correct intention when you do plant medicine is. Is to surrender to the wisdom of God, to surrender to great mother, to surrender to great Father and to receive whatever wisdom they are calling you to embody. And this is the big thing. You can go to ayahuasca one time in your life and never be called to go again. I know people. I've seen people that have had hundreds of ayahuasca ceremonies, and they're still an asshole. Plant medicine gives You a key to the door. You are the one that must walk through it. Plant medicine will not solve all your problems. I'm here to tell you it may create more the intention of how you approach plant medicine and the sacredness of that space. When you are feeling energy in motion, emotion in your body that wants to be let go of, whether it's sexual trauma, physical trauma, car accident, loss, There's a time and a place for plant medicine. But it's a plant and it's medicine. You wouldn't only eat plants and you wouldn't only eat medicine. When you take in plant medicine, it has a specific time and a place for it to really be of service to your nervous system, to your heart and to your soul. And I am not here to give guidance on that. I am here to give a sacred warning that the guidance you seek is in the process you're walking. And be gentle with yourself and be mindful and be curious and be cautious about where you sit, how you sit, and how many times you sit. With plant medicine, I say that from experience. The big takeaway, however, is that it did show me the psychic shattering that I had given to myself from pornography. I'll never forget. I was throwing up in a bucket in Costa Rica and I was throwing up on the face of an unborn child. So ayahuasca God, great mother was screaming at me and saying, if you continue to use porn, this is what your life will be. You'll be vomiting on the face of your unborn child. Not much more of a bigger visual did I need than that. That's as big of a visual as I needed now. Could that have worked out differently? Yes, it could have. I could have never come back. And some people don't, because ayahuasca is like a hammer. You can build a house or you can kill. So it deserves that sacred respect. And last, but very, very, very not least is fatherhood. Could be motherhood. If you're a woman. Fatherhood has been my greatest teacher because it has shown me the capacity that I thought I had for patience, for forgiveness, for understanding, for work, for energy, for lack of sleep, for providing. You name it. Fatherhood brings it, motherhood brings it. You will never know yourself and the capacity to which you can hold until you become a father or mother. Now, I totally respect that there are people out there that they don't want to become a father or mother. Well, be careful. You may become one. Just because you don't want to be doesn't mean that God may not dream a child through you. But for the people out there that maybe can't have children, there are ways in which you can still become a father and a mother that are so incredibly powerful and sacred. Through adoption, through coaching and mentoring, that are just as profound. Now, I don't have experience with those, but I can see how they'd be just as profound. Your children don't need us to be perfect. They don't. That's the greatest gift. They don't need me to be perfect. What they want, what they desire, what they deserve is my presence, my daughter, my son, they deserve my presence, my imperfect presence. And every time I do a process on my inner child, on little Joshi, little 3 year old, 7 year old, 11 year old, 14 year old, 17 year old, however many times I connect with little Joshi, that's the degree that I can connect with my son and my daughter. Now, connection doesn't mean that I have to be crying and healing that inner child. It just means that I can go for a walk with him and play. That's all it is. We have these parts that are inside of us. And everything I've talked about today, it's on the screen. Fatherhood, plant medicine, the wellness routine, men's group, mindful language, Alan Watts and David Hawkins and quitting porn. Conscious relationship parts, work and the breath work. Before all of that was me. Before all of that is you. And what happens is when you start to bring these 10 tools, these life changing tools into your being is that you extend your capacity to change. That's where you really become an identity transformation architect. You become an architect of your own identity transformation because you have the courage to be willing to look at the truth and the truth will set you free. It is not just something that is written in religion or in the Bible. It is something that we all know. Anytime I'm lying to myself or others, there's always a price. And so all of these tools, these 10 powerful tools, all they did for me was bring me closer to my own honesty. They just brought me closer to more Josh. And so if this is inspiring to you, if this is bringing you closer to yourself, just in hearing this, join us, join us in the liberated life tribe. It's on the screen now, liberatedlife.com in that community, you'll have a space to be nourished. You'll have a space to be heard, to be seen, to figure out what is the next step for you. And then when you're ready to take that next step on your own journey of coming to self, of transforming your own identity from confused and stuck and stressed and blah blah, blah, blah, blah. The program that we've all been in. When you want to go from the identity shift from broken to not broken, you can trust that I'll lead you there until I see you again. Another podcast I'm wishing you love wellness, but most importantly, peace and power. You cannot have power unless it comes from peace.