100 | Healing Beyond Talk: Somatic Therapy with Amanda

What if you stopped trying to outthink your pain and started to feel it? We welcome therapist and somatic practitioner Amanda Newton for a candid, deeply practical journey from hospital based psychology and burnout to body led healing, nervous system regulation, and the intentional use of MDMA-assisted therapy for trauma.

Amanda traces the moment a heart scare forced her to question a 70-hour workweek and a mind only approach. From there, she dug into herbs, acupuncture, and somatic practices that shifted her baseline from survival to safety. We unpack how dysregulation hides in everyday life. Alarms, inboxes, caretaking and society. And why the body must learn to feel safe before the mind can think clearly. Expect tangible tools: shaking to complete stress responses, interoception to locate emotions as sensations, and an anger practice that moves charge out of the system in under two minutes.

We also touch on psychedelic medicine used in therapy. Specifically MDMA. When used intentionally it can can raise oxytocin, reduce fear, and make it possible to revisit a trauma without reliving it,  and rewiring triggers at the physiological level. Amanda shares outcomes she’s witnessed, addresses MDMA myths, and explains why integration ~ nature time, somatic exercises, and daily regulation ~ turns breakthroughs into durable change. We touch the edges too: personality disorders that resist awareness, partners stuck in cycles of people-pleasing and control, and how shifting your internal frequency changes who you attract and how you relate.

If you’ve tried talk therapy and still feel stuck, this is a map to the other 50% of the work. You’ll leave with clear practices, a fresh lens on anxiety as a safety signal, and a grounded sense that your body isn’t the problem. It’s the map. If this conversation resonates, subscribe, share it with a friend who needs it, and leave a review to help others find the show.

Connect with Amanda here: https://wellnesssomaticcenter.com/

Books we covered:

All the Way to the River: https://amzn.to/47pHABU
When the Body Says No: https://amzn.to/47VoZxz
The Body Keeps the Score: https://amzn.to/4939uVw

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Chapters

• 1:01 Meet Amanda Newton
• 2:42 From Hospitals To Holistic Healing
• 4:50 Discovering Somatic Work
• 7:50 Nervous System Dysregulation
• 12:02 Talk Therapy Versus Somatics
• 16:45 Shaking, Release, And Research
• 20:00 Stress, Illness, And Emotion
• 23:40 Feminine And Masculine At Work
• 27:45 Anxiety As A Signal For Safety
• 33:00 Who Somatics Helps Most
• 38:10 Growing Apart And Closing Gaps
• 42:50 Psychedelics In Modern Care
• 47:40 MDMA: Safety, Myths, And Use
• 52:10 Reworking Trauma With MDMA
• 55:50 Autism, Connection, And Oxytocin
• 59:30 Narcissism, Limits, And Hope
• 1:05:00 Patterns, Partners, And Boundaries
• 1:09:20 Reading Bodies: Reiki And Blocks
• 1:13:40 Autoimmunity And Remission Stories
• 1:19:20 Belief, Practice, And Placebo
• 1:22:40 Processing Anger Productively
• 1:27:00 Teaching Kids Regulation

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:31

Welcome everyone to another episode of See You on the Other Side. I am so excited because we have our first guest for season four. Amanda. How do you want me to address you? Amanda Newton's good. Amanda professional. Okay. Okay. I'll keep my aliases aside. The other thing I was going to say is I feel like you have a lot of training under your belt and experience under your belt. Can you kind of introduce yourself and give the listeners more info about your background? Sure. That's funny because I would probably say the exact opposite. Really? I disagree.

SPEAKER_04: 1:12

So my background is in psychology. So I got a master's in psychology. And my intention was to do normal therapy work. And I started working in psych hospitals. And I realized people weren't getting better. And that was really frustrating to me because human, I've loved human behavior probably since high school. Like I I could have flunked out of high school, I think, because I never went and I hated school. And then I found psychology, read the textbook like from front to back in a day. And I was just so, I don't know, enamored. And I remember the teacher said something wrong and I was like, that's incorrect. He's like, do you want to stand up and teach the class? Like, absolutely. And I did. And so, like, I think that's probably where my love of psychology started. And I, but when I was working and when I was working in psych hospitals, I was getting really frustrated because no one was getting better. And if we got people better, we got them to baseline, which to me isn't overly exciting. Like, great, you're not hearing voices now. Or, you know, and so I got frustrating and then kind of went into the business end of things and started doing operations and marketing and business development. And I kind of worked in every, I mean, outpatient, inpatient, community mental health. I still did a little clinical work here and there, like doing assessments. And then I worked with a lot of startups helping them start, you know, their hospitals or their treatment centers. And then I went into consulting. And I don't I don't know if you want my whole story, but I'll give you the whole thing. I went into consulting and a company hired me and I was a partial owner of the company to run it and kind of redo it. And in that time, I I started to get a lot of health conditions that were coming up. And I I didn't have time for that because my entire life I was working 60, 70 hours a week. I have two kids. And then I I got a heart condition that came up. And I was like, well, I can't quite ignore this. And so I went to the cardiologist and he's like, well, you have to give up your stress. And I was like, my children? And he's like, no, your job. And I thought, I can't give up my job because that's my whole entire self-worth. That's who I am. I wrapped my whole life up into my job. And I thought, who am I if I'm not my career? Well, I found out really quickly, but I had the opportunity to take off and kind of heal myself. And I went the Eastern medicine route, did all the herbs, the acupuncture. And this is where I found somatic work. And I knew somatic work existed, but like in the behavioral health world, it falls under our umbrella, but I don't think a lot of us know about it because we're so busy working on the cognitive side of things, which is now what I know what I know is kind of ridiculous. I mean, to spend 100% of our time, we do need to spend some time there, but it doesn't need to be a hundred percent of our time. And when I found somatic work, it well, I did cure my heart condition, which is good, but oh wow. Yeah, I got to the next level, like baseline's here. I got up here and I thought, wait a minute, is this how we're supposed to feel? And everyone that works in the psych field knows we're missing something. They all know it because all therapists have done their own work and they realize something is missing from here. And I figured it out. It was the body. We're doing all this work on the mind and not integrating with the body. And so we're only doing 50% of the work when we do, you know, kind of traditional talk therapy, which is good. We need to do that 50%, but we also need to add in the other 50%. And so I was like, I need to find out everything there is to know about this. So I read every single book and I would not, those books are terrible. It's like going to medical school to learn about polybagel stuff. And I did all the training. So I was like, okay, I'm gonna start working with folks. And when I say I I don't have the experience, what I mean is my experience came from working with people. And I had a kundalini activation, but that's a whole nother conversation.

SPEAKER_01: 5:21

Are you serious? Yes. So can we talk on that on that later? I do.

SPEAKER_04: 5:27

But that's really what kind of catapulted me into the smoke neck kind of work because I was able to feel energy where before I wasn't able to feel energy. So that really did help in my work. But I had this wealth of knowledge, obviously, of human behavior. And then I learned these different somatic practices and kind of put all of my knowledge together in one. And I was like, oh, these are all the things that work. And it's kind of an iteration because then I see more people I work with, the more I learn just about, you know, the body plus the brain and putting it all together. And it's funny because half of my clients are therapists, which I love because they've realized, oh shit, you're right. There is something missing in the work that we're doing. And when I get to work with therapists, I'm giving everything that I know to them because I want them to be able to give it to their clients. So then everybody can start to get like, you know, a hundred percent better instead of 50% better.

SPEAKER_02: 6:28

So to those who don't know like what somatic work is, can you kind of give like a brief explanation, like a simple explanation of what that is? Sure.

SPEAKER_04: 6:39

It's soma and somatic means body. So essentially it just means body work. And there's uh a couple different ways to go about this. And mine is really getting into your body in the present moment in a parasympathetic state, is really what I'm after. And so part of somatic work is nervous system regulation, and that's usually where I start with people because most adults I see walking around have dysregulated nervous systems, except for maybe some Buddhist monks. And the reason we're so dysregulated is usually from our trauma responses and/or just how we do everyday life. I mean, the way that we're doing life is not how we should be doing life. We should not be like waking up with the alarm clock and getting all these text messages and emails and running and getting kids and I mean, we should be waking up with an alarm clock, going outside, you know, with our shoes off, picking some berries, maybe feeding the chickens, not moving like really, really quick. My dream life.

SPEAKER_00: 7:40

That's like my five-year plan. But also like that's unrealistic for a lot of people. Yeah. Because, you know, life is very, very busy and with kids. And if you're, you know, a mom and you work and that feels like an impossible, it feels like a dream, not a possibility. You're right. It does.

SPEAKER_04: 8:02

And when I think about somatic work, like versus traditional talk therapy, talk therapy is giving us coping skills and teaching us maybe why we think the way we do, why other people think the way they do, whereas somatic work builds the capacity in your body to deal with the triggers at a, you know, a kind of at a physical level. And so, and Christine, you're absolutely right. I try to teach people like basic little things to put into their day in order to be able to regulate their nervous system. Cause you're right, we can't just blow up everything. I mean, I did, but we can't just blow up everything. I thought I did too. I'm not doing this anymore, and I'm gonna go live the simple life.

SPEAKER_02: 9:47

Yeah, I think it's like we had a guest on several years ago who was like, You're not broken, our culture is. And I feel like that's like such a we have to learn how to live in our bodies in a world that's designed to keep us out of our bodies. So I think that that's important. When you were talking about like reading all the books, The Body Keeps the Score. I know that like everybody talks about that book, but I I was like, oh my God, it was like such a heavy read. Like I felt like I was doing homework, I couldn't like stay focused. I was like, this is like a big person book. Like I'm not adult enough to read this and understand it. I get the concept of it. Like our body is holding on to this stuff. So, like another book that comes to mind is like Walking the Tiger, where like this concept of all these animals having this body movement that they have, this this not a tradition. It's not a tradition.

SPEAKER_00: 10:45

It's like a I was literally talking to my son about this yesterday.

SPEAKER_02: 10:49

Like getting energy out. I can't remember what the concept is, but like if something traumatic happens to an animal, they usually have this thing that they do afterwards to release their body of all the trauma that it's holding on to. And we don't do anything like that. Like we're not taught to do that. We don't know what to do to how like how to move stuff out of our body. So yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 11:13

We're we're removing the negative imprint. And I actually not all my clients do because I make them do it in the session. It's we get up and we start shaking because it's and it's not just animals, we do it too. So like if you working in psych hospitals, I've witnessed lots of fights. But if you're witnessing a physical fight, people shake when they get done. And the reason is the adrenaline's leaving the body, the cortisol's leaving the body, but our body also knows that we have to remove that negative imprint. So we know to do it physically, but we forget to do it when it's a negative emotion or trauma. But you know what's really interesting is I was reading this study, and I can't remember if it was mice or rats, we'll call it rats, but they had, they had all these rats, and the researchers were activating the rats. And what they would do mid-cycle, mid-shake, the the researchers would stop the shake. And I think the vast majority of those rats that they stopped the shake, they either dad or had some medical problems. And we're the same thing. We are animals, we are mammals, right? So and then when I I have a couple of physicians in my practice, and I'll talk to my physicians about this. I'm like, okay, we know that stress in the body causes all of our diseases and disorders, right? And so what is stress in the body? It is unprocessed emotion. And so, like, what if we just started processing emotions? Would we still have all these diseases and disorders? Probably not, which is kind of wild if you think about it. And so I'm like, tell the doctors, you need to teach this to all your patients.

SPEAKER_00: 12:56

But isn't it kind of crazy though that doctors don't teach that, especially in a lot of, you know, in Western medicine, that's not something that's often talked about. And when you were talking about like how you were working 60, 70 hours a week, plus you're a mom of two, I I feel like it's it's really hard to balance that. And you were having heart issues, and I used to own a business, and then I have had my son, and I was, you know, also getting sick and getting hives and getting like constant UTIs, and then going to a doctor and just getting a pill, and then the UTI would go away and then it'd come right back. And it wasn't until I went to a holistic doctor, and he was like, I think it's stress. I think you've got a lot on your plate, and I think there's you need to take some things off your plate. And I'm like, I can't do that. Cause like what you said, I was like, this gym is this is like my identity. And if I don't have that, I don't know who I am and I don't know what I'm gonna do. And it did get to a point where I made the choice to close down, but I'm like, I'm not a person anymore. Like now I'm just a mom, I guess. And I don't know what I'm I felt like I had no purpose and I felt so lost. And I feel like so many people relate to that and they're struggling and they're maybe showing they have an autoimmune disease or they're going through health issues, but they're like, I don't know what to do, I don't know what to let go of, I don't know where to start, I don't know how to regulate myself. Like, I don't even know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 14:32

And you you bring up a good point because like, and I like talking about like feminine energy and masculine energy because oh, I love that. Yeah. Okay. We we have been sold a bill of goods, right? I'm 46, I think. And and I was always told, you know, you you can do better than it anything a boy can do, but better, which yes, I agree that. But it was almost kind of like we were taught to work like a man. And that's not that's not we are very powerful, but we are not powerful in the way that we're supposed to be working like men. And so these corporate jobs, and I'm not saying all corporate jobs, I'm saying sometimes how we approach these corporate jobs are like where entrepreneurship is just like go, go, go, crush it. I hate what people are like, go crush it. I'm like, oh my god, women, we should not be grinding it out and crushing it.

SPEAKER_00: 15:21

It's supposed to be crushing. I used to say shit like that though, all the time.

SPEAKER_04: 15:24

Like girl boss, go.

SPEAKER_00: 15:26

I know like don't work girl bossing.

SPEAKER_04: 15:28

Yes. Yes. And so if we work like a man, we're gonna get burned out. And so, yeah, I can I completely understand that. And and you're right. If but the problem is if we don't give up stress, if we don't give up something, and if we keep on grinding it out, our body will do something to say, no, you're not. Because our body's this like perfect antenna, and it's always giving us signs and signals. It's like a smoke alarm. It's like, hey, hey, listen up. That's the same thing with anxiety. And what we do is like, let me ignore this and just go to my brain and see if my brain can figure this out, which is the wrong thing to do.

SPEAKER_02: 16:13

Well, another thing that I really have an issue with is like, you know, I see anxiety as like a signal now too. And I used to struggle really bad with it. And I was medicated to turn it off. And at the time it made sense, but I looking back now, I was like, my body was telling me that I was in an unhealthy situation. And I would just kept like ignoring it and like numbing it away so I could function on a day-to-day basis. But looking back now, I was like, holy shit, like I should have listened to what it was telling. But I wasn't taught that. None of us, none of us were taught that. I think we know a lot of people who are like on a journey to find the right medicine, but but I'm not like giving away information or anything, but like we know these per people on a personal level, and they're in very abusive toxic relationships, and they're in like a horrible work situation. And it's like, I don't think it the med like finding the right medicine is necessarily the issue. Like, I think you might need to like look at what's happening in your life, in your circle, and in your home, and that's where the answer is. But you're trying to turn that off. Like your body's telling you something, it's screaming at you, and you're trying to turn it off and look away.

SPEAKER_04: 17:38

And that's what I'd tell my clients is like, I always want to know if somebody's on medication because I always have to set the expectation. Like, if you're on medication, this is gonna be hard. Because and I and I don't want to ever convince somebody don't take medicine, because I think that's a real personal choice. I will give people, you know, suggestions that that's what they're looking for. But when you go to do somatic work, if you because these medicines often work almost too well because they're gonna numb you out. And so if you're numb, you're not gonna be able to connect with the emotions that I'm trying to get you to connect to. So I'm like, not that it's impossible. I just tell people you're gonna have to work much harder than other people will. And like you with anxiety, anxiety is not really the enemy. Now, it might be kind of going off because if our subconscious kind of records everything that's ever happened to us and our bodies are always scanning for danger, it might pick up something that is not dangerous, like, you know, this moss wall behind me. If I'm sitting here and I say, my subconscious picks up this moss wall. Oh, remember when you were five years old sitting next to the same moss wall where you got bit by a dog? And then my nervous system goes, yeah, let's go into fight or flight. We're in survival mode. So all those things are kind of, you know, hanging out in the background that we're unaware of. And so sometimes it's just misfires, right? Yeah. But our anxiety is still a clue that something is going on, and we really had to tune into it. And the the you know, the antidote to anxiety is not calmness, it's safety. And we have to teach our body safety and what that feels like. And a lot of times we kind of place safety on other people or other circumstances instead of trying to do it within.

SPEAKER_00: 19:29

So let me ask you this. What would be some I guess who would be a good candidate for somatic therapy? That's a good question. Everybody knows. I'm like, is this a good question? I don't know. Like maybe like if there are certain things that are happening or if there are certain things that you're struggling with and talk therapy, like, then is somatic therapy like a potential.

SPEAKER_04: 19:56

So the vast majority of people I see, so I have my therapist over here that come in, they're like, okay, it usually they want to make sure that they're doing it themselves. And of course, sometimes they go to teach their clients. And I have a lot of first responders because they got lots of trauma. And what their bodies are doing is staying at like a survival state and they don't know how to get back to parasympathetic. Wow. So I see some firefighters, some cops, see a lot of teachers stressed. Yeah. And I see a lot of it's funny because when I started doing this work, I just assumed I would see mostly women because we know we're all about seeking help and you know getting better and being a better person. But I see a lot of men, because I think they're like, I don't want to talk about this shit just working out of my body, right?

SPEAKER_00: 20:45

I was going to ask that. I love that because I kind of assumed you would have mostly women because I feel like men are taught to suppress. At least women do. We do have, I think the struggles are just different. And but women will try to go sometimes I feel like are oftentimes better about going and maybe trying to find something. Or to talk to our friends. Yes, or to talk to friends or you know, to vent about it or whatever, where I feel like men are really conditioned to suppress and to to not share or to not admit that they need help, or you know, so I actually love hearing that.

SPEAKER_04: 21:22

I did I know, and I'm so happy because I feel like uh men are starting to come more and more because other men are talking about it. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I love it.

SPEAKER_01: 21:34

This is happening.

SPEAKER_04: 21:35

This is what I think because I'm I'm like starting to get worried about men and women because women, so much of them are, you know, de-centering men, which I think is a good thing. Not like I want you out of my life, but making them the most important or whatever is in their life. But what I've noticed is you have all these women evolving spiritually, consciously, and the men are like, there's a gap in like all these women are leaving their husbands and their relationships. And I'm like, okay, men, we we gotta get this party started because you're gonna get left behind. If I mean, and I I see it in traditional therapy and you know, spiritually and in this work, sometimes the gap becomes too big where someone has grown way too much and they're no longer on the same sheet of music. So it's it's happening. I'm I'm seeing more men, but a lot of times I see folks probably I would say 75% of the people I see are neurodivergent or uh intellectualizers. So they've done all the therapy and sometimes they know way more than the therapist. And so they're like, they can't tell me anything I don't already know. And and I get it because discovery is not actually recovery. So they might be really good and have all the insight in the world, but they might not be able to make that shift. So that's why I tell people like that's that's just really great for people that you know would be appropriate for somatic work. I also think anytime you have significant trauma, sexual trauma is really good for somatic work. I I just think if you have an interest in growing, you probably need traditional talk therapy and somatic work because those are the two things that work so well together. Just more men are are getting to that point where I think they're starting to realize that they need to also evolve because they're getting left behind because women are just like, oh wait, I don't need you anymore. And the fact is we don't actually need men anymore.

SPEAKER_02: 23:40

It's interesting because we said this before, but like we have a lot of women who reach out to that to us specifically about like what when we talk about psychedelics, and they're like, My husband needs to do this. And I'm like, you need to do this first. Like, you go first, because then you can like hold his hand through the process of healing and growing. And and Christine and I have even talked about before, like in our relationships, you know, our husbands are doing the work and they have come such a long way. And I am so grateful that I have someone who's like willing to do that with me, but it does feel like I'm dragging him sometimes. But I'm like, but at least he's coming. And I have said before he got sober, I think I told you before this, like he's sober now. But like before he got sober, I'm like, dude, if you don't, if you don't step up and change and grow, I already know I'm so far ahead of you in this department. But if you don't step it up, we're gonna this this isn't gonna work. I need you to like meet me a little bit of the way. And he he did, he stepped it up. But I saw this quote and I want to say this because it reminds me of what we're talking about literally this morning. I took a screenshot. It says, if he stops growing, you'll start dying next to him. And I was like, oh, I love that because I think women need to be the leaders in this. So we are because we're the nurturers, like you're talking about that feminine and masculine energy earlier. Like we're intuitive, like we're the natural healers, we're the mothers, the nurturers. So I think men need to feel safe with us in order to evolve and grow and change. And if we can show them that like we're safe for them to do so, then they'll let their guard down a little bit. Then they'll, you know, see, okay, if they can do it, I can do it. I I just I'm not saying like women should lead everything, but in this sit in this department, I think we need to be leading uh the growth.

SPEAKER_00: 25:48

Absolutely agree. And and for for me, like after I did my first psilocybin journey, it took my husband a year to be like, okay, like I've seen how much it's changed you and how much you've healed from a lot of things that you struggled with from your childhood. And I think I want to do this too. But it took a year of me just showing up differently, responding to things differently, kind of modeling things for him to be like, okay, wow, this is crazy. I've just like watched you change and evolve right in front of my eyes, like in real time, every single day, like consistently. He's like, Show me the way. And then he was open to it. But at first he was like, I mean, I don't know. Like, you're talking about mushrooms. Uh you have trauma, not me. I'm good. And he kind of used to do that. Like, my parents were to get like, you know, my trauma is his trauma was that he lost his parents, but he was like, you know, you grew up with abuse, you grew up with addiction. I think you need to do this. And he was right. But then it got to a point where I'm like, I mean, I think all of us could use this. So even the ones who don't think that they have trauma. That's right.

SPEAKER_04: 27:05

Yeah. And and I think that that's great that both your all's husbands were willing to go along because I agree with you. When I think of leadership, feminine and masculine energy, we normally think of like masculine energy is leading, but this is more the spiritual healing world. And this is, I always say women were leading in the spiritual world and men are leading in the physical world. I'm like, I might run out of gas. I need you to make sure my car has gas. Like me in the physical world sometimes. I love that. I love yes. God will heal your mother wounds. Let's go. Let me nurture you a little bit. But they, you know what I when I work with men and I hear them, and what they're saying is, I have never found a safe space to communicate some of this information to. Because, you know, growing up, they're told, you're fine, get up, there's nothing wrong with you. So it's not like most men are not allowed to emote because they're not going to be validated. And if they do, you know, have some sort of emotions, they're going to be teased for it and riddled ridiculed for it. So we haven't really set up the dynamic for men to be able to do this kind of work. And and so I think uh I'm hoping that like more men that are kind of coming to this work are like, oh, this is a safe place to do this healing work. I can do this. And I I'm so glad that you're all's husbands kind of came along. I actually I had a my psilocybin journey, I don't know, it was a few years ago, but then I decided to leave my relationship after that. So I think people have to be really prepared before they go in because the you know, the way you see the world and your part in it changes. And I was like, oh, this is complete. There's no more work I need to do here.

SPEAKER_00: 28:55

So I think though that is what a lot of people are scared about because I think that they're miserable, they they want help, they know something's not right, they don't feel right in their body.

SPEAKER_02: 29:11

But I think there's an inner knowing.

SPEAKER_00: 29:14

Yes. And I always go back to what Henry said about my husband, because I was like, my this was before he had done journeys back. Oh yeah. My husband is worried that he's gonna do a mushroom journey and then he is going to like quit his job. That's what my husband was worried about. And Henry was like, Sounds like your husband hates his job. That's weird. What did what did he do after he did a journey? He literally did a journey and quit his job. He was like, holy shit, yeah. I like But it's like it's in there. It's like so it's it, but but people are they're scared of it. And I get it because like, think about that. It could be letting go of a relationship, letting go of a job that you have like attached your identity to, letting go of these patterns that made you feel safe, just anything. So what do you have to say to people like that? Because we get that a lot.

SPEAKER_04: 30:16

Well, that's it. You're right, because we created all these kind of defense mechanisms. And and in my experience, I quit the job, I quit the husband, I quit my entire life. I sold the Range Rose, sold the ha the beach house, the lake house, the everything. I said, you know what? My life is so much better if I was simplistic, because this is what I was struggling with. And just what you're saying, how do we hold all these things up? Well, what if I didn't? What if I just let everything go? Oh shit. And I've never been happier in my life because to I I didn't grow up with Monagar pre lower middle class and I learned about wealth. But then what I didn't realize is you have to hold all of it up when you have money and all these different things, and that's so much stress and so much pressure. I'm like, what if I just live simply? If I have enough money for Botox, yeah, I'll be good. And so, and now I live in a perfect house in St. Matthews. I work when I want to, I really enjoy the work that I do. And I don't have to worry about holding all these things up. And my my stress is minimal. So now, if I would have told myself I was gonna do all this before my journey, I'd be like, oh, hell are I doing that? You're getting rid of all of that.

SPEAKER_02: 31:35

No, it's like we do have to warn people like you have to almost be ready to blow your life up. If that doesn't happen, that's great. But like you have to be willing to because that's the only way you're ever gonna like actually make a change that you need. And if you're not willing to let go of any of that, then this probably isn't the route for you.

SPEAKER_04: 32:00

Yeah, but I think too, with the medicine that helps is as you know, these human beings doing this earth school, we have all these doubts, right? And then when I think when you connect with the medicine and you connect with that source energy, oneness, it's a knowing. So you go from like questioning to a knowing. And when you get to that part of a knowing, you're like, I'm good. Yeah. And I think that's what most people are missing is that knowing part. So if you can access that with the medicine, then you kind of lose some of that worry. Or when people come in with somatic work, which they're usually scared of, is like, I've built up all these defense mechanisms to protect me. And so don't be taking that away from me. Cause this, this is how I'm functioning. And like, I'd promise you, oh, I'd get it too, because I was the same right. I was, you know, a dimissive avoidant and like I didn't have any feelings. I was like a robot. I was happy all the time. So people are like, oh, that's great. No, it's not. Like when you're not experiencing all of life. And then I thought, oh, if I start taking this away, am I gonna be okay? And what I realized, like with somatic work, you're like putting down the the baggage, putting down the weights. And so actually processing your emotions is way easier than avoiding them. So that's a little different with just somatics versus doing somatic work and doing psychedelic medicine. I do think people have to be, like you said, ready for maybe blowing everything up.

SPEAKER_00: 33:33

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 33:34

Well, now I kind of want to know when you got into psychedelics and how that can tie into what you do in your practice.

SPEAKER_04: 33:43

So I I've had my own experiences with psilocybin, but I've only done one journey. I'm gonna probably do another one in my lifetime. And I've had some experiences with MDMA just because I was like, I'm never gonna, I'm not gonna be able to talk to my clients about this unless I have the experience myself. And I've read all the research. So I I've been reading the research for the last five years, and I actually, if you I still do some consulting work with companies. And probably about a year or two ago, I was working with the largest behavioral health company, consulting with them, and I was talking to their chief medical officer, and I was talking about the next place to go. I was like, we really need to get into psychedelics, and I really need you to say that's the direction we're going. And he's like, I'm all on board. And they had a lot of connections with the VA, and they were doing a lot of work with the VAs, and the VAs had these beta sites that are set up to do MDMA therapy with with trauma, right? And so what they're finding, I think in the that latest study, I can't remember, 75 or 77% of one treatment, people did not have the criteria to have PTSD anymore. Which we don't have anything like that. And so I was telling them, I was like, if you're working with, you know, this closely with the VA, we need to start maybe doing putting, maybe creating beta sites, you know, for private mental health. And it's like you really need to be the first person to come out and say this because if the largest behavioral health company is saying, yes, we're on board with this, let's see where it goes, and other people are gonna start following along. He ended up leaving the company so that didn't all work out. A whole ghost wrote a whole article about it. And I was so excited. I was like, dang it. But he's he's a mover and a shaker. I'm sure he's doing something in some other realm. But I remember being on the phone with the folks that were working closely with the VA, and she goes, Well, wait a minute. If they only have one treatment, then will they not need, you know, traditional kind of inpatient or outpatient therapy? I was like, no, that's the beauty of this because the medicine doesn't cure it. You have to kind of do the work around it. Now, will they need pharmaceuticals? Probably not. That's not our problem. Right. So, and I was like, but we have to beware because you know, I'm sure the pharmaceutical companies aren't gonna like this and they're gonna try to use everything for them not to. And I I did some lobbying myself in previous jobs, so I know how the sausage is made. So I do worry about that, and I think that's probably why, you know, that because the, you know, MDMA was gonna get passed, I think, last year and it got blocked by the FDA. Yep.

SPEAKER_02: 36:24

So all I'm doing just makes you wonder, like, hmm, maybe because there's not as much money in this type of treatment because it works so well.

SPEAKER_04: 36:33

Well, I don't even not just that it's not enough money, it's that if we cure people, that's a problem for every industry. Because if you look at, I mean, I've even worked on the employer side of things, the employer spend, the biggest spend is mental health. And so if we get people better, mental health from a mental health perspective or an addiction perspective, that affects all of healthcare, not just mental health and addiction. So it it's a real problem to cure people. And I mean, we see it in traditional kind of healthcare. But what I know is I'm always gonna be on the right side of history. And so I'm gonna be communicating information about research and with the clients that I work with, I always ask them about their experience, if they've ever had any experience with psychedelic medicine or how much they know. And as we kind of work together, and I say, you know, sometimes give them more information about psychedelic medicine. And if they ask me, I'm happy to help do integration work with them. It's not something I don't provide the psychedelic medicine, but I'm happy to do like pre-work or work during with the medicine or, you know, post-work with some of the medicine. Because I think, as you all know, if you've had the medicine, it's like you can have this moment of being one with the universe and knowing exactly what you need to do. But if you don't kind of keep integrating that information, it it doesn't really stick. And we see that in the research too. You kind of have to, well, use the medicine and then integrate it. And there's a couple different ways, you know, people decide to integrate that information. I like integrating with nature and somatic work.

SPEAKER_00: 38:17

Oh, I love that. So can you give the listeners? We have we have talked about our personal experiences with MDMA, but can you give the listeners maybe what your definition of MDMA is? And then also I want to add another question onto that. I was talking to someone about MDMA just a few weeks ago, and I didn't even fight it. Just I just kept my mouth quiet, but she brought up, she was like, Oh yeah, that's like so bad for your brain. So can you can you give what you would say back to that?

SPEAKER_04: 38:54

Well, I would agree with her if you're doing a lot. So, like when people talk about MDMA, I only know it in the therapeutic sense. I've never used it to go party with. I'm like, I don't even know how people do that. Clearly, there's other stuff mixed in with MDMA if people are going to party on it. And I mean, it can fry out your serotonin if you're using too much. So there's definitely some some risks with it. But clinically, when people take a dose of it, it's usually a much smaller dose than somebody's gonna go out and party with, and it's not clearly mixed with anything else. So, but I mean, even if people are gonna do NDMA therapy, really they suggest not doing it more than once a month. And it's not really necessary because once you really how I've worked with it is to rework like a trauma, similar to what people do in EMDR, but using like a specific trauma. Because really what I'm trying to do is rework the trauma, feel the emotions that you were feeling when the trauma happened, and then replace them with the good emotions, like the the peaceful emotions or whatever. And that's biochemically happening when you take the medicine, right? So when you go to get re-triggered, the physiological response won't come up. It'll almost connect. It's like what fires together, wires together, right? So if you go and do, if you rework a trauma and then you get re-triggered, that physiological response shouldn't come back. And I I I'm a testament of this, which is this is a crazy story. I I feel like this would only happen to me. But I had I had a a a police officer that was my client, and he was telling a story about this perpetrator in this past event. It was my perpetrator he was talking about. Of course, he didn't know. And I'm in the middle of session. I know, and I was like, wait a minute, and I can't tell him what's happening because he's my client. And I'm just sitting there, I'm like, okay. And then I I took a moment, I was like, wait a minute, wait a minute, I'm not even triggered. Like, oh and I it was like, oh shit, this did work. Wait a minute. Because normally I would get this entire kind of physiological thing that would happen in my body where my heart would start beating fast and I would start sweating and I would start to feel unsafe. And like, and I was like, Oh, I'm good. I mean, now granted, it was an awkward situation. Right, that's crazy. Yes, yes. So, but as far as clients go, I've I've they get the medicine themselves, and there's kind of different ways that we've done it. Like I've I've worked with a client that had a mother wound. And what we'll do is we'll go back to the trauma. And sometimes we bump up against the trauma, we don't all all the way go in, but it's much easier to go into the trauma when you have MDMA because sometimes I'm not in the business of re-traumatizing people, but with the medicine, it's easier to do because they're not gonna go into that state. Or sometimes, if I, you know, clearly I know the person well enough, I might just bump to that trauma. And what I'll do is bring their older self to the trauma and have their older self, you know, tell their the younger self what they needed to hear in that moment and maybe communicate what the adult version needed to communicate to the parent. And that's how I kind of work with the trauma. But the medicine is super powerful. So, like if I do work without the medicine, it's just not it's just not as intense and doesn't work as well. It still works, but not to the level the medicine's gonna work.

SPEAKER_00: 42:51

And how would you define it? How like if somebody asked you what's MDMA, what would you say? I would say that's a good question.

SPEAKER_02: 43:02

I don't know if anyone maybe not like the clinical definition of it, but like maybe like how what it what it could do for somebody, like what why somebody would do that.

SPEAKER_00: 43:15

But also I I think too, people don't know what MDMA is. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? Like people Yeah, it's it's hard to explain.

SPEAKER_04: 43:24

Well it is, but I tell people, I mean, it's gonna raise your, you know, serotonin and your dopamine and your oxytocin. And I I worked with it the other day. I worked with a client. She has had probably some of the most significant trauma I've ever heard of. And she has never been in her body before. Like sh she did, she doesn't know when to eat, she doesn't know when to drink. That's how separated she is from her body. And I told her, it's like, you know, with the medicine, you're gonna feel fully in your body. And so when I was working with her, I almost witnessed her as an eight-year-old. And it was the sweetest thing because she's usually like trying to keep everything together. And she she looked beautiful, she looked like an eight-year-old, she looked vulnerable, and it was the most amazing thing to witness. She goes, Is this what people feel? Like all of the time. I was like, Well, not at this level. I said, But it is giving you a taste. If you've never been in your body before or you can't remember what it feels like after the trauma to fully be in your body, that's what MDMA is gonna do for you. And it's gonna, when I think of MDMA, it's letting the ego go so you can be vulnerable and connect it. And I do like, you know, when people do MDMA, you know, with their partner, especially when I think about like couples that are really having a hard time learning how to reconnect, MDMA will do it automatically. It's just like everything like will go out the window as far as your ego to be able to bring that connection back. And it's it's it's incredibly beautiful. I mean, most of the folks that I've worked with when they decided to take MDMA have had trauma. I did work with one person that read the research about autism. And I haven't been on that side of the research much, but he had read that, you know, with autism, a lot of times they're seeing and feeling so much at once that it's almost like they can't hone in on certain things. So a lot of times, I think early on in autism, we thought that, oh, these people are just totally disconnected, which we're finding that's not the truth. They have way more connection than everybody else. But sometimes they're not able to hone in on it. And so, like, he took the medicine in order to experience kind of more that the oxytocin and the feeling that he's supposed to feel instead of because it's almost like he's disconnecting himself. And this is like what it was like a almost a reconnection. So that was a that was a pretty cool experience. And I just did energy work with him while he was doing the medicine.

SPEAKER_02: 45:59

Say, like that to me is like I've witnessed that in my husband since he started doing some of the psychedelics that I do. Like he's on the spectrum as well as my 17-year-old. His ability to connect and empathize is crazy compared to before. Like I I've always said this, and I know we've already done an episode on it, so I don't want to go too deep into it, but like I've always said like mushrooms save my life, but MDMA saved my marriage. Because the first time we did it, like we were like, oh my God, this like I'm remembering why I love you. Like all that shit that like built up, like the resentment, like has been like we can push that aside for a second and focus on this connecting. But I love what you said earlier about like helping people get in their bodies because I would say it helps get us completely out of our heads and not just in our bodies, but into our hearts so we can have conversations. I have a friend who's like been going through a really nasty separation for several years. They're not quite divorced yet, but they're they're they're going there. And I've even said, like, I feel like you all would benefit not to like get closer or to mend the relationship, but I feel like if you all just like did some MDMA and sat down together and had a conversation, like you could walk away from this marriage with the with like it wouldn't be like such a bad thing anymore. You could see where the other person is coming from, you could have deeper conversations and walk away knowing that you did the best you could and knowing that they're still love there. I don't know. Just a thought.

SPEAKER_04: 47:49

Yeah, I had a couple that was working with it, but he was he had narcissistic personality disorder. Oh gosh. And why I think this is really interesting is because they needed to reconnect. They've been together for like I think 20 years or whatever. So I didn't have any part in this. This was just my client that um decided to do the medicine with her and her husband. And he was so resistant to the medicine because he realized he was gonna have to drop his ego and maybe truth would come out. So he blocked that entire experience. I didn't even know that was possible. I didn't either, and I was like, whoa.

SPEAKER_00: 48:28

Oh my god. Okay, so can I ask a question? This wasn't even on my bingo card of a list of questions, but you often you said it, so I'm gonna ask it. We because we haven't talked about narcissistic personality disorder with anybody much on here, anyways. Something I've I've wanted to talk more about. Can psychedelics work on somebody who has narcissistic personality disorder? Obviously, with that situation, he resisted, that didn't work, but I think a lot of people can relate to having somebody who has NPD or they have a lot of the patterns, same patterns or characteristics. And I feel like a lot of people have someone in their life or you know, whatever. So what is your I guess?

SPEAKER_04: 49:22

I started to read things about like so that kind of the MDMA thing was like, oh, that yeah, I've never heard that. Yeah. But with mushrooms and like journey work, I think there's a possibility. And normally I wouldn't say that there is. Like we know our tr none of our medicines cure personality disorders. There's I mean, people say there's treatment for it, but you don't think so. I've never seen any improvement because it's not a it's not a it's not a mental health condition, really. It's not like something that goes into remission. It's it's a personality. And so we know that our personality is pretty set. Now, what I do think with personality disorders is people can decide to change their behaviors because it's not working within the framework that they need to work. And they're like, okay, now are they gonna change as a person? No, but they can change their behavior in order for a certain relationship maybe to work. But when I think about psychedelics, psychedelics to me are so magical and next level. Is there a possibility, in my opinion? Maybe. If there was gonna be a hope, it would be that because I don't know anything else.

SPEAKER_00: 50:43

I feel like with anybody who has like a lot of narcissistic traits or they have NPD, they have such a fragile ego. And for me, specifically with like when I've done psilocybin journeys, any ego that I had, it transformed it. It didn't k to me, it didn't kill it, it transmuted it. So I see totally see what you're saying. Like it could transform into something else or make you aware, or like you know, there's been so many journeys where it's like you know, hit me on the head like, hey, you're sabotaging your own life, okay? Like I know shit happened to you when you were a kid, but right now you are the problem, you know? And so like I guess that does give me a little hope, but also how are most of those types of people like, hey, I want to do this because I'm wanting to work on myself? Because that's like when I did a a journey, I was like, I I will whatever it shows me, I'm just don't want to feel like this anymore. So if there's something that I need to change, I'm willing to do that, where I feel like that type of personality disorder is not because it's everybody else or everything else.

SPEAKER_04: 51:57

Yeah, the awareness isn't there. So I I think I would be super impressed if there was someone with narcissistic personality disorder that had the awareness that maybe it's me, maybe there's something I'm doing, and I'm gonna go do this work. Yeah, but I think that's part of the problem that they're not willing because they don't have a problem.

SPEAKER_02: 52:20

I feel like it would take everyone in their lives either leaving them or pushing them to do something in order for them to do it. They would never do it on their own.

SPEAKER_00: 52:33

And even then, like maybe even then it's like yeah, with like addicts, it's like they gotta hit their rock bottom. Sometimes, you know, everything is.

SPEAKER_02: 52:46

I think for somebody who probably is narcissistic or has narcissistic personality disorder, like they are probably never gonna hit a rock bottom. I don't know. That that's my I'm saying that because like the the person in my life who I would say is pretty diagnosable has had two children not speak to her, one hasn't talked to her for 10 years, her own mother hasn't talked to her in 12 years, and now her other son is not talking to her, and it's like everybody is like begging you to do something or to get help. Everyone is, and you are like, I'm not the problem, not me. It's it's me, I'm the problem. My other sister-in-law is the problem, you know, everybody's the problem but her. And so it's it's it's it's frustrating because it's like everyone is trying to get you to get help. We're not we're not like even like saying you're the bad guy, but at this point, you're kind of the bad guy because you're refusing to to see that like it might be you. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know if they'll ever have that awareness. That's kind of what I feel like. I'm like, if the people in your life that you love are are walking away because they've been begging you to get help and you're not getting help, like that to me is like, yeah, I don't know if there's what more do you need for a rock bottom? Like, I don't know.

SPEAKER_04: 54:12

Yeah, well, I mean it's certainly mechanism, and that's how and then they wear it as a badge of honor sometimes.

SPEAKER_00: 54:21

So do you work with narcissists or people who have NPD? Can I ask you why?

SPEAKER_04: 54:29

Because I don't think I can help them. Like I feel like I would be setting them up for failure. I have trying to think, I probably had a client and I was getting to the point where I was gonna say, well, this isn't helping because they would come and complain about everything in their life, but they were the center of it. And when you kind of approach somebody with narcissistic personality disorder and give them the mirror, oh, they don't like that. So they're usually gonna self-select to go, or you're gonna have them go. And so that was the process because there's really no, and normally I can see it coming from a mile away. Nine times out of ten, I can see it. And it I just don't want to set people up for failure. I don't want to villainize people that have personality disorders because there's a reason they have a personality disorder, and it is a defense mechanism, but I don't think I can be help much help for and to be honest, I don't not just narcissistic personality disorder. I don't think I'm a help to most personality disorders.

SPEAKER_02: 55:38

So I never like thought about it like that. It's not really like a mental illness it that that you get, like it's not anxiety or depression that can like come and go.

SPEAKER_04: 55:48

It it really is like just well, what I always give the example of we don't diagnose people like this anymore, but like at the top line of a diagnosis, we would put all their mental health disorders. So this is your bipolar, your schizophrenia, your anxiety, your depression, like anything that can kind of get better or get worse, right? And then the second line is what we what remains stable over time. And the only two things that go on that line were mental retardation and personality disorders. So I always think of personality disorder is the same as mental retardation. They don't get better. And that's why they went on that line. Interesting. Yeah. So when I see somebody, a lot of times I'll see clients that have partners that have personality disorders and they're working hard at it. It's kind of like addiction. Like I'm like, you're working harder than the person with the problem. Yeah. Like you can't fix it. I was like, you have to either get to a point where you say, Okay, I can't fix this person. I have to accept. I either get to a place of acceptance and work on me, or you gotta go. There's really no two other ways about it.

SPEAKER_00: 56:58

Acceptance or leave. Do you work with people who acceptance or leave?

SPEAKER_02: 57:05

That's that's hard. That's hard for a lot of people. That really is.

SPEAKER_03: 57:12

Wow.

SPEAKER_02: 57:13

I know. I was like, did you hear what she just said?

SPEAKER_04: 57:17

Even forget the the personality disorder really with any of our partners. We really have to accept them for who they are and always tell people, you know, when they first when someone first starts dating and they get some red flags, I'm like, okay, would you be with them if it got 20% worse than this? They're like, oh no, this is bad enough. I'm like, okay, because it's gonna get 40% worse, just so you know. Because we all have our problems and we all have our baggage, and we really have to look at our partner and say, okay, can I accept this within you? Right. And and there's like there's baggage that I can accept, and there's baggage I can't accept, and we have to really know that about ourselves. And that's that's why we do relationships, right? To learn and grow.

SPEAKER_00: 58:03

Do you work with a lot of victims of NPD?

SPEAKER_02: 58:07

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 58:13

Yeah. Well, because it it's always it's this repeating pattern, right? Because a lot of times when we think about trauma, and always say, you know, we end up marrying one of our parents, the one parent that we couldn't, you know, get the love or how we wanted it. And I think people think, oh, we just do that because that's what we know. And that's actually not true. We do it because, you know, as kids, we have no autonomy to really do anything, fix anything. And then as adults on a subconscious level, we have autonomy. So we're like, oh, let me, you know, get into the same situation so I can actually fix it this time. Because I have power and I have control and I have autonomy. And that's why we kind of repeat the pattern, because we're trying to do it where we actually have some sort of control power. Well, we know it doesn't work, but we still learn a lot. So what I meet is someone a lot of times that had the narcissistic mother that now has the narcissistic wife. And I'm like, okay. And you know, it's like the universe will keep sending you the same daggone lesson until you learn what it is that you need to learn.

SPEAKER_02: 59:24

You're exactly right. And I would even go as far as to say, for about 15 years, my mother-in-law was one of my best friends because we were so much alike. Oh shit. I, and you know this, like I've struggled with that because I was also a victim of my circumstances. I was married to an alcoholic, so was she. Like, I was like, I played the victim. I was the people pleaser. And when I stopped doing that, and this again, this all ties back to like my first journey and like realizing like, hold the fuck up. I'm the problem. I'm the problem. Like when I stopped doing that, I was like, wait a minute, she's also a victim. And you know what I mean? Like, it's like I that's a really hard thing to say out loud, but I know I think that my husband subconsciously like married me for that same reason.

SPEAKER_04: 1:00:21

Oh, for sure.

SPEAKER_02: 1:00:23

And you never said that out loud for me. Because I don't think I've ever like hearing you say that and knowing what I knew before, because like I said, like we were so much alike. Like she would call me the daughter she wished she had, you know. I am like blown away right now because I'm like, holy fuck, he did marry his mom. Yes. Well that's a bullshit.

SPEAKER_01: 1:00:47

Like, I'm so sorry.

SPEAKER_04: 1:00:50

Look, even you know, it when I think about this, a lot of times I'll get the the people that have suffered, you know, the abuse, and I don't want to ever blame a victim, but I do want to have them recognize that it's the same coin, just opposite side of the coin. And they're attracting you and you're attracting them. And so we have to be responsible for the frequency that we're vibrating at. And so when people do this work, either somatic work or just kind of any kind of healing work, you vibrate at a different frequency. And the goal is to not attract that type of person, right? And it's great that you and your husband. Have done a lot of healing work together because you're right. The the people pleaser is always gonna attract, you know, the the addict personality, right?

SPEAKER_02: 1:01:41

That was like a really hard lesson, too, because I'm like, I have accepted this. Like I created this problem. Like I played a role in it too. Like that that was like a mind fuck in itself. And so, yeah, knowing what I went through with after having that realization, I can only imagine, like, let's say my mother-in-law does psychedelics one day and has that same realization, she's gonna have a really hard time when she realizes like she's the one who pushed everybody away, and she's the one who created the life that she has. Like, I can like I've gone through that process. I know what that feels like, and it was a really hard thing to go like you go through all this like guilt and shame, and like not that doesn't feel good. No, it doesn't feel good. I felt like an addict like getting sober for the first time. Like Have you read All the Way to the River yet?

SPEAKER_04: 1:02:42

No, what's that? You're gonna love this book. So it's that author of Eat Love Pray. Eat Pray Love, Eat Pray, Love. I actually about finished with the book. Let me see. Elizabeth Gilbert. Okay. She really talks about this, like being like almost like a love addict people pleaser herself. And like at the end, she ends up like marrying her best friend who kind of goes back into addiction. It's a it's a great, great, great story because she's such an amazing wordsmith that you'll really appreciate that book. Okay. Interesting. Love that.

SPEAKER_02: 1:03:22

Love that. Okay. What I do want to ask this. So what is something that you see show up in the body a lot when you have clients come to you with a lot of trauma? Like, what are some of the ways that it shows up without you even like having to talk to them? Like, what do you see physically?

SPEAKER_04: 1:03:43

Well, so when because it normally when I work with people, I kind of break it up in three different sections. The first thing is I teach them the nervous system regulation. Because I really want to get their body, teach them how to get into a parasympathetic state, because that'll kind of help our work. And then then I teach them how to process an emotion in their body instead of in their brain. I always tell people the only thing we should be doing in our brains is math. Everything else should be done at the level of the body. And then yes. Well, I can't even do math. So the third me either. I'm drunk. The third thing is we work to get the trapped emotions and stored or trapped emotions or trapped trauma out of their body. And I do this in a couple different ways, but the first thing I do when we're doing that kind of work is do I do Reiki. So I'll do energy work. And so this is where I'm kind of scanning the body and picking things up in the body. Now, Reiki isn't something that's, you know, woo-woo. They're doing in hospitals now. I'm like, finally, you're all catching up that we're going to do that. Oh, really? I didn't know that. Yes. I know that they it wasn't MDA Anderson. There's like some not C or side, I can't remember. There was some big article that came out that they were giving it as one of the treatment options at like one of the post world renowned hospitals. Why I can't think of it off the top of my head, but I think Norton's actually used to do it in oncology. I'm not sure if they still do. I love that. So, and it's nice too when I work with physicians and they're like, I'm all about it. Teach me all the things. But part of it is I'm scanning the body, and anybody can be taught how to do Reiki. I think people who are empathetic can pick up on energy better. I was not, I'm not an empath, but the kundalini activation did allow me to kind of feel energy.

SPEAKER_00: 1:05:32

I thought that too.

SPEAKER_04: 1:05:33

Yes. And so it's you, it's almost like you're being the conduit for the energy to come and go through you. And so when I'm scanning someone's body, whatever's happening in their body might happen in my body for a split second. So I had to really pay attention. I'm like, is that my back pain or is that their back pain? So I have to get centered before I do anything. So I realize what's going on in my body before I start on somebody else's body. But what's interesting that I pick up, and a lot of people, I pick up a lot of like blockness in the throat, which is a lot, a lot of times where people aren't speaking their truth or they haven't spoke their truth. And what it feels like is just that. It feels like something is like stuck. And but the thing, the tricky part is I don't know the difference between what's emotional and what's physical. I can I'm just picking up something. So for instance, I was working on this lady, and every time I worked on her, she had blocked energy in her throat. And the practices, I mean, I was working to try to work that out, you know, when I did Reiki, but I always tell her, I was like, okay, you need to speak your truth. You need to make sure you're standing up, especially if it's in a safe situation. She was doing everything, doing anything, and it wasn't getting it better. And usually I see it get better over time when I work with somebody and it wasn't getting better. I was like, you need to go to the doctor. And she was like, okay, she had a mass on her thyroid that that had to get surgically removed. I was like, oh my God, I'm so glad we caught that. Holy shit. If you were picking that up, yeah. Or like I had this one guy, like, there's I'm always assuming it's emotional in nature because I I guess I'm not, I don't know, that's where my brain goes. But this one guy that I was working on, I'm, I felt like this, like this dense energy, almost like no, it was more like a pressure. That's what it is, pressure. And I was like, what is going on in your pelvic area? And he had his prostate was enlarged and it was causing pressure. And so I was like, oh, okay. And so every time we did energy work, I was trying to work on his prostate area. He went back to the doctor. The doctor's like, it's shock. What are you, what are you doing? And he was like, Do you think it's this? I was like, Is are you doing anything else? Oh my God. So that kind of thing really always shocks me because the physical world is, oh, hang on. The physical stuff isn't something that is my background.

SPEAKER_00: 1:07:59

So I'm never really kind of expecting it. Do you get a lot of clients who have like a chronic condition or autoimmune disease? And with like somatic work, their symptoms tend to get better.

SPEAKER_04: 1:08:14

That is my favorite thing because what I hated working clinically in the hospitals and everything like that is no one ever got like better. There was no end. Like I love putting furniture together because like, oh my God, it's done. Like with people, there is no done, there's no fixed, especially in mental health. We don't get to check the box or like traditional physical issues. You know, you broke leg, oh, you fixed it. We don't, we don't get to do that in the mental health world. But somatic work, you do get to do that. And that's what I I love. And it is so, so incredible because when people come with autoimmune conditions and I teach them how to put their body into a parasympathetic state, that's the only time we can actually heal. And so they switch off, you know, that response that's triggering their symptoms. So people go into remission. So they get to go to their doctor and they're like, oh yeah, my rheumatoid arthritis is in complete remission. Well, that's what it does. Or I had this one therapist who she had some issues with her shoulder. And she went to every doctor. It'd been like two years, couldn't get anything fixed. We did two things. One, we saw what kind of trapped emotion she had, and it was love unreceived. And then we got her to talk to her body, and her body was saying that she was holding up the world's problems. Duh, she's a therapist, right? We worked that out of her, it was gone. And I'm just like, and this sounds like miracle stuff. And to me, it is miracle stuff because I'm like, oh, absolutely. I've never got to witness people getting better. Like, so anytime people have trapped emotions related to a physical symptom, I'm like, oh yes, let's go. Because if we can kind of release it, then the problem should, you know, in theory be gone. Like if there was this one study they did, and I can't remember if it was in The Body Keeps the Score. No, it wasn't in that. A book that I like better is When the Body Says No. That's Gabramate. That one's much better reading. I only tell therapists and educators to read when the, you know, the first book, When the Body Keeps the Score, because you're right, it's it's too much. It's too dense. Oh, yeah, it's it's too much. But there was this one study that they showed they were trying to figure out what all cancers had in common. And they could only find one thing. And what they found was repressed emotion.

SPEAKER_03: 1:10:41

Oh.

SPEAKER_04: 1:10:42

And the number one repressed emotion among all cancers was anger. So we know anger causes cancer. And I'm like, why don't we just work with the emotions of not getting trapped? And that's my goal, really, is let's let me teach you how to not get emotions trapped in your body, and then let's work out the ones that are stuck and see if you feel better or feel differently. And it, I think that's why I love my job so much now because I'm like, oh my God, I actually see people getting better when before like working in kind of the systems, you don't you don't really see a that has to be like so satisfying to see change.

SPEAKER_02: 1:11:19

It is.

SPEAKER_04: 1:11:20

And and I I don't want obviously I don't want to take a shit on the the places that like I I'd still do consulting in the behavioral health world. But when I've been in it so long, and it's really turned some to something very different, where a lot of these companies are private equity owned, and so you're just trying to make the money and you're trying to keep people in the the cycle. And I don't know if that's happening purposely. I'd like to think that it's not, but just people aren't getting better. And so now the further that I kind of move away from that, and I see people that are like doing have done the talk therapy, are doing somatic work, have included functional medicine and psychedelic medicine, we are actually curing people. And I've never I would never say that before because the best we can typically do is treat symptoms. And a lot of times with a lot of things that we're treating the symptoms, we cause other symptoms.

SPEAKER_03: 1:12:24

Right.

SPEAKER_04: 1:12:25

It's I just never thought after 27 years that we could actually cure people from things. It's wild to see. Oh, you're healing people. I know, I love it. Exactly happening. And I think the best part is I'm not doing it. They're doing it. Like I'm giving you some tools, but they're they're the ones doing it. You're gonna heal yourself. It's not gonna be a doctor, it's not gonna be a therapist, it's not gonna be any of that. You you have the ability to heal yourself.

SPEAKER_02: 1:12:51

And you're also giving them tools that they can like use long after they've seen you. Like that's another thing I love.

SPEAKER_04: 1:12:58

That's what I tell people. Like, the hardest part of this work is remembering to use the practices. If you don't use the practices, it won't work. And when I think about since I've been doing this, uh, there's only two people I feel like I haven't been able to help. And one of it, I was seeing this guy for oh, he was probably on his fourth or fifth session, and I was like, wait a minute, I said, do you feel like you can get better? And he was like, No, absolutely not. I was like, Oh, well, we're done. I was like, Because I'm not gonna heal you. I was like, people have to remember they are the placebo effect. We are the placebo effect. And so if you don't believe you can get better, you will not get better. So I'm like, I can't help you. And no one else is gonna be able to help you either. And then the other one was a doctor that kind of wanted me to do everything to her. And I'm like, yeah, that's not how this works. You're gonna put some work into it or you're not gonna get better.

SPEAKER_00: 1:13:51

So you you brought up anger earlier, and I meant to bring that, I meant to bring that up when we were talking about men, but then we, you know, whatever. But I feel like with men, they're taught to suppress, but the one emotion that they can show is anger. It's also something that I very much so relate to. I had a very angry father, and then he was an absent father, and then I grew up with a mom who I think I got her perception about men and I didn't realize it, and it was very negative, and I felt like I was somebody who was a woman who was very in her masculine. I've definitely worked on being more in my feminine and softening up, but anger has been something that I've been more comfortable showing as well. Vulnerability that is much, much harder. What I guess I don't even know if it's a question. But I feel like what something I realized is there was anger and I was more comfortable showing it, but behind it was honestly like a lot of grief and sadness. Like so much grief, but anger felt I felt more powerful and I felt it felt I felt protected if I was angry, if that makes sense.

SPEAKER_04: 1:15:23

Yeah. I I posted the other day that anger is sadness is bodyguard. I'd heard that somewhere. I was like, that's perfect. And vice versa, too, right? So well, what I think about anger is I always tell people no one's doing it correctly. Like women, we're not allowed to be angry, so we like push it down. And men, they it's like they're trying to give it away. They're like, take this. And so it's like none of us are processing it correctly. And anger is not a bad thing. Anger is actually a really good thing because a lot of times it it's what I consider a secondary emotion, right? A lot of when I'm working with people, I'm like, what's that emotion? They're like, is it anger? That's probably that's probably what happened after you were hurt or after whatever. But we shouldn't look at anger as something that's bad, it just needs to be expressed and processed correctly. But I do think you're right. We do kind of hide behind it because it's like it's this is my power.

SPEAKER_00: 1:16:24

But yeah, anger is anger's a tricky thing. What is maybe a somatic practice when someone is feeling really angry and it they want to do it in a productive way? What is a suggestion that you would offer?

SPEAKER_04: 1:16:42

My favorite anger practice, and I tell people you don't have to do it when you're angry, but it's gonna feel good when you do it when you're angry. But we probably all have some stored anger in there so you can't get it out. So I'm gonna show you what it looks like. It looks quite ridiculous. So I tell people like, it's funny because I'll I'll go and train companies on nervous system regulation. I'll train them on how to do this so they won't get burned out and leave their jobs. But I was like, if you do this, don't do it around other people. So I'm like crazy. So what we're trying to do is really move the anger out of our body so it doesn't kind of get stuck in our body. And so what I tell people to do is like sit up in a chair and like pretend like you're holding a like a weighted ball, you know, the ones that you have in the gym, and you want it to be like really heavy, so like you're pushing it out. And that's really what we're trying to do. You're trying to get it from your body to go out. So it's really heavy, but you're gonna grunt how you do this. So it looks like this. Like that. And like really, like really heavy. So it's like you're pushing something. And so I tell people to do like four or five rounds of it. Okay and then sit there and be like, is it does it feel better? Because really, the reason that you're angry, that's the story, right? Now, but if you process it in your body to process an emotion takes about 90 seconds, and so you can do anything for 90 seconds, right? Oh wow. There's a couple different ways to do this, but that's like my favorite anger practice. And what happens is if you can process something in your body, you don't go to your brain because it's like all our body's trying to do is feel safe. We did the day thing, or like complete the entire stress response. And so that's kind of what your body's doing. And so it's like, oh, okay. Now the story might still be there, but it might not have the angst around it, or like, I'm gonna fight you right now, kind of deal.

unknown: 1:18:39

Okay.

SPEAKER_02: 1:18:40

Yeah. I was telling like my daughter, I gave her like a pillow that she like screams into when she's angry because she went through a phase where she would like break things. And I I know that phase. Like I went through that as an adult. So I get that, but I'm like, we gotta teach you how to get this anger out. Like, I don't want you to feel like you can't be angry, but like we gotta figure out a way to do it where you're not breaking things or hurting people because that's never happened. So yeah, she screams into a pillow in her room.

SPEAKER_01: 1:19:13

Yeah, tell her to move something because it's like you can really like that. Yeah, I want to teach her that. I want this is for us too, just so you know like this is also for us.

SPEAKER_04: 1:19:23

Yeah, I always tell people anytime I work with adults, I'm like, no, go home and teach your kids this because nobody's gonna teach them this. And if we can teach kids emotional regulation and nervous system regulation, I don't know if there's a better thing that we can't teach them in life because they're gonna they're gonna feel better inside their body, they're gonna feel better.

SPEAKER_02: 1:19:44

And they're not learning this shit in school, so it's kind of our job to teach them all this. Although I'm teaching my kids stuff I didn't learn till I was in my late 30s, so I feel like that's like, you know.

SPEAKER_04: 1:19:54

That's right. Well, I'm I had to, you know, they have read with your kid or whatever in school. And I went and brought a book and I got to the teacher. I was like, hey, I brought this book, but I really don't want to do this. I want to teach the kids, you know, some somatic work and some meditation and stuff. And can I do that instead? And she's like, Yeah. Because I thought I'm gonna teach these kids. I'm gonna teach them.

SPEAKER_00: 1:20:15

I love that. So somebody who's scared to just feel anything, what what would you say would be one simple step in like the right direction? Who to feel anything? Because I think a lot of us are it we've become conditioned to be scared to feel.

SPEAKER_04: 1:20:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 1:20:34

Well, I think And we just do.

SPEAKER_04: 1:20:36

Yeah, yeah. I feel like we have these chopped-off bodies where we just walk around with this head and this brain and let me think about it. And if anybody is any if anybody's had anxiety, they know that their brain is usually not their friend. So, what I tell people to do is something that we call interoception. It's a perception internally. And so it's really sitting in a sensation. And you can practice even happy sensations or angry or sad. I tell people to close their eyes because it's easier to do with your eyes closed. Like if you're angry with somebody or frustrated or whatever, unless you're drought or something, don't do that. Just close your eyes and pay attention to where you feel that in your body. There's some emotions that are easier to feel in your body than others. Like, vulnerability is a good one. I had vulnerability stuck in my hand and I didn't know what it was for like two weeks. I'm like, what is this? What is this? What it took me that long to figure out what this was. So, because it kept on coming up, and I was like, in certain like difficult conversations, and I was like, is this sadness? Is this loneliness? Is this what I figured found the fairy is a vulnerability? But I do when I say sit in the sensation. So if you get excited about something, what does that feel like in your body? And try to sit in it as long as you can. So, like when I get excited about something, I feel it's like my heart has like this light coming out of it. And so I just try to sit in that sensation. Or when I when something is a no in my body, it's in my gut and I can feel it. Now, this doesn't work if people disassociate. So I am a fellow disassociator. So when I first started doing this work, a masomatic therapist was like, Where do you feel that in your body? I was like, what the fuck are you talking about? Right? I had no idea because I was so cut off from my body. And so when I have people like that that can't pick up a sensation in their body, I'd tell people when they're first starting to do this, pick up, try to pick up the easier ones. Like when you're stressed, you might feel like teness in your neck and just sit in that teness. Because what we try to do is avoid it, right? Like, oh, I'm so stressed. Let me think about how I can get out of this. But your body is just trying to say, hey, pay attention to me. And so if you acknowledge your body and say, oh, okay, neck, I see it's kind of tensing up here. You want to narrate almost what's going on physically instead of narrating things in your brain of what's going on. Like, okay, my neck is tense. Okay, now it's almost almost moving down to my shoulders. My shoulders feel like they're moving up to my ears. That's kind of what you want to do. That's the interoception part. But if you don't, if you disassociate, meaning, like a lot of times with people with trauma, they cut kind of go into this place of void when there's difficult times or just people not being in their body. You actually have to start with physical symptoms. So, like hunger, having to pee, having to poop, thirst, and have them sit in that feeling. So, like if you're hungry, okay, what does that sensation feel like? It feels like, I don't know, like things popping in my stomach and try to sit in that sensation. What that does is it builds a pathway, almost a trust back into your body. And that will build the pathway for the emotions to come up, which I didn't really believe. I was like, oh, is that really happening? Yep. Then you'll start to feel emotions in your body. And you should actually feel emotions in your body before they hit your brain. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_01: 1:24:07

I know that takes a while to notice, but interesting.

SPEAKER_00: 1:24:11

Uh, probably a lot of practice too.

SPEAKER_03: 1:24:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_02: 1:24:15

Hey, you got anything, Leah? No, I wanted to touch on the kundalini, but I know we don't have time.

SPEAKER_00: 1:24:20

That next time or in person would be like, no, we're already at an hour.

SPEAKER_02: 1:24:24

I know, like talk later in person. But here's my last question, and it's like a fun one. Do you watch Love is Blind? No. Damn it. Okay. Then never mind on that question. So this is still another fun one. To close out, if you could have the answer to any question in the world, what would you ask? If you could know the answer instantly. Like personally or like a world question? Either. Any anything.

SPEAKER_04: 1:24:52

What is the purpose of the physical world?

SPEAKER_02: 1:24:57

That's a good one. I love that. That's a good one. I need to understand that. Does anybody know? No. Next time we all do your journey to ask for a cudge.

SPEAKER_01: 1:25:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 1:25:10

Yeah.

unknown: 1:25:11

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02: 1:25:11

Go in with that uh being our intention. Amanda, thank you for for coming on here with us today. Thanks for being our first guest back. Like some people to you. Yes. But also, I kind of want to go, I want to come see you myself. Yeah, love that. And to all of our listeners, we'll put her information in the bio. Do you do Zoom or Yeah?

SPEAKER_04: 1:25:38

I have people all over the world. I prefer in person, but okay.

SPEAKER_02: 1:25:43

That's even better because we have a lot of listeners who aren't local to Louable. So yeah. So we'll put her information in the bio and the show notes and stay open, be curious. We'll see you guys on the other side.