Manders Mindset
Are you feeling stuck or stagnant in your life? Do you envision yourself living differently but have no idea how to start? The answer might lie in a shift in your mindset.
Hosted by Amanda Russo, The Breathing Goddess, who is a Breathwork Detox Facilitator, Transformative Mindset Coach, and Divorce Paralegal.
Amanda's journey into mindset and empowerment began by working with children in group homes and daycares. She later transitioned to family law, helping people navigate the challenging emotions of divorce. During this time, Amanda also overcame her own weight and health challenges through strength training, meditation, yoga, reiki, and plant medicine.
Amanda interviews guests from diverse backgrounds, including entrepreneurs, athletes, artists, and wellness experts, who share their incredible journeys of conquering fears and limiting beliefs to achieve remarkable success. Hear real people tell how shifting their mindsets—and often their words—has dramatically changed their lives.
Amanda also shares her personal journey, detailing how she transformed obstacles into opportunities by adopting a healthier, holistic lifestyle.
Discover practical strategies and inspiring stories that will empower you to break free from limitations and cultivate a mindset geared towards growth and positivity.
Tune in for a fun, friendly, and empowering experience that will help you become the best version of yourself.
Manders Mindset
Your Mind Creates Your Reality Part 1 with Em Hollis & Scott Sunderland | 122
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Manders Mindset returns with an eye-opening conversation featuring Em Hollis and Scott Sunderland, founders of The Art of Looking In. As educators, coaches, and mentors, they guide others in uncovering their true potential but their own journeys of transformation are what make their work so powerful.
Scott shares his remarkable story of overcoming complete paralysis through visualization and mindset shifts, while Em opens up about her decade-long battle with addiction and the profound inner work that led her to healing. They dive deep into how childhood experiences shape subconscious beliefs, the ways in which the mind creates reality, and the power of taking full responsibility for personal transformation.
This first part of a two part conversation is filled with raw honesty, powerful realizations, and insights that will challenge listeners to look inward and take control of their own stories.
🔹 Episode Highlights
[0:38] – Manders Mindset returns! Why taking a break can be the best way to move forward.
[1:57] – Meet Em Hollis & Scott Sunderland: Founders of The Art of Looking In.
[3:41] – Exploring identity: Who are we at our core?
[7:34] – Scott’s journey: From total paralysis to walking again through the power of the mind.
[20:18] – The mind-body connection and how beliefs shape physical reality.
[30:37] – Em’s battle with addiction and the mindset shift that changed everything.
[43:57] – The life-changing retreat that brought Em and Scott together.
[53:55] – Why real transformation requires stepping into the unknown.
Whether you're facing health challenges, addiction, relationship difficulties, or simply feeling stuck in old patterns, this episode offers both practical wisdom and profound hope. As Scott beautifully states in his closing words: "Whatever you're looking for...happiness, healing, transformation, it exists for you. So go find it."
Listen to Em Hollis's Guest Appearance on Breathwork Magic!
To Connect with Amanda:
~ linktree.com/thebreathinggoddess
~ Instagram @thebreathinggoddess
Follow & Support the Podcast:
~ Instagram: @MandersMindset
~ Join the Manders Mindset Facebook Community HERE!
~ Explore Amanda’s NEW podcast: Breathwork Magic (Available on all major platforms or you can listen on Apple)
To Connect with Em & Scott:
~ Youtube
~ https://theartoflookingin.com/
Welcome to the Manders Mindset Podcast. Here you'll find both monologue and interviews of entrepreneurs, coaches, healers and a variety of other people when your host, Amanda Russo, will discuss her own mindset and perspective and her guest's mindset and perspective on the world around us. Manders and her guests will help explain to you how shifting your mindset will shift your life will help explain to you how shifting your mindset will shift your life.
Speaker 2:Welcome back to Mander's Mindset. We're back. We're back. I'm so excited. Welcome back to Mander's Mindset. Thank you so much for joining me.
Speaker 2:I took a little break in February so I could go inward and shift my own mindset. I am so excited to be back for more incredible conversations, more amazing guests that will help you look at the world a little differently and, honestly, that has been my biggest reason and intention of Mander's Mindset since the get-go is to help you get a little gem from something that either I say or one of the guests says. To look at the world a little differently. If you've missed Mander's Mindset, trust me, I've missed you guys too. Me, I've missed you guys too. But this pause gave me time to reset, refocus and come back with even more of a powerful mindset to help you guys shift and transform your own mindset and your own life, and today's guests are perfect way to kick that off. So today I am joined with M Hollis and Scott Sunderland, and they help people remember who they truly are at the core and understand what they're capable of.
Speaker 2:This is a two-part conversation that I am releasing. Scott and I sat down and recorded a pretty long, almost two-hour episode. I split it up and in part one of this two-part conversation, we dive pretty deep into their personal journeys and the profound mindset shifts that changed both of their lives. Now this episode is filled with raw honesty and powerful realizations, and so many moments that will make you pause, take a step back and reflect. So if you're feeling stuck, searching for clarity, or maybe you just need a reminder of the power you hold within, inside of you, then this episode is for you. Now let's dive in.
Speaker 2:Welcome back to Mando's Mindset, where we explore the power of shifting your mindset to shift your life. I'm your host, amanda Russo, and I am so excited. Today I am joined by M Hollis and Scott Sunderland. They are the founders of the Art of Looking In. They're educators, coaches and mentors in the field of self-help, healing, transformation and personal growth. Through their own trials, tribulations and transformations, they have found their deep desire and passion to ultimately help individuals remember who they really are and what they are truly capable of. You also may have heard me speak with Em on Breathwork Magic, and we are going to delve deeper down both of their journeys today. Thank you so much for joining me. Thank you for having us.
Speaker 2:Of course. So that's an awesome bio, but who would you guys say you are at the core? That's typically what I always start asking with Scott, if you want to go first and tell me who you'd say you are at the core.
Speaker 3:Wow. Well, I've been working on that for 59 years, so I should have an answer. I think I'm still. You know, I think that's kind of all our journey is to find out what we really are Right, and that's really what we love to speak about is we say it all the time? You know who you really are, and there's been so many leaders, thought leaders that you know it's about finding separating the ego from the soul or the spirit, and I think we are in that process in our culture, humanity now trying to really understand what that means and who we really are. So for me, it's really understanding that I've probably done this one or five million times living in a human body and understanding that I'm not all these thoughts that run through my head on a daily basis, and I'm getting it. It's a work in progress though, but I'm definitely getting it.
Speaker 4:Tell them, share a little bit about your. You know what brought you to today, who you are.
Speaker 3:What brought me here?
Speaker 4:A little bit about your upbringing.
Speaker 3:So I I mean, I never thought my childhood was hard, bad, whatever my mom she was, you know, a single parent and lived with her and she had a drinking problem and some other problems. She was definitely suffering, and so it was a very solitary, I guess you could say, upbringing. But in that I found a lot of strength because I was in charge of my life at three years old, which is, you know, great when you want to eat what you want to eat, which consisted of frozen hot dogs. I love frozen hot dogs. So that was kind of the first. It kind of gave me this view of myself because I did everything for myself and played on my own, didn't really have many friends, anything like that, but it gave me this power, this strength, and that really launched me into my life of being an entrepreneur and starting a construction business when I was 19.
Speaker 3:Went through a lot of learning in that, a lot of success in that, a lot of failure in that. And then I guess the big one for me was I think I was about 32, 35, something like that, and I contracted an autoimmune disease and I became completely paralyzed, 100% paralyzed. My mind was the same mind that I was before, it was just in a body that just would not respond at all. And you know, face, the fear, face of would I be able to walk again? That really was probably one of the greatest lessons that I ever went through experienced, because it really kind of forced me to look in. And I remember one night I was laying there and I kind of woke up it was probably middle of night and I swore there was this voice that said what if everything that you see out there is actually just inside your mind and your eyes are not looking out of your head, they're looking back inside your mind? And it totally flipped everything for me. And it that what that did for me? It gave me this power of what if I am creating everything out there, but I think it's out there when it's really in here.
Speaker 3:And Deepak I was a big fan of Deepak Chopra and Dr Wayne Dyer and they would kind of Deepak would definitely talk about that and that kind of became the training ground of well, if maybe I can fix my body, maybe I can, you know, repicture myself. So I would literally just stare a picture on the wall of who I once was and say, okay, so can you recreate that, can you get your legs to move again, can you learn to talk again, can you feed yourself again, can you do all the things that you used to do and took for granted. Well, now you kind of wish you had it, so can you get there again? And obviously it worked, whatever I did. So I guess that maybe answers that question, I guess.
Speaker 2:Em, who would you say? You are at the core.
Speaker 4:That is such a deep question, Very deep. Who I am at my core. Well, I think, like he said, there's the personality, Em, and then there's, you know, whatever we all are beyond that, I think, if we're talking the identity of M Emily, you know, like him, my parents were worse when I was young and so I moved, my dad and I moved across the state and all my siblings lived with my mom and so I was alone there, same as him. So I think you can relate Amanda as being an only child. Sometimes, when you're growing up like that, it does require you to find a certain strength in yourself because you're by yourself and so you don't have. You know, when I would go see my mom I would be with my siblings and I loved it. I hated being alone and that's what drove. I think, as we now know and teach people, that's what drove.
Speaker 4:A lot of my life was that fear of being alone, because I was when I was little and it was terrifying and I hated it. But it also gave me strength until my dad and my stepmom and I had a brother and that was amazing because then I wasn't alone anymore. But that core wound of being alone sort of drove a lot of my life moving forward and you know, at 15 and 16, I think that feeling alone manifested into not really feeling like a part of culture. I had lots of friends in junior high and high school. As we all know, junior high and high school are the worst years anyway. They suck, they're hard, You're going through all sorts of emotional stuff. So on top of that, you know, I had all this sort of what some would call trauma from my childhood and that manifested. As you know, I had lots of friends, People would say I was popular, and yet I still didn't feel like I fit in with it. I still felt like I was in the outside looking in, even though I was in, and that ended up putting me the first time. I attempted suicide twice, once at 15, once at 16. No-transcript were things that we now teach.
Speaker 4:As far as personal empowerment, not being a victim, all of these deep concepts I learned down there and when I came back from that it did fundamentally shift my life and I ended up going back and meeting my first husband, had my first son, and then we were just babies. We were 19 when we got married and so obviously that wasn't. It didn't last for too long. And then I met my second husband. We were married for 10 years, second husband, we were married for 10 years.
Speaker 4:And that was another stage in my life that I was like, okay, I'm going to fit in with everyone, I'm going to do what everyone says I'm supposed to do to be happy, which is have a family, have kids, do all that and then you'll feel satisfied, You'll feel happy. But I wasn't. I didn't. I felt almost depressed and I just couldn't. I knew there was more to life, but I didn't know that I could do it or how to get there. And eventually you know they say the saying, when the student's ready, the teacher appears and ended up finding a book by a man named Dr Joe Dispenza. And that was really the tipping point to my you can call awakening, and that opened the door to Scott and I's life eight years later. To answer your question, at my core, I think I've always been a seeker. I've always been a seeker somebody that's looking for more deeper meaning, deeper fulfillment.
Speaker 4:I'm not a superficial, surface level person. I want to go deep on things. So if I could say anything, that's probably who I would say. I am at my core.
Speaker 2:Our question is so how old were you when your parents got divorced? I was two, okay.
Speaker 4:And that was 1984. Not a lot of parents were divorced. You know then, Okay, and that was 1984. Not a lot of parents were divorced. You know then, yeah, there was two, right, yeah?
Speaker 3:mine was pretty Two kind of crazy yeah, and it was in 1984. It was in 1984.
Speaker 2:Now, Scott, were you an only child as well. You mentored your mom. I have a brother and a sister.
Speaker 3:They were older so they were in school and stuff like that. But again, you know, it's I don't know. I never really looked at it as it was. This, you know, bad childhood or anything like that. I really didn't until I was much, much older, in my teens, when I would tell the story of how I grew up and people would be like, oh, oh, my God, you were like neglected and I'm like, oh, okay, but I didn't really. I didn't really feel that way. I felt kind of like I had the best childhood in the way. I miss my mom, you know. I definitely missed her and she was in a lot of pain. So I understood, you know where she was and she, I mean she completely flipped her life around and became just an absolutely amazing person. Very spiritual she was. I guess you would call her like, what would you call her? Like? It's not really a psychologist. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I guess a psychologist, A very spiritual psychologist and a huge, you know, inspiration, I think, for a lot of people, and you know.
Speaker 2:But you said, you fended for yourself a lot.
Speaker 3:I was probably around three and my brother and sister would go to school and, you know, sometimes I'd you know whether I put myself outside or my mom put me outside. I would find myself sitting outside waiting for my brother to get home, to get me back in the house. But I was. I had food. You know what I mean. I learned very early on to kind of feed myself and again, when you feed yourself you eat what you want, right so? But I learned to. Really, I guess self-soothe would be the right word, but it's still.
Speaker 3:There's a mark, a very deep trench in your brain and it can take a lifetime to overcome and most don't overcome it at all. They just become a victim. They could create a victim mentality around that wound. So if you're left alone and it could have been one day, you know what I mean when you sat in your crib and you cried and cried and nobody came that can literally leave that wound and it's kind of like a scar that never heals, a cut that never heals.
Speaker 3:And you know, a lot of times I think in our history it was like all right, just get over that and move past it. Where I think in today, you know it goes to the other side of the meter of, oh my God, what happened to you? And you are a victim then and we're looking for middle of the road. We want to be yes, this happened to you. It's not your parents' fault, because your parents probably happened the same to them, so don't go blaming them. Let's just look at this, let's face it, let's find out what the emotion is behind it, and then how do we move forward, using that as a strength and not a weakness. And it's been very effective individually for our lives, you know, together, working together on that and being able to help a lot of people really attack it in that way, to not be afraid to open up that wound of fear or neglect or, you know, just being alone, you know, because it can have such a cause and effect in your later life.
Speaker 2:It's so true, they those zero to seven that age range is like, and it can be something so small, even like you mentioned, a one-time thing, you know it doesn't have to be so small, even like you mentioned a one-time thing.
Speaker 3:You know it doesn't have to be big. We worked with this one guy and I'll never forget we have a community call every week and he got on it and he had his hand up and he wanted to share this thing. He goes. I have to share what happened to me. He said that my girlfriend was in the kitchen and she was trying to cook potatoes in the oven and something happened. And she said can you get these out of the oven? And he said I don't know where this voice came from. He said but I just screamed at her what is wrong with you and why can't you take care of that yourself?
Speaker 4:You stupid girl.
Speaker 3:You stupid girl. And he was just like I, really sweet, quiet guy. But he said I was shocked. And he said, right after I said it, I remembered my father. My brother and I were outside and my father was teaching my brother how to use a chainsaw. They were really young, really young, like single digit young. I kept asking my father this question over and over again about something I was dealing with and he's worried, I'm sure, about, you know, my brother cutting his leg off. So we turned around and he called him by his name and he said just shut up, like you know, and stupid, stupid boy, just quiet. And you can understand the reaction of the father because, again, trying to save limbs, literally. And he said it all made sense in that moment I was just.
Speaker 3:All these years I have just been repeating that in my mind, but not calling my girlfriend a stupid girl, calling myself a stupid boy, and that's why it literally can take one sentence, usually out of a parent sometimes teachers, guardians, right, but mostly parents that leave that little sentence for you to use to create your reality every day, your perception, every single day. And when we uncover it, at first it hurts, but then we can see underneath it and we can say oh see, this is the thing that's been in my way all these years. This is why I was never able to start a business, because I kept thinking I was a stupid boy. This is why I didn't do well in school. Because I was a stupid boy. This is why I didn't pick the friends that I wanted to hang out with, because I was just a stupid boy. And then that's the moment that it's a magical moment when you watch somebody get it.
Speaker 3:They don't just get it, they get it, they don't just get it, they get it. Like the house of cards crashes down and you see, through your life, the whole life you've been living, has been based off of one single sentence, and it can transform everything. When you want to cover that, it really gives you that freedom to then see way more than you ever were.
Speaker 2:That's insane, that story. I want to transition a tad. Scott, you mentioned developing an autoimmune disease. I think you said around 30-something. Can you elaborate on that? How did you discover that?
Speaker 3:I started my construction company and I was getting. I was pretty successful. I was doing really well. I would build retail stores and I was getting. I was pretty successful, I was doing really well. I would build retail stores and I was. You know. More stores, more money. I was really working myself to death and I love to. I was the guy who never said no. So when people asked, I said sure I'll do it. So when people asked, I said sure I'll do it. And it got to a point where I had so much work and I was so far behind that the phone calls started coming. I started to kind of fail on my job sites and for somebody who was a people pleaser, it was devastating because I had failed people and they trusted me and I let them down.
Speaker 3:I remember still working and all I can remember because I was away from home. I was on the road working in Maryland and all I kept thinking is I just want all this to go away, I just want to go home, I just want to lay in bed and I want all of this to go away. And literally probably four months from that moment, there I was laying in a bed. So in a way. I knew that I created this autoimmune disease. That said, ok, no problem, you want to go home, you want to go to bed, you want all this to go away, no problem. Well, but it won't be home, it'll be a hospital. And I knew I created it. And that was the magic for me, because I knew that I did this, so I looked at it as kind of as much as I could. Obviously, when you can't move your body and people don't have answers for you, it's pretty scary.
Speaker 4:How quickly did it happen?
Speaker 3:So it originally happened probably, for the first onset was probably three days to where I really I was dizzy, I had trouble moving and then, probably in the next few days from that, I was pretty much in a bed. And then they said the harder you work, the faster you'll recover. Well, you don't say that to me, because I'm going to work really hard and I work myself into exhaustion. And how they worked me. I would just sit on that like a little hand bike and I would sit in a wheelchair but at a desk and I would have them strap my hands to this bike and I would just pedal it with my hands for hours and it just it wore my body out and then it was just complete shutdown at that point. And then so I knew I created it. And again I knew that if I create this, I can uncreate this and I can create better. I can be better than I was. I'll learn, I'll do all the things. But you know when this took about a year and I was in the hospital about four months and you go in the up and down. Some days it's OK, other days you are in such a depression that no one know how nothing is going to get you out of it, because you just don't even, you don't even want to see yourself. I mean, I really did not look in a mirror for probably four months because I was terrified too, and they didn't want me to either. You know my doctors. They didn't want me to. So I know that now we can't. We do create our own perceptions, realities, whatever you want to call them, which means we create our own health and we can create our own, our own, yeah, our own diseases, our own. You know, it's really funny working with people and to see people that have gone through you know cancer and all that and kind of seeing through it, like, and then explaining to them maybe this is why this happened for you, and then having a different perspective on it kind of opens up their eyes. And we just had a call with a woman who she's going through it right now and we've been working with her for probably four years and I've never seen anybody with going in for bone marrow cancer as glowing as this woman is and she's such an inspiration. When she wasn't at all, she was scared to death a year ago and now here she is with this. You know, I guess you could call some people would say, yeah, it could be a terminal illness and she's like living this incredible life. You, it's really crazy.
Speaker 3:But I went through it for a reason, didn't know why. I took it as a break and all I really wanted to do is be able to walk again. Suddenly, I didn't care about the money, I didn't care about the reputation, I wanted to walk and that was it. And I would watch people walk in my room and I'd be like how are you doing that? How was I able to do that months ago? And now I can't do that. I look at my body and it says nope, what is the difference between me and you, and me here and me five months ago? I mean, I just had and I knew it was something here and I just said, okay, it happened and I will walk again.
Speaker 3:And that became the. You know, that became the mission focus, that. And I would just stare at this picture of me standing on a mountain at on a ski trip and just live that day. Live that picture Every single minute of every day. I just sat there and stared at it, closed my eyes and I would just be there in it, feeling the wind, feeling the sun, hearing the people all of it, and I don't know, it's probably yeah. 10 years later, something like that, I stood on that same mountain with my son, you know, and it was like, oh my god, I made it wow, you almost like visualized that totally did totally yep, wow, yeah wow, I never forget that.
Speaker 3:I didn't even realize it, that. You know it was my son's. I think it was his 16th birthday, so it was yeah, it was almost 15 years, because he was a year and a half old when I was in the hospital and I was taking him and I said, if we're going skiing, we're going to Alta and this is where this picture was from and Alta's in Utah. And when I got on the lift I realized, oh my God, I'm going there, I'm going to be in this, in the moment where this picture was taken, that I. That changed my life, by the way, this picture completely changed my life.
Speaker 3:And when I was going on the lift, my son it was four, a four chair and my son was on the other side, you know, on the end, and I'm on the end and I am getting very emotional, and then the tears come and this woman next to me says are you okay? And of course, I tell her the story. By the time we get to the top, the three of us are bawling and my son's like Dad, come on. And she's the woman I was talking to. She's yelling at my son. You have any idea what your father's gone through, get over there.
Speaker 3:We're taking this picture and he's just like whoa, what's happening here, you know and yeah, it's kind of like it was again what the human spirit can do, right, what the human spirit can go through, can endure, and what it can overcome, and it's just not my story. It's so many stories, right, and we just don't, sometimes, we just don't choose to look at those stories because maybe we want to be the victim, maybe it feels better when we are, you know, I guess, less than what we are capable of. I just, you know, I just choose, and there's been plenty of days where I like to be the victim. I mean, I'm no, you know, I trust me, I can play that part too.
Speaker 2:So yeah, no. So, post getting out of the hospital, what did life look like for you?
Speaker 3:I was just. I was angry that it happened, but I was grateful that I was walking and I didn't understand why I had to go through it. So I guess you know you're angry at your creator, whatever your creator is of why did you do that to me? And you know, I think that lasted a long time for me, probably a good maybe five, 10 years of really. You know why me, you know, and I think even today there's still a little bit of that in me, but I've been given the glimpses of it happened because you could handle it and to show you how, maybe, how strong you are, maybe to help somebody else move through what they're currently going through, or maybe to help yourself.
Speaker 3:You know, 15 years from now, when something awful happens. You know, didn't really know there's no, that voice wasn't loud enough for me to hear. You know, didn't really know that voice wasn't loud enough for me to hear. So now I'm just incredibly grateful for the simplest things and still complain, still complain about you know why is there no snow in Towson, new Mexico, and Florida's getting four or five inches, but we have none. Like why are you torturing me again?
Speaker 2:right, we forgot yeah, no, I get it. No, I. I want to transition a tad now. Um, you mentioned you, you got married and you had kids, and you were checking the boxes, basically, but realized you weren't happy with that. How'd you come to that realization?
Speaker 4:I probably knew that. I probably knew that very early on. We all know it, know that voice that's like really quiet, that says something's off about this. But I didn't listen, as most of us do, and when I met my then husband, I was going to school. I had my son. At that point he was four and it was one of those relationships that it's very fiery in the beginning, which should have been a red flag. That's what the rest of the marriage will be like.
Speaker 4:But it wasn't just because I was at a place in my life that maybe was seeking somebody else to fulfill me. It was like 23, 24. And we decided I can look back now and go. I know for sure why I went through some really hard 10 years of my life in that life and in that marriage and as that version of myself. But for sure I know that had to happen, firstly to have my daughter and secondly to lead me to where I am now and to lead me to that point that I was at right before I read that book and really I think what catapulted me is I had, I was going to school when I met my ex-husband. I was going to college and I was working and I had my son, and so it was a lot of stress, as it would be.
Speaker 4:And a friend said hey, if you take this pill, it helps you, like, deal with things better, like you, you'll be able to get school done, you'll be. And it was a hydrocodone, actually an opiate, a pain pill, and I had never, I hadn't gotten any surgeries or anything at that point, so I didn't know. But what it did was I got high on on the pain pills and I was able to do all of these things. For me it was sort of like this energy Also on top of the energy. It helped me to avoid all my stuff that was under the surface. I'd been under the surface for a long time and so that started my pain pill addiction at that point and it wasn't like a massive part of my life until I met my ex-husband and then, very quickly into our relationship, my addiction to those overtook my life and nobody knew about it. You know I was a functioning addict because you know, at that point I was physically addicted, so I had to keep up. We had, I had my daughter very early on in our marriage and he had a son, so we had three kids between us. And and that just got worse Our marriage was really unhealthy and dysfunctional, especially, you know, the first five years, and it was in a loving environment, so to speak.
Speaker 4:And finally, at some point, probably about seven, seven years into it, I went I can't, like I can't keep this up, I can't. My every waking moment is thinking about how do I make sure I have enough pain pills just to get through my day. And at that point, you know, I was taking like 10, 10, 10, 10 hydrocodone at a time just to function. That wasn't even like to feel whatever anymore, that was just like I need and I knew I could not keep that up. And I was ready to go to rehab Like I was just ready to do whatever.
Speaker 4:And my husband ended up finding this doctor and they put me on what's called Suboxone, which it's supposed to help you get off of opiates. It's like an opiate blocker but it's sort of like switching to an electronic cigarette if you're smoking. It's not really getting rid of the addiction. And I knew when I switched that, you know, I knew I'd known the whole time something was off. I knew like this just is not what I'm supposed to be living, this is not the life I'm supposed to be living and it just it got that feeling, got worse and worse and worse and finally, towards the end, I had this thought, for some reason, I don't know where it came from I wasn't in at that point to the personal development space or mindset space or spiritual space. I didn't know any of that.
Speaker 4:But for some reason I knew if I don't do something different, I'm going to get sick like cancer sick, like I can't keep this life up. I'm, you know, my marriage is a mess. I'm unhappy, I'm, I feel like this isn't my life. And my mom ended up moving to where I was living. At the time Kellogg and her and I were really close and I think her moving to Kellogg sort of gave me that sense of support that I needed to go. I have to do something different. This isn't working. And when I read that book it resonated so much and that's what opened the door to self-help and personal development. And you know all of that and you know, over the course of the next year I really could see why and how the life and the marriage reflected all of my stuff for my first seven years and, you know, really just started doing the inner work and it changed everything.
Speaker 2:Wow, that's now in terms of the pain pills. How long take you to fully stop them One day?
Speaker 4:Okay, yeah. So we went after I picked up that book and I started doing a lot of inner work on myself, so a lot of journaling, a lot of meditation. At the time I was doing a lot of Dr Joda Spence's meditation, and so I was really and my mom was doing it at the same time so I had her as a support. I would go to her house and we'd talk about it, like, ok, what are these feelings we're feeling every day? And you know, so I had like somebody that I could really do that with. And as, over the course of that, that inner work was not to quit the pain pills, it was to live a happy life, you know, just to feel like I knew that there was supposed to be more to life. Like some people are, like they're totally, they feel good, like working the nine to five, and you know the mom that her whole life is her kids. And, like you know, I had a side, we had a side business, I was working full time and it just wasn't like this, doesn't it does? It feels like there should be more, like I feel like I should feel happy on a day-to-day basis. But I also knew I was numbing myself with the pain pills too, and I knew that marriage was a reflection of that and not healthy. But I was too afraid to leave. I was too afraid of what people would think of me as a people pleaser. And so over the course of that year and doing that work every single day, we I ended up going to a at the time what was called an advanced meditation retreat led by Dr Jodis Benza, and at that retreats actually where we met for the first time I ended up having a very deep spiritual experience. And what had happened in that year was I noticed I didn't need to take as many pain pills throughout the day to feel okay. It was like a side effect of the work I was doing. I was like whoa, and it was to the point when I went to that retreat I was barely taking any during the day at all. So I knew, like how he says I know it was up here. I knew it was up here because I'm like it's so small that I know in my mind like I could stop that. And so when I went to the retreat and I had, you know, a very what changed my life from that moment on after that experience there and I came home literally that day.
Speaker 4:From that moment on, after that experience there, and I came home literally that day from that workshop, I left my marriage that night, went and stayed with my mom. I knew that was the first thing that I had to do and a few days into that I had stopped completely for a couple of days. But then the physical withdrawal started to set in which I wasn't necessarily prepared for, and then I had to make a decision. I had to decide okay, I can just like sort of wean myself off of this. That's what a lot of people were recommending. But I'm a very stubborn person and I knew like, if I am going to fundamentally shift my life and create a life I want to live, I can't take this with me. There's no way that this can exist in my reality.
Speaker 4:And I made that decision in the afternoon on a Tuesday and I went through about 48 hours of one of the most horrid things you can ever imagine is detoxing physical detoxing from opiates. It was hell and I just held on to. I know this will pass. I know this will pass. And a lot of people said you know physical withdrawal because I'd been an addict for 10 years, so it had been in my system for 10 years. A lot of people said, oh, it'll be months before you feel normal, like be careful because you get suicidal. And I didn't have any of that. After seven days I felt completely normal.
Speaker 2:Wow, and now this meditation retreat. How long after, after the this pain pill incident then, did you go on this retreat Like what's the time?
Speaker 4:difference. So I went to the retreat and then I came home and it was probably about four days after I came home from that that I decided to cold turkey myself quit. So it was right. After that and I always say for anyone listening to this who maybe has struggled with addiction or is trying to get off of addiction, I don't recommend that everybody do that Like I recommend that you listen to your own inner guidance when it comes to that.
Speaker 4:Many people told me don't cold turkey like that, because it can be dangerous. But I knew I had a strong enough will and mindset that I could do it and I knew because of the profound experience I had at that retreat, I knew that I could do it and I knew because of the profound experience I had at that retreat, I knew that I could do that and I did and I, like I said, the first 48 hours was hell, but because I number one, I didn't listen to what people were saying about, like they would try to tell me that and I would just say, no, I'm not going to listen. I did some things to support my body, like supplements, and obviously I slept a lot. But I don't recommend everybody do that, but for me it was I knew the right thing to do for me, yeah.
Speaker 2:No, you said listening to their body. Yes, yeah, yeah, no. You also mentioned you took some type of pill. I think you said suboxone. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4:So did that help you? No, no. So I was on opiates pain pills for about eight years the first eight years of my marriage and then that's when I was like I've got it, I can't do this anymore. I was going to go to rehab but they ended up. We found a doctor that prescribed Suboxone in place of the opiates and so I was on the Suboxone for about two years. So that's what I quit cold Turkey that you know. It was two years later that I went to the workshop and did the work and then stopped that. Like I said, if you go look up Suboxone, it is supposed to help people get off of heroin, even opiates. In my experience it's not dealing with the problem. You know it may help sort of wean, if that's what you want. I wasn't using it to wean, I was just using it as a replacement. It felt better because, I don't know, it felt more acceptable, but it wasn't.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's kind of just like, is no? Is there any like? I don't know what suboxone is like. Is there like it inside of it? Like?
Speaker 4:So suboxone is just. You know they give it to. Like I said, it's legal. Obviously Doctors give it to people who, number one, are trying to get off opiate addiction, pain pill addiction, a lot of people who are addicted to heroin. They'll give it to. And what it chemically is, they say, is an opiate blocker. So it makes it so that if you're taking it and you take, let's say, a hydrocodone, you can't get high from the hydrocodone. It blocks it. However, you still get the high from the Suboxone. So, like I said, it's sort of like somebody who's trying to quit smoking cigarettes and then they replace it with an electronic cigarette. Is it better, maybe, but you're still not getting rid of the addiction. Yeah, okay For watching.
Speaker 4:I mean, I don't want to again. This is my own journey. Other people may be watching this and maybe they are. I know people who are taking Suboxone and it is helping them sort of create that space away from it. But ultimately you're going to have to stop that too and that's going to be hell. You know, there's no way around it. There's absolutely no way around it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. So now you both go to this advanced meditation retreat. Scott, you went to that one right as well. That's where you guys met, Okay.
Speaker 3:I was a volunteer there.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay, so like you must have knew about that, if you volunteered, was that like your second time going?
Speaker 3:It might have been my, maybe my fourth, maybe my fifth.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 3:Because when I, so I, if anybody have seen it, what the bleep do? We know it was, I don't even know what do you call it. What do you call that movie? Movie documentary, slash, whatever? Yeah, but it was 2006, maybe.
Speaker 4:It was sort of like, wasn't it around the same era of the Secret yeah, like the same and that stuff started coming Way deeper.
Speaker 3:Yeah, way deeper. And I remember seeing that and you know, knowing this stuff, because I experienced it firsthand. And you know this guy, you know it had a whole bunch of people in there, you know thought leaders, you know, you know it had a whole bunch of people in there, you know thought leaders, you know. And this guy, you know Dr Joe Dispenza, and he was.
Speaker 3:He went through kind of similar what I went through. He was hit by a car and um, and he said I'm going to rewire, I'm going to fix my back and to walk again. And he did. And I'm like I, this guy's like me, so I started listening to him. I, this guy's like me, so I started listening to him every day. I would, you know, drive to my jobs for work, I would you know, go check on my jobs and stuff, and I would just play whatever he had out all the time, on cassettes I will age myself and CDs, and and I just knew, you know, and then finally he came to Philly for a day. He was coming to Philly and I went to see him with a friend and then he was coming.
Speaker 3:Oh, he was coming for a three-day workshop in Philly after the one day and I had said to my wife at the time I was like, and I had said to my wife at the time I was like, oh, this Joe Dispenza is coming, do you want to go? And she goes. Let me get back to you on that. Two weeks go by, do you want to go or not? Because I'm signing up, Because my friend already signed up and she's like, oh, don't worry, just go ahead, I'm not going to go. And I went to sign up and it was sold out, just go ahead, I'm not going to go.
Speaker 3:And I went to sign up and it was sold out and I'm like, I was really angry, you know, because I'm like you know, I've been listening to this guy for two years now and he's coming to Philly and I want to go to this workshop. I just went to this one day and now, so long story short, somehow I get in and very long story but fabulous story. But I get in and I go and I just the whole three days just bawled my eyes out, just bawled my eyes out and I don't know touch something inside me, opened my heart, I guess you could say, and I'm like man, I got to do this again. So I went again and I went to one in Mexico and that blew the doors off of everything of who. Scott Sunderland was all of it and I was free. I was absolutely free. I was free.
Speaker 3:I had a lot of survivor's guilt. I was involved in 2012 in a tragedy that it left a big scar, the same things. I guess you could say that you know being paralyzed, kind of. You know the cause and effect of that led to this and it was live or die time and I kind of knew that. I just was really, but it's all hidden underneath the clothes. You know what I mean, you, but I'm the owner of this you know construction company that's successful. People need me, you know, whatever. But underneath all that you're very hollow and very empty. And you know, by going to that it shifted me dramatically. And when I came home from that, you know, I suddenly the person that I knew I wasn't anymore. So the person my, my wife knew at the time definitely wasn't who I was. So she didn't like it and I said, you know, I want to go to this one and I'm just going to sign up for a, you know, to be a volunteer and if I get accepted I go, if I don't get accepted I won't. And I got accepted so I went. And after that, you know, I knew I was not the same person and when I went home I knew it was time I had to go.
Speaker 3:And you know, I think we're all faced with these moments that can either change your life or keep your life Right, and that can be whether it's an addiction, you know, because if you're an addict, you're trying to escape something and maybe it's those feelings we talked about earlier, you know, those original child wounds. Maybe that is what you're trying to cover up. But I promise you, in doing what we do and because we've went through it, you know some people are a little slow learners. They have to go through it a few times. But you know, when you've kind of altered that and you know can be a stored for somebody else to, when they're ready to say, okay, this isn't working and it's not. You know, anything in my life I need to change, it's me that needs to change.
Speaker 3:I really do believe that's the awakening of greatness. It really truly is. And you know it may not look very sexy, you know, and it may be really scary because you're afraid of what people are going to think or say or do. But when you take full ownership of who you have been and then also the full ownership of I want to be this, and I think that's a perfect, you know, a perfect explanation for him of what she went through because, knowing her, like you know she says she's stubborn it's not really as stubborn as I don't even know what.
Speaker 3:It's just a drive that. No, this is my life and this is the direction I'm going and this is what my action is now is a cause of that. Like that's what matters. It's this is where I need something is telling me I need to go in this direction. I'm going to listen to it and I'm going to follow it and whatever happens over here happens. That's. She's brilliant at that and very and I've, you know, look at that, as you know, a huge strength for me to look to right, because it is, it's very, it's pretty amazing. It is, it's very, it's pretty amazing. But I think, when we've seen it more and more, you know in in the last years of you know, you hear people waking up or you know, oh, I'm awake, I'm awakened now, or whatever. You know it's not easy. I mean it's it's not like I'm just going to cross over the state line and suddenly I'm awakened. You know.
Speaker 4:Your rainbows and butterflies and unicorns and everything's beautiful and lovely all the time.
Speaker 3:No, it's not like that. I mean you have moments, you have these amazing moments and I think they are really the kind of the guidepost, of the lighthouse to keep coming this way. You know we're a big. We listen to Abraham Hicks, which we listen to everybody but Abraham Hicks has been, you know, pretty instrumental in our journey as well, as you know Dr Joe, and you know Fred Allen Wolf and Deepak Chopra and all these great leaders and Tony Robbins, right. So I mean I was listening to Tony Robbins when I was 20.
Speaker 3:So I think you know hard things make really strong people, and you know it takes a lot of guts to get on that field and play that game, knowing that you may not be the best, but at least I'm playing it. And I'm not up in the bleachers yelling at the people on the field saying you did that wrong. At least I got on the field. And when I see people do that, man, my heart goes out to them. But I'm the one who's cheering behind them saying you can do this. You just you got to stack and you got to fight and the result is absolutely amazing because what shows up for you when you step into that ring and you trust that voice that you know many people pray to. Whatever you call it God, whatever it is, when you listen to it and you let it guide you, that's when magic can happen. And it's not this voice in our head, like potato Joe knows screaming you, stupid girl, right.
Speaker 4:Yeah, when you realize that, yeah, I'm in control of my life, I'm in charge of my life, and that was that moment for me deciding I am not taking one more pill ever again. And that's why I say I don't recommend that to everybody, because not everybody's in that place and ready and they need to support whatever that voice is for them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you have to be ready.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I think the thing that made you ready honestly, was, once you go, when you're in this, you know workshop for four days or whatever. It's a whole new energy you've never felt before.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So it's I've been on the field temporarily, I need to get back on that field, and if that means I have to leave these pills out here, then I'm getting on the field and the pills can, and the pills can stay out there, right For sure. So it's like I know I hit the ball, I've got. I got a double.
Speaker 4:Something major happens to me at that workshop. So I, you know that sort of catapulted me Once you know that sort of catapulted me.
Speaker 3:Once you know you can hit the ball, then man, then you can swing for the fence. You know so, and I think that is exactly what happened for you.
Speaker 2:So how at this retreat? How did you guys meet? I'm sure there was a bunch of people there just because he was volunteering 900 people yeah, I think at that one and that you know.
Speaker 3:Oh well, that's how the story.
Speaker 4:Dr Joe Dispenza. I'll tell the story Now is very mainstream. Yeah, yeah, yeah, a lot of people know about it. For his workshops, he now does seven-day workshops. At this time when we met and when we were going, they were on four-day, yeah, and they were never sold out. You know there's, but now they sell out within minutes when there's two to 3,000 people there, so that was 900 is still a lot, though, for you sold best meeting.
Speaker 3:There was maybe a hundred. You know what I mean. A hundred, 150,. You know something?
Speaker 4:like that you can tell how we meet.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so anyway, I'll. So I'm a volunteer and I would just like to go on record of I was probably the worst volunteer, the best and the worst volunteer, because you cannot tell me what to do. I am not a good follower. I am very like this is how I'm going to do it. You know what I mean. And it was funny because you know Adam, who is like Joe's right-hand guy and he would say all right, so, scott, this is what I want you to do, and he would go through the whole explanation of you know well you're going to be.
Speaker 3:They had mind mapping, where they would put these electrodes in people's heads and then they would have them do meditations and they would measure what the brain was doing in that. And fascinating. I mean, he's done a lot of science, a lot of scientific studies in this retreat. So Adam's telling me you know he's like, well, first you got to get the person you know and they're sitting in front of me, and then you got to get this like Vaseline glue and you put that in her hair and you put this net over there and you put the little electrodes on the Vaseline stuff and I'm just watching them. I'm like none of this is going to happen. I'm just and he's like, excuse me, I said I'm not going to do any of this, so can I watch the door? I'll be really good at watching door, so I became really good at watching the door of this thing. So we had to give out these. They had this thing called heart math and it was another, you know, experiment, scientific testing, and they were instant electrodes Sounds.
Speaker 4:So whatever is very. He has tons and tons of scientific research from years of measuring what's happening in people's brains and amazing stuff. I mean groundbreaking really big colleges now actually.
Speaker 3:Yeah, huge. And so you know, I have to give out. These people have to come to me, whoever is in this mind mapping because there's 45 chairs in the front where these people had to sit and they had to come to me and I would give them their number of their chair. They would reach into this little bag and they would pull out their number. So I'm like, well, I'm going to have fun. So I'm running around.
Speaker 3:First off I called it mind mapping or heart map. I called it heart map when it was heart math. So again, I represent very well and the you know people would come up and I say, okay, so pick your. You know, pick your thing. And they would reach your hand. I'm like, no, you have to tell me the number that you're going to pick and then go reach in and pick it. Because isn't that what we're doing? We're creating our own reality. So if you want to create your own reality, you might as well start with picking the right number. So people would come in they say, okay, all right, 24. And they'd come out with 32. I say you're not that good, get back in the room, work harder, maybe next you can get within three. And I would do that. I did that with all these people.
Speaker 3:And then finally she comes up because she's in heart math in the Dr Joe community of how I was paralyzed and how I went through this tragedy. And she responded I'm coming there and I'm coming by myself and I'm terrified. And I said I'll be there, just look me up. I promise you you are not alone when you come here alone. You will never be alone when you come here, it's life changing. And so she comes up and I said well, easy, what's the number? And she's like what do you mean? I said you have to pick the number and let's see how good you are. And she goes number one and she reaches in and she pulls out number one. That's an absolute, true, factual story. That actually happened. I'm like that's pretty good. Yeah, you've been really good there.
Speaker 4:And the thing that happens at these retreats is usually you see the same people, so it's 900 people. You'll end up seeing in Maddie Hirsa this day of Ernst then, and that's sort of what kept happening. You know he'd be volunteering and I'm going through crying my eyes out for four days and doing a lot of healing, and you know we keep running into each other and there was a moment after that I think it was like second to last day, and it was during a what we would do walking meditations at 6am in the morning, and this is at Palm Springs, in this beautiful hotel, is where this one was held at, and there's this gorgeous golf course, and so we would go out and do the walking meditations at 6am on the golf course and that's that morning. During that walking meditation was when I had my very powerful experience and when it was done and I came up and I'm like walking around, I was trying to find the girl that I was rooming with, because she was really the only one that I knew there and because I wanted to tell her what happened.
Speaker 4:I knew something shifted in me and so I'm like, walking over this, go to walk over this hill, and I see someone walking towards me and every you hug everyone there, like even after meditations, like everyone's hugging everyone. It's a beautiful, amazing experience. Everyone should do it as long as it is. And I see him walking towards me and we hug. And it's scott, and as we're hugging, we're. It was so bizarre because I was like does he know what just happened to me? There's no way he could know, but there was a familiarity when we hugged that I I didn't know it was her, by the way.
Speaker 3:I couldn't see her because the sun was right behind her, so she was just like this dark figure. Then, yeah, I just saw standing there and I was just like in love with the whole thing that was happening.
Speaker 4:So and there was just there was a familiarity. I can't explain that any better way, but it felt like, oh, we have known each other for many lifetimes and we're just meeting again in this one.
Speaker 3:Long story short. We got married there, Almost in that very thin exact spot.
Speaker 4:After a Dr, joda spends a retreat.
Speaker 2:I love that. Oh my gosh, that's adorable. So now, when did you guys start working together? When did this business? And like, you guys clicked and did you know? Right then Like, let's, you did.
Speaker 4:Well, there was a lot within that moment to two years later. You know, like he said, he went home from that. He ended up leaving his marriage. I went home from that workshop. That's when I quit the pain pills. I left. You know, I left that night that I got home because I knew.
Speaker 4:You know, in our work we talk, I talk, a lot about leaving from love, and what I mean by that is people will leave relationships or leave family members or friends because they think that person's the problem and and yes, part of that if you're around dysfunctional people. But the thing you have to understand is it's, it's something in you that needs to really be healed. And so when I left my marriage, it was from a place of deep love for myself and for him. It was like I knew I could. I knew it was not a loving thing for my kids, for him, for me, to continue in this marriage. So when I left, it was from love. I knew that. You know, I needed, like he said, I needed to follow something that was pulling me, and it was probably about a week or two later. After that we ended up connecting on the phone and, you know, start talking on the phone and then it was a couple of weeks later. We went to another Dr Joe retreat but it was in a follow-up, advanced or something. It was like his last level. So it's like, really, and it's only two days and it was in Mexico and it was pretty much then that you know I always joke there was no dating. I swear to God, to you, there was no dating, like there was no hiding anything, for it was like we just were, had always been and just were. It was as if we knew everything about each other. It felt I'd never I, the only other person in my life that I had ever felt that safe or that loved or that connected to, was my grandma. Growing up, she really was the only person and that's how it felt with him. It was like it just was and that was it. It didn't. It was not like and you know, we, we, I let, we lived across the country from each other, so we had to do long distance for, you know, a while.
Speaker 4:And then eventually I made the decision to move to pennsylvania and, like I said, in those first six months we went through him and I went through a lot of hard times, hard because we lost a lot of people in our life, a lot of. We lost a lot of people in our life. We lost a lot of people that didn't like the changes I was making and he was making, because that's what happens when we change and transform a lot of times, unfortunately, and so we went through a lot, but we both. The one thing I know neither one of us ever doubted was number one, that we were supposed to be together it was never a doubt and number two that we should follow this path and that we should help others follow this path. So it was pretty early on probably six, eight months into us being together that we said we have to help other people live a life that they know is possible because we're doing it. And we both knew that.
Speaker 4:He ended up writing his book Finding the Ugly that talks about his experience of being paralyzed and then losing his best friend. He wrote a book about that same time and from there it was like, ok, yeah, let's start a coaching company where we can really help people do what we did. And it's hard. Like he said, it's challenging. I don't care what change you're making in your life, I don't care if you're quitting smoking, losing weight. I don't care if you're starting a new business, if you're getting out of a toxic relationship.
Speaker 4:Any change you decide to make in your life is going to be challenging and there's going to be people in your life that aren't going to like it, and I knew that. I knew that first year of practicing his meditations, before I went to the retreat and doing the inner work. I knew deep down inside I actually think people are not going to like it when I start changing, because I was a chronic people pleaser and I was always about doing everything for everyone else. Take your power back and say this isn't me anymore, and so it was very challenging. But you know, we look back now, seven, eight years later, at our kids. You know we have five kids between the two of us and thank God that all happened. You know, seven years later, thank God, and our business has changed and transformed and evolved.
Speaker 3:Because we transformed and evolved.
Speaker 4:Yeah, you know we knew early on OK, we need to help people do what we've been able to do, and so you started with coaching. Yes, Yep, we started. You know he was using a lot of mindset techniques, the same stuff that he used to get him out of the hospital.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I just taught people what I did. You know what I mean. It's like listen, it's just easy, it's really easy to do, but your body's going to reject all of it. It's not going to want to be a part of any of it because it likes being who you are. You know, whether you know you're a victim. Whatever your body tells you, your mind is going to get it first, but then your body is going to really give you the problem. So you have to outlast your body and that's why we would say it takes about a year to really implement this. You have to be easy with yourself. Awareness is 90% of it. Understand what your mind, body connection, what is happening there, then you have a greater understanding and, I think, a greater you kind of. You take it easy on yourself a little bit more because you know January 1st that gym is full. Right, that gym is full of people on January 1st, but you know come February 17th. So we're like listen, your job on January 1st is just to walk in the gym, don't lift the weight.
Speaker 4:Yeah, very. You know integration is such a big thing that people don't talk about. And you know we were watching community. We were watching people go to these Joe Dispenza retreats and then not change their life when they got home. And so we were like, well, we're doing that, surely we can help people do that. So he was really working with the mindset, and shortly into that process was when I found out about breathwork and ended up taking the class the Soma breathwork class that I took, and so I was really helping people focus on the breathwork. He was really helping people.
Speaker 3:So it's really mind and body. Yeah, you know. So that's really how we.
Speaker 4:And actually for the first two. The first year was just him and I, and then after that we ended up meeting our very best friend His name's Simon Harris at a Joda Spencer retreat a year later and he was going through a lot in his personal life. He ended up losing his wife that's why they were there because she had cancer and he taught and practiced this healing modality called freedom activation. And so the three of us were like, wow, that really fits in. The freedom activation fits in with the mindset and the breath work.
Speaker 2:We ended up working, the three of us, for two years yeah, that's how you point yeah, really amazing people and helping people yeah, I like how you said go to the gym but don't lift a weight. You know, training your mind to do the thing. You know I'm somebody who and I don't necessarily look like it now but I went through a crazy weight loss transformation. I lost and maintained a 70 pound weight loss and I went through a lot of trials and tribulations with that and atomic habits. I don't know if you've read the book, but like that small, the small little habit, you know, like leaving the gym clothes out, and there's be times I'd go for five minutes and people are like why would you go to the gym for five minutes? Because I'm checking off the fact that I did it. It's like changing this identity, you know.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:Because you think like all right, so today I'm going to go to the gym and I'm going to lose three pounds on the treadmill, which, come on, you know, that's just. That is like saying I'm going to get my PhD today, when I even stepped into a college classroom, right, it's just not going to happen, and we tend to do that to ourselves, right? So you really have to start the babiest of steps and yeah, just to go sometimes to make them to just to just get in the car to go, and we would literally have people, you know, I would say it's.
Speaker 3:It's not the weight, it's not the paralysis, it's not the cancer, it's not whatever the doctor tells you it is, it's your mind, it is that voice inside your mind that is creating whatever that is, whatever that wound is. That's why you're going through the weight, you know, that's why you're going through the weight, that's why you're going through whatever the doctor tells you it is. And I think, when we are really gentle with ourselves and I forget who it was, but I remember talking to somebody and I said just get in the car. Just get in the car. There was a woman we worked with. She could not leave her apartment. She was so ill she could not leave her apartment. She came on one of the calls and she said I crawled out my front door, I crawled down the steps hands and knees in snow and not a year later she said I was in the woods and I camped by myself and there was like two feet of snow and I made it, because that's literally what it takes sometimes.
Speaker 3:So sometimes it's not about going to the gym, it's just getting in the car to go to the gym because it's hard. You know, you're overcoming a habit that isn't like. It's not a donut habit, it's not an ice cream habit, it's a habit of you. It's who you have become your whole life. And now you're going to fight that and think, oh well, I'll just go to.
Speaker 3:Well, january 1st I'm going for four hours, and then the next day, the second, I'm just going to do two. I'm going to do legs for two hours. I'll probably lose. I'm thinking two and a half pounds, right, that's about right. And then I'm thinking the third, I'll take the day off. I'll just run around the house like 27 times, and then on the fourth, I'll go back and I'm going to do that's going to be my marathon. I'll do six hours, bro, you ain't getting out of bed.
Speaker 3:On the second, you're not going to get out of bed because you're going to say I can't do that. Yeah, but you can get out of bed and then you can walk across the floor, then you can go to the bathroom, then you can get in the car and then you can say you know what? I did something today. That's winning. Yeah, and if, listen, if that's where it has to start, then that's where it has to start. But you have to find that strength in you to say I did good today. I did good today. I could have sat on the couch or never got out of bed, but I got out of bed. I could have sat there and never took a shower. I went in the shower, I got a shower. I did good today and chances are the next day you'll go further. That's right.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, well, thank you guys so much for speaking with me I really appreciate it us too.
Speaker 4:Thank you so much. I hope your listeners got lots of value from that today I'm going off. I'm sure they do yeah, they like to talk I know so do I.
Speaker 2:Where is the best place for the listeners to connect with you guys?
Speaker 4:So, best place website is theartoflookingincom Super easy, and then YouTube it's a really great place, and it's Art of Looking In on YouTube.
Speaker 2:Okay, awesome, and I will link both of that in the notes. And no pressure, but any final words for the listeners. I do just like to always leave it back to the guest. I don't know if that's a good answer.
Speaker 3:You got any final words. It exists for you, so go find it. I mean it is whatever you're looking for, happiness, whatever it is, I promise you, as someone who's been in both sides, it exists for you. So I always end everything with go find it, Go find it.
Speaker 2:I love that. Thank you guys so much. I really appreciate it. Thank you.
Speaker 2:And thank you guys for tuning in to another episode of Mander's Mindset. Thank you guys so much for joining me for another episode of Mander's Mindset. I hope this first part of M and Scott's journey really resonated with you and stay tuned for the next episode of Mander's Mindset where we delve into the second half of M and Scott's journey. And I wanted to share a few takeaways that really resonated with me and I encourage you guys to reflect on these. First of all, your past does not define you, but it can shape you. Scott and Em both shared childhood experiences of loneliness and struggle. Yet, instead of being victims of those circumstances, they use those challenges as fuel to fuel their personal growth. Our wounds early on in childhood can either hold us back or they can serve as a foundation for our strength. Can serve as a foundation for our strength. You know I've talked on some episodes about how at some point, it stops being about what was done to you or your circumstances or your upbringing, and at some point it becomes how you shift your mindset in what you do with the circumstances that have led you to today. Next, the next takeaway is how your mind is way more powerful than you think. Scott's story of overcoming full body paralysis through visualization is a testament to the power of the mind-body connection. He didn't just hope to walk again. He mentally rehosted in his mind, he lived it, he visualized it in his imagination and it made it his reality. They emphasized how healing begins when you take radical responsibility.
Speaker 2:Em's journey of overcoming addiction was not just about quitting pain pills. It was about fundamentally changing her mindset, healing deep inner wounds and stepping into a version of herself that no longer needed or wanted to escape reality. She emphasized the importance of listening to your inner voice and to make changes from a place of self-love and not a place from shame. They also emphasized the power of a single thought. One sentence spoken to us as a child can shape our entire identity. You know, scott shared the powerful example of someone who unknowingly carried the label of quote-unquote a stupid boy for decades. These subconscious beliefs run deep inside of us, of us, but once we uncover them, we can rewrite and change the story, because everything is just a story.
Speaker 2:Next, m and Scott emphasized that transformation is never easy, but it's so worth it. They both experienced major life shifts that required them to walk away from certain relationships, certain careers and old identities. Change isn't comfortable, but, as Scott said, it exists for you. So go find it, go create it Now. This is just part one of our amazing conversation. In part two we'll dive deeper into their work with personal transformation, how breathwork and mindset techniques change their lives and how you can start shifting your own reality. Well, thank you guys so much for joining me on this episode of Mando's Mindset. If you enjoyed the show, I'd really appreciate it if you left me a rating, left a review and shared this episode with anyone that you think would benefit from viewing it. Thanks, guys. Until next time.
Speaker 5:In case no one told you today, I'm proud of you, I'm booting for you and you got this as always. If you enjoyed the show, I would really appreciate it if you would leave me a five-star rating, leave a review and share it with anyone you think would benefit from this. And don't forget you are only one mindset. Shift away from shifting your life. Thanks guys, until next time.
