Sneaky Powerful - A Podcast Dedicated to Somatic Experiencing®
Sneaky Powerful is a podcast that explores the journey of healing from trauma. Through the perspective of Somatic Experiencing®, a naturalistic modality of trauma healing developed by Dr. Peter Levine, Ali Capurro and her guests explore the process and intricacies of reclaiming vitality. Within these artful conversations there are many threads, and specifically threads of hope, healing, and love.
Sneaky Powerful - A Podcast Dedicated to Somatic Experiencing®
19 - Embodied Aggression Brings Us Back to Life
Authentic power emerges when we embrace all aspects of ourselves—even the parts that growl. In this fascinating conversation with Thayer Cuson Case, we journey from Zen monastery halls to trauma therapy rooms, exploring how spiritual practice and trauma work can integrate to create whole-person healing.
Thayer's remarkable path began with teenage meditation, led through college football and a career-ending injury, then to 18 months living in a Zen monastery. This winding road eventually guided him to trauma therapy after experiencing firsthand the aftermath of 9/11 as an EMT. Throughout our discussion, he reveals how these seemingly disparate experiences created the foundation for his psycho-spiritual somatic approach to healing.
The heart of our conversation explores aggression—not as something to suppress, but as vital energy essential to fully embodied living. "Waking the tiger isn't about making people calm," Thayer explains, challenging common misconceptions about trauma work. Instead, he describes how truly embodied aggression feels "powerful, sexy, and full of life," while offering practical insights into recognizing when our relationship with aggression becomes either explosive or repressed.
We dive into fascinating territory when discussing the unexpected value of sometimes blocking tears to allow necessary aggression to emerge, especially for those conditioned to discharge emotion quickly. This nuanced understanding extends to exploring how athletes often struggle with identity and energy regulation when formal sports careers end—a transition that left both of us navigating challenging emotional terrain.
The conversation culminates with Thayer sharing how group therapy creates powerful opportunities to "play through" developmental wounds in real-time settings. His explanation of uncoupling relational trauma through authentic interaction offers hope for deeper healing than individual work alone sometimes provides.
Whether you're interested in trauma healing, spiritual practice without bypassing, or understanding your relationship with aggression, this episode offers profound insights from someone who walks both contemplative and therapeutic paths with equal dedication. Listen now and discover how embracing your inner tiger might be the key to authentic wholeness.
Hey everyone, welcome back to the Sneaky Powerful Podcast. My name is Allie Capero and I'm so glad you're here. Today's guest is Thayer Cuson Case, lcsw and SEP. He is a clinician and coach who has been working in the field of trauma for 20 years and is managing director of Maverick Psychotherapy Group. In addition to his experience in leading workshops and teaching, thayer was also part of the Somatic Experiencing International Working Group on Crisis Stabilization and Safety, which drew on his experiences as an EMT.
Speaker 1:Thayer's psycho-spiritual somatic approach to psychotherapy is deeply rooted in somatic experiencing, his 30 years of Zen Buddhist practice and honoring the intersectionality identity of each individual. Thayer has expertise in working across the lifespan with children as a play therapist, adolescents, adults and families. He has particular expertise in somatic stabilization, acute PTSD and trauma and attachment developmental wounding. There lives in the Catskills Mountains of New York with his partner, two standard poodles and a college-aged daughter. When she's home, he loves spending time with his family and friends, being in the woods, studying archetypes in sci-fi, fantasy and comics See trauma nerds and he's also practicing and competing in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. My conversation with Thayer was inspiring and super fun and I hope you enjoy it All right. Hey Thayer, welcome to the Sneaky, powerful Podcast. It's really good to be here with you.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me, Allie.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you're not at home. Where are you right now?
Speaker 2:I am Miami Beach in Florida.
Speaker 1:Can you see the beach from where you're sitting?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean this window is pointing towards the beach from your, where you're sitting, I can. Yeah, I mean this. This window is pointing towards the beach. You can't really see the beach, but it's close very close couple minute walk very nice.
Speaker 1:Well, good, I'm glad you're in this great space for this conversation. Um, so in the pre-call we kind of talked about a little about what we're going to talk about and if you're cool with it. My super big curiosity is yeah, when you were 22 and 14, when you said you got interested in meditation and then you lived at a monastery, I'm like, please tell me all about that, because one of my guesses is trauma somehow comes into that story. Maybe not, but maybe yeah, I mean.
Speaker 2:yeah, I mean like certainly um, trauma and also like my path to becoming a therapist, for sure, and also my path to um working with, starting to understand and work with somatic experiencing, which was, you know, from 2009 so from a long time ago at this point, you know, and uh. So, yeah, I mean, I guess you know I I had um, uh, I had been interested, sort of be interested in Buddhism specifically and Islam, when I was in high school and I had taken a class on Buddhism, islam and Hinduism, on Buddhism, islam and Hinduism, and I'd always been involved in my church. I'd grown up in the youth clubs and groups and I'd done a lot of Habitat for Humanity and Midnight Runs and food banks and food pantries and that kind of work. I really liked that kind of religion in action type of work. It wasn't a Christianity with missionary stuff, but it was very involved in that and I didn't really like the church aspect so much, but I really liked the, the, the giving aspect of it or the, the, that kind of work and and I liked some aspects of the religion, but but I I didn't connect to it so much.
Speaker 2:So when I, when I had encountered Buddhism, I was like, huh, this is interesting and I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I. I was like, huh, this is interesting and I, I, I. I found it very intriguing and I also was from early age, was at a one of a diagnosis of ADHD, which was something that was a big part of my, you know. I thought I was to some degree or my physiology was, affected by that, since I was, you know long time, third grade. I remember being on, yeah, I know.
Speaker 1:so we're talking about like early 80s right, that's what I was thinking is we're about the same or similar age and I was thinking yeah, I just turned 50, so I was born in 75.
Speaker 2:So you know it was, you know I remember, you know there wasn't a lot of people who put on Ritalin in the early 80s but I was, yeah, and so and you know, I think you know it helped me for sure. But that wasn't the complicated part. It was more of you know my system and how that related, related to what my proclivities, my non-neurotypical presentation slash, perhaps acting out in a family system, type things, um, but uh, but I felt, um, really kind of at home immediately. I remember from when I was 14 and we learned how to do my teacher actually was a buddhist, surprisingly, and and taught us they did a class on how to do meditation, so I used to learn how to. I've learned how to do that and I remember using, using that to kind of like start to learn how to concentrate in whatever way that was a 15 year old to to like, um, start working with my mind in that way, and I, you know I didn't know what I was doing, but I remember being very drawn to it and I remember used to do it when I was trying to fall asleep at night or or things like that I got to college and I was still very interested, but I felt a lot of pressure to do pre-med because both my parents are physicians, so there was a kind of an implicit pressure and I didn't want to do that at all and I did terrible at first, um, and then I I kind of uh in college, I, um, I quickly switched to a psychology major and then I?
Speaker 2:Um, realized that most of the classes I was taking were religion classes and I switched to. I was taking religion classes and I switched to, eventually, a religion and psychology double major, which was what I did in college, which was great. There was a lot of work to do with the major, but I was very happy about it because there's two things I really like to do's that that's what I continued studying buddhism more like academically, and I'd I started to. You know, I continued to have some interest in that, and I also I played football in college too, so I was, you know I had a lot of.
Speaker 2:I had a lot of, um, you know like, and I got very injured, terribly injured, on my senior year, which was terrible because I had a. You know, I was pretty good, I probably would have been All-American my senior year and I broke my leg very terribly and I was very disappointing. I worked hard to get in that kind of shape and that really turned that around and I really threw myself into my studies and that's when I really kind of deep dove into Buddhism stuff and so I ended up at the end of my thesis that I defended was like on Soto, Zen and, and, uh, Naqshbandiya, Sufism, which is a form of Sufism, and I, uh, um, basically the conclusion I came to is like, you know, I really just need to practice, like that. You know, the academic study of religion is kind of silly unless you do it. So I, I, I, I, I did that and so you know, I had a brief stint of working after college, um, and I quickly was like you know, I really want to go study buddhism more.
Speaker 2:So I kind of talked my way into an interview at this monastery, upstate new york it's that monastery called. You know they're like why do you want to come. I was like you know I want. I called you know. They're like why do you want to come? I was like you know I want to come do a year. And they're like well, have you ever been here? I was like no. And they're like well, do you want to? I was like. I was like I can do this. I've had.
Speaker 2:They're like well, you should probably at least come up and do know like they're like listen buddy like you know, you got to come up for at least a Sunday, right, and check this out and see what. And so I remember my friend drove me up and dropped me off and I went in. The night was a terrible pain Cause I decided not to use a chair and I sat on the ground and I was like. I was like this is it? I'm a home right? And uh, I don't remember any of it.
Speaker 2:And so I then I you know, I quickly got out of what I was doing and I and I applied for a year. They said I don't think so. And they said you want you come and do a month at a time? Oh my gosh. And then so, and so I went and I did a month, and I did another month, and I did a month and a time. Oh my gosh. And then so, and so I went, they did a month and I did another month and I did a month and finally, um, actually more accurately, I did a couple months.
Speaker 2:I had to go back home, get the surgery to get all the hardware out of my leg, and then I moved back in for a couple of three months and then I did. Then they let me stay for official year, right, so that's where I was there so for like 18 months or so, and uh, and then uh, um, yeah, and so that's where I met my wife actually, and and then I we moved out and I lived in Brooklyn for a while and and, uh, it was an EMT actually, and then I, um, and that's part of where I saw the trauma because it was an EMT actually and then I, um, and that's part of where I saw the trauma because it was an EMT during 9-11 and then I uh, and then I um, uh, and then we decided that we wanted to move back, so both of us moved back to the monastery for two years after 11 wow, yeah, I mean, it wasn't necessarily we, that was our plan all along.
Speaker 2:It wasn't really because of 9-11, so to speak, but and also during that time I got my msw. So I uh and uh, and we had been part of the brooklyn temple, which is part of the zen mon monastery, and uh, and so yeah, and then I left the left, the monastery and talked my way into a job.
Speaker 1:Stop talking your way into it.
Speaker 2:It's true. Who's this guy?
Speaker 1:That's how he got on the podcast everyone. He just talked yeah, yeah, talked my way into it.
Speaker 2:I mean, boy, I had no job experience. I just was coming out of this kind of strange person, coming out of a monastery and, and you know, I went to all these job interviews and like I was like who are, who are those, this guy? And finally I met this wonderful guy who ended up being my, my boss and supervisor at hospice and I and he hired me on the spot and I was like this is it man? And he I'm forever, forever thankful to Rod Roberts for that and his friendship and mentoring me and that was great. Oh yeah, so that's how hospice yeah, I worked for hospice for a while.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that was part of my yeah, you're true this is all pre this is all pre somatic experiencing stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right. And then because, well, actually, about what year do you think you were working hospice?
Speaker 2:When do you think you got that job? I worked hospice from like 2004 to like 2007. Okay, 2008, something like that, sc 2009. Yeah, like 2007. Okay 2008, something like that, sc 2009. Yeah, and then I switched jobs. That was, uh, um, social work director at a hospital, nursing home, and and then I, I uh started taking the training and started having a small private practice and uh, and then eventually um moved over.
Speaker 2:Nancy napier was my first se teacher, which was great yeah and uh, she's amazing and uh, yeah, and I had, you know, diane, pull out or dave, that was all. It was cool, it was a great experience. So, anyway, that's, that was kind of my trajectory into that. But but sitting and sitting meaning meditation and you know, uh, but it's practice. It really, you know, it's an integral part of my life. I just it's just so much of what I do now. I don't really it's not like explicit um so so, yeah, deeply informs how I work, for sure, it being in the practice and and how I understand things. So yeah, so that's kind of like how I got it.
Speaker 1:That was my trajectory yeah, it really is fascinating and I have this. There's several questions that emerged while you were talking and I'm trying to decide which one I want to go with. But one of the cooler, cooler things that I want to know more about is maybe how spirituality, because, as you were talking, especially with trauma, the timelines are for me.
Speaker 1:In my own healing journey, the timeline has always felt kind of my own healing journey, the timeline has always felt kind of confusing is one way to say it, but that doesn't really capture it. Mysterious might be a better way to say it, because my trauma, a lot of it, was in this sort of like dissociative space where I didn't even know about it for a long time. And so, as you're talking, I'm thinking about how it's like there's this big pull from future Thayer saying here, come this way, come this way, come this way, and that might not be with your belief system at all, but I guess I was kind of curious about any of those kind of concepts of trauma, spirituality, future self, timelines, and I know you're into um, what would I call metaverse, like uh, what's the way, how do I talk about that? What you're into like comical trauma and stuff.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah, we can get to that. Yeah, yeah, cool. That brings me back to pre pre pre high school too.
Speaker 2:Okay um, but uh, yeah, no, I mean, I think, I mean, I guess.
Speaker 2:So the question is like, like the pull of the future self and like spiritual, maybe integrate, like how I understand spirituality, like I mean, I mean, I guess, to me, like I, you know, spirituality, the way I understand and the way I practice, you know, can take lots of different forms in terms of you know how people understand that, but for me, I, it's something that is is like kind of as a deeply personal experience. So it's like, um, you know how, you know it's a relationship to who I am. It's like kind of it's a, you know, it's being making sure that the question of like, who am I, like it is, is, is there. You know, it's like the question of the caterpillar to alice, right, who are you? Yes, right, and that that, and that's that central existential question, is is a lived question and a live question.
Speaker 2:And and also, maybe, you know, as I got older and you know more mature, like you know who am I in relation to others, you know how do I, how do who am I, you know who am I and who are you? Right, like, like, so that curiosity is always um, and who are you and you can be, you like, allie, the person or the woods or this place or anything, so like you know self and other, but not as a concept, as a lived experience.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, do you feel like? I feel like somatic experience has really helped me kind of oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think somatic experiencing was a natural extension of this kind of practice for me because it, like it can be, you know, it's very personal. It's what one's personal, subjective experience is of of something and that's what's honored and at the same time, honoring that, like, we are animals that have right, right, certain outer and responses that are programmed, you know, in the nervous system to survive and that, like, survival energy is really, you know, what we're working with. We're talking about trauma, so, like what, what my interest in spirituality has been over the years is like, you know, how do you live an authentic life, how do I live an authentic life? How do I, how do I? You know, maybe my hope is that that it gets inspired in others too, you know, um, and I really feel that, like, if I'm doing that, that will help, you know that that kind of is inspiring that's at least what I feel like around people who I get that sense from that they don't need to say much.
Speaker 2:It's just more of like how somebody is and you know, and I think that what my interest in spirituality and how that's merged with trauma work, is that, like, to me, spirituality, whatever spirituality, is someone, someone's you know, connection to a larger sense of themselves or the earth, or the universe, or whatever you know is is nice, it's a nice, it's a nice word, but like, are you in touch with your feelings? Like do you, are you in touch with yourself in a deep way? Right, and, and if? Or is it just another very sophisticated defense to not feel right, or to or to block someone out, or or to you know, or any of these things? And and an answer to to that for myself, has been absolutely. I've done all of that, absolutely and still do yeah, yeah, yeah, me too, yeah, and and I don't.
Speaker 2:And so I feel very dedicated to um, to working as something called spiritual bypassing yeah or spiritual override, you know, like where there's a lot of like I'm gonna be, I'm calm and all this. You see that all the time the se community that's that's one of the most common misconceptions of trauma work, even after doing it for a while is that somehow we're working with people to make them calm and that's, in fact, that could be damaging for somebody.
Speaker 1:It's like it could be freeing you could reinforce the prison.
Speaker 1:Yep, yep, yep, right can make the pre, you can reinforce the prison. Yep, yep, yep right. Well, those you've said, two things that kind of are a good segue to that. Um, the topic of aggression, which is something that we were going to maybe talk about, and specifically, I'm like spirituality and aggression, because I find that with, with clients, a lot, just the complexity of but I'm not supposed to be whatever mean boundary, all this stuff. So if, if, however, you want to start that, I'm open to hearing no, maybe just based on what you just said.
Speaker 2:Like you know, like I'm afraid of being mean, you know that's. You know if that's a, uh, that's a young statement, right, right, right, right, like I don't want to be mean, mom, right, right, right, okay, like you know, it's like, it's like a, you know, or I want to do, I want to be good or bad, yeah, yeah, yeah, I don't want to be bad, you know. So, like we already, you know, we play our hand about our relationship to aggression very quickly, right, you know, and I think that you know the way I've understood aggression, like even in, you know, in a kind of Buddhist context or any of this thing, and also my current kind of deep dive that I'm doing right now is I'm really studying modern psychoanalytic group work, um, and there's a huge emphasis on aggression, which I really love. And and, uh, and I really love group work, a ton very relational um about working with aggression, not necessarily in a way like sc, although they're very you know those. I tend to combine these modalities a bit. I mean, sc is not really a complete modality in and of itself, it's more of a kind of incorporated modality, um, but, um, so, yeah, so I think, like understanding one's relationship to aggression, I often will ask people that too, like, what's your relationship to aggression?
Speaker 2:And people almost most often than not have an answer that, well, I don't like it right, or you know it gets me into trouble. You know it becomes an it right and you know I think that you know, or aggression's bad because they're. You know, I don't problem with aggression, I can use it all the time. Well, that's actually not being in touch with aggression.
Speaker 2:You know, aggression can be like zeroed out, like where it's, like you're, it's repressed and, if you want to use that language, or frozen, over-coupled, under-coupled right. So it's under-coupled, rather like in using somatic spin, it's under associated, dissociated right. Or aggression could be over, coupled over, associated and be explosive and right and in a constant stuck on fight right, which is not also like. I would say that's not embodied aggression. Embodied aggression is actually very powerful and sexy and like and very full of life and and sexuality often, yeah, right, so it's a very uh, you know, you know. Or the opposite is true.
Speaker 2:You know, people who are so, quote, calm and and have a really hard time expressing aggression, often feel dead right, somebody's missing in their life or like they, you know they can't connect to themselves, or they find themselves in fun or please appease all the time, or whatever, and, and you know, or builds up or people come to explosion and so like depression to me is really a central part. Or, if we use se language, know being deeply familiar with fight response and you know it's funny because I always joke when I'm doing the SE trainings. Or, you know, doing any teaching that, like you know, peter Levine didn't call the book like waking the aardvark, or something. Or like waking the bunny, you know. Like waking the lizard, you know it's not a no. Or like waking the waking the, the lizard, you know it's not no.
Speaker 1:Or like waking the capybara, whatever I know I'm trying to think of all the great yeah yeah, obviously sloth like there's no waking that wake.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean waking the giraffe. You know like nobody, like, those versions didn't sell yeah, right, right yeah somebody like what's this? I don't want who cares Like.
Speaker 1:I don't want to wake my inner giraffe.
Speaker 2:So so, like you know, like that's not, you know it's like the tiger which is like this, like archetypal, you know it was, it was. You know, like yes, tiger can run away, but that's not people's first association to a tiger. You know, people look at like a tattoo tiger of like the end of it, like running away, like why do you have a tiger? Because they could run fast. You know, then you might have like a cheetah or something you know like, or like a kangaroo, or you know, I don't know, but like you know, but a tiger is like this, in, like you know, it's the fear.
Speaker 2:That's like the apex predator.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right of the jungle a cowering tiger as a tattoo I know, I know like, oh, like frozen, like.
Speaker 2:That's not the association that we want right that's right that's so you know the possum, you know so.
Speaker 2:So, like that's, I mean so. So that's what's kind of interesting, right, is that like there is implicit right from the beginning, like working with, like waking the fight response out of freeze, right like letting the tiger emerge, and I think like that's a real people have a real hard time with that. You know especially like, and then you put, you know gender and racial concerns, all these kinds of things, in the mix. You know the intersectional identities that people have and and and we have very different, uh, relationships to aggression and also what, what's, what's quote allowed in society that's exactly like and I was thinking about how it is so personal.
Speaker 1:It has to be your own personal experience with it, because there's there's so many. You use the word sophisticated earlier to describe basically what I adaptive responses. You know we come up with these sophisticated adaptive or maladaptive responses or behaviors sophisticated adaptive or maladaptive responses or behaviors and I know that finding out, learning more about my aggression has been fascinating. And using the under couple over couple language is so helpful because it's exactly right, like the out of control aggression. You know the fight response stuck on on. Well, that's not what we're going for at all.
Speaker 2:No, no, no no.
Speaker 1:But not the other end of the spectrum, the undercoupled like can't feel the aggression at all. But I've noticed like different dynamics, like maybe you know, on a soccer field I was very much comfortable, I was very comfortable having embarrassing aggression where I was yelling fuck you on this to the people yeah yeah, like so the parents it's. Maybe I learned it from my wild. I'm just kidding.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But then there's also this dynamic where, if there's a certain type of power dynamic, I'm in a freezer fawn response before I even know what's happening, and learn about the nuances and it's in process. But that's been fascinating and the complexity of aggression is. I want to hear more about it because especially the vitality and anything powerful, sexy, that makes us feel alive, yeah.
Speaker 2:I want more. I mean you can say it is, I mean it is life force, I mean it's like when it's flowing through you. So it's like you know there's a. You know, like you said, I mean these cosmic conditions like which you know, like I use Buddhist terminology cosmic conditions or psychological conditions. You know, in my experience, like you know, like you said, like on this, like the soccer field is a great example, so like or a sports field, especially for female, or what I've noticed in the United States, like female conditioning, right Like where, like you know, I remember my daughter was on the tennis team in high school and you know, and people, they had no qual, uh, qualms, being, you know, aggressive kind of.
Speaker 2:You know, sometimes people needed some encouragement. But you know, when they got to a certain level, like they, you know, the aggression was kind of encouraged. But you often heard I'd never heard so many sorries in my life, right, like sorry, sorry, sorry, yeah, which was kind of oh, it's interesting because and I don't think I've ever said sorry to anybody in my life on a sports field and I started playing sports and I could walk all the way through college, right, except maybe when I hurt somebody by accident, right, yeah, I mean when I wasn't a jerk but I.
Speaker 2:I, but there wasn't, like you know. Oh sorry, I just like squirted on you yeah yeah, or like a lot of negotiation. It was kind of like a lot more like you know, fuck you, fuck you, now we're going to play. Okay, now we can hang out afterwards, right, there was that kind of you know it was very different yeah right and it was very passionate, huh, so that was a different kind of thing.
Speaker 2:Or just like you know, you can see the aggression, like you know again, this is a great generalization, but but you might, we might, we could say that, like a lot of times when I work with or have worked with, you know, many times with people who are working with waking the tiger, you know, say, like an assault or you know, car accident or something that happened to them, right, that like there's a lot of um, you know, like tears come really fast, so just like there's a conditioned right, like so we might actually work, not every time again, there's always the conditions of what's working and being attuned, etc. But like I might actually ask them hey, like you know what happens if you block your tears, right, and then boom, the aggression emerges. Because there's the can, because, like the crying, the discharge of the aggression really fast, right, like prevents somebody from experiencing the aggression. Now, of course, it's not always like that.
Speaker 1:Not always, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:It's not always, but it can be, especially like when somebody's working with a really powerful feeling right, and the opposite can be true for people who have like traditional male-bodied conditioning right, where somebody might move to anger very quickly and not feel, say, the sadness or the grief, yes, absolutely Right. So it's kind of an interesting kind of like where, like tears might come a lot harder right. But because the anger comes first and again, we could, you know the aggression, you know. Then the life force is stuck through the inability to we could, you know the aggression, you know. Then the life force is stuck through the inability to grieve, you know. Whatever, if you want to use the languaging around that, yeah, no, I like that.
Speaker 2:The coupling dynamics, right, you know, yeah, so, yeah, so this is where the vitality of you know? So, to me, these are like like this is a spiritual endeavor, like a spiritual endeavor to be alive and aware and and so, yeah, yeah, I mean there's more to the meditation in terms of like working with liminal states or like being able to, to be able to work very carefully with how the mind turns very quickly in traumatic states, or the trance-like work of SE. You know so, yeah, that's been very helpful for me to be able to recognize and feel very comfortable working in extreme states of mind. It doesn't freak me out.
Speaker 1:I yeah. I've gotten the to get some basically supervision personal sessions with you. That, yeah, you're the way you hold space and it feels very clear that it's things aren't going to freak you out. You would have been.
Speaker 1:you probably made a fantastic EMT too Like that's actually been a really great encounter to have you show up and, yeah, that's interesting. Um, I want to go back for just a second block your tears. I love that. I think it's worth emphasizing, because I think there's this common idea that, yeah, no, let the tears come and obviously, yes, good a lot, but sometimes it's sometimes, yeah, you're not.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love that worth repeating well, it's to me, it's to be like we want, like to me, this stance and again this is dovetails very nicely into any what I call you know, at least in zen work. True, like real zen practice is that, you know, anything is subject to investigation. Any reaction, any thought, any feeling, any state, any encounter, anything is subject to the you know, is subject to, to bring it into question about how it's relating to the self Right. And you know, and it's and it's always in it, or you know what is. You know how does the true voice come through in that, whatever true is.
Speaker 1:I'm like let's talk through one of those. I love that Because, as you were okay. So what was I thinking? I was thinking about subject to the self, any experience, any thought? How do you do that in your own life? Can you think of an example?
Speaker 2:thought how do you do that in your own life? Can you think of an example?
Speaker 1:yeah, I mean like you know, like um, like we could say like right now, okay, perfect, like you know.
Speaker 2:Like, like you know what you know, I could say you know, what am I feeling towards ally right now? Okay, you know, like, am I, you know, or you know, or you know, to investigate a little bit, like, what are my impulses, that I'm feeling in the inside right now, like, what aspects of myself do I want to convey? Right, and what, and, and, and. Then, you know, maybe you know, if this was a different format and we were having a different kind of conversation, that might be something that we might explore together, like, oh, you know, like interesting, like, why did I choose to share that and not this?
Speaker 2:You know, I'm sharing certain aspects of, like, my story, so to speak. Right, I have a story internally of me and I'm sharing one version of that right now, you know, and that is you know, and why am I deciding to choose that? You know, I'm not totally sure there's some aspects of, like, I mean, I have some ideas about that, you know, like I, you know, I want to convey some of my experience, so, like I can, you know, communicate to you like, like, what I feel are important aspects of my life story that convey about how my inner world is a little bit.
Speaker 1:Right, here's something really funny. Since we're experientially like in this moment, it totally shifted something inside of me having you say that. I'm like, oh my god, that's so cool. Like the, when you communicated more of what goes on internally, I could feel like my core in the front body soften and kind of go oh yeah, and then I felt so much relief knowing what you're feeling internal kind of intentions or thoughts were.
Speaker 2:Isn't that interesting and I didn't know right.
Speaker 1:I mean, yeah, exactly, I didn't think I was holding, like you know, anything related to that, until I felt like the, uh, the softening and then we could say, you know, like this is the one.
Speaker 2:It was curious to me then, like the question for me, if we were to you, would be like you know, I find that interesting that, like that, that is a question for you, like, of course you're holding something right, right, you know, and and. And I find myself doing that too, when I say like oh my god, I can't believe I was. It's like well, really, actually. No, of course, I can totally believe that to be true.
Speaker 2:You know, like we're always defending ourselves to some degree because we don't know oh my gosh you know like we, we don't, we don't know, and like, like you know, and like and and so like I, you know, just like, like, I've learned, you know to. You know speak from the eye always and and speak. You know how I feel towards somebody. You know, using language, language and being in a leadership role has really taught me that a ton, you know, because being in leadership role is probably the most difficult thing I've ever done, and so, and it's super difficult, but but yeah, we returned to aggression. The other thing too about aggression I guess I wanted to share about myself too, which is how I I think about is that I also believe that people need to move their bodies too, like, like that is, in whatever way that is, and and to really honor that. And you know it's interesting I was talking about we're here in miami and I have, um, my daughter who's 19, and she brought a friend also who's 19 and we were, and my wife is here, bethany, and we were all talking last night and at dinner and, um, you know they were talking about how they both played sports in high school. That you know, and some of them, uh, like her friend goes to georgetown and you know it's all division one sports there, right. So you know she was saying how somebody in her she was a freshman last year and you know one of the players from georgetown I don't know if anybody of your listeners are basketball fans, but one of their, one of somebody from georgetown went to nba from as a freshman, right, and and that guy was in her class. You know, and you know he's like seven feet, you know at like 18 years old. You know it's like crazy and uh, but you know we're reflecting that.
Speaker 2:Like you know you, since a little kid most of us who played sports, probably you included you start playing like really, really young and you keep going and, like you know, I was at practice playing sports, like you know, three hours a day. You know, every day, right, at practice playing sports, like you know, three hours a day, you know every day, right, right, right, like since I was in middle school essentially I mean, I guess elementary school you don't practice that much. But then when you start getting into middle school, yes, like tons. And then in high school, you know I started the summers early and then, like you know, I would already it's August now I would already be back in school, doing two a days in the fall, right Like, for I'd be there weeks before anybody got there. And in college you start a month early too, so it's like you know and so like, and then you just stop.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Right and a lot of people I know I did. I realized I I like you know I had developed a new relationship to my body. You know, and I didn't do I didn't. I've always exercised and kept in shape. And then later on in life I discovered um jujitsu, which helps me also right immensely with my own like, staying in my own. It helps me express myself in that nonverbal way and communicate, get a lot of touch and and be able to fight you know like intensely and be able to go to the verge of like you know, of being able to. I need to like. My body needs those extremes in order to to function in a while. Not everybody does.
Speaker 2:Yes Again some people need to do a vigorous walk. Yes, and that that's the same as doing, you know, high level jujitsu, where you're like life is on the line, it doesn't matter, right, right, right, it doesn't matter, it's whatever works for somebody, so that helps move things through.
Speaker 1:When you said that, after you know, whenever your sports career, your formal sports career, whatever it might be, when it stops, what were your? What do you think, what were you going to say after that?
Speaker 2:Well, I think, in my experience, like I, what I experienced was that, like I just suddenly was, like I was, like you know, pretty much a speed addict, you know trying to, like, you know snorting tons of Ritalin and drinking too much and, like you know, verging into like coke addiction and all these kinds of things and, like you know, and then you know, really wanted to like do some more with whatever I thought Buddhism was at the time and I could have seen myself go down a really kind of destructive path and I didn't know what to do with all this energy in my body. I always was working out and luckily I found the monastery and I was able to go there and that's why I truly feel like my life was saved. I was going down a very dark path and I and I had a lot of substance abuse in my family and I could, could have gone down that path very easily. And, uh, and I saw myself going down that like very acutely and I felt I got yanked out of that stream and I feel eternally grateful for that. You know, just as substances alone I mean, I am, I am an addict through and through and that's something that, and so I have to always mitigate that right now, hopefully.
Speaker 2:My only addiction right now is caffeine, so I'm okay with that. Yeah, yeah, so, so, all these, so. So I think what I've noticed, especially in my clinical work and supervision, all this kind of stuff, is that a lot of times people have played a lot of sports, even just intensely, in high school or even college. When you just stop, people don't know what to do with this energy at all, because they've either been managing their traumas or managing their affect and feelings through the sports, and then it just stops and they don't know what to do with themselves. Or and maybe it's more mundane, where we don't know what else to do so this is a real, not tender, but um.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of not yeah emotion connected to this for me because I feel like I really decompensated after. After high I had an opportunity to play college volleyball but I was very done with I don't even know what I was done with, but some piece of that I was done with. But then I fell apart and I started to have anxiety. So then I was in Santa Cruz and I tried to play again and that was not good. It was like trying to bring something from the dead and it didn't. It was not effective. And then I started to have panic attacks. And there was a lot of other pieces to this story, but this one in particular yeah, it was incredibly, incredibly. Not only the physical energy piece I think that was a huge part of it but the identity piece, the um I was absolutely yeah exactly like yeah, it was volleyball has a violence to it.
Speaker 2:I mean, volleyball is hardcore. You know like you're punching a ball like you, the spiking, I mean you know like. Yeah, so it's fun. Yes, you know it's like, and like you know, it sounds like you were really high level too, so you were able to really like you're a high enough level that maybe playing college yes, yes, right so I mean, you know, maybe you weren't playing at like ucla or something I was not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, do you want yeah?
Speaker 2:yeah, I mean, I was like I didn't realize you were six, nine and uh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But you know, whatever it doesn't matter, I mean I played Division three sports and it was still. It's still hardcore, right, yep. It's not Division one. I mean, it's at the same level but it isn't whatever you know, like so, but it's still that, like you can manage that, and I remember that, and then it just stops.
Speaker 1:I mean, it's a whole other podcast about sports.
Speaker 2:It really is and if you ever do that.
Speaker 1:I'd be down because, specifically, my partner also played college football and we talk a lot about the transition where this aggression is really encouraged on the football field, and then so is affection too that which I we have never had to know about. We'll have to talk about that, well, I guess. Yeah, I mean, that's it.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I mean affection. I mean, like you know, that's like part of the reasons why I really enjoy doing sports now as an as a middle age person. Is that like you get the kind, you get like contact, you know, yeah, and it's like a real. It's a totally different thing. I mean especially in wrestling, jiu-jitsu.
Speaker 1:I mean, like you don't yeah, you said that with the touch and I was kind of interested about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you get a lot of oxytocin released, tons of oxytocin people I mean. That's why there's a joke in jiu-jitsu. It's like you do you go to a class or you do it a lot, and like you know I could go anywhere in the world, like I'll probably go somewhere in here in Miami, and like your role and like you feel like your best friends are people. I'm like I don't even know the person's name, right, cause you have all that intensity and you're working with survival kind of energy ish, yeah, you know, depending and it's also like chest and you're making a lot of bodily contact and you have all these hormones released and you're like I love this guy, like, who knows, this guy could be a total dick, but you don't know. Like you just feel that now, if they are, that's different yeah, like most, most people in the jujitsu world are really cool.
Speaker 2:I'm like it's kind of more like surfing, yeah, like it, you know, and dicks are kind of weeded out yeah, yeah yeah, you know where they do mma, which would be much more of a right so like so anyway yeah, that's actually really fun to think about.
Speaker 1:Yes, because the transition being a difficult transition in general, as we know, are know can be hard on the nervous system, but then major ones like that, especially involving movement, going from regimented movement to nothing, is startling. Huh, with not much language around it. That's so cool there, okay, so I want to make sure not to use up too much time. Let's see if we take like five more minutes. Is there anything that, like, you want to make sure in your intro? Obviously I'll talk about. I'll introduce you all to there. You'll already get the introduction, so that's good. But, um, yeah, anything else that you want to make sure to say?
Speaker 2:Oh God, there's so much to talk about. I know that's what I'm like. I don't know why. I mean we can talk about aggression, we can talk about spirituality, we can talk about.
Speaker 1:Maybe group work and aggression.
Speaker 2:Yeah, group work and aggression. Also, I want to do a plug for Trauma Nerds, which is fun, which we do with my buddy Bertt, and that's absolutely, that's a nice. That's also another area that I'm really interested in, which is like the combination of like popular, like we call like nerd verse right, you know and how to how to communicate and be skillful with people. Um, you know, how do we communicate some of these principles, especially these kind of naturalistic principles of, say, like se, in a way that that is digestible for people and might introduce people so they can let to go know themselves a little bit better or know that there might be some relief, or know that they're even suffering.
Speaker 1:Be honest, well, oh, like, yes, yeah, that increased awareness and all of the things we've talked about today have really been touching like on the bigger um issues of if, if we had more awareness overall in our culture, you know how would that shift? So many of the issues, problems, pain exactly.
Speaker 2:I mean, those are all the like. Yeah, exactly the reply I have to. You know, I believe that, like you know, just our just one person, bringing awareness, does make a difference. So I mean I truly a difference to what I'm not always so sure, but there's something.
Speaker 1:Something happens, something good.
Speaker 2:Hopefully, hopefully, hopefully we don't know it could be we could be barking up the wrong tree. Oh my God, I don't know, it's always a possibility. Um, I mean you know people, humans thought the world was flat until relatively recent in our history. So you know, or what even the world was so? So I mean, yeah, I mean I mean just quickly on group work. I mean I, I really think that you know, um, people being able to communicate directly with each other and being able to say what they're feeling and start to really work to uncouple that terror that often arises.
Speaker 2:A group work's terrifying. It can be. It's not for everybody, but I've had a lot of success and bring some people into groups and and bring a lot of some of the somatic principles in the group. Although it's relational in nature, we might, we might check in with the body and and check in with threat responses and also be able to recognize when somebody might be in something right. Um, and and I've enjoyed it too, I'm just, in fact, right after this, I'm going into my own group that I'm in as a participant, which is really, which is really wonderful, and online yeah, it's online yeah so that's cool, too, to note that it can be online for some reason absolutely envisioning it in person, that's it can be in person.
Speaker 2:I mean, I, one of the one of the process groups that I run, is in person or hybrid or all online. And we do, we, because people live within like a two hour radius with each other, and this group I'm in is an international one, so there's people from all over, but it's, you know, it depends. But group work's really wonderful. It's a nice way for people to. It's a nice thing, I think, for, especially for people like us who are working like healers or therapists or you positions where, like you know, we, we therapists, tend to you know again, I'm going to generalize here but therapists tend to, you know, put a lot of bubbles around themselves and they live very kind of isolated lives, right, so it can. I think this is a good way of of letting people piss you off a bit and learning how to work with it.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it because I've seen situations that I've been in, even recently, where maybe cognitively, I'm like yeah, I know how I want to say this, what I want to say, the boundary I want to hold, and I'll have this clarity. And then when I go to do it, I'm like four years old, in trouble with my dad again and my physical-.
Speaker 2:Exactly, exactly. I'm like fuck, I know, I know. Well, that's the fascinating thing. Is that that's why group work can be so terrifying. Is that the point of it?
Speaker 2:At least in this type of group where I'm doing, is that at the point, but what ends up happening is that all of us do regress, and that's what's invited in, so you can be that four-year-old and play through it. You need to play through it in an environment that can hold that Yep, right, and then hopefully the group leader can hold the aggression towards the leader, which is what we want, right? It's like and and, and, so there can be a. You know, we can grow up in that context parts of us that really you know, without it being so, like in some ways contrived, like in a one-on-one situation where, like work with the inner child and like which is also incredibly powerful and helpful but if you don't really know until you're in a group, like what the effectiveness is and that situation, what you just said is exactly where I feel the fruits of that labor, I'm like I'm not acting like I'm 10.
Speaker 2:This is a miracle, like I remember, like I will have like a reaction. Somebody's like dude, what are you talking? Look at you, weirdo. But I'm like this is something to celebrate that I have no idea you're talking about, right so? But I know, because I'm like I could have gone down a very different path.
Speaker 2:Like you said, like you know, like you know, like you know, like you know, it's big things. Like you know, we uncouple things in that ideally over time, sometimes many years, and then what happens? Our lives are a little bit easier Because we're not, as we've, uncoupled the relational trauma in a live setting. Exactly Right. And again, again, it could be too overwhelming for people and whatever, but, like you know, and it is at times and that's okay, but, like you know, I think it's a good move and so we, we can talk more about it offline. Oh my, I have to go to. I have to go to my group. It starts in a minute. Yeah, I know it could be late, I have to talk about it okay, no, we will, we will okay.
Speaker 1:Thanks for coming.
Speaker 2:We'll make it short and sweet and I'll connect with you soon yes, thank you so much, and thank you for everybody's listening to this yes, okay I'll talk, thank you, okay, bye.