S3E39 · Unna Goldsworthy: Unna Movement

Alrighty, beautiful people, welcome back to the Virtus Performance Podcast. We have a long awaited guest, certainly in my world. Anna, welcome to the podcast. It's an absolute pleasure to have you. Glad we finally got time to sit down in our busy lives. Schedule's been a bit weird lately, not normal. But hopefully we'll start to get normal from here on out. Yeah, a rhythm is coming. My world's a little bit weird everywhere at the moment, so I'm waiting for that. It feels like it's happening this week. Perfect. That's what we want. So we want to find that rhythm.

First question for you. What gets you out of bed in the morning? Me, out of bed. A few days a week, my dogs get me out of bed. The walk, making sure they're healthy and happy. There's that look on their face when they're like, "We're doing it, aren't we? We're doing it." It's go time. It's the little wriggle they get in their body. So yeah, two dogs at our home. Names? So we've got Bjorn, who's our dog, and he's coming up three, but he's still got a very big puppy vibe. And then a slightly adopted dog, which is my partner's mum's dog.

Her name's Pace, and I think they're actually born on the same day, but from completely different places. Very serendipitous. Yeah, great word. Yeah, so both of them out on the turf gets me up. What breeds are they? They're standard poodles, and one looks like a standard poodle with what people would imagine a poodle to look like. So they stand about hip high, but she's very beautiful. And what I noticed today is she got washed and clipped and groomed the other day, and she's got the poof at the front and the fluffy ears, and she looks like a show dog poodle.

So essentially it looks like Tyler. Yeah. But she walks differently when she's been groomed. So a little bit of swagger, a little bit of arm swing. She's got a vibe. Yeah, I love that. And then dear Bjorn, he's pitch black, but he's just shaved down. I shaved him last time for the first time, and it was pretty funny because it's akin to shaving, or in my mind it's akin to shaving a sheep. And I thought I was doing really, really well, but then when I stepped back and there was all this kind of ... You were too close to the thing.

You didn't get to see the whole picture. So much patchiness. And by the time I was done, I was pretty proud of myself, but my partner was like, "Yeah, it was an honest day's work. Well done." I think that was the last time I shaved my head. I was like, "I've done a good job." And then KP get home and go, "What the fuck have you done to yourself?" Yeah. So that gets me up of ... I'm enjoying, which I hear you don't. You're like an alarm or coffee gets me up. No, no, no. It's just more of a gripe of that being the answer, and not having any depth to it.

But of course, alarm and coffee, two of my favorite things in the morning. But yeah, it's not actually coffee. I'm enjoying with the ... I think this is the first year I felt older, because when daylight savings started pre-summer, it hit me for six. I was like, "Normally this is the transition I like, because the evenings are longer and da, da, da." But it honestly took me, it felt like a month or more to get used to this new cycle, because I was so used to waking up early, walking the dogs, getting started. And now that daylight savings has gone back, I'm now waking up before my alarm again.

And I'm like, "I'm loving that." So I'm sort of ... I'm cruising into the seniors vibe. Yeah. That's the vibe though. I think waking up before your alarm, I am hanging for that part of my life where I'm not dragging myself out of bed, because the alarm's pulling me out. So I love that. I do. I really do quite like it as well. And it is, thankfully, a feeling of being awake and ready to get up, rather than this, your body actually naturally waking you up. So that's- Yeah. What's it like? I've known that for a few years.

Brilliant. Yeah. It's sort of new for me as well, in a way, because my little one's ... She's nearly five now, but she was a bit of a struggle with where she was sleeping for a long while. So only just getting my bed back. But I think my health is the best it's been in a long while as well. So that's representing itself. Something in that. Sleep's good for you. And my body is ready to do it and regenerate itself. It's got all the things it needs. So I'm really ... Yeah. I'm pretty pumped about that, actually.

I'm quite proud of- That's great. Proud of the last few years of health journey. Yeah, that's awesome. Yes. Yeah. Is there part of you that misses the shared cuddles and shared bed stuff? Or is it- Just to be honest, it's not 100% out. So even last night, she was reading books and snuggling and I went, "I'm just here for this." So we fell asleep together. But yeah, it's both ways when you do go to sleep with the bed by yourself and you're like, "Oh yeah, there's that space." Yeah. It's amazing, but there's almost like something missing.

Yeah. And she gets really ripped off, because when you put her to bed, she tries to bargain with you to stay in bed. I'm like, "Babe, I'm too big to sleep in this bed. It's really uncomfortable." Then she falls asleep, wonderful. Then you sneak out and every morning that she goes to sleep in her bed, she comes back in and she's ripped off. She's like, "You said you were going to sleep with me." So then the way you wake up is like just someone pissed off with you, which is not a nice vibe. No. But yeah.

So yeah, getting the bed backs. Your bed back's really nice. So it's not an all the time thing though. Let's not stretch the truth. Yeah. It's a challenge. It's a challenge, but I'm glad you're getting to the other side of things. Yeah. And I do wonder why we push so heavily for it. It's like I sleep with a companion and that helps me sleep. And when I talk to a single friend and they're dating someone and they notice that when they're sleeping in the same bed, they fall asleep better. It's weird that we have this thing of, "Get to your bed, sleep by yourself."

Yeah. And I think that's part of it's boundaries for us as well. You want them to be able to sleep through the night and all those kinds of things. And for us, we could put the girls down at seven, mostly. Seven o'clock. Seven o'clock, that's the plan. But yeah. So we get our own time, so we get to take a breath and decompress a little bit. And the nights that we don't get that, I notice the next day or two. Pretty rubbish, which has been every night lately. But yeah, I don't know. It is an interesting social rule.

It bleeds into your relationship a lot as well though, right? Because then it's if you haven't had that quality time to reboot or debrief or connect, it slowly does start seeping into other places. 100%. 100%. So yeah, it's just a balance. I think it's just being aware of what you need when you need it and which levers you need to push and pull. It's the perfect brush off from a very tired man who has no solutions. There is no solution. Just a balance. Okay. Well, you're a few years further down the track than I am, so any tips?

No, I feel like we would need more details on what's going on. Oh, there's so many things. Yeah, yeah. We need more details. I'm not going to brush over the top. That's so arrogant. I love a Hail Mary bit of advice though. I think it's great. With context, knowing that it's part of it, but it's like Hail Mary bit of advice. Hey, just do this. I think I can just for some reason, I had a flash of maybe our parents' generation where they used to, no, it was probably a generation before where they used to put whiskey and stuff like that.

Like drugging your children's not a great idea. Oh, there was a moment last night where it was a genuine chance. I feel like there's so many moments where we get pushed a little further than we have the emotional tolerance or energy tolerance for that we get more insight of what's going on for us. Then how do we reboot? And then it feels like we mentioned before the pearl and the turd. Like there's always in the turd moment, there's always a little pearl, like when they do finally fall asleep and you hear them breathing and just

taking that tiny pearl moment within the turd, knowing that it will end and that that sound of you laying with them getting to sleep or whatever, it won't last. I had some advice the other day. There was something along the lines of like when you're in the moment, we're in the turd moment and things aren't going well and you've been pushed too far, just like close your eyes for a second and just imagine that you're 80 years old and this is decades ago and you have the opportunity to come back to this moment, like how much you'd want that and how much you'd enjoy that in practice.

A little bit different, but yeah, I get that. But I guess what I come to is that does it actually help me in the moment or, you know, building the skill to do that takes a little while. But I think they also being able to be really honest with where you're at at the moment. So when you're feeling annoyed and you're feeling frustrated and having an element of play or honesty in it, like if you can have that moment where you go, I'm feeling really frustrated and you get to say to your kid, I'm going

to need a cuddle because I can feel this frustration in my body and it's not helping you get to sleep and it's not helping, like just being honest about it. Yes, I find that helps. It's just kind of just like voicing what you're feeling and Lucy especially, Lucy's daddy's getting really sad, like I'm starting to get upset. Like, I need you to stop. She's like, do you need a cuddle? Yeah, because they're really selfish humans, but they're really compassionate when they get the opportunity when that window opens. And I think that's the dissolving of the turd for the pearl.

The pearl can shine. Yeah, that tiny pearl. But yeah, I feel for you, it's unique to the family. It's unique to the scenario. And I'll see if I've got like a gold piece of info, but I don't know. I don't know if there is one. I think it's just keep showing up and do best and enjoy the little things when they, enjoy the little wins when they happen. Yeah, and maybe some non-sleep deep rest protocols during your day. Yeah, I did lay down and switch off for a little bit this morning. After coffee and things like that, what does your normal day look like?

What fills your world? My world. So my world's a part-time world at the moment, which I committed to myself after really working a bit too much. When my son, who's now 10, was born, my life got unplanned, thrown back into a stressful work scenario. And when it came to being pregnant second time and doing mat leave again for the second time, I was like, okay, what do I want it to look like this time? So my life is now part-time and that will be a bit of the vibe until my daughter's at school next year. So part of my week is hanging with her and doing school drop-off and all that kind of stuff.

And the other days are building my empire. Love that. Tell us about your empire. For those playing at home, what do you do? Yeah, what do you do and why do you do it? So my job title is an exercise physiologist, but I think the purpose and thing that's really pulled me in the last five years, you have that key moment in your career where, okay, that person, the way that person speak has changed my direction or that kind of thing. So the vibe pulled very heavily towards the mental health requirement of our job and just being much more direct and clear about that.

So acceptance and commitment therapy is a big part of the way I work with people and it either comes in organically or it comes quite clearly from that first point of meeting someone. And then also offering those skills to groups of people or contexts of people that are driven to put the context of their health that goes around their whole life into play and the skills that I can offer to make that a reality. So that's definitely been a big shift in the way that I practice and along the way as well, because I'm 22 years into my career and I've worked across a lot of environments, which I really love.

But in this environment, I don't know what it is about entrepreneurship, but I keep getting pulled back and it's not a hate relationship, but God, it's hard. Yes. I was having this conversation with one of our members who is managing director and owns a bunch of different businesses. And it was a little bit surprising just the way he spoke about it, but we were just chatting how things going and stuff. And he goes like, mate, this is hard. Like these things that we're doing, they're difficult. They're not easy. Because I guess because we're the kind

of people that want to do it, you tend to, when things aren't going as well as you want them to, you tend to beat yourself up a little bit and you kind of, I tend to sometimes, I'm pretty good at kind of going, yeah, things are fine because they're never as bad as we think they are. And they're never as good as we think they are. Go around to that little negative feedback loop of like, I'm not doing well enough. Things aren't going as well as we want them to. We're not making enough progress, all these kind of things.

But he just said, like, just take a breath and be kind to yourself and know that not a whole lot of people do this and do it consistently and do it for a long time. And a long, long time, right. So, yeah, I think I've been entrepreneur-ing, not successfully, but I've been doing it or building on that success for life. I think you've been doing it, that success enough. For the whole, yeah, the whole time in some capacity. Like there's been periods where I've been hired by places. But when I look at it, it's always been, there's been an undertone or something happening in the background that was always that way oriented.

But I feel what you said before, this idea that like, it's really hard and that, I guess I'm really thankful that I have less of those overt negative loops, but just pure frustration when you're putting in the effort. And it's not obvious, but I have, I've been finding some calm with that lately, particularly around getting to know the community here, because I've only been here in Mornington for five years, pre-COVID for the people who don't like COVID movies. So it feels like there's something going on at the moment where there's abundance and community in the air and the entrepreneurs are working harder than ever.

And there's more now. And everyone's working really hard. There's more burnout in Australia. There's a stat at the moment. There's worldwide, I think I'm trying to remember the numbers. I'm not great with numbers. I'll believe you, whatever number you say. Yeah. Let's blow people away. So in Australia, 62% of employees are burnt out compared to 48% internationally. So we're the highest rate of burnout. And even within our C-suites, that's where it's sitting a little low, but still in the 60%. So I'm pretty confident with my memory with that, but it's, yeah, we work, we work

really hard, but I'm feeling this sense of abundance where it's nice to be deliberate and conscious, but something's happening in the air at the moment where things are just, you're doing the work and they might not, the rewards are not popping up as you'd expect them, but they're coming in through, you know, when grass grows through like a crack of concrete. Yeah. That's a really cool analogy. Yeah. That's the vibe I'm getting at the moment. I definitely feel that. Like it, like I feel like we, like just from our perspective as a team, as a

collective, like we're working as hard as ever, but there's been times over the last few years during COVID before COVID where, where you've kind of had that abundance of things coming to you and there's almost like that attraction pace where it, it's underlined by hard work, but it's, you know, you can't, like that, you can't control that aspect of it or you can control is doing the work and you know, it's the same as training in the gym or, or working towards a particular goal outside. It's the, you're only, you can be responsible for the work you put in, you can't be responsible or take ownership of the results until you actually get them.

It just takes time and you know, everything takes longer and costs more than we want it to. And sometimes you've just got to be in that season of putting in the work and knowing that it'll pay you, pay you back at some point. But yeah, the lawn in front of you might not be growing, but you know, through the cracks in the concrete, the grass is coming up and you'll be able to enjoy fruits of that labour at some stage. It just might not look, and almost never looks the way you want it to look or the way you thought it would look.

Yeah. Yeah, but definitely the people you meet vibe at the moment is really energising for me at the moment. And it's definitely why I've found myself here because the community is so strong. What you've created over the last eight years is so amicable. Like it's, it's very clear. So it's, I think that's really exciting to be part of it. And I must apologise if I'm maybe too pushy, because I'm like, what have you got me? No, no, I've loved it. Like, it's been a kind of a, like a drawn out process of like getting to know you and spending time because you've, you know, life's been happening, right?

Like for us, for you guys, finding your dream home, which is, which is huge. Yeah, that's, I was thinking about that a lot lately because, you know, having been away recently, working at La Trobe, there was this, it reminds me every time I get there because I go there yearly, I'm driving around in Bendigo doing my gig. But for the first like week, it's like I'm literally reconnecting synapses of where to drive. And then here, again, completely different synaptic experience going on. And then new home literally moved in a week ago yesterday. So that's massive. Like that's such a big change.

So much recalibration going on for me at the moment. But thankfully, it's all feeling very energetic and in places that I want to be. So that feels really, really cool. Perfect. Yeah. If you this is a sucky question, because there's so many different ways you can take it. But if you could distill your philosophies around exercise physiology and progress and movement and all of these kind of things into a, not necessarily a sound bite, but into a bit of a chat, like how would you articulate what it is you do and how how you what you believe essentially?

I guess it really is the holistic version of meet you where you're at. So and I guess also the flip of that, which I'm quite proud of in the last few years is understanding what that means for me working with someone as well. So when I'm having a response to someone's the way they're going about it, like what is, what's my response to them? So why am I having a body response to them feeling resistant to my idea or that kind of thing? So being able to truly flip the experience like, you know, why, what

have I got to change to help this person get to be where they need to be in this little moment compared to the person that will come in two hours? And that's philosophically from my own point of view of what I can control, that's helpful for people. And certainly, I guess not having a box set up for someone. So truly being able to just meet someone where they're at as they walk in and being able to read like, do we need you know, is this the smoke rather than where the fire is? And you know, what's really causing this?

Is this a neurological mental state thing that we need to work out before anything's going to change in your body? Like, how do we actually prepare your whole system to move forward and being able to broach those kind of tricky, trickier conversations. So that's philosophically, I think it is a soundbite of, you know, meeting people where they're at. Yeah. And being able to nurture. What's your process been like over the last few years to get to that headspace? Because I guess, you would say you probably had a different approach early on in your career? Yeah, for sure.

It reminds me of the little thing you put on the grams the other day about, you know, that Tyler's moment where he was just like, what did I do that for? And I guess I feel quite lucky in my career because I've come from hospital environments and working across neuro in hospital environments, but working in that space when I wasn't fully qualified. So I was in a space where I had to be an observer. So I was my first, was it my first job? One of my first jobs was a porter in a rehab hospital and physio assistant.

So I was doing a heap of cool shit before my time around really amazing minds, but also, you know, just me in my solo time going and picking up patients from their bed, chatting away with them, picking them up, you know, managing time in that way was really, really cool. And so being able to be observant, very much working in that neuro world and getting that neuro crossover into Musk, that clarity has definitely been a pathway where I feel like that's a bit more of my superpower compared to just being truly Musk. And then to

be honest, I think there was a couple of turning points where it was meeting mentors or idols in the space where they are, they were just truly passionate about what they do. So Kathy Dooley is an anatomist, chiropractor and movement specialist over in the States. So doing neuro kinetic therapy work with her is mind blowing. And as a presenter, also, she was a big influence to my presenting stuff as well, because she's what she brings to a room. It might not suit everyone, but it was inspiring to me, just high energy, thorough, constant, and really knowing that everyone that left the room left with something big.

And then another big turning point for me was meeting and working with and I studied with them over many years, Gary Ward from Anatomy in Motion. And his sidekick, Chris Sridharan, who he's hard to find, he's not on the internet anyway, he's a bit of a stealth mode man. But that was I think where I truly learned to think rather than live in a box of formula related stuff so that when someone comes in, and it looks a certain way, but it's it's not that it's how do I actually process and problem solve this based on anatomy rather than being just putting someone in the same box?

So you've rolled your ankle. So the answer is this. It's pretty interesting. Like I've felt it with conversations with you. Excuse me. That was definitely one of the big impacts Greg had on this place when he came in, I think. And I think it obviously it comes from that desire to continue to learn and continue to grow and develop. But I think it's just it's almost just like time in the chair time in the in the role that allows you to kind of go full circle multiple times where you kind of it allows you to

see the whole picture for what it is and know that there's going to be, you know, a million different potential reasons for X, Y and Z. Like, yeah, like I'd noticed that noticed that with some of the then in, you know, everyone has their value in different ways, but some of the newly graduated physios and things that we refer to and work with it, it's very much like, oh, it's a rolled ankle. So this is the protocol. This is just the way it is. And I think it's important to have systems and principles that you lean back on and rely on.

But we are, you know, human body is a dynamic complex system with millions of inputs every moment, every moment. And we need to be able to adapt our our way of of coaching or teaching or or consulting to Yeah, to those. It's a plethora of opportunities. Yeah. And it really speaks to the journey of the practitioner, right? Because I feel for this in as a lecturer and a tutor when it took me a while, because I was so excited for them to have that sort of bigger model where it was like, but they almost took

me a long while to get the idea that you've got to allow them to be in the box first, to then to be able to break it open. And then even coming from uni to on the floor and working with people where you've got square wheels and intuition. And that sense that you get from something is just from years of treading there, treading there, I don't know if that's not even analogy, but, you know, doing doing the thing and then, yeah, I remember reading it. It was a basically a how to become a practitioner. It's this huge book.

And there was just this beautiful little bit in it where it was talking about how thought processes for practitioners change and that we get to a point where we have, you know, the round wheels and we're cruising along. Yeah, but there will be complex things where, you know, where we gather around together and go, what the hell's going on here? I can't see it. And we go back to square wheels. And that's important that you do kind of swing back and forth. Because if you're living in a place where you know all the time, then you've lost your curiosity and you're not meeting that person where they're at.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. For sure. Like, do you have a, a, I mean, a system in your head or a process you follow? If you see someone for the first time, obviously, the bigger first part is just sitting listening and hearing what, where they're at and what they have to say. But do you have like a, almost like a mind map in your head where you kind of go, alright, well, this and you follow the process that way? Or is it more of? Yeah, well, I guess so when I first meet someone, it's going to be just very that dynamic psychosocial.

So I'm hearing about, like everything in life, what's influencing everything. But from that physical point of view, we literally go, okay, so let's think about the body. And we literally go, okay, what's happened at your foot? Let's have to do that. And we go all the way through and go what has influenced your every footprint you're putting onto the ground. And then you and but it's not that like this magic guy where it's like, oh, this cup, cup came first, this one, this one, this one, this one, it's like, no, it's the balls being moved. And this happened fifth, but it's having the biggest impact on your body's ability to adapt.

So it's like figuring out the in the body needs to create that adjustment for sure. And that's yeah, literally hearing about them also what they understand of what's happened, because you would know this in and out as well that it often when you sit down with someone and you go, okay, you've got a bulged disc or you've, you've had cancer and you know, with that surgery has done this, but what's actually happened? That's often the first time they've sat and had a conversation about the reality what's happened in their anatomy. And I think that's some

that's a big in as well creating a little bit of pace or where they're interested in working on as well, because it will often come I have I've got an instinct for here and here and here. These are the ways we could do it. Where do you want to focus? And they've they've got a vibe for what's what they need the most. And they Yeah, and I think that's really important as a for new coaches, new practitioners is you kind of that meeting your client or your patient where where they're at. Sometimes they'll come in and it might be a might be an ankle issue and they just want their ankle treated.

Whereas you're kind of coming from a space of, well, it's probably like that's not the cause we need to we need to treat something else. How do you reconcile with that? Like, knowing so much and having so much experience versus the they just want their thing treated? Yeah, and I guess that's the thing when you do, you can scare someone away quickly when you're like, so it was my ankle why playing with my clavicle? I think for some people you can just go okay, we're going to work in these two places because they're influencing. But

there's, there's definitely tricks we can do where you get immediate feedback from the body that are that feels different when we can address or reposition something in another area. And it's, yeah, it's a little bit like, it reminds me of almost like this is a bit of a random connection. But in Parkinson's, where the research and the movement stuff that they're doing in that now is huge leap and one of the buy ins they do with how we can tap into the brain and influence movement quicker is like intention and you know, get your reach to the ceiling.

Now I want you to try and push the ceiling off and that when we bring intention into it, what we create in the input processing idea, creates change in movement. So this idea that if we can connect the two meaningful parts that don't make logical sense, even though we all sang, you know, the knee bones connected to the, you know, we all did that. Yeah, that's true. But yeah, it's, You almost like give them the capacity or the tool to be able to think outside their box initially. They're interested. Yeah. And I think that's the buy in that we really want because for people to do, some people are like this percentage of people are interested in doing their rehab.

And then for the rest of them, we've got to do a little dance and we've got to figure out the buy in. What's your values? Where's your, where's your hard points? What have we got to do to make this you not be in this position in a year's time? Like, what does that look like? Yeah, I read an article the other day from one of my mentors over in the US and he it was essentially like, just make sure we're not putting the cart before the horse, make sure that when someone comes in, and they want, like most people come in here because they want training, right?

They want to get fitter, they want to get stronger, they want to be better at this sport, they want to lose weight, whatever it is. And they can come in and you can kind of be like, are you sleeping? Are you drinking your water? Are you having good nutrition? And if they're not doing those three things, kind of the training doesn't necessarily matter. And you kind of need to bring the horse to the front and go, let's nail those things first, as we build in all of these other things. I can imagine your process is probably pretty similar to that.

Yeah. And I guess if we could expand on the analogy, because I love a metaphor analogy. It's like, you've got to train the horse to pull the cart as well. So we've got to have insight of why when my day gets bad, why do I devalue the things that I would sit in front of a mate and say that I value? Like, where do I bullshit myself through just living an autopilot life? And that's where I like to dig. It's like, okay, you say this, but then you've also said this and I don't. That's such a conflict.

There's something in the middle here that we're not being honest to ourselves about, like, what are the hard conversations we need to have? Because everyone knows you should be hydrated. I find it fascinating because I think it was yesterday or two days ago, I was far out, it was like four o'clock and I was about to get a footy train. I hadn't drank it. I hadn't actively drank any water that day. And I was just like, such a fucking idiot. This is essentially my job. It's harsh. I don't know. I respond well to that. Like, what are you doing?

It's just this really simple, simple thing. And do you have any ways that you help people figure out what's right in front of them? The simple things that they need to be doing? Because like everyone everywhere knows that we need to move often. We need to drink plenty of water. We need to eat well. We need to get plenty of sleep. However, our actions tend to show us the opposite is true. Yeah. I think there's definitely a few little sort of sit down processes that I find are really, really powerful. There's one called the choice point, and it's just essentially about getting into your metacognition.

So into your thought processes, into the things that we do without being conscious or deliberate. So we say we want X in this amount of time, or we say we want better performance or optimisation or whatever it is. But when we come down to the crux of what drives our first thoughts and our second thoughts, you know that speed of processing and go, "Okay, here's the scenario. This is what you want. What are the things that take you away? What do they sound like in your head? What do they sound like to other people, the excuses and stuff that you say often that just don't actually make you feel proud or impressed by yourself at any point?"

And then what are the actions that we do? And then it's just really cool to then go, "Okay, what are the towards moves?" But I find the towards moves, conceptually we can always think of the logical things, but when it comes to actually just being kinder to ourselves, like not calling ourselves a fuckhead. Does that get me to where I want to be? What is the value in that for me? If I was talking to someone in a friendly way and expecting them to be compliant and helpful, would that be something that I say to them?

So why am I saying that shit to myself? It helps me. I reckon if I said it to Tyler, it'd help him too. I wonder if there's a gender thing, because one of my early training partners was male and he says that as well. I need to have a conversation with him now because I think hopefully we joke in that way. So maybe if it's jovial, if there's a tone of- There's a laugh that comes to it, especially when I say it to myself. I think that's the point of difference, whereas I think there are other people that truly say, "You fucking idiot."

And go through that negative spiral. They have hate inside what they're saying to themselves. I have nothing but love for myself, I promise. Okay, well then we're clearer. We're much clearer. So I feel like there's that, but I think the key thing, this whole thing is this is just touching on the top of one of my most favourite tools, but to go as an aside, one of the things we do is how about we just observe ourselves and how often we do these things and in those moments, if we're just an observer and we're observing without judgement, what capacity do I have to do something slightly different than what I've done at other times?

So I think it really opens us up to not actually having to do a thing or drink two litres of water or blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but when we just pause and go, "Okay, I'm doing that thing where I shove in a phone call or I shove in an extra email, I give in to the urge of doing the thing that I said I wasn't going to do," but when we have those moments and go, "Oh, I'm doing it again," and just take two seconds to say, "Okay, body, what do we need right now? Oh, wow, we haven't eaten two hours since we were meant to.

We're really hungry and I'm just pissed off at my colleague because they're talking loudly through the wall. This isn't me. What's the stuff that's shaping my day?" It's such a powerful question to ourselves. It's like, "What do you really need right now?" And actually give yourself the space to cultivate that awareness to figure it out. Yeah, with things as they are, what needs to be done in that moment? Because you're right, we're on autopilot for majority of the day, whether it be at work or driving or even training at some points. We tend to get

stuck in the same pattern where we're just repeating actions and it doesn't allow us the opportunity to stop and breathe and things like meditation or journaling or even just conversation that's different. It's really hard. I think that our autopilot is jacked up a little higher from just to collective idea that we're going fast and it is literally really hard to drop gears. I think involved in that is this urge that I should be doing more and resisting that urge is really tricky. How much do you think that leads into the 62% burnout you were talking about before?

I think a lot. I think our identities are so heavily aligned with work. Often when we talk about who we are, it's aligned with work and I guess that our performance is always around work. But I think when we sit back and we look at people that we idolize, they've actually got an understanding of their performance in their whole life, not just at work and that our identities get carried really heavily there. I had a beautiful moment with a client yesterday and I caught up the week before, same as always, solid plan, all good. We write good programs.

This is what we do. But then it's not what the crux is and she'd come back and she was apologetic because she'd done none of the stuff. So I was like, "Great, the door's open to do this work now." And we came down to it and we're working and we're just nailing things down. I said, "What would your work colleagues describe as your highest quality character, anything there?" And it came down to integrity. And then we had a bit of a hard conversation. I'm like, "So how are you acting in integrity towards your health now?

If that's one of your easiest skills in your work environment and that other people can depend on you on, when we move it over here, are you being dependable in integrity around your own health?" And she's dealing with something that could be debilitating, like perfectionist personality with a potential for chronic pain, like it's an acute disc that's only two or three weeks old. So this pathway could go into a really tricky place. So when we sat with, "What does it look like when I act in integrity?" And then I find that when we nail down the hard part where I'm moving away from what's truly in my character, I think we have, that's where there's resistance as well.

I think that's a bit of the agitation that we bring to life is when we've moved away from that character of what we know and being pulled by something else. It's so helpful to have someone like you to remind, pardon me, I struggle today, to remind you to pull yourself back to, like, who do you want? Like, written on the wall downstairs is like, "Decide the person you want to be and prove it to yourself every day." Like, there's two sides of it. You have to, once you've done the work one day, you can't just not do it the next day and the next day.

You've got to keep showing up and keep doing the work. Yeah, and definitely credit to people because when we say, when we, nailing down the, maybe the one small thing that I can focus on, and it might not feel big enough because I'm not, you know, rubbing shoulders with Obama or something, but it's like, what's the one small achievable thing that's going to have a ripple effect that I can focus on that is achievable? Because we're ultimately talking about creating new synaptic pathways in the brain. That's no small feat. So when we go in too hard or we judge ourselves too heavily, we can see where we take ourselves off our horse and cart really quickly.

And that, yeah, I think, you know, bring it in full circle. That's where we've really, this is us training the horse to carry the cart and we've got to be gentle to ourselves in that way. Gentle enough to know that you've got to show up every day or contribute in some way every day. Like I love, just love the concept of compound interests, like whether it be health, wealth, relationships is, you know, there's like, think of like, I like using the example with our members, like think of your oldest friendships, like how many little conversations and little contributions you guys made to each other to create that, that friendship.

And most people, you know, getting to a little bit older now have those friendships they've had for a decade or two that you could go a year or two without speaking to that person. But because you've done all the work in the, in the previous decade, it doesn't matter too much. You could, you know, like I'm, I'd love to see them a little bit more, but I've got friends that I don't speak to very often and we catch up a year on and nothing's changed. And I love that. And I think we can do the same thing from a health perspective.

Yeah. I think we're on another analogy here. I'm excited about it, but it speaks to the genuine nature of your character too. Right. And that, yeah, I love that little, I think, yeah, we're definitely on a new analogy where it's like, well, if I actually treat my health as a friend, what would I do with them? And then that's like, actually I'm a bit of a friend. Yeah. But you go through, we go through these, through these chapters or seasons where we lean too hard towards one thing. Like I love another analogy for you. I

love the pendulum analogy is like we will swing too hard towards work and then we'll kind of create some awareness and go, oh, I'm working too hard. I'm spending too much time. And then you'll kind of swing back and you'll go, I need to spend more time at home. So you do that and then you're kind of like, oh, I need to spend some more time at work. And I think as we get older, ideally that pendulum doesn't swing as far back and forward. We're just kind of like shifted, like making little changes. Yeah. We ultimately want it to be in the middle.

It's like, yeah, it's yeah, yeah. The pendulum is a fun one, right? Because it's, we really are, I guess being clear on what it looks like when I can create rock solid boundaries so that, and that's what creates this, the less of the swing in the pendulum. I think within that as well being realistic and auditing life where we've, we've got cycles in our life where they're predictable. So when we go, okay, of coming up to the end of a quarter or for students, for example, a lot of the crew that I work with, yeah, in high school and their, their Olympics is getting through that exam period.

So we need to periodise and have reality that, okay, you're, you're not doing a footy final, you're doing exams and our exercise and how we're bouncing around this needs to, like it needs to ebb and flow. So there's room for everyone in that same thing. But, and that comes down to rock solid boundaries, which is hard. And knowing what, knowing what you need, being able to, to articulate to yourself and to everyone else what you need. And then also what your family needs, right? Like you've gone through that shift of working to family because you've identified that that's what your family needs and you, that's probably what you needed to a point.

Yeah, I think that was just thinking back to one of the things you asked before. It's, I think what's defined me to be where I am now as a practitioner. That was a big thing is cause when I hit rock bottom in my family dynamics when I was under a heap of pressure at work, pressure that I had created because I was learning how to be an entrepreneur and I, in theory I will never make those mistakes again. But I, it was, I had to get to rock bottom and thankfully that's where the grass grew through the concrete again.

And some of the things that I learnt from there shaping me so strongly as a practitioner now, and I wouldn't change them, but thankfully I still have family to come to at the end of it. Yeah, but there's absolutely no like substitute for that experience and to go through it. Like the value now lies in you being able to teach your students and teach your clients about those lessons without them having to go through it. Like even just a really simple visceral example. I've done a few hamstrings playing football and one of the boys is like phase two into his rehab and like I was like, mate, slow, like slow down, just back it off.

Like I know you're keen to get back, but I've been there, you know, and he kind of joked, he's like, oh, I've got to figure this stuff out for myself. I'm like, yeah, sure. But if I can save you six weeks, six weeks by explaining to you my experience and the, the, the problems that I had to go through and the solutions that I've realised afterwards, like isn't that what you want? He's like, yeah, yeah, that's what I want. So, you know, we went for a lap, a couple of laps and chatted about it. And it's kind of like, you know, just like essentially it was just be patient.

Just, just know that it's probably going to take a week or two longer than you want it to. But you know, that slow down allows you to go faster, faster later. He's lucky to have had you hopefully, hopefully it sinks in the urge to just push more because my identity says I should be somewhere else other than just being kind to our bodies. And that's the weird thing about rehab, right? Especially with fatigue related stuff and cancer fatigues and things like that is sometimes you don't know until you push a little bit further. So there's, yeah.

And there's a balance between wanting to experience it yourself and wanting to learn from others' experience. Like there's some things you've just got to do. You've just got to go through it yourself. But it does help to put the ego aside for a second and listen to what other people who have said it have to say, and whether it be other business owners or other parents or other athletes, like just listen to the examples that the people around you and the experiences people around you have had. Because even if you don't like it, there's probably

a little nuggets of gold to pull from it so that you can then make the best decision and do the things that you said you would do. Yeah. And it's funny too, right? Because in sports and in athletic pursuits, there's such high highs and low lows and that it's hard to create composure in the middle. It reminds me of one of my mentors, but this proverb that I'm trying to remember and it's like, "Oh God, I could bore some people here." I'll try and summarise it, but it was essentially a farmer and something happens and the townspeople come and they go, "Oh, we heard about this."

And he's like, "Oh, it's fine. It's not good, not bad." And then there's a flow on from that. And they're like, "Oh my God, are you okay?" And he's like, "No, it's fine. It's not good, not bad." And I'll learn it and maybe next time we can go up properly back. I could have a crack for you. I think I know the one you're talking about. Yeah. And it's just- He's in his village and he's working with his son and the cart, so the cart that the horse is pulling breaks. I thought I'd link that back.

And his son goes, "Oh, no, Dad, that's the worst." And he goes, "Maybe." And then his son has to do more work to pull the cart and he breaks his leg. And the village people say, "Oh, that's so bad. You don't have your son to help you on the farm anymore." And he goes, "Yeah, maybe." And then the army come into town and they're conscripting new soldiers, but he's too old and his son can't go because he's broken his leg. And the townspeople rejoice and go, "That's wonderful. Your son's going to be okay and he doesn't have to go to war."

And he goes, "Maybe." And essentially it's just the things are not necessarily good or bad. They just are. Yeah. I like the idea of that we get to decide how we respond to things. The next thing that happens is it's actually a good or a positive thing and it would not have happened without that path. Exactly. But if I'm killing myself with it's good or bad and then reshaping my life when it's, you know, I don't know what the ramifications are going to be of this. Some are predictable, some aren't. But if I'm just kind of patient in what I can observe and learn from it.

And I think that's a really tricky thing from the rehab and the athlete point of view. It definitely reminds me of one of the greatest lessons that I learnt early, really early on from a stroke patient is, and from her own words, what did she say? She was a corporate and stroke back in. We're in rehab, a lot of gait rehab based stuff. And she was saying, I'm a better person now than I was before. I was a real asshole before. And because of the stroke, I can see the world differently. And I'm thankful for my life.

That's such a visceral example, right? It's not and it's not what we expect. We, you know, we offer, oh my gosh, you want this life back. But it was just really cool for me to have met her so early in my career and gone. Ah, and then luckily enough, another spinal patient has family was struggling for him to get things back. But he was actually like, I'm okay, this new life is okay for me. And he was more at peace with it. And it was a challenge, acceptance and that capacity to kind of go, this is my reality.

Like, how can I make the best of it? Yeah, what what does life look like now? And yeah, just meeting those people in the way have been really powerful. And I guess that's ultimately what through the acceptance and commitment therapy thing is that I'm trying to facilitate for other people that are stuck, stuck or struggling in places. I think that's why I love it so much. Yeah. And I guess we all had a we've all been through the last three years of a real life example of when things don't go the way you want. There's two ways of two ways of dealing with it.

And ultimately, like, like, we are a stronger, more resilient, more robust business now than we were pre COVID. And would we be would we have have the experiences and would we have the capacity to do things we can do now before? If that never happened, we wouldn't. So So, you know, am I grateful for COVID? Yeah, essentially, because that's our reality that that was what happened. And we have the capacity now to go. Here's what we learned from it is what we're implementing. And here's what the world looks like now. Yeah, it's ultimately just like saying, I'm, I'm grateful for life.

However it comes, I can do I can deal more fatty love of fate. I love that. Just saying, I'm all fatty, though. I'm more fatty. Yeah, awesome. Well, let's, let's, we could talk for hours, I'm sure. But let's wrap this up a little bit. What, how can people come see you? Where are you treating it? What is your week? What Yeah, what does your week look like now that it's getting back into a rhythm back into a rhythm. So I'm looking forward to meeting new people on Tuesdays and Thursdays here at Virtus for kind of clinic work or so body work or mind work.

And from speaking, that's just stuff that comes up with around people understanding their bodies or into that kind of more more mindset based stuff. And that is building growing. So that just happens by conversation at the moment, if anyone wants to chat. And what else I'm in the city, in a clinic in Northcote, in an osteo clinic there, which is, that's kind of cool of, I treat solo there, but I also co treat with an osteo there, which is very cool and powerful. And so it's just a bit of a jump for people who happen to be in that area and want to give it a go.

You literally have four hands on you at once. Yeah, I've had an experience as a patient side, it's literally the whole kind of neuro experience that input out. So she's moving structures. I'm implementing what I can see I want to do with her on the table as like guided movement. And then we just invite the motor centre to be part of it with movement in the end. Like, yeah, we're excited. It's a bit of a pilot thing at the moment, but that's super cool. Yeah, that's really cool. And yeah, I've really, she's an amazing mind as well.

So that what else do I do? Oh, you're a mum. No one needs me for that. But that's, yeah, that's life at the moment. You've got a bunch of courses and things like that. Yeah, yeah. So I've got the perimenopause course. So that looks at what changes in our physiology and perimenopause and what can be tricky and then therefore our white set changes and physiological changes where our training needs to change with that as well. And also a burnout based one that is sort of leaning into effectively what saved me when I was absolutely bottomed out was getting more in touch with how to train with immune system in hormone cycles.

So that's a bit of a passion face. And yeah, of course, my other courses which are in mindset or masterclass based stuff. Awesome. I'll post all of the websites and things, but what is your website and what is your Insta handle just for anyone that wants to jump straight on now? Yeah, insta's una.movement, that's U-double-N-A and my website, una.movement.com. Perfect. Thanks for coming on. And the most comfortable chair in the world. I could nap right now. Have a good day.