021 - Health Movement Podcast - Johanna Godinez - B.A.Y Lifestyle - Yoga

[00:00:00] Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the Health Movement Podcast. If you're listening to the audio version and want to jump over to the YouTube channel after you finish this, you certainly can. It's the Health Movement Podcast on YouTube. Without any further ado, enjoy the show.

[00:00:21] Welcome everybody to another episode of the Health Movement Podcast. This is episode 21. I can't believe this is still going on, but it's pretty exciting.

[00:00:31] My name is Derek. I'm a certified personal trainer and a teacher of over 20 years. My co-host Tim is not able to join us tonight. So once again, thankfully you're not just stuck listening to me though. I do have a very fun guest on with us that I know you guys will enjoy.

[00:00:49] But before I introduce her, we're not doctors. The advice we give is just our personal opinions. So make sure you consult with your physician before doing anything further. So without any further ado, this is Johanna.

[00:01:04] Hey, hey. How are you, Derek?

[00:01:06] Good, good. Thank you so much for coming on. And just for the listeners before we get going, Johanna told me a little something about her that she did before.

[00:01:19] Getting into yoga and everything like that. So I am going to grill her a little bit on that because I'm curious to see about it.

[00:01:26] But to start off, we're going to try something new with the shows. We're going to do some quick wins. These are just little hacks that you can do in your life that are going to have a good effect or a good outcome.

[00:01:39] And they're super, super simple. So I was going to go first and then I'm going to let Johanna do one.

[00:01:45] And I think for me today, I'm going to say get seven hours of sleep. If you consistently can get seven to eight hours of sleep every night for a week, try it.

[00:01:56] You're going to feel very, very different than if you're consistently getting only five or six. A lot of studies show energy goes up, productivity goes up.

[00:02:04] And cognitively, you're much better. So give that a shot. Seven hours of sleep. No excuses.

[00:02:10] I like that. Yeah. Sleep is so important for us to recover. I'm going to go with incorporate meditation into your life.

[00:02:17] And you can start with just five minutes in the morning. When you wake up, open your eyes, sit up and then close your eyes once again.

[00:02:25] And then just watch your breath. Just notice your breathing and see what comes up.

[00:02:30] And I promise that that's going to make you feel much better to just start your day in a much better way.

[00:02:36] And gratitude.

[00:02:38] And gratitude. You're only allowed one. No, one.

[00:02:42] No, I'm kidding. So can that's a good segue, I guess. Can we hop into that quickly?

[00:02:49] Meditation? Because I if I'm being honest, I don't practice it much and I never have gotten into a routine and I know it's valuable.

[00:02:58] I think I just don't really know how to do it right. I don't know.

[00:03:02] So can you maybe give us a little background or just a quick two minute spiel on the best way to do it?

[00:03:09] Absolutely. So a lot of people think that yoga is a physical practice and meditation is a different practice.

[00:03:15] But to be honest, meditation is one of the aspects of yoga in the yoga sutras of Patanjali, which is like a 2500 year old book that kind of lays out how to incorporate yoga.

[00:03:29] Meditation is the seventh of eight limbs.

[00:03:31] You have the yamas and niyamas, which are basically how you're going to act in society and how you're going to take care of yourself.

[00:03:37] Then you have asana, which is what we in the Western world think of as yoga, which is the physical practice of yoga.

[00:03:45] Then you have pranayama and pranayama are the breathing technique.

[00:03:49] Then you have pratyahara, which is your ability to withdraw your senses to be able to have a million things going on out here, but remain in your own state of peace.

[00:03:59] Then from there, you have dharana, which is concentration, dhyana, which is meditation.

[00:04:05] And then you have samadhi, which is oneness, which is your ability to understand that we are all just one thing that's happening.

[00:04:13] We are not as individuals as we think we are.

[00:04:17] And it's funny because most people think that meditation is something that you just sit and try to quiet your mind and not have anything happen.

[00:04:25] Whereas meditation is actually understanding that.

[00:04:29] If you sit for a second, you can see that you are thinking.

[00:04:33] And if you can see that you are thinking, then are you the one thinking or are you the observer of what thinking?

[00:04:42] So meditation is what starts to get you into the deeper aspects of spirituality, which is connecting to what in yoga we think of as our true self.

[00:04:51] And the true self is the observer of the human experience that we are having.

[00:04:56] It's our ability to disconnect ourselves from all of these attachments and aversions that we have in life and kind of come back to the fact that we are just the observer.

[00:05:06] We are not actually the experience that's happening.

[00:05:09] What happens when you meditate is you can sort of see how you think.

[00:05:14] You can watch the thoughts as they happen.

[00:05:17] You start learning a lot about yourself.

[00:05:20] You start to understand where those thoughts come from, how you react to those thoughts, the emotional shifts that happen because of those thoughts that you're having.

[00:05:28] So meditation is all about understanding your mind and understanding where your thoughts go so that you can sort of start to control the direction of the patterns of your thoughts, which makes you a much happier person.

[00:05:41] Because our most depression and again, we are not doctors.

[00:05:45] Consult with your doctor.

[00:05:47] But most depression isn't clinical.

[00:05:50] It's not because you have some chemical imbalance.

[00:05:53] It's because you are so used to having negative thoughts and then giving conversation to those negative thoughts, which the thoughts then affect your body and affect your emotions, that you lower your vibration and you lower your state of being.

[00:06:08] So meditation is what allows you to just watch how those thought patterns are going so that you can start to change those thought patterns because thought patterns are habits, just like everything else that we do in life.

[00:06:21] That's a great, great explanation right there.

[00:06:25] I like the, well, I don't like it, but the negative thoughts and how people perseverate on them.

[00:06:32] And then I even know from teaching 10 and 11 year olds, when there's a problem with a friend or something socially, they will find evidence to support things that are going on.

[00:06:47] If they see people talking, they immediately assume they're talking about them.

[00:06:52] And it's not like it is as mean as it sounds.

[00:06:56] Most people are selfish and just focus on themselves and they don't really care about everybody else and what's going on with them.

[00:07:04] So it's, it's really tough to break that, that habit of, of focusing on the negative and trying to find the positive there.

[00:07:13] Yeah. And I think especially for younger people now, it's really tough because of social media, because we get this impression that everybody's lives are so perfect and somehow we have all these problems.

[00:07:24] And the reality of it is that's not true.

[00:07:28] You know, people are putting out their best face all the time to the camera when behind closed doors.

[00:07:33] They're having just as many issues as everyone else.

[00:07:36] The benefit, you know, yoga, you mentioned something about everyone thinking of themselves and yoga is a very selfish practice because it's about you understanding yourself, your reactions, what part you are having in the issues that you think are happening to you so that you can then take kind of ownership of the things that are happening.

[00:07:57] Because in yoga, we believe that we are the creators of our lives.

[00:08:02] We are the manifestors of our lives.

[00:08:04] Nothing is happening to us.

[00:08:06] Everything is happening for us.

[00:08:07] So our ability to kind of watch our thoughts and watch how we are reacting and how we are habitually reacting to the things that are happening is a great way for us to elevate our own lives.

[00:08:18] Because in the end, you spend 100% of your time with you.

[00:08:23] That's true.

[00:08:24] So the only one that needs to put up with you all the time is you.

[00:08:28] So nothing better than you loving yourself and being able to put up with yourself in a great way 24 hours.

[00:08:34] That's a great way to put it.

[00:08:36] That is, that's really true.

[00:08:38] That is really true.

[00:08:39] You had just said, I can't really read my writing.

[00:08:45] Oh, we are the creators of our lives.

[00:08:47] I like the way that you said that.

[00:08:49] And, you know, you hear that goes positive and negative.

[00:08:53] You know, if things aren't going well for you, yes, there could be, you know, circumstances that happen out of your control.

[00:09:01] But you control how you respond to certain situations.

[00:09:06] If you're not happy with your job, if you're not happy with where you are in life, it's your fault.

[00:09:12] For the most part, and that's harsh, but it's true.

[00:09:15] But one thing awesome about that is that if it's your fault, you're the one who can change it.

[00:09:21] So when things go well, it's not luck.

[00:09:24] It's, it's not somebody else doing it.

[00:09:27] You worked hard for that or you put yourself in that position to, to have that outcome onto you.

[00:09:34] So that's, I like that.

[00:09:35] Creators of our own life.

[00:09:36] Yeah, and even if it's a good situation, like you took advantage of the situation.

[00:09:40] Yeah.

[00:09:40] So even then, it's something that we have to do.

[00:09:43] And, and that's huge because you notice like if you're having a bad day and your mindset is crap, then all of a sudden everything starts to go wrong.

[00:09:52] You start to get caught off by people.

[00:09:54] And a lot of that has to do with vibration.

[00:09:56] And I think that like we don't talk about vibration enough.

[00:10:02] You know, we, we see with our eyes and we perceive that we are solid physical beings.

[00:10:08] But if we understand matter and we understand atoms, atoms are space that's vibrating and it has little particles that are vibrating.

[00:10:17] Therefore, we are actually not as physical as we seem.

[00:10:21] We are mostly vibration.

[00:10:23] And when they talk about like, you are an average of the five people that you hang out with.

[00:10:28] What they're really talking about is your vibration.

[00:10:31] Like how, if the people that you are with are in a negative frame of mind and are always complaining and are always talking about their problems, they're going to have a lower vibration.

[00:10:41] And you by proxy are going to lower your vibration.

[00:10:44] When you hang around, even if you're having a horrible day, if you call the funniest person that you know, ultimately, you're going to be having a better day because their vibration is going to serve to help elevate your vibration.

[00:10:57] And that's, that's really important because vibration is something very much attached to our thoughts and our emotions.

[00:11:05] So again, through meditation and through observation of what we're thinking about and how we're reacting, we are the best tool to elevate our own vibration.

[00:11:15] And the cool thing is, if you elevate your vibration, then by proxy, you help elevate the vibration of those around you.

[00:11:22] So it's, it's a great way to just look at the world and look at life and how we affect other people and how they affect us.

[00:11:29] That's true.

[00:11:30] I mean, there are definitely, I'm guessing you have them too.

[00:11:34] There are people in your life where they walk into a room that you're in and maybe you're having a crappy day and you immediately feel better.

[00:11:42] There are also the people who have the opposite effect on you, but it, you're right.

[00:11:47] You're right.

[00:11:47] The, the connections you have with people and that vibration you put out there.

[00:11:52] And honestly, I don't know a lot about the vibration, but I understand what you're saying about how important that is.

[00:12:01] And, you know, a lot of times when, when we talk about somebody's, you know, either fitness journey or just they're trying to improve themselves.

[00:12:11] Sometimes you have to leave people that are friends behind for, for at least a time.

[00:12:19] And maybe permanently because they might not be heading to the same place you want to be and you can't get there with them.

[00:12:27] Um, and that happens often in this journey of, of growth, of human growth, of spirituality, of self-improvement, self-development, whatever you want to call it.

[00:12:37] That often happens because you basically start not just vibrating at a different level, right?

[00:12:43] But you start speaking a different language basically than, than those other people, because you start elevating your life.

[00:12:49] And so the people that are no longer kind of matching that vibration are, are going to fall off.

[00:12:56] And that happens naturally.

[00:12:57] And sometimes we try to like hang on to those people or those situations.

[00:13:01] But when it's time for us to move on and grow, my privacy, they're just going to fall away.

[00:13:07] Yeah.

[00:13:07] And, and maybe the greatest outcome would be they come along with you and realize, you know, I want to go where you're headed too.

[00:13:14] Um, and that's, that's awesome.

[00:13:16] If that's the case, it's not always, but that's, that's, that's what you're rooting for in the end.

[00:13:21] Absolutely.

[00:13:23] Yeah.

[00:13:23] So I had, um, you talked a lot about mindfulness.

[00:13:27] Um, there was a retreat you had, which was the power of sound retreat, um, which I read.

[00:13:35] And the first thing it started with a smoothie.

[00:13:37] So I'm like, all right, I'm in.

[00:13:38] That's all, that's all I needed to hear was start the day with a smoothie.

[00:13:42] But can you talk a little bit about that?

[00:13:45] So one of the things that we do, so I own a yoga school.

[00:13:47] So I mostly train yoga teachers and help people elevate their understanding of the lifestyle of yoga.

[00:13:54] Not just.

[00:13:55] Oh, I'm sorry.

[00:13:55] Can you, do you want to take a second to introduce your, your business?

[00:13:59] That's right.

[00:13:59] I'll kind of segue into it.

[00:14:01] Okay.

[00:14:02] Um, so as, as part of what we do in the yoga school, because we don't have an actual studio with students coming in,

[00:14:09] we mostly do these teacher trainings.

[00:14:12] What we do is we do a monthly event that's donation based for the community.

[00:14:18] And every month we have like a different focus.

[00:14:22] And the power of sound was a couple of months ago.

[00:14:25] Last month, it was about gratitude and the power of gratitude.

[00:14:29] This month, it's actually on Sunday.

[00:14:31] And it's a cacao ceremony to help us set intentions for the new year.

[00:14:35] So what, part of what we do is we offer individuals that may or may not be aware of all that is encompassed by yoga,

[00:14:44] different ways of them to understand.

[00:14:47] So we'll talk about mindfulness.

[00:14:49] We'll talk about meditation.

[00:14:50] We'll talk about the breathing techniques or pranayama.

[00:14:53] We'll talk about different yoga practices.

[00:14:56] And each month we kind of bring in a different workshop and the sound vibration.

[00:15:02] Again, I talked a little about vibration.

[00:15:04] So it kind of goes well with what we've been talking about.

[00:15:07] But sound healing is like the path and the future of where we're going with medicine.

[00:15:14] There's actually hospitals nowadays that have sound healers come to the NIC unit with babies that are having issues when they're born.

[00:15:25] And they will play gongs and they will play sound bowls.

[00:15:28] Because we realize that if you take a wine glass with water and you start going around in the rim,

[00:15:37] you'll see ripples starting to form in the wine.

[00:15:41] The same happens in our bodies, right?

[00:15:43] Our bodies are mostly made out of water.

[00:15:46] We know that we're about 70-75% water.

[00:15:49] So what happens with sound vibration is the frequencies from the different bowls go into your body and help heal the body.

[00:15:59] When that specific workshop was a group sound healing, so it's done with crystal bowls.

[00:16:06] And everyone's hearing the same tunes.

[00:16:08] And we use different instruments.

[00:16:10] We use the bowls.

[00:16:11] We use rain sticks.

[00:16:12] We use gong.

[00:16:14] But when we do it one-on-one, it's a chakra ceiling.

[00:16:18] So the chakras are the energy centers that are in your body.

[00:16:22] It starts with the more animalistic chakras, which are the root chakra, the sacral chakra, and the solar plexus.

[00:16:29] The root is kind of like the meet and greet, like human, fight or flight, very materialistic, very earthly chakra.

[00:16:41] The sacral chakra is about our individuality and our sexuality and our fluidity.

[00:16:47] Our solar plexus is our ability to act, to do.

[00:16:51] So if in the sacral we get ideas, in the solar plexus we go for it.

[00:16:55] Then the heart chakra, which is the fourth one, is love, empathy, compassion, acceptance.

[00:17:01] The throat chakra is about speaking our truth, being able to voice our opinions, being able to have conversations, empathic listening, mindful conversations.

[00:17:13] Third eye is about intuition.

[00:17:16] And crown chakra is about unity.

[00:17:17] And with the metal or the Tibetan bowls, which are actually not from Tibet, they're from Nepal.

[00:17:23] But they're called Tibetan bowls.

[00:17:25] The metal bowls, if you have them in the right octave, they go doremipasolatido.

[00:17:31] And each one of the chakras is connected to a different tune.

[00:17:36] And you actually put bowls on top of people's bodies so that they feel the vibration going into their bodies.

[00:17:44] And it helps them heal or work with the energies that are associated with each chakra.

[00:17:51] So if you're having trouble with your love life, if you're having trouble with your sexual intimacy, with your partner,

[00:17:58] if you're having trouble with your actions, if you're having trouble communicating something,

[00:18:03] you can focus the bowls on the different areas of the body that are connected with those chakras and help with those vibrations.

[00:18:10] It's really amazing world.

[00:18:15] Just hearing you talk, how much experience do you have with all this?

[00:18:19] Because it's just flowing off the tongue.

[00:18:22] Like you can tell this is something you're incredibly passionate about.

[00:18:26] I am.

[00:18:27] I'm an MBA.

[00:18:28] So I go to school for business.

[00:18:33] But this world, like I started in health and fitness in 2008.

[00:18:37] I became a personal trainer and I used to teach all kinds of fitness classes.

[00:18:42] And then in 2011, I got my first yoga certification and it just changed my life.

[00:18:48] Like most people, I did yoga because I was flexible.

[00:18:53] And I was a dancer when I was a kid.

[00:18:55] So like I can do this flip.

[00:18:57] I can do a back bend.

[00:18:58] So for me, it was like, oh, I can do all these things and I can incorporate them into my workout.

[00:19:03] But then I took my teacher training and realized like, oh, my God, there's this whole world that I have no idea about.

[00:19:12] And my whole life that turned into yoga, I've taken probably about 1700 hours of training.

[00:19:21] I have 50 hour training, 30 hour trainings, 100 hour training, the 500 hour training, a 300 hour training, two 200 hour trainings.

[00:19:30] And then all my continuing education.

[00:19:32] But the sound healing specifically, I learned in Nepal.

[00:19:36] I did an Ayurveda retreat for a month in Nepal and they used to have they had their own teacher training.

[00:19:45] And I just wanted to relax.

[00:19:46] I had just done a retreat and I needed some time for myself.

[00:19:50] But when they realized that I had a yoga school, they were like, so can we trade you teaching for some education?

[00:19:57] And I was like, sure.

[00:19:58] What do you got?

[00:19:59] And they said we have sound healing certifications.

[00:20:02] And I was like, help me and I'll trade you.

[00:20:04] So I taught some of their teacher training courses and they certified me in sound healing.

[00:20:10] And I've really become super passionate because I had a crazy breakdown in a sound healing session where like I was just falling.

[00:20:23] And I was crying and crying and crying and like hysterical.

[00:20:28] And I was like, what is happening to me right now?

[00:20:31] And afterwards, they're like, you know, we hold a lot of trauma in different parts of our bodies, mostly because we teach little boys that they shouldn't cry.

[00:20:42] And and and we tell people that experiencing emotions that women are too emotional and they shouldn't express their emotions as much.

[00:20:51] Right.

[00:20:52] Society has all these shoulds.

[00:20:54] And and and because of that, we hold on to a lot of trauma and a lot of emotions.

[00:21:01] And what happens with sound healing is it has an ability to basically like shake out those traumas from your body.

[00:21:10] So to this day, I don't know what it was that I got rid of, but it was definitely something that I needed to relieve.

[00:21:20] And after having that, like super intense experience and then being asked, like, do you want to learn how to do this?

[00:21:29] I just I couldn't say no to that.

[00:21:31] Yeah.

[00:21:32] You strike me as somebody like when you hear you have a 50 hour training, are you excited to go because you get to learn more?

[00:21:39] Oh, yeah.

[00:21:39] Yeah.

[00:21:41] Hi.

[00:21:41] My 500 hour training, I did online with a teacher in India that was like, OK, during COVID, he was like, you know, this is going to be my gift while everyone is going through this hard time.

[00:21:57] And he was like, if you commit to do the 500 hours, I'll do it for free.

[00:22:01] And I was like, I'm in.

[00:22:03] I am all in.

[00:22:04] And it was so hard to understand him because his accent was so strong.

[00:22:08] But I was there every single day.

[00:22:11] How long did that take you?

[00:22:13] Six months.

[00:22:14] Yeah.

[00:22:14] I was going to say that that's that's a long training.

[00:22:18] That's incredible.

[00:22:19] June to December 2021.

[00:22:21] So are all these tailored towards something out like some different aspects or is it deeper knowledge into certain areas?

[00:22:29] So this one specifically, he's actually a chemist.

[00:22:33] So he has a Ph.D. in chemistry and a Ph.D. in yoga.

[00:22:37] So for him, it was very much about like the ayurvedic part of it.

[00:22:42] So the food, the oxygen, how everything works in your body at a more technical term.

[00:22:48] Plus, because he was Indian, he brought in a lot of the Indian philosophy.

[00:22:51] Our training, for example, is more about giving students a 360 degree view of the practice.

[00:23:00] So we go through the philosophy.

[00:23:02] We go through the anatomy.

[00:23:03] We go through the postures.

[00:23:05] We go through the breathing techniques, different meditation techniques.

[00:23:08] And we kind of teach our students how to incorporate the practice, not just for themselves, but for their future students.

[00:23:18] Excuse me.

[00:23:19] Excuse me.

[00:23:22] That's, I don't know.

[00:23:23] It's incredibly interesting because for me it was, I did, I don't know if you're familiar with P90X and Tony Horton and that BX.

[00:23:31] Yeah.

[00:23:32] So that was my first introduction was the Thursday yoga.

[00:23:35] And I honestly, I missed one day of the 90 days because I was sick and I couldn't do it.

[00:23:42] So I added it on at the end.

[00:23:44] The hardest day, hands down, was the yoga.

[00:23:47] And it was a 90 minute yoga session and I never finished it once.

[00:23:52] I got close by the end.

[00:23:54] And I think I did the last one, but it was more like I just left the tape playing and I tried, but it was pathetic.

[00:24:03] Okay.

[00:24:04] And I'll do it every now and then, but it is so difficult because I don't know.

[00:24:09] I always came from the mindset even before that, and it's completely wrong that it's like, oh, it's just for stretching.

[00:24:17] It's just like you said before.

[00:24:19] The thing is yoga can be very different for very different people.

[00:24:23] For example, part of our 300 hour training includes chair yoga.

[00:24:26] And chair yoga can be done for the elderly.

[00:24:30] It can be done for cancer patients.

[00:24:33] It can be done with people that have weaknesses, even in wheelchairs.

[00:24:38] So it really depends.

[00:24:40] My favorite practice to do is called rocket yoga.

[00:24:43] And you rest on your forearms, standing up like it's basically a handstand on your forearms.

[00:24:49] But I don't teach that to my students.

[00:24:51] I teach them calmer versions of the practice.

[00:24:55] So really yoga can be just stretching for runners, for example, people that are cyclers, runners that are always in this front back, front back movement to get them opened up.

[00:25:05] But it can be very advanced for athletes or people that are more into working out and getting their bodies challenged.

[00:25:16] Or it can be very meditative.

[00:25:19] For example, yin yoga, you're just holding poses two to three minutes a piece.

[00:25:24] And it's just 10 poses in each class.

[00:25:27] Yeah, but they're more like stretching.

[00:25:30] Yeah, it's miserable more for the mind.

[00:25:31] No, I get it.

[00:25:32] I'm joking.

[00:25:33] I'm joking.

[00:25:33] No, I see the benefit and everything in the challenge of it.

[00:25:37] And the hardest part for me was the breathing, to remember to breathe and do it the right way.

[00:25:44] Because I'm like, just like ridding it sometimes to hold the pose.

[00:25:48] And you're like, oh, you didn't take a breath for 20 seconds.

[00:25:52] Like that's not the way you're supposed to do it.

[00:25:53] Yeah, and what actually makes it yoga is the breathing.

[00:25:56] Because what builds the physical practice into a meditative practice is your ability to move with the breath and to continue focusing on keeping an autonomous breath as your body is being either challenged physically or mentally.

[00:26:14] Otherwise, it's just a workout.

[00:26:16] It's just a workout.

[00:26:17] It's more of a workout.

[00:26:17] I was probably doing more of the workout piece than that.

[00:26:21] But that, I would imagine, is something you advance to after you get maybe movements down or you get the breathing down and somehow you get the combination of the two.

[00:26:30] Yeah, it took me six months after doing yoga six days a week to actually be able to follow the type of breathing that they do, which is called ujjayi panayama, which is all in and out through the nose into the back of the throat, locking your low belly and the bottom of your pelvic floor.

[00:26:46] It took me like six months to be able to get through a whole class.

[00:26:49] That makes me feel, I don't know if that's true or not, but I'm really glad you said it.

[00:26:53] True story.

[00:26:54] True story.

[00:26:56] That's awesome.

[00:26:57] So if somebody wants to get into yoga, is it more you figure out what their goal of it is?

[00:27:06] Or is there something where you're like, all right, this is great, and then you can see where it takes you from there?

[00:27:13] No, well, because the way that I work with clients, I don't have studio classes.

[00:27:19] Yeah.

[00:27:19] So I don't do classes where you just come in and you fit into the practice.

[00:27:23] All of my clients are either students of teacher training or private clients.

[00:27:29] For them, it's really an individual practice.

[00:27:32] Like I learn what's going on in their life, what's going on in their bodies, what's going on in their minds.

[00:27:38] And I build the whole entire practice based on that.

[00:27:42] That's awesome.

[00:27:43] For example, he is in his 70s.

[00:27:46] He was a doctor.

[00:27:48] His wife has Alzheimer's.

[00:27:50] And we just do meditation and breathing techniques.

[00:27:54] We don't do any physical postures at all.

[00:27:57] Whereas I have other people that are runners or cyclers that want to just really open up their bodies because they're so tight in their hip flexors, which is affecting their back.

[00:28:09] And then we just work on poses that are just more back bending, opening up more lunges to help open up the hip flexors.

[00:28:17] So it really depends on what the person wants to get out of the practice.

[00:28:21] But if you're looking to just go to a yoga studio, I would suggest kind of don't just go to one class and then decide that's not for me.

[00:28:33] Because every teacher is going to be different.

[00:28:36] Every style is going to be different.

[00:28:38] So it's all about kind of like tasting all the different teas and figuring out which one you like.

[00:28:44] Right.

[00:28:44] So it's go to different teachers, go to different classes.

[00:28:47] And a lot of yoga studios offer like very cheap introductory packages that are like $33 for three classes or $99 for a whole month.

[00:28:59] And I would suggest go to as many as you can.

[00:29:02] Find as many teachers as you can.

[00:29:03] And then when you find someone that speaks your language and speaks to your body, then commit to that.

[00:29:10] I like that.

[00:29:12] That makes perfect sense.

[00:29:13] So, yeah, everybody out there is thinking of yoga.

[00:29:15] Give it a shot because it can definitely help.

[00:29:19] The average person thinks about it five years before they walk into their first class.

[00:29:23] Is it really?

[00:29:24] Uh-huh.

[00:29:25] Wow.

[00:29:26] You know, yoga has existed as long as the world has.

[00:29:30] Because if it's about vibration and vibration started with the start of the universe, yoga has been around since the beginning of time.

[00:29:38] There you go.

[00:29:39] But for us, because we have these misconceptions of it's too hard or it's not hard enough.

[00:29:45] I'm going to be bored or I'm going to be too challenged.

[00:29:47] Then we take those ideas and we make up our mind based on knowledge that's not even real.

[00:29:54] Right?

[00:29:55] Which is what we do most of the times about everything in life.

[00:29:58] But it's all about kind of trying it on for size and then figuring it out from there.

[00:30:03] Yeah.

[00:30:04] I mean, we talk in here sometimes about, you know, if people are trying to get in shape and they want to go to a gym but they're intimidated to walk through the door.

[00:30:12] There are plenty of things to do at home.

[00:30:14] Would you suggest even trying some YouTube videos if they're like good people?

[00:30:18] And then once you get maybe more comfortable with it, jump in to the studio?

[00:30:22] There's really good stuff.

[00:30:24] Like for fitness, there is a site called FitOn.

[00:30:28] It's an app and they have everything that you can imagine.

[00:30:31] Yoga, fitness, stretching.

[00:30:33] If it's just yoga, there's Asana Rebel or All Stars.

[00:30:37] There's a few.

[00:30:39] I'm working on an app.

[00:30:40] I just haven't finished it.

[00:30:41] So I haven't watched it yet.

[00:30:42] But you'll have to let us know when you do so we can plug the heck out of it.

[00:30:46] Absolutely.

[00:30:47] But yeah, again, it's all about trying it on for size.

[00:30:50] But in YouTube, you can start and you can really look for what it is that you want.

[00:30:55] How long do you have?

[00:30:56] Do you have 10 minutes?

[00:30:57] Then 10-minute easy yoga class.

[00:31:00] 10-minute stretch yoga class.

[00:31:02] 10-minute hard yoga class, right?

[00:31:04] And based on that, I think Brett Larkin is one of the girls that has a good YouTube channel.

[00:31:13] And then again, same thing.

[00:31:15] You still have to have that connection with the teacher, right?

[00:31:18] So try different teachers and then figure out what kind of works for you.

[00:31:22] I like it.

[00:31:23] I like it.

[00:31:23] And you had also mentioned gratitude being important.

[00:31:26] And I agree 100% with you there.

[00:31:31] How do you incorporate that?

[00:31:33] Are there any things you do throughout the day?

[00:31:35] Yeah.

[00:31:36] Personally, I wake up in the morning and I open my eyes.

[00:31:40] I say three things I'm grateful for.

[00:31:43] And then I get into a couple of minute meditation.

[00:31:45] And my meditations are not very long.

[00:31:48] Sometimes they're three minutes.

[00:31:49] Sometimes they're 10 minutes.

[00:31:50] When I go to meditation centers, sometimes they're three hours.

[00:31:54] But for my personal meditations, usually I just do a couple of minutes every day.

[00:31:59] And the benefit of that is, again, it's vibration.

[00:32:02] You change your vibration.

[00:32:04] Let's say that you had a really bad conversation before you went to bed.

[00:32:09] Usually you will wake up and it'll be a continuum of the conversation that you were having, right?

[00:32:15] When you wake up and you have that moment of I'm grateful for A, B, C, and D.

[00:32:21] And then silence.

[00:32:23] You can change that narrative of continuing yesterday into today.

[00:32:28] So it's super powerful.

[00:32:30] Not just in that sense, but also it helps you become more aware of you slept in a really comfy bed last night.

[00:32:40] Some people didn't have that.

[00:32:41] That's true.

[00:32:42] You get to have breakfast afterwards.

[00:32:44] Some people don't have that.

[00:32:46] You have maybe a pet that you get to wake up to in the morning.

[00:32:50] Many people don't have that.

[00:32:52] You have maybe children or grandchildren or fathers or stepfathers.

[00:32:57] You know, it just helps you remember the things because we focus so much on what we lack, right?

[00:33:05] That's in yoga, that's attachment or aversion.

[00:33:08] What am I wanting that I don't have?

[00:33:10] What do I have that I want to get rid of?

[00:33:12] And with gratitude, you learn to just be grateful for the things that you don't even think about that many other people.

[00:33:21] Do you realize that one billion people don't have clean drinking water?

[00:33:25] Oh, it's insane.

[00:33:27] It's insane.

[00:33:28] I saw something.

[00:33:30] Yeah.

[00:33:32] If you're in like the top 1% wealthiest people in the world, it's something like, and I'm going to get the number wrong, but it's roughly like if you make $25,000 a year, you're in the top 1% of everybody.

[00:33:45] Or it might even be like a tenth of a percent.

[00:33:48] It's something crazy like that.

[00:33:50] And, you know, granted, there's cost of living and all that based on where you are, but, you know, you get the point.

[00:33:57] We have a lot that we definitely take for granted.

[00:34:00] Yeah, so gratitude helps kind of remind you of that and helps bring that out so that you can be in a state.

[00:34:09] What happens is when you develop that practice, when things go wrong, instead of you automatically going to the problem and how that's negatively affecting you, you start to see the opportunities and the situations and what you can be grateful for.

[00:34:24] Because a lot of times, like, bad things happen, right?

[00:34:27] Let's say that you had a horrible breakup, but then a couple months later, you meet the person of your life.

[00:34:32] And it's like, oh, wait a minute.

[00:34:33] So the worst breakup in the world just turned into the best thing that ever happened to you because you got to meet this really amazing person, right?

[00:34:40] And we don't take the time to, like, actually sit back and be like, man, I thought this was terrible, but I'm really grateful that that happened for the best and for my own good.

[00:34:53] Yeah, I like that.

[00:34:54] And, like, even just being grateful for what you had, just, you know, you might not like the house you're in, but to somebody who's homeless, it's a castle, you know?

[00:35:03] You don't like your meal, but somebody who's starving, it's a feast, you know?

[00:35:08] So it is, you don't want to value what you have based on what other people don't have necessarily, but it's a good way to put into perspective the things that you do have and the things you should appreciate.

[00:35:23] I like that.

[00:35:25] All right.

[00:35:26] I do want to ask you a little bit about this other endeavor that you had for a time.

[00:35:30] So you were a race car driver.

[00:35:33] I got to hear a little more about this.

[00:35:36] Yeah, my dad raced when I was growing up, and I was always fascinated with the speed and the world of racing.

[00:35:48] And I got into it late in life.

[00:35:50] I was already in my teens, but one day I basically told my dad that if he didn't let me drive his race car, I was going to steal it and drive it in the highway.

[00:35:59] And that I was going to get exhausted and he was going to have to deal with the repercussions of whatever happened.

[00:36:04] Oh, nice.

[00:36:04] And my dad knows that I'm a little crazy, so he's like, maybe I should hear her out on this.

[00:36:11] I don't think that was an empty threat on your part.

[00:36:14] I'm guessing you probably would have.

[00:36:16] Would have, yeah.

[00:36:17] I used formula cars.

[00:36:18] I probably would have gotten stuck in the first hole that I found.

[00:36:21] True.

[00:36:21] But what he said to me was, okay, most really good race car drivers start in go-karts.

[00:36:29] So if you want to race, we're going to go and we're going to put you in a racing school.

[00:36:33] We're going to go go-karting.

[00:36:35] And I did a three-day course, and I was hooked.

[00:36:40] So within two weeks, I did my first race.

[00:36:42] The second year, I finished second in the championship.

[00:36:45] The third year, I won.

[00:36:46] Nice.

[00:36:47] And I really got into it.

[00:36:49] So then he bought me a formula car, and I was racing against him in Formula Renault.

[00:36:53] You raced against him?

[00:36:55] Yeah, I raced.

[00:36:56] Oh, how did that go?

[00:36:57] It was really awesome because it was three pairs of dads and kids that were racing in that period.

[00:37:04] That must have made him so proud.

[00:37:06] Yeah, it was.

[00:37:08] Those were amazing days.

[00:37:10] And then I graduated college, and I had gotten a scholarship for college, but my dad had saved money for me to go to college.

[00:37:21] So he gave me the money that he had saved.

[00:37:25] And for a couple of years, all I did was drive.

[00:37:28] I started a racing school here in Puerto Rico, a karting school.

[00:37:32] And I would go to these events called Solo Ones, which are like SCCA events, Sports Card Club of America.

[00:37:40] It's like people bring their own cars, and it's a time base.

[00:37:44] And I would set up tables, and I would say, give me $25, and I'll make you faster.

[00:37:50] And then I would sit in the car with them, give them one or two pointers, make them faster, and then hook them to come to my racing school.

[00:37:57] Oh, nice.

[00:37:58] I did that for about a year.

[00:38:01] And then I realized, like, if I actually want to have this as a business, I need to learn more about business.

[00:38:06] So I went and got my MBA.

[00:38:08] And, of course, where am I going to go but Charlotte, North Carolina?

[00:38:12] I can go race whenever I want.

[00:38:15] So while I did my MBA, I raced Legend Cars and Thunder Roadsters at Ovals in North Carolina.

[00:38:22] I did Hickory Motor Speedway and Charlotte Motor Speedway.

[00:38:26] And segue into yoga.

[00:38:29] When I finished my MBA in 2007, I had a ride for diversity.

[00:38:37] So I had a full paid year in a series called ARCA.

[00:38:42] And it was a competition.

[00:38:45] And it was mostly Hispanic, Blacks, women.

[00:38:48] It was all about diversity.

[00:38:49] But being Hispanic and a woman, I definitely had a leg up on that one.

[00:38:54] But then in the beginning of 2008, with the economy just falling into pieces, our sponsor was a mortgage company.

[00:39:05] And they backed out.

[00:39:06] So I went from basically making it like having the one thing that's going to make me make it to have run out of money and not being able to race anymore.

[00:39:19] The last race that I could have done was the 24 Hours of Daytona.

[00:39:24] It would have been $35,000 for a seat in a Porsche.

[00:39:29] And that's when I realized, like, I can't afford to do this anymore.

[00:39:33] Yeah, that's a chunk of change right there.

[00:39:36] Yeah, and I got super depressed.

[00:39:40] And that's how I found yoga.

[00:39:42] I had a friend of mine came to my house and she was like, you need help.

[00:39:46] And I was like, well, the kind of help that I need is circumstantial.

[00:39:51] It's not a pill isn't going to get me out of this depression.

[00:39:54] So I went to a place called the Hilton Head Health Institute, little plug in there for them.

[00:40:01] It's in Hilton Head Island in South Carolina.

[00:40:05] And I learned all about fitness and all about yoga.

[00:40:08] And that's what got me into becoming a personal trainer and started my life in the health and wellness industry.

[00:40:18] But yeah, then I did yoga for myself.

[00:40:20] I wasn't really teaching it.

[00:40:22] It wasn't until 2011 when I really got into it and started teaching it.

[00:40:27] So like you said before, sometimes when one thing ends, it leads you somewhere else, which you wouldn't have been if the first thing didn't end.

[00:40:36] So I'm glad that worked out the way it did because that sounds like quite a ride.

[00:40:43] Not trying to be a dad joke guy there, but that sounds like a blast.

[00:40:49] Are there YouTube videos that we can post up here too at some point?

[00:40:54] No, we didn't have that when I was racing.

[00:40:56] There were no cameras.

[00:40:58] It wasn't like it was the 60s.

[00:41:00] Like it was 2000s.

[00:41:02] Maybe arena racing.

[00:41:04] Maybe you can find some of arena racing when I was doing that with Duper.

[00:41:08] But no, there's not a lot.

[00:41:10] I mean, that was, yeah, I don't think a lot of those things, maybe six, it's called 600 racing.

[00:41:17] But maybe they'll have some of the legend cars or Thunder Roadster races.

[00:41:21] But none of these were televised or anything.

[00:41:24] All right, all right.

[00:41:25] Smaller.

[00:41:26] And back then, like, I had a flip phone.

[00:41:29] So, I mean, I wasn't taking, you know, the flip phone.

[00:41:30] Yeah, no, I remember that.

[00:41:32] My StarTap flip phone that I loved.

[00:41:34] I wish I could go back to that.

[00:41:36] Me too.

[00:41:37] You throw those things and then put them together.

[00:41:40] They would still work.

[00:41:41] You get that little antenna that you pull up like a half an inch, but somehow that makes the reception better.

[00:41:46] Yeah.

[00:41:46] Yeah.

[00:41:46] That was good.

[00:41:51] That sounds like a lot of fun, if I'm being honest.

[00:41:54] I've done, we, in Massachusetts, we have this thing called F1 Boston where it's like go-kart racing stuff on these tracks inside that we used to go to every birthday from like 21 to 24, 25, something like that.

[00:42:08] It was a lot of fun.

[00:42:09] Never been behind the wheel of an actual race car, though.

[00:42:13] I mean, when I wasn't racing like in the season, that's what I would do.

[00:42:18] They have leads at those.

[00:42:20] I used to go to, it was called Victory Lane.

[00:42:23] Oh, okay.

[00:42:24] And in their leagues, like, I remember I raced Robbie Gordon in one of those leagues.

[00:42:28] Really?

[00:42:28] You know what I mean?

[00:42:29] Like, they had really good drivers coming in.

[00:42:31] And it was really competitive.

[00:42:34] Yeah.

[00:42:36] Is there a lot of trash talking going on in these things?

[00:42:40] Oh, yeah.

[00:42:40] And me being a girl, like, there's more women in motorsports.

[00:42:44] Now there's like a ton more women in motorsports.

[00:42:46] So back then, I remember going to a race in Canada.

[00:42:49] And out of 500 drivers, I was the only girl.

[00:42:52] That's got to make you feel good.

[00:42:54] Oh, yeah.

[00:42:55] It was amazing.

[00:42:56] I had really good teens then, too.

[00:42:58] But, yeah, there was a lot of trash talking.

[00:43:00] And, I mean, I had to hold my own because some of these guys were, they were tough.

[00:43:06] I remember one of the arena racing.

[00:43:10] My dad came from Puerto Rico to come watch.

[00:43:13] Yeah.

[00:43:14] And this guy, he was like 6'2".

[00:43:17] He, and those cars are really small.

[00:43:19] They're half-scale cars driven in a tenth of a mile oval inside of an arena.

[00:43:24] That's why it's called arena racing.

[00:43:25] And they're really easy to flip over.

[00:43:27] And this guy flipped me.

[00:43:30] And he was, like, he was a lap behind.

[00:43:34] So he was trying to get his lap back.

[00:43:36] Yeah.

[00:43:36] And he flipped me.

[00:43:37] And there was a picture of me holding my helmet with one hand on one of the, whatever, what do you call them?

[00:43:46] Like the guys that wave the flag.

[00:43:48] Oh, the flag, yeah.

[00:43:49] And I have one hand, and I have my helmet, and I'm about to hit this guy with my helmet.

[00:43:54] Like, then I look back, and I'm like, I would have been the worst.

[00:43:57] No team would have wanted me because I had the worst temper back then.

[00:44:01] Like, I was like, you can't mess with me.

[00:44:02] Because being a female in that world, like, I really had to show that I had the same amount of co-owners that they did.

[00:44:10] You needed a big skin there, too.

[00:44:11] Yeah, you had to go.

[00:44:12] That's great.

[00:44:15] Awesome.

[00:44:16] Well, thank you so much for joining us today.

[00:44:18] I don't want to take up any more of your time, but this was awesome.

[00:44:22] We haven't had anybody with your background and your expertise on here before.

[00:44:28] So I think it'll be really helpful for a lot of people.

[00:44:31] Oh, thank you so much.

[00:44:33] Anytime.

[00:44:33] It was my fun.

[00:44:34] Yeah.

[00:44:34] Do you want to plug your business?

[00:44:37] I'll put everything in the show notes and stuff, but just to give you a chance to plug it.

[00:44:42] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:44:43] Totally.

[00:44:44] Like, if you've ever thought of incorporating yoga at a deeper level or wanted to come to Puerto Rico and want to learn yoga while you're at it,

[00:44:52] beyond Asana Yoga School.

[00:44:54] The website is B-A-Y Lifestyle, baylifestyle.com, bay-lifestyle.com.

[00:45:01] You can find our information there.

[00:45:03] You can apply to come to one of our retreats.

[00:45:05] Or if you're into wanting to do yoga but wanting to travel, we're going to Bali in September for two weeks.

[00:45:14] So we're going to Bali, Nusa Panida, and Java, three Indonesian islands.

[00:45:18] Wow.

[00:45:19] And we'll be immersed in that beautiful culture, doing yoga, meditation, and hiking volcanoes, and doing all kinds of fun stuff.

[00:45:29] Did you say September?

[00:45:30] Yep, September 6th through the 20th.

[00:45:33] All right.

[00:45:33] I think the Health Movement Podcast will have to go to Bali just to be there to witness all of this stuff.

[00:45:39] I think that would be wonderful.

[00:45:40] Oh, it's going to be off the chain.

[00:45:42] Oh, I don't know how my school would feel if I took like the second and third week off of school.

[00:45:50] That's right.

[00:45:51] That's right.

[00:45:51] No, I've got the COVID.

[00:45:53] I can't come in for a while.

[00:45:55] So yeah, I like that idea.

[00:45:57] All right.

[00:45:58] Well, thank you so much for joining us.

[00:46:00] I really appreciate it.

[00:46:01] Thank you so much for having me, Derek.

[00:46:03] Have a great night.

[00:46:04] You too.