#106 - BC Vaught on Music, Hed PE, Breaking Benjamin, Tour Life, and Action Sports

Transcript

action Park media. Alright, everyone. So what is it that your body is trying to tell you If you're anything like me, My body is yelling certain things and I'm like, Do, do, do do do well, not anymore. Especially not after this amazing chat with the wonderful Bianca. And we break down some physical symptoms that can occur when you're not in a great place mentally and learn to listen to the signs that your body is giving us. I found this chat super helpful. Not only that, she's an epic human. This is pretty depressed with Bianca. I guess I wanna start with how you got into this work because, uh, since I was put on to you, I've been following and there's not a lot of kiwis in this space offering. I don't want to call it free therapy because it's not. What you're doing is kind of using your knowledge and resources and gifting it to the world. To which we're all yum yum deliciously grateful for Yeah, I guess my first question is how you got into this line of work and and why did you feel so important to kind of put it as a kiwi in the online space as well. Yeah, sure. Great question. So, um, first of all, like my my work, I'm a mind body practitioner, so I'm really passionate about both mental health, but also the connection between our mind and our body and just really, like holistic health in general. Um, and a lot of the reason why I got into the work I do is purely based on a series of events in my own journey. And I mean, I'm more than happy to go into that at the start, So I, um I was diagnosed with two chronic pain all the way back in 2011. So I was, like, honestly back then, like, there was nothing out there. So, as you can imagine, there was no like in therapy. There was no, like my body holistic health. I was only 18 at the time, so as well, like, I definitely keep things to myself and just suffered and carried on as best I could to look like I had it all together in the external world as we do. Um, So, yeah, I had two chronic pain conditions involved with the which is a pelvic pain condition, which first of all, was very difficult to deal with in itself because of the pain being in that region. Uh, and also a condition called fibromyalgia, and that is a widespread condition. Um, but on the other hand, I was also dealing with anxiety. And that was after a very traumatic event during the Christchurch Earthquakes. Because I'm from here in Christchurch and I was in the city when it happened. So little did I know that all of this was very interlinked and it took me really, honestly, took me about three years before I started to find things that really helped shift my pain and really helped calm my anxiety. So I spent a lot of time going around the medical system. I was given a lot of medication. I was, I had an operation, I had brain scans and really nobody could find anything wrong with me. They were like, we see these sorts of things. But here's the medication. You're just going to have to manage this forever. Unfortunately, we can't help with their very best intentions, of course. Um but it got to a point through a series of events where my, uh, physiotherapist suggested I look into the mind body connection, which at the time I was completely sceptical about because I was like, Well, this pain is obviously physical. So if anyone is to imply like that there is Excuse me, an emotional element, then I just would completely dismiss it. Um, but I also, uh, started getting some counselling and some therapy to finally start to deal with some of the trauma from the earthquakes. And that's when I started putting together a bit of a puzzle whereby when I started actually addressing my emotions that I had suffocated, that I had held in for so long. My body did feel different after I had been to, to speaking and and releasing emotions. And so I later kind of went on, and I discovered little things along the way until I did this three day training, whereby I learned about how my brain and my thoughts and my neurology really impacted my body and how our chronic stress trauma it can really shift over time like our physiology and manifest as chronic disease. And that was just game changing to me. So that's kind of how I got into it eventually, like I got well, I I started retraining my brain, regulating my nervous system. And within about a month of being consistent with some tools that I had learned, I just saw dramatic shifts in my pain levels. And that was really what inspired me to start doing the same a few years later. So I moved to London, studied and set up my business. It's amazing. Um, I mean, so many questions on that It's so good to like, have context. So what What were some of those initial things that you saw? Results? Because I can hear everyone listening, being like ask her what she did like, Yeah, So some of those initial things, like, you know, and that you would recommend people do initially when they're starting, perhaps a journey. Yeah, for sure. So I think, um and I don't To be honest, I don't really make the distinction between physical, chronic issues and mental chronic symptoms like anxiety Depression because, honestly, we know that if you are dealing with anxiety and depression, it does come out in the body. There are physical symptoms, and of course, if you are going through pain or fatigue or something that's, you know, you feel physically. It also impacts you mentally. So first of all, I think it's actually just acknowledging and actually opening up to the conversation that, hey, like everything is interlinked because I spend especially with the chronic pain. I spent a lot of time seeing people that would really look at the areas. I was experiencing pain so they'd look at, like, specific areas in my, you know, in my body. But they wouldn't necessarily ask me what had been going on for me emotionally. Any stresses, and that's not their fault. It's just that professionals don't have time to do that, and they're not really trained to do that. And it's the same with sometimes pro, probably more so back then, if you were going to see someone like a counsellor or a therapist for anxiety, they're really good at talking through your issues. But sometimes they don't have that full understanding of of what's going on in the body and those sensations in the body. So for me, the best thing I could do for both the anxiety and the the pain was to start to look at incorporating anything that was sort of top down. So that could be being open to seeing a psychologist. And I know that in itself can just take like, a It can be like, a huge step. You know, um, a counsellor. Any brain retraining, any meditation, anything that's really starting to look at our thoughts and what's going on neurologically but also incorporating anything that is bottom up, which means starting to connect back into the body and learn how to feel safety in the body. So, yin yoga, all of these slow things that again can be quite confronting at the start. If you're used to being up here for me, I really found it challenging. Um, breath work, massages, um, certain poly vagal exercises where you're doing, like, self massage. Uh, these small things that we can do to start to signal safety back into the body. Um, so, yeah, back then I was just learning bits and pieces here and there, like I was like, the physio is really great. I did some n LP, which is a form of therapy that I now teach as well, which is sort of both top down and bottom up. Um, but I did this training called the lightning process. Which was that three day training That really helped me get to the final point where I had some tools, um, that were based on visualisation coaching again, learning to calm the body, retrain the thought. So had elements of C BT and all of that together just really shifted what was going on for me. Um, my neuro, my neurology that was keeping me stuck. So my brain pathways that were keeping me stuck but also helped my body get into that calm state so it could heal itself. I'm nodding, and probably audibly people will be like I've been told, and my editor is like, stop responding audibly to people. So, like, the whole time you're talking like yeah, uh-huh. Yeah. Sorry. I'm trying to verbally, uh, agree with you as well as, uh, So I'm nodding because I have been in cognitive behavioural therapy. I have, um very a lot of those, uh, the negative thought patterns. Um, catastrophizing, uh, mind reading those kind of really obvious ones that come up for overachieving Taipei, people who have perfectionist tendencies. Uh, and it is a very initially quite an overwhelming process to try and train your thoughts because it's quite upsetting to me when I realised how much of my own thoughts were really quite horrible, even when it came down to, like cutting an orange like I'm like, you're a piece of s**t. You can't even f**king cut an orange, right? It like like just the judgement on every task was actually an exhausting thing to learn about myself. Um, but and I and I share that I don't need sympathy for just that, you know, if you are going through that, it can actually repel you to not want to do the work. I think I'm now in a phase where I'm trying to incorporate the body element to it. And I do feel a lot of resistance to meditate for breath work because my experiences is trying them and a lot of emotion coming up. So I was really excited to chat to you today because I think that's where I'm at in my journey. I know I kind of have to push through, but Yeah, I was just wondering if you can speak to those struggles that people experience because saying like, Oh, I did this for a month, and it's great. I also want to set realistic expectations for people because because I'm in that phase right now of changing my diet and realising that I have some gut issues. Whether that's causing the Depression or the Depression is causing all of that. It's just a cycle. A little yeah, a little bit like a lot. And it can feel quite overwhelming. So I just wondered if you could speak to that. You know what? I felt the exact same because when I was, you know, looking to get myself back on track to feel, I'd say quote unquote normal again, Uh, it felt completely overwhelming. And I was your classic say, recovering people, Please, a high achiever perfectionist like you name it the works. And that has been a journey I've been on ever since because I'm really I feel like sustainable changes and small wins will always get you in the right direction. It would be easy for me to say, like I just don't experience any of that anymore, and I think that's not true at all. Uh, I do slip into these patterns, absolutely, but I do feel like I recognise more whether it's useful or not useful. So for me, that word sort of useful, not useful, it sort of helps me take the judgement out of it of good verse. Bad. Is this useful for me in this moment to be heading down this old neurology? Because I do like to think of it as old pathways in the brain that have just been strengthened, strengthened, strengthened over time until we're just geniuses at people pleasing perfectionism. So much so that it's just like autopilot. And just on that, because people might be a little bit unsure if they don't relate to what that might mean. Uh, an example might be say, my best friend has seen my message but doesn't text me back. The pathway that is planted in my head should be logical. Like she has three kids. She will text you back. She loves you, but yet it's like I've done something wrong. She hates me. I'm a bad friend. I carry, like the quickness in which my brain can create, have created a whole functioning neural pathway. That brain pathway is like a super highway. I just want to on that, because I think sometimes people might be like, What is she What? What are we talking about? But that kind of behaviour for me like that. That highway? Yeah, very fast, Super high. It's been run a few times. Absolutely. And I think the thing is, is that actually acknowledging If we look at the brain, the brain likes to make things easy for us. It likes to keep us keep us safe. But it generally has a negative bias, and it likes to make things easy. So it knows that if we've been running down that pathway, we've been unconsciously, by the way, not meaning to at all, who wants to be like that? We would not use it. But, um, over time, it does strengthen. So it does become quicker and quicker and stronger and stronger. So every time, we really, uh, even have that awareness of like, Oh, hey, here I go again. Here's that thought that I know too well. Even if we have that glimmer of awareness, that is the first option or first space for us to make a new choice, and our brain is still going to want to head back down that old pathway of like my friends don't care or whatever the thought is. But the more that we can recognise it and then make a new choice. It's not necessarily easy for me. What I really found over time is that consistency of getting better of, first of all, recognising it and then making that choice like what is useful for me in this moment, even if it's, uh something that I haven't considered before, even if it I don't fully believe it. What would be a new, useful thought to pick in this moment? And it takes so much self compassion, which I feel that so many of us do not give ourselves. And it was myself included. You know, I found it really difficult when I was learning these tools and these techniques to to say nice things to myself, to be super gentle, to be patient. These are all things that I really had to practise over time and still practise now. But I have seen over time that by consistently just making small changes that I I do show up in new ways, or at least I have new choices here where in the past I would have just gone down that same pathway without recognising and it takes a lot of awareness and in itself can can be quite a lot when we start out. Yeah, um, something that you did speak on which I had an aha moment because I actually think that I might be both, But you spoke about the helper pattern and the, uh, achiever achieving pattern. And the a ha moment for me was, um that the if you have achieve a passion that you feel guilty if you rest or relax, or could you maybe define what they both are and then school me on if you can be both. So I think, um, I don't know if I mentioned it before, but a lot of people I see with these chronic conditions so chronic being anything long lasting between sort of three and six months, we know that you can have acute anxiety as a response to a situation or, um, you injure yourself and you get pain. That's a normal response. But when it is just chronic and there's no re reason or the original, uh, reason is sort of in the past. That's what I'm talking about. So a lot of the people that I see that have these chronic symptoms mental or physical. They do come under these sort of four categories that I have noticed consistently, and they have these symptoms the fatigue, the pain, the burnout, the anxiety and that is what you see. The cheaper, which are people that really set high standards for what they put out into the external world. So they are the ones that are consistently pushing, and almost in that sense, you're not feeling enough because anything you do doesn't feel like you've got to your full potential. So that might be in work. Or, um, it might be in certain routines. And it's just that constant need and almost, I guess, comparison in a sense as well to other people and where and what they're doing. And a lot of that is on other people's version of success. So it's not like we're necessarily always tuning in as to what we find important, but we're like pushing ourselves to that next level when we're not allowing ourselves to rest or have a break, and that is when the body starts speaking and what I often see is with achievers like really high performing athletes or any anything like that, because we're in that constant. Go, go, go. We stop listening to these, like internal cues from our body that maybe we do need to take a break. Maybe we do need to be more self compassionate, and over time that just creates a lot of stress in the mind and the body, and that's when symptoms can start to appear. So that's one pattern. It's just really like, I'm sure so many people can resonate with that, like I definitely could. I was that type of person at uni that I would I'd be like, up all night doing my essays. I would be freaking out if I got, like, a B. I had that real achiever mentality. So I do want to say in that note as well that I'm not necessarily to the extreme like that anymore. So there is room to shift. But first of all, we've got to recognise that that is like one of our patterns. Um, it was I think I think that that was an aha for me because I get a lot of pushback from my close family and friends who I try to only take advice from people who know me. Well, um, this kind of push to slow down and relax and and I I feel myself getting quite defensive about it and quite hurt by it. Actually, Um, like, I do take it quite personally because I do feel like I've got pressure together and I'm driven da da, and it's kind of part of my identity. But I do. There is an avoidance to that sitting still moment. Because if I were to sit here and watch TV, the amount of guilt would almost be, um, insufferable for me because of the negative self talk that would come alongside it. Um, yeah, no, I definitely hear you. And I think it's again being having that level of compassion that actually being and achieve it or being a driven, ambitious person is not a negative thing at all. Again, it just depends on, um to what level and how do we feel about it coming back to what actually fuels us? Because if it is like, hey, I really enjoy what I do. I really enjoy doing this. Uh, you know, working this job, I enjoy finishing this project that's different than constantly, uh, doing it out of a place of being tired. And you just keep pushing through, uh, doing it because someone else says you should be doing it. It really depends as well on what kind of, uh, a whole lot of different things, really. But yeah, I definitely hear you, and I think it's and it almost because at a nervous system level, if we've been someone that has constantly been busy and being like, I don't know why, I keep coming back to work. But work is for a lot of people, that thing that keeps them going because it's such a huge part of our life. If we've been busy, if we like to stay busy, if we always like to have things on the go and then we rest. Our nervous system can often be completely thrown by that because it's a foreign. It's a foreign feeling, and it almost feels. I know this is a strange thing, but it almost feels unsafe because our natural state is like that fight or flight, maybe not necessarily the fight or flight, but it is that on the go, this is my normal. This is what feels normal in my body's chemistry. So a tip for you would probably be not to force yourself into these long meditations at all. It's not about that. It's just finding those tiny moments of safety. And it could start with, like, a two minute walk, even an active walk, even grounding something where you can just start to build that level of that sort of window of tolerance of, of feeling, calm. Because if you're going to sit in an hour meditation, that's like it's just not gonna yeah, we've got to be realistic, you know? Yeah. Hm. OK, so then you got the helper. Oh, yes. Sorry. So the helper so helper is definitely something that I could resonate with for sure. So helpers, Um often I see them in clients in terms of nurses, teachers just just giving people and helpers tend to put other people before themselves. And that's not necessarily a bad thing, of course, like putting others as first and being caring is is what we want. But when you're doing it and again in a way whereby you're already tired, maybe you're driving home and a friend calls you out of the blue, but you know that you're just like you're shattered. But then you it's not an urgent thing, but you detour. You go help when we're constantly doing that. Running on low battery, running on empty our body again only has so much energy. So that's when we can start to see these physical issues. Pop up and help is very empathetic people, but learn as a as a help, but also learning to put yourself first and love yourself as much as you do for other people. That has been my biggest lesson, especially if you are someone that just tends to again out of, uh, what you know, out of your body's normal sort of response. First response. Think about everyone else for yourself. It's really about bringing it back to you and implementing those boundaries and really tuning in as to like, Hey, do I want to do this? Do I even have the energy to give, uh, and making decisions from that place of choice rather than I'm getting my validation through helping and what? I also realised that something quite recently I had a bit of a light bulb moment is that like by being so wrapped up in everyone else's issues and trying to save and help everyone else. I'm actually only distracting myself from my own problems, and it took me a while to understand that. But it was a bit of a light bulb moment because I'm like, actually, it's a little bit selfish of me to be feeling like I can constantly give when I'm not giving to myself. Did I? OK, and then apparently there's two more that I didn't know about. Let's see one of those as well. What else you got? Um, what other ones? The perfectionist as well. But I might be like Pokemon. I might be able to get that I've been again. There's no judgement. It's just starting to understand these things, which are not bad and bad. They coping mechanisms, mechanisms and again, they're not necessarily bad things. It's just like at what point are they useful? So in terms of perfectionism, it's that more that internal expectation of like I need to do it this well before it's worthy or before I put this out to the world. So for me, like where my inner perfectionist, I don't love labels, but where It's sort of shown up a little bit. Is putting out content. I'm like, Right. I need to make sure that this is really concise. I need to make sure this is really clear. And that tendency to sort of, um that paralysis of overthinking and thinking If this is, is this what other people will they understand? This Is this good enough? Or all the finer details are they all, um, you're trying to pick out every little fine detail before you present that it can also show up as just trying to do the right thing. So being the good girl, which again has, I think, comes through a level of socialisation of what we taught growing up to do the right thing to be well behaved. And if you step outside of that, then for many of us there have been consequences or, um, different things like that. So it's just starting to recognise that perfectionism doesn't actually exist. It's not even it's a complete it's an illusion. But for so many of us, we get stuck because of the fear of failure or the fear that this work or whatever, Um, what I put what I'm putting out is not at the level that it should be, and therefore we we get paralysed in that so perfection. Perfectionism does not exist. And I think with the rise in social media, what we're seeing day to day, it's a real issue because we are only seeing a tiny portion of what someone's life is. Um, OK, what else do you got? What, and remember, these are just things that I sort of made up. It's really nice. It's good to start to start to see the patterns. And the No. One was. I think Controller, and that controller is thinking that we have to carry the responsibility and have it all together consistently. Baby, Um, I'll start a club. Can I start a subgroup in your group? For the four? The four from 44 from four Club? You'll probably find that you'll be more inclined to one or the other, but I think, um, one more than the other, I should say. But controllers Yeah, it's It's really just that whole, not allowing people to maybe help not wanting to feel so vulnerable. Let's say in a situation you feel like you could do a better job rather than ask someone to support you. So you just take on all that responsibility. You just say I'll get it done myself. Um, it's maybe a little bit hard to really let your walls down a little bit. And in that sense it's again that feeling of like we're trying to keep things under control, I guess. And maybe this is maybe I am self diagnosing incorrectly. I felt like I feel a need to control the temperature of a room. I feel heightened, I guess, growing up in uh, in some cases in an unpredictable environment where someone was, um, had addiction or was a bit chaotic. I have developed in my adult life this acute awareness when I enter a room to, like, almost put a number above everyone's head of what temperature they're at. And as soon as someone increases or decreases and changes the vibe of the room, I feel a need to inject comedy or leave it like if I have to. It's on me, which is not. No one's given me that job. It's self a pointed to keep everything calm, which is just probably a fear to, I guess of someone being unpredictable. Is that because I think it just it, really There's so many ways it could fit into different things. But I think you're right in the sense of just trying to keep things predictable, keep things safe. But also just a lot of it for me Kind of comes down to not feeling like others can help you to the degree that they need to, so it's easier just to do the job yourself. But it's easier just to, um, to sort of, I guess keep yourself removed and keep a lid on things as such, which I do feel like we all, uh, feel sometimes because it's really hard talking about or asking for help. Be trusting that people can hold us in our emotions or trusting that somebody can help us to the degree that we need help, whether it be just doing a job for us or something at work, delegating that kind of thing. Yeah, that's so good. Um, hey, I've used my time with you. I love you. You're amazing. This was such a good chat. Like I feel so informed. Uh, where can people follow you and find you? Because I know that you are really doing the Lord's work and putting so much of this information just out there for people to gobble up. Uh, where can people find you? Sure. So, um, my instagram is mainly where I'm at, and that is a neuro. So n EU r o dot spark. Um and that's where I'm just, like, posting random things that we just talked about today. Little bits of information. I often will try and, uh, speak from the heart as well. From my own experiences, client experiences. Like I said earlier, I teach the lightning process, which is the three day training. So if anyone really resonates with any of these symptoms and they want that, uh, support and they want to be able to shift some symptoms, please do come and, um, get in contact because I'd love to help. And I also do like online workshops around anxiety. Just different things in terms of mental health. Um, which I do every month. Awesome. Oh. Oh, I need to sign up for all of them. Um, for four by four. For you. Um and yeah. Thank you so much. I'm so grateful. No problem.