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Mindfulness Special: Relaxing Guided Session to Manage Stress and Anxiety with Allen Friedman · Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Today is a very special surprise episode I wanted to drop in your feed to help you relax as we close out the year.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: This is a replay of a mindfulness session on alternate nostril breathing conducted by our very own Alan Friedman.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: It was done during the recent 21 day body recomp challenge, but I wanted to share it with everybody.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: If you want the video and you want to watch it live and see what he's doing with his hands that you can emulate, all you have to do is join our Facebook community, the Whits Wates Facebook community.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: The links are in the show notes, but you should still be able to perform this exercise from the audio alone.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: I left in all of the silence.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: I didn't shorten that here so that you could get the full, authentic experience.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: If you hear long seconds, many seconds of silence, that is intentional.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: I hope this finds you well.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: I hope this brings you peace, joy, relaxation as we close out 2023 or whenever you're listening to this, and enjoy the episode.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Whits Wates podcast.
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: I'm your host, philip Pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger, optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: We'll uncover science-backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset, with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry, so you can look and feel your absolute best.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Let's dive right in.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Mr Alan Friedman is a school psychologist for many years.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: He's a certified yoga instructor.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: He has additional certification in trauma sensitive yoga.
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: He's been a spin instructor and, of course, he's an avid lifter and member of our community learning, learning and growing every day along with us.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: He is also a master with years of wisdom, in my opinion, and can take us through a very exciting moment here where you're going to learn and grow physically and mentally.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: So I'm going to turn it over to Alan.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: Alan, welcome.
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: Hi, welcome, so good to be here.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: Whether you're here on the live or on the replay, this is a wonderful community.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: Okay, mindfulness really is being present in the moment.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: Essentially, it's really accepting what's going on around us with intention and awareness, and to be fully engaged in not only one's surroundings but what's happening inside of us, with non-judgmental, with a non-judgmental approach and with just an acceptance of what's happening and noticing it and observing.
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: So part of mindfulness is saying oh and then being able to respond to that.
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: So there are two types of nervous systems that are at play.
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: I'm just going to review them very quickly.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: There's a sympathetic nervous system, which is typically fight and flight, and the parasympathetic nervous system, which is typically rest and digest.
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: The fight and flight is a very evolutionary, very important nervous system because we have to respond to stress, we have to respond to safety, we have to respond to so many things in our lives to safeguard us, and it requires us to fight and flight.
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: The opposite of that is maybe you've experienced after a heavy meal or when you're just about to go to sleep.
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: The parasympathetic nervous system is rest and digest.
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: It relaxes you and it's a calming type of nervous system where you're at peace and it's the opposite of the sympathetic nervous system where you're able to rest, digest and your body does the functioning of repair a lot of times during the parasympathetic state.
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: So the key is for today is how are we going to switch between states of being?
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: So a lot of times we are appropriately aroused, we are appropriately under an appropriate level of stress, you may say, to help move us along, to learn, to challenge us, and then there are times where we just want to chill, where it's getting to be a little too much, we might become hyper-vigilant.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: We might be looking around us for inappropriately or too much, being so too aware of what's happening around us.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: It's called hyper-vigilance.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: You might have a sense of anxiety, you might have a sense of mental and physical unwellness that needs to kind of just kind of chill.
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: So what we're going to be doing today is a way to kind of switch states of being, and it's not anything magical, it is so beautifully physiological that you're going to kind of get a sense of it, hopefully, today.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: So the next slide is going to illustrate the vagus system, the vagus nerve.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: The vagus nerve is a cranial nerve that starts from our brain, goes down towards our body, but importantly and I think this is very interesting personally that it affects the vocal cords and your breathing, your pharynx, your larynx, if you notice in the diagram.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: It kind of goes into your tongue and then it kind of descends all the way down into your organs, your heart, your lungs, your liver, your spleen, and then it really innervates the diaphragm area where your digestive organs are.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: And that is what we're going to focus on today.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: I think it's so cool because we can change our mind from our body up.
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: So today we're going to be doing an exercise called alternate nostril breathing, which is going to affect this whole vagus system through breathing through our diaphragm.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: Diaphragmic breathing is not something that okay, it's good to do, it's healthy to do.
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: There's an actual physical reaction that occurs.
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: We innervate our vagus nerve Next slide.
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: So when we activate our vagus nerve, when we become mindful, we can deal with stress around us a little better.
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: As it says in this picture, in the photo, we attend and befriend our stress.
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: We become aware of it, like Philip mentioned, we become present with it, we use our prefrontal cortex, we have our higher level thinking involved, we become engaged and curious and compassionate, whereas if the sympathetic nervous system is kicking in, all of our thought systems kind of shut down.
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: We act instinctively.
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: We may have a level of anxiety, we may feel helpless, we may not know how to problem solve at that point, or we may just be operating from a survival mode.
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: So right now we're going to be delving into the vagus nerve.
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: We're going to have a quick well, somewhat quick exercise and a little bit of breath work.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: This is going to be very different than the imaginary and breath work I did in the previous training, because this technique itself, I find, requires just the breath work to do the effect.
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: So let's give it a try.
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: So if you're righty or lefty, it doesn't matter, we're going to be closing the same nostril.
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: So if you're right-handed, you're going to be starting off with your thumb on your right nostril.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: If you're left-handed, you're going to be starting off with your pinky or index finger on your right nostril and your thumb, if you're left-handed, will take care of the left nostril.
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: So before we start, everyone get grounded.
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: Sit in your chair, shoulders above your hips, hands down, relaxed, maybe lifting your fingers up in the air, wiggling them and then taking your toes, lifting them up in the air and then placing them back down from your pinky down to your big toe, lifting them up again, placing them back down and taking a nice deep breath in through your nose and out through your mouth and if you notice any clogged nose, if you have an asthma or if you have any breathing issues, simply monitor your breath, go into a diaphragmic breath however you wish.
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: Everyone has.
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: You know you may have a cold or a sinus infection or something of that sort, so just kind of breathe in as best you can and the way you can.
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: Another deep breath in through your nose.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: First thing, if your breath goes down to your belly, if it stops in your chest or stays in your throat, take another breath.
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: Where does that column of breath end?
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: And maybe next time bring it down a little bit more into your belly and feel the diaphragm raise.
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: If you've ever watched an infant breathe, their belly rises up and down.
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: We want to kind of simulate that.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: And through your nose, maybe out through your nose this time, breathing in deeply, maybe inhaling for a count of three or four and exhaling as you wish.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: And now, if you want, you can close your eyes or maintain a slight gaze in front of you if you're not uncomfortable closing your eyes.
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: Close your two fingers your index finger and middle finger, if you're a righty, if not, it's your other hand and cover your right nostril with your thumb.
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: Breathe in through your left nostril.
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: Close the left nostril with your ring finger or pinky.
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: Open your right and exhale, and through the right, covering your left nostril, pinch the right nostril.
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: Close, open the left Out.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: It goes.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: Try this in your own breath and through the left, close out through the right.
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: Practice this yourself three times Right.
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: Close the right, out the left.
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: See if you can elongate the breath when you breathe in through your nostril.
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: Can you breathe in a little deeper?
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: Can you start to access your diaphragm through the breath?
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: Come to rest with your fingers on your forehead.
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: Now what I'd like for you to do is let's get a little deeper in this.
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: Close your right nostril, breathe in through the left.
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: Breathe in deeply.
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: Let the air swirl into your forehead, into your nasal passages, down into your diaphragm, filling your belly with air.
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: Close the left nostril out the right.
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: Let it out slowly In through the right nostril.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: Feel the diaphragm with air.
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: Close it out through the left.
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: Breathe in deeply through the left nostril.
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: Let the air swirl into your forehead, down into your diaphragm.
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: Close the left and out the right.
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: I'm going to give you a couple of minutes now to do this on your own, breathing in deeply, as deeply as you can to innervate your diaphragm, feeling the nostril opening the opposite one and out it goes.
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: And whenever you're sufficiently relaxed and you feel like your practice could be over, gently open your eyes again, focus on your gaze and assess where you are now versus where you were three minutes ago.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: Has anyone affected a shift in themselves?
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: Philip, yes, okay.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: So what this is is where we are changing our mental status and our ability to kind of like, be mindful and focus, simply through changing our physiology, on nervous system, from the biggest nerve.
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: Okay, and I wanted to end on a little bit of a quieter note following Alan's session, to be concluded with our outro music here.
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: I really hope you are fulfilled and found what you are looking for from this.
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: Feel free to share it with others.
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: If you found it helpful, feel free to revisit it again and again.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: If you want to watch the video version of this, along with the slides and the training that he gave at the beginning, please join our Whits and Weights Facebook community.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: The link is in the show notes and I wish you a very happy new year.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: Thank you for tuning in to another episode of Whits and Weights.
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: If you found value in today's episode and know someone else who's looking to level up their Whits or Weights, please take a moment to share this episode with them and make sure to hit the follow button in your podcast platform right now to catch the next episode.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: Until then, stay strong.