Recently I had the chance to sit down with Long Island's very own Brenna Guinan, mental health counselor extraordinaire and host of the refreshingly honest and brilliantly funny mental health podcast Real Fckn Talk. We discuss how the pandemic has, in many respects, created a mental health crisis not only for patients but for the dedicated mental health professionals out on the front lines. 

You can reach out to Breanna here:

Instagram: @real.fckn.talk

Email: realfckntalk@gmail.com 

Podcast: Real Fckn Talk (spotify, apple, etc)

Imagine a world without the inner narrator (our inner head chatter) telling us what is what. Imagine your inner narrator not being there. Imagine everything is neutral. You would have no judgement of your outside world. Yet the outside natural world is always completely neutral. It's your internal jibber jabber that adds meaning and creates that noisy world. You can have that quiet. You can view your world without judgement (even if the head chatter is at high volume). You have this thing called stillpower. Stillpower is pointing you back to that quiet everyday. Whether you have a neurotypical brain or a neurodiverse brain. You just don't pay attention to it.

Recently I had the unique opportunity to sit down with an extraordinary young man named Thomas Henley. Thomas is an Autism & Mental Health advocate, creating YouTube videos, podcasts and documentaries. With a degree in Biomedical Sciences from the University Of Manchester, a Commonwealth gold medal in Tae kwon do, and a talent for public speaking, Thomas seeks to raise awareness and support others on their own personal growth journey.

Thomas' motives come from his long history with Autism, Depression, Anxiety, Eating Disorders & Panic Disorders. Experienced in Special Needs teaching, human sciences, and how to help others understand his conditions, he seeks to bring a new face to Autism and Mental Health disorders.

"Life isn't showing you the truth of reality. It is not programming you. You are programming yourself to see life a certain way." - Rachel Francis

This week I spent time with the brilliant embodiment coach, Rachel Francis who hails from East Cork, Ireland. Rachel shares her journey exploring Italy and what's possible when we begin to see every moment as the gift just as it is, the good, bad, and the messy parts in between.

Rachel's Bio

Rachel is a certified Embodiment Coach. She specializes in helping people 1-on-1 in their mid 20s and 30s who feel disconnected to their full potential, unfulfilled and unconfident, embody a new self-concept and cultivate self-authority to obliterate sabotaging beliefs and negative patterns that are holding them back from the person they are meant to be and their happiest life. Rachel is also a Directory Member and Expert Coach with the international holistic retreat group Bien Etre and I am a host of the Spotify podcast 'Spiritual Roundtable Podcast'.

Taylor Roark of Galiant Trainings is not only a masterful intuitive coach aligning consciousness with purpose, he is also a wonderful human being. Taylor and I had a brilliant conversation back in August about what it means to connect with what our heart is calling us to. It happens to all of us if we pay attention to the quiet voice inside of us. That quiet voice is a blissful gift from the universe. It is that leap of faith that your brain innocently turns into a dangerous cliff edge. It's only when we see beyond the illusory nature of the Netflix movie of the mind do we discover it is a featherbed.

I have been patiently waiting to have my friend, the brilliant Chase Marks on my podcast for some time now. I finally got to interview the fabulous Chase Marks, the host of the Bystanders Podcast (which is my top five favorite). To say that Chase uplifts the lives of others (as a podcaster and a mental health advocate) is a true understatement. Chase also works in theater automation which is so apropos to our discussion today about the "theater of the mind" and how the drama of mind is not only made up, (if we really pay attention) it is not a creation of our own doing. It just is and it doesn't matter where it comes from. It's not us. So sit back, relax and enjoy. You will be glad you did.

Mental health is not something you work on. It's not something you obtain. It's not something you "manage." It is your true north. Your essential nature. And it's all there on offer. And in the immortal words of the Scottish mystic Sydney Banks: "We are just one thought away from mental wellbeing. Just one thought." Nothing better encapsulates this truth when we finally see who and what we truly are, underneath the noise of thought and thinking. It's called inner resilience and inner wisdom that guides us along the river of life like a perfect GPS system. We have flickers of our inner wisdom all day long. We just don't pay attention to it enough. Emily Davis, host of the brilliant mental health podcast, "The Wondering Mind," gets this truth. Then she forgets. Then she remembers again (like all of us do from time to time). Emily and I sat down to chat about her journey with ADHD and depression and how, after many years of suffering she started paying attention and trusting her own inner wisdom underneath the noise of her thinking.

Are my thoughts clear? Is my mind quiet? Am I open to my essential nature (found in all of us) which is resilience, compassion, and love? And it's not found in our very human experience of thought and thinking. It's in that quiet space. It is in that quiet space that most of our most beloved athletes win championships and break records.

Simon Mundie is a lover of sport. Especially tennis. He has interviewed some of the greatest tennis players of all time. Recently I had the honor of (from across the pond) sitting down with Simon Mundie, host of the brilliant podcast Life Lessons: From Sport and Beyond. Simon is also a critically acclaimed presenter for BBC TV and Radio 4's Today Program. Simon shares many touching examples of the fearless competitive wisdom in the athletes he interviews and how this precise discovery rests within all of us, right here, right now, no matter the circumstance.

In today's podcast I had the pleasure to speak with the brilliant transformational coach, Siobhan Friel, on how the mind really works (what they didn't teach us), and why we often forget that we are making it all up.

ADHD is a paradox of opposite abilities and behaviors that resonate at more intense levels than in those who do not have ADHD. Paradox is the coexistence of seemingly contradictory qualities or phases. One major paradox in a person with an ADHD neurotype is the inability to focus due to periphery noise. Periphery noise can interfere with the ability to carry on a conversation, get important work done, or follow direction in a person with ADHD. This can strain relationships (work and interpersonal) and lead to us feeling constantly exhausted and misunderstood by our frustrated peers. Peripheral noise is kryptonite to a person with ADHD. Sniffles and coughs are like bird calls in an aviary. Sniffles evolve into snuffles in my ADHD brain like blows in a steel foundry. To make matters worse the noise can sometimes be louder and more disruptive than your neighbor's car alarm going off in the middle of the night. It's not only disruptive it can be painful to a person with ADHD. Understanding how the speedy ADHD mind works is not only helpful to a person with ADHD but to our co-workers and the people (who care about us) to practice patience, compassion and make accommodations when the noise in our head is disruptive.

In this episode I had the unique opportunity to speak with a very special human. His name is Daniel Jackson, a gifted spirit guide and intuitive coach. Daniel shares how we can polish the lens of the heart, mind, and soul from the wisdom of our ancestors beyond the veil. It was truly an honor to listen to Daniel share his wisdom and experiences channeling spirit. You don't want to miss this episode!

In this episode I had the unique opportunity to speak with Scott Gazzoli, successful entrepreneur, Brooklynite, and host of the Causing the Effect podcast, a top 25 mindset podcast on Apple. Scott takes us on a colorful journey from growing up as a young kid inside the mafia to recreating himself over and over again until he found real success and contentment not just financially but in his heart, mind, and soul.

Mya is a brilliant coach and shaman from Queensland, Australia who helps her clients awaken from their dogmatic slumbers. Mya utilizes her shamanic gifts to help her clients see beyond the noise of their limiting beliefs and conditioning.

In this episode I share the microphone with my very first guest, my dear friend and fellow podcaster Bobby Couto of the Bobby Couto Show and the Disgruntled American Podcast. It's a feel good and engaging conversation between two friends on two different coasts. We share our personal experiences on mental health and how we both "experience" a rapidly changing world through the lens of generation x.

In today's episode I had the unique opportunity to speak with Matt Roberts, aka, "The Psychological Performance Coach," on how to experience more of what every human being wants more of (clarity of mind and wellbeing) and why we often (innocently) look in the wrong place for it.

In this podcast we explore the nature of labels and the behavioral conditioning that humans innocently experience when diagnosed with ADHD, anxiety, OCD and other related "disorders" and how to see beyond the stigma attached to the label.

A typical ADHD adult experiences life more intensely than neurotypicals. The ADHD nervous system wants to be engaged in something interesting and challenging. Attention is never "deficit." It's always excessive, constantly occupied with internal engagements. When people with ADHD aren't not present and in a state of flow they have many things rattling around in their minds all at once. Past, present, and future are never separate and distinct. When we see the illusory nature of this "neuro-experience" called ADHD we are better equipped to be the silent observer of the frenetic system which allows us to get less "sucked in" to it.

Your brain loves you and wants to keep you safe. But just like your laptop computer at home your computer is useless without "YOU" at the controls. Especially when your brain glitches and spews out all sorts of error commands in the form of overwhelmed, scary thinking. Scary thinking when there is nothing in the present moment to be scared about. So don't worry. It’s never your fault. It happens to all of us. It is the experience we call being human. As long as you see it as 100% nonsense and temporary. As long as you see it just anxious, sped up, overwhelmed ego fueled angry thinking that 100% means nothing and will settle on its own very soon. As long as you see the glitch in the operating system, the more we see the glitchiness as normal (and very human), the less we suffer. The less we suffer the quieter we get. The quieter we get the more time we spend in a very magical space called the present moment.

When we see that our worst enemy is not your desperate circumstances but the very human tendency to getting caught up in the content of our thinking, silly beliefs, and conditioning of how life is supposed to be. Syd Banks, the brilliant Scottish mystic once said: "Everyone at this moment is mentally healthy when you look at yourself from those eyes and you look at others from those eyes the way you are changes." And you don't find it in your intellect. When our mind calms down we enter this space as Syd Banks calls it, "pure consciousness." You don't have to believe in spirituality (or practice anything), being religious to see what I am pointing to. It's always there. It's always on offer. It's built in to everyone of you. Once your thinking gets quiet we drop into the fearless now.

You can end up chasing your own tail believing that authority figures, doctors, law enforcement. the media. your family, your boss say it must be true. But it may not be "the truth." The only truth is this moment. The only real truth is relaxing into hope when we get present. The only truth is living in the feeling of possibility right now. Living in the feeling of enjoyment despite how good or bad your circumstances are. So what is true with all of you at this present moment? Because all we have is this G-d given moment right now. As Syd banks once said: "get out of the future, get out out of the past, and get over yourself."