The Loud Whisper Takeover
Featuring interviews with actors, stunts, dancers, filmmakers, action movie directors, athletes, Krav Maga teachers, acting coaches, and more.
Epic tales of changemakers, authentic personal stories, and top tips about the industry, the podcast is a treasure of knowledge helping storytellers of all kinds on their own journeys, and inspiring people to take action upon their own dreams.
Ever heard your inner voice getting louder and louder, urging you towards a new path? When our inner guidance starts to become so loud, we can no longer ignore it, and we MUST take action... This is often a time when life changes direction drastically. We are literally being called to take that leap of faith, make that phone call, write that script, make that film in other words, time to embrace our wildest dreams, shift gear, and grow exponentially.
Let's dive into the art of listening courageously to our inner compass. Because every one of us is destined to live a grand story and adventure while walking on planet Earth!
Headphones on, notebooks out, and buckle up!
Hosted by Cindy Claes.
The Loud Whisper Takeover
30: Nervous System Regulation for Combat Athletes and Peak Performance Artists
Actors, stunts, dancers... we are all "peak performers". Briana Bowley, a specialist in nervous system regulation for high performers, reveals how our fight-flight-freeze responses can either sabotage our efforts or become powerful allies in our creative journey.
When you'll understand why you freeze during that Brazilian jiu-jitsu sparring sessions or why you're drawn to action movies despite hating real-world violence, you might gain access to profound new insights about your own patterns and potential.
We explore the seemingly contradictory attraction many of us have to martial arts and action movies while being fundamentally non-violent people. Is it because survival is portrayed in such vivid ways? Is it about reclaiming power? Seeking the spark of uncertainty in monotonous lives? Or perhaps it's about creating those powerful "blended states" where challenge and safety coexist, allowing us to test our edges in controlled environments.
In this episode we learn that the body cannot distinguish between surviving through an experience or thriving through it and how the "minimal effective dose" concept helps performers achieve results without burning out.
One of Cindy’s key takeaways is how opportunities to "brag" about successes can reprogram nervous system patterns.
Ready to transform your relationship with performance, success, and the inevitable challenges of a creative career? Discover how understanding your nervous system patterns can help you approach your craft with greater self-awareness, efficiency, and compassion.
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Welcome to the Loud Whisperer Takeover podcast. Today we are going to talk about combat sports, martial arts, why we love action movies yet we hate violence, and then one very, very important topic it's all about high performers, peak performers and their risk of burnout. When we are artists, we are really there, putting all of ourselves into our crafts 365 days a year. When, on top of that, we work with our bodies, when we are a dancer, when we are a stunt performer, we're also in this high peak performance mindset at all times. How can we go through life with a bit of a more smoothness and peace, both for our bodies and for our mental health? Today I have a very special guest, brianna Bowley, straight out of Australia. Hi, brianna, how are you doing? I'm good. How are you? I'm super excited to be talking to you today. So maybe just because you're doing a lot of different things related to high performers, can you tell us in a nutshell what you do and what your methodology is about?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely so. I work in nervous system regulation work for high performers, and this is essentially looking at the fight, flight and freeze response and how that affects and impacts our ability to show up at our best. If we're living in this perpetual state of stress which is often the case for most people because we live in a very kind of a high stimulus environment then it diminishes our ability to recover, it diminishes our ability to think clearly, it diminishes our ability to be at our best across multiple different facets. So my work is really about encouraging people to set themselves up to operate from a place of safety, operate from a place of relaxation and, with that, perform better across the board.
Speaker 1:I'm just thinking because obviously I can see myself when I'm a leader of a project and I'm facing conflict and I can analyze it on a psychological level. I can see myself when I'm a leader of a project and I'm facing conflict and I can analyze it on a psychological level. I can see, okay, here I've been fighting, freezing, fighting, but I'd like to go to me as somebody that is interested in combat sports. So I did a lot of Krav Maga.
Speaker 1:At some point I was training 17 hours a week in Krav Maga. My nervous system was triggered right, left and center, yet I kept going. It was not always a nice kind of feeling, but for some reason I just kept going because I was so dedicated to learn more about this methodology, about this methodology. When people get involved in combat sports, when they get involved in things like Krav Maga, self-defense, martial arts, will that also come up, or will they always try and go to the fight response? For example, I'm training boxing. If I freeze, I will lose my boxing match right or I will not be able to spar, or whatever. What happens in those moments.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, in a nutshell, our body or our nervous system learns what responses we instinctually lean towards, based on past experiences. So I'll use myself as an example. I have a habit. I train Brazilian jiu-jitsu.
Speaker 2:I have a habit when I'm stuck in bottom side control underneath the heavy opponent, I can sometimes find myself freezing.
Speaker 2:And I've been able to track it back too, because I grew up with an older brother and I grew up with a lot of, you know, male cousins and I got very used to basically being lovingly beat up as a kid.
Speaker 2:And I learned really early on that if I tried to fight back these are boys who were older than me, heavier than me, physically stronger than me If I fought back, it was actually more fun for them and they would spend longer beating me up, whereas if I froze then they would leave me alone and they'd get bored of it.
Speaker 2:And so I now know that sometimes in these moments in jiu-jitsu, when I'm stuck in bottom side control and there's this sense of hopelessness, there's this sense of I can't get out of this, that freeze response is alert response, because that was how I survived as a kid. Now I can train myself out of this and I am consistently working at shifting the response. But it's in a nutshell our nervous system can't tell the difference between whether we simply survive through an experience or whether we thrive through an experience. Of course, in my situation in jujitsu, for me to be at my best on the mats, regardless of what situation is happening, it would be ideal, it would be my preference if I didn't freeze. But the reality is that my system can't tell the difference between oh, I lived another day, or I lived another day and won the match and did it effortlessly, and so on and so forth, and so the freeze response is there, because that's how I survived as a kid.
Speaker 1:That's so interesting that the nervous system doesn't make a difference between I survived another day or I survived another day and I won, and I was productive and I was yeah, all of these things that we value in society.
Speaker 1:What also is being reflected back to me is, when I'm sparring, especially in Krav Maga, is that I go into freeze mode. And what you now said now is I have actually a background like I grew up in a very violent family environment and actually what happened was, well, you don't fight back, but if you just roll up in a little ball and wait for it to be over, it will be over at some point. So it's and I realize, yeah, in Krav Maga it's often that sort of that comes back, but you said we can train ourselves out of it. So how do we train ourselves out of it? Is it just that realization in the moment of no, now keep going. You're in freeze mode, now go in fight mode, or how? Or is it meditation outside of the training session? Or how would you, yeah, coach your clients and getting out of these patterns?
Speaker 2:yeah for sure, part of it can be resources. So as an example, and again I'll use my situation as an example as a white belt who's brand new to the mats has no idea how to get out of side control, then of course, when I'm stuck under side control I'm gonna freeze and I'm not going to know what to do, whereas now, being further along in my journey and being closer to Purple Bell, now I do have these resources. So I noticed that it happens a lot less because I'm now well resourced with other options and other ways of dealing when that pressure or that stimulus that reminds me of childhood experiences kicks in. But the other piece is that, in a nutshell, to retrain and repattern these responses, we actually need to have the experience in safe spaces. So, like a common analogy that I use is that if someone has like a phobia of spiders, then if they're put in situations where they're around spiders and they're not bitten or they're not, they're not stressful experiences with spiders. Maybe their experiences with spiders where you know that they see them in a different light or they see they're more of I guess, for lack of a better way of putting it the cuddliness of spiders, or are able to see them in ways that they resonate with. It takes away some of that emotional charge. It takes away some of that stress.
Speaker 2:So one of the ways that I personally use when it comes to my situation in jujitsu is I actually share what's going on with my training partners. Then I say to them hey, I have this response that comes up for me. It's a freeze response. Here is why it occurs. I'm trying to train myself into recognizing that sensation of being trapped under someone heavy as being a situation where, although it's uncomfortable, it's not unsafe. And I encourage my training partners, in the right circumstances, to actually put me in that position and they know what's going on for me, they know what to look out for if I start to freeze up.
Speaker 2:I know that I can tap out of those situations when I need to. But when I am stuck in those circumstances and I can feel myself starting to go into my freeze response and I'm really clear on what these symptoms are for me when I can feel myself starting to move into a freeze response, I consciously talk myself through it. So I will, even if it means that I'm not actively trying to escape, just doing my best to remain in my body so it could look like you're having an internal kind of dialogue with myself. Sometimes it's a it's actually an external dialogue with my training partner, but doing whatever I need in that moment to basically stay present, to stay in my body, to not go into panic, to not go into shutdown and start to retrain my system. That experience isn't something to shut down when I'm in. It's not an experience that I need to escape. It's an experience that, over time, I can start to see as being a safe experience.
Speaker 1:There's something very important that you said like you would retrain yourself when you're in the safe space. For example, you're training, you're sparring with a training partner, and then you would share with your training partner what's going on, so that they can also be of good support. And then we have these fight, flight and freeze responses in spaces that are not safe. For example, we have to solve a conflict in real life with somebody we work with, we have to renegotiate our salaries or we have to renegotiate terms and conditions of our contract. As a performer, we are under a huge amount of stress because, as performers, we don't always have work, and so we're in the situation where we are like, oh, can I even fight back or not, but we might not feel in a safe space, we might not feel like we can share, like hey, I'm freezing here. So how would you then prepare performers to go against their patterns or have a better relationship of conflict, but when they're not in a safe space?
Speaker 2:Yeah, great question. So I would say the answer to that is it's all of the work leading up to those moments. I always encourage my clients to get really clear on what has them at their best and what has them at their worst, and a lot of this is like background homework. So it could be something as simple. As me, for example, I know that if I get less than eight hours of sleep, that I'm not at my best. If I get less than eight hours of sleep several days in a row, like my ability to be resilient through stress is severely just diminished.
Speaker 2:And so it's tracking these kind of simple things over time so that we can set ourselves up and provide ourselves with what we need, so that in these moments of stress, we can essentially hold out before we're thrown into chaos, before we're thrown into dysregulation.
Speaker 2:So there's something called a window of tolerance, and a window of tolerance is basically how much external stimulus or how much stress we can take on before we're thrown into dysregulation.
Speaker 2:And so I kind of use the analogy of you know, if you think of like a bucket of water, and every time your needs aren't met, you're adding more water to that bucket, and then finally you have this experience, which is stressful.
Speaker 2:You don't know how to handle it. You know you're having to face conflict or whatever the thing may be. You've only got maybe this much space left in the bucket before you overflow, and then you know we have emotional chaos, but every time you're having your needs met, it's like emptying water out. So you now have more space in the bucket to take on whatever may come your way during the day where you still have more space in the bucket to take on whatever may come your way, during the day where you still have more capacity before things start to overflow. So, to simplify that, it would be a matter of, in every situation outside of that stressor, learning how to regulate, learning what you need in order to be at your best and, as best you can, avoiding or being discerning about the situations that don't have you at your best, so that you've got a greater capacity.
Speaker 1:A question around our love for martial arts and combat sports. I'm just going to go from the general idea that most people do not enjoy violence or not violent. Of course there are exceptions and people that absolutely love hitting others and would go to some sort of boxing environment for these reasons. But I would say that, generally speaking, myself or people that I work with in action movies or people that are involved in martial arts or other sort of combat sports or even Krav Maga, do not like violence, do not want to be involved in any sort of real fights, yet we are attracted to these sort of practice environments, these sports. Yet we are attracted to these sort of practice environments, these sports. Why do you think that is, and what do you think is it that we are expressing of ourselves during training? I'm really interested in that question because obviously I'm an action actress.
Speaker 1:I hate violence to such an extent in real life, yet I love action movies. I want to be casted for action movies. I want to train my fighting skills. I love watching these kind of movies, but I hate it in real life. I have bits and pieces of answers, I think. Sometimes I watch a movie and then I realize I'm watching this violent, in between brackets movie. But there is a story of survival, and the story of survival is so close to our instinct as human beings of what it takes to survive that we get totally drawn into the story. Is there anything else that attracts us to either doing the sport or these kind of movies, watching it, it or doing it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do think that there is a myriad of different reasons why we're drawn to these things. I think in many cases it is that story of you know, at some point in our lives we've had an experience which has stripped us of our power or stripped us of something, and so, you know, martial arts is a way for us to get our power back, to get that experience back, to feel empowered again. But I do think that there is an element of a lot of the time we live, for the most part massive generalization here. But I think we live very kind of monotonous lives as human beings. Most people work their nine to fives. They get up and they go to work, they come home, they look after the kids, they go to bed, they repeat, and so there's this monotony. And so I think that often, as human beings, we're looking for that spark of something that gives us a sense of aliveness or a sense of uncertainty, and this kind of additional stimulus, I suppose. And so I think for a lot of people, in a strange way, martial arts is providing that is providing this hit of uncertainty, this hit of aliveness.
Speaker 2:And when we look at the nervous system, we also have what's called blended states so we can be in our safety state whilst being in fight state, and so fight state alone is a stress response, but when it's blended with our safety state, it can look like things like play, fighting with their siblings, it can look like wrestling with their kids or wrestling with the dog, and so I think martial arts provides us with that.
Speaker 2:It provides us with that opportunity to test ourselves and to have this experience of violence in controlled ways, where we can find the edges of where we feel comfortable going, whilst also having these experiences of play and bonding. And almost for lack of a better term, for lack of a better way of putting it, it's like that experience of kind of like a shared suffering. There there's this interesting bond that happens when you're in competition with someone in jujitsu, where after the fight, it's like you have this kind of this unique bond because it's the shared struggle, it's the shared suffering of being head to head with one another and then coming out of it more connected than ever. So I think it's yeah, it's an interesting blend of wanting to experience our own edges whilst wanting to connect and also wanting to maybe gain back something that we've had taken from us at some point in our lives.
Speaker 1:A couple of things I want to bounce back on. I have three questions actually. I'll start with the first one. You said there was an element of uncertainty we might be attracted to and stimulus, and so martial arts, combat sports, might be an environment that creates that level of uncertainty. So we're living a little bit on the edge sort of thing. Do you think it can also lead to an addiction to dopamine and adrenaline, or not?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely yeah. I think a lot of the time I'm always hesitant to touch on some of these topics, but I think this is a safe space to do it. I think a lot of the time what I see often in clients who get into combat sports is that usually they've had somewhat of a coyote upbringing and so there's actually, in a strange way, there's a sense of uncertainty in martial arts, but there's also a familiarity, there's a yeah, there's this sense of oh, I know this environment, this is familiar to me, and so it's a way of having this need for uncertainty met in a familiar environment. And I think a lot of the time when someone's had a traumatic upbringing, when things are too safe or too certain, there's a sense of boredom and the boredom actually feels unsafe. The boredom feels unfamiliar. The boredom is the thing that actually has them go into a stress response. So I do think a lot of the time, yeah, we're having a need met for familiarity through the uncertainty of martial arts.
Speaker 1:You said it was an opportunity to test ourselves. It's an opportunity to grow. So is it then a true embodiment of I can grow? That then translates mentally in self-confidence in other areas?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely yeah. I think the growth is a basic human need. We're driven towards this, and I think this is what separates us from the animals, because, unlike animals, we do have the ability to think about what we're thinking about. This is what makes humans, that we're driven towards growth, we're driven towards progression, we're driven towards this experience of momentum, and so I do think martial arts is a really beautiful way for us to feel like we're progressing at something, and I think that and forgive me, I don't know if it's a saying in Krav Maga, but in jujitsu or judo or a lot of those kind of grappling sports, we have the belt system, and I think that, in and of itself, is part of what keeps people committed to the sport, because we get to see through the color of this little one-inch piece of material, we get to actually see and experience their progress.
Speaker 1:Third question you talked about actually the sparring sessions or competitions, are a way to play, to bond, to create a bond. After the sparring session, winner, loser, it doesn't matter, it's the fact that we shared a struggle. I've done a little bit of Brazilian jiu-jitsu and I can relate to that. However, I've also looked at other combat sports such as boxing or MMA, and they make a whole thing of making enemies from each other and until the end they play that game of enemies. Do you think it always ends into a stronger bond or do you think there are other sports that actually the we are enemies and playing that game of we are enemies until the end also exists, or do you think it always ends up in a stronger human connection?
Speaker 2:it doesn't always end in a stronger human connection. I think it depends on what drives someone like. For myself, I'm very connection driven and so for me to be really transparent, martial arts wouldn't be, it wouldn't mean anywhere near as much to me if I didn't have that opportunity to bond with my training partners, to bond with my opponents. I do think in some sports we do see that classic and even jiu-jitsu for that matter jiu-jitsu is not immune to this. But I think in some sports we do see that meeting to operate as though they're enemies and I think that that generally points to someone who needs something to fight against. You know, and maybe it is that I've had a traumatic upbringing and so that feels safe and it feels familiar to have someone to fight against.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I do think that there is a psychological element to it of if someone's not your enemy, it's really hard to want to punch them in the face. But I also do think when we look at sports like, say, the UFC or some boxing matches, I also do think that there is an element of marketing in that. When we look at the likes of, say, conor McGregor, for example, I think that he really capitalized on that WWE performative kind of hatred of his opponent and getting in his head and all of that as a marketing ploy more than anything. And I would actually wonder how much truth is behind a lot of that kind of hatred of one another versus how much was just a way to to draw people's attention into the sport two things that sort of you know come to mind when you're saying that.
Speaker 1:I love how you always come back to the this feels safe and this feels familiar, or this feels unsafe and this feels unfamiliar, and how we unconsciously might, yeah, carry things from our past that feel safe, which chaos can be such a known world and a familiar world and then can end up being a safe space. And then I also love that. You said, well, it might be very hard to hit somebody in the face if you don't see them as your enemy, but, because that was one of my struggles in Krav Maga, obviously we don't hit people in the face. There is always an element of safety, but we have to take the scenario as far as possible so that we can put our nervous system in a situation that is as close as possible to reality, so that we can defend ourselves if we were to be in a real fight and for me, you know, hitting somebody else or I was so scared to just hurt someone else it just felt awful, awful, but, like you said, yeah, how can you actually hit another human being? Because empathy is also a part of our natural state of being. So I find this just super interesting, and also in terms of my character analysis as an actress doing action movies and how I relate to the other characters you know as a character, not as Cindy just given on the layer as well and on how to look at these things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'd love to talk about your work with high performers now because, obviously, and in the world of combat sports and in the world of dance and in the world of stunts, we are in the world of acting.
Speaker 1:We are very much a community of artists that work with this reality, that is, you don't know when the next job is going to come, yet you always have to be ready for the next job. So there is a bit of an underlining mentality of you got to be ready 365 days a week. So we are always ready for the next casting. Our bodies are always training in case the next job is coming tomorrow and then, when we are on the job, we want to do the best that we can because we're so passionate about all of that. Please feel free, you know, to add anything that comes up for you, but maybe the first thing I'll start with is you emphasize the sentence a lot, which is less, is more. Could you tell us more about what that means and also how we as artists, actors, stunts and dancers, can apply this less is more to our industries and our everyday life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely so. I think, as high performers, we're often encouraged to work hard to the point of struggle or to the point of suffering. I think that there's such a kind of undercurrent mentality of like really grinding yourself into the ground. And so, when we look at that from a nervous system perspective, if we're always in this kind of high stress, high functioning state, like our body isn't having time to switch into parasympathetic mode, we're not having time to rest and recover, and so when I speak about less is more, it's really about being really intentional and efficient in where you do put your energy. So there's threads of you know what I spoke about earlier, which is knowing what has you at your best, and really doubling down on that, being discerning, about moving away from or limiting um putting yourself in dynamics that have you at your worst. I think and forgive me here, because this is a little bit difficult to answer without without specifically having someone sitting in front of me where we can pick through their unique set of circumstances but I really think of that as like finding the here's a good way of putting it finding the minimal effective dose that's going to get you the result that you're looking for without kind of having to go above and beyond. So I use the analogy. Actually, I'll tell you a story quickly. I have a lot of kind of connections within the farming industry and and forgive me for any animal lovers here, because it's not a I'm an animal lover too. It's not the nicest example, but I think it paints a really clear picture.
Speaker 2:So eagles I often use eagles as an analogy in my work. So I talk about how the eagles are incredibly efficient. They're actually very lazy animals. A lot of the time when they have the opportunity they'll pick roadkill up off the road. When they fly, they're not actively flying. A lot of the time they're actually catching the updrafts and when it comes to hunting, they don't really move into action until they've already spotted their prey. The rest of the time they're just gliding, gliding on the updrafts.
Speaker 2:And so I had an experience a couple of months ago where I went out to a friend's farming property and I noticed that a particular time of the day all of the eagles were sitting out on the trees and just like looking out over the paddocks. And so I asked the owner of the farm like why are the eagles here at the same time every day? And he explained to me, it's because the eagles have learned over time. That's usually when the kangaroos come out, and the kangaroos are pests, and so the farmer will come out and shoot the kangaroos, and so the eagles are now hunting the kangaroos, but rather than having to hunt for prey themselves, they're doing it much more efficiently because they've already been killed. And so, in a nutshell, it's that it's figuring out how you can still get the job done without burning yourself to the ground, without doing it in a way where you're stressed out and high strung and exhausted and fatigued, without having to be in this perpetual state of struggle, but still getting the job done.
Speaker 1:Before I bounce back on the efficiency, I must say I'm a bit shocked. Are you guys like killing kangaroos in australia?
Speaker 2:they're pests here, but they're, yeah, the country's overrun with them. A lot of foreigners are so shocked but, yeah, they're the country's really over outrun, overrun with them, okay. But that's.
Speaker 1:That's another topic, so the animal lover in me will just okay I know that's a piece of news.
Speaker 1:I was not expecting to hear kangaroos. Just I know that they can be very dangerous and stuff, but I never thought that they would be seen or perceived as pests. Yeah, all right, let's go back to to efficiency, minimum effective dose for maximum impact, sort of thing, would you say. It's a bit similar to the 20, 80, but 80 of the of your effort in that 20 of actions. Yes, that give you 80 of the results, kind of.
Speaker 1:Thing yeah, that's a perfect way of putting it, because obviously I'm also passionate about fitness and bodybuilding has also been a part of my journey. And there is also this way of looking at long-term training, which is okay how can I build a maximum amount of muscles in doing certain exercises or doing a certain programming? But then also there is this very important thing that we also have to look at, which is that we have to go into deload after a certain amount of weeks. So for a certain amount of weeks we use a certain amount of weights, we lift heavier and heavier, and then for a week or two we take time off because our muscles need to repair.
Speaker 1:And I think that is often the cycle that artists we find difficult to find is those two weeks of repair. For example, when I was a professional dancer, you never know when the next casting is, so you cannot let yourself go into these two weeks of repair, because what if you call tomorrow for a casting and you've got to look your best and be your best? And yeah, I think those are the little moments that we find it more difficult. You talk about common survival mechanisms that you see in high performers. What are about common survival mechanisms that you see in high performers. What are the common survival mechanisms and how can we overcome them?
Speaker 2:So I think a lot of the common survival mechanisms are that mentality of having to push ourselves to extremes in order to prove ourselves or in order to feel like we're good enough. It can be that phrase response. I think probably the main one that I see really in if we're talking sports specific and entrepreneurship for that matter is really that like fight response of oh, I've got to really be willing to struggle in order to prove myself. That prove myself piece is usually a pretty clear indication that there's a bit of like a us versus them mentality or a bit of a fight response mentality kind of occurring there. And yeah, again, at risk of repeating myself here, it's really about starting to understand what does trigger off these different states for an individual.
Speaker 2:So I always encourage all of my clients to get really well-versed in what their fight response, their flight response and their freeze response looks like for them, so tracking it down to such a nuanced extent that they're able to identify it in the heat of the moment, like as it's occurring.
Speaker 2:So for me, I know that a fight response for me does look like like my palms start to get sweaty, I know that like I start to get this heated feeling up through my chest coming up into my face.
Speaker 2:I know that my thoughts start to become a little bit more like either blame or defensive.
Speaker 2:I know that a freeze response for me feels like my limbs start to get heavy and it's like everything gets really like eerily quiet, like my senses are a little bit more diminished. And so, yeah, I really encourage my clients to to start to track what these responses look like for themselves so that they can first of all identify when they're in those states and then, from there, start to create a toolbox of okay, when I'm in a freeze response, a hot bath is the quickest thing to get me out. If I have that available to me, or speaking to myself in a particular way is a great way for me to get out of freeze response. Or like squeezing all of the muscles in my body brings energy to my system, so that helps to bring me out of freeze response. So, yeah, I first of all identifying it and having an awareness of what it looks like, but then also starting to build out like a toolkit for lack of a better way of putting it that helps us to move out of it.
Speaker 1:Earlier on, you told me, cindy, sometimes it's difficult for me to say or express how my methodology works if I don't have a person in front of me with a specific set of struggles or conflicts. So I wanted to ask you how about you coach me for five minutes, yeah, with my personal things, because these things that you just shared, not being good enough and I have to struggle to prove myself, really reflect a part of my reality. Are you up for?
Speaker 2:that challenge challenge.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay. So let's start with the first one. And I'm not good enough. And pushing ourselves to some extremes. I'm somebody that will go through extremes. Like I said, for example, if I get into Krav Maga, I'm going to start training 17 hours a week. Did it lead me to burnout at some point? Absolutely, my nervous system was not able to handle. It was not the amount of training, it was the amount of triggering of my nervous system feeling unsafe because we're sparring so much in a week that I couldn't handle. But yeah, I don't know if it's like some sort of undiagnosed ADHD that gets me into extremes for these things.
Speaker 1:I also believe there is this sense, this underlying thought of I'm not good enough. I'm not good enough. There is also this sense of I'm not perfect enough. For example, a lot of my friends that do action movies. They have a very strong background in martial arts. They grew up doing martial arts. I didn't. I have a background in dance that turned into a passion for fitness, that turned into a passion for choreographed fights, and so now, over the last few years, I've been trying to do Brazilian jiu-jitsu and Krav Maga and try to be as specialized as I can. But there is this underlying thought of am I good enough? Do I know enough? I know a lot in comparison to other artists. I dive deep into how to be a good actress. I dive deep into how to be a good movement artist, but how can I go against this thing that sometimes makes me pursue all these paths to an extreme?
Speaker 2:First of all, I want to celebrate you for your honesty here and for sharing that, because I think that this is something that most people face in some way, shape or form. It's just very few actually admit to it, so I really want to acknowledge you for that. There's a few, just for the listeners sake. There's a myriad of different ways that I could tackle this, but, for the sake of time, the key thing that stands out to me in what you've shared is there's a piece here around self-concept and my work with the Bollie Blueprint, which is essentially my methodology that I created.
Speaker 2:We work across 10 pillars. We work across 10 pillars of nervous system regulation and one of those pillars is self-concept, so it's essentially how we see ourselves in relation to the world. So the first thing that I want to ask you because it sounds like you're clear on what you don't want, but if you had it all your way, how would you want it to be Like? How would you like to know yourself, how would you like to experience yourself in relation to your training, relation to your career, kind of picture for me I would love if I had it all my way.
Speaker 1:I would love to basically be casted for a role where I know exactly which movement skills I need, because at the moment I'm training for a variety of opportunities.
Speaker 1:But if I had a specific role where we are like, okay, you're gonna need to master, you know bo staff or you're gonna need to master Brazilian jiu-jitsu, then I would. I think there would be a stronger sense, a stronger peace of mind, because I'm like, okay, I can just and only focus on these two practices because that's what I need for this specific role. I think what kind of makes me go in all different directions is number one I'm a multifaceted artist. I'm making film, I'm directing film, I'm writing, I'm acting. So that already makes me go in different directions. But then I think, when it comes to my movement practice is, I don't know which role might come my way, so I'm doing and krav maga, and boxing, and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and learning bo staff, and still dancing, and so that's where I put myself at risk of burnout, and I know it and it happens. I think it's the clarity and the fact that I don't have a specific role at the moment or a big role where I'm like okay, that's what we're going to focus on for a year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, beautiful. So can I point something out to you here? Sure, there is a really subtle handing over of your power here. So it's and don't get me wrong it makes absolute sense. So there is an element here of because I haven't been told what specific roles I'll get. I don't know what to focus on, right, so you're focusing on everything. So this is where you get to make a choice right and really take your power back. Either you double down on your preferred roles and make that like you're a specialist in, say, krav Maga and whatever jujitsu, let's just say and you just hunt those roles, or and I'm gonna guess there's assumptions in here, so correct me if I'm wrong or you get to own your power as a multifaceted individual, which one feels more aligned.
Speaker 1:Multifaceted. Let me explore a lot of things and let me get excited about a lot of things and, yeah, dive deep into a variety of yeah, that's what really gets me excited about life.
Speaker 2:Beautiful. So you get to own that, and I really resonate with this because in my work, like I'm someone, I'm so multi, I have so many, a myriad of different hobbies, a myriad of different. I wanted to try everything and anything can study all of it, and I would see so many people in similar lines of work to me where they would pick one thing and they would double down on it and I would think, oh, if only I just have one interest, and that was it, that I could just go all in on that. But what I realised down the track was that I was actually discounting the fact that I can do something that they can't, and that is taking this myriad of different interests and bringing them together in a way that they didn't have access to because they were only good at one thing, which neither is better or worse. It's just that they've got access to different opportunities, dependent on what path they've chosen to take. And so if you were to fully own your power as someone who is multifaceted, then who would you know yourself as?
Speaker 1:I would know myself as the person that does Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and bow staffing and dance and all of it, because I always say perception of others is I'm changing box, but the perception I have of myself is no, my box is getting bigger and bigger and bigger, and that's what excites me about life Beautiful.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I would really look out for you, and this is a very human thing to do. So it's not to say that you've got it wrong. It's not to say that you've messed it up, anything like that. As humans, we instinctually look towards the negatives. We instinctually look towards. We put more emphasis on the things that we don't want, because we're looking at the things we don't want so that we can avoid them and survive them.
Speaker 2:I would really encourage for you put all of the emphasis on what you do want, so you want you can sit here and say to me oh, I don't want to experience not feeling good enough.
Speaker 2:I don't want to experience doubting myself. I don't want to experience the burnout that comes with trying to do everything all at once. Put all of your focus on making what you do want so real that you bring it to life. Put the emphasis on what you do want being so crystal clear in your mind that you can tell me exactly what it looks like, exactly how much money you'd be making, exactly how many opportunities you'd get each year, exactly what those opportunities would look like, how that would make you feel, how people would respond to you as a result of that, your internal dialogue as a result of that and keep getting clearer and clearer, so that reality is much more. If I were to ask you what you desire, that reality is so crystal clear that you could tell me it without any hesitation, to a greater extent than telling me what you're trying to move away from. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and that is going to lead me to the second part of our personal coaching. You talked about that. There was this sense of needing to struggle so that we can prove ourselves. That is something that is recurrent with high performers. So I'd love to talk about abundance and financial success. So you said about focusing on what we want, or internal dialogue.
Speaker 1:I think abundance and feeling a bit more settled financially speaking has been obviously a big focus for me as an artist, because it is made of a lot of ups and downs, a lot of instability, a lot of we don't know how we're going to earn next month, and so I've lived a life where there was no financial stability and I wanted to become a bit more stable. Now I am, for the very first time of my life, in a stronger position when it comes to abundance and material stability. Yet I feel there is and I've been journaling a lot about this. I had to go through a process of just accepting it for myself. Hey, that's where you're at right now and it's freaking amazing, but I can feel in how I'm sharing it with my friends.
Speaker 1:There is not. My words lack something. I don't know if it lacks power or if it lacks pride, or if it. But there is this I'm holding back in truly sharing with people around me. Hey, that's where I'm at right now. There is not. I'm not saying that I'm not going through struggles right now, but the sense of struggling financially is way different from what I experienced before. Yet I'm not fully sharing with others. I do not struggle right now and I am in a stronger place. Is that related to? I can't prove myself enough if I don't share the struggle, because I'm journaling a lot about it. I'm just catching my wordings when I'm sharing it with others and I can see and feel that there is something that is not fully um embracing where I'm at right now. Yeah, I would love to have your insights on it yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 2:It sounds like it comes back to that self-concept piece a little bit. I think a lot of the time, artists, we have that identity of the struggling artist. Unfortunately, it is a industry where financial struggle is common, and if we bring it back to what we were speaking about earlier around certainty and familiarity and anything that our nervous system hasn't experienced before, we deem unsafe, that our nervous system hasn't experienced before we deem unsafe, right. And so it's about setting ourselves up to have more of the experiences that we desire, more of the experiences that are unfamiliar and uncertain, but having them in safe spaces where we can start to train ourselves. That, oh no, this is a safe experience to have, and our self-concept is that of I've always been the struggling artist, this is how my friends relate to me, this is how I receive, this is how I'm supported, and whatever else may come with having some element of financial success, then you're going to avoid anything that's not that familiar. So you've got to start training your system more towards that. It is safe to be financially well off, it is safe to be an abundant individual, it is safe to be wealthy, it is safe to have an abundance of opportunity flowing your way, and so this could look like something as simple as to begin with, just actually have it.
Speaker 2:It sounds a little bit bizarre, but actually just having a conversation with yourself to begin with like having these conversations of oh my God, you'll never guess how much money I've just made, you'll never guess how much money I've got sitting in my bank account and having the conversation back with yourself that you hope to have from your peers, or something as simple as if you're worried about what kind of response you're going to get from your friends.
Speaker 2:Maybe you've got that one friend who is a really safe space and you can just say to them hey, I've noticed this pattern, but I tend to like overshadow my successes a little bit.
Speaker 2:I'm not sure why, but can I share with you some of my, some of what is happening in my life, and would you mind just really celebrating me in this? And then so you're, you're setting yourself up with that learned experience that not only is it safe to be, to do well, but you also get connection in doing well and over time kind of building that. So I actually encourage all of my clients to brag when a client comes and works with me, the first thing that I do because and I'm not sure what it's like in your culture but in Australia we've got this tall poppy syndrome where it's oh no, we want the underdog to win, but we don't want anyone to be above average. And so as a way to counteract that, I encourage my clients come in here and just brag and brag and have that become such a familiar sensation. Have that sensation of really shining. Be so familiar that you feel safe in being seen, you feel safe in doing well, you feel safe in your success and your abundance and you get connection from it.
Speaker 1:Flippin' love this. Nobody has ever told me go ahead, cindy and brag yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like me and my friends and I'm very blessed with friends who get this work We'll be like hey, we'll ring each other. Hey, can I have a brag? Do you mind if I just brag? Yeah, go for it. And we'll sit there and we'll just hype each other up. And it's so beautiful because, again, I come from a culture where it's not safe to be above average, it's not safe to shine too bright and so to have peers around me who encourage it and bounce back with the same energy, it's oh, it's now welcome to to do well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm going to definitely go and try it out. I will keep you updated, Brianna. If people want to work with you because obviously I'm guessing that you also work with clients online and stuff If they want to work with you, get to know more about your coaching programs. Where can they find more about it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, If they search my name, Brianna Bowley, on pretty much any social media platform, they'll find me. I also want to mention I've just created a new dominant state quiz that they can check out. So basically this will. It's just a series of questions, it takes about two minutes and it will help you identify what your predominant state is and then you'll get emailed out a bunch of tips and resources and stuff to support you in starting to shift that. So you can access it at wwwnsquizcom it's free and yeah. So searching my name on any social media, If you've taken something from this episode, please message me and let me know, because I love hearing feedback. I love hearing what people have taken away.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much, brianna, and we will put the quiz in the show notes so people can access it straight away.
