Above the bridge
Above the bridge
Episode 131 Catching up with MATT CHONG (Lucid Explorer)
Join me, Thaddeus Park, as I recount a personal lucid dreaming experience that unexpectedly brought nightmares and nostalgia in equal measure, and led me to reconnect with a longtime friend, Matt Chong. Known for his deep insights into the realm of lucid dreaming, Matt shares his expertise on how this fascinating phenomenon allows dreamers to become aware of and even steer their dream narratives. Together, we explore the mystique behind conscious dreaming and how substances like melatonin can influence these extraordinary nocturnal adventures.
We dive into the science and anecdotes of lucid dreaming, touching on how both of us have encountered the vivid and sometimes unsettling dreams. This episode isn't just for those familiar with lucid dreaming; it's an invitation for all listeners to reflect and engage with their dream states. Whether you're curious about the techniques or have wild dream tales of your own, Matt's insights and our shared stories promise an engaging and enlightening listen on the power of dreams.
Aloha, welcome to another edition of the Above the Bridge podcast. I'm your host, thaddeus Park. To all my listeners and people tuning in for the first time, I want you to know how much I appreciate you guys. If you guys could like subscribe, make a comment onto whatever platform you're listening to, that would be greatly appreciated. You can find us everywhere on every single podcast platform iHeartRadio, spotify, apple is a big one Pandora, wherever you get your podcasts Like a comment, I would appreciate it also on our youtube channel.
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Speaker 2:All right, this week on our show we're bringing back somebody I've known for a long time and when he was a former member of our show, previously Mr Lucid Explorers himself, matt Chong. What's up man? What's up man? Thanks for having me back. What made me think to bring you back For one? I've been wanting to get some previous guests back on. I've been wanting to get some previous guests back on, but I recently, in the last week or so, I had a lucid dream which made me think of you, and it was I took menotolin, menotolin, menotolin.
Speaker 1:Mela yeah.
Speaker 2:Melatonin. Yeah, so I took menotolin and I forgot back in the day when we used to compete and we used to go to the mainland to fight I would take that to kind of reset my time clock and for some reason it gave me nightmares. So and it happened multiple times. So I've never took it for a while for years. And my fiance had it and honestly she got me to take it because she was hyping up the taste, because it was like this gummies, and she said it tastes super good. So I took it. And then I had a lucid dream and for listeners who don't know what a lucid dream is, I looked it up and you can correct me if I'm wrong. It's a dream in which a dreamer is aware that they're dreaming and can influence the dream in a certain way. Is that correct?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you just basically realize you're dreaming while it's happening, and then, once you get that down, it'll take a little bit of practice, but then you can essentially do literally anything Anything you can possibly imagine, and way more. You know what I mean, so yeah, it's awesome.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that happened to me and it made me think of you. I fell asleep and I was in a lucid state and I influenced my dream in a certain way consciously. So it was that fine medium and it made me think of you because, honestly, that's the first time that it happened to me in where I could recall that it happened. I'm not saying that didn't happen to me before, but this time I remembered it and I think it was because of the supplement I took and I wanted to get your input, if that's a normal thing, and I want to also to know what are the benefits of being able to lucid dream on the norm. Like you said, once you get practice, you can.
Speaker 1:You can do it on the norm or the regular yeah, well, um, you know, as far as melatonin is concerned, like I think that helps you sleep better, potentially, but it doesn't. It hasn't really been shown too much to necessarily help with lucid dreams specifically. But like other things, like, um, they like nootropics, so like alpha brain or some of the other ones that kind of fire up your brain a little bit more. Now some of those can be a problem because they fire up your brain so much you have a hard time going to sleep yeah you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:But, but those can really help. But if, nonetheless, it's really about just getting more sleep, and so if melatonin helps you sleep more and deeper and longer, then you know, as a kind of like uh benefit effect of it, you could also help you have more lucid dreams. But when it comes to the benefit of lucid dreams, man, I mean it is, it's huge. I mean, one thing that's undeniable is just for, like, the pure experience of it, right? You can actually have any experience imaginable. You know you can fly, you can be a god, you can meet with deceased loved ones right Now. Whether it's really their spirits you're meeting with or not almost doesn't really matter, because it can still be a very deep and meaningful experience. You know whether it really was their spirit or not really their spirit, you can obtain information from them, right? So like, say, if you're a couple different views on it, but say, if you have the view, the more materialistic view, or like it's everything within a dream, is your subconscious mind, right? You know you get to interact and essentially build a relationship with your subconscious, subconscious mind. You can ask it questions, you can try to, you know, can try to give you answers to things. Um, it's a good.
Speaker 1:You know I haven't done this too much myself, but there's been studies shown where you can kind of try like to influence your physiology through it, right. So, uh, like I have back issues for the past like 10 years or so and I've tried to I've seen this said in other places where it works 100 percent and so it didn't work. I didn't feel like that much better in the morning but I got like this glowing, calming yellow power out of my hands, like put it over my back, it felt warm, it felt nice. I still woke up. My back was sore.
Speaker 1:But there's been other examples where you know people really went ahead and fix things through their dreams. I mean, if not like one way you could potentially try to fix yourself through a dream that you could find, like a archetype, could be any dream character, but typically you know you'd probably be better off if you could find, like you know, a doctor, archetype or dream character and you could ask them hey, you know I'm dealing with this problem, you know what type of remedy could I possibly do? And then you know you could try implement that into your life.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I mean the benefits of lucid dreaming, you know are huge when you, when you, lucid dream, are you in a rem state of mind like, how much impactful sleep are you getting? Or do like, or would you wake up and be like, oh fuck, I, I didn't, I didn't sleep enough, or something like that oh yeah.
Speaker 1:So now I mean, in my experience I've never really had, I've never really felt like lucid dreaming has really screwed up my my sleep or I'm tired the next day. I I mean, if anything, because it's normally such a fun and trippy experience, you wake up feeling great and even more energized. But so lucid dreams typically do take place in REM style sleep, right, but that's not exclusively only there. So they have like some master dream yogis who are said to be able to stay lucid through all the different stages of sleep right. So you go like stage one is light sleep, stage two is a still light but a little bit deeper. You have stages three and four, which is like the really deep sleep, the slowest brain waves, and then you hit rim.
Speaker 1:Like some of these master yogis are said to be able to be conscious through all these states, even through, like the deep, what they used to call dreamless sleep, although it's pretty well established that it's not dreamless. It's just you know there is a conscious experience going on there. It's just that it's very difficult for people, unless you're like a master yogi or something, to be able to hold your conscious awareness through that. But then you can also get lucid in other states. So, like, one of my favorite things is like, um, being lucid within the stage you want to sleep hypnagogic or hypnagogic, depending on how you want to say that word, but same thing basically.
Speaker 1:Um, you know, so you can be lucid in that liminal state and that's one of my favorite things to do as well. But, um, yeah, being lucid, I mean you're still going through your REM cycles. When REM ends you're pretty much going to wake up. You can, can do little things to maintain the dream, keep it from breaking down, even when you can tell REM wants to be over and your sleep cycle is about to finish. But you only will push it out. 15 minutes would be a long time, and then it shouldn't really affect your sleep too much in a negative sense sense.
Speaker 2:So in you, in your experience, do you run lucid dreams every night, or like you pick and choose. Or it happens like on occurrence, or it's like you tell yourself tonight I'm gonna have a lucid dream, so I'm gonna prep for it, or put myself in that mindset, or it just happens. Every single time you sleep like how has it been for you?
Speaker 1:man, I wish it happened every single time I go to sleep, but that is definitely not the case. If you ever see anybody like you, go on reddit, you look it up. Oh yeah, they're getting lucid every night. Those guys are almost a hundred percent bullshitting, you know what I mean. Or even if it was every night, like, is it every single dream? Because, like, the sleep cycles are roughly 90 minutes, right to say you go through like whatever four. Because, like the sleep cycles are roughly 90 minutes, right to say you go through like whatever four, five, six different sleep cycles throughout the night.
Speaker 1:You know you're getting lucid in every single one of those dreams. You know I would imagine pretty much, probably not so like, uh, for me I always go to sleep with the hope and desire and I set intentions to try and have lucid dreams. But, like for me, if I'm not trying this has just been happening to me since I was a teenager I'll have them about once a month or so and then if I'm really locked in and doubt in, and you know you can do a bunch of different techniques to try and have more lucid dreams. So if I'm implementing everything, then I could be pretty consistent with it, like you know, um, maybe like three nights a week, maybe more, and some of those nights will be like multiple dreams within that night.
Speaker 2:So you know, maybe I have like two or maybe even three lucid dreams in one night so that can happen too okay, I noticed that you do a heavy amount of research and you dive deep into this uh community and you read and break down books and you kind of give give a lot of insight to the books that you're reading and and what you're gaining from them. Um, so you have a youtube channel, correct?
Speaker 1:yep, yep, lucid explorers, check them out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, check that out, bro. It's pretty detailed, right For one, you're very good at your communication skills. Whatever you're trying to relay to your listeners comes across very well. You're very well spoken. All the research you're doing how much has it changed the way you've been dreaming?
Speaker 1:and and how you create your own lucid dreams.
Speaker 1:You know what's funny is, like, probably not too much actually, I mean to be honest, like in the beginning it helped a ton, right like in the, because I was lucid dreaming since a teenager, but but it was never on purpose, it was just on accident have them once a month, you know whatever.
Speaker 1:But then once I started to take the practice seriously, the first few books I read, like the first one that really changed it was Andrew Holachek's book, dream Yoga, dream yoga. So. So just like the first book and you know, like a lot of these books, they really honestly say a lot of like you know, the same thing, just kind of presented in different ways. So I think the main thing that I can, you know, the fact that I continue to read all these books and stuff like that, it just helped me more with ways to try and help other people have more dreams. Like it really just helped out my toolkit that maybe on stuff that I don't necessarily use because I have my own practice basically established in how I like it. But then when I hope, when I'm helping other people, it gives me, you know, a lot more options and different techniques and things that other people can try for for their practice.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's super cool. And there is a community out there, correct? Like there's a lot of people that kind of dive into this and and try to learn more and stuff, and you're, you're heavily into that community. How, how big is this community and and locally, how big is it?
Speaker 1:Man, it seems big online but I mean still in my, in my experience, it's probably pretty small. I mean, I really I started my channel specifically because I've ran out of people in like my real physical life to go ahead and like interact and share with. You know. So, like I used to join local meetup groups, so I used to like run one too back in the day and you know that was good, cool and fun, but you know it wasn't, it wasn't really enough for me. So then I branched out to online and then, once you're online, then, you know there is a pretty big and always growing community out there.
Speaker 1:It is kind of weird though, because like it's really split up into different camps and the different camps like the fight all the time. You know what I mean. So you have, like the, you got the lucid dreamers, the more materialistic minded people, and then you have basically like the more spiritual minded, esoteric, uh, astral projection, you know obe type crowd. The obe is kind of more like in the middle right, and then you have kind of like more the astral projection crowd. That you know and this might, they might be right, but you know, really think they're out there, you know, visiting other other dimensions and shared realities and uh, you know, some of the things are actually like roaming, waking reality in their astral form and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:And I've ran some tests and experiments to try and prove that to myself, because you know I don't believe it, but I like to leave the door cracked open to it being possible. But, um, you know, nothing has ever been proven on my end, but the smallest of all three of those communities, seemingly, at least at least from my perspective does seem to be the lucid dreaming community, like the astral projection community, I would say without a doubt, is bigger. I think mostly because it's just it sounds more interesting Like does somebody coming into the practice. Especially if they already have this kind of lean towards spiritual type stuff, you know they'll start to lean more into that side of things. So, like I know that if I went more that route with my content I probably would grow my channel faster. You know what I mean, but uh, I just don't quite believe it. So, uh, it's hard for me to really make a lot of videos on it, although I have covered a couple of books. You know more from like the OBE, um, astral projection type type crowd and you know.
Speaker 2:So that's been a fun dive, dive, kind of getting there, like pushing my belief systems a bit what is some of the um response you've been getting from people that have been visiting your channel and and kind of honing into what you've been teaching and sharing with your listeners what? What are the responses you've been getting?
Speaker 1:shit man.
Speaker 1:Pretty much all good. You know all, mostly all good stuff. You know I got a few people on there. I mean more than a few now. You know, over the years it's been slowly growing. I mean I forget how many years I'm into this now, but I think we're like actually making content online started like 2019 ish. So a good five, you know, solid five years or so. So it's been nice.
Speaker 1:You know, like a couple, like people come in a lot. I interact a lot with them. Some other people who used to come in a lot. I helped a lot and I think they kind of got their practice down and, well enough, established that I don't see them around that much anymore. But that's all good. You know what I mean. So, yeah, I mean that's actually my favorite part about having my channel. Really, it is interacting with people interested in the practice and then, even if they come from more of the astral projection side of things you know what I mean that's all good. I welcome them all, you know, and we can have a nice discussion on things.
Speaker 1:I've tried to run experiments with people, too, from the community or, like you know. Okay, we'll try and meet up in a dream, you know, try to have like a shared dreaming experience. I could try and like say, okay, this is it. Now, I believe none of those have really hit I've had some were like, uh, some of the more ash projection type crowd would try to like to ask project through my house and then tell me things about my house. Then I'd be like, oh, that'd be awesome, you know, because then I could kind of switch sides and believe in it more, although those are also generally a miss Bullshit, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:It is what it is, but at least you're open-minded to check it out, see if it really would work or not.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, man, you cannot be closed off to stuff like that. And you know, my practice did actually help bring me around to spirituality more in a way, and kind of more like a religious aspect. Where you know, I grew up very religious. We was going to church pretty much every Sunday, except for my dad. My dad somehow got to get out of it all the time. You know, sunday, okay, we're going to church. My mom asked my dad hey, dad Harrison, you coming? Like no, like well, how come he gets to stay home Watch football? Yeah, so, like you know, so I had that. And then I had a couple of experiences growing up like getting baptized. And then on this other time we were like passing out food on I think it was Christmas, but it might've been Thanksgiving, but you know, one of the big holidays we sacrificed the day to go Chinatown, pass out food. And out of both of those experiences, you know I have a very deep spiritual experience off of it, like the baptized one happened first.
Speaker 1:That was before we passed out food on the holiday and I wasn't expecting much from it, went to cockroach bay too, which was cool because, you know, me and pops would go there and surf and whatever, sam would join us too. So we went over there. Um, you know, I went in not thinking much of it. When it popped out it really felt to me, like you know, that that was something, you know, that felt real. And then, um, I mean, I was full-on religious, believed in it a hundred percent. Then high school rode around, started to question things more, eventually went like full-blown atheist, you know, at some point. And then that carried me through for a long time, like you know, mostly pretty much like all the way through my 20s and that.
Speaker 1:But then, once I started to take my lucid dreaming practice more seriously, you know, it opened me back up to, you know, just realizing we don't have all the answers, and you know spirituality and things like that. So that did open me back up to maybe not necessarily believing in, like you know, the Christian style of God per se, but definitely believing in something more than you know just us. You know we live, we die. Nothing happens. Now, you know, I'm more open to the possibility. I think you know something probably does happen after we die. Now, is it exactly like it says in one book or some other religion? No, probably exactly like it says in one book or some other religion? Nope, probably not in my opinion. But you know, I do think, uh, you know some, something happens.
Speaker 2:I don't know what happens, but something I agree. I think something happens. I I'm a Christian, so obviously I believe in that. But I always had the idea that religion was created to understand what that thing is and it also is to give people um and whole communities of people. It helps them take away the fear of dying because if you have a hope of something happening after.
Speaker 2:Religion helps take that, take that fear away. That was always my opinion. I definitely believe in in god and and that some something's out there, that that happens and and I have experienced a few things in my life that helps me understand like that their guarantee is like there's definitely something going on yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. I also noticed, like some some of your um, some of your videos, you, you test out products and you test out different things to help you to dream. And what is that?
Speaker 1:uh, this is not one of the. It's a light machine, so it's a meditation device oh shit, that wouldn't work on me, man. There's no way I could sleep with that you don't gotta sleep, you just gotta get into a deep meditative state. It works pretty good, man you should try them out.
Speaker 2:I see that the club all the time, but you're, you're definitely open to it like even just with pillows and different types of supplements and like what are some of the stuffs you tried. And then I'll I'll get into it later with one of our sponsors, the red reishi. Yeah, that stuff I have good experiences with that. But what are some of the products you've tried and, and negatively and positively. How has it influenced not just your lucid dreams but just sleep in general?
Speaker 1:so I pretty much only review products because that's not really the main focus of the channel, just when I find cool shit that I really like yeah, so basically everything I reviewed on. There has has has been dope like um, I have, like the last pillow talking about pillows a millet hole, pillow, millet holes. Okay, that is the best damn pillow ever. I love this. It's kind of like the old, like the Sobacawa pillow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I had one of those.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, so it's like that, but way better. Because it's like it that, but way better. Because it's like it's a bit softer, it forms better. It's quieter too because, like the buckwheat pillows are kind of loud, like, yeah, used to have one, I liked it, but you know it just, it just wasn't. Um, was kind of too noisy, you know, and you move around you hear all that sound. So milly hole pillows. You guys are interested in that. You got to check that thing out. That thing's been super dope I'll try it out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you, you, man, I mean it's been awesome. Another one that helped out a lot was sleep, kind of like a side topic, but like saunas. So I have like a plug in the wall sauna where, like so when you go to sleep, you want your core body temperature to drop. It's pretty much when you are the coldest is like right about your normal bedtime, and then throughout that night then your body temperature rises and that's one of the things that helps you to wake up in the morning. But kind of paradoxically, you go into a sauna Once you're done cooling off because your internal body temperature heats up so much, you actually end up cooler, right Plus it's kind of socks, right?
Speaker 1:So when you're done, you're, you're like oh, I'm just so exhausted you lie down. That's a great way to do it. Um, also a cold plunge which, um, you know, I just got like industrial or like a company level, uh, ice machine then I got like this you know simple thing you fill up with water that you can fit inside, dump that in.
Speaker 1:that works great too. So like, particularly like during the summer when it was really hot. You know, we don't like to sleep with the AC on if the kids aren't in the room with us so we can hear them if they're screaming or whatever. So a municipal hop in the cold plunge. It doesn't even have to be that cold really Like if it's in like the fifties. I find that to be plenty good enough. You have to stay in there a little bit longer, but you know, stay 50 degrees, stay in there like five, six minutes Gets your core body temperature really nice and cold. But now when I go to sleep I can still use my blanket you know what I mean Just because it's comfortable and I would rather use a blanket than not use a blanket. So that's been a great help. Different devices and stuff, like you know meditation devices and of course this one was pretty dope too the red mushroom extract. So yeah, there's a lot of good shit out there.
Speaker 2:That's cool. I definitely had the Sobhakao pillow but for me, like when I grabbed it or like the smell, it just smelled dusty. Smelled dusty, like yeah, I didn't care for it too much. The um, I wouldn't mind trying it out, though what you said, the millet hole, I would. I would want to try that.
Speaker 1:I'm always down to figure out it has a kind of a smell to it, though oh yeah, yeah, put some essential oils on that fucker or something, yeah.
Speaker 2:But shoot, you've been trying out different things. Have you like ever smoked weed or did mushrooms or stuff like?
Speaker 1:or alcohol. Has that helped, or kind of not so much. So yes, to all of them. But so I mean, alcohol definitely does not help for any reason. You know, I mean alcohol definitely fuck shit up. I mean, well, I guess one way it can kind of help, because it makes your sleep so so, so bad, right, it mostly makes it bad. So, like, maybe you drink alcohol it helps you fall asleep quicker, right, yeah, but then it's, then it's going to just mess up your.
Speaker 1:When you sleep, you go through those different sleep cycles we were talking about earlier, which are dominated by brainwaves, and so when you sleep, when you sleep drunk, it messes with all of that. So even if you get a good eight hours of sleep, but you drank a lot, you're still not going to wake up feeling good, and part of that reason is, aside from the hangovers, it just messed up with your sleep cycle. Similarly, marijuana does the same thing there, where you know maybe you fall asleep quicker, you fall asleep processes better, but it does mess with your sleep cycle and your brainw and all of that. One thing that marijuana is good for, and also mushrooms as well, is doing like more hypnagogic stage one of sleep meditation or dream work through that because it can help, like marijuana, you know more specifically because I've tried that more than I've tried mushrooms, but you know I mean marijuana can can help a lot if you're going to do more of the like stage one of sleep, dream work type stuff, for sure.
Speaker 2:What was your experience with mushrooms and I wanted to ask you, the kind of lucid feeling and dreaming that you were doing, would that be kind of equivalent to the same kind of things you'd be tripping when you you took mushrooms? Because I've done a hero's journey before and I was wondering if the, if those two are kind of similar yeah, I mean to me they're, they're super similar.
Speaker 1:you know what I mean and like that's why I like when joe rogan would talk a lot about dmp and stuff like that, because I've done that as well, and like I mean it definitely works. I mean, of course they're great because it's a guaranteed way to get you to this really trippy state of mind.
Speaker 1:But, you know you have the lingering hangover effect from it and all of that and you can get, you know, very similar experiences and wake up the next day feeling amazing off of this dreaming. Granted, it's just a lot harder to come by. You know you got to do all this other stuff and then also get kind of lucky to have it. But shrooms are cool. You know what shrooms are really great for and I bet you could probably guess. But using light machines or mind machine type stuff. Mind machines are basically light machines that are synced up to binaural beats. If you ever heard of those where you basically be listening to something with headphones on, you have sound coming out of one ear at a specific frequency and then a different frequency but also a very specific frequency in the other ear, and they figured this out in like the 60s or 70s, but anyway, it gets your brain brainwaves to match up to it. So you combine stuff like that with mushrooms or even with marijuana and you can have some really powerful experiences off of that for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, mushrooms was a trip and it dives deep into your subconscious and creates thoughts and memories and visions that may have been there already, that you don't remember, or for me, it was kind of made me come in, come into terms with stuff that I kind of suppressed. So it was, it was a definitely positive, good experience for me um, a little heavy and it it kind of it. For me, it took away the bullshit blinders like anything that you created in your head. That was bullshit gone. Now you're just dealing with reality. So it felt really clean and I felt a really big sense of love. When, when I took it and it was a while ago, but probably one of the best, for best things that I've done to make myself a better person it was it was pretty, uh, life-altering. I never really admitted it on this show before, but yeah, that's it was.
Speaker 1:It was a trip yeah, like doing like psychedelics and stuff like that when you have a good trip they're great, but now when they're bad, they are so bad, you know what I mean and and you're fucked, you're stuck there for hours. There ain't no getting out, you you know, you just got to sit there and take it. But they can definitely be super powerful. I don't know if you remember, he only trained with us for a little while, but my friend Alex, that came to a couple of classes. I mean I think he only went for like maybe like a couple of months before, but anyway, he took a bunch of shrooms and then actually went bipolar.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's another you know scary part to taking those. Yeah, I wouldn't do it Like I. I it was more of a for me. I had some friends that were doing it the right way, like with um, a purpose and it it. I had to prepare myself. It took like multiple months for me to prepare myself until I was finally ready, and so I I went at it like it wasn't like, oh, let's go take some shrooms and trip balls.
Speaker 1:It was already yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was like I. I I did it the right way with kind of a spiritual guide doing it and it was.
Speaker 2:It was, like I said, probably one of the top five best things I've done to make myself a better person and help me understand a lot of my past also stuff with my parents, and it was a. It was pretty cool and and I got a lot of tools to how to handle different emotions moving forward in my life. Now it was I wouldn't I would recommend it to everybody, but you got to be ready and you need to do it the right way, I would assume. But I was wondering how similar are the lucid dreams into to experiencing mushrooms like is it? Is it like spot on or is like there's no comparison?
Speaker 1:no, no, no, they're. They're pretty similar, but I mean it would have to also be. It's obviously not like every lucid dream will be like that. I mean, most won't, but you can have absolutely really trippy type experiences that not only look like the type of trips or experiences that you might be having while taking psychedelics, but you know, as far as like the mental breakthroughs and things that you can have, you can absolutely have that as well through a dream work practice, for sure, yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, speaking of mushrooms, I've known and I was super stoked that you went ahead and tried it because this red reishi from our sponsor, med Mushroom Hawaii yeah, that stuff for me has been a game changer for sleep.
Speaker 2:And they have these other three mushrooms and I noted a gradual change, maybe throughout like the month of when I first started taking them, but for me the red reishi was like an immediate change. Within two nights of taking red reishi I felt like, oh, I was had a better, deeper and more restful sleep and when I woke up I felt way more refreshed and the change was immediate and I was like, ok, when I, when I seen that you were going to going to kind of use it as a trial for your show, I was like, okay, I'm not even going to explain to him what's going on with me with it, I just want to hear, like, what experiences you had, because you're kind of more of a authority on the topic. So I was like, oh, that's perfect, I really want to know, like, what his experience was with the red reishi yeah.
Speaker 1:So I mean I liked it a lot so I found that it helped me. So, like, um, when I do go to sleep and I dream journal, I always capture certain things like, um, how easy it was for me to fall asleep, and I'll typically will do that by a time weighted thing. So like I pretty much always give myself one hour of time I'm not going to be stressing about it to lie in bed and fall asleep. Now, most of the time I will fall asleep quicker than that. But you know, that's kind of my my gauge. If I go over an hour, that's when I'll mark it down more negatively. You know, when I noted in my dream journal then if I fall asleep quickly within like, say, quick for me it'd be like 20 minutes or less, then I'll, then I'll give that a three.
Speaker 1:I go on like a three-point scale.
Speaker 1:So like two is within an hour, one is over an hour, three is quick and the falling asleep, the red ratio absolutely seemed to help me with that and then I did have no, I was still kind of within my norm range for lucid dreams, but I was having good dreams with it and, if nothing else, I think just because it seemed to help me get more restful sleep.
Speaker 1:I also tracked up how I feel when I get up, so the red ratio was certainly helping me fall asleep quicker, and then I was waking up feeling more refreshed. But kind of within that waking up feeling more fresh, and plus, when I was doing the experiment, because I was dedicating my time to the experiment, I played less video games, so I went to sleep earlier and I got more sleep, you know. So all that you know, as a byproduct would give me more dreams in general and also up the chances of me having more lucid dreams, but the lucid dreams were also kicking with that one combo. I found that worked really good, though or for the lucid dreaming route is the red reishi mixed with time release, b6 and um, and that that seemed to work really good for you oh, that's super good to hear, I think.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean the the other mushrooms are super good too, but it for me it was the, the red reishi for the sleep, because it was like a immediate, like I said, like a immediate change in everything. Also, I wanted to ask you for diet and exercise and also, like you said, you were playing more video games now, kind of changing your sleep pattern. How has those three things been more beneficial or negatively impacting your dreams and sleep, especially diet?
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, diet, so actually actually so right now. You ever heard of the 75 hard? No challenge, it's some challenge they have out there. I never heard of it either until my my co-worker was but was bugging me to go ahead and do it so for like for 75 days straight. I guess I'm actually doing the 75 soft they call it, but the real way to do it is you go 75 days straight.
Speaker 1:You have to follow a diet that whole time. If you miss one day along that 75 day path, you go back to day one. So if you were on like day 74 and you fuck up, you're supposed to go back to day one, of which is why I am not doing that by any means. So then the other part of that, you're supposed to work out twice a day for 45 minutes at least, each one of which has to be outside. So that's too hard for me to commit to for 75 days, but I'm doing at least one workout a day for 75 minutes, drink a gallon of water at least a day and then try and get better sleep. But one thing I found so for my diet is what I'm doing is I'm just doing intermittent fasting, and that one to me, can absolutely help with your dream work practice, specifically because if you're not eating as much, right, you're going to get tired a little bit earlier. Plus, I mostly want to eat at nighttime, and so instead of trying to fight this urge to eat all night, I'll just say screw it, I'll go to sleep earlier, right, but that can work really good too. And then, plus, sometimes if you start, if you're really hungry and thinking about food a lot, you can start to work in reality checks throughout the day. Like, a reality check is something you're doing throughout the day that you eventually want to carry over into your dreams, and it's a way to do like a scientific test, essentially to prove to yourself if you're awake or if you're dreaming, because right now, who knows man, you could be dreaming right now, right, because every time you're dreaming you think you don't actually realize what's going on, right? But then throughout the day, when you get hungry, I would do a reality check.
Speaker 1:A simple one is you just look at your hand, because hands a lot of times will be screwed up in dreams for whatever reason. They'll be blurry, you'll have too many fingers. So I look at my hand. I like to count my fingers like this you know, make sure everything's right. And then when you work that habit in enough within the daytime you know at nighttime, mid-dream, just randomly, you'll be thinking about food You'll have this habit built in to do your reality check and that can help you get lucid right there.
Speaker 1:And then on top of that, like back in the day when you used to have like dream temples and like race or I don't know where, but you know, really long time ago, part of the things people would do is on this journey to the dream temple, you know probably would take multiple days. Very common thing was for them to fast. It was a way to sacrifice something to go ahead and have this experience at the dream temple. But similarly, I think if you're going through that throughout the day, you think to yourself okay, I'm fasting with a purpose, I'm fasting to have this more impactful dream, then that just helps sink that intention in deeper and then, as a result, can up the chances of you potentially having a lucid dream. So for me, that's been the main thing I've noticed.
Speaker 1:I've tried messing around with different diets and things where people will say you know you eat a banana, I'm just pointing out the air, but you know you eat something and then it's supposed to help you have better dreams. So I've done a little experiments like that over the years but never really noticed any big difference. You know when it came to that differently?
Speaker 2:So playing video games, how has that impacted your sleep cycle and your dreaming? Is it just because you're staying up later, or is it because of the visual stimulation and excitement and dopamine you've been getting from the video games?
Speaker 1:So I mean it kind of goes two ways. So in one way and this is kind of the most immediately impactful way video games is like my number one killer of my gym work practice by a million billion miles. Because my time to game is when, you know, after the family goes to sleep. You know, put the kids asleep, watch a show, do something, hang out with my wife and then say, like you know, 10, 10, 30, I can come up and start playing video games, but then you know, I'll get stuck into playing it. I want to try and stop by 12. When I'm having too much fun, I go to sleep at two. And then you know, instead of getting like seven or eight hours of sleep now, I'm getting like four or five hours.
Speaker 1:And you know that is, if you're only getting like five, five and a half, less than six hours of sleep, it's going to be very, very hard to have a good dream work practice.
Speaker 1:Mostly because just the longer you sleep you spend exponentially more time per sleep cycle in REM and so if you're waking up at like the six hour, five and a half hour mark, you're missing out on a ton of potential dream time, and then also because your mind will be more tired and sleepy. It's just harder for it to really be sharp and realize that you, you know and realize and try and get yourself lucid, really be sharp and realize that you, you know and realize and try and get yourself lucid. Like most of the time when people get lucid it tends to be, you know, later in the night, like right before the morning, where you've already had like seven hours of sleep, that's the best time to try and get lucid right there. So it's definitely killed it in that sense. But in another sense, video games and there's been studies on this as well In another sense, video games and there's been studies on this as well can actually help lucid dreaming a lot, particularly because it gets you used to controlling this 3D virtual environment.
Speaker 1:And that's essentially what you're doing within a lucid dream and so a lot of those perspectives and skills and realizations really can actually help you have more lucid dreams like I forget the study now off the top of my head, but there's been several where they were saying like video gamers have more lucid dreams by, uh, by by a decent percentage over people who don't, so it can't help, for sure that's super interesting.
Speaker 2:I wouldn't never, I thought, but it makes sense. I know I don't. You're probably competitive like me and that's what messes me up playing video games.
Speaker 2:I cannot go to sleep on a loss or like if I gotta pass this one level yeah and that's why I hardly play, because, like I would just be, I would take it personal and then be up till four in the morning and then, next thing, you know, it's like okay, now I'm not getting any sleep, you know? I mean, like mom, just stay up already keep playing for another couple hours. Yeah, I also wanted to ask you, because you have children, have you tried to teach or help or even record some of your children's dreams, and have you been teaching them how to, how to lucid dream?
Speaker 1:Oh, yes, big time. I mean well, right now. So only my older son is the only one who's had lucid dreams and stuff like that so far. But I love to teach them about it, cause I know sooner or later, you know, they're going to have one.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it could really, you know, really just blow their minds and change their lives with it, even with the younger one when he wakes up. Oftentimes I'll wake him up whispering in his ear like are you dreaming? You know, are you dreaming? But the problem is, when he wakes up he listens to me, and if not dreaming, I do like them to share their dreams with me, but the younger one, he just can't really barely ever recall him. The older one, though, does share his dreams with me. I remember, like the very first solution dream he had that I actually believed a lot of times. I just think they're lying to me.
Speaker 1:It doesn't sound that legit, but um, so my older son was having his dream where they were snowboarding across mountain peaks, from island to island, like going across the island chain, right. And he realized, oh wait, you can't do that, right, I must be dreaming. And so then he got lucid at that point. And then I spent years since he told me this. But at some point he gets like he sees by this tree there's's a pile of lucid dreaming books over there and he wants to bring them back to me. So he picks them all up and wakes himself up and he's like, oh damn it, I don't got the books with me anymore, but it was little details like that that I was like oh, this sounds like a legit lucid dream to me, as opposed to somebody else just telling me.
Speaker 1:I'm like eh, I don't know about that. Yeah, to dream to me, as opposed to some of the other ones just telling me I'm like I don't know about that. But yeah, I mean, I, I love it.
Speaker 1:I mean, if nothing else, I guess they're more interested in dream of an in sleep yeah, I'm always over here like preaching go to bed or sleep, even though even though I'm over here staying up till two in the morning playing video games, but you know what I mean. So, um, got them to do that, like. Uh, I got them to at least the younger one. The older one hates taking naps, but you know, because I love to take naps.
Speaker 1:Naps are amazing. But you know, so like, even though he's six now, he's kind of old to still be taking naps, you know he just he enjoys it. You know we'll lie down there. We also meditate together, although I'm sure he's not listening to it. But a lot of times when I'm going to sleep with them I'll play like a little meditation guided meditation track. So we'll lie there together. I'm following along and typically, you know, within like 10 minutes or so, because that's how long most of the meditations we do, you know the younger boys are asleep. So it's been good.
Speaker 2:Nice, oh, that's super cool. I also wanted to know, um, you said you did the cold plunge and stuff. How beneficial has that been, not just for dreaming but just overall health in general? I have friends that do the cold plunge. I am traumatized from it because of master smith. We had to do it and I was stuck in one of his trash cans and he wouldn't let me out. And, yeah, I've never done it since.
Speaker 2:But you guys were doing cold plunge way back then too. Oh, yeah, he put us in you know that big gray trash can that he had. We did in there, yeah, yeah, yeah. And we you couldn't just climb out, like someone had to carry you out, and he just stick me in Lyle, like we'd go and we'd be, yeah, and I, yeah. Ever since then I'd never tried it. My friend made one out of a freezer, like he sealed it, put me to it, yeah. And he keeps asking me to do it and I'm just like I don't know and like I'll test it, like I asking me to do it and I'm just like I don't know and like I'll test it, like I'll put my hand in a cooler, and I'm like there's no way I'm putting my whole body in a cooler, but I want to try it it's more of a mental block, I think, but how beneficial has it been.
Speaker 1:I know you do a lot right oh yeah, I mean I cold plunge every day, multiple times a day, mostly because I got the ice machine constantly pumping out ice you you know what I mean. So I'm constantly filling up coolers. I got to use it, so I'm in there all the time Now. So I guess one of the main benefits, let's say, is it helps with inflammation and all that kind of stuff, and I'm assuming that is true, right, but nothing that I've really been able to notice. Like I'm all bussed up and sore. I went to like a double. I went back kickboxing too, by the way so we're at um at o2 yeah
Speaker 1:yeah. So, like we went over there, I did the double class, went from kickboxing to jujitsu, all bussed up, sore and broken. So I will, after stuff like that, I will definitely hop in the cold plunge, but I still wake up sore the next day. I mean I think it can help too. I mean at least like once you get out and you're all numb, you know it helps with the pain at that moment. But the main thing I like about it is the, the mental work it takes to do it Right. And then, plus, like I call it, like my cold shield, like I go in there, I drop my core body temperature so much and I'm typically such a hot and sweaty person that now I'm nice and cool. I don't got to worry about sweating for the next couple hours and things like that. So I really like it.
Speaker 1:It's also good to cut down on caffeine, right? So, uh, I can. If I get going on caffeine, I can. I can drink way too much of it, but being able to hop into the coke lunch in the morning, I can skip that morning coffee. It's a nice way to kind of shock yourself awake. Plus, you know you feel extra clean and refreshed when you come out of it, so that that's really my, my favorite aspects. It's just the mental clarity will give me like before hopping on this I jumped the cold plunge, you know what I mean To kind of give my brain that little bit of awakening if I have a mental block at work, because luckily I get to work, I'm home-based, you know what I mean, so I do most of my work from the home.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to write up some big report or I'm putting together a training topic, and I have this mental block, you know, instead of having to go grab some well, not recent, but in all, yes, we did the um, the Spartan race, which was something that I wanted to do yeah. That was intense. That took definitely took a lot of mental strength. What distance you did the. Was it the blue one? It was the five mile. Oh, that's pretty.
Speaker 1:So not the 5K, because I mean they have like a three mile one, two right or something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, oh, six miles. It was six miles, 30 obstacles. I could be getting it wrong Somewhere around there. Yeah, it wasn't the marathon one, yeah.
Speaker 1:Those marathon ones, suck. I mean, it was like I think it was like it was like half a marathon, it was like 12 miles or something. Yeah, I didn't do that, but that one really sucked. I don't need to do that again, but I find that I used to do those all the time and I would do them like every year they would come, but like, yeah, the six-ish mile one, the middle one, yeah, that's like the, that's the perfect length.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it was my first time and for me, the mental strength of getting to train for something again so I would wake up and go run, and for my daughter to see that I'll wake up, make her breakfast, go run and for her to see me train for something and then accomplish that goal was was kind of good for me. So I like it was. It was good to feel like I was training for something and kind of pushing myself because I mean I haven't done that since we were competing and it's different but still the same, you know, I mean yeah, and then, especially when you got like your daughter because she's training volleyball all the time, I see your video but I mean that's great to do that.
Speaker 1:I mean that's one of the things I like most too about you know, as your kids start to get older. So now I'm working out with the 10-year-old turning 11 tomorrow actually.
Speaker 2:Oh nice.
Speaker 1:So we're working out together. He said he wanted to do the Great Aloha Run. So I'm like, okay, then, if you're doing it, then we actually got to train so we've been, like you know, running laps around the block. I love it. I mean, yeah, that's super awesome, that's cool and it's something that I've done with my dad.
Speaker 2:Like my dad used to train me at the gym and stuff like that, and so did my dad. Like my dad used to train me at the gym and stuff like that, and so did your dad. When you guys started training Taekwondo and kickboxing, your dad was there as well as your brother. So your dad was leading by example and incorporating that into your guy's life. And now you're doing that with your kids and it's like a full circle. It's pretty cool. Your dad was super cool, yeah yeah, that was fun.
Speaker 1:Man, have you ever done the? You've seen that push-up challenge? Um, it's not queen callie, I always call it like queen callie up, bring bring sally up. I mean, you know it's not like bring sally up, yeah, yeah, down so like um, it's basically like know it's not like bring Sally up, bring Sally down, da-da-da-da-da.
Speaker 1:So, like it's basically like I think it's like three minutes 25 seconds. If we do all the reps it's about 30 different reps, but it gets very hard right. Like typically it's a push-up challenge, but I mean doing it with my son, we do it to like everything We'll like be curling, like like doing something really light, like 15 pounds or something, but you just gotta hold it like this for three and a half minutes and it's a big mental struggle. Anything else, but I found my son killed it at that stuff. Even like talking about the cold water thing, bring your hand, yeah, like I water. Right, that's a classic pain tolerance challenge. Yeah, yeah, my, my old, my older son, he, he kills it it. He just he won't, like, he won't take it out. Like I try to beat him and now that I know I don't, like I can't really beat him, I tried really hard the first time. I'm like, okay, screw it, man, you can have me on now.
Speaker 2:That is cool, isn't as hard?
Speaker 1:I don't know like I find just the hand in the cold water isn't as hard. I don't know. I find just the hand in the cold water is harder than put your whole body in there.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's good to know. Yeah, yeah, I also wanted to ask you after the first time you recorded and came on my show. I had a lot of people hitting me up about not really lucid dreams, dream analysis, like, oh, does he do dream analysis? Does he know what your dreams mean? And I? I never asked you that and I feel like it's two separate things.
Speaker 1:if, if, if, I'm correct yeah, yeah, so they are totally two separate things, and so I I've done that a few times with like people I know, but I think that to really give good dream analysis, you have to know the person very well, right, and so it's it's hard to do if you don't know super well. And then on top of that, I do also kind of feel like you know, unless it's somebody I know like extremely well, like maybe my kids or something kind of just like throwing darts in the dark. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2:yeah yeah, come up with.
Speaker 1:So I I think when it comes to dream analysis, you know I don't really do it too much, I just think it's more, it's more going to come from the own person's perspective. You Just kind of look at it. I mean, it's your dream journal, right, dream journal? And then you can kind of read through it and then also go back to it after time passes and then you can try to find some running themes. You know something I've noticed in my own personal practice, which I guess is kind of obvious. But you know, if you're in a really stressful time of life, right, you know, the dreams don't always match up. But that tends to give you more crappy, negative, stressed out dreams in a really happy time of life. I think things tend to follow there. But yeah, I haven't. I haven't done too much dream analysis myself though.
Speaker 2:Yeah it was like I always oh, if you get a like, there's like these dream books, and if you dream this, this and this, you look up in a book and this is what it means. I feel like it wasn't. It's not that cut and dry.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, so those dream books are total BS in my opinion Okay yeah.
Speaker 1:That stuff makes no, makes no sense. Dream of a snake. It means this Like yeah, I mean it depends on like your own personal upbringing, background and beliefs Then it can represent certain stuff like that. But you know, when it does come to dream interpretation or like dream analysis and things like that because I always tend to focus on like lucid dreaming stuff and I had one of the regulars on my channel pointed this out to me, out to me and I didn't really go too much deeper into.
Speaker 1:But I thought it made a lot of sense where a lot of times, when it comes to dream analysis, they tend to discount uh, lucid dreams more than regular dreams, just because your conscious awareness is in there and it can kind of like fuck things up or muck up, uh you know what's happening within it, because whatever you're thinking in your feelings gonna affect what's happening. For instance, like doing dream, you know, on regular non-lucid dreams. But then, in a similar sense, if you are lucid within the dream, there's going to be so much dream analysis. That's just more like trying to find answers within the dream space. Then I think it can actually be more beneficial because then you just ask dream characters questions and basically get a response from your subconscious and essentially, and then you know, try to find answers to whatever your question may be.
Speaker 2:Oh, that makes sense. Oh man, this was super enlightening, I think. Um, we hit every topic I wanted to kind of talk to you about and I got or two more actually.
Speaker 1:Who is that okay so? So the first one is because you brought it up. You got to share with me your lucid dream man, what happened in it.
Speaker 2:Oh, that lucid dream had something to do with our pet cat, and it was. Our cat got not escaped but left the house because it was not in captivity. You know what I mean. It left the house Cause it was not in captivity. You know what I mean. Like it left the house and we couldn't find it.
Speaker 1:I'm always scared to do that.
Speaker 2:No, we don't we don't, but but it it did in my dream, right. And then it was just us navigating. It was me navigating how to find them and I felt like I was controlling where I was looking. And then I remember thinking his um, his feeder over here goes off at a certain time, and I remember let's go back to the feeder at that time, and that's where the cat was and I controlled myself doing that.
Speaker 1:that was like that was it and that it was.
Speaker 2:It was, uh, something I remembered, and something I remember like creating the actions in the dream. It was like I chose to go back there, I chose to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, you went. Oh wait, the alarm would go off.
Speaker 2:That's where yes, yeah, and then I was thinking, was I just like half asleep or like? And I was like that must have been what a lucid dream was Like.
Speaker 1:it was like a big like sliding scale of lucidity.
Speaker 1:You could be kind of lucid or you could be super lucid and anywhere you know in between. But if you are lucid, if you ever want to find something, one of the good ways to do it is you can just kind of rep this out until it works, Because basically the reason why you found your cat there is because you thought it makes sense. So you like expected the cat to be them, and expectation plays a huge role in the dreams. So a quick way to kind of do that, if you're trying to find anything within the dream space, is you can just kind of break your line of sight to it and then say, for example, spin around and then try, expect it to be behind you. Or you can go out and just go like this, block your vision with your hand and then expect it to be out there in front of you. So that's just a nice way to kind of you know if you're trying to search out what to test it, test, test it out, little trick that can help you find that.
Speaker 2:Well, that makes sense. Yeah, that's, that was it, and that was that seemed like the closest thing that I could recall. That was similar to what you were describing or what your, um, your videos describe, and I was like, oh, that's, that's pretty much what it what it was. It's probably god telling me to get you back on the show there you go, yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:And then my next question is totally off topic. Uh, this came from a long time ago. I heard you referencing mgk. Right, you don't like him? Oh, yeah, okay, but tell me not so. When he was beat with with Eminem, mgk's Rap Devil song killed Eminem. I don't know.
Speaker 2:Okay, I listened to his song, but did you listen to Eminem's rebuttal?
Speaker 1:Both of them. So he had Killshot and I forget the name of it, but he released two right Against MGK.
Speaker 2:I just heard kill shot. And I remember because, oh, my friend chris styles, he's on the radio like, oh, he posted something. And then he sent me to the, the, the, the, the fucking file of it. And I remember I was at the gym and I was listening to it and I'm like, oh my God, this which one You're listening to?
Speaker 1:Killshot or Killshot, killshot OK.
Speaker 2:That's the one Eminem shot back, right, yeah, yeah, yeah. And technically he took Machine Gun Kelly out. The whole freaking genre of music, man? I don't know man, I like Rap Devil better, oh OK, well. Genre music, man, I don't know about it, I like rap devil better, oh okay, well, that's your. But I gotta admit I do like mgk's alternative music. It reminds me of bling and obviously he has travis barker playing drums for him yeah, and I like that style of music and his sound is is very late 90, early 2000 ish like 182.
Speaker 2:So I really like his, his, his rock stuff. But his rap, his raps were cool. But I I thought, oh, I thought eminem, just like right, you just like eminem ended his rap career. Eminem pretty much ended Limp Bizkit. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, he has killed many people. Yeah, eminem has ended many careers.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's just my opinion and it's something that I'm not a huge fan of the genre. I like rap and I'll listen to it here and there, but I'm a rocker. I like rock the most. I'm actually going to a metallica concert in june at levi stadium.
Speaker 1:yeah, oh, I was like man is metallica coming here, shit, oh no yeah, they have they. I've went every single time.
Speaker 2:they and I just found out yesterday that, uh, when we go to las vegas for my daughter's volleyball tournament in April, motley Crue has a residency at the MGM, so we're going to go to that.
Speaker 1:And they're still playing music. I don't know how, because those guys did so much drugs.
Speaker 2:I don't even know how they're still alive, but whatever yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It'd be cool.
Speaker 1:JK Brock stuff is dope. The only problem with that for me, I mean, and I do like him. I liked him since his like mixtape days, but like once he once he went the rock route like I don't know if this is, um, his girls influence on him, uh, making fox or whatever. Yeah man, then he got like all famed out half the time mode and yeah, yeah, he's looking like super hardcore gangsta dude or he's like all in pink emo like you know yeah, oh bro, what the hell man what happened?
Speaker 2:hey, he had a hot chick though, so whatever yeah, whatever man he's winning in life yep, guarantee. All right, man, we've been going for over an hour. Um, where can people find you on your youtube, instagram and whatnot?
Speaker 1:oh yeah, so, um, you can find me at Lucid Explorers on everything I believe. Instagram is Lucid underscore Explorers and then, like TikTok and YouTube is just whatever the thing is, slash Lucid Explorers. You can reach me there. You can email me at Lucid Explorers at Yahoocom, and, yeah, I'm happy to help out with anything. Typically, what I focus on is like meditation stuff, and then I'll listen to stuff, of course, but you know, and then also sleep, and that's and that's my main grounds. Oh, one more thing. I know we're going long, but how's your meditation going? Because haven't you been planning on like picking that up for like the last couple of years? I hear you bring up meditation every once in a while. I try it.
Speaker 2:I try it honestly and, to be honest, I fall asleep or I get distracted. I cannot clear my mind and that's been a huge problem for me. I, even when I sleep, like I need to turn on the TV and doze off, or my mind just creates different thoughts or I focus on different things and it just keeps me up. And I think a lot of that personally had to do when I was going through my divorce. I couldn't go to sleep because as soon as I turn off the TV and try to go to sleep, everything is in my head so I would just focus on TV until it kind of just dozes me down. And because my mind is focused on TV, I'm focused on what I'm watching. Then it kind of closes. So meditation is the same. If I try to meditate I can't clear my mind, to have like a meditation state. I start thinking it is I got to do that, I've got to figure this out. So I tried multiple times and I either felt like I said I'll fall asleep or I won't clear my mind.
Speaker 1:So when you, when you're doing it, you're sitting up or you're lying- down Sitting up, I've tried lying down, I've tried standing, I tried.
Speaker 2:What else I tried?
Speaker 1:out of the beach.
Speaker 2:I never tried walking.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but that for me, if it puts you to sleep, then just meditate to sleep, kind of like how I put how I put a younger son to sleep right, you do the meditation, boom, he passes out. But so I was thinking about this and I was thinking that this might benefit you specifically. If, hard time ignoring the thoughts and feelings that are coming up, right, and that's one of the standard things you want to do within a meditation practice, right, you learn to to let thoughts go, problem is, yeah, hard thing to try and wrap your mind around, right. So an easy way I've found to kind of just rep this out in like a guaranteed way is with breath work. Have you ever experimented with like holding your breath and doing stuff like that?
Speaker 2:yeah, I um was turned on to this guy, hoff william, oh yeah yeah yeah and um, I've done stuff in the morning, like with breath work, like that, but not, not at night or for meditation okay.
Speaker 1:So one of the good things I found with it is it's a good way, once you have that urge to breathe right, because that urge, it's a get, it's going to come on sooner than later, and so you can learn to kind of stay one step removed from that urgent feeling to breathe right, which is essentially what you want to do when you're learning to let thought goes and let thoughts go and all of that. So, um, a nice quick way to do it, the way I like to do it, is you exhale out first, kind of like you would do with wim hof, actually right, but minus the whole hyperventilating stuff beforehand right, exhale out, close your uh, you know, hold your breath, and then, as that urge that starts to breathe starts to kick in, you just practice staying one step removed from it.
Speaker 1:And then a nice way to give a nice clear indicator on when you can breathe and when you want to essentially give in and breathe is you wait till there's like real physiological signs of it, right?
Speaker 1:So first, typically what will happen at some point is your stomach will start to contract, right, typically kind of weak at first. Then it gets harder because really you have this urge to breathe but you know you don't really need to breathe yet, right, you can go minutes without breathing and especially if you exhale out, that urge to breathe will come on, like you know, under a minute easily, right? So then your stomach starts to contract harder and harder. You just keep trying to ignore it, and then normally what happens for me is, after the stomach starts to contract pretty hard, I'll start to uncontrollably gulp and then, if I make it that long, that's plenty long already. Right, that's going to be quite difficult to make it there. But then you just breathe in, and one of the cool things about exhaling first is that when it is time to breathe, all you got to do is inhale, as opposed to if you inhaled first, held your breath, then, when you hold it, you got to blow air out and then breathe in.
Speaker 2:Oh, that makes sense, that makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So, I found that to be really good. So you wrecked it out, you rest for about a minute, right, and then you blow your air out again, you hold your breath and then this is. You know, it's good. It's good for meditation, it's good for learning how to drop stuff, it's good for just a mental workout and like kind of like the cold plunge is yeah. Yeah, all of that also works great for clearing your nose.
Speaker 1:If you have like a really plugged nose, guaranteed way to clear that nose is you hold your breath right, because then your body thinks you're going to suffocate to death. So I will do whatever it's got to do to just clear up all of that right. So even if my nose is really plugged and I'm going to sleep, I'll rep a couple rounds of this get my nose clear. Now, if I'm really sick and congested, of course it just plugs up right away. But especially if you're on that edge where your nose you think is almost going to be clear but it's just a little bit plugged to, a couple rounds of this breath hold. You know, when you breathe in, breathe in through your nose, in this case, not through your mouth.
Speaker 2:Right Just to really have all that extra air come in there, and it can work great at clearing the nose, meditation and, uh, you know, mental workouts. So I'll definitely try that for sure. Yep, yeah, maybe that'll help me, um, be able to meditate or clear my mind, for sure yeah, I mean holding holding breath.
Speaker 1:I find is a very fun little meditative mini session to do. You know, especially when you get to that nice, because after a couple times I mean especially after you do a couple rounds, after you rest it for a minute it gets a lot easier. It's kind of the same thing. I think wim hoffer do that as well right, you do multiple rounds of it and it gets easier, right, as you get deeper into it, and then you can have these nice, really calm moments within your mind and then that can give you a nice little glimpse at. You know, you're not really supposed to have an actual goal when you meditate although I like to have a goal when I meditate but it gives you a kind of goal and goalposts that you want to reach when you are doing your meditation, to try and find these nice moments of calm clarity.
Speaker 2:So, uh, yeah all right on, all right. Well, oh, and for us, you can find us at above the bridge podcast on instagram, youtube. Our website is atbpodcom and my instagram's thaddydaddyhi. Bro, it's always good to talk to you, man. I appreciate you coming on and sharing. I know this is something that you're passionate about, so I can. I can tell it comes out easily to you. So there's always good fun conversations with you, especially with this stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man, that was a blast. Thanks for having me on One topic we didn't touch on. This would be way too long. We ain't going gonna crack this now but maybe in a future episode.
Speaker 1:Is um stage one asleep, hypnagogic luminal work not many people talk about that, but I find that to be the perfect training ground for lucid dreaming, because it's a lot easier to get to consistently, you know, as opposed to trying to get lucid randomly in the middle of the night when you're in REM. But you got to pass through stage one asleep every time you're falling asleep. So that would be a fun one, I think, to do next. Yeah.
Speaker 2:We'll definitely come back on, and I also do want to talk to you about our when we used to train. Oh yeah, yeah, I had Lyle on one time.
Speaker 1:Oh. I listened to that one. That was cool, like, oh, where'd you train? I was like, oh, I used to train at Smith's and of course they all know him.
Speaker 2:I was like hey.
Speaker 1:Is this guy going to be on NME or on Friends? They're all cool with it.
Speaker 2:Alright, on, alright, man, we'll shock us for the cameras, yeah right on shout out to the artist group network aloha, thank you.
