[00:00:00] Hi everyone and welcome back to Reflect Forward. I'm your host Kerry Siggins. I hope you're
[00:00:13] having a great day today. Today my guest is Sam Kbert. He is, oh my gosh, this interview.
[00:00:20] I can't even wait for you to hear it. He was a serial entrepreneur, built a million
[00:00:25] dollar business in Silicon Valley, was named to Silicon Valley's 40 under 40 list at
[00:00:30] 31 years old and he was miserable. He was unfulfilled, felt like he was lacking purpose
[00:00:36] in life, fell into a deep depression and he decided that he was going to go on the spiritual
[00:00:42] journey to figure out why he felt this deep void. And he started working with plant
[00:00:49] medicine to expand his thinking to really go deep into what was the purpose and meaning
[00:00:56] of his life. And he came out the other side saying I need to share what I've learned
[00:01:02] He's written five books and his latest one, Overcome the Overwhelm is just being released.
[00:01:08] We have such an interesting conversation about what these journeys are like and
[00:01:11] why it's so important that we as leaders need to understand ourselves and really
[00:01:16] think about what's driving us and what the purpose and meaning of our lives
[00:01:20] are and why are we always chasing success and what does contentment and joy look
[00:01:24] like? I know you're going to love this interview, so hang tight and I'll be right
[00:01:28] back with Sam.
[00:01:30] Alright everyone, welcome back. I have Sam Kbert with me. Sam, thank you so much for
[00:01:40] joining me on the show today.
[00:01:41] Yeah, Carrie, thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here.
[00:01:44] Yeah, it's gonna be so much fun. So you and I met at an Impact 11, although I don't
[00:01:48] think it was called Impact 11 back then when we were going there and learning about
[00:01:52] how to be better keynote speakers.
[00:01:54] Yeah, that was a great event. That was two years ago at the time of this recording
[00:01:59] and it was either three or four ring circus. It had another number in it.
[00:02:03] Three.
[00:02:04] Yeah, three ring circus. That's what it was.
[00:02:06] Yeah, that's right. It's so good to have you on the show and we're gonna get
[00:02:10] into talking about your life as an entrepreneur and how you got out of it
[00:02:15] and about your new book, Overcome the Overwhelm. So maybe tell us a little
[00:02:20] bit about your journey. I know that you were a serial entrepreneur and you
[00:02:24] got burnt out. So tell us a little bit about that.
[00:02:27] Yeah, absolutely. Back in 2019 I hit a numbing depression, sleepless nights.
[00:02:32] It was really as a result of being like a hamster on a never ending wheel
[00:02:37] of chasing success but never actually getting anywhere at all. And that will
[00:02:42] culminate in building my business to a million dollar company that year
[00:02:47] while working less than four hours a day and I was named to Silicon
[00:02:51] Valley's 40 under 40 list. And that numbing depression was like,
[00:02:55] I don't deserve this. I'm not worthy of this. And that was part of it.
[00:02:59] And the other part of it was what do I do next? And what I realized in the
[00:03:03] years that followed that, because I went deep down the spiritual path,
[00:03:07] was on a subconscious level, meaning I wasn't aware I was saying this.
[00:03:11] But I was saying to myself, when I achieve ABC, I will feel XYZ.
[00:03:17] So I was always chasing that carrot. And then by the time I got to that
[00:03:21] success, it was like, man, I still feel the same though. What is going on?
[00:03:26] And that's what led me to going within in the spiritual journey.
[00:03:30] And that's yeah, back in 2019.
[00:03:34] You know, I think that's so common and not just with entrepreneurs,
[00:03:37] but you know, I think we all look for external things to make us happy.
[00:03:42] And we don't understand that that really comes from within, especially when
[00:03:46] we're bombarded with consumerism and social media and chasing other people's
[00:03:51] dreams and keeping up with the Joneses, so to speak.
[00:03:54] So you can really find that you get caught up in things that aren't important.
[00:03:59] And I think we see that all around us today where people are just truly
[00:04:03] burnt out and they don't know who they are.
[00:04:06] Would you agree with that? 100%. You nailed it. Yeah.
[00:04:09] So tell us a little bit about your spiritual journeys. What did you do?
[00:04:13] Did you sell your business and move to the mountains?
[00:04:16] What did it look like? Pretty much.
[00:04:18] No, my business, I couldn't sell it. Unfortunately, it's a promotional
[00:04:22] products company and those companies aren't really the type of business
[00:04:26] that you can sell, at least not for much.
[00:04:28] So it doesn't make sense to. But that said, it all started with the plant
[00:04:32] medicine ayahuasca. Are you familiar with that? Yeah.
[00:04:36] So I sat with that medicine and then it was like, show me everything
[00:04:40] because people say that's like 12, 15 years of therapy packed into a single
[00:04:44] night. And for me, it felt like a lifetime of therapy and it was just
[00:04:49] very much a spiritual awakening experience.
[00:04:52] And then I started to integrate and go deep down the path.
[00:04:55] I changed everything in my life, moved from Silicon Valley to the
[00:04:59] beach town of Santa Cruz. I spent the next two, three years going
[00:05:03] really deep when the pandemic hit the lockdowns a year later after
[00:05:07] having this experience. I looked at it as an invitation to go even
[00:05:11] deeper on my inner world. I ended up becoming a yoga instructor,
[00:05:15] breath work facilitator, leading men's groups, totally, totally
[00:05:19] different person. And that's when you and I met in 2022.
[00:05:24] That was three years into like this deep, deep, deep journey of
[00:05:28] going within with blinders on and just disconnecting from the
[00:05:32] outer world. And when you and I met in the spring of 2022,
[00:05:37] that was me coming back into the business world being like, okay, well
[00:05:41] now I did all this work. Now I'm ready to share it and
[00:05:45] alchemize it and really in the workplace and maybe not go so deep
[00:05:49] on the spiritual themes, but talk about like mindfulness and being more
[00:05:53] intentional with our inner world, making up our thoughts and feelings.
[00:05:57] So let's back up to when you decided to do the ayahuasca journey.
[00:06:01] You were depressed, you weren't happy. Give us a little bit of detail
[00:06:05] because I think a lot of people are curious about it. A lot of people are scared about it.
[00:06:08] And of course, many listeners have probably gone on a journey like this before.
[00:06:11] But how did you get introduced to it and what really made you decide
[00:06:15] that that was a path that you wanted to take? Yeah, absolutely.
[00:06:19] I love talking about this. Have you seen the movie Limitless with Bradley Cooper?
[00:06:24] I have. So for the listeners who haven't seen it or need a refresher,
[00:06:28] there's this movie that came out, I don't know, maybe like 2010s-ish.
[00:06:32] I don't know if that's how you say it, like the 90s, like 2010s,
[00:06:36] but neither here nor there. This movie with Bradley Cooper where he's struggling,
[00:06:40] then like this guy who was a semi-family member, I think it doesn't matter,
[00:06:44] randomly, quote unquote, randomly comes into his life with this
[00:06:48] we'll just call it a nootropic. And now his brain is firing on all cylinders.
[00:06:53] So around the time I saw that movie, this random, quote unquote,
[00:06:57] random guy came into my life telling me about microdosing with psilocybin.
[00:07:02] And at this point in time, I'm on the board of multiple nonprofit organizations.
[00:07:06] I'm starting to take off in my career and I'm like, oh man,
[00:07:10] I loved mushrooms in college and even in my high school days,
[00:07:13] but I've been sticking with just alcohol because I'm a professional
[00:07:17] and maybe a little bit of campus here and there with being a California guy as well.
[00:07:22] So that said, when he started to tell me about microdosing with psilocybin,
[00:07:27] he was sending me these articles. This is back in 2017 of Silicon Valley executives
[00:07:32] microdosing for like peak performance and creativity and all that.
[00:07:37] And I'm like, well, oh, okay, okay, I guess I can do that and still be a professional.
[00:07:42] Like this was my thinking back then. So I started microdosing and it was an amazing experience.
[00:07:46] It was great. Then this guy tells me about ayahuasca and I'm like, ayahuada,
[00:07:51] you know, like what are you talking about? And then he starts to tell me more about it.
[00:07:55] And something in me told me one day I'm going to do that,
[00:07:58] but I was scared out of my mind and I had no reason to go and do it then.
[00:08:03] Things were on the surface good, but I kind of kept that in the back of my mind,
[00:08:07] be like, oh, good to know there's this thing that if things hit the fan, I can go do that.
[00:08:14] So about a year later after that was when the numbing depression hit.
[00:08:18] And then at this point in time, I'd gotten into Transcendental Meditation the year before.
[00:08:23] So I started meditating. I was starting to go yoga more frequently.
[00:08:27] So I was starting to explore mindfulness and I've always considered myself a spiritual person.
[00:08:33] I grew up in a certain way where I didn't know spirituality was actually a thing.
[00:08:38] I just didn't know what I didn't know.
[00:08:41] So when I started to do more mindfulness type stuff like the meditation and yoga,
[00:08:47] I had like this remembering.
[00:08:49] And when I said ayahuasca came back into my field during that numbing depression, it was undeniable.
[00:08:56] Like I didn't even have the vernacular, the verbiage to say I was feeling called to the medicine,
[00:09:03] which is something you hear so often in medicine communities.
[00:09:07] But it was an undeniable call.
[00:09:10] Like literally everything was lining up for me.
[00:09:13] And at that point, I was just at such a rock bottom.
[00:09:15] Yes, I was terrified, but I also kept hearing people say you have to be able to surrender.
[00:09:21] And I was already at this place of like ultimate surrender.
[00:09:24] So I was like, it can't get worse than this.
[00:09:26] So that's really what led me to sitting with the medicine.
[00:09:29] And one of the things I didn't mention because I don't really lead with this as much,
[00:09:33] but I've been a psychedelic integration coach or spiritual integration coach for the past several years.
[00:09:39] And I've worked in a lot of different medicine spaces.
[00:09:43] So when you and I met in 22, I was kind of coming out of the medicine world and coming back into the business world.
[00:09:50] So now I have my foot in both worlds, you know, business words, OK, make the language more accessible,
[00:09:58] talk about mindfulness and whatever else.
[00:10:00] And then the deep seekers that are working with medicines like ayahuasca or the toad medicine,
[00:10:06] bufavarius, that's 5-MeO DMT.
[00:10:08] So that's thrown a lot out there.
[00:10:10] But that's how I was called to the medicine and I had the confidence that it was the right decision at the time.
[00:10:17] So there's a lot of people who maybe think that this whole idea that psychedelics help depression or PTSD or anxiety.
[00:10:26] With all of your study and your experiences, why would you say that maybe that is a false perception?
[00:10:33] I think when we get caught in victim mentality and the integration of these medicines,
[00:10:39] which it's by no shame of anyone.
[00:10:41] I mean, I've been there as well where we might point to the medicine experience,
[00:10:46] the ceremony of working with a psychedelic for therapy,
[00:10:49] and we'll point to that and be like, it's because of this.
[00:10:52] This is what ruined me.
[00:10:53] And now I'm worse.
[00:10:54] Like I see that a lot.
[00:10:56] And like I said, I think of this as victim mentality and it's no shame.
[00:11:01] It's no guilt.
[00:11:02] I'm not trying to call anyone out.
[00:11:04] I've experienced that myself in being caught in the victim mentality and the integration of the medicine.
[00:11:09] Thing is though, when we're working with these medicines,
[00:11:12] it wakes us up to the fact that I am you, you are me.
[00:11:15] We are all God split off in existence and that we are co-creators of this reality.
[00:11:21] We could look to quantum physics or how the subconscious mind works to really understand that on a more scientific level.
[00:11:29] And once we have this gnosis, this felt experience of that to be true for ourselves.
[00:11:34] Now what doesn't get talked about enough is the negative effect of manifesting.
[00:11:41] If we are not conscious of our thoughts and feelings,
[00:11:44] now we are negatively manifesting our experience through this human experience.
[00:11:50] And that's what I call victim mentality.
[00:11:53] And again, it's not about like calling anyone out.
[00:11:55] It's just regaining conscious control of your thoughts and feelings.
[00:11:59] Because when we can do that and it's cliche say, but so true.
[00:12:03] If we can look at something this is happening for me as opposed to to me
[00:12:07] and then start to get curious and apply the lessons, then we can grow beyond it.
[00:12:11] Last thing here that is so big because last year at the time of this recording,
[00:12:15] 2023 last year was the most challenging time of my life.
[00:12:21] So I was really, really being challenged with, okay, you've been doing the work the past few years.
[00:12:27] Like now how are you going to apply it?
[00:12:29] And what helped me and what's helped so many of my clients as well is adopting its game time type mentality.
[00:12:36] Being like, what's the point of doing all this work and learning about these spiritual or even mindful lessons and concepts
[00:12:43] if we're not going to apply them when we need them most?
[00:12:47] Yeah, I think that that's so true.
[00:12:49] You know, back to the point of our thoughts become our reality.
[00:12:52] But I truly do believe that when we are conscious of our thoughts and conscious of our words
[00:12:57] and align that with our actions, we can truly change outcomes, both negative and positive.
[00:13:03] So I am right there with you.
[00:13:05] And I think that a lot of us get stuck in when things happen to us,
[00:13:09] whether it's by happenstance, if you believe that or by our own doing that hard things mean that it's bad.
[00:13:18] What I've learned is that a lot of times that's the growth that you need,
[00:13:22] whether you believe in God or the universe or hey, it's just the way life works.
[00:13:26] Those challenges get put in front of us for a reason to help us grow and gain new experiences.
[00:13:32] And we tend to put negative words to those experiences instead of looking at it like,
[00:13:37] OK, yeah, it might not be easy right now, but what's going to be on the other side of this?
[00:13:42] And that's what really resonated with me and what you were talking about.
[00:13:46] How do you embrace those difficult times knowing that some really, really good things can happen on the other side?
[00:13:52] You just can't see it when you're in it.
[00:13:56] Yeah, absolutely. That resonates.
[00:13:58] I think of the symbol in Fendi, I have a Fendi for the number eight and flipping the number eight on its side,
[00:14:06] we get the Fendi.
[00:14:07] And I believe that the symbol of Fendi is such a great representation of the human experience
[00:14:13] because we have highs and lows, yet we always come back to meet ourselves exactly where we're at if we're willing to.
[00:14:20] So why do you think it is that people are so unwilling to?
[00:14:24] Is it that they don't have the skills, the tools, they're afraid?
[00:14:28] What in your experience? I mean, I know it's unique for everybody, but what are your thoughts on that?
[00:14:33] This is the million dollar question. I mean, I work with the Toad Medicine.
[00:14:37] Are you familiar with the Toad Medicine?
[00:14:40] I'm not.
[00:14:41] So it's called 5-MeO DMT. That's the molecule, not to be confused with just DMT.
[00:14:46] Like Joe Rogan has talked about DMT at length a lot of times.
[00:14:50] When you hear someone reference DMT, most likely they're referring to NN as in like Nancy Nancy DMT.
[00:14:58] What I'm speaking about is 5-MeO DMT.
[00:15:01] And when someone's referring to 5-MeO DMT, they're either going to say the full thing like that or 5-MeO or Toad Medicine or Bufo.
[00:15:09] They're not going to just say DMT. It's very much more about healing.
[00:15:14] Whereas the normal DMT we hear about is more like a wild trip, if you will.
[00:15:20] Recreation. Yeah, recreation.
[00:15:22] Yeah, exactly. Totally.
[00:15:23] So having worked with so many people that work with the Toad Medicine, that is 5-MeO DMT, this is also called the God Molecule.
[00:15:31] It's a very fast acting medicine where you actually inhale it, you smoke it and it's a crystallized venom from the Bufo, various toad.
[00:15:42] And when you inhale this, it's about a 10 second inhale, the ego goes offline.
[00:15:47] Now I say the ego, it's like our identification of self.
[00:15:51] It's almost like you just instantly go to sleep.
[00:15:54] You're not going to sleep.
[00:15:55] But when you go offline, what's happening is new neural networks are forming within the default mode network of the brain and it's releasing trauma and old stories and limiting beliefs.
[00:16:06] And you're offline typically for anywhere 3-7 minutes.
[00:16:09] Then you start to come back into your body and you're left with this heart expansion type feeling.
[00:16:14] It's like a Kundalini awakening, if you will.
[00:16:17] And then in the integration of that, whether someone's experienced with psychedelics or not, it can be very challenging and isn't always.
[00:16:25] But when it's very challenging, it's typically because as opposed to say even canvas, but psilocybin is used ceremonially or ayahuasca, all of these things, they're the archetypal energy of the feminine.
[00:16:42] And with that, we are sitting with these different experiences in our life, seeing them from a lot of different angles and learning a lesson.
[00:16:50] We're being taught something.
[00:16:52] Whereas within Bufo, it's so quick and we're left with this overwhelming feeling and we don't necessarily always have the time to understand and unpack the lesson.
[00:17:02] So in the integration, it's kind of like, whoa, what now?
[00:17:06] And that's where the subconscious mind comes through, where it's like a negative manifestation and our thoughts and feelings get trapped in different ways where now life gets harder.
[00:17:18] And a lot of times what I see with our clients are people I know working with these medicines is that if they are someone who experienced say depression, that depression may intensify in the integration.
[00:17:32] And it's happening for them so that they can really feel it, process it and move through it.
[00:17:38] But that feeling of whatever it is, maybe it's anxiety, maybe it's fear, whatever the thing is for that person, when it becomes so much, there's nothing that no one else can say or do.
[00:17:50] Like literally I'm in a group with almost a thousand people and there's people giving amazing feedback.
[00:17:56] There's one on one clients that I work with.
[00:17:59] And then some of them that have had these challenging integrations, I can think of one person in particular recently where about two or three months later she called me up and she apologized.
[00:18:12] You know, it was like, oh, I just couldn't hear it. It just wasn't landing or whatever.
[00:18:16] You know, we hear this a lot where it's like they just need to come to that conclusion for themselves and we can do our best to walk them through.
[00:18:24] So we're guiding them to that conclusion because we can't just tell them.
[00:18:29] But that's the delicate process and why you hear so often you have to be able to surrender.
[00:18:35] So it's really about surrender at the end of the day. It's not waving a white flag.
[00:18:40] Surrender is all about acceptance without resistance.
[00:18:43] And so does it make sense for people who say, OK, you know, I need to rewire my brain.
[00:18:49] I need to figure out my depression, my anxiety, whatever it is, my unhappiness and I want to try a plant medicine to do it.
[00:18:55] Is it important that they have someone to help them through this, whether it's a community or whether it's a psychiatrist or counselor who is trained in being able to help people get through that?
[00:19:07] Because I can imagine it might be feeling really lonely. Like you go and you have this transformative experience and then you're like, what do I do now?
[00:19:13] Yeah, please don't listen to this podcast and then go find five grams of mushrooms and do mushrooms on your own.
[00:19:20] Yeah. If you get one thing from this, don't do any of this on your own.
[00:19:24] It's imperative to work with a facilitator or a shaman.
[00:19:29] And having said that, it's the Wild West right now.
[00:19:32] And I see this being so immersed in the community where people do the plant Earth medicine one time and next thing you know, they're serving the medicine and they haven't done anything to integrate the experience for themselves, let alone have the reps and the skill set to be serving that medicine.
[00:19:51] So not only do you need to work with a facilitator and not just do it on your own, but you also have to vet them as well.
[00:19:59] And one thing I say is if you find that you're approaching entering a plant Earth medicine ceremony or psychedelic therapy and like a more clinical trial with a therapist, if you have to roll up your sleeves to make it happen, like go on Google and search like for a facilitator like you would for a vacation,
[00:20:20] then you're very much in that yang energy and that masculine energy.
[00:20:24] I say if we're going to put a percentage on it because I'm a little analytical like that, but let it be a little bit more 60 to 80% coming from the feminine, the yin energy intuitively where you're being called.
[00:20:36] And you'll know when you're being called because it all just happens for you.
[00:20:40] That said, we still want to apply that masculine energy and use discernment.
[00:20:45] And that's when we can start to vet these facilitators and be like, okay, let's make sure like this actually is a good idea for me.
[00:20:53] And I have enough space to not only prepare but integrate on the other side.
[00:20:58] Awesome. So now let's talk a little bit about, alright, so 2022 when we met, you know, you're working on becoming a keynote speaker, really taking that to the next level, writing a book,
[00:21:09] so talk a little bit about that integration back into the business world and what that looks like now.
[00:21:14] That was a culture shock for me. I mean, I traveled more than I had ever traveled in my life in 2020 and 2021.
[00:21:23] I was not home for a month straight, almost for two years during 2020 and 2021.
[00:21:29] Medicine community, medicine ceremonies, retreats, yoga type stuff, doing the work and learning.
[00:21:36] And it was just a lot of growth and expansion.
[00:21:40] And then it was just a different vibe, the type of people that I was around.
[00:21:46] They were new to me because when I was pre going down the spiritual path, all I knew were business people.
[00:21:52] And that became my norm so much.
[00:21:55] And I was so deep in it that when I went back to conferences, I think we all felt like in early 2022, like, oh, this is a culture shock because, oh, wow, we're actually in person and networking and having business things again.
[00:22:07] So I had that typical culture shock that most of us had.
[00:22:12] But on top of that being like, oh, wow, this is almost, this is the word that's coming through, but I don't mean to use this word, but it's almost repulsive.
[00:22:19] You know, it was almost like, oh, this is toxic.
[00:22:22] This doesn't feel good.
[00:22:23] And I became more mindful of not only my energy, but other people's energies too.
[00:22:29] So I really got curious about like energetic hygiene being like, OK, my channels are wide open right now, not to sound super woo and esoteric.
[00:22:38] It's just like how I felt then.
[00:22:40] And now it's been two years since then.
[00:22:43] And I feel like, you know, it's a pendulum.
[00:22:45] My book at the time in 2022 is called Soul Life Balance.
[00:22:48] And one of my messages is about soul life balance as opposed to work life balance.
[00:22:53] It's a priority, prioritization of our mental health.
[00:22:57] And I kind of look at from that lens with everything I do.
[00:23:00] Like I said, with the medicine experiment, with the medicine ceremonies, when you're thinking about doing one, use a little bit from your soul, a little bit from the life, feminine and masculine.
[00:23:10] Well, it's the same way going back to these conferences and being enmeshed in the business world.
[00:23:15] Now on that pendulum, I feel like I'm way more on that life side.
[00:23:19] And it's not as deep as I was back then on like the soul side and the spiritual.
[00:23:24] And that's where it's so common for any of us to get lost in either our thoughts or feelings and be like, oh, is this the wrong path?
[00:23:32] Am I doing it again?
[00:23:35] And that's where we can release judgment, guilt and shame.
[00:23:38] I mean, I'm constantly in my head processing things to be like, OK, how do I actually feel so that I can show up with intentionality and not just get back to who I was before doing the thing?
[00:23:51] Because I think I'm supposed to do it and then achieve it.
[00:23:54] And then be like, well, shoot, I never actually want that at all.
[00:23:57] So that's what helps me. It's just being intentional with everything that I'm doing these days.
[00:24:02] And so what are you doing these days? Talk a little bit about what coming back into the business world looks like for you now.
[00:24:07] Absolutely. There's a new book that I just released.
[00:24:10] It's called Overcome the Overwhelm, and the subtitle is The Six Step Breath Process to Access Inner Peace.
[00:24:17] The word breath is an acronym. And this book just came through me.
[00:24:21] I went to Bali for a Kundalini teacher training.
[00:24:24] And when I came back, I was doing a certain form of journaling, which is called expressive writing or the Pennebaker Protocol about writing about traumatic event every day for four days in a row.
[00:24:36] And I did that based off of the traumatic events that I experienced in 2023.
[00:24:43] In doing that, I started to write my first fiction book.
[00:24:47] And I've written five books previous to this one, but they're all nonfiction.
[00:24:52] So I started to watch a master class on how to write fiction books.
[00:24:56] And I was basically writing this fiction book that was loosely based off of what I experienced last year to help me process it.
[00:25:04] And it was unlocking like new creativity.
[00:25:07] I only was doing it for about two weeks.
[00:25:10] And then one day I showed up for a writing session and this other book wanted to come through, which has now overcome the overwhelm.
[00:25:18] So it's almost like in reflecting back on that, I can see I was actually writing this fiction book just to get to the point of writing this new book.
[00:25:29] And this new book is the process that I use to help myself get through the most challenging time of my life.
[00:25:36] And then once I started to be like, oh, wow, this is working.
[00:25:40] I was sharing it with my clients and was working with them.
[00:25:43] And then I started to sprinkle it in in my keynotes.
[00:25:46] And it's really resonating with people.
[00:25:48] And now that's the book overcome the overwhelm, the six step breath process to access inner peace real quick.
[00:25:55] Emotions are energy in motion.
[00:25:57] There's a 90 second rule that Dr.
[00:26:00] Jill Bolte Taylor taught us about.
[00:26:02] She's a neuroanatomist and the 90 second rule teaches that our bodies process emotions in 90 seconds.
[00:26:09] We have a 90 second physiological response when we experience an emotion.
[00:26:14] Remember that emotions are energy in motion.
[00:26:18] So let them be in motion.
[00:26:19] If we accept them, we let them be in motion.
[00:26:22] They won't get stored in the body.
[00:26:23] The three themes to help you remember all six of these steps like this is just very high level.
[00:26:28] Breathe, feel and think intentionally.
[00:26:31] So you notice you're feeling that emotion.
[00:26:33] You don't want to feel instead of constricting and contracting and tightening and disassociating.
[00:26:38] Breathe into it, feel it and think intentionally.
[00:26:41] That's great.
[00:26:42] And when you say think intentionally, what do you mean by that?
[00:26:45] Yeah, like I said, very high level.
[00:26:47] We have over 60,000 thoughts a day.
[00:26:49] 80% of those from the day before, 90% of those are negative.
[00:26:53] So I like to say by breathing and feeling this emotion and accepting it, we earn the right to apply the power of positive thinking because there's a toxic positivity movement going on right now.
[00:27:05] Don't entertain negative thoughts.
[00:27:07] Don't entertain negative feelings.
[00:27:09] And it's like, no, that's how they get stored in the body.
[00:27:12] You're lying to yourself and that creates dis-ease.
[00:27:14] The body knows.
[00:27:15] The body is smarter than your mind.
[00:27:17] It is the body-mind connection.
[00:27:19] Anyways, first you breathe, you feel, you accept, you process the emotion.
[00:27:23] Then we leave the experience feeling uplifted and we create an empowering limitless belief.
[00:27:29] It's usually something that's the opposite.
[00:27:31] So if I'm feeling something I don't want to feel, I can even go as far to say, okay, like I'm feeling really discouraged by my life right now, whatever the thing is.
[00:27:42] And then when you leave the experience, I am confident.
[00:27:45] I'm feeling good.
[00:27:46] Then you let that land into your body.
[00:27:48] So you leave on a positive note.
[00:27:50] That's great.
[00:27:51] Have you read the book Hardwiring Happiness?
[00:27:53] No, I got to check it out.
[00:27:55] It's so good.
[00:27:56] I can't remember the name of the author right now.
[00:27:57] I read it when I was on vacation in the Dominican over spring break and I actually had gone into a naturopath who does the biofeedback.
[00:28:08] He put on the head ring and it tells you all the different things in your body.
[00:28:11] And he said, well, this is really interesting.
[00:28:13] You've got some like childhood trauma baggage, you know, that you're still dealing with.
[00:28:16] I'm like, yeah, I know.
[00:28:17] He's like, but you have a really hard time accepting joy.
[00:28:20] And I thought about that because I'm a super joyful person.
[00:28:23] Oh, I'm a very positive person and I try to bring joy to the world.
[00:28:29] But I think that my constant drive and ambition, because I am such an intense human being and so driven that it is really hard for me to.
[00:28:37] I think truly accept joy.
[00:28:39] I think on a logical level, I can understand it.
[00:28:41] But do I really feel it?
[00:28:43] So I said, all right, I'm going to figure this out.
[00:28:46] And a friend of mine who is in YPO with me had given me this book in 2020 during the pandemic when we were talking about all the craziness in life.
[00:28:55] And I finally was like, I'm taking this with me and I read it anyway.
[00:28:58] So I'm figuring out like how can I really truly accept more joy in my life?
[00:29:03] And I love this book and it's a whole process about how you can hardwire happiness into your neural pathways in your brain.
[00:29:11] And it's really being able to feel it in the moment.
[00:29:15] We can say, oh, that was a beautiful thing or that thing makes me happy, but it's fleeting and it goes.
[00:29:20] And this is about a whole process that they walk you through to be able to imprint that and think intentionally.
[00:29:26] And even sometimes a process that they do talk about is to actually attach a negative experience so that when you have that negative experience with this thought,
[00:29:36] this memory, you minimize like, oh, that wasn't so bad.
[00:29:40] Anyway, it's absolutely brilliant.
[00:29:42] And I have been practicing it and have absolutely noticed a difference in one being able to appreciate a moment of contentment or of happiness or even joy more deeply than I previously had.
[00:29:58] And now I'm really practicing how do I attach this feeling to a negative experience so that I can let that negative experience go or it doesn't have such a hold on me?
[00:30:07] So I think it would really resonate with you and the work that you're doing.
[00:30:10] And how do you really create these new pathways without having to use substances or go to talk therapy, which for me never worked and kind of hardwire happiness into your brain?
[00:30:21] I love that. Now I write it down. I'm going to check it out after this. Thanks for the tip.
[00:30:25] I think you'll like it. So tell me a little bit about your keynote speaking.
[00:30:29] What do you speak about? And you're just getting ready to go do a TED Talk. Is that correct?
[00:30:32] Doing a TED Talk in a couple of days and the TED Talk will be on soul life balance.
[00:30:36] I'm going to equate the soul life balance to the yin yang or yang and explain how yang is the outer world and then relate that to isn't it easy to see that we're living double yang through work life balance and then introducing the new framework of soul life balance and then getting into that.
[00:30:55] And that's partially what goes on in the keynote of soul life balance.
[00:30:59] And then the new keynote is overcoming overwhelm, which has to do with the book overcome the overwhelm.
[00:31:05] And that's the one where I'm teaching the six step breath process.
[00:31:09] In addition to that, I bring in different experiences for workshops, not necessarily a keynote, but breath work journeys, deep cathartic releases and different activities and experiences like that.
[00:31:21] And if people wanted to find out where you're speaking or watch you on YouTube or get in touch with you, where would they do that?
[00:31:28] My website is Sam Kbert, K-A-B-E-R-T, samkbert.com.
[00:31:34] And there's a tab there that has a link to my podcast, my YouTube show, my books, all the things.
[00:31:40] So thanks so much for connecting and the social media handles are all there too.
[00:31:45] And I'll include all those in the show notes.
[00:31:47] Okay. Final question before we wrap up the name of this podcast is reflect forward.
[00:31:51] What does reflect forward mean to you?
[00:31:53] I love that question.
[00:31:54] You know, for me it's about the lost art of reflection and contemplation.
[00:32:00] Adyashanti talks about this and this was something I was very passionate about when I was like in the thick of that journey from 2019 to 2022.
[00:32:09] And what I realized in creating the space and time to reflect not only does it create those new neural networks that you were alluding to or saying,
[00:32:17] but also it gives you the opportunity to realize you always have a choice.
[00:32:23] And now you can consciously choose how you want to live your life moving forward.
[00:32:29] I love it. I knew you were going to have an amazing answer for that.
[00:32:32] Thanks.
[00:32:35] Awesome. Well Sam, thank you so much for coming on the show today.
[00:32:38] This was a very enlightening conversation.
[00:32:40] I really appreciate you sharing your journey with us.
[00:32:42] Thank you, Carrie. Appreciate you having me and thank you guys for listening.
[00:32:46] Absolutely. All right. Hang tight and I'll be right back.
[00:32:49] All right everyone. I'm back. I hope you enjoyed that interesting and insightful interview with Sam.
[00:33:01] Be sure to check out his latest TED Talk and all of his information is in the show notes.
[00:33:06] With that, I will leave you to your week. I hope you have a great one.
[00:33:09] If you like this podcast, please share it with a friend, write a review, go onto YouTube, subscribe to it,
[00:33:14] subscribe to it on your favorite podcast platform and rate it.
[00:33:18] That always helps with the algorithms and I really appreciate it. Thanks so much.
[00:33:22] Have a great day. We'll see you next week.