The Playbook with Colin Jonov
Formerly The Athletic Fortitude Show.... Colin Jonov’s Athletic Fortitude Show has rebranded to The Playbook with Colin Jonov, evolving from a sports-centric podcast to a universal guide for mastering life’s challenges. While retaining its foundation in mindset and performance excellence, the show now expands its scope to empower everyone—athletes, entrepreneurs, professionals, and beyond—to live life to its fullest potential
The Playbook with Colin Jonov
Dr. Sean Drake: Nervous System Periodization for Elite Performance
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Dr. Sean Drake and I challenge the grind-at-all-costs model and show why safety in the nervous system is the true unlock for speed, strength, and durability. Breath-work, emotional clearing, and smart routines turn chronic pain and burnout into sustainable capacity.
• defining nervous system periodization and safety as performance multipliers
• using breath, humming, PEMF, cold, sauna, and vagus tools to shift state
• tailoring regulation to time of day and training demands
• linking chronic pain to unprocessed emotion and protection patterns
• live tapping and breath sequence to release stored tension
• building routines for hydration, minerals, sleep, and visualization
• moving from injury prone to robust by clearing old injuries and reflexes
• coordinating teams to avoid siloed, hardware-only rehab
• compounding gains over quick fixes with tech and discipline
• doing hard things with intention to find peace and focus
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What is the most misunderstood idea about nervous system training and sports performance?
SPEAKER_00:It's misunderstood. We're rolling right in. Let's go. I think safety in the body. Uh, you know, and and I I talk about this a lot, but I think so often when we think about performance, we think we need to push harder when in reality, safety and calm and peace and chaos allows us to have that next level of capacity and performance. And so instead of being beating somebody down, beating somebody down, beating somebody down, it's that it's like that periodization. Like we look at periodization of muscle growth, we look at periodization of strength, we look at periodization of power or speed, but we don't really look at it as periodization of your nervous system. So where is that athlete at conceptually, right? Physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. And then how do we create safety in some of those areas that haven't been looked at so it raises their vibration, their ability to have a higher capacity in sports, take them to that next level? How do you create that safety? So I think it's two things. Um, I think one, you got to build trust and rapport with the client that's in front of you, right? Or the athlete that you work with. Number one, they have to know that they can truly let some of their guards down or their boundaries down that have helped survive and get them to where they're at, which is makes them who they are and such an amazing athlete. Then on the other side, I think there's ways with technology. Like if you come to my clinic, like I've got every single piece of technology you can think of to influence your system without you having to force the system. So whether we're using, you know, high Gauss PMF, we're using different types of like vagus nerve stimulators, we're working on the body, we're allowing that system to get into parasympathetic. So any way I can do that through breath work, cold plunge, sauna, and giving that athlete that ability, now I can go and train them in a higher capacity.
SPEAKER_01:When you're working with athletes specifically, and everybody comes in at a different physical, emotional, mental realm. How do you dictate who needs what type of training or what type of nervous system work versus another? What does that balancing act look like?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I think it comes down to two things. Like, number one, I always ask my athletes, like, hey, I'm a genie, you get three wishes, or my CEOs or you know, people, I'm like, what are your three wishes? Because at the end of the day, some guys think, man, okay, I I'm coming here because I have a shoulder pain, or maybe I have, you know, I can't, I can't do a certain movement. When in reality, their goal is to throw 100 miles an hour, or you know, get two extra sacks this year, or be able to um run for another 100 yards, whatever it is. So it allows me to know where they're mentally at. At that point, now I know, okay, I need to check your physical body. Do you have physical limitations? I need to check your emotional side. Like, where's your emotions at? Like, are you super angry about something stressed out? Sorry, I'm at my father-in-law's house right now, and he's got these dogs and the dog's side to eat while we do this. Adapt and go. But yeah, so and then on the other side of it too is you know, is it are we getting are am I getting somebody after they've worked out or after they've had a major, like, you know, traumatic season? Like last year, like I had one of my Philadelphia guys come back. And it took me two days just to help him with the frustration and anger around the season, right? And so we're doing a lot of breath work, we're doing a lot of different, you know, neuroemotional techniques to try to move that energy out. And once I get that, I get him bowed in and locked in, then we can go again. So it always comes down to, you know, is it the morning? Like if I've got a client in the morning that I know they're doing their workout in the afternoon, I'm gonna train their nervous system a little bit different. I'm gonna bring them up, put a ton of energy in them. If it's the end of the day and they're getting ready to, you know, they already worked out in the morning or they have their competition, and I'm bringing their system down. So it it regulates into the time of day as well when we're looking at the cycles.
SPEAKER_01:How do you regulate, self-regulate some of your nervous system? If I can't get into clinic and I have a competition, how do I make sure that I'm doing what I need for myself? And how do I know I'm doing the right things?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I think it comes, I think it comes down to it. You know, for me, it breath works number one. One of the quickest ways that you can self-regulate your breath. Uh, you know, six in the nose, six out the nose is one that I love to use, especially when like you're just trying to really get into a calm. Like it can be five to six seconds. I like six. And if you can get into that cyclical pattern of in, out, and then the advanced side of it is starting to add in like the humming. So being able to actually like start to hum on the way out. So you're getting that vagus nerve training going. And then from there, we can pretty much do anything. Another side of Vegas nerve or what you can do to self-regulate is there's a lot of tools out there now that are that are very affordable that you can use every single day, whether you're on the field, off the field, doing whatever it is that we need to do. And then from there, I think the other thing too is being able to tap into what you feel. So often, like, you know, we feel something, but we don't know how to move that. And so understanding, like, okay, I'm angry, just closing your eyes, like, where do you feel that anger in your body, right? Or like, hey, like I've I'm anxious about this competition. Well, anxiety is actually a good thing when you're a high performer. If you're not anxious, then you're not really like you're not going after, you're not really going after your stuff and you're not really living your passion. So at the end of the day, to me, it looks like one, do you have a do you have a routine? I think routine regulates your nervous system really well, especially when you're a high performing athlete. If you're just going off the cuff and being like, oh, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this. You're your your brain's working 3,000%, you know, harder than somebody who's like, hey, I got my meal prep done, know my morning routine. I'm waking up, I'm brushing my teeth, you know, I'm making my bed, I'm doing this, I'm taking my quiet time with God, meditation, whatever it is. Good. Okay, now I got my game plan. I'm reviewing gameplay, going to practice, doing my lift, coming back, doing you know, I recovery, eating, maybe a nap. So routine is a big part of nervous system regulation as well.
SPEAKER_01:Do you work with people on creating routines, or is that something you kind of leave to the individual athlete?
SPEAKER_00:No, so I do that a lot. So what I especially when you come do a three-day uh full reset with me, after that, I coach you. And so what we'll do is we'll say, okay, after the three days, I've got you pretty much dialed in to where your nervous system can do anything it wants to do. And then I'm like, okay, this is your routine for the next 30 days. This is your mission statement for the next 30 days. This is the people I need to put around you to make sure that you're successful. I'm one spoke in this wheel. Like, I'm not my strength, I'm not your strength coach. I'm not your, you know, I'm not gonna be your dietitian, but I am gonna be your your your best nervous system regulation performance coach that you're gonna have, especially when it comes to being the best of you. Like I'm gonna constantly challenge you and push you and drive you, and I'm gonna find things in your city where I know I can challenge you. And that's that's one of the fun parts about what I get to do.
SPEAKER_01:If we're breaking down what nervous system training is or what it just means for someone who may not understand or may not have a background, how do you simplify what it means to train your nervous system or what that functionally is?
SPEAKER_00:So I tell everybody this I say, you know, your body keeps score. You know what I mean? Like I'm I'm big on somatic therapy. So if there's been problems with your history of your life, that's stores. And so the simplistic way to say it talk about the nervous system to people, and I say this you have a you're a rocket ship, and at the end of the day, you got all these different softwares, hardware. You know, a lot of people focus on you know the hardware or the physical. To me, this is the software. The software runs your body. You know, it says whether or not you're gonna go into a calm state or you're gonna go into an excited state. And what we're doing is we're literally training the software, constantly updating it. And now with all these other opportunities of AI and you know, different ways to learn you, I think that we're gonna be able to see like nervous system adaptation go like this.
SPEAKER_01:How important is nervous system in relation to injuries as well? Because a big part of my athletic career and even transitioning into regular life has been injuries. I've had four knee surgeries in the last two years, one of which was substantial cartilage replacement. And to be honest, like I'm in chronic pain. I'm 29 years old and I'm constantly trying to find new ways, new things I can do to try and alleviate this pain. And so, like when we first connected, my immediate thought was, hmm, I wonder if I'm not doing something correctly with my nervous system or you know, with some of the other natural impingements that my body has. Like, what am I not doing where I can fix the pain I'm in?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I think there's two parts to that. Number one, you haven't worked through the emotional side of that injury. Not wrong. Yeah. No, no, and this is, dude, I'm telling you, like when I learned this and I started really applying this in practice, and I started applying this to my clients, it was amazing to me how much of the pain that we quote feel, even from a surgical standpoint or major trauma, that is an emotional connection. And it's just this byproduct of this pathway of when the injury happened, or you know, you gotta think about when you have a surgery, you're under anesthesia. So you're literally getting the crap beat out of you and you don't even know it. And you come out of this thing and like you know if you get in a boxing match and you get hit. If you're on a ton of demerol and you get hit, you have no idea you got hit. But like your body knows you got hit. So two weeks down the lane, like something happens to you and you flinch and you're like, what the heck? Well, your body went through this trauma. So if you don't have a way to move that energy out and move that emotion out, it's never gonna fully get better. Now, yeah, we got to look at biomechanics. We got to look at where's your strength at, we got to look at some of the external factors. But I think when it comes down to chronic pain, I would almost put my whole entire like licensed career pathway that it's emotional.
SPEAKER_01:It's something that really has been, you know, an emotional journey and probably something I I haven't dealt with. Well, I remember I had uh, you know, his name's Tony Hoffman. He was uh BMX prodigy, ended up becoming a drug addict, going to prison. Now he's motivational speaker, coach, things of those natures. And he was on the pod fresh after the surgery, you know, itself. And um, you know, we talked about the grieving process a little bit, but and it sounds silly with all the other real world traumas that that we face, even you know, loss of close family members and how deeply impacted psychologically this injury has affected me because I went from a place where this really all started when I was 26. I was like peaking in my athletic training. I was done playing sports, like okay with that. And but I was just training hard and I was just getting better and faster, could jump higher, stronger. And there was an addicting feeling about that. And then the injury happened, and it was nothing that I did, it was just something that had I learned had progressively gotten worse over time. And I was thinking, like the other surgeries, because I've had a number of them in my life, like after I would just come back and hit the ground running. Yeah. And it's been the total opposite. Like, can't run, can't jump. If I've run, if I do something competitive, I know it's gonna sit me down for a week where I can't go run and jump again. And it's just this constant like tug and pull. And I just I haven't found the way to handle it in the best way possible, even though a large part of me works with athletes on how to handle it. It's like I haven't done it for myself.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and and you know what? I was I was actually talking to my wife about this. Um, I just spent the last two days in a Disney World. And, you know, I had three of my best friends, one of his birthdays, and he's like, hey man, I know that your dad was a you know PJ Special Forces. He was an amusement park guy. You told me stories about how you guys just like murder amusement parks, and like, you know, you could hit every ride multiple times, you hit all the shows, you did everything in one day. Like, would you set up the agenda for the two days? And when I do something, everything has intention, right? And everything, it's I mean, everything is a ceremony to me in reality. Like everything that I'm doing, whatever I'm intended to be in, like I make sure that I'm 100% present in that moment. And you got to think about doing four parks in two days. That's a high capacity program, right? And you got four guys with four different physical factors, you got four guys of coming in with four different emotional factors, right? I just found out that my you know, godnephew had passed. I just found out my grandmother's in the hospital. Like, you've got all these emotions coming in, but you have a mission. And so one of the things that I love to do, especially with a team that I'm working with, or if I've got a client, and you know, the first thing we did as a group was like, hey, like, where's our check-in? Like, where's everybody at? Like, what do you need right now? Like, what do you need to feel safe? What do you need to feel to be like, hey, like this is gonna be a good two days? You know, I'm not I like what do you need? And so oftentimes I'll ask an athlete that and they're like, man, I don't know. And right there it shows me number one, they don't have safety in their nervous system because they don't even know what they want. They just want they want to play again. And, you know, I dealt with this this last season with a high-level quarterback with an injury, and you know, supposed to go draft, and now he's gonna have to push back one year, and you know, this is how the game works, especially in football. But I told him, I'm like, hey, like, no more playing around. Like, okay, you had your grieving process. Now we got to get to work. And so instead of working on the quote, injury that everybody wanted to like wait on, I'm like, hell no, man. We're gonna start building capacity. We're gonna start, we're starting to train the body, the brain, the mind, the spirit. Like, we're gonna start really like pushing energy in the body. Like, I can like Justin Pugh, and he's cool with me talking about this. Like when he had his ACL tear with the Cardinals a few years ago, one of my guys, and he's like, Doc, what do you think we can get back faster than anybody has ever done? And I'm like, if you listen to me, we'll get back faster than we've ever done. But we gotta have the right people around you. We gotta have everybody on the same page, and you gotta trust me. And we got him back, and then the Bills called him and, you know, or the Giants called him, and he, you know, he was off the couch, right? That whole story about, hey, you know, I'm I'm off the couch, that joke. Well, it happened because we had technology that not only one worked on the body, the physical body, but we did a ton of emotional stuff around it. We got we got clear, we got focused, we got programmed. And it gave him that ability to go into one last season, retire, and now he's on the air. You know what I mean? Like he moved down to Florida, he's killing it. Um so to me, with I can't wait to get you out to Scottsdale number one. Because I I think we should we'll do a podcast, I guarantee, after you come out. Because anyone who is a high-level athlete or a high-level CEO or somebody who is a driver, that that's their life, right? Like they're driving. We get a dopamine hit off that. And the one thing you said is that you were addicted to that next level, right? We have that at that man, I want to keep going, I want to keep going, I want to keep going. But I do think there's a book called Driven that I think everybody on this podcast should listen to, and I'll actually send you a copy. It's it's like as the book's going on, I'm like, man, that's me, that's me, that's me, that's me, that's me, that's me, that's me. And then they talk about their their sniper meditation program that they do with driven people to slow them down, right? So, like, we use bow and arrows. I I work with a couple mental people where we use, you know, bow and arrows to calm the system down, to focus in to get preciseness, and we use a bunch of technology. But to me, it's like when we're going through that level of pain, it's like, okay, what can I do to focus in on where I'm at? Because I know I can't be on the field right now, but I know that I can I can chop wood and carry water. I know I can chop wood and carry water. So, where can I get discipline in my life with where I'm at? That when I get back on the field, I didn't lose any of my my mental awareness, you know, I all of my like stuff that made me where I'm at, but it only enhanced that. So now I've got this enhanced mind, body, soul, and I've got a body that's ready to perform. Okay, now I now I'm gonna do things that I never thought I could do.
SPEAKER_01:Where was it in your journey and experience that led you to discover that the current training system wasn't enough and that this additional nervous system training was needed and the eye-opening experience that we all really need?
SPEAKER_00:Man, so it came down to me. Um so just to put it into context, I've been in this technology since I was in my master's program back in you know 2010 to 2013. I'd been researching everything that you could do to help the body heal faster for our rugby team at Life University, working with Emory and Georgia Tech, you know, in Kennesaw when I lived in Atlanta. But it wasn't until I went through a major divorce a few years ago, and my depression got to the worst it's ever been. And my body went from like 220 pounds all the way down to 165, 160. You know, I wasn't eating, I wasn't drinking, like thank God I wasn't, you know, I didn't drink alcohol because I would I probably wouldn't be here right now. But, you know, one of my buddies challenged me. He's like, hey, like, you know, I was suicidal to the point where, you know, I had a freaking Glock in my hand in my bathroom. And I'm very open about this now. And, you know, Dr. Greg Rose from Tiles Performance Institute called me that day. He's like, dude, something just fills off. And he was talking to me every day during my this this beginning of this divorce. I thought I'm losing everything, right? Like I've I've worked hard, I've got all this stuff, and now I'm getting, you know, it's being taken away. And my other buddy, Brian Kane, who's a top performance coach that works a lot of my athletes, actually challenged me to do an Iron Man at his house. Like I'm sitting there crying in his you know bath in his uh kitchen, and his other buddy walks in, he's like, Hey, I think you should do an Iron Man with me. And I'm like, dude, I have like I have no strength. Like I'm literally going to practice and going home and crashing. And so I had to learn how to use these tools from an emotional, physical, mental, like nervous system training standpoint, instead of saying, Oh, I'm just working on your knee or oh, I'm just working on your body. And so I rebuilt my my capacity of my nervous system through these energy systems. And then, you know, this last year, I basically got challenged to hey, dude, do have Fireman at altitude, living in the desert with only two weeks of training, and I'm like dumb. And, you know, I'm sitting there with, you know, DC current on my body. I've got a red light on my head, I've got a vagus nervous stimulator in my ears, I'm on hypoxic, I've got, you know, green light, red light all over the place. I'm doing like right afterwards jumping into cold plunge, regulating. Then I'm going into, you know, high, you know, hypo um hyperbaric. I'm I'm doing all these, I'm doing sound therapy. So like then I'd find my way into regulation, then I'd go jump in the cold plunge and re-dysregulate. And so it really came out of the pain and struggle that I was going through and the depression and the lack of focus that allowed me to take these tools that we talk about as O enhancement tools and really make them like a pure training tool.
SPEAKER_01:What was it that brought you out of the sitting in the bathroom with a gun in your hand to being like, okay, I'm gonna do this marathon training or Iron Man training. What was it that was like was able to uplift you and get you out of not wanting to be here?
SPEAKER_00:It was the people around me. It was God, honestly, like 100% God, and the people that were around me. Like I get emotionally even talking about it, thinking back to how good my life is right now, and losing my nephew last week of like, man, like I wish I could have just talked to him and been like, hey man, I was where you're at. Like, fly out and see me. Let me do some work with you. Like, I had we had no idea. Like, you know, the kid's a stud. He just brought you know Pike back on campus, and his dad and I were pikes, and like he, you know, was working at ESPN, like, and I look back and I'm like, man, I had such a good life, and we all have great lives. And like we have these little traumas, but it was the people that were around me. Like, you know, I had another buddy of mine, Michael, that would literally show up in my house and make me get out of bed and go walk the block in the beginning. And he didn't miss a day. And you know, he would get on the bike with me and he took me through. And, you know, he's he's also a very phenomenal, like acute mental guy. Like, you know, and Eric Burns and Mikwalski, like both those guys are phenomenal. And, you know, they they really like he came around and just made sure I was there. You know, I had a guy, one of my best friends, whose son is Cam Caminetti, who's now pitching for the Braves right out of high school. But, you know, Dom Caminetti like literally showed up every morning with me at Camelback and Pastor Apeak, and we hiked every morning, whether it was rain or like shine, like we were there. And so it was the men that I had around me and the people that I had around me and breath work. And like I was doing everything I could. I took improv comedy classes, like to just learn a different way to get out of my head, get out of my nervous system. And I do this with some of my players and CEOs. I put them into other things that they're not comfortable with. I'm like, okay, you're gonna go take an improv class, you're gonna go take a ballerina dance class, you're gonna go do, you know, depending on where they're at and what what I need to get them into feeling uncomfortable about. Some of them like, you're going to a freaking rage room, man. Like, go break some stuff. Like, just go break some things and put some lint biscuit on. Just like just go after it, right? Like, so I think that we're learning that there's no food in there. We're learning that there is a different way to train through experiential through experiences. And that's why, like, when you come work with me, it's not just in the clinic. You know, I may take you up a mountain, I may take you paddleboarding down a river, I may throw you out of an airplane, you know, um, to go skydiving. I may uh put you into a random theater class. I may challenge you to drive a race car. Like, whatever I feel I need to do with you to get you to know that you're you can do anything. Like, and now I'm gonna probably take people to Disney World. Like, this is no joke. Like, I really think like my part of my plan moving forward is you're gonna do your initial three day with me and Scottsdale, and then we're gonna have three points throughout the year that I'm working one-on-one with you in person in real life. And so, you know, maybe we go to an amusement park and I just bash you and like, you know, put your nervous system into the most chaotic areas and then figure out where your breaking points are, where your inner child wasn't worked on. You know, so I think there's a lot of things that like, you know, came out of this the past two days that were and and people say that Disney's magical, and like, you know, I was kind of anti-Disney growing up. We went a couple times, and my dad was a big bush garden cedar point, like big roller coaster guy. But he loved Disney as a man because his imagination, my dad pushed me to always know that anything's possible. And when the last two out of the last two days, we ended in Epcot, and I thought Epcot was like the old person park, right? And it kind of is, it has all the countries of the food. But those rides are so stimulating in your mind and your body to know that wow, like the future is now. You can create it. So be present. And I think that's that's the lesson of what came out of that.
SPEAKER_01:Tony Robbins has this saying um that I love it. It made me think of what you were saying in relation to, hey, my life is so good now. My life was good back then, is we don't experience life, we experience the parts of life that we focus on. And I have that constant reminder in my mind when I find myself down a rabbit hole with my knee or when something's not going my way or with the loss of a of a family member. And I think in particular, when you look at loss and how deeply that can cut us, and instead of focusing on the loss, focus on the amount of years or the amount of time that you got to spend with that person. If it was a short period of time that you met that person, focus on just being grateful you got to meet them or spend time with them at all and how that's impacted your life and how you can carry them forward. That's not to say you can't mourn or grief or have these, you know, perceived negative emotions, even though I don't look at them that way, but to use those emotions to generate productivity and forward movement in your own life.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Well, I mean, my dad died in 2020, right? I went in a spiral. I mean, he was my hero. He was like, he was a guy that just really helped develop my my nervous system along with my mom. My mom was, you know, supply in the Air Force, my dad was a PJ. And so like I had one side that was super detailed, logistical, like everything has to be like dotted and crossed. And I had this like chaos is life, like learn resilience. And you know, I I don't think I properly even grieved my dad until the past two days at the amusement park. And the gratitude of like where he even showed up his energy, like my buddies even saw it. And it was like, man, dad, like, thank you for all these lessons. Like to have taught me, to have like taken me into these situations that I didn't even realize I've been using with my my my clients for the last like 15 years. And it was because of him, right? And I think you know, to talk about your knee injury, two things need to happen. Number one, we need to get you back into safety. We got to get your body calm. Then we have to move the frustration and anger out of it. We got to get you out of that lower vibration into a higher vibration of like, you know, where you're at. And then we got to tell your body, hey, these are the new ranges of motion to be safe in. And then we got to train them. The physical is almost last. And, you know, we're gonna, we're definitely gonna do it when you come out. But on the other side of it, too, is like what you can start doing now is noticing, like, even let's just do this on a podcast. I think it'd be a really good little exercise, but like close your eyes. And I want you to think about the knee injury and like what happened, when it happened, feel it, and then I want you to notice where it's at in your body and tell me where you feel the frustration or disappointment, whatever it is.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so I was doing a split rear foot elevated split squat. Um, it landed, came up. There was no like significant pain. It was just, you know, felt awkward, felt weird. Tightness in like the top of my calf, and like calf like right under that extends into under the knee. And I was like, all right, whatever, finish my workout. Within an hour of finishing my workout, the knee gets like stuck. Can't straighten it, can't bend it. And I was like, I know something's not right here. So where the frustration honestly, like I feel the frustration in like my belly, into my chest, into my throat is like just real like tense, like where I feel it when I talk about it.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, so out of those three, which one's the most powerful? Like, where's the most energy? Probably my my throat. Okay, because you the thing is you haven't truly been able to speak about it, right? So this is this is the psychological side of the nervous system that I talk about. So here's what I want you to do. I just want you to tap your throat, close your eyes, and I want you to breathe big. I was like, use your voice. Keep going. Think about it. Keep tapping it while you're breathing. Nonstop tapping. Don't don't quit. Now I just want you to say this knee injury, this knee injury was a lesson. Was a lesson. And if that hadn't happened, and if that hadn't happened, this podcast wouldn't be happening.
SPEAKER_01:This podcast wouldn't be happening.
SPEAKER_00:Lives wouldn't be changing. Lives wouldn't be changing. I wouldn't be able to mentor these performance athletes.
SPEAKER_01:I wouldn't be able to mentor these performance athletes. Because of that? And because of that? And this story? The story?
SPEAKER_00:Anything's possible. Anything's possible. What I want you to do is I want you to smile, stop tapping there, and tap your sternum and hint like a dog. Big breath in. And then move your knee a little bit, like uh like just flex it, extend it, and then ah, and just relax for a second. Ah, now close your eyes. I want you to think about that again. Think about like the injury. Where's it at now? Where am I feeling it? Yeah, less in the throat, probably. Yeah, a little bit in the chest. Okay, let's tap the chest. Do this for me real quick. This is one of the things I do with my guys when down the road. Close your eyes. Breathe in. Really feel it. Think about the that injury. Keep breathing in, keep going. This injury does not define me.
SPEAKER_01:This injury does not define me.
SPEAKER_00:In fact, it enhanced me.
SPEAKER_01:In fact, it enhanced me.
SPEAKER_00:And yeah, I'm still feeling some physical pain.
SPEAKER_01:And yeah, I'm still feeling some physical pain.
SPEAKER_00:But I'm getting to change a lot of lives because of it.
SPEAKER_01:But I'm getting to change a lot of lives because of it.
SPEAKER_00:I'm gonna start to honor that and appreciate it. I'm gonna start to honor that and appreciate it. We're gonna be able to move through this.
SPEAKER_01:We're gonna be able to move through this.
SPEAKER_00:May not be back on the field. I may not be back on the field. Hundreds of lives change because of it. But a hundred lives will be changed because of it. I can do anything. I can do anything. My body can do anything. My body can do anything. Mind can do anything. Mine can do anything. Smile and tap your sternum and pant like a dog. Big breath in smile. Hold it for a second. Just feel the gratitude of what you just went through, all the people that you've been changing because of this story, this pain, this process, and then just let your body relax. Okay, think about it. Where's it at now?
SPEAKER_01:I mean, it's kind of dissipated. I feel some tingling in my fingers. I'm gonna be honest.
SPEAKER_00:So here's what I want you to do. Tap your fingers together now. That energy is moving. You've been holding onto this so tight. So let's breathe. Now here's what I need you to do. I need you to say whatever you need to say around the situation that is no longer holding on to it, but accepting it and moving past it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you know, I I think it's I have to accept, you know, I may not be able to jump 40 inches again or, you know, run super fast or be the explosive athlete that I that I once was. But, you know, at the end of the day, like what I want to be able to do is, you know, train hard, you know, be able to, you know, sit on the ground, play with my kids with without me getting stuck.
SPEAKER_00:You know, I'm gonna change this because you're going into a lot of the negative subconscious side. So we're gonna change that. So just keep tapping. Okay. I am gonna jump again.
SPEAKER_01:I am gonna jump again.
SPEAKER_00:I can jump again. Can jump again. But now I have a new barameter, I have a new level of where I'm jumping. Now I have a new barameter, I have a new level of where I'm jumping. I'm gonna jump from there. I'm gonna jump from there. And that's where I'm gonna start. That's where I'm gonna start. Anything's possible. Anything's possible. Smile, tap your sternum, and pant. Take breath in. Squeeze your whole body, hands, fists, feet, legs, quads, hamstrings. Squeeze tighter. All think about all the frustration. And then I when you get ready, I want you to yell as loud as you can and relax. You got your baby probably in there. So just just like let out a little okay. Now feel your body, feel into that emotion, feel into that situation real quick for me.
SPEAKER_01:It's out of my my chest and my my sternum, it's out of my fingers. So it's honestly kind of just like located, like my frustration is just kind of like located in the knee itself.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so tap the knee. Let's move this and move the knee up, frustrate, like tap all around in both hands. Like get on, get I'm below it, around it, moving it, turn the ankle while you're doing it, breathe. Really see it, feel it, and just like thank you, knee. Thank you, knee. For giving me the career that I've had. For giving me the career that I've had. Allowing me to have this new opportunity. Allow me to have this new opportunity. But now, but now we're letting go. We're letting go. We're setting new boundaries. We're setting new boundaries. We're gonna build better. We're gonna build better. Smile, tap your stern on, and pant like a dog. Big breath in. Move the knee. See how much different that feels. Feels better. More range of motion, relaxed. So this is this is what I tell people. I'm like, you can't just chase physical. You gotta chase the nervous system. You gotta chase the emotion. You gotta chase the breath. You gotta chase the limiting belief. You gotta chase the understanding that these bodies are meant to do amazing things. We put limitations on ourselves. You let people put limitations on us. I really get frustrated sometimes with some of the docs that I get that I collaborate with when they tell them, hey, you can't do this. I'm like, you're gonna have them sit around for four weeks? No, we're not doing that. And obviously if the philosophy is changing now, but this has been, you know, 15 years in the process of being in a career. And the more that I dive into this, it's like I touch less people now than I ever have because I now only snipe the exact area that needs to be moved or stuck or just you know processed with physically, the rest of it is this nervous system training. It's just like boom, let's go. Using Resumax, using Zen Bud, which is like an ultrasound vegan nerve stimulator. You know, the Resumax is a Vegas nerve simulator, but it's also a body tool, being able to use EQ Pro now with people like putting energy in the body, taking them, bringing their energy up, taking them down. But this is how cool it is to be able to like you as an athlete, if we can do that immediately after surgery, think about how much you know you're gonna progress your your progress right off the bat. If we can move that and get that out, because now you have a different, your your body's safe. It's like, okay, now I can work.
SPEAKER_01:Now that energy moving, right? Starts in my my belly, you know, moves up, you know, strongest in my throat, goes to my chest, goes to my fingers, goes to my knee. What is causing that energy to move?
SPEAKER_00:That's your that's so this is a root I love answering this question. That is the way that your body has put emergency brakes on to allow you to keep going. Like I tell people all the time, the best of the best, find ways to make it happen. You know, especially with my NFL guys, like they fly out for three to five days postseason, and because they've taken micro trauma like car accidents all year long. And you know, we do a three and a half day, four-day full cleanse, like mind, body, soul, like everything. And then they can go back to their families with no aggression, anger, frustration. They're focused in on off season. And they're like, it's funny. So many of my guys, when I started doing this in the NFL, especially working with the Sack Summit with you know, Max and Cam Jordan and Von Miller, like the ones that came out, like Daquan from the Giants last year, after two days, he only had two days in me. He's like, bro, I feel like a rookie. You know, I had Miguel, you know, good from the Lions come out. He's like, bro, like you just completely blew my mind. You know, Marshawn Nealing, which we know had a real a very sad situation. Like, this has been a rough few months for me, right? Like, Marshawn was like a little brother. He became like a little brother to me after the sack summit this last year. But, you know, we were able to help him work through his stuff and his body getting going. You know, that energy moving is like when that injury happened, it started at the knee, but then you, your body started holding to try to stay strong, stay stable, stay focused. And so it's constantly moving. And then it, then what happens is it has nowhere to go. So that's when we start building that more angst and disruption. And then all of a sudden, that's where another injury happens or another situation happens or a breakdown happens. And that's where we got to clear this to build that capacity back up.
SPEAKER_01:How do you use this process? Because I think about it, right? And I talk about it with you know, one of my friends who is a exec for an NFL team, and we talk about different NFL athletes that appear to be injury prone. And how do you utilize this to change that narrative in your own mind from I'm injury prone to I'm robust and adaptable? And one injury doesn't have to connect to another.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Well, I think most of the time, the the guys that are quote injury prone, no one's ever gone through their actual injury history, truly gone through it. Because a lot of guys don't want to talk about it. Like I'm a vault. Like when you work with me, I'm like, look, man, I'm here for you. Period. I want you to have a legacy. So I need to know everything. And you don't think about, you know, when you fell off a bike at five years old, or you know, you took that first hit and, you know, pop warner football, or you, you know, you you were a little bit like blacked out at this point. You're not looking at eye movement, you're not looking at the brain, you're not looking at the cranial nerves. Uh, and these are what control everything, like the quantum neurology that I also do in the clinic is you know, there's a holographic nervous system to what we have. Like we have this like 3D body, but then we have this 4D quantum world that we have around us. And if these areas are not connected, and this guy, quote, has like he has a all of a sudden has an ACL injury, and they focus on the AL, they rehab that, but they didn't look at his left shoulder where he had an AC separation, and yeah, they rehabbed him, but it's not it was never fully rehabbed. Well, that's still causing this. Now something else happens. So when you work with me, I spend like a two weeks if you're if you're local or you fly in, like, I mean, it's it's one to two days of just pure going through everything you've been through, going through your body, getting it safe, working on the areas that your old injuries are, getting that emotion out of it, getting that range of motion back, and then retrain the body on top of that. Because most of these guys that are quote injury prone, their numbers look phenomenal on their jumps, their squats, their pulls, everything, their speed. But no one's looked at this other side. And the minute you can they're they're so tense emotionally or like spiritually, right? Where they're just holding on. Well, if you're holding on to something and you're running fast, something's gonna break. If you're not in flow state and you're not in freedom, you're gonna break. You have friction. So I don't think it's that they're injury prone. They're just not looking at the other sides of these athletes.
SPEAKER_01:I feel like you're speaking to me with that right now because if you looked at any of my testing, right, even rehabbing from this passing injury, my testing's great. Like when I was back competing, like fast, jump high again, strong, one of the strongest guys in the weight room. Like you wouldn't be able to pinpoint or nitpick why the injuries kept coming. Now you could say it was because, like, you know, I was tight, immobile, and sure that does play a role. Thinking about how certain injuries, tightness had nothing to do with it.
SPEAKER_00:And is the tightness a physical tightness, or is it emotional tightness, or is it the fact that your nervous system is such sympathetic, it doesn't want you to perform?
SPEAKER_01:I feel like it's a combination of it all. 100%. And, you know, never once to your point have I ever had anyone go through my injury history. I don't think anyone where I've had any injury has really gone back to any of the previous injuries. It's always just been focusing specifically on this MRI on this injury.
SPEAKER_00:That's called isolation effect, right? And that's where, you know, even in teams, like when I when I'm brought in to consult on performance, first thing I do is we get everybody together and they're all on silos, most of them. They don't ever talk. But if you look at the best teams in the world, they're they're cohesive. So you know, like for instance, um, you know, I'll I'll give a shout out to Brandon McDaniel at the Dodgers. You know, when I was with On Base U, we came in and taught on base you to the Dodgers. And one thing that Brandon has done is he has brought the best of the best around him and as a as an organizer of information, stays on top of each guy individually. Like, so and they're looking at everything, right? And that's that's how it is in my clinic. Like, or if you work with me privately, it's like I'm not, I don't care where you are right now. Because you're right now, you're where you are because of all this other stuff that's happened to you. So, unless we go and clear this, I can't fully make you the best person right now. That's that's the wrong way of thinking. Like, I tell people all the time, like, if you're coming to me for a knee injury and that's what you want me to focus on, I'm the wrong guy. Because I'm probably gonna go after your big toe, or I might actually look at like, you know, your nostrils. Like, I, you know, there's so many things that I look at from a from a balanced perspective. I'm gonna look at your breath, I'm gonna look at your hearing, I'm gonna look at your balance, I'm gonna look at, I'm gonna scare the living crap out of you in unique ways that you're not even gonna know. And I'm gonna check your primitive reflexes from when you were a kid because you probably still have some of them. And those are keeping you, those are emergency breaks when you try to perform. So once we clear out all this emotional baggage from childhood, we clear all these like patterns up. Now all of a sudden you're like, man, I I didn't even know I was this good. I knew I was good, but I didn't know I was this good. Like, that's that's how it should be. Like, unless it's a major trauma, like, oh my God, that guy got hit, he separated. Shoulder, that's the only time I focus on acute injury. Like if it's an acute injury and you got pain, hell yeah, we're going after it. We're gonna get it back quick. But if it's chronic pain, I'm like, look, shut up, listen to me, let's go after your old crap. And I promise you this and not only that, but then we got to say, what's your chemical structure like inside? You know, what's your blood work look like? You know, guys that like you and I that are aging, like most of them, their testosterone sucks. You know, their cortisol sucks. They don't sleep, they don't even eat, and they're and they're going to crossfit workouts and hydrox workouts and burning their nervous systems out, which I am not against. But I'm also like, guys, like, come on now. Like, look at where you're at and and you're wondering why you're in pain. Well, you don't have enough water, you don't have enough, you know, electrolytes. Uh, you're probably not in ketosis when you need to be in ketosis. You're you're probably eating the wrong food that you're allergic to. So you've got this histamine response. Like, there's a whole rabbit hole of the nervous system that we can go down another day on biochemical, but like, you know, I try to stay out of that or for out for a lot of that because it's not my passion. And it's a really, it's it's one of the things that I know what I'm great at, and that's what I'm gonna stay great at because that I'm gonna become valuable within that, right?
SPEAKER_01:And if I try to do everything, that's when I'm like, I become a master of a ton of things, and or you know, I'm good at a couple a lot of things, but I'm not a master of how do you think some of those other external components, like you factor in phone, screen usage, all the different opinions of the world, particularly when you're uh an elite level athlete, how do those things factor into disrupting your nervous system?
SPEAKER_00:Dude, it's so I have a rule with a couple of my guys that are in MLB, and you know, I I make them play Call of Duty post-game. And because number one, they're still in a competition, but it allows them to come down, right? And not only that, but now they're social with buddies. Like so it creates this community effect to bring them down. I've got some guys that you know I'll have go through a certain breath work, you know. I have other guys that I'm just like, dude, we need we literally need to get you to rage. So there's a lot of ways to go after it.
SPEAKER_01:What is the is there like anything that you think is like non-negotiable everybody has to do and it works for everybody, or is it truly unique to the individual?
SPEAKER_00:No, I think there's things that everybody has to do. And then some of those things. Yeah, I think peace, meditation, quiet time, and whether or not you believe in God, you have to believe that there's a higher power somewhere. Like you need to take time and really pour into that faith, into that consciousness, into that like level of like anything is possible. I can't do this on my own. And whether that's you when you're in that moment or those 15 minutes or whatever it is, maybe it's your family you attach to that for a second, or you have your why, right? But you have to take quiet time. You have to really like the best of the best that I that I work with and the ones that I know, they have that morning quiet time, or they have that visualization time during before the game, or you know, so that's a non-negotiable to me. Like you have to have your visualization and quiet time. You've got to make sure you have the right amount of water and high quality water. Like, water is so important. Like, I am I'm mostly on water, you know, and and like because high quality water is so important. You know, there's so many chemicals and crap in there, and when you're an elite athlete or you're a high performer, like hydration is one of the best things for you. Making sure that you've got quality uh electrolytes and minerals. You know, your body can't work without minerals and you know, quality electrolytes. I think the other thing too is sleep. Like you gotta be on top of your sleep, and you gotta get into a routine with it. You gotta make sure that you know that um what your REM sleep is and where you actually are at. And you've got to have a system, like for me with my guys, I have them go through their body with ResMax and I put them have them put a Zen butt on before they go through and maybe listen to solo tones um from Solodome and put them into a little bit of a pattern frequency-wise to bring them into that grounding before they go to bed. I have them visualize the greatness of the day. What they, you know, and I don't ever say like what I do bad. It's like, you know, what did I do good? What can I do better? And so it puts them into this mindset already of like, okay, I'm ready for tomorrow. One of the things that I've I've started adding into my programming of my distance guys is all right, listen out like five things you did the best today. And then like tomorrow, what's the first objective that I'm hitting in the morning? And what are three bullet points that I'm gonna hit throughout the day that's gonna make me better for the next day? And so if that's maybe like meal prep, eating, calling somebody that you know they're frustrated with, making that meeting with their coach, making that meeting with whatever they need to do to get out of their head so that way they can focus on where they are.
SPEAKER_01:If you could describe how you want people to realize how this affects them, yeah. How would you describe the immediate and long-term benefit that they're getting from implementing this?
SPEAKER_00:So I'll tell you two things. Number one, never look at short-term gratitude and gain ever. The things that feel good, yeah, they're great. Don't get me wrong, I can put you through something right now, you'd be like, Sean, that was amazing, but it's not sustainable, right? So I tell I tell all my high performers, I'm like, you have to understand this is a commitment, this is a discipline. And then you're gonna see a compounding effect at some point where you're like, holy crap, like I cannot not do this. And it really comes down to it's so easy now with technology to be able to do things that we used to not be able to do. Um, but at the end of the day, if you have your routine and you have your ability to find peace and let go and forgive, a lot of things can happen in your body and in your in your career.
SPEAKER_01:How do you find peace for yourself with everything that you have going on?
SPEAKER_00:Um, my wife's a big piece of it and my dog. Um, you know, my wife has a way of being able to really ground me. You know, I'm a million miles an hour all the time, right? And like Steve will tell you that too. And but I think some of my things, I have to be active, like and and not just like normal active. You know, normal active doesn't do it for me. If I'm not pushing four parks in two days, climbing mountains, jumping out of airplanes, then I'm not I'm not really being at full peace. Underwater, scuba diving, sailing on a boat. But when I don't have that, the way that I find peace is I do a lot of reading. Like I'm I'm reading a couple books right now, War of Art. And it's when he took he was a Marine and he talks about how he's an artist, but he's a you know, he's a writer now. And he says the reason that he most artists fail is because they're not willing to endure the suck. And Marines are the best enduring the suck, and they make fun of a lot of the people and all the other forces because you know they're pampered or they have better living, you know. But Marines are like, nah, man, like I can do anything. Like you put me anywhere, anytime, I'll endure the suck. And so I I tell my players, like, you have to find ways to feel the suck. And, you know, whether that's getting in a cold plunge, getting up at 4 at 5 a.m., getting on a mountain for a sunrise that you don't want to be at. Whatever I whatever I don't want to do, I do. And that's when I find peace. Because I'm like, man, okay, like I didn't want to get up this morning. I've been on the road, you know, last two days, you know, we got in late last night, and then, but I'm committed to this, and it got me up and I'm at peace. But had I had I canceled this and laid in bed, I would have had all this angst and frustration and just all these disappointments inside my body. I'm like, do what you say you're gonna do, number one, and then do hard things. And it doesn't have to be things that that push you past the point of breaking, but do hard things each day, and you're gonna find a peace really, really quickly that you've never felt.
SPEAKER_01:There's something to be said about doing hard things because I found in my own life I'm at my most joyous when I'm doing hard things and overcoming them. Whether that's physical, mental, emotional, you name it, when I'm doing something that I perceive is hard and I overcome it, I am easily in my most joyous state. I don't know why, but I do know that's when I find myself most joyous.
SPEAKER_00:Well, it's genetic, right? We're warriors. We're meant. We're meant to be in the arena, we're meant to be on the field, we're meant to conquer. And when we have that, that's when we're at peace. When and I I do a lot of studying on, you know, the Vikings and Rome and a lot of in the art of war because of my dad. But like, I look at a lot of it and it wasn't about the killing, the murder. It was the challenge, the like, oh man, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go into England and this cold weather, and I'm gonna be in these horrific areas and like you know, you look at Washington, and yeah, they were miserable, but there was a joy within that that fight for what they wanted and what they needed and what they they drove towards. You know, Tim Ferris talks about it as like, what's your why? And if your why is big enough, then you are gonna do hard things to get it. And when you get it, it's it's the best drug there is, right? Like we're the drug, we're just feeding this drug constantly. Like, with, you know, do we want to do we want more of it or do we want less of it? And so to me, I'm like, give me more. And when I get less of it, I'm not the best me.
SPEAKER_01:I can't thank you enough for for coming on today, man. You know, if if people want to reach out to you, they want to get a hold of you, where can they find you? And is there anything in particular you're working on right now that you want to promote?
SPEAKER_00:No, I appreciate that. It's so funny because everybody always asks me this on podcasts. I'm like, no, no, no. I'm like, yeah, you can always see me at Dr. Sean Drake, follow my wife, PMF Pilates, he's a modern athlete. But I'm finally announcing it to the world. Like, I'm going all in on my coaching and my my intensives uh this next year. I'm gonna be taking probably 10 high-level clients only and then doing some, you know, some small stuff in the clinic itself. But I want to find the best of the best in the world that want to be their best, and I'm gonna be putting that program out. We're running our three-day intensives at the clinic now. I'm only gonna take so many per month because it takes a lot out of me. These are eight, nine-hour days on top of integration, then you know, post-care. But I'm going all in on the intensives because I that's where I see the biggest change and impact I can make in the world right now. Running my, we're gonna be running our first uh performance men's camp for you know, whether you're a high-level athlete, CEO, um, maybe you're a dad that wants to just level up. This is not a come in, get the crap beat out of you. This is gonna be a very unique container that when you leave, you're gonna be refreshed, but you're also you're gonna be so dialed in that you know you can do anything. Um, and then we're gonna put people around that. Uh other than that, I think the big thing is um get ready with EQ with what my wife does. Like we're gonna be really pushing the modalities that we have out into the world this year, teaching that. And then I'm launching modern modalities for people who want to learn how to use modalities to manage their nervous system.
SPEAKER_01:Heck yeah, man. I appreciate you. This this was a fun one. Uh pretty cool to get to to do some unique things on here as well today. So thank you again, man. Listeners, thank you for tuning in. Tune in next week. Uh download the pod, subscribe to our YouTube channel. Five stars only, baby. Thanks, Sean. Yeah, bro.