017: Sex Addiction, Romance, and Artificial Intelligence, with Patrick Eilers, MA, LPC
Speaker 1
[00.00.00]
Welcome back to Real Food Mental Health with Cody Cox. Today we have an inspiring guest, Patrick
Eilers. He is a licensed professional counselor based in Michigan, but he's recently transitioned into
coaching. In 2023, he became a certified Professional Life coach and is set to launch his own practice.
Bloom works concepts and coaching with experience in therapy for anxiety, depression, addiction,
particularly sexual addiction. Patrick has also taught at Concordia University, Ann Arbor and Jackson
College. He's passionate about empowering individuals to navigate life's challenges and achieve their
goals. A guest recently told me that something like 95% of podcasts fail within the first few episodes,
and I can see why. Because there is so much time and energy that goes into the production of a show like
this one. If you would like to support me in the production of this podcast, go to coffee. You can pay a
couple dollars or you can pay more if that's something you can afford. But either way, I'm going to
continue to produce free content for as long as I possibly can because this information is so important
and I want everybody to be able to access it. Thanks so much for listening today. Welcome to the Real
Food Mental Health podcast, where we explore the powerful connection between mental and physical
health. My name is Cody Cox, a holistic nutritional psychotherapist, and I'm here to guide you on a
journey to true wellness mind, body, and spirit. If you're tired of quick fixes and want real solutions that
address the root cause, you're in the right place. Let's get started on your path to lasting wellness.
Welcome back to Real Food Mental Health with Cody Cox. Today's guest is Patrick Eilers. Welcome,
Patrick.
Speaker 2
[00.02.04]
Thanks, Cody. Appreciate it. Uh, looking forward to being here.
Speaker 1
[00.02.07]
So, Patrick, you are a licensed professional counselor in Michigan, but you've also gone to life coaching.
Tell us a little bit about why you've transitioned a little bit more to the coaching side of things. Yeah. So
I'm been a counselor for about nine years now. And, um, so I've been in the professional space, uh, you
know, for almost a decade now, kind of working to some degree, whether it be individual counseling,
couples counseling. I was an adjunct professor for a little while teaching intro psychology. Uh, one of the
couple universities here in locally and Michigan. Um, so I've done some different things in the field, but I
really, you know, the last four years or so, I've been working specifically in the, uh, the realm of sex
addiction. Um, so that's been kind of a specific niche for me. Um, relatively new. Um, and I learned, um,
if anyone's familiar with Doctor Patrick Carnes, he's kind of the, the, uh, the founder of that particular
program that we learned and we kind of learned everything, you know, basically from how to help
people. You know, at the beginning of their recovery process all the way to the end. And that includes
going through disclosure with their partner and those kind of things. And one of the things I noticed
about it, just right off the bat, or at least a couple of years into it, was that, you know, there were a lot of
people who were going through this. You know, it's a 3 to 5 year program. It's a pretty intense, um,
amount of therapy that you have to do. You know, I could think about it like, uh, that old show, this old
house or this old house with Bob Vila. Kind of like you had to deconstruct the whole entire home in
order to kind of get to a foundation and kind of rebuild the house. And so one of the things I noticed is
that some people were not in a position that they needed that type of intensity. You know, there was
certainly an element of people getting burned out. You know, a year or two into the program and there,
you know, at the point where they're kind of like, hey, this is just, you know, I want to continue to go
forward because this is what my partner wants me to do. And this is what all the experts so are, so aresaying to a degree. Um, but for me, it's a, it's a really struggling. But I'm at the same time maintaining my
sobriety. You know, I'm not acting out anymore. I'm not having a healthy relationship sexually. I'm not
watching porn, etc..
Speaker 2
[00.03.59]
So one of the things I started looking at was just the idea of like, how can we start to change some of
these things in the field from a perspective of just being able to be more impactful, more inspirational,
um, really helping people who are kind of in that in-between space, the people who maybe don't need to
take their whole house apart, but maybe those people who need kind of a initial space, you know, six
months or so, six months to a year kind of service to kind of move them in a direction. And, and life
coaching really offers that. Um, I think about, you know, kind of going the show idea like, uh, the life
coaching is more like bar rescue or like Gordon Ramsay. Right? It's kind of a short term kind of kick in
the pants, you know, give you some really good tools, kind of redo some of those spaces you're going to
gives you kind of a jumping point and then down the road if, if that's something that isn't maintaining,
then that's where you might have the more of the conversation. Looking at something like a recovery
program or, or deeper level of therapy. But I think there's a lot of people in that space between those two
things. And so that's that's really kind of what motivated me to want to move into the life coaching space.
I'm I'm calling it mental wellness coach, but same, same kind of idea, uh, being in that sort of space of,
um, just helping people in the short term or the shorter term rather than necessarily the long term.
Speaker 1
[00.05.04]
Yeah. And I mean, coaching definitely reaches a broader audience. And so good for you for recognizing
that need. I definitely think there's there's a need for, um, professionals who can help people through sex
addiction. But in your opinion, I know you have years of experience in this. What would you say is the
number one cause of a sex addiction? Because that one seems to be pretty controversial. Like, some
people would even say, it's not even a problem to have a sex addiction. But what's the cause of it?
Speaker 2
[00.05.36]
Yeah, there's. You know. And if I'm stumbling here, the easiest answer probably is just to say that, you
know, it's a case by case scenario. I mean, that's probably the most honest answer I can give you as far as
everybody kind of has their own story. I really think it depends on some age groups, and it depends on
kind of where people's experiences have been as they've grown up. So you look at people who are prior
to the internet, so I'm talking, you know, people who have been, you know, 18 and up before 1995. Let's
just say that as our year, um, most of those folks usually have had some type of experience with
pornography or a sexual abuse scenario or, um, an early sexual experience with a partner, you know,
whatever that is. I mean, not that the people that post that haven't either, but certainly those folks usually
have a more of a foundation in those kind of what I would call traditional type of, um, addiction spaces.
So when you're looking at sex addiction, there's about ten different criteria we'd look for and they would
meet. Not that the people post 95 wouldn't, but certainly those people would would probably fit much
more. The traditional type of, you know, um, basis for where that would start. So some of those type of
things I just gave examples of. Post 95 ish or repost internet. So like I was born in 1989. So I kind of was
born in kind of a little bit of both, both eras. But certainly when you were when you're older, when
you're, you know, sixth or seventh, eighth grade, you know, the internet was kind of at a position where
there was still a lot of it was and it still is. There's still a lot of it that we're learning about how it affects
human beings. But certainly at that point in life, um, you know, getting kind of caught up in the
pornography space was pretty easy and still is. And it's one of the big reasons why people are struggling
with it as young as eight, seven, six years old. I mean, there's there's kids that are real young that are
getting getting hooked and they're getting hooked because they just they have access to it. And because
there's a curiosity factor and because there's a, you know, getting away with it. There's a lot of different
things at play. And when those things start to elevate, then what ends up happening is, you know, again,it becomes an obsession. So when that becomes an obsession, that's where the sort of addiction piece I
think mentally comes into play. Then your body likes to do the same thing over and over again. You kind
of pair those two together. You start to have a consistent pattern over and over again of how I, you know,
I cope with my stress, right? My stress is coped through pornography or some type of sexual behavior as
reduction of stress and those kind of things. You know, typically it's pornography. Sometimes it can be
pornography, assisted masturbation, sometimes it's masturbation alone. Um, those all kind of fall in that
same kind of space. So the reason I kind of identify those two differences is because I think people who
are older, their story is going to look a little different. They're going to have some type of physical
encounter before they have pornography become later, usually a later concern, sometimes not all the
time. But um, but the younger folks definitely have more of a this has been built into their life. This is
how they learn how to cope with it when they were five, six, seven years old. So you see a completely
different type of attitude toward it. I think from the perspective of this is just what's worked for me. I
might not like it, but this is what I this is the only thing I found that helps me. So it's a different type of, I
think, approach to it than somebody who maybe had pornography. And then they kind of get away from
it, and they got married and they had unhealthy relationships. And then later on it circled back to porn.
It's just a different kind of journey. So I do think that certainly people who are younger have a different
type of challenge with it. And again, you can't escape with a lot of stuff. With the internet. You can't
avoid everything on the internet. You can't avoid I mean, you can do what you can do, but I mean, what I
look at it is either you're going to be able to put boundaries in place that are going to keep you from
having less opportunity or you're going to have opportunity. And opportunity will present itself no matter
what, even on things that are not supposed to be sexual. I've talked about a lot of other podcasts about the
idea that, you know, there's a lot of hyper sexuality and things that aren't meant to be sexual. So you see
it in Instagram all the time. You know, there's the the girl hiking in the mountains and there's a really
awesome view of this great mountain. But then there's also a girl here in the corner wearing yoga pants.
Now, inherently, this is not about trying to sexualize that particular, um, picture. And I'm not saying that
that was an intentional thing, but it's become something that can become very sexualized for people who
view that. And even if it's not something that's, you know, explicit sexual material, so you keep adding in
some of that stuff, you keep adding in the, you know, people have this access to it all the time, coupled
with opportunity, which usually comes in the form of, you know, the phone going in the bedroom or the
bathroom because we have a very intimate relationship with our devices. Um, opportunity continues to
present itself. It becomes a cycle. And you see kind of over and over again. So like I said, sort of
different ages sort of play it differently. But, um, that seems to be one of the things that does have a
pretty big impact on folks in their their kind of continual behavior. There are certainly generational
nuances to this. And in my professional experience, I used to work with a lot with pornography still kind
of do sometimes, but it seems like a lot of it comes from a lack of like a sense of connection with other
people. So. So it might be relationship based, but then, like you said, some people are coming from a
physical experience first. And that makes me wonder about sexual abuse. Mhm. Yep.
Which, which I guess you could also tie into relationships in some way. But but what have you seen with
Speaker 1
[00.10.37]
that.
Speaker 2
[00.10.43]
Yeah. Sexual abuse can be definitely be something that people have experienced in that. I wouldn't say
the way the way I look at it is I wouldn't say it's common, but I wouldn't say it's uncommon. And again, it
depends really on sort of the person's, you know, age range and experiences, etc.. So it would be one of
those ten criteria that you would look for. You know, again, compulsive behavior. That would be in one
of those. It would be in that criteria. But again, that not everybody has all ten of those criteria. Sometimes
they, you know, have nine of the 10 or 8 of the ten or whatever. But it's rare for somebody to have well,
it's mostly rare for somebody to have all ten of those things, you know, be part of their life. And it could
be a variety, you know, it could be depression, could be a struggle with, with like you said, relationships
is a big part of that. Um, other type of psychological, um, or physiological issues in the family certainlyis a big part of it, that generational gap that you talked about. Um, so there's some things in that that
would be in those, those criteria that we would look for. If you're talking about diagnosing sex addiction,
there's a lot of those things. Again, with diagnosis, you know, there's there's kind of that space where,
you know, in order to be diagnosed, it has to meet X amount of criteria, but you have a lot of the er
symptoms that are sort of surrounding it. So most likely um, it probably lends to that, but doesn't really
mean that you are diagnosable. I think with the sex addiction, if I remember right, it's you have to have at
least three of the ten. So you know, it doesn't there's not there's not a huge space there between before
that becomes, you know, diagnosable in that sense. Um, I wasn't aware that there was an official
diagnosis for sex addiction. Well. So no, you're right. So I guess let me rephrase that. So when we use
when when you're when you're a CSat. So certified sex addiction therapist we have an assessment that we
use called an SDI sexual dependency inventory. And that inventory will give you criteria that looks for
those for those ten particular things. And or in order to sort of be leaning toward that idea that you
probably diagnosable as sexually compulsive or in that sense, that would be the kind of official term, um,
you have to meet that criteria. Otherwise, if you don't, if you meet one of the ten, you wouldn't be, you
know, you're not qualified to be in that space because there's not an official diagnosis. A lot of times
people get, you know, sort of secondary diagnosis. I think it's compulsive, unhealthy, compulsive
behavior or unhealthy sexual behavior. I can't remember something like that.
Speaker 1
[00.12.56]
So I'll typically diagnose people with unspecified impulse disorder,
Speaker 2
[00.13.00]
something like that, or like a generalized anxiety. It's a pretty common one. Um, so I sometimes I put if
people have more depression symptoms, it would be an unspecified depressive disorder with a secondary
of. Um, yeah. Of something of sexual. Unhealthy sexual behavior.
Speaker 1
[00.13.17]
So kind of jumping back to the origin of sex addiction, I have noticed. Um, well, I tend to analyze the
social influences of these things, and so. So I have noticed that younger generations are definitely in a
harder spot when it comes to these things. You were mentioning how it's very normal to take your cell
phone into the bathroom, because that's that's an intimate thing. It's we have this relationship with our
smartphone. But the problem with that is we have easier access to this pornography. And it's not even it's
not even just plain pornography. It's it's the soft porn that you were describing earlier to where it might be
Instagram, it might be Facebook. And I'm hearing a lot of my clients say, yeah, I was doing fine until I
saw this Instagram post where it's like, it's a girl in a bikini or, or even just yoga pants or something.
That's that most people would think is pretty innocent. It can trigger this cascade of obsessive thoughts,
which then leads to. Relapse?
Speaker 2
[00.14.27]
Yep. Very common. So
Speaker 1
[00.14.29]
if you were to treat somebody with sex addiction, what are some of the more common methods that you
use that seem to help most people?Speaker 2
[00.14.37]
Well, the program that we were in kind of approached it from three, three different perspectives. So there
was the individual therapy that you did with with someone like me. Um, there was the component of
working in a group with another group of guys who were struggling with some of the same kind of thing.
And then there was a, a, a what they call a sponsor. So similar to like an AA type of thing. Um, having
somebody who's like a one on one relationship and I think you kind of hit the nail on the head earlier
when you said it's a lot about relationship. Um, the two of the biggest areas is seeing that people respond
to a lot that they talk about or shame, which is a big reason why people don't get any help. They stay
isolated. The more isolated you are, the more likely you're going to probably continue those behaviors.
Um, the secondary part to that is that when you when you're isolated, you're going to just like I said,
opportunities is there. Um, so when people don't get involved with and there's, there's lots of groups out
there beyond just hours, so that the program we were part of is, you know, that's Doctor Kearney's
material, but, um, something like sa so sex politics, anonymous sa uh and SLR those are kind of three of
them. And they're very similar to like an AA program or 12 step. And really the idea there is to try to get
more people together that are struggling with something similar, to build those relationships, to build that
community and then being able to move forward. Now, the one difference about Doctor Kahn's program
is that there's a therapist that's facilitating those groups. So it's not the same kind of thing as it would be,
like in a group where you're coming together and everyone's kind of sharing their experience. And that's
kind of this, the typical model that moves forward. It's self-directed, whereas in the Doctor Kearns group,
you're you're the one that as the therapist you're facilitating that, that direction. So it's kind of like a half
and half between like it's
Speaker 1
[00.16.14]
actually group therapy rather than a support group
Speaker 2
[00.16.17]
closer to it. Yeah, it's a little more so what they call it process groups. So it's it's similar to it's kind of like
a half and half between like a, like an educational piece where you have material you're following and
then also having an opportunity for people to share. And you know what their reflections are on feedback
and stuff like that. So it's kind of a mix. Um, and people seem to respond to that pretty well. In my
experience with the groups, the groups can get very, um, very tight knit. They really they really build a
lot of camaraderie there. They like to hear each other's stories. Um, it takes a little while to kind of build
that up as you kind of go forward. But once you once everyone usually shares their first step or their kind
of their story, uh, people are a little more open to kind of talking more, more openly about things. And
so, uh, the group group work was always pretty successful. I felt like as far as their, their improvement in
relationships. The one on one relationship is important because they're, they're building that sort of, um,
space so they can continue to be more transparent. Um, again, that's something they're practicing with
their partner too. But certainly when you're in this relationship with a sponsor, you you kind of learn that
they're a safe place as well as the therapist. So that model seems to work pretty good for how to how to
treat how to sort of attack it. I guess if you weren't going to be in a program, I would say getting involved
with some type of group or or, you know, something like that where people are struggling with some of
the same things and whether it be 12 step or a faith based one would be CR uh, celebrate recovery. And
just being able to share your story, I think is a pretty big piece. Making those connections. And then as
you continue to move forward there with that, having some type of, um, either life coach or, um, a
therapist or somebody that's, that's, that knows more about sex addiction than just the average therapist.
Not that average therapists don't know a lot about it because they work with it a lot, too. But CSat
specifically are usually trained in kind of helping a person go through a program like that. Like, you
know, there's a book material they can help them out with. There's, you know, certain reflections that can
help out with certain things. You look at maybe a little different than the regular therapist might. So, um,
there's different ways you can do that. Um, but those are some things you can consider when you're
looking at treatment.Speaker 1
[00.18.16]
Um, yeah. There are a lot of support groups out there. And I was going to mention my church does an
addiction recovery program, and it's got it follows the same 12 steps as AA. Yeah. But it's it's altered. So
we've got a, a pornography addiction group and a general addiction group. And so theoretically you
could go to this with any sort of addiction. But you mentioned the value in having peers. So just working
through this as a group and having knowing that there are people in your group who are dealing with the
same thing or a similar thing that can be powerfully motivating, which can then. Be more likely to
guarantee your success in overcoming it, or at least finding improvement, right? And then, like you said,
there's also value in having a therapist one on one or a coach one on one, because as you build that
rapport, that personal, personal or professional relationship with this person, then you can go even farther
and more deeply into your personal problems.
Speaker 2
[00.19.17]
Yeah. And a lot of times, you know, especially with the sex addiction piece, is that, you know, it tends to
be that it it does encompass a lot of people's lives. You know, I always like analogy I use when we talk
about kind of what does that look like in your life is, you know, it's a fish tank. You know, your fish tank
is full of all kinds of things in your life that are alive. And if you drop a couple drops of red food coloring
in the water, the water is going to turn red. You're going to have to learn how to navigate your life with
this red water. You can't take the water out. Everything else dies, so it does touch all parts of your life. If
if the secret is broken, so to speak, or comes out, you know, certainly can affect not only your personal
relationship with your partner, um, can create a lot of what they call partner betrayal trauma for a partner.
Um, they become hypervigilant and kind of what's knowing, you know, there's a loss of trust, those kind
of things there. And then beyond that, you know, the effect of, you know, could be affecting your job,
could affect your other parts of your personal life. And I've had people where, um, you know, they're
they're acting out in the bathroom, you know, they're going at work, they're going they're taking the
phone in the bathroom and, you know, masturbating in the bathroom, those kind of things and those that's
not uncommon for that to happen. Um, but that's again, part of that intimate relationship with the device.
And so, uh, part of those opportunities are breaking that relationship you have with that device. Um, and
so a lot of that is, you know, trying to remove the device from intimate spaces, which, you know, again,
include the bathroom in the bedroom particularly.
Speaker 1
[00.20.34]
And that can be so hard. It kind of depends on, on your lifestyle, really, if you're a student, if you're a
professional, sometimes you really need to have your phone with you. But a strategy that I like to use is
I'll have people change their phone to grayscale, okay, where they can still essentially do most things on
their phone. It doesn't lock them out of anything, but grayscale really reduces that dopamine spike that
they're getting when they see the bright colors on the screen. And so it's way more boring to the brain.
But it tends to work as people keep it on grayscale. And yeah, I do have people come back and they're
like, well, it was annoying. So I changed it back to color. But the people who keep it on grayscale
significantly reduce their screen time.
Speaker 2
[00.21.19]
Yep, that's a great idea. Um, I know there wasn't there was an app out there that does the same kind of
thing. It minimizes a lot of the or changes a lot of the way things look. So it's much more minimized.
You know, it's either black and white or grayscale, like you said. So there are some really good tools outthere with those kind of things. And I'd recommend the same kind of thing. Yeah. If you can get a way to
make it be something that's not so, um, you know, giving you kind of the constant feedback you're going
to it'll be you'll have more success I think breaking it.
Speaker 1
[00.21.44]
Mhm. And are there any specific apps that you would recommend. I know of 4 to 5, which is specifically
like a kind of like a social media app, particularly for pornography addiction. But would you recommend
any specific apps.
Speaker 2
[00.21.58]
Yeah, there's about three that we would typically use. Uh, the big one that a lot of people know about is
Covenant eyes and covenant Eyes. There's there's pros and cons to it. The, the pro is, is that, you know,
it's a it's a it's pretty good on catching a lot of stuff. Um, it's a it basically has a, a report every I think it's
every day it prints out a report and sends it to an accountability partner. Um, I recommend not the
accountability partner being your partner. Being your partner. Um, it needs to go to somebody who's
exterior to the relationship. Because I think because a lot of times it triggers a lot of partners in that way.
But, um, some partners insist on it just, you know, it's a whole different conversation. But, um, yeah. So
covenant is a good one. Uh, there's another one called, um. Uh. I can't think of the name of it now. Uh,
it's kind of like a hybrid of the same thing. Like, there's a there's a little bit of a of a component of
accountability, but it's it's not as much it doesn't give you reports all the time. Basically just whatever
pops up that's a concern. It will send an alert. And then there's ones that, uh, there's some like the, the
kids kind of apps where they have like or like gab phones. I know that's a pretty big one as well. Um, you
know, to just basically eliminate the, the ability to be online. So there are some things like that that can
be really, um, that can help a lot, just as far as being able and like I said, I can't think of any specific
name, so I apologize. But, um, there are some of those kind of things out there like that that can be just,
you know, again, it's kind of a total lockout, but, you know, if you may need that, if that's where it comes
to me. Again, depends on kind of where you're at personally. But, um, those things can really make a big
difference.
Speaker 1
[00.23.27]
And I think the, the lockouts have to be self-imposed for most people, because if it's a child and they feel
like their parent is just restricting them, they're going to find some way around it. When it's self-imposed,
you, you kind of remember in the back of your mind what your why is like, why am I doing this? Why
does this matter? Which makes you more likely to respect those self restrictions?
Speaker 2
[00.23.48]
It can be, you know what I've what I've discovered is that sometimes the the excitement is to try to find a
way around the thing. So that's another part of it is that and even if it's self-imposed, I've had people
where they just that's what they find. It'd be entertaining to try to find a way to get around it. Um, but like
you said, if it's self-imposed, sometimes they already know how to do that. So that that does take some of
the excitement away of it. Sometimes a partner will be the one that will put the restriction in so they have
the access to it. And that kind of feels more like you said, same kind of thing. Like mom and dad are kind
of taking something away from me. And then I think the curiosity goes up. So there's it depends on the
person. I think it has to be a little bit of that balance to that for sure. Yeah.
Speaker 1
[00.24.23]And I found particularly with like a screen addiction, for instance, when people put on the screen time
settings on their iPhone and it tells them you've reached your screen limit for today, what do they do?
They just manually override it and they keep doing what they were doing. But I always tell people at
least it's making you think twice about
Speaker 2
[00.24.43]
it. Mhm. Yep. It's
Speaker 1
[00.24.45]
giving you an option. So it might be better to turn it on anyway, even if you know that you're going to
override it because it makes you, makes you start being aware of what you're doing where you might not
otherwise be
Speaker 2
[00.24.56]
aware. Absolutely. Awareness is huge. I mean, I think at any kind of time you're working on yourself. It
all starts with being being aware. It all starts with understanding kind of what you're doing. And and I
find a lot of people have good awareness. They're just there. It's the awareness. And then the continued,
you know, sort of acceptance of that awareness I think is a big, a big challenge sometimes. Acceptance is
a huge challenge. I do a lot of mindfulness work and acceptance. I've come up with three main parts of
mindfulness that I teach everyone, and that's awareness of the present moment. Acceptance for the things
that we can't change. Acting on purpose for the things that we can change. Now with that wording, you
might notice that the it has some similarities with the Serenity Prayer, and I did. I actually did lead
Alcoholics Anonymous groups years ago, not realizing that what I was teaching was part of the Serenity
Prayer. So it's coming from these 12 step groups. Um, but I kind of wanted to segue into more of the
Alcoholics Anonymous. The spiritual focus of the 12 step groups a little bit more.
Speaker 1
[00.26.04]
Um, how do you typically address, from a spiritual standpoint, something like a sex addiction?
Speaker 2
[00.26.12]
Yeah, the big thing, I think, you know, from a and again, this is somewhat sort of also what Doctor
Kearns would teach in their, in their program. And again, I think AA and essay and a lot of the 12 step
groups would also agree. And a lot of the work he did was kind of based on their experience of AA in 12
step. And the success they had, um, is really the idea that, you know, it comes back to you. You talked
we talked earlier about relationships and that's part of it. But I think the big part of it that people are
missing is their purpose. What is their purpose? Um, I really like have you ever heard of Simon Sinek?
But he's got some really good material out there for, uh, businesses. But one of his things is The Golden
Circle and his his three are, you know, the what's your early? You said what's your why, you know, how
are you going to execute that. And then kind of, you know, basically what's the third one I think is, uh,
you know what your, what what is your, you know, what's your what what what are you going to do in
order to execute your how and your why, so to speak. So basically like. So there's a purpose there. That's
essentially what I'm trying to say is that there's a basically brings you a vision for where you're going.
And one of the things I used to tell the guys when I work with them in the program is that, you know,
like your vision is your down the road space. Like if you're in a mountain range, you know, the first
mountain you're going to climb may not be the highest mountain, but that's the first place you're going to
start. When you get to that, the top of that mountain, it's going to give you the vision for it to keep going.So what does it look like in five years? What does it look like in ten years? What's your vision down the
road? You know, what's your mountaintop moment that you're going to get to, that you're going to be
able to see? Now, it doesn't mean it's going to look the same when you get up there, because you can
imagine what it might look like when you're down at the bottom. When you got to climb up to the top of
the mountain, it will look different, but it still will be fulfilling of what that vision is. You need that sort
of guidance in that way. And so spiritually, I think you got to have a purpose. You know, if you don't
have a purpose to what you're doing, you'll it's all just sort of kind of, you know, there's really no where
you're going. You have no direction and up, down, backwards, forwards. And it keeps people sort of
stuck in that space of just continually doing what feels good versus what feels what's healthy. And I
would say or say, you know, again, you know, especially with like masturbation, those kind of things.
Right? Those can give us temporary relief, but they don't necessarily cure the the internal distress, which
really is, you know, the lack of purpose or the lack of relationships or whatever it might be. So I think
spirituality plays a big part because it gives you for a lot of people, it gives them the anchor, gives them
that space of like the base of where they're going up to the top of the mountain. Another analogy you can
think about, like a cable car. You know, if you're at the bottom of your rock bottom is the bottom of that
valley, and the top of the cable car is the vision that you're going to get to, and that car is going to go all
the way up that side of the mountain to get to the top. So you got to have that purpose because that's
that's what's going to ground you at the top of that mountain. So I think spirituality plays a huge role in
that. And again, for a lot of people that, you know, I'm coming from a Christian background, so it's going
to be mostly relating to a Christian perspective of, you know, God's God's got a purpose for your life.
God's got purpose for where you're going. You know, there's a reason why you're here. There's a reason
why your life's been the what. You know the story that it's been. And if you, you know, hold to that and
understand that there's more going forward than just where you're at right here in the moment, that, um,
you'll have that direction to move forward. And now I'm kind of simplifying it, but that's sort of
essentially the idea is that you got to have someplace you're going to see yourself going to. It can't just
be, you know, better than what it is. But that's a lot of times that's the first thing. People are, right. You
know, I say, I'll say like, you know, what's your vision? They'll say, well, I want to be a better husband or
I want to work out more or I want to, you know, eat less food that's junk food. Or I want to not watch
porn or whatever it might be. And those are all great goals, but they're super vague, like they're just kind
of sort of, you know, broad. You got to narrow those down into being very specific. What does it mean to
be a better husband? What does it mean to be a better partner? What does it mean for you to to eat better?
Is that three meals? Is that all meals? Is that two meals? You know, the more specific you are, the more
that vision becomes clear.
Speaker 1
[00.30.00]
I fear that things are getting worse. In terms of you mentioned sense of purpose, and earlier I mentioned a
sense of connection. Um, we're becoming a lot more isolated. And and in our culture, I don't know if it's
just America or if it's so kind of a worldwide thing, but in our culture, we tend to celebrate independence,
individualism. But essentially we are we are taught to be self-sufficient and to not need other people. And
the internet has exacerbated that. But what has that done to our mental health? I think not very good
things. I think it's good to to serve other people, serve your spouse, serve your children, serve serve your
siblings or whoever it is that you're living with and the people that you see outside of the home. It's good
to to learn how to serve better, but many of us are just sitting at home or staring at Instagram during our
downtime. We are losing that sense of purpose. We are losing that sense of connection. And these are
very, very important things that a lot of people are losing. And I would say most of it has to do with the
internet. And so if we can get up and start moving physically, we're going to feel better. If we can start
interacting socially, we're going to feel better. There are so many ways to do this. Um, and I would say to
a sense of purpose. That's a hard one to attain, because a lot of us feel kind of caught up in a trap of
having to choose a career. And once we get in the career, we feel stuck forever because we have a
mortgage to pay or rent to pay, groceries to buy, things like that. And so sometimes it might be you're
keeping that career that you hate, but you're adding some hobbies that you love on the side, finding
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Speaker 2
[00.32.36]
Yeah, I've talked a lot about other other podcasts I've done. One of the things that I feel like we haven't
really answered, and we really won't be able to answer for probably another 50 years, but is that, you
know, we haven't really seen the lifespan of a human being from birth till death with the internet. And
what does that mean for us if we ever saw that, what does that look like for, you know, us versus people
who've never. You know, we have people who've been born with the oh, nothing but the internet, but we
haven't had people live the entire life cycle through it. I think what you said was spot on. I mean, there's,
there's, there's there's a lot of disconnect. And so there are some ways that it has brought us together. I
mean, obviously it brought us together for this conversation, but in other times there's ways it just
disconnects us. And so I think that because of that, the screen become has become a barrier for people to,
um, be vulnerable. And that's kind of what you're just speaking to, is that, you know, the ability to go out
and to to be physically active, to be socially active, to be interactive, whatever that looks like. Those all
take some, some level of level of vulnerability. Maybe not a ton of vulnerability, but a little bit of time. I
think the less vulnerable we are, the more likely we're probably going to just stay cocooned and isolated
from, because we don't want to step out into that. Um, one of the things I saw a lot, and I've seen pretty
much through most of my time working with other folks, has been that vulnerability is such a huge piece
of why they aren't able to move forward, because they just they feel like they, you know, who really
cares about me? Who's really close to me, you know, can't trust other people? I mean, those are some of
the bigger, bigger questions that they ask. Um, they may not be verbalizing it like that, but that's what it
seems like. It comes back to, you know, so what? What are we as human beings? How are we able to,
you know, step into those spaces that are incredibly difficult. And, you know, I'll be the first one to say, I
think I think it's, you know, therapist. That's a hard place to be to because we, you know, we get the we
get the opportunity to walk alongside people, but we don't get an opportunity all the time to to share who
we really are with those people. Um, right. And so that relationship that's with other people, I mean, I
value those relations I have with my with my clients, and I always have. But I also recognize at the same
time, uh, ends up getting into this venture of being a business owner and kind of, you know, doing it for
myself, that there's also spaces where, you know, those relationships are always going to have some level
of distance because that's the professional space that I need to be in. And so because that's that's what's
going to help them. So, uh, you know, it's hard it's a hard practice to want to, to want a, want to and be
also then execute that same idea. Um, we can live we can't live on intentions. And I know I'm that's
something I'm really not very good at. I, I want to live my life on intentions and I'll live my life and
execution and, um, that's something that I think is a big part of, you know, just being human. We have to
be able to step in that space. That's not easy to do. And across the
Speaker 1
[00.35.19]
board, thankfully, intentions are a good starting point. It gets your mind heading in the right direction.
But then you're right. You actually do have to take action for anything to happen. As far as I want to shift
back to relationships a little bit more, because that's another really common issue these days. So we kind
of talked a little bit about how that ties into sex addiction. But then also, what would you say to the
couple who maybe maybe there's no sex addiction there, but there's a whole lot of conflict, isolation, lack
of purpose, lack of connection.
Speaker 2
[00.35.59]
Well, I do think there has some ties to sex addiction. Maybe not in that behavior, or maybe that's not part
of what either of them are doing, but I love there's a John Gottman quote for those who guys who know
John Gottman, um, he talks about this idea that disillusionment leads very predictably to, um, or
loneliness brings a direct correlation to disillusionment. And when we're disillusioned, it's very easy forus to look for the exact quote is real or alternative or real or alternate possibilities. And I think that when
there's a lot of conflict in a relationship that that elevates, you know, we start having the wandering eye,
the wandering eye gets, gets stronger when we're disillusioned in the relationship that we're in. You see
this in dating. You see this in marriage. Um, you see this in friendships. I mean, I think less with
friendship, but certainly with within dating in, uh, in, um. Marriage for sure, that that disillusionment can,
can really lead to a lot like we talked about, right? Instagram becomes you might not be looking at porn,
but you're looking at the girl that you know you wish, or that person that you wish you were with because
they have such a great looking life. Um, there's this person over here that they're able to do things that
that that's a real person, a real man. Real woman does those things. You know, when you start comparing
your partner, when you start stepping into that space, um, that's a slippery slope because, um, if you're
not bringing yourself back to some level of reality, um, that fantasy just grows. And I think that's a
fantasy that gets fed. You know, before in the past, it may have only gotten fed, hey, once a week or
maybe once a month or something like that. Maybe there was a coworker who had you saw every once in
a while that you had a comparison with. But now with the internet, there's more than, you know,
thousands and thousands and thousands of possibilities on top of that being every day. I mean,
disillusionment, just, you know, that just comes in like a wrecking ball. I mean, you're not you're all
you're going to do is compare your partner with everybody else. And then I think that also spills into
yourself. How do you also compare with other people and your relationships with with yourself, and how
does that look like for you? So know, I think a lot of conflict comes from a place of yes, it's not being
able to necessarily work through and hear each other as a couple, but it also is about what you're doing on
the outside of the relationship. Um, it seems like the relationships that turn back into themselves are the
ones that allow for those, those spaces of continued learning. And one of the things I used to talk talk to
couples when I worked with couples was that, like, sometimes this isn't about always necessarily coming
to an exact resolution to whatever this issue is. It's being able to know that you have somebody who can
hear you and somebody who can understand and somebody can relate and somebody who can verbalize
that and return to you. Now there's some issues. Absolutely. You have to some come to some conclusions
with, but there's some issues that are also just that's the person who they are and they're different than the
person you know. So you see this a lot when people get, you know, grow together. Right. You one
person grows one way and a person grows another way. Um, if you've committed to being with that
person, then you have to adapt to that. Um. Not easy, not fun, not something you want to do. Um, but it's
something that is part of that commitment is like learning how to grow with that person and loving them
for where they're at now versus where they were five years ago, ten years ago, 15 years or however long
you've been together. And so I think one of the things that happens with dating in this, in this, in this part
of the society now, is that dating has become very much about instant gratification. I imagine this person
should be this way. So they look this way, they act this way, they, etc. I find this close to the person I
could to that. When that doesn't meet the specs of what I want, then I just move on to the next one. And,
you know, going kind of back to the sex addiction piece is that you see, people have a lot of compulsive
relationships, um, in some cases. So there does seem to be something about this idea that I'm unsatisfied
or I'm not satisfied with this person. I keep trying to find what they kind of call the cosmic lover, this sort
of perfect person that's out there. And social media just amplifies that idea 100 times over every single
day. Um, and so I think there's a big piece of that that's also a player in now, too. If people talk about
wanting a relationship that their grandparents or their parents had, you know, 30s, 40s and 50s, 60s, you
know, that era. Well, they didn't have the internet. They didn't have as much comparison. And the ones
they kind of found somebody they stayed committed to that person. Um, no matter what happened. And
so that's, that's, you know, it's not impossible to do that. But I do think it's a different kind of challenge
now than it was then, because you didn't have the same level of bombardment of options, because
disillusionment comes pretty quickly. Kind of back to what you're talking about a little bit earlier. Yeah.
So I've been telling people for years about what I call compare and despair. I've actually seen that term in
the research because when I was in graduate school, a major focus of the research that I did was on social
media's effects on mental health. And they used the term compare and despair in regards to possible
causes for depression and anxiety. And I can definitely see that. But I never thought of compare and
despair and how it relates to relationships. That makes a whole lot of sense. You go on social media even
if you're not on social media, you watch YouTube, you see things online. It's hard not to compare. Right.
And then that makes you that essentially that that develops what you call that disillusionment.
Disillusionment and makes you dissatisfied with your current relationship. And you're totally right inthat. I often think about my grandparents who grew up in small farming towns when they were dating.
Life was a lot simpler. I mean, they had landline telephones and that's it. It was expensive to make long
distance phone calls. Yeah.
Speaker 1
[00.41.44]
And so when they were dating, there wasn't a whole lot of compare and despair. I mean, yeah, there's
always that high school drama. And I think it was a thing back then too. Sure. But once they started
dating, they were pretty well committed to each other. And they didn't have that perfection mentality that
you were describing. And I even experienced this when I was single. You and I are kind of at the older
end of the millennials, and we have seen that where when people are dating, they're looking with kind of
a shopper's mentality. Yep.
Speaker 2
[00.42.13]
It's a consumeristic dating. That's what that's what it is. Yeah.
Speaker 1
[00.42.16]
I don't know if you have experience using like an app like Tinder. I used to use it, but, um, I, I noticed
that even back then when I was single and I was using these dating apps, I was like, people are being so
superficial. They're looking for this perfect partner. And they're not finding it no matter what. They're
always going to be disappointed because of the perfection that they're looking for.
Speaker 2
[00.42.39]
Yep. And I think this is really where, you know, and I probably lean to just this being more with men
than women, but I think it could go both ways. Um, this is right. This is where pornography, I think,
really kind of takes a jump for people who are younger because, like you just said, so. So you go into a
consumeristic type dating approach. Right. With with apps. I never use Tinder, but I've used Bumble and
Hinge actually by my wife on hinge. But the reality of it is, is that like, you know, it's a consumeristic
approach. So like if you don't feel like you're going to be at the top of that sort of food chain, so to speak,
right? You're always going to sort of have those, you know, rejections or ghosting or, you know,
whatever else you want to call that, you know, sort of in that space. And how does that create a belief
system around what you experience with when you see this, this fake, this fake experience on with
pornography. So I think about like point of view videos, right. The point of view video is really about me
having this sort of pseudo intimacy with this person who is a beautiful person, who is going to tell me
what they want to do to me, okay. So I get to get an immediate hit from that, that I can experience much
quicker in a way that takes literally sometimes, you know, I can take 15 seconds to find what I'm looking
for. And again, it depends on where people are in their experience, because sometimes it's about, you
know, seeking that that particular thing out or whatever. But let's say you get to that point, um, and now
you're bringing the disillusionment in because now you're seeking that's your that's your standard for
perfection, your standard for perfection person, or in this case, um, cosmic lover is somebody that's a
porn star. Now, you're not gonna have any relationship with this. They're never going to meet this person.
But you're sort of mind talks, you know? That's what you're looking for. So now you bring that into
consumerism, consumerism, dating. Now again, you could look at that from a church or from that church
the way I think about it. And this might be offensive to people, but to a degree, in the church realm, it's
the person looking for the porn star who goes to church. That's that's what you're looking for now
because you've made that standard. And so if you're outside the church, it could be the porn star, you
know, fill in the blank, wherever that is. And so you're you're suddenly now have this bar that's
unrealistic, not real. It's fantasy based. And so now you bring that into where our world is already
swirling, swirling with with fantasy anyway, that's nonsexual fantasy, but still fantasy nonetheless. It just,you know, you get I just my imaginary mind. My mind goes to the fact that silicon being a washing
machine, a fancy you're just never going to be unless you purposely try to pull yourself out of it. You're
going to be, and you got to be back in the reality somehow. And that's where it gets hard, I think, because
our brain likes the idea of having those standards, because it's just, you know, that's what's enjoyable. It's
able to think about being with person X or whatever the case is when you're single. So that's where I
think the disillusionment comes with. A lot of that disillusionment comes from.
Speaker 1
[00.45.17]
Yes, yes, we developed this this fantasy standard. Yeah, that's a good point. I mean, I was thinking too,
that we have a lot of apps, these these photo editing apps, the filters on our cameras, I all these things,
even if it's a picture of a real person, it may have been tampered with to make it more appealing. And in
many ways it could be more sexualised than reality. And so what are some ways that we can be cautious
of that and kind of step away from that mindset?
Speaker 2
[00.45.54]
Well, I think you bring up a really good point. I mean, I think we're, you know, we're at a point where, I
mean, as much as we might not like to think about, we're kind of at the precipice of what's going to be
opening up. Like we're kind of like we went through like the narrow tunnel, so to speak, to get to the
where it's going to just the chasm gets much wider, I think very quickly. Um, we didn't get into the idea
of sex robots. We didn't get into the idea of what I can do with those, those things. But there certainly
were on like the cusp of that. Um, there was a video I saw in one of the trainings that they showed they it
was a it was basically a years difference between, you know, the robots. I think it was the one was like
2014. The next one was like 2015 or 16. And the first one you can see, you know, we we could obviously
tell, you know, it's a robot. I can tell it's not real. Right. But when you get to the 2016 one and so this was
ten years ago now almost, almost. Um. You had that really weird feeling of this. This is this is just real
enough to look like it's real, even though I know it isn't kind of thing. So that's a space where, you know,
what does that do for us now? How does that change relationships? Are people going to have
relationships with robots and that relationship with human beings? Yeah, I into that and all those kind of
things. And we've had, we've, we've heard already how I can affect that, you know, affects therapists in
the sense that people are trying to find ways to make that be their, their their empathetic response or, you
know, whatever they want to word that, um, but you had that you had the sexual component to that. What
does that do? And how does that change? You know, there's a lot there's a lot there. We don't even really,
you know, know how to get into. But to answer your question, how do we kind of kind of get away from
these ideas of, of, you know, the false reality I think is really being about, you know, like you said, I
think it I think exactly goes back to what you talked about earlier. It's about being in relationship with the
people who are in front of us. Um, it's about getting out from behind the screens. It's about getting away
from having the intimacy with a device and have intimacy with a human. Now, again, that's that's easy
for us to sit here and talk about that. I think it's easy for us all to say, okay, this is a good way of doing it,
but I do what I do like is somebody I know, somebody personally, who actually has gotten into the idea
of just doing a year long unplug of of of their, of all their social media and etc. and those kind of things.
That might be a really good thing for some folks. It may not be a year, maybe it's six months, maybe it's
three weeks. But I do think doing some type of fast to like, to some degree like that is a really good thing
to do. Um, you know, and then also being intentional, going back to that word, taking your fasting time
and going and doing those things that you're not doing when you're on your phone. So like you said,
going out and doing the walks, going out and, you know, going to the store and interacting with people
and going to do something new and social or going to, um, volunteer somewhere or do some hobbies you
like to do, whatever that is to help you be in reality. Now, I think, you know, from a media consumption
perspective, we assume reality is like the news versus social media, when really both of those are sort of
in a fantasy space. They're just different, right? It's a different sort of target that they're looking at. Right?
When you're when you're in social media, it's everybody's opinion versus the media is one specific
opinion kind of thing. So it's not really what's true. It's about, you know, really what can feed the
entertainment so to speak. And I think that goes back to the idea of fantasy. So so I think being presentand again doing things like, um, so one of the things we used to do with the guys a lot of times was like
learning how to just go out and spend five minutes outside in your backyard, you know, where five things
you see, four things you could hear, three things you can touch, two things you can smell. I mean, those
are all grounding exercises, but it's the same kind of concept. I mean, you're you're getting yourself away
from the screen. You're getting yourself into something physical. Um, so some of those are definitely
things you can use in that way to kind of get you back in reality.
Speaker 1
[00.49.28]
Essentially, by doing that, you're getting your mind out of the internet and back into your body. And it's
going back to those mindfulness principles I mentioned earlier. This is why I teach these principles,
because I've noticed these things are pretty well lost if we're not aware of ourselves. We lose our minds
in the internet. We become mentally unwell, our relationships start falling apart. We we develop
addictions, all kinds of things. Even our physical health starts to suffer as we're more sedentary and we
don't go outside. And I was thinking to the work that I do is very dependent on the internet. I mean,
obviously right now we're reporting we're recording a podcast remotely over the internet. I'm sitting in
my office. I wish I could be outside because it's actually nice weather right now for early February, but
I'm going to go outside later for sure. I'm going to do it on purpose so I can be in my body in the present
moment and just be part of life instead of just part of the internet. So you mentioned AI, and I am deeply,
deeply concerned about AI because especially those who are part of generation Z seem to be. I wouldn't
say that they're totally dependent on it, but they're definitely starting to get that way, at least the few that I
have spoken to. So, I mean, these are college students, current college students, high schoolers. They're
starting to use AI a lot more, especially to help them write papers in college. And the professors are are
well aware that they're using AI. I think professors have this idea that it's just this inevitable technology.
We just have to be okay with it. But I'm noticing that people are losing their ability to think for
themselves.
Speaker 2
[00.51.19]
Yeah. And it ruins critical thinking. It
Speaker 1
[00.51.22]
ruins critical thinking. It ruins creativity. And I'm not going to lie. I've used it a little bit myself, but I'm
really cautious about it, because I want to keep the mental skills that I have to create outlines to to write
blog posts and whatever it is that I'm working on. But then once in a while it does make sense to use that
because it is available. And so we just have to be mindful of what we're doing once again, get our heads
out of the internet and back into our bodies.
Speaker 2
[00.51.53]
Yeah. Yeah. There's a there's an AI course, uh, from Google. That's actually really good. I took it, uh, last
year because I was interested in how it applied to what I was, you know, what I was doing. And so, you
know, creating outlines and doing some different things like I'm doing right now, you know, making my
program or talking about earlier. Um, you know, those have been really helpful. It helps me to put that
together and it helps me to go through and edit it and those kind of things. But one of the things that they
teach you is that, you know, you're not you're not supposed to just put in the prompt, take the prompt and
copy it and keep it. It's you have to go through it and re-edit it and try to make it your own as best you
can. You have one of the things about it. Yeah. And so one of the things I noticed even with like that
lines, it's tough, is that sometimes it works out exactly the way you would word it anyway. So you have
to kind of get creative. And how do you change it and those kind of things. So, um, but I'm with you. I
think there's certainly a number of it that you want to be. You want to be cautious about how much you'redepending on it, because it does something that you said ruins your critical thinking and rules your
creativity. I know people who will take it. Like you said, write a blog post and give it an opportunity to
clean it up. Maybe get some punctuation right. Like, I'm terrible with grammar. I like to write, but I'm
like the worst punctuation in the world. So, um, so for me, that would be like that would be useful for it. I
would really benefit from that in that way. But yeah. Um, but I'm with you. You got to kind of you got to
use it responsibly. You got to use it ethically. It's something that's not just a dependency. Um, because
otherwise it will be. Absolutely you won't. You will just type in this one sentence prompt, and I'm gonna
get all this feedback from that way. And I, I imagine as time goes, there probably will be some
limitations that they'll put in place so that it doesn't just become something that, yeah, it'll be the Wild
West. Otherwise everybody will just be able to do whatever they want to do. And that's not that's never
good.
Speaker 1
[00.53.34]
Yeah, I have seen some things already where they're talking about regulating like AI generated images.
They need to have a specific watermark to to make it clear that this was generated by AI. And it's not a
real photo. Um, but I didn't explicitly tie this back to addiction. I could potentially be an addiction. As we
become more dependent on it and we we lose the skill to think for ourselves.
Speaker 2
[00.54.02]
Yeah, sorry if it if it gives you the type of. Yeah, if it gives you the kind of response that you're hoping
for. And that's a, you know, that's a, a coping skill to some degree. Absolutely. I can see that too.
Speaker 1
[00.54.12]
Yeah. So we're coming up on the end of our episode. Patrick, I wanted to ask you one question. If you
could change one thing about the way people approach health and wellness, what would it be?
Speaker 2
[00.54.23]
Yeah, I think the biggest thing is just to know, like, I mean, one of the things I always say, um, is that,
you know, we're none of us are really alone and we're all kind of in the same space, right? We're all
learning it together. We're all different parts of our journey. Um, none of us. You know, when you talk
about healthy, you know, there's no there's no ideal. You know, I think as far as, like, a standard, I think
everyone's, you know, healthy in their own. They gotta figure out how to be healthiest in their own space.
Now, there's things that certainly are unhealthy. We don't want to do those things. We obviously want to
get into be more healthier. But I think it's a people tend to be really hard on themselves, on, you know,
it's like being that, you know, being perfect or not, right? It's the pass fail type of approach. I know for
myself, that's something that I tend to struggle with. So, um, it's about consistency over time. And we
talked so going back to like addiction like that's a big part of it. You know, understanding relapses are
going to happen. Understanding that this behavior is not going to change overnight. You got to be patient
with it. Um, so in the same idea health and wellness is really a consistency. It's a process. It's a lifelong
process. It's not something that just all of a sudden tomorrow you decide, you know, you know, you love.
You love eating broccoli every day for every every meal. Like that's just not going to happen, right? You
gotta you gotta sort of build over time and build it into your life. Um, I think the other thing, too, is that
health and wellness is also something that, you know, in different seasons is going to look differently in
different places. You know, your physical health, your your mental health, your emotional health, you
know, kind of going back to like eight dimensions that I was speaking about earlier. You know, there's
eight dimensions and there's all different kinds of wellness. And it's never that pie. It's never, like, ever
solidified. Right. It's always changing. And so there's many things in our life that are going to knock that
that pie apart and going to change it and going to modify it. You know, different things are going tohappen in our lives. Can we accept those things? Can we can we take on those challenges and can we
kind of move forward and being able to know that they're going to help us grow as people? Um, the
health and wellness journey is a growth process. It's not just a one and done. So I think you know what?
The only thing I change is, is, is helping people have that perspective is that it's not just about, you know,
the one time choice you make, the one decision you make. It's a process of, you know, small choices you
make over a period of time. It gets you in a further direction. Um, you can't move forward in your life if
you don't take the furlough type of earlier. Take the first step of execution. It's not. You can think about
going in that direction, and the intention is a great first step. But the second step to the first step of
thinking about it is also then executing it. Um, and for some people that's, that's in some seasons is much
harder than other other ones. It doesn't mean that you can't do it, but it does mean that, you know, what
are the things that are going to help you get to that point? Is it going to be a support person? Is it going to
be a therapist? Is it going to be a coach? Is it going to be, um, a trusted friend? Is it going to be a podcast
you listen to? Is it music you have? Whatever it is, it helps you start to execute. I think that's a big thing
to consider that. So knowing that health and wellness is not something that just happens, it's something
that you have to be intentional and continue to work at.
Speaker 1
[00.57.14]
It's an ongoing process and relapse is part of the recovery process is what I was taught in addictions
counseling. So okay, one last. Thing. If people wanted to find you to work with you, how could they find
you?
Speaker 2
[00.57.29]
Absolutely. So. Um, no, I don't have a website, but I have a Patreon channel that acts as my website. So.
Patreon.com. Um, it's free to become a member. Um, we do have a ten month subscription if you want.
Deeper if you want more stuff there. Um, but all the podcasts they do, all of the, uh, other some of the
resources I put up there. Articles I like, articles I find things like that are all up there for free. Uh, you
certainly are welcome to, uh, to join that. Um, the email is bloom cc@gm.com. Uh, that's my direct email
for the company. So you can get in touch with me. Um, there's also a therapy portal link if you go to my
Google business. Uh, so if you look up Bloom Works Concepts and Coaching LLC on Google, there's a
Google business page you can link right to my therapy portal, and you can schedule. And I do offer free,
free consultation, 30 minute consultation for people who are interested in want to work with me. Um,
they get an opportunity to see if it'd be good, good to work together and, um, kind of set up kind of what,
what my other perspective with the business is. And then we go from there. So, Um, those are some ways
you can reach me. Also, you can also reach me on LinkedIn as well. Uh, it's Patrick Eilers, Ma, LPC, um,
and Bloomberg's concepts and coaching. You can look up through it through there as well.
Speaker 1
[00.58.38]
Okay. Great. And I'll put those in the show notes. Okay. Thanks so much Patrick.
Speaker 2
[00.58.42]
Thanks so much Kelly. Appreciate it. Good. Good conversation with you.
Speaker 1
[00.58.46]
If you enjoyed this episode, make sure you leave a review that really helps me out. And also subscribe to
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