SPEAKER_00 0:00

So you're thinking about running, but not sure how to take the first step? My name is Brian Patterson, and I'm here to help. Welcome to Brian's RomPod. It's me, your host, Brian Patterson. And I'm back. And today's episode is one I think a lot of runners are going to nod along to, especially you if you love running, but you're also a bit beaten up, a bit tired and wondering how the hell you're going to keep doing the sport for the long haul. I'm joined by Kelly Hale from Inspired Well, and Kelly brings a really refreshing take on fitness and movement. This isn't about chasing endless miles, smashing yourself every session, or thinking about more is always better. Her philosophy is more about training the whole person, strength, movement, quality, recovery, mindset, and the stuff that actually supports your running rather than quietly sabotaging it. In this conversation, we talk about why so many runners end up injured or burnt out and how more balanced approach to fitness can actually make you a better runner and why longevity in the sport should matter and just as much as your pace or your PBs. So whether you're training for a race, coming back from injury, or just trying to enjoy running without the constantly feeling broken, I think you're going to get a lot out of this chat. So without further ado, I'd just like to welcome Kelly to the podcast. Welcome. I have an audience somewhere around here, probably under the table.

SPEAKER_01 1:56

I love it. Thank you so much. I feel like I've just run a race and people are cheering me on at the end there.

SPEAKER_00 2:02

Oh, brilliant.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

Thanks for having me. I'm honored to be with your amazing audience.

SPEAKER_00 2:07

Great. Now, before we sort of get into our chat, I usually ask my guests as to what their experience of exercise was like when you were growing up, let's say during high school. I mean, were you a natural athlete or were you much, very much into your books?

SPEAKER_01 2:27

So I definitely was a mover. I had started studying dance at a very young age and I loved it. And then when I was in high school, this was when fitness classes and aerobics were really kind of coming onto the scene. I would have a break between dance classes and why not do more movement? Because I loved movement. So I would take these fitness classes at the dance studio. And then I did that for quite a while. And one day the instructor was sick and couldn't show up.

SPEAKER_03 2:56

Right.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

So they asked me to run, they're like, you take this class all the time, teach it. And here I was a teenager, and I said, I, you know, was said, okay, even though I didn't know what I didn't know.

SPEAKER_02 3:08

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

And I said and taught the class, had a lot of fun. I realized there was a lot of growth that could happen and a lot of potential. So then in high school, I petitioned to get certified to teach fitness classes, and they didn't want to let me because I wasn't yet 18.

SPEAKER_03 3:23

Oh, oh.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

I had a patient say, I want to take this exam. And I got them to let me take it. I think it was almost 17 or just barely 17. I took the exam for certification and I loved the topic. I loved the study. And then that inspired me to study exercise and health science in my undergrad. And, you know, I loved movement. So I continued dancing through college and was doing weight training and fitness and soon after discovered Pilates. And I've never been a runner per se, but in high school gym class, the gym teacher was also the track coach. And he was trying to get me to run sprints because I was pretty fast. And I was like, well, I was just trying to get over with. And I really didn't fit it in my life with dance and everything I was doing. And to your question, I was also very academically focused. I was very focused on my studies as well, but trying to balance it all. And that's when I first bumped into nervous system regulation because I had most ADHD. And so even though I pushed and pushed and studied hard, it sometimes was challenging because girls mask it and I just looked like this great student who was doing well. But if it weren't for my movement practice, I probably would have struggled even more.

unknown 4:43

Right.

SPEAKER_00 4:44

So do you think so? You said you were diagnosed with ADHT. So was it talked about a lot at the time?

SPEAKER_01 4:53

Oh no. It wasn't talked about, especially with young girls. It wasn't recognized for me until much later in life. And young girls really mask it. You know, they look like great students and they're not necessarily bouncing off the walls. And, you know, at that time it would have been described as ADD or ADHD, and I probably would have fallen under ADD. I kept, and I still have a great ability to hyperfocus. Like I can lock in and write for six hours and forget to eat, or is I'm so locked in and hyper focused. And so it really wasn't recognized or supported at that time. And it didn't look typical. But now we have so much more understanding of how this presents in young girls and women. A lot of women I serve discover it in midlife when their hormones are shifting. So it's been something that they discover later. And thankfully, I was dancing a lot and exercising, fitness classes, strength training, what have you. So that really helped to keep my brain able to achieve at the level that I was. But I was also living in fight-flight freeze. That's how I did everything early in life.

SPEAKER_00 6:04

Right, right, right. Because you trained to become an occupational therapist. Is that is that right?

SPEAKER_01 6:10

That's correct. I love my undergrad exercise science. I did some credit rehab, but I knew I wanted to work with people that were challenged to find movement and function. You know, not everyone has the privilege of moving with EDs. And I saw that early on. My dad had a lot of challenges, had numerous surgeries, was in a really bad accident. So I knew that was a whole segment of people that needed to experience the joy of movement, but maybe in a different way. And I chose occupational therapy. I consider both OT and PT, but I chose occupational therapy because that profession really looks at mental and emotional health. It's physical and mental. And I loved that piece of it. And it's really served me well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:59

Okay. Now I know you just touched on the vital flight phrase in terms of the nervous system. Can you go into a little bit more detail about that and how let's say me as a runner or as an our audience as runners, how you know, how that can help us understand it?

SPEAKER_01 7:21

Oh, absolutely. I'd love to. So fight flight freeze is there for a reason. It's there to keep us safe. We are wired from you know thousands of years to have this ability to go into that. But the idea is to go into it when absolutely necessary and not to live there, right? But a lot of us do, and that's where I was. I was living there for decades. But I do find that sometimes people who run, if they have, if they're in fight, flight freeze, that flight part is sometimes exacerbated by running. They're running to find the runner's high, they're running to find, you know, that they extend themselves and then they feel easy after. But sometimes they can actually feed into the flight part of fight-flight freeze. So when I work with runners, I like to empower them with tools they can use before they run and after they run to make sure they're not feeding into that flight part of fight-flight freeze.

SPEAKER_02 8:25

Right.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

But people, you know, runners and non-runners, people that are active, people that are less active, they don't realize how they're getting stuff done. They look like high achievers and often we're overachievers. We're, you know, seeking that validation or whatnot. And dipping into fight-flight freeze to make it happen. And the challenge is teaching our nervous system how to regulate so we don't live there. We can go there when the saber-toothed tiger's chasing us, or you know, something happens that is dangerous, but then we need to be able to break that down, dial it down.

SPEAKER_02 9:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:03

And between those states of heightened awareness, like fight, flight, freeze. And there's also fawning too in there. But going there and then quickly coming back down. And that's what a regulated nervous system will do for us. It helps to bring us back to that baseline and only dip back into the fight, flight, freeze when it's necessary.

SPEAKER_00 9:25

Right. So the fight is, so so can you just explain those different stages?

SPEAKER_01 9:33

Sure, I'd be happy to go. So fight is that person that often doesn't feel safe and so they're very defensive. You know, this is the child that might find that they have to pick a lot of fights on the playground because that's how they're trying to find safety and they don't have other coping strategies. So that could be fight.

SPEAKER_02 9:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:53

And fight could be less physical. It could be more someone who's always ready to have an argument. Um, or we could be even fighting with ourselves, you know, that constant inner conflict. Then the flight is the person. I see this a lot with the people I serve who can never rest. The person that is in that state of flight, they're constantly running their lives, they're constantly busy, filling every moment of every day. And not only is someone who's multi-passionate, but you know, I think about a woman I've served who had a lot of loss and a lot of grief. And she can never really be still. She's always moving, always taking different classes and whatnot. And that's really her way of dealing with flight. And someone else might have flight show up in a different way. You know, they are not able to stay consistent or committed in certain areas of life. And then the freeze can show up as someone who looks like they lack motivation, the person who doesn't want to get out of bed, who is that DR flights, and oftentimes they seem slow to respond, but that's the way that they're processing because they're in that freeze mode. And so for them, a lot of things feel heavy, a lot of things feel challenging. And then the fawn that isn't talked about as much is that classic people pleaser. And we see this with a lot of women who are constantly apologizing, trying to win people's approval. I really get concerned when I've worked with some young girls who basically apologize for breathing. And I'll say, you have no reason to apologize. There's nothing to apologize for. Then we work on regulating their nervous system so the nervous system can trust that they don't have to slip into fawn. And all of us will vacillate between these, but the goal is to not go there unless it's absolutely necessary. There's a true danger, and also not to stay there for very long. It's exhausting to a person to move through London fight flight for fawn or yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:01

So basically it's do we all have these different stages? Or is it that what a person will be one of these particular stages, or they'll they'll encounter this within their life? Or is it, you know, as we as individuals, we are born like this, or we are conditioned within either these different stages? Has that been your experience?

SPEAKER_01 12:30

Or oh goodness, yes. So we all have the ability, it's a safety mechanism to be able to go into fight, flight, freeze. If that saber-tooth tie is coming, you better run, right? Yeah. So we have to have that inherently wired within us. But a lot of people, through their life experiences early on in life, they don't feel safe. So another way to think of fight-flight freeze is survival mode.

SPEAKER_02 12:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

The person becomes hyperindolent, always constantly watching to make sure that they're doing the right thing, that they feel safe. They often struggle to relax and be themselves and be their most authentic self. So the challenge is that some people adopt this or adapt this as a coping strategy to, and I joke because I lived there for years. I always joke that, you know, I don't, I don't drink the drinks we have here like Red Bull, which are like energy drinks. But I always joke that was my Red Bull of choice. Like I could just put a bit more fight, flight, free. And I didn't go into freeze a lot. It was always kind of that kinetic spinning energy. I could always go there and push myself harder and push myself further to continue achieving. So instead of, you know, reaching for something like a Red Bull, I had this wiring that made me work in that way, that I was constantly in that survival mode. And a lot of women, even if they didn't kind of grow up with that, and men too, yeah, if they didn't grow up with it, their young adult experiences, even their mid-adult experiences, can kind of promote that. You know, I think about the client I serve who's in a high-intensity law practice, and he was an environment that like really push, push, push, high demand. Yeah. Or the woman becomes a mother and she has a few children, and she's constantly feeling pulled in several directions. That can cause her to go into fight, flight freeze. And instead of coming out of it, she might constantly find herself in that place.

SPEAKER_00 14:42

Yeah. So it sometimes it can be like uh, you know, you're you're it's it's a kind of condition, and then suddenly suddenly you you can find yourself going through this and not being able to come out of it. And that is where you come into it in terms of your helping to for people to come out of this. Is that right?

SPEAKER_01 15:05

Yes, absolutely. And I'm so grateful that the term nervous system regulation is so it's becoming more and more of a common language, uh, you know, household phrase, if you will. But I'm also concerned because people are taking a few breath exercises and they're saying, go ahead, this is going to help you with nervous system regulation. But here's the thing if you're stuck by a flight and freeze, any of those, and you do some breathing exercises and your moral reflex, which is early developmental movement, is tripped up. It's not supporting you. When you go to do breathing exercises, you might feel more anxious and more agitated. And so before someone does something as lovely and basic as a breathing exercise, they may need to do some nervous movements, go back to early development so that they can access the breathing exercises without feeling agitated. I cannot tell you how many messages and letters I get from people saying, oh my gosh, doing these couple of movements, I finally understand why breathing exercises felt so hard or so anxiety provoking for me. But now that I'm doing these developmental movements first, I can then access the breath work with the intended outcome actually happening for me. So we definitely approach nervous system regulation from a very unique perspective.

SPEAKER_00 16:33

Right. So what are those movement exercises, you know, on the basic, or was it some is it something that will vary from individual to individual? So what could they do? What could Yeah, this is a great insight.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

Yeah. So there's definitely specificity to the individual. And if I'm working with someone one-on-one in person, I can actually test which of their earliest developmental reflexes that are tied to survival mode or fight flight freeze, I can test which ones are tripping up. But I serve a lot of people virtually in a group setting. So obviously I can't do the testing there. No. But in watching them and then also knowing that anyone who's in fight flight freeze, there are particular movements that we want to support. And I can describe those a little bit. So one of the top reflexes, now let me just step to the side for a moment and talk about reflexes or early development that is hardwired in the baby. And those are what helps the babies to move and explore their environment. And they have to build one on top of the other. So eventually they can roll over, and then eventually they can crawl, and then eventually they can walk and so forth. So those movements get integrated. They kind of snowball until they can do the larger gross motor movements and fine motor movements too. And what happens is a lot of us, now you and I growing up in a time where we didn't have screens, we played outside, we were all outside all day. We most likely integrated these reflexes with ease.

SPEAKER_02 18:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:08

But we're with these kids on screens earlier and earlier, and less time outdoors and less risk with their movement outdoors, they are not integrating them. And it will show up in their academic experience. But for adults and in their development and their stress level and their mental health too. But for adults like us that most likely had a kind of childhood that allowed us to integrate them, yeah. What happens is life stress, trauma, illness, a car accident causes that reflex that was in the background, that early reflex had done its work and stepped back, it causes it to come up and trip them up. So for example, I'm gonna look at three really important reflexes in adults and young people. I don't work with the people usually younger than late middle school. So we're talking, you know, not younger than 12. But what will happen is their moral reflex, that's M O R O. That's the first reflex of life. The baby comes out and they do this function, and that sets up to breathe outside of the womb. And so adults moving through that can be so nourishing, even if they're not able to have it tested. And then we can move through something called the fear paralysis reflex. We can do a gentle hands-on exercise for that that helps to calm that reflex that's very tied to anxiety, very tied, both of those are tied somewhat to the startle reflex. And so even though I might not test someone that I work with virtually, they'll tell me I'm easy, those sounds bother me. And I know that we want to support those. So those are a few of the moves. And I know we have the video. I can actually show you some of the movements if that would feel appropriate. And I also have videos with them, but those kinds of movements, I'm thinking of your runners, would be such a d to put into their warm-up. Because no matter if they're flight freeze or not, if they do a movement like the Moro reflex to support breath, they're gonna have an easier time facilitating breath with their run, right? Yeah. If they go into the fear paralysis report, they're not gonna have as much anxiety about that niche going off at mile 10 when they're training for an event, for example.

SPEAKER_00 20:30

That's right. And then I think it's so much about getting into, especially with we're bringing it back to running, is that it's very much about being able to find a rhythm. And once you find that rhythm, be it through, and I think very much through your breath work, that can help with you with the enjoyment of the exercise of with running. Because I know when you're going from like say a standing star, maybe warming up and then going into your running, you know, it's like your body's going through shock. And it's like I know for me, the like the first 10, 15, maybe 10 minutes. It can feel rather odious and then you know, quite um arduous sort of thing. And you once you get into the run, then you can feel that you're into this kind of rhythm, enjoying enjoying it.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

That's a very wise insight, Ryan, because the nervous system loves rhythm. If you look at babies moving and just exploring, you can see them rock, you can see them do rhythmic movements.

SPEAKER_02 21:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:40

And adults benefit from that. And you know, when I work with runners, I very often will say, make sure you also sprinkle some walking in, you know, walking before, walking after, because walking stimulates and nourishes the gate reflex, G A I T reflex.

SPEAKER_02 21:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:57

And that automaticity and reciprocal. Movement is so important. And then you want to transfer it to the higher level movement of running. So there are exercises you can do. For example, you can sit on the floor or you could sit down with your legs outstretched, knees straight, and alternate flexing one foot and pointing the other. And this is going to nourish that gait reflex. That would be amazing for runners to do before they start. And ideally, we'd love them to do it again at the end with their shoes off so they can really articulate through their heat. But that's a warm-up that I give a lot of walkers, hikers, and runners. Just put that in there from a nervous system standpoint. Yes, it'll feel great for the calves and the ankles and the shins, but it's really so much more than that. It's about the brain and the nervous system needing to be reminded of that automaticity, which will help you with that rhythm of running.

SPEAKER_00 22:50

Now moving on, so I've got here the gutsy brain movement. And I've got here, what is it and why should runners care?

SPEAKER_01 23:01

Oh, yes. So the gutsy brain movement is decades of my work coming together, and it's actually the name of my membership. I for years have had a wait list for my one-to-one, and I want this work that is very unique to reach others. So I decided to create this group, this beautiful community. And what we do is we do exercises that are movement-based, that help people support their gut because those early reflexes tie into gut health, digestion and elimination. And the gut health is also affected by emotions. So we move through emotions. And then the joints, the nervous system is highly connected. So we do exercises in that group where we are building stability, but first we might move through movements, early developmental movements, again, those reflexes that nourish the nervous systems for spinal health, for knee, for ankle, for foot health. And then we can go forward with strength and stability work. And another part of that is, you know, and I call it the gutsy brain movement because you kind of have to be a bit gutsy to say, let's move beyond traditional exercise and go a little deeper to these developmental movements. You have to be willing to step aside. Yeah. And it also ties to the gut health, the gut brain caption. We do org exercises. We can do actual gentle releases for all the different areas of the intestines, the stomach, the liver, for example. And then we also do moving meditations in that community. So I will be the first to tell you that I was a meditation failure and dropout because I couldn't sit and still quiet my mind. And I said, Well, I love movement. Let me see if there's a moving meditation. And I had already been a long time instructor of Pilates and didn't quite get that brain connection. I enjoyed yoga as a participant, didn't quite find it. So I went on and created it. I studied brain gym, GYN like gymnasium and system regulation and early development again and reflexes and brought in the OT and the exercise science background. And that's what goes to brain movement is. I created a moving meditation that we can kick up the intensity so it supports athletes and others. Yeah. We also have the moving meditation that brings them to the calm, which is actually really a repappen for the nervous system. So we move beyond certain movements, like same-sided, same arm is leg moving. That's the stress and the trauma lives in those kinds of movements. And then when we move to crossbody or oppositional movements, that's where the integration and the repatterning of the nervous system really comes through. But in order to get there, we have to move through the stress, we have to move through the big emotions and then invite that crossbody. So what you can take from that is anytime you're doing an exercise program, whether it's your run or strength training or flexibility work, always finishing with a crossbody oppositional movement is going to bring you back to that place of grounded calm.

SPEAKER_00 26:28

What do you mean by crossbody?

SPEAKER_01 26:31

Yeah, sure. So the simplest way I could describe it, and some people might be listening and not watching the video, the simplest way I could describe it is if you're standing and you start marching, you know, lifting one leg and then the other, and then you reach the opposite arm to that leg. So just a circle marching, but then adding a crossbody movement touching the cloud. Yeah. And there's so many movements in the plaque repertoire and in other movement practices where there's an oppositional, you know, reaching out in opposite directions. And I might take my left arm up to the corner of the ceiling and my right leg to the corner of the floor opposite, right? And so there's so many movements, whether we're lying on the mat or we're doing strength training, that we can do some oppositional movements, which really nourishes the brain and the body.

SPEAKER_00 27:25

Okay. And this kind of brings you down to a calm, as it were.

SPEAKER_01 27:29

Yes. You know, it's so interesting because people will say, I'm right brain, I'm left brain, and I have to smile because what they're really saying is when I'm under stress, I revert to right brain tendencies or left brain. For example, when I'm under stress and I'm not into creating my brain out of my body, I mean, thinking that's not as often as it used to be because I have all these tools. But when I'm under stress, I become very linear left brain. I'm a super creative person. I use my right brain a lot. For stress, I am going to make a list and then another list to tell me about my list. And I'm going to keep, you know, getting very linear. But then when I do cross body movements and go deeper and integrate the right and left side of my brain and my body, then I'm truly right and left brain as I supposed to be. Really, we're all right and left brain dominant because we want to integrate them for optimal function.