Yeah. How? How often do you engage in specific nervous system and quotes regulation type activities?

If I'm not pull training, which I haven't been because it's just been so cold, probably if I'm lucky twice a week realistically. I have a consciousness, you know, with Nate, you know, nose breathing. So obviously I'm not, I'm not walking around mouth breathing. Yeah. But as far as like a practice or something, a side's dedicated to breathing, maybe twice a week. And then if I'm pool training, it's for sure three days a week because in a way that whole training, that's what you're doing. Because that's how you're recovering. That's how you're doing everything is, you know, getting offloading CO2, down regulating, oxygenating, going through the whole

thing. Yeah. What would be the highest leverage nervous system regulation? Sounds like such a kind of annoying word to use for that. It's a little bit too much. How do you calm yourself down? What's like the best technique to calm yourself down if you're feeling anxious and feeling stressed? As far as a technique to

provide for someone else. Very, you know, very easily for me is once I learned that if the exhale was longer, so five seconds in, seven seconds out, let's say, ish, I might kind of drop into that kind of pattern to drop into my parasympathetic because that takes no time at all. 90 seconds to two minutes. And so rather being something that I'm mentally trying to sort of tell myself, I just click over to let me pay attention to my breathing pattern and get those exhales longer than those inhales. And then I also noticed the tension in my body when I'm doing that. So I'm a person who will put on a mask. So you know, the jaw, all my muscles tighten up. I get very kind of, you know, it's like, it's like the worst elements of stoicism. It's like taking things that are meant to be good and sort of going a little far with them. So I've used that also as something to pay attention to and scan very quickly top to bottom where am I holding tension and just being conscious of as the exhales happening, sort of invite that tension from that area of the body to also go with those exhales.

That's a really beautiful thing to share. You have a tendency of putting on a mask. Do you, why do you do that? What do you think, what do you think that originates from for you?

Oh, I think, I mean, I think we all have variations of it, right? Because we have to be a lot of different people in the world. I think mine, for me in particular, maybe was exaggerated. It probably started when I was very young. I didn't, I didn't live with my parents from age two to seven. I lived with a different family friends, a couple that were friends of my parents. So I don't know that I was given a ton of emotional kind of latitude as a kid. So I think I can remember sort of feeling like I was going to hold on. And so I use sort of an internal holding on. And it's also a natural part of my personality would be to kind of examine things for a while before I would commit to reacting to something unless it was sort of really immediate and urgent. And then you go into, and then I continued to kind of be in these weird environments as a kid with sort of unpredictability. So I would be very still and sort of use that as a mechanism to kind of calm myself or center myself and then sort of use that to survey things around me, to try to figure out the best either reaction, place for me to move to, plans to make, whatever needed to happen. And then now go into sports and they teach you to do that because for other reasons, right? Like you're competing and you're feeling pressure or it's not going your way, but you can't really afford to let everybody know that in the moment. So it's sort of probably got turned up a little bit with that. And then if I really examined it now that you're asking, I live with somebody, Laird is very dynamic and emotional and like sort of out there with it all, very different from me. And so I think sometimes, so I don't get caught in that. I also have a tendency to all just be really more still because it also works well with our dynamic.

I think balancing a

pole or poles. Yeah, I think so. And it, but it helps me to be with someone like that who is kind of courageous and willing just to like, here it is, you know, and, and even when I have to articulate something uncomfortable to somebody, I can remember Laird saying that he had confronted a friend of ours about something. And I remember being like, Oh my God. And he thought, and he said to me, no, that is being loving. Being honest that way is actually being loving. So I think that that's another really valuable lesson is within trying to be fair, balanced, measured myself. At times, that's actually maybe not as loving and honest and intimate as somebody who's willing to just say, Hey, this is what I think and feel. So I've had to look at that too, I think. Yeah.

In some ways, it's almost like a distrust of the person in front of you that they wouldn't be able to hold you in your authentic expression. Yeah.

Or, or I'll add to that as an extension of that because there's a part of my person, like I have, I think a natural kind of nurturing and some other things in my personality. And if I'm oriented towards like telling the truth or doing the right thing, I would go that way. But there's also a part of me that is, I think just not disconnected, but harsh. And since I question that, I'm always really careful in my reactions where, for example, I'll use Laird as an example. He's really a soft kind of heartfelt teddy bear. So he isn't questioning where he's coming from. So he just kind of says it and he doesn't question like, is this coming from a good place or a scared place or whatever? And so I think it's, it's also self regulating because you want to make sure you're making moves that, listen, if you're aspiring to try to be a certain way at times, sometimes that takes a really conscious effort, especially when it doesn't feel natural. You know, when I want to tell everyone to fuck off and I don't care or whatever, I know that's not how I feel in the long run. So I'm trying to, you know, control all those feelings or filter them to get to land to the place of like, Hey, where do I really feel in the long run?

I wonder you speaking as a woman. I think it was a very common thing for humans in general to feel if they're able to have enough self awareness to be able to identify that it seems like almost as though I'm wearing a mask throughout the day, women, I would imagine have an even higher level of pressure to wear a mask to the point that they actually physically put masks on their face every day. And plastic surgery is not a different thing as in men have their own iterations of all that as well. But I wonder for you speaking as a woman, what are specific, what evokes a sensation within you from your partner or from maybe, I don't know, your community people you're with or yourself that makes you distinctly feel safe to be like, well, I really want to be seen at a more vulnerable way. And I don't feel like there's any necessity to wear the mask. Okay.

Well, here's the deal. My reasons are a lot more brutal than that. Because when I hear you say it, I'm like, Oh, those aren't my reasons. I don't care about safety. I care about not having to go back and do damage control, apologizing, staying in a situation intertwined way too long because I stuck my foot in my mouth. My thing is, I'm always looking for the most efficient, clean, getting get outs unless we're in a very intimate dynamic, like we're friends and we're having a real conversation, then it's just all there. But if it's like just day to day interactions with people, I'm looking to never be offended. I'm looking to not offend you if I can help it. I'm sort of looking to avoid all things that take extra excess energy that have nothing to do with anything. So actually my reasoning is not about safety. It's about unnecessary entanglement. You know, and if at the end, I've made a real what has landed so clearly for me is that to be loving and loving and compassionate and empathetic when I can is always the best way. It is not always the natural way. So I use that space, that time to say, okay, what does that look like for you to show up that way? And you know me a little bit. It's still not really warm and fuzzy, but it is of love and it will be of service, but it still has my tone to it, which is, you know, it's pretty matter of fact. So I think I just figured out if I was creating this code to live by what were the dynamics that I would be able to do that. Because I'm not actually worried about being direct or telling you what I really think and feel or, you know, saying something that might be uncomfortable. It's more about is it necessary? And is there a more productive way to get this done than, you know, kind of those tools? And so I think I'm usually trying to measure that out.

So it's more like a surgical thing for you. Like this is the best, most like the stoic approach is the best approach to get the job done in this. And maybe I don't need to do a tangle so much like deep, vulnerable kind of sappy, emotional stuff and others kind of put on like the mass to get her done. Yeah.

And but I'm happy to be very honest about home feeling, but it still comes across like not such a reveal. It comes across as like here, you know, sort of a matter of fact. This is what I'm experiencing. So that ability to observe at times even can be about like, oh, I'm feeling frustrated. It doesn't mean I'm going to be taken down by my frustration. I'm going to be, you know, sidelined. It just means, oh, yeah, that that emotion is higher today. So. I

wonder. So you've been in relationship with Larry for you mentioned before 28 years. Yeah.

We've been together. A couple years. Yeah, we've been together. So November will be 29 years. We've been together, married 27 years at the same time in November.

If you had to, to place a finger on some like a couple, you know, secrets to longevity in a marriage. Yeah. What would be a couple of things that stand

out? You know, Aaron, it's so interesting. I think it's all it's so it's like parenting, right? It's so wildly personal what people want to need and what works between two people. What I will say that maybe has shown up, it seems pretty powerful if each individual is coming to the relationship with the idea of serving the relationship and the other person. Having said that, I always joke there, you know, learned I have there's a military term, mutually assured destruction, mad. I think in our case, what happens is, is both of us have pretty strong boundaries and pretty strong personalities. And so what we've decided, what's an interesting thing is it's almost created a neutrality for us where we don't even bother. You know, I am not nicer to any person than I am to layered. And so, you know, usually that's the person that's in your pocket that annoys you, you annoy them, you're on top of each other. Why do you talk so loud? I've heard that story before. You know, it's just like, I mean, we've been together a long time, right? And then you add kids and the stress of, oh, that kid's doing that and one parent's like, that's okay. And the other one's like, why are they doing that? And, you know, whatever. But if I come with the attitude of I'm here to try to make your life better. Let me, let me pay attention in the ways that seem to be right for you. And simultaneously to that, let me have a really strong sense of self and what I would like and what I'm, I need to kind of get through my days and also where I'm building towards. And that has really been powerful because what I have learned, and that's why, for example, even me wanting to monitor, I don't want to control. I want to, I want to be in charge of my emotions, right? Is it's like, I just want to move as much towards positivity, meaning positive words, positive support. And sometimes you hear it usually with somebody who's like kind of more like she's, she's soft and she's in a flowy dress and all that. But I know that to be of service and love is the end game. I know this. And so that has really helped now on other kind of more, not superficial, but let's say further down the, the rung of the ladder. I, Larry and I have a practice of a, you know, of a closeness or intimacy that has to do with us as a couple, not just, you know, we're parents of kids and we, you know, it's like, we're just going back to being a couple. I think we do that naturally pretty well. And I actually give Larry the credit for that because the way he treats me, it's like he still treats me like his girl, you know? So what happens is that evokes kind of that sort of timeless girl within me that I direct that energy back at him. So he, he's very generous in that. But that of service part and making yourself happy because nobody, even the best partner and the best partner for you cannot do that for you. And especially as you get deeper into years and you become in some ways simpler as a person, because hopefully you're getting a little more mature, but then also you're more complex because you're looking at time and how much you don't have of it or what you want to do with it. So there's sort of this simplification, hopefully some wisdom's happening, but also then some real, some really fine complexity of like, Hey, man, what is it really all about? So I think coming into it with that has been helpful. And then, you know, maybe similar values, how you get there, you get there very differently, but maybe how you feel about nature, your health, money, all the stuff, even kind of what time do you want to go to bed? If those sort of line up that feels yes, in the worldly terms, we've maybe been together from it, but I want to remind people that you can have also a successful relationship that lasted for 10 years. Like I am not of the thinking that it's like, Hey man, unless you run it out till somebody dies, it wasn't a thing. It's like I see a lot of couples that kill it for eight years or 10 years or 15. And that was a success. So I also think sometimes certain relationships have timelines. Yeah.

Yeah, it's like, let's like we've done the work. Like we did the job. I think we can move in another direction. When you said that a layered treats you like his girl, that's something I noticed as well. He seems like you guys are like girlfriend boyfriend, which is amazing. And I think really important. How specifically does layered treat you like his girl? How does like, what does that show up? And how can we learn from that as other folks? Well, one of the

beautiful things for me is like layered, I think, even though he has rough around the edges. And again, you know, layered he, you know, he is, he's very out there, right? Like you, you just know where it's at. And that can, and it's very, it's, I think for a lot of people too, it's like, Whoa, but it's, it's actually, I feel, I find it to be refreshing. And it's like, yeah, you never have to guess. That here's this person. So you have somebody who's like that. But yet what I would say is that even though, for example, if I have friends over girlfriends, for example, he is loving and kind, but certainly the only energy or sexual energy is only been, it's only directed at me. So you also know that there's something within he treats me like his girl. It's like I'm that one person that he's having, he's in on that frequency with. And by the way, my friend can come over and he'll be like, you look pretty, but it's still said in a way that's not, it's like the best way. It's like he wants you to know you're doing like you look good, you know. And so I think one that he kind of has this pocket that is only held really for me. And then I would say he has it for our daughters differently. Obviously, they're, they're, you know, it's, it's a, it's a father, daughter, love, and it has this special tenderness that is only for them, you know. And it's quite beautiful. And then, you know, it's just, it's like the day in and day out. I don't, the way Laird looks at me, the way, you know, he has coffee waiting for me in the morning. If I'm talking to him most times, he pays it, you know, he's listening. And I'm not super demanding on Laird's time. I'm not, I'm very much, I'm an only child. Like I'm fine to be alone. But what I appreciate is when he is there, man, he's, he's locked and loaded. He lets you know that your desire, he lets me know like I, I desire you. I'm, you know, it's sort of like, I know it sounds terrible, but it's like it'd be easy for people to tire of one another. Yeah. So when you have a partner who's who was also contributing to that energy of like, I'm interested, I'm into it, I'm, that is very, that can be very powerful in both ways, right? Like, I find that I think for men, if they're now have to feel like they have to chase more times. Obviously, there's always exceptions, but they shouldn't have to beg or chase for or did it occur to her that like to go and that we haven't been together for a while. Like, you know what I mean? So I think the sensitivity on both sides and for her, for him to be like, you know, you can see that they're attracted to you. And also there's a deep respect between Laird and I that, you know, it's like training. It's like you're doing the right thing. These are things you have to practice every day. So when I wake up, it's not like I'm trying to earn the relationship. But what I am trying to do is show up today and do the best I can and really show up for this person. And I'm not assuming because we've been together all these years and we have houses and kids and all this stuff and we're intertwined in business, but that's what's going to keep us together. I never think about that. I'm not writing on that. It's like, and I think I feel like Laird does that too. And finally, both of us, if it's not going to be good overall, like if it's not fun and it's not good, it doesn't mean it's not hard. It's not work. Why bother? Why bother? Why be together? Why do anything like it's okay? You know, and what people don't realize is you can really contribute to how fun and cool and sexy and exciting and interesting your relationship is. And so I think that that both Laird and I are not, you know, we're not sort of here to just be passengers in the

thing.