Overcoming bi-polar disorder with David Clark #15

The mBraining Show

Recovering from bi-polar disorder.

A true story about bi-polar disorder. During his initial years in Australia David began to realise something was not quite right with his brain. Having experienced a series of depressive episodes in the past, he then experienced his first psychotic episode lasting some six months. Some time later he was diagnosed as having bi-polar disorder.

Practically fully recovered now, he has written his memoir ‘WTF! Life is Not Always What it Seems’ as a way of sharing his insight into what life is about and how we need to take control even when we are not in control.

David is the founder of The Lime Green Solutions. His mission, to be delivered through his website www.calmercoaching.com is to empower people to achieve their full potential through “calm and graceful wisdom”.

He previously worked internationally in organisations seeking to improve outcomes for their communities. Roles including leading training projects in Bulgaria, Estonia, Denmark and Russia.

David headed up a training team based within the UK’s National Audit Office which subsequently led to a secondment at the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office followed by a life-changing decision to move half way across the globe to connect with a sunnier way of life.

Tools that help manage bi-polar disorder.

overcoming bi-polar disorder

As part of his recovery David has built up a substantial toolkit of knowledge into human behaviour and is now entering a new chapter of his life. He is sharing his insights through – for a better life! He believes wholeheartedly that we are all capable of being awesome. Through his toolkit, accredited as an NLP Master Practitioner, an mbraining coach and a DISC Advanced behavioural profiler, he is able to enlighten, empower and energise people to realise their awesomeness.

Highlights:

00:43 Introduction
07:59 Something wasn’t quite right
15:56 Seeking help
22:49 How mBraining helped
29:25 Considering diet
30:46 WTF
37:17 Dave’s advice
44:55 MBIT

Transcription:

Intro 0:04
You’re listening to The mBraining Show, a show about the new field of mBIT, where you’ll get a blend of neuroscience-based research with practical applications for wise living. And now here’s your host, Bill Gasiamis.

Bill 0:19
Everyone, welcome to another episode of the training show. If you would like to have someone speak at your next event about the applications of mBraining in your delegates, businesses or personal lives, go to Billgasiamis.com and fill out the contact form, and I’ll be in touch to see how we can make that happen, for now, it’s on with the show.

Introduction

Bill 0:43
Today’s guest is David Clark. David is the founder of Lime Green solutions. His mission to be delivered through his website, calmcoaching.com is to empower people to achieve their full potential through calm and graceful wisdom.

Bill 1:01
David previously worked internationally in organizations seeking to improve outcomes for their communities. They’ve headed up training. A team-based within the UK is National Audit Office, which is subsequently led to an economist at the Victorian Auditor General’s office, followed by a life-changing decision to move halfway across the globe to connect with a sunnier way of life.

Bill 1:28
During his initial years in Australia, he began to realize something was not quite right with his brain. Having experienced a series of depressive episodes in the past, he then experienced his first psychotic episode lasting some six months, practically fully recovered.

Bill 1:45
Now, he has written his memoir, WTF, life is not always what it seems as a way of sharing his insight into what life is about, and how we need to take control, even when we are not in control. As part of his recovery, David has built up a substantial toolkit of knowledge into human behavior, and is now entering a new chapter of his life. He’s sharing his insights through karma coaching.com for a better life.

Bill 2:18
He believes wholeheartedly that we are all capable of being awesome. Through his toolkit accredited as an NLP practitioner. And mBraining coach and a disc advanced behavioral profiler. He’s able to enlighten empower, energize people to realize their awesomeness. Welcome, Dave.

Dave 2:39
Got Hello, Bill. How are you?

Bill 2:41
Pretty well, mate. How you doing?

Dave 2:43
Excellent. Excellent. Yeah. Not bad for Monday. Not bad for Monday.

Bill 2:46
You’ve been in Australia for a little while. Now. How long? Has it been?

Dave 2:50
About eight, nine years? Something like that?

Bill 2:53
Yeah. A little bit more than a little while.

Dave 2:56
Yeah, maybe.

Bill 2:58
Dave? I just wanted to find out. You said you’ve worked previously internationally, which countries have you worked in?

Dave 3:08
Which countries have I worked in? So I’ve been to the US, I’ve worked in Moscow Russia, I’ve worked in Denmark worked in Turkey worked in Hungary, Romania. Where else Bulgaria? Oh goodness me, have I covered them all? Did I say Denmark, Estonia? Yeah so there’s a few.

Bill 3:36
The reason I ask is because it leads me to just a question that’s not particularly on topic. But how does one go about adapting and changing the way that you communicate to people to deal with so many different people from so many different cultures?

Dave 3:56
Oh, god, that’s a bit of a question. So God heightened? That’s a really, really good question. Look, I guess because I didn’t really I wasn’t fully up to speed with what I certainly wasn’t training and training are in bit, but I’d sort of read a bit about NLP. So I understood a bit about body language, human behavior. And I guess I just had this ability to connect with people to develop rapport and gain their trust in me my abilities.

Bill 4:30
What was the work that you were doing in those different countries? Was it all a similar kind of role?

Dave 4:35
Yeah, yeah. So basically, in each case, it was introducing performance audit. So that’s examining the economy, efficiency, effectiveness of the implementation of government policy. So we couldn’t question policy itself, but we could question how it was implemented.

Dave 4:58
So we could look at absolutely everything. Ask anyone anything go anywhere. So we had that legal authority. And it was really looking at achievement of outcomes. So was government delivering against the objectives? It set itself when we were going into those countries into the audit offices in those countries? and helping them learn how to do the work that we did.

Bill 5:23
Excellent. Did did the people, you know, in the places in the in the roles within governments that could make a difference? Did they really care? Did they really want to know, or was this just something that they did to make it look like they were doing something? And I’m only saying that because I’m being a little bit cynical, right about politics?

Dave 5:41
Yeah. And I understand I said, Yeah, yeah, no, so the majority of the countries who worked in were pre accession countries. And by that, I mean, there were countries wanting to join the European Union. So they were former Eastern European countries.

Dave 5:55
And part of during the European Union was they had to demonstrate they had an effective functioning Audit Office, both in terms of financial audit, but also performance audit. So they came to us to how seek help in building capacity capability and delivering performance audits, which is basically auditing government and reporting to Parliament.

Bill 6:18
Okay, so they did care?

Dave 6:20
Oh they did they did and because I, because I specialized in health. So there was an added driver. And, and it was particularly fascinating in Moscow, because they were really, really passionate about helping the delivery of health services to those that were really disenfranchised.

Dave 6:45
And I was quite amazed, or both by the psychology culture of the accounts chamber in Moscow, but also by the people and how passionate they were about actually delivering impact. So actually having impact for those the population for the people, actually the taxpayers, the people receiving the services, so it’s quite a fascinating role.

Bill 7:10
Yeah. Sounds interesting. So that role led you to as a common in the lovely state of Victoria in Australia.

Dave 7:18
It certainly did. Yeah, yeah. So So basically, the audit obviously, was looking to improve its efficiency, effectiveness impact in the work he did in the performance audit field. So I basically came over and shared, shared what I knew and what I did.

Bill 7:34
How long ago was that?

Dave 7:36
So that’s about we’re talking about 12 ish years ago now. Yeah, maybe, 12, 13 years ago.

Bill 7:45
And not that you have to convince me my but what was it that made you fall in love with Australia?

Dave 7:51
Well, it’s that simple. The weather. I just had enough of the English winters. And the short winter days, it was simple.

Something wasn’t quite right

Bill 7:59
Well, fair enough. All right. So then, while here, you had a couple of different experiences. And in the bio that I read out, you, realize something was not quite right with your brain? When were you first aware that something wasn’t quite right with your brain?

Dave 8:18
So so the first first indication was when I was in my second year, my degree, so this would be I was about 19, 20 years old. And we don’t even have the term in England, in English language in England, but it’s called a brain snap. So it’s basically where you just have this verbal outburst.

Dave 8:41
And then you feel really embarrassed and you just want to walk out the room. And that was second year, my degree at a seminar the lecturer was late, and I just let loose a little bit embarrassingly.

Bill 8:54
At the lecturer?

Dave 8:55
At the lecturer. Yeah. And I subsequently got a two two, and I was due for two one, and he marked me down on the paper.

Bill 9:06
That’s about all he could probably do is thinking another one of those pesky students just trying to tell me how to run my life.

Dave 9:12
Look, I did apologize afterwards, but you know it. That was the first one then I had a second one at my visa, the final stage of my accounting qualification, and that was again a verbal outburst again, quite embarrassing.

Dave 9:27
And that was about 27 years old. So that’s nine years later. Then the third one was about 33, 34. And that was at a meeting of my boss’s boss and his boss, so quite a senior meeting. And I again, verbal outbursts quite embarrassing, hide under the table, can I leave the room please?

Dave 9:48
And the final one was in Moscow airport, resulting typo between the visa and my passport and they wouldn’t let us leave the country and I kind of I was tired. It had been a quite a following week, and I kind of lost it a little bit. And yeah, a bit embarrassing again. But we all managed to resolve the situation and leave the country. So yeah, but these things happen. And I had no understanding, no understanding what was going on.

Bill 10:15
I’m listening to that, right. But between 18 and 27 happened twice. I mean, I’ve behaved inappropriately, more than two times seriously inappropriate more than two times between the ages of eight and 27. It was probably one of my frustrating points in my life, just because of the you know, who am I? or What am I doing, you know, and then taking, starting a new business and trying to get going and to make money out of and all that kind of stuff.

Bill 10:40
So you probably wouldn’t be blamed, if you will, sort of speaking to professionals about this. And somebody said to you, that between 18 and 27, what happened was just normal, what made it not normal? And did you feel at the time for those first two outbursts that it wasn’t normal?

Dave 11:01
Oh completely not normal, because I was pretty good at keeping quiet when I’m supposed to be pretty good at maintaining my mood, whatever, you know, just calm, gentle individual. However, there were these moments, environmental triggers, where I would just not be able to filter, not be able to dampen down what was going on inside my head and it would just blurt out.

Bill 11:34
It would blurt out. But again, and I’m just playing devil’s advocate here. But that doesn’t sound any different to the majority of people that I spoke to at 27. Were you sort of suspicious that there might be something else going on? Or were you just thinking? Oh, we’ll have another one of those outbursts no big deal?

Dave 11:52
Well, look, I didn’t put the pieces together. I mean, the thing is, I didn’t really understand what was going on wouldn’t knowing now the symptoms, and knowing you know, the patterns of the diagnosis, my father had hit, really bad mood swings, to the point where he was violent.

Dave 12:16
And I didn’t really understand that I just kind of, you know, because I grew up with it. Just went well, that’s him. And this is me. So unless you have a framework within which to place the symptoms, you don’t really understand what’s going on. You just kind of accept it and you just chug on with life.

Bill 12:34
Yeah, you’re normal is your version of normal, you’ve never experienced anything different. So Exactly. Just go about thinking, Oh, well, that’s normal for me.

Dave 12:42
Yeah, you kind of go or it’s just my, whether it’s personality, or whatever you want to call it, it, just kind of accept it and just move on and just go, Oh, this has been embarrassing, but it’s just part of who I am. I try and manage it, but it just happened. So yeah.

Bill 12:55
At between 18 and 27. I didn’t do this often. But I was caught in a pattern where everything that was happening to me it was somebody else’s fault. Was that the kind of thing you were experiencing as well? Or were you able to clearly define that that was an outburst somebody did something that triggered me but how I behaved was my responsibility.

Dave 13:17
Oh, that totally the, how I responded was my responsibility. But it’s an interesting thing, because it was almost like, you lose control, you just can’t dampen it down. Now I can sense it coming up with me. And it’s actually I attribute it to violation of values. Which is fascinating now sort of, you know, the wonderful world of mBIT and NLP you’re able to unpack all this.

Dave 13:50
What comes up within us to signals and unpack them and make sense of them and then repattern them reframe them. But I you know, that’s where it came from violation of values. And look, I had a very busy brain and there was a bit of anger in there as well frustration with the world but I sort of managed to control it to a point but you know, now now with the diagnosis, fully understand and able to just ignore it just so much more.

Bill 14:22
Yeah, pretty powerful stuff. So tell me about the last episode. Not that I want to hop on the situation of episodes, in the airport in Russia. Did I get to the point after that it was going to be scary. Was there a possibility that the Russians were going to go to town on you and all that type of thing? How did it end up?

Dave 14:44
It was look my name Clark and they’d put an E on the visa and there was no E on my passport and that was the issue. That is how minor it was, but they were classic, official I guess I’m really not happy that there was a typo. Thankfully, my colleague work colleague spoke fluent Russian, so he was able to deal with the situation, but I really wasn’t helping by kind of behaving, rather, unprofessionally will summarize it as unprofessionally because I just lost it. Yeah, anyway, okay, history now.

Bill 15:25
Yeah. Okay. And how long after that? Were you given a diagnosis? Did somebody say that you have this diagnosis?

Dave 15:35
10 years.

Bill 15:37
Well, okay, so in your early 40s, was.

Dave 15:40
44 yeah.

Bill 15:43
So for 40 for another 10 years after that. You went about being your normal version of yourself. And then what got you to go to see somebody about it.

Seeking help

Dave 15:56
So I was in what I thought was potentially my dream job. And during that dream job, I slipped into psychosis. I had no awareness. No Did anybody around me. And I lost the job. And then I was chugging under my own steam. I went to see my main GP, it was middle of April.

Dave 16:24
And he, I don’t remember much the point. But he said, I think I’m going to diagnose you give you a script for lithium. To which I responded, does that mean I’m going to coals and want to pass by the battery stanchion a battery?

Dave 16:40
Because lithium’s in batteries. And if you read people’s memoirs about bipolar, that’s the kind of thing they respond to, you know, the sense of they have a sense of humor if they’re psychotic, and, you know, just make quirky comments. And, you know, it was kind of a bit of a random thing to say from him anyway.

Dave 16:56
But he said, Well, I’m going to give you the script anyway. And come in tomorrow, we’ll do blood tests. And this is normal procedure. But really, they should not have let me go. So I went in the following day. And because I had that script, because I felt fine, because people who are psychotic are generally quite happy. And I don’t remember the specifics of what he said, but he again, he let me go.

Dave 17:16
Not a clever move. And anyway, I’ll just chugging on under my own steam. And then I went back something must have told me something wasn’t right. I went back to see a different GP. This is the third week in April. And he said, Well, you seem okay. But I’m going to give you a referral to community psychiatrist.

Dave 17:38
So I went to this community psychiatrist, I, yeah, but on for I think 25 minutes, stopped. And then he laughed at me said you’re showing all the classic symptoms. If you nobody will ever employ you in the state you’re in. If you go on antidepressants, you’re liable resection.

Dave 17:58
And if you go on a plane, you’re liable to one to open the plane door mid flight. And I was bit bemused by that.

Bill 18:06
Why would somebody say that to somebody who’s never had that thought in their life?

Dave 18:11
Why would a professional quote unquote, psychiatrist say that, who is psychotic? I don’t know. Anyway, look, he gave me a script. And I actually did get this medication. It was Seroquel, which is an anti psychotic, and it was a low dose. That was, must have been mid June, I came out of the psychosis in third week in September.

Dave 18:39
And then I was told what have been going on. So I then was put on after that lithium, and I won’t bore you with all detail, but there was another period of depression, which was medication induced, which is rather unpleasant. Anyway, I’m off most of it now. So I’m very happy. And I think I know more than my psychiatrist now.

Bill 19:03
Yeah, that wouldn’t surprise me. You. You said that you didn’t notice what was going on, but neither did anyone else. Now. I, I had a couple of challenges in my own brain three brain hemorrhages and in surgery, and the first two episodes, I didn’t notice what was going on.

Bill 19:22
Even though you could say it was pretty obvious, you know, left side numbness, all the classic symptoms of stroke. And the people around me kind of noticed. But I didn’t allow them to follow their gut instinct of becoming aware that there was an issue, did anyone else around you sort of say I’m not feeling like everything is right with you? Or my guts telling me something? Did anyone at all remark that maybe something wasn’t right?

Dave 19:56
Look, to be honest, if they had have done I would not have I was not there. I was not in psychosis is really intriguing. And I sort of talked about in a book intriguing state of mind. Because I was not I was not there. I was there because I was breathing, eating, you know, living as a appearing to be a normal human being.

Dave 20:19
But I had no conscious awareness of what I was saying or what I was doing. So, yeah, six months or six months is pretty full on. But it’s, I can laugh about it now.

Bill 20:33
Well, that’s great thing. Well, I understand what you’re saying. Because when I went through what I went through, I explained, I explained that as I was out of my mind, and no matter what anyone told me about what was happening to me, I could tell them that I was fine.

Bill 20:48
And I needed to go to work. And I was busy, and I couldn’t stop and I couldn’t go to the doctor couldn’t do any of that stuff. So I totally relate to that. Now, as as you started to come out of it, you started to find ways to help yourself. I mean, what are some of the things that you did on your own then helped you get through it?

Dave 21:10
So yeah, it’s been totally had to roll my own boat on this one, because my GP certainly had no idea and still has no idea about mental health. And my psychologist, the time again, very little idea, his response was, well go back to work, see how you go. And if that’s some work, just take some more time out.

Dave 21:31
And that was a year after I’ve commanded psychosis, I thought, dude, you have no idea the pain I’m going through, nor the exhaustion, because it was it was pretty awful. And so they’ve all disappeared. And there’s the same, my psychiatrist, and I still had an appointment this week still doesn’t understand my symptoms, nor can offer any insight nor advice.

Dave 21:51
So I basically connected with a meetup group, social support group of people who’ve been on a similar journey. And that has been a total reframe all for me because hearing other people’s stories, helps, quote, unquote, normalize my experience. And that’s the biggest challenge that you just feel so alone, and so burdened with self judgment.

Dave 22:14
Meeting other people who’ve been through similar experiences, similar journey, you feel, quote, unquote, normal, and you feel human. And that’s huge. Also reading people’s memoirs, huge. So thank God for Melbourne library, because I’ve been able to find out, learn other people’s experiences, other people’s stories, to be able to be way more compassionate with myself, in terms of the healing and rebuilding, which has been the biggest challenge.

How mBraining helped

Bill 22:49
That’s pretty cool. So you mentioned the two times now. stuff around the heart, you spoke about a violation of your values? Some of the (inaudible) would trip those things. And then you also spoke about compassion? How important is it to be able to connect back into your heart on this part of your recovery?

Dave 23:14
Yeah. I mean, it’s just, you know, I am just absolutely cannot, you know, mBIT mBraining has really transformed my reality and helped me forward. Because, as I say, there really is no wisdom elsewhere. But now, through this lens of science and what Marvin and grant have done, I just have come to the conclusion, I ignore three quarters of what comes up in my head. And, you know, I have these wonderful little mBIT conversations, and I’m so much calmer, and so much more focused, and it’s just delightful.

Bill 24:02
How does a conversation like that guy? Because a lot of people want to know, and you know, some people will say to you, you’re probably ignoring your head at your peril, because that’s what head people would say, right? So how do those conversations go? So not only detail of a conversation, but where does it start? What is it in?

Dave 24:24
So I’ll go through the whole sequence, but it really is, because I am able to because I’m much more sensitized now to what’s coming up with me so whether it’s head heart or gut, pick up and unpack and some it’s some of the stuff is quite quirky, bizarre, but now I can interpret it much more in detail, much more refinely.

Dave 24:48
And, you know, some of the stuff is just bizarre and it takes coaching, you know, to get self coaching to determine whether it’s a short term, medium term. Long Term useful or just to ignore it. But also because I’ve got way more clarity over my longer term goals, vision mission values, I’m able to focus my energies a lot more. And just connect to with my gut, my core purpose, motivation, values, you know, just really having a lean approach to life.

Bill 25:27
And learning approach to life. Awesome that makes it so much simpler.

Dave 25:32
Well, it really helps me because because I can now identify where my brains misfiring. And I use my and it doesn’t, it’s like a little child, sometimes it doesn’t like not being listened to. But I can salt it for knowledge, experience with an information that adds value, but I don’t use it alone. So I consult my whole being really to ensure that I’m arriving at as comprehensive a decision as possible.

Bill 26:05
Well, why not? I just asked everything and everybody within you whether or not everyone’s happy with a part of the process that you or a path that you’re going down, or whether it serves you and others. And if it doesn’t, and somebody or a part of your intelligence is kind of saying, hey, this doesn’t serve us.

Bill 26:24
It’s an awesome place to start and investigating why it doesn’t serve, and how are we going to be able to shift it or perhaps change the path a little bit to then become a process or, or an experience that serves the whole being instead of just the head?

Dave 26:43
Yeah, completely. And it’s, it’s really just having a more wiser, but more graceful and gentler approach to life. And through that, you’re just much more happy and alive. You know, you haven’t got this absurd, just living in the head, which I had before it was atrocious, and just so unhappy and unhealthy.

Dave 27:09
Whereas now, I’m just way more, you know, I’ve lost eight kilos of weight, and I’m just almost, you know, everything’s going in the right direction. So, you know, some people say bipolar is a gift, you know, these sort of things that get thrown out where it gets a bit of a challenging one. But you know, sometimes we need a wake up call.

Bill 27:31
Yeah, I know, if people out there listening regularly to the embryonic show, they’ll have known, but I often refer to the three, you know, hemorrhages in my brain has a gift, it was what brought me to the understanding that there’s intelligence in the heart and in the gut, which meant that I didn’t have to use my head. During my recovery, I could just tell it to switch off and go away. And I was still able to make really important decisions with my heart and gut.

Bill 28:01
Because we know that they play, you know, a third of the role in each decision as well, not just the head. So I totally get where you’re coming from. I’m curious, you mentioned, you’ve lost a little bit of weight. So what was going on in your gut, all the research is pointing at the gut, and being responsible for a lot of neurological disorders of the head. Yeah. Tell me about what you know about what was happening in your gut what’s changed.

Dave 28:30
So the the issue there was real tightness and tension and also overweight, which is a side effect of some of the medication I was on, I’m no longer taking. But that’s a side effect that often you don’t get told about weight gain that you know, we’re going to give you this medications may get better, but it’s going to make you put on weight, which is actually going to make you ill again.

Dave 28:54
So yeah, it’s a bit of a problem, but we’ll try and make it solution. But the issue for me was that when I had an appointment with my naturopath, he said, Look, this is bad fat, and your risk of metabolic syndrome, which puts you at risk of diabetes. So I thought I’ve got enough going on, so I need to lose it. So that’s been the driver there. And it’s been again hard, hard graft, but it’s going it’s going and it’s gone. So yeah, and I feel a lot more healthy for it.

Considering diet

Bill 29:25
Were there any foods that you felt or looking back now that sort of puts you in that state of being more stress or more anxious or something along those lines that were affecting you?

Dave 29:39
Well, oh, my carb consumption was way way no good. And sugar as well. So sugar is gone.

Bill 29:47
She was gone. And carbs What do you eat instead of bread?

Dave 29:53
Oh, but well, so my I’m on a limit or trying to maintain limited 20 grams. carbs a day, which if you look at the general food available is quite a challenge. But it’s a I found that really we don’t need to eat as much as we do eat and the cleaner we eat like i’d steam a lot of veggies and stuff like that. The cleaner we eat, the healthier we’ll be.

Bill 30:25
What do you what do you think about avocado? Is that some of you just recently?

Dave 30:29
Oh yeah. So avocado, broccoli, cauliflower, walnuts, almonds. Yeah, just tuna, herring. You know the omega three stuff. blackcurrants? Yeah, just just keep up to speed with the nutrients.

WTF

Bill 30:46
So you wrote a book mate. WTF doesn’t stand doesn’t usually stand for something that goes in the title of a book.

Dave 30:58
I had to explain to one of my cousins what WTF stood for. And she said, Oh, gosh, well, I’m not sure about that.

Bill 31:10
WTF is okay. Life is not always what it seems. So tell me a little bit about what the book is about?

Dave 31:17
Well, you know, when you when you get to age 44, you think you’ve kind of done it all seen it or know it all. And then you get the rug pulled from under you. And that lasts for six months. So it’s kind of like, we cannot ever know enough about our beings. And the book, really, you know it, it shares my story.

Dave 31:40
And it shares the wonders of the brain. So without my brain, I couldn’t have lived the life I’ve lived, which has been pretty fascinating. And I certainly couldn’t have predicted at the age of 18 nor 25. I didn’t really start having a career till I was 30. But, you know, I just didn’t understand what was going on inside. I was a bit sort of ignorant and you just sort of chug through life and then kaboom, at 44. You know, shit happens, big time,

Bill 32:09
Midlife crisis or?

Dave 32:10
You could say that, you know, it’s just like, we don’t know what we don’t know. And nobody ever tells us this stuff. And it’s kind of like well actually might help some people to actually learn maybe a little bit about how they’re designed and how they work and how they function. And with that wisdom, they could actually live a better life more calmly and more productively. Who is the book good for?

Bill 32:34
So if somebody who’s listening has suspect a partner or a spouse or a loved one might be going through something similar to bipolar? Is this book gonna give them some insights?

Dave 32:46
Yeah, so I talk about the warning signs, the symptoms. I talk about neuroplasticity, and then I talk I actually have drawn on other people’s stories, as well, both in America and in UK, so actually intertwine it my own experience with other people’s experiences with their brain.

Dave 33:11
But I also towards the end share how I what I’ve used in terms of my recovery, so unpacking NLP, and neuro plasticity, so I draw on Norman Doidge, his work and also Barbara, I can’t remember her double barreled name. But anyway, there was a lady who also focused on neuroplasticity to heal her brain. And but then the last section is about DNA. So I also included a section that demonstrates that we are way more nurture than nature, and we can rewire our DNA.

Bill 33:45
Nice. So when you’re rewiring your DNA, and you have children, you actually made a difference in the DNA that they inherit from you as well. Right?

Dave 33:54
Completely. Yeah. So look, it really is saying, you know, these people that go, Well, he’s me, Woe is me can’t do anything powerless. Well, actually, you can, and the science says you can so let’s go on a journey.

Bill 34:06
The sciences you can you’re obviously shown that you can what and the people around you have experienced your highs, your lows. What are they saying about you now? Your family and friends, your loved ones? How are they responding to you now?

Dave 34:22
Yeah, they’re like, we have a laugh. We have a laugh. And that’s what life’s all about. They. Yeah, they think I’m doing pretty well, really. And I think I’m too I when I saw my GP a couple of weeks ago, I said, I’m a walking miracle.

Bill 34:37
You said that to him?

Dave 34:38
Yeah. I gave him a bit of feedback as well about his random thoughts. He was banging on about Ferrero Rocher and erectile dysfunction. And that really wasn’t appropriate for the reason I was there. I had to give him a bit of feedback. And I just said your thoughts are quite random. And he agreed.

Bill 34:56
Wow, that’s interesting.

Dave 34:58
Yeah, what in the world we’re in, we can spot these patterns, and it’s like, yeah, are you okay? You’re the GP, I’m supposed to be the patient here.

Bill 35:08
Well, it’s good asking Have you mate at least down here the opportunity to respond if it wasn’t, If there was something not quite right with him? Tell me about Calmer Coaching, is that the type of coaching that you do when you’re a calmer person, or is that the type of coaching you deliver for people who want to be calmer?

Dave 35:28
So basically, it’s both drawing on my my skills experience that I have evolved over the 20 odd years working in the public sector, the Audit Office, looking at how big systems work, but also bringing that down to the individual. So also adding to those 20 odd years, the learnings that I’ve evolved in terms of how the brain works, but also how our multiple brains work.

Dave 35:58
And adding to that the behavioral styles that we all have, so it’s really offering the wisdom that I’ve evolved to help myself to help others to really get clarity on what the way to achieve in their lives and help them pace themselves through how they can calmly but effectively achieve their goals and what they want to achieve in life. What the basically, yeah, you can have clarity of their vision mission values.

Bill 36:31
That’s nice, so tell me, you used to be a bit of a headcase like me, how do you lead these days?

Dave 36:44
I’m way, way, way calmer. Like, I couldn’t beforehand, I couldn’t even sit down for five minutes to watch Telly or just was just a hyper bunny. And now I’m way way chilled out way, way chilled out. So I can have a laugh. I’m very sociable bowler. But I’m a lot more grounded and more focused. So I’m way more focused on what I do, who I spend time with, and where and what I’m at.

Dave’s advice

Bill 37:17
If there’s people listening now that are going through or have been through similar experience to you? What would you say to them about how you know about whether or not I suppose just what would you say to them just full stop, if they came to you for advice, you know, and you had three minutes just to share some valuable sort of stuff with them.

Dave 37:43
Okay, so most of the issues that I experienced with people is that they, they haven’t got their own overwhelm, they’re over in overwhelm, we’re living in a world of overwhelm. So it’s, you know, it’s a kind of information overload, and they’re not really clear about their story go for the big one legacy. So they’re not clear about what outcomes they wish to achieve in their life.

Dave 38:10
And they’re not clear about their mission, they’re not clear about their priorities. So really, it’s helping them and they know what that they know it in their deep down in their gut. And, you know, it’s all these classic mBIT, they’re living in their heads, so their heads, heads, just overwhelming the whole being, and the system’s in meltdown, because of this, the heads just totally running the show.

Dave 38:37
But if we just get out of it, connect more deeply with our sense of being through the heart and the gut, then the wisdom appears, the true wisdom appears the true intuition. And people have this within them. And once you have that conversation, you people go, Whoa, hang on a minute, hang on a minute, and this stuff opens up.

Dave 38:58
And the more you explore it, it sort of rebalances their being right. And then the head comes down and the the gut and the heart comes alive. Yeah. And they become much calmer because the heart is being listened to. And the gut has a role, you know, so it’s everything becomes much more imbalance.

Bill 39:23
Is it an overnight process? You know, what can they expect? What can somebody expect from a process like this?

Dave 39:29
Depends where the person is at, so look, I won one of my coaching, they were suicidal when I first met them, totally lost. And now they because they kind of had a little bit of an inkling of what they want to achieve. But they had no self confidence, no self worth giving themselves, their value was extrinsic, so they were valuing themselves based on the people around them and they were to have healthy friends.

Dave 39:58
Yeah, it was just it was going a bit pear shaped and in the wrong job, now, much more clarity over what matters to them. They’re now living their dream, they’re becoming a chef. And just clear about who they want in their life who they don’t want to live. So a lot of the friends have disappeared, and just just much clearer about the boundaries, what matters and a gentler, happier person.

Bill 40:24
Yeah, awesome. Tell me, Dave, what is a disc advanced behavioral profiler.

Dave 40:33
So disc is the behavioral style. So there’s dominant, influential, supportive and controlling. So dominant is task focused, must get the job done, regardless of the people. And influential focuses on the people and the job sort of secondary. And then supportive is people person, so very much focused on the people at the risk of their own health and well being.

Dave 41:03
But making sure that everyone else is happy around them. And controlling are people that are totally obsessed with policies, procedures, legislation, doing the right thing, regardless of whether or not people will get hurt, or people might get a bit offside. So those are the four styles. It’s all again, evidence based scientific analysis.

Dave 41:26
And there’s an online tool through which people respond to various statements, and through that they can receive insight into their styles and through that understand their way of operating but also how to interact with others. And it also a enables people to understand other people’s styles. So how to get the best from others understanding your behavioral style, and having other people’s behavior style, and how to effect strategies that will be a win win rather than a win, lose or lose lose.

Bill 42:06
Yeah, I it sounds like it would have been an amazing insight into, into oneself, especially when a lot of these things are not in our awareness. We don’t know how, sometimes how our profile sits in what kind of sort of space so having become aware of that probably allows you to sort of see why your interactions with others have failed in the past or have worked really well.

Dave 42:35
Completely, completely. And look, they often ebb and flow situationally. But I was very high D. Early on in my career. And I guess that was partly my success, but I did. I did risk some relationships as a result of that. Whereas now I’m much more I focused, basically, as a result of my health.

Dave 43:02
And also, you know, just realize that there’s more to life than getting stuff done. Because sometimes stuff doesn’t need to be done, because it’s really high cost, low value, even though it might seem important at the time. If you look at it five to 10 years down the line, does it really matter? Probably not.

Bill 43:21
So from the mBraining model, which intelligences we’ll go through the disc profiles here, which intelligences are involved in the dominant profile?

Dave 43:34
Head.

Bill 43:36
Influential

Dave 43:37
Heart.

Bill 43:38
Supportive?

Dave 43:40
Heart, gut.

Bill 43:42
Controlling

Dave 43:42
Head.

Bill 43:45
Yeah. Wow. That’s pretty amazing, mate it’s been awesome getting to know you and having a bit of a chat to you and understanding how it is that you’ve come through what you’ve come through, I think it’s going to make a big difference to people that might be experiencing something similar or loved ones who are listening.

Bill 44:05
That have noticed something similar in you know, in the people that are around them. What I needed to end with now that you’re a veteran here in Australia, and we consider you one of our own.

Dave 44:21
That makes me feel very old.

Bill 44:23
Who do you follow In the cricket when Australia plays?

Dave 44:35
I don’t watch cricket.

Bill 44:38
Yeah, that’s a cop out by that. I don’t believe that for one minute. But look, I’ll give it to you. I’ll let you finish on that note.

Dave 44:43
You’re very kind.

Bill 44:45
Dave, thank you so much for being on the program. I really appreciate your time.

Dave 44:49
And thanks for the opportunity.

Bill 44:51
You’re welcome Dave All the best.

Dave 44:52
Good on you. Thank you cheers.

MBIT

Bill 44:55
Recently, research in the field of neuro cardiology and neuro gastro inter ology have shown that the heart is not just a pump pushing blood around our body, it has up to 120,000 neurons, which is the same amount as a lobster’s brain. And the gut is not just some stinky plumbing, remove all that we do not need.

Bill 45:16
It has approximately 500 million neurons. That’s the same amount as a cat’s brain. In the past, you will have noticed how you and many of your friends say things like follow your heart, or listen to your gut. That’s because there’s a level of intelligence there, that ancient wisdom traditions have been talking about for more than two and a half 1000 years, and which is now being validated by modern science.

Bill 45:43
So when you engage an mBIT coach, you are getting someone that is skilled in helping you unlock the wisdom in those intelligences and discover what your heart desires, and what you truly value, the action you need to take and how to listen to your gut to take gutsy action, as well as engage the creativity in your head to come up with the unique ways to achieve the heart’s desires. If you want to know more about me coaching, get in touch we can meet in person or via Skype, go to Billgasiamis.com and fill out the contact form and I will be in touch. I look forward to meeting you.

Intro 46:22
The presenters and special guests of this podcast intend to provide accurate and helpful information to their listeners. These podcasts can not take into consideration individual circumstances and are not intended to be a substitute for independent medical advice from a qualified health professional. You should always seek the advice from a qualified health professional before acting on any of the information provided by any of the transit lounge podcasts.

Intro 46:50
This has been a production of themrainingshow.com check us out on Facebook and start a [e-mail]/mBrainingshow. Subscribe to each show on iTunes and check us out on Twitter. The mBraining Show we’d like to acknowledge and thank mBIT international for their support with this show. wants to know more about mBraining? Visit www.mbraining.com

The post Overcoming bi-polar disorder with David Clark #15 appeared first on The mBraining Show.