Lisa Danylchuk Host 00:01

Josh Pais, welcome to the how we Can Heal podcast. I'm excited to have you here today and to talk about losing your mind. 

Josh Pais Guest 00:09 

Yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 00:10

 Yes, so I'm a mental health professional and I read your book. I love it. There's so many overlaps between, I think, what you do and what I do, which people probably wouldn't guess, being that you're a professional actor and I'm oftentimes sitting or moving with clients in an office and doing things like that. But I think, especially probably wouldn't guess, being that you're a professional actor and I'm oftentimes sitting or moving with clients in an office and doing things like that. But I think, especially in terms of trainings the training you offer there's a lot of foundations that are the same, so I'm excited to dig into that a little bit today. 

Josh Pais Guest: 

Great, me too.

Lisa Danylchuk Host: 

I want to start by asking what are the benefits of losing your mind? 

Josh Pais Guest 00:45 

Oh, my God, so many. I mean when I first off, I'll just say, when I refer to mind in the reasons that it fires up, is when we disconnect from the body, and we typically disconnect from the body when we have, and I'm going to say, the false belief that there are bad sensations. I don't think there are any bad sensations. It's all built into our DNA. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:28 

And when you say sensations, you're talking about emotions, emotions. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:32 

Yeah, specifically emotions. So a common pattern is we feel a sensation. Often it's fear, anxiety, nervousness, for for some it's happiness and joy and ecstasy. Whatever you have a low tolerance for, you manage it in some way. You do whatever it is, it's all management, it's all suppression, and as soon as we disconnect from the body, the mind fires up and tells us that we suck. Basically, it's some form of unbelievable abuse for over 30 years and everybody at every level, no matter how many awards they've gotten, has the worst mind. And so often when in class, when I start talking about this, people come up to me on a break and they'll go like I know what you're saying, but my mind is really bad. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 02:42 

But me, I'm different. 

Josh Pais Guest 02:43 

Like this is yeah, no you don't know, but it's like true for bad. But me I'm different. Like this is like no, you don't know, yeah, but it's like true for everybody. And so when we lose our mind to get out of here, we start to have access to our creativity. We can connect to the immediate environment where, when we're engaging and with someone in any form, it's we're really being with them and people are desperate to be heard. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 03:10
Yes. 

Josh Pais Guest 03:11
And when we're up here, we are filtering out our potential, we're filtering out the world around us and live in just these repetitive cycles. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 03:24
Yeah, just looping around in the stinking. 

Josh Pais Guest 03:27
And we decrease our aliveness and decrease our health, and it's really essential, and especially with what's going on on the planet on so many levels. It's a reflection of people operating from their mind and not their heart, and it's no longer that's just no longer going to help us survive as a species. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host
03:59
Yeah, and that's deep. I mean you start with I know you, I'm really deep you are. 

Josh Pais Guest 04:04
Did I tell you that?  I should have said that at the beginning. 

Lisa Danylchu kHost 04:08
Super, super deep. 

04:12
But I mean, I think this way too, with a micro and the macro right, like you see something happening in an individual and again, I've worked a lot with families and communities and individuals in my time and and then you just see the layers of it, right, you're like, oh, this is how this happens for that person, this is how that impacts their relationships, this is how this impacts their family or their kids, or in their community and their workplace, and and and out to you know nth layers.

04:40
And so I think it is really helpful to have empowering practices these days that are present, moment, focused, because what I see a lot of people going, maybe I watched the news or maybe I was scrolling social media, and now I anything like that, and and I know, you know we're trying not to go to like positive emotions, negative emotions, it's all sensation, but there's a disconnect that's playing out in that there's a disconnect from, actually, I hear birds chirping right now and there's a nice breeze in the lemon tree and, oh, my partner's right next to me on the couch and we're both scrolling through our phones, and we're both scrolling through our phones and we're both doom scrolling when we could be holding hands or snuggling our puppy right. So there's a missed opportunity for life and a lot of. When I read and hear, listen to your work, a lot of I think about energy, right, like you talk about atoms and how I know your father influenced you. He was a physicist. 

Josh Pais Guest 05:46
Yeah, he was a theoretical physicist who worked with Einstein for 11 years. He was pretty deep too. A big shift in my life came from a conversation that I had with him when I was six years old and I didn't know what he did as his job because I knew other kids. It made sense what their dads did. They were like bus drivers or, in New York City, drug dealers, or you know carpenters, or you know what have you, or you know carpenters, or you know what have you. And my dad would just scribble these what he called you know equations on this enormous blackboard. And so I was like what do you do and what is that? What is your job? And I was sitting next to a table and he said the smallest part of that table and the smallest part of your knee are the same thing. They're atoms. And he said that's what I explore. The building part of that table and the smallest part of your knee are the same thing. They're atoms. And he said that's what I explore the building blocks of the universe, you know. And I was like that was super trippy, you know. And I was just looking at everything, like everything's atoms. 

06:57
And then, you know, cut to when I got out of acting school and I started auditioning and I was just crippled by fear and anxiety and I just thought there's no way I can do this. And then, when I reflected on the story, I just told you and thought, well, if my body is atoms, then ultimately, what's happened? Ultimately, what's happened, these emotions must be atomic vibrations. And once I started to experiment, feeling what I was feeling as the most purest form of it, which is just a vibrational pattern, then it took the judgment out of it as good and bad, because it was just something, you know, like this vibrational frequency or it was very flowing or chaotic or compressed or expansive opened up to me and my acting career took off and then soon people started to ask you know, asking me to teach, you know what I've been exploring? 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 08:11
Yeah, there's some sense of aliveness in it, right Like that. 

08:15
energy even makes me think of like qi in traditional Chinese medicine like when we block it and it gets stagnant in certain areas, or is it flowing here and just allowing it to move through the organs for health, right? So there's something about that and maybe there's some ways we can measure it. I'm not that type of scientist but like some ways we could look at it and figure it out, and I think there's maybe a little nth degree mysticism to it too that I personally like I like just calling it energy or spirit or whatever, but just knowing that I mean when you have conversations with people, when you're teaching people can relate to this, right, they're like oh yeah, there's a super link. 

Josh Pais Guest 08:54
Well, at first it's like what are you talking about? Like, what do you mean? Atoms, you know? And I say well, you know, I'll ask someone like well, what do you, what do you feel right now? And they'll say anxiety, for example. And I'm like but what do you feel? And it's like anxiety. But what do you? What do you like? How do you know? What you're feeling is anxiety? 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 09:21
Like, what is the yes, I've had the same conversation with so many people like defying anxiety, like what is the same conversation with so many people like define anxiety. So many people say they have it and they're talking about a million different things, even yeah Right. 

Josh Pais Guest 09:31
I think a lot of people, when they talk, when they when I asked them what their experience of anxiety is, they talk about the thoughts that they're having. It's like I just feel terrible, I feel like an imposter, I feel like I'm no good. And none of those you don't. Your body doesn't has no idea what feeling like an imposter is. It does not have you don't feel that, but you feel something moving around in here and something moving around in here, and then, as soon as you suppress it, then the mental chatter starts and then that's often what people identify as anxiety. But if you stay with the purity of the sensation, I found that it shifts within 7 to 12 seconds. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 10:23
Yeah, shifts within 7 to 12 seconds. 

Josh Pais Guest 10:25
Yeah, If you suppress it, it'll hang out for days, weeks or years, yeah, until you're ready to feel it, yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 10:38
Yeah, that's a lot of baggage to build up right. 

Josh Pais Guest 10:40
 Yeah, I mean, I think it's on page 25 of my book. I talk about the greatest myth of our time yes, being in, you know, perpetually upset. And the myth is and it's so simple, but it's so ingrained in all of us from like birth Well, maybe not quite birth, but as soon as we are, you know, we're able to communicate through most people through the rest of their lives. And the myth is that there are good and bad sensations, and that is, you know, it's just, it's not true. It's not true. It's like we are. The human being is designed to feel the full range of sensation that we feel. It's in our design, and so the work that I do is about increasing your tolerance for you, as opposed to a technique to not feel this and not feel that. And it's like we can't selectively edit ourselves. If we try to reduce one sensation, we reduce them all. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 12:12
Yeah, I work a lot with complex trauma and child abuse, so of course I hear those people in my head and those extreme circumstances of like well, if a kid's being abused and they're not feeling good and they're managing it with dissociation or unable, like, I think it's important in those situations to point out we're just surviving, right. Put things to the side because they're too much for now. We don't have the support to feel it. The therapist in 20 years can hold our hand to feel it Like that's adaptive and good. So we're not trying to say, if you can't, oh, absolutely, absolutely. 

Josh Pais Guest 12:48
But it's just a catch if it becomes a lifestyle of suppression. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 12:53
And healing is often that, especially in those extreme cases I'm thinking of like that slow paced okay, like can you feel this now? Can you feel that now? What if I hold your hand? What if we bring in all the supports? What if we go to a peaceful place first? What if we just take the smallest little piece of this feeling? That's really overwhelming. 

Like there's all these ways that we that's where I feel like there's this Venn diagram of what you're doing and what I'm doing. That's so similar. It's so much somatic psychotherapy in it of like, yeah, feel it to heal it. And when it's when the whole point is it's too much to feel well, then let's find ways to widen that window, let's find ways to bring in the sensation, because, it is true, a lot of times people have a whole bunch of experience and sensation and we might you know it might be harmed. They might've been harmed a lot as a young person and there's residuals of that. 

But then they're also not feeling joy necessarily in their life, and so they perhaps come in with like a depressive disorder or something, or even you know some, a complex cocktail of of diagnoses and it's, it's that process of like, well, how can we build a relationship then? That's safe enough for you to start to go through, essentially, this process of connecting with yourself, connecting with energy, trusting your emotions and your responses, like if you were pissed off because someone was yelling at you yeah, of course you were Like most people would be If someone knocks your coffee over with their elbow in the line, you're going to be like what the hell, dude? 

What are you doing? Right? Like, again, going to your point, the greatest myth like it's not a good or bad emotion or sensation, it's. It's a response to our environment and honoring and trusting Even. I know you talk about your nervous system in this book and the great, great grandmother right, that's like there's wisdom in that for sure. And we got to like okay, thank you for that wisdom. And it doesn't mean I have to live in fear of the things that have happened before. 

Josh Pais Guest 14:44
Right. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 14:45
Or any of the possible things that could ever go wrong for a human being right Like that. 

Josh Pais Guest 14:50

Yes. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 14:51
Let's put that aside and actually live what's happening right now. 

Josh Pais Guest 14:55
Yeah, absolutely yeah, and I'm sure you know, with the work, you know the brilliant work that you do, and you know, and how it crosses in with what I do it's just, you know, the body just becomes so balanced. I've had people, you know, literally come in and like their spine is like this, you know, and literally by having them feel um and for like what do you, what do you feel in there, and just feeling it, and then you know like emotion or energy gets released and it was like just party with it. You know, it's like I'm always saying just party with it, and I mean it was probably within 20 minutes. You know, this guy went from this to this, not focusing on his alignment. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 15:52
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 15:52
But it's just what he had compressed in there, you know had been like a hockey ball, yeah, and it just started. You know, we just feel, and it wasn't. You know, he was like whoa. You know, it was almost like a roller coaster and it just started. 

You know we just feel and it wasn't. You know he was like Whoa. You know it was almost like a roller coaster but it was like. You know, we kind of like all talked about like it's just all, it's just vibrations and and you tell me, I mean, within the paradigm that we're talking about of energy, on that we're talking about of energy, I mean, is trauma like almost compressed energy? It's like so much has happened at a time in the past that it was, like you said, too much to deal with in that moment, and that's a great ability that the human body has. 

To like this is too much, I need to. I need to pocket this so I can manage and survive, and that it's just really energy that gets locked in somewhere in the body and then it's almost sealed until you kind of let yourself start to feel it, and for me, you kind of let yourself start to feel it and for me, you know, I don't go really into the psychological of it, but it's just the energetic. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 17:12
Just the present moment experience. 

Josh Pais Guest 17:15
Yeah, yeah, because I'm not, you know, I'm not a, I'm not, you know, a psychologist or anything. But you know and your work has been really healing for people. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 17:24
Right, it has, it has or anything, but you know it's been really healing for people right Go from crunched over to the side and closed off, to standing up and feeling energy moving and releasing something that's been there for days, months, weeks, years, right. And so in service of I know you work you worked with that, or you work with actors, but you also work with entrepreneurs and other folks who find themselves in fearful places, which you know being a human right, whatever you do. 

Absolutely.

You talk about surgeon in your book. I mean you could use it when you're, I don't know, doing construction and demo on a big building. I don't know. 

Josh Pais Guest 17:55
Absolutely or lawyers you know a lot of lawyers that you know they have to do their closing argument and an interesting thing is that if you suppress anything, you block a communication experience with whoever's there. And for a lawyer, you know their audience is in closing argument is the jury, and if they're feeling nervous and they suppress it, their, their mind starts firing up and the ability for their audience to connect to them is limited because they're not letting themselves connect to them. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 18:42
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 18:42
And the thing is, you know, I've worked, you know, for years with actors and you know actors are, you know, have to put their ass on the line and they're going to feel nervous. 

And you know, we've all been taught that nervous is bad, especially in acting school. But by allowing that nervousness to be there, like an audience like leans forward and they're fully there with that person, and they don't appear nervous, they just appear authentic. Yes, because it's not a bad energy and it's almost like that your being is generating energy to help you do the task at hand. Yes, but if we're not trained to allow for all that vibrational frequency and that's all there to help you. But if we manage it, you know, as I said before, we manage it and then the signal gets distorted and people are like can't fully trust you because it's like you're hiding something. And you know, and there's such beauty in someone allowing themselves to be nervous without running away, like keeping the staying out, staying connected with the individual or the audience while this energy is happening and breathing, you know, and then it sensations and that's that's a troubling myth that we're. You know that I'm trying to undo. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 20:30
Well, you're also you're also talking about vulnerability, right Like being seen in how you truly feel. And I know you mentioned a few times like going on a first date and the energy that goes with that. And it kicks me back to college where, like I'm super attracted to someone and then I'm just like so closed off because the energy so much, and then it doesn't go anywhere. And you're like well, yeah, because you couldn't like you didn't let them see you right. 

There's no connection there, and I think that's such a huge piece of what you're talking about and we're talking about here. Even when you talk about, like, trauma and energy getting stuck, I think of harm and I think of protection and just how our bodies are wired to protect us from harm and to learn from past experience so we can bring whether we think of it as an energetic block or a neurological pattern or whatever if there's an experience of harm, we're going to learn from that. Good, good job, brain. Thanks for remembering and bringing forward. And then, if that's not the case anymore, especially, we have this protection in place that prevents us from connecting with other people. 

Josh Pais Guest 21:37
Yes. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 21:37
Though I can't show that I'm nervous, because that time I was nervous in fifth grade. At the play, somebody pants me in front of everyone, and then they called me a name for the rest of the year, whatever.

Like even things like that. We carry forward. And then there's this rule right that we're maybe not even conscious of, like, oh, I can't show this emotion or I can't show that emotion I'm going to get, and the sort of harm in it is is also social. It's like, well, I'll be made fun of or people won't like it. 

I feel like there's a huge social element of your work. Actors are with other people, creating connections with other people, performing for other people right? People receiving that are looking for some kind of connection or meaning or story or experience, and so it makes so much sense to me that when you connect with something that's true, that's real, that's alive in the moment, that that's more compelling, because I think so much of what so many of us want these days is just something real and something connected and human and honest, and even if it's messy, right, even if it has all this vibration. 

Josh Pais Guest 22:47
Like yeah, absolutely. And you know, if you think of you know been to a play or even somebody you know public speaking and they mess something up and but they're like open about it and not contracting. It's like the audience is like sometimes they'll applaud. Yes, you know what I mean. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 23:08
Yes. 

Josh Pais Guest 23:08
Because it's like something real is happening and so often we think we need to present this. You know 3.0 version of ourselves, but ultimately no one wants to see that, not in this era. And if you can allow whatever is there to fully be there, you know, if you're, you know, a podcaster or you know wanting to connect to people in any way, it's like that's the most powerful connection tool is to honor all these charges. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 23:49
Yeah, so much of what you describe also feels like yoga to me, and I know you said you've done yoga since you were six years old. How did that influence your work? How do you see that connecting? I mean? 

Josh Pais Guest 24:02
it. You know it's been, mean it, and you know it's been. I still, you know practice, um, you know pretty much three or four times a week. Um, I mean, how has it not I, I don't even know. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 24:20
I'm like it's connecting with emotions, it's releasing emotions. I think when yoga people do there are people mistake. That, like calm, is always the goal. So there's that element in yoga where it can get suppressive, like I have to be spiritual and I have to be calm all the time. 

Josh Pais Guest 24:35
That's one maybe contrast, but you know, we do like usually some kind of physical warmup. And if it's yoga, you know there's a yoga element and, like some people are, you know that have practiced for a while, like they're like you know, and I'm like what, what are you doing? You know that's not. That's actually suppressing yourself, like it's more like it's more like what. 

What is this Like? What, what, whoa, what is that Like? And it's just trained me to be in my body and honor. You know the the. You know it's pretty, it's a. It's a magical thing in the universe that we have this body, you know, and I mean, maybe there's other bodies out there, who knows but it's pretty astonishing that we have this and that it's an experiential entity that we are. You know, and I sometimes say like if somebody is like I don't want to feel that you know, like I'll sometimes, I sometimes say like if somebody is like I don't want to feel that you know, like I'll sometimes jokingly say, well, in a hundred years from now, when you're floating around, you're going to be like oh, anxiety, was I really missed that anxiety thing and that fear, and now I'm just like it made me feel so alive yeah it was so, oh gosh, and I missed it. 

You know it's like we don't know what, we don't know what's going on, but why miss this physical being that we're that we are? Why miss it? You know what I mean, why and it's, and that's you know. Back to your original question. You know what I mean, why and it's, and that's you know. Back to your original question. If you're in your mind like, you can't, you can't, you can't fully connect, you can't fully connect with you. And the more that you connect I mean this is I have a connection to the nuance of sensation that's like it's so rich and the more that you you know, the more that you explore, like, the more that of being spontaneous while I'm acting is to be. You know, my goal. I don't always get there, but it's just to get to a place where I'm fully in the unknown. Of course, I know the story that we're telling, I know the lines, but it's then, it's in that unknown, magical place where art happens. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 27:30
Yeah, rather than rehearsing something and having every little inflection point down, letting your voice carry in the way it wants to carry in the moment, in response to the person that's actually in front of you, or just leaving space, so it doesn't have to be so hunkered down. I mean, I feel like we can. You're also talking about a yoga philosophy, in my mind at least, of Stira and Sukha, of like structure and ease, where it's yeah, yeah, no, your lines know the story. If you show up and you're just like, hey, I'm here to be spontaneous, and people like who's your character? Like that's not going to work. 

Josh Pais Guest 28:03
Yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 28:03
But you have that down and you can even use. If there's, you know, anxiety or energy, you can use that energy. 

Josh PaisGuest 28:10
Absolutely Get the character and steady. That's your job, yeah, and I would say that's everyone's job in the moment that they're putting their ass out into the world and whatever, whether it's a date or whatever it's like your job is to is to honor this and use it to um, you know to, to reach your potential. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 28:39 

Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 28:39
And there's so much out there that is, you know, holds these different things is bad and it's all. All of that is just suppression techniques. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 28:51
Yeah, and I think of that at times as protective of true connection. Right, you've probably been in a workshop or two where one of the assignments is to like gaze into your partner's eyes for 10 seconds. Have you done that? 

Josh Pais Guest 29:03
I'm sure, as an actor. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 29:04
You've crawled on the floor and, you know, acted like an alligator and done all those warmups right. Like I feel, like those moments of connection can feel really vulnerable, or even as yourself. Someone comes and says, oh, I love your work, Right, and it's like well, that's a lot of energy coming at me. 

You could, you know, push it away or you can connect with it. And there's always these moments for all of us of of opportunities for connection and you know, whether or not we we lean into that or we have some, some wall come up. And sometimes there's good reasons for boundaries Like don't get me wrong. 

Josh Pais Guest:

 No, I think. I think the ability to put up a wall is fantastic. Again, it's just you don't want that to be your lifestyle. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 29:50
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you don't want to live behind a wall. 

Josh Pais Guest 29:54 Yeah. 

I developed these. It's about 25 different tools that I call inner atomics, which encompass all of human behavior and they're all energetic patterns, basically, and you know, and playing with kinespheres, and there there's like a kinesphere of, you know, of being armored and like holding energy away, and there's a kinesphere of like what I call welcome to my living room, where it's like as if you're having a party and like come in, come on, come on in. And all these, you know, came out of teaching people how to create any character for any role in any medium. And then over the years it's been like, wow, these are interesting tools to transform people in a completely non-psychological way by just seeing what inner atomic they're living at and then saying, hey, what about try this? You know? 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 30:54
Yeah, you use the word kinesphere. Can you define that for folks listening? 

Josh Pais Guest 30:58
um, yeah, so, um, I'll tell you what the four kinespheres that I play with. And for me it has to do with the energetic. It's often the energetic pattern, the energy that extends past the body, and so there are two big kinespheres and two small kinespheres. Kinespheres and I was just describing, like the big kinespheres. One is as if you, as if you're maybe 25 feet away, you have a chain link fence and you're not going to let anybody in and that you'll meet people like that and they'll be. 

They'll shake your hand and be like you know, and it's like you're. There's no invitation, do you know what I mean? And this can be great tools for an actor to play a character like that. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 31:54
Yes. 

Josh Pais Guest 31:55
And then the so that's one. It's like you're just holding energy. Don't come in, this is my space. And then, as I was just saying, the next big kinesphere is what I call welcome to my living room, and it's like everything is open. Anything can come in. You're not, you're so strong in your because you're just receiving with. No, I can. Whatever you I can handle whatever. Come in, come in, come in. You, I can handle whatever. Come in, come in, come in. And then the small kinespheres. One is the kinesphere right at the perimeter of the body, and often those people are like at a party, like they'll stand really close to you you know and they have no sense of space. 

It's like. It's like and they're you know, and sometimes that can be like a great thing to play with if you're feeling you know, in like in a social situation and you're like you know. But if you just play with like there's no boundary, I can walk right through space. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 33:03
You're describing my dog. 

Josh Pais Guest 33:05
Yes, In your face, totally, he would get in your skin if he could. Yes, yes, a hundred, that's like yeah. And then the other small kinesphere is a withdrawal From the immediate environment, going. It's almost like spinning inside, going in in, in leaving the outside world. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 33:35
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 33:36
And that can be both meditative and beautiful. And it can also be depression. Also be depression, yeah, you know, can almost be. You know, like it's, like I know, in periods of my life when I felt depressed, I was like my energy was spiraled inward and I could see what was around me, but I was, I was in here yeah, and I far, I Far inside. 

Far inside. And you know I've experimented, you know, just with people in class that you know that were feeling some depression at one, and I don't, you know, this is not, I'm just playing, yeah and but and be like, well, what happens if you kind of uncoil, and not in a psychological way at all, but just uncoil energetically and start to take in, you know, and maybe even welcome just as an experiment, and it's so interesting to see, you know, people like oh, you know, like it's like oh, I don't know if I can do that, that's like you know. But then it's like it's all play, you know, and if you just treat it like play, it's like oh, wow, oh, I can live in, I can live in this arena. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 35:01
Yeah, it's play and it's being open to change and not so identified sometimes. I mean, sometimes people say I feel depressed and sometimes people say I am depressed and there's a big linguistic difference in that. There could be a big identity difference in that too, right? Well, I've always been this way. It's just how I am, or I've been this way since this happened or since I was 16 or whatever you say. But playing is going beyond the bounds and seeing what happens and not knowing, and so there can at times be an identity piece, even for people to shift, or even just a habit, right, like we get in a habit and a routine in our bodies and the way we relate to our emotions and our thoughts, and we're just there. But then you go to a class that's about acting and next thing you know you're expanding energy out and going. This actually feels different, right.

This is a whole new experience of my body and of other people probably too. 

Josh Pais Guest 36:00
Yeah, and I think what you said about identity is something to really I think I don't know the name of the chapter, but it might be a malleable identity. Yes, is that? You know, we develop an identity out of you know, very early on We'll either see people and be like, oh, I want to be like that. Or you know, most of this is very unconscious. And then we create a structure and we're like, oh yeah, this is me. You know, like you were saying, yeah, oh yeah, no, this is me. But so often those identities that we created were created by a much earlier version of ourselves that was just latching on to fitting in, or like grammar school. Or you know, like you said, not to be made fun of. Or you know, and then we, you know, without awareness, we, we continue to, you know, live in this structure. Know again, it takes bravery to to like, okay, well, what's outside this structure? You know what I mean. It's because it's it's disrupt, it's a disruption, but when people do that, it's like magical. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 37:17
You know, it's like they blossom yeah, there's fear on the edges right of doing something. 

Josh Pais Guest 37:23
Oh, yeah, but it's, it's like it's fear, it's like a membrane of fear that feels like, oh, I could never. You know, once you step through, you're like, oh my god, this is what. What was I doing, you know? 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 37:47

Okay, we're talking about identity right now. We're talking about moving through that membrane right Of fear, and I think we live in a culture you talk about. We live in a culture that values confidence, like have the confidence first and then do the thing. And you're like no, no, no, feel the feelings and do the thing, feel the sensations and do the thing. And I think we live in a culture that values extroversion, like the person at the party who seems really comfortable and outgoing and lets their energy flow. 

And then I noticed in your book there was a page that had notes from the workshop that was handwritten and one of the negative thoughts someone wrote was I'm an introvert, like that was preventing them maybe in acting or in whatever their skill or services. That was a thought that was preventing them from connecting, engaging, feeling sensations, whatever. So I'm wondering if you have any thoughts on this, like introvert versus extrovert. Some people say introverts like hear words in their heads before they say them, and that's just a different style. Have you come across this in your work, like people who say, oh, I'm an introvert but I can still do this? 

Josh Pais Guest 38:56
Yeah, I mean, you know, I think we're in such a culture of wanting to label ourselves and to give us also to label ourselves with some affliction. 

Yeah, you know what I mean. And then I'm living, you know, like you were saying I'm, you know, oh, I'm. You know, I have this, you know syndrome, or I have this, you know, not to say that there aren't people that have illnesses and you know, and so on. There aren't people that have illnesses and you know, and so on. But a lot of times, you know, extroverts are, they're just suppressing. It's a form of suppression because they're really tender and scared and vulnerable and they've come up with a technique to they're putting on a mask and because, you know, there's times when someone you know, I'll know if I'm at a dinner party and there's somebody that's like having to talk all the time, it's just like shut up. Having to talk all the time, it's just like shut up, you know, it's just not, there's not. 

And they're saying you know the stories that they're saying they said at the last dinner party, and so that's just, that's a way of hiding, and so is you know. And being an introvert is just having a low tolerance for living in your human body and to hold vulnerability as bad and vulnerability is so beautiful. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host
Yeah, yeah you know, and vulnerability is so beautiful. Yeah yeah, and I think about how people say introverts need time, more time alone, extroverts need more time with people. I mean, I want to just validate and celebrate. We're all different and wired differently, so you know, we're all going to find what works for us and what's true for us. But what you said matches with if we're wearing a mask that takes a lot of energy, right, we feel like who we are isn't okay and we have Not we don't, we feel it's not we feel. 

Josh Pais Guest 
we hold the story, which is different than what we feel, and then we run that over and over and over again and it's like you know this, this is my identity. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host
And then the draining, the energy drain that that can have right Of that story, feeling really true, feeling kind of locked into it. 

Josh Pais Guest
Yeah, and it takes, you know, it takes bravery to feel vulnerability and not spend all your time alone in the woods. Yeah, you know, but it's everybody, you know, it's all part of this great myth. Like there's, it's we, just all of us. We don't have to be different than who we are. But the more we can increase our tolerance for who, what I don't even know what the word is but the more we can increase our tolerance for living in our body, the more everything starts taking care of itself and it's exhausting to perpetually manage and suppress yourself. You know these vibrational patterns. You're like using an exorbitant amount of energy to not let you know the buzzing in your torso, buzz, yeah, and then so many people that I work with, when they start to just let things feel, you know, let them own the vibrations, it's like, oh my God, I have so much energy. Yeah, and it's just, all that's happened is that they've stopped using all their energy to manage themselves. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 43:32
And it doesn't. You know it comes out of the great myth and it and people, it doesn't help you it's. You know it's like and you know so many of the you know just going kind of extreme. But you know, like these mass shooter, you know these people that go out it's like, and then you find, you know, until they couldn't contain it anymore and then you know, blow off, you know whatever um yeah, so feeling and that's an extreme example yeah but it's like we we get into trouble when we're over managing something very natural. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host  44:27
Yeah, Suppressing or judging right. 

Josh Pais Guest 44:30
Yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 44:31
It's just part of being human. 

Josh Pais Guest 44:32
It's like, yeah, it's like you know, putting up you know a band around a tree and being like nope, you cannot grow. No, no, no. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host: Yeah, and then the band's going to break eventually, yeah. 

Josh PaisGuest 44:46
Yeah or the tree will die you know whoever, no, yeah, and then the band's going to break eventually. Yeah, yeah, when the tree will die you know whoever, whichever wins. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host: 44:52
Yeah, you talk about playing small too. I think that's like a really common expression, and when you talked about that membrane of fear right at the edge, right it's like moving through that takes a lot of courage. 

Takes, you know. You give so many sort of anchors in your book of using your body, using your breath, using sort of a mantra to come back. There's all these ways. What would you say to someone who's like right on that edge, where maybe there's something they want to do but they're feeling a lot of fear and they feel the contraction with it? 

Josh Pais Guest 45:24
and they feel the contraction with it. I mean, when any person, no matter how much they've achieved, extends further out into the world, it's natural. It's normal, it's guaranteed that you're going to feel more and it's not a sign that you're not ready, it's not a sign that you're not professional, it's just what happens to the body as it extends outward, and I think it has. I think that it's part of an ancient survival strategy that we've inherited. You know, I talk about like the great, great, great grandmother who's in the cave and somebody runs out of the cave, you know, carefree, and they get something bad happens to them, and so, and so this great, great, great grandmother is like I am, I'm not going to let I'm, you know, I'm not doing that and that gets passed down. 

That survival strategy, which was the right survival strategy for that period of time. It gets passed down and, without awareness, we will continue to not leave our cave, whatever that is, and it's and it, and you know, I talk about just talking to your nervous system, like it's, almost like you're talking to your ancient grandmother, it's, and literally just say we're, we're okay, we're, we're gonna, we're gonna go talk to some, some people right now and and you know this, the this, the vibrations increase like, but we're okay, you know, because the nervous system sometimes doesn't know the difference between almost literally getting killed and, for an actor, like going into an audition yeah because it's you're stepping out into the world and we just have to nurture and honor. 

You know, our great-great-great-grandmother. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 47:32
I must say great-great-great-grandma. 

Josh Pais Guest 47:34
Yes, yeah, and just be like we're okay, we're okay, we're really okay and yeah, and it's going to. We're feeling a lot of stuff, but we're okay. We're feeling a lot of stuff, but we're okay, and that just it undoes the past. 

And it's maybe even honoring, you know, your great-great-grandmother, and it's we have. This is the survival strategy of this time. We have to allow ourselves to be present because otherwise we're going to continue to work out of our heads and it's going to be it's, you know, our mind. We can't put our mind on the altar because it's an abusive. It's an abusive thing. That is there trying to protect us, even saying like you're no good. You're no good at that, that's something you're not good at. It's just like stay in the cave, be safe, don't feel too much, don't you know? And that, like I was saying, that may have been a great survival strategy at one time, but now it's the wrong survival strategy. We can't keep going this way connection. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 49:03
And we need connection with ourselves and with other people and that's such a primal urge that even the fear of getting out of the cave it's like well, if you're the only person in the back of the cave and everyone else is outside, I hope you come out at some point because you're going to survive with connection to other people. 

Josh Pais Guest 49:24
Yeah, I love that. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 49:25
Hiding by yourself alone in the dark. 

Josh Pais Guest 49:28
Yeah yeah. And you know, and if you're hiding alone in the dark, you know, enjoy it. Might as well make the most of it. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 49:37
Make it cozy, bring in a candle. 

Josh Pais Guest 49:40
And sometimes it's great to you know, withdraw from the outside world and just be in like a really private time and you know, and and that that's that's important to give to yourself as well. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 49:56
But it's just not having not letting these be the the modality that we live every part of our life in well, I hear in a lot of your work that dynamism, that being able to be dynamic right, just like an actor is not going to play the same character every time. 

If you have the different kinespheres, if you can be in the cave, out of the cave, if you know what those sensations are like, if you can connect with the experience, work with the experience, right, bring a candle into your cave or whatever, or not, that gives choice and that's a big thing in trauma recovery too is a lot of times people don't have choice for the traumatic thing they've been through and then their body responds great-great-grandmother responds, and they go what the hell was that? And then they're stuck in confusion and a lot of swirling stuff in the body and trying to manage it and coming to a place where it's like, oh, I can understand now a little bit of why I responded the way I did or why my nervous system did, and then having a choice of like okay, well, what do I want to do with that? If my body wants to hold up, do I want to do that in an unconscious way or a conscious way? Go to restorative yoga. 

Maybe I do a retreat, maybe I make my home this lovely little cove that feels so nest-like. That feels really nourishing for me. 

Josh Pais Guest 51:09
Yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 51:10
If that's what I'm needing, right, but having a choice rather than having some default or having, like you've said, that mental chatter. That's like criticizing the choice at the same time. Yes, never leave your house, or you know, whatever the narrative is yeah, yeah, and I think it's also interesting. 

Josh Pais Guest 51:29
I know there's times when you know I have to be in some kind of public arena, but I feel like I just want to retreat and you know, and I experiment, being like, yeah, like what is that? What are the atoms doing? Like what is the actual vibration of it? And it's quite intense sometimes, but it's like, let me just go out into the world feeling raw. What, if raw is like? Oh, you know, and it's a lot, it's a lot, but it's also it's, it's beautiful and it's much more beautiful than I feel raw and it's like armor up and like how you doing. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 52:18
Yeah, faking out yeah. You know a persona. 

Josh Pais Guest 52:22
Yeah, cause that's detrimental. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 52:24
Well, it's disconnecting from what's true, right. It's disconnecting from the sensations in your body too. 

Josh Pais Guest 52:29
Yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 52:30
Yeah, and that's the kind of acting that I think people don't lean into as much right. 

Josh Pais Guest 52:36
When it's. I mean, there's nothing worse if you, you know, go to the theater and, like you know, in five seconds, if it's either going to be oh my, my God. You know, this is like. I have to sit through this because they're on autopilot, not revealing anything of themselves and just putting up a mask, and it's like it's oh God, it's one of the most horrible experiences. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 53:03
What's that sensation like in your body? 

Josh Pais Guest 53:05
It's just it's a it's probably a little bit of anger and um swirling and just like it's probably close to rage. Actually, you know, I was still sitting in that seat, but it's like god, I have to sit here. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 53:20
I have to sit here and feel all this energy you know, it's just it. 

Josh Pais Guest 53:26
It's disappointing because you're especially like, say, with the theater, like an acting is, it's a ritual, and in the ritual you want to fire up the imagination of the audience. And that happens when the actor is open to their truth, because then the imagination of the viewer makes the story come alive in their head. But if we cross the line and this applies way beyond acting as well but if we cross the line and indicate or show this is what's happening, then the imagination of the viewer stops. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 54:06
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 54:07
You want to give, you want to have a bit of a vacuum of aliveness so that people can then come in and like oh, wow, it's this. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 54:17
It's that you know not to be gendered, but it's mansplaining the audience. 

Josh Pais Guest 54:21
Right yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 54:23
Over. Yeah, yeah, yeah, or you know and women could mansplain too in that situation. 

Josh Pais Guest 54:32
Yeah, yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 54:34
We'll call it over explaining for it. Yeah, no, it looks gender. 

Josh Pais Guest 54:38
I like mansplaining. I think that's a good term. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 54:42
I have this question about so committed. Impulse is the name of your work. 

Josh Pais Guest 54:46
Yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 54:47
And I'm not talking about myself here, I'm totally talking about myself here. Sometimes, when big decisions come, I can get stuck in analysis, paralysis, like it's a thing that I thought I moved through because I used to do it a lot as a teen. And then it's actually. It's happening right now with one part of my life. It's just a trip I'm planning and I'm just like over the top and it's going to be amazing because it's over the top Cause I'm like, do you tell? 

Josh Pais Guest 55:09
And I know you mean the trip is over the top, it's going to be amazing and over the top, because I'm like do we want to do this, do we want to do this? 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 55:16
And I just keep going forth and I enjoy it actually. But sometimes analysis, paralysis is not enjoyable and the term committed and impulse is like you're going to just go with it, you're going to cross that threshold of that fear bubble, you're leaning into it, you're riding it, it's, there's no more question, right, there's no more doubt. And then the impulse is usually a really quick thing that comes up quickly. So I think about even intuition there too, and the difference between that and like being, you know, the impulsivity of just, I don't know, eating 18 bags of cheetos in a row. 

Josh Pais Guest 55:50
Yeah, but that's yeah, but that that's. That's actually a suppression of impulses, right, like impulses are. So it's like the purest expression of who you are, and like so often impulses are considered something bad. Somebody was, you know, an impulse crime or or an impulsive act. You see it on the, you know as a definition on the news. But that's really somebody that has suppressed themselves, suppressed themselves, suppressed themselves, and then it came out, you know, in this. So but the, the purity of like of a of a spontaneous moment, the period of an impulse coming out, is just perfection, and the more that we trust that, the more that we handle situations absolutely perfectly. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 56:44
Mm, hmm absolutely perfectly. 

Josh Pais Guest 56:52
But it's like we're in a culture that is where mind is at the top of the food chain. You know like that's the, you know that's the hierarchy, and as I'm going all over the place. But as children, you know if you're in school and the teacher calls on you and you go, I don't know like that's the worst, that's humiliating, you know that's the worst thing. And so we then go through life going like I'm always going to know. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 57:15
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 57:15
I'm always. But magic, a magical place is to be in. I don't know. I don't know Because then you're open, I love this. 

And if I have any mantra and I don't have, I don't know, because then you're open and if I have any mantra and I don't have many mantras but if I have any mantra to myself, as I'm about to shoot a scene, you know, and the lights and the camera and everything's being set up and I can, and my mind starts going like, oh, you'll do this and then you'll do that moment. And then I was like wait a minute, and it's like I just say to myself I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know what's going to happen, and then I can go into the scene and really be with that other actor and find the magic of this dance that has never happened before, and that's what makes you know never happened before, and that's what makes you know. That's when my best work emerges, when it's I forget and I go like I'm going to go on my path and I'm going to do it this way, this way, this way, this way. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 58:23
You know, often like the director will be like um yeah, let's, let's try it again. 

Josh Pais Guest 58:25
Um, you know, like the all the choices are right but they're not. 

There's no spontaneity, there's not no impulse, and a lot of the work that I do is just lots of exercises that are playful and sometimes a little strenuous, but anybody can do them. 

It's just, it's just stepping a bit outside the what we're used to, um, and just training people in exercises that lead, that require being spontaneous, and it's not hard work, it's just like, just you know, and then the more that they do this and this is people in all professions the more that this, you know, they've retrained their nervous system that it's okay to follow an impulse, it's okay to walk up to someone and say something, it's okay to um to be like, actually, this is what I want to do with my career. 

I was just talking with someone last night who came over for dinner, somebody very well known and very successful, and you know, and he was talking about like I actually want to do this whole other thing, and he and it's like, and then I started doing it and you know, and this guy has made set, like since I've known him, three career shifts. Yeah, somebody, you know that, everybody knows and and it's like, it's so, it's so you know if, if he suppressed his impulses, he would just stay in the same trajectory and die. Yeah, die fat, because it's like this is what's this is what's worked in the past and that's awesome. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:00:07
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:00:08
But then if the impulse is like, actually I really want to go over here, but I don't know what it is and I don't know what that would mean, and I don't, but For me, like that's, that's, that's the juice, that's where you're become so alive, yeah, and it's, and you're going to vibrate more, you're going to feel more. But if you that's why it's just so important that we increase our tolerance for ourselves and then we can, then we can cross those barriers that we talked about. And, yes, you're going to feel fear. And what's bad about fear? Like who said fear is bad? Like it's just if you feel the purity of the vibration, like like someone would say you know, in class I'll go, like somebody will get up in front of class and they'll be like I feel so much anxiety and like that's like oh, that's fantastic that. And like what do you feel? And it's like you know. 

And then I go like move with your hands, you know, on your chest, like the try to generate the experience that you have when you feel anxiety, and like go ahead, it's like it's you know, and it happened, like moving their hands all over their body, and and then I was like is, is that kind of what anxiety is for you doing, and I was, and they and they go, yeah, that's, that's it. And then I, and then I'll say like, well, is it really that bad, you know? And then their face is like hmm, and it's like actually it's not that bad. Do you know what I mean? But it's the it's we've. We know there's this word anxiety and we know it's a bad thing. And you know, I'm sure some people have identified excitement as one energetic pattern and if we could measure it for another person, that same energetic pattern, they might've been like, oh, this must be what anxiety is and it's bad. 

So I need to suppress it, and then I live in my head. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:02:10
Yeah, yes. So much in what you just said, and part of why I wanted to ask about that committed impulse is I went to a meditation workshop years ago at Spirit Rock out here, and they talked about decisions and the best decisions being the ones that you can like, the quality of the decision directly being related to how long you can tolerate the anxiety of not knowing Right. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:02:27
Wait, say that again. That was a little out. Say that again. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:02:31
The quality of the decision directly related to how long you can tolerate not knowing the answer. How long you can tolerate not knowing knowing the answer, how long you can tolerate not knowing. So when I'm asking you about over planning and all these other things, like there is an element of it's uncomfortable because I'm like, oh, I want to know and I want to tell everybody else this is the plan. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:02:52
But there's also this very alive and for me right now, in this case, joyful experience of dancing around with different options, right, so let me, let me ask you, me ask you do you think you're hitting your upper boundary of feeling so ecstatic and joyous? Is that a possibility? Because it sounds like you're having so much fun and maybe it's like you know. It's like you know, it's like that can almost be like disturbing you know, to allow. 

But I would just experiment with like this, you know, like letting it, just letting it go and not feeling, and you'll come up with the right decisions yeah and you know those decisions are coming out of your body and and I'll bet, because I know this, I'll do this it's like this is what we got to do this. And then it's like no, wait a minute. No, no, that's you know. And then your mind will be like no, that's you know. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:03:52
That's reckless yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:03:54
Yeah, that's reckless or whatever, but that might be something to play with and those are treat those as impulses of like, I want to, I want to go there. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:04:10
It's like like, treat it like a impulse to follow. 

You're just going to have me extending my trip another week, josh, come on To come back to work. It's so funny and and I think, with things like this, it's like I saw some meme in the middle of this that was like I hope. Your biggest stressors today are like, should I go to Dubai or Paris or something like that? Like, well, this is good. I'm having, like you know, experience around planning something really fun with my family, so it's good to have that perspective, but it's also fun to play with these sensations in lighter scenarios, right? 

01:04:43
Yes, absolutely you can apply it and practice it and then learn from it. There's that saying, for whatever it's worth of how you do something is how you do everything. So it's like how you plan a trip is how you decide if you're going to marry someone, or how you decide other things. And so there's so much aliveness in your work and in your book and even in the way you write it. So I just want to celebrate and say thank you, for I mean just reading it inspired so much in me and how I was preparing for this interview or all kinds of things. My dogs are celebrating in the background now I don't know if you can hear them. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:05:17
Yeah, I hear them, that's great. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:05:18
Allowing things to be such. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:05:22
It's a powerful truth, right yeah, yeah, and it's like, almost like, who are we to not let things be? 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:05:31
yeah you know, oh yeah, trying to get my dog not to bark doesn't really work. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:05:36
Oh no, oh no, that just very well yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:05:40
So I was inspired. I usually I want to wrap up and tell people where they can get the book and you and all that. But I've never done this before on podcast on my podcast, I've heard it on others I want to do a lightning round. It's like five questions. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:05:53
Okay, okay, good, that just rose up some fear, so I'm going to party. It's fun, it's fun. I'm going to feel the charge I'm going to feel it, I'm going to party with it. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:06:02
All right, Josh Nice. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:06:05
Favorite Italian food Eggplant parm. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:06:10
Favorite Yiddish or Hebrew exclamation Oy. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:06:17
All-time favorite movie to watch. I'll just say I just watched Taxi Driver again. Yeah, and that was a movie that really instilled in me. Yes, I really want to be an actor and just like the commitment and the you know, it's just so brilliant. Of course it's violent, you know, at the end, but it's like it's so brilliant. Of course it's violent at the end, but it's so committed. Everybody is so in it. Yes, it's awesome. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:06:50
Nice, so it shows what you teach. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:06:54
Yes. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:06:54
Yeah, beautiful, okay, favorite book. It can't be Lose your Mind or Everything is Figureoutable. Book it can't be. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:07:06
Uh, lose your mind, or everything is figureoutable, jeez. Let me look at some of these. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:07:08
Let's go favorite book, to reread something you've gone back to this perfect day by ira levin I don't know that it it's a little bit hard to find. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:07:25
It's a futuristic world where, well, quickly, I'll say it's a futuristic world where everybody is medicated so that they don't have violence in the world and everybody's on the same track, and then there's a couple of people that catch on to this is happening and they're breaking out of it. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:07:51
Wow, definitely going to look for that. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:07:53
Thank you. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:07:54
That's awesome. Favorite yoga pose or practice. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:07:58
Ekapada Rajakapatasana. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:08:00
Love it. I love saying that one that's like yeah great pose. Yeah, if you had to perpetually repeat an acting project that you've done before, over and over again, which one would you choose? 

Josh Pais Guest 01:08:18
there was a movie that not a lot of people saw, but you can catch it online. It's called Touchy Feely. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:08:27
Okay. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:08:30
And it was with an amazing director who is no longer with us, Lynn Shelton. This amazing director, and it was just amazing cast. And we started with a structure of a script. We had the whole story but some of the scenes in the script were written like this happens, and then that happens and this happens and we would just improvise the story, like honoring the story. But there was so much improvisation but everybody in it was so grounded in their characters and it was just so free and spontaneous and so much fun. It was so much fun making that movie Just beautiful. It's movies got so much heart. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:09:15
Yeah, and it follows along. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:09:17
Allison Janney is in it and we have this crazy scene where she's a Reiki healer and I'm this like really suppressed guy you know and kind of, and you know, kind of falls in love with her and you know it's just like there's so much, yeah, and I play this, this dentist that suddenly gets the ability to heal people and he doesn't know what's, he doesn't know what's happening, he doesn't understand it. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:09:43
Um yeah, so touchy feely touchy feely yeah yeah last question, and a little more of an emotional one what's the story you hope people tell about you after you're gone, 100 years from now, when you're floating through? And it could be a funny one, it could be any little story. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:10:04
Like an incident. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:10:06
Yeah, like something. Oh, I remember, josh, it could be this one time or what. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:10:11
Always tell us or something that you just hope people carry forward I think it would be something in committed impulse class when josh demonstrated physically, representing what was going on inside his body in a non-verbal, purely physical way. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:10:44
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:10:44
And that that opened up the door for other people to experiment that way. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:10:50
So remember that time when Josh was demonstrating anxiety or anger for us and how that looked yeah, or whatever his truth was in that moment. Yeah, and then what people took from that? So the echo and the reverberation. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:11:04
And just how it was like oh, I was in that moment. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:11:07
Yeah. And then what people took from that? So the echo and the reverberation, and just how it was like, oh, I can do that too. Yes, I can do that too, yeah. So the reverberation of I want to say freedom, right. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:11:14
Yeah, and impulse and following impulses and creating something beautiful. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:11:22
Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, you've done that and you're continuing to do that and there's, I agree, something really beautiful. You've said a few times today it's like connecting with ourselves, but you've said it differently like really being yourself and freeing yourself and freeing your energy. There's something really powerful about that. So, yeah. Celebrate it. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:11:45
Yes. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:11:46
So your book is out on September 30th 30th. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:11:54
And it's called Lose your Mind. The Path I have, like this, is the cover Lose. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:12:00
Your Mind the Path. Lose your Mind the Path. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:12:03
Lose your Mind the Path to Creative Invincibility. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:12:07
Yes, I love that. And there he is on the back. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:12:11
There he is on the back. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:12:12
Uh-huh, and I was going to ask what's your hope for this book, but I think it's what you just said. Is there anything you want to add? 

Josh Pais Guest 01:12:20
I mean, you know this may sound arrogant, but I feel like this is my gift to humanity, Like this is the best gift of me that I could make and give, and my dream is that people will read it and feel more alive, healthier, more vibrant, more playful. A lot of the book is about being playful and just engage with one another and just get out of our heads really, because it's not a good place, it's not a nice place. Our mind is not nice. I'm not talking about inspirational ideas, but the chatter is not nice and it's not worth trying to make a better set of thoughts. You want to step out of that paradigm completely because your mind wants you to try to fix it. But it's like step out of that paradigm completely and then there's this whole other arena to play in. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:13:28
Yeah, to live in and to play in. How do you think the world will look different if everyone does that? 

Josh Pais Guest 01:13:37
I think people will not let. I think starvation could end on the planet because people be like I can't let that happen. I think people, I think violence would decrease, because so much of violence is a result of suppressing and suppressing and not knowing how to deal with, say anger, for example. Yeah, like, anger is just a charge. It doesn't mean you have to punch somebody, you know, but it's like being that charge. There's nothing wrong with it, it's awesome, and it can also be used to create magic, and create art and, you know, and write a book or give a lecture or whatever. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:14:22
Yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:14:23
So I just feel like people would be more alive, more connected. You know, and you know I write in the book that you know there's. You know, after Hurricane Sandy and also after the eclipse you know the big eclipse that happened you know, in the last year that after these big events or 9-11, after these big events, people are like walk through at least the streets of New York and they really see each other Like, oh my God, we, you know, we've been through something. And then, and unfortunately, so far until people read this book, unfortunately, it's taken like often a catastrophe that we were like wake up, and it's you and we're together and and you know, and like the experience that's happening right now, the fact that we're these humans on this planet walking past each other on the street, that's pretty trippy, you know yeah, so it's just too yeah, but it's just to be like, not pretend that we're by ourselves. 

Yeah, you know and we also have to recognize that that this thing, you know, this technology it's designed. People are millions, billions of dollars to keep us in these little things and be addicted. And then we become very manipulatable because we're like you know we don't we're, you know we're killing off this because people make money when we do this. You know. 

And it's like I'm not saying this is bad, Um, but if it, but just to catch if you're addicted, and then be like, okay, what am I feeling? What am I trying to get rid of? Yeah, when there's an impulse an impulse whether it's an impulse or just a desire to like to pick this up like, take a moment and go, instead of just getting lost be like what am I feeling? Maybe it's boredom, Maybe it's fear, Maybe it's uncomfortableness, and then let yourself feel it. And then, if you still want to do this, do it. Yeah. And you know, I know we're probably going over. But you know, one thing that I'll experiment with is if I'm in a restaurant by myself, yeah. 

You know I'll get uncomfortable sometimes, yeah, and then I want to pick this up, you want to stick to your phone. I want to go like, yeah, this will, this will med here's, this is good medication. And then, but I'll experiment, being like just, I'm just going to be in the restaurant and I'm going to feel this charge, so like I'm practicing increasing my tolerance for being uncomfortable. Yeah, so that it's not something I have to run away from and it's not something I have to manage. It's just like okay, yeah, well, and this is a lot of vibrational frequency, but it can be really fun, it can be really fun and we can play with it, right. 

Yes, totally it's all there to play with. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:17:41
So many things you described make me think of we talk about in PTSD as avoidance right. Yes, totally, it's all there to play with. So many things you described make me think of we talk about in PTSD as avoidance right. Well, either I'm on my phone, or I'm overworking, or I'm eating 18 bags of Cheetos at once, or whatever the thing is. It's to not feel something and I love breaking it down into sensation and just being with the sensation in a way where we allow it to pass. And yes, especially if you have PTSD or you've been through things like get, let's get some help, hold your hand, get a professional that can help you through those really big gnarly, you know, judging of intense emotions. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:18:15
Yes. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:18:16

And there's so many micro ways we do this every day right. In terms of oh, I'm in a restaurant alone. Many micro ways, we do this every day, right? In terms of, oh, I'm in a restaurant alone, I'm going to pick up my phone. Why did you need to do something? Or were you just uncomfortable? Or was there some sensation creeping up that you didn't want to feel? 

Josh Pais Guest 01:18:29
Yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:18:30
So connecting, and the thing that I love about this is you know I learned to eat alone in restaurants traveling in Europe before cell phones. You know when you had to text by, like pressing a, a b, c, c, c. So it was like too much work and I loved it because I would just meet so many people. 

Josh PaisGuest 01:18:46
Like if. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:18:47
I wasn't sucked into something, or even if I didn't pull out my journal or a book, if I just sort of sat and looked around and then I'd like catch someone's eye, or someone needed the ketchup not ketchup in Europe. But you know, pass it over whatever it is. You can actually connect in the moment and some beautiful things come out of that Relationships, opportunities. Hey, come over to my house for dinner, okay, I mean, there are things that sometimes seem wild or crazy when you're traveling, and when I was traveling in that way, that ended up being amazing memories. We cut ourselves off from that with the little choice of I don't know what to do. Let me just play a game on my phone right, yeah, let me sit and it's suppressed. 

Josh PaisGuest 01:19:29
It's just suppressing yourself yeah, so just and if you, if you and sometimes you know, sometimes that's not so bad, you know, but it's just again, like sometimes, like I just want to look at my phone. Yeah, but it's just when it becomes a lifestyle that it's. You know, it's not, it's just not good for you. 

Lisa DanylchukHost 01:19:49
Yeah, it's not creative invincibility. 

Josh PaisGuest 01:19:51 

It's not creative invincibility, it's creative suppression. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:19:55 

Yeah, yeah. So your book comes out September 30th. People can get it, I'm sure, online, everywhere you can get it everywhere Online. 

Josh PaisGuest 01:20:03
Your book comes out September 30th People can get it. I'm sure online. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:20:03
Everywhere. You can get it everywhere Online bookstores All of it, yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:20:05
If your bookstore doesn't have, it just be like why? 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:20:09
not. Why don't you have this book? Hello, yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:20:12
Yeah, but it should be everywhere, and yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:20:15
And Audible too. You read the and. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:20:17
Audible yeah, it's on Audible and Kindle. Yeah. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:20:21
Good. Yeah, I did the audio book a couple of weeks ago, so Awesome and having a book coming out is enough, but I just want to give space if there's anything else coming up that you want to share. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:20:34
You know just if anybody listening, you know, is interested in coming. And you know, training with me and committed impulse. I don't teach, you know, all the time. I teach a couple times, three or four times a year, but it's just a blast and it's always the best people and you just like walk out of there feeling so alive and so present and it's just so much fun. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:21:00 

So and I know you offer online. Are you doing in person as well? 

Josh Pais Guest 01:21:05
Yeah, I'm moving. For several years because of COVID, I shifted to teaching online and it actually worked really well, but now I really want to get back and so I'll be teaching on the committedimpulsecom and you can see what I have coming up and I'd love yeah, come play. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:21:27
Yes, Awesome. So is that the best place for people to connect with you, follow your work? Committed Impulse yeah. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:21:33 

Or you know, hit me up on Instagram when I'm suppressing myself. 

Lisa DanylchukHost 01:21:39 

Suppressing yourself in your DMs. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:21:40 

I mean that can be, play too right yeah, no, no, sometimes it's super fun. Yeah, it's just, I try to really catch if I'm using it to get away from something all about our relationship to things right like how are we interacting with them? 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:21:54 

And yeah, yeah, yeah well, thank you so much for coming this was was so much fun. 

Josh Pais Guest 01:21:59
Thank you, you're awesome. I'm so glad you had fun. 

Lisa Danylchuk Host 01:22:02
And I'm excited for your book and the impact of it. I already told my partner and I want to send it to my stepson. I'm like, okay, let's get this going. I think it's a lot of energy and good juju in it.  So thank you for that 

Josh Pais Guest 01:22:16
yes, oh, you're so welcome.