Chi Torque, Coiling and Movement Communication with DJ Murakami and Chris Chamberlain
Michael Hughes
Welcome to the Gymnazo podcast where you get to peek behind the curtains of what it takes to create and run a seven figure fitness facility that ranks in the top 5% of boutique fitness studios for revenue. But to be honest, that’s the least important thing about us. Founded by me, Michael Hughes, Gymnazo has created an ecosystem of services that blend performance with restoration techniques and attracts top coaches to its facility hosted by stoners, Paden and myself and our top coaches. This podcast shares our best practices on everything, from how to build a sustainable fitness business, to how to program for maximum results to how to build a hybrid training module that’s online and in person. We have marketing secrets, movement, innovation, and breaking down trends in the industry. If you’re a fitness professional, or fitness business owner, this is where you learn how to sharpen your skills and to see maximum results. Here we go. What’s
CJ
What’s happened, y’all welcome back to the Gymnazo podcast. I am your host, CJ Kobliska. Got to savage humans on the show today. DJ Murakami and Chris Chamberlin. Welcome on you, guys.
DJ
Thanks for having me on CJ.
Chris
Yeah, super excited to be here, CJ.
CJ
I’m gonna give a little breakdown of just how you guys entered my existence. Just so people know, have a reference point of why are these two on here? We’ve heard of them, why are you interviewing them? Or just shut up conversation but a couple of years ago, I don’t know if it was through just Instagram and searching around and stuff getting on the suggest ads but I came across like both you guys around the same time by now that you guys had chatted or had a relationship at all in any way. Um, just knew you guys were in California. And I think I was just so blown away by the amount of strength. And not just strength as in pushing weight, but strength and all these different angles. I mean, chiseled from ever. You didn’t have a bad side there was above you, beneath you to the sides of you. You look damn good. And you looked like you’re having a good time doing what you’re doing. One of it was DJ it was just it looked like you were a damn gorilla out there with like your your T things hanging out, no matter what you were doing. And I was I was inspired by it. I started to like, bring in that aggression into my training. And I was like, Oh, I feel something like primal in here. So I’m going to follow this guy. And around the same time I had, I think Tom Mountjoy had popped up. And his name was primal movers. And I was like, oh, man, okay, I’m getting Phyllis primal energy. And now I’m finding this, like anthropologist and I got this strength trainer, and I got this guy who’s just using the savage protocols. And I even know what your name was, Chris. But I was like, seven protocols sounds badass, I’m going to see what kind of exploitation this guy is doing. And I think what brought me to you guys the most was just your explorative heart. Your your mindset was kind of like everything goes. But I’m going to explore this at a deeper level. And whether it was intentional to communicate the specific message across. It’s your videos and comments beneath like the conversations that we had, I was inspired by it. So I’m really excited to have the opportunity to chat with you both at the same time. I don’t think that’s ever happened before for a Mayan. So thanks for being here. And thanks for breaking whatever we’re going to break down today.
DJ
CJ, do you think you were a victim of the algorithm
CJ
100%
DJ
That you willingly connected to all of us?
CJ
I think it was divine intervention in the sense that, yeah, when she pops up on my Facebook, and it looks like something I want to buy, I know that it’s feeding me what I what I want and I’m gonna purchase that thing. So I just want to say you guys want to follow follow, I’m in whatever this is going to take me down. I’m going to the rabbit hole with you.
DJ
I also trust that the overlords know what’s best for me. They know me better than myself.
Chris
I’m total victim I changed. My name is savage. And then I immediately saw in my feed DJ, and that’s how I met DJ. on social. That’s yeah, that is about
DJ
get into the university. Game there.
CJ
Yeah, there’s a word man. It speaks. speaks it speaks digital when it just goes to vote he does. But when did you become strong camps just for those? Those people that are listening that don’t know who you are? Strong camps on Instagram. When did you become that? And how did you become that and why did you become that?
DJ
Yeah, like it’s a persona identity. It was actually 2014 or 15 what it was so I had an Instagram before and personal Instagram that was private. It was just pictures of like flowers and meals that I made. And I decided to make one for my business and I had a Saturday Boot Camp that I called strong camps. It was like strength circuits. So I made an Instagram to promote my Latter Day, bootcamp class and call it strong camps that’s how it started. And then I did one video where I had my shirt off doing an exercise and I’m like, Oh, wow, I’m not going to fill my boot camps anymore. Exercise
CJ
this tech sell man sound pack sell the you gotta follow the algorithm. Right? It’s all about you, Chris. I know, you recently became Chris Chamberlain on Instagram. So you’re back to your original original name, but savage protocols. Where did that start?
Chris
I was KB beast fit. Which was nothing. I literally have been. I’ve been on social media for like, not that long. Like a little before I met DJ probably. So I haven’t even been on it there
DJ
was there an AOL
Chris
like aim name, I still have an AOL email, by the way, guys is the one you’re gonna get back at me the best. And I’m not 40 or 50. I’m in my 30s. So pathetic. You know, savage protocols. Originally, the idea of it was, it’s just this idea of just like, I had like a method to my madness a little bit. So they sort of oxymoron to each other. Like, I’m going to be doing some downright dangerous, awesome shit. And, but there’s also a really progressive and regressive approach to how I do things, actually. So it’s super attainable to anybody in my mind. So that was really the thought behind that originally. Nice.
CJ
Right? Oh, thanks for sharing. I know, I just got a little thing up here on my what to edit it out. But I don’t think I got that little thing and said 10 minutes left. So I’m gonna, when we ended that 10 minutes, I’ll just call you guys back in. I don’t know why my thing updates, but there’s simply no limit on here. So just if he doesn’t have shit knocked out, tap back in. Yeah. Thanks for sharing on that. The background of you guys. When you two guys met up? I know, you said it was through Instagram. How did that kind of take off? Because with what you guys have created with chi torque, and just the level of communication of what strength can it can really be as a more three dimensionalized more multi dimensional than that than just lifting heavy weights but lifting heavy weights in different directions? Where did you guys relationship and communication take off?
Chris
You know, I think I did I invite invited you? I mean, we met no one view realistically, like good time. That’s where I would say, Yeah, well, when we met up, there’s more of a relationship
DJ
there. We meant Oh, mu which, which was we pretty much had these like random tasks, movement tasks. And Chris would like, load up all the tasks in over the top ridiculous, like feats of strength. And I was like, Oh my God, this dude is strong, like it was savage protocols. So that’s when Yeah, we were like, I think we’re both doing some challenges on Instagram. And that’s where I gained a lot of respect for Chris was just, its sheer farmboy strength.
CJ
Pound for pound some of the strongest guys, I know, both of you. And
DJ
yeah, I think Chris might be if someone said who has the most like raw farmboy strength? I would say yeah, Chris Chamberlain.
Chris
What a guy here. Thank you, DJ, I appreciate that.
CJ
What what are the what are the test protocols here? What are the three to five things you’re going to do to prove this?
Chris
Oh, me. I’m gonna pick out things that nobody else has thought to pick out. But I’m just gonna do it because I can and nobody else will be able to. DJ is the only one I think that might be able to pull it off. No, you have to be able to lift my anchor chain that I have. Only a couple men have been able to do it. And most of them have been Olympic athletes. So
DJ
you got that in the garage? No.
Chris
It’s right behind me. Got my anchor back here too. Shall be done looking for a safe if anybody has a safe or an animal I’m working on right now.
CJ
What do you haven’t saved nothing. I just lifted.
Chris
Yeah, well, I want to be able to I’m going to weld in the plates things so I can play.
CJ
DJ, what would you say is that some of the strongest feats you’ve accomplished? Again, to put it into a top three?
DJ
Oh, boy. I don’t know. I mean the ones that were hardest, don’t look the most impressive but one that stands out to me is I was at this Airbnb in Joshua Tree and there was a huge satellite dish. It was like really big, maybe the size of like a whole roof. And it wasn’t too heavy. So I’m like, Okay, I could do this, but it was windy. So every time I would try to pick this thing up, if a gust of wind would come by, I would it would topple over and like, blow me away. So I had to time it exactly in between these gusts of wind. And yeah, that was the hardest one just because of fear factor. And because of balancing this thing against the wind.
CJ
I think I remember watching that one. Because
Chris
I’ve done the shopping carts, the thing I was remember, DJ, it’s how I will forever remember you and you were ingrained in my head.
DJ
Yeah, I mean, that’s what’s fun about those odd objects and implements is, I mean, they’re difficult to pick up, because they can be heavy, but the awkwardness, the sketch factor of dropping it on your face, and balancing it, and orienting yourself underneath it. I don’t know if do you hear that in the back?
CJ
Yeah, motorcycles rolling around back there. What? There’s,
DJ
I live next to motorcycle gang. So
CJ
those come out and rap map? No, you’re on the phone. Every time. DJ, something that inspired me. And I think it’s what may have stemmed the creation of maybe the start of chi torque, I don’t want to get into that kind of what that was. And what it means to you guys, was when we were in Peru, back in 2019. And we’re, we’re under the influence of cactus. And I found myself doing nonstop swinging of my arms and all different directions. And I look over at you, and you’re so calm, and maybe possessed calm, I don’t know. But you were, it seemed like you were carrying two giant boulders, and like, levitating them around you. And for what it was it inspired me to go pick up rocks and throw them as far as I could across the river that we’re at. And I look back over and you’ve just you said stop moving. And I don’t know, if you saw me or I saw you would happen. But I felt this this spark that has never left me since that day. In fact, I even had a crazy dream last night. And I was like, oh my god, I think this came up because I’m gonna go talk to these guys. Tomorrow. I saw a gorilla face like I had shared and it was like his big old things that come through and it was your face. And last night, it was a grizzly bear. And I know if that was representing Chris, myself, just the energy that you brought through. But do you mind kind of going into that time in your life, which wasn’t that long ago, but I think it was around the time that she torque was being created, and kind of break down that process of maybe creating a course or creating that just your communication with your body in order to relay this to other people. Boy,
Michael Hughes
that threw a lot at you.
DJ
Yeah. I guess that’s kind of how the idea originated was communication, because Chris came down and he was showing me this coiling move that, you know, David whack originated. And once again, it’s like, I respect Chris, I trust him, he I listened to strength. So I’m saying, Okay, I’m going to try this out. So in he’s kind of start learning it and starting to try to verbally articulate it, because he felt it, he got into the coil. And he’s trying to like, you know, show it to me. So he’s coaching me through it, telling me the things and I’m, as I’m looking into it, I’m like, Okay, this is actually very similar to the torque concepts, which is a model I use by Julian for now, created it. And that’s the way I kind of pieced it together and was able to access this coiling motion was okay, oh, it’s this torque, which I’m creating, and then I’m spiraling it, essentially. So then I come back to Chris, and I’m communicating my language and my model, and he’s, you know, coming back with his language and his model, and we’re seeing it just line up everything. I’m like, Okay, so let’s look at the principles behind these moves and see if we can create just a framework in a language so that we could easily access and communicate what we’re trying to teach. So that’s kind of where the concept of the tutorial came from was, we’re just laying out these constraints of torque intention, and then filtering movements through them and seeing what comes out. So we’re experimenting with that. We’re playing around with that. And yeah, come when we met in Peru. And we took the San Pedro, the watch Yuma, which is pretty much it’s similar to I guess I would say MDMC chemically. So it’s a very physical, like, embodied experience. And we took a good amount, we took a lot, so psychedelic doses. And we’re in this sacred valley with this river, this large river going through, and there’s just the valleys the backdrop in front of us behind us, we have all these trees blowing in the wind. And the Chi torque stuff is on my mind. And I see this tree is rooted deep in the ground, just blowing, and the wind, and I’m just watching it. And I root my feet into the ground, and I start waving the tensions, like pretty much the constraints, we were said,
CJ
sorry about that DJ, that it could cut you off. But we’re now getting to the real juice of the roots.
DJ
Yes, essentially, I think I write down all the symbols in message, Chris, and that the tree is the third contributor of the tutorial course. And let’s be honest, all all great inventions were influenced by psychedelics, whether it’s the iPhone, the double helix, DNA model, or the or the internet. So thank you tree.
Chris
Yeah, remember, DG, I remember you, you sent me an email from that trip, about your experience. And up to that point, really this course, like, it was the first time we were really working together, like you said, we were trying to create a way to communicate all that similarity, we were sort of seeing between these two guys, we were both sort of learning from and using models. And I’ve tried to develop everything that we’re doing with David. And we had kind of created some sort of base up to that point of what we sort of thought we were trying to communicate. And after that experience, I got this, like, I started looking for it the other day, because I was talking about somebody this is I got this, like, beautiful email from you that I’ve never, I’ve never had such like a nicely written email to me in my life, about this experience that you had with it. And it was sort of like, we got to like, think differently on all this and apply some different stuff on it too. And we sort of like at that point, I really feel like that’s where we started sort of crystallizing the idea of what we really actually wanted it to be. And I think we started remodeling it a little bit and really turning it into what it is today. I think that experience you had was pretty profound in regards to helping us communicate better on what we were after.
CJ
So only you might if I break down a few few those pieces, just to those who are unfamiliar with Flex method, or if you haven’t practiced some of the principles. Christina chatted a little bit more about the coil and that experience of why that’s important or why that may be one of the one of the three pieces that brought this communication out of you guys.
Chris
Yeah, I mean, so I met David, I was wondering about what he was referring to as coilin core, which at that time was super young. And we really didn’t even have an understanding of it. Like I said, I was working with DJ, trying to figure out sort of how to communicate it and understand it, I even did something with LMU. Sort of right as I was onboarding with Weck method, I you actually I used my course through on you sort of as a way to, to understand better how to communicate it and understand how people what they were feeling that was really valuable experience for me, but as ideas side bending, which I would refer to as external at the time, what we were after was what I believe is external origin, I think, on a single side was what I was after. And what I was searching for, and DJs language that he had learned from Julian really helped me understand what that meant, because Dave didn’t really have that that thought process behind it, even looking at it directly towards like, specific performance acts not as like an in line of intent and creation there. Yes, a side bending and understanding external I think was really, that really helped me understand how to grab internal torsion when we get to talking about that stuff. And really, I think it’s what I sort of helped bring to the table for cheese org was an idea of sort of splitting the intention or understanding how it might apply To that, at that point, I think maybe we had only been really exploring it sort of like in the center, which is how a lot of people I think are gonna understand it and feel it at first.
CJ
Yeah, I mean, like with the way of the course lined up, it starts out with very basic, it seems very essential, going from like the roots, and then to floating your roots into more of an open chain. And then diving into actually shifting it from one side to another and flowing with that, and then carrying it over to walking, it was like an initial like, Okay, here’s your roots, take up your roots. And then now go travel with those and reroute yourself. And it’s established a good foundation, that when I found myself, like, you’d launched him, and I’m going into this, and I, I probably spent three or four days of just nonstop, I wasn’t doing anything else, just watching the videos, I still had time off of work and was it was it was screwing with my mind, if that’s the only way I could put it, I couldn’t think through it, I can only feel it. And it was shifting my mindset where I had come from a background of I have to think through things and understand them conceptually. And then try to write it down and and talk about it. I had lost touch with that feeling space. And after that experience improved, kind of brought me back and I was like I was mind blown. I had to stop thinking and start feeling in a sense. And this kind of helped me to anchor that. That feeling and what it meant to really feel something to know it versus to conceptually try to understand and figure it out and all of its pieces, reduce the pieces and then try to put them all together. So thank you for putting those pieces together and kind of aligning that helping me align those pieces. You’re talking about the external internal torque, we’re working with the coiling core, showed you more of the externalization of it. What do you mean by this internalization of torque for somebody who’s on the outside going? Yeah, kind of done coiling? But there’s something that’s the opposite of that. Is it opposite? Is it different is it along the same lines, you said it was kind of two ends of the spectrum?
Chris
I mean, for me, I mean, it’s as simple as like, DJ said, the idea of hugging a tree would like this idea of coming around center line is my thought process on it, and meeting from the front, creating that inner internal torque. And then vice versa, this idea of pushing away or meeting the centerline in the back in a sense, would equal external torque in a very simple concept of it. I was what I do with web method, and all that I think a lot of it has to do with like gravitational forces and stuff like that, too. And then the external intent of what you might be doing, and what you’re applying it to, and how it all sort of divides out and does its thing. But I mean, that simple concept, literally giving somebody a hug, and then pushing them away from you. It’s just a simple way to experience the concept. I think DJ used to do like a nice little, like I was a towel drill or shaking out your sheets, something like that as an opportunity to sort of Express or feel what we’re talking about. And I love how you mentioned feel a lot, I think that’s a really important piece of it. I had I was sick of I was sick of just like overly technical stuff. So having sort of like a general thought process, and a way to filter through movement and try to experience it a little differently was really big for me. I know, that’s what made me really love like that, like I may, I may have a section that we did in the course, like where it is a little more flowy where we really get to put it together that one really, I really enjoyed that portion of it. But yeah, that’s what I mean by insert, I guess it’s just if it gave somebody a hug, I think that’s a great way to explain the DJ, if you would agree with me on that.
DJ
Yeah, I would say, going back to the communication, it started all positionally, as in your joint goes here to here. But that wasn’t really the point of like the coil or creating the torque, right, it wasn’t just mimicking positions. It was tension through the muscles. So when we brought in these chain of muscles into the tour concept, so external torque is going to be the opposite chain of muscles as internal torque, which is the muscles contributing to you know, going towards the midline. So then we had a more objective way of saying, Okay, we want the line of tension to be generated through here, because you could take a snapshot, or a picture of someone doing both torques. And they could be in a similar position, but you don’t know the intent behind it are where they’re driving the force. And that’s where, really what I got from David and Chris was this directional intent, which I never had in the gym. I was always kind of just standing there sagely, or even if I was going in different planes, I was just moving weight up and down or to a certain spot, but this like, waving motion that’s generated to the torque in which includes balance and verticality, which are things that I didn’t really know I couldn’t really grasp until putting in these constraints of the course. It just like you said, the feeling of the feeling and the tension of the movement are prioritized over just creating shapes.
CJ
If you take it into something simple, I think you guys had said something about a deadlift. And there’s one way that you can do if you say you could crush the bar, you can rip the bar, but what are you really doing when you’re crushing? You’re ripping the bar, and it’s more of a full body expression. And I was talking to Leo savage about this and how it mentioned, like, yeah, lifting weights is an expression flows and expression. It’s all expression, when you when you go to train, there’s still a motion that’s involved with it. And there’s an intent more behind the emotion, like the motion may be driving something. But what’s your intent when you go into this action or into this activity, something like just doing a standard barbell deadlift, over over grip, and you go to do your deadlift? Talking about the expression of your tension? So well, what are you intending to do? Are you tending to just to lift the bar up? Because there’s probably some other things that we subconsciously do when we’re going to lift that bar up, we think it’s simple, we’re just lifting up, but how many other pieces are involved in the success, the success of that movement, you know, what is your right foot and left foot doing, you can look at it biomechanically, or looking at it, internal and reflecting and internalizing what you experience. Now, something beautiful can come from this deadlift, something powerful can come from this deadlift. I’ve seen so many people approach a bar and be very vulnerable with it. And it’s like, Oh, your back is having issues, or we’ve been told, like, Oh, these, we have to correct these things, when really, it may be a matter of just connecting somebody deeper to what they’re trying to do, as opposed to just like, oh, this bar is scary. I’m going to lift this thing, instead of trying to correct all this form, how are we communicating the intent, and I think what typically people do is, say, chambers will do is say, rip the bar or crush the bar. So it applies some kind of tension into that bar, bringing it to, you know, if you say crush, it may bring you more into somebody similar to an ice or that compression in the front, like, like the hug and something may if you rip the bar apart, it’s more like that fire that expansive energy, and both are correct. But if we don’t know what we’re doing, that may be disconnect. That might be where there’s a lack of success. That’s putting it very simply. But I think there’s so many layers that as a coach, if we’re aware of, we can start talking to that behavioral side of it, and just saying, we need to fix all these like knee and your back and your shoulder and all these pieces. Maybe they just need that deeper connection. And so what I guess what I want to ask them is what kind of use may you give somebody if you’re applying the concepts from Chi torque, and you’re not necessarily trying to say, take this whole course and then come see me, you’re just going to use bits and pieces to help that person become more successful in that session? What are the things you find yourself saying or speaking to, that helps somebody new, who maybe is more vulnerable, maybe is that weak or new to training and just unaware of that communication with their body?
DJ
Or this is something I think me and Chris probably approached differently, which is great, because you could kind of figure out whatever cueing, whatever drills, you want to transmit the feeling or the proper tension that you’re going for. So I will either change the somehow can change the constraints of the exercise. So if I want internal torque, an easy way to describe this is if you’re lifting up a sandbag or an object between your hands, a baby a box, your mediately compressing the object as you press it above. And if you have a barbell a lot of people are taught rip it apart. So under an x ray, you could be hitting the same positions, but you’re squeezing entirely different muscles while you’re going through the path. And you’re going to find this affects mobility. This affects where you’re gonna feel it the next day where you’re driving the tension. So all either I’ll change the implement for people and say, Hey, we’re going to use the sandbag, to squat or to press. Or if I want to break it down. More on a isolation level, I’ll look at the muscles that contribute to more media attention and internal torque. And we’ll just isolate those muscles with like bodybuilding. And that might bring it up or contribute to them gaining connection to their body so that they can then use it on an exercise. And I’m sure that I’d like to hear how Chris uses it. I’m sure if it’s more of a movement lens that he uses. Yeah.
Chris
I’d love to talk about this because something that’s always been big for me. I just kind of want to go back to some stuff you’re saying a little bit and answer this question same time because we’re sort of getting into queueing. And for me, I grew up laboring, I was a construction worker with my dad. I grew up just lifting stuff my whole life. DJ always says I’m far I’m strong, and I would agree in that sense is that I actually felt like I got weaker when people started cueing me, and trying to tell me what to do. And I immediately gravitated away from it. Because I genuinely had like an intuitive understanding of like, no, no, no, I’ve lifted really heavy shit over my head and put it over a wall. And like, I didn’t do it that way. Don’t tell me. So I sort of migrated away from coaching, like people telling me what to do. And so this lens that we sort of created is such a great way to like filter feeling, and start to help somebody else understand that feeling without so much cueing, it lends an opportunity to kill if you would like, and you understand it. But what I have found is there as a DJ, same as like, picking up a sandbag or something in the front, some like carry like that. It’s very, like intuitive to feel the internal torsion or like experience. And I will, I will go out of my way, just to make sure that there is exposure to different drills that lend themselves to almost always put the person there without any thought process. So there can be a layer of not having to feel like they’re constantly being told what to do. But we can develop like that we can, they can develop that feeling with themselves, because a DJ like things can sometimes look similar in shape, or appearance. But the intent behind it may be different. So I tend to find that like, if somebody’s in something that could sort of be one way or the other, like add, like I don’t know, like, if they don’t know that, I don’t know. And then they rely on a cue, and maybe they get the experience I’m looking for as their coach. So I really, at this point, in my understanding of it, I really like I really go out of my way to do things that feel totally opposite of the other thing, that there’s almost no chance of them even experiencing it. And then that’s a big thing we’re, I’m huge on is position. So developing positions, before we start creating full movement a lot of the time and not that I don’t do movement. But I think it’s great to work on like isometrics, and holds and postures and understand them and under duration and load and then or some sort of intensity. And I get people to experience that in either of the lines. And then learning to move the line with that once they understand it. And then also, and then being able, I think at that point, there’s an understanding of a b, what I’m after, and then learning to transition between the lines. So with like anything else, I think something positional positional first and picking exercise choices, that obviously makes sense for the person and the goal. But it also also makes sense for educating the line of intent you might be trying to tackle and develop that. And realistically, I can get super specific with some of that stuff, maybe in a minute if we want to. But like, it really depends on the external tasks of the person what they’re after. And I think a lot of time in the gyms, a lot of people don’t actually know what they’re directing all of this intensity towards, I get the opportunity to work with like a lot of athletes right now and stuff like that, and high level people. So there’s like a very, like specific intent, which is really helpful. And this stuff is really informative on how to develop pathways for very specific tasks or like singular jobs, maybe a high performing athlete has, which is really cool. I’m working with somebody really special, like really cool with that right now, which was kind of elbow, maybe we’ll go into at some point. But that kind of makes sense.
CJ
Yeah, I want to touch on a few points that like the positions, especially as I work with him, and also especially our community, we’ve got a wide range of abilities and capacities to move and to train, but everybody’s looking to better something and to live more easily more freely. And we created this class called mindful movement, that’s just essentially a yoga style class in the sense that it’s a little bit more posture related, holding in certain areas, and then connecting with your brand connect with your body. And what I’ve seen happen over the course of we had this once a week for just before the pandemic and then through the pandemic. And we stopped doing it but we started integrating it into our training. And it was essentially working into positions and staying in them into a duration until you feel something and not just visiting the position and going out of it. Because I think so often, especially with the way that we live our lives in the kind of a rush, and we’re gonna get all these things done, at least in this western culture is that we don’t give ourselves time to feel we just think and we do doo doo doo doo. And in that doing, you have an opportunity to feel but without spending time in what you’re doing, just getting it done checking it off the list. We don’t reflect back on our experience or we don’t have time during that experience to reflect and so in this class, taking them through our spherical movement series first just you know, getting the thoracic spine hips and shoulders to move through their general up and down motion, lateral motion and rotational movement, kind of setting a framework of lines of sensation of balancing your front of your body, balancing the back of your body feeling it lengthen, not feeling just a contraction of the tissues, but feel them load or lengthen first, and then contract to bring them home. And then working through some diagonal type motions like hybrids of the plains. And then finding that we can integrate the Chi torque series and coiling and how beautifully those mesh after there has been an opportunity to slow down and connect with an extension and hold and just notice your breathing and extension. Notice your breathing inflection, notice your breathing and lateral bending, notice your breathing and rotation. And then having the funnel of one side going through some extra realization as the other side is going through an internalization of torque and going oh, one side feels free, one side feels different. And just having the opportunity to say pause here and breathe. It’s like people get lighter, and they feel freer. And they’re calmer after going through a series like this, this is kind of the outside of not just the training side. But the it’s a meditative movement, it’s an opportunity to just notice what your body is already doing. And give it time to process those sensations of those feelings. So that when you visit those positions, like a single leg balance, or a stride stance, or a deep squat, or your heels are just off the ground, and recognizing what is it that your body is trying to do. It’s trying to communicate, it’s trying to foster a way to maintain your stability, maintain your roots so that you don’t timber like a tree. And how beautifully you said it DJ, that tree was like that, that element of just the we got brains, we got brains putting together all these pieces. And then something so simple as a tree gives you that this deeper, feeling deeper meaning of connecting with roots, and then seeing how that carries over when they’re actually doing with load. Like now they look like they’re stable, they don’t look like they’re struggling. They look like they’re actually enjoying themselves in the experience versus like, I fucking hate this workout. I’m dying. Nothing wrong with that. But there’s an opportunity to shift that experience ago, I recognize what I’m doing how I’m doing it. And I’m just doing it that I’m actually I’m experiencing myself right now, I think what I’m hinting at is just its presence, it brings you into that moment of what you’re doing so that you can make a different decision that might actually be better for what you’re trying to do. You’re trying to lift a plant in your backyard and bring it to the front yard. And it’s in a heavy pot. How did you do that? You know, you see the answer it with words, but maybe you chose a different position. And like you said, it’s so intuitive and innate. But I think many people who have walked this earth longer than we have started to become out of touch with it because they’ve been taught out of it, or never been gifted an environment where they can explore that. Maybe they never gifted that themselves that opportunity. So I don’t know if you’ve had any conversations with other I’ve seen some other like Yogi’s working with with coiling and WAEC method. But any other application of cheat torque, I see love people’s personal practices thriving like they’re, they’re doing things differently. And it seems to be more explorative. But as a any instances specifically that you guys can think of of like real time application or even your own.
Chris
I mean, it completely educates everything, I do a wet method, by the way, like 100%. So everybody that runs through read method, and to some level is going to be influenced by the understanding and the language of this for sure, like 100%. is as far as exact application like somebody specifically doing something. I think like even people like yourself, CGI, I would definitely say that I think people have kind of picked up a little bit of the language in regards to like, especially like the simplicity of having the emojis and stuff. And then being able to like just write something on the board really easy, like using symbols and stuff like that. So I think in general, I mean, coaches in that have done it. It’s, it’s been as simple as applying that language and intent to movements, and maybe removing some of the responsibility on aggressive cueing in my mind. But I don’t know about you, DJ, if you have somebody like super specific that’s taking some off with it, or
DJ
I could speak personally, it’s it’s changed my programming, and how I program exercises. So now I kind of filter them through, okay, I’m going to take this pattern squat deadlift, and now I have the internal torque, external torque in this split torque model doing it so now I have three pathways and that actually ends up in my assessment a lot of times because we’ll see people who they like you’re talking about the plant, they have one solution for a problem. And they don’t know how to add that there’s different solutions to solve the same external task. So I this is a story I tell about a lady I trained who she came in, and she complained about lower back issues a lot of lower back Back Pain. So I had her doing a clean impressed with a sandbag will really light sandbag. Actually, this might have been a medicine ball actually. So she would pick it off the off the ground, press it overhead, drop it, pick it up, press it overhead and drop it. And I said, Okay, so now we’re gonna go to just deadlifts. And she goes down to pick up the ball, arches her back and lifts it halfway and drops it and says, I can’t do this. It hurts my back. You know, I can’t do deadlifts. And and I said, you know, that’s funny, because you just did 10 You know, ground two overhead presses, you had to pick it up, that’s a deadlift as well, you know, it’s the same task. But just the cultural baggage in the language of deadlift, it being an exercise where she was probably coached a certain way, or cued the right way to do it, how you have to do it, kind of what Chris was talking about, like he didn’t like to be cued. So this lady had all this influence put over how she was able to access a movement. And how I viewed it was, okay, let’s assess this, she went into full external torque in order to do the movement. So our plan was teacher to connect it internal torque, and about cueing. I forgot to mention, I do tactile cueing all the time, everything, because it gives you that map of where do we want the line of tension. So I’ll press onto those main muscles. And I said, this is where we’re driving intention. And the whole organism will orient more around that when you give them that feedback. So we gave her the connection to internal torque, and then had her move dynamically through it, you know, position, and then into the dynamic movement. And of course, there’s mobility in there. And we worked our way to the deadlift from the floor, it looked the way she was told to never do it, there was some flexion, there was some bracing in the opposite direction, which goes back to you know, that tree, you hug the tree, or you rip the tree apart, and go into it. And that’s how a lot of people are deadlifting is ripping that apart, or you’ll see this quote unquote, you broke form, or you lost form when knees collapse in or when you arch. You know, that’s just a different strategy of switching torque, is how I see it during a movement. So yeah, we simply just gave her a different option to do the task, and she no longer had issues doing it. So you know, that’s, I think a way that I use it now is assessment and application of exercise selection.
CJ
If what you said about the choice that when you say cultural baggage that comes with when you say something or a deadlift or a squat or a lunge, and how it has its, each person has a definition of what that is. And it could be most of the time, it’s the contribution from external sources telling you how to do something, unless nobody’s had that, then they just, they do it a certain way. And they maybe have some other options, because they don’t have this blockage or this wall that says, Don’t do this. Somebody yelled at them, or they saw somebody get hurt, because they did it that way. And then it’s like this deeper assumption that there’s emotion attached to it really inhibits our motion. And somewhat, it’s really helped me work with individual people when they come in when they’ve got the city back and knee valgus or something. And they’ve been told, like, Oh, I didn’t need to keep pulling my knees outward, because like, they only go outward. It’s like, well, can we can we communicate this on a level, that’s not wrong. It’s just something that your body may not be aware of how to communicate with the rest of your body. Because you’re not just a knee, you’re not just a hip, you’re not just a shoulder, those are individual pieces. They’re all attached at some in some way, shape, or form, to the muscular system, the skeletal system, nervous system, all of the above all organs are working together and to just open that conversation and say, Hey, listen, there, there’s a lot of right ways. And there’s not really a wrong way. It’s just we need to help your body communicate better and match your intent with your action. Because you might be thinking that you’re doing something when your body is not doing that thing. So Can Can we be a mirror as coaches as opposed to just having them look in the mirror and say, I need to be perfect form? Can we be that mirror where they can reflect on their experience? And another conversation we have a lot of times is I can’t feel something for you. But I can see it. And then you can feel something? So can you learn how to share what you’re sensing or experiencing, so that I can we can kind of step into each other’s experience here and help each other out. I think that helps to remove some of that cultural baggage because now it’s a conversation about their movement, and it’s experience that shared versus you don’t know what I’m feeling and you don’t know what I’m seeing. And I’m the authority and you’re the person paying me and I’m just going to tell you how it’s supposed to be done. I don’t think anybody’s doing that to say on purpose, but we tend to get caught up in that because of the lack of communication with our own body and realizing there’s so many ways to do something. There’s probably a Better Way more efficient way to do it than you might be doing something if it’s certain. Yeah. But what is causing that? I think it’s that opening that communication. There’s a book I read, it was called Emotional anatomy. And looking at how somebody may hold their body, right, maybe they’re like, very rigid, and upright, authoritative, or the opposite. And they’re kind of closed down, more depressed, they’re closed off to the world, and they’re in protected mode. And then there’s like, the bloated, you’re just, you’re out, you’re kind of living in your stomach and your low back. And then there’s the opposite of just like crumpled in. So like they talk about these four things, even Stanley, Stanley, Stanley something, but in the most anatomy, if you look at that, that that helped me become aware of like, Oh, somebody’s coming in to see me to get better. Can I see them for who they are right now and not to say put judgment on that, but just recognize that their body maybe steered in certain torque, inward, outward, maybe some more upper Islam on the lower and their, their awareness is living in one of those places, not in the full body? And something that we did you take us through a tactile movement drill DJ that was like, Hey, can you flex this tissue? Can you activate it, you touch on a shoulder a touch on the back? Can you just contract that space, or bring awareness that space. And it’s amazing how easy some things are and how difficult other pieces are, depending on where you’re where you may be living in your body most of the day, or when you’re training a certain way, like, Okay, I’m on a certain protocol, I’ve got to get this much strength, this many reps this kind of load, how caught up, we can get in that side of the experience that’s so external, that we may not be reflecting on how we’re doing something and connecting deeper with ourselves so that we don’t need to do something one way we just react to our environment as it is. And so be it, it is what it is, as opposed to like, okay, like the videos of functional training in real life, or traditional training in real life, and you see a guy doing laundry, and it’s all laundry dump, sit. It’s kind of like it’s a very was it a bearded bearded. But it’s kind of like making fun of what we’re what we’re training our body to do. And when we’re in that 20 minute, 30 minute, one hour, two hour training session, how much inputs, we have the opportunity to connect with, from an external environment, different forces that can help us just live our life more freely, and not have to have complex conversations about what’s going on. And more. So just more of a connected experience of what happened. And what really happened.
DJ
Yeah, like what you said about the feeling, you feel the movement, because that’s, I think the evidence based like training world, a lot of people are anti subjective feeling like does sensation doesn’t matter at all, doesn’t matter where you feel it because it’s not measurable. You know, I disagree. I think the one thing that connects all of us are these major, like muscle groups and landmarks in the body, like, we can all flex our PEC right now. And we can all feel that happen, when we all know we’re feeling kind of the same thing. And it’s going to kind of put the same tension and bias the same position through the body. So that’s why I think it’s valuable to give people teach someone to connect and feel their body and you’re giving them a very valuable skill that they could then use as an internal compass, when they’re navigating tension through movements, instead of just hoping they look aesthetically correct, or, you know, they’re they’re performing it the right way, which is the best, I think it’s the best people think we have available is like, we just got to reverse engineer this to make the skeleton shapes similar. And then you’re doing it correctly. But we’re also different. And like said, there’s different intent involved. So the feeling I think, is something universal, that hasn’t been articulated, or we don’t have the instruments to maybe measure that. I mean, we have EMG, but that’s not too reliable. So I think that was kind of our conversation in the beginning between Chris and I was okay, how do we, how do we verbalize this, communicate it and then transmit that feeling on to other people. And I think people are doing it in lots of different ways. And I love that.
CJ
Yeah, there’s a lot of different paths to get to success. Stuck in one we’re gonna find some failure. Those aren’t bad, but maybe it’s finding a new path. We got two more minutes guys, Chris and DJ, I’d love for you guys to share a little bit about how people can find you You and apply a lot of the principles that you bring into your own practice and into your service in your community, whether it’s with coaches, with athletes with just your population that’s coming through. I know Chris, you’re through Weck method and TJ, you’re kind of a thing. You’re just a standalone. I don’t know, I don’t know much about where where to find you and your kind of
DJ
good for my business.
Chris
Hopefully, I can share a bit more where people
CJ
can can search you out besides just the social media channels, but get a chance to realize that you’re a real person in flesh.
DJ
Yeah, I’m not a bot. You could, you could find me on Instagram, strong camps and have a link tree was everything on there? Or? Yeah, that’s it.
CJ
That’s why nobody
Chris
just to go to the links to find
DJ
it somewhere on the link tree.
Chris
You know, I mean, they can get cheat. Org, that would be the number one thing. We’re sitting there talking about language, we created a way to communicate, I think the best way to find that would be defined cheat. org, which is on on your linktree right now. Yeah, the human strong.
DJ
Word my in my opinion. It’s on there. Yeah. So yeah, if you if you head there, it’ll take you to all the courses available in coming up, Chris and I are going to be showing our own training, our own programs are going to be available to access on the strength quest, which is a platform we’re coming out with. And Chris is gonna be showing you all the rotational strength he does with that split torque, and I’ll be showing you how I program internal, external and split torque in my programming.
CJ
Rad how about you, Chris.
Chris
Yeah, I mean, strength threads, I think that’s gonna be a great way to sort of like gather and find the two of us, and sort of like an tangible program that you can start playing around with us. And then if you’re a coach, or just a movement practitioner, and you’re you’re interested in learning more about sort of slit towards him, even layers of this and how we apply it at Weck method. We have live courses of the rotational movement training course, that are coming up, I got one in Austin, actually, them this week, which I don’t know where this goes. But and then we have, we have one coming up in August 12, in San Diego, and then we’ll be shooting out a bunch more of those as well. And we teach you guys rolling robes, like how to propose these purple speech writers and elastic bands. And we’ll be using a lot of the torsion concepts involved in that as well.
CJ
That was one of my favorite things that I’ve done with courses that I’ve taken was actually got recommended. It was like, it’s actually because of DJ is doing, he brought ropes out to Peru, I did not want to play with them. I was like looking up in the distance going like, what the heck, what are they doing? Like? He’s wearing like a belt, and then he’s thrown around? What is this and then two months later, I found myself in San Diego with Chris. And it was a absolutely brilliant experience and has helped this community out so much at Gymnazo. I mean, we’ve got rope flow classes, that it’s it’s techniques, but it’s more flow and kind of where as a group working out with different motions and people were taking them on vacations and saying like, Oh, so cool that I got to get some movement in its keep my practice and then come back and feel like I’ve I’ve continued to make progress or sustain my level. And it’s brought like, I mean, worldwide communities together. I don’t know if but
Chris
yeah, what’s cool too, is like, if you come out to a course with me and stuff through I always I love talking sheets work and stuff while we’re at it too. And anybody that sort of stumbled upon and feels like a nice little secret community in some level. But I’m always really excited to use that language as well and talk about how it applies to things that are super fluid, like like the rope like that my understanding of the origin and then I’d love to explain that and a way to express it. And we didn’t really discuss that today. But this is not something that always has to be like high tension or high load or something like that the intensity doesn’t always have to be way up there. And that was something I think we were really pushing at first. It’s not exactly that that’s a great way to feel it and I think me and DJ naturally gravitate towards that in our own practices. That’s just who we are that we learn by strength and intensity but maybe I’m speaking for you but I definitely do myself so that’s a cool thing. I also sort of like discounts if you if you’re in the know
CJ
right on thank you guys so much for popping on i He has a minor leccion budget back and dive into more of those concepts. This is kind of more like an overview kind of see where things come from. So people feel like they’ve kind of been part of that part of this since the beginning cuz it’s still it’s still growing in the communities that are sharing this similar verbiage. Communication is I suppose very powerful and it’s a way that I when I came to work with it, I was actually going through the Chi torque course and it was like it It felt like it was they tied together so well and you I feel like we’re already connected you and I Chris with before before ever really meeting you in person. So I really do appreciate that and hope to see you guys all very very soon.
DJ
Thanks CJ good shadow.
CJ
DJ Chris. Thank you so much. Until next time, y’all. Check us out on Instagram on YouTube and of course our other podcasts. Peace.
Michael Hughes
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