Let's Start Here

Navigating intensity: I'm going to be honest with you: I'm very proud of this episode.

In this episode, we bring together the strands we've introduced over the past several weeks. We take rating our perceived experience, as we've talked about for the past three episodes, and tie that concept in to our discussion of the "the water we swim in," which we talked about back in Episode 10. We use the prism of my (Benjamin's) experience at Burning Man back in August to discuss how we use RPE to navigate intensity in all walks of life. We touch on Jerry's teaching that, when we start down the feeling path, we tend initially to feel worse instead of better, and for those of you who have begun to play with the techniques we shared back in our early episodes, you are probably becoming uncomfortably aware of how the "water we swim in" has become very turbulent indeed. We are living in interesting times; this episode includes some powerful teachings on how to deal with that.

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Rating Your Perceived Experience--Putting It Into Practice: In this episode, we discuss how to really put RPE into practice. We give a detailed exploration of how RPE will shift through a weight-training set, in order to point out the level of presence RPE practice can offer us. We explore how cardio RPE might differ when we're working in the gym versus running outside. We discuss the problems inherent in doing too much or too little, in both the gym and in our lives in general. Our stories this week include discussons of how to successfully run the Bolder Boulder (an annual 10k in Boulder, CO, that attracts 50,000 participants) and some interesting consulting work Jerry did.

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RPE, Part 2: In this epsiode, we continue to explore RPE. We discuss RPE for stretching, and then get into the big subject of food, hunger and satiety. Because talking about food in a fitness context often brings up questions related to weight loss, we talk about strategies for weight loss as well. We finish up with a discussion about the Zone of Moderation.

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RPE, Part 1: RPE ("Rate of Perceived Exertion" or "Rate of Perceived Experience") is a big subject, and in this and the next several episodes, we explore it in depth. In this episode, we discuss RPE in the areas of strength-training and cardio. Our conversation takes us into areas as diverse as Buddhism, the energetic cost of performance-enhancing drugs, and (of course) consciousness. There's a lot of material in this episode; we hope you enjoy it.

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The Water We Swim In: In this episode, we talk about the energetic background in our world--what we call "the water we swim in." Our exploration leads us through discussions about several different types of breath, a conversation about the #MeToo movement, and a brief examination of the energetic reverberations of one of the great crimes of the past.

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Change Yourself: In this episode, we take our first dive into "the art of changing the world" by discussing how change has to start with the one thing we can truly control--ourselves.

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Benjamin Becomes a Teacher: In this episode, we discuss what it means to be a teacher. We make a distinction between teaching and what we call merely "instructing." Finally, we share how critical it is that a teacher be first and foremost a student.

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Are you intrigued by what we've been sharing with the podcast and think you'd like coaching from us? Please contact us!

Jerry's website is https://awayoflifefitness.com/
Benjamin's website is https://benflows.com. (If it doesn't load, it's a still-under-construction issue. Please email him instead at ben(at)benflows.com)

Writing: In this episode, we discuss the techniques Benjamin teaches his writing students to help them let go of struggle and break through blocks, and how those techniques parallel Jerry's principles for exercise.

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Play With It: Perhaps you've noticed us using the phrase "Play with it" in previous episodes. In this episode, Benjamin describes why he found this phrase to be among the most important teachings Jerry shared, Jerry explains how it came to be, and Benjamin tells the story of three different arenas in which he played with the teachings.

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