Jeff Patterson

Jeff Patterson is a practicing martial artist of 36 years and author of "The Yielding Warrior." We discuss what the meditative arts are, the 5 regulations  that can lead to a healthier life, and some tips for someone who may want to begin adding meditative arts to their lifestyle. You can get a free copy of his book on his website Here.

Transcript

Rob Valincius: Not every day, uh, I get to start the podcast, there's tech issues. We're on time. This is a beautiful thing, man. It's, it's a good way to start a thirsty Thursday. Uh, I'm your host, Rob Valincius. This is the drink o'clock podcast. And I have the pleasure of having with me, Jeff Patterson. Now, Jeff, you're bad ass bro.

You're a, uh, practicing martial artist. You've been doing this for, 36 years almost i'm 38. So almost as long as i've been alive. You've been kicking ass Uh, you're an author. I saw that you uh, your most recent book is the yielding warrior Uh, you've written uh study materials for great tai chi and um, how do you say is it?

Um, but you got a lot going on man, welcome to the podcast appreciate you taking the time out of your day to hang out

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. Thank you for having me. Appreciate it.

Rob Valincius: so Um, I always like starting off the podcast especially with someone with your background. I mean You You've been all over the place. Talk to me a little bit about growing up, man. What was, uh, you know, what inspired you to, to kind of get on that track to eventually lead you to martial arts and, and meditation?

And tell me a little bit about your background up until that point.

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. So as a, as a kid growing up, I didn't have a whole lot of opportunity. I was a pretty low income family. We grew up in, uh, HUD housing and, uh, you know, I got food stamps as a kid to go buy stuff at the store and I was always embarrassed to, uh, hand them over the,

Rob Valincius: Been there.

Jeff Patterson: so, so, uh, yeah, I didn't have a lot of opportunity, but I was always interested in the martial arts, but.

Yeah. Because of where we were financially, I didn't have an option of joining an academy or school. And so when I got my first job, um, and started making a little bit of money, I found a local academy and started training and I really just started to develop a passion for it. And I joined the Marine Corps shortly after that.

Uh, when I got out of the Marine Corps, I can moved up here to Portland, Oregon and continued my training. I used to train at a boxing gym, not too far from my academy now. And at a boxing gym, the way that they run things there is a lot different than your traditional fitness style class in that it's not one instructor leading a group of people.

Usually, when you go into a gym, it's four or five teachers or instructors around coaches, and each one of those coaches has four or five fighters they're working with. Well, at this one particular gym, One of the coaches was a very well known coach. He had created national and world champion level fighters.

I really wanted to get to spend some time with him. So I would always show up at the gym when I knew he was going to be there. I trained hard, let him know that I'd be worthy of his time. If he started helping me out and, uh, you know, I followed him around for maybe three or four months. And finally he started giving me a few tips here and there and showing me some stuff.

And it was only about two or three weeks of getting to train with him when he said something to me that changed my life forever. And that he said, you know, if you really want to be a good boxer, you should start doing meditation and Tai Chi. Now at the time I was this 19 year old kid thinking Tai Chi was for old people in the park and wondering how that's going to, how that's going to help me be a better fighter.

But You know, I had a lot of respect for him. I knew he was trying to help me and I took on the practice and it's changed my life in many ways. And through the years, you know, I've been fortunate enough to have over 26, 000 students come through the academy here. And I've literally, I've literally heard hundreds of stories of how the meditative arts has positively influenced people's lives.

And that's what's. Giving me the energy and the motivation to write my last couple of books and create my online programs and, uh, really just try to get this message out there.

Rob Valincius: It's wild how life is, right? One, one chance encounter, one, one sentence can just change your life. You know, um, and it's weird because you never know when that's going to happen. I think sometimes people just, especially young people, you know, um, they always just want things to happen now, now, now. Right.

It's, it's especially the culture we live in. It's a, it's a now culture. Uh, not what, what you did for me yesterday. It's what, what have you done for me lately today? Right. Um, and I think if sometimes we just kind of slowed down a little bit. And I'm sure that plays into a lot of what you do with, with meditation, and we're going to talk about that because I'll be honest with you.

I don't know shit about meditation. Um, so when, uh, we, we connected, I'm like, oh, I got to talk to this guy because, uh, you know, that's something I've actually, I was, I was talking to the wife. I said, you know, I think I'm going to get up. Uh, earlier in the morning, I I've started to, I'm not a morning person, Jeff, at all.

I've never been a morning person, but recently, uh, on the weekends, I've been getting up at 7 30, which is right around when I get up for work during the week. Uh, but in past, I would just sleep till, you know, we don't have kids. So. Sleep till, you know, nine 30, 10 o'clock, 1030, you know, and then half the morning's gone, you know, and, uh, you're kind of starting the day in the afternoon.

Uh, but I'm trying to, to get better with that. It's, it's, it's, it's tough when you get older, you're so used to the routine of doing stuff. So changing isn't as easy. Um, but I'll tell you, so. When I was younger, I'll tell you my martial arts story. Uh, when I was younger, uh, I had, uh, and I don't know if you remember this.

You remember when the yo yo made a comeback, it had like ball bearings in it and everyone was playing with yo yos again. This was probably how old was I? I was probably. So we're talking 25 years ago, probably, uh, yo yos made a comeback and I had one, I was playing with it. A kid came up to me at, you know, as I'm walking home, he's like, Hey, can I play with that?

And I'm like, yeah, man, go for it. You know, I was, I was like the quiet fat kid, you know, and I just wanted friends and, uh, he just started walking away with it. He's basically stealing the yo yo in front of me. And, uh, I, I picked a fight with him and he was, uh, you know, I'm, let's see. I was probably five foot.

230 pounds. I was, I was like, I was a big fat kid, you know, and he's taller than me. And he's probably, I probably outweighed him by a hundred pounds and he just beat the shit out of me. And then I didn't, I didn't learn enough from that as he's walking away. I'm like, yeah, that's right, motherfucker. You better leave.

And then he comes back and he beats me up a second time. Uh, so I go home and, uh, you know, my dad at the time, my parents had got divorced. Uh, and I just decided to live with my dad and, uh, he's like, what the fuck happened to you? And i'm like this kid beat me up. He stole my yo yo. He's like, that's it.

You're going to karate You gotta learn how to fight. You gotta learn how to protect yourself Uh, so I did taekwondo um, I started with a um, kind of like a Storefront boutique y kind of place and the sensei there He was he was pretty good, but it was all about numbers getting people and they didn't really care and then uh, You I guess somewhere along the line that we, we met another guy that, that taught and he actually taught in his basement.

And, um, he had a, we had a decent sized class. I learned a lot from there. I got, I think I got a stripe or two on my, on my white belt or not a yellow bell. And I had, I think a green stripe. Um, and then eventually I kind of, you know, You know, dropped out of it because I started getting into sports and I lost a ton of weight because I played a ton of basketball, but that was my foray into into martial arts.

And, uh, you know, it was fun, man, sparring with people and kind of learning, you know, because with Taekwondo, it's it's a lot of, uh, you know, forms and memorizing movements and things like that. It was cool, especially for a kid, you know, um, kind of teaches you Patience and virtue and you know, it's it was a cool experience.

I'm glad my dad My dad put up with that because it was pretty expensive back. Um, listen, you studied all over the world, man What's what's what's that? What's that experience? Like, you know, I think it was you said seven different countries, right?

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. So it's, you know, I've spent my whole career traveling around and training with teachers all over the world. And it's, uh, it's been very fun. You know, it's something that I'm passionate about. I love learning. I'm actually taking off here this weekend to go to, uh, Dubai and India. And, uh, just always, always looking to learn.

Um, you know, I've, I've been training now for 36 years and I feel like I'm as much a student now as I was 20 years ago. Uh, this, You know, the, the meditative arts is an extremely deep subject and there's lots of different directions. You can take the practice, I break it down into kind of five different directions where you have the athletic side of the practice, where you can improve your timing and stability and awareness to improve your performance on the field, you have the therapeutic side of the practice, the medical side of the practice, the philosophical side, and then also the meditative or spiritual side, where there's.

That's what most people think of when they hear the word meditation, and really you can follow any one or a combination of those paths and, you know, spend your whole life down any one of those areas.

Rob Valincius: Yeah, I mean, uh, I gotta say I I don't know if i've ever meditated in my entire life, but I guess it's that stigma where you just think about, uh, meditation and you just assume immediately it's like a, you know, Hindu esque thing because it's, it's part of the Hindu religion pretty, pretty heavily, I believe.

Um, let's, let's, let's break this down to fundamentals. Okay. Because I know I'm, I, I have, uh, I have a lot of different styles of listeners for the podcast. Can you, can you break it down to its simplest form? What meditation is right to the regular Joe. Um, and I know you had mentioned three types. Can you kind of reference those and kind of break those down as well?

So we can kind of get a better understanding of what really is meditation.

Jeff Patterson: So that's a, that's a really big question and that there are lots of different things that we can integrate into a meditation lifestyle. And usually when I bring people into the meditative arts, I talk to them about learning how to build an evolving life practice around the meditative arts. And that could include things like a movement practice, like Tai Chi or Qi Gong or yoga.

Could be sitting meditation, breath work, standing meditation, walking meditation, could be working with some of the mental side of the training or internal energetic circulations in the body. I mean, there's, there's many different things that come with that. Now, depending on why you're drawn to the practice, we break down our practices or our time in the practice in three different main categories that you mentioned.

One would be ritual. The other one is active and the third one is philosophical. And briefly I'll kind of talk about what those are. So a ritual practice is when you set a little bit of time aside every day and you do a sitting practice or a Tai Chi form or whatever that meditation is for you. And this is kind of the core.

Foundation of your meditation practice, you know, and one of the most common things I'll hear people say is, uh, you know, I've tried meditation before and just didn't work for me. I couldn't quiet my mind and with a ritual practice. It doesn't matter who you are, you're going to get distracted. You know, I, I mentioned already, I've trained to some really amazing practitioners and I've never once met anybody who doesn't get distracted.

So, you know, somewhere along the way, people got this misconception that in order to be successful with meditation, you have to quiet the mind and be in this blissful place that nothing bothers you. And it couldn't be further from the truth. The idea is, is that if you're sitting in that ritual meditation or doing a ritual movement practice and you get distracted 50 times during that session, every time you get distracted, you recognize a distraction.

You use your posture, your breath, your movement, whatever it is to help bring you back to center. And now you just got 50 repetitions of being off center and coming back to focus. And if you do this every day, every week, every month, every year, you start to develop this power and this resiliency and ability to deal with anything that gets thrown your way.

And now if somebody says something to throw you off your game, or you have a bad day at work or whatever it is, It's a lot easier to come back and find your center and that focus. And that's one of the benefits of having that core ritual practice. Then we have active practices. which are really important tools when integrating meditation into your life because meditation is meant to be a way of life and not a hobby that we do once in a while.

And by integrating these active practices, we can do them when we're walking down the street or standing in line at the grocery store. And they could be as simple as, counting out 10 breaths or maybe doing some spinal rotations or maybe a simple movement practice. And by integrating these periodically throughout the day, now we're helping our physiology, our mental state, our emotional state.

Be more aware of these things and be more present. So we start to learn how to live the lifestyle and get a little bit more in tune with these practices. And then lastly, we have the philosophical side of the training, which can be integrated both in our ritual practices and our active practices. And they help with, uh, strategy and mental awareness and just being more, uh, in tune with our emotions that are in our mindset.

Rob Valincius: awesome. Yeah. I mean, uh, I, you know, now after talking to you, I feel like I do, I do some form of this. So if I have trouble sleeping, you know, um, I have a very overactive brain. So sometimes, you know, my body's tired. I'll lay down, close my eyes. My eyes are bloodshot. I'm tired, but my brain is just popping all over the place.

I will, um, Try to slow my breathing and I will count to 300 and I will slowly do it. And, uh, typically if I make it to 300, I just start back over. Um, but most of the time I don't make it there and it helps me kind of drift off to sleep. I know that's probably not a true form of meditation, but I feel like now that talking to you, it might be, you know, something that I've kind of incorporated into trying to fall asleep. Um, so now that you have that broken down, I know you had mentioned some other things as well. So, uh, you know, what are, what's the five regulations? Um, and then how, how can you lead a healthier life with those?

Jeff Patterson: You know, the five regulations are an essential part of any meditation practice. And they're like the core fundamental basics that it doesn't matter if you're doing yoga, tai chi, qigong, if you're doing sitting meditation, whatever it is. You need to cultivate these five areas and you'll see when after we go through explaining what they are and how to use them That they can help you in any area of your life The the basics of the five regulations is regulating the body regulating the breath regulating the mind Regulating the energy and regulating the spirit and briefly.

I'll kind of touch on what those are. So regulating the body is You The first place that we usually start because it's the easiest place to see benefits from the practice in a very short amount of time. And there's some simple adjustments we can make and basically regulating the body is your skeletal alignment and your muscular tension in the body at a basic level.

And then at a more detailed level, we get into. maintaining a certain amount of muscle in the body. So we stay healthy, keeping flexible, keeping a certain basic diet. So we have the appropriate nutrients coming in and getting enough sleep so we can maintain that energetic state. Now, an example of kind of regulating the body from a physical standpoint would be If you think about a time, maybe you're sitting in front of your computer for three or four hours, and you're feeling lethargic, a little bit depleted, your shoulders are rounded forward, maybe your neck's getting sore, and then another time when the most important person in your world walks in the room, and your body perks up, and you feel like you're on top of the world.

Well, these two different energetic states We're in a hundred percent control of all the time. And so being aware of how we're holding our skeletal alignment, how we're dealing with the transfer of tension throughout the body, as we move through the day can play a huge role on our energetic states throughout the day.

And so this is kind of the first place we start when we're building a meditation practice. The second level. Is regulating the breath. And this is a very deep topic and something that you'll study for the rest of your life. If you get into the meditative arts, um, oftentimes Qigong is referred to as the science of the breath because there's literally hundreds of different breathing strategies.

Now, once you understand how to use these strategies, we can get different outcomes with them. And because there's so many of them, we kind of broadly categorize them into Yin methods and Yang methods. Yin methods are often deeper, more holistic style of meditations. They're great for, uh, dealing with anxiety, with panic attacks, with boosting our creativity.

An example of the Yin breath would be if you ever listen to somebody sleep, Their natural breathing pattern is a longer inhale and a shorter exhale. And this is the body's natural way of bringing your conscious mind and your subconscious mind, which is where you are when you're sleeping and dreaming.

And so if you want to emulate this style of energy in your meditation practice, we can lengthen the inhales, maybe do soft retentions at the end of the inhale and shorter exhales. To get these kinds of outcomes. Then we have the young side of the breath, which is more aggressive. It's kind of like if you ever had to push your car, maybe you pick up something heavy, your natural instinct is to exhale, put tension in the breath, maybe even make the breath audible, and this helps generate that energy and extend it outwards.

And so once we understand how to use the breath as a strategy, now we can use it to regulate. Our physiology, our mental thoughts, our emotions, and you know, in Chinese philosophy, they call this balancing the con and Lee or the water and fire and you know, I don't doesn't matter who you are. Everybody goes through the day with emotional ups and downs.

Some people are like a roller coaster. Others may be a little more balanced. But when you can recognize these imbalances and say, you start to get excited, it, We can use the Yin side of the breath to help bring us back down. And when we see ourselves starting to feel depleted, we can use the Yong side of the breath to help build us back up.

And so learning how to use this strategy in our days will help us maintain balance and focus and be a little more centered and come from that present state of mind in everything we do. Then thirdly, we have regulating the mind and it just like the breath, this is a very deep topic and something that you'll spend your entire life working on.

And it kind of comes back to something we already touched on when we talked about, you know, when you meditate and you get distracted, you use the practice to help bring you back to center. Well, when we develop that sensitivity and the awareness of those imbalances, Now we can make adjustments before they get too far down the wrong path.

You know, there's this story that I really enjoy about these two older monks and they're walking down this dirt road after a big rainstorm and it's a mess everywhere. There's mud puddles and it's muddy. And they come up to this huge mud puddle and on the other side of the puddles, this beautiful little girl standing there in a white dress and the older monk yells across the puddle and says, Is everything okay?

She's over there crying, and she says, I need to be somewhere, but if I walk across this puddle, I'm going to get my dress all dirty. So the older monk, he rolls up his pant legs, he walks across the puddle, picks her up, puts her on his back, takes her to the other side, sets her down, she's off on her way.

Well, him and the younger monk are walking a couple miles down the road, and the younger monk says, You know, we're not supposed to touch girls, but yet you did back there at the puddle and he's just furious. And the older monk looks down at him and says, you're still thinking about that girl. I left her back there at the puddle.

And how many times in life do we have to get two miles down the muddy road before we finally realize we need to let this thing go. And so this idea of being more aware and more in tune and more present when these things affect us. And how we can use this to affect us mentally and emotionally gives us the tools to make those adjustments before it gains too much negative momentum down any one of these paths.

You know, and some people hold on to this stuff far too long, you know, it could be not just five minutes, but some people hold onto it for five years. And learning how to recognize this before we get too far down any negative path can save us a lot of heartache and energy on the other side. Then we have

Rob Valincius: Yeah. Wow.

Jeff Patterson: We have regulating the energy.

Regulating the energy is an extremely deep topic and something that we could literally talk about for hours, but I'll just give you a brief example of it. Once you have. reached a competent stage in regulating the body, the breath and the mind. You now have the tools to guide the energy in the body, whether you're leading it inward, you're circulating it, whether you're extending it outward.

And with a lot of different meditations, we'll use this kind of energetic circulation to get different outcomes. And we talked a little bit about that with the breath. And you know, the example would be something that we do every day or maybe not every day, but naturally in our lives is on the inside of things.

When we're bringing that energy inward, something that happens naturally is when you cry. If you ever listen to somebody breathe. They're naturally, they're inhaling longer than they exhale, which brings that energy inward, which is why a lot of times if people get depressed and they're in this negative state for a period of time, they end up getting sick because this inward energy also weakens your immune system.

On the flip side of that, you think about something else we do naturally all the time is when you laugh, right? You're naturally extending the exhale and sometimes you'll get sweaty. You'll get hot when you laugh. And this is the way of bringing that energy out. So when we can learn how to guide the energy in the body, we can lead it to get different outcomes, which can be beneficial when we're working with regulating our body, our, our mental capacity, and also our emotions.

And then lastly, We have regulating the spirit and regulating the spirit is a very profound idea. And it's something that meditation masters and Qigong practitioners will spend their entire life working towards that stage of enlightenment. You know, once you understand these five regulations, you now have the foundation and the tools to adjust anything you do in life and the different meditative arts and the different practices that we do Help us guide and regulate these five regulations.

Rob Valincius: Yeah, that's awesome. I mean, I can already see how, you know, if someone's struggling with something, you know, what that would look like if they just, you know, Took the time to, you know, figure out what it is that's bothering them. And then it seems like all of these things, it's now, are these regulations are, are they, um, almost like steps or can you kind of tackle any of them at once?

Like, do you have to do the, you know, the, can you do the spirit first if you want, or, you know, are they interchangeable

Jeff Patterson: Yes. And no. Uh, so you, you really can't get to any deep level of regulating the spirit without a foundation of the previous four. However, you can start from day one working on regulating the body, the breath and the mind and do it all at the same time. The idea is, uh, it starts to become something that We regulate in the beginning, but we want to get to the point where we're naturally regulating without consciously regulating.

And when you can get to that point and it starts to become a way of life, now you really start to get to where you're reaping the benefits of the practice.

Rob Valincius: now, these regulations, these things that, that help people live a healthier life, right? Obviously it's good to start young. Um, what's your recommendations for someone that's older, maybe someone that's, you know, a senior, because I work in the senior world, you know, so I, I, uh, work with Medicare and insurance.

I deal with seniors all the time and it's, it's kind of wild because you deal with. Um, one, one man, 65 is a totally different other guys, 65 where, you know, some people that are 65. Um, they just beat the crap out of their bodies and, you know, they, they have a wheelchair or a walker. I mean, they really look old.

And then there's some people that are 65 that can run five miles and, uh, half the time they're in better shape than some of the people that I know that are 45, you know? So, um, you know, Can you take these things, uh, and start them, you know, in, in your later years, as well as just your younger years.

Jeff Patterson: Definitely, you know, and in my practice here at the academy, it's not uncommon to have somebody come in here in their seventies and start to practice, you know, and the, the great thing about incorporating meditation into your life is you can use it to help with your mobility, your balance, your strength, your flexibility.

It can keep you more mobile and healthy way into your later years. You know, and a lot of people practice. the meditative arts for longevity. You know, there's so many studies and benefits that show that if you do these practices, they can help you live a longer, healthier life.

Rob Valincius: So let me ask you this, um, because I, I know that in reading up, you know, with a lot of your stuff, I, I didn't see you mention much of it. So with meditation, does that also, uh, play into like yoga? Because I do know a lot of older, like a lot of, uh, older clients that studied yoga and did a lot of yoga for years.

They tend to be pretty spry in their older years because obviously yoga focus, a lot of it's focused on, you know, flexibility and balance.

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. Yoga is a meditative art. You know, yoga, Tai Chi, Qi Gong, um, sitting meditation, standing meditation, breath work. All of those things are different meditative practices.

Rob Valincius: Um, so talk to me a little bit about some of these different, um, practices, because, you know, you hear, I mean, I've heard Jiu Jitsu, um, Mai Twai, Tai Chi, um, the Qi Gong is, was, or the Qi Gong was new for me. Um, Can you explain that, you know, I have to go into vast amounts of detail, but can, can you explain some of the minute differences between them or, uh, you know, obviously it might even be more than minute.

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. So, you know, kind of going, uh, Getting into a little bit of a different topic. If we go into the external arts, when I say internal arts, I talking about like the meditative arts, external arts, I would pull things like Brazilian jujitsu, Muay Thai, Western boxing, Taekwondo, uh, you know, any of those more combat style martial arts.

While some of those may have some meditative elements in them, For the majority of the people that come in here to the academy, if they're doing Brazilian jujitsu, they're not really involved in the meditation program. They're kind of more focusing on Brazilian jujitsu or they're focusing on the Western boxing or whatever that is for them.

Uh, the, the meditative arts is more geared towards, um, you know, you know, health oriented practices. However, Tai Chi in and of itself originally was a martial art and used to You know, if you go back a thousand years ago, everybody who practiced Tai Chi was doing it more for the. Uh, physical side and more for the martial side.

But now, you know, if you were to pull all of the Tai Chi schools around the country, I bet less than 5 percent of them have over a second grade education and how to use Tai Chi as a martial art. Most people these days practice it because there's so many health benefits. And. Um, you know, as you mentioned for, for seniors, you know, it's, it's great because it keeps them more stable on their feet.

It keeps them flexible. It keeps their muscle tone up. And so it really helps as they age into later years. And then for the younger practitioners, now you're setting the tone because, you know, it's one thing. If. You know, you abuse your body for 30 years. One year of practice isn't going to be enough to make up for those 30 years of abuse, you know?

So the getting into this

Rob Valincius: It's true.

Jeff Patterson: at a quicker age or younger age can be really helpful. And, uh, so, you know, really anybody can benefit from it. You know, I told you I started when I was 19. And, uh, I see people across the board coming in here from their teens all the way up into their even nineties. I've had students in that age range as well.

Yeah,

Rob Valincius: love when, you know, uh, I think here's the problem, right. In, um, you know, in America, a lot of the times, especially when you're, when you're retired. People just kind of sit around, they don't, they don't tend to do anything. And I think, and, and look, this is me working in an office, you know, I used to work in retail and I was all over the place.

I was, you know, uh, standing. I never got to sit, uh, and I was in the best shape of my life, you know, and then I work in an office, uh, I'll be on year 10 in April and, uh, I've put on probably 75 pounds over 10 years. You know, it's, it creeps, right? It's like five to seven pounds. You don't realize it. And then before you know, you're like, Holy crap, what happened?

And, uh, you know, it's that, it's that office culture just sitting around, you know, so recently, yeah, I've tried to be a little healthier, you know, I'm not. Uh, drinking as much. I'm, uh, trying to get as much, um, mobile activity as possible. So I'm, I'm making sure I get, uh, at least every hour I get up, I'll, I'll walk around for 10 minutes instead of just sitting there, you know, and I feel like I could feel my hunched shoulders, you know, from just sitting all day like this.

And, uh, but it's the same thing with seniors, you know, they get to that age where, you know, Um, and they don't have any hobbies or don't do anything. They just kind of sit in and you're not getting the vitamin D from the sun. You're not moving around. It's your body deteriorates faster. I mean, it's just, uh, you know, we're, we're not meant to just be sitting around inside with, you know, fluorescent lights or, you know, you're, you're meant to be kind of out and about.

And, uh, you know, uh, we lose that. So it's, it's good that you, with your practice, you do get to, uh, kind of spread the good word and, And help out some, some seniors who I'm sure really need it. 90s is cool, man. Guy was probably kicking it. Um, and that leads me to kind of my next, uh, the next thing I want to talk to you about.

So, you know, for a beginner. So say I, I wanted to, to get into the meditative arts. Um, do you have some tips and tricks on, on, uh, you know, starting up and, um, you know, if someone's doing this, uh, then they've never done it. You know, how often. Should you practice the meditative stuff?

Jeff Patterson: for sure. You know, I have three things that I like everybody to consider when they're thinking about taking on a meditation practice. And if you follow this and you really put some time and, uh, effort into these three questions, The chances of you being successful with the practice is going to greatly increase.

And the first one is, why are you being drawn to the practice? What's making you interested in wanting to take on a meditation practice? Is it that you want to stay healthy into your older years and watch your grand kids grow up? Or maybe you're dealing with a stress disorder or an illness and you want to use the practice to help with, Anxiety or panic attacks, or maybe you're an athlete and you want to use it to improve your performance, which is why I got started, you know, whatever the reason is.

And then once you have that basic reason. Think about a little bit deeper on that as to how that will change your life. If you get that outcome, if you do this practice and it helps you on that path, it helps you with your anxiety and you don't have panic attacks anymore. How much more confident you are, are you going to feel?

How much better are you going to feel when you're going to the grocery store or whatever it is? And. Also, if you don't do it and you keep having those panic attacks, how are you going to fill in that scenario? You know, so kind of give it some fuel. Think about, you know, what is the main motivation behind it and really spend a little bit of time and investigate that because I don't care who you are, whether it's tomorrow, next week, or next month, your alarm is going to go off in the morning and it's going to be time to get up and do your practice.

And you're going to say, I'll hit the snooze button. I'll do it tomorrow. And if you don't have a reason to get up and a reason to do the practice, it's not going to work for you. You know, and with, with, you know, you asked as far as like, uh, you know, how often you should do it, it should be a way of life.

It's something that we do every day. You don't need to retire to a cave and meditate for the rest of your life. But if you did a ritual practice that was say 20 minutes a day and integrated some active practices throughout the day, and you kept that up for a year, you could get a lot of benefits from that, which that leads into my second thing, which is now that we have our why understanding the importance of consistency, because doing this practice, it's kind of like You know, if you, uh, plant an apple seed and you go out there and you water it once, and then you go out the next day and you think you're going to have an apple, there's a problem.

You know, you, you've got to be consistent. You've got to feed a water, you got to give it time. And then it starts producing fruit. Meditation is the same way. You've got to put the time in to really see what the benefits of the practice are. You know, it's like, just like working out in the gym, you know, you can't go one time to try to do bench press and bench press 400 pounds, you know, you got to build up to it.

And so having that consistency, it teaches you discipline. It gives you start to develop integrity and perseverance and many other qualities that come with the practice. And these qualities now start to feed over into every area of your life. You start to develop more of these things in your relationships, in your work relationships, in, you know, your hobbies and everything you do.

And so having that why being consistent. And then the third one is you need to find a guide. You know, there is. A million videos out there on YouTube. There's all these apps that you can go get and listen to different things. And if you try to be self taught and watch these videos and listen to apps, you're, you're going to spend a lot of time going down a path where you're not going to get very more, much more than a surface level.

You know, having somebody to point you in the right direction can save you years of time. I've literally had students come into the academy that have been doing the meditation practice of some sort or another for 10, 15, 20 years. And they'll see somebody who's been here under guidance for 12 months. And they're further along in their practice because they've had somebody pointing them in the right direction and showing them how to take the right path that doesn't get them distracted.

So. Life is short. Your time is valuable. Having somebody to help point you in the right direction is huge. And so with those three things, if you really consider that and you do a ritual practice every day for 20 minutes, you take on some active practices throughout the day, integrate some philosophical practices, and you keep that up for a year.

I guarantee you, not only will you do that for the rest of your life, but you'll see so many positive changes that, you know, you'll stop looking at it like a chore you have to do and start thinking, man, this is something I get to do and get excited about it because you'll see so many benefits from it.

Rob Valincius: Yeah. I mean, look, that's, that's, I mean, it's, that's, that's some knowledge, man. I mean, that's a lot. I mean, those, those keys there are, uh, I mean, those could flow to a lot of things in life, right? I mean, even your job, you know, uh, and, and the things that you do, it's like, uh, you know, you get up in the morning and you're getting ready for work and a lot of people it's like, well, why am I doing this?

And I bet you, if you asked, I 95 percent of people are going to tell you, Oh, I got to pay my bills. Right. But at the end of the day, yeah, I mean, we all got to pay our bills, but you got to have some purpose. And I think, um, we, today we, we get very restless because no one can ever answer the, the why question.

I feel like I probably, I could probably answer some of it. Um, I think I know why, but you know, I, I, you know, I, in your twenties, you, you think, you know, why, right. In your thirties, you're like, I know why kinda. Yeah. I don't know enough, but I know, I know enough. And I think, I think it's like that gradual, um, knowledge factor with age is, you know, and some people grow, you know, they, they get it early, but I do think it's a natural progression of, you know, your twenties, your thirties.

And then when you get into your forties, that's really when shit starts to go, starts to go down. Right. You're like, all right, I know who I am in a lot of factors. I know, you know, why I'm doing certain things. I think that just comes with age. Um, can you talk to me about what, uh, yielding is and, um, you know, what's its use, is it, you know, how, how it's useful for people?

Jeff Patterson: is to me, one of the coolest concepts in all of the meditative and martial arts. It's why I named my last book, The Yielding Warrior. It's, In that book, I've broken it down into three kind of pillars of yielding. We have physical yielding, mental yielding, and emotional yielding. Physical yielding is the idea that I push you, you push me, whoever's the bigger, stronger person with the most leverage.

Eventually he's going to push the other person over, but with yielding, instead of us trying to see who the bigger meathead is, when you push me, I get out of the way of that force. So now I can respond with less effort. So I'm not trying to butt heads with you and see if I'm bigger and stronger than you.

Now in athletics, you have to know how to do this because you're going to come up against people who are bigger and stronger than you. No matter what sport you play or what you do. And so understanding how to use this skill is really valuable for anybody who's competitive. Now, in order to be good at physical yielding, a lot of things have to come into play.

You need to be well rooted. The lower part of your body needs to be strong and flexible so you can change your central equilibrium without getting tight. The body has to be relaxed. The breath has to be calm. The mind has to be present. All of these things take years and years, if not a lifetime to develop.

And the cool thing is, is that while we do want to work towards mastering these skills, because we can use them for so many different applications from day one, by integrating a meditation practice into your life, you start to develop a higher sense of awareness inside yourself, and you start to recognize all of these things.

And now, because I'm a little bit more in tune with these things inside myself. I also start to see these things more clearly in other people. And this is where we move into what I call mental yielding. Now, say for example, you and I are having a conversation and I say something that unsettles you and I pick up on it right from that first sign of imbalance, it's a lot easier to adjust the conversation and keep us in a happy place.

Then if I'm not paying attention to that, and pretty soon I'm so far off track, you want to slap me upside the head. And so, you know, learning how to use yielding in all of our interactions is extremely powerful. One, you're just being more considerate, which is something that, you know, we should all try to do anyway, and two, it allows us to be strategic.

In our interactions, which can help us guide conversations and interactions to a positive outcome with the least amount of resistance. This is great for our relationships. It's great for business sales, negotiations. I mean, many different applications and ways that we can use this strategy of, of mental yielding.

Then we have the idea of emotional yielding, which is very much like mental yielding, but with your own interpersonal conflicts. So you think about oftentimes something will happen to us and we'll respond and we'll go down this path and we might get an hour, a day, a week down that road and realize.

Maybe that wasn't the best choice, but with yielding in by incorporating meditation into our life, we're able to stay more present and more aware when these things happen and approach them from a balanced standpoint rather than being distracted, which allows us oftentimes to save us a lot of heartache and make a more educated decision that will save us a lot of time.

And so. Understanding how to use these different kinds of yielding is extremely valuable in many areas in life, you know, and oftentimes when I'm explaining yielding to people, I'll hear them say, ah, that makes a lot of sense. In fact, I use yielding all the time. And while I would agree, I think everybody does some yielding all the time, whether they recognize it or not.

It's kind of like, You know, if you or I were to walk into a crime scene with a detective who's been on the job for 30 years, I guarantee you that person would see things about the series of events and the timelines that I know at least I would have no clue of. And the meditative arts helps us see things inside of ourselves and inside of other people that I truly believe most people will never have any clue of unless they have this kind of practice in their life.

Rob Valincius: Wow. Yeah. I mean, I, you know, you're talking about it, you know, the different stages. I'm like, I definitely do a little bit of that. And I think honestly, in today's, I mean, parabolic type. Atmosphere with, with emotions and things like that. I feel like if more people learned yielding, there would be a lot less conflict in this world.

And look at the end of the day, right? Conflict isn't. It's not always bad. That's the other thing, too. I think we live in a world where it's like nobody wants conflict and you have to agree with whatever side is the majority. And I think that that's I grew up in a time and I'm sure you did, too, where conflict.

It was okay to have conflict. Um, it was healthy to have a little bit of conflict with whether it's your friends or people you don't know, or whatever, because, you know, you could talk about it. And at the end of the day, you walk away from it is what it is. And, um, You don't see that as much in today's world.

Um, and I'm not saying let's spread, you know, conflict everywhere, but I'm saying, you know, if, if people learn how to handle it better, um, you know, because not everyone has the same opinion, you know, me and you probably differ on opinions. Um, and we would never agree, but it doesn't mean that we can't sit down and have a great conversation.

I think, I think we need to get back to that. Um, because that's where some in my opinion, some of the best. Things have come from that, whether it's, you know, uh, movies or, uh, you know, different types of meditation or whatever. It's just someone had a difference of opinion and chose to, to go their own way.

And, you know, that's, that's my rant of the day, uh, on that. But, um, let's talk a little bit about your program. So, um, can you explain what the yielding warrior program is? And, um, How that differentiates from other meditation programs.

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. So I created the Yielding Warrior program to teach people how to build an evolving life practice with the meditative arts. So it's not focused on any one style of meditation. It's teaching the science and the theory behind it. So basically you can learn how to write your own prescriptions, if you will.

When certain things happen, you know, we're always kind of at an imbalance. And if you're doing an energizing meditation practice and you're already feeling a little bit excited or stressed out, you're doing the wrong practice. And so understanding how to. Use these different methods to find that balance and work with these five regulations is really essential, you know, and within the program, you're going to learn things from, uh, movement exercises from Tai Chi and Qigong and different stretching routines through breath work, um, sitting meditation, energetic work on the body, understanding the philosophy behind meditation, standing meditation, and basically just kind of learn how to.

Build an evolving life practice with the meditative arts.

Rob Valincius: So, you know, in, in today's day and age, right? Um, you know, we are a very, uh, internet focused, uh, type of world. Does your, um, program allow for, uh, remote learning? Cause I know you're, you're up in the, the way Northwest. Well, for me anyway,

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. So it is an online program and you learn that way. However, as I mentioned earlier, you know, the internal arts is meant to be, uh, a practice where you turn internally. That's why it's called internal arts, you know? And so if you're thinking that every time you go to meditate, you're going to watch a screen or listen to an audio, you're already just on the surface.

Now it's okay. And obviously I believe in it, or I wouldn't have created a program around an online program. But you can use these resources to learn the practice, but when you do it for your daily ritual practice, you don't want to use it as a crutch where you have to turn on the video screen or listen to the audio programs.

You want to get it memorized. So. That way you can do it on your own and really reach, reach a deeper level of feeling, you know, and it doesn't matter what meditation practice you do. We've already mentioned many different ones in this conversation. What gets you to a high level of development and practice?

Is to develop a deeper level of feeling. And the only way that you're going to get that physically, mentally, and emotionally is to turn that focus inward. You know, in today's society, we're so distracted with our cell phones and advertisements and all of our to do's and being in the cities and things that we've got going on that.

Um, you know, when we do this practice, it's meant to help us kind of return to who we really are and really pay attention to kind of our heart and our soul. And, you know, it's one of my meditation teachers. He always says, you know, we're so caught up in today's society that, you know, we're all walking around with masks on, you know, we got these barriers up to protect us from, you know, things that we feel like we want to say, but we don't or things that we want to hide from other people and we don't want to show who we really are.

And You know, having a meditation practice, it's one of those things that helps us take those masks off because you know, a lot of people, they go to look at themselves in the mirror and they're still wearing that mask and having a practice like this helps us learn how to take that mask off and at least stay connected to who we really are with ourselves.

Rob Valincius: I couldn't agree more with you. Um, what was it like opening up? Your own program. Um, did it was it like a, um, a different type of feeling? Because, you know, obviously you've you've worked with a ton of different students. Um. You know, was it was it nice that you could be able to take all of this knowledge that you've accumulated over 36 years and be able to kind of bestow it upon other people?

Jeff Patterson: Yeah, well, you know, I've, I've been running this Academy now for 30 years. So it's, uh, kind of been on, on my own thing here for a while. The main reason why I started the online program was just because I've seen it through the years helped so many people. I wanted to get out there. To more than just the folks here in Portland, you know, I wanted to try to see if I can help a bigger audience.

And that's why I created my last couple of books and created the online program and my teacher training program.

Rob Valincius: That's awesome. That's awesome. Um, about your book real quick. Um, you know, your most recent book that was the, um, the yielding warrior. Yeah. Tell us a little bit about it. What, what, um, I mean, is, is you have three books, right? Is, do you have to read book one is book three, just a different view of what's going on.

Tell us a little bit

Jeff Patterson: No, they're, they're all different. You know, the, the yielding warrior, which is the one that I'm really working to promote right now, we kind of touched on that when we talked about the different elements of yielding, but it teaches you how to use this concept and everything you do in life. And it goes into detail in, um, different practices you can do to cultivate that awareness to reach a higher sensitivity.

So we can work with these different methods of yielding and uh, it's really pretty deep. There's a, there's a lot in there. Um, anybody that is interested in that philosophy, I'm giving a free copy of the book away. Just pay for shipping and handling. If you go to the yielding warrior. com forward slash book, you can order a free copy of that.

Rob Valincius: Jeff stole my next question, man. Yeah. You, you, you jumped the gun. I was going to ask, how do you get a free book? Um, that's awesome. That's, that's awesome. And we'll, uh, we'll make sure that we post that in the show notes and everything. So, um, Do you have, uh, is it like, uh, do you have audio versions of the

Jeff Patterson: Yes.

Rob Valincius: Speak in my language. I'm an, I'm a, uh, audible guy. That's, that's what I, I do. I have an hour drive to work. I have like 45 minutes to an hour, an hour drive home. And, uh, I got away from the radio. I just, it was starting to, It's the same thing over and over again. And, uh, so I, I do a lot in, in, in my older age, I've started, like, I really like science fiction and stuff.

So I was listening to a lot of science fiction books, but I started to really get into history kick and I'm really in a bourbon. So I was, I was, uh, read a book about Pappy. I don't know if you've ever heard of Pappy van Winkle, uh, that bourbon, uh, had a really cool story and just learn about the history of, um, of bourbon and whiskey and in the United States.

And it's. It's a pretty wild thing, man. There's some pretty cool things. I had no idea. And I'd imagine it's, it's, it's almost the same thing with, with your practice where it's, uh, things that you learn, you're like, wow, I, you know, I never really thought of it that way type of thing. You know, it's like a light bulb type moment, um, with, I'm sure a lot of the stuff that you're, you're teaching people, um, especially from all over the world.

Right. All, uh, you know, your practice, you don't, you're not necessarily just teaching people in the U S you know, you're teaching people all over the world, right.

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. Yeah. You know, one of the things I've always loved about the meditative arts is that there are a lot of lessons like that, you know, you'll learn something and maybe I'll have a teacher that gives me something and I'll think, oh, that's interesting. I get it. But then five years later, I'll be like, ah, that's what he meant.

Now I understand that, you know, it's like, it's, it's pretty cool when those things happen.

Rob Valincius: Now, before we get out of here, um, and, and, you know, I'll put you on the spot. We'll see if you, you remember it. Tell, tell us something that was taught to you by one of your, uh, what do they call the meditative arts, uh, like trainers? Is it sensei's? Is it, is there, is there something like that? Does it matter?

Is it culture

Jeff Patterson: It depends on where they're coming from. You know, in the, in the Chinese arts, a lot of times it's called Sifu. Um, sometimes, sometimes guru, sometimes just teacher.

Rob Valincius: Tell me something that, uh, that, that one of your teachers has, has kind of told you that, um, kind of never, you never forgot that maybe we can leave the podcast with today. I do like the story about the monks. That was good. Uh, that was really good. I liked that.

Jeff Patterson: At a very young age, one of my teachers told me to create a life and not make a living. And that's always stuck with me. And I've spent my whole career working on ways to create the life that I want and not get stuck in the day to day grind of making a living. And I think that changing that mindset and having that be my belief has really led to a lot of good things.

Rob Valincius: I liked that. I liked that. That's a great way to end it. Um, if more people did it, uh, I think you'd have a lot more people that are happier. I mean, you, you end up just making the, uh, whoever you're working for more rich, you know? And, uh, At the end of the day, I think we all have it in us to Step outta the shadow of, of those people.

But look, Jeff, it was a pleasure having you on, man. A ton of great stuff. I, I learned a ton and I'm, I'm gonna be honest, I was, I was, uh, excited to, to kinda learn about some of the different things. I mean, you hear these words, right? You hear Tai Chi and Muai, all that stuff, right? But I, you never really know what's kind of behind a lot of those things.

Um, and I, I think this meditative practice is, is really cool. Um, can you tell us where everybody can, can find your content so that we can, um. And they're

Jeff Patterson: Yeah. So you can go to the yielding warrior. com. Uh, that's a great way to just reach out to me through all of my programs, my book. Um, also all the social channels. You can look me up through the yielding warrior. I'm pretty much on all those.

Rob Valincius: awesome, man. Uh, this is the drink clock podcast. You can find me anywhere. You listen to podcasts, uh, and drink clock pod on basically all socials. And, uh, we'll probably have this up, uh, by tomorrow, actually. Uh, we'll, we'll see how the world treats me tomorrow, but we'll, we'll hope to have it up tomorrow.

So, but it would look, it was a pleasure having you on man. And let's do this again sometime soon. Maybe I'll, uh, maybe I'll take a couple of classes.

Jeff Patterson: Nice. Well, it was nice to meet you and thanks for having me on. Appreciate it.

Rob Valincius: Thank you, Jeff. You have a great night.

Jeff Patterson: Bye bye.