Movers + Mavericks

Be curious about what you read and who you train with.This weeks podcast is a result of a t shirt a guy would wear when we trained alongside each other @whitehartcrossfit. Efrem Brynin trains @whitehartcrossfit and I remember seeing his T shirt with the logo and slogan Strongmen on it. I got it but I also didn’t until I began to see a few more around in the box. So I got curious about what it meant and what it was for.Turns out Strongmen is a bereavement charity Efrem founded with Daniel Cross after being connected by one of the SAS Who Dares Wins team as they had both been on the show and suffered from unexpected loss.Hearing this it felt right to do what we can to share what they are doing and how just because culture has shown that men deal with life events like bereavement in one way, does not mean they aren’t looking for a more connected way for them to express the rise and fall of grief and bereavement which can literally make a once stable world fall apart around the person.We are all strong, and cultu

The sports field is literally a proving ground, and in this weeks podcast we explore an idea that maybe the proving ground is not fully understood and that we often attempt to prove something that doesn't need to be proven. That, you are enough and you have always been enough.Now imagine what that shift in understanding would do to how we show up on the field, that you are in the field because of who you are.That is what I take from our podcast with @rick_cooper, ex rugby player, fireman and now leadership coach and speaker. We talk, Competition. Connection. Resilience. Leadership, how to pick yourself up when you are told you will never walk again and more.Thanks brother for your time, as always it was a pleasure.If you like the pod and feel like buying us a coffee to keep us fueled, then follow the link in the bio.Peace☮️, love❤️ and rigor✊.

Welcome to the weMove podcast. When does sticking at things and never quitting become detrimental and negative to progress? Quitting, is a term that has so many negative connotations. There is so much glamour in the social media feeds of never quitting, doing something whatever it takes that it can get clouded and confused. I am all for the idea of not quitting, but sometimes I do wonder what it’s all about when slogging away at something, where the stakes are not related to what really matters, like life/death. Todays podcast is with David ‘Jacko’ Jackson, one half of @schoolofcalisthenics, former professional rugby player who had to make the decision to call time on his professional playing career due to culmination of impacts, tackles which were slowly over time affecting his longevity as a human. Jacko suffered a seizure during practice, leading to the necessary scans etc to confirm that the life forward from then on would need to be different. This is where quitting is legitimate, though still a tough pi

Chris and James riff on Paul Warrior's 30 day Atlas ball program and Chris' dive into  Shadow Work

Chris and James discuss thoughts from 2020

This weeks episode we are on the bike, exploring one persons infatuation with the bike, or at least that’s what he was originally thought it was.Turns out it was a vehicle for expression, but not of the ego image that is so often the case. But something deeper, the bike was a support vehicle to connect with what was needed. To grieve the passing of his dad, a big transition in the scheme of life. We spoke to Dhiren half way through this year and this conversation really was a gem. Articulate, and willing to ask questions of himself that many suppress, Dhiren spoke about cycling, the infatuation that occurs when we begin the movement journey of a specific genre (in this case cycling), the addiction of feeling fitter, stronger, more capable and the all too common gentle attrition of the physical self that comes from endurance pursuits.Sports are neutral, inert. It is us that give them a charge be that positive or negative. I fear that we are illiterate and ill prepared in our comprehension of why we move. That

Hey there, welcome to the weMove podcast. There’s a lot of internal change happening within weMove at the minute. Not the obvious change, Chris and I are both still involved, but with this year being what it is, it has evolved us. I’m now in Portugal living with my young family, which has been a radical, obvious, natural, needed, timely, earned move. For how long, who knows but we are up in the hills, surrounded by nature, farmland, real life and it is just what we needed, I needed. And Chris is roaming and exploring in his own way, revisiting his place of birth, and the constructs that come with that. We are both in a good place, however you define a good place. I would say it still comes with the daily sludge to move through, but interspersed with real gems and progress.Training here is happening more in this place for me than the initial phase of lockdown 1. I just didn’t want to move, I wanted to be quiet and luckily I had the opportunity to. Become a kind of hermit, training with a close group of friends

Hey there and welcome to the weMove podcast.With one more episode in our movement and search for meaning to come, we are holding off whilst we complete the accompanying short film Chris has been working on. It’s rally good and a lovely bookend to the series.In the meantime we are beginning a new series of conversations with a growing number of body work practitioners influenced by the concepts of Eastern Medicine specfically acupuncture, of which there happen to be two who have piqued my interest on instagram for their personal message and their aesthetics. And whilst how we choose our personal team isn’t always best based on aesthetics of their insta feed and words. These mediums do portray someone’s flavour as I call it. Their personality, their interests etc,, which has been how I have gathered and formed those around me who I call on when I am struggling physically, mentally or spiritually.There are many practitioners out there in the world, no two are the same even if they come from what is on the surfac

Hey there and welcome to the weMove podcast. To say that the last few months have been unpredictable is an understatement, it has certainly taken its toll on the routine and structure of my days and for that I apologise as the frequency of our podcast releases has been intermittent as a result. Todays episode is a continuation of the movement and search for meaning conversations and one that we recorded as we entered the first week of the original lockdown. For some there is a second lockdown and it is curious how this episode is timely even now. We often feel the need to rush but as one of our friends wrote the other week “Rushing is what got me…” Just goes to show that quality be it actions or conversations rarely have a sell by date. In fact having just moved to Northern Portugal and observing the cities of UK and perhaps beyond, there is a manic rush that prevails under the guise of direction and purpose. Anyway back to the podcast. This conversation is with Olivia Berggren who had a similar experience to

Damian Fearns: Let emotions be your guide."In modern society most of us don’t want to be in touch with ourselves; we want to be in touch with other things like religion, sports, politics, a book - we want to forget ourselves. Anytime we have leisure, we want to invite something else to enter us, opening ourselves to the television and telling the television to come and colonize us."Thats a quote from Thich Nhat Hanh that resonated with me looking back through old notes and it relates to this weeks podcast. Many of us are missing something at the moment in all the"good work" people are saying they are doing to make themselves better versions of themselves.That thing is connection with our emotions. There is as I see it a prevalent negative culture pervading social media and other areas that encourages individuals to lock into a cycle of emotional navel gazing. A continuous process of just looking and talking about emotions preventing them from what they are wanting to do, express themselves

Episode 4 in the Movement and Search for Meaning series with running coach Ollie McCarthy. We titled this the Taboo of Talking as we talk about suicide, Ollie's experience of coming to terms with his girlfriends attempted suicide and how he found weightlifting and running his avenues for processing this event. Incredibly poignant for Chris and I, as we have our own experience in 2019 of my gladly failed attempt at suicide. Being able to talk to Ollie about his experience, listen to him and share experiences without the charged emotion of me or him being in each others experiences I found very helpful in developing an empathy with my life partner Lucie and also with Chris. We don't talk enough, yet we talk too much in this modern world. And I believe that the space to talk, listen and be heard is one of the most powerful and transformative practices for our mental, physical and spiritual health. Thanks Ollie. If this is a conversation that resonates with you, or someone you know, it would be great to

Welcome to the weMove podcast. This is connected with our Movement and the search for meaning series aswell as being a follow on rom one of the very first conversations we had for the podcast with Naomi Absolom. When we first met Naomi back in 2017/18 we were all beginning to question what the labels and names of the practices we were doing and how we were living. How they supported us, how they confined us and what would in fact take us forward, healthier, happier, stronger. Naomi was questioning the confines of the world of Yoga. Because when we say yoga we have a view of it, created by the Gurus, distorted by the media to gain mass appeal and yet it leaves a void or even a restriction on entering or exiting. Taking this step Naomi moved through it to a place where she is now, free of labels which in itself makes a space that is indefinable and for many that can appear to be too wild, too scary. This period of lockdown however has blossomed the possibility of where Naomi was heading and been a co creation w

There is always a little bit of truth where theres a problem,Rae Dwyer is our second guest and it was the following instagram post that we read that made this the next step in the series. "Something that has left me in awe and rendered me speechless of late: The experience of  f e e l i n g  over thinking when it comes to the formation of core beliefs. I really want to do what I'm trying to say justice. Stay with me.It's that in-your-actual-bones knowing. Perhaps a thing you've realised that maybe part of you would like to unrealise for convenience but knows that it's impossible. A belief/perception/epiphany that is completely untethered from motives of the ego and societal conditioning, so therefore cannot be denied and will in fact often come about as a result of having peeled away those rotting layers of internalised capitalism, homophobia, patriarchy. A bubbling up that at first, gives rise to a deep discomfort and frightening confusion, but once integrated, preceeds something tha

Movement is freedom, its how we express ourselves and communicate with others and the world around us, but what do you do when someone close can suddenly no longer move? The thought of not being able to move is uncomfortable If we aren’t moving then we aren’t living. That is today’s conversation with Rachel Kay, choreographer, dancer, founder of Creation Box studio and Flight Mode Method, and the second conversation in the Movement and Search for Meaning series. Rachel is a successful artist and choreographer whose professional skills were called on in a way that couldn’t be imagined, her dad had a stroke, leaving him unable to move. Taking an honest look at what she could do and how she could connect with him, she turned away from her career as a commercial choreographer towards becoming her dad’s choreographer teaching him how to move again and reconnect. What do you know to be certain? More and more I realise that life is just too short.

Andrew Tracey, Mens Health UK Fitness Editor, founder of Farm Fitness and all round training machine sat down with Chris and I before we headed to the gym to indulge in some sweaty pushing and pulling back at the start of the year. We’ve orbited in similar circles as Andrew so it felt only a matter of time before we sat down and press record. If you watch him on instagram his means of fitness generally involve a lot of lifting, and commitment to putting in the time, regardless of where he is, what time it is and how busy his day was. Inspired by the original Gym Jones, the facility created by Mark Twight to put in the work, we share similar visions as to what the world of fitness can be. A place to learn about your Self if you are prepared to get into the shadows and dark corners of the psyche and inquire into the capacity and potentiality of our capacity and capability. I wasn’t expecting Andrew to be so gentle, and it was lovely to hear him talk about being inspired, inspiring and putting into the world his

I’m fascinated by the reasons we each have for moving. Why we move. And it felt the right time to open up the conversation with some of those that we know and who listen to the podcast about their experiences with movement and what it has brought to them. Personally past experiences with movement and observation of others journey I have noticed that we move in whatever form our bodies are innately drawn to and it is my personal belief that is because our body is wanting to express something more than our mind/ego can comprehend or the conventions of sport and competition allow. There comes a time in the experiences Chris and I have listened to when a specific event evolves the idea of movement and physicality from sport and striving towards navigating what we are, who we are and why. So I am saying that movement gives us meaning and a mechanism to process our past lived experiences to make sense of them and organise them in our body and mind to support us in the future. Where sport is about competition and th

Today we bring up the concept of the Shadow, the term coined by Carl Jung to describe the place where we store our psychological wounds, negative thought patterns and ancestral baggage which can weigh us down and prevent our true self emerging and ascending in the world.Chris and I have both been interested in this concept as we became curious as to how people including ourselves would find movement, sport, physical activity healing to our soul and psyche, and also a distraction when used and abused. Just the idea that there was something not quite right with me due to my past experiences sounded woo woo, and a little daft until I began to recognise patterns emerging in how I would deal with certain situations which seemingly reappeared throughout my daily life. The ones where someone says or doesn’t say something to you and it triggers a cascade of thoughts and emotions that come from seemingly nowhere.That nowhere is the shadow, the side of yourself which you don’t see but is very much there and influencing

Hey there and welcome to the weMove podcast coming live from my living room and the wonders of Zoom whilst we are in this time of isolation.So the last week or so, we have been surrounded by news, news and more news on Covid 19/Coronavirus. I wanted to know more about what we can personally do to regain some control of our Selves whilst the news and media does its best to create increasing levels of fear, panic and hysteria.So I made a few phone calls and extended whatsapp messages to the sources that I trust when I have questions health related, both physical and mental and in this case particularly with regards to how we can optimise our immune system and provide it with the resources to do what it needs to do.Having knowledge that I trust from those who are at the tip of the spear in their fields gives me the opportunity to makes necessary steps forward, I trust you get something from this conversation that can be actionable and timely to support you through this defining era of the new decade.From Chris a

Glen Burrows, co-founder of ethicalbutcher.co.uk talks regenerative and grass-fed farming and how the industrial food industry has removed the nutrients of the food we eat for their own gain. We as a society can inspire farmers to rediscover the farming methods which restore the earth we live on and sustain healthy, nutrient-dense, and complete animals and plants.Glen first wrote for weMove.world in Issue 1 with his essay “Watch what you eat” and how the labels we define ourselves by can create a straight jacket for our own growth and health in all senses. Three years on we catch up with Glen as he prepares to launch his new venture Ethical Butcher, an online butcher dedicated to providing meat that is better for our health and the planet, inspiring a return to natural farming techniques, an honoring of the animals themselves rather than a cheap mass-produced mechanised machine.We cover some ground and link into the wider world of farming, regenerative techniques, soil health, functional medicine, Zach Bush M

This week James speaks to Ryan Willms who James first met back in 2008 in their previous careers in mens fashion. Having not kept in touch since then, it was a post written by Ryan in 2019 sharing his new direction and perspective for what was important - purpose and health that created an opportunity for reconnection. Ryan’s journey to date will resonate with many of you. Developing a successful career, working relentlessly and overlooking the vehicle that created the success, his body and mind. From creating a successful publishing/media company titled Inventory, Ryan moved from Vancouver to New York, the logical step for career success. My experience of New York is one of hyperdrive, the pace is relentless and combined with with ever quickening world of fashion losing sight or even abandoning our health and sanity easily happens. Ryan got to the end of his road on a photoshoot in Alaska, and it was a serendipitous meeting of one of the team that gave Ryan the opportunity to begin to assess his situation an