#208 Breathwork is the key to happiness, the minimum morning routine, and learning to listen to your body's intelligence, with Tim van der Vliet.

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION

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Please note, while an effort is made to provide an accurate transcription, errors and omissions may be present. No part of this transcription can be referenced or reproduced without permission.

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Tim van der Vliet  0:00  
Stress doesn't make us happier. So less stress is more happiness. How do we get less stress by the ability to slow down our breathing. So the key to happiness to make it really simple the key to happiness in two words is Breathe slowly. And that's it.

Agi Keramidas  0:27  
You are listening to personal development mastery podcast where you will find both the inspiration to grow and the actions to implement towards your next level. I am your host Agi Keramidas and my mission is to inspire you to stand out and live your best life. I interview thought leaders, authors, entrepreneurs, spiritual teachers, exceptional people who will inspire you to improve your life and offer, through their wisdom, actions you can take and implement. Tune in for two new episodes each week and make sure you follow the podcast to get the episodes as soon as they are released.

In today's show I am delighted to speak with Tim van der Vliet. Tim you are a breathing specialist, a Wim Hof Method instructor, a YouTuber also and the father of five children. Your 15 plus years of experience self exploration and training have led you to create a set of techniques based around six pillars which allow someone to control the life both mentally and physically. You are passionate about helping people live a life with more energy, amazing health focus and getting as much out of life as possible. Tim, welcome to the show. It's such a pleasure to have you here with me.

Tim van der Vliet  3:30  
Thank you it's a pleasure to be here.

Agi Keramidas  3:34  
I am as I was telling you earlier I am a Wim Hof Method enthusiast myself so I'm very much looking forward to the conversation and discussing some of the elements of that along with other things so we'll start with a little bit of background so we can get to understand where you're coming from so can you take us back to the time before all this started before the the breath work and your this changes as a scribe so we can understand a little bit of where you're coming from.

Tim van der Vliet  4:13  
So I think where to start because I'm not gonna start when I was born you know not knowing we're not getting there i i was a stock markets trader you know, the the guys with if you're if you're old enough, you understand this, guys with colour jackets screaming quotes into trading pits. An option trader in Royal Dutch Shell, one of the biggest stocks in the world, and I was that was my job. And then at a certain moment I became I became cocky. I became kind of arrogant because I was one of the biggest traders of the darts market and the document market is the second biggest market after Chicago, you know, so I was becoming cocky, like feeling very good about myself and, and then at the same time, I was becoming fearful of losing my money. And in six months time I make the story short, in six months time I lost my whole capital. And that's sort of like, like, hitting rock bottom, you can say, you know, financially, that set off my path in personal development. Because the funny thing was that I remember vividly, that in the week after I lost everything, I was standing in front of my house, and I felt relieved. And I noticed in hindsight, that we're losing all that money that I had was 600,000 euros and like, 500,000 British pounds in six months time, you know, without spending anything, you know, losing it in the market. But I was like, I felt better than ever, because with the losing my money, I also lost the fear of losing my money, you know what I mean? And that's sort of a path where I stayed in the financial markets, but I started doing yoga and self exploration, and at a certain moment, the last two years working, working for a Swiss algo Trading Company. The last two years, I, I didn't need sleep, I had so much energy. So I three kids back then worked five days a week, I was partying one or two days a week with my friends, you know, like, like we all do. And, and then I didn't need a lot of sleep. I was sleeping like three, four hours a night with so much energy. And I was reading every self help book, watching YouTube videos, you know that I call it my open up phase. And after two years, I was kind of ready, I have my my philosophy straight. I especially call it philosophy, because well, because what happened then is I wrote I had written down my thoughts in those two years. And when I stopped my job, I published a book. Within six weeks, there was this book, and I self published it. And a year later Hay House, a UK publisher came into the picture and said, like, we want to publish your book. And this is where my teaching career set off. Basically, I said to the publisher, like okay, thanks for publishing, see you later. And he said, like, well, this book is just the beginning. Now you have to teach and I was like teaching really. So I became funny enough from stock market guy to a spiritual teacher, meditation teacher. And into you know, the mind body spirit festival and these Hay House events and internet spirits of worlds. It sounds like it wasn't a criminal criminal worlds, you know, I will say the spiritual world. And then, around six years ago, seven years ago, I met Wim and we became friends and I started practising debriefing breath hold techniques. And called training and it was doing daily exercise already. And this is where

Agi Keramidas  8:26  
everyone should have to interrupt him, did you did you meet him through an event he was doing was his I was wanted into how you got, you know, initiated into the Wim Hof?

Tim van der Vliet  8:39  
Well, the first time I met him was at one of his fundamental workshops in Amsterdam, but and when we talked a bit, but we didn't became friends. We didn't become friends. But then we were both having a talk in Brighton at the Veg Fest. So this was once before Wim was famous. And we had a full day to get her and this is where we talked for six hours and, and basically we became brothers there, you know, like we're on the same path. We do it a little bit differently. But as you already mentioned, I'm a Wim Hof Method instructor and I'm very proud to be one because it's an amazing technique and women is, is is a big teacher. Let me get this straight. He is a friend, he is not my guru. I don't just buy everything he says. But he is really one of my big inspirations because mainly because of his his strong mindset and his clear goal, you know, he really knows where he wants to go to. And that's a big inspiration and inspired me to do the same. You know, like I have a clear goal in life and I don't get off path very easily because I know very good what I want. So that's about six years ago, 556 years ago, where we've been became friends. And then he asked me like, don't you want to become an instructor into Wim Hof methods? And my first reaction was hell, no, they're not the eyes, I'm Poland and in getting into the cold, and then I was very aware of that, that I was actually very afraid of that bar. Then I thought like, Oh, yes, this is what I want to do. And then after the so I became an instructor. And after that, I made a clear decision that I want to travel the world teaching this method. And that's what I'm doing now. You know, apart from that, I teach a lot of corporates, which is essential, most breathwork instructors are in the yoga and spiritual space. I'm in the corporate space, because I can make it very simple. So that's something that I do, also. And I do, I, I have my own breathing technique, which is extremely simple. And I'm also teaching breathwork instructors, a my own breathing technique. So those are like the three things that I do in daily life. And apart from that, I'm a, I'm a father of five, you know, and being a father is very important for me. I'm there, I'm around, you know.

Agi Keramidas  11:24  
Thank you that can, I'm going to ask you about more specifics about your technique in a moment, there were a couple of things based that came up to me while you were sharing this story. And one was, how you have been in, in my sense, the way that you were describing it, it sounds like you were called to teach. So first, it was your teaching after you wrote the book, and then we must do to teach the method. So it is something that it looked like your path was there, and you just needed to follow it despite maybe some resistance that I suppose it's a human thing to have the voice that doesn't like things. So that was one thing that came to mind. And there was one other thing you said about the corporate world that you did some breath work, rather than more on the spiritual settings like yoga and meditation. And I think that's very important, because I believe that people who are, you know, doing yoga meditation and are already in asserts may be for something beyond what's, you know, the physical or what we have here. On the other hand, people in corporate maybe are more detached from its shuffle by you teaching them breathing, hopefully, or maybe they can initiate a process of them going to the spiritual question, realising more about it. So it was just some thoughts that came up. I don't know if you want to add anything to that.

Tim van der Vliet  13:11  
No, you're absolutely right. Although what I see in the, in the yoga world, people are still searching. And I kind of think in paradoxes, you know, like, I stopped thirds, searching, and started finding. And that's because I never thought about it that I was called to be a teacher. But now you mentioned it like that. I'm like, Huh? Yeah, that's funny. You're right. And, you know, people are out for searching and thinking, thinking too much, basically. And if you just relax into the process, and instead of searching become a finder, you you know, what you want and things piles by you're like, that's my goal. Yes, thank you. And also what I've seen in the years that I've been teaching, which is now 10 years, that people kind of don't know what to do with it, you know, we go from one guru to the other in the spiritual world, or one teacher to the other, or you're a biohacker. And it's a certain moment you have to our morning routine, and you have to do this, this, this, this and this, and I cut it down to very simple, very little, and that is what works it also works for say a call that's a more spiritual oriented people that are already on a certain path of becoming, getting more you know, living their purpose or or getting more out of life. But in the corporate world, and that's, that's what I find is very important that breathwork instructors are teaching there because if you want to create a great effect, you can change, I don't know, say, company, a management team of, of a big company, like, let's call one of the uglier companies, you know, like the, that are only focused on money, like some pharmaceutical or an oil company, you know, they don't care about the environment. And you can, systems are difficult to change, but systems called sis of people. And if the people went in a system, especially the higher sea level or management level, can be changed into a more intuitive form, not losing the rational mind, you know, it's a combination of that intuition, that intuitive brain and a rational brain together, that may actually create a ripple effect that that is, well, I'm not worried about the planet, you know, save the planet is, is an illusion, it's about saving humanity, you know, the planet will survive, don't worry, but then we create a more sustainable world that we can pass on to, you know, seven generations or 100 generations, after us. So to make it very simple, I'm very practical is what I'm doing. And honestly, also what I need myself because I'm so super busy, as you can imagine, and I've this is, you know, one of the sessions that I have, and I have another two sessions today. And then as it gets a lot of work to do in planning of all my trips, you know, I don't have time for one hour of morning routine in the morning, or I don't make time and I choose to do so. But by doing a little bit, that's actually enough. And that creates a calm mind that instead of you no beating yourself up, I didn't do enough. I did enough. I'm okay.

Agi Keramidas  16:58  
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That's wonderful. Thank you for bringing the conversation there. Because I can relate to what you said I'm not a biohacker. But my morning routine is long, the full the full version of it anyway. And there are times when I have the privilege to have time to dedicate one hour. But that's not what I would always like, like to do some very much I can resonate with what you're saying about having something that is takes much less time and effectively produces the same result. Or even better, because you can have an one hour routine and maybe not doing the things that will produce the maximum benefit. So you in a way you're deluding yourself that you're doing something amazing, whereas you might be wasting time I'm speaking generally of course. So I wanted to ask you about this morning routine or the morning ritual that you talk about. And can you tell me in a brief then that you have three pillars, three simple things that you say you do every morning and you teach others to do? Can you go through them with me so we can get an overview first and then we can dive deeper into

Tim van der Vliet  19:47  
some of them? So first, first, you know, where does this come from? I call this a dentist model. So we we brush our teeth every day. And we go to the dentist. Once a year, we clean up everything and we have a checkup and everything. Now, then, going through the why do we have clean teeth, of course because of both. But minimum morning routine is like brushing your teeth every day for a minute. This is the 80%. And 80% of your of having clean teeth is from brushing your teeth every day. And then once a year you have that checkup and clean up everything that's the other 20% you could say. So what I've seen a lot is people are searching for something. A lot of people don't know what they're searching for. But, but they're searching. And becoming a finder is basically starting doing something yourself every day. And this is what I call the minimum morning routine. And of course, this consists of three pillars, as you said it's exercise, breath work, and cold trading. Exercise two minutes can be longer, but two minutes is enough. Breathing five minutes can be longer, but five minutes is enough and ending your shower cold say for 30 seconds or a minute. That doesn't cost you any time. So in my philosophy, I have a minimum morning routine, which is that seven minutes that includes exercise and breath work. And Nicolle trading doesn't cost any time. And I have a maximum morning routine, which is as big as you want. It can be three hours, you know, it is I have one day a week where I practice for two, three hours including an hour of meditation and all that stuff, you know, like standing on my hands, trampoline jumping, running. The five Tibetan rites, you know, like yoga 45 minutes of breath work just, it's really big. It's so big, that's irrationally big. And the funny thing is, you never have to get there. You move but your minimum morning routine is what you let's call it what you have to do. And a maximum morning routine is optional, and you flow somewhere every day between the minimum and maximum morning routine. The good thing of keeping it this minimal, is for example, yesterday, I was in the plane from Argentina back to Amsterdam. And I downloaded all these videos on on Netflix, you know a series that I'm watching about time travel of course. And there were some good see resume, but we're also flying through in the day, you know, so I slept half an hour. And I come back and there's a bunch of kids, there's the full time job that I'm having here. I had to give a session you know, two and a half hour session group coaching for for my crowds. So there's simply no space to to have a jet like I don't do jet legs. Very simple. It's just a mindset thing. And I'm okay with even with a half an hour of sleep and that's, you know, like my energy level now from being okay is compared to say seven years ago when I wasn't spiritual teacher, it's five times bigger. So even if I'm at 3040 or 50% Today, it's still way more than 100% say seven years ago and that is because of that minimum morning routine because if you do two minutes of exercise on five minutes of breathing and I'm walking here in the streets of Amsterdam and I'm feeling a bit off because I slept only half an hour which is no more than normal instead of going into a story in my head like oh it's because I didn't sleep is because I've had jet like you know like we we were making ourselves crazy with a rational brain we cannot live without it and we're living with it is a challenge as well. But because I did my two minutes on my five minutes

instead of going into Oh, I'm screwed up today because whatever story I'm going like I'm getting into that thought of our I didn't sleep away and Mr. Exercise I did my breathing. I took my shower cold. I'm okay. So this is a mental thing you but if any limiting thoughts or call it a negative thought and sweat, but I did my exercise briefing and goal training, so I'm okay. It's not a negative thought anymore. And that is the power of doing a little every day.

Agi Keramidas  24:59  
Thank you and then If this is amazing, and it makes me think two things, one is even the small, small induration practice one is practised daily, it accumulates the effects. So that's one thing that, like, you know, you pick up momentum and it it compounds. The other one is it's very impressive as the way understood, especially with this particular example, that you said that you had half an hour of sleep, and then you did this short routine, and then your mindset was different. So I think it was more then the knowing in yourself that you did what you needed to do. And therefore you had this satisfaction or internal content contentment about I have done what I needed to do. And then it's easy to change your your state because of that, the mindset thing and the fact that you've done it, rather than it was the actual two minutes of exercise that you did that produce that effect. So I hope what I'm trying to say, gets clear that that's how I understand it, that these practices, in the end affect the way that you think and perceive and look at it yourself.

Tim van der Vliet  26:28  
Yes, you're exactly right. Because, you know, in two minutes time, you don't burn a lot of calories, say say somebody wants to lose weight. But what does happen is that you get energy, it's all about energy in the end. And beyond that there's nothing but space or love, if you want, you know, if we want to make it fluffy, you know, but it's all about energy. So by doing two minutes of exercise and five minutes of reading you, your body remembers you wake up, you do this before breakfast, you wake up and you move your body, it remembers that it's made to move and not to sit behind a screen the whole day, and eat candy. So through today, you will have more energy. And this is where you change your path bit by bit simply because you'll have more energy, you order less of a lunch, you know you eat less. And this is like you profoundly changed from the inside instead of the personal trainer trainer two days a week, I'm not against that, don't get me wrong, but you should do both minimum morning routine and then do does bigger things as well. And you will notice that because you have more energy does bigger things become easier. And if you do breath work in the morning, just five minutes, you're more aware of your breath the whole day. And that's another thing that that really makes my life better because my nature is impatient, easily bored. And I can get irritated. You know, like if something doesn't go fast enough, basically, that's my nature. So how do I manage that with my breath, and I do a lot of breath work when I'm in a public space. So say we meet for a coffee in London, I'm guessing you're in London, by the way, but we meet we meet for a coffee and you're 15 minutes late, which is normal, you know commuting in London, you will I will not get get bored or impatient or irritated because that means that's 50 minutes of breathwork exercises waiting for you. And that is really, I really want to scream this off the top of the roofs, you know, that is if you start practising, even during a zoom session with all your colleagues sea level, you know, highly important, you can be aware of your breath and do little things that make you less reactive, more focused. More, you know, intuitive without losing your rationality, you know, like be more of of a high quality human 2.0 basically. I've seen in in the crowd that I'm in for the last 10 years that people are over searching and if you start practising, it all falls into place. Like when I was teaching meditation and spirituality. You know, I still have the same philosophy but I was very eager to teach to give information. And now I'm way more relaxed and I give maybe I give what people need instead of what I think they need, you know, because I've learned to take a step back and that's that's part of it. is what it all comes down to doing a little every day killing death moments in life with some form of breath work. And even if I do five minutes in the morning, I'm also teaching a lot, of course, but I'm doing, I'm guessing between one to three hours of breath work every day. But it doesn't cost me any time. Because I'm killing these dead moments in life, you know, if you feel where, where this is going through this, that we become less patient less irritated, and less bored, while actually working on your call at personal growth, or your health, or your weights or whatever you need from life, it becomes more effortless, and it all starts with a minimum morning routine, where you gain the mindset from, I did enough instead of it is never enough.

Agi Keramidas  30:56  
I will ask you about the breathing? Can you tell me if just a quick comment, because I'm very curious, in two minutes. What kind of exercise can you possibly do that can have an impact? Because two minutes you want? Is there something specific that? Is it something that is intense in two minutes? Or is it No,

Tim van der Vliet  31:17  
no, it's very light, actually, it's, it's called two exercises, but the one I start with is called the arm twist. And, of course I can show you but most people are listening, it's basically where you put your feet straight on the ground. Bare feet, if you can, your feet like completely straight hip width, and you start twisting your arms. Well, maybe I will show you anyway. So it's really just standing like this. And then looking backwards and just twisting your arms, okay. And I can share a video also afterwards or for two minutes. And this is lubricating your spine, sending more blood to your spine, you know, like training your deepest, deepest core, which is your spine. And we have a lot of problems, especially if we get older, lower back pain, neck pain, you know, name it, am I doing this exercise every morning for two minutes, you sent blood through your spine, lubricate the discs, it all becomes more flexible. And after that I do five minutes of the 85, which is my own technique. One round takes one minute, five rounds, five minutes. And that's enough to trigger a two, I would like to say to trigger nursing people because it's so simple, and it works so so it's so effective. That if you do this for a month, you seriously when in the seven minutes you you gain more energy or maybe lower back pain of that you're ready walking around for 20 years, the width is getting a little bit less, or maybe he's going all the way and from there. So you start to feel with this minimum morning routine. And you see the benefits instead of me telling you, oh, this is good for this and that and that and that and do it is one hour of every day. And it will be good. Because what I see most of the time, and it's really more than 80% is people do it for three weeks along routine. And then you throw it over the fence and I feel bad because they go for. And this is so simple that it's really hard to give up.

Agi Keramidas  33:43  
And I find that and also Bible speak personally that every time I have tried to implement a new habit whether it is part of my morning routine or the evening routine, or whatever it is, it's not necessarily easy to integrate that routine into what I'm already doing. So I have found that the simpler it is, the more likely I am to start doing it. Or if I can combine it for example with something else or like what you were saying earlier, breath breath work while you're waiting for your friend to come for coffee. I find that when I do them like that it's much more likely to do them over a period of time because after a while after I've done them then I don't have to think about it they become habits and I hone and do them anyway. But it's I think that initial period when you're trying to put something new something beneficial into your day to your structured that it's a very let's say delegate the gentle period that if you don't do it in a way that is forgiving also or seamless then And I've done that many times myself. That's why I can share that so easily because I have tried complex things which looked amazing. But it was too much complexity to add on top of everything else that I'm doing. So I like very much this approach of the simple and with less time. And of course, if you have more time, go ahead and do three, what

Tim van der Vliet  35:23  
happens? Yeah, what happens often is after those seven minutes, somebody is like, you know what, I take the train half an hour later, texting my colleagues, sorry, I missed the train. And I do another half an hour of breath work. But the funny thing is what happens then it's not because you have to do it, but because you want to do. And this is where the real changes. You know, you start doing what you want, what you've done is good enough, you stop beating yourself up, you have like a relaxer mindset. And then if you want to do more, you do it. Because it's, it's because you want to do it. And not because you won't, because you have to do it. And where, where where I can we go a bit into philosophy, which should, and I have been feeling this for over 10 years. But I was very shy in sharing this. But I believe that we're in a paradigm change into a new form of species like from Homo sapiens to Homer luminous. You could call it the enlightened person. I call it I make it very simple from a human 1.0 h one o two, human 2.0 H two O. And in this paradigm change, we we you know, there's I call it little Tim and victim. Little Tim worries, little Tim. US are why is this happening to me? Let him once you compete, you know, and I, you know, let him it's okay to be there. I acknowledged little team, because a little team is also saying like, you better start preparing now. Because you have a meeting with IV in five minutes, you know, better. Make sure you set up everything, you know, it's, it's very okay for a little theme to be there. But I want the victim h2 Oh, my ah, oh, my human 2.0 I want more of that, because that is what is helping me further and with that helping the world's further or humanity further. So very simply said a human 1.0 asks, Why is this happening to me? Why a human 2.0 ask, why not? Or a human 1.0 is a victim of life and a human to print series using everything that happens in life as a learning moment. A human 1.0 needs a guru, a human 2.0 It's its own Guru, you know, that is inspired not only by big names, but also by, for example, your child that is sleeping in your bath and has a cough all night and you can't sleep. You know, that's when you get to that more of the you bring zero outs. You got to learn from everything that happens in your life. And we got to, I believe, I don't know if it will be 50 or 100 or 500 years from now, maybe 10 years from now that there will be a new species of humanity. And this is a evolutionary jump. The third big one. The first one was when single cell organisms became multi celled organisms. This was a huge leap forward in our evolution. The second was when water life went from water to Earth another big leap forwards and this is the third and what belongs to basically become a bit of a nerd you know, like I'm called the breathwork specialist but I call myself a breathwork nerves because I'm I'm very aware that I know nothing and I'm just keep on learning.

But in this paradigm change, you know, we're often put away as that guy is crazy or aware. No, you know, this is what I do. Also with my online teachings, I create a community of people getting together because we can talk about breath work. The main thing is breath work. You know, exercise is essential to send blood through the spine. breath work is the main pillar, I would say and cold training and so simple as just ending your shower cold. It doesn't have to be cold. Only you have to don't have to lie in an ice bath every day is just ending your shower cold. If you need more energy, you do the three minute ending your shower cold. If you feel like today, I don't want to do anything you do 30 seconds. And a strong thing is that, you know, we all flow up, we all have ups and downs in our lives. Where is the growth is it's where we are up and everything is perfect relationship is good, money is good, you know, like, health is good, energy is good. Or do we grow where we are in a dip and we feel like giving up everything, but we still do that seven minute morning routine. That is where we grow.

Agi Keramidas  40:43  
Absolutely, it's when we there is discomfort and we go past the discomfort that we grow. When everything is comfortable, there is no growth whatsoever. And so as you said about finishing the shower cold because I have my own experience with that it is really the most important thing that happens is a trigger in my mind, especially on the days that I felt very comfortable with the the hot water, the warm water. And you know those moments that you don't want to get out of the shower. It's so calming and relaxing. And my mind starts putting these objections to turn in, it's too cold. And it is that moment when I command, I take command over my mind over that little voice or that human 1.0 that he was saying earlier, when I say no, this I will do. It doesn't matter if I don't like it even more the reason. And of course, when I say I don't like it, it only refers to that thought that I'm going to switch to code once I switch it and the cold water hits me then I like it very much I like very much how I feel afterwards to be precise. So I find it very important as a tool to train your mind to do something that is not comfortable. Because that really pushes you out of that comfort zone and out of that wanting to have everything as you expect them to be. And then obviously when something else during the day requires a similar behaviour from your surface easier to take it's because you have you trained your mind to just do whatever needs to be done or whatever you have decided to do despite of the discomfort or the fearful voice or however you want to call it. So that's my own personal experience with the cold shower. And actually I wanted to ask you something for someone who's listening and probably maybe has not done anything like that or the idea of cold shower is you know a little bit scary. You You say specifically to end with cold so that means you do your shower, normally as you would and then at the end. Can you tell me just how you describe how you teach?

Tim van der Vliet  43:21  
Well, I see a lot of in in the cold training community that people are pushing it and this is another another paradox but you actually become stronger by light training than by pushing it. So when when I am when I fall off day and I'm showering hot and then i i don't i still have resistance I've taken over 500 highs above probably 750 I serve resistance. Okay, that is okay, first of all, that is normal. And even with the gold charm today not and then I put it even hotter, uncomfortably hot. And then I turn it to cold all the way and I slow down my breathing. And if somebody has a problem with that, or it's your first time and you're really your hearing is now you think like I cannot do that that's your mind screaming to you. Then try this shower hot. Who did even hotter get out of the shower turn into cold completely. You take a deep breath in. You hold for one or two seconds while holding for two seconds you get honoured that cold shower with your face and your chest. The moment that hits your body you breathe out long

then you breathe in again. While holding you turn around next problematic part you know your upper neck and your back and the moment it hits your back, you're breathing out long. I've called this four to eight breathing, but it simply breathe in as slowly as you can. And as deep as you can you hold for two seconds, and you breathe out as long as you can, and calming down, or coping with stressful situations like the cold shower, but can be applicable to any form of stress in your life. If you slow down your breath out, you get to be more calm, more focused. You can cope with stress, you stay saying you make the better decisions, whether you are a yogi, or a C level of a big company. It's all about making better decisions. How do you do that are making your breath out longer. And if you have done your cold shower, in the morning, you had your moment of stress, apart from all the physical and hormone benefits and all that stuff, you had your moment of stress, and you're able to cope with stress better. Because what I've seen a lot, and honestly, especially in that spiritual world, is that people walk away from the things they fare. And this is the power of a whim calls it the power of light hormetic stress inducing out of your comfort zone stress on yourself every day by exercise free think cool training my three pillars, what should I do this, you put light hormetic stress on your body. And this is where we grow. And if you activate the fight or flight because if you go for a run, you activate the fight or flight. If you descend on that cold shower, you activate the fight or flight if you do take the breath, deep and faster breath you activate your fight or fight or flight. But you do this voluntarily. And by lightly activating that fight or flight or sympathetic nervous system, you get to be more calmer through the rest of the day. And most people that are searching, instead of finding searching, they are walking away from the things that's triggered our stress, well, if you would phase them, and you'll slow down your breathing, you would be able to cope with it. And this makes you more of a human simply said more of a human 2.0.

Agi Keramidas  47:33  
I like very much. So you've mentioned it a few times during the conversation, that differentiation between searching and finding. And I think there is a there is a subtle verse but also at the same time a very important difference between to me. I, I think that you can search for all your life, but you have to somehow change the way you think about the searching and start. I'm trying to express it the way that the way I understand it. But I like very much how you said going from searching to finding. And I think finding is also a part of searching but you have to allow the founding to happen and not keeping on searching. So it's just an observation. You said it a few times in it. I wrote it down and circled it. I think it's very important for someone to realise the difference.

Tim van der Vliet  48:36  
It's actually a great book. It's called the finders. And I'm really not you know, I read all the self help books, what is it like I don't know, like 15 years ago or something. That's the typical searching behaviour, keep on reading more self help books at a certain moment. You need to implement it in your life. But my brother is an amazing guy. He told me if he gives me a book, I read it. It's good because I'm not reading a lot of those books anymore. I'm more into practising and teaching at this moment. I rather speak to people and get inspired you know like that. And but my brother if he gives me a book, I read it and it's called the finders and well probably if you Google it, it's a very good book. It's I would say that's that's my one of my top five books now. Because what happens when we're searching, we're so busy with searching and new things are that and you know, we get stressed that we don't see what is actually in front of us and just passing by which may be the biggest April opportunity of your lab. So if you don't relax into the process, you're not you don't have your eyes wide open. You're focused on searching, searching. Well, if you would just relax you will see that it's passing by your own hand to say like, yes, yes, I like that, because somebody is offering you something. And this is something that, that I keep on learning I'm in, like, like I was in Brazil and in Argentina last four weeks, and especially in Brazil, my, my coworkers are Brazilian. Everything is last moment. And my Western European mind wants to plan things. And it's so last moment that I really learned to let go, like, we had the last workshop. We had one subscriber, and I am then in like, wow, we should cancel it. You know? Am I my colleague is me Sharma. He's is really telling him trust the process. I'm like, okay, yes, why not? You know, even if there's one person sitting there, sitting there, who cares. And, like, last moment, there is another 11 that subscribe to the, to the course. You know, so I have, it's not a big crowd, but you know, enough for for crowds. And I've really learned that by working together with Brazilian people, and Brazilian people are just so amazing. So open. So without attitude, you know, I love this country, I love the people. And I learned to really, you know, not not only think I trust the process and keep on repeating it, like trust the process, you know, like, I'm getting stressed about it, because I'm actually not living what I'm what I'm trying to be actually really letting go and trusting the process. And, and that's what I've learned in this last four weeks that it's like I can, it sounds a bit vague, maybe in a bit woowoo. But like, I can really trust the process. And like, there, there is some form of energy that is guiding me and that wants me to do what I want I'm doing the only thing I should do is stop out for thinking and get into my relaxed mode and start finding instead of keep on searching.

Agi Keramidas  52:10  
You said trust the process. And you were saying earlier about the inner guru that we have rather than needing some outside guru to tell us what is the path? And I think that it doesn't matter if so if someone calls it might call it war. I personally don't see these things when you have experienced them. They're real. The you really can tell that when you I mean, wouldn't you have this inner intelligence, this intuition that comes and gives you something and you implement it? And you see that? Wow, it has happened against what my mind was was telling me, then it smart smarts easier to keep on going into that inner wisdom. And utilising it. It's not of course, it's not easy. It's not. It's not easy. Always. Sometimes it is sometimes it's not. But it is something that I do remember if you mentioned it in those list of characteristics between the 1.0 and 2.0 version, but I think it's also the ability to really trust your inner guidance. Because,

Tim van der Vliet  53:33  
because, because we we cannot always, you know, a control freak wants to manipulate the world around them. And, you know, like, we didn't predict, for example, the coffee at times, you know, or like you want to manipulate how a ice bath is feeling. Good luck. You can't, but you can manipulate if you want. It's an intense work, but you can manipulate your reaction to external events. And with that, even in intense situations can be stress on work can be an eyes above can be a running practice. Thank you. Relax in the process, control your breath, slow down your breathing. And be okay with that stress. And this is where the growth is because what you do underwater is you activate your inner peace or your meditative state, you know, I should know I've been a meditation teacher, I threw it over the fence and become a breathwork instructor because I can get a group of people within a minute into a deep meditative state, whether they're sea level in companies or it doesn't matter where they're from, just by extremely slowing down their breath. You know, the the veteran Some unknown factors all together, nobody's judging each other, there's no polarised polarisation. Everybody is just slowing down their breath and noticing, oh my god, I, you know, people go into deep meditative state within one or two minutes time. So I get to simplify things for myself as well basically. I think I'm not sure like, what what you've planned, but in a very simple philosophy is, stress doesn't make us happier, right? Unless it's self induced hormetic stress, you know, but stress doesn't make us happier. So less stress is more happiness. How do we get less stress by the ability to slow down our breathing. So the key to happiness, to make it really simple, the key to happiness, in two words, is Breathe slowly. And that's it. And if you want, we can slow down our breathing for a minute, and we count the number of times that we're breathing, then we do five rounds of TT five. And then we measure it afterwards again, because you know, especially for the people who are listening, you want to test things for yourself. Instead of trusting who I am, or what I say, or whatever you said, beautiful stuff and breathwork specialists, and it may be easy to Oh, yeah, I'm gonna follow that guy. Now you want to test for yourself? And how do we do that by satisfying the rational mind. So we measured before the five minutes of breathing, and afterwards, how often we breathe, and you can see for yourself and measure for yourself, if this stuff is working or not, maybe, maybe I'm a charlatan, let's, let's say I'm a charlatan, that you want to test if this stuff is working for yourself or not. So become becoming your own guru, instead of you know, having a new one, basically.

Agi Keramidas  57:04  
I like what you said about the need to satisfy the rational mind. So it's so it's very important. And I will repeat that too. But I what I will repeat once more because I I will highlight it actually what you just said right now that the key to happiness is to breathe more slowly. That's so it sounds so simple as a phrase, but yet is very profound. And someone who has practised some breathing techniques can can see how that happens. So I just want to highlight it and say that once again, the breathing more slowly. And it's even even thinking about it. Now I'm smiling because I also another thing when you become aware of your breathing and slow it down, it tends to bring you back to the present moment, when you concentrate on your breathing no matter what else is happening. It's it's a pathway going inward. So I really appreciate your approach very much the way you describe this concepts and hoping that that you useful to the listener not in the way of you know information, because that's not what I am doing the podcaster the all the information is out there, you can go and look it up. It's just getting something that you can use and implement and act on. And Tim, you have given us so many things today. So it's Thank you, thank you very was nice and simple to implement, and yet very wise and profound, which is I think that's the the beauty of it, its simplicity.

Tim van der Vliet  58:56  
So thank you for listening to me.

Agi Keramidas  59:00  
I would like also to ask you some quickfire questions to start wrapping things up, which I always ask my guests and the first one is What does personal development mean to you?

Tim van der Vliet  59:15  
Personal Development is for me a process of getting more body intelligence. And body intelligence is the same as the intuitive mind. Yet with respect to the rational mind, so say for example, how do I find the truth is when I feel something works for me, and I've practice it and I can guide my rational mind around it by measuring by double clinical trial, things like that. So personal development is for me to learn to listen to my body and my intuitive mind using my rest mind getting the to align and setting out the path of what I want from life. And also, you know what, because this is a selfish process, you could say, and then the ultimate, this is not a paradox, the ultimate selfless, selfish act is to start helping others submit, maybe something to think about. But if you want to get everything out of life, at a certain moment, you are helping others or cleaning up planet Earth. That's always my universal agenda. Yet, you know, that's, you could say, the intuition, body intelligence, yet my rational mind more time or money is also present. And when they come together, when I get to help people with respect to my own agenda and time management and make enough money to, you know, to pay for our five children. This is where I shine most. This is like the ultimate goal for my personal development to shine more or to become more of a human to bring zero. And those two should be aligned, private and universal agenda. So universal, helping others and cleaning up the Earth, private agenda, having enough money and having enough time.

Agi Keramidas  1:01:29  
Thank you. Miss Johnson, also hypothetical question, if you could go back in time and meet your 18 year old self, what's one piece of advice you would give him?

Tim van der Vliet  1:01:40  
It's funny, when I was 18 years old, I was pretty depressed and suicidal. And the message that I would want to give is exactly how I got out of that. And that is, I call this a power of paradox. This is the most the highest form of thinking both in body intelligence as rational intelligence as there is, as I was very much in a depressed state, because of my lifestyle, you know, Amsterdam, young, smoking, joints and losing energy and getting depressed. I was thinking glass half empty. And the paradox is a paradox is a statement that is both true and untrue at the same time, right? Very simply, so the paradox is that whatever you think the opposite is also true. And I literally that got me out of that depression, in relatively fast was, wait a minute, it is as much effort to think glass half empty, I don't have enough friends, I don't have a girlfriend, I don't have I'm not good enough, basically, into glass half full. And that's a mind shift that got me out of that depression then. And that is, that is what I would want to tell myself just before I got that message. And, and apart from that, also, that you can really trust the process of life itself what life has for you, if you are able to relax into the process and, and think glass half full instead of glass half empty, or both at the same time, you know, but not only glass half empty. Is that same you really don't have to worry about about that path that is set out for you or that you will follow because it will give you the most amazing life that you ever imagined and even beyond your imagination. And that's what I'm what I'm still working on, you know, it's not that I'm ready. I'm just I'm like a child on the path. And I like I know nothing I'm willing to learn is like a friend of mine and author in the UK. He made this quote one's a letter to the universe. Okay, I've listened I mean, I love that

Agi Keramidas  1:04:15  
indeed, thank you. Tim. What is that tell us what is the best place for someone to to connect with you and find out more and if you want to share a few words also about the the online course that you have your new online course.

Tim van der Vliet  1:04:31  
Okay, thanks for that. So the you can find my website, Tim fender fleet.com, my phone number and my email or in the upper left corner, and you can send me a whatsapp you know, I'm very available. That's how I spend my time on my phone, not on social media, but talking to people. I find that very important. And then I have I'm doing like two things. I'm educating because I feel that there should be more like really knowledgeable and experienced breathwork instructors on educating breathwork instructors. It's not Wim Hof Method, just to be clear. And that level one is called control your breath, control your life. And this is basically where I step into front and I teach like 8080 90% of what I know, I do this together with another instructor that is also teaching my my techniques, TT techniques simplified to my breathing, and the rest exercise stuff, mindset. So that is, if you want to get over your stress, or be have a better performance or better focus, that's where to start with. And some people are triggered to change their life and become a breathwork instructor with a special focus on teaching the corporate world because this is where we need it. So very rational, yet, it's a very energetic process at the same time. But to start out, I would say control your breath, control your life, you can find it in the menu, and Iris also breathwork certification, if you really want to dive in deep, I would say and then you can find me if you Google my name on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, anywhere.

Agi Keramidas  1:06:18  
Thank you, Tim, even though you know, during our conversation, there have been many items that one could listeners can take and implement. But if I asked you now based on all the conversation we have, if you had to give to the listener one thing, one actionable item they can implement what would you tell him or her

Tim van der Vliet  1:06:42  
five minutes of breathing every morning before breakfast. And you can find on YouTube, TT five, or TT 10 That's perfect. Or a simplified to my breathing. Just go to my YouTube channel, you can find it. And if I can actually send you a video of the seven minute morning routine. It's an unlisted video if you want to share that with your people. And I also you know, I want to give credits to Wim because then years ago, I was a spiritual teacher and I thought I knew everything and I, you know, even knew better than other people. And now I've fully integrated this and this has been because I met Wim and I started instead of pranayama techniques doing deep breathing breath hold techniques. And, and Wim is an amazing example. I'm I think I mentioned this in the beginning of somebody that has a clear focus on what he wants for the world and for himself. And he is a true inspiration when it comes to that. So yes, and he is total body, you know, we can sometimes we play with the kids he lives 50 metres away from me, we just played into play, we don't talk about breathing or science you know, we have our 20 minutes about science and breathing that we just play with the kids you know, it's it's, it's a good friend I like it.

Agi Keramidas  1:08:16  
He's also a big inspiration for me for I didn't have this opportunity, but he's very inspiring and I have learned and implemented as well so much for him so I will also extend the respect and the gratitude that you started. Tim I want to thank you very much for my heart for this conversation it was I found it extremely useful and there were some parts I know that everyone can take different parts of it but I really enjoyed it. I think I could easily ask you for another three hours anymore questions. But thank you again very much for your time for sharing your wisdom and inspiring inspiring us today. Any last parting words?

Tim van der Vliet  1:09:08  
No well just for people if you want to get a hold of me you know send me a whatsapp I'm available for people you know like I cannot do like spend like hours on one person but I can definitely help out. So you can contact me whether over email or via WhatsApp. And you know we can talk about what what you need or what is the problem and how you can can become more of a homo luminous. A human to bring zero H two O essential for live

Agi Keramidas  1:09:54  
I hope you enjoyed listening and that you got a huge amount of value from today's episode. If you have, please share this episode with someone who you think will benefit from it. If you want to know more about what I do, visit my website, AGIKERAMIDAS.COM and until next time, stand out don't fit in!