Why Success Still Feels Heavy

SPEAKER_02 0:04

Dear listeners, here's something that most high achievers eventually discover like usually be hard way. You can do everything right. You can build a career, hit the goals, stay disciplined, and still wake up most mornings with a tension in your taste. You cannot quite explain. A fog that doesn't lift. A version of yourself that used to feel unstoppable that now feels just out of each. And the harder you push to get back there, the more resistance you feel. So today's guest figured out why. And the real answer is not more strategy or more mindset work, it's something deeper, wider, and altogether more transformative than that. So hey dear listeners, welcome back to another popular episode of Healthy Mind Hill Velife, where we talk about the real foundations of healing well, not just performing well. I'm your host, Abik, and I'm really glad that all of you are here today. And today's guest is a former Silicon Valley software engineer, turned somatic coach, and energy worker, the creator of the mind works method, and the founder of Top Human. So he works with the high achievers who have done all the mindset work and feel stuck, helping them move from the nervous system dysregulation back into the genuine internal power. So welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_01 2:00

Thank you so much for having me. Amazing, amazing.

SPEAKER_02 2:04

So Andre,

From Software Engineer To Somatic Work

SPEAKER_02 2:05

like I I I want to start with uh like the pivot the from from Silicon Valley software engineer to somatic coach and the energy worker. Um that's that's not a that's not a small shift. What happened that made that path not just interesting, but necessary?

SPEAKER_00 2:27

Yeah, it's a really good question. And to properly answer it, I want to go back to when I was younger, when I was in high school. And, you know, when you're in high school, at least here in the States, you're supposed to decide what you want to do for the rest of your life when you're not even 18 years old. And I remember back then choosing to be a software engineer. And I did not want to. So I had made a decision about what I was going to do with my life so that I could get a job, so that I could make money. But it wasn't something I felt good about. It wasn't something like I was good at it, you know, I was good at math and physics and stuff. So it logically made sense. However, that started a life for me, which was one that was not in alignment with who Andre actually was. And, you know, you you get into college, and I went to a great college and university, and then you go to the workforce and you enter society as an adult, and you're making money, and now you have friends and you have status and you have built this life. And you can't just throw it all away, you know. I mean, most people don't. And so you keep going and you keep building, and you you keep the flywheel moving because it's just what you've done and it's all you know, until there comes a point where something happens and you decide I've had enough of this. I want to actually do something that I enjoy, something I actually care about, something that's more in alignment with who I am. And I always knew in the back of my mind that software engineering was not the thing for me. And after I had several events that affected my health, my physical health, my mental health, I started having to figure out non-conventional ways to improve because going to therapy wasn't helping, going to doctors wasn't helping, a lot of the conventional wisdom wasn't working for me. And so as I started to solve that problem for myself, that's when I found my passion and a lot of technical ability as well, you know, that I was like, there's stuff here that I've had to learn and figure out and find answers for that were a challenge for me to find answers for. And I can help people with this. And this feels way more aligned than the software engineering path that I've built so far. So it's been many years in the making, but that shift really comes from finding something that's in alignment with who I am, with what I want to do, and with what serves people.

Why Mindset Tools Stop Working

SPEAKER_03 5:45

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 5:46

And you describe two paths on your website, like familiarity and transformation. And uh so what you are naming in in the familiarity path is something that so many people recognize the journaling, the frameworks, the motivational content, the uh waking up earlier, all all the all the right moves that somehow don't create lasting change. So what is the core misconception about stress and mindset work that keeps people uh circling the same block without uh breaking through?

SPEAKER_00 6:28

Yeah, that's a good question. I would think it comes down to it's not necessarily a misconception. You could say it's a misconception. I think it's a lack of education. And what I mean by that is people are taught how to manage their stress. They're taught you have stress, you have to do these things to push through regardless. You have to learn how to live with it, you know, stuff like that. It's you know, okay, you you get distracted or you know, you're so stressed you can't think straight. Okay. Yeah, do maybe do like some a walk or like do a temporary thing to temporar soothe and manage the stress. And then on top of that, let's add a productivity pack or framework or more to-do lists that help you organize so that you can kind of push through anyway without having to use your higher brain functionality to think more creatively. You just operate more. And the mindset of there's not much I can do about my stress, but I have to learn how to live with it and quote, manage it, is very different from learning why we biologically and physically carry stress in the first place, and how to actually dissolve and eliminate it at that root level is it's very different if you're talking about managing versus eliminating and dissolving and removing the stress, is a very different mindset and much more transformational than the familiar conventional paths of learning how to manage and push through it.

The Cost Of Living For Others

SPEAKER_02 8:30

And uh the people you work with, the high performers, business owners, people who have built real things and achieved real things.

SPEAKER_03 8:41

What's underneath the stress when you actually get in there with everybody?

SPEAKER_01 8:48

Yeah. One thing I that's a really, really good question.

SPEAKER_00 8:52

The one thing that I've noticed across everyone that I've worked with so far, most of them are building a life, or most of them have a conditioning, a programming within them of doing things that other people wanted them to do, and not living a life that's aligned to them. And what that does is if you imagine two paths, and your path is very straightforward, it's straight ahead in front of you. Doesn't mean it's easy to see, right? But let's just imagine visually, it's straight ahead in front of you. And then there's the path that you start taking because of all the societal reasons, what your coaches, what your parents, what your teachers tell you to do. And that path deviates. Let's say it goes off to the right. And it might only go off a little bit at the beginning, but eventually it gets further and further and further away from the path that you're actually on. And so the more you go down that path, the more painful it becomes. And the more energy, the more stress it takes to keep the facade going that you think you're happy when you're really not. And so bringing you, bringing you back to yourself, bringing you back to you, bringing your the human being who's achieved all this back to the mindset of I'm doing this for me. I'm making these choices because I want to. I'm taking care of myself, not just people pleasing and doing things other people want. Taking care of myself.

SPEAKER_01 10:38

Like that's been the biggest thing that I've noticed as a consistent commonality between a lot of my clients. Got

The Daily Feel Of Unalignment

SPEAKER_01 10:49

it, got it.

SPEAKER_02 10:51

And like you described the specific profile on your website that I think a lot of people are going to recognize a person who wakes up in the subtle weight of uh weight in the chest most days, who has moments of drive and clarity, but they uh don't last, who has big goals and real potential, but something underneath keeps creating resistance. Oh, what does that person's daily experience actually feel like?

SPEAKER_01 11:25

Yeah, it's one of it's one of unalignment.

SPEAKER_00 11:29

It's one of I'm living this life because I have to, and there can be a constant questioning of what am I doing? And do I really want to do this? You know, we we in school were taught how to be so that we can enter society and what we need to know so that we can be a member of society and get a job in a corporation, you know, as part of all of that system. And then you enter that system, and now you have potentially a family, or you have rent to pay, or a mortgage to pay, you have bills, you have to pay gas, you have to get food. And so that now you've built this life on something to get money, but it's not aligned with who you are. And at a deep inner part of us, we are all some type of soul or spirit or whatever you want to call it, that has our own desires and our own ideas and our own creativity. And the further, the longer we avoid and don't live in alignment with that, it eats away at us. And so our minds will question. And that causes us to have and to store stress within the body. And that also causes stress in the mind and makes us overthink and ruminate and worry, and it causes all these other things. And so the daily experience is one of unalignment, of dysregulation, of dis-ease. Things don't flow the way we want them to flow because we're not in alignment with the flow that would happen for us if we were, if that makes sense.

Relapse, Conditioning, And Real Change

SPEAKER_02 13:29

And uh I mean, if I have to ask, like uh kind of the real transformation, right? The kind that sticks is really a straight line, right? Like someone does the work feels genuinely different, and then a stressful period arrives, uh the old pattern uh reserves. And uh and uh it can it can feel like nothing has changed. So how do you help people understand what's happening in those moments?

SPEAKER_00 14:00

Like how to work with uh relapse rather than being derailed by yeah, so we all have conditioning patterns and they get started very, very, you know, we're not in some crazy woo-woo way, but we get programmed by what our parents tell us, the environment we live in, what our teachers, what our teachers tell us. And we have these these these programs, these apps that run, whether it's a a deep belief of I'm not good enough, or I didn't do it right, or I should be doing XYZ, or I need to do this to get that, whatever it is, we have these subconscious underlying beliefs that if you do some type of work, let's say, or you get motivated, you watch a motivational video, and it helps you for a day, or it helps you for maybe a week, right? You do some work and it helps a little bit. It might not have actually worked at the deeper level necessary to have things in your life shift automatically. Because if you're working at a superficial level, you're trying to put a band-aid on the solution when really we need a deeper change to happen so that everything above that happens automatically. So that's one of the reasons why. And in my experience, as I try to receive work and transformational work from people, very few know how to dig and find what the right core thing is, and then also have the tools to actually shift it at such a level that change just happens.

Mind Body Connection For Lasting Relief

SPEAKER_02 16:03

And I mean, for for the person who is listening who has been high functioning on the outside and quietly exhausted on the inside for longer than they'd like to admit. So, who has tried multiple approaches and is starting to wonder if lasting change is actually possible for them? So, what would you want them to hear?

SPEAKER_01 16:26

Yeah, a very, very good question.

SPEAKER_00 16:29

What I would say is the conventional advice is missing something. All of the right things that you've been doing, all the things you've been trying, whether that's the meditation, whether it's the therapy, the journaling, hiring a coach. All of that is really missing something a lot deeper. And what that thing is, is like it's your mind, your head and your thinking is only part of the picture. And there's a lot of mindset work, and there's a lot of coaches or cognitive behavioral therapy. There's journaling, right? A lot of things that work at the level of the mindset. And the reality is that the biological reality is that we're human, and humans are more than just a brain. We have a body, we have a nervous system, we have a heart. And if you look at the similarities in stress patterns between adult, between humans and animals, what you notice is that the body is way more involved than we think, than most people realize. And so getting the body, bringing the body into the picture, which might sound confusing to someone who's never lived that way. It might sound weird or unnecessary to someone who's very intellectual and been very smart their whole lives. Like, what are you talking about? Like, I am connected to my body. I, you know, it's here, I'm here. But there's a level of deeper connection that you can build with the body in such a way that you can work on these deeper levels. And so building the mind-body connection is the first place. Or even just realizing where you're at with your body. Are you connected to it or not? Can you feel it? Can you not? Do you realize how much stress and where you're carrying your stress physically in the body, you know, and bringing that into the conversation and starting to do work at that mind-body level is really where the lasting change can start to take place.

SPEAKER_02 18:49

I agree. So uh lovely conversation.

One Practice: Stay Curious

SPEAKER_02 18:54

Andrew, like uh, if you have to give one advice to the listeners today, what that would be.

SPEAKER_01 19:02

Let's see, one piece of advice. I would say to be curious and ask questions and keep looking for a better solution.

SPEAKER_00 19:23

That's what got me to where I am. I didn't just accept where I was. I did not just accept the state that my body was in, that my mind was in, that my health was in.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

And I stayed curious and kept asking questions and was hungry for tools that actually worked in a way where I could immediately feel the difference.

SPEAKER_00 19:51

And I think a lot of people, it's easy to just play that victim card and accept stress as part of life and accept the negative mental states we get in as part of life, and not believe that we can actually do something about it. But if you do believe you can do something about it and you choose to not accept that as your standard for your reality, then you will seek out another tool and another tool and another tool until you find one that actually makes a difference.

How To Connect And Closing

SPEAKER_00 20:30

And that one tool can change your life.

SPEAKER_02 20:35

And so if listeners want to connect with you, where they can connect.

SPEAKER_00 20:41

Yeah, uh Instagram is a great place. My my handle is tophuman with an underscore on either side, or of course my website, which is tophuman.co.co.

SPEAKER_02 20:56

So the listeners want to do is I'll put all the links and that you gave Sekatisonos for easy reference. And that's the wrap for today's episode of the Man Hill Life. And if something Andrew said today named something you have been living with but haven't had words for, please don't trust past that recognition. It's pointing somewhere important. So as I mentioned, Andrew's details and the top human platform will be in the show notes. And if you know someone who has been running on empty behind a high functioning exterior, then this episode was made of help. So with this hope is your week and this is Elemental Life. The version of you that feels clear, all, and generally at peace is not behind you. It's waiting inside you. So take care of yourself and see you next time. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 21:58

Thank you so much, Savik. Had a great conversation.