The Fear Never Left: Childhood Trauma That Followed Him Into Adulthood

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Hello and welcome to Overcome a Mental Health Podcast.

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I'm your host Travis White and this is place for you to share your mental health stories.

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I'm very excited to introduce tonight's guest.

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I'm speaking with Julio Rivera.

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Julio is a writer, martial arts coach, and mental health advocate.

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Julio, welcome to the show.

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Thanks Travis, thanks for having me.

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Well, it's my pleasure.

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I'm very excited for our conversation.

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And without wasting any time, I'm just going to hand the microphone over to you and let

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you tell us about your story.

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Sure.

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Well, it starts with me in my early childhood.

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I grew up in a really rough area in Brooklyn and was exposed to a lot of violence and

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crime and was the victim of violence.

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And it was just a very volatile place to grow up.

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although I had some happy memories around the age of eight, I witnessed a murder that

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really traumatized me as a kid.

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And the murderer was actually the dad of my best friend at the time.

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And so it caused a lot of confusing feelings and he ended up never doing time for the

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crime.

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And so I would see him every day while I was growing up building.

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And he knew that I was the one that called the ambulance, which means I was the one that

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got the police to come, which meant that he had sort of a grudge against me.

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And here I was an eight year old kid.

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dealing with that every day.

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So it was a lot of anxiety and stress.

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And I never knew what was going to happen when I left to go to school or when I went to

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walk down the block.

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I didn't know if I was going to get rubbed at gunpoint, which did happen to me.

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You know, there were fights constantly and it was just, it was just tension all the time.

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You know, I was always scared.

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So as I grew up, I decided to build a strong outer shell to

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defend myself and I started working out and lifting weights and competing as a bodybuilder

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and being this tough guy on the outside but internally I was still terrified and I just

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hoped that if I built this external scary looking frame that people would stay away from

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me and it did work for a long time but I still felt kind of terrified and I didn't know

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why and I wanted to overcome that.

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So when I was done with bodybuilding, threw myself into martial arts and studied as many

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martial arts as I could and earned three black belts.

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And after a couple of decades of that, I found that I was still carrying this fear inside

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of me.

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So I spent more time in therapy and in meditation and kind of tried to get in touch with

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what the trauma was about and really in a lot of ways kind of returned to that childhood

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so that I could process these feelings.

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it was only then that the fear started to alleviate a little bit.

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And I still deal with the challenges every day, it's really different from the way it was

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before when I was just trying to solve it with the physical stuff.

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That's crazy, like, that you had to witness that at such a young age.

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And that you actually had to live with, knowing that person and that there's no time

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service.

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Like, that's, to me, that's insane.

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Like, no, no kid should ever, ever, like, have to witness anything like that.

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And the perpetrator, did you, like, so you, did you personally know him or was it just

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somebody, like, him off the street?

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no, I'd spend time in his home and, you know, his son was my best friend and he, you I

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knew him as long as I lived in that building.

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But he was, he was, you know, he wasn't stable and he, he would pretend to be the security

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guard of the building and sit outside and kind of guard it.

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But he wasn't, he was just this, you know, mentally unstable guy who

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got back from Vietnam and was a little bit, you know, just was kind of detached from

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reality a little bit, but he was supposed to be this Kung Fu master.

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That's the thing that really, as a kid, had me so confused because he was known as this

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master, but when something happened, he just pulled out a knife and plunged it into the

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sky.

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There was no Kung Fu involved, you know?

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So I don't know if that has anything to do with why I became a martial arts instructor,

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but...

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That's always something that stood out in my mind about him, you know.

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Yeah, yeah.

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And so how long did it take you to like, did you know right away like you were having, I'm

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guessing at eight years old, you didn't understand like what you were going through was

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anxiety, like, and all these different emotions.

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Like, when did you connect the dots?

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Like, where was it when you were older?

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Like, tell us more about that type of

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Yeah, you know, the anxiety early on would manifest itself into like stomach aches.

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I'd be at school and I'd suddenly feel ill.

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and I felt all the symptoms of anxiety, but to me, because it just felt like a stomach

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ache and it made me, it just made me feel sick.

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Then I would tell the teacher I was sick and it would call my dad and my dad would come

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get me.

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And my dad was very frustrated because this would happen all the time, but it was really.

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I had this need to escape the school immediately.

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I felt terrified.

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I felt like I was being chased by someone.

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And that went on until I was about 12, and I started seeing a psychiatrist.

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Then I started seeing my guidance counselor would give me therapy sessions.

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And that's when I started getting in touch with the idea that maybe my past had something

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to do with the feelings I was having.

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But even then, like the bodybuilding kind of suppressed that.

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It kept me from getting too depressed and it kept me from, from kind of sinking into these

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darker feelings for a while.

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gave me an outlet that I didn't have before.

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So, it helped me manage the feelings a lot, the physical stuff, but it wasn't until I got

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older and I went deeper into therapy and I did EMDR.

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which is a form of therapy.

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It wasn't until then that I really started to identify that little kid at that moment who

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was so terrified and what he must have experienced.

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Because until then, hadn't really, I could think back to the moment, but I couldn't think

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of how I felt.

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I had disconnected the fear in that very moment.

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It's like I had gone somewhere else just to not experience it.

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So it wasn't until I was 40 years old that I kind of approached that little boy during an

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episode that I was having and I comforted him and I let him know that he was safe now and

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in that moment I got some closure for that traumatic event.

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Yes, I can only imagine like what that closure would feel like.

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It's just, that's crazy.

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Well, I want to kind of take a go more towards your martial arts background here.

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How has martial arts shaped your approach to mental health and resilience?

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You know, um, the feeling that you get after a hard sparring session, it really feels like

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you've been cleansed, you know?

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Um, and there were many days that I would go into training feeling anxious and depressed.

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When I first walked into the dojo and then by the time training was done, I felt like a

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different person.

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And I felt like I could open up to my teammates about what was going on with me and they

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felt the same way.

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So, um,

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we would have these mat therapy sessions where we would just open up and kind of spill our

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guts to each other.

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And I don't think that would have been possible if we hadn't exhausted each other

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physically and kind of beat each other up and made this gentleman's agreement as martial

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artists to test ourselves and push ourselves.

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And once we had broken through physically, we were ready emotionally to share.

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And for men, that's difficult to do.

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So within the community of martial arts, it gave us the opportunity to both, you know, be

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men and do something that men do that's very primal, but at the same time expose the

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sensitive side of us.

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And I didn't expect that when I started martial arts, but that's what it turned into.

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That's really cool.

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It's like you, you you created that safe space for men was created to actually open up.

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Cause like you said, that, doesn't happen in very often.

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It's like where I feel like as a society, we're taught like, well, if you're a man and

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you're open about your mental health and you're not tough, you don't have that you're not

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masculine enough.

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Like, and I I'm always like,

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My thought is like, you know what?

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I've learned that like, it's okay for me to shed a tear.

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It's okay to me openly talk about like what I'm going through.

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Yeah, yeah.

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For me, actually my first sensei, my first teacher, he was a therapist and he had a

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therapy office in the dojo, in the back of the dojo.

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So he was someone that I was seeing for therapy for years while I was training on the mat.

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So I would get my physical training there and I would also get my emotional and mental

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training done in the back office.

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So those two things kind of coincided.

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They co-mingled for me really early on in martial arts and mental health.

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Yeah, and now I want to shift kind of to your depression.

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Sorry, I have all these different ways that I can just want to different things I want to

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talk about.

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What do you what did your darkest days look like?

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man, I remember the worst depression I've had in the last 10 years was Christmas probably

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three years ago.

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It lasted from Christmas Day for about five days.

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And I can only describe it as like a voyage through hell as dramatic as that sounds.

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was...

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in bed in the dark.

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I also got physically ill at the time, so I was shaking and sweating as if I had a fever.

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I don't know if that's what triggered the depression or if it's vice versa, know, if the

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depression triggered the illness.

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But I just lost all hope and I was in deep despair.

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And it had come like right after a hypomanic episode where I was feeling super high.

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So the crash was particularly hard, you know?

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Whenever I'm feeling super good, that's kind of, that's one of the sad things about it

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that I have to fear that fall is right around the corner.

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So that happened during that Christmas.

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So I spent about five days just feeling like I wanted to end it every day and physically

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in the dark, you know, because I couldn't face anything.

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Yeah.

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And that wasn't even my longest, that wasn't my longest depression.

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You know, it's lasted months at a time.

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Yeah, sometimes severe for months at a time.

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Yeah, I've dealt with that too.

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And I've definitely dealt with like the feeling of, just want to end it.

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I want things to be done.

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And it's hard in those moments because you have to, you have to somehow find it within you

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to pick out the good.

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Like this is what I do anyways.

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I have to find it within me to pick out the good in life and what I have and say, you know

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what, like I have more to live for.

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and to like die for and it's like and I got to the point where I had very bad suicidal

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thoughts and I knew how I was going to do it.

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knew like I'd never had like a date or like a when but it's just I knew how if it came to

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that but good thing it just never got to that point.

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I was saved somehow before it got.

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Yeah, yeah, I've gotten, I've gotten to the point.

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I've tried twice.

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mean, they were, they were, have to say they were half-hearted attempts because I didn't

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succeed.

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Thankfully, the first time was probably 20, 25 years ago with pills.

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And the second time was, was in 2019.

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And that time I tied a

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one of my black belts around my neck and I hung it off the handle of a steel door and I

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just kind of leaned into it and allowed it to put me to sleep.

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And then as I was kind of about to pass out, the belt gave way from the door handle and

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that was that.

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I could realize, but I realized in that moment, hey, it would be really easy to do this,

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you know, which was kind of comforting in a way.

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Because I've been choked out many times in training and I thought to myself, well, it's

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just like getting choked out.

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You just go to sleep and you know, it's just, don't, you don't wake up again.

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but for me, it was always my daughter that would stop me.

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you know, the thought of my daughter and leaving her and that was the only thing that

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would keep me, keep me here with my feet on the ground, you know.

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Yeah, mine falls back to my family as well.

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There's a time back when my 20s before I was married and it was my fiance who I'm now

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married to now that always kept me going.

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But now it's like I have three kids and like I can't imagine like, it's just like I feel

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like, yeah, it's like if something were to happen to me, I'm passing just her onto them.

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So.

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And after, you know, those attempts, like what kept you here?

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Or you said your daughter, but what helped you like start to rebuild?

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You know, for me, my depression is it's just a cycle that has to kind of ride itself out.

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You know, it's very difficult to pull myself out of it.

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The only thing I can do is just put one foot in front of the other and keep moving.

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As long as I don't get stagnant and just stop, can eventually work my way out of it.

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But I don't think it's something in particular that I do.

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I think it's just forward movement.

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um Even when you don't want to do it because that's the thing with depression.

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You don't want to really do anything at least I don't but I just kind of Go on automatic

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and do it like a robot and then eventually the feelings subside

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I can relate to you.

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Like that's me too.

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You said like you pretty much stole the words out of my mouth.

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it's, I don't want to do it, but eventually I just have to work my way out of it.

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And I remember talking to my therapist about this once.

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And I said, you know, there's days where I feel like I'm taking two steps forward and then

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five steps back.

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And he's like, well, don't focus on those five steps.

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Like you're still taking two steps forward and eventually it's going to be three then

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four.

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He's like, you just continue to take those baby steps.

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Don't count the backwards steps.

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oh

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Yeah, it's a, and it can be anything that you, that that's that forward motion for you.

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It can be the smallest thing.

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You know, some people, for some people it's just being able to get out of bed for some,

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you know, be able to take a shower and, you know, go to work or see your kid or whatever

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it might be, you know, whatever small step you can take is better than just sitting there

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in your depression.

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Yes, that is for sure.

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And sometimes it's like for me, it's just like going out in the sunlight and getting that

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breath of fresh air and then coming back into the house into the dark.

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And it's like, well, at least I got the breath of fresh air.

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Yeah.

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And what, so I'm skipping around again.

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I'm sorry.

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I'm all over the place, but I keep thinking of different things.

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So what parallels do you see between physical combat and the internal battles that we all

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face?

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I think they're both resistance, know, especially in jujitsu we're dealing with using the

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energy that's given to us to our advantage, know, the energy that's supposed to be being

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used against us.

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We use it as our ally.

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And it's the same internally.

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I mean, we have this resistance to what is all the time, the resistance to our feelings in

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that moment.

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resistance to what's going on around us.

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But all we can do is use that motion to get where we want.

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We can't deny that things are going on.

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If I'm facing an opponent, I can't deny that my opponent is there, but I have to use their

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actions to my advantage.

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So when life pushes you in one direction, you have to somehow find a positive in that and

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see where you're being guided by that, by life.

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And in the same way, our opponents guide us to where victory is.

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They may be trying to beat us, but if we use our skill and our cunning, then we're going

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to use the strategy against them.

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We're going to use their power against them.

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depression is incredibly powerful, and anxiety is incredibly powerful.

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But it's just like before you have a fight or you're in a tournament and you feel

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incredible fear.

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and you feel this anxiety, but it's really just, it's really just excitement, right?

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And it's what it's how we're labeling it in that moment.

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So the fear of fighting and that anxiety that you get before a fight, relabeling it is

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really important.

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So if we can learn to relabel anxiety before a fight, then we can learn to label like

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relabel anxiety.

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when we're just sort of having a moment or we're having a flashback because of PTSD or

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whatever it may be, then we can take some control of that feeling and start to call it

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something else.

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Very well said, I love it.

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Now, I'm gonna shift topics here again.

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I wanna dive also into your writing.

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I'm curious to know how writing has...

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uh

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think of how to phrase this.

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How has writing impacted your healing journey?

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You know, I started writing at the same year that I started therapy and I started

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bodybuilding, all lifting weights when I was 12.

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So all those things happened during the same year.

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And I feel like it was just a time that I needed to express myself in as many ways as

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possible.

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So I started writing poetry when I was 12 and it was all kind of very dark and sad.

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And then when I was 13, I won an award for writing an essay on the Holocaust.

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And my teacher told me that I was talented.

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And from then on, I would write my feelings down and I would write poetry.

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And I majored in journalism at NYU.

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So I didn't really want to work for newspapers or anything, but I started writing for

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magazines after college.

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I felt like the expression was something that I needed.

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I needed something that was non-physical.

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I needed a way to express myself that didn't have to do with my body or with my physical

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ability.

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And then as time went on, I realized that even in writing fiction, I could put lots of my

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personality into it and I could send a message with what I was writing, whatever it was.

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whether it was a screenplay or whether it was an essay, could still speak my mind in there

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somehow through the themes and stuff.

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it was a natural kind of progression for me.

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to express myself outside of the physical.

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And I felt like I could be as open as possible in my writing.

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I could write just for me, or I could write for other people, or I could get as personal

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as I wanted to, and not have any fear.

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And it was one of the few places that I could live without fear.

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I love that.

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I love hearing stories of when people find something that like helps just transform them

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and that it's like, I don't know how to explain it.

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It's just really cool to hear these stories.

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So, uh, and you have remind me you have two books out.

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Is it two and then some essays, correct?

20:49

I two books out, tons of essays on Medium.

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The first book, it's called Broke Down Sensei.

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was, it's about how I dealt with trauma and bipolar disorder, how I fought it, kind of

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from the outside in, trying to build a strong foundation at first.

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It wasn't intended to become like the memoir that it did, but I was off my medication at

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the time.

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and I was cycling really rapidly between depression and hypomania.

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So I was riding differently every day depending on my mood.

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So it really turned into this kind of roller coaster ride.

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And one day I'm talking like I'm the second coming and the next day I'm just, I'm feeling

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like a pauper.

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So it was a trip.

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at the end I felt like it was...

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even more raw than I wanted it to be, but I still wanted to put it out.

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And I did, and it got a little bit of backlash from some people in my life.

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And I actually did go in and re-edit it after someone kind of expressed to me that they

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were hurt by some things.

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But I didn't take anything out that I felt like compromised my vision at all.

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So that was important to me.

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And then the second book,

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oh, no, you go ahead, you finish your thought.

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The second book was what the first book was intended to be.

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was a study of Jujitsu as a metaphor for life and martial arts in general, and how to deal

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with, how to help deal with the issues with mental health and depression and anxiety using

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the principles of Jujitsu and dealing with resistance.

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So yeah, I'm really proud of both of them.

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The second one was like I said, it was what my vision was all along and I was medicated

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and therapy and everything when I wrote it.

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So I had a certain amount of clarity that I didn't have when I wrote the first book.

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So this question might be more geared towards your the towards broke down sensei.

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Do you feel like it was more in the end like after writing it do you feel like it was more

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therapy or more like exposure?

22:57

It was definitely therapeutic.

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was, you know, the first draft I wrote by hand and I wrote it purposely in a, a, in a, a,

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in a handwriting that I couldn't read.

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It was just scribble.

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So I wrote the whole draft that way because I didn't want to have to, I didn't want to go

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back and read it and make corrections of that.

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I just wanted it to be emotion, like raw emotion on the page.

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And then when I was done with that draft, that's when I started typing and reading my

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drafts over and stuff like that.

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that first draft was all just feeling and letting it out.

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It's, I actually think that's really cool that you did it all by hand.

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It's, I mean, it seems like a lot of work, but that's still really cool that you did it

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all by hand.

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Yeah, was like I was moving feverishly, you know what I mean?

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Because I had so much to say and I had so much to of pent up in me.

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And it was right after my divorce, so I had lots of feelings going on about my divorce and

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about my ex-wife.

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And some of it was, there was some vitriol in there that I had to get out in that first

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draft.

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and even the second and third draft.

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mean, it wasn't until maybe the fifth draft that I had kind of calmed down and I stopped

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being so angry and I, you know, started to examine things a little more clear-headed.

24:18

Yeah, and I want to go to your, kind of skip to your bipolar diagnosis.

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What misconceptions about bipolar disorder do you wish people better understood?

24:33

I think that people just generally dismiss mental health disorders.

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you know, under that label of crazy because they just have a tremendous fear of it.

24:47

know, people are afraid of having to deal with mental health issues themselves, of losing

24:47

touch with reality.

24:54

I I don't think people understand the severity of it either.

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I think it can be kind of thrown around a lot, know, oh, he's manic depressive or he's

25:01

bipolar or, but it's bad.

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it's, it's no, it's no joke, you know.

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And I think.

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I think people don't want to talk about it, at the same time, they don't understand how

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damaging it can be to your life.

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You know, how much you can just throw everything, make everything go haywire in your life.

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And I don't think there's enough empathy for people that are dealing with issues.

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I don't think there's, I think there's a fear that if you talk about it, then you're

25:33

opening up the possibility that you could have to deal with it yourself.

25:43

and people were terrified of that.

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And I think the biggest misconception and the thing that always bothered me as a kid was

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that people think you're choosing to be depressed when you're depressed.

25:54

People think that that's a conscious choice and you could just snap out of it at any

25:54

moment.

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And God, if that were the case, God knows I wouldn't have gone through all those days of

26:00

depression.

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Right?

26:10

Like, it's like, you really think I would choose this?

26:15

There's no way, like, I would choose to just sit in a room or a bed and be depressed and

26:15

have a hard time waking up and not wanting to go to work and, uh, like, faking a smile

26:30

just because that's what I have to do to get through the day.

26:33

Like, yeah, it's, I agree with everything that you just said there.

26:42

And it's like, especially, you know, these, these, I think of it this way.

26:46

It's like, everybody's had a bad hair day, but until you've been through like some of the,

26:46

these deep spouts of depression, anxiety, you know, whatever it is that you're, whatever

26:57

mental health it or struggle you're dealing with, until you're actually dealing with it

26:57

day in and day out, like a bad hair day doesn't even compare to like,

27:11

having to deal with any of that stuff.

27:13

Mm-hmm.

27:14

Yeah.

27:15

I'm always amazed when I meet people that haven't dealt with severe depression and haven't

27:15

dealt with severe anxiety and people that are, that can't relate to it, you know.

27:25

To me it's because it's just been a lifetime of dealing with this stuff and you don't know

27:25

what life would be without it.

27:34

Yeah, and my more severe depression and anxiety came out in my 20s after I had some

27:34

medical issues.

27:41

And I remember when I first started realizing that I'm an anxious person and I get really

27:41

bad anxiety.

27:47

Back at the time, I wasn't married yet and my wife or then fiance was like, I...

27:56

She didn't know how to deal with it.

27:57

Like she didn't know how to help me and she would try and she would say like, I don't

27:57

understand where you're coming from.

28:03

Like, I don't know why you're acting this way.

28:05

but the now years later, she's, she's dealt with like some anxiety issues herself in the

28:05

past year.

28:13

And she looked at me, I think it was like six months ago and said, I finally understand

28:13

where you're coming from and why you did the things you did.

28:22

And I said, it's it.

28:25

I said, that's crazy.

28:26

I said, I never thought I would see the day that you would be an anxious person.

28:30

Because that's always been my job.

28:34

I said, you've always your job was just to be my caretaker.

28:38

But but I said, I am glad that you finally like have been able to I said, not that I'm

28:38

happy that you had to go through that.

28:46

That's not what I'm saying, but.

28:48

It's a good feeling to know that you've walked in my shoes a little bit just so you can

28:48

have that clear picture and understanding of what it's like.

28:58

Not that I'd wish it up on anybody because I don't.

29:00

Mm-hmm.

29:02

Yeah, that's one of the great things about my relationship with my ex-wife actually is

29:02

that she's very understanding about my situation.

29:10

you know, same with me and her and whatever her issues might be.

29:14

So we can, even though we're divorced, we can still lean on each other and kind of

29:14

understand each other.

29:20

And, you know, she's somebody I reach out to when I'm having difficult times.

29:23

So she's a social worker as well.

29:25

So having somebody that kind of understands.

29:28

mental health and mental health issues.

29:30

It's just a huge, huge help.

29:35

Yeah, and I think that we all need at least one person in our corner that understands like

29:35

somewhere, you know, the mental health a little bit just to, I mean, even just be there to

29:48

listen to you.

29:49

Mm-hmm.

29:53

So you've become this mental health advocate.

29:56

How do you balance being vulnerable and protecting your own mental health while advocating

29:56

for mental health?

30:04

I'm not afraid to talk about my darkest days or the times that I feel weakest because I'm

30:04

secure in certain, I'm secure in my masculinity just because of the things that I've done

30:23

and who I feel like I am as a person.

30:26

So I don't have fear of.

30:28

of appearing weak when I talk about my vulnerability.

30:34

And I think it's super important for people, for men in particular, who have a strong

30:34

facade to talk about this stuff.

30:45

particularly with young kids, with young men, there's...

30:54

there's a choice that has to be made between being sensitive and being tough and that's a

30:54

false choice and I and for me if I don't sort of discard that line and not try to protect

31:08

my masculinity, if I don't do that then I'm not really helping all the people that I can.

31:14

So, you know, don't feel like I have to defend whether or not I'm a

31:21

whether or not I'm a real man just because I'm talking about my vulnerability.

31:28

Yeah, and I actually really admire that about you because it's, I love that you're

31:28

vulnerable and open to discussing it because I think, I think we need more men like this

31:39

to be able to be vulnerable and you know, but sometimes though, I guess you can't really,

31:39

we have this problem society where people are going through these struggles, but they

31:50

don't.

31:51

No, maybe they don't know or they're not admitting that they have these struggles and I

31:51

think before we can actually be vulnerable and open up and talk about them, we have to

31:59

admit to ourselves that like, you know what, I'm struggling.

32:02

I'm going through this.

32:03

I'm not just going through the emotions anymore.

32:06

I have to, you know, I'm depressed or I'm anxious or whatever.

32:12

Yeah, yeah, I think uh too often it's just discounted is just the way things are supposed

32:12

to be.

32:20

You know, I'm supposed to be feeling terrible all the time.

32:23

You know, we kind of become we become used to it and we, you know, let those feelings

32:23

become who we are, you know, when our life could be so much better if we addressed, if

32:35

address what we were feeling.

32:38

I totally agree with you.

32:42

So what do you think we need to change like maybe socially or systemically to better

32:42

support people in crisis?

32:51

I think there have to be tons more resources poured into mental health hotlines and

32:51

hospitals and good treatment programs and group therapy sessions.

33:07

It's incredibly hard to find good groups to become a part of when you're dealing with

33:07

mental health issues.

33:13

I've tried in the past and it's not very easy.

33:16

so I think there have to be more resources for people where, where they don't have to jump

33:16

through hoops to get help.

33:24

because it's hard enough to say that you need help with your mental health, you know, it's

33:24

a very scary thing to admit.

33:29

so the more difficult you make it for people to get help, the more likely it is that

33:29

they're just not going to do it.

33:36

and we see from the, from the homelessness crisis that it's, it's a, it's an epidemic.

33:42

mental health issues, mental illness, the situation with the homeless and with crime, and

33:42

it's only going to get worse as mental health issues aren't addressed.

33:53

That's the key to everything.

33:54

So just more resources for sure.

33:58

Yeah, it's just pretty seeing this like crisis, mental health crisis and it's gone gone

33:58

like with the homelessness and everything like it's pretty crazy because it's gotten way

34:10

worse in the last what five years, six years.

34:14

I mean, it could probably go beyond that, but it's kind of where...

34:19

Yeah.

34:19

And a lot of it, think, coincides with cost of living and how difficult it is to keep a

34:19

roof over your head for people, especially for people who have issues with their stability

34:29

as it is.

34:29

have to be a lot of them can't live on their own without supervision of some sort.

34:34

So if those programs don't have the funding that they need, then they're just going to be

34:34

out on the street.

34:41

There's no other option for them.

34:46

Yeah, for sure.

34:48

I'm curious though, like when did you first feel that your story could help someone else?

34:53

Like when did you, when did that come into play?

34:56

when I first got diagnosed, I immediately was open about it and I, you know, I had my own

34:56

Jiu-Jitsu Academy at the time.

35:07

So I wanted to use that as a platform.

35:11

So I would share on my social media that, you know, if anyone needed help or if anyone,

35:11

you know, wanted to talk and, know, that I understood what the depression was like and

35:22

what anxiety was like and.

35:24

And I had people reach out when I did share my story and say that it really helped them

35:24

and that it made a difference.

35:32

And that's when I remember telling my ex-wife, you know, I realize now why, what I'm here

35:32

to do.

35:38

I realize now that I'm here to help other people that have gone through what I've gone

35:38

through.

35:43

you know, I don't wish it on my worst enemy.

35:45

And if I can help, you know, one person, then that's huge for me.

35:50

So I decided to focus my energy on that and, you know, even whether it was at my school or

35:50

on social media or at a workshop or seminar or whatever, my main concern was to delve into

36:05

why people were training, what kind of trauma they were dealing with, and, you know, how

36:05

their training could help them become more whole.

36:12

And I got a lot of backlash because of it.

36:14

People involved in my business or people close to me.

36:18

We're afraid that it would turn people off if I became this advocate, that it would be bad

36:18

for business.

36:25

But I didn't care.

36:26

I just knew that it was something that I had to do.

36:29

And it wouldn't be worth it to me to continue my work if it wasn't focused on the most

36:29

important issue to me that there is.

36:38

Mm-hmm.

36:38

Yeah.

36:39

it's like in situations like that where you feel deep inside of you, like, you you told

36:39

your ex that, I feel like I need to do this.

36:48

I found my calling.

36:50

If you're feeling that deep inside you, like, you need to do something about it.

36:56

It's kind of like the same thing that happened with me in the podcast.

36:59

I was like, you know what?

37:00

I really feel like I could build a platform for people to come on and hopefully share

37:00

their stories.

37:06

Yeah.

37:06

And it's, it's, and I, I've just got on told my story and I'm like, at first I was like a

37:06

little bit nervous about people were thinking and feeling, but now it's like, I don't even

37:17

care.

37:17

If I, if I say something, you know, about somebody that's in my life and I offend them,

37:17

it's not me trying to offend them.

37:28

It's just me getting stuff out there.

37:31

Like.

37:35

I'm really glad that you're putting yourself out there and that people are responding in a

37:35

good way.

37:43

Yeah, yeah, it doesn't, you know, it doesn't take millions of people responding for it to

37:43

kind of touch you.

37:51

You know what I mean?

37:52

You get that one message and it's just like, it sends you over the moon because you know

37:52

that you did something.

37:59

Oh, that's that's totally for sure.

38:01

And it's like, you know, I haven't I haven't received like much feedback on this, but it's

38:01

like those one or two that I get here and there.

38:08

It's like, I think to myself, this is the reason why I keep going.

38:12

mm-hmm yeah absolutely

38:17

And so, you know, you've been through, you know, a lot of different things.

38:23

What are some small, like daily practices that keep you grounded?

38:29

So my mornings are always the same.

38:31

I get up and I pray first.

38:33

And when I pray, I use prayer time just to give thanks for the things in my life.

38:38

I don't really ask for anything.

38:40

I give thanks for what I have and I give thanks for things that I envision myself having

38:40

in the future, Good health and good family and all those things.

38:53

Then I'll meditate for 20 minutes every day.

38:55

And that really started because, you know, I have ADHD as well and it was a challenge for

38:55

me to sit just for five minutes.

39:03

So I built it up gradually, a couple of minutes here, then five minutes and 10 minutes.

39:07

And now 20 minutes is my regular meditation time every day.

39:11

After that, I'll read a book for 20 minutes to 30 minutes.

39:15

And then I'll do a language lesson for

39:18

five minutes.

39:18

And that's all just designed to kind of get my head in the right space for the day.

39:23

So that I'm, I'm open to learning right away.

39:27

And I'm, I've kind of, I've calmed my body down.

39:30

You know, the meditation is really, I kind of consider my body kind of like a dog in a lot

39:30

of ways that I have to train.

39:39

And that I've had to, to train to sit when I ask him to sit.

39:44

and not be overly anxious all the time and not have to move constantly.

39:50

So that 20 minutes in the morning is, I know is the time that I'll be able to sit in

39:50

silence and not move a muscle.

39:57

And it's really, it definitely comes in handy during the day when I can put myself in that

39:57

state of mind again.

40:07

I wish I had.

40:10

that control I have during meditation, wish I had more of it during the day because I do

40:10

still get fidgety and anxious and you know, yeah.

40:21

Yeah, it's, meditation is something that I need to get more like, I've done it before and

40:21

I've done breath work and that type of stuff.

40:30

I just need to put it more into my daily practice because I don't do it enough.

40:36

That's, but it's, and I feel like a lot of what you just explained, it's like, you know,

40:36

you're doing a routine and you've, you're working on rewiring your brain to like,

40:47

do better throughout the day.

40:48

I honestly think that's when it comes to mental health, that's what you have to do a lot

40:48

is like rewire your brain to so you can do certain things or behave a certain way.

40:59

It's like, but it's a constant thing.

41:01

Like it's a constant struggle to be able to do that.

41:05

Yeah, yeah, it's definitely a lot of work.

41:09

It's a daily practice.

41:10

You don't really get any time off, you know, not if you want to make sure that you keep

41:10

yourself together.

41:20

Yes, for sure.

41:22

I have a few more questions here for you.

41:25

If you could go back and speak to your younger self, what would you say?

41:31

I would say you're safe.

41:33

would say that you don't have to be afraid.

41:37

There's a difference between being diligent and being aware and being afraid.

41:43

And that you're not in that scary place anymore.

41:49

You've gotten out of that.

41:51

and you're okay now and you can trust people.

41:57

love it.

41:59

And what's next for you personally, professionally, and in your advocacy work?

42:06

I'm going to continue to work with my private martial arts clients.

42:10

I don't teach group classes anymore.

42:11

I only work with individuals.

42:13

And it gives me the chance to of delve deeper into their personalities and understand why

42:13

they are training and what they hope to get out of it.

42:22

So I want to do more of that.

42:23

I want to do more workshops, which I do corporate workshops where I teach a course called

42:23

the Art of Empowerment.

42:30

where it's a combination of martial arts and mindfulness and understanding your own trauma

42:30

and the trauma of the people that you're dealing with so that we can have better

42:39

interactions in general.

42:41

So I wanna do more of those workshops and more speaking to different groups about mental

42:41

health and about bipolar disorder and about...

42:50

being a non-judgmental ear for the people in their lives that need it because I think

42:50

judgment is really what holds people back from sharing and if they could feel like they

43:02

can they could express themselves without being labeled by the person you're talking to

43:02

they're much more likely to to express their their reality and and much more likely to

43:15

open up if they do need help and they are

43:18

struggling and we have to take suicidal ideation seriously.

43:29

I had a friend months ago, I was feeling incredibly depressed and suicidal and I opened up

43:29

to him about it and he got kind of upset and he told me, if you're

43:48

you're not going to do it right so stop talking about it.

43:50

And he told me that I wasn't, he said you're not special so stop talking about it you're

43:50

not you're not going to do it.

43:57

It wasn't exactly what I needed to hear at the time you know but it it but it showed me

43:57

okay I can't I love him but I can't talk to him about this because it's not going to be

44:06

beneficial to me.

44:07

So we have to pick and choose the people in our lives that we can share this stuff with

44:07

for sure.

44:12

Yes, for sure.

44:13

It's like there's a lot of people I can think of that would handle me talking about it to

44:13

them like in the same way that your friend did.

44:22

But I actually have a friend that like, you know, we've been close enough throughout the

44:22

years, like I've always like kept in touch with him.

44:30

And I remember a couple of years ago, he opened up to me about he had a suicide attempt

44:30

where

44:39

He actually went through with it and almost died.

44:43

And he spent some time in a psych ward.

44:49

And I was like, dude, like, I can't believe I didn't know this.

44:53

And I felt crushed that like I didn't know.

44:57

And it was almost like a guilt, like, you know, what could have I done?

45:00

How could I been there better for this person?

45:05

And now like I...

45:09

talk to him all the time and it's, you know, it's, he's my go-to person.

45:14

Like last year I had a really dark spot where I was dealing with some suicide ideation

45:14

stuff and thinking about stuff again.

45:22

And I text him right away cause he's the first person and I was like, I know he'll

45:22

understand what I'm going through.

45:29

And I know that like,

45:32

Maybe he won't have the right things to say the right words, but he'll at least understand

45:32

and push me in a direction that I need to get help.

45:39

And so it's like whenever I'm feeling down or if I think he, if he's not like, I know this

45:39

guy pretty well.

45:46

So it's like, if he's not texting back, I know that he's having struggles.

45:50

So I'm going to bug the crap out of him until he responds.

45:55

Um, but it's like, we, need people like that to, in our corner to understand us and.

46:03

are there for us.

46:04

Yeah, yeah, even just checking in every once in a while, like you said, is so critical.

46:09

Yeah, I lost a friend a couple of years ago and, I always wonder if he, if he would have

46:09

called me, would it have made a difference, you know, or if I would have made a call to

46:19

him and spoken to him right before, you know, because for me, it's uh so often it's just

46:19

been one person's, you know, kind word that has kind of helped me.

46:31

go on another day.

46:35

Yeah, and it's like sometimes those kind words come at the exact moment that you need to

46:35

hear them.

46:41

it's like you...

46:43

I remember this wasn't too long ago.

46:46

It was just a small compliment I got from somebody.

46:48

was like, you have no idea how much I needed that right now.

46:54

yeah yeah yeah

46:59

Yeah, I don't think we do that enough for each other, you know.

47:04

Yeah, I totally agree.

47:10

And kind of the last couple of follow-up questions here, or not even questions, so we, let

47:10

me put up this one first.

47:20

Where can people find you?

47:24

So I'm on Instagram as internaljujitsu.

47:28

My website is internaljujitsu.com.

47:30

The name of my newest book is internaljujitsu as well.

47:33

It's on Amazon, Barnes and Nobles, books.org or at your local bookstore.

47:39

Broke Down Sente is on Amazon as well.

47:41

Facebook, internaljujitsu, pretty much everywhere I'm internaljujitsu.

47:46

Yeah.

47:46

And on YouTube as well.

47:49

Perfect.

47:50

And I'll make sure that I add links to all those.

47:55

And last thing here, we've discussed a lot of topics, covered a lot of ground tonight.

48:02

Is there anything that you can think of that we did not discuss that you'd like to bring

48:02

up?

48:09

think recognizing anxiety and depression in young kids, I think is really important.

48:15

I think we're kind of quick to label kids nowadays with certain disorders like ADHD.

48:21

But I think the depressed child is still kind of looked at as the black sheep or just

48:21

someone that can't.

48:31

you know, get along in public or whatever, they're not, people aren't really delving into

48:31

why that depression is there.

48:39

And it's always, know, kids have layers to them.

48:42

You know, it's not, it's, it's, it's not just simply a bad attitude.

48:47

And if we can address those things earlier on, we're going to make for better, more

48:47

well-adjusted adults.

48:53

And that's, to me, that's critical.

48:57

Yeah.

48:59

Yes, it is.

49:00

And I think I feel like it's almost become a problem like in today's society and how we

49:00

raise kids and just all the different things that we have around kids now.

49:08

It's like, I just can't believe the technology that is introduced to our kids at such a

49:08

young age.

49:13

And it's like, you know, it's like I didn't have some of this stimulation that my kids

49:13

have now.

49:21

And it's like,

49:22

and I can see how some of it's causing problems and can see things creeping in.

49:27

It's like, okay, well I need got to dip this right now before anything gets any worse.

49:33

Yeah, Yeah, it's overwhelming the amount of technology that they have and the access they

49:33

have.

49:39

I mean, I don't know how I would have dealt with it as a kid.

49:46

Yeah.

49:50

But also my kids now, like they have no patience.

49:53

That's one thing I'm trying to teach them.

49:56

Yeah.

49:59

Well, every answer is at your fingertips in a second, so it's hard to have patience.

50:05

Yeah, very true.

50:12

Awesome.

50:12

Julio, well, thank you so much for coming on the show.

50:16

I admire what you're doing and admire you getting out there and sharing your story.

50:23

And I wish you all the best of luck in your future endeavors.

50:28

Thank you, Travis.

50:29

Same to you,

50:33

and thank you to all those that listened.

50:35

If you resonated with this episode, please share it and leave us a review and subscribe.

50:43

Thanks again for listening.

50:44

Until next time.