How Can Community Connection Support Brain Health? with Kurt Roskopf

Welcome to Brain Health and Healing. I'm Sandra

Lee. This show is for people living with head injuries and

the families and supporters who love them. If you are ready to

reclaim your life, identity, and dreams for the future, you are

in the right place. Welcome, everybody, to Brain Health And

healing, receiving adversity's gifts. I have a wonderful new

guest on today, and an association that I am excited

about having going forward. Kurt is a renegade maverick and a son

of a gun coming on this show to get it done. He's a change maker

and marketplace disruptor. With this, he enjoys his roles as a

disability ally and an ambassador with Project Diehard,

which is a veteran service organization combating veteran

suicide by spreading hope to veterans. So I am now officially

aligning myself with Project Die Hard, and so you'll be hearing

me talk about Project Die Hard every episode. So, welcome,

Kurt.

Well, thanks, Sandra. It's great to be here.

Thanks for doing this. This is great to be a part of it.

Share a little bit about your experience and how

you came to be doing what you're doing now.

Well, I guess first of all, I guess I go right

back to the the saying of it takes a village to raise a

child. So I like to proclaim my appreciation and gratitude for

all of the adults, including my parents and grandparents and

uncles and everybody for what they did for me and growing up

and my experience as a minor, you know, in the world, you

know, up through age 17 and and beyond, obviously, even in early

adult life, you know, because that that's so important. Before

the show, we were talking about community and such, you know,

and I remember vividly doesn't take much effort of me to think

of pretty intimate interactions, you know, with adults, and you

know some of this comes into the realm of service work of members

of Lions International, Lions Clubs, and Lioness, you know,

women in the service, you know, the we serve mantra of the

organization, and you know, also as a Catholic, you know, with

Knights of Columbus and Ladies of Columbus for, you know,

supporting you know people with, as we'd say now, intellectual

disabilities, and you know, so all these influences, you know,

make a big difference. That childhood impression, you know,

is where this comes from. You know, and then as it would

continue, it has to do with the sport I love, water skiing. My

mother and and two aunts perform water ski shows back in the

'60s, and then my brother got me into the club I still belong to

40 years later now, but 38 years ago, 30 going on 39 years ago,

adaptive community approach program serving adults with

disabilities came to our club about providing adaptive water

skiing. So we've been doing that now. Like I said, going into 39

years of doing that, so that's a huge influence, you know, to be

able to understand the disability community and that

proposed relationship, but my story is about for 40 years I I

basically missed the ultimate opportunity in that. But 13

years ago, I woke up to this. I'm 54 years old now, so I'm

talking about entering my 40. So as a 40-something, all of a

sudden I'm getting this through the Americans with Disabilities

Act because the ADA Legacy Project constructed a blogging,

a 365-day blogging experience available online, and I plugged

into it to look it over, and and so 365 days of Americans with

Disabilities saying why the Americans with Disabilities Act

is so inherent to their life, you know how it's so empowering

and necessary, and but the the real theme of it all is the

lives of people with disabilities are every day, and

that's where I was able to take my self examination and talk to

myself in my own voice and kind of say, "Kurt, you're kind of

doing, you know, the relationship with people with

disabilities occasionally, as the spirit moves you. Maybe with

this annual event of a adaptive water skiing event, but yeah,

the 360 days of the year, you're a little weak. You're really

shutting out what's possible with people with disabilities,

and I never realized what that was going to amass. But then

with the water skiing side, I ended up attending a. Is an

event where they were taking injured, wounded veterans water

skiing, adaptive skiing with the sit skis and everything, and so

there I was able to have conversations and friendship

with veterans and veterans service organizations and the

staff and the leadership and and all the things. So now I started

to realize things that I could put on my calendar to keep going

on this journey about veteran issues. So I had already taken a

dabble in suicide prevention, but there's a particular

component when you're talking about veteran suicide. You know,

so now through business networking, I've connected

through to Project Diarrhea. That was like four years ago. I

met Brian Gibson through business networking, and it's

been quite a journey as an ambassador, learning about

things like church hurt. You know, members of a church kind

of talking to a pastor to be like that guy scares me, bothers

me. I don't feel the you know I don't. I'm not experiencing

worship the way I want because that guy is here.

And then it's our goal, you know, kind of hurting this

person in you know, because then the pastor has to approach this

veteran to say, hey, we have a congregate not comfortable with

you being in her proximity, and you know I'm hearing things like

veterans are not disclosing their identity as a veteran

because there's some systemic bias and leadership bias out

there, and there's some things that manipulate that journey of

a veteran, because you'll get a little economic incentive for a

year having hired that veteran, then it goes away, and now all

of a sudden that employer is not feeling, you know, the

enticement to keep the veteran, so so they discharge the veteran

from employment, and you know, there's just a lot of crazy

things that resemble our culture, custom, and genetic

memory, and this can bring us back into you know what you're

talking about with brain injury and the brain. Because through

business networking, the last handful of years, I've had

people in Australia and other places around the world teach me

how you know mental health is such a financial benefit. Mental

health is funded like great. I think it's wonderful. I don't

want to speak anything against fund. Like let's fund more

mental health. At the same time, we're missing funding brain

health because that's the foundation: is how is the brain

doing? You build mental health on top of anatomically and

functionally. How are things working? You know, with all the

signaling that needs to happen with that brain. Because if

you're working with a malfunctioning machine, you can

go wellness all you want, but it's trying to run your car, and

the engine doesn't work, right?

Yeah.

So, so, so all of this is coming out of. I have

people who tell me, Kurt, you're basically doing, you know,

volunteer private side of social work. So if you think of what

all the social workers social workers are doing, great work.

At the same time, that whole realm has its limits, and then

we get into unmet needs. So at county levels across the U.S.,

you know, people are dealing with, okay, what do we do for

all of the people in the county that aren't getting their needs

met, and this is the space I come into that private public

partnership. So with nonprofits, that's part of it. Nonprofits

expand the public work, but then nonprofits get volunteers and

they get donations from the private sector in a way that

doesn't happen with government. You know, government, you pay

your taxes, and it is what it is. But through nonprofit space,

the whole, you know, kind of coming in to mitigate the gap of

unmet needs that can grow, and that that's really what I'm

about. Is in the broad spectrum of it, I tell people I'm a

Make-A-Wish Foundation for everyone, including you, Sandra.

So, what's your wish? Where do we go from here?

Yeah. Well, I know as I step into working with

people and helping them recover from brain injuries that there

are a lot of people out there who have a need for recovery and

don't have access to resources, and so finding ways for them to

get some of these resources, and some of these people I've been

speaking with have also been veterans, and so looking at how

there are so many people who are really struggling, including in

the veteran communities, and supporting them. In getting what

they need, so in my case, you know, helping their brains work

better, and also looking at the whole, you know, suicide

prevention issue. It's like when people are really struggling and

they don't feel like they're being heard and they don't feel

like their needs are being met. I can really see how so many

people get into that suicide track in their thought process,

and so supporting people in, you know, getting the support they

need, having people to talk with, getting the understanding

they need, and you know, maybe getting the care or the

treatment that they they need, so that they can function

better. They can be more functional out in the community

and and serving the way they want to serve. So I'm adding,

you know, this suicide prevention piece is really

important.

It's it's really important, and this journey of

being a disability ally has taught me that you know I come

from a culture that stigmatizes, so that that's that's what I can

confess to, you know, in Catholic fashion. You know,

confess your sins, curiosity, you know, and you know, because

the idea is like with suicide, like I say, Catholic Church. So

if you look at our Pope and you look at the issue of suicide,

there is this profession within Catholicism to to kind of equate

suicide with sin. So so we have that to address in terms of you

know, you know, I do these things in the Catholic. I have a

Catholic friend who says, "Well, Curry, you're a Protestant," and

like, "Well, okay." I'm just like, there's just things that

come to me as real and that need to be addressed because in

loving our brothers and sisters, there are things that I don't

believe serve our brothers and sisters on the planet, and when

it gets that point, because early on in youth, I subscribe

to a fashion where I say I allow people to do anything they want

as long as it's only at their own consequence. As soon as

somebody does something that's an impedance on someone else,

they're basically making a choice for someone else. They're

impeding in other people's choices. That's where I come in,

and I say, "All right, is this relationship something that can

be improved upon here? I think there can be more equity in

this." And you know, so but like I say, I I I plead guilty that

on the issue of suicide, I've had feelings of how could that

person let me down? How could that person do that to us? You

know, how could the you know like judgment upon the person

comes forward, and like I say, I'm 54 years now, and I'm

talking in the last handful of years, I've kind of been able to

switch my thinking, but culture, custom, genetic memory

predisposes me to say someone is a victim of suicide. That

they're not a criminal committing suicide because a lot

of people say that. That's part of our Our wordage, you know,

will say, "Oh, Billy committed suicide," and it's like, "Oh, he

committed." See, and I would say this, and I believed it. It'd be

that person committed suicide. It's ergo like committing a

crime, but it's like, no, a person is vulnerable. They

they're a victim of society, culture, custom, genetic memory,

all the things, and there's like this cocktail that comes

together that the person starts to do things almost like

relating to hypnotic suggestion type of thing. Yeah, when people

do things that really, you know, and they say with hypnosis

you're not going to do something that you otherwise would do. But

what if in your conscious state you are in suicide ideation?

Then all of a sudden, in hypnotic suggestion, hypnosis

could propagate the issue because now even in your

conscious state, so there's all these things that I never really

thought of until recent years, and even in the recent year,

getting because staying on the topic, you get kind of right in

there with the raw deal. And I've never been in suicide

ideation, and but however, I have been, you know, someone

who's had traumatic brain injury, you know, but not to the

extent that I feel you're probably serving. Because one is

when I was a teenager, I was at a a pool at a resort, and it's

this thing of a shallow pool. It was before they really put out

there, don't die. Well, as a teenager. I'm sitting here

diving, and it was like a three foot thing, and smack my head,

traumatic brain injury, concussion type thing. I, as far

as I remember, I don't don't really believe I had a

concussion, but it still is in that direction. And then I've

also been in. Well, I tried wrestling freshman year in high

school, and I had a concussion there because the person I was

up against lifted me up and slammed me into the mat, and I

blacked out, so to speak. But apparently, I was still going

through the motions. I still grabbed the hand of the ref, and

the other gentleman's hand went up, and I just stood there.

And then somehow I found my way to the stands and I'm sitting in

the stands like finally coming to, you know. So I had that and

then I also was in a car collision where I blacked out

and you know didn't really come to until the EMS was there to

transport me to the hospital and it was right at the point where

they're ready to extricate me out of the car, you know. So, so

I've had traumatic brain injuries, but never really went

to someone like you that could help me with it. So, I think

there's a lot of that untreated traumatic brain injury. So, this

is an advocacy, right?

All over the place. People don't realize. Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, so that's a lot of great information and

perspective on life in general, and the places that we get to,

and certainly the places veterans get to in their minds

and where they get stuck. I like giving people here at Brain

Health and Healing Practical strategies, practical things

they can apply to their life. There's a lot of what you said

that we can apply to our daily thoughts. You know, where do I

get in my mind? So, what gems do you have to share with our

audience so they can again write it down for how they can apply

it to their life.

Okay, so you know I don't want to get too far into

into your wheelhouse and what you bring forward, but you know

I was an EMT for 10 years, and the biggest component I take

away from my practice of EMS, emergency medical services,

pre-hospital care, is perfusion. So, so we'd always give the

patient oxygen and you know such like this because that is so

important to give them you know a successful recovery from their

incident when we come through the doors of the ER and we hand

them off to greater care in the ER and you know so that's

something that I've been able to think about just living life is

how am I doing on my own perfusion because the depth of

your perfusion is ever so critical. So when we talk about

the brain, you know, and you talk about breathing exercises

and things like that, or even the quality of water, you know,

there are companies that help us get better quality of water, and

and it does. It's like an invisible reality that can

easily go unattended to, and so like diet and exercise and stuff

like that. You know, like mom always used to say, you know,

eat your vegetables, and you know, such. You know, it's so

important that we get the nutrients we need, and we're,

you know, properly hydrated and you know well rested. You know

things like this that you know we get kind of drawn into things

that come at our own expense, and that can get us to veer away

from self care. And this is where I celebrate adaptive

sports and recreation, because folks who are wheelchair users

need us to participate with them, and we need them to

participate with us. Because fact of the matter is, is I've

gotten more activity. Thank you, people with disabilities.

Because what would I do at these events? Is I'd set out to do

activity that I wouldn't do if it wasn't for, you know, that it

was inspired from them, you know. So I do more skiing

because we're going out to do water skiing with our friends

with disabilities. The inclusion, you know, and that's

so important because it's so powerful to get someone who's a

wheelchair user to say if they want to come out of their

wheelchair, that we create a life that that happens, not that

oh too bad you're a wheelchair user you got to wake up go in

the wheelchair and then now some people don't mind that I don't

want to say if somebody does that like oh shame on them but

it's. People appreciate being able to get out of their

wheelchair and go into something like a sit ski, or do skydiving,

or do downhill snow skiing, or you know go on hiking trails

because of action track chairs. It's still sitting, but it's

still getting out into nature in a way that's invigorating, and

it's a little bit more of you know going over branches and

stuff that you know is more active than strolling around the

house on their everyday wheelchairs. So, so this is

something that that I guess is kind of something that I

benefited from, and it's something that I didn't suspect

in my 20s and 30s and my childhood and so forth. So I

guess that's what I can leave people that that can be a daily

benefit, like that blog that the lives of people with

disabilities are every day, and experience how if you're someone

with a disability, to not be bashful to grab folks like me

and say, come on into my life. You're going to be better for

it. And then those who don't identify with a disability come

into the disability community because we're all going to be

better for it. Just like with the Americans with Disabilities

Act, or you know, in any country you can name, when we do these

things that bring us together, we're all better for it.

I really love that. So it's like actively

interacting with other people, whether you're the disabled

person or the non-disabled person, to to get past that

barrier that people get in their mind about that. So it's like I

imagine how it'd be easy for someone who's disabled to get

into this place of not connecting, not choosing to be

active, and so like you're talking about engaging in the

the more physical activities and finding ways to do that, and

then I know for me as a you know a normally abled person, there

can be this this barrier in my mind that I don't cross because

of the discomfort, and so for you know, all of us to just be

more aware of this, and when there's an opportunity to

actually like make that connection, such a valuable

thing. And then, of course, you gave lots of practical, you

know, just general health, like water, sleep, perfusion. to have

your body and your brain work as well as possible.

Yeah, because as I sit here, I can, you know, move

my arms, you know, wiggle my fingers, you know, all that. It

seems, you know, maybe silly to worry about it to that extent.

But if we go through the day, you know, flexing your toes or

you know whatever your mobility can be, you know, you see some

people moving their neck, and it's kind of like, oh, that

person obviously has neck issues, whatever. But even if

you don't have neck issues, it's good to stay limber and you know

let the muscles and everything move a little bit than to be so

petrified and you know so lacking movement to be so

sedentary, you know, because that works against us, you know,

and we're doing that. And in terms of interaction with

others, I call it, you know, mastery of invitation because

it's about matching, you know. So when it's a good match, a

good fit, so you assertively invite and welcome and give a

sense of belonging when it does happen, so you attract it. But

we don't want to force, you know, a mismatch, you know,

because the cry of people with disabilities is nothing about us

without us, and self determination, and you know, so

you want to just make sure that it's the other person's idea

that they match you in the interests of doing this, that,

or the other thing, you know. Because I talked to a gentleman

at a transition fair, and I could tell the water skiing. I

could tell it was kind of like okay, couldn't wait until I was

done talking about the water skiing. So I'm like, all right,

I'm getting your your your nonverbal cues here that you're

not as interested in water. I'm like, what is your interest? And

he said, well, as an example, maybe something more like chess.

I'm like, there you go. We're at a park. We're outdoors. We're by

a lake. You know, I'm with a bunch of people doing adaptive

water skiing, but it's not like if 20 people show up, they're

all out on the water at the same time. There's people waiting

their turn, and the waiting is long enough that you could

probably get in a chess game with them before they actually,

you know, are going out on the sit ski. So what about that? You

come out to our events, enjoy the park, enjoy the outdoors.

Socialize with people, and you're there with a chessboard,

and we'll have somebody roll up and you know do the chess thing

with you, and you know we'll we'll come have them come away

from the chess game if they're their turn to ski and whatever.

But that adds to the event because you're there playing

chess with us. How about that? You know, and that became more

of a conversation.

I love that the energy of invitation.

Yeah,

just connect and engage and put out there and and

be involved, be engaged. I love it.

Yeah, and so Sandra, I got a question for you

with the chronic pain community and the realm of people with

disabilities. When you talk about an invitation, I've had to

be taught that it sounds great to make plans to have an

invitation, RSVPS, but it's so easy that someone coming up to

needing to prepare or do the logistics of getting there, you

know, that it's just not in the cards because medically

speaking, physically speaking, do you hear that a lot with the

traumatic brain injury experience? That unfortunately

people just need to stay home and take care of themselves

rather than go and do that fun sounding activity.

It's certainly a factor. So it's like some people

can't leave their home because they can't walk, or you know, I

have somebody who used to stay at home in the dark all the time

because the light was too bright, and she never went

outside. So yes, there's there's certainly elements of isolation

that come about through that, and then there's also aspects

of, you know, people just not speaking with people about where

they are and what's happening. And you know, one of my clients

said, you know, she never talked to anybody about her brain

injury because nobody understood, and so she just

stopped speaking about it, and Willie really withdrew. And now

that she is doing better, she's her life is opening up. How

she's thinking about herself is changing, and she's out doing

social things. You know, she started to go to like the

symphony, and you know things that used to get kind of get

like put away as being not available. And so, world can

open up. And part of it is it's it's a mental emotional shift.

So it's like sometimes it means reaching out when maybe it

doesn't feel quite comfortable, but allowing yourself to to go

beyond that self-imposed barrier. So I want you to share

about something you have that makes it easy for people to

participate in a fun way that's also beneficial for people's

health. So tell us about that.

Okay. Well, I'm listening you, and I think

you're kind of leading me into the shakedown. Is that right?

Okay. See that traumatic brain injury stuff kind of has me a

little foggy in here. I had to make sure here. So, but in any

case, the shakedown, you know, started as the 12 o'clock

shakedown, and when we say 1212 o'clock, that's out of Central

Time, because the creator of the shakedown is out of Madison,

Wisconsin. He's a gentleman who lives with MS, very active with

the MS Society, multiple sclerosis, and the idea of what

happened was is he's a guy who does drum circles. He's a

drummer, and you know, so that's what would keep him active: is

getting out of the apartment or the house and going out there

and serving all these groups, schools, whatever, in the valley

of a drum circle, and all these programs that can surface around

that, you know. So maybe the traumatic brain injury community

is benefiting from drum circles. I'm not sure, but you know. So,

but what he noticed during COVID time, you know, so March and

April of 2020 is not going out there and doing the activity of

the drum circles, and you know, you know the work of getting the

drums into the space. You know that movement was something that

you know helped control the affects of MS, and when it was

stay safer at home, the you know the sedentation. He noticed the

repercussion in his MS condition, so he knew he needed

to do something. And you know he's a well-studied person, so

he knew it needed to be a very doable goal. And so we hear from

you know health. Professionals, fitness professionals, that you

know how 15 minutes can make like a big difference. A

15-minute daily regimen. So he's like, all right, he's going to

do this thing, ergo to his drama circles, and you know, a

shakedown because of shaking. Because he'd do that in the

drama circles that some people did the percussion of the

drumming, and some did the percussion of shaking with

shakers, so he went into it that way. And so he DJ music, he get

the music going, and he would DJ so, and then lead the shakedown.

15 minutes of music and motion, and then so now it got it's

gotten to be far enough past COVID that that you know staying

safer at home is no longer necessary. So he's out and about

again, and so the shakedown for him actually now is is obsolete.

You know because with MS you actually do have to limit. You

can't do too much, or now you lost the benefit. Now you're

going to your detriment. So he's in that space. So my wife Sue

has taken over the 12 o'clock shakedown, but you know it's 12

o'clock Central Time. So I more just call it the shakedown, and

then deal with the time zone thing. 1o'clock Eastern, you

know, whatever. Everybody's welcome to come on Zoom, and we

also have a Facebook page that describes all this.

Facebook.com/slash/12oclockshakedown. It's the words, the characters,

all spelled out. So it's a long URL.

Facebook.com/slash/12oclockshakedown. All the words typed out, and

then you can see the history to this, all the Facebook activity

since 2020 when the page got started, and all of our Facebook

lives, and so some people, if they can't make the time, they

just go on at the time that they can, and they plug in, and then

you've got an archive of six years over six years worth of so

it's over 2000 videos by this point, you know, of doing it

every day, and so part of the journey has been. He told us a

lot four years ago, where doing this with us it'd be a lot of

ahead of the time of the shakedown. He'd be like, "Oh my

gosh, I so do not want to do it. I do not want to do it." But he

does it out of the commitment to us, and then he gets going, and

he's like less than a minute into it. He's so glad that we're

doing it, and it's every day. And that at that moment he was

doing it. It's just you know he had a saying for it.

It's like motivate or you know motivation follows action, and

it was something like that that you may not feel motivated to

it, but when you just do the act, when you do the action,

that motivation just feeds into it. That there's that little bit

of muscle memory and you know theological memory that you just

kind of like, oh yeah, just like yesterday. Okay, let's let's go.

15 minutes, you know, goes by quick enough, and you know,

looking forward to the next day supposedly, and you know that

ritual. So, so we have that that everybody is welcome to, and so

folks can contact us. Can see some of it right here on the

YouTube channel as well. Actually, we have some shakedown

videos shared there. YouTube.com/addabilitynetwork

and. so if we can be part of that minimal, it's not an

end-all cure-all. It's not an all-in-out fitness program. So

we recommend that you think of more activity than to just do

shakedown and that's it. But at least it can get you going and

have a little minimal thing to subside your sedentation. You

know how sedentary you are.

Sounds wonderful. Being

a computer guy, I need that. Yeah,

and it it connects you with other people. If you're

able to participate at the actual time, then you can do it

with other people, which would be really fun.

Yeah, we do it every day. So if people, if we

don't see people for a year, I'm like, well, you gave me 365

reasons you don't want to be around me. You know, it's like

really 365 days you cannot come in any of those days at that

time. I'm like, I think I know enough about life that I'll just

take the hint. You know, which is fine. You know, you know, and

and I I think I shock people like my friends when when

they're people who have never joined me even after six years

you know I'm like geez you gave me 2000 reasons why you don't

want to be with me at that time I'm like okay message sent

message received you know so we have fun with

yeah so I have a different kind of a question so

if you have a vision for where things are going in the world,

where you want them to go, your your picture of what you're

putting out there that you're working towards in the future,

what's happening, and what are you doing?

Well, I'm a big collective impact guy, so as

soon as I use the word collective impact, you know,

let's make sure we follow how I'm using the phrase. You know,

so in government, they've created for decades this idea of

private-public partnership because of the unmet needs thing

that government knows you need to work with the private sector

because government, you know, is not so well funded. It'll take

care of everything, you know. So, but then with that,

collective impact is born. So, if you go to Wikipedia or Google

it or go to your AI, what is collective impact? I mean, it's

a science. It's an expertise. There are experts of collective

impact, and as much as that expertise is out there. I feel

the urge and the need, and I practice saying I require six

components of collective impact. So I talk about the faith

spaces, the service sector like volunteering with nonprofits,

the educational field like universities and K 12, whatever,

the government work obviously got to figure out to plug it

into what government is doing. Let's not try to change what

government is doing unless you are in legislative advocacy.

That's fine, but navigating all that and then the business

community professionals, like with being a disability ally,

inclusive hiring. You know, a lot of people are, or three out

of four professionals don't understand inclusive hiring, and

I've known that for you know 30 years in my professional life,

and you know so I've changed there. And then all the fun

things, you know, it's fun gets done. So again, it's like a six

cylinder engine, you know, and that fun thing is the thumbs up.

So you got the Give Me Five program with the thumbs up, and

it all fits together. The six fix, you know. So again, you

know, faith, service, education, government, the business

community, and all the fun things, which is hobbies,

pastime, leisure activities, travel, you know, arts, you

know, painting, music, you know, sports, recreation. When you say

you work to live, you know Sandra, what's living it to you?

And to me, I feel that's that affinity that you have, that

energetic devotion and commitment you have, is where we

maximize, you know, our team, our human family, a family

member of the human family, 8.3 billionness around the world,

and I talk about the six aspects because to really be able to

help a person be the best version of themselves, we we

look at what people want to share or not. Like if people

don't want to talk about their faith journey, we'll just check

it off that we understand that that's a private thing for them.

They're fine, you know. Go on to the other aspects, you know. But

that, to me, as an EMT, I was taught sample signs, symptoms,

allergies, medication, past pertinent medical history, last

oral intake, events. You know, I've in critical thinking, I've

been taught to do a little bit of a curiosity dialog, you know,

high yielding questions, and you know, form an understanding

first, like consultants do. Consultants sit at a table with

a business person and say, "This is how I understand your

situation for an agreement that that is status quo. This is what

I propose, and this is what I can tell you what happened. This

would be the why you would come with me in my program, you know,

my product, my service, and that this would be an improvement for

your business. And when you clearly communicate that, that

matches the decision maker's perspective. That's where you

form that, you know, contractual agreement, and you've got a

business deal, and you go and do it. Same thing in life. Life

works that same way in mutual agreement, mutual benefit,

reciprocity, interdependence, and that holistic thing. So a

lot of people love the mastermind concept. And to me,

when Napoleon Hill taught us about the mastermind concept, to

me that's how I absorbed it. I said Napoleon Hill is telling me

that yeah, this is how to have a great mastermind relationship

because when you under when you build a relationship and you're

so intimate that you know all of those aspects of the other

person and people, now you can really take into consideration,

you know, at least some initial respect to their best interests,

and when you can do that, it's just so great.

So I think that's a little bit of what we're missing out in

villages, neighborhoods, communities, you know, regions,

and our national business and our international business. I

feel if we can get 8.3 billion people, kind of having a more

holistic and complete look at the business we have with the

other 8.3 billion people, I just think a lot of this, you know,

this notion of being different or. You know, or contrasting, or

concerning, or conflict. I think a lot of that melts away when we

can do that. You know, kind of with unbiased pathways. That's a

little jargon I've created because I feel that that's my

headline of how I sum up the culture, custom, genetic memory.

Is it has put me on bias pathways, and I subscribe to the

bias. I practice the bias. I subject to other people to my

bias, and it's it's obviously still with me. I mean, I

suppress it pretty darn good, like 90 some percent of the way,

but it sneaks into what I say, and that's where this constant

interaction pays off because I can keep tweaking and keep

recognizing, like, oh, that was a little bit of my bias, you

know, kind of coming out again. So then I can adjust and you

know practice this art form to be as favorable to the other

person as possible.

Wonderful message. Basically, connect with people

and be well-rounded. All of these aspects of life, because

that's what makes life most full and available. Thank you, Kurt.

So, how to connect with Kurt and Project Die Hard are going to be

in the show notes, including how to access the shakedowns that he

shared with us. Thank you, Kurt, and thank you for watching Brain

Health and Healing.

Thanks, Sandra. Thank you to all of you out

there.

I really appreciate Kurt's message about

participation, Invitation to actually engage with other

people, to engage an activity, to not just like you know slink

back into the normal of not living life fully. So for you,

what would be an action that you can take that gets you more

engaged? Interacting with people, going outside and being

more active yourself, even if it's just being more active. If

you're you're sitting in front of a computer, being more active

physically, in addition to the things I always talk about, you

know, so just drinking water, breathing, sleeping, all those

things, but just engaging more, including in relationships, in

community, interacting more with other people and the world, so

much value in that, and I love the idea of these shakedowns

that are available every day with Kurt and his community. So

go to the show notes and check that out. I will. put it all

into the show notes for you, and then go to the Facebook group,

Brain Health and Healing Facebook group, and comment.

Tell me what was valuable for you. What's interesting? What

are you going to incorporate into your life? And comment on

the show. Please rate the show, comment, and share it with other

people so that more people see these messages. And if you or

someone you know has had an accident or fall or a stroke, I

would love to talk with you. And you can contact me for a share

your story call. It's a 10 minute call. It's not a sales

call. Just an opportunity to share your message with me.

Share your experience. Be heard instead of isolating away or

holding back and like not living life fully. Engage. Connect with

me. I look forward to hearing from you, and just give me

comments so that I know that you've listened. If you have

questions, I'd love to answer them. Thank you for being here

for brain health and healing. See you next time, and imagine

what's possible when you engage fully in life, and your brain

heals itself every day.