Breathwork Magic
Welcome to Breathwork Magic, a podcast dedicated to exploring the life-changing power of Breathwork. Discover how conscious breathing can unlock inner peace, resilience, and clarity as we dive into inspiring stories and practical insights. Whether you’re new to Breathwork or looking to deepen your practice, each episode offers wisdom to help you connect more fully with yourself and the world around you. Everything starts and ends with the breath.
Breathwork Magic
Breathe Through the Chaos: Taming Your Thousand Elephants with Manal El-Ramly
What if the breath isn’t just a tool but the gateway to your truest self?
In this expansive episode of Breathwork Magic, Amanda Russo welcomes Manal, the founder of Maintain and a transformational guide in emotional healing and spiritual alignment. Together, they dive into a rich, inspiring dialogue about the breath as our most powerful access point to presence, peace, and personal growth.
Manal shares how Breathwork shifted from a practice to a way of being—and how it helped her access emotional clarity, spiritual alignment, and ease in the body. She introduces the Butterfly Breath, a fast-acting technique that instantly quiets the mind and calms the senses, and reveals how our relationship with breath reflects our willingness to surrender, grow, and truly be. This is an episode for anyone feeling disconnected from their body, mind, or purpose and ready to awaken to what’s already within.
🔹 Episode Highlights
[2:59] – The moment we’re born, we breathe ~ Manal reflects on the sacredness of that first inhale
[5:38] – The story behind “Maintain” and how her brand reflects inner attainment
[9:02] – Exploring the four-body model: physical, emotional, mental, and egoic
[16:34] – A live walkthrough of the Butterfly Breath technique for instant calm and clarity
[23:00] – How breathwork supports her cold plunges, acupuncture, and everyday awareness
[25:56] – What to say when someone claims they “don’t have time” to breathe
[33:03] – Confronting resistance, emotional buildup, and the metaphor of 1,000 elephants
[38:39] – Why some people avoid personal growth and what grumpy old men can teach us
[44:20] – Manal’s manifestation formula: know it, trust it, feel it, be it
🔹 Connect with Amanda Russo, The Breathing Goddess:
~ Sign Up for Virtual Mindful Mindset Mondays HERE
~ Book a 1:1 Breathwork Session HERE
~ Instagram: @thebreathinggoddess
🔹 Connect with Manal:
Manal's Website https://www.mattain.me/
Welcome to Breathwork Magic, the podcast that explores the life-changing power of your breath. Breathwork isn't just a practice. It's a gateway to healing, transformation and shifting to a new mindset, by letting go of the past and embracing the possibilities of the present moment. And embracing the possibilities of the present moment. I'm Amanda Russo, your host, a certified breathwork facilitator, level two Reiki practitioner and creator of the Mander's Mindset Podcast. On my own journey, breathwork has been a powerful tool for releasing what no longer serves me and shifting my perspective to step into my fullest and greatest potential.
Speaker 1:Each week, I'm joined by inspiring guests, blood work facilitators, healers and wellness enthusiasts who share how this practice has helped them and their clients heal, grow and embrace lasting change. So take a deep breath in and out, settle in and let's explore the magic of your breath together. The transformation starts now. Welcome to Breathwork Magic, where we explore the life-changing power of your breath. I am so excited to be joined today with Manal, and she is going to help us discover our innate power of the breath. Thank you so much for joining me.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's my pleasure, and your voice is so beautiful.
Speaker 1:Thank you, Thank you. Now I'd love to know when you first discovered the power of Oprah to know when you first discovered the power of Oprah?
Speaker 2:Wow, that's a really big question. I know, amanda, you're blowing me away. I get all these like complex questions all the time and like all these things that challenge my intellect, but this question is by far the hardest question I've got. I'm going red. I mean, I've always known we breathe and you're right, I don't even know when I moved from unconscious awareness of the breath to the conscious awareness of its power, because we're breathing from day one. I mean, what do they do? When we're born, when we come out of our mom's wombs, they're like, I don't think they blow in our faces, but they'll do something. They want us to cry, and that shows that we're able to take our first breath and breathe and live separate from our moms.
Speaker 2:And then I just talked about blowing my, my children's father. Would you teach them to swim? And he would like blow in their faces and they would instantly, like, instinctively, take in a breath and he'd put them underwater and then bring them back up. That's how he exposed them to love of the water, and so that's a conscious awareness of helping somebody take in their breath so they could learn. But when did I learn? I don't want to be so shallow and say when I started to learn about pranayama, but I think my awareness of breath is more recent than a lot of the podcasts. I'll be like I've always been an inquirer, I've always been a seeker, I've always been a student of life, but my awareness of the power of the breath has been very recent oh, I'm so embarrassed, I don't know five, six, seven years. And I would say it's through yoga and through pranayama and through different modalities where I realized that we're breathing unconsciously and when we consciously stop to breathe, then we can stop our thoughts, our misbeliefs, our emotions and get present in our body.
Speaker 1:You did answer my question and you can answer it however you want to answer it.
Speaker 2:So the answer is it's a more recent awareness in my spiritual growth and I'm embarrassed because the profound nature of our breath and our ability to come still and become aware and become present is unparalleled, amounted to any other. Any other tool like our breath is our most innate, natural, organic way that we can use to become present. And I have all these fancy tools and all these different steps, I have my five, four, three, two, one framework, but the breath is just the essence, the core, the catalyst, the purest nucleus of presence I don't think it's bad.
Speaker 1:Oh that you need to be embarrassed about, like it's a recent discovery. You know, like we are all always learning, evolving and growing. Like we're in 2025, right now. Just five years ago, in 2020, I wasn't even meditating to give you reference. So we're always changing and evolving. Now I call myself the breathing goddess.
Speaker 2:Like maintain is what I'm about. Maintain and my name, manal, and it means attainment in Egyptian. My parents are Egyptian, I'm a purebred, and so Manal means attainment, and so when I had to figure out my company, I knew from Steve Jobs that you pick something that's well. Steve Jobs picked Apple, which is a word we all know. But I knew from branding is that you pick something that's very unique and that nobody else will really replicate. You pick something that's very unique and that nobody else will really replicate. So I took the attain from attainment and put the M for Manal and got maintain.
Speaker 2:It's about attaining the life that you desire, and maintain is all about recognizing that we're here in this human journey to grow, to learn, to expand. We're here for expansion and the breath. Coming back to the breath, because it's all about the breath, the breath is the first thing that we take when we enter this human journey and it's the last thing that we are human, celebrating that we are here on this journey and the things that we can't control, because we're all looking for control is life and death, and breath is a representation of this life and this death. So I'm embarrassed because, like I said and I shouldn't be embarrassed, but it's cute. Okay, it's cute, and I'm embarrassed because, like I said, and I shouldn't be embarrassed, but it's cute, okay, it's cute, and I'm embarrassed because you're like when are you aware? I'm like oh my god, I can't give you something wise and interesting, I can't give you like oh, this was my wise moment. I'm like oh my god.
Speaker 1:I love that though, you know, I feel like that's so relatable to everybody, like I feel like a lot of people started becoming more consciously aware, whether it was through meditating, whether it was through breathwork, like during COVID, post COVID. Like that changed a lot for everybody, you know, and times were stressful and yeah, it's not a bad thing, you know, pre and post COVID everybody talks about, like that, you started tapping in more consciously. You know it's just reality, but it's. You're growing, you're evolving, that's great.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, yes, and I've always seen the breath as a tool, but it's far beyond that and your question exposed it to me it's actually. The breath is life. The breath is the essence of life and we're always unconsciously taking it in and releasing it. And when we consciously do it, it allows us to be, to be, and that's what I believe that we're here to master the master of being Married to doing, married to doing, because the action and doing is part of the pleasure of life, but the being is the presence. And when we master the balance of being and doing, I believe that's where we're really at ease and flow, happy, allowing, satisfied, appreciative in abundance whatever other adjective you want me to throw in there.
Speaker 1:Now I'm curious when did you discover breathwork?
Speaker 2:Okay, when did I discover breath work? That was a specific question. I would say that it was in pranayama with my yoga teacher, and my yoga teacher is a real yogi and he's from India and he's teaching us the essence of what it is to perform yoga and the elements of it, and he goes back into the, the vidas and all of this such. So breath work was from him and he taught us different breathing techniques and through these different breathing techniques, I realized that it I'm all about energy. Okay, so I'm going to rewind a bit. I'm all about energy and finding alignment and ease'm going to rewind a bit. I'm all about energy and finding alignment and ease in your body.
Speaker 2:I see that we have four bodies the physical, the emotional, the mental and the egoic. The physical is where we feel physical sensations. The emotional is where we express our emotions. We have our primary core of emotion sadness, anger, frustration. We have our mental body, which is where we have our thoughts and we blame our mind, but our mind is actually processing for our physical body. If we hurt something, then our mind feels it. If we feel emotion, our mind feels it. So we're blaming our mind, but I'm like hello, the mind is just a communicator. Are you listening to the communicator?
Speaker 2:And then the fourth body is the egoic body, which is ultimately where we hold our beliefs and our identity and we want to get to a non-resistant egoic body, as I am. So I found that the different techniques whatever it might be, the square I'm doing, the butterfly, whatever it might be, the cleansing breath they helped clean the different bodies and that there was physical ease and an emotional softening and the mind can get as close to empty as possible, because I don't think it ever can be. And just there was just this sense of connection to greater. So I keep answering your questions with so many words, but it is a podcast. But I learned it through my yoga teacher, probably seven, eight years ago was pre COVID, so seven, eight years ago. So I learned about breath and the power of breath work probably around the same time and I would say breath work first and power of the breath would be later.
Speaker 1:Now I'm curious have you done breath work outside of like a yoga class, like just breath work?
Speaker 2:A pranayama class which is focusing just on breath and different breathing techniques.
Speaker 1:Was that like a once in a while thing? Did you have any consistency to that? There was consistency, no judgment. I'm just. I don't want to be like if you what you might have maintained or attained from that.
Speaker 2:It's a really good question. The breath work is the easiest to be lazy on With my yogi. In every class there's yoga, meditation and pranayama and so there's an understanding that you can't do one without the other. So they're all connected. And so when I did my yoga class intensives and then maintained it, there is an element of meditation and pranayama in it. Then I did my meditation intensives with my same yogi and then that was a intensive in the breathing and then adding the yoga and the meditation as the subtopic, not the major topic.
Speaker 2:And I would say I've continued my yoga on a daily basis, my yoga on a daily basis and meditation on a daily practice. And the breathing is where I have to be more purposeful in it. I use breathing as a technique and a tool every day, so I will be aware of my breath and I'll group. So I guess I'm answering yes and no. It's not part of my cause. You can't do yoga all day. Like all of a sudden I turn around and I'm answering yes and no. It's not part of my, because you can't do yoga all day. Like all of a sudden I turn around, I'm gonna do sun salutation or cat dog in the middle of the street because I mean you, but who's stopping you?
Speaker 2:you're right, I do stretch at times, but my yoga is for my spinal health because I know, as I age, I I want to be strong. It is for my strength, it's my agility, it's for my physical capability and my meditation is for the same thing. We have the luxury of drawing on my breath any time of the day, so I do have purposeful times that I'm breathing, but it's not like my yoga and my meditation, where I carve it out Right, because I can be somewhere and realize, oh, connecting to my breath right now is absolutely powerful and it will get me present. And I'm not present now. And then I'll do my square, breathing, perhaps three in, hold it, three out, hold it and do it for about 30 seconds and realize that the mind that was thinking about what we're going to do for dinner and or did I put my laundry in the dryer, which I probably hadn't has stopped and is now allowing me to see the beauty of the green. I can see the bird and I'm like, oh, my god, was that bird really here 30 seconds ago? And I just didn't even take the time to be aware.
Speaker 2:I can feel that my heart might be at ease or at tense, or what my body is. So, yes, I use my breath work every day, but I don't use it as a deliberate practice, like I do my yoga or my meditation, because it's integrated into my. It's almost like are you aware of what you eat every day? Yes, I eat every day and I'm aware of what I'm eating for breakfast, lunch and dinner and my snacks but it's something I have to do every day, so I will consciously become aware of my breath multiple times of the day, with the explicit intention to become present and to allow myself be at one with my body. How's that answer, amanda, because these are tough questions.
Speaker 1:How are they tough?
Speaker 2:questions, because I don't think I'm your typical breath work podcast interviewee but breath is so and I appreciated that you're like this is about breath work and everybody in here is curious about breath work and we're going to focus on breathwork and I'm like I admire so much that very specific niche because it's just so incredibly powerful. We talked about it. It's life. At death it's life, and so my answers are more philosophical than applicative and it's more integrated into who I am and how I approach a aligned life versus a tool, even though I keep saying it's a tool. So I am a bit inconsistent, right there.
Speaker 1:I get it Now. I'm curious, this pranayama breathing that you were doing. You were doing it pretty consistently. Do you remember like what it helped you shift within your life?
Speaker 2:one of my favorites is the butterfly, and we put our fingers on all of our different senses. So I have my thumbs on my ear, I have my index fingers on my eye, I have my middle finger on my nose, I have my fourth finger and pinky around my mouth, and then there's a buzzing that we get from our internal, that we go for, and through that buzzing I've turned off all of my senses, or my senses is now vibrating and there's a sense of clarity and ease. I don't know if I did it too quickly and you and the listeners were able to catch it, but it instantaneously gets that mind to stop and all of the senses really present with a singular intent vibration that was very cool.
Speaker 1:I have never seen or heard of or done that. Can you do that a little slower with the fingers?
Speaker 2:so our thumb on our ears are, yeah, so sort of like on the tip of the earlobes, the index on the eye, so sort of lightly on the eye, the middle finger on the nostrils, and then you put your fourth finger on top of your lip and the pinky goes comfortably underneath your mouth and then we're gonna, we're gonna take a deep breath in and then just sort of from our, from our neck area, we're just gonna get like we're gonna do a buzzing sound. It's gonna be then another, because we're not gonna be able to say let's do it three more times, take another, it should be five, let's take two more, take another deep breath in and sort of again that sort of another deep breath in. Is that good, or should we take two more? Wow, did you get a sense of presence, clarity, so almost like we're turning off the senses from the external and we're aligning to the internal, and so it's just almost a resetting, like a sense of of peace. Do you have a sense of peace?
Speaker 1:that's come over. Yeah, that was cool because it it covered all the senses. So you're not seeing, you're not, you're not smell, you're not any of the above. I like that. Now, where did you learn that? Was that in pranayama? Yes, in pranayama, with my yoga teacher. Wow, I like that, and that's something that you could do. Really. I was going to say anywhere, but not necessarily if you're driving down the road, but realistically, you could do that in the street even though you're not doing your son salutations in the street.
Speaker 2:Well, square box, like a box breathing, sort of taking a deep breath in on the count of three, holding it on three, releasing on three, holding on three, something you can do while driving on the street, wherever it might be, and again, it's not as powerful as sort of closing off your senses to the external world, but it's still just amazing. Reset.
Speaker 2:Would you say that one is your favorite. Yes, it is. It is my favorite because it's so fast and then I don't know if I clearly said that you're supposed to be doing that like this sound and it's at high frequency that vibrates in the fingers and just sort of helps it. But yes, it was always one of my favorite because so impactful, like so impactful, just very concentrated dose of be get here now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm, I'm big on that. We don't got time to waste. Like the, the breathwork modality that I facilitate is breathwork detox and one of the things is like it's fast acting results. You know what I mean. Like it's laying down, so it's not something that you can necessarily do like driving down the street, but like I like the quick results, like you might change your life after one session. And people are like I don't know about that and then they see they do it and they're like, oh shit, you know what I mean. We want this instant gratification. So I think that's another reason I really liked the butterfly thing, because I wasn't thinking about nothing and it was instant and you know what I love too, amanda, about the breath.
Speaker 2:It's like everybody might be doing breath work every day without even realizing it was breath work. That's why I was embarrassed about the answer. So that's why I was embarrassed, because when you go for a run and you go out there and you sprint and you get out of breath, all of a sudden you're breathing at an atypical rhythm and it's slowing down your brain and it's making you present. So, whether that's whether you're swimming, you're running or whatever form of exercise that you're doing, that your breath is moving out of its typical range, which is then causing you so you're probably doing breath work all the time in your day-to-day activity and the power then becomes in becoming aware of it. So if you realize, when you're running and then start to tap in to your breath boom presence because you'll find that it's breathing heavier and then, when you go into heavier, you'll feel the heart and you'll feel different manifestations of your body.
Speaker 2:I've been cold plunging a lot lately because I've been reading about the benefits of it health benefits and acupuncture, and acupuncture, again for the health benefits Before I get pricked. My acupuncture, dr Ping, I absolutely adore. So I'm now talking about Sivashji. Now, dr Ping. What does he say to me? Take a deep breath in and then he says release. And during my release, boom, he puts in the needle. Why? So I won't feel it. So in there there's a natural pain deterrent Taking the breath, put in the needle and then cold plunging.
Speaker 2:It's cold. I'm still at 60 degrees. I haven't gone down to 50, 40, or 30. I'm still like a wuss at 60, but 60 is really still cold. 60 degrees, it's cold. Get in with my two feet. I take a deep breath in, just like I do with my needle, put my whole body in and while I'm putting my body and I actually don't feel the coldness racing all in my body because during that period that I'd have those sensations I'm exhaling. It's just so powerful. So our breath is a tool that we can use and connect with during 24-7. At night, when I'm going to bed, the countdown from 100 to whatever it might be, but part of that is like counting and becoming aware of my breath and my body and its movement. So we're doing it all the time and we have the power to use it to enhance our awareness of our physical reality all the time.
Speaker 1:It's so true, you know, and I like how you mentioned taking a breath in, like it allows us to have that pause, whether it's before the needle, whether it's before. I think it's even helpful before you make a decision, before a lot of things. You know, so many people think that they are actively breathing, but they're holding their breath sitting at their computer and they don't even realize it, you know, I mean.
Speaker 2:I love that you said that, because I'm a coach and I'm on insight timer and I do a lot of fun things with people and I notice sometimes I'll say to whoever I'm coaching, take a deep breath in, and they go, like I said, take a deep breath in and I might get like a and I'm like no, no, I want to see your whole body Take a whole breath in, like and release. Let your whole body be actively engaged in this. Beautiful Amanda. I want to say lovemaking, like this amazing connection with self and the universe, like I remember reading somewhere that the air is sacred and every breath that you take, if you can realize how it's infused with love and beauty and abundance and ease and flow and all of these things that we're looking to manifest and we realize we're breathing it in. So just become aware of the breath and allow the infusion of abundance.
Speaker 1:I'm curious what you would say if somebody said that they don't really have the time to be aware of their breath. They have so much stuff to do. We don't need to think about that because we already just breathe.
Speaker 2:Okay, it's an interesting question. I actually also realize now. Again, I said I'm an insight timer. I start all my meditations with a breath, with breathing, three breaths, and I end it with three breaths and I actually imagine energy and it goes. It's combined with breath. So actually infused in my work, in ways that I'm not even conscious of, is the breath.
Speaker 2:But if someone says I don't have time for breathing, I'll say, well, no, I would laugh because that's how I deal with everything. I would laugh and I would say, well, I'm glad you breathe because it means you're alive, and then I would say that your breath is your connection to life and breathing unconsciously is fantastic because it means you're alive. But there is such a power in awareness. Awareness is the first step to everything. I wrote the book Transcending Anxiety from Fear to Freedom and I have my five-step process that I mentioned before, and step one is awareness. The basic tool to this awareness is the breath. So I would say to the person I am so glad you are breathing and if you weren't breathing, we wouldn't even be here together having this conversation and I would just invite you to explore it was just so funny because he was like I have to think about making a living, I don't have to think about breathing, and I did not know what to say.
Speaker 2:Probably in that moment I would not have known what to say and would have laughed.
Speaker 1:And I was just like I get it. Well, I would ask him.
Speaker 2:If I would ask, I would ask if he's aware, like if he's self-aware, like I would just ask in general, like, like I know that you're doing, that you're living, but what's your level of self-awareness and what's your relationship with being? It would be a question. I'd turn it around and do it in a form of inquiry and then when he said, oh, you know. And then if he doesn't answer that question, I'll then ask about emotional intelligence or emotional awareness or mindfulness. So I'll ask some of these keywords and when he finally says yes to one of them, because you're not going to want to say that you're emotionally intelligent, you're not going to want to say I'll say, oh, my God, that's amazing. That requires awareness. So I'll make the bridge between what they are in awareness, and then I would make the bridge between awareness and the breath and I'll say one of the most powerful ways to get into awareness is through our breath. And so I would just sort of like ABC with him.
Speaker 1:That makes a lot of sense and I love how. Step one is awareness. Step one is awareness. Awareness is key for everything. Like, no matter what you want to do, if you want to change something, if you want to start something, like if you're not aware you can't make a change, you can't make a shift. You know you can't. If it's not in your awareness, you can't do anything with it. You know you can't. If it's not in your awareness, you can't do anything with it.
Speaker 2:You know, you're not even aware, you can't even hear the truth that somebody else is telling you. Is your intention awareness? Are you looking for growth and expansion? And if the answer is no, then no matter what you or I or anybody would say about the breath and the power of awareness and all these things, it would be mute because his ego, his personality, his lack of desire for growth and expansion wouldn't even allow him to connect with the words that we're saying.
Speaker 1:That's true.
Speaker 2:I can tell you why Because I work with people, because it hurts, because they're not. Your face is like oh, amanda can relate. I mean, we all can relate. It hurts. I teach again, I teach energy, I teach emotions, I teach working through resistance. I will teach anxiety, I teach alignment, I teach all the things we're talking about.
Speaker 2:And the reason that people don't want to do is because it hurts. And what hurts isn't the sadness, it's not the anger, it's not the anger, it's not the fear, it's not our physical bodies, it's our resistance to it. So what hurts when someone's sad isn't that they're sad. Actually, feeling sad is nice, because that's why we have sad movies. Why would we have all these melodramatic movies so people can cry, if feeling sad wasn't nice? It's just, nobody wants to feel their sadness. So we resist our own sadness, and that's where the pain is.
Speaker 2:And then awareness is opening the door to it. And if we've been suppressing it, it's almost like we have a thousand elephants that want to come through the door. And so if I've been opening the door every time, an elephant it's so funny I'm talking about elephants because of the elephant in the room. So I wonder if it was a conscious analogy. But if one elephant knocks on the door and I let it in, it's like, oh, come on in, elephant, and I awareness. And then a second elephant comes, but come on in awareness. But then if I've been suppressing my elephants and there's a thousand elephants, I open that door, boom, they're going to overwhelm me and it's just going to take me down. And so people who haven't been doing their work I call it play in my teaching their work they're going to feel like it's hard, it's overwhelming, it's going to knock them down. And you need to I don't like the word need, but that it will require a certain sort of like trepidation, tiptoeing, to gently open the door and say I see you elephants, I'm going to let you in. Let's please line up one by one, single file, single file, and we'll deal with you one at a time. Come on in angry elephant and next sad elephant, and then guilty elephant and then shameful elephant, and so you have to then be able to deal with it one at a time, at a time, at a time. That's why nobody wants to be, that's no. That's why some people are averting awareness. But amanda, this is why big things happen in our life. This is why we get ill. This is why we get I'm going to say divorces. This is why we get I'm going to say divorces. This is why we struggle financial struggles, things with our children, with our partners, because this is when the universe says you know what, you don't want to get aware? Well, guess what I'm going to make you. And when people are feeling overwhelmed during these pivotal moments, that's when they're willing to get aware and start to do their again quote unquote work and start to see. Maybe I should go see a therapist, maybe I should start doing my yoga, maybe I should start becoming aware of my breath and doing my breath work. So these pivotal moments are actually gifts because they lead us to awareness. They're not bad things.
Speaker 2:I remember talking to one of my guides. Again, he was a I don't know if he was a monk, but he can't say him by a name because I can't remember his name. But I said why is this happening? Like, why is this happening to me? It's like in the midst of something that was happening to me, I'm like why? And from his wise mountain space he said yogi, I'll call him yoga. Yogi, is it yoga or yogi yoga? I'll call him yoga. Yoda, yoda, it's yoda. I'll call him yoda, amanda, I'll call him yoda, and it will be wise. It's these moments where profound growth is available and it's where you stop calibrating to the external and allowing yourself to calibrate to your internal beauty and your breath is one of the most amazing tools to access that and I'll say thank you, yoda, but it hurts so much. And Yoda will look at me with such a smile and say, well, manal, it hurts.
Speaker 2:This is now Manal's quote. This is from my book. It's the opening of my book. It's hard until it's not. It's just like a muscle. You know, I always say if I decide that I want to grow my biceps or my triceps and I go to the gym and I go 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, do I expect that all of a sudden I'll have a beautiful bicep or tricep? No, we know. It takes 6 to 8 to 12 to 24 to 36 weeks, whatever it might be, depending on where we started to get our abs or get our triceps or get our biceps. It's the same for whether it's the emotional strength that we're building, the mental resilience, the egoic beliefs, the awareness in the presence, we can't expect that we say I'm going to breathe right now and all of a sudden all of that stuff comes out. So Yoda says oh no. Manal said it wasn't Yoda, it's hard till it's not. And so Manal says to Yoda thank you, I'll go work.
Speaker 1:I love that it's hard until it's not, and I love the analogy of the muscles. It's so, it's so true, you know. I also like how you mentioned not everybody's going to put in the work. You know, like not everybody wants to be aware of those and I don't I'm not judging, I was overweight for 23 years of my life but that's why we don't have a fit culture in the United States. You know what I mean. Like there's certain things that are hard and, yes, not everybody's putting in gonna put in the loop yes, it's hard until it's not.
Speaker 2:And if we start to reframe it instead of work, it's play instead of work. It's being instead of work, it's alignment and still work. It's humaning and still work it's. You know, I believe we're our purpose, I believe we don't need to find it and look for it and search for it. We are inherently, inherently our purpose by virtue of us being a human.
Speaker 2:So when we start to recognize oh, this is my physical vessel, I always also Amanda struggled with self-image and body image, and body image more than self-image. And when I realized one day that this is the vessel that's carrying my spiritual experience, how can I not honor and love this physical vessel? This is the vessel that's carrying my spiritual experience? How can I not honor and love this physical vessel? This is the vessel that God gave me and you know sorry, sometimes I feel like my breasts are too large. That's what God gave me. So I assume it's mostly women listening to this or whether you know whether you're you're, you know whether, whatever your, your, your rear looks like, whatever your body looks like my stomach, and I realize this is the vessel that I've been given. So it's my honor, I'm not even gonna say obligation, it's my honor, it's my love, it's my luck, it's my fortune to take care of this vessel in the best way.
Speaker 2:And how do you take care of it? Through food, through water, through exercise, through sleep, through cold plunging Cold plunging has been so fantastic for me Through breath work, through yoga, through running, through being, through playing, through laughing, through happiness, through crying, through allowing, through living, through being, through crying, through allowing, through living, through being. So, yes, it's hard until it's not, and let's get to. It's not together, and we get to, not by recognizing it's an honor for us to be here as humans and to live and to laugh and to be and to explore. Like Amanda, this is amazing, like it's the first time to meet you and it's just like such an incredible conversation that we're exploring that goes so beyond the breath. But the breath is life, so it's not even beyond the breath. You actually. Your podcast is about life.
Speaker 1:Interesting. It's about life, you know it's. It's true, though. You know I'm curious. I I mentioned not everybody's going to do the work, even if you don't call it work. So in things. I saw a meme a long, long time ago and I'm probably going to butcher this, but it said something along the lines of not everyone is here to achieve everything they are looking to achieve and, as much as it sucks, they are here to show the people who are what happens if you don't put in the work, don't go after your goals, don't have awareness. I'm butchering this. It said it so much better than I am. I know the point that you're making. Do you agree with that? I'm just curious if you agree with that or not.
Speaker 2:Okay, it's something that I focus a lot on like. So it's something that I question, like you know, I go to bed and I'm questioned. I'm a seeker, I'm a seeker and I'm questioner, so it's something I do look at like why is their life like this and why is my life like this? And I try to get to the root cause of it all. And yes, there are some people that look like I almost feel sad.
Speaker 2:Okay, as people age, there's two things that happen. One is they learn that they have no control and they start, they learn that they don't have control, that control is a delusion, and they start to surrender to life Whether they're religious or spiritual, it doesn't really matter, but they surrender. And in this you could see, there's an inner peace and there's this kindness and compassion for everything that unfolds. Okay, that's one type of people. The other type of people are the people that have not surrendered and they're still fighting and they're still trapped in their ego. And it's what Ang Lee what was that movie called? It's Beyond your Years. I know that you at least live 23. I'm like really.
Speaker 1:Amanda, are you sure?
Speaker 2:you're older than 23?
Speaker 1:I am older, live 23. I'm like really, amanda, are you sure you're older than 23? I am older than 23. I just look young.
Speaker 2:I know my first was this, and then I looked detailed and I said no, she is older than 23. But I was going to tease you and you said 23. I'm like, oh, at least I know there's 23 years. I'm just teasing you. Do you remember the movie from the 80s or 90s? I think it was the 90s Grumpy Old Men. I don't know if you remember.
Speaker 1:Okay, see Not seen many movies? More often than not, the answer is no.
Speaker 2:Okay, grumpy Old Men. So they're grumpy old men because they haven't done their work, they haven't become aware, they haven't surrendered to the greater mystery of life. So they come in two packages and then I wonder to myself, like oof, how terrible it would be to be the grumpy old man, like to be from the package, that I'm not willing to become aware and acknowledge and grow and expand. And I'm like, what is their purpose? And I realize that their purpose is just like you said in that meme. Their purpose is that we I'm going to put myself in the surrender group even though I'm not old that we that are willing to become aware and surrender. It's a mirror for us to learn from.
Speaker 2:There's some people that are able to learn by looking at other people and there's some people that just have to make their own mistakes. If you're one of those that have to make your own mistakes, open your eyes. Open your eyes and look around. You do not have to make your own mistakes. But if you're that type and you learn, fine. But that group of people, the grumpy old men, are there to help the astute ones that are willing to learn from other people that how to surrender and how to grow and how to expand, how to let go and how to stop taking life so personally, because you know what Life isn't personal.
Speaker 1:I loved all of that. That is on point. I agree A hundred thousand percent, completely. I think that makes sense. That's what the grumpy old men's purpose is, and it might seem a little sad out front, but like, I think it makes logical sense.
Speaker 2:Amanda, I know, when I've looked at some of these grumpy old men, I said, you know, with my spiritual friends they're like, would you want to be them? And I'm like, oh, whatever. And they said, well, could you imagine that they sort of sacrificed and I don't know if that's the right word Themselves in this human experience to be placed as a way of helping us learn? And I don't think anybody's really a victim and anybody's really sacrificing. So that's not really the right language or concept in my empowering mindset, and I do believe that in the law of attraction and manifestation and the breath is the gateway to that as well, the breath is the gateway to everything. I do believe that we can shift and create our reality by aligning our beliefs with our thoughts, with our feelings. So it's know it, trust it, feel it, be it. And so it starts here.
Speaker 2:This is what my TED Talk talks about, the Purpose TED Talk, and it's also in my book and it's in my teachings. Know it, it in the mind, not know it in the mind. If we know it in the mind, it's the ego, it's know it in the egoic body. Know that there's a greater mystery. We know that we're here for greater purpose. We know that whatever we want to manifest is within us, whether it's again worthiness, it's love, it's relationships, it's the, it's the house, whatever. But if we use these external things to validate our worthiness, then we're going to struggle. We got to know that we're unconditionally worthy in love and freedom, but still desire all the wonderful things of life. I don't know if I said too much there, but anyway, we know it in the egoic body, we trust it in the mental body. We just trust. We trust life, we trust our story, we trust ourselves. We trust not necessarily other people. We know when to trust other people, because people are like oh, if we're trusting unconditionally, there's bad people.
Speaker 2:If I'm aligned with my inner power, I know whether I can trust you and not trust you. I know when I can. So I trust myself, and when I trust myself, I trust all that's around me. So the trust is aligned with my inner power and then I feel it. So if I know something and I trust something, it feels good. You feel it so when you know, when you're feeling these positive things and then ultimately, then you're being it, you're embodying it.
Speaker 2:So I do believe that any of us at any stage, whether we're a grumpy old man or a surrendered person, we have the potential, no matter where we are in life, to create our future and our destiny and our presence. That's what Métain is all about. But going back to those thousand elephants in front of your door if you haven't done your work and there's like those hundreds of elephants in front of your door you got to let them in one by one, become aware of them, process them and then we can start about how to align with the things that we want to create and manifest. So, how many elephants do we all have knocking at our door?
Speaker 2:I challenge all the listeners how many elephants do you have at your door? Are you closing your eyes to your past and to pains that you don't want to confront and to shame and to guilt and to fear and anxiety? Or are you allowing yourself to be at one or at peace or in alignment, and processing and aware of your past, not from a place of victim, from a place of empowerment, from a place of breath, breathing, using the breath, because we're going to keep coming back to the breath, because this is the breath podcast Breathing into my past, breathing acceptance for who I am, breathing acceptance for my body.
Speaker 1:I agree with everything you said and I like how you mentioned about trusting in the mind and beliefs, the thoughts, the feelings. It's key. Well, thank you so much, manal. Oh, my gosh, this was amazing. I could talk to you for a long time.
Speaker 2:I feel as if I can talk to you and a long time I feel like I can talk to you and laugh with you. This was so much fun. I can feel your spirit and so I'm like during my lives I do lives once a week on insight timer and so during them I'm giddy and I laugh and I whatever. But everybody's texting, whatever. But I feel like there there's your energy and you just got me out talking about elephants and Yoda.
Speaker 1:I know, I know, oh my gosh, and we are going to chat on Mando's mindset very soon, so you guys stay tuned for that. Any final words you want to say to the listeners, manal, before we close out?
Speaker 2:I want to say that if you are here listening, I feel like your listeners know and I feel like they're coming in and they're knowing that there's something greater for them to tap into. I just have that feeling. I've never said this before on a podcast. I just feel like they know, and Amanda's got it. It starts and ends with the breath, one of the greatest tools. It's actually the only tool you need. If I had to say you need one tool, it would be the breath.
Speaker 2:I'm still not going to put away my five steps because, as human, with our intellectual mind, we need the five steps and to rationalize under these things. So don't get me wrong. I'm not going to take that book bear and throw it out, because there's still a lot of power to it, because we have our intellectual mind. But if you want to say there's only one thing I want to do, there's only one tool I'm going to use, it is the breath. Drop the mic. How's that, amanda? For a closing right? That's the only tip. Like, if you had to pick one tool, I would just pick the breath, right. Is there another one? I mean awareness, awareness, but awareness. The breath is the tool to the awareness. So, going down to the lowest common denominator. It's the breath that gets me to awareness. It's the root of our life and death. It's the breath. So, if you're listening, let's keep growing and expanding together.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you so much for speaking with me, Manal. Thank you, Amanda. This was fantastic.
Speaker 2:I really enjoyed myself.
Speaker 1:I'm so glad. Thank you, guys for tuning in to another episode to Breathwork Magic. I hope today's episode inspired you to connect more deeply with your breath and embrace the transformation it can bring. Breath and embrace the transformation it can bring. Remember, as long as you have your breath, you have options. You're not stuck. You can make a change, you can make a shift. Each inhale is a new beginning and every exhale is a chance to let go of what no longer serves you.
Speaker 1:If you're craving a reset, I'd love to invite you to Mindful Mindset Mondays, now held on the last Monday of every month. It's a virtual pay-what-you-can breathwork session designed to help you recharge and realign. You'll find all the info in the show notes and if you're ready to go even deeper, you can always schedule a one-on-one breathwork session with me. This is your space to work through what's coming up and move energy in a more personalized way. As always, thank you so much for listening. If you loved this episode, it would mean the world if you shared it with a friend or left a review. Your support helps more people discover the magic of breathwork and the shifts it can bring. Until next time, keep breathing, keep shifting and keep embracing the magic with inside of you. I'm proud of you, I'm rooting for you and you got this.
