“We have seen that the brain grows by use and that the more you use it, the better it will function.” Glenn Doman, the creator of the Doman Method"[i]

Watch this interview on YouTube here https://youtu.be/KUF52WCNRxU

I’d like to add, that the more we understand how our brain works, the more we will actually use it!

On the episode we will explore:

✔  The work of Joshua Gillis, Neuro-Integrator, and the outstanding results he has been having with world class athletes from the world of ice-hockey, to skiing, and wrestling.

✔ Where his work with "unlocking blocks in the brain" began.

✔ What we should all know about our the evolution of our brain and why movement is critical for "unlocking" our true potential.

✔ An Intro to the Neuro Func APP used to improve sports performance, cognitive abilities, and behavioral intelligence.

✔ How to access the FREE sessions in the APP to try it out.

Welcome back to The Neuroscience Meets Social and Emotional Learning Podcast, where we cover the science-based evidence behind social and emotional learning (for schools) and emotional intelligence training (in the workplace) with tools, ideas and strategies that we can all use for immediate results.

I’m Andrea Samadi, an author, and educator with a passion for learning specifically on the topics of health, wellbeing and productivity, and launched this podcast to share how important an understanding of our brain is to our everyday life and results--whether we are a teacher in the classroom, a student, or in the modern workplace.

On today’s episode #238, we will be speaking with Joshua Gillis[ii], who is on a mission to spread his groundbreaking knowledge in neuroscience to as many people as possible, and maybe even convince them to become a member of the small but growing, NOWLiving community.  Before we get into WHAT exactly Joshua Gillis has discovered in this field, I’ve got to say that something about his work stuck out to me when his team contacted me.

While preparing for interviews, I want to be sure the topic is in line with our season theme of brain health as it relates to learning, and Joshua’s work goes deep into the brain and learning, which I saw with some of his teachers and colleagues who included Glenn Doman (USA), Blythe and Godard (UK) and (I hope I’m getting this one right, as I’m not well versed in Russian) Svetlans Masgutova (RUSSIA). This is quite a powerful list, but the minute I saw Glenn Doman, my mind went back to 1999 when I was working in the seminar industry, and the speaker I worked for, opened the seminar with the work that Glenn Doman was doing in PA, helping children with special needs accomplish the impossible. If you’ve ever heard my story, in those early days after I left the teaching field, I was still trying to figure out where I was meant to be working, and I would write down anything important that caught my attention when it came to helping young people live up to the potential we know we all have. When the speaker told us about Glenn Doman’s work, where we took a young boy named Brendon, who was severely handicapped, and was told he would “just live his life like a vegetable” and with the method of using his brain and movement, they had this young boy up and running (and I forget the time frame) but that’s not what was important. It was the fact his life changed 180 degrees from what everyone expected of him. I thought the story was profound enough to write his name and phone number on the first page of my seminar notes, where we I was supposed to be learning about how our mind is connected to our earning potential.  That weekend, I couldn’t stop wondering about what made such an impact for that young boy and it wasn’t difficult for me to find the notes I jotted down from that seminar.

IMAGE 1: My first introduction to the work of Glenn Doman in 1999 led me to purchase all of his books, and raise my two children with the Doman Method.

The problem with this #1 Best Selling Parenting Series was there was a huge gap with understanding the brain, or how it works, to allow me to properly use these books.

23 years after first hearing about the Doman Institute, I still have some of his books, but without any training these books and theories remained unused over the years, which to me is a huge waste.  I wonder if Joshua Gillis’ work could fill in the blanks of what I didn’t understand, so others listening to this podcast, could use these concepts to their advantage, and perhaps Multiply Their Baby’s Intelligence[iii] and join Joshua’s mission to bridge the gap between theory and practice.

Let’s learn a bit about Joshua Gillis now that you have an idea of those innovators he has worked and learned with.

What Joshua has found, seems to be, the basic coding to unlock our brains to its true and full capacity like I heard about with that young boy Brendon, all those years ago.  His work is all based on the evolution of the nervous system and that our brain’s first job is to move the body. The result is a training and therapy system which will offer physical therapy, behavior and learning for children, psychology, endocrinology, men’s and women's health with a new more effective and holistic way to resolve these problems and so much more.

Joshua has been working 36 years as a therapist, treating over 10,000+ clients, including top athletes like:

Former Swedish ice hockey player, Peter Forsberg, who was known for his “on-ice vision and physical play” who was considered one of the greatest players of all-time, as one of NHL’s All Time Stars, and Winner of 2 Stanley Cups with the Colorado Avalanche. Peter Forsberg worked with Joshua for Rehabilitation and Increase in Performance and after his treatment he said “I could not even get my foot into the skates before getting the neuro-treatments. After surgery, and physio with the world’s best I had given up hope of ever skating again. Thank God I gave it one last try! After only 7 treatments I was skating and two months later back with the Avalanche and a million-dollar contract. This stuff is just unbelievable!”

I will put a link to Joshua’s top athletes in the show notes, that includes Markus Larsson, a retired Swedish alpine skier who took part in the 2002, 2006, 2010 and 2014 winter Olympics who said “From the first treatment, I felt the difference. In a month after the treatments and neurotraining my finishes improved by 10 places to the top 10. Then, after a day of training and treatments with Joshua, I pulled off the impossible, a 5th place in the Olympics at 35 years old.”

How this happens, I don’t know…just as we still don’t understand exactly why when we turn on a light switch, electricity lights up our room, but Joshua has discovered something that “switches on” something in our brain, helping us to overcome where there were once blocks.

Let’s meet Joshua Gillis and see what we can learn about our brain and body, with an approach to improving the “human condition” that’s so interesting, that anyone listening will be moved and touched by his journey where he went from a Ski coach into pre-med and alternative medicine scouring the planet for knowledge living in Sweden, Italy and France, along with his personal struggle to help his two sons which is actually what led him to the creation of this work. I’m hoping he can unlock some of the mysteries of the brain, so we can all take something back to improve our own health, wellbeing and productivity.

Welcome Joshua Gillis, thank you for coming on the podcast today. Where have we reached you today? Are you still in Maine?

INTRO Q: Joshua, I’ve got to say I was thrilled to see your work come across my email, when your team reached out to me,  as it took me back over 20 years ago before I was even thinking about the brain and learning and came across some of your colleagues.  Can you take us back to when you began to make a connection with our brain, learning and movement? Where did this journey begin for you?

Q1: I’m sure you can see that I’m a huge Glenn Doman fan, and bought all his books when I was pregnant with my first daughter, of course, wanting to Multiply my Baby’s Intelligence before she was even born. I can’t be the only one who wanted to do everything possible in those early days. How did you meet Glenn Doman and what did you learn from his work?

Q1B: What should we know about the origin of our brain and our central nervous system?

 Q1C: What should we know about the brain to make it all simple?

Q2: So what’s behind the levels that you have used in your Neuro Func APP that you have used to improve sports performance, cognitive abilities, and behavioral intelligence?

Q3: So what exactly will people be doing at each level in the APP to improve their performance?

Q4: Does your APP help us to unlock our blocks through movement at each level?

Q5: This next sentence is profound. Especially with the topic I’m covering here on the podcast-helping people to learn how an understanding of their brain can impact productivity and results (in schools, sports and the workplace). You say:

“When certain and specific movements are practiced, there is a powerful shift deep within our unconscious mind that positively affects nearly all of what we are; emotional clarity, behavioral stability, intellectual and artistic ability, postural perfection and sports performance.”

Can you explain what this means?

Q6: What is your current focus/vision for your work?

Joshua, Thank you very much for coming on the podcast and sharing your fascinating journey to help us to unlock our brains so we can reach those higher levels of capacity.

Is there anything important that we have missed?

Final Thoughts

When I think back to the beginning of this episode, I was hoping that Joshua would be able to fill in the blanks for what I didn’t understand about the brain, but I realized that we don’t always need to understand everything. I learned that in order to unlock our potential, movement is critical, and Joshua has figured out the best movements that he has put into 5 levels in his app. I went through each level (you can sign up to access each level for FREE with your email address as well) and what I noticed was that there were some exercises I had recently started doing in physical therapy for neck pain. If you’ve ever been to physical therapy, you go when you need to recover your muscles from an injury, or recover from an accident or injury, and sometimes the exercises can feel like a waste of time. You do the same motion over and over again. But then, after each session, you express to your therapist whether you feel better or not, and after every session I had attended, I felt an improvement.

Before seeing Joshua’s app, or the exercises he’s been doing with athletes over the  years, I’m not sure I would have believed the power behind it all, until I thought of this one exercise called the “Cat Camel” that he has in the app.

If you have something that you would like to work on, I highly suggest trying his app, and see what you notice. I will be having Joshua back on the podcast to take a deeper dive into each of the 5 levels, but until then, try it out, and see if you can use movement, the basic blueprint of your brain, to unlock your potential, like we saw from the athletes he has worked with around the world.

I’ll see you next week!

LEARN MORE ABOUT JOSHUA GILLIS

Website https://nowliving.today/

NeuroFunC in the Apple App Store https://apps.apple.com/us/app/neuro-func/id1544667683 (Sign in with your email/password to access FREE Training).

EMAIL nowliving.today@gmail.com">nowliving.today@gmail.com

SEE ALL APPS https://nowliving.today/applications/

TOP Athletes Joshua Gillis has worked with https://nowliving.today/top_clients/ 

RESOURCES:

Glenn Doman’s Work with The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential https://iahp.org/

Brain Gym https://www.braingym.com/

FOLLOW ANDREA SAMADI: 

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/AndreaSamadi  

Website https://www.achieveit360.com/ 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samadi/ 

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/Achieveit360com  

Neuroscience Meets SEL Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/2975814899101697  

Twitter: https://twitter.com/andreasamadi  

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andreasamadi/ 

REFERENCES:

[i] Glenn Doman https://www.domaninternational.org/glenn-doman

[ii] Joshua Gillis Website https://nowliving.today/

[iii] How to Multiply Your Baby’s Intelligence by Glenn Domann 2006 https://www.amazon.com/Multiply-Babys-Intelligence-Gentle-Revolution/dp/0757001831#:~:text=How%20To%20Multiply%20Your%20Baby's%20Intelligence%20provides%20a%20comprehensive%20program,for%20a%20lifetime%20of%20success.