In this enlightening episode, Scott Wallace shares his transformative journey from environmental science to becoming a breathwork facilitator. Discover how breathwork serves as a powerful tool for emotional and nervous system regulation.

Key Learnings:

✅ The impact of breathwork on mental health, personal growth, and spiritual well-being.

✅ The science behind breathwork and its therapeutic benefits.

✅ Practical techniques to integrate breathwork into daily life.

Tune in to explore how breathwork can unlock your full potential and foster a deeper connection with yourself and the world around you.

 

Listen on:

    

Transcript:

 

Patrick Obolgogiani (00:02.396)
Scott, you started out as an environmental scientist. How did you switch from that lab coat to focusing on breath work and coaching?

Scott Wallace (00:12.632)
Yes, Patrick, interesting transition, man. So the first career I was in, studied a Bachelor of Science and had a real passion for nature, ecology, conservation, and started to deepen in the activism and advocacy space and developed a a big passion for better looking after the environment and started to understand that human behavior,

and our choices, habits, decisions, and the relationship that we actually have with ourselves is actually really important to look at to create deeper ecological sustainability as we are all part of this interconnected and interrelated earth community. So following my studies in environmental science, I went on to work for a couple of universities here in Australia as an educator and a tutor in science and environmental subjects. And

After I completed my first degree, I actually was encouraged by a relative of mine to study law. So I went to university again and did a bachelor of laws and really wanted to understand how the system is set up and how we can better protect animals, nature and the environment through influencing the law, through legislation, through governance and

I really started to understand that the way that things are operating on this planet, the biggest concerns were actually not what's illegal, but I found what is legal is actually most destructive and a lot of legal violence and abuse, know, of nature, of animals, of control. And that was really confronting to learn about. So essentially,

Ecology, conservation, activism, inter-law, and then I started doing a lot of public speaking in the early years of my career. You know, when you get so passionate about a topic, an idea, a concept, a bit of tech, a principle, you want the world to know. And you feel if only everyone knew this, if everyone had sat in this plant medicine ceremony, if anyone had this wearable, if everyone knew about breathwork or nervous system or conservation, it would change the course of humanity. And so I became

Scott Wallace (02:38.71)
one of those people that started doing a lot of seminars and public speaking and eventually was invited by a political party to be guest speaker at one of their events. And I did that guest seminar speaking about veganism and animal rights.

earth-centered governance and different ways of looking at the political landscape. And the following year after that, they invited me to run as a political candidate. So I actually joined the Animal Justice Party and they invited me to run as a candidate in state elections and also the local and federal elections here in Queensland, Australia. And so...

It was in 2020 that I stepped into running as a political candidate. And during that year, that's when I was coming to the end of a long-term relationship, which I'm happy to delve into, you know, what that brought me in terms of growth and learning and experience. However, that's also the year that I ran in the state and local government elections. And it was during that year where I was at home one day with my partner at the time.

and sitting on the couch at home after spending the whole day handing out flyers and how to vote cards and vote one and you know being in that space that I jumped on Instagram jumped on Instagram and I came across a video of someone called Lucas Mack from Awaken Breathwork one of the co-founders of Awaken Breathwork and he was like fam

shit is crazy in the world right now, let's just stop and breathe. And I was like, amen, man, there's a lot happening in my life. And I sat down, opened up the phone and watched this 30 second video. And it was of conscious connected activating breaths. And it was just simple breathing in and out of the mouth.

Scott Wallace (04:46.554)
five breaths into this practice. Patrick, I just started to feel all of this emotion and energy, the tension in the throat, that sensation in the stomach and tears just started streaming down my face and it helped me unlock and tap into my emotional state, my nervous system and what was happening beneath the surface for me.

in a way that I hadn't really prioritized before. So that was my into breath work in 2020. And more or less since then, it's been going all in on breath work, breath work journeys, doing facilitator trainings, multiple trainings, working with different coaches, and now running a personal development and breath work company five years in that we facilitate workshops, retreat style events, seminars, online group programs.

I speak on a lot of stages and events across Australia. And this is the thing that I've been focusing on for the last five years. So this is the passion and the next iteration of how the mission that I have is being expressed. Same mission, there's different ways of going about elevating humanity's consciousness and helping humans tap into their full potential and creating a better, happier, healthier environment, man.

Patrick Obolgogiani (05:53.005)
Amazing.

Patrick Obolgogiani (06:12.633)
Amazing. Yeah. think as you, as you know, we're on similar mission with unlocking the human potential. And in this case with the same vehicle breathing, but, that's amazing. Maybe just going back to those years when clearly wasn't easy between, oh, let's say those, you know, pre-finding this new vehicle. Can you talk me to about like, what was a difficult day? Do you remember like a moment that was like really hard for you? One of the toughest days or moments and what was the internal monologue in your head?

that day.

Scott Wallace (06:42.158)
Yeah, experience that comes to mind is this day when I first discovered BreathWoke when I was at home during the elections. You know, this was a was a six year relationship that was going to come to an end. And to be quite frankly, it was a beautiful relationship most of the time, but it actually became quite abusive in the last couple of years. And it's not something that I hear a lot of men speaking about, you know, domestic violence from

male perspective and on a deeper spiritual level I've received the growth the lessons the insights and experiences that I was here to get from that relationship but it was a very stretching time throughout that the last few years and so being at home that day feeling really stressed out feeling that pressure and responsibility of running in the these political campaigns for state government and

and being giving so much energy out and media, social media, briefs with the team and the volunteers and being home knowing that there was a lot of instability within our relationship but I've got this big mission. I've got a responsibility to represent the party and I felt that for a lot of my life, especially during my activism and advocacy, that altruism and selflessness

was a really beautiful trait. However, it meant that I wasn't prioritizing my own needs and wellbeing and alignment and health and nervous system. Not that I had any idea about nervous system regulation five years ago. But that was a peak stress, high tension moment. And I remember feeling that full energy that overwhelmed the dysregulation at the time and

Patrick Obolgogiani (08:25.281)
Yeah.

Scott Wallace (08:41.41)
really like, holy shit, what's going on in my life? There's a lot happening and the breath was the key to help me come into deeper presence, brother, to help me land in my reality. And sometimes that's all it takes is one nice, big, slow.

Deep breath to get present to what's going on.

Patrick Obolgogiani (09:05.592)
Beautiful. We've mentioned the work, the breath work a couple of times and it does feel like it's trending right now and it has different meanings to different people. Like it can mean like doing kind of box breathing technique or can go way beyond that. Like how do you even define breath work when you talk about it?

Scott Wallace (09:24.654)
Yeah, great question. So I like to look at breathwork as a relationship. Breathwork for me is about the relationship we have with ourselves, with our breath, how we can learn about our breath, use our breath and harness our breath to unlock our full potential, to be able to influence the states of our nervous system, our emotional states. So as you would know, there are...

lots of breathwork techniques. are hundreds and hundreds of different styles and practices. And I feel every week I'm hearing about or discovering another technique that someone has created. So whilst there are a number of like modern OG founders of breathwork where a lot of other, you know, training and researchers stemmed from, I've really value the whole broad umbrella of breathwork knowing that

there's so many different styles and techniques and I don't actually spend, I spend most of my time supporting my clients and sharing with my community and personally using just a handful of simple techniques that have allowed me to create 99 % of the deep transformation, healing, increase in performance, managing stress and tension, healing from trauma, the emotional recalibrations and so much.

For short answer, it's about the relationship we have with ourselves and the relationship with life, Patrick, because if we're opening ourselves up to inhaling and breathing in.

We're receiving life. We're actually relating to life in a different way by receiving and feeling what's going on because a lot of people are tight, they're in contraction, they're not, their breath is tense, they're holding it and then similarly the exhale. It's about letting go, our willingness to let go and to surrender to this journey of life. So that's some of the meanings and

Scott Wallace (11:31.67)
interpretations that I have with breath. It's life, it's how we relate with ourselves and this planet as well, you know.

Patrick Obolgogiani (11:38.58)
Yeah, well said. it's at least what I've noticed is that when you like the breathwork community, you may say that, that there's almost different sub areas within that. And some of them are definitely more kind of performance oriented and some of them are much, they kind of go a little bit deeper if you may say that, you know, whether it's like deeper into the ancient wisdom that, you know, come from, you know,

thousands of years ago, but also there's like this element of connecting something a little bit deeper than just your material being. And I wonder like, cause you have a pretty rare background. have come from the scientific background into this world of breathwork. Was there like any sense in you that was a little bit skeptical about this, like almost like mystical part of this community and this work, or did you can, what is easy for you to accept that, that might be something interesting going on here.

Scott Wallace (12:22.989)
you

Scott Wallace (12:38.743)
This question's putting a big smile on my face. I'm feeling like the convergence of all these years of learning of growth and skepticism and so powerful. Another little element on the way that I look at breath is the bridge between the mind, body and spirit. When we learn how to harness these breathwork techniques to slow down our brainwaves, to access altered states of consciousness, to slow down

Patrick Obolgogiani (12:43.732)
You

Patrick Obolgogiani (12:57.582)
Mmm, yeah.

Scott Wallace (13:07.821)
the default mode network, for example, and slow down that brainwave activity to tap into the unconscious mind, it's starting to go into the unseen parts of the human experience. It's starting to go beyond the 3D rational, logical part of the human experience into new terrain. And I'm sure you could appreciate as someone, given your experience, background and focus, that

the scientific method is valuable. However, I found that there was so much knowledge and wisdom and truth that the scientific method and the larger scientific community and my experience as a scientist, there was a lot more invalidating and dismissing unless it fits this certain box. It's not given as much weight as something that for example has been proven according to data.

But then again, there's people that have wisdom and traditional indigenous tribes and communities that are doing really incredible work and change in the world. And they haven't been using, you know, they've been using their version of science. So I think healthy skepticism, questioning what's out there is really important. And in this world of an abundance of information, it's so easy to have conflicting and contrasting opinions, belief.

facts. So I was pretty, I would like to think I was a lot more open than I was, but in actual fact, I was quite anti-religious many years ago. I really valued the scientific method and dismissed a lot of unseen, a lot of the intuition, a lot of the mysticism, you know, the relationship with God, source, universal energy, whatever people use that word.

as. That's where I was a bit resistant and didn't feel quite open when I first started before breathwork and going through a a more spiritual path in life. yeah.

Patrick Obolgogiani (15:21.972)
I can imagine. Maybe if we go back into the actual scientific realm, think a lot of people are interested in like, what's going on physiologically when we're doing a breathwork session, let's say we can talk about in a moment what it actually looks like, but let's imagine there's probably some sort of breathing happening for like a period of maybe an hour sometimes. Like what's happening in the body.

Scott Wallace (15:46.008)
Yeah. So I love to speak into some of the more, the focus areas that I tend to focus on repeating. The focus areas as a transformational coach and breath work facilitator, what it is that I'm supporting my clients to experience and the ways in which the breath work can actually support them. the

One of the common questions, before I answer that, one of the common questions that often people ask is, how do I do breath work? What styles and techniques should I do? What's best for me? And I like to break it into two main categories. The first, or really three, the first is your relationship that you have with your breath on a daily basis. The moment by moment ability to know where you're at. And this is where the product that your lab

Patrick Obolgogiani (16:23.987)
Yes.

Scott Wallace (16:42.561)
have been working on and creating is be so valuable to give people that feedback, that data and that insight. But there's so much power in focusing on our presence and really starting to combine that with the expanded awareness of how we're breathing and the ways that our breath affects our nervous system, our emotional state, et cetera. The second thing is I encourage my clients to get a daily

breath work practice. This could be five minutes, 10 minutes, 15, 20. Some people have a morning routine that's three hours. Great, do your thing. I've gone through those phases and as a business owner and entrepreneur, sometimes our non-negotiable activities can be the thing that actually holds us back. So it's the moment by moment breath awareness, secondly, getting and creating a consistent daily breath work practice.

Patrick Obolgogiani (17:19.859)
You

Scott Wallace (17:39.875)
And then there's the bigger therapeutic transformational journeys that I facilitate for my clients as well. And I find the daily breath work techniques and the daily flow as a bit more of a daily tune up. know, checking in on the head space, coming into these meditative states, noticing what's happening in the body, starting to process and...

shift and clean out the vessel, clean out the body of any debris and emotions, energy on a day by day basis. And then more infrequently is a deeper breath work journey where I'm guiding clients into, you know, it's a two, three hour session, deep into altered states of consciousness. It's a ceremony. There's an intention and we go into that, that experience. So more than happy to speak more about the breath work journeys.

if you're wanting to tune into that, great. So I believe that as human beings, we are the ultimate creators of our reality. Where focus goes, energy flows. We have this ability to create, to manifest, influence, manipulate and play in this game of life. On the other hand, there's a level of letting go of control and a level of surrender and not knowing.

what's gonna happen that's also part of this duality of the human experience. And so I do my best to navigate that paradox and polarity in a way that allows me to feel like I'm living in alignment. And whenever I'm starting a breathwork journey with a client, I'm always inviting them to set their intention for the journey. What's their intention for this experience? And I rarely go straight into

the breathwork component of a coaching and breathwork session. It's typically like for a three hour session, whether it's online or face to face, I'm dropping in with my clients, seeing what's alive for them. Are there any themes or topics they want to get some support on or explore and unpack? And then usually from that, they set an intention on what they want to get from the breathwork journey. And that setting of an intention is really

Scott Wallace (19:59.436)
fundamental for creation and for our ability to manifest. Cause as soon as we set that intention, we're sending as I'm not sure if you've, if you've heard of Esther Hicks, she, she channels a being known as Abraham essentially. And she uses this phrase sending rockets of desire out into the universe. So it's like that which you're wanting to experience and call in, we're putting it out into the, into the quantum field. And so that,

that first instance of getting clear on your intention is so powerful. That sort of shapes often what people experience. depending on the seminar or workshop or coaching session I'm guiding a client through, they may be laying down for anywhere from an hour to an hour and a half where I'm guiding them through mainly two types of techniques, which is a conscious connected activating breath where they're breathing in through the mouth.

Scott Wallace (21:02.158)
and the conscious.

Scott Wallace (21:06.062)
connected way or they're doing in a restorative way, which is a breath work technique where we're doing it in through the nose and then out through the nose or mouth in a slower, gentler way. And I'll speak more into the specifics in terms of the nervous system a bit later on, but essentially these two techniques are what my majority of my clients are using throughout that experience to self-regulate and to start to

go into these altered states of consciousness.

when

We are doing a meditation or even a daily breathwork practice or a longer breathwork journey. What's happening is they're starting to become a shift in the oxygen levels and CO2 levels throughout the body. We're also starting to quite slow down brain waves. in daily life, often we are in a high beta brainwave state and even a couple minutes of breathwork is

able to help people to slow down that brainwave activity and come into a low beta or an alpha brainwave state and in a longer breathwork journey you're able to tap into an alpha theta and even sometimes slower brainwave states where you're accessing the unconscious mind. You're coming out of the noise, coming out of the monkey mind and starting to quieten down what's going on and I think

Scott Wallace (22:45.579)
For a lot of people that have a lot of noise, that are struggling with stress, anxiety, tension, a very overactive mind, breath work is such a powerful tool because it's an active process that actually slows down the mind. Whereas meditation, it's like, sit there, be present, be aware of your thoughts, and there's thousands coming through. So I feel like breath work is such a hack, man.

Patrick Obolgogiani (23:11.279)
Yeah.

Scott Wallace (23:15.085)
Yeah, there's more, there's more, I'm happy to go into more, but do have any questions or anything at that point before we dive deeper into the journey of breathwork?

Patrick Obolgogiani (23:26.956)
No, think that's a lot of people have maybe heard of these brainwaves, but not many people probably know kind of what they are. So maybe I'd be curious if you've looked into that, like, do we know much about like, why evolution has created these brainwaves? Like, what are they? And you mentioned like you go deeper. Does it mean like your prefrontal cortex somehow like shuts down? Like I was just curious to know if you've ever studied this topic.

Scott Wallace (23:32.907)
you

Scott Wallace (23:54.828)
Yeah, so from an evolutionary perspective, I haven't really thought about it. I know when we are, for example, if you're in a delta brainwave state, this is often like deep sleep, deep rest, deep sleep. And so when people are going to rest, they're coming out of the beta and alpha brainwave state to actually allow a deeper level of recovery and recalibration to occur. for people that have been in a high fight or flight or stress state for a really long time,

Patrick Obolgogiani (24:05.476)
Yeah.

Scott Wallace (24:24.949)
A breathwork journey is a great opportunity for them to slow down, reset, come into a restful state, but they are in a non-ordinary state of consciousness and they're not sleeping for eight hours. So there's a real power in, there's a real power in equipping people with these techniques and guiding them into these journeys where they can be in control of influencing

these brainwave states. a really interesting process that's taking place is when you're slowing down your brainwaves, you're actually starting to tap into unconscious material, which means people's timeline, their beliefs and programs and habits and past trauma and so many more parts of their experience that's driven by the unconscious mind, which is 90 to 95%.

of our experience, only 5 to 10 % is the conscious mind, you're accessing that. Which means you're getting into the software. You're getting deep into the software of the human being where you can reprogram, where you can bring up more insights and awareness and tap into inner guidance and be able to access parts of the limbic brain, for example, that processes memory and emotions and...

a lot of the experiences we're having as humans in terms of our past timeline is processed through the limbic brain. So there are some really interesting links with breath work and on a scientific level and physiological level, what's happening within people that can create, that contributes to creating the shifts, the breakthroughs, the healing, the transformation that people are experiencing every week and every day.

through breath work. One of the, there's this part of the brain called the default mode network, the DMN. And when brain waves slow down, activity in the default mode network also slows down. And so what's happening is when activity slows down in the default mode network,

Scott Wallace (26:51.401)
Imagine the default mode network is like the bouncer or the security guard between the conscious and the unconscious minds. Imagine there's a doorway and the default mode network is standing there and it's like, no, you're not going to get in here. You're not going to feel your emotions. You're not going to tap into that memory. You're not going to embrace change because that's a potential threat. There's a risk that it's going to be uncomfortable and I'm not going to let you go there.

That's the role that the default mode network has. It's connected to identity, connected to the ego, connected to those defense mechanisms. So the beautiful thing that happens, Patrick, is brainwaves slow down and activity in the default mode network slows down, which actually leads to a dissolution of the ego. So this is something really powerful because we are

in an active process, slowing down brainwaves, reducing activity in the default mode network, and that is correlated with the dissolution of the ego. So this is one of the reasons why people have emotional breakthroughs, why they access memories and past experiences and feelings and desires and guidance that comes from within them, because it's always there.

It's just the conscious faculties often get in the way of people having these experiences, but the inner wisdom and inner power is always there within us as human beings, Patrick.

Patrick Obolgogiani (28:27.533)
Yeah, it's a really nice metaphor and quite easy to access. And I think at least some of us have watched documentaries about the compounds like the DMT. There's a lot of documentaries been recently and I'll talk about DMT or the default network in the same way, where you can reach these altered states of consciousness by quieting down the chatter, so to speak. But it sounds like with breathing, you can actually reach the same state without

chemical compounds.

Scott Wallace (28:57.581)
100 % 100 % and before we dropped on for the podcast I was sharing with you that I just got back from a festival a few days ago here in central Queensland and this is a psych this festival is called mushroom Valley so you can get a feel like the vibe of this festival it's filled with psychedelics people are on all sorts of plant medicines and recreational drugs and MD and ketamine

Patrick Obolgogiani (29:06.486)
Yeah.

Patrick Obolgogiani (29:14.391)
Mm-hmm.

Scott Wallace (29:27.671)
Drinking like there's a lot happening in these spaces now. I live a relatively sober life I haven't smoked cannabis for years. I don't drink for a few years and One of the reasons why I love doing a facilitating breathwork Journeys at these festivals is to equip and empower people With a safe contained open space for them to have a psychedelic experience for them to have an out-of-body

multidimensional, deeply transformational experience with nothing but their breath. For them to tap into these altered states and still and not have a hangover. And this is something that I'm really passionate about because I see a lot of people wanting to go down the pathway of plant medicines and other treatments. And when clients ask me,

on guidance and support in terms of plant medicines and recommendations, if they haven't done breathwork journeys or breathwork with me for a couple months, I'll typically get them started on that because I think a lot of people are wanting for a big shakeup, a big shift. They're wanting to have something that's undeniable. They're wanting to have an experience that changes their paradigm and gets them questioning who the fuck they are and what's happening in this world and how can they live a happier, more fulfilled life.

I see Breathwork over the years has really supported myself to have these experiences and the clients that I work with. And it's so much safer. It's so much more consistent in terms of, you're not going to go on a bad trip. Mind you, it can be very sensitive when we're working with the emotional body and people's past trauma and all of that. So there's a level of...

you know, being trauma informed and being aware of how the body mind system works. But generally speaking, breath work is so much more safer compared to someone taking a psychedelic or drugs where they're not sure what's in them. Getting high.

Patrick Obolgogiani (31:30.837)
Yeah. Is there a group of people for whom it's not maybe ideal? Like is there someone you might say like, hey, you want to wait until or maybe that is not for you? Is there anyone anyone like that?

Scott Wallace (31:36.044)
Yeah.

Scott Wallace (31:42.254)
Yeah, so I'll start with the techniques that I use and some of the medical contraindications. Yeah, so the activating conscious connected breath work that I facilitate for most of my clients is the breath work breathing in and out of the mouth with no pause between the inhale and the exhale. Now that puts a lot of pressure on the body mind system. It increases blood pressure. It can...

Patrick Obolgogiani (31:47.34)
Please.

Scott Wallace (32:10.637)
create a lot of tension in the body and can be physically and emotionally quite intense at times. Now, for someone who is pregnant, if they have glaucoma, retinal detachment, if they have experienced big recent surgeries, heart conditions, angina, if they have experienced psychosis where they've been hospitalized, these are the conditions.

seizures, there's a big list of contraindications that this breathwork technique is not recommended for people. Now, this doesn't mean that it's always gonna be detrimental if people have those conditions, but it is generally a case-by-case basis when I'm working with people in a one-on-one capacity, and that's my professional opinion and guidance based off

the medical contraindication. So that's the first layer. Now, the other layer to this is when it comes to personal development and growth and transformation, depending on people's, depending on the amount of work they've already done, depending on the amount of somatics or trauma-informed therapy or mindset work, plant medicine ceremonies, all these things

influence someone's readiness, but also the level of relevancy and appropriateness to experience a breathwork journey and to deepen into this work. So I have a questionnaire that I run through with clients before we start working together to make sure I've got medical history. I understand some of their past, some of the challenges they've had to really get a good snapshot. And there's sometimes

I won't recommend a three hour breath work journey to a client. I'd recommend, let's just start with an hour and we'll do this in a titrated way. Just like in the lab where you've got the pipette and you're dropping a one drop at a time into the beaker to get that right amount in that solution to create that desired effect. We don't want to squeeze too much into that beaker and create an explosion or to create too much of a disruption. So the essence of

Scott Wallace (34:36.332)
Trauma is something that's too much, too fast and too soon that the body mind system isn't able to process. And so I really want to make sure, and this is so important for the breathwork industry and I haven't seen enough of this is people being trauma informed and knowing how to work with the body mind system in an attuned, clear and coherent way. So that's one of the reasons why breathwork isn't for everyone.

Breath awareness, 100%, shorter breathwork techniques depending on their medical conditions, sure, but the bigger ceremonies, it's big stuff. It can be really intense for some people, case by case basis, yeah.

Patrick Obolgogiani (35:20.904)
Yeah. What about like, I've noticed that, which I think, because there's so many traditions where people come from schools of thought, it is pretty, what's the word like heterogenous when it comes to the practitioners, facilitators, like even the titles, like there's guides, there's coaches. so for someone like who actually would want to go deeper, they're like, they've done the breath work for like five minutes a day and they would want to go one level beyond.

What would you recommend to them in terms of how to almost vet a potential facilitator? know there's some certifications out there that trying to hopefully help here, but outside the certification, what would for you be a marker of, okay, this might be someone you could trust?

Scott Wallace (36:07.916)
Yeah, great question, man. And as someone who is a coach and mentor and facilitator, I've seen the rise and expansion in this industry over the years. And I read one stat that was based off research on LinkedIn that I think was a 10 year period between 2010 to 2020, I think. There was an increase of coaches and facilitators.

which was 13,000 % across the world. that was, so like 137 times more coaches in the 10 year period. So there's a massive boom that's been happening. Now that's just on LinkedIn. And a lot of the coaches I know are not on LinkedIn. So there's even more than that. there's, I'm not sure where it is in terms of the city where you're living in. However, I live on a city called the Gold Coast in

Patrick Obolgogiani (36:50.429)
Yes.

Scott Wallace (37:05.556)
Queensland, Australia, and this is a melting pot and a hub for business owners, entrepreneurs, coaching, health, wellness, personal development. You can walk out your front door and you'll meet another breathwork facilitator pretty much. You can go down to your local cafe and there's, you know, I'll see friends and other entrepreneurs that are all here. So if you are looking, if someone's looking to deepen their journey and deepen their practice,

You can start going online for online trainings and experiences. But if you have the opportunity, work with someone who is local and a practitioner in your area running workshops, running training in your local area. Now, even for a three hour breath work journey, I'm facilitating this for my clients online or face to face around Australia or around the world, I'm connecting with them. So there is still so much power in

deepening breath work and having a breath work experience online or face to face. I personally love connecting with people face to face, but in terms of sustainability for the business, if I can, you know, work, do a breath work journey for someone in Finland, do a breath work journey for someone in America, 3 a.m. depending on the time zone, I will. And that's the great option of access. So for people wanting to deepen, start with events, start with local people in your area and

Trust your intuition. Get curious about the people that are out there. And there is so many more coaches and facilitators and people out there. And it's not about necessarily getting the perfect person or having the perfect event. But I found Patrick, was following the threads of alignment. So having that curiosity and...

sending that message to find out more or going to that event and from that event maybe going to do another one or deepening your work with that practitioner and coach for as long as that feels aligned. And that's what I did for the first few years as I was growing and building my business was going and experiencing different events, different facilitators and practitioners and getting a feel for the style, the way of coaching and the guidance that really aligned for me.

Scott Wallace (39:27.74)
and then focusing more there. That's what I'd say is the first recommendation. And yeah, look, we've got, I have an online platform on the app called Circle, and we've got some guided practices on there, like 20 minute practices, and we're also hosting a weekly call called the Empower Hour, Breath, Business, and Beyond.

And it's just a quick hour coaching, community, breath work, energy work, meditation. And that for a lot of people wanting to find out more about breath work is a good start because it's not a massive commitment. There's zero financial commitment. It's an easy in for people and we can start practicing and learning some more techniques. So yeah, that's what I would say is the next best step for people wanting to deepen.

Patrick Obolgogiani (40:23.01)
Appreciate it. Maybe you kind of did actually cover a little bit about it, but like there might be a lot of listeners to this podcast who actually either are a coach, might be up and coming coach or want to become one. You already mentioned a couple of things that you'd advise. One is to try different varieties so you can get a sense of what is your own style. And the other thing you mentioned was to get more in like understanding of how to work with trauma. Is there anything else you would

Scott Wallace (40:35.436)
Mm.

Scott Wallace (40:49.74)
Yeah.

Patrick Obolgogiani (40:50.31)
want to mention to kind of someone who wants to become a breathing coach or a breathwork coach.

Scott Wallace (40:55.306)
Hmm, yeah, 100%. Over the last few years, I've shifted my focus in the business to now primarily serving and supporting other coaches, business owners, entrepreneurs and leaders with their personal development to help them create more alignment, more flow and fulfillment. And breath work is one modality and one technique that I bring into that. And I see a...

really massive wave coming through at the moment, Patrick, of coaches and other facilitators and practitioners starting to bring in more breath work into what they're doing and becoming certified as a breath work facilitator. And I think it's an absolutely incredible, powerful, necessary tool to have for any holistic or integrated healing, development and transformation.

Being able to work with breath in addition to the 3,000 other techniques and modalities and certifications that a lot of people have in their tool belt already can be life changing because we're starting to integrate the breath in a really powerful, simple way. So definitely recommend and invite people to become a breath work facilitator. It's not moving into next year.

something that we've got on the pipeline within our company to train up more facilitators. But there's lots of different facilitator trainings out there. So that's the first thing there. Secondly, I've noticed a lack of people working in the space of health, wellbeing, transformation, and healing that are lacking trauma-informed education where

they're missing a whole space of context, of understanding, of knowledge that can really help their clients create deeper shifts and transformation. And I know where I live on the Gold Coast that there hasn't been many solid trauma-informed trainings that are available. Now this has been

Scott Wallace (43:19.892)
evolving over the years and the first breathwork facilitator training I did was a two day course, very shamanic influence, lots of energy work, bringing in lot of shamanic philosophy and the next facilitator training I did was a nine month trauma informed breathwork facilitator training. Whilst both were really relevant, the quality, the depth, the thoroughness,

and the level of education and resources in the nine month program compared to the two day, vastly different. So really look at the quality of the education, the experience of the practitioners you're gonna train and work with, and to know that I don't think there's an end goal with this work.

If anything like me, Patrick, we value growth and learning and continuing to expand. And I see this as a real great opportunity to continue to meet ourselves in a deeper way. And for the other upcoming or established coaches, facilitators, practitioners out there looking to deepen their work, the more consistent they become on their own inner work, their own deepening, healing, their own growth,

that's going to allow them to serve and support people in a much deeper way. It's like, eat the medicine yourself. Be the first, be the leader to walk through the fire, to go through the initiations, to do the training, to do the shadow work, to confront your childhood trauma, to confront all these things. And then you can lead people from a more embodied and aligned place.

Patrick Obolgogiani (45:09.039)
Yeah, that's really important. As you mentioned, I think it's both when you're running a company as a CEO, like your, or whatever trauma, like stuff you have going on will influence everyone else. And I think probably the same is true for a facilitator, a coach is like, whatever you have going on, we're going to definitely influence the work you do with, people. having at least that like intention or process where you're working on that stuff probably is quite important. imagine.

Scott Wallace (45:39.309)
fundamental man I had a client it was one of my first coaching clients and he was a director of a company in compliance like I think building compliance around fire or something like that and he'd gone through his it was in his 50s I think at the time and experienced mushroom psilocybin for the first time a few months later he experienced his first breathwork journey with me and was like what is this like

Where have you been my whole life? And the more work we did around authenticity and depth and bringing more love and compassion into the workspace and self-regulation and nervous system work, that started to shift his company culture because people were feeling more open, better regulated. They had the tools to look after themselves more because one of their directors was living it, was

breathing it was sharing it and leading in that way. And for all the other CEOs, directors, organizers, managers and leaders tuning into this podcast, your ability to be regulated within yourself, to have the depth and level of self-awareness on what's happening physiologically and mentally.

to know what's going on and have that self responsibility is going to be so important for leading your team. Because if you're leading and creating and serving from a dysregulated nervous system where there's a buildup of energy and emotions that you're not processing and you're becoming reactive and you're projecting on people, well, that's definitely going to affect your team culture, your team morale and the results that you're going to create. And so,

This is where I see the importance that we have as leaders in this world to prioritize ourselves, to look at our own fulfillment, our sense of alignment. And there's a real powerful shift that's happening in our culture where I'm seeing this next wave of leaders, Patrick, and they're going to be the ones that are regulated in the nervous system, that are expressive, that are living a more authentic

Scott Wallace (48:06.23)
fulfilled, empowered life and doing what they came here to do. That's the new wave, the new generation of leaders that I'm here to create, that I'm here to deepen myself into that. So yeah, there's massive ripples that we can create through this work, man, 100%.

Patrick Obolgogiani (48:25.155)
Yeah. Maybe just get quite practical here for the listener. Cause like, I want to make sure we can leave something that they can, they can take, take home and start trying beyond just going into a deeper session. You kind of mentioned a lot of your work is just fundamentally around these simple techniques that you can do in five minutes in the morning or in the evening. What would you recommend as a starting point? for someone just wanting to kind of almost like snack and get into the, uh, the rhythm of

Scott Wallace (48:26.668)
Hmm.

Scott Wallace (48:52.585)
Thank

Patrick Obolgogiani (48:54.317)
connecting with their breathing and getting the power of it.

Scott Wallace (48:56.182)
Yeah.

Great, so let's just drop in for a minute now. Actually, I'll share these practices as part of the podcast. So if you're not listening to this while driving and it's safe for you to do so, you can close down your eyes, you can relax your shoulders, and you're going to start with breath awareness.

Patrick Obolgogiani (49:02.467)
Let's do it. Let's do it.

Scott Wallace (49:20.844)
So noticing how you're breathing in this moment. Without the breath needing to change, we're becoming the observer of the breath. And noticing if your breath is coming in through the nose or whether it's going in and out of the mouth.

Noticing is your breathing rate slow and deep.

whether your breathing is short and fast. And maybe for some of you, you notice you're not breathing much at all. And submitting yourself with that openness, with non-judgment and curiosity, becoming aware of your breath. Now let's take a nice big, slow, deep breath in through the nose, filling up your lungs and your belly.

and gently exhaling out the mouth.

Scott Wallace (50:19.766)
with a nice deep breath in through the nose.

Scott Wallace (50:25.42)
and exhaling out the mouth and just keeping this going for another 30 seconds and relaxing your shoulders with each breath softening your body.

slowing down.

Scott Wallace (50:47.468)
starting to bring your focus and presence into your breath, into your body, into this moment away from the distractions and just checking in with your inner world as you breathe slowly and deeply. This technique that we're doing at the moment is a restorative technique and it's going to stimulate the parasympathetic nervous system, slowing down brainwaves.

Quietening the mind, grounding, helping people feel more relaxed, connected to themselves. Let's just go for three more breaths.

Scott Wallace (51:32.46)
through the nose and out. And if it feels good for you, we're going to practice a breath hold. So if it feels good for you, on this last breath, you can take a nice full deep breath in, filling up your lungs and your belly. And now exhaling fully, emptying your lungs and coming into a breath hold.

as you relax your body and hold that breath just hold it for as long as feels good for you.

And if it resonates for you, asking yourself this following question, what does my inner guidance want me to know right now?

Scott Wallace (52:20.358)
opening up to receive any guidance, insight, words, colors, symbols, thoughts, ideas.

and it's okay if nothing comes up.

you are ready to breathe. Just coming back to a slow, comfortable way of breathing.

Scott Wallace (52:48.102)
and a good technique for everyday breathing is in through the nose.

Scott Wallace (52:56.204)
and out through the mouth.

or nose, slow deep breaths.

Scott Wallace (53:10.829)
And when you're ready, you can bring a bit of movement to your wrist, your ankles, your shoulders, and opening your eyes and just landing in the space you're in, having a little look around.

Scott Wallace (53:31.66)
coming into the present moment.

Patrick Obolgogiani (53:36.096)
Thank you,

Scott Wallace (53:36.14)
So that's a simple few minute practice. I refer to that as a restorative flow. It's taking five minutes, three, four, five minutes to slow down, to check in, to recenter, and that's going to down regulate the nervous system for people and help them slow down. that's one practice and the other is an activating breath, a conscious connected.

mouth breath, breathing in and out of the mouth. And I think we should do 10 breaths for this as well to give people a feel of what this looks like and what this can feel like for them. And so just a reminder, if you have any of the contraindications that we mentioned previously around heart conditions, if you've had surgeries, if you're pregnant, any of those contraindications, this activating breathwork technique is not recommended for you. It's my professional recommendation.

So let's take a minute now to close down our eyes and we're going to practice a breathing technique known as conscious connected breathing or activating breaths and we're going to do this by breathing in through the mouth and out through the mouth in a conscious connected way with no pause between the inhale and exhale and when we get started in just a moment inviting you to focus your energy and effort on the inhale

filling up your lungs and belly, and then exhaling gently. You don't need to force the breath out. So we're also going to go for a breath hold in this next practice, but this time we're going to do an inhale and hold on that last breath and see what that feels like. So before we get started with our 10 conscious connected breaths, let's just take a nice slow deep breath in through the nose.

Scott Wallace (55:35.556)
and letting out a bit of a sigh or a sound. And again, just making sure it's safe for you to drop in for this breath work experience. And let's find our first breath in and out of the mouth in three, two, and one. Inhale.

Patrick Obolgogiani (55:38.015)
you

Scott Wallace (55:57.077)
one.

Scott Wallace (56:01.581)
too.

Scott Wallace (56:07.212)
three.

Scott Wallace (56:12.844)
4

Scott Wallace (56:17.644)
Five, halfway, putting in some effort and energy.

6.

Scott Wallace (56:28.044)
Seven, three more breaths now.

Scott Wallace (56:38.252)
And on this last breath, filling up your lungs and coming into a breath hold, holding that breath, palms facing upwards and open if that feels good for you.

and holding that breath for as long as feels good for you, allowing that energy to guide you, knowing you are safe, supported, protected and guided, and that you are worthy and deserving and loved and the universe wants you to win.

Scott Wallace (57:21.238)
softening and relaxing into that state of being.

and when you're ready returning to slow gentle way of breathing.

Scott Wallace (57:37.318)
And on the next few exhales, just letting out a big sigh or a sound if that feels good for you.

Scott Wallace (57:51.692)
These sighs are so powerful for shifting energy as well and resetting the nervous system. And when you're ready, opening your eyes again, coming back into the space or room where you're in.

Patrick Obolgogiani (57:54.333)
Hmm.

Scott Wallace (58:17.718)
So after that, typically for those restorative breaths, people often feel much more grounded, focused, clear, connected and bit slower. And activating breaths, the conscious connected breaths, it's really common for people to feel a little bit sweaty, a little bit hot, a little bit like tight and tense because we're actually stimulating parts of the sympathetic nervous system.

elevating that state, which is the sympathetic nervous system is where our fight and flight stress response is and a part of the parasympathetic nervous system in the dorsal vagal complex. This is where our freeze and our fawn stress response lies. So essentially with these two techniques, you can use this to activate and elevate your energy and get that higher alert state and

with the restorative breaths in through the nose and out through the nose or mouth, you can down regulate your nervous system. So I recommend for all my clients to combine their daily routine that has a bit of both if there's no medical contraindications and that's a good fit for them. Because what's happening is we're expanding the tolerance and the range of the nervous system and getting more comfortable with these sensations and becoming more comfortable

Patrick Obolgogiani (59:38.152)
Hmm?

Scott Wallace (59:44.47)
feeling our fucking emotions and feeling sensations in our body. Because bro, one of the biggest things that's getting in the way of people living a more fulfilled and empowered life is just that they're not feeling their feelings. Like they're just not feeling their feelings because they're afraid of what it's gonna mean, how long it's gonna last, and how to handle it. So just remember to breathe fam, you've got this. So how are you feeling after those practices Patrick? What are they?

Patrick Obolgogiani (59:47.842)
You

Patrick Obolgogiani (01:00:09.808)
Amazing.

Scott Wallace (01:00:12.779)
How's your experience?

Patrick Obolgogiani (01:00:17.852)
I felt like really present after the first one. Less chatter in the head. And then now I feel like after this second one, as you mentioned, there's a bit more warmth. There's energy, like alertness. I would imagine that the second one might be quite good in the morning to activate everything. And then maybe coming from work, you want to be with your family or something, you might want to...

calm you down? Is that the way you would guide people to do it?

Scott Wallace (01:00:51.701)
Yeah, it's a good way to put it and often people ask me what's the best breathwork technique to do and when should I do it? And the first thing that I share with them is some breathwork is better than none. It doesn't matter what you're doing, just do some. If it's only for five, 10 minutes in the morning or five, 10 minutes at night, go for it. And as you shared, doing an activation breathwork in the morning can be really powerful. A lot of people are waking up, having their morning hit of caffeine.

and maybe feeling a little bit groggy and having to tap into some inspiration and motivation to get to work or to show up in their family or their business, whatever it is. And that can be a good way to like get focused, get amped and ready for the day. And typically at night, if I'm doing breath work in the evening, like late at night or in bed, I'm doing a restorative breath work in through the nose and out the mouth for, until I sleep essentially.

And that is a good way to down regulate after a big full day. And I know, you know, for us as entrepreneurs and business owners and creatives, there's so much happening in our minds. There's so many downloads and responsibilities and things to focus on and tasks to handle and then our own health and wellbeing. So really getting some consistency with these practices can help people.

maintain a more elevated state of being, feel more vital, feel more connected and to serve and create and lead from that place is what's going to change the world.

Patrick Obolgogiani (01:02:32.732)
probably a beautiful way to start closing. Is there anything, when you start looking into the future, there's been a big shift as you mentioned already in the last 10 years and five years since you started. How do you see things evolving in the next, let's say, five, 10 years? And what's the hope you have of how the work we do could influence, well, we, both you and me, could influence the world?

Scott Wallace (01:02:59.744)
Yeah, as you said, there's been a big trend shift with breath work and more and more people are starting to hear about it, use it more consciously and deepen into this work. And I think that's such a positive shift. Mind you, there's some people out there that think breath work is the work of the devil and is a sin. And there's a whole discussion on religion and philosophy and all that that we won't drop into for this.

podcast because it sounds like we're going to end it soon, but generally speaking, I think it's a very positive thing around using breath work to improve mental health, physical health, spiritual health, elevate people's energy and come back into their hearts, come back into connection with the body. And I see that as very

It's going to shift humanity's trajectory. The more connected, regulated, compassionate, aware and empowered humans are. That's, wow, that sentence sounded really weird. I think I missed a couple words there in that sentence. The more authentic and raw that we are as humans. I think that's going to really open up a drastic shift in our consciousness and our awareness. So I see more people.

exploring and experiencing breathwork. I think it's going to become really common as a mainstream modality to help treat a lot of mental health things. A lot of the symptoms that people are experiencing, social functioning, cognitive function, motor skills, sleep, immune health, digestion. A lot of these issues

can be traced back to a root cause of having a dysregulated nervous system. And so I think we're gonna see a lot more research and lived experiences and anecdotal experiences of people using breath work to treat and heal and actually get to the root causes of some of the most pressing.

Scott Wallace (01:05:16.192)
parts of the human experience, the more we move forward. And I really believe that and I'm seeing that happen. And I've had clients over the years that have come off and reduced their reliance on prescription meditation, prescription meditation. Dude, after this breath work, I feel so cooked. It's really shifted the energy. Prescription medication.

And they get more into prescription meditation, where it's like getting to healing the root causes, handling the trauma, the emotions and energy at the first instance, which creates so much shifts for the human experience. So I see positive things. I'm really excited for the future of breath work. And it's a reconnection, Patrick. It's a realignment back to our original blueprint.

back to the original blueprint of life and our power as human beings. And I'm really looking forward to being a part of this space. And I feel that I've come into this arena in the early majority, sort of at the start to the early majority within the Western world with the uses of breath work. And I'm looking forward to be around here and continuing to journey my own self, my own journey with breath work and transformation and helping more people into the future to create change.

so that way they can go out there into the world, run their companies, their businesses, bring their projects and ideas out into the world and elevate humanity's consciousness, man. So I'm so amped.

Patrick Obolgogiani (01:06:55.833)
Yeah, I can hear that in your voice. And hopefully at Alveos we can be part of that as well and helping hopefully fund some of that research. As you mentioned, it's really exciting to, to really transform. think that that needs to happen is to show. Unfortunately, or fortunately with data, but Hey, this actually works. it can, as you mentioned, fix the root cause of something that actually is then trickling down to all these different, different areas. can people find you Scott? If they want to learn more about your work and maybe even get in touch.

to work with you.

Scott Wallace (01:07:26.092)
Great. Planet Earth, Patrick. That's where I reside most days of the week. I live on the Gold Coast here in Australia. my team and I run a face-to-face workshops, training, retreat style immersions throughout the East Coast of Australia. And online, we've got a number of group programs, one-on-one coaching, and a whole lot more for businesses and organizations available. The best contact point is probably my Instagram, social media.

Patrick Obolgogiani (01:07:30.85)
Most days.

Scott Wallace (01:07:56.328)
at Earth Centred or Facebook at Earth Centred as well or Scott Wallace and that's the main point of call. We can find out all about the work we're doing and get in touch with me and if people have more questions on breath work, anything we've covered in this podcast, more than happy to connect with them and on my social media there is the application for coaching and for mentoring so they can work their way through all of that.

But social media is the best place, for sure.

Patrick Obolgogiani (01:08:29.219)
Yeah. I think you're prolific on the Instagram. looking forward to that. I feel like we, there's a lot of ground we didn't cover like around the, the wisdom part and personal growth. So maybe we'll do around two at some point, but for now, thank you so much, Scott, for being on the podcast and for everyone listening - we'll make sure to add links to the old, everything mentioned and be sure to tune in. We are going to have our advisor, John Dickinson. It's a, our scientific advisor and just work with some of the top athletes in the world.

in terms of the, you know, both Premier League and also in the Team GB Olympics team. So make sure to tune in for that next week. Otherwise have a great rest of the week. Everyone, thank you Scott again.

Scott Wallace (01:09:13.26)
Thank you, Patrick. I appreciate the invitation to be part of the podcast and I'm looking forward to see the developments in your company and collaborating more on the future. Thank you very much.

Patrick Obolgogiani (01:09:24.793)
Thank you. Take care.