Rick Hayhurst has been a manual therapist for 28 years and counting!  And a teacher of teachers in the manual therapy arena.  What that means is he knows how to help people “heal”.  Mentally, physically, and emotionally.   His surprisingly simple step 1 “the gift of noticing”.  Most people, it seems, do everything in their power other than notice.  Listen in.  You will be enlightened. 

Administrative: (See episode transcript below)

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Transcript: 

[music]

0:00:05.9 Mischa Zvegintzov: Welcome back, everybody, to the Tools for a Good Life Summit, and right now, I would like to introduce to you, Rick Hayhurst. Welcome, Rick.

0:00:17.5 Rick Hayhurst: Hello, hello, hello.

0:00:19.6 Mischa Z: Fantastic, welcome. I'm gonna read your bio real quick. So, Rick, you have been a manual therapist for about 38 years. I believe we hammered it out and decided it was 28 years. You've been a... Yup... You've been a coach for about 28 years as well. You've created and developed six different massage therapy schools. You have produced multiple continuing education programs, and this is for the manual therapy arena. Correct?

0:00:52.8 Rick Hayhurst: Yes.

0:00:53.1 Mischa Z: And you find yourself quite boring.

0:00:57.7 Rick Hayhurst: Yes. Very uninteresting. [chuckle] A perfect coach. Yes.

0:01:06.3 Mischa Z: I just wanna get right to it. So I think that... I want to know... You've been in manual therapies, and so when we talk about manual therapies, there's obviously massage, things like that. What else fits into manual therapies, when you say manual therapies?

0:01:22.5 Rick Hayhurst: Anything that manipulates tissue. So if you think about... The chiropractor is a manual therapist, he's working manual... The physical therapist is a manual therapist. Anaprapath is a manual therapist. A massage therapist is a manual therapist. There are manual therapies that don't fit in those categories, so they're actually just manual therapists... They're called manual therapists.

0:01:45.7 Mischa Z: Okay. And so, you tend to be more along the lines of the manual therapists that are manipulating tissues, then.

0:01:51.8 Rick Hayhurst: Yeah, yeah, in fact, the DO is a manual therapist, the doctor who has a DO designation, Doctor of Osteopathy, they actually learn osteopathic manipulations. So...

0:02:01.9 Mischa Z: Oh cool.

0:02:03.3 Rick Hayhurst: Yeah. So some of the continuing education programs that I run, have included all of those modalities. So not just one or the other, but... And pain management has been my study and also what I've produced over time. So in any case, those are manual therapies.

0:02:21.8 Mischa Z: Cool. Thank you. Thank you for answering that question. And I noted for you, that you... Transformational massage and body work. And so, I think someone such as myself who maybe has been a bit... In my younger years, was a bit... What's the word? I don't know if... Skeptical... So not contemptuous, but skeptical of the usefulness of massage... Like, transformational, I would think. I'm not sure if that's something I would say about massage or other sorts of body work. But as I've gotten to where I am today, mentally and then emotionally, I'm like, "Oh yeah, we as humans, we hold a lot of stuff energetically, inside, that would be awesome if we could release it, via some transformational massage and body work." And I know you're gonna say yes to that. So my question to you is, tell me some before and afters that you've seen, with some of your clients, of like... Yeah, this was the state they came in. This is... We did. And this is where they are.

0:03:40.2 Rick Hayhurst: Yeah. Such a great conversation to have. Really, what is the story your body is telling? What is that story? And every body is telling a story. The story your body is telling may or may not be the same story your mouth is telling. And so to really get into the distinction between what is the story the body is telling as a result of what is the energy that I'm holding. What is the trauma that I'm holding? You know, a ballet dancer is telling one story and then the person on the couch who hasn't moved for 30 years is telling... That body is telling a different story.

0:04:18.1 Rick Hayhurst: And it's no judgment about one or the other, it's just a story that the body tells. And so when you think about the before and after of a transformational session... So fundamentally, I'm a coach. Fundamentally, I'm an educator, I'm a coach. I've been educating my whole professional life and coaching people through experiences of trauma, often, all of that time. So when you think about putting a session together for someone who has a body that's telling a story... So one story would be headaches. A woman walks in my room... Excuse me, "I've had headaches for 40 years, and I don't know what you're gonna do for me."

0:04:56.3 Rick Hayhurst: And she's a little bit angry.

0:04:58.0 Mischa Z: Yeah.

0:05:00.4 Rick Hayhurst: And I said, "Well, I'm not gonna do anything for you because that presentation doesn't allow me to." I just wanna honor where you are and where you are is like, "I've had headaches for 40 years, and what are you gonna do about it?" Well, I'm not gonna do anything about it. But I'm gonna invite you to do something about it. And is that... Are you ready for that? Because maybe she's not. You gotta understand that 40 years of headaches and identity, it's not just a headache, it's an identity. And it's a story that lives inside of that person, and that's expressed in the body of that person.

0:05:32.2 Rick Hayhurst: Now, if you look at where the body is, the body is a vehicle in life, so that lives in her life. Headaches live in her life. So if you wanna unravel that, you have to get that you're unraveling a life. You're unraveling an identity. So let me just check in with you. How is that occurring for you as I'm saying that?

0:05:51.7 Mischa Z: I like it... Well, I don't like it, but I like it. I'm not sure if I'm answering the question.

0:06:02.2 Rick Hayhurst: Yeah, so, like it or not, what is it saying to you? What's occurring inside of your own body as you're hearing me say like 40 years... What are you gonna do about it? How is it occurring for you as I'm just being that person who's holding that space, that's saying, "I'm not gonna do anything about it."

0:06:16.3 Mischa Z: Yeah, meaning... So you're asking me like if I were to hear, "Hey, Mischa, what are you gonna do about this?" Is that... Am I understanding that right?

0:06:27.9 Rick Hayhurst: So we'll edit this out.

0:06:28.9 Mischa Z: Yes...

0:06:33.5 Rick Hayhurst: Yes. So... And then... And take two. So the gift of having that person who comes in who says, "I've got 40 years, what are you gonna do about it?" Healing happens on the inside. So healing is our responsibility. What are we gonna do to heal ourselves? Now, we look outside of ourselves for support for practitioners, therapists, etcetera. We look outside for the coach to say, "We need to do step one, step two, step three." Whether or not we do it is up to us. Whether or not our body changes as a result of a manual therapy is up to us.

0:07:09.1 Mischa Z: Yes, okay.

0:07:10.1 Rick Hayhurst: And sometimes, again, we have a holding pattern. It's an identity. Pain can become an identity. So a person comes in, 40 years of headaches, what do you gonna do about it? Nothing. What would you like to do about it? A lot of resistance. Like, "My doctor told me to come and that's why I came." Okay, great. Alright, great. Tell me about your headache. Wow. Now, you're getting to the story. I had a child and it's from the epidural, I'm sure of it. And that could be the case. It could be true. So I pull up some charts and I say, "Hey, let's just look at some pain patterns." And as you look at these charts, do you see yourself in any of these images of pain, the cause of pain and referral patterns, things like that?" And she says, "Yes. There's me, there's me, there's me, there's me."

0:08:00.0 Rick Hayhurst: Now, when a person responds like that, the truth is, it probably is them. It probably is what they're dealing with. And so, I say, "Okay, great. Well, this is what I suggest. How about we treat these things." And before we do that, my question to you though is, you've had headaches for 40 years, you've seen doctors, you've seen specialists, you've changed your diet, you've done all kinds of things to approach healing these headaches or this headache. What is missing? And she says, "I don't know. I don't know." And I say, "Well, you have to get that something's missing in the formula because 40 years of treatment and still having the same pathology... Just... We're just looking at like... Is there something missing?

0:08:46.1 Rick Hayhurst: She says, "Well, I really don't know. What do you think is missing?" And I said, "Proper treatment." I think proper treatment is missing. I think you're doing a great job with what you're doing, and you've landed in this chair. So let me just invite you to this experience. Maybe this experience can inform you or your body in a way that it hasn't been informed before. Great. She was a little like, "Okay." [chuckle] Like one of those.

0:09:12.9 Rick Hayhurst: And I was so grateful for her, she's a beautiful human. We're talking about a beautiful woman, we're not talking about anything else. We're talking about a beautiful, educated... Highly educated human.

0:09:25.5 Mischa Z: Yes.

0:09:26.0 Rick Hayhurst: And so, I invited her to lay on the table, and I think I touched her for about 20 minutes. A little manual therapy in her head and her neck and treated what I saw in the charts that she defined as her. And finished... Again, just 20 minutes of manual therapy. And I said, "Let's just check in. How are you doing?" "Well, I don't have a headache anymore." And I said, "When's the last time you didn't have a headache?" "I told you it was 40 years ago." And I said, "Okay. So in 40 years, you have had zero interruption in the headache expressing itself painfully." "Yes, 40 years."

0:10:07.2 Rick Hayhurst: And I said, "And today, right now, you don't have a headache." "I don't have a headache. What did you do?" And I said, "Let's just check in. Is it okay with you that you don't have a headache?" "Yes." "Okay. What I did was treat you according to what I explained in the beginning. And we looked at the charts and we just addressed what you pointed out, so we just followed your lead."

0:10:33.3 Rick Hayhurst: "Wow, I don't have a headache." And I said, "What you have to define for yourself is, are you okay with that because I can't support you if you're not. So if you're okay with that, we can go forward. If you're not, then I can't treat you." "Well, I'm okay." I said, "Great. I'll see you in three days, and I want you in my schedule every three days for this much time. Let's just check in. We'll do six sessions." If we wanna cancel any of that we can. Let's just put it in a calendar. "Okay." So leaves, comes back in three days. "How are you doing?" "I don't have a headache." And I said, "Isn't that amazing?" "What did you do?" And I said, "Do you want the headache?" "No." And I said, "Then look at your face and tell your face that you don't want the headache." [chuckle]

0:11:24.9 Rick Hayhurst: And she is confronted by that.

0:11:29.0 Mischa Z: Yes. Yes.

0:11:29.1 Rick Hayhurst: And I said, "Listen, you have an entire life set up to support being in pain, and I understand that." It's okay that you have that, but in order to change it, sometimes, we have to look at what are the systems that keep me in a holding pattern, and then how can I transform that holding pattern so that I can then transform the expression of the pain, which in this case is just a headache.

0:11:54.1 Rick Hayhurst: And I said, "So I'm only inviting you. I'm just inviting you." It means nothing to me. And I hope you get out of pain, but it doesn't affect my life, but I'm just inviting you. Are you willing to be in this work? "Yes." [chuckle] "Great. Great." And the gift of this story is just that healing is possible. Healing is possible, and it starts really with the mindset. The expression of pain is not the beginning of the pain. You gotta get the iceberg... The tip of the iceberg is the expression of pain, but what's underneath of it. And so, as we address that mindset, are you okay with it? Do you want it? And what are the systems that you have in place to support what you used to have versus creating new systems to support what you want to have? Go ahead.

0:12:47.0 Mischa Z: Yeah, yeah. No, I wanna get to the question because I think this is na