- I just remember at eight, nine years old, being this sweet little boy and his mom was just so bad and not understanding and not knowing. So it was when we started to get into like the really, the young child work in the process. I was like, I have been stuck at eight, nine years old for the last 30 years. - Welcome everybody. My name is Drew Horning, and this podcast is called Love's Everyday Radius.
It's brought to you by the Hoffman Institute and its stories and anecdotes and people we interview about their life post process and how it lives in the world. Radiating love. This episode mentions childhood traumatic experiences, addictions, and disordered eating. As such, it might not be suitable for all listeners. Hey everybody, welcome to the Hoffman Podcast. Doug McNich is with us. Welcome, Doug. - Hello, my friend. Thank you so much for having me. - I am excited for this conversation.
And you are an internationally award-winning executive chef, restaurant consultant. Your bestselling author, four books, is that right? - I have written four cookbooks. Three of my books have actually been awarded Best Vegan Cookbook in the world. - Incredible vegan chef. You're an educator, you're an activist, you're a pioneer of society's plant forward future, a vegan future with over two decades of expertise launching and developing successful businesses in the food industry.
So tell us first, welcome to the Hoffman Podcast. - Yes, thank you so much. I'm so grateful to be here. - And just real quickly, you were sharing before we started that you are grateful for Hoffman and the work you did. Will you just share a little bit about what it's meant to you? - Oh gosh. The Hoffman process has been the biggest life changing tool I've ever experienced.
I had no clue, um, going into it what it was like or what I would experience, but it's changed me and it continues to change me to this day in ways that I never, I never could have imagined really, truthfully. It's just, it's improved my life tenfold. I'm so grateful for that experience. - Will you tell us a little bit about how you came to the process and how you came to be the executive chef that you are and tell us your story a little bit.
- Yeah, for sure. So I started cooking at a really young age. I was 15 years old in the kitchen. I fell in love with food. I fell in love with everything about the, the insanity of a kitchen . Um, I worked for a couple of years in a British pub. I went to chef school. I'm, I am Canadian, originally from Toronto. I live in Philadelphia now, but went to chef school when I was 18, did that route and, uh, continued just to work my way through all of the ranks.
I cooked in, uh, restaurants all over Toronto. I cooked at the Air Canada Center, which is where the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Toronto Raptors play. I did catering. I did all sorts of jobs, and I gained a ton of experience when I was 21. I was in a pretty low place, you know, uh, I come from a pretty difficult background in terms of my mom and dad and a lot of neglect and abuse in my childhood.
And with help from Hoffman, it's, it's, I've really come full circle to understand that, you know, I became an addict and I started using everything from pills to alcohol, to pot to porn. You know, I got into some harder drugs when I was younger. And for those that know the restaurant industry and certainly what it used to be like, that didn't help anything . Um, I was more or less an alcoholic by the age of 19, flourishing as a cook, but more or less an alcoholic.
And I was addicted to morphine. And, um, you know, you name it, I did it. I had a pretty tough home life when I was 21. I, I, I sort of bottomed out the first time. And, uh, long story short, I fell in love with a woman on the internet. She was 10 years older than me. She lived in New York. She was a vegan. She filled my head full of ideas that animals have these feelings and I'll be healthier.
And so I took the plunge, became vegetarian, lost some weight, fell good, did the vegan thing, became an entrepreneur in and around there, started doing my own thing. I didn't really know what that meant. I'm like, I'm gonna become a brand . Um, you know, I saw Jamie Oliver doing it and Gordon Ramsey, and I was like, I'm gonna be the Gordon Ramsey of vegan food. I had a lot of great, amazing opportunities. Uh, I've, you know, I've worked my butt off. I've written four cookbooks.
Three of them have won best in the world. I had a restaurant in Toronto for five years. I've been on TV a hundred times, done the media training thing. I've signed autographs. I've had people shake in their boots to meet me. I visualized, you know, becoming a celebrity chef when I was younger. And I'm super grateful that I was able to achieve many, many things, especially at a young age. Many, many things. And in 2017, I was actually awarded Best Chef in the city of Toronto.
So I'm not best vegan chef. I was actually voted as the best chef in a city of 6 million people. And I couldn't believe it. I had one restaurant open, I was opening another one on the outside. I had everything going for me. I was, you know, like I said, signing the autographs, doing the tv. I had money in the bank, but I had killed myself to get there. I had put on, I don't even know, 80 pounds. I was drinking a lot. Again, I was eating poorly.
I wasn't sleeping, certainly wasn't meditating or practicing any mindfulness. I was drinking 16 coffees a day. I bottomed out. And then right around there, my dad died. I had this sort of coming to God moment where I'm like, I have to change. So what year was this, Doug? This was early 2018, end of 2017. The way I came about Hoffman was I took a course from a good friend in Toronto. Her name is, uh, Kimberly Carroll. And she was trained in the Hoffman Method.
She did the Haman process, I wanna say 20 years ago, 15 years ago in Toronto or in Canada. So I had my first introduction to vulnerability meditation, thinking about my problems, my emotions. Think I, to me, I was a, I was a man. I didn't talk about emotions. I didn't talk about feelings. I stuffed them down and I drank them away. So I did this course, it started to open me up, you know, writing letters, doing things that I had never done before.
And it helped. And I look back now six years ago, and that was my first introduction to mindfulness, my first introduction to, I didn't even know the name Hoffman Process. I, Kimberly never said that she was trained in this method. It was just this method. So really quick, flash forward a couple years later, I still hadn't beaten my demons. We were in the middle of Covid, drinking a lot, not taking care of myself.
I listened to Scooter Braun on the Jay Shetty podcast, and Scooter talks about doing the Hoffman process. So I go on the website, I get this brochure mailed to me, and I had it on my nights side table, I swear, for two or three years. You know, the cost of doing the Hoffman process wasn't in my budget. I just, it was covid. Restaurants were shut down, but also spiritually, emotionally, mentally, I know Now I wasn't ready.
And then flash forward years later, you know, I still had these career successes going on in the foreground, but in the background, you know, I was still drinking a lot and I was still not treating myself properly. I would do things like watch Ecker tole videos till three in the morning and chug vodka while doing it. So I thought I was a spiritual guru, but I wasn't actually handling what was, you know, quote wrong with me. Um, moved to the United States.
I was diagnosed with diabetes March 6th, 2023. I am five foot seven, and I wound up at 315 pounds through a lot of therapy and a lot of work. I know now that I was, my patterns had a control, a control of me. And March 6th, 2023 was my coming to God moment. Again. It was like, okay, you wrote these books. You've toured the world talking about healthy food. How in God's name did you get here? And it's been a year now, just over a year of unraveling at all.
Hoffman was always in my mind, I had that pamphlet. I spoke to Kimberly Carroll and I said, have you ever heard of the Hoffman process? And she said, sweetie, that's what I'm trained in. This is what you learned before. And I was like, oh, I'm gonna do it. I called, I swear to God, I called the California office that day, and it was a six month wait list. And I was like, no, I need this now, . I need this now. As God is my witness on that call.
Someone called the person next to them and canceled. And she said, Doug, we had a spot open up right now. Can you take it? And I said, yes. I didn't even think I just said, yes, give me it. And I made it happen. - Wow. You, so you take all of that transpired in your childhood and all that was happening in the ensuing years and the patterns that were emerging and hurting you. And you show up in California at the retreat site.
What happens, what, what happens in the first few moments as you step onto the beautiful Northern California retreat site? Oh, - It was absolutely beautiful. You're, you're right about that. Absolutely. Just gorgeous. Oh gosh, whew. There was a anticipation, a fear, a trepidation, curiosity, curiosity about what was going to happen, how it was going to happen. I mean, I'll say that the grounds there feel magical. There is 100% something magical and spiritual about those grounds there.
You know, we get there and there was already some people there, and I walk into the dining hall and we start, you know, shooting the shit with each other and talking to each other. And it just, it started to feel more real and more, you know, more calm and more grounding. And, but it was just the hairs on the, my skin were standing up as well, because there was just that like, you know what, Doug, you're 40. You gave yourself diabetes. You've owned up to this bullshit.
You've owned up to all this nonsense that you've put yourself through. You know, you are an amazing human, you know, that you can take on the world. There is something you have to beat. And I knew it, I knew it deep down. That was the first day I got there. And, uh, yeah, .
- Wow. So, so Doug, we're about to go into those ensuing days, but you know, our tagline is when you're serious about change, and so many people want change, but help us, if you can help the listeners understand the evolution of change, the process of change. How did that come about for you in the following days? Take us, take us into it so we can get a kind of visceral sense of you changing.
- I chose to fully be present there and to, I think for the, one of the first times in my life to really push aside the mind chatter as much as I could and be open and honest and real and vulnerable. It wasn't easy. There's 39 other people in the room with me whom I had never met, but I chose to be there. I chose to do the work. I, I remember the first day we had to fill something out and it was, you know, what, what do you hope to get out of this?
Or something? And I said, I need to find my true self, not this celebrity chef shit, not this dad, not this husband who is Doug. And that was my intention. I set that intention on day one, and I'm so glad I did it. I really, I just did my best to show up and listen and do the best possible work I could. And, uh, it was hard , it was hard. I mean, it was challenging. It was hard.
But I could also see how there was such a respect and admiration for the process that all of the teachers had and put forth. And I felt safe and nurtured, even though I knew I was unpeeling these layers of Doug, these layers of onion, of the built up ego and the, and everything. I just felt this sense of like, I'm safe here. I know things are gonna be okay. I know it's hard and I know this is work that's going to change me, but I feel safe here. I was really made to feel like
that the whole time. It was just awesome. - Beautiful. So as those layers unpeeled, what happened? What emerged, what happened in this kind of showdown with all of your patterns in the emergence of spirit? Is there a moment in time you can take us to your process? - You know, I, um, I grew up in a really difficult home environment. There was a lot of abuse, a lot of neglect, cockroach infested homes. Um, my mom had mental illness issues. She was an addict.
My dad was an addict, and I fought it my whole life. I, I never wanted to be in that environment, and I was scared of my mom. I fought with my mom. My dad was complacent. And I would call him out even at a young age. And, you know, I just remember at eight, nine years old, being this sweet little boy, and his mom was just so bad and not understanding and not knowing. And so it was when we started to get into like the really the young child, work child in the process, I was like, holy shit.
I have been stuck at eight, nine years old for the last 30 years. - So you in a way greeted that 8-year-old that you had said goodbye to, and you felt reconnected to him once again in your process? - Oh my God, yes. It was just, it blew my mind because here's this like, sweet, I have an 8-year-old boy right now, and he looks like me. Everyone calls him mini Doug. And I, I just kept thinking of him.
And so seeing my 8-year-old self, not getting what he needed, not getting his mom and dad to tell them that he, they loved him and to be safe and supported and, you know, and it was the opposite. I had to keep myself safe from, from them sometimes. And, you know, child protective services were called, and I'm the one that had to make sure that my brother and I would be okay and not taken away. So that, and um, there was one other moment I want to touch on that was huge for me.
And, you know, I suffered with IBS previously to the process for about eight years. I would go to the bathroom countless times a day. I couldn't digest many foods. And it was the day, and I won't get into the specifics of it, but it was the day that we did a, a, a very in-depth process for myself of essentially seeing where mom and dad came from and, and, um, talking to them in a certain way. And, um, I, I was not a religious person before the process.
And I don't necessarily still consider myself religious in terms of, you know, being dogmatic. I definitely talk to God now, I definitely use these terms and think of God and spirit and source differently because of the process. But there was one night in particular, we were coming towards the end of, you know, seven or eight hours of work. And I swear I saw the devil and I went outside and I remember shaking.
And I remember my teacher Sharon showed up for dinner in the car with the other teachers, and she said, what's the matter, Doug? And I was like, I'm, I was just shaking. And I just like, I want vodka. I need vodka, Sharon. Like, I can't do this right now. And I'll never forget, she said to me, continue. And I was like, what? She said, continue, you're doing the work. It's working. And I was like, okay.
And I continued the next day as God is my witness on my mother's grave, I swear my IBS was gone, gone. And to this day, I, it's gone. And I equate that to finally, finally forgiving my mom and dad. And so for me it was two revelations. It was one is this little boy that's trapped. He just needs to be seen, heard, felt. He needs to be given the love he was never given. And two, you gotta forgive mom and dad. I've tried thousands of dollars of medications.
I tried breathing apps, I tried FODMAP diets, I tried not eating everything, nothing worked. I forgave mom and dad. The next morning my IBS was gone and it's still gone. So there you go. . - I'm imagining that's not just an idea that forgiveness, although a simple idea is a journey.
And there was something that transpired over the course of those hours of work, seeing the devil, seeing Sharon who encouraged you to do the last thing you wanted to do, which is to keep going and going in through the experiences the next day, both in the classroom and then also outside of the classroom. Something happened cellularly for you, where you actually forgave your mom and dad. - I, the hair on my arm just stood up.
I have never explained it that way, cellularly, but in the last year, I've lost 120 pounds. - Wait, wait, wait, wait. 120 pounds. - Yeah, in the last year, I've lost 120 pounds. Wow. Yeah. And I'll say every 10 pounds or so, I felt another layer of emotions essentially come out of me. And memories, had you known me six years ago, I was like, God doesn't exist. And this is all hippity dity bullshit. And I woo woo this and meditate that.
I am telling you, as a person who used to be like that, my emotions were trapped in my body. And so when you say cellular level, yeah, perfectly put. I've actually had some calls with Sharon. I love her. And, and you know, I see her about once a month. And I keep, every time I ask, how did you do this ? How is this so possible to, to have so much change? And she said, well, the universe works in strange ways. I can't explain it to you. So yes, cellular level.
And I thought I had forgotten mom and dad forgiven, sorry, mom and dad. But really it took this practice and the process for me to be able to come to terms with that and finally move on. And to this day, my IBS is completely gone. And I, I mean, I'm so, so grateful for that. I, I spent eight years in pain, bloated stomach and going to the bathroom all the time. And it affected my personal life. It affected my business. I'm just so grateful for that.
- So, Doug, what happens next, either in your process or after your process, take us to the moments following those days and where do we go next? - It was, um, I don't wanna say it became more fun, , but there was certainly some lighter parts to it I remember. And, um, it was a nice relief to have those times because, you know, there's a lot of challenge in this. I felt myself opening more, and for the first time in my life, I felt my heart opening.
And I didn't even know what that feeling was. I had no clue. I felt warm in my chest. I felt my heart like happy. And then, you know, there was more challenge after that, of course. It's, it's, it was, it was, there was more challenges and stuff, but I found my heart open and I found my mind quieting for the first time in my life. I was able to quiet my mind. I felt myself bonding with my fellow classmates. And I found myself just in this world of like, wow, I didn't know I could feel so good.
I didn't know I could just have this feeling of pure, abundant energy flowing through me. And it didn't matter if I was making money or sending an email, receiving an email, achieving a cookbook or opening a restaurant. Nothing mattered. It just got to this feeling of like, I have everything in me. I don't need booze, I don't need pills, I don't need porn, I don't need food. I don't need quote success or quote fame. I don't need any of these things.
And that was like, holy shit, I don't need any of these things. And it was just such a realization and, and, you know, seeing everyone open up as well and the energy flowing and the teachers, and it was just such a, ugh, beautiful, magical time. Absolutely beautiful, magical time in a beautiful, magical place in California. - And then you, you head out, you have your post-process weekend and you return home. Take us there. - Uh, yeah, so I had my post-process weekend. That was wild.
And in a good way, definitely had a glow, definitely felt like I was floating. Spent a couple days in a spa. I'm glad I did. I do feel like I needed some time to come back down, fly back to Philadelphia prior to the process. My wife of 13 years, and I were having a tough time. She had asked me for a separation earlier in the summer. It was very challenging, very challenging for me emotionally. I did relapse in the summer with pills after this happened.
But I will say that the tools that Hoffman provided me with the insight, the self-awareness allowed me to deal with what a, a month later I moved out, you know, at the time of recording this, I'm five and a half months out of a separation. I have stayed completely sober. And not only have I stayed completely sober, but I have my, my practice is a, it's every day. You know? I mean, I'm human. I'm not perfect.
There's gonna be some days where I, I don't do a quad check or don't meditate, and that's fine. But this has become part of my life. And I truly believe Hoffman came in at a time where I needed it most. Because had I had to deal with this separation of my wife of 13 years, and we also have an 8-year-old little boy, I don't know if I would've stayed sober, you know, those first few weeks and a couple months.
I cried every day. But I noticed the patterns and I was able to come back to self and just doing quad checks and all of this work, it's just changed my life completely. And it's also allowed me to have an awareness now of understanding five, five and a half months later that Candace and I are best friends and we're better off that way. We don't, we we're not good, at least not now living together. We're not good romantically, at least for now. We co-parent a beautiful little boy.
We've become best friends again. And it's, it's really a beautiful thing. And you know, I credit so much of this to Hoffman and just all the tools, and I haven't even explored all of them since post-process. Like, I'm still unraveling and discovering more and more I feel like every hour sometimes. So I'm so grateful to that and the experience. And, um, yeah, - Doug, you know, we talk about the left road, right road. You remember that model.
And one of the things we say is that life happens, you know, there are certain things that are going to happen. You know, the question becomes how do you respond to life happening? And it sounds like one of the things that happened to you is that your wife wanted this separation and you moved out. Part of what's different is how you showed up to your life on the right road, despite this separation.
- Yes. As you illustrate and as Hoffman says, you know, I am human and, you know, doing the process and the work that I continue to do almost every day, it doesn't mean I'm perfect. And so there's been times where I've slipped a lot. Christmas was really hard for me. Um, it was my first Christmas in 15 years not having family around me, and my little boy wasn't with me. And I cried and I got a little nasty with her, and I sent some texts and, but I was able to catch myself.
And due to Hoffman and due to the work, I was like, what am I doing? I'm caught in these patterns. I'm caught in abandonment. I'm caught in not enough. I'm caught in shame. I'm caught in guilt. I'm caught in. How did you fuck this up? How did you fuck this marriage up? Like you, you're, you're not enough. Thankfully, I was able to come back. The work post process has, has been, I would say, arguably just as important as the work and the process.
I mean, the process definitely opened me up to it all. And, and, um, helps rewire a lot of things. I mean, I'll just say it again. I'm so grateful for this and I still like, I still don't know how this happened. , this is, the change is amazing. Like, the, the tagline is right when you, when you're serious about change, and I mean, I will say that 100 million billion percent, there's change and it, and it's, it's all positive. Like there's absolutely nothing negative that came out of this.
It's just all positive. And it continues to be, to this day, - I'm just smiling, Doug. 'cause I'm, you know, I hear you kind of laugh a little bit in wonderment at your own change. - Yeah, yeah. just sometimes I, like, I walk around, sometimes I work from home and I have a lot calls, a lot emails, nature, and I'll go for walks where I live. I, I say it to Sharon when I meet with her once a month. I'm like, I just compliment people now. I'm like, Hey, nice boots. Your hair is beautiful today.
The trees look greener, the sky looks more blue. These are felt senses along with, for the first time in my life, I'm not looking for anything back. I'm not saying you have really nice boots because I wanna have sex with you. I'm saying you have really nice boots because I genuinely, my heart feels your boots, your boots are beautiful. Uh, yeah. Like had you known me six years ago, I was just, this still a sweet sole. But you know, there I was always after something, I complimented someone.
It's 'cause I was trying to manipulate them. I was trying to get something for myself. So yeah, I mean, I laugh because I still can't believe sometimes who I am. I know I'm a child of God. I know I come from the light. And this is just something that, it's in my heart forever. I'm just so grateful for this. - What's happened with the quality of your connection with your friendships and with your son? - Well, with my son, it's actually better than it ever has been. He is just the sweetest child.
And I had to end this family trauma bloodline. I had to, it went through the families of generations. I know this, there was abuse, neglect, diabetes, alcoholism through both sides of my family, my mom and dad through all of their relatives. And I said, this ends now. And, um, my boy and I have the best relationship in the world. Friends is another. It's interesting, you know, I've, I've spent the last five, six months in what they call now monk mode.
I've been working out a lot. I go to bed early. I am, I'm up at three or four in the morning. I, I have a Hoffman group here in Philly and I definitely stay in touch with some of the grads. - You were saying earlier, you, you just went to one last night? Yeah, - We had a Hoffman graduate group, uh, last night meet up, shout out to charity and everyone there we did quieting the chatter. So we did some work around intellectual self and our emotional self.
And we got in a fight with each other last night and, but we reconcile . So it's, it's beautiful. You know, once a month we meet up, we have a WhatsApp group with all the grads. There's a couple people in particular on the east coast that I stay in touch with and I'm gonna go hang out with them this spring. But I will say, not in a negative way, but I crave more now out of life. I wanna know where we came from. I wanna know why, you know, why we are the way we are as human beings.
And so not in a pejorative way, but I just can't do, since Hoffman I can't do basic conversations. So if I walk up to someone, I'm like, how are you? And they say, good. I'm like, no, how are you? Like really, truly, what are you feeling in this moment? So I'm looking for the others , if that makes sense. Yeah. So I, I wanna say it's been a bit challenging, but at the same time it's a breath of fresh air because I did that whole, Hey, how are you? I'm good. Okay. Well how's the weather today?
Oh, how was the sports team last night? I can't do that anymore. I, I, I need more than that. It's opened me up to another world and, and I'm so grateful for that too because I know, you know, coming into spring here in the northeast and the winter's over now, everyone's coming outta their shell. I'm gonna find my other - And I'm, I'm also curious about food and cooking. How has your time at the process and your life post-process impacted your relationship with eating food and preparing food?
- Well, it's interesting, you know, you bring that up. I wanna touch on like, the career thing for a second. In terms of food. I kept asking myself, why did I wanna become a celebrity chef? Why is it that I, I went down this path of wanting to be known. I purposely wanted to be known, like, you know, whatever that meant over the years. And I've just come to realize there was that little boy inside of me that needed to be seen.
It needed to be heard. So the more I'd get on tv, the more I'd, you know, have an accolade or, you know, fly to Europe to do a live cooking demo or Australia or whatever. There was that little boy who was, you know, he needed that. But of course it's not what I really needed. I chased things for a long time. So the process has changed me in a way that I spent 25 years in food and I can't see myself ever completely leaving it, especially as an entrepreneur, you know, I love doing multiple things.
I love working on multiple projects all at the same time. But there is something that's called me lately to help and to serve. I don't know what that is yet. Part of me wants to become a Hoffman teacher. Part of me wants to help children. I, I, I don't know yet. So my relationship with food in terms of the professional thing is, you know, I'll still, like I said, I'll always love that, but my passion is going into like, serving the world right now.
And, and it's hard to explain because it's really come up in the last few months of my life in terms of food and eating. Yeah, definitely more mindful. I'm very cautious now. I don't wanna say cautious. So I'm mindful and respectful of my body. I do my quad checks almost daily. I talk to my body and my body tells me like, Hey, today I need you to eat less fat today I want more protein today I need more water.
And I listen to it and sometimes my body's like, Hey, let's go get that fries with gravy, . I, I want some, I want some damn fries today. And I listen and you know what I'm gonna tell you, it works. It's worked for me. I did my quad check today and it said eat a little bit more. 'cause I fasted yesterday. And so my quad check this morning, my body said, Hey, I need a little more calories today. So I'm listening to it. I've already had a big meal. So yeah.
- With that sigh, I just have to ask you, what's it like to have reflected so fully on the scope of your childhood, your Hoffman process, your career and your life posts process? What do you notice as you have talked about all these things in such depth and vulnerability? - Oh gosh, that is such a good question. I went through a lot my whole life. Didn't give myself grace. I was really tough on myself. I, I'd beat myself up.
I'd, I would be really down on myself, but instead of feeling it, I would push it away. I'd push it away with whatever I could. So reflecting and going back and looking and I'm easy on myself because I know I'm human now. Forgiving myself for all of the, you know, quote mistakes that I've made, giving myself grace. And then honestly like understanding that it's that old adage of like, you know, what doesn't break you makes you.
And so I sit here now at age 41 and looking back at having this amazing career I've had already at a young age winning all these accolades and awards. It's like, I'm like the second part of my life. I feel like God is telling me to help. God is saying, you know, listen man, I put you through this shit so you can help others. Honest to God, that's what's coming up in my heart right now. I want to follow that. And I don't know what it is taking my time.
It's sort of how I've always manifested things in my entrepreneurial career. But God is saying, you gotta serve a lot of people that went through what you went through, Doug, they'd be dead, they'd be heroin addicts, they'd be in and out of psych wards and you're here. Not only are you here, you're standing, you're getting muscular, you're becoming a fitness guy. You have this outlook on life where all right, bring it. I'm okay. It's another, another tough thing.
I'm gonna deal with that. And not only am I gonna deal with it, I'm gonna come out on the other side stronger, wiser, and more humble. Like I said, so much gratitude for this. And um, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Going up that mountain and that hill to the center in Petaluma, seeing the deer, the mist, the watching the sunrise, that first day, just embracing it all and just really saying, okay, I'm here for this.
You know, our teachers told us for the year after, you're gonna continue probably forever. But they said certainly for that first year, you're gonna continue to see change and feel change. And they're right. I continue to stay curious. I continue to stay present as much as I can and I continue to, um, follow my heart and lead with love. Love always. - Doug, thank you so much for your time and your heart here in this conversation. - Aw, thank you so much. I really appreciate it.
And I just thank you for everything you do and everyone at Hoffman. And maybe one day my friend will teach together, who knows . - I look forward - To it. Thank you so much. - Thank you for listening to our podcast. My name is Liza in Grassi. I'm the CEO and President of Hoffman Institute Foundation. - And I'm Rossi Hoffman, teacher and founder of the Hoffman Institute Foundation.
- Our mission is to provide people greater access to the wisdom and power of love - In themselves, in each other, and in the world. To find out more, please go to hoffman institute.org.