Brain Optimization

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

people, brain optimization, veterans, trauma, ptsd, effectiveness, retreats, treatments, life, relive, event, talk, process, Michael Cortina, therapy, rates, coach, practice, years, exit your way

SPEAKERS

Damon Pistulka, Michael Cortina

Damon Pistulka  00:02

All right, everyone. Thank you once again for joining us on the Exit Your Way Live with me today. I’ve got Michael Cortina or Cortina. Excuse me. Did I say it? Right?

Michael Cortina  00:14

You said it right. Cortina

Damon Pistulka  00:15

Cortina Michael Cortina. Welcome, Michael.

Michael Cortina  00:20

Thanks, Damon. Glad to be here. appreciate you having me on.

Damon Pistulka  00:23

Yeah. Well, today we’re going to talk a little bit about brain optimization. I mean, that the tile in itself is intriguing to me. So. But before we get to that, let’s talk a little bit about your background. Because I mean, you’ve been helping people. And when we talked a while ago, you had mentioned some really interesting things about helping people through PTSD and other things. So let’s kind of walk through your background a little bit. And I think that’d be cool.

00:51

Okay, sure. Great. Thanks, Sean. So, by background, I have a bachelor’s in psychology and master’s degree in social work and went on to get licensed to practice at independent levels. And was working in the field for a number of years, well over a decade, and was not really happy with the effectiveness or lack of effectiveness To be frank. And if you look up the effectiveness rates of outpatient therapy and counseling there, they’re not really impressive. And so I fell well, within that mix. You know, I was working with people with all sorts of things work related stress, anxiety, marital distress, life problems, you know, grief, guilt, trauma, addictions, all sorts of things. Yeah.

And I certainly had a number of success cases, but nowhere near as many as I wanted. And if you mentioned PTSD earlier, if in the area, for example, of PTSD, if it was something related to something that was painful in the past, the process of addressing that was excruciating for people, and I was going through like rain forest roof of Kleenex in my office. And yeah, there’s got to be a better way I was I was, I was actually, at that point, looking to pivot and get out of my field altogether, because I just wasn’t real happy. I wanted better for the people that I was serving To be frank, I wanted better. Yeah.

That’s what led me to going and learning other ways about what’s really going on with the brain and how to optimize it and how to get much more effective results in a much more efficient manner. And so that led in this whole other journey of different study, and, and doing getting way outside the box of traditional practices. Yeah. And which just then, when I saw the outcomes and the efficiency at which results were happening for people, my passion went right through the roof. It’s like, it’s like I had a I was just starting off in my career all over again. Yeah. Just wonderful. Brain optimization was born

Damon Pistulka  03:15

Yeah. So when you talk about brain optimization, and we talked before, you talked about, not only do you have better success rates, but it’s much faster.

03:29

substantially faster? Yes, I in the area of, well, if we look at the area of trauma or PTSD, okay. That’s something I knew that there was something very different happening when I was learning how to work with people in different ways. So much so that I felt compelled to track my data. So I have this, I have this monster Excel database, right? Ever, everything I’ve ever done all my results, my outcomes. And which, by the way, I can tell you that is something I never, never did prior to this.

And 99% of therapists and counselors and coaches out there, don’t do this unless you’re looking at university or research setting. But I had learned that there’s that this could be much more effective. So I was compelled to keep data. And I’m showing about a 90% effectiveness rate and getting trauma PTSD resolved. That that is just I want things in full transparency, two things that tells me the full transparency one, it’s not 100% doesn’t work all the time. Yeah. Nothing is if anybody ever told you exactly hundred percent Watch out anyway. The second thing is that it’s got a higher effectiveness rate than anything I’ve ever seen in this field.

Damon Pistulka  04:59

Okay, So what? So what is it? Because I don’t know, what is the average success rate with PTSD treatments?

05:08

Oh, well, the average The last time I looked and it’s been some time it’s been some years. But the last time I looked at average outpatient psychotherapy rates, you were talking somewhere around 33%

05:21

Oh, God.

05:23

Yeah, just just abysmal. Yeah. So it’s not really I’ve seen other programs and in people talking about effectiveness rates and, and they’re, they’re going through the roof, they’re super excited, because they’re having effectiveness rates of around 65 78%.

Damon Pistulka  05:45

Yeah. And

05:48

those processes, though, require people to relive and re experience all that pain all over again, where the stuff that I’ve learned and that I’ve developed is, brain optimization does not require that so people do not have to relive re experience any of the pain that they’ve already survived through in the process of getting the pain resolved. So the brain optimization process itself is a substantial differentiator from many of the other treatments out there.

Damon Pistulka  06:23

Yes, I can imagine so because what you just brought up the the whole thing about having to relive that experience, again, no matter what I mean, no matter what the the traumatic incident or incidents are, that’s got to be as bad as anything, again, to have to relive and go through that, again, just on on the way to recovery. And if you can, if you can get past that, without that, that’s got to be much better for the patient as well. Even if the end result is success or deemed successful?

07:05

Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, I, I run masterclass as and for a number of things, but in this particular area and training other people to do this work, you know, I’ll ask LS, you know, a roomful of people, and I’ll say, Hey, who remembers what we used to do with people who experienced stuff related to emotions, you know, like mental illness and stuff like that? Who remembers, and some people will say, Oh, we put them on medications. I say, go back further. And some people will say we do aect Electric, I say, go back further.

Some people say we do lobotomies and I say, go back even further. And they’re not sure. And I say, what we used to do is chain people to walls. I said, Now, imagine you came to this class, you heard about, you know, some of what I do about resolving trauma and doing it really efficiently could literally be done as in as little as a single visit. And what if you came into this class and I said, Hey, guys, I got this great idea. I figured out a way to work with people who have experienced trauma. I figured we should change them to some walls. You’d all look at me, like I lost my marbles and fire so quick, you’d run out the door because you think it’s barbaric?

Yeah, well, the standard of care is we live and breathe right now. I hope that in the near future, we find that equally as barbaric and benign, is chaining people to walls because one of the standards of treatment right now for people who’ve been through trauma and PTSD is to make them relive it in the present tense Yeah. And it just the bottom line our understanding of the brain has evolved and so to with it has intervention it’s just not everybody’s gotten there yet but my mission I hope one day one of my patients is that we look at these current treatments that so many think our standard of care and wonderful is just the chain and somebody to a wall we do much better now.

Damon Pistulka  09:16

Yeah, that’s incredible, man. That is that’s so exciting to hear that because it is it is it’s like it’s like cancer will be someday hopefully, you know, hopefully cancer some days affiliate take you don’t have any side effects and it goes away or something that simple a shot whatever. But you know, today when you look at the way chemotherapy just kills people, if you you can sometimes kill the cancer but you’ve done enough damage to your body or if you’ve got one of these, these chronic cancers that they can keep at bay with chemotherapy.

The chemotherapy ends up killing a person can kill you but chemotherapy does. So it’s it you know hopefully this is a an exciting Citing way that that people are going to start to treat PTSD differently because, again, look at what’s around us right now we’re just talking about this before we get out there a lot of people that are having a lot of trauma from the fact that a lost my job got the kids at home, whatever else is them dealing with family loss of life, so one of their family members died.

This is like, you know, you you talk to people or Dr. Easy a gorgeous, he know, he wrote the book, the seven keys navigating crisis, and he talks about this a lot globally now that, what do you say it’s like, I forget the numbers are staggering the amount of people right now that are having psychological challenges because of COVID, and just everything that’s going on. So I got to imagine that the brain optimization treatment is very in demand at that point. And it’s great to see when you can help people that way.

11:01

Absolutely. People are hurting out there. I mean, you reference it, the numbers are going through the roof with anxiety, fear, uncertainty, domestic violence, alcohol and substance abuse, abuse of children. I mean, so many social determinants. And mental wellness factors are just shooting through the roof right now. You got that? Right.

Damon Pistulka  11:25

Yeah. So when you look at the way that you’re teaching it, that you’re, you’re showing people how to treat PTSD. When you look at all the people in the United States, they’re treating PTSD now, and I know you don’t know exact or maybe you do, how many people are actually converting to brain optimization? Not not enough. Yeah.

Michael Cortina  11:50

I mean, there’s there’s literally when you look at all the all the various providers that are out there, you know, doctors and nurse practitioners and therapists and counselors and psychologists. I mean, it’s it’s literally a drop of water in a very large lake. Yeah, as far as people who, who know how to do these more transformative methods in a much more efficient and effective and gentle way. Yeah. It’s it’s really, really sorely surely outnumbered at the moment here.

Damon Pistulka  12:28

Okay. Well, it’s a you got to know where you’re at. That’s one of the things you know, with anything. And so have you found not success working with veterans groups on on these kind of things?

Michael Cortina  12:39

Oh, absolutely. I, I actually a couple years back, very, such gratitude for this too much respect to, to veterans and military out there. And a few years back, they were doing a nationwide search for people to come and work with veterans at this, this nonprofit. And it’s called Operation warrior resolution. It’s down in Florida, Operation warrior resolution, and they were doing a nationwide search. And I was one of only three people who actually got tapped on the shoulder to be selected to be a provider at these warrior healing retreat weekends. Yeah. So I go out there. And you know, and everything from people who’ve served who’ve never deployed all the way up through special operations forces who’ve had you know, years of, of Battlezone deployment.

Yeah. And, and to go out there, and it’s a it’s an intensive wraparound experience for the veterans. Everything built around these treatments. There’s all sorts of ancillary nutrition education, there’s yoga, there’s body work, there’s equine therapy, but really the hallmark of the retreat is, is this brain optimization work, and have had many, many success stories coming out of there. And it just such a great honor to serve to serve them.

Damon Pistulka  14:20

Yeah. Because some of those kids and livestock call them kids, because they’re all kind of kids to me now. But you know, some of the stuff they’ve seen, just, yeah, you know, I had to deal with in and themselves too, I mean, losing a limb or other damage that they have from it, and, you know, the but the, the brain damage is probably just as bad as the physical damage and a lot of respects core works. So, that’s really cool. That’s really cool. I’m gonna have to think about that too.

Because if there’s some other veterans groups, I want to definitely connect you with them. Because that’s one that the, you know, that’s one of the groups that we do. Try to help a lot when we can. And we do have, we do have a few people that we might be able to share? Because I just think that that, to me is one of the causes that I want to get more involved in our next few years. And then it’s, it’s such a beautiful thing. And you know, even before going out to those retreats, I would serve veterans in my private practice. Yeah, veterans and civilians alike. Oh, yeah.

Michael Cortina  15:28

The Gong going to these retreats have just been really amazing that the the transformative experiences that you know, the these these guys and women do, male and female retreats, come out the other side, I just did a visit with a veteran who was just as recently as last week was the most recent, and we did it over this kind of a format, because this was someone who’s in a different state. Yeah. And it just, boom, things turned around, and life’s gone so much better. It’s, it’s really, it’s a joy.

Damon Pistulka  16:04

It’s a joy. That’s incredible. And so as, as you learn this brain optimization techniques, what is it? I mean, what is it you’re actually helping people do when you do this?

Michael Cortina  16:21

So I would, I would define brain optimization, as a process of getting the brain to respond to life in the most enticing and optimal way possible. Now, that has implications for past events, memories, that has implications for the present moments. And that has implications even for future projections. And so if you think about a lot of times when people, these these things that people experience, I call them distractions. Things like guilt, anxiety, anger, fear, uncertainty. And it goes, I call these distractions. Yep. And the reason they’re distractions is because they’re taking away from a more fully present and enjoyable experience of life.

Yeah. Which can also translate into, I mean, if you think I’ve worked with a lot of business people, a lot of executives, and again, it translates directly into production. Yeah, you know, productivity, effectiveness in the work setting, these distractions, can SAP the battery, away from what it is that people really want to be investing their time and their energy into. So one example then, of brain optimization, getting the brain to respond to life, in the most enticing and optimal way possible is this. Let’s figure someone will stick with the theme so far with the theme has been as you know, PTSD, trauma. Yeah, let’s figure somebody experienced something.

And whatever it was that they experienced, or witnessed or what have you, continues to push a lot of buttons for them, such that whenever they think about it, or talk about it, or if they get a memory of it, they experience dis ease. That could be, you know, nightmares, that could be flashbacks that could be irritability, it could be anger, it could be anxiety, it could be drinking or substance use so that they don’t think about it anymore. perience, any number of fluctuations in mood, such that when the memory of that comes to light, that’s what happens now, what’s going on there. Most people will say, what’s causing that person to be distressed is the event.

Michael Cortina 19:17

And that right there makes the process of helping somebody take about five years longer than what I do. The reason why is I don’t conceptualize it that way. I don’t think it has anything to do with the event. way I’m looking at it is that the brain is responding to the memory of that event. It’s the brain. See, two people get in a car accident. And one of them can’t even look at the car keys anymore. certainly never driving down that street again. Yeah, the other one before you could blink your eyes.

Is it enterprise saying give me the Give me the keys, they want to be in the rental car. Yeah, they both experienced the same car accident, what’s the difference? The difference is just the way their brains processed. The data surrounding that event. Hmm, one person’s brain, the memory got laid down, the neural tracks got laid down as a trauma memory. Yeah, the other person, not so much. So, whenever then anything associated with that event comes to mind, the brain activates, yes, and continues to cause dis ease distress for that person.

So brain optimization for that particular individual is going to look like this, it’s going to look like at the conclusion of our visits, and as they move forward in life, they’ll be able to talk about that event as clearly and as easily as given a weather report. Like, oh, there’s some clear skies out there. And it’s kind of Sunny, it’s not going to push any buttons, there’s not going to be any emotional distress. It’s completed and over with such that there’s no more brain activation causing symptoms in the body. Yeah. And they’re free.

Damon Pistulka  21:15

Wow. I can see how that I mean, what you what you’re talking about, is is very similar to many other things that happen in the world, when people look at a problem, and they say it can’t be solved. But someone looks at the fundamental understanding that the other people that causes the other people to think that can’t solve it, and when they look at it from a different viewpoint, they solve it. Like it wasn’t, was no big deal.

Michael Cortina  21:46

Exactly, exactly. You know, in in, I used to conceptualize it as the events. Yep. The events, and then I learned, I learned where I have 100% failure rates?

Damon Pistulka  22:05

Yes. Oh,

Michael Cortina  22:07

I’ll share this with you, oh, I’ll go there. I have 100% failure rates, and being able to effectively impact something that’s already happened. Mm hmm. I could do nothing about that. But what I have learned how to do is have a dramatic impact in how the brain processes the event that already happened.

Michael Cortina  22:30

Yeah. And so on brain optimization we’re getting what I’m doing there is getting the brain to reprocess Yeah. And so hundred percent failure rate with having any impact or influence on an event that’s already transpired. Whoops. But substantially higher effectiveness rates, looking through the lens of brain optimization and brain based work.

Damon Pistulka  22:55

Wow. That’s it. That’s just amazing, man. That’s just amazing. So what what do you think has been the, I mean, you How long have you been practicing grain optimization now?

Michael Cortina  23:08

Oh,

Michael Cortina  23:11

I’m gonna say maybe, maybe nine years, maybe? Maybe 910 years?

Damon Pistulka  23:16

Yeah. So I mean, this is it. This is a this like you walk down the street yesterday, I thought about it. So that’s a that’s cool, because you got longevity on this thing. And you really see over time I was in to help people like I just man is it’s so amazing on that part. What do you think? Is the is the hesitancy by others to adopt this? More readily?

Michael Cortina  23:44

Yeah, well, it’s a mixed bag. You know, it’s a mixed bag, I would say. One is, one is it’s just not out there as much in some respects, I’m just starting my journey. I’m just sharing my journey of raising awareness. I just, you know, got on LinkedIn only a year ago, in earnest a year ago. And in terms of talking about these type of topics. And so I consider that I’m just starting, I’m at the infancy stages of causing a revolution here. And that’s one. Two is having been doing some different practices over the years.

Interesting things have happened. And so for example, if I do a master class, or not even now, we could say a master class or even just a one day sort of work, you know, training. I collect my evaluations at the end, the evaluations come in, and I look at them and I get about 90%. Really high rating, strong evaluations on what I’ve presented. The other 10% the majority of that 10 percents kind of somewhere in the middle, and there’s only a few percent that actually want Dead?

Michael Cortina  25:01

Yeah, should I fish? And I think what I’ve learned over time, first and foremost is to put my energy into the 90%. Yes. So that that’s where it goes these days. But I’ll give you the takeaway, what I what I learned about that, that smaller percentage of people who, who aren’t, you know, waving the flag for me. Um, a couple things. One is, it just shakes, if they’ve been traditionally trained, it shakes up the paradigm too much.

It is so 100%, the opposite of traditional therapy or counseling, I don’t even use that word, you notice I use brain optimization, because I don’t consider what I’m doing therapy, when you consider therapy in the traditional sense. So it shakes up the paradigm, it’s substantially different way of thinking and working and connecting with somebody. So for some, well, that paradigm shift is too much. for other people. They’re really, they’re really tied into, you know, in traditional kind of settings, traditional therapy and psychological work, some people get very boxed into this idea of evidence-based treatments. And you know, that there’s a lot of formal research to back it up.

And some people asked me that, and I said, You know, I it’s not an evidence based practice as defined in the old days by samsa. It’s, it’s what I would call, I have extraordinary practice-based evidence that you won’t see doing the traditional approaches, I’m an insider, I know that I’ve done the other stuff. So I’m kind of like blowing the whistle on the field. You see it. And so some people can’t get out of that box. They just, you know, because there wasn’t some research study that that says this, they they get really, they have a hard time seeing outside of that box. Yeah. And will immediately discount it, even though it’s having amazing impact for people.

Damon Pistulka  27:06

So we had IRA Bowen asked, What’s brain optimization? I’ll try to summarize it here. And then you you, you can correct me. But what what we’ve been talking about with with Michael here is a different way to treat people with with trauma, and, and not not physical trauma, but the the aspect, the mental, leftover after effects of PTSD and things like that in a different way where your brain processes the way they think about the event. And I’m saying this just to see if I’m getting get that close or not. So it doesn’t cause us so much, so much. Does this ease as you say,

Michael Cortina  27:54

you’re you’re definitely in the ballpark? I’ll just I’ll just

Damon Pistulka  27:59

clear it the right way.

Michael Cortina  28:01

I’ll find you’re with me, you’re with me, I’ll

Damon Pistulka  28:02

try to get there.

Michael Cortina  28:04

fine tune a few things. So, um, the formal definition I’ve come up with is this, it’s, it’s going through processes to get the brain to respond to life in the most enticing and optimal way possible. Okay, so that that’s sort of the formal definition. And example, as, because this has all sorts of application. Yeah, yeah. Well, beyond well, beyond trauma and PTSD, you could just think about someone who maybe they’re not experiencing any heavy duty stuff like, like grief and in England, or what have you.

But who’s just not quite at that level that they want to be they’re looking to level up in their career. And so there’s, there’s things to do for that. Yeah. Um, yes. So it’s the process of getting the brain to reprocess, reprocess. stuff related to the way it’s been reading that event that took place in such a way that the aim is to have zero impact moving forward, that this thing couldn’t push buttons. Give you a quick little example, quick little story just to drive this home.

There was a woman who had been gang raped. While she was gang raped, her favorite song was playing. She can never listen to her favorite song anymore for all those years. She came, we engage in a process we collaborate, we connected we engaged in brain optimization. She’s playing that song all the time now just doesn’t touch her. So something that had been such a horrific trigger for her her favorite song she couldn’t listen to anymore. Now she listens to it all the time and is completely level Ah,

Damon Pistulka  30:01

And it’s quite an example. Because that’s obviously or epic thing. And to be able to process it differently. I mean, even when you’re talking about in this back up again, because you you said a little bit about just the anything and you’ve talked about executives, I know we’ve talked before you have been working with some executives. And I’ve got to believe that the same kind of thing that different levels obviously, affect executives, because or anyone really, that they’re trying to trying to do things and trying to better themselves and their career or life and, and, you know, you just think about anything that, you know, could be that I’m not that I want to be a better basketball player heck on the weekends, or whatever it is.

And you know, and it’s affects you all these things affects you. I remember that that, you know, last weekend, I got jammed all over the place, or something like that, and I get, I’ve never gone there again, or whatever. But if you could practice this in a, you know, almost the process of thinking this way, I got to believe that we it can do some pretty incredible things for people.

Michael Cortina  31:12

Oh, wow, you just trip my memory? Yes, absolutely. And you trip my memory on one very behavioral one, you mentioned basketball. So I was working with a young guy who was going to be going off to college. And he, you know, wanted to be able to do this one move on his skateboard because his plan was to be skateboarding around campus, and he could one particular move that would have made getting life around campus on a skateboard much more easy. Mm hmm. And so, um, so I met him, I met him at the skate park. We met at the skate park. Again, very non traditional doesn’t have to be in an office.

Yeah. That him at the skate park. And kind of, you know, again, went through a few processes of brain optimization, boom, he started doing that move on his skateboard. He was screaming out loud. Air Actually, we were in the parking lot, just outside the skate park, he was screaming out loud and excitement, it was the first time we ever did that move in his life. You know, and so there’s lots of application and certainly, for executives, and and high level sales professionals, you know, I hear from salespeople quite often actually, they deal with a lot of stress, pressure, uncertainty, fear, there’s a lot of sales people who end up, you know, getting quite cozy with a bottle.

Yeah, there are other things to sort of kind of self-medicate the magnitude of what they’re under. And being a very successful salesperson, a high level executive, it’s, it’s, you know, it goes against the grain to sort of walk around and say, Hey, you know, maybe I can use a little bit of assistance. So they deal with that, too. But then they meet with me behind closed doors and high confidence. And there’s beautiful things that could happen for them both personally, and professionally.

And if I, if I could just say this piece too, because if there’s any of your listeners that might fall into this category, or know somebody who falls into this category, know this. two things. One is the brain is an organ, just like any other organ, and just like your lungs, your hearts, your gallbladder, your liver, all those organs are subject to dis ease. So to is your brain. It’s no different. It’s just an organ. So let’s smash the stigma right there. First and foremost. And secondly, if you think about the people who excel they’re at the top of their fields, take any let’s just take an athlete.

Yeah, you know, and what does that athlete have around them, they got a whole team of coaches. They got, you know, the physical conditioning coach, they got the strength coach, they got the cardio coach, they got the sports psychologist, they people who are really excelling, and at the top of their field, not only sometimes have a coach, but have a team of coaches. Mm hmm. So if you find yourself wanting to level up or struggling with distractions, as I call them that are making less effective than you’d like to be, it’s really as simple as that. You’re just engaged gauging with somebody to coach up.

Damon Pistulka  34:42

Yeah. That’s, that’s awesome. Because, you know, it’s funny, I saw an article I think it was last week or the week before they were talking about Russell Wilson, the quarterback of the Seahawks here in Seattle, and they said he spends over a million dollars a year on people that helped them With his mental and physical well being Wow,

Michael Cortina  35:07

there you go.

Damon Pistulka  35:10

So, you know, we do get if you do want to get the top of your game, you do have to have coaches, it’s just the way it is, or and you have to be spending time and money on your development. I mean, that’s just it, it’ll only go so far without that. But I just think that this from the time we first talked about this, and knowing people and family and friends that have been in traditional therapy for things for many, many years, that and when you talked about this and the way that the way that you’re helping people and not just the speed, but the way that they don’t have to relive this over and over and over think it is it’s so phenomenal.

And like the example you gave of the lady that that had the gang rape event and her favorite song, I mean, I if you can help someone do that, that’s quite a thing. This live, that’s right. I thought I had it on mute, but I didn’t get but it’s something. So, you know, in in your in your practice, then are you are you seeing people individually? Are you doing masterclasses? Or how do you how do you help people with that?

Michael Cortina  36:38

So I certainly meet with people individually for brain optimization. And I’m doing brain optimization in person and by zoom. Yeah. So that, you know, I could meet with people all over I just met when I just maybe recently I met with someone who survived the California fires. Yeah. And lost everything. Lost absolutely everything. And had been really, you know, was experiencing PTSD, trauma stuff, I won’t get into detail of the story just to kind of protect that confidence. Yeah, but it was a pretty dramatic experience that this individual had gone through with the California fires.

And had heard about me through a colleague on LinkedIn, and reached out, and we met for one visit exactly one visit, it went maybe an hour and a half hour and 40 minutes tops, and checked in with this individual several weeks after the visit, and said, That was some that was weird. That was different. I bet in therapy before I’ve never experienced anything like that. And I am 100% not getting any, any level of distress any triggers related to the fire. It was amazing. Wow. So yeah, it’s it really has dramatic impact on people so much so that I do what I did with you earlier. I feel I never did this when I practice traditional therapy.

But I feel compelled to do this now practicing brain optimization. Because usually, by the time people get to me, they’ve heard, you know, a number of good things, or they’ve seen some of the recommendations or testimonials on my website or LinkedIn. And then I feel compelled to say, it doesn’t work all the time. It’s not I mean, it might sound like common sense. Um, but I think that’s really a testament to what’s been happening for folks and just how high the effectiveness rate is that Yeah, I go out of my way to be transparent and say, you know, a, there’s no guarantee. But we’re going to shoot for the moon, that’s for sure.

Damon Pistulka  39:04

Yeah, yeah. But I mean, on the other hand, you know, if someone has a talent, right, and there’s a lot of people, like I said, they go through years and years and years of therapy, and still the progress is minimal, if any. And this is something that I I mean, if you’re looking at your mental health, and how that can affect your day to day, the costs on your just just don’t put money in it just cost on happiness and enjoying life. Hell, it’s, it’s why you should be certain without until you’re dead, because it just it’s it’s so important.

So I think that’s our I respect you for saying that it’s not effective all the time. But I do encourage that, you know, if people are having trouble too, definitely, definitely seek seek help and definitely talk to you because I think it’s brain optimization. Yes, is an incredible thing I really do. Especially when, when you think about it, like I said before, I think this is a different, a way of fundamentally looking at a problem and solving it differently. And when people do that interesting and good things happen. So I’m really, I’m really excited that I’ve learned more of it. It’s just cool.

Michael Cortina  40:26

Thank you. I so appreciate that. And that’s a great description, it really is fundamentally different. Yeah, it is just, it’s funny when I work with people who have been in traditional therapy. And I’m like, you know, just put on your seatbelt. Because this ain’t gonna be anywhere near the same. Yeah, yeah, fundamentally different. I realized I only answered part of your question earlier.

So yes, I work with people individually. I also do consultation for bit mostly healthcare organizations, but I do consultations for business around leadership, training and development, workflow efficiencies. And then also, getting back to 2020 has obviously been a unique year. So kind of getting back to offering master classes. That’s something that had been going on for a number of years. 2020 sort of took a little hiatus on that. So that’ll be coming back around. Okay,

Damon Pistulka  41:31

as well. Well, very cool. Well, Michael is so awesome to get to talk to you a little bit more. And I’m just I’m, I’m amazed at this. I’ve just, it’s it fascinates me to listen to this. And I hope that if there’s one person that got benefit from this today, I’m gonna it’s going to be jack, because this is this to me as you as you talked about that the fundamental difference in the way you’re doing this as his game changing for people and if people are having trouble, they definitely should, should consider this, I think. Thank you so much. I, I just love that we had this opportunity to sit down and talk and and if people want to get a hold of you, what is the best way to do that? Oh,

Michael Cortina  42:22

thank you. Yeah, so you could get ahold of me at? Well, you could go to my website, which is Michael fortina.com. Okay, I ch H e. l. Michael 14 a.com. You can. I’m on LinkedIn, I’m very active on LinkedIn. You could find me there. I think those are too good to find me.

Damon Pistulka  42:46

And we’ll put those links in that in the stuff want to get this posted. And we’ll watch this on YouTube and such so people can see it. But man, Michael, thank you so much for stopping by today, the roundtable and talking about brain optimization and how you’re helping people because man, you’re doing good things. And I love to get the word out there and just let it be known man because it’s needed. And you’re helping people. So cool.

Michael Cortina  43:13

I thank you. I so appreciate your time. I appreciate the opportunity to have this discussion. Thank you for that.

Damon Pistulka  43:22

All right, everyone. Have a great day. Thanks, Michael. All right.