Paths of Service: Anthony Mullally

https://headliner.ai/mullally-2-11_09_2022-15-58-m4a

Uyi

Okay. So, man, listen, thank you for coming down again. And I'm not a big rugby person, but, uh, we're going to talk about rugby, and we're going to talk about what you're into now as well. And Alex put us in touch. Let's start with you. Play professionally as a rugby league football player, right?

Anthony

Yeah.

Uyi

There's a difference between rugby union and rugby league. You missed out here.

Anthony

It depends who you're asking is going to give you a different answer. So Ruby Union boys will say not as much technicality to it, but the average Ruby Union play would admit that Ruby league is a lot more fast pace due to the average tackle, you have a playable HM, and then you go in again. The defense have to retreat 10 meters every time we're in Union, you have a tackle, there's a rook, probably takes about ten to 15 seconds, where tackle league takes about three to five. And the upcoming and nonstop aerobically, it's a lot more challenging in certain positions. Maybe the union is a lot more technical. There's a lot more intricacies in the rook area, et cetera. But yeah, the biggest thing to say is the pace of the league game. You have further, uh, for the collision as well. So the defenders have to go back 10 meters. Attackers obviously, like, further for the collision. So I think the impact is actually greater. But in Union, I'd say you have more smaller contacts due to the river. So it probably kind of balances itself out overall. But they're both very attraction games. The nature of it is kind of like chaos, but the body is not really made to go in ways you can in rugby. So I take a carry into two people, well, preferably one, but two people get me if they've got good control of me. And you've got a third man who's going to come in and chop my legs, just like, take my legs out. My body could twist this way. Uh, that's why we get, like, a lot of injuries, because I don't think the body is made to play rugby. You can't be too fancy tuned to play rugby. You're not like a Ferrari unless you're a winger. And you're just like you need to.

Uyi

Be a muscle car.

Anthony

Yes, it needs to be a muscle car.

Uyi

That's kind of a mustang.

Anthony

That's the best way I can put it.

Uyi

Yeah, I hear what you're saying. I was doing a reading about the history of rugby, union and Rug can't remember the person who actually invented rugby, but he picked up the ball one time. It was football picked up the balls don't run. And that became really popular. And obviously rugby can't split off, and then American football split off as well. But there were people who played professionally and there were people who played amateur, from what I understand. And the ones who played professionally were northern, primarily the majority. And they got paid. And it was considered a working class sport if you were playing in the 1800s. Playing that kind of sport wasn't gentlemanly. And then the people who were playing amateur rugby were the southerners mainly, and they didn't get paid, basically. They had other jobs. They had the rugby union went mainly to the south and the rugby league went mainly to the north. And that's how two sport associations formed. Eventually, the rugby union players started to get paid as well.

Anthony

Just to add on to my knowledge of how when it's split. So obviously the northern is like so a lot of us were like the coal mines, not M me. Not me.

Uyi

Two years ago.

Anthony

M. Yeah. The guys who were playing were working the coal mines, and then they were coming up and they're having to go training, et cetera. So one of the reasons they went professional early was so they didn't have to basically be doing that. This might be controversial, but then because the north south divide, the the southern blocks who are playing, apparently they were from more aristocratic backgrounds, et cetera, and they could afford to say they were a doctor, and then they were just playing. They were in a rush to go professional. So I think there was more of an urgency for a league lads to go pro. So they basically get out the pits.

Uyi

Yeah, that makes sense. Right. Like, who wants to really work in the pits when you can get paid to do a sport, uh, even though you can get damaged in the sport. But then, I guess in the south, if there were other professional careers, historically, now it's completely changed, right. We're talking about 200 years ago.

Anthony

Yeah.

Uyi

But now it's completely changed. Historically, if you did a sport, it was kind of seen as a lower class thing, because it's like, why don't you have a trade? Why don't you have a profession? And I guess the north was more industry based. You had the coal mines at the factories and in the southern cities especially. Obviously in London, the city was emerging, and then they had more professional careers developing. But it's kind of controversial, isn't it, the north south divide? And it still is. So if anybody's listening, he's not British, he's not English, they would be like, what the hell are you talking about? There's a north south of White. But they still is.

Anthony

Right. I live in Cornwall now, and geographically, demographically, carnival really should be playing with the league due to the miners, et cetera. So they're quite similar. But it's funny, they hear mine of an accent down there, uh, in the winter. They love it. They love the accent. They all make lots of Game of Thrones references. That's a good point. Yeah. And it's just like they find it so entertaining.

Uyi

You do watch Game of Friends? You do watch it.

Anthony

Yeah, of course, of course.

Uyi

Right. So basically, when they cast everyone. And Sean Bean was like the big star to be on the show right, for the first season. So they cast him, they cast a family. So all it characters, they weren't supposed to do northern accents, but Sean Bean had a northern accent, so they were like, what do we do here? And they're like, well, let's just like everyone did an or an accent that Shaun Bean does referenced it. I heard that rugby union, some people say it's a bit more strategic because you have to play a bit more tactics than rugby league. Is that fair?

Anthony

I was just about to say before you ask that rugby union to me is not the same, but it's more similar to NFL in the way that your position is very specific. So, like, a Ruby League prop would have to do like a lot more Ruby quotes. I used to make 30 tackles a game. Ten to 15 carries, lots of carries. We're winning with the ball, running with someone. And then a ruby union prop. The main role is the scrum. They're so good at the scrum. They practice position on specific sessions just on the scrum, just on different things. So it's a lot more finely tuned for specific areas. Like you can spend a lot more time on a specific role because it's going to have the constraints for you to do that where in rugby league is a bit more m like chaos. So you have to be more like adaptive. I'm not saying it's better, I'm just saying this is just the way it is. It's more controversial. Which one's better?

Uyi

It's more like there's more freedom to play.

Anthony

Yeah.

Uyi

Whereas in rugby union you have to keep to your position. Pretty much.

Anthony

I feel like in rugby league you have to be more wellrounded to do other things, where in rugby union you can be more specific at your role and be very good at that. Does that make sense?

Uyi

That makes sense. Yeah, I guess kind of like with football, you have your positions and you become really good at those positions and it's very rare you see the defender suddenly going halfway across the world. Yeah, I understand, uh, an energy. I've heard this might sound offensive, but it kind of makes sense. There's a chess and there's a checkers, and they said rugby union is more like chess and rugby league is more like checkers. Now, I know it sounds offensive because you're like, well, chess is a high skilled game, but I think they mean in the sense that like you just said, in chess you've got the pieces that play certain positions, and in checkers every piece is the same. And checkers moves at a faster pace. Whereas chess, you have to take time and use your pieces strategically to advance in the game. Does that make sense?

Anthony

Just not a million miles off.

Uyi

So let's, I guess, go back. How long were you paying professionally. When did your career start?

Anthony

The 17. I signed professional contract entering my hometown, witness where I'm from, and then I went to Australia after that. For a year. I played for the under 20s League, which was, like, pretty high standard compared to the league I was in back home against men, and they did in the twenties was significantly better.

Uyi

What do you mean when you say against men?

Anthony

Saw the league was, like, fashionable men, and then, obviously, they went to in the 20s League. So, like 1920 year olds.

Uyi

Right. We wasn't older than that, but the standard was higher.

Anthony

Uh, say that there are a lot better athletes teams, uh, where 50% of it might have been Pacific Islanders, like tongues, Samoans, and strong people. Strong people born to play would be a big athletic. That was a rude awakening for me, obviously, that I've been in. Spent the rest of my career playing against, uh, these guys.

Uyi

How long?

Anthony

Um, a year.

Uyi

Okay.

Anthony

So that was a great experience. Came back and played, uh, first season in Super League, which is the top league in the UK. And that was, like, 20. And yeah, that took me until 31. So it's been, like, a 13 year professional career.

Uyi

You play for Ireland as well, right, mum's Irish. Okay. On the world stage. How is that representing Ireland?

Anthony

It was great. I played two World Cups, um, 213 in the UK and, um, 217 in Australia, which was really good. In 2013, we played Australia in Ireland, in Limerick. That was a really special moment for me. Got a bit emotional singing in the national anthem. And then Australia was amazing because we're now as one of the best nations in rugby league. But we're emerging, an emerging nation, and we missed out just short of the quarterfinals. We beat Wales. We beat Italy. We had to win all three games to go through. We lost to Papua New Guinea. In Papua New Guinea. Do you know much about Papua New Guinea?

Uyi

I know a little bit about Papua New Guinea.

Anthony

So that place it's amazing. The fans and people are so passionate about rugby. It's one of the only places in the world where rugby is the main sport.

Uyi

Yes, the national sport. I understand.

Anthony

So you see these guys playing and Papping again, and you see them play in England, and they're always different players, but there's something different about them when they're playing. And papana. It's like they grow an extra few feet.

Uyi

Really?

Anthony

Yes. And they're just super passionate. It really hurts playing. It's one of the games, like when I was on the bench raid to come on, and you see it, and I just like, don't know about this one today. We just lost him. It was, like, 1612.

Uyi

Oh, wow. Okay.

Anthony

But the lot was riding on them, making the quarterfinals for them as a nation.

Uyi

Yes.

Anthony

There was talk about when they're actually going to win just like, the nature of it, but they deserved to win. But it was just to go over there and play in Papua New, uh, Amazon experience.

Uyi

Do you speak French?

Anthony

Petty.

Uyi

Okay. Because you played in France. Petty.

Anthony

Japan. Petti Francis.

Uyi

Um, what was that experience like? Because obviously you've talked about Australia, and you played in Canada and in Ireland. And these are all English speaking countries. I know Canada. They speak English and French. But they speak English. What was it like playing in France?

Anthony

It was amazing. It was amazing. But the only issue was it was to join the lockdown. Okay. And, um, there's was really strict. I know different countries were differently, but.

Uyi

We weren't strict at all.

Anthony

No. Uh, you have to have a piece of paper to leave the house.

Uyi

Yeah, I remember.

Anthony

It felt wild.

Uyi

You needed a permit, right?

Anthony

Yeah. It felt like World War II and Benjamin. But, uh, it felt weird. I was sat there on the bridge one day, over feet in the water around the just near the trees, and the police drove past. They got out, and they shouting at me to put a mask on. I was, like, on my own in, like, a rural area. I was just like, this is wild. But anyway, I'll be allowed to go to training, which is a blessing. But at first, the dads kind of kept themselves to themselves, so there wasn't a lot of integrating with them. And obviously, because of language barrier, it was very isolated there. But as a good opportunity for my own personal practices smashed through so many books. I was in, like, meditation, a lot of time to put things together. I really utilized a lot of reflection.

Uyi

Time, to be honest. You said, uh, you're picturing it, but it was like we were in a war situation. In fact, it was described as a war. A war against COVID. So, yeah, it must have been a strange situation.

Anthony

Yes. At the time. What time you left the house, what time you got me back on the paper as well. Really full on. I was in a beautiful old style, like, French house right next to Carcass, where I was as a massive castler. It's unbelievable. You can see that from the window. So it was the best of a bad situation. It was good.

Uyi

And you just retired recently?

Anthony

Yeah.

Uyi

How does it feel when retiring?

Anthony

It feels good. It feels like, you know, vampas.

Uyi

Yeah.

Anthony

Slipping off a tight shoe. So then I went to Luther Giants from Witness, went to Rhinos. And that's where I kind of had success in the terms of trophies, a trophy, but no contention. And then, uh, I went to Toronto, the Canadian team that came in the league to France. And I've been up the new Cornwall team, which weren't coaching and stuff now. And I've just retired. So, yeah, the retirement for me, it's been coming since Leeds, since I won the Grand Final of Leeds in 2017. My motivation just dipped off a cliff.

Uyi

Is that because you hit your goals and up?

Anthony

Yes. I was like, it's all I ever wanted to do from a kid. Remember, like, the next player coming in. It was like a big idol to me. He's like, at, uh, school, and he just sat on the table and he had this hoop wing on. He was, like, tapping it on the table. I was like, there. And the whole time probably nine years old. And then I was just like, what? I want to and then you visualize me pulling the trophy with me. That's what kind of got me from me and Hulky, and then played all the Trafford. Like, 74,000 people got that moment with the trophy and stuff. It was great after it. But then coming back into preseason a few weeks later, I saw this massive feeling, like an empty void, like, what's next? Well, yeah, just a bit disillusioned because I still have the right leads rounds. One of the most successful teams was, like, the man united to the football. So it's not like, well done, you've won the league. Now we'll chill this year, and then we go again. We're trying to win every year, and for me, I couldn't afford anything worse. And I spoke to one of my teammates, Jamie Jones be calendar day is he won seven or eight Grand Finals. And I was surrounded by guys who won similar amount of trophies. And I was speaking to him. I said, how do you do it every year? Just more the motivation, because it felt like trying to climb a mountain for me to try and compete again that year. So, obviously, that season, my performance has suffered due to my lack of motivation. I really wasn't feeling it anymore. And then went to Toronto, and that kind of helped me reunite a little bit, because there's something different. The whole process started dwindling away from being so, like, the next layer of purpose. And I feel like that layer had been fulfilled. So I was moving into the next, and I'm still moving into it now.

Uyi

When do people normally retire? Because I'm guessing that you kind of retired a little bit early.

Anthony

Well, people retired at 31. You wouldn't be like, um that's, uh, not unusual. Probably 30 to 35.

Uyi

Right.

Anthony

But for where I'm at in my body, I could probably play some 38. I'm completely fine. I've had the injuries here and there, but I've had a fortunate career in terms of injuries, apart from some concussions. But in terms of my potential, I could have been still going at the top level for at least three more years, I'd say. But I just, uh, was not feeling anymore.

Uyi

Yeah, I mean, that's a brave thing to do, to actually say, you know, I'm going to step back. Because a lot of successful sports people tend not to want to retire. They tend to keep going on when they've been successful. I've attained it, but now I want to do it again and I want to do it again. So it's quite a bold thing to say. You know what, I'm happy with where I am now. What did the people around you say? Like your team, your friends or family?

Anthony

You can hear it in the voice and then speaking to you at your mom and stuff. Sure. Ah, do what you need to do. But, you know, I'm worried. I've got things going on. The gamble I see as just being authentic and stepping into my true false. I'm confident that this path will support me while I'm on it's. Like more of a path of service. The men's retreats, I'm doing the workshops, different things like that. So I'm really confident that's what I'm supposed to be doing. I feel like when you take that leap of faith, the universe kind of catches you almost easy. Said and done. I appreciate I'm not saying I don't get the scarcity. Try not to waiver, not push it away because it's not helpful. Not giving those false a place. I'm trying to just you're really believing in the pathaman. So yeah, I'm just trying not to external influences affect how I feel about it.

Uyi

So then I guess internally you're feeling quite determined and committed. I did a podcast a while ago, but it just came out yesterday, funny enough, and it was a yoga teacher. Uh, she said a similar thing. She was at a crossroads, and I guess you were probably at the same place about a year ago where she was thinking, well, what do I do? Do I do my career or do I become a yoga teacher? And that was like her call in. And then she made the decision to become the yoga teacher, and she said, Right.

Zaz

So when I was accepted onto my yoga teacher training course and these courses, people may not realize, but yoga teachers invest a huge amount of money. Your beginning course is around four grand, three to four grand, and then you do constant courses yearly to keep improving, to make the payment. And I put the phone down, going, Yay, crap. How am I going to afford this? Oh my God. But when you make a commitment to something, the universe listens to you. And there's a wonderful quote that says, when you commit to something, the universe puts in your way all manner of opportunities that would not necessarily have arisen unless you make that commitment. So I said yes, I'm going to do it. I said on the phone, yep, I'm in. Put the phone down now. How am I going to afford this? And I'm not kidding. Less than 2 minutes, about 90 seconds later, the postman dropped some letters. Through the letterbox, I went, one of those nasty looking brown envelopes that's always going to be bad news. And I pick it up and I opened it up and it's from HMRC. And I opened it up and it was a tax rebate.

Uyi

Wow.

Zaz

For £4000.

Uyi

Just what you need.

Zaz

Just what I needed.

Uyi

And I, uh, was like, universal, isn't it?

Zaz

Thank you, God. You want me to be a teacher.

Uyi

You just have to kind of seize those opportunities or even see or recognize those opportunities.

Anthony

Yeah. And there is an element of practicality. Right. You can't just quit everything and just.

Uyi

Hope for the universe.

Anthony

Yeah, hope. You obviously got to be practical application.

Uyi

Of course.

Anthony

Which is what I've been doing for the last three years. Really putting things together. It's still not there. But I feel like I've got different avenues. I'm just finely tuning it. So I'm going to be taking on a role at the club as a play wealthy manager, basically look after the players well being. And, um, speaking about after rugby, these things have been especially with the young lads. And for me, I want to be able to help them be able to, when it's necessary, just identify as the role of the rugby player. They don't say I play rugby or it's something to do. They say, I am a Ruby player. And their whole identity is based around being a Ruby player. So you take that away and who are they exactly? What did you have? And, uh, thankfully for me, this is what I kind of started to realize back in 2017. So it's been a process, like unraveling.

Uyi

That's a good point, actually, because there are careers where people do literally identify their career. And I guess sports people do that. For example, doctors. And Lloyd, I am a doctor, I'm a lawyer. And other people, they're like, well, I work in banking. That's not literally who I am. But you're right. Yes. When banks gone. And who are you? Maybe there's something else that you haven't considered.

Anthony

Yeah.

Uyi

You had a nickname in rugby, right? I don't know when that nickname started. I'm guessing it started only a few years ago. The Vegan warrior. Yeah. Was that the only nickname you ever had?

Anthony

I think that was one of my teammates taking the myth and stuff. Somewhere in like, the vegan world. Picked up on it, and then tech go do a talk or whatever. There's like the vegan warrior. I was just like I never once called myself the Vegan Warrior name. Sometimes, uh, Big Sexy is another nickname.

Uyi

I wasn't going to give you that at all. I didn't even know, even if I did have said that you are big, I wouldn't say sexy.

Anthony

But, you know, I did make that one up. The vegan warrior just stuck, unfortunately. An old demon of man, Keith Galloway. He thinks he's really funny. He changed my Wikipedia name to Winston. And one time I think there's a place I went to, cop 26 and he bought me fights. I can't remember what they did. I made the train and he put Winston in there. And I was like, I asked the ring. I was like, sorry, it's just my teammate. But first you should have asked me.

Uyi

Less than out there. Kids don't rely on Wikipedia. Are you still vegan? Yeah, it's been how many years now?

Anthony

About five years.

Uyi

You probably get asked all the time, but what was your decision into going vegan?

Anthony

It's kind of like a trifecta of things, really, with environmental impact. First of all, vegan is not perfect. Being vegan. I think all vegans went through like a preachy phase.

Uyi

They did.

Anthony

Yeah. I'm, uh, not one of them. I kind of keep it to myself now. But environmental impact, the actual ethical side of it, kind of the health side of it, uh, it's just kind of second nature to me. I don't really go to the things anymore. We talk about it, but it's just the way I live my life, and it's just so second nature. If the grid goes down tomorrow and we have to hunt for our food, I'll eat meat. Yeah. Right now I don't feel like massively called to, that's all. When it comes down to it, I was in France and hoping I'll lose any vegan endorsements. I ate fish. That was because I got invited by my landlord. He's all French friends. It's old couple and a lovely old couple. And obviously they thought vegan meant you can eat fish. They didn't know. So they prepared me to say, beautiful dish. Obviously they got the fish right from the harbor where they lived. It's on the ocean, and I was a fan offender and turn it down. So that's kind of where I'm at with it. I have to loosen it in place, that I will, but I just won't make the consumer purchase of things, because that's where a lot of the pack comes from. Thinking is I try to live the most conscious lifestyle I can try. I'm not perfect. I'll definitely have my footprint, as we all do. So in my sphere of choice, my circle controls, stoics would say, how can I choose the least time? It's kind of how I try to live.

Uyi

It was like a big vegan movement. I feel like it's kind of petered out a bit because I guess it was a new thing then, like veganism, and there's a lot of interest and there's a lot of social media attention and documentary coming out. And now it's been a bit longer. You know, people are used to the term veganism and plantbased, et cetera. Some people who were pro veganism, pro plantbased, have said, you know what, I'm not that anymore. Some people are like, well, you know, I dip in and out. But I think the most important thing is your own life and do what you do. And I'm not going to judge you for doing this, but then you don't judge me as well. And I think from both sides, you had, like, the antivegan movement as well, who were like, what are you guys doing? And then you had the preachy vegan movement as well, who were like, no, it's terrible. Like you just said, you could get criticized for actually not becoming vegan, which is a strange thing as well. Okay, I made a choice to become vegan, and now I decide not to be vegan. Now you're going to condemn me for that. But, yeah, I understand the point of doing the least harm. Unfortunately, you can't live life without doing harm.

Anthony

Exactly.

Uyi

What do they say? In order to create, you must destroy, which is a fact of life. If you want to dip in and out, that's fine. You shouldn't be judged for it or feel like you have to explain to other people, uh, why. So now you've moved away from rugby, I understand there's two things that you've gotten into. The first thing is breathwork, which is massive. Now everyone's talking about breath work and breathing. Actually, I read the book Breathe.

Anthony

Amazing.

Uyi

He was amazing investor. Yeah, absolutely incredible. And you're doing these retreats for men. Yeah, let's start with the retreats for men. How did that come about?

Anthony

In my early 20s well, no, teens. I, uh, didn't really conduct myself in the best way. I wasn't awful, but I had a really distorted image of what I thought it meant to be a man, really, or to be an athlete, to be a Ruby player. And that looked like a super dominant person.

Uyi

An alpha male.

Anthony

Alpha male a bit, which, first of all, alphas are important because I think there's a back push on alphas in a minute, which obviously, we can get into that. But I had the wrong interpretation of what an alpha was. Obviously, an alpha for me is someone who's like a shepherd, rather like a steward to others, a leader. Uh, you lead. You lead by example when you're also generative. You know your purposeful integral, but it doesn't come up with the oppression of others. I got in trouble for fighting when I was younger. Uh, just missed prison, and it didn't really stop me. I was still not fighting all the time, but I'll just be going out, obviously, getting hammered. And, um, I come in and training on a Monday, and I had a bit of a fight, and we all were laughing about it, which is what we do, isn't it? But whatever the issue was, it wasn't authentic to me. It wasn't who I wanted to be, but it's how I wanted to be perceived. I was doing this stuff, but never filmed me. I just did it because of that's. What it meant to be a rugby player occurred.

Uyi

To be a man.

Anthony

To be a man, yeah. And I used to get micro depressions from hangovers, as we do. I just remember thinking, it's just not who I am. You probably. Read the book Power. Now I can't tell everyone's like, gateway book into spirituality. But it's amazing. People laugh with it's. Amazing book. It's life changing. So I read that about six, seven years ago. And, um, that's kind of when I realized it's not who I am as far as I was betraying. That started the whole journey of unraveling and trying to break that down within myself. So fast forward a few years when I was in meditation. I was known as a hippie and would be completely different. I was still seeing these behaviors which weren't healthy within you with other people. Not that I was a saint, yes, saint, but I was seeing the stuff I used to do. I was like, this isn't very helpful. I could see behind the people that were doing the things. I could see behind it. I could see the projecting project, insecurities, et cetera. I think this isn't healthy for men to be doing this. I strive to fit this mold. So I really started training breath work. At this point. I'm putting a one day workshop on my friend's surf school. So we're going to surf and do some breath work, meditation. And we'll have a discussion, like open group discussion about masculinity, what it means to your masculinity. We don't really get taught in all good and understanding. We're going to get taught about the feminine, which is obviously a part of us as well. I'm not saying racial feminine side. It's just part of us. Understanding these energies and where we are at any moment is important. So, yeah, through a workshop there did it, set it up. We got twelve guys come and even just from that day, it was really a profound experience opening up in people, like doing different things and the element of vulnerability, which is a big part of it. So then that led into retreats. And now we do four retreats, three nights meditation, breathwork surfing, jujitsu. My coach comes on, he'll do some stuff. Lots of different activities. It's like challenge Restore. Challenge restore. And at the end there's something about that space for guys to come and just drop it. One of the people in the last retreat, he's sponsoring a place on the next one because obviously you got a lot from it, you want somewhere else to experience it. And, um, we threw it out there. Not to gain promotion, not like, sure, like et, but more if you know someone that's very benefit, please reach out. So that kind of vibe. And um, the wives will always recommend the husband because the man is still really struggling to take that step. So does everything. He and the kids supports us. He was just so focused on everybody else and that he'd never take the time to invest in himself for his own well being. As men, when we do that, when we focus on slowly work solely on the family, what we need a separate outlet to express ourselves in whatever gives us, like you say, whatever gives us that value. If we don't do that, like a separate purpose, which we follow, which we get a lot from, I think we suffer. We really suffer, and it becomes about everyone else and not about us. So I kind of epitomizes the kind of people who come in on the retreat, kind of like, stop gaps to come and reassess apply new things into your life, break down old structures, and then go away, hopefully with a clear vision of where you want to go.

Uyi

Next, in a sense of purpose.

Anthony

Yeah, exactly.

Uyi

Yeah. I think the thing about becoming a man I'm 43 now, obviously, you start to become a man when you're a teenager, really, but it's a rush of hormones, a rush of testosterone, and a rush of things like adrenaline, and one that's overwhelming. You don't recognize it at the time, but there's a huge transition, there's a huge change, and every boy goes through that. Whoa, where's all this energy, this anger, this sexuality coming from? And how do I use it, this potential? And I think everybody goes through that wild stage because you feel like you're invincible. And then you also want to challenge structures, you want to challenge hierarchy, you want to challenge your parents. Uh, because I'm a man now, and I can do all these amazing things. And then you go out there and you do all these things, the bad and the good, and then you get perspective, and you learn about the world. You become a bit wise. And unfortunately, one of these things about wisdom is it's something that tends to only come either with age. Experience tends to come with age, unless you've grown up in a war zone or something like that. And then you reflect, and then you realize that's not being a man, that's not being a lead, that's not being an Alpha, I don't have to fight the world. I have to prove something. But I think everybody goes through that journey, that trial. Some people get lost, and some people do manage to come back or know that they need to come back and center themselves and find, like, the true purpose or what the true definition of being a man is. I also think that it's just a reflection of the society we live in now. We live in these huge cities with 10 million people, and that's not how we evolved. We evolved in small tribal communities where there would be elders and people available to teach you about the ways of being a man. And we don't have that anymore. And so doing a retreat where men can come together in a place like England, where you have these big cities where people probably do feel lost, is a really good thing.

Anthony

Yeah, you're sitting on the head with the elders, but it's something, like, really passionate about personally, I don't have a mentor, but it's something very open to. And I grew up a dad, so I grew up a strong male role model. But my mum was a very tough one and she can't feel both in a way, but it's not the same. But she didn't know them, but she did a great job. Somebody said to me recently, he was the same, he's a therapist. And he was saying he was able to carve his own way of what it meant to be a man and uh, not have to live up to someone else's expectations, etc. But so in itself that was a really interesting spin in it, which I never thought about that way. So obviously, what about rituals? Like right to passage etc. The ceremony. And I think that's something that's missing is missing in society's. Ceremony. A place like monthly biweekly to come back and celebrate life on the one of the regions we had a sweat lodge on. That tradition from the coat of Tribe. Obviously at risk of not appropriate in someone's culture, it's just something that I feel obviously I look back into my the Celtics and there's nothing that I can bring them. I feel a deep resonance towards the way they live. Obviously. I don't even bring someone on who's a uh, facilitator. It's just such a powerful tool. There's still a culture that has very close to those uh, traditions which I think, uh, we've lost a lot of hours. So I am aware of why I'm not trying to find like a Celtic one, which is silly, but I can't really I've not seen to find one.

Uyi

I think the whole appropriating thing is a funny one. Cultural appropriation. I understand. Absolutely. I think culture is always appropriate. People appropriate. That's what happens when communities go around the world traveling and they go, I like that, that's really useful when they take it. So there's no culture that can say this is my thing and nobody else can take it or nobody else can use it or nobody can say that they started it because I started it first. Come on man. Like humans all start from the same source. So how different are you from everyone else? That's one part. I think what is offensive with appropriation is when people take advantage of a community by using something that is distinctly theirs and then profit off it. So I think when big companies go to some community in Latin America and they see old it's like this Amazonian group and they have a particular style of bag, I'm going to use that, I'm going to monetize it and I'm going to sell around the world and now say that it's ours, that's appropriation. Right? But when people say, well, you can't have your hair this way because it's appropriate, what are you talking about man? How many cultures have their hair in this way? Or how many cultures used sweat lodges or other types of rituals that were very similar. Humans are humans, man. You've got two arms and two legs. How different can every culture be? So there will be similarities, and people will copy because that's how you learn. You observe and then you internalize, and then you copy, and then you make your own. Have you read any of Joseph Campbell's work? Joseph Campbell wrote the Hero's journey.

Anthony

No. Did the power, doesn't he?

Uyi

So his stuff you probably find it really interesting. He's dead now, but he was a mythologist, basically. So he would study myths and stories from different cultures and basically show how all these stories that we have are universal. They're universal. Every culture has them, but in different forms, right? The gods are the same in different stories. They have different names. They're the same god, right? Like, I don't know, thor, god of lightning, god of thunder. Uh, god of the storms. Zeus, god of god of lightning, god of the storms. Shango, god of lightning. Got a funder, god of the storms, right? It's the same person in different cultures from north to ancient Greek to West African. So we have these different interpretations of who these people are, but they have a really primitive history in humanity. And there's a reason why we have these stories there because they're intrinsic messages that are valuable to human development. Sometimes we lose these messages, sometimes we forget and we need to be reminded, but sometimes they're still there. And we see these stories again in our children's books. We see the stories in the films, right? We see the stories in the fairy tales. There's a boy or a girl and she lives in this village. And everybody in the village lives in the village. And they say, don't go out of the village. Don't go into the woods. Because in the woods, out of the village, out of the state of the community, there is a monster. It could be a witch, it could be a dragon, right? It could be a fairy. And then something causes the girl or the boy to go out. And when they go out there, they meet all these incredible beasts and powerful beings, and they're in danger because now their circle is widening. And then they go on this adventure and they learn something. They go deep into the sea and they see the monster. And once they defeat the monster, once they meet the dragon, there's treasure. They've learned something, and then they come back. It's the Hebrews journey to the village, and they teach the people in the village about the things they've learned, whether they become the princess or the king, the wise and one or whatever. And these stories are universal, but people have lost their stories, especially if you lived in cities, in modern Western society. So I think it's important what you said to give people the opportunity to do that. And I can understand exactly what you're saying about you feel like something's missing. I think we do feel bad and I think that's why we like to go to the movies and watch the same stuff. If you watch every film, it has that hero's journey. If you read a book, it's the hero journey. Why do these messages come up again and again and again? Why do we have these rituals? Why do we sing songs? Why do we have national anthems? These are historic things that can be traced back thousands and thousands and thousands of years. It's a very valid point that you're making.

Anthony

Weird. The sweat lodge. It was the winter, obviously. So winter solved. This may or may not not be some fungi involved. But that's down to interpretation.

Uyi

Right.

Anthony

Um, because obviously wet is hot in there. So the likelihood of the wound of the planet when you're in there at some point so hard you're in the feet of position on the floor. But at that point you kind of lose where you start and anything else begins and you feel tangible. That connection to nature. I see connection in a few different ways. A lot of connection between ourselves being you, between natural environment and, uh, yourself. You're higher self almost. And for me, you, uh, don't have to go too spiritual or weird to talk about our connections in nature. If you just look at what happens to us when the physical body moves on will be digested. Won't we buy certain types of fungi and we'll go back we'll go back to the cycle of the carbon cycle. For me, I have deeper beliefs, but if not, if it didn't have that, that'd probably be enough for me. The fact that here we identify as a combination of false past experiences, future events, we package that together and that's where we say who we are. Physiologically, that's not even true. Curiously, with mammals, that procreate that's more true than the personality that we have.

Uyi

There, uh, are many layers of truth because you're right, that is the literal truth. And some people have a, ah, metaphorical truth. But to them that's the truth, right? Like you never tell someone what the truth is because they're going to say that's the truth is personal to them. There are objective scientific facts which I agree completely. But Carl Sagan said we are made of star stuff and that's true. You know what I mean? We are formed in the heart of.

Anthony

Stars and we can because the cosmos.

Uyi

Is also within us.

Anthony

We're made of stars, though. We are away from cosmos to know itself as well.

Uyi

If you haven't heard of him, uh, Cosmos. Amazing book. Amazing book. He died again, like, in the 80s. Amazing person. You'd enjoy him. But the next one to talk about was actually the breathwood. People are starting to realize how important breathing is. You don't just breathe like people do. Just breathe. But there's more to it than that. Let's get into that.

Anthony

Yeah. So it's funny. It's almost like, unless you're in these communities, which obviously Brett was really popular, and obviously Wim Hof's just been on the BBC, which is massive for it. But unless you're into it, if someone tells you you're like, fucking how to breathe, mate, don't tell me how to breathe. I'm alive. I haven't made it 31 years. But, uh, just because it's like an automatic function doesn't mean it's optimal. So I trained a few different schools, and the most recent one, I do workshops, I represent. When you read the brief, do you remember the bit with Patrick McConnell and the Auction Advantage? That works a lot with, like, the CO2 tolerance.

Uyi

And this is when he would do the blood test here.

Anthony

He wrote a book. The auction advantage. It's very updated, uh, science driven book. Paul breathing for performance. And just functional breathing mechanics help people breathe day to day. For starters, because poor breathing at rest equates to poor breathing during performance. So you have to get it right from the source. And what does that look like? That looks like how we breathe through our nose at rest, or we breathe through our mouth. If you're breathing for your mouth at rest, you're probably going to be breathing a little bit higher than metabolic requirements for that moment. So what that's, uh, going to entail is if you're breathing a little bit too fast, your brain is going to then register that as some sort of danger. There's a reason why people are quite agitated, little bit stressed all the time. The awareness of the breath is key to our internal state. So unless you're aware of that, uh, and you know where you're at, how to manage it, you've got this unconscious breathing pattern which is affecting you at any given moment. How people are supposed to meditate, how, uh, people supposed to do a presentation at work. If you're nervous and you breathe really fast, you've got to go perform. But your brain is monitoring the breathing is like, I'm in danger here. This is a safety target trying to chase me because it doesn't know what difference, does it? I was like, you know, like, from the external environment, an internal stimulus, like a false motion? Yes, it triggers it if you're not worried that you can't make any changes. So awareness of that is key then the functional breathing. Nose, mouth, are you breathing upper chest, are you breathing lower? Aldamine, where the bit chocolateynated blood is obviously the nose. Tasha diaphragm take you there. You get to things like CO2, which is crucial for restoration. Obviously was short on time, so I won't fully go into it. But functional breathing, breathing for performance. So it's obviously different to the Wim HOF stuff. Wim Hof's hyperventilation breathing to cause adaptations in the brain, which is amazing. But with the oxygen advantage, you kind of focus on day to day breathing, like how you breathe at rest. I'm also training now with alchemy of breath, it's still sanctuary in this way. It's a bit more out there. It's the transformational breath. Have you heard of that?

Uyi

No.

Anthony

Holotropic breathing stand groff similar to that. It's not a holotropic, but it's conscious connected and it's basically it's to work with trauma stored emotional blockages in your body. And it works very similar to how psychedelics work in the brain. Quite in a default mode network brain becomes more integrated, pathways to subconscious come up and obviously it gives you the ability to process whatever's there because unless you're actively doing it, a lot of stuff just buried down, we can't go there. So with this kind of breath work, it gives you the opportunity for the conscious mind to see what subconscious mind is showing it for you to process. It not as easy as that, it got to be a good setting, etc. For the integration prepost. That's kind of theory I'm going into now and I want to take that into the sports world as well. Bring it into me, retreats and things. And it's just an extra healing modality of my journey into breath work.

Uyi

And you're an oxygen advantage coach, right under Patrick McKenna?

Anthony

Yes. I'm just passing on information. I soak it up and then I just pass it on. That's one of my strengths, to be able to obtain stuff and then pass it on. Quite a bridge, really.

Uyi

Yes, bridge and medium and actually talking about men trying to find out who they are and cultures and community and those leaders that used to exist in those small tribal groups. There would be a guide, it would come in different forms, like a spirit guide or shaman or a wise man, a village elder. So what you're saying sounds to me like you're on the journey to become that role of the person who acts as a guide for other people.

Anthony

Yes. When you break it down, it's probably right. But again, I'm on the journey, I've done free retreats now my ability to hold space is improving and that's kind of my m next stage, stepping into that more fully. It's not about me or the other facilitators, we're just creating the space. So whatever needs to happen, happens. That's what it's about, really.

Uyi

Yes, which is ultimately what it's about. You can take that micro and you can extend it out to the macro. We are individuals, but at the same time we're a society. So if we wanted to find out more about the retreats that you do, if you want to find out more about the breath work, where could we contact you, where can we see your content?

Anthony

So obviously, uh, on the Instagram and the link in my Instagram bio is to the website for the next three years. The website is growing, so it's just all the information we come up there. I'm going to be doing more regular brief work workshops in New Key throughout the winter. That will all be via my Instagram. So it's basically all comes from there, to be honest.

Uyi

What is your instagram? Um, that'd be a good start.

Anthony

Right. Malali 91.

Uyi

Spell it.

Anthony

Mullally 91.

Uyi

Okay, cool. Yes, there are do you have a website?

Anthony

Yeah, I have the retreat website, but I tend to put the ones for the next retreat in there so people can see it obviously hopeful through there. But I do have a personal website as well, which I'm going to be putting separate from the retreat, one to one breath work coach and stuff. But it's not quite ready yet.

Uyi

Cool. Listen, we've had amazing chat and actually a lot of information, so I really appreciate you coming down and sharing it with us. I definitely think we've should have another chat, actually, in a year or so's time and we can get deeper into what you're doing. Right, because the retreat sound really interesting and the breathwork sounds fascinating, so we can kind of unpick, um, it a.

Anthony

Bit more yeah, sounds great.

Uyi

Cool, man. Thank you very much.

Anthony

Thank you.

Uyi

I appreciate it.