 Hello there! My beautiful, lovely, talented, and delightful internet friends. Welcome back to my channel. Cakes would like to welcome you as well. Thank you so much for joining us here today. Though I do have a furry guest for the intro of my video, I'm going to have a real human guest for the rest of this video, and I'm really excited to bring it to you. If you know me or you've watched my channel, you know that mental health and mindset are things that matter to me greatly. As many of us have, I've experienced a great deal of trauma in my life, and I've gone through difficult things like losing my leg, hence this channel name. And I came across a YouTube channel not that long ago that talked about some fascinating stuff when it comes to mental health and theater and prison. Now while this video does not relate directly to amputation as many of my videos do, I would highly encourage you if you have the time to listen to this full conversation. What Dominic has to say about mental health and how he's seen it play out in prisons with the use of theater, which is just a fascinating combination to me, is really eye-opening, and I learned some really cool things throughout the course of a conversation, like for instance, why it really is okay to cry in a way I'd never thought of before. You'll understand what I mean later on. And I'm really excited to introduce him to you guys. Also, we did do a video on his channel. There may or may not be rock climbing involved. It was a pretty fun time. So when you're done watching this video, check out the link down below to check out his video and his channel. I also want to note that as we dive in, this video is sponsored by my patrons over on Patreon, and an extended version of this video, kind of the full conversation will be posted over there later today. So keep an eye out for that. Check it out if you're interested. Link on the screen and down below. Without further ado, let's dive in. Hello there, my beautiful, lovely, intelligent, talented internet friends. Welcome back to my channel. I'm in a new and very bright and sunny location with a good new friend of mine. Welcome, Dominic Syracuse. He's also a YouTuber who I met very randomly and it has been such a gift to get to know you and learn a little bit more about you also, but then also what you do. And I wanted to have him on this channel because you guys know that mental health is something I really passionately care about, and you do something that is so unique and so cool when it comes to mental health and life. And I would love for you to tell people what it is. Sure. So thank you for having me, Tom. I love your channel. I created a business called Cognitive Behavioral Theater, which is where I use theater and improv games to teach the principles of cognitive behavioral therapy. So I'm not, I'm in no way a licensed psychologist or anything like that. Yeah. But I've been using acting games and improv techniques to teach cognitive behavioral intervention in maximum security prison. That's so, so, so cool. That was one of the first videos of years that you clicked on. I think it was like, like, should I learn in prison? I was like, interesting. All right, let's check this out. And talking about how you use theater to help people live and process life is absolutely fascinating. How did you find yourself doing that in maximum security prison? So I went to prison. I mean, my favorite thing is to go is to talk to people, you know, like when I was in prison, you know, get some odd reaction. So what I, the way I fell into it was I have been acting my whole life. Yeah. So ever since second grade, it was, it was the place that my parents made me go because I had crazy ADD. Oh, yeah. Like, if you behave in school, you can go to this place and be as crazy and silly and funny as you can. But you have to behave in school. And I said, okay, deal. And I started doing theater and it was just my life. I was president of drama club and middle school. So forever for always, basically. Always. And then, and then I ended up going to college for it. And I went and I ended up getting a master's degree. The woman who created the program, she believed that growth as an actor and growth as a human being are synonymous, which is fascinating. I would never, that would never cross my mind. Acting such a solipsistic art form, it's everything is about me. Yes. My face, my voice, my, which is odd, but very accurate. Yeah. It's very look at me. Yeah. Look at me. It's all about me. And as much as I loved it, I had this burning passion to do it. Yeah. There was a little bit of guilt there. I was like, well, what am I doing to help others? You know, and so that's what I would do to kind of to balance it. I would go and help others and the two fed into each other because the more I learned about the brain and how the brain works and people in different situations, the more I kind of had to draw on right as well. And then when I go to my master's program, I find out, Hey, this is a way you can actually do both at the exact same time. You can teach acting to people who are in extreme situations. I realize is I can use these acting techniques that I've been learning my whole life to teach behavioral therapy. And instead of building a character, I would help people build their character. Interesting. And what I found especially in prison where it's people who are chained up, constantly told to sit down, shut up, behave, you know, spoke only when they're spoken to and then to borrow a lot from my favorite poet and then are never spoken to. What this did was we created the free space for people to express themselves in a way that is nonviolent, is completely safe as in you won't be judged for doing it. And in fact, you'll be praised for just the polar opposite of probably what I think most people have been told their most life. Anyways, unfortunately, in our society, we start at argument. Yeah, like argument is where we, I am right. It just goes to fight in a second. So that was one of the first things we teach people in jail is listen, anything in this room is up for discussion. So if you have a different point of view, that's awesome. Yeah. But the goal is always to learn from one another. Yeah. And whenever you want to speak your opinion or your mindset, you have the floor and you get to share with us what you think and why you think it. And that just creates a environment where people can go, okay, so I'm able to share this thought without one, afraid of having to battle for it. Right. And then two, it creates an atmosphere of learning. Yeah. So that everybody goes, oh, I see why people do that. I think you told the story on your channel, I think it was one of the first videos I listened to, but I think that has a lot of power when it comes to seeing people as human beings, which we kind of don't do a lot in our society. How have you seen that play out with people telling their stories or hearing other people's realities? I mean, have you seen good things or bad things? Absolutely. So the story that I love the most was we went into a women's prison in Los Angeles. Yeah. Start by just playing these fun games. Yeah. Like, all right, let's get everybody loose. Let's get everybody laughing. Yeah. A little more comfortable looking weird or whatever. Yeah. I mean, even that, it creates this explosive energy. Yes. Because they're like, oh my goodness. Then what happens is once you're opened up with laughter, you're open. Yeah. You're open rather than closed. Yeah. And so once you open up, then we start being vulnerable and encouraging others to be vulnerable. As in, I'll start sharing something about myself and my life and all of that. And then what we do is we teach people how to take their life story and turn it into a one person show. Oh, okay. Yeah. So they can stand up in front of the cell block. That sounds terrifying. Right. Really cool, but terrifying. They get to share their story. And coming from a psychological component, what I've learned now, learning about cognitive behavioral therapy, is that when you are listened to, when somebody's just engaged in listening, like you're listening to me right now, it's the same feeling in the brain as being loved and comforted. Oh, that makes sense. So the same chemicals come out of the brain as if you're being held. Oh. Right. So that's the cool thing is that when, so for them just to have people listen to them. Yeah. Just listen is making them feel loved even in that moment. Yeah. You know, which is huge. We're doing these shows and all these women are sharing and there was this one woman who just really took to the exercises. Okay. It's kind of like my star scene. Yeah. And she wanted to tell her story and we practiced it for a week and then it was time to come up live and share. And she came up to me and she went, I can't, I can't do this. And I said, well, why not? And she said, we're like, we practiced all week. Yeah. It's time. My director brain's going like, go Sage. She's like, she's going, she said, listen, this has been really, really great. She's like, I feel so great doing this. Yeah. But she's like, you're going to ask me to go up in front of all the inmates in this prison and perform this. She's like, there's people out there who's tried to kill me. There's one person specifically who's, I mean, actively tried to stab me before. And so you're asking me to go up in front of them and being vulnerable. Right. Like show weakness. Right. The stakes are much higher. Yeah. It's not just, I'm afraid to speak because people are watching me. It's, I'm afraid to show any chink in my armor because I'm just going to give them ammunition to, you know, that they can use against me. Yeah. And I said, okay, I completely understand. I said, here's the thing. Her whole piece was about how she lost her daughters because of her meth addiction. The state took away her, her daughters. Yeah. And she said that, and it was this beautiful piece about how meth, she thought meth was, was helping her making her feel better. It ended up being a thief. It took away her daughters. It took away her life. It took away her freedom. Wow. And I said, I could go up and do it for you, but it's not going to be the same. That's not your story. Right. And she said, no, no. She said, I'll, I'll tell my story, but you have no idea what I'm, what I'm, what you're asking me to do. Yeah. So then she gets up, she performs it, and there was not a dry eye in that. Yeah. There was not a dry eye. And we were, I mean, I was crying. The other castmates were crying. Yeah. The warden was crying. Everybody was crying. And after the show, we did a Q and A and we let people stand up and talk. Yeah. And, and this one woman stands up and she kind of looks at me like, that's the woman that, you know, that I've had this beef with. And the woman is crying and she goes, listen, I know you and me have had our differences. But she said, I had my kids taken away because of meth too. I know what you've been through. Wow. And so anything between us is over now. And then they got up and they hugged in front of everybody. Like I've heard this story before and I still want to cry. So, so like I said, it was after that, that they came up and said, Hey, we got an anger management program. Yeah. We'd love for you to come because you get, they get time off their sentence for doing this. Oh, cool. Yeah. You know, you go through this program, but we're not having a lot of success having them open up emotionally. So, so then I just went cool. And I started learning a lot about the brain and psychology was just great because, you know, I've dealt with depression and I've dealt with anxiety. I've dealt with trauma and I really, I fell in love with it because I was able to understand why I felt the way I felt. So much, so much that I thought was like a powerful force over me. Yeah. It ended up being like my depression, for instance. I, for 10 years, I just thought depression was this force. Yeah. That just took a hold of me, grabbed on and didn't let go. I used to think about it as like just a cloud that would come in and I was at its mercy. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Right. Do anything until it passed. Yeah. And sometimes it didn't pass. Yeah. You know, forever. And then I found out, wait, no, this is, not only are there ways to control it without medication or anything like that, a lot of it is just stemming from the way I think. Yeah. And so working on just changing the way you think is enough to, you know. Coming back to CBT. Coming back to CBT. So that was, that was the cool, amazing part about it. Are there any, are there any, be it acting, exercise or something else you learned in your study that you use to help people begin feeling something or work through anxiety or depression or something? Yes. Is there anything that our audience listening today could employ? Yes, there is. You'll notice my entire team is tuning out because they hear me say thousand times. On their phones. They're like, if I have to hear about in monkey one. Okay. So, this is my favorite thing that to kind of explain to people is your stress. Let's talk about stress. Right. Stress. Everybody feels stress. It definitely exists in prisons, exists everywhere. Yes. Yes. Right. It exists everywhere. We are a high stress society. Yes. So here's kind of the origin of stress. What we call stress is you have this part of your brain and it's called the amygdala and its whole purpose is to actually, is, is to save your life. Yes. Really. And so what it does is it gives you emotions. Yeah. Your emotions are not a weakness. They are literally your brain's way of saving your life. Yes. So things that make you, that are good for you. For instance, eating food. Yeah. Or sunshine or exercise. Yeah. That will make your life prosper. That make you feel good. Yeah. It will give you the good chemicals, the happy chemicals. But then the things that are bad, anything that could threaten your life or bring you pain. Yeah. Anyway, it's released the bad chemicals, cortisol. Yeah. You know, these things that make you feel tense and stressed out. And the reason for that was, you know, back when in the day, if there was something threatening our life or could cause us pain, we needed a way of knowing that we had to get out of there. It's called fight or flight. Yes. So either we could fight off this thing that's going to cause us pain or run from it. Yeah. And then once we did, we were good. Like, you know, the cortisol purge. You do the thing. We can take a deep breath. We can relax. Yeah. Right? So now that we have cortisol in the body, the hard part is we as human beings, we register emotional pain the same as physical pain. Right. Yes. So the brain doesn't know the difference. So things that could just hurt our feelings, that's pain. Yeah. So the brain will, you know, release cortisol over something that isn't going to physically hurt us. So for instance, I'm afraid I'm not going to pay my bills. Right. I'm afraid. My boss hates me. My boss hates me. My significant other is mad at me. Yes. Oh, yeah. Right. Right. These are these are things that it's not going to kill you. No, but it's sometimes it feels like a well, right? Because it causes emotional pain. Yes. Got it. So your poor brain is just pumping out cortisol. Yeah. And there's nothing to fight or run from. Oh, right. You're just stuck. You know, you're just stuck. And the worst part about it is we have this amazing thing called an imagination. It's our most incredible superpower. Yes. Right. It's the thing that that we can envision solutions. It's where creativity comes from. It's what put us ahead of every other animal on earth. But the issue is imagination means to picture oneself. When we picture ourselves in a terrible situation. Yeah. When we imagine our spouse being mad at us. Yeah. And you know, the pain that would cause or we imagine not being able to pay the bills. Yeah. When we imagine failing, our poor amygdala doesn't know that that image isn't happening right now. Oh, right. And you feel it. Like, yeah, you think about, I could think about something in your body almost like reacts to it before you know what you're doing. Precisely. Yeah. So what ends up happening is we end up getting all stressed. Yeah. This cortisol is coming. And the more we think about it, the more we, the more, the more stressed we get. But there's no way to purge it one way or another. It's just building up. It's just building up and building up and building up. And we call that feeling stress. Oh, okay. I'm sure it's all basically. Yeah. That's what it is. Now, here's the exercise that I love to illustrate this. So imagine a monkey. Okay. So imagine a chimpanzee. Okay. And imagine that he's missing all teeth, but he's right. Now, once again, you're laughing right now. Why? It's a funny picture in my mind. It's funny. Your amygdala is seeing the picture of a hilarious monkey. Yes. And you're laughing. It doesn't know the difference that it's not in the room. It's funny. So now let's, let's get more specific with it. Let's say that this monkey has a hairdo just like Elvis. Okay. So the monkey's got a good looking guy. He's wearing a tuxedo, like James Bond, like chimpanzee James. Tom Ford and fitted. Yeah. Exactly. And he's got a, he's got a cane and a top hat. He's doing a little dance for you. And he's doing a top dancing thing. And now imagine he's got a red sparkly bow tie. Oh, nice. Good choice, man. It's just like, it's shimmering. And he's got red sparkly shoes, like the Wizard of Oz. And they're dancing, right? You got this monkey. Okay, great. Sparkles and all. We've just built a picture. And the more that I give details about that picture, the more vivid it becomes. That works the same with stress. So if you're imagining the worst case scenario, you can. Yeah. I'm imagining I'm going to get fired from my job. I'm imagining my boss hates me and is going to yell at me. The more details you give it, really become. All the imagination of what, like, what could happen in that situation that you bring in. You are just, you are just making it more and more specific. And the more specific you make it, the more cortisol starts to flow. Oh, interesting. So now here's how people handle stress and it doesn't work. Okay. They try not thinking about it. They go, ah, just get it out of your head. It's all in your head. Yeah. Stop worrying about it. Stop being stressed. Okay. So now let me show you how ineffective that is. Okay. Ready? You can think about anything. Just don't think about a monkey in a red bow tie. Just don't think about that monkey. Stop thinking about that dancing. But I am. Definitely. But I am. You can't get it out of your head, right? What happens every single time I say the words? Don't think about that monkey. I'm thinking about the monkey. There it is. It's very clear. Okay. So now to show the flip side of it about how it works the same with happy thoughts. Okay. It works the same with joy. Just thinking about something that makes you happy. Yeah. Will give you that happy juice. Yeah. Those happy chemicals. So, um, what's your favorite place in the world? The cornfields of Indiana. Don't judge me. It's peaceful. I love it. So I want you to imagine you're in the cornfields of Indiana. Okay. Okay. And I want you to imagine you're walking through the cornfields. Okay. And I want you to imagine you can, you can feel the big old corn husks in between your hands. Okay. Okay. And you can feel the, the, uh, you hear that sound of the leaves. Yeah. The corn husks. Yeah. Right. And you feel the sunshine on the back. You take it a deep breath. You can smell that fresh farm scent. How's it feel? It's, you feel something. Yeah. Like, I feel something that releases. Right. It's just a pleasant thought. Yeah. And so you can kind of relax and just enjoy that thought. Yeah. At any time, did you think about a monkey in a red boat? No, he was not in the cornfield. It was just me. Right. So here's the point. With any, if you are in actual danger, like if there's something actually, then you got to deal with it right now. Yeah. But if whatever you're dealing with is imaginary, if it's in your head. Yeah. Then instead of giving it mental energy and building that picture up more specific and causing more stress, you can flip it and you can start thinking about something that's more hopeful, that drives you, that inspires you. Yeah. And so when there's a challenge facing you like, oh my gosh, I got to film this video with Joe. And I'm so worried because what if it's horrible and what if it's boring and what if I don't do a good job? The more I think about that, the more I'm stressing out or I flip it and go, man, Joe's so awesome. I have so much fun whenever I'm with her. I'm going to come in and I'm just going to have a good time. We're going to laugh like we always laugh. We're going to crush this video. People are going to see us and just love everything we have to say. All of a sudden this thing that hasn't come to fruition yet, I'm building myself up for in a positive way that I can just grab and tackle and conquer rather than building up all this unnecessary stress that at the end of the day, you know, it's going to ultimately end up dictating how it goes anyway. No, talking about cortisol build-up, you and I had a conversation about this before that I thought was fascinating because though I may seem like I'm emotionally okay on my channel or like I have things figured out, shocking surprise, I don't. I sometimes have a really hard time like actually being okay with emotions or crying. That's a really difficult one for I think a lot of people. And you told me something about cortisol that was fascinating that gave me more permission to cry, which was a good thing. Would you mind sharing that? Absolutely. So we're all stressed out, right? We all got things that that causes a ton of stress and that feeling of stress is cortisol. It's a chemical in your body that's making your heart beat fast, that's making your neck tense up, that's making you irritable. One natural way to get it out is just being active, you know? Things where I like being active. Exactly. It's a tall fight or flight for a reason. It's giving you the energy to move around, to do something physical. So I always suggest working out, exercising, going for hikes, rock climbing, whatever. Do something physical, whenever you're in that state, because that's, you know, one way to get it out. But let's say you just can't. Let's say it's buried you so much, because you get trapped by it. I don't feel like doing that. I don't feel like anything. That's just terrible. Your body has two built-in mechanisms to get rid of cortisol, right? And the first one that I love talking about is laughter. Yes. Yes, because, you know, it's, it's, it's dull. It's like, of course, nobody's sad when they're laughing. No, right? No, at least for that split second moment. Yes. And think about it. Isn't it weird that we make a noise when we laugh? Yes. Isn't that crazy? Laughter in general is weird. It's weird. It's weird. I do it a lot, but it's weird. Right. We do it a ton. So when you're laughing, what's happening is that noise and that shake is purging, is that physical release for your nervous system? Hating. There's the physical release. And then when you're actually joyful, that feeling of joy, yeah, is the feeling of that, those happy chemicals flooding the cortisol. It's the kind of purge it. Yeah. It's like, it like gives you a bath. Yeah. It's like a happy bath. Let's say you're not in a mood to laugh. You just can't get yourself to laugh or anything like that. Well, then we have this wonderful thing called crying. Yeah. Right. And if you think about it, laughter and crying are very similar. Sometimes I can't, like sometimes you're not sure if someone's laughing or crying for a second, right? You're like, oh, okay, they're good. You know, like sometimes you can laugh so hard you cry, which is bizarre. Right. Absolutely happens. Right. They're very similar. You make a noise when you cry. Yeah. You shake when you cry. Right. Think about it like a rag. Yeah. A rag just full of cortisol. Twist it, shake out, shake it out. And guess what? Those tears have cortisol in them. Which is insane. Your tears contain cortisol. So that's, it's your body's natural way of purging the stress, which is why there isn't anyone on earth who hasn't had a massive cry and been like, oh, I feel so much better. Yeah. Because you're getting it out. Oh, yeah. And, you know, that's a, that's a tough thing about our society is because one, you know, we're so, so, so stressed out. Yeah. But we live in a society that says, first of all, be serious. Don't play. Yeah. You play. Stop being silly. Yeah. You don't, you don't, you don't take it seriously. Yeah. Well, playing, moving around, being active, jumping up and down, giggling. Yeah. Just getting your mind off of what's stressing you out. Yeah. These are ways to purge the cortisol. Yeah. Then they say, you know, oh, everything's a joke to you. You can't laugh this off. You're laughing right now. This is serious. Is this funny to you? Exactly. Okay. So we're not allowed to laugh. So we don't have to play. We don't have to laugh. What are we left crying? Oh, but you can't do that either. You can't do that. You can't show that you're weak. Yeah. Big girls don't cry. Yeah. Right. Or for men, be a man. Oh, seriously. And we're so afraid that, oh, no, if I cry, they're going to view me as weak. They're going to view me as vulnerable. They're going to view me as unstable. Oh, sure. Right. So we don't have play. We don't have laughter. We don't have crying. So what do we left to do? We're left to just be stuck. Just stuff it all deep down until you die. And then you have any excuse you can to lash out. Yeah. To have that argument on Facebook, to, you know, push somebody to leave that YouTube comment. We're looking at you. No, you've got to get it out in some way. Yeah. Here's the big discovery I made is that being playful is literally the heart of acting. So I tell people just like basketball is a game you play when you're a little kid. Yeah. And if you're good enough, you get old, you become professional. Acting is a game you play when you're a little kid. It's make believe. Right. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Of course. Yeah. If you're good enough at playing, make believe, playing pretend, then you can go pro, right? Yeah. But that's why it's called a play. You go see a play. Yeah. Or a movie is a screen play. The word is play. It's meant to be fun. It's meant to be joyful. It's meant to get your mind off of whatever's It takes you out of the world. stressing you out. Yeah. And you have this outlet, right? And then you have the two things that first stress, which is laughing and crying, which are the theater. That's right. Which is nuts. Crazy. What would happen if there was more play? What would happen if there was more laughter? What would happen if people were, were, you know, okay, with just crying? Hang on. I need to have a really good cry. Yeah. Real quick. You know, like I just need a, sorry, I'm built up. Yeah. Give me just 20 minutes here. It's hard. It's hard for people because we've trained ourselves not to. Yeah. When we first had this conversation, I was like, Oh my God. I mean, I've learned through years of counseling that emotions are there for a reason that you're supposed to feel them. Yes. But, but learning more about like the physical ramifications of like the, some of the largest expressions that we have, like laughing and sobbing. They literally are there for a biological physiological reason. And it's not just Yeah. Seriously. Why else would we have them? Yeah. And I would also go so far as to say that emotions are one of our greatest assets. It's not our greatest asset as human beings. I think so. Because, you know, there are guidelines, whether, whether it's for protection or safety or they're kind of like a guideline we're up, but there's no good or bad emotion. Yeah. There's no, we do that a lot. We go, Oh no, I'm feeling a bad emotion. Yeah. I'm angry. That's bad. I'm angry. I shouldn't feel that way. That's bad. Or, or I'm, I'm, I'm sad or I'm jealous. Yeah. I'm scared. Yeah. Or I'm insecure. You know, we go, we go, I can't feel those things. That's not me. Yeah. And then what we do, Let's think positive and sad. Yes. And then what we do is we put on a mask. Yeah. Right. So that's what I do is I offer people an outlet to take their emotions and purge them in a way that's constructive and a way that helps people in a way that's artistic and fun and joyful and joyful. Thank you for sharing with us about what you do. I have such respect for it more than I respect you as a person. You're fantastic. I love, I love that you have passion for what you do and that you're willing to share it with us. Well, I appreciate you. Thank you so much. So if you don't know, as I said in the beginning, Dominic has his own YouTube channel and we did a video over there that may or may not involve some rock climbing and a rock climbing race, which I may or may not have won, you'll have to watch to find out. Who knows? Who knows? But links in the description. Don't check that out. And we also have, instead of me, blabbering the whole time. We got Joe. Blabbering the whole time. And thank you so much for, oops, I just hit my mic. Thank you so much for being here with us today. Thank you again, Dom, to everyone watching. I love you guys and thinking about you and we'll see you in the next video. Bye, guys.