How Spiritual Alignment Unlocks Nervous System Regulation

Nervous system regulation after trauma feels impossible, even when you have done the therapy, followed the protocols, and pushed harder than anyone knows. You are not broken, and you are not lazy. You are missing a layer.

In this episode, Antoinette Berrafato sits down with Caleb Matthews, creator of the DNA of Design framework, to reveal why medicine treats the body and therapy treats the mind, yet most healing approaches leave out the part of you that governs everything else. Caleb breaks down his Spirit, Soul, Body method, a three-part blueprint for moving out of chronic fight or flight and into a regulated, purposeful life.

At the heart of the conversation is a truth he wants every listener to hear: "You have a unique purpose, a blueprint that has been customized by God and breathed into you at conception, and you are built for more than just what you're good at. You're built for something that you're designed for. Whether you're a seer, an activator, a catalyst, a navigator, a builder, a steward, or a healer. No matter what your design is, there is a place for you in the earth. There is a place for your expression to come forth."

If you are a veteran, first responder, caregiver, or anyone recovering from trauma and burnout, this episode hands you a recovery method you have never heard before. Caleb shares the story that changed everything for him, the surprising difference between being good at something and being designed for it, and why your hardest seasons never disqualified you from your purpose. He also reveals the seven design types, and which one you are may reframe your entire recovery. Antoinette and Caleb unpack her design type in this episode.

Chapters:

• 0:00 You Are Built For Purpose
• 0:55 Meet Caleb And The Blueprint Idea
• 2:03 Trauma Healing And The Trap Of Trying
• 5:29 The Missing Layer Beyond Mind And Body
• 7:34 Baby Steps Back To Childhood Joy
• 16:19 SSB Explained With A Mirror Practice
• 20:39 Soul Loops And Joy Versus Happiness 
• 27:05  A Coma Story And Speaking Life
• 31:04 The Seven Design Types Quiz In Action
• 36:52 Nightmares As Signals Not Sentences
• 42:02 Entrepreneurship And Designed Versus Good At

Are you a Seer, Activator, Navigator, Catalyst, Steward, Builder or a Healer?

Most people are playing a game they weren't designed for. 

Take the free DNA of Design Quiz in under 5 minutes and discover the unique blueprint you've been overlooking your entire life.

Connect with Caleb Matthews and take the free DNA of Design quiz.

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Transcript

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You Are Built For Purpose

Speaker 0:00

You've been made spirit, soul, and body. With a design that has been built for this time in history, you've been brought to the earth for such a time as this to express your joy and your design unique to you that cannot be expressed by anybody else. In every land and every nation that you are listening to from, whether you're the United States or Canada, Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, South America, Central America, you have a unique purpose, a blueprint that has been customized by God and breathed into you at conception. You are built for more than just what you're good at. You're built for something that you're designed for. Whether you're a seer, an activator, a catalyst, a navigator, a builder, a steward, or a healer. No matter what your design is, there is a place for you in the earth. There is a place for you in the land that you live in. There is a place for your expression to come forth.

Meet Caleb And The Blueprint Idea

Speaker 1 0:55

Hi friends, welcome to the New Normal Big Life Podcast. We bring you natural and integrative health information and stories about nature that we hope will inspire you to get outside in adventure, along with a step-by-step plan to help you practice what you've learned to create your own new normal and live the biggest life you can dream. I'm your host, Antoinette Berrafato, the Wellness Warrior. Let's get into today's topic. Welcome to New Normal Big Life, Caleb Matthews. Why don't you tell us who you are, what you do, and the one big thing you want listeners to remember from your expertise today?

Speaker 1:27

Antoinette, thank you so much for having me. Yes, my name is Caleb Matthews with the C-Link, and I help people discover their unique blueprint, which I call the DNA of design. What I want our listeners to walk away with is a MPA, a multiple perspective advantage, the big picture of that we are three parts: a spirit with a soul that lives in a body with a unique design given by God.

Speaker 1 1:55

I'm excited for this conversation. I think it's going to be powerful both for me and for the listeners. So let's get into it. Awesome.

Trauma Healing And The Trap Of Trying

Speaker 1 2:03

Most of us listening have been through real trauma. Military and first responder service, hardworking blue-collar folks, family caregivers, and those wrestling with chronic illness. We're doing all the right things. We're following all the protocols, but still stuck, some of us. What's happening in the nervous system and what can we genuinely do to move forward?

Speaker 2:28

There is one thing I want to address as I address what you presented, Antoinette, and that is trying. This word trying. Now, this is going to be counter, you know, an opposite effect for many of our listeners thinking what I responded, and that is we need to step back and we need to stop trying so much. Because when we're trying, we're exerting our soul, which isn't a bad thing, but we're our soul is governing our mind, our will, and our emotions. But we are not allowing our spirit, our human spirit to govern in those situations. And what happens is within our nervous system, there is a fight or flight response. There is those molecules of emotion that are replaying that story within our soul, but our spirit is not at the wheel. That's the initial problem when we first look at it.

Speaker 1 3:17

Wow, you just flip my frame of reference completely. And that's awesome. That's a good thing. So a lot of people might be thinking, you know, I've been suffering for a while. And I see, especially on social media, people living their best lives because we only post, well, most of us only post the good times, right? When we're at our best, we're in the glow, we're in the flow, we're in the zone, our happiest moments. And that can make other people who are in their season of suffering feel like, why not me? And so for a lot of people, I just want you to know remember, people are posting their best times. They're not posting their hardship, right? That's right. But the human experience, in my opinion, is periods of good times, periods of challenging times, and ebbs and flows. And so if you're in a season that you think is negative, just like winter always eventually turns to spring, this season will pass. A positive season will happen. And the thing that I remember is when I'm in my negative seasons where I'm just like, God give me strength to make it through this. Yeah, what I remember is how I felt during the good times. And I remember that that good time is possible again. And some people might have to go all the way back to childhood. And some people might go back to a five-minute conversation out of a really difficult life that impacted you in a positive way. It doesn't have to be long periods of positivity, but just tap into when the times were good that carries you forward. So just like when I'm sometimes having a flare-up of symptoms and I'm struggling to walk, to make sentences. I remember my best whitewater kayaking day when I was just in the flow, reading and running the river. Those sticky holes can't keep me. And that gives me strength to go on because I remember I will be back on the river, crushing it again.

Speaker 5:27

That's right.

The Missing Layer Beyond Mind And Body

Speaker 1 5:29

So, Caleb, functional medicine addresses the body, therapy addresses the mind, but you teach that there's a third layer, and most healing approaches leave it out. What is that layer and what does leaving it out cost someone who's working toward recovery from trauma?

Speaker 5:45

There's a deep cost to leave out this third layer. And this third layer is really the engine. It's the gasoline of the vehicle. I'll use the vehicle analogy here. Our body is that vehicle. Our soul, we are the ones sitting at the wheel with our mind, will, and emotions. But that third part of our human construct is the gasoline, it's the engine, it's the spirit, which is our wisdom, our conscience, and our revelation. It's that deep within sense that guides us. It's our innate blueprint that we're given to by God that can govern the situation. I love how you talked about the example of just going to that happy place, Antoinette, of just the places where you're a child, the discovery. I'm going to use Pooh Bear as an example, actually. One of my favorite examples is uh going to the Pooh tree. Pooh Bear and Piglet, they would go to the tree, and we've all seen those cartoons or those sketches online where they're sitting and on Pooh's bench and looking at the tree, looking at the wind. And Pooh and actually Jesus have this one thing in common. Both of them uh interacted with the wind. Pooh and Piglet wondered where the wind was going that would carry the letter to Santa. And Jesus, when he spoke in the scriptures uh to Nicodemus in the Bible, he said, Stop, listen. What do you hear? Nicodemus is like, Well, just the wind. Right. Where is it coming from? Where is it going? Well, I don't know. But that's what it means to be guided by the spirit. Sometimes are those moments where our natural mind will not be able to understand. But our spirit, when we govern that three-part being, our whole part being, then we can be able to actually step into walking in our design as opposed to feeling like it's all within our own soul and our own power.

Baby Steps Back To Childhood Joy

Speaker 1 7:34

So for someone who's never experienced that, how might it look in a baby step sort of way?

Speaker 7:41

So I'm gonna use a sandbox. All of us, when we were little kids, we had this discovery within the sandbox, right? You know, you'd sit there in the sandbox, you'd look around, you'd feel your way around and say, oh, there's the shovel, there's there's the the pail, there's the sand. We didn't go to the sandbox as children to find something initially. That that came as we discovered. So what that looks like for each one of us, Antoinette audience, is going back to the sandbox, going back to those things in our childhood of what gave us joy? What is something that gave you joy that nobody else had? For me, I was nicknamed ETM as uh as a young boy. Talk too much because I love to talk. And now, many decades later, we're having a conversation on this podcast and on these kind of platforms because I'm using that passion. But if I would have stuffed it and allowed maybe my critics or people saying, oh, ah, you talk too much, stop talking, then I would stuff that and not embrace that. So here's a key and here's a clue. Go back to your childhood, pan through the river, pan through the muck, pan for that gold, and find that one thing that gave you passion and follow that as a first step.

Speaker 1 8:57

I love that. That's so easy, and anyone can do that. So I hope everyone listening will try it. So you use the term DNA of design. Break that down for someone who's never heard of it. What does it mean to have a design and why does understanding yours matter when you're rebuilding after trauma or a difficult season?

Speaker 9:17

Our DNA of design is simply our innate individual blueprints. Because in our physical DNA, we all have those areas where we have within our own physical construct, you know, our eye color, how we look, how we function. That can't be replicated 100%. You know, we live in a world where there's cloning and things like that. But down to the T, here is a reality scientifically. You cannot be cloned 100%. It's the same way within your DNA of design in the spirit, your spiritual DNA, that which you are given to from conception, from birth, that which makes you unique, how you express yourself, how you communicate, how your emotions positively are able to function through your life. That's your DNA of design. And there are seven different design types that we'll get into, of course, that break that down. But your design is a way that you function that's specific to you, that nobody else can function like. It's like the snowflakes. No two snowflakes are alike, no two designs are alike. The way Antoinette expresses her design type is going to be unique to Antoinette versus me, even though we have some similarities. We're not exactly the same.

Speaker 1 10:28

What influences your design type? And is design similar to character?

Speaker 10:35

Yeah, design is character is what is played out in your physical construct. But I'm gonna I'm gonna step back and I'm gonna I love my analogies. By now, audience, if you're like, come on, Caleb keeps using parables and metaphors and analogies, hey, that's just part of my design type, which by the way, mine out of the seven, there are seven, but mine is a seer design type. I like to describe the world in pictures and metaphors. I was always that guy that loved watching cartoons on loop over and over again. My brothers say, Why are you watching that same scene over and over again? That was me. But here's the here's the example. I know I'm speaking to an audience that loves sports, especially a lot of our listeners tuning in from the United States, love going to a good sports game, a football game, you know, a soccer game, a hockey game, and you're and you're in the stadium. So let's just step back and imagine ourselves in that stadium for a second. You look around you, the crowds energized, there are many fans around you. There are concession selling hot dogs and popcorn and drinks that are having to do their job. Then there's the players on the field on both the away team and the home team. There's the referee, and then all of a sudden you hear blast, and it's the anthem of the star-spangled banner, and you've got the singer that's there in the middle of the field, and you look over top and you see the airplanes flying over top doing all their dips and tricks and things. Then you see the Snoopy Good Year blimp right over top of the stadium, and you see that camera angle looking at the stadium down below. Why do I say all that? That is MPA, multiple perspective advantage. That's looking at the bigger picture. Now, our character, as Antoinette mentioned, is that part it is a part of walking our design, our physical construct. But the bigger picture is there is so much going on around us where we need to ask ourselves this question within walking on our design. What is speaking around me? What are the links that are speaking around me that are revealing themselves, like God is revealing to me that I need to pay attention to and not be so in my soul, but I need to allow my spirit to understand and govern what's happening in the moment.

Speaker 1 12:42

And is that just more uh quiet listening? How do we tap into that? How do we reach that state?

Speaker 12:49

Tapping into that can look like, for some, going out for a walk and looking up at the tree and observing the birds. For others, it could be cooking a meal because you love cooking, but stepping back and savoring and smelling the food. For others, it could be you just need a good hug from a golden retriever, the happy dog around the corner of the street. Doing these things that build new ramps and ignite the neurons and these pathways within our molecules of emotion, there needs to be something that comes in when, especially when we're dealing with trauma and we're dealing with those loops that are playing themselves around and around and around. For us, the way that we play this out is we need to engage with those things, those individual elements that speak to us. For me, myself, I love to journal and write down my dreams, which is a whole different topic in itself, dreams of the night season. Write them down, treasure my dreams, ask myself, ask God, what are my dreams speaking to me? That's a way I can build a new ramp versus getting overwhelmed by what's happening around me.

Speaker 1 13:56

What came to mind when you were speaking is that essentially you're doing somatic healing for nervous system regulation through cooking or petting a dog or going for a walk and observing nature. And so you're using your mind and you're allowing your mind to relax and using your body, doing something physical, taking in things through all of the senses, and then allowing the sensations, the experience, the knowing to just happen. Is that kind of sum it up?

Speaker 14:29

Yeah, yeah, for sure. That's definitely a great, a great approach and a perspective on that. It really is what you're saying, Antoinette. It's taking a census of our senses. Because we have five senses, and it's important to filter them. Because if I before I go to sleep, like for me, it doesn't work for me if I if I'm amped up or say I watch a scary movie, I don't like watching scary movies. Say if I do and I and I and I trigger that those molecules of motion, but not in a good way, it's going to affect my sleep. It's going to affect my dreams, it's going to affect that pure flow. But we need to take a census of our senses and do exactly what you were talking about there, which is it works differently for each one of us. How we activate the amyla, the proper amydella hit, just the positive dopamine, because there's good dopamine and there's bad dopamine.

Speaker 1 15:17

Yeah. So for those of us who are not Canadian A, we're gonna say amygdala.

Speaker 15:23

Amygdala. There we go. Amygdala. I love it. I love it. I love it. Me, my accent. There we go.

Speaker 1 15:28

We say A where I live too, so you are at home. That's why I speak your language. I understand what you mean. I love it. I told you we're kindred spirits.

Speaker 15:39

We are. We have so we we love the binoculars too, right? We love the this whole sear realm, too, right? Like talk to me through that, Antoine. Uh you uh you took the quiz, didn't you?

Speaker 1 15:50

I did, I did. But you know, before we get there, there's a couple more things I want people to understand because this is all very new for me. I'm very curious about it. And maybe it's more that I'm curious than anything, but I I do have a couple of questions before we get to that. Is that okay?

Speaker 16:08

That's fine. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1 16:10

So before we talk about your SSB method, it might be helpful for us to understand what the acronym stands for. And can you define each one for us?

SSB Explained With A Mirror Practice

Speaker 16:19

Sure. Yeah. So SSB stands for spirit, soul, and body. And so this whole acronym is an acronym and a picture for our three-part trichotomous construct, which is I believe that we are built with a spirit that has a soul, that has a body. And we spoke a little bit about that before with the vehicle analogy. And in my encounters and my experience and being a different nation's East and West, and encountering people in different cultures and elements, I have found that especially in the West, in my observation, that we focus on the body, we focus on the mind, and those things are good, but left to themselves, without the governance of the spirit, we can be led on pathways where our nervous system and our entire state is overwhelmed because we are not engaging with our spirit. You talked a little bit before, Antoinette, about the social media. A lot of people just talk about the good times and not the suffering and walking through the valley. David in the Bible, he talked about spirit governing the soul. He said, Why are you downcast, oh my soul? Well, well, who's talking? It's not his soul talking to his soul. Otherwise, he would have said, Soul, I talk to my soul. No, it's why are you downcast, oh my soul? His spirit was talking to his soul to instruct his soul to rise up and to be able to throw off the shackles of walking through those difficulties. Now we are going to go through difficult times, but how we govern ourselves through those times is important.

Speaker 1 17:50

And so for a veteran or first responder who's never approached healing from that angle, what does activating the spirit look like day to day? And how does it show up in your physical body?

Speaker 18:03

Well, day by day, it's really before we get into the physical, it's really stepping back and engaging with the spirit. So we talked about the spirit element of SSB, not in a woo-woo sort of way, but in a very concrete practical way. Here is what I'm thinking of right now in the moment that comes to mind as I was pondering this this morning, this SSB. And remember Aladdin? And tonight, remember Aladdin, the genie in the lamp, right? Our audience will know this very well. And, you know, you rub the lamp, and there comes, there comes the genie. In our world today, a lot of people look at the spirit element of SSB, connecting with God, connecting to the Creator, connecting to their human spirit, to their conscience, like the genie in the lamp. It's like, okay, what do I need to do now? What do I need to think about? What do I need to activate physically? And those things are fine, but without the actual governance of the spirit, it's a lifestyle of walking that through day by day. So instead of playing itself out in the body, that will come to play out. But first, we need to step back and we need to engage with our higher power, engage with the creator, engage with God, whatever language that you say God has, we need to engage with the spirit first before our day by day. And what that looks like is speaking to our human spirit. Now, some of you like pause, wait, what did Caleb just say? Yes, talking to your human spirit. You know how we mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the most handsome or beautiful one of all. But this way, here's an activation that we can do right now. One thing that I like to practice, one thing we did the other day on another podcast. And this is something I want to teach our audience to do. So look at yourself in the mirror and speak to yourself and call your spirit to attention, saying, I call you to the forefront to take your rightful place to govern the mind, to govern the soul, to cover your mind will and emotions and to govern the body. And I invite you to the forefront to take your place. As an innate spirit given by God, I invite you. So just talking to your spirit, because what that does within the neurons and the electrical pathways within the molecules of emotion in our brain, our brain begins to respond as we speak. It's impossible for it not to when we are speaking to it. So why not invite your spirit, your soul, and your body into an invitation by activating that?

Speaker 1 20:28

Wow, and that's a very simple practice that anyone can do. It's not scary. It's just something you can do while you're brushing your teeth in the morning. I love that. I love simplicity.

Soul Loops And Joy Versus Happiness

Speaker 1 20:39

So, how does the soul specifically govern the way we respond to stress and chronic nervous system dysregulation? And what does bringing the soul into alignment do to someone's nervous system?

Speaker 20:51

Our soul, it hits rewind and replay on so many things, right? Like if I close my eyes right now and I think about in my soul, my mind, will, and emotions of some of those happy memories or maybe hard memories, that's a loop that I can choose to replay. For a lot of our listeners who have gone through trauma, you know, are, you know, first service veterans and first responders, that there are those moments where the loop is happening and you're replaying those loops in your emotions, in our emotions. But how we regulate that is knowing that it's not ours, especially the negative stuff, that it's like washing our hands, that we need to invite our spirit, and this is the part of inviting our spirit to take dominion over our soul and our body and to regulate those emotions, those molecules of emotions. That's why we talked about earlier building that ramp. Because when you take something out and you go through that healing, there needs to be something else that's filled in. And that's where we talked about filling that ramp with those specific joys and those paths. Because happiness is temporary, but joy, joy. Joy is everlasting.

Speaker 1 22:02

Right. And you know, a lot of people don't understand that distinction. Can you sort of explain to people the difference between the temporary happiness and the permanent joy? I I like to talk about joy as being a resilience skill because even when you're going through your darkest times, you can still be joyful that you're doing it with friends and family supporting you, that you're in a safe environment, that things are bad, but they could always be a little bit worse. That's how I approach it and see it and view it. But what how what would you uh say to unpack that a little more?

Speaker 22:47

Yeah, so happiness can be something like, I'm I'm happy that I got, I'm just gonna use a really silly example. I'm happy that I got another subscriber on my YouTube channel. Yay! You know, like just like that's a it's a happy moment. But is that gonna bring me joy for the next five, 10, 15, 20 years? Probably not. But the joy, when we dig back into that, I I can think about, okay, what's something that just cranks me on no matter where I'm at? Talking right now. This is a joy. This is something that I've had since I was six years old. Since sitting on my front lawn talking to the neighbor's dog called Ace Black Labrador, talking and teaching. That was my first audience with a dog. And then my stuffed animals talking to my stuffed animals. That's what brings me joy. Those moments of activating my design. See, it all comes back to that. That's my definition, is when we are doing what we're supposed to be doing, that fills us with joy. Antoinette, right now, you're calling from the Midwest and the United States and here in Canada, but guess what? We wouldn't be having this conversation, audience, we wouldn't be having this conversation if it wasn't for some of the great explorers and navigators who walked in their design. Christopher Columbus, when he discovered America. He wouldn't have gone out looking for the new world and venturing into those places where people thought he was crazy if he hadn't have picked up Marco Polo's adventures, the stories of Marco Polo. And Marco Polo was also another navigator with that joy who explored. So what I'm talking about with that joy is those men, they explored their joy. And guess what? Amelia Earhart, amazing woman, would not be an aviator pioneer in America many, many generations later, accessing her joy without the first two people that I just mentioned. So everything here all falls into line. When we are walking in joy in our design, that's joy. Happiness, those are things that happen temporarily. Joy is something that's built into our innate blueprint.

Speaker 1 24:45

Wow, that was really well said. Thank you for that. So by the time someone reaches their body layer of your framework, what's different in their nervous system to compare to someone who's never done this kind of work?

Speaker 24:57

It walks out in a way where the pressure is off, the savior complex is off, because we're we're told in this world, our culture is constantly pressuring us that you have to have everything figured out by X, Y, Z, otherwise you're missing the boat. So when we're engaging with our spirit, we're engaging with our God-given blueprint, our DNA of design, then we are following our blueprint, our set of instructions, our individual marching orders, so to speak, versus following somebody else's armor. I want to use a biblical story that I love sharing, and that is David versus Goliath. And when David fought Goliath, King Saul tried to say, You'll be my champion, but in order for you to fight the giant, that big scary giant, you got to put on my armor. Now, how often we've heard that in our culture where we say, oh, unless you become like Tony Robbins or Taylor Swift, or you got to be somebody, something else, then you'll be able to win. No, it's your design. So, how about eventually, when it comes into the body, when someone's gone through this framework, is people are following design-led framework, their individual, innate spiritual blueprint by discovery versus following somebody else's set of instructions, which isn't cohesive to one's design. Conform culture is never the way.

Speaker 1 26:16

Amen. I've always been thought of as weird. My friend said, You're weird, but I like you anyway. And it's because I was super outdoorsy and just lived for it in a very cosmopolitan environment, and everyone just thought I was strange, but thankfully liked me anyway. So that resonates.

Speaker 26:36

Awesome.

Speaker 1 26:37

So we wellness warriors carry a specific kind of trauma load: hypervigilance, moral injury, chronic fight or flight, physically demanding conditions, and we're often away from loved ones for a long period of time. We never fully power down without a lot of intensive work. And I can speak from experience. How does the DNA design framework apply to someone in a situation like ours?

A Coma Story And Speaking Life

Speaker 1 27:05

And where do you typically see the first breakthrough happen?

Speaker 27:08

I see the first breakthrough happen when we push us when one pushes aside all the other elements that look like they are the correct, attractive answer. Now, I'm going to explain here because the best way of explaining is by stories. I love my stories. And this story here is something that happened a few years back. It was when I was doing spaces on Twitter, X online. And that's kind of where podcasting led into doing more of this. And there was a member of our community, I won't name my uh just for privacy rights, but he was in our community and very brilliant man, actually, a top doctor in one of the uh biggest hospitals in London in the UK. And brilliant, just really, really kind, genuine man with a different spirituality, different faith, different belief system, Islamic. And uh, what happened after many months and you know, just having these great conversations is after one of our spaces uh podcasts, uh he stepped off. And then I didn't hear from him for a while, and his friends were starting to worry about him. And what happened is his friend went to go check on him because uh the friend of mine was uh of ours, he was having some just going through some of those uh mental struggles. And when they found him, he was on the floor. He had tried to take his own life, and he was just there's blood all over the place. So his friend took him to the hospital, and uh, he was in the hospital and he was on life support, and his family, his friends, community was all around him. And his friend found my contact through my friend who is in a coma in his contacts, in his book, and his phone. And he sent me a message and said, Hey, is such and so, you know, he's in a coma. This is what happened. Uh, we could really use your prayers, your support, but also I know that you're somebody that really believes in the spiritual. You really, really believe in this framework of SSB. You really believe in this. And so we, and even though he had a different faith and system than me, like I'm a follower of Jesus, not Christianity, not institutional Christianity, but I'm a follower of Jesus. Jesus is my higher power and my gate. But for him and his community, they're all Islamic, Muslim community. But he said, I don't understand this, but he said, I know that our friend really treasured what you has to say. And so we just would love for you to be able to speak uh just over his life and just some blessings, some meditations, just some voice notes just to send to him. So what he would do is he would uh during times when guests were allowed in, he would get in there and with his our friend's phone, he would hold it up to him and play the voice clip of clips that I would create this musical ambiance, kind of like with some Hans Zimmer soundtrack kind of feel. But just like I would speak to my friend's spirit. I would speak to him and say, come to attention to take authority over your mind, over your body. Your body must respond to your spirit, and even just speaking the life force and the dunamous power of Christ just into his body, just the verbal activation, the spoken word. And after three or four days, he came out of that coma. He came out of that coma. He responded. His body responded, his soul responded, and he came back. And then he got to call me on the phone four days later and said, and the first thing that I got to say to him was, Welcome, brother, back into the land of a living. He was gone. He was gone just on life support. So what that looks like is the the doctors had their say. They said this is what's happening, there's the earthly reality, and then there's a spirit, then there's God's reality. And so what that looks like, especially in those situations, is blocking out that noise and going straight to the source and speaking the truth of what God's blueprint.

Speaker 1 30:46

Wow, that is so beautiful. I hope that people who are in a season of great despair can hear this and get some comfort and also some support and they know where to find you. We will cover that in the at the end of this

The Seven Design Types Quiz In Action

Speaker 1 31:04

discussion. So, Caleb, you offer a free quiz that identifies seven design types. And I had a lot of fun taking this quiz and learning about my design type. I learned that I am the seer truth revealer. I was not surprised when I saw that. I had no idea what the design types were. I didn't want to know. And I just dove into the quiz, and I actually learned a lot about myself just by answering the questions, even before I got to the end of the quiz. So if you're up for it, I'd like to talk about what I learned. Absolutely.

Speaker 31:40

Hey, this is this is where the application hits the road. So I think our audience is like, yes, let's let's talk about this. How does this look like practically? Let's go for it.

Speaker 1 31:49

So the quiz said that I possess an extraordinary ability to perceive what others miss. It says, your spirit-led intuition allows you to see beyond the surface, discerning patterns, motives, and truths that remain hidden to most. You are wired to reveal what is unseen and speak truth with clarity and conviction. The identified strengths, growth areas, and SSB insights were accurate and relevant also. And in full disclosure, my husband, who probably knows me better than anybody else, said, yeah, he agrees with the assessment. So without giving everything away, how does knowing your design type change the way you approach your own healing? And what is the most surprising thing people discover about themselves when they take the quiz?

Speaker 32:39

It it it changes, it changes absolutely everything in the game. And what I mean by that is it's it's like the superheroes, right? Marvel Comics and the superpowers, a superhero that knows that they're wired differently, they're kind of curious, but they don't know exactly what that superpower is, that they have a level of success or a level of being able to walk through that in their life. But until they discover what that superpower is, design types can't fully function in that superhero story, the superheroine or hero. It's the same way with the design, as Antoinette's describing with the sear design. That's when you know your design, you're able to actually actively look for places and partner and govern your entire human construct in a way that you wouldn't be able to if you're kind of have the question mark over the head of like, okay, what do I do here? How do I respond to that? Because this plays into not just personal dynamics, but in team, team building dynamics as well within your coworkers and with your family and places of uh of influence as well. It changes because you're not just looking at the concession at the foot at the stadium, at the football game or the hockey game, and looking at uh selling hot dogs or selling chips, just to use a silly example, but you're looking at the bigger picture.

Speaker 1 33:56

Yeah. And, you know, when what I expected was that I would find some similar answer. I didn't know the word seer, you know, that wasn't it. But I I have a good sense of who I am because I spent a lot of time working out who I am, the real me at my very core, the me that for many years I was afraid to show people because whenever I did, they would say, You're weird. So I had a feeling that what I was going to find was confirmation bias, meaning I did a lot of work to know who I am, and I would get some flavor of confirming who I am because I'm very much grounded in that person. So let's unpack my quiz results. And not because it's all about Antoinette, but to help people see what they might learn about themselves by taking the quiz, by getting the results, and working through what they find.

Speaker 34:57

Yeah. So for a seer, for Antoinette, it's like with those binoculars, even sitting in the tree. We had this conversation before, before the podcast, before we actually gone live with you here. And those binoculars are looking for animals like out in the out in the river, out in the property. It's like when you when you're a seer, so all the seers out there, if you are if you've listened to this and afterwards you take the quiz and you get seer, listen up. I'm a seer as well, too. So I'm speaking this to all the seers as well. And that is when you're looking through those lenses of what's happening around me that's deep beneath the surface. You're not just looking at the outer structure like the builder. You're not just looking for the direction like the navigator, you're not just looking for creating the spark at the catalyst, but you're looking with those eyes like the binoculars of a scout that's in front of the army. You're you're looking ahead to see, okay, what's what's in the future that I can pull into right now? What is beneath the surface? What's the matrix, so to speak? What's that code that's influencing the natural world that's speaking to me? Now, for Antoinette, I Antoinette and I, it's great. We just met on Pod Matches Podcasting Made Simple. And so I don't, this is actually the first time me having a full-on conversation with you, Antoinette. So just to let our audience know that perspective, this is what I see though. A lot of seers, and Antoinette, I believe that you're somebody that in the night season that you have these, you have dreams as well. Because is that accurate? Would you say that dreams are something that you get codes from as well, too?

Speaker 1 36:24

No. And I was going to ask you about that. I get my download when I'm awake. Okay. And I actually don't dream.

Speaker 36:32

Never? And I don't know what that's not even one? You don't remember anything from when you were a child?

Speaker 1 36:38

No, I don't think I I don't remember. Well, I have had nightmares. I've had night terrors, but I've never had just dreams.

Speaker 36:49

Those are those are those are you're getting you're you're making me

Nightmares As Signals Not Sentences

Speaker 36:52

well, I'm excited about this whole conversation, but this area right here, I think is really important to touch on. This this right here, right here. If you've close your eyes, if I've closed my eyes, audio to close your eyes and you see something, whether it's a nightmare or whether it's a positive or a negative dream, if you're if you're seeing stories after you fall asleep in your dreams, that's still a dream, even if it's a nightmare. Now, I'm gonna I'm gonna show an example here of what it looks like to flip to flip something. Because there there's two sides of a coin. You got heads and you've got tails. There is gold through the muck. Now, many times over the years, especially in the places I've been to, like Stonehenge, you know, SAR, haunted happenings in the United States, like big new age festival, a lot of people coming in with different crazy wild dreams to say, okay, well, I had this dark nightmare from start to finish. What can that possibly mean? Now, whatever comes against you defines you. So if Antoinette dreamed of a angry, I'm just going to use just an example here, of an angry horse that had fire breathing from its nostrils and it was chasing Antoinette and trying to stamp on her, and then she woke up. What would I say that would mean? Well, I would say to Antoinette, what that means to you is that there is a, there is a reaction to the authority that you carry, because horses represent authority. There is a negative reaction that's trying to stop you from accelerating your walk and your individual purpose. And you are somebody that gives discernment because fire coming out of the nose. You are somebody that guides people in discernment. But there are negative powers and forces that are trying to stop you from placing your authority in your own DNA of design. That's what I would say.

Speaker 1 38:31

Wow. Okay, that was powerful. I got some chills.

Speaker 38:37

So do you have like a like a nightmare that you could share, maybe, and we could maybe unpackage a little bit of that?

Speaker 1 38:43

I always assumed that my nightmares are confirmation of my resilience. That even when the odds look completely against me, I succeed in my my nightmares and my night terrors. Yeah. And so even though it's not, I don't have them hardly ever anymore, but when I was having them in the in the beginning, it was like, whoa is me. I wish this didn't happen. Then it became, well, you know, I always win. No matter how awful it is, I'm victorious. So maybe that's the lesson that you are more resilient than sometimes you remember when you are awake. That's right. So I don't know if that's you know the case.

Speaker 39:29

That's that's part of that for sure. And I would say, especially speaking to those who've gone through, you know, trauma, first responders, those serving in the military and those in those, you know, like first ground boots in the ground situation, a lot of a lot, and I've spoken with a lot of people in there over the years as well, too, in different areas, is that nightmares are our primary way that they see their dreams and they don't have a lot of the positive side of things. Now, one thing that is a uh a temptation, I guess, to say is that for if someone just has nightmare and nightmare and nightmare, you know, like dark encounter after dark encounter in their dreams, it's because, okay, subconscious says this got to stop. Like, I don't want to see this anymore. And we tell our subconscious that we don't want to have dreams anymore, and then we don't have any filter, and then there's no positivity that comes through. Now, so I want to just take this opportunity as an example. Uh, your life, but also just those out there. If you're somebody that's only dreaming dark terrors and nightmares and nightmares and terrors, there is still gold through those moments. There is still gold to be found. There's resilience, as Antonio's talking about. But don't completely turn off the tap of dreams because you've had a large chunk of night terrors, because the enemy of your soul, I call him the devil, but you know, like there's God and then there's a devil. There's light and there's darkness. So there are blueprints to be unpackaged. Now, Harriet Tubman, one of my great heroes, heroines of American history, she had dreams on the underground railroad. God would actually speak to her. This is well documented. If you look this up, audience, after our podcast here, she would follow her dreams as a roadmap on the underground railroad. God would say, go there and not there. So she'd have a lot of positive dreams, but even night terrors where she would see the people trying to come after her and take her back into slavery and captivity. If Harriet Tubman had turned off the tap, then she wouldn't have had the map in her DNA of design. So all that to say, and Antoinette, back to your sear breakdown of your design type. I I believe that you are somebody that dreams. It's just a matter of leaning into that more from what I perceive, of even the night terrors have meanings behind them. Yes, resilience, but there's even more to be unpackaged there. That's just my interpretation. And I always like to say to my audience and to you and to our audience as well, chew in the meat and spit out the bones.

Speaker 1 41:45

So I love that. Yeah. And you know, I I am definitely going to meditate on that in my walk through the forest today. And maybe tonight I'll have a different experience or not. Sometimes change doesn't happen quickly, but I'm open to it and excited for it.

Entrepreneurship And Designed Versus Good At

Speaker 1 42:02

Yeah. So, in thinking of moving forward in your writing, you mentioned early stage entrepreneurship as its own sort of proving ground for someone coming out of trauma who's trying to rebuild the life, maybe starting a business or a new chapter. What's one thing they need to understand about their own design before they take that leap?

Speaker 42:22

That there's a difference between what you're good at versus what you've been designed for. Now, for for me, I was in corporate world for 10 years. I was very good at sales. I was one of the top salespeople in my company. But I left a 10 yeah, I left a 10-year career because that wasn't what I was built to do. I had to ask myself and God this question Caleb, after 10 years, can you see yourself behind a desk selling telecommunications products, phones and TV and internet plans and wireline and wireless communication plans for the rest of your life? And I had to answer that. I said, no, that this is not what I'm designed for. This isn't what my conscience is calling me for. This isn't what I'm built for. And because I had that resolution, I decided to test at the corporate world that I was in, big corporate world, and say, okay, after 10 years, I've consistently been your top performer. I've earned my stripes. Now I want to carve out my own entrepreneurial path. So I had an idea that I passed through many business executives, directors of sales, executives that were even higher up than my boss. I had many different sets of eyes on this business proposal. And my business proposal was this I was willing to take a pay cut, so a decrease in pay for commission to test this beta test this out. I was saying, I'll work six months in Mexico. That's where one of my homes is. Cabo, by the way, come to it, Cabo. If you ever want to come to Cabo and turn out the invitations there, come to Cabo, experience it. But six months in Mexico was my plan. And six months. Months in Canada, and I would do remote sales and drive traffic to the stores through following up with clients and businesses and just selling them on our products. And then in the six months I was in Canada, I would float around the different stores kind of like a hybrid manager and make sure that they have support staff to be able to cover in those gaps. So I passed that idea out to my business executives that were higher up than my boss, as I said. And they said, yes, this is a great idea. Go for it. No-brainer. I pitched this to my boss. Now keep in mind, after 10 years, I'd loyally served this company. I was one of the top performing salespeople. And he sighed and he said, Al Caleb, he said, online sales don't work. Wow, what? Like what Jurassic Park era of prehistoric dinosaur are you? I didn't say that out loud, but you know, I probably should have looking back in that buddy. He was like, online sales don't work. And I knew at that moment, because he said to me, Oh, well, we don't even want to try this idea out. What an insult. He wasn't even willing to give me, I was willing to go back to what I was doing, even if the idea failed. But he said, we're not even willing to try this idea out. What he was telling me was, Caleb, your DNA of design doesn't really matter to us. You're just another serial number in the big court concentration camp. You're just another number, another number tattooed on your spiritual flesh. You're just a big cog, you're a little cog in a big wheel. And I knew that I wasn't going to stay. So I sold the house. I left a 10-year career. I left my land of my origin. And I went to Mexico, got my residency, got my citizenship, and became a digital nomad. And I run two businesses. That's where I decided that I am not going to do something I'm good at. I am going to do something I'm designed for.

Speaker 1 45:45

Wow, Caleb. Your story at the start gave me chills because I knew where you were going, because I felt it in my own life. And I had to give up my work as a C-suite executive in tech because it wasn't what I was designed to do. And it was making me very, very sick. And that was a huge decision, but the best decision I could have ever made. So this has been such a powerful conversation, which I absolutely knew it would be from the from the moment we started commenting in the podcasting made simple live conversation. I was like, I'm going to seek out Caleb. And I'm so glad you reached out to me first. That was awesome. And we were able to have this conversation today.

Final Blessing And How To Connect

Speaker 1 46:33

It's been everything I thought it would be and more. So what do you want to leave listeners with?

Speaker 46:39

What I want to leave listeners with is this truth. That you have a design created in the image of God. You've been made spirit, soul, and body with a design that has been built for this time in history. You've been brought to the earth for such a time as this to express your joy and your design unique to you that cannot be expressed by anybody else. In every land and every nation that you are listening to from, whether you're the United States or Canada, Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, South America, Central America, wherever you listen to this from, you have a unique purpose, a blueprint that has been customized by God and breathed into you at conception. And that you are built for more than just what you're good at. You're built for something that you're designed for. Whether you're a seer, an activator, a catalyst, a navigator, a builder, a steward, or a healer, no matter what your design is, there is a place for you in the earth. There is a place for you in the land that you live in. There is a place for your expression to come forth. And so I speak right now to your human spirit and to your design. And I say, Welcome. If no one else has ever told you this besides an Antoinette or a Caleb, hear this. Your design is welcome in the earth. You are welcome to fill that space that God has put you here for, that no man or woman can take away from you that which has been put in you to be fulfilled to the days of fullness. Because in the Bible it says that when King David fulfilled his design in the earth, it said that he went to his fathers. He passed on full of days. Your days will not be one day shorter than what it should be. So I bless your spirit to be filled with your design in every capacity, full of days.

Speaker 1 48:38

Amen, brother. Thank you so much for this gift. I am sure everyone is going to want to know how to connect with you, follow your work, and all the things.

Speaker 48:47

Sure. First and foremost, take the DNA of design quiz. We mentioned just even there in the exhortation. There are those seven design types we spoke about. I'll have links in the show notes for Antoinette. Take the quiz. As you can hear from her experience, it's well worth it because then you'll be able to know how you actually handle sitting at the steering wheel with your spirit governing your soul and body. So take the quiz. It takes less than five minutes, absolutely free, at the link provide as well, whether you're a seer, a steward, a navigator, a catalyst, a healer, a builder, an activator, and take that quiz. And of course, if you want to go even deeper than that, I invite you to my YouTube channel. I have three to four videos per week on youtube.com/slash at the C Link, where you can discover more about design as expressed through neuroscience, history, and also the Bible and the scriptures and how it applies to your own life. And here's an invitation I want to throw here as well too. If you're like, okay, Caleb, but I want more than that. This fall, I am creating the C Link Academy because of the demand for this, an online paid community. I'm reserving 15 spots. I've already had a few people already take a few of them to where if you join the first 15, then you have a lifetime monthly paid rate to have access to the community, the trainings, the extra content, and the coaching, as well as one complimentary free design application for your own individual design. It's a one-hour one-on-one, which is valued at $250, but it's complimentary. But for the first 15 people that want to be a part of C Link Academy, you can contact me at the C Link, sign up for my newsletter, which I'll include there as well, and message the word Academy, and then you can be a part of that as well. But those are some of the places you can find me.

Speaker 1 50:32

Thank you so much for that. And everything will be included in the show notes. So easy to connect with Caleb and work through your season. Thank you so much, Caleb, for joining me today.

Speaker 50:44

Thank you, Antonette. It was an honor. Thank you so much. The information in this podcast is not medical advice and should not be treated as such. Always consult your physician or healthcare professional before pursuing any health related procedure or activity.